This was the moment of life and death! Oscar stared intensely into the girl's eyes, examining thoroughly the movement and flickering of her pupils.
The girl's soft, shining pupils suddenly dilated, and Oscar's machete moved right at that moment. She was obviously in a disadvantaged position as the young man's strength was much more powerful than that of her own. Although the girl had been avoiding direct strikes, there was not much one could do in such a dire situation, and soon enough the Persian girl was hit right in her guts by Oscar's strong punch, throwing her off to the ground.
"No one can do this to me!" Arayna Mogadishu stared angrily at the Titan who was slowly approaching her. She stepped backward and clumsily fell into the riverbank, the lower part of her pants drenched with the freezing river water. Eventually, she came to realize that this fat, pig-resembling pagan did not intend to hurt herself, but only to humiliate her by removing her veil.
"So… so does it mean that he has seen my face now?" Arayna Mogadishu suddenly thought of this, "Forgive your daughter, True God, for this life that belongs to You has lost its meaning now."
Princess Arayna Mogadishu promptly took out a short knife from her waist and pointed it towards her own heart. She took a last, resentful glance at the young man, which, as he could feel, was filled to the brim with rage and hatred!
"Hey! Stop that! Stop it right now!" Oscar naturally would not want to lose his spoils of war just like that. He dashed to the side of the girl and knocked the short knife off her hand with his machete. However, the girl did not seem to have given up in ending her own life, she went up to the young man and directed the sharp edge of his weapon towards her own throat.
"What is your problem?" He did not hesitate and instinctively kicked the girl with his kneecap to shove her away from the pointy weapon. Of course, this strong kick made the girl fall onto him, saliva and gastric juice spat out of her mouth.
It was only until then that Oscar had the chance to properly take a look at his captive. He examined the girl thoroughly from head to toe, and finally landed his gaze on the girl's pale face.
"Beautiful! So beautiful!"
Her bright eyes resembled a graceful curve, and her lips exuding an aura of exoticism. They were painted with rose-colored petals, which defined the beautiful outline of her lip whenever she speaks. However, the most attractive part was her soft, delicate skin! It was slightly pale, yet contained bits of faint, golden color like a precocious paddy. Oscar could not contain his impulses, extending his hand that was previously holding the machete. He wanted his own skin to meet with that body filled with mysterious atmosphere.
"Damn… damn it!"
Oscar paid the price for getting distracted by the beauty of the girl. His hand flew over to his lower abdomen and he fell to the ground, and the small lioness had struggled away from his embrace. He panted like a thirsty dog and looked around to see where his prize had escaped to.
Six Persian warriors dressed entirely in black walked out of the woods slowly. His heart ached greatly when he noticed his mysterious prize let herself fall into the arms of one of the big men. She was crying and mumbled something inaudible to the ears of Oscar.
"Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!" Arayna complained to her teacher in the Persian language.
"You should not have been here!" The tall Persian warrior replied expressionlessly while hugging the unlucky princess. The former tore out a piece of his garment and covered it over the princess's face, while his companions respectfully turned their heads away as a sign of not offending the girl.
Wobbly, Oscar stood up. He did not intend to be the hero; his hand was already tightly holding on to the small whistle which he intended to use to notify his comrades.
The young man realized the odds were against him as the six tall warriors with ferocious features slowly began to encircle him. He was not confident that he could run away from this fight. Besides, Oscar thought that the especially tall, fierce-looking man holding the girl in his arm could possibly be of the same combat level as his own coachman. He noticed that on the warrior's waist was a machete hung casually. It seemed to be attached to a silk chain filled with black holes.
"I must be the unluckiest man on Earth! Had I offended any God or something?" Oscar muttered to himself. That was a Persian Black Belt warrior! He would never have thought to have entered such a rare encounter in front of his own homeland.
The young man focused, adjusting his breathing, but his condition seemed to be only getting worse. The girl had probably hit him on a vital part of his lower abdomen and it hurt so badly that he could not even use a fraction of his energy. The special breathing technique that Thirteen the Assassin had taught him had never failed him like this!
"How long are you all going to hide for? Is that just for embarrass me even more?" The young man turned to the dark woods behind him and shouted angrily.
