Chapter 327: Blazing Flames of the Battlefield[R-18] (45)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 327: Blazing Flames of the Battlefield[R-18] (45)
Left alone in the room, Adele quietly lay down on the bed. The faint, vibrating hum of the ship was the only sound tickling her ears.
“…He wasn’t wrong.”
A low monologue escaped her lips as she closed her eyes.
The Licencia Group was an old military-industrial corporation. It had started quietly, a family of soldiers stretching back to her grandfather’s time and beyond.
Above all, they were people who held the conviction to ‘protect people with technology.’ That was why, when she was young, she had dreamed of following in her grandfather’s footsteps and becoming an ‘engineer for the people.’
But—
“The problem was that Licencia grew too large.”
As the technology grew, money followed. As money followed, power flocked to it. And desire wormed its way into the cracks.
“Endless greed…”
She clutched the edge of the blanket.
Her father was different from what she had imagined. In front of the world, he was colder and more calculating than anyone.
He was a man who spoke of working for peace while in reality using people like ingredients for the sake of power.
‘Adele Licencia. Do you have any idea how many people have died because of the weapons you created? And not just in the Earth Federation. Arsenos, private armed forces… they’re all dying by the technology you people made. You don’t even have the right to be sad.’
Oh Hyun’s words wouldn’t leave her mind. They had struck her right in the heart.
“…Right. It’s not like I’m some innocent bitch, either.”
She gave a bitter internal smile. If she hadn’t met Su-hyeon, she probably would have become a person no different from her father.
‘My regret alone can’t bring back all these dead…’
She slowly opened her eyes. Still, she had to stop, even if it was now. She didn’t want to live like a monster who used people as a means to an end… like some people she knew.
—Knock, knock.
A careful knock sounded at the door.
“Miss, it’s Su-hyeon.”
“Come in.”
She was still wearing the maid outfit Jin Seo-yun had put her in, something she now wore daily. It had become so familiar to her that it almost felt natural. But right now, she didn’t have the luxury for such trivial thoughts.
“What is it, Su-hyeon?”
Su-hyeon’s voice, when she answered, was incredibly heavy.
“……We found it.”
“What did you say…?”
Her heart plummeted. Without a word, Adele shot up from the bed and followed Su-hyeon, her feet moving heavily. What she found there was a single, massive mechanical arm.
Requiem. Jin Seo-yun’s machine.
The Licencia crest was engraved on the shoulder. The black paint clearly marked it as Requiem’s arm.
“A-Anything else…?”
Her voice trembled.
Her eyes shook, her breathing grew ragged.
“……There was nothing.”
Su-hyeon bowed her head. Even she was clenching her trembling hands.
“Ah…”
Her lips parted, but no words came. Her knees buckled as if she were a puppet with its strings cut.
—Thud.
As if collapsing, Adele sank to the floor. Her mind went blank. Her vision blurred.
“Miss!”
Su-hyeon rushed to support her, but Adele didn’t move an inch.
*
“Khahaha! Let’s drink ‘til we drop tonight, you bastards!”
With Brol’s drunken roar, the ship’s interior had transformed into a rowdy drinking party.
From mechanics with repair tools on their backs to helmsmen with their combat suits unzipped, Brol’s subordinates sat in a circle, loudly exchanging drinks.
And the women I had befriended over the past few days while helping with repairs or sharing jokes were sitting on either side of me, offering me drinks and snacks.
“Seo-yun, try this too~! It’s meat I cooked myself!”
“Here, here! My turn! Open wide!”
Even as I downed my glass, food was relentlessly pushed at me from both sides.
The red-haired woman next to me was about to shove something into my mouth when the woman with the bob cut on my other side slapped her arm.
“Sob… Miri and Sona… I liked him first…!”
A tearful voice came from the other side of the room. A man who seemed completely drunk kept his head down, downing drink after drink.
“Hey, hey! For a skinny guy, you can really hold your liquor!”
A large man holding onto the table across from me laughed heartily as he spoke to me. His teeth glinted from within his bushy beard.
“I’ve never been drunk enough to cause trouble, is all.”
When I replied with a smile, the room erupted in laughter once more. Glasses clinked, and beer started to overflow as it was poured.
The reason I was leisurely drinking with them was that this was the best way to get close to them.
I didn’t know how long we’d be together, but it seemed like it would be longer than expected, and I needed to earn their trust.
‘I have no idea where Adele is… I can’t make a move.’
Finding her in the vastness of space was practically impossible. So, for now, getting Requiem repaired was the top priority.
Fortunately, Brol had told me yesterday that there was a technician on the planet we were heading to who could work on Requiem.
I was thinking about that as I accepted a snack from the person next to me.
“Captaiiiin! We’ve got a big problem!”
Someone burst through the door, shouting.
“What’s with all the fuss?”
“T-Turn on the news…! Right now!”
