In the middle of the Great Therbae Kingdom army's temporary headquarters, Hero General Matias Arlandel sat in a chair that he had placed in the middle of his tent.
"Arnian tea truly tastes pleasant. Don't you agree, Teresa? It's perfect for a spot of afternoon tea," he said.
Matias had short silver hair and an equally silver mustache. He was of average build, but his handsome face made him popular with the kingdom's women. His dedication to his wife, who had been his childhood friend before marriage, was also a trait that added to his popularity. On top of everything, Matias also had the title of a hero. He gave off a sense of gravitas befitting one who had become the supreme commander of the Great Therbae Kingdom's army at the age of thirty-seven. Despite all of his impressive titles and achievements, the large cup he was holding in his right hand was cheap and unevenly shaped.
"And yet, a detached force went off and burned all of the fields to the ground on your orders," his deputy, Teresa, said in a calm voice. She was twenty-four years old, with long, eye-catchingly glossy black hair.
"I had no other choice. It's not as if I enjoyed razing the internationally renowned tea fields of Arnia for the sake of our petty king, who went and started such a foolish war to satisfy his childish pride."
"Don't you think you're speaking out of turn?"
"Humph. I'm not scared of him. He's a coward who can't start a war unless I'm around, yet has the pride of someone who thinks he can. Don't you agree that starting a war with Arnia out of jealousy towards its king, who's around the same age as him, is ridiculous?"
"In any case, neither you nor I can refuse his orders so long as we're in his army. There's no need for any more complaining."
"The previous king was a wise man. He was someone who deserved loyalty." Matias sighed as he thought of the Great Therbae Kingdom's previous monarch, who had died from a sudden illness. That had been when things started to go wrong. "If the Great Therbae Kingdom doesn't change its ruler, then it will perish."
"That's out of line."
"Humph." Matias took a sip of the tea. It was truly delicious. Why must they destroy Arnia when it was capable of creating such delectable leaves? "Drinking the world's best tea from a cup given to me by my son when he was a lad... There's no greater joy in this world. Wouldn't you agree?"
"I've heard you say that many times now," Teresa sighed with a small shake of her head. "He made that cup himself, right?"
Before Matias could answer, a messenger ran into the tent. "General, I bear news!"
"Has Arnia surrendered?"
"No. Our spy discovered that the mercenary group, Moon Blossom, will be reinforcing them. Morale is high on the Arnian side."
"Moon Blossom... The mercenaries I've heard so much about, huh?"
They'd completely obliterated the reinforcements that Matias had sent to take down Arnia's central fortress, and with only a few people at that. They had even gone so far as to keep one of the Therbaen soldiers alive so he could spread their name. Thanks to Moon Blossom, Matias had to give up on conquering the central fortress.
Not only that, but Moon Blossom had destroyed three of the monster-tamer platoons he'd sent to wipe out Mullux Village. Word of this had spread like lightning among both allied and enemy forces. It was understandable, considering they'd killed three intermediate-tier monsters with a group as small as a platoon. There was one more concern Matias had about them.
"Is Punti still missing?"
"Yes! No one's seen Lord Punti, the monster mediator, yet!"
Even Punti, a hero candidate, had gone missing after his encounter with them.
"Punti is a powerful warrior, but his personality is very...honest. If they cheated in their battle with him, I doubt he would've been able to handle them. I should've taught him what kind of people mercenaries are..."
As a whole, mercenaries were usually in charge of dirty work. They took on jobs that clients didn't want to give their actual soldiers, or participated in underhanded operations that would sully a country's honor. Mercenaries often performed work that no one on the straight and narrow would ever have to do.
"Sir, you underestimate him," Teresa said. "Punti is stronger than you think he is. The average mercenary wouldn't be able to defeat him even if they tried to gain the upper hand with trickery."
"Would you consider Moon Blossom a group of 'average mercenaries'? You call soldiers for hire who can destroy a battalion with a small fraction of its men and exterminate three monster-tamer platoons 'average'?"
Their feats were so unbelievable, Matias suspected the involvement of another hero.
"Ah, no... I apologize... I spoke out of turn..."
"It's fine. I will go see them myself. Tell the troops that tomorrow, Hero General Matias himself shall cut a path through the battlefield!"
***
Jyrki and his team were in the middle of traveling to the front on horseback. Since Salume didn't know how to ride a horse, she sat behind Jyrki on the saddle.
