In the next few months, Micahel's group managed to round up most of the forts under the CC#3 control. The command centre controlled 31 forts. Michael managed to enslave 21 fort guardians and kill the remaining 10. As for the 26 peak-saints at the centre, Kandrif was going to use his own squad for the purpose.

After Michael and Kandrif reunited, the entire squad mobilized. War drums were rung and the entire army of the fort was prepared for the march. Kandrif had purchased several powerful and obedient warhorses for the purpose of this war. It was all for this reason. He was going to hit swiftly and take control. At the same time, Michael used his soul-art to give commands to the 21 fort-guardians to lead their armies into battle.

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In one of the forts controlled by the dark empire, a few soldiers were talking among themselves:

S1 : Hey, I heard that the command centre has been giving the fort-guardians lots of trouble. They have been threatening and even killing the commanders. In fact, just recently, a completely outrageous order came. They are asking all the armies to attack the fort#21 of the light empire!

S2 : What?! Is that not the fort that is inhibited by all the geniuses of the empire. I have heard that there would be many peak-saint experts there. No one has dared to touch that forbidden place. Has the command centre lost their minds?

S1 : I have heard that this is their way of neutralizing the fort guardians they don't like. But the problem is that we all will have to march to our deaths as well.

S2 : What can we do? The army is build on strict heirarchies. The fort guardian can think about rebelling because the orders are not coming from his superiors but his contemporaries. As for us, what the fort guardian says, we have to do.

Just that moment, bells started tolling in the central building of the fort. This led to a flurry of movements throughout the fort. All soldiers hurriedly stepped into the compound and got ready to listen to the order.

The fort guardian appeared on the stage and said:

The command centre has been asking us to go to our deaths. I have decided to take the army back to the command centre. We are going to give up this fort. If they want to go to their deaths, they are free to do so. Some others have also decided to join me in my protest. Don't worry, they will not attack under these circumstances.

This led to some feelings of insecurity among the military but they could not defy a direct order from their superior.

As these things were going on in different forts, one of the spies of the CC#3 sent a terrifying message back:

Several of the fort guardians are rebelling. It seems that they have all been bought over by the light empire. They are all mobilizing toward the command centre.

It was just that the message came too late - just two days before the armies of the various forts were about to reach the command centre. This led to huge outrage among the command centre. They hurriedly contacted their scouts and confirmed the news.

It was indeed a betrayal. The command centre council met together to understand the situation.

One council member said while gritting his teeth:

The light empire has outdone themselves this time. What a good method! What should we do?

Another replied:

What can we do? We need to contain the rebellion. If the rebel armies meet up, they will become stronger. We should attack them when they are separated.

This led to others speaking their opinions.

But what if we are attacked at the same time? We will have less support that way.

Are you crazy? Who would dare to attack us with our forces? Perhaps only the beast prince has so many standing forces. But, the beast prince is too far away. Even if he marches his army day and night, he will need many more days to reach. The forts between the light empire and us are mostly vacant. The light army will most likely be busy taking over those forts. They will never attack the command centre. Besides, the HQ will send an army to reinforce the command centre as soon as needed. There is nothing to worry about.

Okay, we will send 10 peak-saints along with the standing army. These squads will kill the peak-saints by going around on the fastest warhorses. That will still leave 16 peak-saints in the command centre.

After the meeting was finalized, 10 peak-saints with a huge army were sent out from the command centre without delay. Their orders were clear - kill or capture all the betrayers. They split up the army in 10 groups and attacked multiple rebel groups simultaneously.

The battles between the command centre troops and the rebelling troops were very uneventful as most of the rebel troops were marching without any leaders! The rebel army surrendered in droves. All the leaders with the cultivation of saint-realm were not seen on the battlefield at all. This caused the ten groups to be flustered and all the peak-saint leaders of CC army felt that something very bad was going to happen. Even as they returned their troops back to get to the command centre, they saw in the distance the lights of formation guarding the command centre change colours!

The command centre had fallen.

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Kandrif was looking at the command centre in the distance. He had used the warhorses to reach the centre very fast. After that, Michael had called all his slaves and many other saints as well. The other saints were also captured and enslaved.

