Second Life as a Soldier

I stood near the entrance in awe.

When Barry and the other soldiers from the fort described how majestic House Petrae’s beast was, I thought I understood what they meant.

I was wrong.

That was not just some dinosaur-like beast. No, it was a fucking T-rex with an outer body made of black quartzite. The beast stood eighteen feet tall. It barely fit through the town’s gate even when the gates were completely open. Each step it took sent vibrations that could be felt even two hundred feet away.

That also made me realize that I had failed to understand the real stature of Captain Tellus. I knew Tellus was a noble, and I knew he held a different status, but this was on a whole other level. Just the cost of feeding that beast would be equal to the cost of feeding a whole Fort Darrow’s worth of soldiers.

The beast was leading a military parade. Behind it marched a hundred soldiers in five rows, all wearing House Petrae colors, followed by two rows of five identical carriages. They were the most beautiful carriages I had ever seen in my life. One man stood on the front carriage, and I assumed he was Captain Tellus.

There was also a delegation from the town standing near the gate to greet them. I could see Captain Roscoe and Edmund among them.

It had been a week since I met Lela and Leif. I had just been walking around town, enjoying my time, only to run into this parade.

Once the parade passed, something ominous settled inside me.

I knew something big was coming.

The amount of force Captain Tellus had brought here, especially the Tier-4s, was enough to take down forts like Dunvale and Darrow with ease.

It could be that this was just how nobles traveled. After all, three noble scions had gathered in one place, but their gathering was suspicious.

Why were they here?

Just what sort of invasion were the higher-ups expecting?

Taking a few deep breaths, I made my way to the barracks to check on my squad members. It had been a long time since I had visited them, and with Captain Tellus’s arrival, my meeting with him should happen sometime soon.

I was sure my squad was still in town and had not gotten into any trouble. If they had escaped or even tried to escape, someone would have informed me.

The whole time, a part of me had been scared. Scared that they would try to make a run for it. But with each passing day that I did not hear any reports about them, my relief increased.

Them staying in town meant my method had worked. They had started seeing the squad as something they could belong to, a place where they could see their future.

I arrived at the longhall where they were staying, and I got one more surprise of the day.

There was one more Tier-3 mana signature present.

Eliminating all the known mana signatures, I knew this one belonged to Garran.

This was good. With an ominous future ahead, having my squad’s toughest tank and hardest hitter at Tier-3 was great. I hoped Kael and Barry also reached Tier-3 soon. That should increase my squad’s combat power to high Tier-3.

“Look who is here. Sergeant, I thought you only spent your time with nobles from now on,” Barry commented as soon as I entered the longhall.

“Well, I didn’t want you lowlifes getting scared without my noble presence around,” I replied, earning chuckles from Rokan and Daren.

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“How was your time off? Did you guys do anything interesting?” I asked.

Almost immediately, Barry averted his gaze.

I looked at the others. Varric and Kael just shrugged, whereas Garran replied by informing me about his breakthrough. I congratulated him and moved on to the others.

“Yeah, Sergeant, it was good. Brakk and Oren took us to many places. We ate a lot of food and got ourselves some short swords. Then Silas took us to a big emporium to show us the rune equipment nobles purchase. Obviously, everything was too costly for us to buy, but it was fun,” Rokan said.

Well, fuck. Even I would have liked to go to a rune emporium.

Maybe that was what I would do after meeting Captain Tellus.

“Well, good to hear some of you had fun.”

Then I turned and looked at Barry, Varric, Garran, and Kael.

“I came here today to inform you all that I just saw Tellus Petrae arrive. I suspect we will have a meeting with him soon enough.

“And while I still want you four to join me, I have recently learned that Tellus Petrae is coming with his nephew, who is a complete brat. One wrong word from any of us, and someone might get killed.”

Once I learned about Julius’s presence, I lost some of my confidence in taking them to meet nobles. Tellus Petrae was an army captain. He would not stoop too low to punish my squad just to save face. But Julius was different. From the stories, he was someone who might toy with me and the others just for his own entertainment.

“I don’t think it will be a problem. We might not have seen a noble this high-level, but we have all dealt with brats like him, and trust me, they are more dangerous than any beast we have faced. They lash out at anyone without reason. We can handle him,” Kael said.

Internally, I smiled. That was some confident talk from someone who had almost punched a sergeant over a small disagreement. But seeing the others agreeing with Kael, I decided to give them a chance.

After chatting with them for a few more minutes, I made my way to Peter’s quarters to inform him about the same thing.

True to my expectations, the next day, I received an invitation to meet Tellus Petrae at the mayor’s manor, where the whole Petrae family was staying.

The following day, six of us, Peter, Barry, Kael, Varric, Garran, and I, stood in front of the mayor’s manor in our Royal Army uniforms.

This manor was almost twice the size of the Roscoe house.

“Hey, Edward, what rank will you have to reach for us to stay in a building like this?” Barry commented, earning a glare from me.

“Don’t joke around right now,” I said in a stern tone.

“Oh, someone is edgy,” Barry said with a smile.

And he was not wrong. For some reason, my heartbeat was up, and whenever I thought about sitting in front of Tellus Petrae, the image of his T-rex beast appeared in my mind.

As I was mentally preparing myself, one of the guards standing at the gate approached us.

“Yes?” the guard asked.

“I am Sergeant Edward from Fort Darrow. I was asked to meet Captain Tellus here,” I said.

“Yes, we were informed about that.” He nodded. Then, looking at his fellow guard, he said, “Guard the gate. I will take them in.”

“Follow me,” the guard said, opening the gate for us.

He took us through the gardens, past several guards, and toward the building’s front entrance. From there, another guard took over and led us inside.

Inside was a large hall decorated with gold.

The hall looked like a place where courts were held, with a throne-like head chair at the front. There were already a few people present. Most of them seemed to be from House Petrae, with one young noble sitting to the right of the head chair, while on the left sat a chubby man who also looked like a noble.

Once the guard guiding us approached the chubby man, I realized that he was the mayor of the town. The guard said something to him, and the mayor looked at us before gesturing with his hand, calling us closer.

“Sergeant Edward and Young Master Peter, it is good to see you both. I see that you are here to meet Captain Tellus. He is running a little late, but he should arrive soon,” the mayor said politely.

“Sergeant Edward, if you don’t mind me asking, I am curious which house you belong to and which city you are from?” the mayor asked, finally explaining why he was being so polite to me.

With my connection to Peter, and now with Captain Tellus, the mayor had assumed I was also some sort of noble.

“Lord Mayor, I was just born in Oxspell.”

As soon as those words left my mouth, a frown appeared on the mayor’s face. Even more surprising was that I sensed a mana fluctuation and a hint of killing intent from the right side of the throne.

“Edward of Oxspell?” a voice came from the right before the mayor could say anything else.

The young noble who had been seated there stood up. He had a strange smirk on his face, and his eyes were fixed on me. The hint of killing intent vanished quickly, but my squad had sensed it.

We had spent too many months in the wild, making us highly sensitive to killing intent.

“Looks like the brat is out for your blood already,” Barry whispered into my ear using a skill, making sure only I could hear him.

Trying not to show any reaction, I just stared at the young noble.

“Edward of Oxspell, stationed at Fort Darrow. I have heard about you,” the noble said, making his way toward me.

He stopped once he reached the edge of the platform. Then, looking down at me, he said, “You know, we are the same age. From what I heard, your Awakening caused a huge uproar at the training camp, so much so that people were talking about it even during my Awakening celebration.”