Supreme Spouse System.

Chapter 632: A Table Full of Knives

A Table Full of Knives

Vice Commander Johny.

The man had hair too. It was not as neat as it could be. The hair on the sides was uneven. It looked like he had been running his hands through it a lot. His hair framed his face. His face looked really tired. It seemed like he had been up all night a lot of times and had not gotten sleep. The mans eyes were dark like his hair.. They did not seem sharp. They seemed like something that was still burning, but not very strongly. His eyes were quietly stubborn. They were still burning even in the dark. The black hair and dark eyes made him look like he was really tired. Had been, through a lot.

His armor was not black it was trimmed in silver. The markings of his rank were visible in the light when he moved. The armor was polished in the places it looked ceremonial and proper.. There were scratches and dents, in other places, where real swords had hit it. These scratches told a story of battles that were fought at range of orders that were followed in places that nobody talks about. They were proof that he had earned every stripe on his armor he did not just wear it for show.

He did not sit straight as Black. His shoulders had a slump, to them the kind that happens when you have been carrying a heavy load for a very long time.

The man looked really tired as he leaned back in his chair.. It was clear from the serious look on his face that he was not in the mood for jokes. Being, in Command can really take the humor out of a person. It can make a man very serious. The mans face showed that Command had changed him.

Johny looked at the piles of papers on the table. There were orders and reports and things, about getting supplies from one place to another. It was like the whole war was just written down on pieces of paper. Johnys mouth moved a little like he was trying not to smile. Then he let out a breath of air. It was not really a laugh and not a sigh either.

He said in a voice "You know, when Leon told us he was going to give you a promotion I really thought he would give you some time before making things super hard, for you."

Commander Black did not look up.

The papers that were, in front of him did not move much as his fingers got tight. Then they loosened up again.

He said that he trusts me. This is very important, to me. He trusts me. That means a lot. I am not going to let him down. He trusts me. I will make sure that does not change.

His fingers were still clasped together on the table his knuckles were pale. The skin was stretched out tight. It looked like he was holding onto something that you could not see. The promise he had just made was weighing heavily on him. The table did not budge. But he did he moved a bit his shoulders shifted slightly which showed that he was holding a lot of feelings inside. The promise was still, on his mind.

Johny let out a snort. He said "Trust or punishment it is really hard to tell the difference when it comes to trust and punishment."

The man had a smile on his face but his eyes were really sharp. His eyes were watching Black closely. It was, like watching someone walk on a rope. You want to see if Black will make a mistake and fall.

Black finally turned his head enough to give him a sideways glance. It was not angry and it was not amused it was just sharp. Black said "That tongue of Blacks will get him stabbed one day."

His voice was really calm. You could tell there was something else going on underneath. It was, like a warning, the kind of thing that comes from someone who has seen how those stories actually end. They know what happens when things go wrong. That is what made his voice sound like that.

Johny said "oh with a funny smile. He did not wait to say this.. Johny said he would prefer it to not be tonight.

He leaned back a little trying to make it sound like he was joking like nothing in the room was going to jump out and surprise him. The man leaned back a little trying to make the woman think he was kidding, like the things, in the room were not tense and ready to happen. He was trying to act like everything was okay like the room was not full of things that were coiled and ready to strike, like the things that the man and the woman were talking about were not going to cause any problems.

The humor did not break the tension. It actually made the tension more obvious. The tension was still there. The humor just made people notice it even more. The humor and the tension were still present, with the humor making the tension stand out.

Across the table sat two officers. They were the kind of people who were always ready for something to happen. These officers were veterans and they knew that to stay alive they had to be quiet and wait for the moment to act. One of the officers was a man with a scar above his eye. The scar was from a knife. It was clear that the knife had come very close, to hurting him badly. This man never took his eyes off Black. He just kept staring at Black with an steady gaze. The officers were men. They were the kind of people who could be very hurtful if they wanted to be. The other man was leaner his eyes were really focused his fingers were tapping a beat, on the leather file in front of him. It was not like he was nervous or anything it was just that his fingers were moving to a beat that only he could hear. The mans fingers were tapping in a precise way like he was counting down to something.

Neither of them said a word.

They did not need to.

