“The royal palace bunker line, huh.”
Soon, Sydney’s group entered the underground sewer.
“Deactivate skill.”
I opened my eyes. A brief wave of dizziness washed over me, then my vision returned.
“Every man for himself.”
I remembered the last words I’d exchanged with Sydney. None of us were in any position to help anyone else right now. Keeping my own people alive was already more than enough.
I looked over the group again. Their condition was a sight to behold.
“Urk, cough! Cough!”
Minister Josef kept retching, one hand clamped over his nose. His finest tailcoat was already caked in mud.
“Ugh… haa….”
Elise, too, had her sleeve over her mouth as she leaned against the wall. The guards entering the sewer for the first time were also tearing up and sniffling, struggling even to breathe.
On the other hand, the seasoned ones who had already been through this countless times with me were different.
“Lieutenant Colonel, nothing abnormal up ahead. Weapons check complete.”
Hanna rolled up the legs of her combat uniform with practiced ease.
“…Haa, we came in here again.”
Erika sighed, but she did not let her guard down.
“There is no better place to hold out. Minister, keep your breathing shallow.”
Seraphina stood ramrod straight, giving instructions to the dazed guards and Minister Josef. Of course, every single soldier and the minister listening to her had the corners of their mouths turned down.
Drip.
“Ah, damn it.”
Just then, a warm liquid ran down along my jawline. Red drops of blood fell to the floor. A side effect from squeezing my mana circuits dry earlier. It seemed it still hadn’t fully stopped.
As I frowned and tried to stanch the bleeding, Elise carefully approached me.
“Please stay still, Lieutenant Colonel.”
She took out a white handkerchief and wiped beneath my nose and around my mouth. Then she whispered in a small voice.
“You overdid it again… Your mana circuits….”
After stopping the nosebleed, Elise’s gaze moved to my shoulder. There was a graze left where a bullet had just brushed past me earlier.
Without hesitation, she tore the hem of her own clothes and wrapped it around my shoulder. As she did, she asked,
“By any chance, earlier in the basement….”
She stopped before saying more. It seemed she had guessed something, but she did not press me.
“It’s done.”
“Thank you, Major.”
“…It is my duty.”
I lightly rolled the shoulder she had finished bandaging, then rose to my feet.
The [Minimap] was still full of red dots.
“Still, it’ll take them quite some time to find this place.”
There seemed to be enough time for a brief “attunement.” I quietly approached Seraphina.
“Seraphina, give me your arm.”
“…Pardon?”
“We don’t have time. Come here.”
Seraphina nodded silently. Even so, she awkwardly lowered her eyes. The tips of her ears were faintly red.
“Status Analysis.”
[Name: Seraphina von Reinhardt]
[Condition: Physical fatigue, psychological relief, slight palpitations]
[Emotion: ……To think he called me that. And he even got angry because he was trying to save me first…….]
“She’s still thinking about that?”
I began the attunement.
“Hand of Attunement.”
[Skill “Hand of Attunement (Lv.2)” is activating.]
[Stabilizing the target’s biological energy.]
My palm touched her skin. The chill of her tangled mana calmly settled, and her taut nerves relaxed gently.
[Name: Seraphina von Reinhardt]
[Emotion: …My body really does feel better.]
“Don’t push yourself too hard. We still have a long way to go.”
“…I will keep that in mind.”
Treatment and reorganization of the battle line. About ten minutes passed like that. Just as the group finished their short rest and began to rise one by one with stiff bodies—
“…They’re coming.”
The approaching enemies appeared on the [Minimap].
“Lieutenant Colonel. Pipe passage at eleven o’clock. Four approaching.”
Hanna quickly reported.
“Their mana waves are rough… and their morale is a mess… They seem like conscripts forced in against their will.”
I adjusted my grip on the submachine gun and nodded. On the [Minimap], red dots were moving close against the left wall. Sure enough, these were not the movements of a skilled search team.
“Everyone against the wall. Hold your breath.”
We all hid ourselves in the darkness at once. Then silence followed.
Before long—
Splash, splash.
Footsteps broke the silence. Flashlight beams swept chaotically across the walls.
“Damn it, the smell is fucking awful. Are you sure this is the right way?”
“Shut up! We confirmed the embassy is connected to this place.”
Their voices were thick with irritation.
“…Amateurs.”
They had openly turned on flashlights in the dark and were even chattering like that. They did not know even the basics of concealment.
Using the [Minimap], I accurately gauged the positions of their heads, and the moment they rounded the corner, I pulled the trigger without hesitation.
Tatatatatang—!
“Aaagh!”
“Guh!”
The heads of the two men in front blew apart. The startled men behind them tried to pull out their guns, but my aim was a beat faster.
Tatáng! Tang!
Nine-millimeter rounds buried themselves in their chests and napes, and their bodies collapsed into the sewer filth. Red blood mixed with the dirty water, giving off a revolting stench of gore.
