--- Outside the palace, few minutes earlier ---

Severlinus leaned against the wall of a house, while marveling at a piece of tech in his hands.

On one hand, was a device barely the size of his palm. Captain Albert of the British SAS called it an infrared strobe. Severlinus was confused when Albert explained to him and his men on how to use it, because when he turned it on, it did nothing. But Albert convinced him that it was indeed turned on by lending him his NVG, and sure enough, the strobe was blinking, emitting lights that were invisible to his naked eyes and only visible by using NVGs. Albert then explained to him that this was one of the means to mark targets for airstrikes with pinpoint accuracy.

On his other hand, Severlinus held some sort of clay with a small metallic rod object they call C4 and took a small device. A plastic explosive and a remote detonator, as Albert called them. An explosive so powerful, Albert said it could topple down a castle wall tower with just one block of it. Whether it was true or not, Severlinus had no idea. But he did not want to find out. At least not when he was not the one holding the detonator.

"Who knew that such a small and unassuming object could be so dangerous,” Severlinus mumbled to himself while looking at the inactive strobe.

"And this explosive too," Severlinus mumbled while looking at the C4 block this time. "If somebody did not know any better, they would probably give this to their kids as a toy, or maybe to a pottery craftsman. I wonder if you can actually make pottery from it," he joked with himself.

Then, Severlinus heard a commotion from the other side of the house. Currently, Severlinus was in an alleyway with a concentration of Ticaret men on the other side of the block and their barracks just a bit further from the house Severlinus was hiding behind. Secluded, but still close enough for Severlinus to enjoy the commotion and what was about to come.

“Hey! What in the hell is all this commotion about?!”

“Sir! These Oprichinina soldiers just came to us and accused us.”

“You! You are their commander here? We found this in the common area of our barracks! This thing is the Other Worlder’s device to mark targets for their airstrike! We have checked all of our men, and that only leaves you, Ticaret dogs, who went to have drinks with us just a few days ago!”

“What? What nonsense are you Imperial pigs talking about?!”

“I am saying that there are traitors in here, and that could be you or all of you! What is wrong? You damn merchants want to cut your losses and now you are colluding with NATO?!”

“You damn bastards! Is this also your way to get back at us for Mount Obto?!”

‘Good. Good’ Severlinus thought to himself while barely able to contain his face from grinning. ‘Keep following the script, and keep building up the tension.’

Mount Obto, a bloody chapter in Imperial-Ticaret War that happened over three hundred years ago where the Ticaret army was slaughtered when their leaders were invited to a ‘peace talk’ by the Empire, leaving the army leaderless with their guard down. A dirty move by the Empire. But then again, when does the Empire ever care about honor? Only when it suits them, that’s when. Now, it was an exploit Severlinus could use.

Severlinus kept leaning against the wall as he heard the commotion getting more intense. Hearing all of that commotion brought him back to his old days.

--- Akusho district, Sadera. 20 years ago ---

Long before Severlinus joined the Imperial Army ranks with the simple goal to leave the streets and survive, he had to survive as a street urchin on the streets of Akusho in his early days. At one point of that chapter of his life, he was a target of bullying for a local gang. All the money he earned, all of it would be taken, he would be lucky if they left him some spare change just for the giggles. When they felt like it, Severlinus would get beaten up just for their fun. Finally at one point, he had enough. He wanted to get back at them, hard and thorough. But instead of taking them head on, he decided to use his brain instead of brawn. He started to look into the gang, more specifically, the leader. Apparently, he had become arrogant with the fact that he and his gang were quite strong among the other gangs in one part of the Akusho district, but it seemed that he was relatively unknown in the other part of the district. That was when he found an exploit he could use.

On the other part of the district, there was a really strong gang. One that does not know or care about each other’s presence. A perfect pawn for Severlinus. Severlinus snuck into the rival gang’s headquarters and stole a diamond necklace from the leader’s room, a necklace that was supposed to be a gift to the leader’s love interest. Thankfully, his attempt was undetected and successful, allowing him to move on to the next part of his plan. He purposely passed through the bully gang’s territory before he came across the gang again, with the leader included. Sure enough, Severlinus got beaten up again and had all his belongings stolen, including the necklace. ‘Perfect!’ Severlinus thought to himself as he was laying on the mud with bruises all over his body. Next phase, he spread rumors in the rival gang’s territory, about a diamond necklace spotted in the hand of a gang leader on the other side of the district. Naturally, Severlinus thought about keeping his trace to the minimum, so he recruited fellow street urchins to spread the words.

Few days later after sundown, the angry rival gang leader barged into the bully gang’s hideout with his entourage and came across the bully gangs along with the leader, intoxicated with an ale bottle in one hand and a diamond necklace on his neck. Severlinus who watched the situation unfold from a safe distance could barely hold his excitement. The timing couldn’t be anymore perfect. He knew that the bully gang often got drunk at night, an exploit that he wished he could use. But often is not the same as always, and thus it was too random for him to exploit. And he also couldn’t set the time when the rival gang would show up, so it was a mere coincidence that the rival gang would show up when the bully gang were smashed. The bully gang leader, shambled towards the rival gang leader while giving the rival leader some colorful words smugly, in his intoxicated mind thinking that the rival gang leader was a mere nobody challenging him. The rival gang leader simply asked him if the diamond necklace on his neck was his.

