Caught in the Trap

A short while before the raid, Serafina returned to the command tent and stared blankly down at her own two hands.

The inside of the tent was cold. Normally, that chill would have burrowed into her bones and twisted into that searing, aching pain that tormented her. But tonight was different — the night air felt nothing more than refreshing.

"……Impossible."

She wrapped her arms around her shoulders. The memory of what had happened in Max Jäger's tent was still vivid — the sensation of his hands stroking her back.

"Ugh…."

Just thinking about it made her body flush with heat. She hadn't only bared her upper body in front of a subordinate officer — she had writhed under his touch and let moans slip from her lips.

And yet she didn't regret it. No — quite the opposite.

So this… is what ordinary people feel when they sleep.

She carefully laid herself down on the cot. On any other night she would have had to toss and turn repeatedly, adjusting her posture against the pain, but tonight, for the first time in far too long, she could pass the night free of agony. Her eyelids grew heavy as lead. Max Jäger's voice echoed in her ears.

"A secret I'll carry to my grave."

"You should be fine for the time being."

"…Arrogant bastard."

With the faintest smile ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠playing at her lips, she sank into the deep swamp of sleep.

She dreamed.

She stood alone in the middle of an endless field of snow. In the howling blizzard, she huddled in on herself, shivering from cold and pain. As always, she had to endure it alone.

Then — someone came walking through the snowstorm. A man in a black uniform. His face was blurred, impossible to make out, but the aura he radiated was achingly familiar.

Without a word, he approached the huddled Serafina and embraced her from behind. His chest was warm. His touch melted the chill from her frozen back.

The Serafina of the dream did not resist. Craving his touch, she burrowed into his arms.

"It's all right now, Captain."

His low voice tickled her ear. Intoxicated by it, Serafina thought she never wanted to wake from this dream.

"Enemy attack! Enemy attack!!"

"All hands, up! To your positions!!"

Sharp shouts shattered that sweet dream to pieces.

"…Hah!"

Serafina's eyes flew open with something close to a scream. Cold sweat ran down her spine. A commander who slept until the enemy was practically on top of her. Without even a moment to straighten her uniform, she grabbed her pistol and burst out of the tent.

"2nd Company! Don't panic!"

She had barely stepped outside, mid-shout, when—

"……Huh?"

A dazed sound escaped her lips. The scene before her eyes was not the hellish carnage she had braced herself for.

Fwoooooosh—! Bang!

A flare rocketed into the night sky, turning the pitch-black darkness into broad daylight. And beneath that light was revealed a scene of utter, one-sided slaughter.

"Gwaaagh!"

"Kugh!"

The heads of charging orcs burst open like watermelons.

Ratatatatatat! Boom! Boom!

Machine guns spat fire without pause while riflemen worked their bolts with mechanical precision. The orcs couldn't even close the distance — they were simply melting away.

Pistol still lowered in her hand, Serafina stared blankly at the spectacle. She hadn't even been given a window to intervene.

"1st Squad, eleven o'clock! Concentrated fire where that flare came down!"

"2nd Squad, don't ration your machine gun belts! Keep their heads down!"

"3rd Squad on the right! I see flanking movement — grenades out!"

A cold, crystal-clear voice rang out through the darkness.

Max Jäger stood in the very midst of his soldiers. As if he had known this entire situation in advance, he was calling out precisely calibrated counterfire the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠instant each new enemy appeared.

Serafina's gaze locked onto his broad back. The figure she had seen in her dream — and now this cold, composed profile standing in the heart of a battlefield.

The moment the two images overlapped, she felt a strange dizziness. It was nothing like the pain from her Mana Backflow. A low heat stirred in her abdomen, and her heart beat out of rhythm — an entirely unfamiliar sensation.

Serafina bit her lower lip.

"Situation resolved. Confirm casualties."

"Yes, sir!"

At my order, the soldiers moved. Thanks to the Minimap, the ambush had ended as a perfect reversal. As the darkness of the forest lifted, a line of orc corpses lay strewn in front of 3rd Platoon's positions.

I let my tension go and slung my rifle over my shoulder. When I turned around, I spotted Serafina standing in front of her tent. Her complexion was bright and clear — she'd clearly slept well.

I walked over to her slowly and saluted.

"Reporting, sir. You're awake, Captain?"

"…What's the situation?"

"An enemy night raid. Roughly one platoon in size — most likely a scouting party from the Ashen Claw Tribe. Our casualties are two wounded. The enemy was annihilated to the last."

