novelFrom the Land of the Rising Sun >> Unofficial Island Nation Landing Operation (1)
| ← Ch.180 | Ch.182 → |
Part 1
"Quenser."
"Are you ready to go, Princess?"
Two people spoke quietly in the darkness.
They were on the way to the Island Nation. The fleet was completing their final maintenance checks while hidden within a ship scrapyard in Southeast Asia.
The Baby Magnum was completing its final tune up as well.
Once that work was complete, they were headed straight to the Island Nation.
The Princess showed him the hand she had hidden behind her back. Or more accurately, the small box she held in it.
"Here."
"?"
"In the Island Nation, you give chocolate on Valentine's Day."
"Oh?"
"Girls give it to boys there!!"
"Gweh!? Why are you attacking me with the corner of the box like that!? Stop shoving it against me!"
The Princess didn't answer and continued attacking him with her eyes squeezed shut.
But that aside...
"Yahoo!! This is handmade, isn't it!? Anything handmade by a girl is cause to celebrate if you ask me!!"
"Anything!? This is supposed to special, Quenser!!"
"?"
"(Oh, but I can't tell him girls give it to the boy they l-l-l-l-like. There's just no way. But he won't understand if I don't because he doesn't know the Island Nation traditions!)"
Rejoicing Quenser tore off the wrapping paper and began devouring the chocolate with the ferocity of someone starved for flavor after so long with nothing but flavorless rations.
The Princess stared in disbelief when he did this right in front of her.
"Quenser..." she said.
"Hey, I have to eat it while I have the chance, " he said in his usual flippant way. But then he lowered his voice and took a more serious tone."I might not be coming back alive from this one, so I don't want to leave anything undone."
"...You're right."
The Princess narrowed her eyes.
This really was not the time for something like this. Neither of them said so, but they still shared the moment together. Quenser could hardly have complained if he got stones thrown at him for this, but that was why he wanted some time to smile together while they still could.
He knew she had to feel the same. She had to know now wasn't the time, but she had still neatly wrapped up the small box. He didn't know what meaning that held for her, but she may have been afraid of ending up dead all alone in her empty cockpit.
"Quenser, what will you do now?"
"We'll see."
"People think Objects are terrible things that will destroy the world. Even though we were fighting to protect everyone."
Quenser only smiled vaguely.
He couldn't bring himself to say that was wrong.
At this point, he didn't have the willpower left to continue hiding the environmental destruction by Objects theory from the Pilot Elite.
Plus, Quenser himself had killed a certain mother. He had repeatedly stabbed her to protect the Legitimacy Kingdom home country of Paris.
The Princess had only been one cause among many, but it had been one-on-one for Quenser. Setting aside whether or not his actions had been justified, Cheddar Affinity would not have died if he hadn't been there.
He would have to live out the rest of his life with a child resenting him for the loss of his mother.
"Well..."
"..."
The Princess was a Pilot Elite. He couldn't pretend to understand how this made her feel.
But he had come to the battlefield dreaming of being an Object designer. This new direction for the world had robbed him of his dream.
So she wanted to hear his answer.
She hoped to find something there to help her.
However...
"I'm sure I'll be doing something related to Objects. I don't care what anyone says - I just love them too much."
The ever-expressionless Princess actually blinked twice in surprise.
"Sure, I'll have to see how people view Objects and what position they hold in the world, " he said, unfazed."But I'm not going to let the ghosts of some dead terrorists decide that for us all. So let's end this silly world war and decide for ourselves what Objects will be in the new world. I'm hoping it'll be something we like."
"Yes."
"You can't stand how the world sees Objects as villains now, right? Then let's start from there. Let's destroy all of this and create a new era where everyone's thankful for Objects. I don't know what actual work they'll do - could be construction and could be garbage disposal - but let's create a peaceful age of Objects so we can walk up to those so-called experts insisting Objects would destroy the world and give them the finger."
"...Yes."
With the softest of sounds, the Princess rested her forehead against Quenser's chest.
And she spoke in a vanishingly quiet voice.
"I would like that too."
"Then let's do it. Someone pulled the trigger on all this to accomplish who-knows-what, but this is still our lives. If we want to do something, we should just do it."
Time seemed to stop for a while after that.
They might not have the chance for any of that.
They might all die in the upcoming battle.
But no one had the right to deny them this moment.
Eventually, the Princess pulled her head away and spoke quietly.
"And don't forget, Quenser."
"?"
"When someone gives you Valentine's Day chocolate in the Island Nation, you have to give them a gift worth three times as much on White Day."
"What kind of loan shark holiday is that!?"
The Princess held a hand to her mouth and giggled when the boy jumped in surprise.
In that rare moment, her icy expression melted.
"You had better repay me, Quenser."
"Sure..."
Ordinarily, making promises now might have been a bad idea.
They shouldn't have been creating extra causes for regret.
But.
Quenser Barbotage couldn't help but smile as he responded.
"You got it. It's a promise."
Part 2
The world war blossomed before a freelance battlefield cameraman's eyes.
Sewax pulled his SLR camera from his face and muttered to himself: "This world deserves to be destroyed."
The Legitimacy Kingdom home country of Paris was surrounded by three defensive lines and the outermost one had been breached.
But the attackers were not free to do as they wished.
A 50m colossus crushed the massive wheat field in its path, switched the format of its main cannon, and unleashed a deafening boom and a bright orange beam of light. That was a brutal railgun.
The infantry down below covered their ears and shouted up at it.
"You're overdoing it, Excalibur!! If we really do eradicate the Faith Organization, the table will permanently lose one of its legs. As much as I hate it, this world needs all four of those legs. As knights of the Legitimacy Kingdom, we have a duty to protect world peace!!"
The Pilot Elite did not care.
Even if the target was officially a civilian medical group arriving on the battlefield for peaceful purposes.
The Elite figured there was probably a Faith Organization assassin hidden among the doctors.
Their food and water supplies had been contaminated earlier, leading to several losses among the Legitimacy Kingdom troops. The only outsiders on base at the time had been a choir there to provide some comfort during such a difficult time, but the entire choir had been "dealt with" by the soldiers after the problem was detected.
The clean wars system had already collapsed.
And it was their fault. So they only had themselves to blame if the Legitimacy Kingdom made some harsh decisions during this world war.
"Excalibur to 22nd Division. Then are you asking me to sit here twiddling my thumbs while we lose more of our people? They are directly attacking Paris. I was granted this sword by my king, so I must use it to protect our people."
The ordinary soldiers had done the right thing.
