Whose Lookout Squad Is This?

The two ten-man West squads fled in panic after leaving nine bodies near the barracks. Add the three men Leo had just shot dead on the road, and they had lost twelve soldiers in total.

Ignaz shouted excitedly, then picked up his longbow and fired at the fleeing West soldiers. His arrows, however, did not have much power. Ignaz was a veteran who had been a soldier for many years. He was also a new recruit, because this was his first real battle.

When Ignaz saw Leo walking over, he happily said, "Squad Leader! We won!"

What greeted Ignaz was a pair of furious eyes and an enraged fist. Leo drove a heavy punch into Ignaz's face. Ignaz staggered several steps backward and fell to the ground, still dazed and completely unable to understand what had just happened.

Leo's powerful hand seized Ignaz by the collar and roughly dragged him across the ground. Leo's helmet and breastplate were covered in blood. At that moment, he looked like a savage lion, and the surviving soldiers around him were completely dumbfounded.

Ignaz was dragged in front of a dead lookout squad soldier. It was the tall, thin soldier who had been closest to Ignaz, a man whose name Leo had not even remembered. Leo pressed down on Ignaz's head and forced his face against the dead soldier's cold cheek, then roared with all his strength.

"Ignaz! You idiot with nothing but that damned Squad Leader position in your head! You are responsible for these four dead soldiers! I gave the order to attack. Why didn't you attack immediately? Why didn't you jump down immediately? Answer me! Answer me!"

One side of Ignaz's face was pressed against the cold corpse of the soldier he had once known best. The other was clamped tightly in Leo's powerful hand. He could not say a single word. He was beginning to understand what he had done wrong.

Leo continued roaring. "Ignaz! Don't think I didn't notice! After I gave the order to attack, everyone was looking at you! They were all waiting for instructions from you, you idiot!

"I'm just an outsider who hasn't even been here ten days. You're the Deputy Squad Leader who has lived and worked beside them for years! This is your lookout squad. I knew that from my first day here!

"If you had jumped down immediately too, we would have gotten the most out of the element of surprise! Look at what you did, you idiot! Because you were three seconds late, those West bastards had time to prepare! Because you were three seconds late, our advantage disappeared completely! Because you were three seconds late, how many soldiers died who could have lived?

"If I cut you down right now, I could call it enforcing military law, you cowardly idiot!"

Leo had said more in those few seconds than he had in the previous eight or nine days combined. He suddenly stood, swept his gaze across the survivors, and roared, "Assemble! Form ranks!"

The 2nd Lookout Squad had started with nine men. Now only five remained: Leo, Ignaz, Little Locke, the short, stocky cook Tim Fielding, and the bearded Oliver Conney.

The other three soldiers stood obediently in front of Leo, still badly shaken, while Ignaz remained stiffly sprawled on the ground. Leo kicked him hard. "Form ranks!"

Ignaz scrambled to his feet and took his place at the back of the formation.

Leo swept his eyes over the four faces before him and shouted, "This is war! A war where people die! I'm saying this for the last time! Execute my orders! Every damned one of you, execute my orders!"

The four men barely dared breathe. Only now did they finally realize that their duty was no longer simply to keep watch. This was war.

Leo shouted, "Ignaz! Collect the enemy heads and hide them! They're proof of our battle merit! Little Locke! Collect the enemy matchlocks and the powder belts around their waists! Tim Fielding! Pack enough food and fresh water to last the five of us for one day! Oliver Conney! Hide the bodies of our fallen men. We'll come back later and properly recover their remains!"

The four hurried to work while Leo stood silently to one side. He looked as though he were staring into space, but he was thinking about an important problem.

He had made a mistake. A serious mistake.

As the Squad Leader, Leo had been with this squad for nine days, yet he had never truly taken control of it. There were many reasons for that.

First, Leo himself had not been very motivated. Sooner or later, he would return to Major Willy's 4th Infantry Battalion, so he had never cared very much about this place.

Second, Leo had not paid attention to details. He had turned a blind eye to the problems in the 2nd Lookout Squad. Even when he noticed something, he pretended not to see it. That was why mistakes had appeared again and again during the battle.

Finally, Leo had never established his authority as a commander. Even if Leo was the Squad Leader, whenever he ordered someone to do something, that person would still ask inwardly: Why should I listen to you?

Great commanders throughout history were often described as possessing tremendous prestige. What that prestige really meant was that their orders could be carried all the way down to every soldier.

Different commanders achieved it in different ways. Some ate and lived alongside their soldiers. Some maintained enough dignity and authority. Some relied on strict military law. Each had their own methods.

Leo's greatest problem as Squad Leader was that the soldiers carried out his orders terribly. Their ability to execute commands was extremely poor. The lookout squad soldiers were accustomed to obeying Deputy Squad Leader Ignaz. They had been together for years.

Leo's treatment of Ignaz just now had clearly been cruel, but he had no other choice. This squad could not follow Ignaz. If it did, it would only march toward destruction.

Ignaz was closer to a seasoned old hand than a commander. He showed Leo enough respect and knew how to find his place, but he was not a good commander. If the 2nd Lookout Squad wanted to survive, there could only be one commander, and that commander had to be Leo.

During this battle, Leo had ended the lives of four enemies with his mace. That brought his Cipher soul power to 41 points, making him a D-Grade Tier 4 Cipher Mage.

Ignaz mechanically carried out Leo's orders, while the other three soldiers occasionally glanced at Leo's cold expression. They moved quickly, and soon the battlefield had been cleared.

Tim Fielding prepared enough dry rations and waterskins and distributed them to everyone. Little Locke carried three matchlocks on his back and had three powder belts hanging from his body. Each belt still held seven or eight powder flasks.

Leo assembled the squad again. Looking at their still-shaken expressions, then at the way they waited for his orders, Leo finally knew that he had taken control of this lookout squad.

"Ignaz!" Leo called.

"Here..." Ignaz answered in a trembling voice.

Leo frowned. "Ignaz, lead the way. We'll use the steep path down the cliff and move to the beach. We definitely won't be able to hold against the next West Empire attack. The lookout tower has already fallen. There's no reason for us to keep defending this place."

Half an hour later, three more ten-man West Empire squads reached the lookout tower, but there was no one left there.