These reprogrammed mana disruptors were now floating in various strategic positions around their world, their silent emanations weaving an invisible shield. This mana-dampening field covered their entire planet, a disruptive blanket designed to scramble magical detection and obscure any incoming scrying attempts. It wouldn't take long, perhaps a few hours at most, before the Empire's mages would discover the interference. But hopefully, by then, what needed to be done would already be accomplished.
Even before the terrifying broadcast ripped through the Imperial lands, a different kind of tension hummed in the hallowed halls of the mages' towers. Vellok stood alongside a dozen other tower masters, their gazes fixed on a series of scrying screens. They weren't watching for entertainment; they were scrutinizing. Their collective focus was on the armor's performance, observing every shimmer, every defensive deflection, every enhancement it seemed to grant the ratfolk.
