"And that is how humanity survived, by sacrificing the men to hold the line and teaching them never to give in. Our kingdoms were built on their iron will."

Team STL hand killed every person in the radio tower and captured it with an hour of having it in their sights. Stark piled the bodies into one spare closet used as a storage for random supplies. If they had been a team from Vale, they would have been instructed to knock them out and tie them up. If they were a team from Mistral, they would have been ordered to round up the men and take them back to the kingdom to be put to work. If they were a team from Vacou they would have never even come to this foreign land. But no, they were from Mantle. They were cold and they struck without remorse. That is how you survive in Mantle.

No one, particularly in the military, is shocked when they kill someone. It is part the training. It is the reason Mantle has been a fearsome enemy. When the men of Vacou staged a revolt the Queen begged the other kingdoms for help as the revolutionaries took more and more of the kingdom. The Queen of Vale couldn't be bothered to help. The Queen of Mistral couldn't come to an agreement on price. The Queen of Mantle didn't give it a second thought before landing Mantle's famous war machines on Vacou soil.

The Revolutionaries weren't given the respect Mantle gives to enemies that met them with honour. Because they were the poor working class and couldn't afford war machines and uniforms. They could on fight a guerilla war, but Mantle didn't care. They were crushed without pause under the cold might of Mantle, and when they were done. Mantle began purging the Vacou government of those that helped them. And when it was over, the grateful Queen of Vacou found that Mantle had taken much of their Dust, metal, and men. Almost more than what the Queen of Mistral asked for. After that, no one questioned what Mantle was all about. It was a kingdom of resolve.

Tecaelis tore down the radio tower with a great pull off red coloured energy. The massive structure toppled to the ground silently as Lucas robbed it of its sound. And then spent the next five minutes glowing softly as he released the absorbed sound as light.

"How much time until they send someone to investigate?" Stark asked Tecaelis as he sawed through the radio tower for bits of scrap metal.

"From what I saw in the schedule they tacked up, it will be about two hours before they expect another transmission from this tower." As he spoke, Tecaelis spun his finger around in the air; controlling an invisible, telekinetic, circular saw that was cutting through the metal. "Then it will be about and hour before they get around to sending anyone this way. This tower is supposed to send status reports of the nearest town, so eventually, they will send another team to go over that way."

"Black, how much time will take to get to that town?" Lucas looked down at Stark from his perch on top of the radio station. He peered back through his scope for a short time and said,

"A little more than an hour if we don't run into any trouble." Stark nodded.

"Perfect, then we move for the town in half an hour."

"Uh, sir?" Tecaelis asked. "Are you sure you want to go after that prisoner. These kingdom is going to be hot on our tails soon enough." Stark gave a slight grin.

"Sergeant Schnee. We have hit every watchtower, outpost, and checkpoint since the first wall we encountered at the beginning of the canyon. We could have easily floated above or snuck around them, but we took the places out. Because it is the same path we need to take to get out. The moment they discover what happened to the radio station they are going to chase us down the path we cleared and find out we are not there. By the time they realize we haven't left, or at least not the same way we came, we will have snuck into the town and freed our target. And then we go out the way they think they already covered." Tecaelis smirked and went back to cutting away pieces of the tower. There was a certain tone in Stark's voice that Tecaelis had gotten used to when speaking to his commanding officers. It had a certain inflexion that said,

"Trust me, I know what I'm doing." But then again, what would a simple engineer like Tecaelis know about such things.

Stark went through the files with an ever increasing scowl crawling across his face. Tecaelis sat in the corner silently working on his project with intense focus. Every now and then he would look up and grab a piece of scrap metal he had removed from the tower and spent a minute or two pulling and pushing against it with his power until it was shaped to his liking.

When their time was up Lucas came swing in through the window from the roof top. When he saw Stark wasn't near ready he looked rather annoyed.

"I thought we were leavin'?" In response, Stark stood up with a file and began pacing the room with it.

"This doesn't make any sense," he said angrily. "They aren't even hiding the fact that they assassinated The Queen, not to mention other people we didn't even know about. It says here that they are about to go after several targets in Atlas and Vacou too."

"It ain't our job to know why, it was just our job to grab the info a get out. But you have us running across the damn canyon going after some fool that got himself caught."

"There is more," Stark said. "When the last Queen of Mistral died fifteen years ago, it was under mysterious condition. She is practical the only one they don't explicitly say they assassinated."

"So what? Mistral is out to pick a fight with the other kingdoms. Not. Our. Job."

"Enough Black! We will leave when I say so. Sit down, shut up, and listen." Stark tossed the file he was looking at back into the pile. He picked up one file he had discarded before and said, "This is from shortly after the new Queen took power, anything catch your eye?" He tossed the file into Tecaelis' lap, earning dirty looks from Lucas.

"A new form of government?" Tecaelis said with a confused look. And Lucas looked confused. Apparently, that was enough to catch his attention. "But the kingdoms have been working fine for the last hundred or so years. We haven't seen war for generations. And then the new Queen announces she is going to reform that government. That's just… crazy!" Tecaelis studied the file. "She claims 'No longer shall men and faunus be treated differently from the rest of society. No longer shall the other kingdoms get away with their treason against The High Crown,' what the hell is she talking about?"

"I don't know, and why didn't she annoce this to the other kingdoms? This isn't lining up." Stark said slowly as he leafed through another paper. "But I'm sure we'll find out at that town, Newons apparently. It says here that is the location of the largest 'correctional facility'. Any idea what that is?" Lucas and Tecaelis both shook their heads. "And everything gets weirder. They mention sending emissaries there, 'to cleanse them from their encounters in Vale'. They mention marking every faunus across the kingdom, shipping large amounts of people by train, and this word keeps appearing everywhere. 'Collectivization' this goes beyond not making sense. Something is wrong in this kingdom."

"Then we better hurry," Tecaelis said as a look of worry came across his face. "The Wraith Winds are coming."