“Clear.”
There was no response to my words. For a moment, silence settled in the darkness.
“…?”
Puzzled, I looked back. The guards were staring wide-eyed, blankly aiming their muzzles at the corpses that had already become lumps of meat. The situation had ended before they could even pull the trigger.
“Status Analysis.”
[Name: Müller]
[Affiliation: Imperial Foreign Ministry Embassy Guard]
[Condition: Shock, cognitive dissonance at a situation that ended the instant footsteps were heard]
[Emotion: What the hell just happened? He fired the moment they rounded the corner and hit their vitals precisely without even looking? Is that monster the Lieutenant Colonel Jaeger I’ve only heard rumors about?]
“I-Is it over?”
The man asked back in a dazed voice, while Erika and Seraphina clicked their tongues despite being used to it.
“The way he still fires the moment they pop around a corner is….”
“Whenever the Lieutenant Colonel takes point, the tactical manuals become meaningless more often than not. To be honest, I still don’t really understand it.”
I merely jerked my chin toward the corpses floating in the sewer.
“What are you doing? Grab the ammunition and move.”
“Yes, sir!”
Hanna stepped forward first and began searching the bodies. The guards following after her flinched when they saw the state of the corpses, smeared with blood and filth.
“Ugh, we have to take this filthy stuff…?”
But their complaints did not last long.
“……”
Because Seraphina and Erika, standing behind them, were staring straight at them with ice-cold eyes.
And standing behind those two women were me, Lieutenant Colonel Max, and Major Elise. Finally, Minister Josef.
“Uuurk…!”
One of the guards retched. Overwhelmed by the pressure, he forced himself to reach out.
Minister Josef turned his eyes away as if trying hard to avoid the sight, while Elise watched with a worried expression.
And I did not bother taking issue with their attitude. Even if they were men who had spent their days guarding the Imperial Embassy in proper dress uniforms, there was nothing to be done. In any case, once they crawled around a little longer, they would get used to it on their own.
I had more than enough grounds to be certain of that. How many times had I dragged rookies like that through the ruins of Rosenheim and the underground passages of Elancia?
At first, everyone reacts like that. They retch at the sight of their hands soaked in blood and filth, and they feel revulsion at rummaging through corpses that had been human-shaped until moments ago.
But once bullets graze past their ears, and once they hear the screams of people dying in the dark with their guts burst open a few times, they quickly realize it.
That surviving dirty is better than dying clean.
“More are coming!”
Hanna suddenly shouted. I instinctively checked the [Minimap]. There were twenty red dots approaching close by in total. Their number was one thing, but that was not what mattered.
“……”
This time, their movements were different.
They were not idiots bunching up together like the ones just now. They maintained their intervals thoroughly and advanced in a cross formation that covered each other’s blind spots. It was typical special operations movement.
“This time, they’re properly trained.”
But—
“Two in the passage at ten o’clock, one in the upper drainage pipe at two o’clock. They’re approaching!”
“Everyone, stay sharp! These aren’t like the last ones!”
Hanna and I continued our briefing.
In the darkness where not a single sign could be sensed, the embassy guards and Minister Josef became mute as fish, glancing around helplessly. But the subordinates who had rolled with me since the Gray Forest reacted differently.
Clack, click!
Seraphina immediately dispersed behind the pipe on the right and drew up her mana, while Erika put her back against the pillar on the left and placed her finger on the trigger.
As the four of us instantly established a firing net, the frozen guards, Josef, and Elise were hastily shoved behind it.
In the underground maze where not an inch ahead could be seen, a formation was completed with a single word.
The enemies were merely approaching after hearing the gunshots, but we had already finished preparing to receive them.
[Name: Müller]
[Condition: Shock, confusion, relief]
[Emotion: W-What is this! How are they taking their positions so flawlessly when I can’t see a thing? Is the Jaeger Battle Group full of nothing but monsters like this? B-But… it’s strangely reassuring!]
[Name: Josef]
[Condition: Extreme tension, rational judgment]
[Emotion: Marshal Ludwig’s praise was not excessive—it was insufficient. I may not know much about tactics, but I do know one thing. If I get out of here alive, I must absolutely establish a stronger connection to Lieutenant Colonel Jaeger!]
Silence flowed for a moment. A sewer cesspool where the stench paralyzed every sense, and only the sound of water struck the ears.
“It certainly is a smelly, filthy place, but…”
It was the same as always. Ever since I had possessed this world, it had been like this. From the Gray Forest to the ruins of Rosenheim, and then the maddeningly vast and complex sewers of Elancia and Londinium.
The dirtier and more fucked-up the terrain—
“Now.”
Tatáng! Tang!
The more broken my maphack became.
“Aaagh!”
Bullets fired in a perfect ambush pierced through the enemies’ bodies.