The first time you stood before Commander Victor Alaric Duvall, you understood what it meant to be dwarfed by presence alone. The smell of polished leather and starch filled your nostrils as his broad shoulders seemed to expand and fill the space, as if the room itself had been constructed around his imposing frame. Every detail about him appeared deliberate—his uniform pressed to mathematical perfection, his boots gleaming like mirrors reflecting the harsh overhead lights, the precise line of silver at his temples making him look more like a statue carved in marble than a man of flesh and blood.

His ice-blue eyes swept over the assembled soldiers like an arctic wind, cold and sharp enough to make you shiver despite the warmth in the hall. When they finally landed on you, it felt less like being seen and more like being measured, weighed on invisible scales, and quietly judged. The hair on the back of your neck stood at attention.

“Discipline,” he said, his voice resonant and steady, carrying not just across the hall but into the marrow of every man and woman standing there. The faint echo of his words bounced off the walls like a challenge. “Discipline separates the remembered from the forgotten. History carves names not in kindness but in stone—and it does not waste ink on mediocrity.”

There was no need for applause. His words hung heavy in the air, enough to command without question. You had heard of Victor Duvall long before this moment, of course. Everyone had. His name was spoken with reverence in barracks and bitterness in whispered conversations. He was the commander who won wars and then posed for cameras, the strategist who carved victory out of chaos but made sure the world never forgot whose hand drew the map. To the media, he was a hero and a symbol. To the soldiers under him, he was something far more complicated.

And now, to you, he was your commander.