Bermuda

A little distance away from the location where the sleeping tents were clustered, a large military tent had been set up next to a huge, geometrically shaped structure, spacious enough to comfortably accommodate as many as thirty people.

Around it, members were taking turns standing guard at regular intervals, as a meeting of senior commanders had been going on inside for nearly two hours, to prevent any potential disruptions or unauthorized access.

One of the sentries, who had been on duty for less than ten minutes, leaned against the wall surrounding the structure and yawned widely as if drowsiness had come over him. He had a carefree expression, thinking that he was just standing there because he had been told to, and that nothing could possibly happen in the middle of the base camp.

Seeing his appearance, his colleague next to him tapped his arm as if to tell him to stay alert. Startled, the sentry turned his head and soon made an annoyed expression.

"What?"

"Is this the time to yawn? Stand properly."

"...Hey, you're not an officer, so why are you making a fuss? We should be relaxing now before we go on patrol to D-5 later."

"The atmosphere isn't good. We should be careful at times like this. Don't be complacent."

"Geez."

The sentry, who had been looking at his colleague as if he lacked flexibility, reluctantly took his back off the wall he had been leaning against. Inwardly, he grumbled that he was acting like that because he wanted to become a platoon leader these days.

Grumbling, he stretched to shake off his drowsiness. Just standing still was also quite a hardship in its own way. Thinking that it would be better to go out and look around the ruins that he might never see again, he turned his head to the last place his eyes had landed on.

The moonlight seeping through the lush leaves dimly illuminated the old structure hidden in the darkness. It was then that he felt something strange.

Until a moment ago, there had been a statue sitting among the haphazardly erected structures. In fact, he hadn't seen it clearly as it was obscured by ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) darkness, but since it roughly had a human form, he had naturally assumed it was a statue.

But now that spot was empty.

The sentry stretched his neck and narrowed his eyes as if to take a closer look. He kept blinking his eyes that were still not accustomed to the darkness. After staring at that spot for a long time, he tried to dismiss it as unimportant, thinking that he might have mistaken someone patrolling for a statue.

However, that thought didn't last even a few seconds. Since he had taken over the shift, it had been in that spot for at least five minutes. In common sense, a member on patrol wouldn't stand in that spot for five minutes, would they? Especially while looking this way.

"...Is it my imagination?"

"What?"

The sentry tilted his head as if unsure, staring at that location.

As his colleague reacted to his muttering, he shook his head as if it was nothing, but then rubbed his goosebump-covered forearm, asking, "But wasn't there something over there?" His colleague seemed to think he was joking out of boredom and shook his head, ignoring him.

The sentry was about to say something, feeling provoked by his colleague's look that seemed to find him pathetic, but at that moment, the tent door, which was reinforced with iron rods, swung open with a bang, cutting him off before he could utter a word.

"Good work."

"Good work."

Along with the voices of the commanders signaling the end of the meeting, a chill that could make one forget the heat of the peninsula blew out from the entrance. That cold air was mixed with powerful mana, which was quite sharp and keen, making it threatening even as mere energy.

The two members who had been whispering hurriedly straightened up in their positions and stared straight ahead with great tension. The thought of whether the statue had been there or not quickly disappeared.

The first to appear outside was Hugo with a cold face.

Dripping with coldness, he walked out with long strides, followed by Bruno and the battalion commanders. Although not as much as the Commander, their expressions didn't look very good either, so the adjutants waiting outside guessed that the meeting had not gone as well as expected.

Hugo lightly nodded with a visibly displeased face to the battalion commanders who greeted him, telling them to go in.

As he quickened his pace and moved away, the commanders stared at his back, gauging his reaction, and soon dispersed to convey the rest of the meeting contents. Before long, only Delua, who had been hesitating, remained there.

After confirming that most of them had finished their business and left, Delua, as if having made up her mind, hurriedly followed Hugo's receding back. Then, she called out to him in a small voice.

"Commander!"

At her cautious voice, Hugo stopped and glanced back. Delua, who had been narrowing the distance with quick steps, had a slightly tense face as the cold gaze touched her.

Still, approaching him, she smiled once for no reason to lighten the mood and suddenly said with shining eyes, as if telling him to trust only her,

"Commander, don't worry too much. If someone keeps pestering Blaine again, I'll fight hard against them!"

There were several reasons why Hugo's expression had stiffened, but one of them was the voices of suspicion and concern raised about Leonardo at the end of the meeting.

Looking down at Delua, who was speaking enthusiastically with her fists clenched, Hugo softened his stiff expression for her sake, as she must have been as tired as he was.

Even though there were signs that the missing persons had escaped to another peak immediately after the collapse, Leonardo's whereabouts had been unclear for several days, so suspicions about his actions during that time had surfaced among the commanders. It was even more so because the member who had disappeared with him was a new recruit unsuitable for the role of a watchdog.

It was a good thing that the 1st Battalion had kept the fact that they had found footprints in the swamp area to themselves, because if the other commanders had known about it, they probably wouldn't have let it slide.

Moreover, since Hugo himself had been concerned about Leonardo's escape, even if only for a moment, he considered it understandable for the commanders to have doubts about him, so he steered them in a different direction without imposing strong restrictions on expressing their opinions.

However, among them, there was even someone who raised an absurd suspicion about whether the caught illegal mining team had any connection to Leonardo Blaine.

Hugo, who had tried to protect him by presenting the circumstances in which Leonardo had been swept away by the landslide while trying to save a member, felt the swear words he had been refraining from for the past dozen years or so suddenly rise to his throat the moment he heard that nonsensical speculation.

And the one who immediately refuted that speculation with logic was Delua.

