Edward allowed the team a moment to rest, sitting on a crate on the opposite side of the room, as even the soldiers not involved in the confrontation seemed to be a bit out of it.

Maybe he did go a bit too far? But in any case, it seemed to have worked. He noticed team Echo glancing at him with fear and respect, quickly dodging his gaze whenever they met it.

It’s just that… Ed was worried about his reputation a bit. He picked up some words like ‘demon’, ‘monster’ and ‘a madman’. He didn’t really want to end up with a title like “The Mad Warrior” or something along those lines…

Making use of the time, he considered what’s the most important objective to tackle next. The team, elite as they may be, probably didn’t have much actual experience fighting the Marked. Ed also didn’t know how powerful their rifles truly were. Well that’s already two things he could start with…

He stood up straight, walking towards the large open space in the center of the hangar. The moment he did, the soldiers followed his actions. They stood before him once again, but this time the atmosphere was completely different. No one dared to whisper, or speak without permission.

Ed nodded, mostly to himself, with a satisfied smile.

“Since we got the introduction out of the way, let’s start with the preparations. Have any of you ever fought, or at least seen a Marked on a battlefield?”

The woman with a hair bun was the only person with her arm raised.

Edward looked in her direction, waiting for an explanation.

“A couple years ago there was this one time. An armor clad figure sprinted through our ranks, leaving a bloody trail of dead bodies. You could barely follow its movement, shooting almost blindly towards where you thought you saw it. That one person alone decimated pretty much an entire battalion. The rest of us only survived purely thanks to luck.”

She took a deep breath staring into the distance before continuing…

“A stray artillery shell fell right where he was standing… he had his back turned, admiring his ‘work’, and didn’t notice the incoming strike before it was too late. It blew a hole straight through his body, even he couldn’t survive a projectile the size of his arm traveling at over twice the speed of sound.”

‘A true Legend probably would tho…’ a scary thought passed through Edward’s mind. He honestly did not expect such an intense story, when asking the question. But it helped a lot. Not only allowing him to understand the female soldier more, but also giving the others a reality check about what they might be dealing with.

“Then I see at least one of you understands the problem, thank you for your answer, what’s your name soldier?”

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“Julia, sir.”

“That’s an impressive past you have, Julia,” said Edward looking right into her eyes. After a short pause, he turned back towards the rest of the group.

“Now that you have an idea of what’s coming, I believe the first thing we should do is determine how much damage, or if any at all, can these weapons deal to the enemy Marked,” he pointed towards the powerful rifles left leaning against the wall.

If only there was a Marked they could test it against safely… Ed tried to stop the incoming thought but there just didn’t seem to be a better idea.

‘Ehhh… they’re really gonna think I'm mad now. And I’m starting to think they may be right…”

It should be fine anyways, it’s not like they can seriously hurt him. And there’s also the minor legend of Perseverance.

“Alright I have an idea, Julia can you pick up your weapon?”

She nodded in response, obediently going to fulfill his request. When she came back Edward took a stand in an empty spot several meters away. He made sure that there was nothing else, but the armored wall behind him. The young warrior rolled up the sleeve of his combat suit showing the bare skin of his forearm.

The members of team Echo looked at each other with scared glances, having some idea already of what their crazy team leader might have in mind.

“Aim for my forearm.” Edward immediately questioned his decision once again. He didn’t know what overcame him today, but it was the second time in a span of an hour that he was asking somebody to shoot him…

Well, it was already too late to regret his actions. So when he noticed Julia hesitating, he nodded to her in encouragement. She could barely hold the barrel up, clearly the gun wasn’t made for being used while standing upright.

Under the shocked gazes of her teammates Julia steeled her resolve, put her finger on the trigger, and squeezed slowly…

This time the sound of discharge was much louder than before. Making Edward worry about causing the commotion. But before he had time to do that he felt a sharp sting of pain hitting his forearm. It resembled being stung by a needle at a doctor’s office, only if the needle was twice the usual size.

Ed investigated the surface of his arm, noticing a small stream of blood flowing down his skin and dripping onto the floor. It was just a surface wound, and Edward’s body started already fixing the damage, but the young man was still pleasantly surprised by the power behind this shot.

Julia’s arms dropped down, unable to hold the shooting stance any longer. She removed the magazine, and approached Edward with a slightly panicked expression.

“Sorry sir, you just said I should…”

“It’s fine.” He wiped the blood off with his other arm, showing off the pink surface of a fresh healthy layer of skin, the only trace left of the small wound.

The Marked passed by the shocked woman, going back to stand in front of the soldiers.

“As you can see the damage is not much, but you don’t have to worry about the healing, that part is unique to me.” He flashed a charming smile to the group.

“The good news is that the bullet managed to get through the aura, and while it won’t hurt the enemy much, that’s enough to cause a fatal distraction in the middle of a fight.”

The group went on to discuss the possible strategies, now that they had some data to back them up. Sitting in a small circle, where Ed first met the group, his confidence grew with every minute spent talking. The combat theory imprinted into his head by master Tarquin finally showed its value in the real world. Like the team learned to fear Edward earlier, they now learned to believe in their leader, finding support and confidence in both his physical skills as well as his sharp mind.

That’s how Edward Thornfield unknowingly evolved from a lone warrior into a budding form of a true leader.