The rest of the time he spent with that group of newer recruits, went mostly uneventfully. Same routines repeated every day for a bit over a week. This was entirely normal, as far as Kaden understood military life.

He was also determined to try being more social, despite his apprehension. The group of fools he followed was acceptable. They were dumb just like the younger people in Dashire which had been the last time he interacted with people in extended manner.

For a moment Kaden wondered, if they would make him lead since he was strongest by wide margin, but none of them seemed to even think of the matter. Hence, he generally silently followed behind, took part in their activities and spoke simply to act along with them. He wasn’t sure, if he really learned something else than acting. It seemed all he needed was to smile and make that constant frown of his go away and all was just fine.

There was also the matter of his cultivation that had seemed to become stuck. If he inspected himself, he did see the core structure change and become dense. It didn’t even look like it had before. It was more… solid. The internal structure had changed and become more faceted. Dire beast core was relatively transparent, but his new core wasn’t. One could say it was rather beautiful like a gem stone.

Despite the more interesting and beatiful form, it was problematic. It was difficult to control. Kaden even felt like, if he had to truly fight, he would be severely weakened? Was this something all beasts on the edge of becoming a High Beast would go through? To live a lengthy time in severely weakened state? Like living treasures almost free to be taken by others. He felt like this was the case since he did see nothing that would point to unnatural progress. In fact, it felt extremely natural. The right way.

Kaden knew there were dangers when one progressed from stage to another at least for humans, but it seemed to be the case for beasts too. For example future risk for Kaden would be when he progresses to Formation stage. He would have to allow his body to construct its innate formation. It was simply the way that mana flowed through his body and these parts had become more sensitive and there were less obstructions along the way. New channels would have to grow along these pathways.

Yet, once they were growing and connecting for real, power and mana flow would increase. One would have to keep it in check and allow their innate formation to fully set in before it could handle that. Failing at it, the new channels would likely explode tearing your internals to shreds. While death’s were apparently rare, extreme injuries were not. As for altering that formation, it could only be done afterwards. The dangers had to be passed by everyone intending to step into Formation stage.

It would make sense that humans wouldn’t be only ones with dangers. If beasts didn’t have any, they would have quite an advantage and would likely have dominated humans by now.

Kaden felt he did have quite an advantage himself. He could sit there in relative safety as his core was evolving. A beast in the wilderness would not have that advantage. Their enemies, opponent and neighbors would love to take the advantage of such weakness.

Still, it was quite a bad moment. Sadge still wanted to use him as punching bag. Not to mention he had difficulties in trying to imitate Sadge’s techniques. In fact, it wasn’t working at all and Kaden couldn’t tell, if it was due to his core or something like the concept of ‘what if’ being too intanglible. One had to have some understanding of mana type to use it. This concept, while he could understand it, eluded him.

In Sadge’s opinion, he was just dumb and he told that to him very clearly. Though, he did add that quite a few people were unable to grasp it. While it was simplified concept of much deeper mana, it was still originating from such mana. He recommended Kaden to look for another technique.

Kaden could only wonder what kind of strange concepts could exist and what he could do with them, if he ever was able to touch them.

On that particular day Sadge was going over stuff Kaden considered to be pure propaganda and mental conditioning. He guessed it was useful to have your soldiers throw away their lives and not questioning anything. This happened while everyone was required to do some physical excercises.

Strong body could contain more mana! That was what Sadge repeated over and over again. Perhaps true, but in Kaden’s opinion, concentrating on cultivation mattered more. That and making the fight for their lives. Life and death situations had been very useful to Kaden himself. He wasn’t going to say anything, though. While it Sadge also spouted some idealistic trash about honor and trusting the chain of command.

“Sergeant Sadge”, Kaden decided to interject at that point. None of the physical excercises posed any effort to Kaden, but since it wasn’t time to fight, he was supposed to do it too. All that following orders and stuff. Yet since it was so effortless, Kaden had time to think. “Who is it that we take orders from?”

“Right now me”, Sadge immediately said. “Why?”

“Who do you take orders from?” Kaden continued. “Who does that person take orders from? Who is at the top? The rulebook isn’ clear about this matter and this confuses me.”

“In what way are you confused, recruit?” Sadge asked with a frown.

“As far as I can tell right at the top should be the emperor”, Kaden pointed out. “We are supposed to be warriors of the Holy Saint Empire, yes? That indeed points that the ruler is the one at top, but rulebook often refers to taking orders from the church. Is the holy pope above the emperor?”

