Vinamour was a single step from forming a domain. He felt it like a soundtrack on his every breath. Only something was missing. Until he found it, whenever a theme perfectly fitted his emotions and circumstances, his Path of Music empowered him.

That happened now. The Theme of Swift Triumph wasn't fitting anymore. He changed it to a Theme of Soft Hatred. It had to be soft. He had the power to kill the arrogant boy, but he would be killed for treason later. That wouldn't do. His grievance hadn't reached the level of mutual destruction yet.

When that tiny part of his mind changed the memorized songs it kept "playing" for him, he became a little better at everything.

Vinamour organized his troops with efficiency and foresight unmatched by the other Battalion Commanders. Not that it was awe-inspiring. He could tell by their ages and how they moved that they had never commanded a Brigade. They weren't a First Lieutenant like him. Granted, he had just become one in the Calamity, but it was thanks to the recognition he gained during his previous military service.

He deserved it—unlike the boy that the Acting General liked.

For a mere A-rank to dare to disregard Vinamour like that! A mere Colonel who let power get to their head! He was a fanmv! His race had an S-rank! It was a quasi-mystical race!

If the Supreme Leader hadn't ordered C-ranks and below to come to serve, he would be raking up victories in the Calamity instead of herding the useless conscripts in the front lines—for the conscripts' benefit!

Ah...

Vinamour closed his eyes and basked in his growing but controlled anger for a few minutes. That's how long the useless Battalion Commanders took to organize their troops. Then he went to meet them.

All nine C-ranks moved to the middle of the room in unison to plot how to win and decide how to backstab each other.

"I propose we fight in stages," Vinamour said as soon as they met. "We have thirty minutes to defeat the arrogant boy. Let us show each other how good the future Commander will be, starting from below. Let the E-rank Squads fight without supervision at first. At the three-minute mark, the Platoon Commanders will start giving orders. At the six-minute mark, E-ranks in the Platoons themselves will also fight each other. At the nine-minute mark, the Company Commanders will send orders to the Platoons and anyone below. At the twelve-minute mark, Companies' D-ranks will join the fight. And so on. At the twenty-one-minute mark, we'll do our best to make our troops defeat each other. At the twenty-four-minute mark, we'll keep commanding them while we all attack the Brigade Commander. Three minutes will be more than enough to get rid of him. In other words, we'll have another three minutes to defeat each other and determine the future Brigade Commander."

The useless Battalion Commanders had to think about it and discuss things for a whole minute before agreeing to the obviously perfect suggestion. Slow minds. Soft people. Unused to making quick decisions. If any of them won, he would rather use his Commendations as a coin to remove himself from his deployment than keep up with his farce.

Vinamour glanced at the boy.

At least in battle, the soft-looking creature could think quickly. Vinamour wondered if he could also pull a trick to win this free-for-all. Vinamour wouldn't support the boy if that happened, but he could accept him. A superior officer who could pull unexpected tricks was almost as good as someone stronger than you.

Vinamour smiled sadistically.

Unfortunately for the boy, when the gap was big enough, sheer power triumphed over all—and the gap between them was insurmountable.

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Mark was a mere Platoon Commander under Battalion Commander Blue Sky, who looked like a ghost Medusa. He glanced at Winter. She had become a Company Commander under Battalion Commander Vinamour. People of the same race were supposed to be grouped together in the military, but the Exemplary Brigade was clearly different.

He wasn't surprised at his lower rank. The girl's growth had been monstrous these past three years. She was almost mastering her second Concept, he was sure of it, while he had barely progressed at all.

His struggles didn't even make sense. He had mastered the Concept of Restriction from the Axioms of the Wind to rank up to D-rank. How couldn't he easily progress his mastery over the Concept of Restriction from the Axioms of Gravity? It was a different Axiom, but the idea was the same! Furthermore, after three years of feeling under pressure in the military, how couldn't he master the Concept of Pressure from the Axioms of Water?

Shen's voice broke him from his musings. "Begin," the Brigade Commander ordered.

Most E-ranks looked at each other with uncertainty. However, a few of the nine Squads from Blue Sky moved ahead, and their Commander screamed at the other Squads to come with them. The others hesitated for a moment but complied, and they all ran against the Squads from the last Battalion Commander, Hukzun, a thick humanoid that wore blood-red plate armor from head to toe.