"Hehe! Hehehe!" The King of Sins, Doramy Basinger, jumped down from a tree and landed on the ground like an agile monkey. "I stayed hidden to not ruin your happy moment, who knows it was only seconds later that these six men appeared out of nowhere."
"Exactly!" The former paladin Sarlat Drosha also paced out of the woods. "Remember that you used to be so strict with the people who interrupted your good times?"
The former paladin turned to his back and asked, "Is that right, Godot?"
Godot snorted and swung his tomahawk in response to the question.
"Where is the other one?" the Persian Black Belt warrior asked suddenly. In comparison, his companions acted much more suspicious as they looked around nervously in search of the enemy.
"You speak Titan language?" asked the surprised Oscar.
"Of course. It seems that you all are neither the soldier nor a local Narcissus. Why did you want to humiliate our Highness Prince?" his brown eyes shone with curiosity.
"How do you even know that? Oh, and that young girl there is a princess!" Oscar replied as his mind assessed the situation. A princess? Had he captured a princess of Persian Empire? Should he gather his troop to capture her again?
"Why don't you ask your princess? Your noble lady almost stole my horse had I not stop her quickly enough!"
Unexpectedly, the Raytheon galloped out of the woods from its hiding place, as though the stallion knew the people were talking about it.
"Andrew!" the Persian warriors shouted simultaneously. Even though they did not know who these Titan people were, they at least learned about the beast that was specifically bred by the Andrew family. Their machetes made a loud noise when they were being swung up high in the air. The warriors had all turned to another individual, someone more violent and filled with hatred.
"Oh no," Oscar mumbled to himself. He shot an intense, piercing gaze at the Raytheon. It reciprocated with eyes filled with innocence and helplessness.
A loud whistle which sounded like a cue for an attack was suddenly heard across the woods. Oscar was the first one to rush towards the Black Belt warrior. Although he was unsure of the chances of defeating the warrior, he knew that the tall guy was nevertheless holding a person, and his movements would undoubtedly be restricted by that.
The rapier of the former paladin immediately and instinctively and blocked off the hacking of the two machetes which came his way. On the other hand, although the attacks of King of Sins were smartly avoided by his opponent, the old man kept putting pressure on the latter. Naturally, Gordot picked the tallest man on the other side as his opponent, and the both of them went against each other with the strength and courage of primitive barbarians.
Oscar's machete still did not have the chance to touch even his opponent's sleeve. This was the first time the young man felt humiliated in a combat. He waved his machete furiously but the warrior seemed indifferent to his attacks. The experienced assassin utilized only the handle of the machete to parry Oscar's attacks.
The exhausted Oscar became anxious, and the pain in his lower abdomen seemed to be aggravating even more after all these strenuous movements. Suddenly, a teaching from Thirteen the Assassin flashed through his mind. "When faced with an opponent that would not relent, all one needed to do was to attack at some other place that would have his opponent be obliged to relieve." The desperate young man aimed at the terrified pale face lying within the arms of the warrior, twisted his wrist inward facing his own chest, and, mustering all the strength he had left, threw out his machete forcefully. "Princess? Go to hell!" The machete swept away into the direction of the warrior's chest.
"The Knife Throwing skill!" the warrior was genuinely surprised. The infamous black machete that symbolized honor and slaughtering was out of its sheath. Concurrently, the expression of young princess's face also revealed her ultimate fear as the knife came her way.
"Snowstorm!" young man shouted again while simultaneously pulling out yet another faint, blue, short blade.
At last, the Black Belt warrior finally let loose his horror. His worst nightmare had eventually happened! The fellow that had stayed hidden in the darkness finally showed himself!
No one knew how Snowstorm appeared in the battle, and the King of Assassins with almost the same ability as Thirteen the Assassin was using a kind of peculiar weapon! The Black Belt warrior had never seen such a flexible, soft sword. Terror was written all over his face when the sword twisted up around his left arm like an entwining plant, its sharp edge eventually pointed at his throat.
