Vicereine was done with her push-ups and was catching her breath as she sat on the chair, her eyes releasing a dangerous glint

"Come on Vicereine, aren't you a bit perplexed at your own actions?" I asked

"My name is not Vicereine" She replied with a huff

I sighed and looked at Alissa and helplessly sighed

"Lilith, are you there?" I spoke, my voice seemingly not directed at anyone

"Here" From the corner of the room, Lilith's voice came out of the speaker

"Play song 320" I requested with a laugh

A song started playing, a song from the 1990's, at first, Vicereine was humming but she soon started tapping her leg, Alissa also enjoyed the song while Cynthia was listening to each and every word.

The chorus was coming and this is where the pain starts

♫Near, Far, wherever you are!♫

♫I believe that the heart will go on♫

♫Once more, you open the door!♫

At this point, Vicereine stood up and sang, never have I heard a voice so painful to the human ears, I can even see Cynthia covering her ears in pain while Alissa was bitterly smiling

♫And you're here, in my heat and my heart will go on and on~♫

I gave my pillow to Cynthia, she didn't even think twice before taking it and covering her head. Her actions made me chuckle, endure Cynthia, you're almost there

After singing her heart out, Vicereine covered her mouth with red cheeks

"Alissa, what's your assessment?" I asked while chuckling

"P-Passable" Alissa answered but her stuttering showed what she really thought

"Really? I always thought it was much more worse" I replied

Vicereine could only look at us in embarrassment,

"Hey Lilith, play that video, the one you showed me before" It was Vicereine's message to me before she leaped out of the ship along with the bomb and King corpse

"Permission to bring a monitor to your room" Lilith replied

"Go ahead"

A few seconds after, Guardian 1 came in while pushing a monitor, he connected it to a power outlet nearby before inserting a cable from his head to the monitor.

The video played, Vicereine and my battle against the Hercules King, the three stingers that pierced through my body. The death of the King after I took a direct punch and firmly grabbed on to him, locking him in place while Vicereine finished him off to the last part where Vicereine confessed to me and left a crimson mark on my lips that trailed down to my chin and lastly, when she jumped out while dragging the bomb with her

Vicereine watched all of this along with everyone, the one that reacted the most was Alissa. I can only pat her head and let her use my chest as her own tissue, it was a bit weird since a cold liquid and sticky snot was on my bare chest.

Afterwards, Vicereine looked at me

"Is it really true?" She looked at me with confusion on her eyes

I beckoned her over and she surprisingly complied, I held her head and hugged her firmly, I stroked her hair and with the softest tone I could muster I spoke

"I know it's confusing, I won't force you to remember anymore, believe what you will" Forcing her to remember will only make it harder for her, what will she feel if Alissa smiled at her but she had no memory of being with her yet she knows they both share a deep bond? won't her heart be crushed?

"Let's take things slow okay?" I asked

She could only nod in reply

I smiled as I ruffled her hair

"Hey..." Vicereine voiced out

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"Hm?"

"Did you just rub my cheek on the snot your friend left on your chest?" She asked in an annoyed tone

"So I've been seen through..." I replied in a disappointed tone

"You!" Vicereine angrily punched on my chest, it was adorable yet it hurt

"*sigh* I am really happy that you woke up Zeno but we've got a few problems" Alissa spoke out

I looked at her, the expression on her face says something like 'I didn't want to ruin the mood but it had to be said'

I nodded and replied, tell me what is it?

♠♠♠

In the strategic room of the castle

In the middle of the room on top of a large circular table was the entire map of Arcadia country and it's surrounding area, on the north side of the map was a huge red flag along with a skull banner, on the west side is another red flag but this time, a banner of a lion

"We're surrounded sire, I suggest a strategic retreat and hold up in the castle, it is our best defensive line as of now" A general suggested as he looked at me

"Nonsense, we can't show weakness to our enemy!" This time, a woman clad in armor rebutted

Two sides with 2 generals on each side have opposing opinions, one wants to defend our first city or our first line of defense while the other wants us to abandon the first city and defend the main castle

"So what are you going to do about the troops stationed in the city? I know we still haven't given the return order for the refugees to return back to the city" The woman clad in armor asked