At my crisp report, she let out a small sigh. A sigh of relief.

"…Impressive. You wrapped up all of this while I was asleep."

"We got lucky. I was doing a sweep of the forest perimeter and the atmosphere seemed off, that's all."

I papered over it with a convenient lie. I couldn't exactly say I'd seen it on the Minimap.

"…Luck again, is it? You always do seem to fall back on that word."

Serafina looked half-convinced by my excuse, half not — but unlike before, she didn't look particularly displeased about it.

Tucking her pistol into its holster, she asked:

"Why didn't you wake me?"

"You seemed to be sleeping soundly, sir."

I added with a grin:

"Managing the commander's condition is part of the operation too, wouldn't you say? I judged there was no need for a Captain to bother herself with clearing out the riffraff."

Serafina's blue eyes wavered, just slightly.

"…Insolent."

She spat it out in feigned coldness, but there was no edge in her voice.

Status Analysis.

Her inner thoughts were laid bare. I bowed my head with a deliberately grave expression.

"By regulation, I should have reported immediately and awaited your instructions. I acknowledge that this was a clear overstepping of my authority. If you choose to punish me, I'll accept it gladly."

"……."

When I bowed and scraped so thoroughly, it was Serafina who grew flustered instead. She cleared her throat and looked away.

"…The results were good, so it's fine. I'll write the report myself. …But next time, wake me. Understood?"

"Understood, sir."

"And…."

Serafina paused, then — after confirming no soldiers were nearby — added in a very small voice:

"…Thank you, Lieutenant."

Her voice was gentler than usual.

"Thanks to you… I actually slept well for the first time in ages. I didn't… even dream…."

A faint flush crept across her cheeks.

"…I'm glad to hear it. Seems the treatment… er, the adjustment worked."

The moment the word treatment left my mouth, her face turned visibly red.

"……! W-well… it's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠true my body does feel lighter…."

She coughed and forced her gaze away. Then, as if to change the subject, she pointed toward the forest.

"I'll leave the after-action cleanup to you. I'm… going in to change my clothes."

"Yes, sir. Go get some rest."

Serafina all but fled into her tent.

Before long, dawn began to break. As the darkness over the forest lifted, the scene of the slaughter we had carried out through the night lay exposed in all its brutality.

Only then did the other platoon leaders arrive, having finally scrambled their preparations.

"You mean to say… you held all of this off alone?"

Lieutenant Walter and Lieutenant Franz stood speechless before the mountain of corpses. Erika, who had arrived last, bit her lip in frustration.

"Unbelievable…."

Despite having been in perfect readiness for combat, she had been reduced to showing up after the fact — her face flushed scarlet, she couldn't manage a word. I absorbed their reactions with due grace and ordered the unit to begin recovery operations.

That was when Gunter called out to me urgently from where he was searching the bodies.

"Lieutenant! You'd better come take a look at this! There's something off about their gear!"

"What is it?"

I asked, moving toward where Gunter was pointing. The soldiers cleared a path, revealing a hideously mangled orc corpse.

"What's so unusual about it?"

"Look at this. They've all got one of these hanging around their necks."

Gunter held out something he'd torn from the body — a necklace of charred bone fragments strung on a crude leather cord.

I took the necklace from his hand. A tepid heat crept up my fingertips — unpleasantly so.

Status Analysis.

"…!"

The instant I finished reading the analysis window, a chill ran down my spine.

It sends your location when you die…?

Which meant these weren't just a night raiding party. For a flash, the daytime battle raced through my mind.

So that's why it felt off.

Think about it — that monster Kardor had driven into our 2nd Company's vulnerable flank without a moment's hesitation. As though he could see through every tree in the forest, he had known our exact position and come charging in.

It wasn't because his senses were sharp. It was because the vanguard we'd killed first had marked our coordinates for him with these necklaces. Without a doubt, one of those corpses our search teams had examined must have hidden a necklace we failed to find.

To think something like this was buried in there.

What an efficient method. If you sent scouts out one by one to comb a forest, finding the human main force would be difficult even for orcs. But scatter necklaces across your scouting parties and have them sweep the forest simultaneously—

Then the main force can march straight to the coordinates the dead scouts transmitted.

Gromnar — that bastard had set a certain, absolute trap, paying for it with his own men's lives. And our unit had walked right into it, beautifully.

What our current situation meant was cruelly, brutally clear.

Their main force will be upon us soon.