But at least three suicides by sidearm had been reported after the execution of the choir. The number of soldiers who were clenching their teeth and suffering from PTSD had to be tens or even hundreds of times greater. And this result had probably been part of the Faith Organization's plot. Knowing them, they might even cut open a baby's belly to hide a bomb inside or threaten an elderly woman into wielding a gun.
The Excalibur's Pilot Elite would not let their horrific deeds continue. He would not allow any more losses from the youths who had sworn to fight for the good of the world.
...So he had chosen to shoulder all the dirty work himself.
He calmly double checked the defense target only he would be attacking.
They would learn the hard way not to underestimate the sword granted him by his king.
The Faith Organization was not going to take this lying down.
The Capitalist Corporations and Information Alliance intervened a lot sooner than expected. The Faith Organization had assumed those third parties would just keep watch from a distance and only join in at the very, very end when they knew which side would win, but they had jumped into the fray almost immediately.
They didn't want this European war to reach the New World.
Perhaps the greatest driver of war was fear, not desire.
"Yes, yes. We just called in the Bad Maidens, the Tartaruses, the Poison Forests, and all the other infamous units engaged in unofficial missions in the Northern Restricted Zone. We might not have as many Objects, but we can turn this around with their help."
"What about the volunteers?"
"They don't even suspect what their real purpose is. Or that they have bombs packed inside their bags."
This conversation would have been unthinkable once, but now no one questioned it.
They would use everything at their disposal.
In this new era, even a stuffed rabbit was no more than a weapon that could be stuffed down an enemy soldier's throat to suffocate them to death.
"Detonate those in hospitals and schools across Paris and the Legitimacy Kingdom won't know who they can trust. We must not fear their wrath - we must use it to our advantage. Once their battleline panics, they will make mistakes and their superior number of Objects will not be enough to determine the outcome."
Why should they fight fair and square?
Quite a few of their Objects had been rendered inoperable or unmaintainable during the chaos following the collapse of Rome, so they had been forced out of the fight before it even began. They were starting at a disadvantage. If they chose to ignore that reality and attempted to fight fair and square, the raging Objects would cause even further damage in Naples and Milan where they had established a distributed emergency government.
So the Faith Organization would not rely on a direct fight.
"I pray the peaceful age of god will arrive to this sinful planet."
But their faith was not broken.
When people had something to protect, they gained the ability to accept even the cruelest of actions.
It was strange how they had gotten to know each other.
The black-haired, dark-skinned bodyguard crossing his arms must have left a good impression back when they met at the Technopics. They were inside a luxury hotel room on Bali, but nothing sexy was going on here.
People gathered around the rich when they were winning.
In the bodyguard business, you helped build your brand by being the first person who came to mind when the rich began to lose and felt they couldn't trust anyone anymore.
A woman calmly sat behind a laptop at a nearby table.
Her name was Alicia Sloppyjoes.
But wasn't she supposed to be an agent for an advertising firm that worked mostly with Capitalist Corporations' companies?
"Alarms are sounding in South America, Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe. This could be a problem. I need to decide where to shelter my assets soon. The LA main bank could be shutdown at any moment. Oh, but I can't trust Oceania because they've always been politically unstable."
"Quit trying to make yourself sound smart. The point is you can't trust any of the digital data, so you want your assets with you in a physical form, right? Diamonds would be your best bet. Cash and gold are too bulky to guard while on the move."
"Can you guarantee they would be safe during this world war with no safe zones to speak of? Diamonds are easily broken by impacts and I have heard they scorch in fires."
"If you don't like it, then I'm leaving. This is stupid and I'm only here to earn money for my family. Especially for my little sister who was separated from me when our parents divorced. It doesn't really matter to me who I earn that money from."
They heard hurried footsteps in the adjacent room. (Their suite actually had multiple rooms. )
That would be Pharmacist Stacy Palmetto providing a special service for a mercenary working for them....Specifically, she was providing the "safe doping" designed for professional athletes. The bodyguard man had no interest in receiving that service himself.
He sighed and asked another question.
"Dammit, I can't believe we're still stuck counting money during a world war. Is the Capitalist Corporations going to come out on top again with the war industry consuming the world?"
"It doesn't look that simple. The situation has moved past the limits of the investment programs. Everyone is pretending things are working out just fine, but it's looking like the New World won't be able to stop a chain reaction financial crisis. If this keeps up, a lot of companies are going to go bankrupt and shut down. And there are signs of the Information Alliance using cyber attacks to take out the crypto assets spread out across the world."
"Will this affect 7th Core too?"
"Yes, even them. Are you familiar with the Object that guards LA?"
"I'm not familiar with its detailed specs, but I have heard it controls animals. Something about using ultrasonic waves, artificial pheromones, and other things to summon swarms of locusts and edible earthworms to form a massive wall protecting the border with Central America."
"The Xanthippe is the Capitalist Corporations' strongest Second Generation. It's a special Object designed and constructed by the burger chain that's globally famous even for a 7th Core company. Beyond simple combat, it was apparently designed to prevent starvation tactics where a unit is isolated with all supply lines cut off."
"..."
The bodyguard man grimaced slightly. The combination of earthworms and burgers may have been to blame.
Alicia, on the other hand, didn't seem to mind.
"Its title as the strongest should help discourage an attack, but simply preventing the damage from spreading too far is costing so much money that actually fighting would probably cause the company to go under."
"Seriously?"
"Their funds are already running low. It isn't a fierce warrior or a mysterious prototype weapon that brings down major countries and ends wars - that honor always goes to economic collapse. 7th Core might be the seven wealthiest companies in the world, but the more money required to keep things operating normally, the greater the risk if the ordinary financial engineering equations fall apart. To be fair, this hasn't happened overnight. The CEO of Salem Logistics was assassinated by Nyarlathotep recently and the Elevator Alliance jointly funded by 7th Core failed pretty spectacularly. This blow hit all the harder because they had yet to recover from those other issues. Things are reaching truly scary territory here. That's why I can't trust the banks. Maybe I really should convert it all into diamonds or platinum and look after it myself."
A dull roar reverberated across the dictator's ocean.
The roar came from the Manhattan 000, the Information Alliance's strongest Object and their home country itself.
No one remained who could stop it.
The baptism of fire and lead had taught the smart ones to remain silent. The less smart ones had been plunged into the watery depths along with their weapons.
"But the Manhattan 000 is our home country. No matter how effective it is, I can't keep it on the front line for too long. 114. I need to cause enough damage to open the way for our other Objects and then pull back."
Melly Martini Extradry was speaking as a Pilot Elite, not as the Martini Series in charge of New York's security.
