Book 4: Chapter 24 – Willing To Trust

"His name's Haruol," Ace explained slowly. "He's a spy from the O'Brien Empire who had managed to infiltrate…

You know what, it's probably easier if you hear the full story from him."

"Wake up," Ace said, giving the still unconscious man a swift kick to the side. "Tell the general everything you told me!"

"Huh, where am I?" Haruol voiced wearily as he woke from his daze, only to find a towering man with an even larger presence staring him dead in the eye, not bothering to hide his killing intent. "Gen… General Murciel?!"

As a spy, even though they'd never met in person, he obviously knew all the higher-ups in the Rohault Army. The moment his eyes fell on the general, he knew any hope of escaping with his life was lost.

"Hurry up," Ace said. "Tell him what you and your team planned to do here today."

Haruol looked at the general fearfully. He could feel a dense killing intent, far more potent than even Ace's, pressing down on him.

As one of the nine Great Generals of the Rohault Army, it didn't take a genius to understand that Murciel was a devout patriot to his nation. So when Ace first said that the man was a spy, he was shocked and quite frankly, in disbelief.

This was war, so it went without saying that both sides would love to have spies infiltrating the ranks of their enemy's forces, but that was always easier said than done.

Both forces had protocols in place to prevent that very situation from happening, and those protocols only became more stringent the higher one climbed through the ranks. So it was obviously hard to believe that not only had their enemies been successful, the spy in question was actually a high-ranking warrior at the seventh rank, but seeing the look of terror and unwillingness on the man's face, Murciel understood that Ace was very likely telling the truth.

At that point, Murciel became unable to restrain his killing intent. If he had his way, he would tear the spy limb from limb and hang his body up for the O'Brien army to see, just to send them a message. Still, he knew that he had to focus on extracting as much information as he could for the sake of the big picture.

"Speak," Murciel commanded, his tone void of any emotion. "Now!"

"The… The O'Brien Army… They planned for me to use my access as a high-ranking scout to help a small elite team sneak in behind enemy lines." Haruol stammered nervously. "We would then stop a little under a mile short of the camp, where the rest of the team would proceed to hide and await my signal.

I would then take the interspatial ring, which housed several high-tier magicite bombs, and using my access… I would place them at several… strategic locations."

"Strategic locations?" Murciel asked coolly. "Like by our food and water supplies or infirmaries?"

Haruol didn't reply, but judging by the hesitant expression on his face, it was all but too clear that the general was spot on with his assessment.

"Continue," Murciel demanded.

"Whilst I was doing that, the main force of the O'Brien army would get into position a few miles out, waiting for the signal, which was supposed to be the bombs going off," Haruol explained helplessly. "At which point the main army would attack from the front, whilst the small team of elites would attack from the rear."

"The only thing I don't understand is why that team would attack at all," Ace voiced. "Even though the O'Brien team is pretty strong, even if they're not at the standard of the nine great generals, there are still a few warriors of the ninth rank here. Any one of them would've been enough to slaughter them."

"You're right; they would've been had they been anywhere near the rear of the army," Murciel sighed. "But my Rohault Army works on the principle that all our most powerful soldiers lead from the front.

It forces the enemy to do the same because they know that if they don't, we'll be able to slaughter a path straight through their weaker soldiers.

We know it's a reckless tactic that paints a giant target on our back, but we all have faith in our own ability to take whatever the enemy throws at us."

Though he didn't say it, Ace could see a few other benefits of using that particular tactic. For example, the fact that not many other forces would be crazy enough to want to use that tactic, when being forced into that position against their will, their hearts won't be in it, which would give the soldiers of the Rohault Empire an advantage and more importantly, seeing their superiors leading the charge would do wonders for the morale of the weaker soldiers, which in turn would allow them to draw out more of their strength.

Unfortunately, the plan of the O'Brien Empire just went to show that their tactic was far from full-proof. With their most powerful soldiers at the front of their army, engaging their opposing counterparts, that small team led by three warriors of the eighth rank would've been able to run riot through their back line.

"I'm guessing with the intelligence you fed back to them, they would've killed all my forward scouts to keep any information of their odd movements from getting back to us…" Murciel snorted, understanding that would be the only way for them to be able to move in such a manner without news getting back to them.

