Chapter 31: Cult?

The training of the soldiers were actually pretty simple. For the individual part, they just had to work out and grind some skill proficiency for attribute skills. There were also some techniques that Alwyn learned from his general class to which he taught to the soldiers. Those techniques helped them speed up the skill proficiency gain especially for physical attribute skills.

As for the group training, they only had to learn how to attack together for now. This also served as training for the team captains to sharpen their leading abilities.

Speaking of leading skills, it looks like Michael was really a suitable commander. While the other team captains were still trying to adjust, he was already accustoming everyone to each other's abilities for them to work together more effectively.

He barely spoke words but whenever he did, his teammates instantly respond and immediately fix any mistake they did.

At the same time, Michael was really strict with his team since everyone who fell behind would suffer some kind of punishment.

To others, what he was doing seemed cruel but to him, this was the right thing especially since this was the military. Back then, he suffered way much more just because his superior was in a bad mood. Michael already felt they were lucky since they were being given a chance to quickly grow stronger.

One technique he wanted to incorporate in his training plan was basically to instill discipline into his soldiers by being the right amount of strict and giving punishments for failure.

General Alwyn had seen what he was doing and partly agreed to his actions. He then advised Michael that accompanying strict rules and harsh punishments should be rich rewards since that was one of the motivations for them.

Michael only coldly nodded and kept silent. It seems that after entering the military, his personality became even colder and aloof. He trained just individually while throwing commands to his team.

After a week of training, the next step was to apply whatever they have learned in real life situation. This time, they will enter the dungeons as teams and will compete on who will be the fastest to clear the dungeon. In addition, the maximum time taken should be 24 hours. Anymore than that and the team will receive some punishments.

Of course, the top teams will receive some rewards.

Right now, the average level of the soldiers were all Tier 2 since they were elites that had been picked out from hundreds of adventurers. There were ten teams and there also happened to be ten Tier 2 dungeons so each team will take one dungeon.

Each team assembled in front of their own assigned dungeons. All of them were standing orderly with serious expressions on their faces. Clearly, after the short week long training, their temperaments had changed drastically from the disorderly adventurers to disciplined soldiers.

Some adventurers were also watching from the side since the dungeons were closed for them for the whole day because of the military training. Some chose to search for dungeons outside but a lot still stayed to watch how the soldiers were doing.

Looking at their organized but domineering line-up, some adventurers couldn't help but envy the soldiers. After all, who didn't want to look so awesome and manly in those military uniforms.

Speaking of military uniforms, there was someone who had awakened with the class Magic Tailor who could make beautiful clothes with magical properties. That tailor had designed military uniforms for the soldiers.

The uniform was pure black and the design was pretty simple. However, each uniform had been created with Tier 1 materials provided by Quinn and and released a faint aura of suppression when worn by the soldiers.

A few moments later, Quinn and Alwyn arrived to send them off to the dungeons. Quinn only said a few words of encouragement before stepping back and watched as the soldiers enter the dungeons one by one.

Now, all they had to do now was to wait for the first team to clear the dungeon.

After only a few hours, a team had already managed to clear the dungeon and came out and as expected, it was Michael and his team.

However, after a quick glance, Quinn noticed something was wrong. The originally ten members of the team had become nine. One of them was missing.

Quinn furrowed his eyebrows and asked Michael questioningly, "Why's there only nine if you? Where's your teammate."

"I don't know. He just disappeared from the team after splitting up for a short time.", Michael just answered coldly.

Quinn wasn't satisfied with that answer and told them to hand over all their team's IDWs. Michael's aura rippled which Quinn caught because of his abnormally high attributes and was even more suspicious. He was even more determined to check.

Michael and his team were silent for a moment before handing over their IDWs. There was a recording function that had been installed inside the IDWs which had been used before to count contribution points and to avoid stealing the kills of other adventurers.

Unfortunately, the transmission stones used on the mass-produced version of the IDW which every resident possessed had limited storage functions so every they submit their accumulated contribution points, all past recordings would be wiped out.

Unfortunately, Michael's team had the same IDWs and could only record a few hours worth. The rest would be deleted.

Luckily, after browsing through all of the team members' IDWs, Quinn had found crucial evidence.

Quinn had found them in two of the members' IDW. In there, he saw a recording of a man who was on the verge of death. With his last breath, he said, "I repeat once again. I will never join you!". After that, he seemed to possess a self-destruction skill and detonated himself.

The two culprits were sent flying by the impact and hit the ground. After that, he could see Michael and the others appearing before the culprits and looking at them questioningly.

The culprits said nothing and only looked at the center of the explosion and shook their heads. Michael also looked at the place of explosion and went silent. He then shook his head regretfully and just took the other members away.

Quinn closed the recording and glanced coldly at the culprits. Michael also stared at them as if waiting for their response. "Why?", Quinn asked them.

However, the two kept completely silent and maintained the same expression the whole time.

Quinn thought for a moment before saying inside his head, "Alice, give me a soul search skill or anything that can read memories."

Quinn only waited for ba few seconds before a ding was heard and a new skill appeared on his skill board. He immediately directed the skill on the culprits.

However, after a few seconds of waiting, nothing seemed to happen. "What's going on? Alice, why isn't the skill working?"

[The skill only works on living beings who possess a soul.]

"Only works with beings with souls? They don't have souls?", Quinn blurted out unconsciously which alerted Michael and the others who were watching.

Michael asked carefully, "What do you mean?"

"I have a skill that can search souls. However, these two don't have souls so what's there to search."

Michael then hurriedly tried to express his ideas, "I was a soldier in back then and I've encountered something like this before. Back on Earth, there were cults that possessed methods to kill members who were captured to avoid exposing themselves. Maybe it's the same here, just with more special methods."

"A cult? You're saying a cult is possibly being formed inside my territory?"