Alice stared at Roan, not knowing what else to ask him. She had been practicing with him for a month, and he was getting stronger and faster—even a genius among geniuses couldn't match his talent.
Before, he had to fight with everything he had just to beat Alice, but now he could defeat her without breaking a sweat. Now he was speaking in some different way, and seeing these changes in Roan, Alice started thinking he was special and that they had a chance to survive.
But one question still lingered in their hearts: why did he want to attack the academy? Was it because of the man on the throne, or for some other reason? So Alice asked him, "Why do you want to attack the academy? You know we'll have to kill students there, right?"
Roan stared at her and said nothing, just thought about something in his mind before returning to training.
Alice was shocked by his reaction. Roan had suddenly become serious about training—he was more determined than ever to destroy the academies.
Aeren went to an unknown forest to walk and eventually reached a small village. He noticed someone was following him but didn't look back or think much about it.
Aeren reached the village and saw a small gate with barely 100 people moving around. He entered a small inn where hardly anyone was sitting and took a seat at one of the tables.
Aeren looked at the waitress and called her over. "Bring me all the food you can provide."
The waitress stared at Aeren, shocked by his order. She looked him up and down and asked, "Are you new here?"
Aeren turned to look at her. She was showing off her body and standing too close to him. "Yeah. Does it matter?" he said.
She smiled at Aeren and said, "Coming right up."
Aeren looked at the seat opposite him and saw a man sitting there. He looked at him and asked, "What are you doing here?"
The man stared back and said, "I want to follow you."
Aeren studied him for a while and asked, "Why do you want to follow me?"
"I'm not an idiot like the others. I can tell you're the strongest," the man said with a serious tone.
"What do you mean?" Aeren asked.
"I mean, I believe you're the right candidate to lead our team," the man said with a smile.
"I'm not interested in leading anyone," Aeren said politely.
"If you don't want to lead a team, just make me your lapdog," the man said, still staring at Aeren with confidence in his smile and eyes.
"Hmm, what's your name?" Aeren asked as the waitress came to the table and put down hot food with a smile.
"I'm David."
Aeren stared at him for a few seconds while the waitress continued listening to their conversation. Then Aeren said, "Burn this village." He looked directly at David.
David stared at Aeren and understood—if he wanted to show his loyalty, he had to burn this village no matter what.
The waitress heard this and froze in place, still staring at Aeren, who was eating his food silently. Then her eyes went to David, who was looking at her.
She looked at Aeren, who continued eating without glancing at anyone around him. Then she turned to David, who was looking at her, ready to kill her. Tears began falling from her eyes as she knelt at Aeren's legs and started begging, "Please, don't kill us."
She continued crying and begging when David punched her face, causing it to explode with blood splattering everywhere—though none reached Aeren's table.
David went inside the inn and started killing everyone. Screams, cries, and fire began spreading throughout the village.
"HELPPPPPP!"
"PLEASE, SOMEBODY HELP US!"
"PLEA...SE..."
David stared at everyone and said, "No one's going to help you all! HAHAHAHA! This place is isolated from the world, and you mere ants want people's help?" He smiled as he spoke.
Aeren finished his food, came outside the village, and watched the burning place.
Standing there, Aeren whispered to himself, "This is the beginning."
Aeren showed no expression but continued staring at the place as it burned to ashes.
David emerged from the burned village, looked at Aeren with a smile, and said, "It's done, Lord."
Aeren gazed at him, thought something about him, then cut off David's head and dismembered his body. Only blood remained in Aeren's hands as he left the place and returned to the organization's base.
Aeren looked at his team and saw everyone appeared panicked, having packed their things.
Then Roan came to Aeren and asked, "Where were you?"
Aeren looked at Roan and said, "I went to get something to eat."
Aeren couldn't even remember the last time he had eaten food—it had been maybe years. Roan stared at Aeren, who was wearing a white t-shirt with black pants.
Roan studied him for a few seconds and said, "We have bad news."
Aeren didn't worry about bad news and asked casually, "What is it?"
Roan looked at Aeren, wanting his help with the team but not wanting to force him to join.
An incident happened at the capital city, and we only have 4 months left before our attack, Roan thought about all this and said, "Some students from the academy destroyed our branches. So we need to go to the capital ourselves now and start our plans there. We'll be leaving tomorrow."
Aeren nodded at his words and was about to leave when Roan added, "You can take any weapon and artifact from the artifact room."
Aeren had thought about taking artifacts from the Royal family before, but to his surprise, he hadn't been able to use a single artifact—they seemed to reject him. As for weapons, it depended on the situation, so he didn't need either from the organization.
Aeren glanced at him and said, "I don't need any weapons or artifacts."
Roan stared at his back as Alice joined him. She was a little scared of Aeren and didn't want to get close to him. Looking at Aeren's retreating back, Alice said, "What's his problem?"