Blue Sky had ordered the Squads to strike fast as soon as the battle started. Mark disagreed with it. It was obviously better not to do anything at first. Whoever attacked last would reap the fruits of their enemies' labor.

Sadly, one thing he had learned in the last three years was that many Guardians were lousy tacticians, no matter whether their minds were E or C-rank. How much they understood or used tactics depended on their Path and personality.

Still, he was glad that the Squads obeyed the Battalion Commander's orders. He would rather have a stupid Commander than a cowardly subordinate. Shen could give good orders to Blue Sky, but beating cowardice from an E-rank was considerably more challenging and time-consuming.

After Vinamour's suggestion about how to do things was accepted, the Battalion Commanders had sent a few extra orders to their people and organized everyone with the weaker Guardians at the front. Blue Sky's Squads quickly reached their foes and started battling.

The military standard martial arts was the best technique anyone from Earth had access to. Well, at least, any D-rank from La'sing. Mark wasn't surprised to find that almost all E-ranks from multiple Nodes were the same. At least that's what it looked like, considering the overwhelming majority was only using those martial arts.

Watching E-ranks fight was boring. They were too slow, and their abilities couldn't do much without a Concept backing them up. Sure, enough imagination and willpower could produce a flame as hot as the core of the sun, which would be impressive, but no E-rank had such willpower.

Then again, one of the things the military had taught in the basic course was "the fundamentals." They contained essential knowledge the military expected everyone to know, which could also be used in the Alliance when the troops returned. The fundamentals included things such as how to make your mana touch enemy mana without engaging in a willpower battle. The Guardian only had to determine how much willpower they were applying to each spell in advance and almost disconnect it from their minds. Having that spell find resistance still took a mental toll, but it was considerably smaller and didn't force the two sides to defeat each other. The fundamentals also included how to almost instantly disengage from willpower battles. And that was on top of teaching everyone how to have their spells interpose with their allies' spells without triggering a willpower battle.

Such teachings allowed for a more strategic allocation of willpower and prevented tired or unskilled allied Guardians from wasting time in a useless mental fight if their mana touched each other. Therefore, things became more what a pre-Alliance human would expect from a magic battle.

Spell met spell and exploded in cool-ish visual effects.

1,944 E-ranks faced the opposing 1,944 and threw magically summoned ice, fire, rocks, and so on at each other. Explosions echoed in the big chamber.

Suddenly, about two hundred E-ranks from Hukzun's side trusted their defense to resist their foes and ran ahead through the magic bombardment. They wanted to get to close quarters, but their rush ended up being bad for them. They were targeted, and it turned out their defense wasn't as good as they thought. Most lost limbs, but all swiftly became heavily injured.

Yet, their advance ended up being a great tactical decision. The Squads weren't used to each other and didn't work well together. There was almost no organization among them at all. Most of Blue Sky's Guardians switched targets to the incoming two hundred while barely keeping magic defenses up. It let Hukzun's troops overwhelm multiple shields. Countless spells struck hundreds of people head-on.

Shen always saved whoever was so injured they might die and those about to get hit on a vital spot by a seemingly strong attack. Mark couldn't see him move and was confident he could teleport. He appeared beside every potential victim, usually backhand-slapping the incoming spells aside, then disappearing with the victims. He brought them to his corner of the room.

At first, he left them conscious, but a few started complaining that they could still fight. When the third voiced their discontent, all the losers suddenly fell unconscious.

Shen was unwilling to waste time convincing his troops that they had been defeated while he had to save others.

The two hundred kamikazes ended up directly causing almost eight hundred E-ranks from Blue Sky's size to die due to their disorganization. That was the beginning of the end for Blue Sky. When the three-minute mark was up, Mark and his fellow Platoon Commanders had no E-rank to boss around.

More than five hundred E-ranks remained on Hukzun's size.

Vinamour Platoon Commanders swiftly led their almost two thousand E-ranks against five hundred. Hukzun's E-ranks had already gotten a little used to fighting together and were defending themselves, giving them an edge, but they were tired and outnumbered, and ended up defeated.

Still, their tenacity impressed everyone. Vinamour's E-ranks were reduced to a mere eighty in the end.

The pyrrhic victory was largely because of one of Hukzun's E-rank's who specialized in sneak attacking people at the perfect moment and disappearing from sight. That guy alone killed a hundred people before he was noticed and another few hundred before he was killed. To Mark, he felt like a mix of Mallik and Shen.

