The Great Chaos
The screen in Central Square displayed Rai Redford calmly scanning the battlefield with a cocky grin.
The unit that had punched through the encirclement charged straight ahead and rescued the separated squad that had broken away earlier.
Even though the pursuing academy students’ troops numbered at most fifty, any contact with Rai’s main force would mean instant defeat. The moment the squad broke away, Rai’s own unit had split as well, but the academy students’ forces had fractured too.
Rai stepped onto the soldier’s back who was already marked as dead, his cigarette smoke billowing from his body, and looked down at Kenya, who had participated as Eisen’s second.
“How… did the encirclement get broken?”
“You thought I couldn’t?”
Kenya was only bewildered. He had taken fifty troops with him to chase down the squad that had fled from Rai’s unit, figuring the devil’s main force would never breach the wall.
The chasing unit ran in total panic. No attempt was made to erase tracks or execute any tactical maneuver. Sure that Rai was nowhere near his unit, Kenya followed at a leisurely pace.
Then suddenly Rai’s main force appeared right in front of him.
Why was this man here? Ten times more soldiers surrounded him, yet he claimed the encirclement had been broken?
“Yes, the second is dead.”
One of the soldiers behind him tapped Kenya’s shoulder with a sword, and Dudley spoke. The outcome was already decided, so no need for a fierce attack. It was more of a playful prod, but Kenya glared at Rai with an aggrieved expression before collapsing onto the ground, his smoke rising.
“You idiots. How the hell did you lose against such numbers?”
“Don’t talk about the corpses.”
Rai laughed and jabbed Kenya’s cheek repeatedly, then stood up.
“Let’s go save Cousin Gwanna next.”
The unit left Kenya and the soldiers behind and advanced.
After several battles, the divided units had been absorbed, but Rai’s force had suffered cumulative damage from the continuous fighting. Some troops had been injured and others marked as dead, so the strength had not changed much from the start.
Yet by easily breaking the encirclement and winning successive battles, the soldiers’ morale soared.
Philia watched Rai, trusting and following the soldiers who cheered for him.
What’s not meticulous about it?
A soldier had once said that when facing fewer enemies, mercenary tactics became closer to pure responsiveness and instinct rather than refinement. But this was meticulously planned from the very beginning.
Before training even started, he had provoked the academy students and placed his unit in a location that would not be attacked. The squad he had supposedly sent off randomly was in fact a pre-planned movement meant to draw attacks from Eisen’s rear or divide the academy students’ forces so he could easily capture them.
The more troops one commanded, the harder it became, yet Rai had neither a professional second nor recruited soldiers as seconds while keeping absolute control over them all.
The pinnacle of refinement—having his own unit and even the enemy within his grasp. It was the closest thing to the Empire’s ideals.
It was not impulsive.
Rai always carried a map in his hand and continued scouting, reading the movements of surrounding units. Amid the torrent of information, he kept devising new plans to perfectly execute the original tactic.
He altered routes, dispatched squads, and sometimes even appeared near other academy students. Every action was part of completing the meticulously laid-out plan, and the academy students, who supposedly held far more troops, kept shaking under his intentions.
Philia had learned two things so far.
How to use soldiers. How to complete tactics.
Even a refined tactic was chilling, but using soldiers was shockingly horrifying.
Rai did not view soldiers as mere units. Just as knights had skill differences, soldiers had their own specialties. He brought in veterans and made them seconds, gathered the strong ones, and handed them over to Abigail.
Before training began, he had shared beer with them, chatted, won their favor, and raised their morale. Then, by saving the squads sent as bait, the soldiers began trusting and following Rai.
Philia smiled faintly as she recalled Rai’s words when he had saved the squad and said not to touch our kids.
It’s not a disposable squad.
He saved some squads but not all. When Abigail had asked if it was a disposable squad, Rai had denied it, yet he had coldly divided the squads he would save and those he would abandon.
Some units had already been annihilated, and others lay beyond the wall, physically unreachable.
Yet the soldiers trusted Rai. Because he had saved a few squads.
As he replenished his forces and abandoned the ones he deemed necessary with cold pragmatism, his popularity continued to rise. Even after repeated battles, morale kept climbing, and the soldiers seemed ready to leap into hell for him.
Tricky.
Rai’s words from when he had been rescued from captivity came back: don’t abandon the hostages, abandon the sword instead.
