Black Badger

“Yep!”

Ami answered.

“I scraped together as much as I possibly could! But I think it still won’t be enough. It’s only about three days’ worth....”

“That should be enough, though?”

“And you’re a doctor now~?”

Ricardo clicked his tongue in mild irritation.

I turned to the green-eyed senior sitting beside the blanket on the right and smiled.

“I’ve been getting a lot better lately, so Samuel was just saying the dosage could probably be reduced.”

“You sure talk well....”

“Carl. Check the distance.”

“Yes.”

At Yun’s order, the senior sitting across from Ricardo answered.

Ami, who was sitting across from me, stretched her legs out and arched her back.

Thankfully, her boots were still fine. She said the battery used to charge them was fine too. Since there were no nearby flying Creatures she could command, whether Ami’s boots were operational had become important. The vehicle was running well enough, but it was bulky, which came with limitations.

Besides, we were moving fairly slowly right now.

There was no guarantee the same thing that happened with the train wouldn’t happen again.

We were crossing the wasteland at less than sixty kilometers per hour.

Carl spoke.

“There’s absolutely no way we’ll arrive today. I think we’ll need to find a suitable place to camp in the forest.”

“Should I go scout ahead first?”

“Sit down.”

Yun answered flatly.

“We still don’t know what we collided with.”

“Okaaay.”

Ami didn’t insist.

“Just let me know if there’s anything I should do.”

After replying readily, she unzipped the backpack beside her with a ziiip.

Then she pulled something out and started fiddling with it in silence.

I stared at the senior across from me. It was strange seeing someone as lively as her go quiet because she was concentrating on something.

What is she working on?

“Ah.”

When I let out a small sound, Ami turned her head.

She looked at me and smiled brightly.

“I’m organizing my wires.”

“Would you like help?”

“It’s okay!”

Ami answered cheerfully, but Carl abruptly broke the silence.

“If it keeps raining like this, the river’s going to swell.”

“There was a river inside the forest.”

Yun’s voice was dry.

“We go only as far as the intermediate supply depot before the forest. We spend the night there, and if it looks like we won’t be able to reach the Safe Point, we halt progress and wait for further orders.”

A rational call.

Listening to my mentor’s dry instructions, I silently nodded.

I also thought forcing our way to the Safe Point would be pretty dangerous.

This was a matter of supplies and nature.

First, we had to consider the possibility of running out of food.

If there had been plenty of edible Creatures around, we wouldn’t need to worry like this. But this was wasteland. There weren’t any edible Creatures nearby, nor even wild animals to hunt. No grass grew here for herbivores to graze on, which meant there were no herbivores, and therefore no predators hunting them either.

The Empire had lands like this too. Places where a Remnant Wraith lingered nearby, or where a black mage’s curse had fallen, or where a terrible drought had struck.

Passing through places like that with the knights had always been the hardest.

Creatures could be killed. Enemy mercenaries and bandits only needed to be dealt with.

But having no food?

Nothing was more fatal than that.

Badgers ate far more than ordinary people, which made the risk of food shortages even greater.

Food was directly tied to survival, so it was better to react sensitively to the issue. I had that bizarre absorption trait, so there was no chance I would ever starve to death, but the seniors weren’t like that.

Of course, as long as I was here, the chance of them truly starving was nonexistent too.

“Who checked the inventory status at Supply Depot C-46?”

“I did~.”

Ricardo answered Yun.

The senior leaning back against the car like me, still watching Ami’s hands, added the explanation.

“There’s enough food and water for six people to last a week.... The resupply team was originally supposed to come tomorrow and refill it~. The idea was for there to be plenty of food by the time we returned from the Safe Point....”

A week is cutting it close.

Listening to the rain growing only harsher instead of stopping, I weighed the situation.

Seven days of food wasn’t a small amount, but it wasn’t enough to truly relax either.

And with the train wrecked like that, there was no way they could immediately send another one loaded with supplies.

This is the first time it feels like we might fail to complete the assigned mission.

