The soldiers took a while to obey Jack's order, but they approached when they saw that the bear was falling and was not moving much, the soldiers approached and attacked the bear using all their strength.
A few swords pierced the bear that still made noises of suffering before he died, Jack saw that the bear died and could finally relax, this fight had been several times more difficult than when he and the other hunters attacked the bears on the big hunt that they made.
Jack knew that it would be more difficult to kill a bear while fighting with the soldiers, but he didn't expect it to be that difficult, he got very tired after that, but he couldn't rest yet because he had to remove the fat soldier who was tied up in the tree.
Jack released the fat soldier and said nothing to the soldiers, he just told everyone to go back to the camp because the forest was so dangerous, the 5 envious soldiers knew they would be reprimanded and they were grateful that Jack saved their lives.
They realized in this fight how important Jack's experience as a hunter was for them to be safe in the forest, if someone else was leading and a bear attacked them, many soldiers would die and be injured so they could kill that bear.
When Jack and the soldiers arrived at the camp all the soldiers were silent, even the soldiers who had done nothing wrong felt the anger of Jack and knew that if it were Captain Max the 5 soldiers would be executed after what happened.
"What do you think is going on here? What do you think this mission is for? Why did Captain Max choose me to lead you into the forest?"
"Do you think this is a joke? How can it be in an army where discipline and hierarchy are the most important, something like that happens?"
"5 soldiers who were recommended by Robert, 5 experienced soldiers went out to go to the river in the middle of the night, why did this happen?"
"You had eaten fish like all the other soldiers, nor the soldiers who went fishing ate more than you, yet you were hungry and decided to risk your life to fish at night !!!"
Pietro and the other soldiers were silent, they knew they were wrong and were ashamed of what they did, if nothing wrong had happened they could still answer Jack, but they almost died and had to wake up all the other soldiers because of what they made.
"Since you don't want to say anything, I'll call one of you to speak, Pietro, come over here."
"Tell me Pietro, were you so hungry to risk your life to go to the river?"
Pietro was even more embarrassed when Jack called him in front of everyone to answer Jack's questions, of course he didn't dare answer saying the real reason why they had gone to the river.
"Of course it wasn't just hunger, it was just to challenge me, I told you not to go to the river with less than 10 people and I didn't let you go to the river after you lied to me and all the soldiers saying that failed to catch any fish."
"I know from the first day that your group is jealous that I was chosen to lead this group into the forest, you think you could have been chosen, even though you are not the best soldiers or the most experienced in our army."
"I'm going to ask you something Pietro, do you doubt Captain Max? Don't you trust Captain Max?"
"I trust, Private Jack, I really trust Captain Max."
"Pietro, do you know what Private Robert said when I told him that Captain Max had appointed me to lead a group of soldiers into the forest? I asked if he had anything he wanted to say to me, and he just replied that he trusted Captain Max's decisions."
"Many soldiers here also know that I was once a prisoner and that I am recently in the army, but they accepted that I was the leader of this mission because they also trust Captain Max."
With Jack saying that Pietro and the other soldiers who were jealous didn't know what to say, everything Jack was saying was true and if they kept saying they didn't believe Jack, it was the same as saying they didn't believe Captain Max.
Furthermore, Pietro and all the soldiers realized after these days that Jack was indeed an excellent leader, for an ordinary soldier with no real authority to be able to organize a group of 60 soldiers to hunt in the forest was incredible.
Pietro and the envious soldiers only challenged Jack because they knew that Jack had no authority to punish them in any way, only when they returned to the capital after almost 4 months that they could be punished when Jack told Captain Max what happened.
But Jack was still able to lead this group and keep the soldiers with the little authority he had, besides, Jack also knew how to lead the soldiers very well in the fights against animals, it was like that in their first fight against the lionesses and especially in the fight against that bear at night.
It could be said that Jack had earned the respect of the soldiers who recognized his skills as well as recognized the skills of Robert who led the soldiers on the Royal Road.
Jack gave no punishment to Pietro and the other soldiers and just ordered everyone to go to sleep, Pietro and the others were even more grateful for that, they knew they would be punished when Captain Max knew what they did, but how they deserved to the punishment they had to accept.
The other day the soldiers continued walking through the forest to find more wild animals to kill, it was the fourth day that they were walking through the forest and they had killed several lions and lionesses so far.
That day they found another bear in the forest, the soldiers were not so anxious because they had killed a bear during the night, so they thought that killing a bear during the day would be easy.
Jack was worried because he knew it wouldn't be that easy, luckily Jack had prepared for this mission and removed three traps from the carts that he had bought before coming to the forest.