Kinoya came out of the tent as he was greeted by the morning sun that was peeking from the back of the eastern forest. The light chilly wind was a gentle reminder of the winter that was fast approaching.

“Headhunter forest!? Headhunter tribes?” He had heard that it was the home of one of the four oldest human tribes? Kinoya shook his head, ‘Looks like the exploration of the forest have to wait.

There were almost 100 women who had decided to stay with Kinoya’s army while most of them returned to the northern part of the city. The red front had taken control over the northern part of the army.

There were many abandoned farms and warehouses outside the city wall, Kinoya had chosen one of them. It was close to the river and was well maintained.

This farm had two of the biggest barns of the area and was given to the women to stay. On the other hand, the army camped outside.

He checked the weight robe on his body. Its weight was equal to his body weight. He took a deep breath and started running.

“System show me the last notification.” During the fight and while he was talking to General Akai, a couple of notifications had popped up. Kinoya had chosen to ignore those at that time. Now he can only hope that the broken system will not be so ‘broken’.

The System that he had inherited doesn’t show any status at his will. The old man had told him that the other system can do it. Alas! he has to use the orb-like any other.

Lucky for Kinoya, that the system could at least initiate a quest on its own. Yet all those quests had 100 or 1000 times harder criteria to complete. All in all, the name of ‘Broken System’ justify its work. Lucky for him, the system also gives unexpected rewards.

[The user has awakened a hidden stat ‘Command’]

According to the old man, the previous owner of Varytita, a normal human has four initial stats: strength, dexterity, intelligence and health. And six hidden stats: Agility, Wisdom, Patience, Command, Endurance and Magic.

Those are called hidden because they aren’t available from birth. People have to work hard to activate them. Some can be activated easily. Magic can be achieved by opening mage space. So all the mages and magus knights have the stats.

Whereas only a sage can activate wisdom. Though some of the people of the upper echelon knew to activate some of the hidden stats most of the people stay oblivious of the presence of hidden stats.

Let say one has intelligence stats over 300. So he will be a good mage. But if he was unable to open his mage space his hidden stat ‘Magic’ won’t activate either. Even if he has ‘Magic’ stat is over 9999 it will be of no use.

Lucky for Kinoya, no matter how broken his system is, it can unlock his hidden stats. And ‘Command’ stats was the last one to activate.

“Now I can tell the old man that he knows three people who have activated all the hidden stats.” Kinoya was happy with the result as he sped up his running. Little did he know that the other two people the old man was talking about were the last and present emperor.

[New title obtained ‘God-son of Red General Akai’]

The next notification surprised him a little. General said that he wanted him as a son, but the system explained it as God-son.

“Why is it God-son?” Kinoya wasn’t sure about the reason.

“Sorry general. I didn’t mean to?” It wasn’t the system but a face that he hadn’t forgotten yet.

While comprehending the antics of the broken system Kinoya had already returned to the campsite. The sun was yet to show its strength, the weather was pleasant as he turned to meet the speaker.

‘When did she come so close?’ He turned to see it was the girl of the brother-sister pair whom he had saved yesterday. “I am no general.”

She squinted her eyes to take another look. She had seen the might of the man. It was much more suitable to call him a child rather than a man. ‘Is he not a general?’

She didn’t dare to believe his words. Whether a general or not, she had failed to understand his thoughts. At first, she had thought it was a trap. A similar fate was waiting for all the girls, but he let the woman return to the city.

Even though many of them chose to stay, almost all of them had expected an assault would come but nothing of that sort had happened.

“I don’t think you have come here to stare at me.” the childish voice broke her trance.

“No, no, my lord.” She was quick to put her eyes down. “I want to thank you, my lord.”

“Thank me?” Kinoya laughed. “You want to thank me? For what?”

The girl hesitated for not knowing how to answer it. So Kinoya helped her, “For saving you? Or your brother?”

“For both my lord. If you weren’t…” Kinoya put up a hand to stop her, “You don’t need to thank me. That was something they shouldn’t do and I just stopped them because I wanted to. And for your brother…”

Kinoya couldn’t complete the sentence neither did he want to. He was more curious about the girl in front of him.

