[Alexander’s POV]

“Doesn’t seem like a reckless decision to go against Calatemps now?” Hephaestion says. He stands in a perfectly straight posture. His cold gray eyes were staring directly at me. I smiled. Hephaestion had been my greatest advisor during this campaign; he had helped me rise to top while avoiding the other candidates’ traps along the way. But I was shocked to hear that he wanted to avoid Calatemps.

“Why avoid him? Don’t you want Calatemps dead after what it did to you?” I asked, knowing that he doesn’t like to touch on that subject but it seemed important to at least get some reasoning from him.

“Hmph.” Hephaestion grunts, I knew that was going to be his reaction to me but if it were anyone else they would probably be limping, “I do not care about my personal interests, Alexander. I only care about you winning this election.”

I nodded, still I do find it strange that he doesn’t want to fight it. When I first found him he was cursing the damn creature. “One of my promises I made to the country is to rid the Calamity Beasts from The Kingdom Of Sela, why not show the people I will keep my promises? I’m sure the scroll would love that deed.”

"We both know this isn't about the election, the scroll or the people." Hephaestion replies in a blank tone.

I grin. Hephaestion truly knows me better than anyone on this planet. “Perhaps. So then you know I won’t back down, correct?”

Hephaestion sighs, “Unfortunately, yes. There is no getting through to you. But we must continue to be careful. I do not fear Elwen’s group although Mansoon seemed a bit off in my opinion, but I wouldn’t worry too much with him. We should be worried about why Midas decided to help you.”

I nod at Hephaestion’s comment. Midas joining in on the campaign against Calatemps seemed weird; he offered to help before anything was officially announced, “True, any ideas how he heard about the campaign or what he might be planning?”

“No clue. Everyone in Elwen’s campaign that knew about it were monitored carefully so none of them leaked anything. I will keep close watch on Midas’ movements, he will not get the upper hand on anything and we will come out as clear victors.”

[Beowulf’s POV]

Larisa told me to stay completely out of the spying part until the campaign against Calatemps started but… I know Larisa and the enemy. Larisa is an extremely diligent person, but the enemy has most likely been watching for any espionage. She needed some sort of backup. I walked into a room that a lot of members of Midas like to call, “The Closet”, a room filled with all kinds of disguises from looking like bandits to even some royal knight clothes. Disguises were only the first part of an annoying process of spying. I had to talk to another member that hates my guts and the keeper of The Closet. To think about it, I feel like most of Midas’ campaign members hated my guts.

An Ariean elf was sorting through some of the outfits inside of The Closet, Arieans elves were becoming more common in The Kingdom Of Sela ever since the Peninsula Country Of Arie opened up its borders with The Kingdom Of Sela. Many Arieans elves have either purple or green hair with their eyes also having a bluish violet color on one eye and an emerald green on the other. This Ariean Elf was no exception; he had green hair. However, he had a slight bit of rudeness in his eyes.

I raise my voice into my normal booming voice “Hey! Brother Yosiev-”

“Don’t use that ‘brother’ title with me. I am nowhere near close to you and we should keep it like that” Yosiev immediately fires out, not even batting an eye towards me as he continues sorting through outfits.

“Rude. I need to infiltrate Alexander’s mansion, on Midas' orders.” I say trying to speed through the process.

“Hmm? Are you late or something? Larisa was asking me to do the same thing.” He bluntly asked.

“That’s why I'm here, both you and I know she’s going to need backup.” I was surprised Yosiev even let Larisa enter in there alone, it was practically throwing her to the lions, dammit why is she so stupid sometimes?

“... If it is really needed then I have an Alexander military outfit for you. This is quite annoying since it may look weird that I have to enter the mansion again. I feel like my cover could be blown.” Yosiev sighs loudly, Yoshiev has been a double agent for Alexander and Midas for a long while, helping us enter into the mansion if needed. He acted as the uniform fitter and tailor in Alexander’s mansion, giving and fixing uniforms for soldiers, guards and sometimes even Alexander himself.

“After I sneaked Larisa in I overheard security may be getting tighter, Hephaestion is already onto Midas’ spying plans. So we will have to do this.” Yosiev takes out a dark blue military outfit, with golden buttons across keeping it together, and he takes out a knife and cuts off one of the buttons and causes a large rip in it as well.

I jump forward and shout, “Hey! What are you doing?!”

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“Securing your passage inside we need an excuse for me and you to get inside.” Yosiev calmly says.

“... Oh I see, I apologize for yelling.”

“I’m used to a big oaf yelling at me.”

Yosiev hands me the outfit and I put it on and follow Yosiev to the gates of Alexander’s mansion.

A guard stomps his metal boots on the stone road as we approach, “Halt! State your business.”

Yosiev hands him a crest signifying he works inside of the mansion, “I need to fix this soldier’s uniform, we are going on a large campaign soon.”