Everyones attention went back to Black. They were all looking at Black trying to figure out what Black was thinking. They were watching Black to see how Black would react. The room was quiet. Black was being very careful, about what Black said.

The room was really quiet you know in a way that felt like something than just being quiet. It felt like the room was waiting. The room was waiting for the man at the center of the table to make a move. The room was waiting to see if the man at the center of the table would get nervous. The room was waiting to see what the man at the center of the table would decide to do. The man, at the center of the table was the one that everyone was looking at.

Because tonight wasn’t routine work.

Tonight was the time when the shifts took place without making any noise. The shifts happened quietly tonight.

Tonight when Leon was sleeping the whole kingdom changed its layout. The kingdom did something strange while Leon slept. It was like the kingdom was moving things around to look completely different. The kingdom rearranged itself tonight when Leon was not awake to see it happen.

Commander Black went through the pile of papers in front of him. These papers were not easy to read. He found papers about people arguing over land. He found notes from spies. He found reports about crimes that happened. He found lists of things they needed. He found pleas for help from people who lived away. He found updates about visitors from countries. He found reports about how the new soldiers were doing at the barracks. Commander Black looked at all these papers about disputes and intelligence notes and crime reports and resource lists and emergency requests from the outskirts and updates about foreign envoys and training reports, from the barracks.

The pages made a sound as he turned them and each one felt heavier than the one before it. Every report had a bit of what was going on in the world. The things that scared people, the things that people wanted and the quiet struggle to keep going. The reports were, like pieces of a puzzle. They all showed the realms fears the realms greed and the realms desperate attempt to stay standing.

And beneath it all—conflicts simmering between Leon’s formations and Aden’s old loyalists. A clash of discipline and ego brewing in the shadows.

That was the danger. Not open war. Not people who try to kill others. The real danger was something and that is what we should be worried, about. The real danger is what we need to think about, not open war or assassins. The real danger itself.

There is resentment.. There is pride. These are men who have not figured out that the world is moving forward without them. The world has already. These men are still stuck, in the past. They are men who do not know that things are different now. The world is moving on without these men.

Black rubbed his forehead with the side of his thumb. He was getting really frustrated. "This Black situation is a little complicated" he said to himself quietly. Black just did not know what to do about it.

Johny leaned back in his chair. Let out a deep breath. He said "That is a little? You have been sitting here at Johnys place for six hours without taking a break."

Black didn’t answer.

He felt it—the shift Leon’s promotion brought.

Not just in rank, but in gravity. The way people now spoke Leon’s name with caution instead of curiosity. The way decisions bent toward him without being told to.

He’d followed Leon for years.

Shadowed him.

Watched him transform from a man into something the world needed to treat as inevitable.

There had been moments when Leon had doubted himself.

Black remembered those. Quiet nights. Blood on his sleeves. A stare that asked if it was all worth it.

Those weren’t just memories — they were scars that never quite faded. Black had stood beside him through them, watched the weight settle into Leon’s shoulders one doubt at a time.

Now Leon trusted him with more than just orders.

He trusted him with stability.

Black’s fingers tightened on the edge of a paper, the faint rustle of it loud in the stillness of the room. He didn’t look at it right away. He looked down, steadying himself, as if he could feel the gravity of Leon’s faith pressing through the ink.

"I can handle it," he murmured. His voice wasn’t loud, but it didn’t need to be. "Even if it’s a mess... I’ll handle it."

A quiet conviction ran beneath the words — not bravado, not arrogance, just a man who knew what failure would cost.

His voice lowered enough that only those closest could hear.

"I won’t disappoint him."

The room seemed to hold its breath.

A brief silence filled the room—not the empty kind, but the heavy, respectful kind. Johny didn’t joke this time. The other officers straightened unconsciously, as if some invisible line had just been drawn.

Then Black set the document down and looked up—really looked up.

Eyes sharp.

Focused.

The warmth drained from his expression, replaced by something colder, cleaner. A soldier who knew exactly where he stood — and where he was willing to go.

A soldier ready to shift into something more dangerous when needed.

He inhaled slowly; the kind of breath commanders took before issuing orders that could shape an entire night.

His voice dropped into a steady, deliberate tone.

"So now—"