Delua first mentioned the fact that everyone knew: "Leonardo Blaine probably never even dreamed that he would come to this Elder Millie Peninsula in the first place."

Therefore, she argued based on facts that he could not be seen as circumstantially related to the illegal mining team, which seemed to have existed since before the peninsula subjugation was planned, and if he had been involved with them or had intended to escape, he would have already left the peninsula long ago instead of staying inside.

Her words not only silenced those who raised suspicions but also succeeded in erasing the small remnant of doubt in the depths of Hugo's heart while defending Leonardo. It also prevented the misfortune of rough words coming out of the noble Commander's mouth.

Looking down at her, Hugo thought that if Delua had not been on this subjugation, he might have had a really hard time, and replied with a faint smile instead of coldness.

"Thank you. I feel reassured thanks to you."

At his words, Delua's eyes widened greatly, then she smiled once more with a proud look. Somehow, she felt recognized.

Suddenly, Hugo quietly scanned Delua's surroundings, which felt more empty than usual. Come to think of it, he remembered that there was something he had been wanting to ask throughout the meeting.

"By the way, Delua. Why did Marlen go directly to the plains? The battalion commanders could have moved without the deputy commander needing to go."

It was a story that had been mentioned once in the meeting, but Marlen Diaz, the deputy commander of the 6th Battalion of the Central Branch, was currently leading the troops of two companies belonging to the 6th Battalion directly and standing by at the demarcation line in the northern plains.

Although it was an order he had given, Hugo had not thought that the deputy commander would move personally, so he couldn't hide his puzzlement even during the meeting when he heard that.

"Ah..., about that..."

Hearing his question, Delua maintained a bright expression for a while, then scratched her cheek and somehow changed to a displeased face.

"Hmm..., Commander, you might not understand this... Was it the day before yesterday? Marlen suddenly said she had a bad dream."

"Dream?"

"Yes, actually, I'm not the type to believe in things like dreams, so I told her not to pay much attention to it, but Marlen tends to believe in such things quite well."

At the story that seemed a bit absurd, one of Hugo's eyebrows rose slightly.

"She didn't tell me what kind of dream it was, but she seemed to be very anxious and concerned about it. Then, she said she would feel more at ease being there than here, so I just told her to do so."

Although she had allowed it herself, Delua also didn't seem to like Marlen's behavior very much, as she showed a subtle disappointment.

"I even told her that I would protect her and asked if she couldn't trust me. You know how she didn't even pretend to listen? She left me behind..."

In fact, the reason Hugo had given that order was to keep the Central Branch's 3rd Battalion and the Southern Branch's 7th Battalion, which were under close watch, within visual range, and to block the escape route of the illegal mining team by deploying the most reliable Central Branch's 6th Battalion on the way to the border zone gate.

However, a senior leader of the deputy commander level would be more helpful for future battles if they stayed here, so unless there was a special reason, Hugo had intended to call Marlen back.

But now that she was psychologically unstable and had gone there of her own will, it became a bit difficult to order her to return. Moreover, since this was the first time Marlen had done something like this as far as Hugo knew, he also thought it might be better to just leave her there.

However, since Delua and Marlen were so close that they had rarely been apart for a long time, he was also concerned that there would be a void in the work that Marlen had always done.

"I see... If she went there because she wanted to, it can't be helped. But then, does that mean, Delua, you will be directly conveying the meeting contents and issuing orders for the time being?"

"Yes, well..."

Delua, who had been answering Hugo's words, suddenly stopped and opened her mouth wide as if she had just remembered something.

She realized that this was not the time to be so leisurely. The content organization and order issuance after the meeting had always been done by Marlen, so while she was doing this, the 6th Battalion members would be waiting blankly without being able to do anything.

Thinking that the Commander had subtly reminded her, Delua immediately bowed her head.

"...Commander, I'll be going now."

"Good work."

Hugo nodded lightly as if he had expected it. Afterwards, Delua hurriedly ran to where her unit members were.

Hugo, who had been quietly watching her back, also moved his feet before long. And after taking a few steps, Flynn, who had belatedly appeared from between the tents, hurriedly caught up with him. Hugo walked ahead without saying much, but glanced at Flynn, who had abruptly appeared, and turned his eyes to the watch on his wrist.

Flynn, knowing that it was an action from the Commander hinting that he was "late," just smiled awkwardly.

"Haha, I'm sorry. I was organizing this and that, and..."

"..."

"How was the meeting?"

"It wasn't even like a meeting. Some of them were just rambling on about useless things."

His extremely cold voice and the words mixed in his answer clearly revealed his bad mood. Thanks to that, Flynn smiled even more while being mindful of his reaction.

Before the suspicions about Leonardo were raised in the meeting, the main contents were situation reports from each battalion and analysis of the cause of the wave.

Another issue that touched Hugo's nerves was about the illegal mining team. Traces of a small number of them escaping from the hideout had already been found near the border zone gate, but they had not been arrested yet.

Moreover, the commanders of the units in charge of defending the nearby gate where the traces were found were subtly shifting responsibility to each other, saying it was not their jurisdiction, so although they did not raise their voices, the atmosphere had already been cold since then.

Hugo briefly told Flynn about the contents of today's meeting while strolling around the base camp as if taking a walk. The direction of his footsteps was not towards the tents. Rather, he quietly led Flynn between the structures located in the opposite corner.

When they were completely hidden by the pillars and walls and no other members were visible, Hugo stopped walking. Flynn, who had been following, did the same. The two maintained silence for about ten seconds, quietly examining the surroundings for any presence.

When a silence came that was so deep that the sound of insects was particularly loud, it was Hugo who first opened his mouth in a low voice.

"So. Did you find out anything?"