"It's cool that we're going to the front and all, but will we even be able to do anythin'?" Jyrki asked Marx, who was riding alongside them on his own horse.
Lumia rode in front of the two. Though there was a small distance between her and the men, she remained close enough to listen in on their conversation.
"I believe...that we'll have to fight in a different way from the usual strategies we employ as soldier-mages," Marx replied slowly. "But I'm not sure."
"If we don't do anything, then we'll get in big trouble," Lumia said, turning her head to look at them.
"So that means the boss is for real about this?"
"Vice Captain, what were you and the boss talking about yesterday?" Marx asked.
Asura had revealed Moon Blossom's new job to Jyrki and the others yesterday morning. After the meeting ended, Jyrki and the others enjoyed their day off, but Lumia stayed behind to talk with Asura.
"Asura is serious about this. She had me pretend to be the hero in order to confirm some things. I don't know the details of her plan, but I hypothesize that she'll be using arrows."
"Aw, man," Jyrki sighed with a shake of his head. "It ain't matter if the other team succeeds or fails. It'll all be the same thing for us—a pain in the ass!"
"Vice Captain, what is your honest opinion about all this? Do you think that the leader, Iina, and Reko can pull this off? I simply can't imagine how they'd do it."
"I can't envision it either," Lumia replied. "All I know is that Asura will do it for sure. I guarantee that she'll go through with her plan, though there's no telling whether it'll actually succeed or not."
"Just what kinda crazy is she?! 'Play dumb if we kill him, but play dumb even if we don't.' What's that even supposed to mean?!"
Asura had looked so happy while talking about killing the hero yesterday morning. No one knew whether she simply enjoyed difficult missions, or whether she felt fired up at the prospect of doing something no one had ever done before.
"More importantly, I have to say that I'm not too pleased about the payment we'll be getting."
"Yeah, same here, Marx."
According to Asura, the payment Moon Blossom would receive for killing the hero would not come in the form of cash or jewels. Instead, it would be their right to ask something of the king. That was it.
"Arnia isn't a dictatorship," Lumia said. "Of course, King Arnia still has plenty of decision-making power, but there are many limitations on what he can do."
"He's got, like, a parliament or somethin', right?" Jyrki asked. He wasn't very familiar with the rules of government.
"That, and there's also the chance of getting dethroned by his nobles and citizens if he makes the wrong calls. According to Asura, he's closer to a...um, what did she say...a p-president? Yes, that's right. She said that he's closer to a president."
"What's that?"
"A grand leader... Someone who presides over things, mostly used for the heads of countries. Isn't it an interesting word?"
Though Jyrki couldn't see Lumia's face, he knew that she laughed a little bit after she said that. Her voice had been light with amusement.
"Why not just call him a 'king'? Wait, now that I think about it, 'president' sounds pretty sick... Hey, Salume, which word do you prefer?"
"Huh? Why'd you suddenly turn the conversation to me? Anyway, I think 'president' is cooler."
"Right?! Yo, Marx, what about you?"
"I don't care either way. I only care about our payment."
"It's too little for how much we're expected to do. I agree that it's unfair," Lumia said. "So that's why we have to end the war first, in order to get the cash reward. I'm actually good at warfare, you know."
"Wow, Marx, didya hear that? The vice cap'n told a joke."
"I'm not joking, Jyrki. I used to be in the army. Listen, everyone, we have to force the Therbaen army to retreat before Asura kills the hero."
Lumia was completely serious about this. The smile on Jyrki's face when he heard her order was strained.
"Vice Captain, that's not exactly an easy task either," Marx said.
He was absolutely correct. The Arnian army was weak. On top of that, Jyrki and the others were being forced to fight in a way they weren't used to.
"Besides, so long as the Hero General's still kickin', they might regroup and reinvade!"
"Until we force them to retreat, that's nothing more than a hypothetical. There's nothing certain about a 'might' or a 'maybe,' right?"
"Well, yeah..." Jyrki muttered. Both the leader and the vice captain of Moon Blossom talked about difficult missions as if they were a walk in the park.
"Vice Captain, do you have a plan?"
"Of course I do, Marx. For an army of that size to move around, they would need plenty of supplies, especially when it comes to rations. What do you think would happen if we were to burn all of them to a crisp?"
"Wooow." Jyrki's smile tightened. "That's harsh. Vice Cap'n, you've been becoming more and more like the boss lately!"
Even the Arnian army would be more than enough to defeat the Therbaens if the Therbaens were famished.
