Allied Kingdom or League?
Where am I — in the Allied Kingdom, or the League?
...There are so many of them.
Dozens of red dots were tightening their noose around the embassy residence, converging from every direction.
Trained movement, all right.
Skill Strong Mind is active.
Suppressing unnecessary agitation and granting cold, rational thought.
Frankly, the situation gave no room for optimism. The weapons Ludwig had provisioned for me were a stopgap at best. We were deep in enemy territory, outnumbered beyond hope, and while the enemy kept pouring in, we had neither an escape route nor a supply line.
One wrong move and I'm actually going to die here.
Of course, I had always lived on the front line, dancing along the blade's edge between life and death — but this was different in kind. Every victory I'd secured so far had been the product of meticulously rigged boards built on cheat skills. A maphack, modern knowledge, and the accumulated intel of a hardcore gamer, letting me seize the high ground from the very start and toy with the enemy at my leisure.
Not anymore. Back in the banquet hall, if my instincts had been a fraction slower, it would have been over.
Granted, I could probably have slipped away alone with Bullet Time — but what I had to protect wasn't just my own neck.
If those red dots stormed the building, it wouldn't end with one death. Not only Minister Josef, but every subordinate who trusted me enough to follow me here would be butchered.
I'm getting anxious. How long has it been since I last felt this?
My body had begun to tremble finely at the horrifying images playing through my mind. I was feeling fear.
Ring—
Skill Strong Mind is active.
Forcibly suppressing unnecessary emotional agitation.
I had lost count of how many times Strong Mind had auto-activated by now.
"...Hoo."
The effect was undeniable. My head cooled. The trembling in my hands stopped, and my pounding heart settled into a steady rhythm.
Taking slow, deep breaths, I analyzed the enemy movement lines on my Minimap.
They were closing in from three directions. The main force at the front gate, led by a shield wall of rioters to soak up the first volley. A mobile team scrambling over the fence. And an assassination squad infiltrating through the sewers.
"Lieutenant Colonel! Multiple hostiles approaching!"
Hannah's voice crackled over the radio. Her Mana Sense was cross-checking the Minimap's data with pinpoint accuracy.
"Copy that. Erika, take two guards and seal off the basement by the rear entrance. Major Seraphina, hold position at the first-floor barricade. The moment they close within fifty meters, open fire without hesitation."
"Understood, Lieutenant Colonel."
Clack. Chik-chak.
The chandelier in the lobby went dark, and the embassy residence plunged into pitch-black night. Only the flames roaring outside the windows flickered and swayed, casting their light across the interior.
I locked my submachine gun firmly into my shoulder in the darkness.
Then—
KRAK-BOOM! KWA-BOOM—!
The iron gate at the front collapsed in a thunderclap of explosives. Through the thick smoke, armed rioters began pouring through the breach.
"All units, open fire!"
RATATATATANG—!
The instant my order fell, the first floor of the embassy vanished beneath a wall of muzzle flash.
"Gwaaaagh!"
"Th-those Imperial bastards are shooting live rounds!"
The lead wave crumpled, spraying blood. They clearly hadn't expected us to skip warnings entirely and start emptying live magazines from the first second — and now they were scrambling in confusion.
Status Analysis.
Target: League-affiliated operative A
Emotion: Damn it, they were ready for us already?
Target: League-affiliated operative B
Emotion: We took losses, but it doesn't matter. The core of this operation is the flanking infiltration team!
"You idiots. Did you really think you could fool my eyes?"
I glanced at the Minimap in the corner of my vision. The movement lines of the team probing our blind spots stood out plain as day.
"Hannah! Two o'clock, on the fence — three of them climbing over!"
"On it!"
Barely a heartbeat after her voice came through the radio—
TANG! TANG!
The three red dots peeking over the top of the fence winked out, one after another, as if they'd never existed.
"Right-side breach team silenced!"
"Good work. Keep whittling them down."
Once the mobile team was swept away, the situation at the front began to shift as well.
When the mindless mob charging in headfirst thinned out into something resembling a coherent firing line, the operatives reformed their ranks and started returning fire with pistols and shotguns.
TANG! CHANG!
Bullets slammed into the marble columns of the lobby, spraying shrapnel. The sheer disparity in numbers had changed the very density of the barrage.
"Lieutenant Colonel! There are too many of them! The line is buckling!"
Seraphina shouted from behind her cover, crouched low.
Defending the first-floor lobby were just me, Seraphina, and three embassy guards — that was all. When dozens came crashing in at once, merely lifting our heads was a struggle.
"I'm going to use my mana! Requesting permission!"
Seraphina's silver hair rippled. A killing light kindled in her sapphire eyes.
"Permission granted. But no over-output. Scatter the mana into fragments and shred everything in a thirty-meter radius to the front."
"Understood!"
Seraphina extended her rifle forward.
Vmmm—
An ominous vibration. Condensed clumps of mana gathered from her fingertips toward the muzzle.
KWA-KWA-KWA-KWANG—!
With a blast that threatened to split eardrums, dozens of blue-white mana fragments swept across the front courtyard of the lobby. A merciless area bombardment, like a giant shotgun blast.
"Gwaaaaagh!"
"My legs — my legs!"