"Zerraria, I know you grew up in the city and wish to defend it but some sacrifices have to be made. As for the soldiers in the city, we'll have them retreat back to the main castle, they'll bolster our defense" The man who wore priest robes replied

"Grand healer Zircon, that suggestion is good but the morale of the enemy will soar while the enemy morale will rise" Zerraria replied

"Not if we instill the soldiers with the right mindset that this is only a strategic retreat" The armored man from earlier replied to Zerraria's words

"You think our people are stupid? no, they will start to think of different things coupled with the paranoia of two enemies soon besieging us, only god will know what they'll imagine!" A woman who looked like a scholar complete with a book and a pair of glasses replied

"Enough, the reason why the four of you are generals is that you all balance out each other, Zircon and Armon is strong with logical tactics while you Zerraria and Elina can easily understand the hearts of people, you need to find a way together not bicker with each other" Cynthia silenced the entire group with her voice

The generals looked at each other in silence, they started looking at each, their expressions bittersweet. I can see it in their expressions, they already know that they can't find a way that will win satisfy both parties needs, one way or another, one opinion must be chosen and not both

I started thinking of a way, the enemy troops are after the prince so logically thinking, throwing the prince at them should shoo them away but I can't help but doubt them, as for the other opposing army, they're filled with bugs, all of them are from the Nerubian family

The Nerubian family is mostly composed of beetle, their King is the Hercules King beetle. Their main army is composed of the Nerubian roamers, the Nerubian roamers have a tough exoskeleton and have evolved to become human-like in shape, they have sharp blade arms and spike on their backs, they can jump up and turn their bodies mid-air to perform a body slam, the unlucky life form to ever meet the body slam will have a couple of holes through their bodies

Next up is the Nerubian crawlers, unlike the roamers, these creatures have a lower half of a beetle while their upper body is like that of a human but it's still covered in bug scales, basically they're like centaurs except their horse body is that of a beetle's. They wield blades that were extracted from dead Nerubian roamers' bodies

And then there are the Nerubian plasma-chargers, they're the behemoth's of the army with a size of at least 30 feet but they're main roles are siege bombers, they stab their 6 legs deep on the ground, open their huge jaws and then release a huge blob of acid 4 feet in radius. It may be small but its corrosive effects are dangerous, they're perfect for opening holes in these stone walls. They can shoot their blobs around 10 kilometers.

Their evolved kind can shoot up plasma blasts instead that will have an explosion effect but good thing after surveying them from the skies, they don't have the evolved kinds

We can negotiate with one but we can't with the other, it's obvious what to do

"Let's defend our first city" I spoke out

Zircon and Armon looked at me with weird expressions while Zerraria and Elina were ecstatic

"Please royal knight, rethink this" Armon spoke out

Basically, I, as a royal knight can only stay quiet in these kinds of stuff but I'm a bit special according to Cynthia so the generals have to listen to my opinion

"I'm pretty sure about my decision, we can negotiate with the lions since they only want their prince back as for those bloodthirsty invaders, they only wish for rivers of blood to flow" I stated my reasoning

Zircon and Armon went silent for a couple of seconds and then nodded

"If the royal knight thinks so then we also agree" Zircon stated while Armon nodded his head

"Thank you for listening to my opinions, I leave the defense to you guys, as for me, I will be leading a team of attacks, we will leave the city and we will set up different ambush areas in order to whittle them down while retreating to the first city" I suggested, our target first should be the Nerubian plasma-chargers since they can break down our walls

"Alright, we leave that task to you while we will fortifying the city walls" Zircon smiled

"I'll negotiate with the lions" Elina pumped herself up

Looks, like everything is decided then

'Lilith, aim and fire'

Shortly enough, there was a small light pillar from the sky and then a loud boom

'Confirmed kill, 2 plasma-chargers, 500 roamers and 36 crawlers. 58 more plasma-chargers, 10,500 roamers and 554 more crawlers'

Lilith reply came buzzing in

"S-Sir Royal Knight, you... was that your work?" Elina stated with a slight fear in her heart

"Yup, that should boost some morale" I nodded my head