The five warriors and two unconscious captives stood on a hill overlooking an extravagant manor.

“Are you sure we can just walk in?” Clef asked Kairos.

“I’m sure,” Kairos nodded.

“And we are to capture the head of the manor?” Boink confirmed their objective.

“Uhuh,” Kairos replied confidently.

“Once we captured our target, this manor will become ours?” Lulatia questioned, doubtfully.

“Right on!”

“Really?” The three of them said at the same time.

Relestia just laughed.

She feels like she is a reader, observing the turn of pages as a saga unfolds, instead of a participant.

“I’ll look after our two guests,” Clef offered.

“Okay, just knock them out again if they start waking.”

They walked up to the manor, jumped over the fences meant to keep critters off the lawn, and headed towards the door.

Kairos politely knocked, much to the surprise of the butler who was not expecting visitors. Moreover, most would inform of their arrival beforehand and await someone to bring them in from the gates instead of coming straight to the door.

“Pardon our uninvited visit, may I inquire if the master of the house is home?”

“Young sirs and ladies are you friends with the master?” the wizened but well-dressed man questioned. His intonation n clearly brought across his displeasure of the rude

“Nay, we are not. Our purpose is in the nature of business with your master.”

“I apologise that you must send in your proposal for the master to peruse. If you brought your ideas in writing and should he feel the encounter to be engaging, he shall send for you again. Kindly return for today.”

Kairos smiled then handed a piece of letter to the butler but shown no signs of leaving.

The man raised an eyebrow but turn his eyes towards the paper on his hand. There is no envelope or seal. Only a mere piece of paper, hand-sized, and unfolded. Thinking that this might not be anything too private, the butler decided to read the letter and then decide should it go into the trash or be passed to the master.

When he saw what was written, all colour drained from his face.

A single line of words was beautifully written, “Mister Thunderstalk, we have come for your owed due to us and to the great Saint Empire. Sincerely, Princess Relestia Vestimore & Great General Kairos Astroire.

As the supreme commander of over two hundred thousand man, Kairos’ official title should be a Martial King, but on the Axis, they used a more understandable term.

The man trembled violently then fell to his knees, “HIEEEE….! S… swo… Soorry! Let me off! If you let me off, I’ll serve as your butler!”

Most men would panic when Kairos and Relestia’s identities are revealed, but the butler is clearly on another level.

The four of them looked at each other, clearly dumbfounded.

“Eh?”

A complete and immediate surrender.

Suddenly the butler jumped up on his feet, much unlike a man of his years, “I know! I will deliver your message quickly! If I show my sincerity, will you let me off?”

Researchers have demonstrated, although there is a link, intelligence and emotional intelligence are separate.

Kairos, vastly talented in the prior, secretly socially awkward for the latter, brilliantly just nodded, only to see the man cheerfully rush off shouting, “Everyone! Lord Kairos and Princess Relestia are here!”

Relestia sighed.

Now everyone will know.

Men… Piffft.

Give them a sword and they can tell you a thousand things about it but give them a person to talk to and suddenly, they can’t speak the language properly.

Kairos only reacted after the butler screaming down the hall, giving everyone in the manor a heads up to flee.

A series of booms and crackle quickly flooded the manor. People started screaming and running about with frantic steps.

This time it was Kairos who sighed.

They must have been following the news of the battle in the streets but had not yet heard that things had finished.

To have the group that fought an army come knocking at the door, asking for reparations, it is understandable why they turn frantic.

But even so, they are a tad overly dramatic, Kairos mused.

Not even a drop of blood was shed… well, except for those who fell or was struck by their fellows.

…..

Looking at the reports from the dwarven scouts, the dwarven king passed the papers to his guests at the banquet.

The gnome king and his two elders each read it several times, as if they need to make certain of what was written.

After a long pause the gnome king sighed, “I may have underestimated our opponent. It seems that I must go to the children personally to make peace.”

…..

High Gnome Thunderstalk sat by the window of his study looking out at the green that stretches out towards the city.

It isn’t easy to have such a spacious residence in this cramped up place. The Blacken Soot Mountain is vast, but for the gnomes that should be basking under the sun and enjoying the garden’s breeze, it is very limiting.

His eyebrows furrowed together, creased from the recent series of failures he suffered at the hands of a young lad.

