The Magician of Sound

"General Paolo and General Erica."

"Yo!" Paolo waved his hand while grinning as if he had expected him to come.

Meanwhile, Erica nodded to him and saluted back. "Good work for coming here."

"Yes." Kai shook their hands before introducing Evan. "This is my friend who will finish this mission with me, Evan Young."

"I know you! You were the one who healed our soldiers in the war." Paolo nodded and shook Evan's hand.

"Nice to meet you." Erica also did the same.

"Still, I never expected to see both of you here." Kai chuckled, not knowing whether to feel relief because he met an acquaintance or feel pressured because they became his boss.

"As you already know, I am the muscle while she is the brain. During the construction process, she is the master in charge of construction and the deployment of the army, while I am the one protecting this base. The others can't defeat us at this, so we are tasked to complete the construction process here."

"I see." Kai nodded. He had witnessed Erica's brilliance, so he knew it wasn't an empty word. As for Paolo, his strength could be considered top class because he rose through the ranks with his prowess alone. With these two, the base shouldn't have any problems.

"We have heard the report about you coming, so it's better to greet you here," said Erica while stretching her hand in the opposite direction. "Now, let's go inside."

Kai nodded and followed the couple.

They walked toward the meeting room where the couple and the commanders under them met. Paolo took the front seat while Erica prepared the presentation. Kai and Evan took their seats as well and waited.

"While we are waiting, I want to clarify first. You two are going to be the only ones coming, right?"

"Yes. Because of a few reasons, only us who are going to complete the mission." Kai nodded.

"Alright." Paolo nodded without saying much. He had deep satisfaction with Kai's performance and had been digging all his information. He realized that if Kai said two people are enough, it would be enough. Although he would ask a few questions if the condition became truly ridiculous, he would be satisfied with a good explanation from Kai.

"Still, don't underestimate the magical beasts that much, alright?" Erica warned them with a smile.

"I understand." Kai nodded. "Is there something suspicious around here?"

He never asked this question during his mission in Yukon Territory because it was too far from where the protectors usually spotted. However, this base was near the place where they fought against the S rank spider, so him asking something like that was nothing extraordinary.

"I don't think so. There are a few things that can be questioned, but there is nothing extraordinary. I doubt there will be a protector around." Erica shook her head.

"Yeah. Maybe they have taken too much loss during the last battle… After all, they have lost two protectors at the same time. As for the magical beasts, I doubt they will run out anytime soon." Paolo sighed.

"Now that you mention it, this place has become the frontline, right? How many soldiers are there in this base?" Kai asked.

"Because we have a joint operation with the military base in Chile, we only have seventy thousand soldiers. We place ten thousand around the coast to watch out any incoming enemies from the sea and forty thousand to expand our border."

Kai furrowed his eyebrows and asked, "Where are the other twenty thousand?"

"Ten thousand are our reserve soldiers… Basically, they are the soldiers you can see around the base. The other ten thousand are helping Chile right now."

"I see." Kai thought for a moment and asked, "By the way, how many soldiers do we have in the southern frontier?"

"Because we need to spare soldiers around the base and the military base in each region and the fact that this era is filled with blood, we have around fifteen million soldiers… Well, half of them are in the reserve army while the other half are scattered." Paolo thought for a bit. "Since we have that much, do you think we should spare more for the last mission?"

"Yes…" Kai nodded.

"That's what I thought at first, but not possible. Maybe because you are too focused on each region battle, you can't see it now, but if you are looking at the entire base, we don't have anywhere enough to speed up our process…"

"An entire base, huh…" Kai narrowed his eyes. "I see. I also need to see the number of casualties and the threats."

"Yep. There was a big threat from the protectors, so many soldiers reinforced each region, leaving only us with tens of thousand soldiers. And the fact that the retired soldiers are too much, we can't really spend more just to get them injured."

"While fighting, we need to maintain the number and other things… It seems that my view is still too narrow."

"I don't say it's too narrow. You just haven't started experiencing how those people in the base control the soldier distribution. Trust me, I have seen it once and don't want to see it again. I simply can't handle it." Paolo laughed.

"Well, they are thinking about how to distribute soldiers and resources to us. Meanwhile, we, the field generals, are required to use what we've got to destroy magical beasts. That's all."

"Yes. I can see that." Kai nodded. "Thank you. This is new to me."

"Haha, you haven't joined the army yet, so don't think much about it." Erica shook her head. "Anyway, let's go back to the point."

Kai nodded, looking at the map projected on a whiteboard.

"As you already know, we are collaborating with Chile Military Base in this campaign. After the spider died, the control that it had in this region disappeared. Many powerful beasts, intelligent or not, started making their own territories.

"There are some that don't want to adhere to this and banded together to challenge those beasts that have territories. Unfortunately, during this process, they create another territory in ours. Hence, we are eliminating them right now."

Kai looked down and nodded. He was slightly surprised by the control that an S rank magical beast had over their territory. And it turned out that their territory was bigger than he expected.

He never thought this once, but this made him understand the fact that killing an S rank magical beast would lead the magical beasts to make their own territory. This proved how everything couldn't be resolved just by killing their leaders, but…

"Of course, there is also an advantage to kill the strongest beast first or you can say their leader. First, they will lose the leadership, stopping the chain of command from the magical beasts.

"In other words, we don't need to fight one million beasts in a single time. Instead, we can fight one hundred thousand ten times. The latter will require fewer resources than the former, so it will benefit us even though it will take a bit longer.

"Anyway, some of these beasts are making their territory now, and their numbers are around eighty thousand. This is a huge number, but we are planning to kill their leaders first to scatter the magical beasts even further before eliminating them one by one.

"And this mission lies on your shoulder now." Erica finished her explanation with a smile.

"Oi, oi. We are talking about eighty thousand magical beasts, you know…" Kai twitched his eyebrows.

"I know. However, not all of them are fighting us. Half of them are fighting those leaders as they are trying to snatch their territory to increase their power. Because of that, it will be a battle of time. Suppose we can kill the leaders before they absorb another territory. In that case, we should be able to eliminate the rest within one or two weeks.

"Hence, your mission is to sneak around them while most of the magical beasts are paying attention to us." Erica finished the explanation with an order.

"What is the time limit?"

"From what we have seen, there are a few leaders coming to the territory beside them and almost successfully kill their leader, so… Around three days starting from tomorrow?"

"Hmm." Kai looked down, falling into deep thought.

"Do you have a suggestion?"

"If we are assuming the prediction is correct, I will use the first day to reduce their number. Then, the second day will be where I kill the leaders. This way, the soldiers can occupy the territory. However, I would like the soldiers to stop there.

"Since they want the territory, just let them kill the magical beast in charge there. I am sure they are going to return to the original territory to inform their friends about it. That's where we are coming."

Erica furrowed her eyebrows. "Do you think the magical beasts are that intelligent?"

"Nope. It's just the basic instinct. Even if they are magical beasts, they are originally an animal. It makes me sick to say this, but most of the time, animals are more trustable than humans… So, I am sure they will return."

"In that case, I will inform the Chile Military Base to hold their position. Do you want to lead the soldiers too?"

"No. My mission this time is to kill the leaders, so I will simply do just that." Kai shook his head.

"That is a shame, but that's inevitable. If there is a different situation, we have a few commanders there. I will give you a written order to take over the army if the situation goes wrong."

"I understand. I just hope it's not necessary." Kai nodded.

They then talked a few more things before a soldier led them to their own room to rest.