It was evident that the Black Belt warrior deserved his title. He used a sheath to block the dagger, and, with another knife's edge, he defended his throat from the blade of the up-climbing sword. Although he managed to escape death, his left arm was severely injured, with blood trickling down from the cuts of the soft sword that had stretched back and forth.
"Stop!"
All the warriors stepped back from the fighting ground and stood behind their leader. Humiliation, anger, and helplessness were written all over their faces.
"Now that is better!" Oscar held on tightly to the beautiful princess beside himself. He was distracted by her once again. Hmm, she smelled wonderful!
The Black Belt warrior resolutely kept his machete back in its sheath. His left arm must be in excruciating pain, yet he was indifferent to the awful wound on his arm.
"Our natural enemy Andrew, what do you want?"
Without hesitation, Oscar removed the princess's veil from her face, and it made the girl cried. Twice! She could not bear the humiliation anymore!
Oscar was satisfied looking at the warriors who had their heads down. He had heard from his coachman before that the only way to humiliate a Persian woman was to remove their veil, and this method was particularly effective on noble ladies.
"Even though we addressed Andrew as our natural enemy, we have total respect for each and every one of your knights! So, could I ask you to please stop humiliating our princess!" the enraged Black Belt warrior finally shouted.
"Sure. If you provide me with some satisfying answers to two of my questions, I would return your princess to you without harming her one bit." Oscar was not afraid to give such a ridiculous demand, as he had the grandest bets in hand.
"Ask away!"
"Do you and your companions belong to the assassin unit of the Great King of Persian Mogadishu? What is your motive for being here?"
"Yakta! Do not surrender! This is an order! You must not surrender to him!" Princess Arayna shouted like a crazy woman in the arms of the young man, struggling to break herself free.
"Your Highness Princess! We are exposed, and we could never finish the mission! The priority now is to keep you safe!" the Black Belt warrior said in a fluent Titan language.
"You admit it then?" Oscar tightened his grip on the princess's neck, the suffocation made her cough uncontrollably.
"Yes! Yes!" Yakta Elladan the Black Belt warrior from Mogadishu noticed that these men were not knights of the Andrew house, but rather a group of shameless bandits. Knights from the Andrew house would never humiliate a woman like this, not even if she was a Persian woman! What made the warrior even more infuriated was that the other fellows were laughing at the background!
"Go on!" Oscar gripped the girl harder.
"Alright! We snuck secretly from the front defense line into Traisen in order to assassinate General Figg from Werksan."
"How many of you are there? Where is your base camp?" Oscar was obviously not satisfied with the answers he received.
"This is more than just two questions!" Black Belt warrior roared loudly.
"I have changed my mind. Answer my questions quickly!" Oscar had gotten even bolder. He placed the short dagger to the front of Princess Arayna's neck.
Oscar assumed that the loud commotion over the other side consisted of swear words and insults aimed at himself, but he could not care less. This was not the first time he had played dirty!
"Can you promise me that you will return us our princess after I answer your questions?" The Black Belt warrior calmed down, he understood that he was not in a position to bargain.
"In the name of the totem of Andrew family, and in the name of the faith of Narcissus Knights!" Oscar blurted out some random ideas from his mind, even his own men were doubtful of his promises.
Black Belt warrior did not want to take the risk of getting his army annihilated, and he also did not want to sacrifice his highness princess. During the brief moments he hesitated, a sudden flame blazed on both sides of the mountain ridge.
"Shameless fools!" a warrior's long, brown hair flowed in the wind.
Oscar was distracted by the flames lighting up in the distant, just as he felt a strong gust of wind coming his way…
"Damn… damn it!" He fell to the ground while holding his left shoulder. "I really am the unluckiest man alive!" This was the third time he had gotten injured within the span of two months.
The Black Belt warrior had to pay the price for his reckless attack. A huge piece of flesh fell off from his thigh, and a sharp rapier pierced through one side of his shoulder blade. The fellow who stayed hidden in the dark had skinned almost half of his scalp, and that ferocious looking old man stabbed into his lower abdomen. Despite all this, the warrior managed to severely injure the shameless guy when he least expected it and successfully gotten a hold of the princess again.