She spoke like she was humming the latest hit song.
Was she speaking out loud to help organize her thoughts, or to assist the massive AI network that operated the Manhattan 000?
"But it bothers me how a few Objects have vanished from such a crucial battlefield. The Information Alliance is supposed to be second to none when it comes to information, so I don't like the feeling that I'm being manipulated by some unseen information. 994."
Part 3
The local time was February 15 at precisely 2 AM.
The sound of the ocean parting intruded on the pitch black world.
"Welcome, courageous warriors!! Whether we go down in history as the heroes who saved the world or filthy deserters is entirely up to your actions. I'm sure you all have different thoughts on your mind, but I know you joined us because you weren't willing to throw out everything you believed in just to obey the orders passed down to you from on high. It doesn't matter if you're fighting for the world. Let's start by protecting our own lives."
Quenser and Heivia's group was soaked with oily seawater as they used the veil of darkness to land on one of the small islands protecting the Kanagawa area at the entrance to Tokyo Bay.
They snuck up behind the self-defense PMC soldiers managing the giant fortress gun and silently slit their throats with knives. The Island Nation had once fought a fierce civil war, but it looked like they could join forces again when necessary. Not every guard out here was necessarily a villain, but Quenser and Heivia's group needed to get past them to reach the villains manipulating them.
"Hurry up and set up the bomb, skinny boy." The prestigious noble sounded impatient."If we get rid of that 400mm railgun, we can call in the fleet!"
"There were supposed to be three of these artillery islands. Blow this one up right away and the others go on alert. I can detonate them all simultaneously using my radio, so let's get back into the ocean and move on to the next island."
"The world war was started here in the Island Nation, the very technological country that developed the first Objects and introduced them to the world."
Something was floating on the ocean surface.
It was not a boat.
It was an amphibious continuous track armored vehicle weighing more than 25 tons and designed for river crossings. It could be used as a boat when a propeller and rudder were attached. Wydine Uptown of the Battlefield Cleanup Service PMC (which actually worked for the Information Alliance) gave a troubled look up at the top hatch.
The source of her troubles was Karen I Winchell, the eyepatch maid next to her.
"Ma'am, I would prefer not to have a real maid anywhere near us. I'm wearing cat ears!! This really draws attention to how fake we are!! Why would anyone choose us over a milkmaid who serves a fancy noble family!?"
"A-a milkmaid is in charge of looking after the cows and making cheese and butter. I don't know what exactly you think it means, but it isn't that!!"
"You're capable in every way, you're a coolheaded and strict instructor with an eyepatch, and yet your defenses crumble at the drop of a hat? Your maid level is off the charts, so we don't stand a chance. Someone please send help!!"
Karen looked coolheaded but was actually very easy to get a rise out of, so she found it easier to relax when focused on her maid work. She cleared her throat and then turned to face Quenser.
"Ahem. Sir Quenser, please have this towel. I can never thank you enough for looking after our ill-behaved cockroach in place of the Winchell family maids."
"Pfft. Cockroach? Ha ha ha."
"Don't encourage her, Quenser!!!!!!"
"The Island Nation is officially part of the Capitalist Corporations and defended by a self-defense PMC purchased with Capitalist Corporations money, but in truth, a complex power balance between the Legitimacy Kingdom, Capitalist Corporations, Information Alliance, and Faith Organization has settled in there. They invited in all those foreigners to fight against their plummeting birthrate and now very few of the original Island Nationers are left. In fact, no one can even agree who counts as one anymore."
They used the ocean currents as much as possible, using the engine only when absolutely necessary.
After approaching one of the concrete-covered islands as much as possible, a highly mobile infantry force silently landed and eliminated the self-defense PMC (who were almost all foreign mercenaries due to the limited number of Island Nationers).
They caught some glimpses of some people more frightening than the island defense force.
"Geh!?" Quenser's eyes widened."A bunch of Martini Series girl just left a different armored truck!!"
"Keep in mind that I am one of the more sensible ones. Those easy-going and coldblooded triplets are nothing like me."
Wraith Martini Vermouthspray looked exasperated while spinning a pen-like device in her hand, but...
"Aren't you our commander!? What are you doing out here!?"
"Oh, do you want the Stopgap Grim Reaper to boss you around that badly? I've only ever treated my borrowed units as disposable tools, so I'm not great at keeping my people alive."
"How are you different from the rest of the Martini Series again!?"
Wraithy was accompanied by a silent young man named Frank and she had zero interest in getting along with the triplets in red uniforms. She puffed out her cheeks when she was thrown into the same category as them.
After the highly international PMC unit was eliminated, Quenser attached a bomb to the base of the 400mm railgun that had a metal jacket of gel around the entire barrel for shock absorption.
The guns being on remote islands meant they didn't have to bother hiding the bodies. They didn't have to worry about an unlucky civilian seeing one and screaming.
The seabirds would probably eat them after waking up at dawn. Nature could be cruelly unbiased at times. But Quenser's group didn't have time to worry about the dignity of the corpses. This was a battle between professionals. If they encountered each other on the battlefield, they had to fight and they couldn't exactly bring the enemy's bodies back with them.
"I've gotten so used to killing. Makes me want to vomit."
"It's that world war that taught you to be like that. I don't know what the people sitting around in their living rooms would think about it, but I'm not about to let the bastards behind all this complain about our actions."
Quenser pictured that hemispherical prosthetic eye lying on the rooftop.
He had robbed Carat Affinity of his one and only mother, but he would have to wait until after this was over for that boy to repay him for it.
"The small Island Nation is secretly used by agents of all four world powers to speak with each other and work out deals behind the scenes. That international group is known as Azumaya. They have built a secret base deep within a self-defense PMC base in Ichigaya. They make all the decisions there. Each member is officially just some random soldier and the higher ups of each world power know nothing about this. They are the ones who fed information to Bad Garage and started this world war."
They met some sporadic resistance.
But this was the last of the three artillery islands. It was too late for them to go on alert now. The armored truck's 40mm machinegun fired from the concrete coast, tearing through a concrete wall and the enemy soldiers to silence them. Afterwards, Quenser attached a plastic explosive to the base of the giant cannon aiming south from the ocean.
"That's the last one."
"The party's all ready to go, so it's time to open the door for all the invited guests pounding on our door."
Heivia and Myonri trudged back to the truck, but Quenser looked back just once.
"What is it, Quenser?"
"Nothing really. I just thought these 400mm railguns would have a round reactor attached to them."
"They probably dug underground to run an undersea cable. That's nothing compared to the Break Carrier. C'mon, let's go."
