Inside what appeared to be a command vehicle—a medium-sized tactical vehicle—a man in work clothes was being beaten by a soldier.
There were other soldiers inside the military vehicle, but no one tried to stop the assault.
“You’d better come clean quickly. There are more traitors, aren’t there? Sergeant First Class Zuo Ming, the middleman, already spilled everything. Holding out won’t do you any good.”
At the question thrown with a punch, the man in work clothes desperately shook his head.
“I have nothing to do with this! It’s all lies. I’m just an ordinary nuclear technician!”
Even as he became covered in blood, the man only kept shouting that he was innocent.
A young noncommissioned officer watching from the side asked the officer beside him.
“Why don’t we just kill him?”
The officer who had been asked, a man wearing the insignia of a higher rank, shook his head.
“I’d like to, too, but it seems the higher-ups need more solid evidence. As you know, his backer is quite high up.”
At his words, the noncommissioned officer frowned.
“Even so, it’s just guanxi with the Central Party, isn’t it? We’re in the middle of fighting the Central Party right now, so what use are those connections?”
At the noncommissioned officer’s protest, the officer let out a sigh.
“Politics isn’t that simple. We may be pointing guns at each other now, but once this is settled, we’ll be working together again. It’s hard to cut off connections all at once.”
“I don’t really understand.”
“Well, I’m saying this, but I don’t understand it either. Just think of it as there not being enough evidence for an order to execute him.”
“In the end, we just need to catch the Americans.”
“There won’t be any evidence beyond that.”
At the officer’s words, the noncommissioned officer nodded.
The man being tortured also heard their conversation, and his expression darkened.
He had been forcibly holding out, but it seemed that even if he endured the torture, he would not survive.
“Stop hitting him now. It doesn’t look like there’s anything more to hear anyway. We can at least give him his final moments.”
At the officer’s words, the soldier who had been swinging his fists also stepped back.
Once the torture stopped, the sounds around them began to reach their ears.
The cries of night insects, which had not been audible until just a moment ago, disturbed their ears.
“That’s a relief. With the weather like this, I thought all the insects had died, but it seems they’re still fine.”
At the noncommissioned officer’s words, the officer drew his brows together.
“You can hear insects?”
At the officer’s words, the noncommissioned officer looked puzzled.
“Yes. Can’t you hear them clearly?”
At that, the officer gave an order to the communications soldier with a grave expression.
“Contact the commander of the 1st Company immediately!”
“If we contact them during the operation, our cover may be compromised.”
“I don’t care!”
At his words, the communications soldier fumbled and picked up the communicator.
It was then.
Thump! Thump!
A knocking sound came from outside the vehicle.
The officer shouted irritably.
“Who is it!”
A low voice came from outside.
“The night sky?”
It was the password.
It was Chinese that could be understood immediately, but there was something strangely off about it.
However, no one noticed that.
The soldier by the door grabbed the handle to open it, and at the same time, the communications soldier’s voice rang out.
“We can’t reach the 1st Company currently on operation!”
The soldier about to lower the handle froze, and the soldiers picked up the guns beside them.
The officer drew the pistol from his waist and aimed it at the man who had been tortured.
He spoke toward the outside.
“It is full of stars.”
The officer answered the password, but no one had any intention of opening the door.
Instead, the officer asked again, placing his finger on the trigger.
“Who are you?”
He intended to pull the trigger if the person outside forced the door open, or if even the slightest thing seemed abnormal.
However, from outside, only the voice came again.
“Please don’t tease me. It worked in other places. The timing was just bad this time.”
The voice that came through was relaxed, as if conversing with another companion.
At the unexpected situation, the officer frowned, and the noncommissioned officer aimed his gun at the man who had been tortured.
Unlike the officer, he intended to shoot immediately.
Before he could pull the trigger, the voice outside came again first.
“Sleep. Sleep.”
As the calm voice was heard, sleep poured over them like a waterfall.
No strength entered the finger placed on the trigger.
Thud. Boom. Boom.
The sounds of people collapsing rang out, and he, too, could not endure the drowsiness and fell to the floor.
Click.
Once all the soldiers had fallen asleep, the handle attached to the door moved on its own.
The door opened, and a man entered.
“Unlock magic is a kind of automated telekinesis magic. If it works like this, then it won’t be any use on electronic locks.”
The man, who had been tilting his head while looking at the opened door, saw the one person awake among the sleeping soldiers and reached out his hand.
“Your injuries are severe. I’ll have to treat you first.”
With those words, he brought the spear that had suddenly appeared to the body of the man who had been tortured.
A strange energy flowed into the tortured man’s body, and at the pain he was feeling for the first time, he screamed with all his might.
“Guaaaaargh!”
***
If I hadn’t hurriedly cast soundproofing magic, it would have been troublesome.
I knew that receiving healing magic hurt tremendously, but I hadn’t expected him to scream like that.
All the enemy soldiers nearby had either been subdued or put to sleep, so there was no worry about being discovered, but the American soldiers who came with me might hear that scream and misunderstand.
I carried the man, who still couldn’t gather his senses, out of the vehicle.
“Is this the right person?”
The special forces commander looked at the man I handed over and nodded.
