Aji bounded down from the top of the wall, his custom wooden staff strapped securely across his back. The weapon he had commissioned was a polished, gleaming long staff—unassuming to the untrained eye.

He greeted his comrades, all of whom had fought valiantly to repel the dark army's assault. Shortly after, senior advisors representing all continents arrived on the scene, bestowing high praise upon the Sky Squad. Though the confrontation had broken out as an unexpected crisis while their weapons were being forged, the young warriors had managed to force a decisive retreat upon the dark forces.

Furthermore, the operation had definitively exposed the Golden Crane Academy as a major covert ally of the Demon Lord. In the wake of the battle, city officials in Linggar Emas—including the municipal leadership—were placed under immediate investigation to determine the extent of their complicity in the conspiracy.

Warrior Jiro brought Nasura forward under heavy guard, while Chief Blacksmith Rakuta provided corroborating testimony. Rakuta aligned himself fully with the Sky Squad and the righteous alliance, testifying that Nasura operated purely out of financial greed. Under intense interrogation, Nasura cracked, revealing two monumental secrets the academy had kept hidden.

The first was the location of the mass-produced arsenal. Escorted by Nasura as their guide, members of the Sky Squad, continental defense forces, and martial association leadership marched to the designated site. At the far end of the sprawling Golden Crane stables, Nasura approached a seamless stone rockface along the base of a massive hill—a concealed entrance disguised by illusion magic and barrier seals. Inputting the counter-code, Nasura unraveled the spell array, causing the rockface to dissolve and reveal a hollowed cavern passage.

Inside lay a staggering sight: endless rows of weaponry, ranging from light armaments to heavy war gear, meticulously organized throughout the cavernous interior. The righteous martial world had been completely blindsided, unaware that an army's worth of weapons was being manufactured directly under their noses. Adante, Mayor of Linggar Emas, admitted his negligence, confessing that he had long turned a blind eye out of fear of the Golden Crane Academy's immense political weight.

Furthermore, the academy had guaranteed local security and provided heavy financial backing to the city, leaving Adante terrified of questioning the source of their endless wealth.

Continental soldiers immediately moved to secure the subterranean armory—a colossal logistical effort that required extensive time and manpower. The cache contained enchanted spell-weapons, standard military steel, and heavy long-range ballistics, yielding enough gear to equip an army exceeding one hundred thousand soldiers. The scale of the operation was terrifying.

The dark army's invasion plans were far advanced; an arsenal of this magnitude meant their standing forces were vastly larger than the righteous sects had ever anticipated.

Under further pressure from Warrior Jiro, Nasura disclosed his second secret: the existence of a master ledger listing every active Mondu agent across the continent, compiled by a high-ranking operative serving the dark forces. His primary contact had been Lord Night—the very member of the Five Gates whom Aji had slain in secret, though none present realized Lord Night was already dead.

Nasura revealed that the physical ledger was hidden inside his private residence. The squad rushed to the estate, only to find they were too late.

Dark operatives aware of the compromise had already torched Nasura's manor, burning the structure to the ground and destroying all physical documentation. However, Warrior Jiro proposed an alternative solution: extracting the information directly from Nasura's mind through hypnotic memory retrieval.

The procedure could be executed by Gayatri, Lao, or Aria. Among them, Aria was the most adept, having specifically cultivated mind-retrieval techniques. Even when an individual forgets or loses conscious recall of specific details, the subconscious mind permanently retains every experienced event.

Arrangements were made immediately. Nasura sat cross-legged opposite Aria inside an isolated, soundproof chamber to prevent external distractions. Aria extended both hands, hovering her palms beside Nasura's temples to initiate the trance.

As Aria tapped into his subconscious, Nasura grimaced, feeling a intense pressure in his head.

Memory fragments flickered rapidly through Aria's mind as she navigated Nasura's subconscious, searching for specific keywords related to customer orders, weapons distribution, and Mondu identities. Closing her eyes to maintain deep concentration, Aria began reading off the embedded names one by one.

Seated beside her, Gayatri and Lao recorded every name and location Aria uttered in real time.

As the list grew, both siblings were visibly shaken by the identities surfacing from Nasura's subconscious. While the names required verification and physical evidence before official charges could be brought, the ledger implicated high-ranking government officials and renowned masters from the righteous martial sects alike.

The volume of data was overwhelming, uncovering prominent figures who secretly operated as sleeper agents for the dark forces.

Drenched in sweat, Aria severed the hypnotic connection, thoroughly exhausting her elemental support reserves. Having compiled the transcript, Gayatri and Lao agreed to keep the document strictly classified until the information could be thoroughly verified.

Leaking the unconfirmed list prematurely would trigger catastrophic infighting across the righteous sects, plunging the martial community into total chaos. They resolved to convene a private council with the rest of the Sky Squad to deliberate on their next course of action.

They also needed to consult their squad leader, Barsha, before making any high-level decisions regarding the sensitive intelligence. Nearby, Nasura clutched his head in pain—a temporary side effect of having his subconscious memories extracted.

Recognizing the threat he posed, the authorities placed Nasura under maximum-security confinement. Escorting him out, the squad handed Nasura over to Commander Yarko, head of continental defense. Nasura was placed in a high-security subterranean cell—an arrangement that ironically brought him immense relief, knowing that stepping outside would mean instant assassination by Lord Night's remaining operatives.

With their objective complete, the Sky Squad concluded their mission, conferring briefly with attending defense commanders and continental advisors. The collapse of the Golden Crane Academy marked a major political shift in the martial world, requiring the Sky Squad to coordinate closely with continental defense forces for upcoming operations.

The squad prepared to return to Prisma City the following morning, ready to receive their respective regional assignments at Sky Squad representative offices across the continents.

Exchanging formal farewells, the squad members set off on their journey back, taking time to tend to their lingering injuries along the way. The harrowing ordeal at the academy had driven home the monumental weight of their responsibilities as Sky Squad members.

Choosing to travel on horseback rather than utilizing spatial portals, the squad rode in quiet contemplation, using the travel time to process the experience together. The battle had served as a stark reality check.

They realized their current strength was nowhere near sufficient to face the full might of the dark army's ultimate leader, the Demon Lord. To many of them, it felt as though they were mere ants tasked with carrying a mountain on their shoulders.

They had suffered real casualties and injuries; had Commander Dasatama and the continental defense forces not arrived when they did, the battle at the Golden Crane Academy could have easily ended in disaster.

A solemn silence hung over the group as they rode, their morale visibly subdued. Observing his comrades from horseback, Aji quietly evaluated their state of mind. He knew that the trial at the Golden Crane Academy had been a crucial, eye-opening lesson for them all.

The time for games was over; they needed to wake up to the true scale of the threat and prepare themselves for the storm ahead. Soon, Aji would initiate the next phase of his plan.