**Kitsune Vulpine's Log, Supplemental**
**Discovery recording**
**35 days after Rothgard's Fall**
Squads clash. Advantages shine. Cohesion forges victory.
From her seat in the white command tent, Kitsune watched the large curved screen above the operations table with rapt attention. Real-time feeds from multiple angles showed two identical mock compounds, each a maze of walls, doorways, and elevated positions defended by Discovery's elite Marines. Below the screen, crew and Marines monitored data pads, their voices low and professional as they coordinated the exercise. Nolan sat to her left, A.L.I. beside him, while Lord Alistair occupied the chair on her right. The Marine training commander stood at the rail, hands clasped behind her back.
On the screen, Squad One under Torin advanced first. The catkin-led team moved with predatory silence, keen ears twitching at sounds the others missed. Torin raised a fist; the squad froze. A single paint round cracked past where they would have been. They adjusted without a word, flowed around the threat with agile grace, and breached the inner room in a coordinated rush. The hostage dummy was secured and extracted in under ninety seconds. Clean. Efficient.
Beside it on the split feed, Borin's squad—dwarven heavy at the point—took a different path. Where Torin relied on stealth, Borin's team used raw power. The dwarf shouldered a reinforced door with a grunt that carried over the audio feed, carbine barking in controlled bursts while his squad laid down suppressive fire. Magic flickered from one of the gnome cadets, a brief shimmering barrier that absorbed incoming paint rounds long enough for the team to reach the hostage. They succeeded, but more slowly, the dummy marked with two orange splatters from close calls.
Sylvana's squad appeared next on the screen. The elf-led group blended magic and marksmanship seamlessly. Sylvana raised a hand; a soft veil of illusion rippled across the open ground, distorting the Marines' lines of sight just enough for her team to close the distance. Carbine fire cracked in precise, overlapping patterns, each shot complemented by a whispered spell that scattered dust or created fleeting distractions. They extracted the hostage with graceful efficiency, though one Marine managed a lucky hit on their rear security, forcing a frantic final sprint across the line.
Not every squad fared as well. On the far compound, a mixed human-elf team hesitated at the breach. The lead cadet froze for a heartbeat too long; a Marine inside the room stitched his vest with three rapid orange impacts. The squad's cohesion fractured under the sudden pressure. They recovered, but the timer expired before the dummy cleared the extraction marker. The Marine commander's voice carried across the tent without judgment. "Failure on Compound Bravo. Squad Four will re-run at the end of the cycle."
Kitsune's nine tails curled thoughtfully around the base of her chair. She had expected rigid uniformity, yet every squad adapted in its own way—catkin senses cutting through the chaos, dwarven strength shattering obstacles, elven magic weaving subtle advantages around the impressive carbines. The Americans' weapons were formidable, yet it was how each cadet complemented the other that truly impressed her. Albion knights fought with individual glory; these recruits fought as one living weapon. The integration of species and the absence of bloodline hierarchy made their cohesion feel almost unnatural. She sensed the strategic weight of it: an army that could absorb losses and keep fighting because every member trusted the next. It was both inspiring and unsettling. If such a force could be turned toward Albion's defense, the Imperia would break against it. Yet the Americans wielded this power without the traditional levers of nobility or ancient oaths, and that unpredictability kept her wary.
The Marine commander turned to her guests, her expression calm and professional. "Success is not the measure we grade on today, Grand Mage. These cadets have already completed two weeks of accelerated training. What we assess now is how well a squad works together and how effectively it applies what it has learned. Perfection is not the goal—force cohesion is. A unit that stays together under fire will survive the real battlefield. One that falls apart, even if they reach the objective, will not."
Kitsune met the commander's gaze, golden-orange eyes gleaming with genuine respect. "A wise philosophy. Unity under pressure is rarer than raw power. Your people understand this better than most kingdoms I have known." Nolan leaned forward slightly, his voice carrying quiet pride. "That is exactly why we train them this way. When the Imperia comes, we will need every squad to function as one, no matter the species or background." Kitsune nodded once, nine tails shifting with slow calculation. The day's demonstration had revealed far more than tactics. It had shown her the living heart of the force she hoped to ally with—and the careful balance she would need to strike if Albion was to survive.