“Seeing as he can’t come to his senses, he must have been tortured quite severely.”
The reason he couldn’t come to his senses right now was something else, but I decided to pretend I didn’t know.
He called for a medic, and the medic who checked the patient said that his condition was not as bad as expected.
“The wounds aren’t serious, so I think he’ll regain consciousness soon.”
It was good news, but the commander’s expression was not bright.
“We don’t have time to wait……”
“I’ll wake him.”
“Would you do that?”
The medic and the commander immediately stepped aside.
After I noticed the trap and acted as a proper guide, none of them ignored me anymore.
I still hadn’t revealed my real ability, but at this rate, I didn’t think there was any need to show more of it.
I placed my hand on the unconscious man’s body and cast magic.
Bzzzt!
As a weak current flowed into his body, the man’s eyes flew open.
“Gah!”
In the midst of that, a faint scream sounded again, but since his eyes were open, it wasn’t a big problem.
Once he regained consciousness, the commander asked.
“Are you Chief Engineer Chen Ming?”
“Who……? Ah! Yes. You’ve come. Thank goodness!”
Confused at hearing English, he soon recognized the American soldiers and nodded frantically.
“This isn’t something to say to someone who just regained consciousness, but we don’t have much time. Please guide us.”
As soon as he came to his senses, the commander immediately requested guidance.
At the commander’s words, Chief Engineer Chen Ming looked troubled.
“I have to guide you, but my current physical condition is……”
Before he could finish speaking, I cut in.
“Your body should be fine.”
“What?”
He stared at me with a bewildered expression.
I told him the truth.
“I treated you.”
Calling it torture aside, nothing had been cut off or broken. They were external injuries from being beaten.
For that much, one healing spell was enough to make him capable of moving.
[He is not an energy user, so if he moves right away, there will be aftereffects.]
Soph told me what to be careful about, but that did not apply this time.
Whether that man was left with aftereffects had nothing to do with me.
“That’s right, just now……”
Perhaps remembering what had happened a moment ago, the man looked at me with fearful eyes.
I tilted my head at the expression, which was different from what I had expected, and the commander said with a delighted face.
“Since he’s been treated, let’s set out at once.”
Judging from the commander’s expression, he seemed to be thinking the same thing as me.
As we hurried him, Chen Ming rose with a worried expression.
He did grimace as he got up, but he was able to stand without issue.
“It really has been treated. But that pain……”
He frowned again, but no one was interested in his expression.
We urged him on as we headed toward the base.
As we followed Chen Ming, I could understand why he had been needed.
The path he showed us was in a perfect position to avoid the guard posts.
However, while guiding us, Chen Ming kept tilting his head.
“This is strange. Even if we avoid the posts, there should be soldiers on patrol. Besides, even though they know the enemy is attacking, it doesn’t seem as if security has been increased.”
He was right.
After rescuing him, we had been approaching the base without encountering any interference at all.
At his words, the other unit members became even more vigilant, but the commander only glanced at me.
It seemed the commander had noticed to some extent.
Chen Ming’s words were not wrong.
There were patrol soldiers, and security had been strengthened further.
The fact that we had been able to come all the way to the front of the base without being caught by the enemy under those circumstances was entirely thanks to me—no, thanks to Soph.
I located the enemies with my super-senses, and Soph put all the enemies who would get in our way to sleep with sleep magic.
A short while later, we were able to arrive in front of the base without being discovered.
I had already checked it in advance with my super-senses, but the base had quite a strange appearance.
Inside the base were a cliff with a huge hole bored into it, several barracks, and a single railway track.
Of course, there were radars and soldiers monitoring the surroundings, as well as armored vehicles and even anti-air missiles, but from the outside, it only looked shabby.
However, I knew how large this base was.
Most of the base I had confirmed with my super-senses lay inside that cliff.
This base was so large that even my super-senses had difficulty checking all of it.
As all the unit members hid outside the barbed-wire fence and watched the base, Technician Chen Ming let out a sigh.
“Originally, from here, we planned to use a transport vehicle driven by a colleague to bring you inside. But now that my colleague has been captured, we can’t use that method.”
The captured colleague he mentioned must have been Sergeant First Class Zuo Ming, whom the soldiers had spoken of while he was being tortured.
It was unexpected news, but no one was surprised.
It seemed they had also experienced plenty of operations that didn’t go according to plan.
“Understood. If it’s difficult to infiltrate secretly, then we’ll have to force our way through.”
After hearing Chen Ming’s words, the commander gestured to his men.
Click.
At his signal, the unit members checked their weapons.
Just as the commander had said, they prepared to force their way through.
I raised my hand and stopped the unit members preparing for battle.
“There’s no need to force our way through.”
Everyone looked at me with puzzled eyes.
Under their gazes, I stood up.
And then I revealed the spear I had been hiding.
Wooooong.
Seeing the spear that had suddenly appeared, people’s eyes widened.
I said to the startled people,
“As I said at the beginning, I am a mage.”
I drove the staff into the ground and continued.
“Mages are better at making paths than finding them.”
With my words, the ground began to move.
Rumble.
The earth collapsed, and a huge hole appeared before our eyes.
It was a hole connected to the underground base.
Nuclear Base (2)