64 Accident Waiting to Happen

Standing on a tor in the middle of the woods Yun looked majestic in her custom made Sect robes. She had modified the colors to a deep crimson with a starburst pattern around her badge in the deep green color of the sect. Half a step behind her stood Long Wuying in a similarly colored robe that had been custom made by the sect long ago. Instead of the Nine Pointed Starburst that Yun had, he instead had an Eight Pointed Starburst, indicating his lower authority during this wartime scenario.

Down on the field in front of them were arrayed numerous sect members wearing their combat gear. Each group stood in a small formation together, but the equipment between them all was extremely varied. Yun turned to Long Wuying and informed him that this would need addressed in some manner. Each group would need something to mark them as a unit, most likely through armor colors and a crest on their shoulders indicating their unit information.

Looking out at the group she began to tell them about the test they were about to undergo. This would be a round robin type contest where all the squads would fight each other at some point, but the factors for victory weren't necessarily simply defeating your opponent. Each squad would be graded by three people on their performance; Yun, Long Wuying, and their commanding Lieutenant.

After performance grading the squads would be given designations based on their ranking within their corps, but these rankings would not be absolute. After ranking there would be a half month for the squads to polish their skills before repeating this round robin tournament, after which the grading scale would also include their growth potential. Squads would then be marked by their status as well, with Elite squads being the excellent units that would get the best choices of missions. Lieutenants would be awarded based on the number of Elite Squads under their command.

The squads were broken down into groups of six, with each Lieutenant having command over nine squads each. This would allow each squad to be highly mobile, while also allowing them to break down into two units of three highly coordinated fighters. As the explanation of everything had been finished she called a meeting of the Lieutenants to explain specifics and give them a chance to issue orders.

Within a tent behind the tor she had just been speaking from Yun sat down at a war-room table with a map laying across it.

"Alright, this is our local region. When we had the inter-sect tournament a little while ago we did a fairly good job clearing out a large area of the vicious beasts that inhabited them, and the other beasts have only just started to migrate inwards and take that open territory for themselves. Just to the north east of Myhrrwar is an old abandoned quarry.

"We'll use this area for the arena. The quarry is in fairly bad shape, and hasn't been mined evenly at all, so there's plenty of cover and positional tactics that can be used, while allowing us to observe nearly unobstructed from above. If there are any questions from any of you, please speak now. This is your best opportunity to speak up."

With only a few questions about rules and the use of skills they were able to establish everything they needed to know. Skills would only be allowed defensively, and no life-threatening or crippling wounds would be allowed. Anyone caught maliciously harming their fellow warriors in wartime would be executed immediately by Yun herself. Saying this Yun directly looked Gao Mao in the eyes, intimating to him that he had better not get any ideas of revenge or payback to help raise his position again.

Of course, he had indeed been thinking of some underhanded tactics to assist his teams to take the upper hand in these battles through some vicious attacks or 'accidents'. Yun had seen right through this, but instead of immediately punishing him she made it plainly obvious for the other three to see that she felt he would be dishonorable.

Soon enough all the Lieutenants returned to their corps and began splitting them up into groups, designating leaders, and giving orders. The battles would happen randomly, with Yun suddenly declaring a battle would occur and which teams would be in it, so all teams would be camped out along the edges of the quarry, just far enough back in the woods to not be able to see inside.

For the first round of fights teams would only be allowed to see the quarry contents when it was their time to enter it, preventing them from planning the battlefield. After their fight they would be required to camp on the other side of the quarry to prevent spreading information to each other.

Having laid out all these plans they set out for the competition location. None of the squads were aware of their destination, only the journey. For four days straight Yun marched them, meandering around the region and testing their endurance and ability to follow instructions. As expected, there was very little issue in most groups. It had been stressed to them all that this was war-time and they would be treated as such.

After three days a trend began to appear in Gao Mao's squads where there would be some level of discontent almost constantly, and Yun knew she had judged him rightly. There were complaints that he was treated unfairly, and that their squads were being suppressed by the commanders that were starting to form, while someone from his nine squads would get into a conflict with another nearby soldier at least twice a day.

Finally, in the twilight of the fourth day, they reached a thick copse of wood in the forest and Yun declared this a military camp. Squads were to set up their corps areas with a command tent surrounded by squad level tents, and they would be required to establish perimeter control measures as well. Until the end of the first Round Robin this would be their life, and she had already requested Elder Lei to bring some small groups out to probe their defenses.

This would be a surprise grading criteria, and squads that did well in maintaining discipline and security during their shifts would gain extra points towards their rank and rewards. Finally a large tent was set up in the center of the camp as Yun's command tent, with two slightly smaller tents established alongside it for her and Long Wuying to live in.