Spoiler
After a week of inspecting all the slaves, the drafts finished. Adonia was pleased with the result. They have managed to gather more than four thousand ohrols for their army. According to her contacts in Kalligan, that was more than Mael managed to gather which was a surprise since he was soon to be the king.
She had all the newly drafted soldiers gathered in the old barracks which weren’t in use since the Separation war. The old barracks were more spacious than the new ones, but they were in bad condition due to years of not being used. Even before the war, they were only used by less fortunate warriors.
Adonia would have preferred if they could get some funds to renovate the building. She knew that was an impossible request considering the amount of gold she wrangled out from the King for the military draft.
During drafting, the look of despair was present on most of the draftees, with some exceptions. Adonia decided they would need a word of encouragement before they start with training.
Her stomach felt weak as she looked at the group in front of her. With mud ingrained in their skin and weak bearing, Adonia stepped back in case some disease came her way. They needed a bath more than anything else.
At least they weren’t walking corpses like Solus was, she comforted herself. After she managed to transform him, these slaves would be easy.
Unfortunately, they were still slaves, not soldiers. And if she wanted them to clean themselves properly, she needed to get the idea of them being slaves out of their heads first.
Somehow, slaves didn’t find the reason to clean themselves which made it way harder for Adonia to get any. Amana and Ellea were the only ones she managed to get to bathe properly and regularly.
She had to convince everyone gathered they were not slaves any longer, and that they are not picked for a death sentence.
“Alright, listen up!” a nearby voice reached Adonia’s ears. It was Tertia, who had started her introduction. Like all the instructors, she stood on an elevated stone platform that surrounded the barracks grounds. That way they could easily be heard by everyone present.
Adonia felt that Tertia was too eager to join the army. The rest of the regular soldiers only wanted to train the new army, but she was insistent on fighting in the war as well. It was surely a push from her father. Since he was the head of Surem’s priest, he must’ve wanted to know what Adonia was doing.
It wasn’t a problem if Tertia was spying on her, as Adonia had the use of capable soldiers like her. Only if she becomes a problem, Adonia would deal with her.
“You’re all afraid that death is the only thing that you will get from this war,” Tertia continued. “But that is not true. Glory and greater life are what awaits you. Rhenos already understands that.”
She pointed at Rhenos, and every head in Tertia’s and Adonia’s group turned towards him. Adonia expected him to shy away from the attention, but he was beaming with pride.
“Only if we survive the slaughter,” someone shouted.
Tertia shook her head. “Yes, yes. You might die in this war. There is no denying that. But we’ll get to the dying part later. Now, I want you to listen.”
She raised her finger. “Without interrupting!”
Everyone turned silent. Even Adonia decided not to speak, and let her group listen. Tertia was passionate about being a soldier, and she might be better suited for the job of inspiring the slaves.
While she was training under Adonia, her words had a massive effect on her fellow trainees. Tertia’s group was possibly the best group Adonia trained, and she suspected it was thanks to Tertia spreading her passion to the rest of the group.
“From this day forward, you will walk the path of greatness,” Tertia continued. “You will become the greatest kind of ohrol there could ever be.”
“We’ll become nobles?” some slave shouted.
“You idiot, nobles aren’t great,” Tertia paced across the platform as she explained. Even with the old barrack being spacious, several times she got too close to Adonia. “Nobles let others do everything for them. They are not capable of doing anything by themselves. They are the worst kind there is. Only immortals are below them, but they are monsters, not ohrols. Which means that nobles are the lowest type of ohrols.”
She stopped moving and turned to the group in front of her. “Throw away such foolish ideas that nobles are better than you. Every single one of you is already a better ohrol than they ever will be.”
Adonia could see a smile on some of the ohrols gathered. Tertia effortlessly encouraged them, and she didn’t get to her point yet either. If she wasn’t spying for her father, Adonia would have made the woman her right hand.
“From today on, you will start to walk the path of the warrior.” Tertia lowered her voice while saying the last word.