"Shield for us!" Black Belt warrior Yakta Elladan screamed out the order loudly, and all his men courageously charged at the enemy. Just when Oscar was occupied in the battle, the intimidating Black Belt warrior had already escaped from the woods with the attractive princess.
"Your Highness!" Murat was not afraid to show his surprise at the injured young man. "Had you been scratched by a cougar or stampeded over by an elephant?" the Major General ridiculed.
"Thank you, my commander, although your way of showing concern was a little peculiar. I am lucky that I have not been attacked by either a cougar or an elephant, it was nothing better than that."
The doctor from Red Tiger Division immediately helped the injured man to get off the horse and provided him the best treatment and care one could ever ask for in the middle of a dense jungle. The young man examined his surroundings while silently whimpered at the pain when the doctor applied medicine over the wounds.
"Murat, it seems like you have been attacked by a pack of ferocious wolves."
"Yes, Your Highness." Murat was strangely excited about the battle just now. Although the opponent's strength and arrogance made him worry about their retaliation, he could not figure out why they had scurried away like little rats in the end. "Your Highness, did you know that initially all six of our offense teams were defeated, only when our rangers rushed into their camp did…"
"Hold on!" Oscar did not care much about their victory, at the moment he just wanted to figure out why his supports did not appear when he blew the whistle.
"Ah…about this…" As expected, Major General Murat was at a loss for words. He did not want to admit that he had forgotten about the young prince.
"Forget it!" Oscar knew the answer by the awkward expression on the commander's face. This fellow must have had ordered all the soldiers to this surprise attack, which explained why no one went to his rescue while he needed them most.
"Hey! Do you want to know why you can easily defeat the assassin unit of Mogadishu?"
Murat nodded as he really could not figure out the reason behind his victory. As a matter of fact, it was not a problem for a group of three thousand finely selected Narcissus Knights to defeat less than a hundred opponents, yet things could get harder when the opponents were an assassin unit. These selected Persians warriors must have been the top-of-the-line, it made no sense that they would actually scatter around like some wild hens.
"Indeed, it does not make sense at all!" Oscar replied through his gritted teeth. "That was because my partners and I were holding back their leader! Damn it! He was a Black Belt warrior! Can you believe it? Dear General Murat, have you ever encountered a Black Belt warrior in all the previous battles?"
Murat shook his head slowly. He remembered his father mentioning to him before that when it happened, it took seven high-ranked officers to take away the life of one Black Belt warrior.
"Are you sure he is a Black Belt warrior? It seems highly unlikely. Those guys are like sacred offerings to their Persian God, and they usually would not leave the temple even for a split second. Not to mention there are only so few Black Belt warriors in the whole Persian Empire."
"Haha, I must be exceptionally lucky then!"
By now many Red Tiger soldiers had gathered around the young prince. They had all heard about his encounter with the legendary Black Belt warrior.
"Your Highness, how does that guy looks like?
"Your Highness, does he have a pair of horns on the top of his head, like an evil dragon?"
"Your Highness, is his machete really two meters long?"
"Shut up!" Murat kicked at his comrades to shoo them away from the prince. "Go clean up the battlefield, damn it! Don't show your vulnerability, there is nothing to worry about! His Royal Highness managed to defeat him all by himself…"
The knights still continued to discuss pertaining to the warrior after they were ordered to disperse by the major general. The surprising news had everyone alert on their toes, after all, who would have thought that such a powerful enemy would appear at the Traisen Front?
"Your Highness, you still have not answered my question." Murat anxiously turned to the young prince.
"Oh yes, you know what? I am not a color-blind! Even though I could not tell what kind of material it was made out of, it was indeed a pure black belt. Unless you think that I could still be unsure even after I've been cut by his machete? That guy resembled a Black Belt warrior in terms of both his fighting skills and his characteristic, and I feel that he was very much like my coachman." Oscar was getting annoyed.
"Your coachman ... is he also a Black Belt warrior?" Murat was even more shocked at yet another piece of unexpected news!
"Of course! It was him who taught me the Knife Throwing skill, which can only be executed by Black Belt warriors, so I'm sure that guy must be ..."
