Chapter 28: The Plan in Motion

It was night-time, and the plan was ready to be executed. Varius had left the bowl of ointment in the tent. He was still near the tent when Nanka hiding nearby gave a signal to Hojo to set the plan in motion.

Hojo took out the sound of a monkey to distract the royal guards at the entrance of the tent.

"Where did a monkey come from?" a guard wondered.

"Wait, I will check," the other guard said and walked towards the sound. It was dark, so he had to take a fire torch with him. When he reached far from his fellow guard, someone attacked him from behind.

When the guard at the entrance saw the torch light going out, he called him. "Hey, are you alright? Do you need fire to light up your torch again?" He wondered how the fire went out. The wind was not even that strong, and there was no rain either. He waited for a few seconds for an answer, but headed there to check himself.

He looked around. "Hey, where did you go?" He saw something lying on the ground. He moved his fire torch closer to the ground and felt something wrong was happening when he discovered it was the fire torch of his fellow guard. "Hey, whe…" He was about to call out, but someone hit him in the head from behind. "Ah." He moaned and passed out after hitting the ground.

It was Hojo who had done his job smoothly. He put off the fire torch and took out a monkey sound to signal his success to his partners in crime.

Nanka and Pantu understood the signal and moved on to the next part of their plan. There were two soldiers approaching the target tent, and Nanka had to take them out.

He ran around the darkness and made strange noises. "Khrr. Khrr." The soldiers noticed it.

"Hey, who is there?" a soldier asked while looking into the darkness. He pulled out his sword and headed towards the sounds.

"It sounds like some animal," the other soldier said. "Go check it."

The first soldier went towards the sounds, but got jumped by Nanka. The other soldier sensed it and was about to alert everyone. "Dange…" he was halfway on his cry when someone shut his mouth from behind and knocked him out.

Nanka had his heart in his mouth and he had already prepared to flee when he had realized his blunder, but Hojo saved him at the most crucial moment.

He walked to him. "Thank God. I thought I was dead."

Hojo hit him in the head. "You made a blunder. You are not cut out for this." He turned his back and began walking. "Someone might come to check, so we need to get out of here now to avoid getting spotted."

Nanka wanted to argue, as he did not like his tone, but he chose not to because he knew he was wrong. He decided to follow him and get out of there. The final part of the mission depended totally on Pantu now.

He sneaked into the tent and saw Hammer lying unconscious on the bed. He searched for the bowl of ointment and found it on the small table beside the bed. "Ah. Found it. I need to hurry before someone arrives."

He took out a small glass bottle which contained poison in it. He poured it all into the bowl and mixed it thoroughly. "Hehe." He smiled like a devil when he kept the bowl back on the table. "Now you will taste the repercussions of hurting our pride." He slowly sneaked towards the exit.

Varius, on the other hand, felt something was wrong when he was in his tent. He took his sword and headed out towards the healing tent. When he reached near his destination, he spotted no guards at the entrance. "Where are the guards?" He pulled out his sword and walked towards the tent with hurried steps before someone hit him in the head with a rock. "Ah." He winced in pain and dropped to the ground. He tried to look at the face of the attacker, but he passed out before he could recognize him. "You dastar…"

It was Logan who had done the job. He sighed in relief when Varius finally passed out. "Phew. He was almost caught." He glanced at the tent before running away. "I am counting on you, chief."

Pantu had headed towards the exit when someone put a hand on his shoulder. His body went into a freeze mode as he was too stunned to even show a movement. There was no one besides an unconscious person and himself in the tent. Then who could it be? He slowly slid his hand under his shawl and got hold of his dagger that was tucked into his pants.

He took a breath and quickly turned to stab the person behind him, but got stabbed instead. That too, in the throat. "Arg. Arg." He could not even make a sound, not just because of his throat, but the person stabbing him was none other than King Hammer himself. "H-ham…" He tried to speak, but Hammer pulled out his blade, resulting in blood spraying out from his throat to his face.

"Death to traitors," Hammer spoke when Pantu dropped to the ground and slowly his soul left his body. He kept staring at the blood-stained face of Hammer in horror, and the expression remained even after his death.

Hammer glared down at him for a few seconds and headed out in fury. "Soldiers!" he shouted, but he had still not recovered, so he felt a pain in his wounds. "Ah." He winced and grabbed his chest. "Soldiers!" He shouted again, bearing the pain.

There were soldiers who came running and were amazed to see King Hammer back on his feet. They all dropped to their knee. "My king, we are at your service!" They said in unison.

"Take the dastard lying inside and hang his body in the middle of the camp," he ordered. "And one of you ask Varius to report to me immediately."

"As you order, my king."

A few soldiers hurried inside and were shocked to find Chief Pantu lying dead there. They carried him away before King Hammer headed back inside.