Kandrif had given up those below the saint realm. After all, there was a limit to how many Michael could enslave. And his limit was about a hundred. There was no way Michael could enslave the entire army. They had to be efficient. Kandrif was a bit disappointed that the command centre only sent 10 peak-saints away, but he would have to make do with that.

The greatest problem that they now faced was the formation. It was a boosting formation that boosted the dark empire's members. As the council knew that the attackers were all rebels, the formation would hinder them and reinforce the people inside the centre. But they would again be wrong. The formation was supposed to make it so that a difference of minor realm could be overcome. Thus, there was no way that a peak-saint could be defeated in a one-on-one battle inside the centre. But, that did not mean that they could not be killed or were invincible. Multiple opponents working together could take down the peak-saints on the other side.

As the standing army of the centre had left, they did not have to worry about being outnumbered. In front of an entire army boosted by the formation, even perfect-realm experts would not be able to take the command centre down. Only the untiring immortals could possibly deal with an entire army by themselves.

Kandrif gave his first orders to Michael. There were many saints still remaining inside the centre. His expectation was that the saints inside would be distracted long enough so that they would be able to set their own formation around the command centre. Then, it would no longer matter if any saints were remaining.

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In Aterna, there was no knowledge of suicide attacks. A suicidal attack was a way for cultivators to burn their life to attack with much greater power than conceivable. This was something that Michael had learned from the devils. They would use such attacks when cornered. It would allow even saint-level devils to take down perfect-realm experts and take down immortal realm experts. Immortal-level devils could take down entire armies with a single suicidal attack.

The art that Michael had learned from a devil was called vitality burning. This art allowed saints or higher realm experts to burn their entire lifeforce and erupt with a huge amount of power. But it was only one attack. If the attack was missed or was evaded, that would be giving up one's life with nothing in return.

Michael did not tell anyone about the art because it could change the power scale of different races. But, he had instructed all the enslaved saints to burn their vitality against the saint-realm opponents. He was confident that the attack would succeed in most cases. Michael could not control the slaves very well and only simple instructions could be relayed. They could easily bypass their instructions and hold back. Michael's method would make sure that there was no holding back. After getting all the saint-realm slaves together, Michael led them all to the centre to attack.

The battle did not even last for a few minutes. Due to the absence of the army, the entire centre was almost empty. Only the high-level experts were present. The slave-saints were used against specific targets and most of them had killed their opponents, though reluctantly. They too died quickly afterwards. In total, a hundred and eighty saints were lost in a single go! This had definitely shot up the price of the war for the dark empire.

The assault had not even been reported to the HQ before Kandrif installed his own prepared formation. Michael had to give it to Kandrif for his preparations. He too was learning many different things. He found that war was not only about fighting but more about strategy. As long as one was not a transcendental being that could suppress everything, strategies would always remain a cornerstone of war. Even immortal-experts would fall in battle if a good strategist was involved.

After setting the formation, Kandrif motioned his personal aide. His aide took out a pouch from the pocket of his pants. After bringing out the pouch, several restrictions set on it were undone and the pouch was opened. What came out was a single pearl. The pearl was white and seemed to be glowing. It took Michael a while to realize that the pearl was transparent and the white light was some kind of energy that existed inside of it.

The concentrated energy pearl!

Michael knew about this treasure. It was mined in the beast empire and was extremely valuable. It contained energy from heaven and earth compressed due to natural phenomenon. A single pearl held the power of thousands of energy-crystals!

Michael could also see the restriction already placed on the pearl. It was a barrier restriction. Michael looked towards Kandrif confused:

Kandrif : What!? You were not thinking that we ourselves were going to defend this place till our reinforcements arrive, were you? This is a barrier pearl. It will give us a lot of time against the dark army. By the time this energy dissipates, the light army will be here to support us.

Saying so, Kandrif broke the pearl open. The silver coloured barrier extended with him as centre and covered almost the entire command centre. Kandrif then winked towards Michael, saying:

As long as I have enough time to plan things, nothing can go wrong.

Then, it was just a matter of reporting the merit and dividing contributions. Things proceeded smoothly.