Enemies caught in the mana fragments were torn apart like rags. In an instant, the courtyard in front of the lobby transformed into a churning mud of blood and viscera.
"Ngh..."
Seraphina let out a groan and slumped against the wall. Her Mana Overload wasn't fully cured yet — a rapid discharge like that was straining her mana circuits.
Status Analysis.
Name: Serafina von Reinhardt
Condition: Temporary mana depletion, dizziness
Fortunately, it was nothing critical — the kind of thing a once-over with Touch of Attunement would fix right up.
In the meantime, a chorus of violent detonations echoed from the basement.
I instinctively checked my Minimap. The rear entrance where Erika was positioned swarmed with red dots, but the narrow bottleneck let her hold the line with grenades.
She's holding up well.
But this wasn't enough.
On the Minimap, the red dots showed no sign of thinning at all.
I honestly can't tell whether this is the Allied Kingdom or the League.
Just how many sleeper operatives had they planted in this country?
Clack.
The bolt of my submachine gun locked back. Empty magazine.
"Damn it, that's the second one already?"
The instant I dropped the spent magazine and slapped in a fresh one, everything went wrong.
"...!"
Beyond the barricade at the front, one red dot that had been hiding behind a toppled statue leapt into the air along a bizarre, unnatural arc.
Status Analysis.
Target: League elite agent
Condition: Suicide attack, prepared to detonate
Emotion: For the revolution... I offer this one life!
"You lunatic."
In his hand was a heavy bundle of dynamite.
His target: the center of the first-floor lobby, where Seraphina and I stood. If that thing went off, the barricades — the entire first floor — would come down on our heads.
The moment he swung his arm back, winding up to hurl the explosive—
Now.
Bullet Time (Lv.2)
Perception accelerated — the world slows to one-tenth speed.
The world's clamor receded into a vast, distant silence.
The flicker of burning flames, the screams torn from the soldiers' throats — even the flash of black powder slicing through the air toward us — all of it began to move in slow, syrupy lurches, as though mired in thick mud.
Calmly, I raised the muzzle of my submachine gun.
Align the sights. The target: the bundle of dynamite hanging in midair.
The movement of my finger squeezing the trigger was the only thing in this decelerated world still running at normal speed.
Click.
The mechanism cycled at one-tenth speed. The trigger pulled, the bolt drove forward, and the firing pin slammed into the primer of the round seated in the chamber.
BAAANG—!
Wrapped in flame, the bullet left the muzzle.
Even at one-tenth speed, it was nearly impossible to follow with the naked eye.
The round punched clean through the dynamite. Slow motion caught the explosive warping under the impact, distorting until it swelled grotesquely out of shape.
Bullet Time has ended.
And the instant the acceleration released—
Everything that had crawled suddenly roared back to full speed.
Flames whipped violently, the soldiers screamed in wild panic, and the swelling of the explosive reached its absolute limit.
And then—
KWAAAAAAA-BOOM—!!
A massive firestorm erupted directly over the enemies' heads.
"Gwaaaaaagh!"
"My eyes! My eyes!"
The shockwave hurled shards of glass in every direction. Superheated fragments rained down on the tops of their skulls.
A devastating blow.
The heads of the core operatives burst open, and the mob, gripped by terror, began trampling one another in their flight.
The red dots on the Minimap receded rearward like an ebbing tide.
"...They're pulling back."
Seraphina reported, eyes fixed beyond the barricade.
"The enemy has withdrawn out of range. It looks like they're regrouping."
"Don't let your guard down. This isn't over yet."
We had repelled the first assault. Not a single casualty on our side — a flawless defense, squeezing every drop out of the resources we had and the cheat skills I possessed.
But this was no time for smiling.
We're running low on ammunition.
The diplomatic pouch Field Marshal Ludwig had provisioned was generous, but it had limits. Our expenditure of 9mm rounds and grenades had far exceeded my estimates. If we endured two or three more assaults on the scale of the last, we'd be swinging empty guns and fighting hand-to-hand with rifle butts.
And that meant death.
"Situation report."
Krrzzt—
[Basement — stragglers cleared. Two magazines remaining.]
Erika's voice, ragged with heavy breathing.
[Rooftop — field of view secured. No hostiles closing within a 200-meter radius at present. However, at least several hundred personnel are staging beyond the alleys. Ammunition: 50 rounds remaining.]
Hannah's report — dry, but precise.
"Seraphina."
"A magazine and a half of ammunition remaining. I can fire two more mana rounds like the one before."
"...Understood."
Leaning against the wall, I dragged a hand down my face. The acrid stench of gunpowder and the copper tang of blood pricked at my nose.
My options were narrowing.
If this went on, I might have to do what I'd done at Rosenheim — forcibly wring out my damaged mana circuits and transmute crude ammunition with Material Conversion.
That wretched business of coughing blood and bleeding from the nose, whittling away at my own life.
That paradoxical act of pawning my lifespan just to survive.
Did I really have to do it again?
Squee— krrzzt—
Just then, a strange frequency hissed to life on the compact radio at my hip.
It was not an Imperial military frequency.
[...kzzt, do you copy. Krrzzt — Imperial side. If you can hear this, respond.]
A cold, imperious woman's voice — somehow, eerily familiar.
It was Sydney Wellesley, Director of the Royal Intelligence Service.