"Hyiiiiiiiieeekk!!!"

*BANG*

The frightened Zurg soldier went limp. A marble-sized hole can be seen on his forehead.

'It's been centuries since I've properly shot at a target, but I see that my aim has gotten better.'

Currently, Lucius was performing a light exercise on the fleeing Zurg soldiers.

While most of them have died on the battlefield, there were still tens of thousands who fled.

Luckily, he immediately dispatched his army to capture the rest. The ones who resisted were shot down.

And he was also participating on the hunt.

But unlike his men, who were just doing what they were ordered to do, he was just there to test his brand new weapon.

'I knew it was right to copy the design.'

He was holding a handgun, but it wasn't just a normal handgun, it was instead powered by electricty.

Yes, this was his first time making a railgun.

'Gunpowder is fine and all, but I need a more diverse choice of weaponry for my military.'

*BANG*

"AAACK!"

Another fleeing soldier was shot. This time, he shot him on the foot.

*BANG*

"AAARGH!?!"

Lucius approached him while casually shooting his other foot.

"No please!!! Spare me!!!"

The soldier looked young. In fact, he was still only 15 years old.

"Are you sure you want me to spare you?"

Lucius asked with a sadistic smile.

"YES!!! I'LL DO ANYTHING!"

The young soldier begged in tears.

"Fine, but don't regret it."

*BANG* *BANG* *BANG* *BANG* *BANG*

Lucius shot 5 more bullets at him.

*COUGH COUGH*

"Haghlugrhrhr??!?!"

This time, he targeted his hands, his crotch and both sides of his lungs, rendering him unable to breathe due to his lungs drowning in blood.

Satistified with the results, he left the still 15-year-old soldier to die a more miserable death.

'I spared him alright, spared him a quick death that is.'

He whistled happily while strolling in the thick woods, casually searching for more Zurg soldiers.

Suddenly, he hit his head.

'Snap out of it.'

He realized that his insanity took over for a moment.

'Well that was dangerous. I should be increasing the security measures of my brain.'

Usually, he would let his insanity take over when he's faced with certain situations.

But earlier, his insanity took over involuntarily.

It had happened multiple times during his stay in Heimer, but it usually wasn't as bad as earlier.

His two last incidents happened because he met someone who he knew after his partial memory wipe, which happened on the crashed spaceship.

Once when he killed the aforementioned man, and once again a short moment afterwards, when he tortured Duke Videl's grandson.

'Hmmm, must be because of that man.'

After the mysterious man's visit, his mind had become more unstable.

'I'll have to redo the whole thing later. But for now....'

*BANG*

He shot at a tree, but moments after, a hiding Zurg soldier fell onto the ground. The shot perfectly hit his heart, even though he hid behind the tree.

'Thanks, helmet body heat camera. That was a nice job.'

He jovially complimented his own gear, for some weird reason.

****

"Sir! Sir! It's an emergency!"

"What is it?"

The Zurg messenger panickingly conveyed the bad news to Edmund.

"General Ubrigate's forces have all been annihilated!"

'Sigh, I had a feeling this would happen. But I didn't expect it would be this soon.'

"So how many of our soldiers survived?"

"O-one."

"One?!"

"Y-yes, it seems that the survivor was deliberately let go by them to spread a warning."

"I see."

'Since there's no point in me flanking, it seems that retreating would be the best option. I don't care if that retarded Emperor punishes me, I can't just march towards my own death. Wait, unless....'

****

"And with that said, we will be surrendering ourselves."

He conveyed his plan to the commanders.

Technically speaking, there was no way he could order them to do such a thing. After all, he was merely a strategist.

However, he wasn't just any normal strategist. He was Edmund De Corvus, the best strategist ever to exist in the whole history of the Zurg Empire.

The reason why the Zurg Empire had risen to the peak of the entire continent was mostly due to him. 

However, it was all going in shambles due to the new Emperor, who was just a spoiled brat.

"Although it would be a gamble, we shall start anew."

To begin with, the soldiers and high ranking military officers with him were all his own soldiers.

Edmund was a noble in Empire, a Count to be more specific.

His men were loyal to him, and him only.

Family members? Other than distant relatives, his closest family members had already died.

His men were on the same boat. All of their immediate family members were gone, leaving them with no one to worry about but themselves and their lord, Edmund.

'I'll pay you back more than a hundred times.'

His target of revenge was the current Emperor of Zurg.

****

"They surrendered?"

"Indeed."

"And you said that the Elves were the ones who discovered them?"

"That is what happened, your Majesty."

"Alright then, I'll meet with them. Could you bring me Elizabeth, Sebastian?"

"I shall do so, your Majesty."

****

"Hmpph! I thought we were going on a date."

Elizabeth pouted, clearly a bit upset of the current situation.

"We are, just right after meeting with them."

And Lucius tried to convince her to calm down.

Although her cute pouting expression made him want to taunt her, it wasn't the right decision to do so.

"I promise to take a break tomorrow. Our date will last from after the meeting until the end of tomorrow."

The promise seemed to make her pout lighten a bit, and it even made her restrain a small smile.

"Now let's meet the guy and quickly do our thing. With you helping me, we'll be much faster to go on with our date."

****

After a few hours of travelling into the border of their territory, which sat just outside the tunnel going through the northern mountain range, they came across the furthest settlement of Heimer.

This settlement was still a few months old, so it was still undergoing rapid development.

The settlement, which seemed to be rapidly developing into a small town, served as both a temporary military outpost and a new trade hub.

Although Heimer's trade with the outside world was still forbidden with the exception of the Enrivier Empire, many traders and merchants from other nations were bypassing this policy by making deals with Enrivier's merchants and traders.

These deals supposedly gave Enrivier merchants a certain cut from selling outside products Heimer. Meaning, for every single outsider merchant's product they sold to Heimer's merchant, the Enrivier merchants would also get a percentage of the profit.

Lucius didn't think that buying these products was bad, but selling Heimer's products to outsider merchants through Enrivier merchants was definitely bad for his goals.

Thus, he limited the nation's exports to primitive and raw resources only. Keeping in-check the status quo of secrecy while guaranteeing a succesful import-export economy.

After passing through the still unnamed settlement, he and Elizabeth arrived at their destination whilst riding his carriage and accompanied by his entourage of knights, which were actually the royal guards he called 'Guardians'.

These guardians had been never deployed outside of the castle until now.

From the moment they were formed, they've been trained differently from the police and military.

They were more like a fusion of Spec Ops and Secret Service agents with the main task of guarding the king and royal family.

All of them carried advanced weapons not found in the military yet. The pistol railgun Lucius was testing earlier will soon go into their hands first, while the military will receive them much much later than the guardians.

'Ah, how I wish cars were real. I want to ride one so bad. These carriages suck real bad.'

"Elizabeth, we've arrived."

"Nnhh, just 5 more minutes...."

Elizabeth was sleeping due to the lengthy travel time.

"Come on, I thought you wanted to go on our date sooner?"

She immediately woke up with excitement.