AK - The Alchemy Kingdom

“Report.”

“Yes, sir. No emergencies or level five missions are being carried. The first stage of the Sandine war operation was a success. The shadow confirmed that the Army of the wind region is staying to deal with the Beastkin counterattack. The young eyes operation is facing a setback. Shadow two continued the operation in Twin Suns, but her initial attempts at Fire Gate failed. Regardless, the agent remains uncompromised. Two escorting operations are in course. The teams under Officer Tael and General Sania met and should be approaching AP in two days. The other operation is led by shadow three, escorting Merchant Keller to Twin Suns. They already are within the tower’s reach and should be entering the forest in a few hours.”

The “report” command demanded an overview of all emergencies and operations above level two overseed by the staff officer. To simplify communication and improve response time, every operation, being military, intelligence, or security, was classified into levels from one to five, according to its importance.

Level five are extreme situations that could compromise AK’s security, like wars or invasions. Level four is reserved for battle engagements and missions that concern national security. Level three and two operations involve dangerous missions that don’t offer risks to AK, such as escorting or beasts hunting. Finally, level one operations include any routine drills, like training, watch, and scouting.

Actually, Lew already knew the operations’ information since he had been performing his duties at AP, but even so, he wanted to check if the staff officer was sharp enough. The Ministry, just like their Kingdom, was still too immature to establish a proper organizational system. Chances were, they would need to restructure their positions within all the Ministries a couple of times before achieving stability. Mostly, the Councilors were following the organization of other nations.

In the Ministry of Defense’s case, Lew organized three separate branches under him. The military branch followed a simplified version of the Serion Kingdom Army, in which he was the highest-ranked officer holding the position of commander. Though he was free to command the military, he had to follow the Council’s policy. So, it wasn’t in any way free reign, just freedom to decide how to achieve their goals.

Under the Commander of AK’s forces stood the generals, who could command AK’s armies. Taking a page out of the Kingdom’s book, Lew decided to create different armies. Though the Serions had five armies because of their power distribution, since no Warden would send their forces to be controlled by another, neither would the Royals.

Although Lew was going for benefits in mobility and versatility, the decision also came as a solution for placing many lofty figures under him. Fortunately, Tael promptly stepped down from the dispute by declaring that he would be satisfied at a lower position, leaving only the infamous mistress of fire and the spear demoness in the competition. However, instead of choosing between Sania and Diana, he decided to give them equal and independent positions.

General Diana led AK Army while General Sania commanded AK Special Forces. Most of the soldiers served in the Army, roughly 250 citizens. And rather than an elite army that would rarely move, like the Serion Royal Army, the Special Forces (SF) were envisioned as a highly mobile force to deal with national emergencies and missions. Even with only 50 soldiers, the SF would receive a bigger budget and access to the best magic weapons, creating a balance between the two armies.

Because of their small numbers, Lew had to simplify the chain of command. So, following the commander, and the two generals, came five officers, who would be responsible for the army divisions, four in the Army and one in the SF. Tael was currently holding the position of Officer in charge of the Capital’s base. Unfortunately, nobody else had the accomplishments to hold the position. So, they planned to choose the other four officers in a year by promoting the best captains.

The captain position was next in the command line. Each captain would lead a unit specialized in a field (archery, defense, attack, scouting). Thankfully, the veteran members of the extinct hunting team were sufficiently competent to fill the 20 captain positions. Hopefully, by the time four of them were promoted to Officers, there would be accomplished soldiers to take their places.

So, officially, AK’s military ranks are Commander, General, Officer, Captain, Soldier. However, the Minister also created a Staff Officer position to hold the gap of missing officers until they were promoted. The staff officers are Lew assistants, who served under him since he took over the Ministry, so they knew enough to carry orders and adhere to the military rules.

Another branch of the Ministry of Defense is the Intelligence Agency. The Agency was created to provide information on enemies and possible threats, so their training focused on developing a different skill set than the common soldier. Basically, the agents were divided into two groups, agents and staff agents. Both the standard and special agents are tasked with missions to gather intelligence. The former operates inside AK’s domain or in the Eastern Forest, while the latter can be assigned to foreign nations. The staff agents, on the other hand, are responsible for processing the collected information and overlook the active missions.

All agents have to keep up with basic training, but only those who pass a strict test can enter a unit and be assigned missions. Until then, they are considered staff agents. The shadow unit is the oldest and most selective unit of the Agency. The ten shadows, who are called from shadow one to shadow nine, plus their leader, the shadow, are outfitted with shadow element equipment. It goes without saying that shadow tools can hide the user from sight and perception. So, the shadow unit is responsible for missions that require concealment. Currently, the three agents with the “special agent” title belong to this unit.

Although the shadow unit holds an elite status, the undercover unit has even fewer members. The eight undercover agents stationed at AP have the mission of gathering intelligence indefinitely. For this unit, concealment is useless. In fact, they need to develop their social skills to extract more information while keeping calm and staying vigilant at all times. On these parameters, Rachel and Ben became role models for others by befriending many Adventurers and surviving several attacks.

Finally, the recon unit, which employs most of the agents, is responsible for identifying and keeping track of beasts and targets through the forest and inside of AP. The agents of this unit have a skill set similar to the shadows but more focused on locating targets.