The Sovereign who was sent to do the shift change for Long Bay Correctional Facility didn't want to waste any more time than necessary there.
"Newly arrived soldiers, as of today, you will be in control of this correctional facility. You will now go through the five levels of this facility one by one before exchanging positions with the soldiers of this rank who are about to leave. If no one has any doubts about this procedure, please line up according to your military ranks."
Most people outside the military area quickly formed a simple line.
There were many Commanders there, but the hierarchical levels within any organization were divided in the same way as their respective magical stages. Thus, High-level Mages went to the front of the line, with the oldest going before the youngest, which was usually the second rule of hierarchical differentiation.
Older people usually had more merit, so it was very common for two people of the same military rank and magic stage to be divided by age in terms of power within organizations.
But there was no confusion in this differentiation. Symbols on each soldier's ID made it easy to see whether they were above or below other people. It would be difficult for someone to come face to face with another soldier and not know whether to act as superior, equal, or inferior.
Vicente followed Evan, along with Sarah, and soon joined the line in their respective positions.
"Do you know what the entrance to the prison looks like?" Evan asked them quietly as the line began to move.
"Hmm, don't worry, I'm aware," Vicente said as Sarah remembered what she had talked to him about before they left Ironcrest.
The entrance to Long Bay Correctional Facility had five levels, basically used to verify the identity of the soldiers taking up positions in the military unit in question.
The kingdom knew that there could be problems with it and had a complex system to reduce the chances of infiltrators entering their prisons.
Since this system had never had any major failures since its inception, it was sufficient, and after passing through all the levels, the chances of being caught in the act were greatly reduced.
The first level consisted of primary identification, where the soldiers would give their data and crucial information for the registration of their IDs at the new post they would belong to for the next few years. At the second level, one would have to use a series of codes that only kingdom soldiers could know.
These codes changed constantly, and when sent to a new post, soldiers would receive new codes on devices that would self-destruct after they read its contents. So, only those soldiers who received such devices could have it.
But it was possible to extract this information from a soldier. So, the last few levels of these shifts were more thorough in checking the identity of the soldiers.
The third level was basically a facial and biometric recognition test, as well as a tone of voice test, which was completed in the fourth level when one's magical aura was tested.
The last level was the most difficult of all, the interview with the Sovereign, who would analyze each soldier's heartbeat by asking selected questions.
Evan then told the two. "The first four levels should be easy for you, considering how prepared you are. But you'd better not use those camouflage devices during the interview with the Sovereign. He'll know you're pretending to be someone you're not."
Vicente already knew this and nodded in agreement before looking at Sarah. "After the fourth test, you must find a way to take off your mask and stop wearing the bracelet with that woman's aura. We'll have to show the Sovereign our true selves."
Gulp!
"That will let someone very strong and dangerous know about our real appearances." She said worriedly.
Changing one's appearance was very easy with special equipment. All you needed was a lot of coins because this kind of device was very expensive and its sale was forbidden. In other words, there were devices for sale only on the black market.
But without such devices, it was practically impossible to change one's appearance on this continent. Even Paragons couldn't accomplish that.
The most they could do was improve their appearance and make them look younger than they were. But that only allowed them to maintain a youthful appearance, not change their appearance to look like someone else.
Therefore, if they showed their faces to that Sovereign, he would have their true identities, which might get them into trouble.
"Don't think about it now. He's a Sovereign, and he will leave this facility right after this shift change. If we don't find him in the future, it's very likely that he won't be able to track us down." Vicente said, aware that even if a Sovereign's memory was excellent, it would be difficult for that man to remember more than 300 faces and thus discover that they were the infiltrators who would cause the chaos that was about to happen.
But he acknowledged that it could happen!
"Tsk! You like living on the edge." She muttered to him, not liking it at all, thinking that she would die because of this crazy person.
But she did what Vicente had in mind and soon entered the first level of the prison.
Long Bay Correctional Facility had five levels between the outside of the prison and the area where the soldiers could move freely, live, and have access to the wing where the inmates were held.
On these five levels were the people who would check the identity of each of the soldiers who would replace those who were about to leave this military facility.
The first people soon passed through levels 1 and 2 and arrived at level 3.
While the strongest went ahead with their identifications, proving who they were, Sarah went ahead of Vicente and Evan since her level was higher than theirs.
"Commander Sophia Aceron, you look a bit stronger than a few weeks ago when you left your previous post, don't you?" A woman asked as a group of four people stared intently at Sarah.
Although the device on one of their wrists showed Sophia's aura instead of Sarah's, the device was affected by the level of the person using it. So right now, this black-haired woman's aura would be similar to Sophia's if this soldier were at the mid-level of the 3rd stage.
"I was fortunate enough to find a promotion opportunity that suited me recently. When my party came to this province, we found a Magic Spring." She said, acting so as not to provoke suspicion.