The murmuring of the crowd made it impossible for Tertia to continue her speech. Using the word warrior, Tertia made a huge difference. Soldiers were fighting in the war, but warriors had tales told about them.
Tertia clapped her hands, silencing everyone to continue her speech.
“I’m sure you all know how great warriors are, you heard the tales about them,” she said. “But let me tell you the whole truth about their greatness.”
The crowd no longer had that aura of depression. They were all riled up by Tertia’s speech.
“Does any of you know why you’re alive, why you are here today?” Some ohrols tilted their heads, but Tertia didn’t wait for an answer. “You are not here today because you were owned by some noble, and most certainly it is not them you should be thanking that you are alive. The ones you should be thanking are the warriors. Those who decided that they should fight for your lives, so others wouldn’t take them away.”
Tertia drew her sword.
“With this weapon, a warrior is granted the power to decide who lives. And from today on, you will learn to use such a weapon to decide the fate of others. You will no longer be used. No longer will others decide what you should do. Instead, it will be you deciding whose lives are worth saving. You will be above others.”
“You will be warriors,” Tertia shouted, but her shout was drowned by the voices of the crowd.
Adonia was impressed by Tertia’s words. It was a bit extreme, but it fulfilled its purpose. She doubted anyone in the crowd was thinking about death anymore. If it wasn’t for her father, Tertia would be an invaluable soldier to Adonia.
As the crowd silenced, Tertia continued. “As for the dying part, that’s why I’m here. I’m here to teach you how not to die in the whole process of becoming warriors.”
Adonia saw the unrest on the faces of the gathered ohrols. Why would Tertia mention that now, when she got them not to think about it. Adonia shrugged as no speech could be perfect, and kept listening to see how Tertia would salvage this blunder.
“Trust me, it’s possible to fight in a war without getting hurt,” Tertia immediately followed trying to remove any doubt from his group. “Our General Hon can defeat most opponents just by standing still. A long time has passed since someone dared challenge him.”
“There is no way that we can become like General Hon. He is enormous,” someone shouted.
“If you doubt you can become like our General, there are other examples of great warriors,” Adonia added. “You must have heard about the Sword and Shield of the Separation war.”
Many nodded as the war happened recently and was fresh in their memory.
“The shield, Prince Mael of Kaligan defeated over a hundred of his opponents in the war. He was so skilled with his shield that his armor didn't have a single scratch on it at the end.”
“But aren’t we about to fight him in this war?” some ohrol asked. The complaints from the crowd ensued and the noise spread throughout the barracks. Even other groups looked their way to see what was the commotion.
Tertia raised her hand to stop the commotion. “I know that. I was mentioning him, only to point out that we have gotten the better of the two. In war, shield pales before the sword, and we have the Sword of the Separation war on our side.”
Tertia pointed at Adonia, drawing the eyes of every ohrol present onto her. It was sickening to have so many dirty ohrols look at her. Adonia wondered how she survived the victory march after the Separation war.
“Master Adonia is the greatest warrior alive. She managed to win us the final battle of the Separation war within seconds. She didn’t even break a sweat,” Tertia said. Every ohrol gaped at the words she said.
“And she is on our side. You can become like her if you use your head during the fight. That’s my job here. To teach you how to use your head in a fight. I will teach you how to survive and become a warrior.”
The faces of the crowd were filled with hope. Adonia decided that it was enough of Tertia’s words.
“What Lieutenant said is very true,” Adonia said to her group. “Every one of you can become as skilled as I am. That applies to everyone in this group the most, as you will be trained by me directly.”
The smiles on everyone’s faces reminded her to thank Tertia later for doing her job.
“But!” Adonia interrupted, “before we start, I need every one of you to do one thing. And this you will do before every training session we have from today on.”
The ohrols started looking at each other. Finally, someone asked. “And what would that be?”
“You have to wash yourselves,” Adonia answered.
Everyone was puzzled, not a sound coming from them.
“What are you waiting for?” she shouted. “Go wash, before I catch something.”