Sniping

The interface continues to display the current wind speed.

It is fluctuating between 12 and 14 meters per second.

They call it blowing snow.

When the wind is this strong, the snow piled on the ground is swept up by the wind and surges from below to above.

Since the angle is different from usual, the snow accumulates on the Titan’s sensors far faster as well.

The sensors always give off a little heat. Before the snow can pile up, it melts.

But there is no way to keep it from obstructing visibility.

At least Ailey has goggle eyes. If it had been a mono-eye, I might really have been unable to see anything.

Identifying the enemy is harder than ever.

With snow blowing like this, thermal sensors don’t mean much either, and the only thing we can somewhat rely on is the magnetic field sensor.

On the other hand, the enemy has already seen us.

Judging by that precise shot earlier, the one round that split a Titan’s waist in half, it was an armor-piercing round of a caliber closer to a shell.

“If the east has an evil dragon, the north has a reaper.”

Levan’s voice crackled.

There was slight interference in the comms because of the snow.

“A reaper?”

This is a story I do not know well.

Before coming here, I had not been particularly interested in the northern front.

“The White Reaper.”

So he means the Finnish soldier.

The motif definitely came from there.

If it were just a character in the game that existed as part of the setting, it wouldn’t be scary.

But if that person is real and my enemy, that gives me chills.

“They say he uses lens eyes with anti-reflective coating and snipes using only mechanical sights, without optical sensors. But his hit rate is over 80 percent.”

If he uses only mechanical sights without optics, then he is shooting with pure sniping skill.

“You can snipe like that?”

“He’s right next to us.”

Split clean in two.

Fortunately, it was split horizontally, not vertically.

And when I looked closely, he wasn’t dead either.

The upper-body core remained intact.

There was no damage, and no red fluid was flowing from the core.

He is alive, but it seems he has passed out and cannot escape.

“What are the White Reaper’s characteristics?”

Does he fly around the sky too?

Or does he move through the snow this time?

“He’s strong in close-range combat.”

“What?”

You said he was the White Reaper who was good at sniping.

“The rifle is a high-caliber sniper type, but he doesn’t have a single dedicated sensor for sniping. Aside from the rifle, all his equipment is for close-range combat.”

His tone is that of someone who has seen it firsthand.

“Did you see him yourself?”

“I did.”

“Did you fight him?”

“No, I ran the moment I saw him. Why would I fight that thing? Even if I don’t kill him, it doesn’t affect the ending.”

Instead of Levan, the other soldiers who were there to protect him must have been the ones who suffered.

“Second, the more enemies there are, the better he fights.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means Dis Pater and Luna aren’t idiots for conducting a defensive battle with only this many troops.”

Come to think of it, Levan did not fight Fafnir at all either.

That is Levan.

He does not deliberately stick his head into an unfavorable fight.

It was the same this time.

Levan does not stick his head out of cover first.

Kaaang!

One of the mass-produced Titans fell backward.

Its shoulder armor had been crushed.

The Titan immediately got up and hid behind another piece of cover.

If you stick your head out first, you get hit.

It would be nice if I could confirm his position just one more time.

I gritted my teeth and uttered the magic word.

“Scared?”

I’m not scared.

Absolutely not scared.

I aimed the muzzle at the movement caught by the magnetic field sensor.

After switching to the image sensor, I poked my head out from behind cover.

Taang!

After firing, I immediately hid behind cover.

A round embedded itself right above the cover.

“Hoo, hoo, hoo.”

I missed.

But I confirmed the position.

I had never intended to hit him in the first place.

“Levan, seven o’clock for sure.”

“Then shoot.”

“I will.”

I aimed the grenade launcher upward.

Toong!

A small grenade fired upward by Ailey.

The warhead section opened as it flew, and the propeller began to spin.

A screen showing the observation grenade’s point of view appeared at the lower left of my vision.

“She’s kind of cute every time she fires, isn’t she?”

“I don’t really understand Ailey’s sensibilities.”