These were rather unusual questions. Quite a few people wouldn’t even go questioning such matters openly, but Kaden did not care. In fact, he had realized not many people knew of the apparent rulers more than their titles. What was the name of the pope? People seemed to call them by their titles. Emperor seemed to be slightly better known to be a young man. There was some kind of succession cycle that most rulers followed for some reason. This had happened recently once again. It was more than likely one of the reasons why the war had started again.

“We obviously answer indeed to the emperor at the end”, Sadge explained Kaden. “Yet, sometimes orders from church have higher meaning as they can receive orders directly from divine sources.” Sadge pointed towards sky.

“What if a priest sees a dream where gods tell him to lead army to a direction contradicting my orders?” Kaden continued his annoying questions.

Sadge rolled his eyes. “Check, if the priest has official holy orders.”

“I see”, Kaden replied and then continued. “What if the priest is a higher ranked? Like a high cardinal who is clearly able to write such orders?”

“Just… if they have actual holy orders at hand, obey those orders”, Sadge said while slightly annoyed. “I get it that sometimes a member of priesthood might come and start giving orders without one. At that point, if you are the one making choices, do what you will, but know that defying church may have consequences. Is this enough for you?”

Kaden clapped his hands together as if he was now understanding something. “I understand now”, he said. “Ignoring the church and gods is fine, if I don’t have to answer to court of inquisitors due to it!”

“Thats not… “, Sadge started and then thought about it. “You know what, I guess thats fine way to take it.”

That was fine to Kaden. As long as he didn’t openly commit a heresy, he should be safe from such consequences. The entire church and its enforcers, the inquisitors, were not something he could offend yet. Until then things such as heresies should be commited undetected.

At this point a few people entered the yard. It was Nelsen. Apparently it was time. This little temporary stop was over.

“Sergeant Sadge, I hope you had your fun as I’m taking my newest team member with me”, Nelsen said. “He hasn’t caused any trouble, has he?”

“The kid is just a bit dumb, captain”, Sadge replied to Nelsen. “But if you give him enough of a beating, he learns.”

“Haha, I’ll be sure to remember that”, Nelsen replied nodding. Then he turned to face Kaden. “Okay, kid, I hope you did indeed learn some basics here. All is arranged, come with me now.”

“Yes, sir”, Kaden replied seemingly obediently.

He had indeed learned quite a bit about keeping up apperances. That and gained some relatively important information such as the techniques that Sadge used. It had been only a bit over a week and he had already learned useful things. It had indeed been right call to join the saint army willingly.

Nelsen led Kaden out soon after. He wanted to take Kaden to meet someone before taking him to settle down finally for the foreseeable future.

They were going to visit an artificer that worked closely with the team. In fact while still loosely part of the team, the artificer was housed just next to the team. Elite team had to have best gear and tools available, things made specifically for each member.

This visit was arranged hurriedly by Nelsen after he learned Kaden had some ability in crafting and had also requested access to more training material. An official artificer had to evaluate the skill level and such matters. If Kaden wanted to see more advanced learning material, he would have to show some credentials… or pay contribution point or personal money. Kaden didn’t have any contribution points yet or too much money to spend.

Artificer was basically just what Kaden was, a mix of blacksmith and formation master. Some other professions might have other fancy titles tied to them like magic engineer or alchemist, depending on what they did. Kaden might be barely called an artificer.

The building where they went looked pretty similar on the outside as the ones Kaden had been to before. That was just how the military layer was. Everything looked the same except for a number assigned to each one. Yet, inside was very different. Smaller training yard and as far as he could see personal rooms and more specialized training rooms. Clearly far higher quality setup than what was available for the new recruits. Housing and training areas for elites was really top grade as far as Kaden could see.

Then there was another smaller building at the corner of the area. It had some smoke coming out of a chiney and some hammering sounds. All of this was clearly very familiar to Kaden. The parts that were less familiar were inside. Walls seemed to be layered with formations for some reason. With quick observation it seemed to be for mana regulation?

“Hmmm, is this the kid you talked about, Nelsen?” Said a voice suddenly as Kaden was observing the formation.

“That would be the case Cyrun”, Nelsen replied to a burly man with short sharply cut beard.

“Well, then lets have a look what he can do”, Cyrun said.