"Of course, the top brass back in the home countries have more authority than some agents shipped out to Asia. But only inside their world power. If anyone gets in these agents' way, they have one of the agents of another world power kill them. That is the truth behind so many wars. It was a global scale murder exchange. They eliminated each other's problems. That gave them the freedom to kill a Legitimacy Kingdom king or a Capitalist Corporations conglomerate president with the press of a button. And eventually, those lowly agents gained the influence needed to manipulate their entire world power. Their names are never found on any documents and they remain nothing more than a random soldier no one has ever heard of. The Island Nation is of course closely watched by the four world powers, but that is what made it so perfect for hiding something. Think of it like a stage magician's table. When everyone is focused on something, they fail to notice what is happening right under their nose. Try this sleight of hand in a living room with all the lights out and they would make a mistake pretty fast. I bet this group would have been caught and eliminated a lot sooner if they hadn't used the Island Nation, which acts as a sort of taboo."
Once he was back inside the floating armored truck, Quenser flicked his radio's switch with his thumb, triggering three consecutive fireworks that illuminated the late night sea. With the three artillery islands down, the Objects and their maintenance fleet could pass through to Tokyo Bay.
The colossal weapons controlled by Pilot Elites moved past Quenser's group. The Baby Magnum waved one of its seven main cannons in greeting as the armored truck was retrieved by a landing ship.
"Thanks, everyone."
"Oh ho ho. You all worry too much. Fortress guns? You should have just let us crush those puny things below our nuke-resistant Objects."
The triple explosion acted as a trigger.
Air raid sirens began to sound from the harbors at Yokosuka and Yokohama and searchlights shined into the sky, but that was not what Quenser's group had planned. Burning Alpha and Ice Girl 1 used aerial bombs to precisely blow up just the docked defense ships and then the entire fleet continued north.
"Hey, little lady? If you rely too much on your own bombs, you will run out eventually, no matter how many you're carrying. And you don't want to have to land on the aircraft carrier every time that happens, do you? The harbor is our target. The most effective and economical method is to block up the ocean with the enemy's rubble. Aren't you from the Capitalist Corporations? Then you need to worry about the cost of all that ammo, don't you?"
"Shut your mouth, Burning Alpha. I am the leader Ice Squadron. I was just immersing myself in some hard rock after finally getting my hands on a phone with a proper subscription, so if you want me to show you who's the better pilot, that can be arranged!!"
Why did it sound like those two fighters were competing over kills before the real battle even began?
Their destination was Ichigaya, Tokyo.
They needed to land near Odaiba and fight their way almost all the way to Shinjuku.
In other words...
"Your job is to work your way from Tokyo Bay to Ichigaya and crush Azumaya there."
Their only objective was Azumaya.
This battle was meaningless for the majority of the people defending the Island Nation, but a shootout was unavoidable when they were attacking those defenders' bases and garrisons. Trying to persuade the troops here would only give the mysterious members of Azumaya a chance to escape.
The Ichigaya garrison was officially known as a Capitalist Corporations self-defense PMC base, but it was more like a joint facility for the four world powers sharing control of the Island Nation. People were rapidly being pushed into the box that had been left nearly empty after the civil war.
That meant there would be Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers there as well, but they could not ask them for help. Quenser's group had already left the Legitimacy Kingdom's chain of command, as would anyone who had stayed on the Island Nation long enough.
This was a deadly battle between outsiders.
They were here to end the world war, but if the side with the superior justification always won, military might wouldn't be necessary in the first place.
A point in the night sky flashed and then a small destroyer was vaporized disturbingly close to the landing ship that had collected Quenser's group in their truck. The steel ship and the seawater around it literally melted to an orange liquid and erupted into bubbles while falling to the bottom of the ocean.
"A laser beam!? But it came from so high up!!"
They could see the fighters rapidly reducing their altitude. Quenser initially thought a flying Object had shown up to break all the rules they took for granted, but that wasn't it.
The blonde-haired, brown-skinned fake maid named Wydine Uptown shouted out from where she was strapped into her seat in the armored truck.
"Sirs and madams. We only have an estimate at this point, but that was fired from 100km to the west at an altitude of around 3800m. That matches the peak of Mount Fuji!!"
That wasn't a joke.
That explained why the fortress guns protecting Tokyo Bay had all been railguns specialized for targeting ships past the horizon. They already had a powerful anti-air defense to shoot down ballistic missiles and bombers.
As usual, Frolaytia's pre-mission briefing had been lacking crucial information.
Quenser had experienced this more than enough already, so he paled and cursed that busty commander.
"A-are you saying anywhere you can see Mount Fuji is in range of that laser fortress gun? Heh...heh heh heh. But doesn't the Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji show you can see it from pretty much anywhere!?"
"It doesn't really matter. You saw how huge that laser beam was. They can't fire it on us once we're inside Tokyo!!"
"Just so you know, it doesn't look it's going be that easy, you peeeeeeeeeeeeeesssssssssssssst."
The eyepatch maid harshly criticized the noble boy's idea (because she so so sooo couldn't bear the idea of her beloved master getting himself killed here☆).
Their Objects could battle at 600km/h, so they could cross Tokyo Bay in no time. Yet the Baby Magnum and Rush had come to a stop.
Something was rising from the dark ocean surface up ahead.
Just like one of those giant kaijus the Island Nation loved so much.
It came from near an artificial island service area in the middle of the highway that connected Tokyo Bay from east to west. Something had been activated, like it was moving to prevent these uninvited guests from entering Tokyo.
It goes without saying what that 50m shape was.
A mysterious Island Nation model had finally shown itself.
"You can remove all the wind and oil you want, but you can never extinguish the forest fire if you don't remove the actual source of the fire....We must crush Azumaya underfoot. The giant feet of our Objects will stamp out the cigarette butt they so rudely discarded on the filthy ground!!"
No one had thought this would be easy.
But everyone here had still joined in because they truly wanted to stop the world war. So the appearance of an Object wasn't going to stop them.
Operation Tokyo Invasion had begun.
Part 4
"Ksh!! We are experiencing some unexplained signal noise. The Island Nation must be doing something!!"
"The complex arrangement of metal pipes and smokestack exhaust in Chiba's industrial zone are interfering with our radars and sensors. Ksh, be careful you don't hit any civilians!!"
Chiba, Kanagawa, and Tokyo.
Thick artillery fire pushed in to greet the Area By Chance fleet traveling north through the bay.
Very few people could stay standing on the shaking deck. Even the highly experienced old maintenance lady was carefully pressing up against the wall while she carried some repair materials. She knew relying on the metal railings would just get her thrown overboard when an impact rocked the ship.