“I’m telling you, it’s cute.”

I said I don’t really understand.

Seven o’clock.

I cannot tell how many Titans there are.

If he can be seen from above, then that is probably not the White Reaper.

It does not matter.

I poked my head out on the opposite side of the cover and fired immediately.

Jjeoong!

A Titan in the distance lost its balance and collapsed.

I had aimed at the hip joint.

If it hits, it is a spot that renders them unable to do anything immediately.

Maybe it was a type with its core located in the groin.

Usually, cores are located in the chest, but there are exceptions.

Or maybe it is a type whose generator happens to be in the pelvis, so it will explode and die just like that.

There is no way to know.

If I don’t shoot, I die, so I have no room to care.

“Deep, aren’t you going to share?”

Ah.

“I’ll share the observation grenade feed with the buddy squad.”

“Feed sharing confirmed. Beginning interception.”

Ttaang!

A strike rang out from afar.

It was Levan’s shot.

As soon as he saw the observation grenade feed, he landed a hit.

Adapting to an observation grenade feed you are seeing for the first time is not easy.

On top of that, because of the wind, the observation grenade is rattling nonstop.

It is impossible to do with only a week of endlessly repeating simulations and training.

The blowing snow, tracer rounds, and the snow kicked up again by the impact of gunfire blurred the view.

Tududududududududu!

Two Titans had outright mounted stationary turrets and were spraying rounds wildly.

Now and then, bullets ricocheted off the gunshields with clangs.

Even firing like that, I doubt they will hit the White Reaper.

They are only spraying enough fire to keep the enemy from sticking his head out within an inaccurate range anyway.

There is a possibility we can hold out like that until the sun rises.

Kaaang!

The Titan on the turret tumbled backward.

One arm fell off.

He had accurately aimed through the opening made for visibility in that huge gunshield and fired.

The Titan mounted the turret again and began spraying bullets.

It is nothing more than a stopgap measure.

“If this is how it’s going to be, then instead—”

“Deep, what are you planning to do?”

“Ailey. Please run the calculations for the auxiliary firing device.”

Reverse-calculate the points from which he could have shot the Titan that was split in half earlier, the Titan whose shoulder armor was blown off, and the Titan whose arm was blown off.

After organizing all possible sniping points into lines, mark the highest-probability points and turn them into a multi-lock-on format.

Then, if we predict the points he moved to for cover and concealment, reduce the firing time gaps as much as possible, and fire at all of them—

“Deep, if you do something like this, my waist might give out, you know?”

“With spirit.”

“Twisting my waist this much is a little too much, though?”

“I’m shooting.”

“You otaku! It’s not like everything works out just because you put strength into your waist!”

I don’t care.

“N-no, impossible! I said it’s impossible!”

“Then use your waist with technique, not strength!”

I ignited the thrusters and sprang out from behind cover.

At the same time, I ignited the side thrusters in opposite directions.

While rotating the body, I fired the sniper rifle in rapid succession.

Kaaang!

There was the sound of a hit.

Not a direct hit. It was closer to the sound of a ricochet.

At the same time as the reverse thrust, I practically rolled back behind cover and hid.

There was no counterattack.

That means he was hit by my round and is making repairs.

It would be even better if his sensors were broken.

Either way, the real one is not me.

“Lucia!”

Kiiiiiing!

It was the battlefield at seven o’clock, cutting across five in the morning.

The light went against the snow mountain.

***

A snow mountain, not a wasteland.

This battlefield is Dis Pater’s stage.

The improved thruster performance was enough to terrify even Lucia without her realizing it.

Thrusters modified with inspiration taken from Fafnir’s wings.

At this level, while hovering, it would not even be strange to call it flight.

“So I lost because he was fighting with things like this equipped.”

They said Ian was the top student in the engineering major.

Perhaps Lucia’s cause of defeat had not been Deep, but Ian.

“Well, it’s not like that matters now.”

The side thrusters ignited alternately, moving her continuously from side to side.

Now and then, the sound of rounds grazing the armor could be heard, but that was all.

