The Red Lion And The Troops

Morning came and I had the same nightmare. Even with Ellie sleeping next to me, the nightmare didn't go away. I was beginning to believe that it really was a warning. I carefully stood up from the bed and made sure I didn't wake Ellie up. But it was useless, she woke up anyway.

"Sel?"

"I have to leave early today. Mom gave me some orders."

I put my uniform on and put Ellie back to bed.

"I'll be back tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?!"

Ellie seemed a bit worried.

"Yeah it's just a long trip, nothing dangerous."

She looked uneasy but I tucked her back in bed. Leaving her with a kiss on the forehead a few giggles.

"I'll be back before you know it."

I gave Lillia some orders regarding my sister and then left to meet my troops.

"We'll be attacking two camps today and they're both near the Nevotre kingdom. It'll have to be done swiftly and silently so be prepared."

They all tended up because we'd be going into enemy territory but they still looked determined.

"i don't have much else to say except to make sure you don't die. We'll be leaving right away."

We made our way out of the kingdom and this time I was running with my magic reinforcement. I was going to ditch my troops at night and visit the princess so I had to stay mobile.

Frankly I was looking forward to meeting her.

I never heard any rumors about her even though she is the only princess of their kingdom. I know she has two older brothers, but that's only superficial information. I have not heard of any other information about her, from her appearance to her standing. Nothing at all. It's beginning to look suspicious since they offered her up to marry me. What could the real meaning behind the marriage be? I thought it'd be about land, but looking at it from another point of view, maybe it was the princess who sent the letter. It didn't say who the sender was, and my mother and I assumed it was from the king or queen.

"Commander, we're almost there, what are your plans of attack?"

"I have another version of the spell from last time, so this time I will head in first, and you guys will surround the camp and make sure no one escapes."

"We can't let you go alone. At least take a few people with you."

"It'll be fine, I'll be quick and if anything dangerous happens, I'll just run away."

Mark didn't seem convinced so I decided to think of a way to convince him.

"first, I'll attack from a far, then I'll rush in. Once u see that the situation is under control, you are to surround them."

"I understand." with a bit of reluctance, I was able to convince him.

When we arrived, there was people training outside and there were more tents than in the previous camp. There was around 20 tents and a lot more soldiers running about. I didn't care too much since my new spell had adjusted and improved.

"Let's go then."

I began charging a massive amount of magical power in my hands and spreading them into small balls of lightning. After some time, I couldn't hold any more of them and I launched them into the air above the camp. I had released around 30 orbs of lightning and on my command, they began firing lightning bolts into the ground repeatedly and sporadically.

A rain of lightning ensued and burned people to a crisp around the arena the lightning bolts landed. It became chaotic very quickly.

I ran into the camp and began cutting down people who were still alive. Killing them off early and showing mercy to my enemies was usually what I liked to do. There was no need to make people suffer.

Some strong looking warriors confronted me and I had to use my magic to get rid of them since my sword kills were subpar.

I picked up a sword from the ground and coated it with lightning and then slashed down one of the strong warriors. The sword melted in the process. I picked up his sword and slashed at the others and repeated this process until they were all gone. I heard the battle cries of my troops surrounding the camp. The plan was going great.

I entered the main tent and I saw a very powerful warrior there burning documents and taking care of miscellaneous secretive things inside the tent.

"Hello." I said to him.

"What is the legendary prince of the Arceia kingdom doing here?"

"I'm here on assignment to get rid of a few of your troops." I didn't think it mattered telling him the truth seeing that he was about to die.

"They deployed their strongest mage for such a meager assignment?"

A lightning bolt came crashing down on the tent and opened up a hole in the middle. Fire spreading everywhere.

In the firelit room, I was about to face off against their strongest warrior.

"Commander!"

Mark walked into the tent and readied his stance.

"I'll take care of this commander. You should save your energy."

Being the lieutenant, Mark was always training and he was well versed with a sword so I decided to trust him.

"Make it quick."

"We still have another camp to take care of."

I walked out of the tent and went around picking off any enemies that remained.

I met up with my troops and then we went toward Mark, who was still engaged in battle.

He swung his sword downward on his enemy only to be stopped by his sword. They kept on clashing swords and looked like they were even in skill. They couldn't get the upper hand on each other time was passing by too quickly so I had to intervene.

I used my magic to gather all the lightning balls still in the air and combined them all into one. Placing it above where we were and released a massive lightning bolt down on the enemy. Killing him off and incinerating his entire body.

"let's go, we don't have time for this. I want to finish before night time."

"You performed well, Mark."

"Good job on holding up against the red lion."

Red lion? Was that guy a famous swordsman?

"Great job, lieutenant."

Everyone was praising him and I didn't know that that guy was such a big deal. I felt kind of bad now. But still, we had things to do.

We departed onto the next camp and I followed the same strategy we had just done.

This camp was a lot smaller and there were no real strong warriors so we wiped it out relatively quickly. It was almost turning dark and we moved back a few miles and then set up a camp of our own for the night.

"Good job, guys. If anyone got injured, please stand up."

A few people stood up, but they all looked like they had minor injuries.

"I'll heal you guys, so line up."

I began healing one by one and then with a bit of healing magic and then told them to go rest.

"Thank you, commander!"

"No problem."

The last one left and then I stood up and raised my voice.

"I'll be going to bed early. Don't stay up too late and rest. Tomorrow we'll be attacking another camp. I did say we were only going to do two, but since we're here, we might as well take care of more of them."

"But why!" Screamed eric, one of the captains.

"can't we just go home and let other units take care of it?" said mason, another captain.

"Listen, I'm the commander, I make the decisions. Why are you questioning me?"

"But you're asking for too much. We don't even have alcohol!"

I face palmed at his stupid remark.

"you drunks!" I yelled at them.

"You're just too young to drink, so you don't know the wonders of alcohol!"

"What wonders! You all just pass out drunk every time!"

I began arguing back and forth with my troops until bedtime and finally convinced them to stop being such a hassle.

I went to the tent my troops had set up for me and called mark over.

"Mark, I'll be going to the Nevotre kingdom right now to visit the princess."

He looked at me with a stupid face.

"What are you talking about? The kingdom is 8 hours away by horse."

"Yes, but I need to go meet the princess tonight."

"Why?"

"I'm curious about who she is. So I want to meet her."

Mark put his fingers over his temples.

"Let me get this straight, you're going to leave us here and go visit a princess in the middle of the night because you're curious about her?"

"Yes."

"Are you a pervert?

"No."

There was a short silence and I got up.

"I'll be back by morning. Just take care of the troops and watch out for attacks in the middle of the night."

"I can't just let you go, prince Sel."

He didn't call me commander this time.

"Look, it'll be okay. I'm just trying to understand why they sent a marriage proposal."

We started a starring contest without knowing.

I won't back down from this so I had to win.

Eventually he closed his eyes and I felt victorious.

"Fine. Be back by morning then." He left the tent with an annoyed look on his face.

I sneaked out of the tent and made my way to the Nevotre kingdom at full speed.

I had put on a black cloak and hid my face for when I arrived.

It only took 4 hours by foot but I had used quite a bit of magic power so I rested for an hour before entering the kingdom.

"I'm looking forward to meeting you, princess."