With Amira and Wukong injured, it was good that Emperor Jordon and his wife, Empress Sharanthia, came when they did. Especially as neither Emperor nor Empress were members of the Pavilion, they were free to get involved in the matter with no blowback on the Pavilion, something both were more than willing to do after Amira was attacked and almost killed.
Still, instead of going out to watch over divisions three and four, like Amira and Wukong previously had, Sharanthia chose to stay behind with her daughter and two young children.
Even though it didn’t look like their enemies planned to send any more saints into battle, with the Cult of Darkness almost completely withdrawing from the Anarchic lands, it was better to be safe than sorry.
At least if anyone did try to attack the city of Gol to finish what the Cult had started, there would be at least one uninjured saint to hold down the fort.
On the other hand, Emperor Jordon remained by Ace’s side, along with Leona.
After telling Cirulus about his discovery, Ace watched silently as his Grand Marshall changed the plans he had already made so they could silently take advantage of their recent find.
Instead of the four divisions splitting up and heading out to four battlefields, Cirulus had them act as one large battalion.
To the rest of the continent, and even the lower-ranking soldiers, they did this to prevent an incident like the one with the cult from happening again. But the truth was, there were three reasons Cirulus had come up with to proceed in this manner.
For one, Cirulus wanted to steamroll through each of the six cities standing between them and their target with as much speed as possible whilst losing as few of their soldiers as possible. And with Killian and the others fighting together, they precisely did that.
Their opposing armies were all but obliterated with little to no help from the ordinairy soldiers.
When all together, Lance and the students of the Pavilion were like a natural disaster in how they swept through their enemies, leaving a trail of blood and limbs in their wake.
The second reason was that, with Killian and the other Acolytes of the Pavilion all in one place, it allowed him to allocate part of their forces – those who were strong enough and he felt he could trust – to remain in their newly conquered territories, to slowly work on assimilating them into the rest of their territories.
The third and final reason was simply to prepare for the worst-case scenario. They were doing all of this to take control of such a high-quality magicite mine, one they couldn’t afford to lose.
They were hoping they could smoothly take over the territories around the mine without their enemies clocking on to their true intentions, but should those other factions learn the truth, they knew that their enemies would likely stop at nothing to get their hands on that particular windfall.
Still, although they were changing their tactics, Cirulus knew that no one would think anything was strange about it. After the saint-level attacks on each division, they would likely just assume that Ace was choosing to proceed cautiously from then on.
“The Pavilion really cherry-picked the best of the best,” Jordon sighed in amazement as he watched Killian lead the charge in slaughtering their way through the fifth of the six territories between them and the complete control of the mine.
“Hmm?” Ace, who had been sitting in the air in meditation, opened his eyes to look at Amira’s father curiously. “Did you say something?”
“It’s fine,” Emperor Jordon shook his head with a wry smile as he watched Ace go back to his meditation. ‘I now understand how he had such accomplishments at such a young age.’
It wasn’t just Ace, Leona, on the other side of the young teen, also had her eyes closed as she focused on her comprehension.
Although, with their mutated bond, Leona was essentially just absorbing Ace’s comprehension to increase her own. Still, she was deeply engrossed in her training, not that Jordon knew about that unbelievable fact.
Being so close to them and watching their diligence made him feel a deep sense of shame. Ace and Leona were both a fraction of his age, with comprehension of the natural laws either just shy of or far surpassing his, and yet, neither of them dared to slack off in the slightest. He couldn’t help but feel as though he was being lazy.
‘I can’t believe my actions are now being influenced by these two little upstarts,’ Jordon mused as he too sat down to focus on his comprehension.
At the same time, within the O’Brien Empire’s sphere of influence in the region, a refined, scholarly-looking older man with a pair of beady eyes was pouring through the reports of Ace’s recent activity with a slight frown. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“What doesn’t?” Lanke – O’Brien’s 22nd disciple asked with a laugh as he calmly entered the man’s office.
“Lord Lanke,” the elderly gentleman hurriedly got up to bow respectfully towards the saint.
“It’s fine, General Marnur,” Lanke waved his hand dismissively as he casually sat across from the black-robed scholar. “There’s no need to stand on ceremony when it’s just the two of us. I was, after all, the one who requested your presence here in the Anarchic Lands.”
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General Marnur had a very unique standing in the O’Brien Empire. As an Empire that focused primarily on the ways of the warrior, Marnur had always been looked down on by his fellow countrymen for his choosing to pursue the path of a mage.
Still, he never argued or fought back; he simply continued down his chosen path – without a magic institute or teacher to guide him, no less.
It was only when he reached the seventh rank, becoming a senior mage, that the empire understood the man’s importance and chose to invest in his future.
Since then, the now General’s rise could only be described as meteoric. Not only had he reached the peak of the ninth rank – only one step away from sainthood – they also found that he had a particularly astute mind which allowed him to become the empire’s leading tactician.
There were two reasons for Lanke requesting the presence of this particular General, and neither of which had anything to do with his power.
Though he was a powerhouse in his own right, the Gol Territory reason had five known experts who were either at or above the General’s current level.
No, the first reason behind his requested presence was his mind. Only a mind as sharp as Marnur’s could weave its way through the minefield that surrounded Gol D. Ace and find the best path to take him down.
