Chapter 304 (1/2)

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio  Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

“Fall in!”

Gerald, who looked like a normal bald, headstrong man again, didn’t wear any armor or have any weapons today. However, he was still naturally in a stern manner, making others not dare to treat him carelessly.

As a master of his level, armor and weapons were just accessories for him. The great posture of a master was the best proof of their identity and was enough to maintain their prestige.

For example, at this moment, by his order, the quarters woke up in the dark with a lot of noise. Soldiers of the Regiment of Knights got up in chaos, put on their armor, took up their weapons, and rushed to the big square in the center of the campsite.

Beside the feet of Gerald, a slender stick of incense was burning quickly and steadily. The length-marks on it had shown that it was a tool for timing.

Although there were clocks and watches in this world, this commander of the Void Mask Knights still preferred to time with this old-styled incense when there was an emergency.

His standard was very simple. Those soldiers who could put on their armor, take up their weapons and get to the square before the incense burnt halfway would be marked as excellent; Before it burnt to three-quarters, those soldiers would be marked as good, and before it burnt out completely would just be marked as passing.

As for those that came after the incense burnt out… good luck to them.

After years of training, the Void Mask Knights had become quite an efficient troop. Even though it took some time for them to get dressed, most of them could manage to arrive at the square before the incense burnt to three-quarters of its length. In the end, there were only two that failed.

Looking at the regretful and worried faces of these two late soldiers, Gerald laughed grimly and said, “Clean the toilet or confinement, make your choice.”

These unlucky boys who had almost passed looked at each other for a while and chose the former with a sigh.

It was indeed dirty, smelly and embarrassing to clean the toilet, but it was much better than confinement.

In traditional military camps, it was common to use physical punishment. But things had been different in Void Mask Knights. There were various kinds of punishment, but none of them were physically harmful—except for the criminals who were escorted to court. Usually, there were two ways of punishment: cleaning the toilet or confinement.

The campsite of the Void Mask Knights had been finely built; the toilets were not very messy and dirty, but were there any toilets on earth that weren’t at least a little dirty and smelly? Not to mention how embarrassing this would be. They would be laughed at by their colleagues for a long time.

But the latter one was even worse. The confinement room was specially made to cut off sound from the outside world, and there was only one small lamp on the roof. Under the influence of the magic array, no matter how hard one tried, it was impossible to touch the walls and roof. It felt like a small ant stood between the vast sky and earth, lonely and helpless. No matter how brave one was, they would be super scared after a few days of staying inside it. They would never want to go back there again for their whole life.

The Void Mask Knights had a complicated source of soldiers, and quite a few of them were experienced adventurers. These heroes had fought with others and got injured, so they cared little about fighting or starvation. But even the proudest of them were so scared of going to the confinement room. They would rather clean the toilet than go back there again.

After announcing the punishment of these latecomers, Gerald’s eyes swept through the neat fourteen lines of soldiers. The eight lines in front were armored soldiers, wearing the specially-made, Void Whole-Body Armor. The process of forging them was a secret. Its major parts were fabricated with entire pieces of high-quality steel, and that had made it totally different from other normal armor.

The traditional armor of this world could be divided into three types: leather armor, Mosaic Armor, and chain armor.

leather armor was sewn with thick leather that had been processed by a fire-proof potion. It was light and durable and worked well in defense. The most important thing was that it was relatively cheap, so it had been the favorite choice for primary adventurers. Soldiers in the army also liked it very much.

Of course, there were also high-quality leather armors, such as those made of special demon beast’s leather. Those were rare to see. It was light and extremely durable, and it offered strong defensive power. Correspondingly, it was very expensive. Even high-ranking adventurers might not be able to afford it.

Mosaic Armor was normally used by experienced adventurers and makeshift troops. Its main component was still leather armor, but it was set with a lot of metal sheets outside to improve its defensive power.

This kind of armor had a rich variety of styles and categories. It also had a different range of price and defensive power. The best ones were set with metal sheets that were sewn into a complete piece one by one over the leather armor. It indeed offered a better defense, but it was heavier as well. Except for those who were very strong, few people could wear such heavy armor to fight.