Lord Thunderstalk had climbed to his position through a series of brilliant deals and being at the right place at the right time. Granted, most of which is inherited, and the rest came from favours owed to his father, but what matters is he is a winner all his life.

Of course, he will never admit to that, fully believing that he achieved everything with his overwhelming intellect.

Suddenly, his eyes drifted to some movements down to the field below.

The foolish commoners are running about aimlessly in his yard once again. He had told them to earn their paygrade, it seems like they had forgotten once again. It is true that he is paying them peanuts, but they should be thankful enough for any scrap off his table.

Curiosity piqued, Thunderstalk opened pulled the window slightly ajar to listen to the commotion below.

The muffled mess of voices became clearer, and from the noises he managed to hear something being repeated, “Kairos and Relestia are here!”

The gnome dropped his jaws in shock, his eyes widened with fear, and his hands shivered uncontrollably.

“Oh no, oh no, oh no.”

Thunderstalk looked around the room for something to grab, snatched a stick leaning against the wall. A Sunflower Pop club. It is a sturdy rod personalised to his grip in a game popular with the gentry.

He turned towards the door, stick in hand, but his whole body shook like a leaf.

“No, no, no. They defeated my army? I need to flee.”

Thunderstalk ran for the exit, but outside the pattering of feet became louder. Along with it is his butler screaming, “Everyone! Lord Kairos and Princess Relestia are here!”

The butler almost ran into the door as he forced it open, and it slammed with full force into Thunderstalk’s nose who was in the middle of his great escape.

The butler stared at his master.

Thunderstalk looked into the eyes of his butler.

*Tut tut*

A tooth fell off and dropped to the floor.

“Hiee?”

Darkness swooped up the man and he fell back into her embrace.

Moments later, Thunderstalk found himself waking up on the floor.

Kairos, Relestia, Clef, Lulatia, and Boink sat around him. On the side, the two unconscious heroes, Rachel and George, remained motionless.

“Good morning,” Kairos said with a smile.

“HIEEEE!” Thunderstalk fainted.

“… Goodnight, I guess?” Kairos muttered with a confused expression. Was he that scary looking?

Relestia and Lulatia chuckled. Boink and Clef burst into laughter.

Moments later, the second time, Thunderstalk found himself waking up at the same spot.

A strange sting is in his nose, half of it from the door, the other half because of the smelling salts used to wake him.

This time round the gnome did not lose conscious but he shut his eyes tight and pretended to be.

Looking at the terrified man, Kairos said, “You know, you can tell the character of the employer from the culture of his company.”

Lulatia said, “He meant to say, your people are very dramatic.”

Clef added, “And cowardly.”

Boink finished him off, “Like you.”

“No!” was the only thing Thunderstalk could cry out.

The expected questioning came. Despite what he said, the gnome is indeed cowardly. He did not need much to crack open all his secrets, but what they heard was unexpected.

“You say that the dwarves funded you?”

“Sure, they did.”

A dark and heavy atmosphere descended upon them all. A long-time ally of theirs turned out to have a hand in their problems.

“Hold on, did they partake in the planning or simply provided you with resources?”

“… The latter,” Thunderstalk admitted.

“And do you know the reason?”

“Of course, it is because I am worthy of their investment!”

The five of them looked at the fool, but he firmly believes in what he said. They knocked him out again and the room fell quiet.

“Delusions of grandeur.”

“Agreed, but why would the dwaves pay him?”

“Discord. They wanted him to create chaos. Any problems that the gnomes have would be beneficial to them.”

“I think we need to know what exactly the dwarves want.”

There are more things to investigate while the people they can trust are becoming less. Kairos felt a need to establish an information agency much alike the Dark Hall.

Unlike on Gaia, they have no expert in this area, fortunately Kairos had quickly read through the training manuals as he walked through all the nine halls.

At that time, he did that just in case they failed to subvert the Dark Hall and needed to create a similar institution from scratch.

Little did he expect to need that knowledge now.

The two heroes they captured soon woke.

When questioned about their motives, they were met with complete silence.

To have George and Rachel stare dumbly back, anyone would figure that something is wrong.

They did a few more checks and concluded that both persons had their personalities removed by a spell.

Without a personality these two are nothing more than machines and that is exactly what those that sent them wanted.

From the beginning, Rachel and George had rejected joining the other heroes to ‘save the world’, preferring to live in this new world as commoners starting anew.

At that time, the six pairs of teenagers did not know the ambitions of their summoners and fell deeply into the snare.