"Your Highness! Hold on a moment! You executed an assassination skill that only the Black Belt warriors could do? So… that is to say… you are on the same level as a Black Belt warrior?"
The young man raised his eyebrows and smirked at the shocked major general. He was not that stupid after all.
Murat was completely dumbfounded at his newly learned information. Oh God! What in the world? Had the Andrew family actually produced a Black Belt warrior?
A bushfire flared across the dark jungle, like little groups of fireflies. Pieces of shattered shield and carcasses of men and horses alike piled on top of each other on the lush, thick grass. Occasionally, emerging from the green fields were seedlings of pure, white narcissus flowers, with bright, red blood silently seeping through its petals and leaves.
Under the pale moonlight, the cold metal of the weaponry being flung up high in the trees reflected faint lights, much like a few pieces of mirror. The Knights of the Red Tiger were seen carefully separating the intertwined bodies of their sacrificed comrades and the enemies'. Some had to be broken apart forcefully, like pieces of icicles, as the bones and flesh of the dead had turned icy cold.
A blood-stained captain took off his armor and retrieved from within a small notebook filled with sermons in order to summon the God of Light. Many of the other knights joined in and half-kneeled before him, and soon the pastor who had taken off his battle attire began singing the songs of God. The mountains appeared to have raised faint smoke in accordance with the choir. Accompanied by strands of the silver rays of moonlight, the light smoke raised from the mountain and slowly drifted into the distance.
The fights happening outside of the peripherals of the campsite seemed to have been the most violent, as several little pits were filled with puddles of bright, red blood. The Knights' foot gears appeared to be contaminated by the hellish atmosphere. Even they dared not look down to the ground when they marched, as they did not want to know if those soft objects they had occasionally stepped on were the hands and feet of their deceased comrades-in-arms or the residual limbs of the resented opponents.
The appearance of the mountain ridge had changed completely. The enemy camps had vanished after the invasion of the knights, and everything seemed to have been drenched in the crimson-red blood, even the strands of the pale moonlight had turned red as they reflected off the ground.
Swarms of beasts lingered around the area under the knights' surveillance. The knights were praying, so were the beasts. They roared a soft, whispering prayer, as though they were hoping for these fierce creatures that were picking up their spoils to not also take away the bones. However, judging from what they had seen just now, the beasts believed that these fierce, heterogeneous creatures would probably stuff anything belonging to the enemy down their throats.
"I have missed a fierce battle," Oscar said towards General Murat with whom he walked shoulder-to-shoulder across the battlefield.
"Indeed, Your Highness." Murat nodded. He then signaled the captain of the guards to move a little to the side to give the prince a better view of the wretched sight.
"Why are they adding salt to injuries?" Oscar pointed at the knights who were stabbing the dead bodies.
"Did you not say that this is the Persian assassin unit? They would do anything to kill, sometimes they even would use their own people as shields. This is just an extra measure to be sure."
"Are all the enemies here?" Oscar mentioned to the pile of dead bodies gathered by the knights.
"I cannot be certain, but I assure you we managed to defeat over seventy percent of them. You know, if it had happened earlier, perhaps during the day, we could have gotten them all." Murat was rather satisfied with the outcome of their attack. They got the upper hand to have killed the crack assassin unit of Mogadishu by sacrificing only a little over two hundred knights.
Oscar nodded in agreement, but he immediately thought of another problem. "Do you think they would have succeeded if these people infiltrated into Werksan to create turbulence among the city, while that Black Belt warrior snuck into the Traisen Front's command post to assassinate my Brother Figg?"
Murat gave the idea a serious consideration. "Your Highness, this is difficult to say. It has definitely been proven now that they successfully snuck in here through our strict first line of defense which consisted of more than one hundred soldiers. Hence, I believe that they could have entered Werksan without much trouble as well. Regarding the matter of the assassination of General Figg, perhaps… perhaps only the Gold of Light knows."
"In other words, I have saved my brother's life?" Oscar was a little proud of himself, but he knew that his brother might not have appreciated it anyway.
"Report!" a voice echoed from the deep woods.
"We are here!" Murat indicated loudly his own position.
The reconnoiter was forced to halt his steps outside the periphery. He was only allowed in after his identity was verified.