Varius was lying unconscious on the ground when a soldier found him.

"Commander Varius?" He tried to wake him up. "Open your eyes, commander! Who did this to you?"

Varius slowly opened his eyes and sat up. "Ah." He grabbed his head as he felt an excruciating pain in the area he was hit in. He remembered what had happened to him. "Where is that dastard? I will kill him." He stood up and started looking around.

"Who, commander?" the soldier asked.

"The dastard who hit me in the head," Varius said in anger. "I will kill him." He looked at the healing camp and saw a group of soldiers outside it. "Why are so many soldiers outside the camp?" He looked at the soldier beside him. "Did-did something happen to my king?"

"No, commander, he is alright," the soldier replied. "He has woken up and has asked for you. That is why we were searching for you."

Varius could not believe his ears. King Hammer was on his feet. His feet rushed by themselves to meet his king. His face had a wide smile, and he had already forgotten the pain he was feeling moments ago.

He rushed inside the tent. "My king!" he cried when he faced Hammer's back just when he entered. He dropped to his knees. "I was so worried about you. I am glad you are back, my king."

King Hammer turned and Varius got shocked to see blood on his face. "You face… What happened?" He jumped up. "My king, tell me."

"Where were you until now?" Hammer asked coldly.

Varius told him he was unconscious until now. Someone had attacked him, taking advantage of the night. "...my head still hurts, my king," he added.

Hammer walked to him and looked into his eyes. "Bring me their heads."

Logan woke up in the morning, hoping to get the news of the king's death. He suddenly heard some commotion outside and his face lit with happiness as he thought the king was finally dead.

He headed outside to witness the blissful scene and followed the people where they went to.

"What is this?" His mouth dropped in shock when he saw Pantu crucified naked on the altar where Varius had addressed the soldiers. "But how? Was he caught?" He scratched his head, as he could not comprehend it. "I should have stayed until the end."

The people gathered murmured among themselves.

"Hey, is it not the chief of the Neptune tribe?"

"Why did they do this to him?"

"Who did this to him?"

Logan searched for Nanka and Hojo, and he found them in the crowd. He could see the terror on the face of Nanka, but he found the face of Hojo relatively calmed. He wondered why.

Varius stepped up to the altar, making everyone silent.

He signaled to the crucified man. "This man tried to kill King Hammer last night. He had sneaked into his tent and tried to poison him."

The people began to murmur among themselves.

"What? He tried to poison King Hammer?"

"Is our King alright? What happened to him?"

"So he was a traitor. He was rightly treated in the end."

Varius continued, "Our king is alive. Nothing has happened to him. And there is something I must tell you." He glanced at Nanka and Hojo. "There are others who helped him." He pointed to Pantu. "There are other traitors among us."

Everybody looked at each other with doubtful faces. "There are traitors among us?"

"Do not worry. You will witness their death here and now," Varius declared.

Nanka understood it was time to get away from there. He had a bad feeling about this. "Did Pantu open his mouth before dying?" He tried to sneak away, but was caught by the soldiers hiding among the crowd.

"Hey, leave me!" he shouted when they threw him on the altar. "You have got the wrong person!" He looked up and saw Varius glaring down at him. He gulped in horror. "Commander Varius, there is a misunderstanding."

"There is no misunderstanding." Everybody heard a familiar voice, and they recognized whom it belonged to.

"King Hammer?" Everybody was awestruck when King Hammer arrived there. He stepped up to the altar and took his place beside Varius.

Logan saw at the mighty aura of the man. "So, he is King Hammer. His face resembles Prince Colt."

"King Hammer?" Nanka had understood it was the end for him, so he resorted to a plea for mercy. "My king, do not take my life. I beg you. Forgive me! Besides," He pointed to Hojo in the crowd. "Chief Hojo was also with us. He, too, is a traitor."

Hojo walked up to the altar calmly and stood behind Hammer with a grin.

Nanka fell into despair. "You dastard..."

"Death to traitors," Varius said and beheaded him with his sword. His head dropped and rolled down the altar. Blood sprayed out of his neck before the torso fell, making the floor drenched in blood.

Logan moved his hand around his neck as he realized he too would have had lost his head if he had stepped out and revealed himself to the chiefs earlier. That brute old man turned to be planted by Hammer to sniff out traitors. "What a scary scheme." He gave a tough smile, as he knew his mission was going to be a lot troublesome now. His best choice was to escape, but his pride came in between.

Hammer stepped ahead to address everyone.

"Whoever betrays their state does not deserve to live! This all happened because of my absence. But now that I am here, we will head forward to reach our goal! We will not stop until we catch the dreams we saw together! Let us put the enemies of the state under the soil!"

The soldiers cried. "Yeah!"

"Long live, King Hammer!"

"Long live, King Hammer!"

"Long live, King Hammer!"