The only person who had any form of preparation and caution was Kairos who had more life experience than the rest of his peers.

Thinking back, perhaps the heroes are mere victims of the greed of the powerful.

Looking at Lulatia and Clef, Kairos asked, “Is there a way to reverse this?”

Both mages shook their heads.

Clef said, “There are two ways to take away a personality. By sealing it or by removing it. The prior is still possible, but for these two…”

He shook his head again.

The room fell silent. George and Rachel continued to stare at the five of them as if the matter did not concern them.

The elf mage thought a little then said, “There are three things we can do for them now. The first one is to hope that whoever did this left what he took intact. If we can retrieve it and return to them, they will go back to normal.

The second method is to head to the elven lands, there are many great elven mages and one might find a way to reverse this.

The third method is to let them develop new personalities. If we break the spell affecting their minds now, they will become like newborns but with their memories intact.”

“Hold on, you mean to say that they remember everything that happened to them?”

“Well, yeah. Taking away their personalities only erases their own desires, but it doesn’t mess with their memory.”

Every moment new bubbling desires and thoughts believed to be unnecessary are removed. Instead, their minds conceive their mission as the utmost importance – a thought that is implanted into their heads.

George and Rachel remain manageable for now because the two sees no escape, however they will in no circumstance surrender, and this makes keeping them under control a difficulty. Moreover, after finding out what happened, the gang sympathised with them.

Of course, there is no greenhorn here in the group naïve enough to take in anyone that needed help. The reason they are looking for solutions is because besides that it is the right thing to do, these people have suffered the same things as Kairos and Relestia and have the power to help them.

Unable to get any information out of the two, they reinforced the bindings and then went downstairs to the hall.

The people they are waiting for soon arrived.

There was no blaring trumpets or announcers to declare the royalty that arrived.

Just a couple of old man that came knocking at the door. Kairos welcomed them in and led the group to the adjacent meeting room.

Although it is not the round tables of the Jarls, the place is elaborate with a grand map pinned to the wall at the back.

The sealing of the room is well-made with thick walls and a heavy door to ensure noise isolation and privacy. The door frame is also fitted with anti-spying magic that will disable recording devices from being brought into the room.

On the whole, it is a completely furnished war room befitting a great general. Looking at the furniture, however, this room seemed hardly used. A glance on the mana storage indicator at the side confirmed this. All the spells are fully charged despite having different energy use shows that they had never needed a recharge before.

They freely went around choosing whichever seat they fancied without any care for the customary etiquettes.

This is a group made up of the most powerful and influential leaders, not only amongst their nation but of the whole of Axis Mundi, and when they gather outside of the public eye most of them prefer to do without the extra tediousness.

The conversation was clean cut and straight forward as well. Those who are used to the roundabout ways of diplomacy would never believe that how indecorous the top dogs can be in private.

“State your demands,” the Gnome King said the moment he got seated.

Relestia smiled and gestured towards Kairos, allowing him to speak for her.

On the side, the Dwarf King rapped the table with his knuckle and warned, “Can’t you be more polite you old fool? You’re speaking to someone who beat you.”

“What? Are you picking a fight with me, you old rogue?”

“I’m just stating facts, you loser.”

“Shut it, I’m still the king and this is still my city!”

“Sore loser,” Hogard gloated.

“Wipe that glee off or I’ll adjust your face for you!”

The two gnome elders that always accompanies their king is no better.

The red elder slammed the table and the black elder dug his nose and threw a booger at Hogard who deftly dodged.

“Gentleman,” Kairos sighed, “I’m still a lad, shouldn’t you act like elders in front of me?”

“Neh,” the black elder refused without hesitation, digging further for a bigger booger missile.

The red elder pushed his nose upward.

Kairos took a side glance at the Dwarf King. Hogard who was caught secretly putting a finger towards his nose, unwillingly put his hand down.

Kairos privately praised himself, it was this close to a scene he did not want to see.

Unexpected to him, the Gnome King was the politest of this lot.

Since everyone prefer to be straightforward, Kairos did not beat around the bush either.

He indicated with a nod to his bodyguard, and the burly man threw a tied up unconscious gnome onto the table, Lord Thunderstalk.

The Gnome King raised an eyebrow.

Kairos said, “I’m sure you’ve heard about Gaia and the Saint Empire by now. What are your thoughts on this matter?”