He replied to her question as if the injury to his shoulder was nothing, "I survived because I sensed the danger and focused on hiding from her."
The injury is actually nothing much. It didn't take much for him to heal it. It was her laughter after he replied that pained him. Wrath's snicker didn't help either.
He sought to change the subject, so he asked, "What exactly was the battle plan?"
She replied, "Command has been fixing to use the hammer of dawn to get rid of troublesome enemies. Unfortunately, the most troublesome enemy we had was elusive and quick to escape."
"Using the hammer of dawn on the Purple Moon Elven King was bound to fail as she was difficult to pin down. That would waste a lot of energy, so some in command said that the hammer should be used on Red Sun."
"Command eventually decided to use bait. This is where you and many others came in. Command selected troublesome soldiers and made them more troublesome by granting them manpower."
"You were not the most troublesome, but your ability to siphon life force from trees made you a candidate for bait. Apparently, siphoning life force from trees is more than enough to make a demigod make a move on you."
"She took the bait, and we delayed her enough for Right Commander to come and restrict her. This allowed the hammer of dawn to pin her down."
She clapped her giant hands together and said, "So that's where we are at right now. A lot of energy for the Hammer of Dawn, the time and effort of the Right Commander, the lives of 20 X-rank soldiers, and many more sacrifices in exchange for one Elven Ring. Such is the nature of war."
Kelvin considered her words and said, "I guess I should prepare myself to be bait for the next operation."
She laughed and stood up. She towered over him as she said, "You are a funny, crazy diamond man that talks to himself. Just make sure to survive, because I'm betting large on you."
Then she leaped away. Her feet kicked up a lot of sand as they dug into the ground and catapulted her far into the distance.
All he saw of her was her pale white buttocks and her back. But he soon lost sight of those too. They faded away from his sight after she pulled too much distance between them.
Kelvin turned to Wrath and asked, "When did you know I was bait?"
She folded her shadowy arms across her chest and said, "It was easy. I knew immediately they assigned you more troops after hearing that a demigod was assassinating soldiers."
"The other option was that they were trying to protect you, but I doubt that is even possible. Not that a thousand S-rank soldiers would make a lick of difference in front of a demigod. It is more likely that they want you to look more eye-catching without overplaying their hand."
He grumbled, "I guess this is what I signed up for. To be used as bait without my knowledge."
Wrath nodded in agreement, "That's exactly what you're here for. You certainly aren't here because of your strength. Yggdrasil doesn't need your strength. You are here to do the menial labor or demeaning work that true gods and demigods don't want to do."
He said with all the sarcasm he could muster, "Thank you for sugarcoating it."
She looked at him and asked, "Did you want me to say that you're important because you're a paragon?"
He shook his head. "No."
"It is good that you didn't expect that. You are important to Yggdrasil civilization as a paragon. But you signed up for war. On the battlefield, you are no different from other soldiers. Yggdrasil civilization is not going to cuddle you."
Then she said, "Be that as it may. You will enjoy certain privileges."
His ears perked up when he heard that. He asked her hurriedly, "What privileges are those?"
She looked around as if she didn't want anyone to hear what she was about to say. Then she moved closer to him and whispered, "You can kill another soldier without punishment."
That surprised him. He said, "Isn't that breaking the first and most important rule?"
She shrugged and said quietly, "That's how it is for a paragon. You might be the same as them on the battlefield. But in terms of politics and value, you're more privileged than other soldiers."
He looked around and asked her, "Why are you whispering?" No one can hear you."
She shook her head. "You're wrong about that. Aganju can hear me. Every true god can hear and see me."
"I am whispering because I was warned not to encourage paragons to kill soldiers. There was quite a scene when the last paragon killed a soldier."
He said, "Oh."
Then he looked around as if trying to see if Agangu was stalking them.
Wrath said to him, "Don't bother. I doubt he is so free that he would be spying on us. Besides, if he wants to hide himself, then you won't be able to see him."
"As good as Extraordinary Perception is, there are many ways to circumvent it. Especially when the true god knows everything about it."
He chuckled dryly and said, "Right. I forgot about that last one."
He didn't dwell on the fact that Aganju has violated his mind and knows all his secrets. He also didn't dwell on Wrath's so-called privilege of being allowed to kill another soldier.
He had more important things to do currently. So he pulled up his mark and called for reinforcements.
Because of his request, 100 soldiers of the first division closest to him were directed to meet up with him. They fell under his command and became his squad.
Wrath saw this and asked, "I wonder why they sent only one hundred for you to use."
He shook his head and said, "I guess my job as bait is over."
"At least this way, I'll be able to tell next time Command is about to use me for their nefarious purposes."