Each of their scouts are very well trained, to the point where unless you were a saint, you would be very hard-pressed to find them, especially when they were in position. But if you had their locations and movement patterns given to you by one of their 'fellow' scouts, finding and dealing with them would be child's play.

"Tha… That's right," Haruol admitted hesitantly, unable to look up from the ground for fear of what would happen to him.

"I see," the general replied before turning to Ace. "I and all my men owe you a giant thank you. Without you, tonight would've been a disaster.

But you should all get some rest; leave the rest to me."

"Do you plan on flipping the table on them?" Ace asked before the general could usher them out.

"I wish we could," Murciel replied. "But whilst their scouts are undoubtedly still out there keeping an eye out for any suspicious activity on our part, our best scouts have been taken out. We have no way of knowing exactly where they are, how many are out there, and what exactly they plan on doing.

At this point, all we can do is ramp up security for the night and stay on guard until tomorrow."

"What if I was to tell you I had a way to not only locate and take out their scouts but also use their own plan against them?" Ace said with an evil grin suffusing his lips.

Even though Ace was technically just a child, he had a way of making people forget that fact the more time they spent with him. Between that and the fact that Murciel desperately wanted to pay the O'Briens back for what they had done, the General found himself open to taking suggestions from the dark-haired youth.

"What did you have in mind?" Murciel asked back.

"Me and my partner Leo will take out all the scouts hiding in the shadows," Ace said as he patted Leo's red-tinted mane with a grin.

"How do you plan on doing that?" Chukaya asked, not liking how friendly the general was being to his love rival. "Not even the army's highly trained scouts would dare say they would definitely be able to find their opposing counterparts, let alone kill them quickly and silently without being detected."

"I'll find the scouts the same way I found this idiot and his group," Ace replied.

"And how did you find them anyway?" Chukaya asked argumentatively.

"Chukaya!" Amira snapped. "Who are you to demand Ace to reveal his secrets?"

"I didn't mean it like that," Chukaya said, his tone softening immediately. "It's just that this involves the lives of thousands of brave men and women of our nation. We can't afford to make any mistakes."

Amira glared at her fellow countryman but ultimately said nothing. As much as she hated to admit it, Chukaya was right. Obviously, she, Killian, and Leo all knew the truth about Ace's bloodline, but ultimately it wasn't right for her to expect Ace to reveal that.

Even Murciel, who had a very good impression of the youth, said nothing. As Chukaya said, there was too much riding on it for him to just take Ace's word on it. He wouldn't force Ace to reveal his secret, but the general wouldn't allow the plan to go any further if he couldn't convince him of his success.

"It's alright, Mira; I never meant for it to be a secret in the first place." Ace smilingly reassured his classmate. "The truth is, my soul has always been stronger than others. And after the old man took me as his disciple, he showed me how to improve the power of my soul."

"How strong?" Murciel asked excitedly.

Although many knew that Aiden was the most powerful warrior in the Rohault Empire, not many understood the reasons behind his strength, but Murciel did. He knew that part of his incredible strength stemmed from his comprehension of 'Impose' and the other part from his soul. It only made sense for his disciple to have the same monstrous qualities.

"My soul is about the same strength as an early-stage saint," Ace stated.

"Impossible!" Chukaya exclaimed in disbelief. "That's not impossible!"

"It's because of that that I was able to find the team from the O'Brien Empire despite being so far away. It's also how, even though I've only just arrived, I know that other than the general, there are 11 warriors at the ninth rank, 43 warriors at the eighth rank, and 113 seventh-rank warriors." Ace stated calmly, ignoring the presence of Duke Kaymin and Elder Ejiro, whom he already knew was following them; he guessed to protect Amira from any unforeseen dangers.

"Do you need me to continue?" Ace asked casually.

"No, that's more than enough," General Murciel replied, still trying to get over his shock. "You're even more of a monster than your master."

The others may not know the exact numbers of high-ranking warriors that made up his army, but how could he not? He got a daily report with the numbers of soldiers of each rank and how many had died after each battle, and he had only finished reading the report of the most up-to-date numbers a little over an hour ago.

There was no way that Ace, who had just arrived, would be able to get his hands on those figures after having travelled here from the capital. This meant that the only way Ace could be so precise was if his spirit really had reached the saint rank and he was able to sense the presence of everyone in the camp.

"So, what do you think, general?" Ace asked with a confident smile. "Are you willing to trust me?"

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Book 6: Chapter 8 – Dragon Number Three