"Your Highness… Division Commander." The reconnoiter panted desperately for air. "Our army is chasing down the enemy rather closely, yet they are too stubborn to relent! Regimental Commander Miff asked for reinforcement!"
"What are you saying? That Miff fellow still cannot take down the enemy with a whole Group? He must be kidding me! Tell him I would send him back to his hometown if he could not bring me the head of the enemy before dawn!"
"Hold on!" Oscar intended to deny that command. "Hold on! Have you not yet realized the strength of our enemy?"
Murat thought that at this moment he should listen to the prince. After all, it was because of his own recklessness that the young prince of the family was hurt.
"What do you think of the matter?"
"Murat, I think we should send out all our men if you intend to take down the enemy at once. I believe they have almost exhausted all their energy by now. We can send out yet another small troop to attack them from behind to support the main Group, and when they are near to surrender we could have the two troops surround them in a strategic location to kill them all."
Murat thought about it and quickly agreed. Even though the young prince's suggestion was not some brilliant war strategy, it was nevertheless practical enough to wipe out the enemy.
"Your Highness!" another voice came from within the woods.
"Report yourself!" the knight guard was a little anxious about the unfamiliar faces.
"My name is Lieutenant Colonel de Barry, the second brigade commander of the Traisen Front First Mixed Brigade."
"I am His Royal Highness's attendant named Percy."
"Let them through." Oscar motioned to the knight.
"Hey, there you are, de Barry! Where have you been? I thought you have been called upon by the God of Light." Oscar joked with the Narcissus County's most famous champion of lances.
"Your Highness, may I lodge a protest?" Lieutenant Colonel de Barry was obviously agitated.
"What is the matter, my dear Lieutenant Colonel?" Oscar looked at the usually cheerful officer. After spending a whole day together, the two had become good friends.
"Your Highness! I would like to lodge a protest about Major General Murat. He… he did not allow me to participate in this attack! In the end, I could only sit on the sidelines with my lance and silently watched our comrades fall down one by one!" the infuriated de Barry complained like a child.
"Murat, what is this about?"
The accused shrugged nonchalantly. "Your Highness, there is nothing much I could do, de Barry is not under my Front so I do not have the discretion to call him in on a risky operation. If anything were to happen to him, I do not know how to report to General Figg of the Traisen Front."
"You made me sit aside like a rock statue just because of such an insignificant, pathetic reason?"
"What I meant was…"
"Alright! My knights!" Oscar immediately separated the arguing parties. "Stop that right now! As the Royal Highness Prince, I ordered Lieutenant Colonel de Barry from Traisen Front to be involved in the attack operation."
"Yes! Your Royal Highness The Prince! I will not let you down!" de Barry said energetically, followed by a military salute to the prince.
"Alright! Percy, my doctor, and what is your matter?" Oscar asked his old friend the Poison Doctor casually.
"Your Highness, how should I handle the injured? I am not able to provide the most suitable medical treatment for them because of our language barrier." The Poison Doctor had gotten a headache because of this issue that had been bothering him. He wanted to save their lives, as he thought the Narcissus Knights might need some of them alive for verbal confession recordings to further understand the war.
Oscar and Murat exchanged glances with de Barry, and the two Knights at the back turned their heads over respectively.
"Percy, who said anything about providing them the best medical treatment or saving their lives? I am already granting them my utmost mercy of not torturing them to death!" Oscar affirmed.
When he looked into the eyes of the determined prince, Percy could not help but feel goosebumps on his arms when he recalled the brutal and inhumane way they had treated the Italia mercenary group. He shivered once more before he left hurriedly to complete his unfinished business.
The sound of the bugle rang across the forest. Due to the hot and humid weather, it was impossible to conserve the dead bodies of their comrades, hence, the knights had kindled a massive fire to burn off both the sacrificed knights and their enemies alike. The bugler kept changing his position to sound the bugle as loudly as he could. Soon enough, knights of all army units gathered near the fire. The burning hot atmosphere had gotten more uneasy because several officers were shouting and screaming out commands in all directions. The knights followed obediently and dashed toward the meeting place, leaving behind their army gears and supplies such as dried goods, tents, cooking utensils, hay, and so on.
