A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor-Chapter 888: VOLUME 3 - PART 1 - THE RISE OF A NEW GENERAL

VOLUME THREE – PART ONE

THE RISE OF A NEW GENERAL

When one looks at time, one is always met with a certain degree of peculiarity. For the historians of Stormfront, that problem of time was no different.

Hundreds of years after the death of Oliver Patrick, many had tried, in various different ways, to recount the telling of his life – but all of them were met with a singular problem: quite how did they tell it?

Some were exhaustive, missing no detail. They sought to describe each day that Oliver Patrick had lived. They saw meaning in every deed that this great figure of the past did, and through that mound of information, they hoped to find the seeds that would inspire the future generations, and allow them to fix the very same catastrophic problems that they were faced with.

With Oliver Patrick, there was a particular problem. Events were meant to be moments of significance, yet to that degree, it could quickly be argued, quite strangely, that every moment of Oliver's life became one of significance.

The scholars didn't argue as often about where the story was to begin. They were all quite excited to begin it in Solgrim, for that is where true records of Oliver's existence began, along with his meeting with Dominus, but soon enough, as they compile their entries, and they list their battles, they come to realize that the boundary of ordinariness no longer existed for Oliver Patrick.

After his victory over General Talon – the accounts of the time did conclude that was indeed who he'd beaten, despite much dispute about the outlandishness of those claims – Oliver's life did not grow any quieter.

His missions from the High King continued. Every month, a boy far younger than the legal requirement for soldiery, was sent in command of between one hundred and three hundred men, to put down a variety of threats throughout the kingdom.

The number of his victories steadily increased, month by month. The scholars would list these victories as they told their stories of Oliver's history, but even they would begin to frown. They quickly realized that even the brilliant and overwhelming could eventually result in regularity.

Thus, after many years of pouring over Oliver's history, there arose a separate study of significance, as they sought to divide up the many events of his life. In doing so, they hit upon a degree of eras.

It became commonly agreed that the most significant periods worth pouring over, were those periods of change. That was where there was believed to be the hope that the future generations sought after, as they looked to a man that history had both admired and reviled, for all the change that he had strewn across the continent.

The first era of Great Change was the Era of Solgrim. After which, even the chaos of Oliver's life settled into a degree of stability. Though his place in the world was unusual, the stability that he'd spent years of his life desperately fighting for had been achieved, at least to a degree.

The High King was unable to carry out any scheme nearly as troublesome as what he had arranged with Talon. The battles that he delivered Oliver were often challenging, but none of them were quite comparable to what he'd been able to arrange with Talon. With his own men under his Patrick banner, Oliver built up a force of unimaginable resilience.

Over the final three years of his Academy life, he carried out each mission he was delivered without fail. Even when missions came out of schedule – as the High King had taken to doing – the Patrick force did not fail to secure victory.

It is in Oliver's final few months of Academy life, at the age of eighteen, and with now forty-three victories to his name – a number that most veteran Captains would be proud of – that Oliver's second era of Great Change begins.

…

…

"What?" Oliver said, his arms folded, leaning back in his chair.

"Don't ask me 'what'. You know what, you bastard," Skullic said.

"Daemon!" Mary admonished him. "You mustn't use such language, even in front of Oliver."

"If not in front of him, who can I use it in front of?" Skullic huffed.

Over the past three years, he and Oliver had grown increasingly familiar, to the point where neither man was exactly on his best behaviour around the other.

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"You're getting cocky," Skullic continued. "And this is what we have to show for it."

"I'm winning, Skullic – I've kept winning," Oliver said. "Is that cockiness, or competence?"

"You," Skullic said, jabbing a finger. "Need to stop listening to Hod. And Verdant, for that matter. They're both one and the same. At least Hod isn't singing your praises quite as loudly as that retainer of yours, but he's not far off it."

"They're both good men," Oliver said, smiling. He didn't meet with Minister Hod very often, but every few months, whenever their paths did cross, Oliver was glad that they did.

"Don't try to make me out to be the bad one," Skullic said, "I'm not calling into question their moral character. They're right enough there. It's their eyes that they have a problem with. They're seeing too much in you, and it's blinding them to your flaws."

"Speaking of floors, is it not amusing that you've been reduced all the way to the ground floor of the Central Castle?" Oliver said, grinning. "Another year, and I figure they'll be throwing you out. I suppose it's a wonder that they've kept you around this long."

"Oh, you think we have as long as a year?" Skullic said, his voice dropping an octave.

Oliver's smile faded. "What? Who's moving?" The humour was gone so quickly, and in its place was the face of a warrior – a young man who'd confronted many, many battlefields at this point. An aura of assuredness came with it. Even Skullic had to respect a man with such a reliable presence.