The Archaic System 34 Proof

Alexander Morrow's look of immense joyed lasted for a few minutes as he asked me questions of my childhood and my time in Agartha. Using a mixture of truths and lies I weaved an exceedingly believable story of a young man who struggled early in life, but was eventually able to rise up and make something of himself. I even elaborated on the struggles I faced in the wilderness and how my necklace was broken and lost in a desperate attempt to survive. After listening closely to my story Morrow seemed satisfied, however, I noticed a solemn look come over his features.

He looked at me as a dominant atmosphere developed around him, "I am happy to find you brother. And even though you killed Captain Sauer I can look past it for my mothers sake. However, don't you owe me some explanation."

I gave him an innocent smile as I confidently responded, "I can understand your concern brother. In truth when I first arrived here from the wilderness I was ecstatic to find that you were the lord. Mother had pa.s.sed a message to me a few months before the migration that if I could I should find you in Agartha. Yet after many days of trying to get into contact with you I couldn't get through your men who would turn me away without a glance."

Morrow nodded as he understood his organization and had set it up this way on purpose to keep out people he viewed as unimportant as ants.

I continued, "One day while sitting in a tavern I overheard a conversation concerning Sauer that made me curious. A young man was describing how he had joined a "personal force" of Sauer's. I considered this strange, however, I couldn't discern whether this was under your orders or not."

After saying this Morrow's brow raised and a cold look solidified on his face.

"After investigating I was able to find proof that he was developing his force in secret and when I heard he would be the final opponent in the arena I realized that would be the best way to resolve a problem for my older brother and give us a chance to meet. There was no way I could reveal the information I had because Sauer would have found some way to suppress it and would have undoubtedly had me tracked down and killed to keep you from finding out."

Morrow nodded his head again understanding the logic of what I was saying. Of course he didn't know that it was mostly made up and a carefully planned lie.

He then asked, "Do you still have the proof that Sauer was building a secret force?"

"Of course," I responded.

I then pulled out the doc.u.ments I had stuffed underneath my inner armor before the fight in expectation of this meeting. Naturally these were the doc.u.ments that I had Barry steal at great peril to his life. To get these doc.u.ments Barry had to break into Sauer's office and retrieve them. Luckily for Barry he was a member of the mercenary group or else he would have had almost no chance at succeeding.

These doc.u.ments contained a record of the money Sauer had embezzled from city funds and used to develop his own personal force. It also had a detailed record of every man under his payroll. We were fortunate that Sauer was partic.i.p.ating in the Arena today because if he had returned to his office to find these doc.u.ments missing he would have became extremely vigilant and might have even fled.

I handed the doc.u.ments over to Alexander Morrow. As he began to peruse the doc.u.ments anger began to distort his features. Eventually he lost all control and slammed his palm down onto his desk in fury. The solid wood desk shook and a crack originating at his palm shot across the desk like a viper. He nearly split the desk in half.

I couldn't help but take a deep breath. There is no doubt that his strength stat was similar to mine, but it had to be less than Sauer's, after all Morrow wouldn't be as foolish as Sauer and invest all his stats into strength. If I had to guess Morrow had to be a level 5, maybe even a level 6.

No doubt Morrow had a firm physical foundation to start at. After all, the standard soldier from earth would have his basic stats start at 10. Even after I consumed the Geodenesis Arboreth sap my basic stats only improved enough to put me at the same starting point as a normal human. It wasn't until I was level 4 that I had the same stats as a soldier started with. Essentially I'm at the same fitness as a level 5 soldier even though I'm level 9 due to my weak starting fitness. Being a government officials son and having trained from an early age I am sure Morrow had a similar starting fitness as a soldier. That means based purely off fitness Morrow and I should be at the same level. In an actual fight fitness isn't everything so even at the same fitness I could fairly easily win over Morrow with my past experience and my techniques.

Even though I could defeat him fairly easily there were two reasons I couldn't kill him here in office and simply take over the village. One, there were a large number of guards on the residence so if I didn't cleanly kill him in one strike I'd have a small chance of making it out alive. Two, even if I cleanly killed him and made it out alive it'd cause chaos in the town which wouldn't be beneficial to my plans. It is much more beneficial to gain his trust and build up my force on my own.

After Morrow's anger subsided and he sat back in his chair I said to him, "Now can you understand why I had to do what I did dear brother? How could I allow this snake in the gra.s.s to live and put everything you worked so hard for in jeopardy?"

Alexander Morrow looked at me, joy, appreciation, and gratefulness radiating from his features, "I really cannot thank brother enough for handling this matter for me. It just so happens that I'm currently in need of a Captain for my mercenary group and you have clearly demonstrated your combat ability in your fight with Sauer. How about it brother, will you be my Captain?"

An enormous grin spread across my face, "I'd be honored," I said as I stood and deeply bowed. Unfortunately, for Morrow he couldn't see how sinister my grin was as I stared at the ground.