“I was told we had to limit visitors inside for today, I can let you in but not him.” The guard clashes his boots together and stands in a defensive form.

“Ah, really? This soldier was really looking forward to looking inside of the mansion…” Yosiev looks over at me and leans into the guard, “because you know, it may be the last cool thing he sees as Calatemps might be consuming him in two days.”

The guard looks around him and opens the gate, “Come in both of you, enjoy your visit, soldier.” and he salutes me by stiffening his body and banging his metal plated chest twice and then tapping his forehead horizontally twice and then turning away from me to continue his guard duties.

“Thank you, sir.” I say, smiling.

Yosiev leads the way into his workplace inside of the mansion, I quickly take off my uniform and trade him a light blue guard uniform, this one instead of golden buttons it had silver buttons.

“Good luck. You’re gonna need it, and don’t get yourself caught or else I would get fired.” Yosiev cracks a smile towards me that immediately goes to a frown, “Now get out.”

I quickly nodded and rushed out of Yosiev’s office and started to look for Larisa. If I were an arrogant high elf where would I go? I started to just wander the halls of the mansion, running into a high elf man holding a black book, not the high elf I was looking for to my disappointment, wearing a cloak and a mask covering the lower part of his face. Our eyes met, he had cold eyes, he fitted the description of Mansoon, one of the guys that I was supposed to be spying on, but I wasn’t too sure if it was him or not.

“You seem lost.” He finally says after a small moment of silence.

“Oh… I’m just looking for another guard, this place is huge and I’m hoping she didn’t get lost or in trouble” I chuckle rubbing the back of my head.

“Ah I see, not far from here, hallway to the left, there was a guard getting scolded by a higher up looking guard if that helps.” He replies, his eyes narrowing onto me.

“Thank you! I appreciate it, I’ll go make sure that ain’t her!” I quickly walk away from him, it normally isn’t good to meet the person you are spying on in the scouting phase of everything, I’ll have to be careful when I do start spying on him to make sure he doesn’t know what I am doing.

Down the hall I saw Larisa indeed getting scolded by a higher up I hear, “What do you mean you can’t find your other pair? You are a lower rank meaning you are supposed to be in a pair ALL the time. If you can’t find your other pair in 5 minutes I will report you to Hephaestion”

Larisa puts her hands up defensively, “No! No! Please don’t do that! I don’t know where my other pair went, I swear! I’ve been looking for an hour now!”

I cleared my throat, gathering the attention of both Larisa and the guard, “Excuse me, I believe you no longer have to report her, I am here.”

“Where were you? Why would you leave your pair behind?” The guard yelled at me, turning all the anger from Larisa to me, “If you hadn’t shown up I would’ve believed she was a spy in disguise and would’ve reported it and she would probably be put to death!”

I shrugged, “Sorry I didn’t think it would take so long to get my uniform fixed.”

“Don’t brush it off!” the guard grabs Larisa by the shoulders, “I’d like you to think about what you had done and apologize to her when you’re ready.” and with that the guard storms off.

“Man, what an ass.” I say rubbing my neck.

Larisa quickly looks around us, scouting to see if anyone is listening. When she confirms no one is around she turns to me with a face of gratitude, “I thought I told you to stay and wait to begin your part of the plan until the campaign started.”

“Sorry, I thought you needed some help.” I replied.

Larisa grinned, “Well I probably would have handled it on my own but-”

I smacked her on the head, cutting off her shit, “No you couldn’t.”

Larisa rubbed her head, the face of gratitude turned into a face of anger, “Piss off! Let’s do the assignment, I’ll fill you in on what I know so far, Saaxol and Baldr seem like best buds, Saaxol has a strange obsession with mushrooms that he lets them grow on him, I am assuming he worships the God Of The Life Cycle…”

“That’s disgusting” I say, already it seems like we will have nothing to worry about with Elwen, if all of them are bottomfeeders like Saaxol.

Larisa continues, “Baldr has no memories of his past life, and has recently lost something important to him, something about his past.”

An amnesiac, another bottomfeeder.

“Bud is strange, he isn’t human like his appearance says he is. I’m pretty sure he believes he is human as well… But anyways, onto what I know they can do, Saaxol is some sort of Druid, he can cast a lot of natural spells, Baldr just seems like a swordsman, and Bud is most definitely a bard casting spells through his trumpet.” Larsia finishes and I’m impressed with the amount she was able to pick up in such a small amount of time she had been here.

“Well then, why don’t we look at Hexa next?” I say, she is most likely a bottomfeeder like the rest of them but maybe she’ll be the one to surprise. Maybe even Mansoon could surprise, he was strangely cold from what I saw. Comparing him to Saaxol, Baldr and Bud, Mansoon doesn’t seem like he would fit in this group. Doesn’t matter in the end though because if Elwen’s group is dysfunctional then it will only work in Midas’ favor.