Andy, fueled by adrenaline and the needs and requirements of war, decided to release the massive sun-like fireball in front of him. It expanded to twice its size as his mana kicked into overdrive, making his aim largely irrelevant. The strike would be devastating. And right there, in that moment, something unexpected happened. An amplification circle in the distance sounded, and Sara’s voice shot across the battlefield.

“Wait!” she yelled.

Andy stopped, his arm trembling as Sara’s body—wrapped in a red barrier—descended into the mass of soldiers like a meteor entering the stratosphere. Not a moment later, there was a chilling wave of magical pressure as a bright light shot out of the mass of soldiers, and a massive arc of light cut through the troops, carrying on for a hundred yards and splitting the battlefield in two. Then the world turned still, frozen in time, like a miniature village encased in glass. No one spoke, no one breathed. They just looked at the crevasse that was eerily similar to the one in the noble district but fresh and devastating, still dripping with molten rock that would soon cool into obsidian glass.

“Yield!” Sara commanded and released more magical pressure as she lifted a radiant sword high, shining bright with nuclear energy. The enemy troops around her dropped to the ground, groaning as if they were under the effects of double gravity. “You have no chance at victory,” she warned. “Refuse, and I’ll kill you all.”

Andy watched in awe, stopping his fire spell and stumbling back, resting against a stone wall behind him. She’s not… killing them. Yet he realized—or perhaps they both realized—that it wasn’t necessary. Not anymore. This number of people meant nothing to Lady Reece, the Benevolent Tyrant of Lemora. It truly felt irrelevant. This level of demonstration seemed effortless.

2

Raul watched Quell’s army approaching. Over four thousand soldiers were marching beside large caravans, pulling wagons of wine and army and bread to feed thousands of soldiers on a month-long expedition. As he watched, he imagined what it would be like to kill a hundred at a time with nuclear attacks. The mages around him could each release fireballs the size of trucks, which would spread wildfires through the prairie that they were in, transforming the dry grass and soldiers into hot flames. It was a gruesome and horrible thought that made the heroes quake as they stood on a rocky hill overlooking the army in the distance. Yet there was another way, and it all came down to the directions that Sara had given him the night before they left.

I do not care how you deal with the soldiers, Sara said. You can kill them, destroy their supply lines, or simply warn them. Just bring results and remember that every action you take has consequences. You won’t save anyone if they attack later and die the same.

That led to the current situation. I need to prove it to her, he thought, thinking of how to resolve things peacefully. The question was how—and she had already given him the answer: demonstrations. Break the army’s will to fight. He wondered if it really required killing. It did in Sara’s last life, but there was something that she told him that he had never forgotten: Sara had won against Agronus with a corrupted golden core. Yet he was with seven mages, each with a pure equivalent. That was a fact. Couldn’t they strike fear into the hearts of everyone?

“Listen, everyone,” Raul said to his strike team. “Our options are to thin out their numbers or make a demonstration so extreme that the soldiers give up. Let’s discuss our options.”

Raul discussed it with the others for about ten minutes, with very few being in favor of killing a lot of people. They opted for a demonstration.

“Then it’s decided,” he said. “We will make a demonstration, but this will only work if it’s so terrifying that no one will fight us. So don’t hold back!”

3

Sara walked through the battlefield slowly. As she moved, more and more soldiers fell victim to her magical pressure, hitting the ground as she passed. All the heroes were next to Andy on the embattlements now, and they were watching her. She didn’t know how to feel about them watching—

—because she didn’t know what she was doing. Yet fighting a hundred soldiers with ease reminded her that she wasn’t who she used to be, so she didn’t have to act the same. In her past life, she battled tooth and nail all the way to Agronus, and while the demon king would still be a savage foe whether he was inside the castle or not—normal soldiers were not.

It might prove necessary to slaughter Lemings soldiers in the future. They might ride on Lemora, and they’d be forced to destroy them in vast numbers in a large-scale siege—but for now (since she had already agreed to reveal their strength instead of attacking the Lemings’ capital), she would attempt to get the soldiers to yield with relative peace. If that didn’t work—she could always massacre them. That was the original plan. So it wasn’t a loss.

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Sara turned to the heroes. “Escaran troops! Surround the city. Heroes! Take to the sky and scour the forests. Kill anyone who attempts to flee. If they get away, they will bring news of this battle to the main forces. One life could cost thousands!”

Troops complied quickly, and the heroes followed suit, mounting silver gliders and taking to the skies.

Sara watched them leave and then walked up to the man she’d later come to learn as Trikal Helsa. “You will not spread the news of our power. So don’t try. I only have one question: Are you and your officers willing to lay down your lives for your people? Or will you force them to die with you?”