Among all that, one commander held her right hand straight out, holding a rapier with the tip standing straight up. Lendy Farolito stared past the sword and into the distance, almost like a painter using her brush to decided where to start on the scenery.
(I can leave the stifling combat information center to that Legitimacy Kingdom smoker. I need to make up for the malfunctioning radars and sensors. That's the best way to help that girl. )
The decoration at the base of the sword was what mattered here.
Lights flashed in the distance. Supersonic artillery shells were tearing through the air and pillars of water burst more than 20m up from the dark ocean near their ships. The fortress gun didn't even need a direct hit. If a piece was torn from the plastic garbage floating in the ocean and hit her, it could tear off a limb.
But Lendy did not bat an eye.
This put her life at risk, but it also gave her a crucial hint.
Anyone who couldn't think like that was not fit to serve as a soldier.
(The enemy is likely using 175mm guns. The muzzle flash is 1/2 the width of the Ki-Yong, so the range must be about 10km. The 30 second gap between light and sound confirms it. Double check complete. )
"Central command to Gatling 033. Set your reference point to 1200m west-northwest. The Island Nation fortress gun is loaded on a freight train. It appears to be traveling north at a cautious 40km/h to avoid tipping over from the oversized load, so correct your aim accordingly. Fire."
A scorching light and a sizzling of the night air erupted simultaneously.
The laser beam secondary cannon unnaturally bent at a sharp angle from the exhaust heat coming from the industrial zone's smokestacks, but that sent it straight down to accurately vaporize the enemy fortress gun hidden in the gap between industrial complex buildings.
"G-gun destroyed. The enemy mobile artillery gun in the Kisarazu area has been silenced!!"
"Wow, that laser beam flew over the industrial zone and then dropped straight down on its target. I never want to fight against that."
A rush of reports came in, but cheers were the norm for an idol.
The idol Elite must have been able to see Lendy standing on the deck with rapier raised in front of her because she commented on it.
"Oh ho ho. I like that pose. I doubt you will go for it, but why not start your own career as an idol? You could go the thick and sexy route."
"Please. I shine best as the manager working behind the scenes."
Of course, taking out that one gun wasn't enough to end it.
But each new instance of destruction tilted the overall battle further in the one direction.
The following conversation was held on the combat information center that Lendy found so stifling.
"Major Capistrano, the destroyers and small aircraft carriers have sent a request to our flagship!!"
"This is only a camouflaged cruiser - the Scarlet Princess."
(Tch. That Information Alliance idol freak left the worst jobs with me. And now I find out that little girl in black and the red triplets from the Martini Series are mixed in with the potatoes entering the Island Nation. Damn, maybe I should have gotten out there too. )
The ship Frolaytia and the others were using was a special warship disguised as a cruise ship to lure in and slaughter pirates. Bringing it to the front line was like advertising the fact that they were so short on resources they had to use whatever was available.
"Our real flagship is that one carrying the Nikolaschka princess. Come to think of it, were they offering sunbathing and a chance to rest on there?"
The busty commander's comment brought a troubled look to the operator's face.
"It's 2 in the morning. The sun isn't out yet."
"That's too bad. I could really go for some sunlight after spending so much time in this windowless combat information center. Maybe I should at least have a sterilizing blacklight installed."
Frolaytia's comment earned a shrug from Captain Alfonso Zoom.
"We'll do our best to avoid it of course, " continued the busty commander."But this might end up being our final battle. Once things really get started, we won't be able to get any fresh air."
They were up against an unidentified Island Nation Object and a laser fortress gun installed at the summit of Mount Fuji.
It was an abnormal situation, but they had two Objects of their own.
(It's two-against-one, so if we make an aggressive attack, they should try to keep their distance to avoid being trapped between our Objects. This isn't going to end right away. Our ships are exposed to their laser fortress gun, but an Object's laser beam or low-stability plasma cannon can increase the ocean temperature enough to bend light with steam or a mirage. )
She couldn't let the great scale throw her off.
She couldn't let the Island Nation's legendary status stop her from thinking rationally.
Frolaytia Capistrano gradually gathered up what little odds they had and combined them into a real chance at victory.
"But first, we need to come up with a name for the enemy Object. Calling it 'unidentified' gives it an air of mystery we don't want."
That was a mass of metal ruled by physics and bound by chemistry.
It was not deflecting their bullets with a magical barrier or anything like that.
Part 5
"The Island Nation Object will now be referred to as the Asian Monster. I repeat, the enemy codename is Asian Monster!!"
"Oh, shut up! Quit wasting time naming the baby and get us out of here!! Evacuate!!"
Heivia proved how well trained he was by snapping back at their commander's radio transmission.
The firing rate of the fortress gun atop the Mount Fuji was unknown, but a single shot could erase a ship from the sea. They couldn't ignore the Asian Monster directly in front of them either. It had four diamond-shaped air cushion floats, with one in the front, back, left, and right, and the long main cannon on its right side was probably a low-stability plasma cannon. That cannon was an obvious threat, but it could probably also sink a destroyer just by tackling it.
So now was not the time to be huddled together in a bunch of landing ships. Quenser and Heivia's group hurriedly operated the lever to unfasten their synthetic belts and clung to the amphibious armored truck to leave their ship.
Fortunately, they were not just adrift and helpless.
The Baby Magnum and Rush moved out and clashed with the Island Nation Object long enough for the potatoes to head for Tokyo Bay's reclaimed land.
Of course, the one Object wasn't the extent of the Island Nation's defenses.
"Ice Girl 1 here. I have confirmed enemy fighters preparing for takeoff at Haneda. We will now attack that airport as an enemy military facility."
"Burning Alpha here. Haneda is an unstable airport constructed on a reiver delta and reclaimed land. So instead of simply dropping a ton of missiles on them, I recommend calculating how the impact will propagate across the surface and trigger soil liquefaction to prevent them from taking off."
"Do I need to shove a big fat missile down your throat to shut you up first, Burning Alpha!? Anyway, commence attack. Engage!!"
Quenser's eyes widened when he saw some flashing lights across the dark ocean and then a nearby part of the ocean swelled more than 10m straight up with a deafening roar.
"They're firing something from the north!? Hey, isn't that where that famous theme park is located!? When did that place arm itself!?"
"The Island Nation clearly has no fear of god."
But if the enemy had made their test shot and were preparing a corrected shot next, they couldn't just wait around here. Land was right in front of them now.
They needed to get on land before the second shot arrived.
They didn't need to fear direct targeting if they used the buildings as shields.