“My lord…”

“I am not your lord.”

“But…” The girl didn’t know what to say anymore.

Her reaction put up a smile on Kinoya’s face “Just say what you want to say.”

The girl took another look at Kinoya and without a single word she took out a crystal. “Please, accept this.”

There was nothing fancy about it, a simple transparent crystal with blue silk slithering inside it. Even Kinoya didn’t know when he had put his hand towards it and…

[Spell Check: [Charm] been used]

[No ill intent detected]

[Trying to break the spell…]

[Spell Check: [Charm] is blocked]

“What is this?” The voice wasn’t loud, yet the girl couldn’t hold under the pressure. Her leg gave away as she sprawled on the ground.

“For-forgive me, m-my lord.” Tears continued to pour down her eyes. She couldn’t speak in complete sentences.

“What is this?” Each of his words was sending quakes through her body.

“Tre-sure. My fam-ly tres-er.”

‘Family treasure?’ Kinoya Looked at the crystal on the ground, ‘a magic crystal?! A magic crystal with [Charm] spell.’ But the truth makes him more confused.

‘No matter how I look at her, she is an ordinary person. Yet she overcame the urges of the spell and…’

“Is that how an empire’s soldiers treat kindness?”

‘Again? How come they kept on closing in without me knowing?’ Kinoya turned to the person who had invaded his domain.

“Oh! So fierce.” Looking at Kinoya the new girl smiled.

She couldn’t be more than seventeen or eighteen. Malnutrition put the signs on her. Her straight hair was a mess while her dirty old robe had failed to hide her white skin. What was more prominent about her was the dark circles on her dirty white face.

“Who are you?” Kinoya didn’t try to hide his hostility, however, the girl just smiled at her.

“Oh! Again! How can such a small body hide such a strong punch?” The girl walked like she didn’t care about Kinoya at all and took the crystal from the ground.

“It is nothing special.” Kinoya couldn’t see it but in her hand, the blue silk didn’t dare to move at all, as if it was afraid of something. “Come on take it. She wanted to give it to you.”

‘Could it be that the spell works only on mage or magus knight?’ Again Kinoya didn’t know why he did it, but he grabbed the crystal from her. The girl, on the other hand, helped the sister to stand on her feet again.

“Before you learn to kill, you should learn how to respect others?”

‘Why are you lecturing me? Don’t you know I can kill you right now?’ Kinoya didn’t say out loud, yet…

“You want to kill me?” Listening to her question Kinoya couldn’t help but shudder, “Your eyes say it all.” The girl smiled at him.

“Who are you?” Kinoya asked the same question again yet the tone is different. This time he is curious about the origin of the girl.

The girl didn’t answer. She whispered to the sister who left with a nod, without saying a single word to Kinoya.

“Who am I? I am Iilea. Is this that good enough for you?” She asked with a serious face yet Kinoya didn’t respond. She chuckled and sat on a bundle of hay.

“You are not going to sit, are you?” Looking at the expected response she sighed and said, “I am someone whom you want to meet at night however most definitely not in the morning.”

Looking at his serious face, she took a deep breath, “I am a prostitute. You know what it means, right? It’s the work where women like us make boys like you feel very good.”

“How can you be so shameless? Is it a job to be proud of?” Contrary to his expectation Iilea walked up to him with a bright smile on her face. While patting on Kinoya’s head, “Is pride something you can eat?”

Silence, absolute silence enveloped. Kinoya was dumb-founded. The smile on her spoke louder than anything, yet out of thousands of words in his mind, Kinoya couldn’t say a single word out loud.

‘I shouldn’t have said that.’ Alas, it was too late.

“Looks like your friends are here.” she gave a deep bow to Kinoya and walked away.

Before Kinoya could say anything, someone ran past Kinoya. It was Chanakya.

“He seems to be close to her.” Palsa spoke from the side, “But captain, those aren’t the words you should say to her. Especially, if it is you.”