And the second reason was one they only factored in after Lanke read the reports of Ace’s forces’ most recent wins, focusing not on the individual power of Killian and the other Acolytes of the Yin-Yang Pavilion but the subtle and surprisingly impressive tactics employed by the various divisions of the Gol Army.
Unlike most of his fellow martial brothers and sisters, Lanke was one of the few of O’Brien’s disciples who hadn’t been chosen from the War God’s College. Instead, he had been cherry-picked by O’Brien himself straight from the O’Brien Army after choosing to head straight to the battlefield after graduating from the War God’s Academy a few hundred years ago.
Whilst in the army, not only did he shine due to his incredible prowess as a warrior. He also showed his ability as a talented leader.
Still, that’s not what’s important here. What is important is that having spent so many years in the army on various battlefields, Lanke was at a very high level when it came to military tactics, and yet, even he had to marvel at the tactics used by Ace’s force.
Obviously, the focal point of the Gol Army’s achievements had come from Killian and the others, but still, as a new force who hadn’t trained together for very long, they should’ve seen heavy losses, or at least heavier than what they had seen. Instead, each battle saw minimal losses, and Lanke could easily discern that it was because of their ingenious tactics.
As hard as it was, Lanke could only admit his inferiority. And after looking into it, he found that the tactician at play was a former colonel from his Empire’s army.
Part of him wanted to go and give the current Empire and his eldest son a piece of his mind for chasing such a man away and into the arms of their enemy. Still, that would do nothing to help their current situation.
As such, all he could do was request the presence of General Marnur. Still, Marnur had been here for a week already, but he was yet to make a move; all he could do was go over the reports of the last few days over and over again, seemingly making no progress.
“The reason I’m here now is to ask if you were any closer to deciding on a path moving forward,” Lanke said calmly. “Whatever happens, we can not allow Ace to form his own kingdom, let alone Empire. It’ll be too big of a stain on my master’s name.”
“I understand, Lor… I mean Mr Lanke,” Marnur hurriedly corrected himself. “But something’s not adding up, and until I can make sense of the Gol Territory’s recent actions, I’m uncomfortable making any definitive decisions.”
“What’s not making sense?” Lanke asked curiously.
“Well, before the incident with them and the Cult, the four divisions of the Gol Army had been acting independently, with incredible success, but now, they seem to have amalgamated.” Marnur frowned pensively.
“I still don’t understand what has you so confused; you know that although the Gol Empire won in the end, two of their top experts were severely injured. It would be more strange if they chose to do nothing and carried on with their same tactics.” Lanke said back, wondering if the rumours of Marnur’s tactical abilities were exaggerated.
“For normal people, that would be true, but Ace is anything but normal,” Marnur explained. “On my journey up here, I went through all the intelligence reports we have on Ace, and if there’s one thing I know, it’s that he’s extremely arrogant. Whether it’s those from his generation or those older, it’s clear he doesn’t put many in his eyes, regardless of whether you’re currently stronger than him.”
Hearing that, Lanke’s brows furrowed slightly as he thought back to the disrespect he showed his master and their Empire. Even if he is the biological child of his master, he wouldn’t forgive him for showing such disrespect to the man he, Lanke, respects most in this life. Still, he knew everything Marnur said was true, so he didn’t interrupt.
“Many would argue that the injuries Amira and Wukong were too severe for them to get back to supervising one of the divisions forcing Ace and his familiar to watch over all of them together, but we both know that for an expert like Wukong’s master, Arianna, injuries like that are quickly healed.
Even though she said neither she nor the rest of the pavilion would get involved with their conflict with us, I very much doubt she would sit back and watch two of her disciples die.”
“What makes you think they didn’t die from their injuries?” Lanke asked curiously. “We can’t get spies close in to figure out the true extent of their injuries. They very well could be dead, which would also make Ace’s actions of destroying the various bases of the Cult in the region understandable.”
“No. They’re definitely alive,” General Marnur replied categorically. “All the reports on Ace’s exploits, from his giving himself up to the cult to protect Amira, his familiar, and that Julius fellow, to his and Killian’s repeated attack on Sabre to find and save their classmate Alissa, to everything that happened last year, they all suggest that Ace is the emotional type who would do anything if it’s for those he cares about.
If either Wukong or Amira had died, Ace’s reaction would’ve been much more aggressive, especially as all of the Cult’s powerhouses had pulled out of the region. Not so much in fear of Ace, but probably out of fear of the Pavilion going back on their word.
Plus, if Amira had really died, even if the Pavilion kept their word and did nothing, do you really believe that her parents, the Emperor and Empress of the Rohault Empire, two extremely powerful saints, would sit back and do nothing?
“If I were to wager, I’d bet that at the very least, the Rohault Empress, and potentially even the Emperor, has arrived in the region to check on their daughter.
From this moment on, it’d be best to assume that there are two additional saints in the Gol Clan’s territory.
But all of that only makes the actions of the Gol Army all the more curious. Their change in behaviour… it’s like they’re looking to take over a certain region in a hurry, but after going over the map, I haven’t found anything that would warrant their attention.”
The more he spoke, the more Marnur focused on the map when suddenly, “Hmm, Mr Lanke? You’re going?”
“You said you couldn’t find anything of interest on the map, but maybe I’ll be able to find something by flying over there personally.” Lanke laughed casually as he took his leave.