Just as Quenser's group arrived at the end of one of the reclaimed land sections, they heard several muffled explosions from an inland point to the west.
Quenser ducked down, thinking it might be a sign of mortars about to fall their way, but fortunately he was wrong.
"That appears to be some bridges and tunnels blowing up, " said Putana Highball while inspecting her assault rifle nearby."I don't sense any eyes on us."
The reclaimed land contained a lot of parks and fish markets. It was still mostly undeveloped, so there was a fair bit of unpaved gravel and weed-filled fields. That meant a shell could easily reach them.
"---"
The radio transmission wasn't quite silent.
Quenser heard a suppressed sigh from the old maintenance lady. Ayami Cherryblossom had chosen to leave the Island Nation and join the Legitimacy Kingdom, so how did this homecoming feel to her?
Unfortunately, someone wasn't so considerate.
"This is the legendary Island Nation?" groaned Frolaytia, an Island Nation fanatic, viewing the footage coming from the potatoes' small body cameras."I had high hopes after seeing Mount Fuji light up like that, but where are all the geishas and ninjas? What's keeping you, Island Nation? Where's the samurai unit that can slice through an Object with no more than the power of their own muscles and a katana?"
"Has this bitch completely forgotten our lives and the fate of the world are on the line here?" grumbled Heivia.
Things might have been differently in Kyoto or Shimane which had been taken by the Faith Organization or were highly influenced by the Legitimacy Kingdom, which valued history and tradition, but Tokyo and Kanagawa belonged to the Capitalist Corporations and Information Alliance who preferred math and logic. Frolaytia wasn't going to find anything she had hoped for here.
And on that note...
"I'm not delusional like Frolaytia, but this is the Island Nation, " said Quenser."I was expecting half the scenery to covered in symbols or to find ourselves inside a giant hologram."
"Oh, you're delusional all right, " said the old maintenance lady over the radio.
A new figure emerged from behind some roughly-stacked steel beams.
Someone wielding no guns or knives spread his arms and dark red flames surrounded him.
Quenser watched as those flames surged up and descended toward him. It felt like he was a frog being swallowed by a big snake.
"I want you all to take back everything you said about this place being too normal!!!!!!" shouted Heivia while they all scattered.
The flames crashed into the gravel ground and scattered in every direction. The flames were unnaturally sticky like with a Molotov cocktail or a flamethrower.
Quenser had been slow to react and froze up, so 12-year-old Catherine had to push him to the ground and drag him behind a pipe. The boy shouted while clinging to the little girl's hips.
"What was that!? Some occult stuff like with Putana!?"
"Teacher, our powers are mostly boosted sensory abilities, so they are not actually what you would call psychic powers. We cannot shoot fire from our hands or bend a spoon with our minds. If you see anyone doing that, they are probably tricking you in some way."
The flames bent like a great serpent, so the rules of bullets didn't apply. They could easily circle behind whatever cover you were using.
But it was being used by another human.
Putana could predict the attack timing using his "gaze", so she gave some pointed instructions and the maid group, led by Wydine and Karen, nodded from behind different cover a short distance away. They pulled the pin from a smoke grenade and threw it to rob the enemy of his sight and oxygen while Heivia, Frank, and some others fired bullets and grenades in from multiple angles.
No one could avoid coughing or crying in the smoke. No one but the dead.
"It's a high-tech flamethrower."
Heivia approached the corpse and lightly kicked a weapon resembling a thick gun.
He knew what had given the man his pyrokinesis.
"I think it's called a Kagutsuchi 9. It uses microbubbles filled with particles of flammable fuel to distribute them over an area. The bubbles can be burst at the desired timing so the fuel mixes with the oxygen in the air and is detonated. Basically, it's like microscopic napalm bombs. It lets you create midair designs with the flamethrower, so you can make your own dragon breath or flame sword if you want. I guess it's like a small Be Ablaze."
"The Kagutsuchi series was originally used for musical parades, you know? The Island Nation must really be desperate."
The old maintenance lady's words were full of doubt and suspicion since she alone knew what the Island Nation had really been like.
The corpse didn't look Asian. He must have been a foreign mercenary or only half-Island Nationer because his hair was a bright blond. Hadn't the old lady mentioned something about this already?
Quenser gulped.
"If this is what their individual equipment is like, what are their Objects like?"
That thought scared him, but he couldn't come to a stop.
That one man naturally wasn't the only enemy they came across. Soon, they saw steel construction beams and a tunnel-like pipe floating in the air. Just when they noticed something small gathering together, one of them coughed up blood and collapsed.
But all of it had to be magic tricks.
If they didn't let the legend of this place influence them, they wouldn't panic or take unnecessary damage.
"Is that an experimental tornado generator?" said Quenser."Basically, it's a drone that alters atmospheric pressure using an extremely powerful vacuum cleaner. I'm guessing he coughed up blood because of microplastics. They're probably meant to be mixed with the air and ignited."
"I don't see how any of this is better than an old-fashioned bullet, " said Heivia.
"It's not and they know it. That's why they've set things up so we can't use bullets. Once they realize we're not falling for their tricks, they should shift back to the basics."
Quenser's group traveled across the reclaimed land to reach a beach TV station where they found the giant bridge had entirely collapsed. But that didn't matter much to them. Once they crossed the ocean with their armored trucks designed for crossing rivers, they would be in Tokyo proper.
The somewhat muffled explosions they heard in the distance were probably the Island Nation troops blowing up their own elevated railroads and highways. Quenser beckoned some girls over.
"Putana, Catherine, come here. You too, Wraith!"
"Hmph. At least it's better than being stuck in that truck with those dangerously stubborn triplets."
Quenser invited over the Martini Series commander and then pulled her up onto the roof of the Battlefield Cleanup Service truck. She tried to play it cool, but as short as she was, he basically had to pick her up like a kitten.
The truck's continuous tracks were grinding across the artificial beach to reach the dark ocean. They were less than 2km from the other side.
"Once we arrive on the other side, our primary landmark is the Keihin-Tohoku Line, " said young Wraith up on the roof."After we follow that coastal route north and reach Akihabara, we turn west. Follow the Sobu-Chuo Line from there and we reach Ichigaya."
Their amphibious truck followed the fallen bridge through the rubble-strewn ocean. Following the road using the railroad as a landmark wasn't the shortest route, but Quenser agreed it was for the best. Trying to take a shortcut in this complexly laid out enemy territory could get them lost, stranded, or dead.
"I need to recharge, big brother!"
