System's POV
chapter-169-2

After drinking the potion, Thirteen immediately felt light-headed, and his thoughts seemed to scatter, making him unable to think properly.

However, instead of being alarmed, the boy felt amused because Rafiki's truth serum was better than he thought.

Although he could make something better, he didn't have the necessary ingredients to concoct one.

For the time being, he allowed the truth serum to take full effect on him in order to prevent the General and Rafiki from becoming suspicious of him.

As a System, his mind was his strongest weapon.

A mere truth serum was nothing to him!

Seeing the blank look on the boy's face, Rafiki glanced at the General and nodded his head.

"What is your name?" General Stark asked.

"Zion," Thirteen replied. "Zion Leventis."

"How old are you?"

"Seven and a half years old."

The General continued to ask the boy several questions, testing if the truth potion was working properly.

After asking over a dozen questions and finding that the boy had spoken nothing but the truth, he began to ask him the questions that were of utmost importance to him.

"Where is my son, Percival right now?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know?" General Stark frowned. "What do you mean you don't know?"

"I got separated from him when I went with Lady Adira to lure the Golden-Eyed Hyenas to follow us to let him and the rest of the slaves escape," Thirteen replied.

Dixon, who had seen Thirteen with the Drow, nodded his head in confirmation.

"What Barbarian City were you and my son being held in?" General Stark inquired.

"I don't know," Thirteen answered. "We were not allowed to leave the warehouse and wander around the city."

"What kind of Master do you guys have?"

"A very wicked and evil Master. He doesn't hesitate to torture Percival on a daily basis."

The frown on General Stark's face deepened after hearing that his son was being tortured every day.

"What kind of torture is my son undergoing every day?" the General asked, his tone as cold as ice.

"Twice a week, he is sent to the arena so that he can earn money for our Master," Thirteen answered. "If he wins, he is allowed to eat. And if he loses, he will be starved for an entire day even if he is seriously injured from his duels.

"On the days that he isn't in the arena, he is forced to fight other Tigerkins in the warehouse. Since he doesn't want to hurt his comrades, he winds up enduring their attacks until he gets beaten black and blue.

"Our Master also enjoys making Percival get down on his knees to clean the feet of Ogres and Trolls with his tongue. He seems to enjoy Percival's stubborn face filled with humiliation every time he licked the feet of all the Monster Slaves one by one."

A loud crack reverberated inside the room as General Stark smashed his table with his right fist, breaking it completely.

"Bastard! I'll kill him!" General Stark growled in anger. "I'll kill him!"

Even Dixon was doing his best to control himself from breaking things inside the room because what the boy told them was simply too much for a warrior like him to bear.

Tigerkins were a prideful race, and they would rather die than be humiliated by their enemies.

It took a while for General Stark to regain his composure. It was hard for him to accept the hardships that Percival was facing on a daily basis.

When he felt that he now regained control of his emotions, he continued his interrogation, but his words were now calmer than before.

"What is your relationship with my son, Percival?" General Stark asked.

"I don't know if Percival considers me as a friend or not," Thirteen replied. "But I often bring him scraps of bread and food whenever he has nothing to eat. We often talk with each other before we go to sleep. That is how I came to know about his family.

"He hates Anwir very much, and he often cries and talks in his sleep calling him a traitor and all sorts of other names. There are also times when he says that he misses his mother and wishes that he had never left home with Anwir to go to the villages on the border."

Thirteen made sure to paint himself as Percival's one and only friend who helped him during his hardest moments.

The boy also didn't hesitate to badmouth their "wicked Master" and curse him for making all of them suffer on a daily basis.

If there was an award for the Best Child Actor, Thirteen would have gotten it then and there, with Vassago getting the award for best supporting actor.

After hearing the other unspeakable hardships that the slaves had undergone under their Master's order, General Stark, Dixon, and Rafiki were becoming more emotional and looked at the seven-year-old, who had suffered alongside Percival, with pitiful gazes.

When the interrogation was over, Rafiki made Zion drink the cure for the truth serum, allowing him to regain his senses.

What they didn't know was that Thirteen had been in full control of his thoughts throughout the entire interrogation, deceiving the adults into feeling more sympathetic toward him.

"General, please give me permission to capture Anwir and have him detained," Dixon said, with fury blazing in his eyes.

His fury was blazing after coming to learn that the person he had trained to become a Warrior was actually a white-eyed wolf who wouldn't hesitate to betray his General because he wanted revenge.

"Don't do that."

Thirteen, who looked weak and pitiful in their eyes, struggled to voice out his thoughts.

"I have a better plan," Thirteen answered. "And if it works, not only will we be able to save Percival, we will also be able to reform Anwir as well. I believe he deserves a second chance. He only acted like this because he blames the General's family for his father dying on his mission."

After Dixon heard the boy's words, he reeled in his anger and looked at the General, who would decide on their next course of action.

"Tell me what you have in mind," General Stark. "If this will ensure that Percival will be rescued, then I wouldn't mind cooperating with you."

Thirteen nodded and began to tell them what he intended to do.

After listening to the seven-year-old's plan, the adults couldn't help but look at him in disbelief.

They never thought that someone as young as Zion would be able to make such a detailed plan that would not only allow Percival to be rescued but also allow Anwir to redeem himself.

Thirteen looked calm on the surface, but deep inside, he was smiling evilly.

If his plan really worked then not only would he acquire a Hero and a Villain, but he would also get the General's support from the shadows, allowing him to investigate the real reason behind the upcoming war.

The seven-year-old strongly believed that this war was just a smokescreen for something bigger.

As to what that thing was, he wanted to put a stop to it before a full-blown battle between the Barbarians and the Tigerkins took place, dyeing the Valbarra Archipelago with the color of their blood.