Gravity Mage with Level-Up System

Chapter 2171: Covenant Wizard Richard

Forbidden Island

The underground office was one of the facilities where the security situation was discussed. Right now, there are staff members working here.

Apart from a few locations, the rest of the area is not under modern surveillance. This is because the black corruption mana can destroy electronic devices.

Therefore, the Covenant only used surveillance in selected areas. It was one of their safety measures, as they followed old-school protocols.

The most critical sectors are under the control of terrifying 11th-order monsters. However, some areas feature terrain that is treacherous even for these monsters.

It did not take long for the news to reach the office, two guard posts had been left unattended. The report struck the office staff as an absurd joke.

They had access to the list of personnel assigned to those shifts, and their organization did not deploy Supreme Wizards for routine patrol duties.

Patrols were strictly assigned to Magic Lords operating under the command of a Forbidden Wizard. To fill these ranks, the Covenant had captured numerous wizards from foreign territories.

The staff decided to dispatch a reconnaissance unit to verify the situation firsthand. Several standby teams were available.

They ordered one of these teams to inspect the post. Led by a female Forbidden Wizard, the unit departed the facility.

Their first destination was the outpost located near the surface facility. Upon arrival, they found it completely unmanned.

The female Forbidden Wizard relayed the status report back to headquarters. The office personnel were stunned and immediately escalated the threat level.

This development warranted the attention of higher command, but protocol required them to verify one final sector first: the seashore outpost.

Two hours later,

The personnel in the control room grew anxious; they had received no further transmissions from the female Forbidden Wizard or her unit.

The team should have reached the objective an hour earlier. Now, two full hours had elapsed, setting off internal alarm bells.

They did not suspect an external assault. Instead, they suspected an incident caused by the island itself.

The island was a forbidden territory; even high-ranking Covenant operatives avoided certain zones. Recognizing the gravity of the situation, the senior staff convened.

They resolved to notify their superiors. The operational staff held ranks ranging between Supreme Wizard and Magic Lord, while the five senior overseers ranked above them as Forbidden Wizards.

It fell upon these five elders to make the call. Unless strictly necessary, they preferred not to disturb command, which was composed of core Covenant leadership.

The executive members were occupied with primary objectives and had little patience for peripheral disruptions.

The elders feared facing reprimands, particularly since their immediate superior was a true Covenant wizard who, unlike them, was not an indentured captive.

One hour later,

A middle-aged man wearing a brown shirt, blue jeans, and brown boots entered the chamber.

He wore a cowboy hat, from beneath which long black hair fell to his shoulders.

His name was Richard, a Forbidden Wizard. Beside him walked a four-legged monster, not a genuine monster, but an magic construct created by puppet magic.

Richard proceeded into his private quarters. Observing that the space was spotless, his brow relaxed; he rarely visited these lower offices.

Unless an emergency arose, he seldom appeared in person. Sitting behind the desk, he summoned the five elders.

The five men filed into the room, their expressions grim.

Noticing their demeanor, Richard recognized that an incident had occurred.

"I hope this isn’t catastrophic," he said.

He then demanded an operational debriefing. The five elders exchanged glances before one stepped forward to recount the events.

Richard leaned back in his chair, listening to the report. The moment he heard that multiple wizards had vanished, his eyebrows lifted.

His immediate suspicion was that a high-tier monster had broken containment or a hazardous spatial fissure had ruptured. Historical records documented numerous such anomalies.

In past occurrences, disappearances were standard outcomes. Consequently, he showed no outward panic upon hearing the report.

When the senior elder finished the briefing,

The five men watched their superior attentively. Richard remained relaxed. The missing wizards were merely captured assets, not sworn Covenant members.

He felt no sympathy if they had been slaughtered by indigenous monsters or consumed by an anomaly. However, recovering their remains was mandatory.

Failure to do so would leave him unaccountable to his direct master.

"I will inspect the posts myself," Richard said, rising from his seat.

"Head, we will assign an escort team to accompany you," one elder offered.

"Hmph," Richard snorted.

"I don’t need backup," he replied before departing. He assumed the wizards had gone missing due to sheer incompetence.

In his view, the captive mages were weak, unfamiliar with the island’s terrain, and prone to triggering environmental traps.

Having the coordinates of the two posts, Richard advanced toward the coordinates accompanied by his four legged puppet construct.

The five elders remained uneasy. While their superior’s working theory focused on indigenous monsters and terrain anomalies, they felt that this explanation overlooked a critical factor.

Meanwhile,

Inside the central control hub, I observed the surveillance mirror. There was no perimeter movement. It remained unclear whether the Covenant had initiated a broader alert.

Interrogations of the newly captured wizards had yielded critical intelligence: all of them were prisoners who had originally been detained on the prison island.

Every captive here had been pressed into Covenant service. The organization appeared to employ mental compulsion to maintain discipline over its subordinates.

The captives executed commands without resistance. I took care to avoid triggering psychological safeguards during questioning.

My primary objective remained clear: locate genuine Covenant members and secure high-value targets to extract intelligence. If this organization possessed a systemic vulnerability, I intended to exploit it.

On the surface, Richard arrived at the first unmanned post. The station was abandoned, with no occupants inside the structure.

He found no indications of combat or physical struggle. The premises were clean and showed no lingering magical signatures. It appeared that no one had entered the site for at least a full day.

There were no tracks indicating monster incursions, nor residual distortions from a localized spatial rupture. Had such threats manifested, his senses would have detected them immediately.

Finding no viable leads, Richard set out toward the seashore outpost.

Time passed.

Mansion:

Suddenly, the system alerted me to an approaching wizard signature. I focused my attention and fixed my gaze upon the mirror.