"Whoa, don't hug me like that, Catherine! We're in the middle of a battle! Keep an eye on your surroundings!!"
"Heh heh heh. Our boat is all floaty, so try not to fall off, big brother!"
And...
"..."
"Mh?"
Catherine made a confused noise.
Wraith Martini Vermouthspray toyed with her pen-like device in one hand and grabbed at Quenser's uniform with the other.
Catherine puffed out her cheeks while hugging him from the front.
"And who is she, big brother? Just so you know, he belongs to me! You can tell because my name is Catherine Barbotage. Heh heh."
"Cough, cough! Y-you married this small child, pedo teacher!?"
"Please don't make this more complicated than it already is, Putana! She's my stepsister!!"
But there was more than one eye of the storm here.
Wraith spoke up, still spinning her pen-like device.
"You can have this average and filthy potato if you like, but I retain the right to borrow him for some fun whenever I like."
"Borrow!?"
"How's that for mature? (Why would This wriggling wharf roach crawl all over him when she is out there in the ocean watching it all? Has she no sense at all?)"
The younger girls were engaging in some kind of battle here, but Quenser couldn't make sense of it. He also wasn't sure why Wraith puffed out her (flat) chest so proudly or why Catherine grew pale and trembled.
Heivia, meanwhile, muttered to himself with a shadow over his face.
"God, why couldn't my little sister be even half that cute?"
After being defeated(?) by Wraith and reduced to trembling in Quenser's arms, Catherine decided to change the subject.
"Anyway, big brother, won't the Azumaya weirdos run away with all this going on? It was just those four who started the world war, right?"
"How are they supposed to run away? Listen, Catherine. On paper, they're just low-level grunts. They have no special rights. If they leave their posts without permission and run, the Island Nation will shoot them in the back for deserting. And even if they get away, they'll stand out once recorded as wanted deserters. Running away dooms them sooner or later, so they won't run away. They know taking any conspicuous moves will mean their deaths."
"Wow. You're so smart, big brother."
"This really isn't something I should be explaining to a 12-year-old kid."
But even if the self-defense PMC soldiers were mercenaries gathered from all over the world, Quenser felt kind of bad killing them to get at the villains they had no idea were hiding among them. But holding back for that reason would be playing right into the villains' hands.
Meanwhile, their truck arrived at the opposite coast.
The tank-like continuous tracks made a loud grinding noise. It was incredible they could reach 70km/h with those.
After crossing the ocean from the reclaimed land and climbing up onto land, the scenery changed entirely. This was prime waterfront property. Fancy high rise office buildings and luxury apartments created a world for the winners of urban life. They probably drank more vintage wine than chlorine-filled tap water here. One of the countless windows around here probably had a beautiful woman pressing her boobs against the glass while having sex.
In that jewelry box of a world, Heivia, Myonri, and some others climbed down onto the ground and readied their weapons.
The low rumbling of a motor was impossible to miss. Unless some wealthy female company president had a tungsten toy with the power of a jackhammer up her tight skirt, that had to be the enemy approaching.
"Here they come, here they come, there they come. Spread out and stay alert, everyone. There's no point in keeping just one line of fire with this many people! They're sending in the ordinary troops this time!!"
It happened suddenly.
A giant roll of something rolled out across the giant intersection of two 6-lane roads like the red carpet for a visiting noble. Tire spikes were deployed across the entire area. Then something emerged from behind a building: a thick powered suit. Even with its great size, it must have had trouble fully controlling the recoil of its 155mm sniper rifle because it had a special device attached around its legs. It looked like it was permanently sitting on something like a wheeled office chair. The chair legs moved on their own to get over bumps and the two humanoid legs out in front could be used to change direction.
"Is that from the Walk Optimization Project? It's been decades since then, so why is the Island Nation still playing with those toys?"
"What's even the point of it being a powered suit anymore!?"
No one bothered listening to Quenser's complaint. With deep booms of gunfire, the Battlefield Cleanup Service truck was torn through like a stick poking into a clump of clay. The average armored truck couldn't have survived, but Wydine and the others couldn't escape the truck while the gunfire continued. Heivia kept his head low and ran away while pulling the pin from a stun grenade.
A lightning-like flash hung around as an afterimage.
The powered suit briefly froze up, not because the pilot had been blinded but because the camera footage had automatically switched the negative and positive in response to the intense brightness. That was the most effective method, but it still confused people when it happened without warning. It was a common problem when enclosed inside a powered suit.
Wydine and the other fake maids used that moment to escape the (wreckage of the) truck. The Martini triplets' truck was still functioning, so they opened fire with their 40mm autocannon. That was only meant to hold the powered suit back, not defeat it. They aimed for the exact moment the powered suit fired, adding to the recoil and causing it to lose its balance while essentially seated in a chair.
"Yikes, yikes, yikes, yikes!!"
Keeping his head low and tearful with fear over being hit by a ricocheting bullet, Quenser ran toward the enemy. He threw a clay-like Hand Axe bomb with a pen-like fuse in it and it attached itself to the powered suit's armor near the right collarbone.
That was supposed to be the most fragile point with a powered suit that could not escape the limitations of the human skeletal structure.
Quenser practically leaped to the asphalt in order to get down as he pressed his radio's switch and blew up the powered suit.
He had gotten closest to the intersection, so he was the first to notice and shouted back to the others.
"One powered suit down, but there's something else further back!!"
"Only one, foot soldier?"
"I'm just a student!!"
Quenser heard an exasperated female voice over his radio and then the continuous track of an armored truck passed by right next to him. It accepted whatever malfunctions the tire spikes would cause it and charged straight toward the second powered suit. This one was leaning against something like a giant stepladder set up in front of it. The stepladder was part of it. That looked like it would affect the movable range of its arms, but it must not have wanted to crawl on all fours like a dog. It all came down to using the poorly-balanced human body as a base. The truck seemed to tilt back as it partially drove up onto the enemy, keeping the powered suit from moving.
At that close range, the long 155mm sniper rifle was meaningless. The giant powered suit struggled like a little girl trapped underneath a large pet dog, so Heivia launched a shoulder-fired missile into it.
"One more down! I'm not letting that skinny boy get all the credit!!"
"Oh, shut up! There's shrapnel way worse than nails flying all over the place, dumbass! You turned this blast area into a danger zone!! I'd be dead if I hadn't gotten down!!"
"You should be thanking us, " said the triplets."We had an entire continuous track taken out by the tungsten spikes. On that note, could you grab any usable repair tools from the scraps of the Battlefield Cleanup Service truck? They don't need them anymore."