If everything had gone according to schedule, the train would have already stopped in front of the depot by now. We would have picked up supplies there, broken through the forest, and been racing toward the Safe Point.

But the train collision delayed the schedule, and now we’d be spending a night at the depot instead.

At this point, we already had to consider one full day of supplies gone.

It seemed Yun had reached the same conclusion.

My mentor spoke.

“We’re not making it to the Safe Point.”

“Yes.”

Carl answered.

“Considering the distance and the supplies, the odds of success aren’t high.”

“File the return report.”

Yun ordered.

“With the weather like this, it’s not like an aircraft can come pick us up right away.”

“Yeah. In weather like this, it’d be hard to get even an unmanned helicopter airborne.”

“But wasn’t the depot a little lower down?”

Sophia, who had been driving in silence, spoke up.

It sounded like she was addressing Carl.

“That’s what we confirmed before departure. If the river overflows, it’s in a position where it could flood.”

“There’s a high chance it actually will.”

Carl answered as casually as if he were discussing the day of the week.

Then the elite senior finished his report to Yun.

“This area normally doesn’t get much rainfall, so Supply Depot C-46 has never actually flooded before. But since [N O V E L I G H T] the river is at a higher elevation, if rainfall exceeds a certain level, it will flood.”

“What flood precautions are in place?”

“As far as I know, none~.”

Ricardo answered.

“That said, the depot itself does have some height to it.... It’s a five-story building~.”

I wish the rain would stop.

Listening to the seniors talk, I lightly furrowed my brow.

Flash floods were truly dangerous. There had been many times I’d lost knights to raging currents.

Back when I was still an ordinary knight, Kyle had once been swept away too.

Being from the grasslands, Kyle wasn’t a very good swimmer. Kairos, maybe because he’d spent so much time chasing aquatic Creatures, had swimming skills that didn’t suit someone from the plains, but neither of them were as good as I was, and at the time I truly thought I was going to lose Kyle.

Of course, I couldn’t criticize him. I myself had once been swept away by a swollen river back when I was still at the temple.

I suddenly remembered Gale hauling me violently out of the water with a deathly pale face that day.

He’d been so furious afterward. More than the terror of being helplessly dragged away by the current, Gale had frightened me more, and I’d burst into tears, sobbing.

“If it’s five stories, at least we won’t drown.”

Ami said calmly.

“But if it really floods and we get trapped in the depot, food could become a problem. We should probably eat sparingly for today!”

“The odds of it raining for an entire week are low.”

“And if I may add, as long as I’m here, you don’t need to worry about starving.”

Sophia answered, and I added my own words.

Everyone except Sophia, who was driving, turned to look at me in confusion.

What?

Caught off guard by the sudden attention, I blinked, and Ricardo casually tapped my shoulder.

“You forgot you’ve never transferred to a human before~?”

“Huh? No. I’ve never forgotten that.”

“What does Hilde have to do with starvation?”

Ami tilted her head with a puzzled expression.

“You mean you’ll go swimming and catch fish for us?”

Hmm.

Better not explain in detail.

Having made that judgment, I looked at Ami and smiled with narrowed eyes.

“Yes, well. Something like that.”

Smack!

I was suddenly hit.

“Ow!”

Ric just smacked me in the head!

“Ric! That really hurts!”

“If the answer that just popped into my head is the method you were thinking of.... I’m going to visit the Advisor after this mission, so keep that in mind~.”

“Huh?”

Clutching my head, I stared blankly at Ricardo.

“Huh? What... what do you mean? What exactly are you telling on me for? Why did I suddenly get hit?”

“You saying that because you think the rest of us can’t swim as well as you?”

Sophia asked in a flat voice.

Rubbing the spot where I’d been hit, I carefully read the room.

If I answered honestly, I was definitely going to get torn apart for it, so I had to play dumb to the bitter end.

In a cowed voice, I mumbled,

“Sorry. I won’t get carried away.”

“Speaking of your limbs.”

Yun suddenly spoke.