It was almost early enough to break the dawn, and the pale moon was already slowly disappearing. The knights had proceeded with their journey once again, putting on their blood-stained visor and their worn-out weapons. They gathered around all the functional arrows from the dead bodies to be used again. They also carved their own names on the tiny corner of their armors respectively because by doing so, they hoped that even if their faces were to get distorted beyond recognition after the battle, people could still tell them apart and remember their names and attributions toward the war.
"Red Tiger!" Murat held their banner aloft and it waved proudly up in the sky.
"Roarrrrr!"
An unidentifiable red object was shot down to the ground like a gush of bright, red blood.
"Give it to me quick!" Figg Andrew Tibotty sprang up from the chair and snatched the emergency message sent over by the Red Tiger Assault Division.
"Come over here!" Figg called out to his men in complete excitement. "Everybody, come over here and have a look!"
The Second Commander of the Traisen Front was the first to take over the battlefield communiqué delivered by the Red Tiger Division. He read its content out loud so that everyone else in the troop could hear it.
All of the commissioned officers of Traisen were not even slightly interested in the news of the dead mentioned in the battlefield communique, rather, they all went for the spoils of war that their comrades had sent over instead. It was a strangely designed machete. To be more specific, it was a boomerang that had the appearance of a machete. On one end of the boomerang was attached to its handle an iron chain about ten or more meters long.
"As expected, it was the assassin unit, and this peculiar-looking thing is the deadly weapon that they used to take down the severed head of their opponents." said one officer that was in charge of the army gears. His comment had gotten many responses from the other officers immediately. Some people with sharp eyes realized that the weapon could not exactly function like a normal boomerang, the user had to retreat the blade manually with the help of the lengthy iron chain as the metal was too heavy to spin itself backward.
"Listen up my knights!" Figg banged his hand loudly on the table. "Please give me your attention for a second!"
The officers quickly regained their composure. They finally remembered that there was still a group of bandits waiting to be punished severely.
"If my estimation is correct, the Persians are now waiting to hear the news about my death. Just like Major General Murat has said earlier, if I get assassinated, I believe it would shake the troop's morale, then the enemy would take this to their advantage and attack us from our most vulnerable point of defense. I really cannot imagine what would happen to you all if that really happened."
"General, you can rest assured! I am sure all of us would still fight until our last breath even if you were to sacrifice!" one officer shouted loudly from the crowd.
"Damn it! It was only an analogy! You really wish for my death huh?" Figg could not believe that someone had actually thought he was being serious.
The crowd broke into laughter.
"Alright, alright! Let us get back to the serious matter. The Persian's conspiracy has been smashed once more. The victory of the Red Tiger has further proved the point of the presence of an assassin unit, and it definitely also brought light to their ultimate intention. By now I believe their principal force has been informed about the failed mission, which means that…" Figg paused midway to rearranged his train of thoughts.
"Which means that they would fully retreat in the span of a very short time." Staff officer Major Griffith completed the commander's sentence.
"Exactly! Figg went forward and patted on the Major's shoulder. "This old wolf Mogadishu had chosen Neliger Valley to launch this attack because that strategic location could provide them a backup plan. Suppose that their operation failed, and at the moment that happened, their principal cavalry corps could scatter away from the vast open field and not get surrounded by our forces."
"General, what should we do then?" An old but experienced officer stepped forward from the crowd, "We cannot just let them come and go as they please as if they are on a vacation! That would not do justice to all the officers and men that have sacrificed, and we would all also be a laughingstock to our comrades, the Red Tiger Division."
"Of course! That is for sure!" Figg had to raise his voice to hold down the crowd that had burst out into chaotic objections.
"Seriously? Are you kidding me?" Figg thought to himself. "I had lost the chance to be with my wife on my wedding night, as well as my honeymoon, all for the sake of rushing back here. All these are definitely not for me getting assassinated by the enemy!"
"Get into formation! My knights and officers of the Traisen Front! You are all going on the battlefield!"
Figg Andrew Tibotty's shout was so loud that it moved even the dust on the roof up into the air.