Godfather's System 229

I decided to approach the general to understand the truth of the situation. Unfortunately, that decision didn’t answer the question of how. The mysterious organization had assigned hundreds of trained agents between eight bases to keep an eye on things.

I wasn’t naive enough to think that they wouldn’t have a security detail with the general. They would probably have their strongest agents there, which would increase the difficulty of my approach.

However, this wasn’t the greatest source of challenge.

No, that honor went to a simpler aspect. They had a much smaller area to defend. Even the smallest of the bases I had visited covered at least a square mile of area, with people in constant motion. It made targeting those places much easier. Having a hundred agents securing a base and securing one person would present completely different challenges.

Then, there was the nature of my mission … trying to make contact with a potentially hostile asset that was under high observation, with the possibility of it turning into an emergency extraction. Had I been running a spy school, it would have been the mission I would choose as the graduation test.

Assassination would have been so much easier.

Defending any asset revolved around three fundamental concepts: assessment and cognizance of the threats to correctly measure the risk, application of multiple means of detection and observation, and establishment of layered security that could either scare off the threats or draw them in.

I had infiltrated, attacked, and when the need arose, assassinated multiple targets in this world. Most of the time, it happened quite smoothly due to one simple reason: They had misjudged my capabilities to a wildly inaccurate degree, which resulted in any security measures they had applied falling flat.

My current target didn’t share that flaw. They not only knew that I was a hero, but they also knew I was almost at level one hundred, possibly assuming that I was even over that mark with all the Experience I channeled to the General. Moreover, unlike Somaton, they were also aware that I had managed to destroy a flying castle, which gave them some understanding of my infiltration capabilities.

If I was any younger, I might have appreciated the added challenge, but I was well past that phase. At this point, I believed that the easier, the better.

The second aspect was equally challenging. I was dealing with an organization that was capable enough to operate despite Somaton’s constant search. Even with help from collaborators, that wasn’t a simple achievement. They likely had some unique spells and wards that they used to protect themselves, which had the potential to trip me up.

It was not implausible for them to have the magical equivalent of a radar or a thermal detector, or some completely different method of spotting trespassers. They didn’t have any such wards on the bases, because they were trying to keep the mana expenditure limited. They might not be sharing the exact same restrictions when it came to protecting the general.

Then, there was the third aspect. One where I had the advantage.

Most of the time, the aim of establishing a security force was to dissuade the attackers, often done through overwhelming numbers and weaponry, trying to convince a potential attacker that his attempt was doomed from the start. Multiple layers of security measures, in particular, were very useful in that, even removing the chance of a suicide attack if applied well.

I had the advantage, because the whole thing was a trap for me. Therefore, they couldn’t deploy overwhelming security openly, afraid of spooking me away. They would either have to keep the security relatively light, or have to hide the majority of security forces, which would inevitably impair their abilities.

And, the vulnerabilities of a hidden security force were never as pronounced when stationed as they would be while on the move, which was where I decided to make my first attempt. Even without their need to keep their security hidden, intensifying their challenge, transferring an asset was always the hardest part of the job. Not only did they have to protect a mobile target, but also maintained control of the road, expanding the area they needed to protect.

Moving ceded the advantage to the attacker, who could attack, harass, observe, or even ambush in their terms, while giving the security the challenge of playing catch up.

Of course, there were ways to mitigate those advantages. Disguises, decoys, unpredictable paths, last-minute schedule changes, and many other tools … none worked against me for one simple reason.

I could feel the location of my party members in real time.

That fact didn’t make the achievement easy, per se. Everything I had seen about them showed them as a dangerous and competent organization, far better than the third-rate rabble that I had been dealing with at the border. They knew all my advantages, yet they dared to use the general as bait while moving him constantly.

Once I felt my party members moving, I didn’t rush toward them recklessly. Even Concealment had its limits. Instead, I pulled out a map of the region, checking the paths between him and the nearest base, and tried to pin down the route he would take. There were too many possible alternatives for most of the route, but those alternatives were more limited in two areas, and toward the other end.

If I was in a hurry, I would have picked a nice ambush spot toward the end of the route, put some insulation wards, and hoped for the best. Luckily, the youngsters were constantly proving themselves to be worthy of the trust I had extended to them, handling the border even better than I could.

That allowed me the luxury of staying away, and observing them remotely. Perception once again proved to be invaluable, allowing me to watch the movement of my accidental recruit, along with his protection measures.

For the first set of observations, I had deliberately stayed far away, enough that I wouldn’t be able to see the general or his direct guards, let alone assess them. First, I wanted to see their peripheral methods.

And, as I watched the transfer, I was glad that I had done so. The preparations for the movement must have started earlier than I had expected, because there had been more than one fake trade caravan and hunter groups on the way.

The guards that were assigned to those groups were even more skilled than I had expected. I might have missed their actions if I didn’t know the exact location of the general every single second, and match those with some suspicious shifts in their movement.

Even before assessing such a route, I had caught six such groups, their numbers ranging from a few to twenty, every single member highly leveled with rarer classes.

“Interesting,” I muttered as I decided to adjust the plan a little. The spies on the way were impressive enough that I doubted even the mysterious organization could afford to assign them as the periphery to all the roads.

I decided to stay and watch them, once again appreciating the luxury of time. Without the need to solve a dozen problems, I could properly focus on the job at hand…

Soon, my patience was justified. Two hours after the general had reached the other base, another set of people approached them, and took over them. It was hard to assess people from a distance, but the subtle clues I caught as they fought against the critters and weaker beasts suggested that the newcomers were weaker, supporting my earlier conjecture.

At the same time, they had granted me another trail to follow, one that allowed me to temporarily ignore the bait they had been dangling, and instead reach my target.

I followed the agents who had been just relieved of duty, who had traveled on foot for six hours, never surpassing walking pace as they acted like yet another pack of ordinary hunters.

Right until they stepped into a flying cart with the ability to camouflage, attaining near invisibility, particularly against a cloudless sky. Even with my Perception, I would have missed it had they not accidentally drifted close to me.

It wasn’t the first time I was dealing with that trick. I still remembered Bertnam using a similar trick to sneak into our base, back when we were still small-time operators, busy making sure our guild survived.

“Exciting,” I muttered as I followed them, happy to notice their route was not heading for one of the eight bases. Instead, their route led to a large town called Ariehold.

I had read about it, though I doubted I would have been able to remember it if it wasn’t for my Memory Stat. It was one of the thousands of towns that spread across the mainland. It was too far away from main trade routes to be rich, lacked any kind of mining or other resources, and too far away from the wilderness to really cooperate with the other towns.

The only notable thing was a small dungeon, but even that had been operating under capacity due to some structural mistakes. Or, at least, that was all that was known about the town.

Of course, once I watched the agents pick this town among all the others, I started to look at the town in a different way. The limited economic potential and the general distance would keep the adventurous away, and the lack of danger would keep the high leveled adventurers. And, a broken, underperforming dungeon would excuse the occasional mana flares.

In other words, a perfect satellite base for a hidden organization.