The town's representative became tense hearing the commander, he recalled Jorge Freylord's request sending troops last year and stepped forwards. 

"Sir, Jorge Freylord unfortunately died the day after the famine happened in the town a year ago... He's no longer alive, the same goes for her wife, Amelia Freylord." 

The commander scratch his head and walked next to one of his subordinate. They whispered each other and walk next to the town's representative while ordering. 

"You guys wait here! You, guide me to his grave." 

The town's representative bowed and guide him to Jorge and Amelia's graves. 

Once they arrived in front of the graves, a young girl was praying in front of Jorge and Amelia's graves. 

Noticing the sound behind her, the young girl turned around and look at the commander. She was startled by the tall and huge commander and stepped back. Noticing the girl who looks exactly like Amelia, the commander frown his eyebrows and asked. 

"You are...?" 

The town's representative was anxious, the stories he heard about the Imperial army wasn't a joke.  

They were people which bad temper and could kill anyone outside the Imperial City without caring.  

They were hated by most of the people outside the Imperial City and it was common between commoners to always listen to them and never angered them otherwise, the whole family could be executed without any reasons. 

He tried to find something to save the young girl but nothing came, he hurriedly explained the truth to the commander trying to not anger him. 

"She's Jorge's and Amelia's daughter. She comes every morning to pray in their graves, please have some mercy for her." 

The commander was slightly surprised by the town's representative's last words and with a sigh said. 

"I'll let her go only after looking that she didn't stole what we were looking for." 

Upon hearing that, the town's representative became worried about the young girl but couldn't do anything, he could only take her next to him and blocked her from fleeing. 

The commander looked at Jorge's graves and suddenly started to dig a hole looking for Jorge's corpse. 

The moment he took away Jorge's corpse, he took a badge from Jorge's corpse and burnt his body. 

Infuriating by the commander's actions, Ashe who was watching from the side couldn't hold his resentments any longer and shouted while running to the commander. 

"What the hell are you doing in front of my father's grave!" 

The commander who noticed the shout from the boy, turned around and blocked his light punch. He looked at the boy and with a surprised expression said. 

"You... are you Ash? Ash Freylord?" 

Ash who heard the commander's words was taken aback. 'How did he knows my name?' Glaring at the commander, Ash stepped back while pushing away the commander's arm and asked while being cautious of the commander. 

"How do you know my name?" 

The commander smirked and explained to Ash with nostalgic. 

"Your looks are exactly the same as Jorge when he was young, even your character is the same! Did you forget about me? I still remember you while you was that little." 

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Ash couldn't remember his childhood inside the Imperial city, thus, he didn't said anything but only glance at the commander with disbelieving eyes. 

"You still don't trust me do you?" 

Of course he couldn’t.  

In Ash's perspective, this guys literally stole something from his father and even burnt his body! How in the world he could even trust that kind of guy? 

"How can I trust someone who just burned my father's body in front of my eyes? You even stole something from him! Give me back!" 

The commander could only scratch his head. He never expected to see Jorge's son still alive.  

In his mind, the whole family already died long ago, that's also the reason why he was sent by the Imperial family to take back the Alchemist badge from Jorge. 

The alchemist badge was something given by the alchemist association and was a precious item. It was an item for identify himself as alchemist and the materials creating it were few.  

But for some reasons, the badges could only be recognized by nobles or soldiers, thus, commoners or villagers who saw the badge didn't knew what the badge really means. 

After finally reorganizing his thought, the commander decided to finally told Ash about his father. 

"I take this badge from your father. The badge means that he was an alchemist, you must have heard this words somewhere did you?" 

Alchemist, it was something that Ash couldn't believe.  

His father never showed any alchemist sorcery and he never saw an alchemist with his own eyes, but he definitely heard about it.  

Before the famine happened in the town, an adventurer group came for sightseeing and he remembered their doubtful stories about alchemist. 

It was an existence that could use sorcery that was way stronger than magic.  

It was the only things that Ash knows about alchemist. 

Ash wasn't the kind of stupid boy to believe everything from adults, even more when the stories seems unrealistic. 

He could only looked at the commander with doubting eyes and after noticing that the commander also had the same badge on his chest, Ash decided to test him. 

"So if you really are an alchemist like my father, you should be able to use alchemy? Show it to me." 

If not for the rules, the commander would have never showed his alchemist ability to a young child but since he was the son of his best friend, he could only sighed and break the rules.  

The annoyed face of the commander could be seen, making the villagers became anxious about what was going to happens. 

The sands under his foots suddenly started to tremble. A magic circle appeared suddenly appeared under his foots and the sands surrounding him started floating. In both of his hands, a fire ignited burning both of his hands. 

The commander was wearing white gloves, but the gloves didn’t seems to burn, Ash was shocked upon seeing alchemy for the first time. 

'Alchemy really did exist.' 

The villagers who watched the scene was utterly shocked by the sudden magic circle appearing under the commander's foots.  

After watching the commander's magic and his expression while burning the death's body, they definitely not want to anger this commander. 

Ash never thought he'll be able to see alchemy with his own eyes one day. But interested Ash was the little coloured light balls surroundings his hands. 

Noticing that Ashe was blankly staring at his hands, the commander cancelled his magic circle and asked. 

"Are you convinced now?" 

Seeing Ash nodding, he finally realized that he lost too much times talking to Ash and forget that he needed to return to the Imperial city. 

He looked at Ash and explained. "Since I finished what I needed to do, I'll be leaving." Then he looked at the young girl and with a smile said. 

"I'm sorry for scaring you young girl... you can go now." 

Hearing the words of the commander, the town's representative's anxiousness finally faded as he released the young girl. 

The young girl who was watching Ash with worries finally run towards Ash hiding behind him.  

Looking closer to the young girl, some familiarities could be seen between her and Amelia which make the commander startled.  

After his curiosity rose anymore he decided to ask Ash. 

"This young girl... she's your sister?" 

Ash who was still hesitantly wondering to tell him or not could only nodded. 

"I see, that's why she recalled me Amelia when I first saw her. Anyway let's move to the Imperial City. I can't leave both of you guys alone here." 

The last mission given to the commander was to guide the survivors of the deserted town in the Imperial City. 

The queen regretted leaving her best friend dying in the deserted town when the famine happened, but since she was also a concubine and not the official queen, she couldn't help them until now. 

The commander was someone close to her, thus, he knows how much she regretted letting her friend dying. 

Now that he knows that her daughter and son are still alive, there is no way he could let them alone there. 

With the survivors, the Imperial army with a total of 200 soldiers and 20 survivors left the deserted town and head towards the Imperial city.