The eighty surviving E-ranks were then sent to a corner of the room to wait for the end of the exercise. Shen's rules were that a Guardian could only fight those of the same rank, so they had no part to play anymore.

Mark waited for Hukzun's Battalion to lose all its E-ranks before approaching Hukzun's annoyed Platoon Commanders. Everyone looked at him. The D-ranks couldn't fight yet, so he theoretically had no reason to approach, much less alone.

However, his deployment orders were to be a perfect little soldier. Perfect little soldiers did their best all the time. He had thought of a loophole that might actually work.

"A subordinate isn't supposed to guess what their commanders are thinking," he said when he was halfway to them. "But every exercise is meant to be won, so I can safely assume our leaders want to win without breaking any rules. Regrettably, victory just got much harder for us. We're losing by 80 people already, and each Battalion only has a total of 2,127 Guardians. Make it 183 now that 1,944 E-ranks are gone. It'll be tough to make up for that 80 people of disadvantage, whom we can't fight."

"Your point being?" a humanoid with a fish face asked.

"I propose we only defend ourselves until our superiors can organize us. If they are wise, they'll also fight defensively until they can fight. Then, we'll be 360 D-ranks against Battalion Commander Vinamour Lavvishi's 180."

The fish guy replied, "That's not how it works. Commander Shen meant people of the same military rank can fight each other, not power."

"Corporal First-Class and Corporal are technically of a different rank," Mark pointed out. "Yet, Commander Shen didn't disqualify any E-rank when they attacked each other. We can try to check." He turned to Shen. "Brigade Commander, did you mean military rank or power rank?"

Shen only shook his head. Probably because he wasn't supposed to interfere with the exercise, or it might look like he was changing rules for his benefit.

"Battalion Commander?" Mark tried next.

Blue Sky completely ignored him. She either didn't know or wasn't interested in answering. Or, of course, she might be adhering to her agreement with the other Battalion Commanders not to boss her troops until much later.

Mark sighed and turned back to Hukzun's Platoon D-ranks. "How about this: We'll fight defensively and not attack each other. We'll help each other from afar if Lieutenant Commander Vinamour Lavvishi's Platoons attack any of us. So, we won't show our backs to each other. When it gets to our Company Commanders' turn to make decisions, they'll tell us to fight or keep waiting."

That made perfect sense, so after a few rounds of convincing, including convincing his own D-rank colleagues, Blue Sky's and Hukzun's Platoons formed two lines with a gap in between. Still, they were considerably closer than their original positions.

Whether Mark was right didn't matter as much as the fact that he might be right. Sure, it would be better for Blue Sky and Hukzun if he were, but the mere possibility was enough to force Vinamour's Platoons to attack.

Proportionally, 360 D-ranks versus 180 was the same as the current 324 versus 162. However, the difference in power became huge once Company Commanders and their helpers got involved. The Company-level D-ranks were theoretically much stronger than Platoons' D-ranks. Things would become much more complex and less advantageous for Vinamour if those people could also attack Platoons.

First Sergeant Alicia Winter was a great example of a Company Commander's power relative to a Platoon Commander's. She could wipe the floor with Mark any day of the week.

Really, if they were friends, he would tell her not to give up on Shen—which anyone with a brain cell could see was happening. She had so much potential! But she had made it clear that she didn't want him to get too close, and he had learned not to meddle where he wasn't wanted. A tough lesson to learn, but a good one.

The free-for-all reached the six-minute mark.

As expected, Vinamour's Platoons chose to attack Mark and the others. Unexpectedly, Blue Sky ignored the Battalion Commanders' agreement and rushed toward Shen, yelling, "Attack!"

She didn't even tell them who to attack! Mark shook his head and chuckled self-deprecatingly. So much for his plans...

He really hoped Blue Sky didn't win because he didn't want a battle maniac like her commanding the entire brigade. If not for him being a good little soldier, he would ensure her defeat. As things stood, he would rather do his best than risk Shen noticing he was pulling his punches.

So, following his Commanders' orders, he turned to the side and attacked the closest and least protected enemy. Going against their agreement sucked, and being the first to do it would make him look bad. But he could only do what he was supposed to, then hope they believed him when he explained himself.

Such was the life of a weakling in the military.