"Hmm. A tactic befitting a soldier-mage. It's a wonderful plan," Marx said. He nodded his head several times, looking pleased.
"I guess it is, compared to fighting them head-on and on open ground," Jyrki agreed.
"By the way, we'll be using the proper techniques of fire and maneuver." That was the basic strategy Asura had taught her soldier-mages.
"So in this situation, we'll attack their food stores, one after the other?"
"Move as soon as you strike, and strike as soon as you move... That's what you mean, right? I never thought it could be used like this. The boss is so smart."
As they continued to converse, they saw ahead of them the largest trading city in the Arnia Kingdom. They would rest up there for a bit and then continue on to the main battlefront in the southeast. Their estimated time of arrival to the battlefield would be around noon.
***
At the same time Lumia's team reached the trading city, Asura was stretching. The breeze that blew across the grass and caressed her cheek felt fantastic. She was standing in some plains located northwest of the castle town.
"Boss...what are we...doing here? Why'd we...even bring our base...?"
Ina had driven a horse-drawn cart, covered by a canopy, all the way out to the fields. Though little, this cart was Moon Blossom's base. Everything that they needed was in it, from weapons to armor. They even had extras of their usual robes, including ones in different colors.
"I hear that the plains in the southeast are really similar to these ones," Asura explained. "So we're going to practice here."
Yesterday, Asura had asked the people in the castle town about this place. All of them had heard about her accomplishments for Arnia and had been more than welcoming.
"Boss, here you go." Reko grabbed a bow and a quiver of arrows from the cart, then handed the bow to Asura. After that, he returned to the cart.
"Isn't that...the small bow we always use...?"
In order to prioritize speed and agility, Asura and the rest of Moon Blossom tended not to use large bows.
"This is called a composite bow," Asura said. "I had it made custom, specifically for a special situation in my plans. It took a lot of time and money before I was satisfied with the final result."
"What's...so different about it?"
"Normal bows are made out of wood, right? But this one uses a number of things mixed together. That's why it's called a composite bow, because it uses a composition of materials."
"So...why does that matter?"
"It just makes it a better bow. You can think of it as having longer range and more destructive power." Asura's left arm had fully recovered, and she held up the bow without any problems. After readying it several times, she nodded to herself and murmured, "Good."
"Iina, here." Reko grabbed a training target and handed it to Iina. The target was a square piece of wood. On it, there was a black circle that had a smaller red circle painted inside it.
"I have to...act like the target?"
"No, we'll hammer a stake into the target and have it stand on its own in the ground," Asura said. "Iina, I want you to stay next to me. I'll need your Accelerate."
"I just had you hold on to it," Reko explained.
In response, Iina silently smacked Reko with the target.
"Oh, how wonderful! It looks like Reko's mastered the art of joking at any given moment. This is a must-have quality for a mercenary. However, the next time you do or say something unnecessary, I'll feed you my shit."
"If it's the boss's shit, I—"
"Shut up. Don't say another word," Asura rebuked him.
"I was joking," Reko replied.
Once again, Iina smacked Reko on the head with the target. This time, she put much more force behind it.
"Idiot Reko...go get a stake..."
"Oww..." Reko rubbed at his head and headed towards the cart.
"Can we kill the hero...with an arrow?" Iina asked, tilting her head to the side. "Even the hero candidate...deflected my arrow at close range... So why bows...? This bow just has better range and power...right?"
"It'd be impossible under normal conditions, yes." Asura laughed. "I mean, Lumia can catch arrows shot at her with her bare hands. When I saw her do that yesterday, I couldn't stop laughing."
"So then...why?"
"Right. That's a good question, Iina. No matter the distance, arrows are useless against enemies with hero-level skill. Not even a composite bow would do the trick. But how about shooting them from far away?"
"Wouldn't they...be able to dodge it...?"
"They might be able to do so if we don't get enough distance. But what about an arrow that flies at them from outside the range of their perception?"
Iina blinked, a confused look on her face. She couldn't comprehend what Asura was saying.
"According to Lumia, she can't sense anything farther than three hundred meters away from her. So we'll play it safe and try from five hundred meters. It'll keep us hidden too, which is exactly what we want."
"You'll shoot from...that distance? Will you be able to hit him...? Will it even reach him...?"
"With this composite bow, it will reach him even without Accelerate. But of course, we'll enchant the arrow with it. I doubt the Hero General has ever been sniped from such a long distance before."