“Your subordinate kept asking to buy one.”

I was horrified.

“What?! You still had that?!”

Smack!

Ricardo hit me in the back of the head again.

Holding the back of my head, I couldn’t decide for a moment whether to speak to Yun or turn toward Ricardo.

Then Ami suddenly glared at me.

“Ami?”

“Thinking about that time all of a sudden is making me annoyed.”

No.

“Why is Hildebert even here?”

“Ah, Ami. I really did beat Yehyeon.”

After protesting desperately, I turned to Yun.

“Was that why Rose came looking for me?”

“What else would it be.”

“You really need to fix that habit of casually mutilating your own body~.”

Ricardo said, his voice edged with sharpness.

Still holding the back of my head, I turned blankly and met the low-pressure stare of the senior.

He had the expression of someone who wanted to hit me one more time.

“I’d rather starve to death....” 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

Why are Ricardo and Yun so sensitive about this?

I understood I’d been found out, but I desperately pretended not to know what they meant. I turned my body back forward with a face that said I had absolutely no idea what Ricardo was talking about.

This reminds me of Seunghyun.

I survived that crisis by eating four of his fingers.

I should contact him again once the mission is over.

Still rubbing the back of my head while following that train of thought, I suddenly remembered something I wanted to ask and turned to the green-eyed senior.

“Ric.”

“What....”

“Doesn’t the Advisor feel uncomfortable?”

Instead of getting angry, Ricardo let out a snort.

He narrowed his eyes.

“The difference in rank is obvious, so of course he does....”

“Ah, right. That makes sense.”

“Still, I should go see him~.”

“Huh?”

I didn’t even say anything that time.

I looked at him with an aggrieved expression, but it had no effect.

Instead, the sharp senior slowly looked me up and down before saying,

“He’s your godfather.... He ought to know what kind of thoughts you’re having~?”

Screeeech!

The vehicle slammed to a sudden stop.

Thunk! With a heavy noise, the cargo shifted. I heard the seniors grabbing the bags beside them.

No one cried out in surprise. Instead, everyone grabbed their weapons and twisted around to check why we had stopped so abruptly.

Sophia in the driver’s seat, Yun in the passenger seat.

Yun was staring ahead indifferently, while Sophia had her head lowered.

“...Sorry.”

Sophia muttered awkwardly.

“That startled me.”

“That’s understandable.”

Carl, seated in the corner, murmured.

“That’s news to me too.”

“Sorry.”

Feeling awkward, I rubbed the back of my neck as I answered.

“It was personal, so I didn’t think it was necessary to bring it up. And I didn’t think any of you would particularly want to know.”

“That’s true.”

Sophia answered firmly.

I wilted even further.

“Sorry.”

“The surprising part is that Senior Ricardo already knew.”

“I found out unintentionally because of an unfortunate incident~.”

“I already knew too!”

Ami declared proudly.

Yun answered flatly.

“If you didn’t know, there’d be something wrong with your intelligence.”

“What!”

Ami flared up.

“But oppa and Oppa Yehyeon never told me directly either! I figured it out myself! Seriously, it’s so unfair that you only kept it from me!”

“What would you even do with that information?”

Yun shot back.

“It’d only make the family tree even more tangled.”

Sophia let out a heavy sigh and started the vehicle moving again.

As I listened to Yun and Ami bicker, I wondered whether Ricardo would really go tell Yehyeon.

But since he seemed especially uncomfortable around Yehyeon, maybe he wouldn’t actually go.

Strangely enough, I could imagine Ricardo going to Yun and reporting things, but I couldn’t imagine him going out of his way to see Yehyeon.

It’s a relief those two aren’t close.

Thinking that, I watched the rainwater streaking across the window.

Once we reached the supply depot and communications were working properly, I should ask Kairos and Yoow about the current situation...

***

Things did not unfold as expected.

“Power outage.”

After quickly checking the state of the depot, Yun gave his diagnosis.

“No backup power either.”

Wow.

This mission really isn’t easy.