“Yhess ittis mhine, sho whhat? Ya jheallous I ghot more mhoney than ya, ya damn whortless dung?” The bully leader intoxicatedly replied.

And thus, he was immediately rewarded with a throwing dagger to his head, ending his life instantly. The bully gang members, with their finite sober minds, charged at the rival gang members to avenge their leader, starting a massive brawl. This brawl turned out to attract the immediate rival gangs of the bully gang. They think that it is their chance to finish the bully gang for good, and thus they join in the fight. The problem was, the rival gang did not know who these newcomers were and immediately thought that they were the bully gang’s backup. And thus they fought them instead of working together, resulting in an even more massive brawl.

“This is awesome.” Young Severlinus mumbled to himself as he watched the ensuing mayhem.

Severlinus, who was still watching, was in awe with the sequence of events that unfolded. From this, not only that the gang who kept bullying him was no more, he drew two lessons from it. First, one person is smart, people are dumb. Easy to get swayed by the flow around them and usually it was the bad flow. Second, You could create this kind of scenario provided that you know what you are doing. Use every exploit you see.

Deep in his mind, Severlinus wished there could be another chance where he could hone his newfound skill. This one worked so perfectly and brought great results. But unfortunately, the great result involved sheer luck, and he did not want that. Next time, he wished that his attempt would be more planned. But unfortunately, or fortunately depending on who one asked, that chance never came again for Severlinus, as his life was pretty much uneventful where he did not need to use his subterfuge skill again. His life as street urchin was still hard, but definitely easier without the bully gang around.

--- Outside the palace, Thaluilas. Present time ---

And today, his chance finally came.

Done reminiscing about the past, Severlinus focused his hearing back on the ongoing commotion on the other side of the block.

“Everyone, please! Right now we have Other Worlder infiltrators in the city! Some of them are even in the castle where our lord and yours are! We cannot fight amongst ourselves right now!” Said a voice whom Severlinus guessed as one of the Thaluilas’ knights.

So far, he was quite satisfied with how his plan was going. But he was more proud of his men who were doing their part, disguising themselves as Oprichnina soldiers. He knew that quite many soldiers from Fabius’ ranks decided to leave his ranks and joined the Oprichnina under Katsuo, giving him valuable men but at the same time, many new faces which the Oprichnina officers would not and have not recognized. Exploit number one.

“No, this is more important!” Said another voice, whom Severlinus recognized as one of his men assigned by him to disguise as an Oprichnina soldier. “Right now, nothing happened. But like hell am I gonna wait until something happens! We need to root out the traitors now! We do not know how many of these devices are out there! By the gods! We do not even know if these devices were the only things the traitors have used. Maybe there are much more destructive weapons spread out in the city for all we know!”

Exploit number two. Even unknowns can be a weapon.

Even though much had been uncovered about NATO, their equipment, and their abilities, admittedly much more were still unknown about them. Everything that they knew came from their observation on the field, coupled with any info they could get from NATO territories. But without full understanding of what they have on the other side of the Gate, any day NATO might bring new weaponry that was alien to them from the other side. And thus, the unknown would always haunt them.

With these two exploits, Severlinus could cause anxieties among the League forces. Evident by the commotion.

The beauty of his plan was, Severlinus did not need many men to incite the commotion happening on the other side of the block. Just two of them bringing the IR strobe to the Oprichnina officers and lying to them that the small contingent of Ticaret are in cohort with NATO was enough to incite the volatile situation that was still growing even right now. Just one stupid man doing one stupid action would be enough to start a fight between the Oprichnina and the Ticaret forces. But that was not enough. The Ticaret forces still outnumbered the Oprichnina and the Thaluilas knights combined. He needed more.

“If I may, maybe there is a way we can thin out the suspects.” Said a new voice.

‘Ah. Exploit number three.’ Thought Severlinus.

“Among us Seckin Sanctum, we have received reports that the smaller contingents of the Ticaret forces have been talking about leaving the war and if possible join NATO in hopes to receive trade permits with them and obtain their goods to enrich themselves. I believe that they have the highest chance to be traitors.”

“W- Wh- What?! It’s not us! I swear!” Said a new voice whom Severlinus guessed as the commander of one of the smaller Ticaret contingents.

“It- It’s not us, either! We thought about it, I admit. But we decided that we have gone too far to even have hopes to trade with them. That is all!”

“Damn you! If you really are innocent, then show us your tents and the house you have been using to sleep! We will tear them up and if I find something alien in there, I swear by Deldort’s name I will gut you all alive!”

Severlinus enjoyed the voice of accusations and vain defenses being thrown around. He felt more satisfaction as the third exploit had done their job, which was collaborators from the enemy side.

