Afar, on top of the plain was the King, he decided to come see this little trial and judge by himself if they were able to fight as an united squad. He was pleasantly surprised by the results, he saw that they were able to fight together and with a little of time they would become a very powerful squad.
When everyone saw who stopped their fight, a lot of them were feeling a great pressure from him, they were intimidated by either his aura or power.
Each of them but Zach and Zoe kneeled in front of Arkantos, even the one who were in pain kneeled, Zach only bowed his head. Nobody but Arkantos and Zoe saw that Zach didn't kneel otherwise he would have been shouted against and maybe some of them would have seeked to teach him a lesson.
"It's enough, I saw what I wanted, the genius squad is able to be united as such you will be given a mission to complete, I will wait all of you in the throne room this afternoon." The King added before disappearing.
Like this the war simulation ended, Bea was bitter about their results but as the King said this time they were more or less united, it was very far from the fight with the snakes. She was glad that they at least improved a bit.
The army's squad dispersed and return to what they had to do, as for the genius squad everyone apart from Bea was exhausted because of their mana expenses or because they were unconscious. As such they decided to stay in the plain to recover a bit of energy.
Everyone was thinking about the fight, if they could have done better and if so how. 'Maybe we would have a better chance of winning if I used my Hell Fire but I fear that I would have killed at least half of them. Though I did them a great favor I don't want to spoil my relationship with Delp.' Zach as usual when he had nothing to do was lost in his thoughts.
Zoe was still disguised as the mysterious girl so she stayed alone in her corner. 'I wasn't useful enough, I have to improve my skills and cultivation quickly.' Zoe thought that she should have done more and so she was dissatisfied.
As for Bea, being the leader she thought about what she could have done from a bigger picture. In her opinion she had done 3 errors.
First, she should have considered the experience of their enemy while making her plan and so think about the possibility of their rearguard being attacked, ignoring this possibility lead to her second error.
She should have left a great close quarter fighter behind like Xaratus, Zach or Taron to protect the rearguard in situation like this. And finally they shouldn't have run towards them to moment it started, she should have stopped and taken a few seconds to take a look at the situation.
As for the more inexperienced one they thought that their lose came solely from the gap between their cultivation level, they thought that if everyone was at least at the peak rank 2 they would have won.
However, in fact it would just have made the fight drag and the enemy squad would have took more time to make their whole plan crumble in pieces.
A few hours later, when everyone recovered or regained consciousness, everyone headed back to the palace, the King decided to give them another mission and this one should be pretty important as he didn't mention it in front of the army's squad.
Once they reached the throne room, they got announced but were told to wait as the King was handling more important matters at the moment.
After 20 minutes everyone finally entered in the throne room and same as always everyone but Zach and Zoe kneeled in front of the King. "Rise. I will put my trust in you, I decided to give you an important mission." The King said in a serious tone.
"You will have to go outside the Kingdom, you will go to Kartelion's border city of Gavno, there you will have to find Kartelion noble's carriage and kill everyone of their household, they will stay in Gavno only for 2 weeks." The King explained and before anyone could say anything he added.
"Beware, as you will go out of the Kingdom you will have to be of the greatest caution, if you were to ever get captured we won't come for you. One last thing, it's the real deal this time, I expect nothing but success from you."
When they heard the King's words everyone became nervous, it was a true task, moreover it wasn't an easy one, all of sudden they got a great pressure on their shoulders. Bea bowed and spoke for the whole squad. "We wont' disappoint you my King, we will come back victorious."
The King nodded with satisfaction, it would be the first murder of the secret war, he got this piece of information the day before and decided that it would be a good first. Considering this mission as not too difficult he decided to entrust it to the genius squad.
As for Zach even though he was also nervous, after all he didn't know what their target had, they should be able to handle them if the King gave them this mission. He was also excited because he would finally be able to gain EXP and maybe do a few test on his soul mastery.
Until now he still didn't have a clear idea of what his Soul mastery was doing, he supposed that it would improve his ability to observe and maybe manipulate souls.
There was another thing he had in mind, it was about the quests, untile now he got 3 of them, he was curious about what would trigger a quest. Maybe it was totally random or maybe there was a certain logic behind them but for now he didn't know.
Considering the tight schedule they had for this mission Bea decided that they would rest and prepare for the rest of the day and the next day they would leave to Gavno. She decided that traveling such a distance while being so much on foot wasn't a good idea.
So they would have 3 big beasts that would carry them, in addition they would be able to reach Gavno in only a bit more than a week.
The night went by peacefully for the genius squad's member, yet the night wasn't as peaceful for everyone, Samos was in the throne room and he was contesting the King's decision.
"My King, it's dangerous to give a mission this important to an human who come from Kartelion and that we don't even know about." The King sighed, he trusted Zach though he wouldn't give him Kingdom's war secret, he wouldn't hesitate to give him important mission like the one he gave to the genius squad.
"Don't worry about him, he won't betray us for Kartelion, I saw in his eyes that there was something that he wanted to destroy there as much as we want to destroy them." The King replied in a serious tone.
"But my King ..." Samos was about to continue to argue but got interrupted by the King. "Enough about him ! If I say we can trust him then we can." Samos nodded his head reluctantly.
Samos exited the throne room gritting his teeth, he didn't like humans moreover this human was coming from Kartelion, in his mind it wasn't acceptable to have someone like him in the genius squad.
While walking in the palace's corridors Samos stumbled upon someone from a family which shared his thought on humans.
"Mister the minister of the army, Samos, how are you ?" The man said when he saw who he had in front of him.
"Head of Farstra house, Aaron ? I didn't expect to see you here, I'm pretty frustrated but that's all and you how is it going in your family." Samos replied, the Farstra house had quite a lot of power in Delp so he showed himself respectful, in addition Aaron should have the same cultivation level as him.
"Our family is going good, I'm here to see the King, I heard that an human was added to the genius squad, it isn't something that can go like that without having an explanation about it." Aaron replied, Samos could see the disdain in his eyes when he talked about the human.
"Take it as a friendly reminder, you won't get any explanation and you won't succeed in removing him from the genius squad." Samos warned Aaron in a serious tone.
"Maybe you are right but I still want to try my luck, I will stand up for my ideas until the end." Aaron said with determination. Samos nodded and Aaron continued to walk towards the throne room.
5 minutes later, Aaron exited from the throne room and as Samos had said he didn't succeed and frustration was noticeable on his face.
"I told you, let's drink to forget about that." Samos offered as he had the same frustration as him.
Aaron nodded and both of them, in the darkness of the night, exited the palace to go somewhere where they could talk and drink.