It sounded like Quenser would have to give a thank you foot massage to those triplets who couldn't perform their own maintenance. He cautiously approached the damaged truck that could blow up at any moment, raised it with a jack, and swapped out the track that was linked together like rosary beads.
"Th-this is terrifying. It's not right that I just get paid ordinary wages for this. I should get hazard pay and more for all this extra work I do."
"Did you forget we're in Area By Chance now? We aren't working for an actual military, so we don't get paid at all until the world war is over. Did you still think we were with the Legitimacy Kingdom?"
"I swear being a hero is nothing but a big scam!!"
At any rate, Quenser and the others didn't like the idea of charging on foot at such a heavily-equipped enemy group. They needed as many functional vehicles as they could get.
But even if they didn't explode like a tank gun, the Island Nation was firing back with enormous 55m sniper rifles. Weren't they afraid of destroying a piece of their own city with stray shots that could punch right through a tank's composite armor?
"This is weird. Really weird."
"What is? Don't assume the Island Nation is going to make any sense. Oh, look. That blue sign says Akihabara."
"Hold on. I thought it was weird this didn't look like the electronics district I'd heard so much about, but are we on the end full of office buildings? We've gone too far past the station, " said Wraith."Turn back! I don't care how confident you look; we're headed the wrong way. The partially-destroyed elevated railroad must have confused us. We need to turn back and pass below that railroad to reach the main road."
Once they did reach the electronics district, they found Akihabara to be a desolate place this late at night.
Even on the main road Wraith had mentioned, all the stores had their shutters down. Worse, several powered suits had set up a barricade that resembled a giant concrete box. These ones hadn't tried to forcibly make up for the inherently poor balance of the humanoid design, so they simply stood on two legs. The concrete block with an anime-style drawing on it was apparently meant to stop their vehicles and provide cover, but couldn't they have just thickened the armor around their cockpit so they wouldn't need cover? Quenser found it odd. And if they just made it so that block could move and shoot, wouldn't they need fewer parts at those specs, which would make for easier mass production?
"Humanoid weapons are so wasteful, " said Quenser."Why is the Island Nation so obsessed with weapons like this?"
"Hey, I wouldn't be badmouthing humanoid weapons or railroads in the legendary Akiba, " said Heivia."You're liable to get yourself surrounded by an angry mob."
"The greatest advantage of powered suits is the ability to intuitively operate it like your own body without needing to read through the manual. That can still be worth it even with the balance issues, " said the old maintenance lady."And let's not forget that Objects are pretty wasteful too. Especially in the earliest stages when they were built for no other purpose than ending the nuclear age."
Simply put, powered suits were a convenient weapon that let you kill as easily as operating a smartphone.
But Quenser wasn't interested in being killed by a shiny kuro gyaru's device of choice.
An exchange of high caliber gunfire began in a strange area with only gyudon shops open despite the lack of customers.
"Ohhhh!! Don't you dare mock me and look down on me just because I'm the indoorsy type studying to be designer! What's so great about being the gaudy popular girl in class, anyway!?" shouted Quenser.
"Eh? You sure are throwing a lot of bombs. What's gotten into you? Do you think the powered suits in Akiba are being piloted by a no-name underground idol or by a phony maid who normally hands out fliers on the street corner?" asked Heivia.
"Akihabara's maids do get a lot of attention, but maybe think twice before assuming they are the same as the popular kids at school, " warned the old maintenance lady.
Since the powered suits had prepared their own cover, their armor had to be no thicker than an armored truck's, so specialized equipment could punch through them. Quenser's group turned west while using shoulder-fired missiles and the armored truck's autocannon to shoot the powered suits on the ground or hiding behind the rooftop billboards for 3D printers and mobile games.
"Damn, it was all men inside. Now I wish I had just shot the powered suits along their center lines. Were they from a butler café or something?"
"Can you please stop thinking about Island Nation cafés, Quenser?"
"(Beep!) Ehh!? You have to be in Akiba to find the Baby Magnum? Why didn't anyone tell me? No wonder I couldn't find it on any of the other battlefields we visited!!"
"What the hell, Myonri? Do you have your personal phone with you?" shouted both idiots.
The battle to determine the fate of the world was changing positions.
They were now following the Sobu-Chuo Line. Using the elevated railroad blown up by the Island Nation itself as a landmark, they walked down a road following the Kanda River and finally approached the city center.
But the closer to the center they got, the more desolate things seemed.
The buildings were all so short.
"That domed stadium is past Ochanomizu. There must be something there, " said Quenser, hoping he was wrong.
"What, did it only now occur to you they might have something waiting for us at the baseball stadium? Look, more enemies are coming!!"
A patrol boat traveled down the cramped concrete-banked river. It looked a little bigger than a fishing boat, but its front and back deck were equipped with a 20mm Gatling gun and an 81mm mortar. Fortunately, the river was a level below the road, so the boat's firing range was extremely limited. Putana and Catherine descended the gentle slope and threw grenades from a blind spot so they landed on the boat's deck and blew it away.
The stadium combined with the theme park did indeed have something waiting for them.
"Charge!! Hurry!! That's a railway gun reinforced with earthen walls and armor panels. They used the nearby railroad to send in the materials they needed to set that up. Quenser, we're stuck here if you don't blow that up with one of your bombs!!"
"Why should I have to do it when I'm not even getting paid!? Okay, Myonri, show us how it's done!!"
"Bff!? I was trying to be inconspicuous so no one would notice me, but you just had to ruin that, didn't you? Stop using me as a dumping ground for all the jobs you don't want to do. Besides, this was Heivia's idea, so he should do it!!"
The idiots started arguing and grappling, so Karen and some others took swift action and slaughtered all of the enemy soldiers.
With a caliber of 800mm, a single shot from that railway gun could obliterate an entire school with its powerful blast and shrapnel, but it was fairly helpless within a range of a kilometer. Since they hadn't shot it earlier, the Island Nation must have set it up in a hurry and didn't manage to complete their final targeting in time. Remember, the Island Nation had been caught by surprise, forcing them to hop out of bed and prepare at the last second.
Quenser's group followed the railroad from there until they saw the river pass below the road. That was called a culvert, wasn't it? It was extremely noticeable and stank like a ditch.
"Are we almost there? Ichigaya has a fishing hole, right?"
"Wait, wait. We still have a station to go. Don't get it wrong. This is the station after Suidobashi, so we're still at Iidabashi."
"After Iidabashi, you won't be following the Kanda River anymore. It changes to Sotobori there, " said the old maintenance lady via radio."The green algae is just as bad either way, though."
| ← Ch. 180 | Ch. 182 → |