Cold choices made while still being treated as a hero. Such methods could never be learned from books.
Philia, who had learned how to manage squads, smiled bitterly yet her eyes shone.
Everything she could learn here, she had to learn.
While Philia was forging a new perspective, the other academy students were in a gloomy state.
Naturally they had thought they would catch him, yet Rai had slipped through the encirclement with ease. The academy students leading the units found it difficult to communicate with each other.
They had to reform the encirclement while chasing him and command their own units. Signal flares that only gave simple signals could not facilitate proper conversation.
The luckiest person right now, since they could not gather to talk, was Eisen. Looking at it objectively, the number-one hero who had lost Rai was Eisen.
He had foolishly sent Bella toward Schultz to thin the encirclement, claiming it could be stopped, only for it to be pierced in one go.
When blame was assigned, Schultz’s responsibility for abandoning Abigail’s squad mattered, but the academy students who lacked full information placed everything on Eisen.
“Haa… so he was such an idiot…”
Fureiman checked the newly formed encirclement on his map. It was not even an encirclement anymore—just a front-line clash formation.
Rai’s unit that had broken through Eisen’s forces moved quickly, blocking the academy students from reforming the encirclement. In the end, the academy students, now in a single-file formation, simply advanced and chased his tail.
They had wasted too much time perfectly forming the encirclement. If they moved to reform it again, the training time would end.
Just as they were debating whether to charge in recklessly for a chance to catch him, someone appeared from afar.
“Hey—Fureiman. Let’s chat a bit?”
Through the bushes emerged Cesset. She had been quietly building the encirclement until now, but now she was moving. With her playful and cute appearance but knowing she was cunning, Fureiman scanned the surroundings.
“I left the unit to a fine second. Wouldn’t a knight like you, a knight among knights, attack an innocent little girl?”
Seeing Cesset raise her hands and smile, Fureiman hesitated briefly before approaching her.
“I came to shake hands and resolve this situation.”
“Any method?”
When Fureiman reacted, Cesset grinned. At the same time she subtly glanced at the staff member assigned to them.
The staff member was a little apart from the two, and their conversation would not reach Central Square.
Realizing Cesset had noticed his gaze, Fureiman naturally drifted farther from the staff member and spoke quietly.
“What method?”
“Eisen, Senga, Delia.”
When Fureiman heard the names of the academy students commanding the units, he fell silent.
Those three had suffered the greatest damage from Rai. Eisen had lost more than half his forces, and Senga and Delia had sent too many troops chasing Rai’s squad and paid the price.
Understanding that Fureiman was refusing to betray them, he shook his head.
“You have the audacity to suggest betrayal. Aren’t you afraid of what happens after training ends?”
Everyone was watching the training. Yet suddenly attacking one’s own side because the situation was unfavorable— that was not the act of a knight. It might even become a lifelong stain.
But Cesset tilted her head with an innocent smile.
“What are you talking about? We’ve been on Rai-kkang’s side from the very beginning.”
「………”
Impossible. Even if it was Cesset, Fureiman had no memory of making such a pact with Rai.
Cesset’s pure smile as she said “us” looked far more sinister than it should.
Yet Fureiman could not help but smile back.
“You’re quite the villain.”
“I am not a villain. I am a righteous disciple siding with the weak.”
“Rai-kkang is hardly weak.”
“He’s bullying the weak and gathering a horde to torment them. And Rai-kkang is a tactical genius who anticipated this situation and prepared allies. We are righteous allies who joined an unfavorable battle to help the genius.”
Cesset clasped her hands and laughed brightly.
No pact needed; one could be made. Through familiars everyone was watching, so they would shout that they had been on Rai’s side from the beginning and attack, and the crowd would cheer the dramatic scene.
Victory would bring points and honor; defeat would be a regrettable loss with no real harm. Cesset and Fureiman were merely one of the schemes to turn this unfavorable situation around.
“So then Eisen first, right?”
“Of course. Our captain, Rai-kkang, has already made him weak himself.”
With a wicked smile exchanged between Cesset and Fureiman, they led their units to slowly shift toward the left where Eisen was.
The first academy student to notice the detachment of the unit that had been marching in a straight line was Bella.
She had encouraged the disheartened Eisen, stood with him so the other students would not blame him, and had been protecting the weakened Eisen nearby.