Without precise calculation, she evaded the bullets according to instinct and rhythm.

Only for an instant.

If she felt it was a bullet she could not dodge, she immediately twisted her body and presented the shoulder armor.

Kakakakakak!

The huge armor-piercing round shaved against the armor and ricocheted.

Amid the spine-chilling sound, Lucia did not recoil.

She merely passed through it.

“Come down!”

Huntress reached her hand upward.

At the same time, a pure-white mass-produced Titan fell from the sky and crashed to the ground.

Soldiers who had risked their lives and hidden in flying drones amid this gale and snow.

One of them rolled along the ground the instant he fell, then slammed into something and stopped.

She did not care.

Most of them were fine anyway.

“Defensive formation!”

The moment the mass-produced Titans deployed their shields and blocked the front, Lucia blasted her side thrusters and slipped out of their field of vision.

At the same time, she accelerated.

She met sensors with a Titan that was still looking at the mass-produced Titans.

It was stunned.

Without giving it time to counterattack, she shot its core.

At the same time, what rang out was the sound of thrusters on the same level as Lucia’s.

“Right, I was wondering why you were hiding back there like a coward.”

Ailey.

A black comet piercing through the white snowfall and the white snowfield.

She aimed the rifles in both hands forward and began firing wildly.

“Ahaha!”

No, it was not wild firing.

Along with the sound of kakakang, the sound of precise hits could be heard.

She was identifying the enemy’s position, shooting, and charging in.

“So it wasn’t that I lost because of the engineer after all.”

The situation is flowing strictly according to plan.

Use the traps Ayla set to determine the direction of the enemy’s movement.

If it is determined that the enemy’s main force is on Deep and Levan’s buddy side, Lucia will raid the enemy while the two of them hold out.

Levan and the soldiers under him provide supporting fire from below.

“Perfect.”

She just has to do as usual.

Kiiiiiing!

The sound of thrusters operating.

Two Titans burrowed into the enemy’s midst and began spraying rounds.

“Hup.”

She thrust her foot forward.

Huntress cut off hovering and trampled the Titan.

It was a heavy-armored type, rare around here.

When it tried to grab her ankle, she fired a pile directly beneath her foot.

Core fluid gushed from the pierced core.

Beep.

“...cia! There’s a sniper here...”

It was Deep’s voice.

That was enough to understand the content.

“Proceed with annihilation.”

Beep.

After receiving the soldiers’ responses, she immediately accelerated, following the traces of the black Titan.

She could tell just by looking at the destroyed Titans.

He is not killing people.

They are definitely wrecked.

But he is mainly blowing off the groin sections, heads, or both arms.

Even though this should not be an environment he is relaxed in or accustomed to.

“He really is unusual.”

A cadet who cannot kill people.

Come to think of it, they said that even among commoners and lowborn students, there are cases where they do well at the academy but ultimately cannot kill people on the battlefield.

Is Deep that type too?

It may be difficult for him to become truly great.

But having that much humanity makes being in his fan club worthwhile.

Besides, right now, it is actually better.

“Then I can be the one to kill the White Reaper?”

The credit will belong to Lucia.

Straight-line acceleration.

That was what she was about to do.

Tukwaang!

She remembered too late.

Lucia’s strength lies in movements that are thoroughly uncalculated, driven by instinct.

Improvisation.

Actions based solely on her own rhythm and intuition.

Put another way, the moment her rhythm is read, Lucia’s lifespan reaches its end.

It was the same as when Deep had dodged Lucia’s attacks.

Raw, uncalculated actions can all be hit from the moment they are anticipated.

“Kuh!”

She barely managed to turn her body toward the shoulder armor, but her left arm was blown off just like that.

At the same time, a white flash pierced the dawn.

It was the Reaper, his entire body wrapped in a mottled white camouflage cloak.

“Close-quarters again?!”

The Reaper held close-combat weapons in both arms.

At the same time as Ailey, who had followed after her, three Titans collided.