Officers were the brains of the military. Without them, armies collapsed. That’s why it’s common policy throughout history to remove the head of authority. Sara would spare thousands of soldiers—but she refused to spare even one of the officers.

Trikal swallowed, his body trembling with shame and humiliation.

4

Raul and the mage corps lined up on the hilltop as Raul activated the strongest amplification circle in the history of Reemada. Then, he addressed the thousands of soldiers—introducing themselves to the army.

“This is Lord Martinez of the Escaran Military!” Raul yelled. “We will give you one warning. If you do not return to Quell after that—we will kill you all.” He turned to the heroes, who nodded. One after the other, they created massive meteors in the skies using amplification stones. It was a surreal moment where dirt and grass and stone lifted off the ground—as if under the laws of zero gravity—floating upward slowly. Then they sucked into the sky at rapid speed, slamming the elements together into massive meteor rock balls. Each grew until they could pass for small asteroids, and then they burst into red flames.

Quell soldiers screamed in the distance, and many of them ran, but it was unnecessary. When Raul yelled, “Fire!” the meteors rained down from the heavens and crashed down a quarter mile in front of the soldiers, setting the prairie aflame. Each strike spread fifty yards of inferno, instantly creating a massive wall of flames and smoke that blotted out the sky. If those strikes hit the center of the soldiers in their tight-knit groupings—hundreds would have died instantly.

The response—was hysterical. Montas bucked and screeched, toppling wagons as soldiers pushed and fled. It looked like the entire prairie was a massive suspension bridge that was collapsing, and everyone was pushing, shoving, and trampling over each other to escape. The response from officers yelling to press on was weak, and the running soldiers knew it. As for the heroes, they could barely see the chaos over the feverish black smoke rising from the prairie. All they could do was wait—and pray—that the soldiers wouldn’t fan out to prevent major attacks before attacking. They showed their cards—only time would tell.

5

Trikal didn’t know what to say to the woman. She was asking him to order a surrender before his execution, and that led to mixed emotions of hate, fear of death, and shame. He was just kneeling there, gasping for breath under her pressure, studying the silver sword glowing crimson in her hand. Qualth—The God Slayer. That sight alone confirmed that the woman was Lady Reece of the Escaran Kingdom—the person he was warned about. Her identity made things far worse—not because he feared her strength, but because the Queen of the Escaran Kingdom herself was standing before him, and he couldn’t kill her to end the war. He was helpless.

“First…” Trikal wheezed. “You…. You’re… Lady Reece… Aren’t… You?”

The woman reached into her cloak and unpinned the hood from her head. Then she took off her hood, exposing gorgeous blonde hair, weaved together in crown braids to hide it from prying eyes.

“That’s correct,” Lady Reece said. “My name is Lady Sara Reece, head advisor to Alecov Escar, the true blood heir of the Escaran Kingdom. I am also given the title of hero, as I am the chosen one destined to fight and kill Agronus Lykspear and put an end to the Thousand-Year War.”

Trikal’s body felt like it was swarmed with tiny, icy insects as her words sank in. Agronus…? he thought. Trikal couldn’t believe that anyone could fight Agronus. Yet… he also could. Lady Reece had just fought off swarms of soldiers, and she didn’t even have a speck of blood on her. She was bearing down on him with so much pressure that he couldn’t move or think well. If she wanted to, she could incinerate all his soldiers—two thousand in count before he took off—by herself. This was the type of power necessary to fight Agronus. It was overwhelming and beyond mortal comprehension. If this were true—if Lady Reece were truly the person to defeat Agronus (the greatest ambition of the Lemings Kingdom)—then fighting her would condemn his kingdom to death and spoil the mission of their military.

“We… surrender….” Trikal boomed over the amplification circle, his voice carrying outward into the blackened summer skies. Two hours later, he was dead.

6

Andy and the others had a new perspective on war as they watched Sara execute the officers. A few hours before, the heroes might’ve seen Sara as vicious for her actions—cruel even—and would’ve asked if there was another way. A few hours later, each of them watched with stone expressions as the men and women who orchestrated a civilian slaughter were cut down one right after the other. In truth, Andy was so angry at the Lemings’ troops for what they had done that he wished Sara would kill them all—he just didn’t want to do it. No one wanted to execute the officers—but they wanted it done. They wanted someone to do it, and they were grateful for it. Never again would they treat Sara—even subconsciously—as if she were a ruthless machine. From that day on, they’d see her as a leader, savior, and General.

The war had begun—and they were prepared to follow her.