Everyone had to chase after Rai’s unit ahead. Yet when she saw the unit moving from behind, Bella stared quietly.
Why?
There had been no talk of changing formation. Chasing Rai with the shortest distance left no time to adjust.
The thought that it might be a trap crossed her mind, but she dismissed it. The unease, however, did not disappear.
“Bia, take command of the unit for a moment.”
“What? Rai-kkang is nearby?”
“Just for a bit. I’ll take only a hundred soldiers.”
“W-wait a second.”
Without waiting for Bia’s answer as second, Bella dragged her forces and chased after the unit moving from behind.
After seizing Eisen’s rear, Cesset and Fureiman charged straight in and attacked.
“What, what is this?!”
Poor Eisen, struck by a surprise attack again, panicked and tried to command his unit, but the forces that had already broken morale from Rai were incapable of proper movement.
In the eyes of the stunned Eisen, the smiling faces of Cesset and Fureiman appeared.
“Sese-seeeet!!!!!! Fureiman!!! You betrayed Rai-kkang?!?!”
The voice that rose from the depths of his heart was filled with genuine pain, as if it were screaming.
“We’ve been on Rai-kkang’s side from the beginning.”
“Sorry, Eisen—Rai-kkang knelt and begged, so I had no choice. Still, fourteen to one is way too cowardly. We should help you too.”
Interestingly, neither of them looked at Eisen; instead they gazed at the familiar on the staff member’s shoulder and answered.
Aslan, watching the sad smile on Cesset’s face on the Central Square screen, grimaced.
“That’s betrayal. Damn woman.”
“How entertaining.”
Diana propped her chin on her hand and laughed. The screen switched, and from behind Cesset and Fureiman, Bella’s unit charged in.
“You bastards!!”
Bella’s unit sliced straight through Fureiman’s unit in a single line.
“Impressive. When did you realize we were on Rai-kkang’s side?”
“Stop your bullshit!!”
Bella, sensing the truth from Fureiman’s expression, shouted loudly and commanded her unit.
Yet she had only brought a hundred soldiers to restrain Rai. Although she had achieved success in the initial surprise, soon she was trapped inside Fureiman’s unit and desperately tried to escape, only for more soldiers to fall.
“One plus one.”
Cesset laughed wickedly and handed Bella over to Fureiman, then charged toward Eisen’s unit. With almost no troops left and already struck by a surprise attack, Eisen’s forces collapsed helplessly.
Each time a unit was annihilated, thirty points were added. Unbearable voices reached Cesset’s ears.
“Fight? Let me join too.”
“Eeeh?! Rai-kkang?!”
“Charge.”
At Rai’s words, the unit that had been stealthily approaching without sound charged forward like a tidal wave. The target was the units of Cesset and Fureiman, who had publicly declared themselves allies.
The unit hit in the flank was split in two, and Bella barely escaped to join the still-confused Eisen.
“Rai-kkang! Why are you attacking your own side?!”
At Cesset’s words, conscious of the familiar, Rai blinked and looked at Philia. Philia shook her head frantically, and Rai, understanding the situation, grinned ruthlessly.
“You’ve become useless now.”
The words that declared him the villain saved Cesset and Fureiman, but not their units. Suddenly a new academy student unit had arrived to pursue Rai’s sudden reckless movement, and Rai simply pierced another encirclement and fled.
The academy students chasing Rai’s unit, unable to distinguish friend from foe in the chaotic melee, stopped in panic.
“Cesset and Fureiman betrayed us! Defeat them!”
“We’re the victims!!”
At Bella’s shout, Cesset screamed back, but the academy students immediately attacked both Cesset and Fureiman.
While fighting entangled each other, Rai slipped away quietly until he spotted Triola joining late and called out loudly.
“Triola!! Thank you! Leave it to Cesset!!”
Triola did not understand what Rai meant, but when attacked from the side he panicked and regrouped his unit.
“What?! Why are you attacking?!”
“You betrayed him too!”
Delia, who had been called a brainless idiot by Abigail, unleashed her fury and attacked Triola. As more units joined the pursuit of Rai, the lines between enemy and ally blurred until everyone fought indiscriminately.
Rai walked away from the chaotic battlefield with a light shrug.
What a scary world filled with distrust.
「………」
Following behind, Philia and Abigail stared at Rai in disbelief.
It was the first time their opinions had aligned during training.