In an instant, the party’s atmosphere froze.
Brol grabbed the remote and turned on the screen, which soon showed a public square. It was an Arsenos broadcast.
On the screen, an old man with a dignified air stood at a podium. His lips were set in a firm line, medals glittered on his chest, and dozens of generals and council members stood in rows behind him.
Beneath the refined dignity, hatred and anger were palpable. The old man placed both hands on the lectern and spoke in a low, resolute voice.
[…Last night, the Earth Federation used a weapon of mass destruction banned by treaty: the Xeno Cyclone.]
The moment he said that, Brol’s face hardened.
[Our entire military force advancing toward Earth has suffered immense damage. Thousands of our citizens vanished in a single beam of light, without so much as a shadow left behind.]
Everyone held their breath, staring at the news screen. The old man’s voice grew more agitated as he took a step forward and shouted.
[This is no longer a simple struggle for independence. This is a fight for ‘survival’!]
At that moment, the military generals lined up behind him raised their fists in unison.
[Arsenos will not be silent! For justice, for revenge, we will enter a full-scale war!]
As his cry echoed, the hundreds of thousands of citizens gathered in the square before the podium roared as one. The shouts of the enraged crowd washed over the city like a massive wave.
A crowd crying for revenge, their faces contorted with fury.
The old man slowly raised his hand. All noise subsided, and he spoke again.
[And to this end, as of today, we are imposing a ‘mandatory military service’ on all citizens of Arsenos. There will be no exceptions.]
The atmosphere in the room turned to ice.
“……Captain, you don’t think we’ll be forcibly conscripted like that, do you?”
Someone asked, looking at Brol with anxious eyes. Brol scratched his chin, his face now completely sober as he spat out a low curse.
“Dammit… We’re well and truly fucked.”
I quietly set down my glass. The festive mood was long gone.
“So, what’s a Xeno Cyclone that’s got everyone so worked up?”
For a moment, the air stilled as if frozen. A man who had been drinking quietly across from me set down his glass and muttered in a disbelieving tone.
“You’re a soldier and you don’t even know that?”
Brol quickly followed up, his voice devoid of any humor.
“It’s called a wide-area thermonuclear proliferation weapon, the Xeno Cyclone.”
His eyes darkened.
“It has enough power to vaporize an entire colony. It’s on a completely different level from conventional plasma bombardments. It’s a high-temperature compression wave that disintegrates all matter within the strike radius down to the molecular level. All that’s left is radioactive contamination and a verdict that the area is inaccessible for hundreds of years.”
Brol sat down quietly next to me and spoke.
“This is a real all-out war now. The Federation crossed the line, and Arsenos has just issued a national conscription order.”
He gave a bitter smile.
“A punk like you, a mercenary like me… we’re all fated to die on the battlefield now.”
I stared at the screen. Arsenos had entered a full-scale war. The sight of them screaming for madness was no longer a political declaration. It was revenge. And that revenge had now turned into a contest to see who could open the gates of hell first.
‘If the Earth Federation used a weapon like that… Arsenos won’t just sit back. They must have something too.’
A weapon of mass destruction. Not just a tool to overturn a battlefield, but a catastrophe that erases existence itself.
‘If this continues, there’ll be nothing left.’
A mad fight of killing and being killed. Civilians, soldiers—such distinctions would disappear.
‘This isn’t the time to be sitting around drinking.’
I turned to look at Brol, who was drinking beside me. His expression was dark, too. The easygoing manner he had when telling jokes was gone.
“How long until we arrive?”
Brol set down his glass and answered.
“We’ll enter the orbital sphere by tomorrow morning.”
“Are you sure there’s someone there who can repair my machine?”
He nodded.
“Yeah. There’s one crazy bastard. He was an engineer the military tried to officially recruit. His skills are the real deal.”
Then he touched his forehead and added.
“But his personality is… a real piece of work. Anyone can see he’s not normal. They say there’s a thin line between genius and madness, and that guy is living proof.”
I slowly lifted my glass and took a sip. The bitter taste ran over my tongue and down my throat.
“Well, as long as he can fix the machine properly, I don’t care. If words don’t work, I’ll persuade him with my fists.”
Brol let out a short laugh.
“Fists probably won’t have much effect on that guy.”
I set my glass down again. The taste of lukewarm beer still lingered in my mouth.
‘Repairing the machine is the top priority.’
And then, find Adele.
The all-out war had just begun. In this chaos, I might actually find a clue to her whereabouts.
‘Is Adele… looking for me?’
If she heard news about me, she might have concluded I was dead. If not, she could be somewhere in this universe right now, being pursued by the Federation forces.
At the very least, if Sheryl Mortimer was moving with Adele, I wouldn’t be too worried.
‘Whatever happens, I have to move.’
To stand still is to die. The front lines were expanding, and each faction would try to re-establish order in its own way.