Severlinus, accompanied by Captain Albert, managed to make contact with Albon’s second-in-command, Dalyol Perberos. Thankfully, he was willing to listen to Severlinus due to him and the rest of the Seckin Sanctum’s men seemingly losing contact with their leader, only receiving orders via Gagnog’s men. After he listened to Severlinus, he thought that the dots finally connected and agreed to help him and NATO in exchange for guaranteed safety by NATO and their leader received treatment should he was still alive and wounded by torture.

From there, Severlinus allowed them to fracture the Ticaret faction and incite more fear and anxieties within the League. They didn’t even have to lie, as many of those small Ticaret contingents were indeed talking about pulling out of the war and if possible, joining NATO in the hopes of being allowed to purchase their goods and thus enriching themselves. Thinking about it, Severlinus could consider it as the fourth exploit.

“EVERYBODY SILENCE!!!”

The booming voice instantly shut all the commotion down and replaced it with complete silence. Severlinus recognized this voice. It belonged to one of the high commanders of the Thaluilas knights.

“Well, this could be a problem,” Severlinus muttered to himself.

“The enemy is currently attacking this very city and the castle itself, and all of you monkeys think this is a good time to fight against yourselves?! Shame on all of you! Now, I want four platoons to come with me to secure the castle! Then I want three platoons from both the Oprichnina and Ticaret to scour the camps for more of these Other Worlders’ devices and the traitors! The rest of you, spread around the city for those NATO infiltrators. Work with the Thaluilas knights to lock down the city. We will sort out the traitor problem after we deal with the infiltrators. DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?!”

Severlinus’ expression turned from full of satisfaction to worry. The Thaluilas’ knight commander’s order had some holes. Such as by spreading most of the League forces around the large city without even a slightest hint of to where to prioritize, it could give the ‘traitors’ a chance to escape. Even still, giving the men something to do while being angry and confused was better than letting them be angry and confused senselessly. Right now, despite the silence, the atmosphere was still thick of fear, anger, anxiety. Severlinus could feel it. However, that atmosphere will dissipate when the high commander repeats his order to the League men. Severlinus guessed that it will take two more repeats before the League men spread out and started doing the commander’s order, and all of Severlinus’ effort will be for naught.

‘Come on, your majesty. I am waiting for your signal.’ Severlinus thought to himself worriedly while his finger was rubbing on the trigger of the detonator in his hand. As much as he wanted to pull the trigger now, he couldn’t. Timing would be the key. He had told Pina and Albert about this. Trigger it too soon, he feared that the chaos would dissipate before Pina managed to evacuate out of the city. And if Severlinus triggered it too late than Pina’s signal, he feared that all of the League forces would converge towards the castle attracted by her signal, instead.

‘I hate to admit it, but I guess I’m relying on luck again.’ Severlinus thought to himself before sighing.

“DID-!”

“I-!“

*BOOM!*

A large explosion erupted from the backyard of the castle, diverting everyone’s attention to it. Meanwhile, Severlinus grinned after receiving the signal.

“What took you so long, your majesty?” Severlinus mumbled before he finally pulled the trigger on the detonator.

Barely a couple seconds passed after the castle’s explosion, more explosions erupted around the city. More specifically, the castle’s food storage, the cattle's western and eastern walls, the city’s western and northern walls, the city’s plaza, some buildings from the castle towards the sewer entrance and the opposite direction, the Oprichnina barracks, Thaluilas knights’ barracks, and lastly the Ticaret’s barracks. Severlinus could clearly feel the shockwave despite him taking cover behind a building.

“By the gods, I guess that Albert fellow wasn’t joking,” Severlinus mumbled.

Right after the explosions, Severlinus noticed the roads were beginning to be filled with smoke. There was so much smoke, some of it spilled into the alleyway where he was. “This smoke is so thick and coupled with the smoke from the explosion fire, this will be perfect.”

What caused these smokes to appear was from all the smoke grenades from the NATO group. Severlinus managed to receive quite a number of them, and with the help of Albert’s men, those smoke grenades were jury rigged to be triggered by remote blasting caps instead of the conventional striker-percussion time fuse.

Now, the stage is set. The league forces are panicking, confused. Now all it takes to start the chaos, was a little push.

“YOU BASTARD!!”

Some of the League men, or more specifically, Severlinus’ disguised men and Sanctum collaborators starting to attack the League men. The Oprichnina disguised men were attacking the Ticaret men, the Sanctum collaborators were attacking the Oprichnina soldiers, Thaluilas knights, and the suspected small Ticaret contingents. They skillfully used the smoke cover to attack the League forces before slipping out of sights to regroup far away from the carnage. The dying screams of their comrades and the glimpse of their comrades being slain was more than enough to start the snowball of chaos. Everybody attacked anybody. Thanks to the thick smoke, they barely had any time if at all to identify their targets, resulting in many friendly kill incidents. Even the Thaluilas knights who were just a bystander, also got pulled into the chaos.

“Heh. Try to catch us now. And consider this as my resignation.” Severlinus said towards the League forces who were too busy with their own battle before making a break towards the rendezvous point.