The Black-Clad Uninvited Guest (6)
It was over in an instant.
The man could only stare blankly as his comrades were brutally slaughtered in a matter of seconds.
Their movements had far surpassed human judgment.
He couldn’t even comprehend what was happening, let alone think about fighting back.
That thing was simply beyond them.
Even Roland, the man who had always boasted that he was the strongest fighter in their organization, had been helpless against the uninvited guest who appeared without warning.
One by one.
With every step the intruder took, droplets of blood pattered onto the floor.
Dressed in clothes so black they were nearly indistinguishable from shadows, the man truly resembled a grim reaper.
Thud.
“Grrk….”
The last remaining comrade let out a gurgling death rattle and fell still.
The pistol he had been holding clattered across the floor and stopped right in front of the man’s eyes.
“Don’t even think about it.”
At the cold warning, the man immediately thrust both hands into the air.
===
Inside the armory, the man swallowed dryly as he stared at the neatly piled corpses of his comrades beside him.
He had been shocked to see three healthy men turned into corpses in the blink of an eye by a blade no longer than a handspan.
Then he was shocked again when the intruder casually dragged the bodies aside.
He had clearly gotten himself tangled up with the wrong people—horribly wrong.
These were men who made their living by killing.
There was no cause, no greater cause behind their actions. They were nothing but cold-blooded murderers.
When he finally mustered the courage to look back at the stranger, he met a pair of eyes so icy that the very air seemed to freeze.
The man quietly erased every trace of contempt he had been harboring.
If his opponent was a human butcher, he needed to hide his feelings even more carefully.
First, he had to survive.
“Affiliation. Objective. And numbers.”
“W-we’re from the Revolutionary Front.”
The Revolutionary Front?
Werner’s eyes narrowed.
He had definitely heard that name before.
After thinking for a moment, he recalled that it had come up during political education class back at the officer training academy many years ago.
Before the unidentified enemy known as the Titans—whose origin no one could determine—had threatened all of humanity.
The world had been in constant chaos.
Nations growled at one another, and within each country, various factions fought viciously over power and resources.
Even now, wasn’t it the same?
The Chancellor and the Emperor.
The Eastern Military District and the Supreme Command.
But before the Titans appeared, the Empire’s political entanglements had been far more complicated than they were today.
There had been the Imperial Faction that supported the Emperor, the Nationalist Faction that backed the Chancellor, the People’s Faction that inherited ideologies from the far west, and the Revolutionary Faction, which was slightly different in nature from the People’s Faction.
In the end, the Nationalists emerged victorious. Their leader, the Chancellor, succeeded in pushing the Emperor—the strongest force at the time—into the background.
In the process, a great number of nobles who made up the majority of the Imperial Faction had been forced to relinquish their power.
If even the Imperial Faction had suffered such a fate, the outcome for the People’s Faction and the Revolutionary Faction, who hadn’t even reached the semifinals, was obvious.
Annihilation.
Of course, just before the Chancellor could swing his ruthless blade at them, the war against the Titans broke out.
Managing the front lines alone was overwhelming; there was no time to worry about how to deal with the revolutionaries.
In a way, the Titans had saved them.
But now that the Titans had disappeared, it was time to clean up the past that had been left unfinished.
The Revolutionary Front was one of the most extreme factions within the revolutionary movement.
“Our objective… is the assassination of the Eastern Military District Commander and other high-ranking officers. B-but I’m just a low-ranking member! They took my family hostage, so I had no choice but to join…!!”
The man, terrified out of his wits, spilled his entire family story without prompting.
It wasn’t particularly useful information.
Even so, one question still remained in Werner’s mind.
Why the Eastern Military District?
The faction that had clearly set itself against the revolutionaries was the Nationalist Faction centered around the Chancellor.
Wouldn’t it have been far more effective to carry out terrorism at the Supreme Command or in the capital?
‘I’ll find out eventually.’
There was no point trying to learn too much here.
Werner drew his pistol and aimed it at the man.
Even though he had been using a blade just moments ago, the sudden appearance of a gun was clearly a threat.
But from the perspective of someone staring down the barrel, there was no time to think about such things.
“Oh God! Please, I beg you! Please spare my life…!! Think of my poor wife and children who are waiting for me at home…!!!”
The man immediately dropped to his knees and prostrated himself.
“If you want to live, tell me everyone who’s involved.”
“T-that’s…!!”
Click.
Werner pulled back the slide of his pistol.
At the sound of a round chambering, the man began to shake like a leaf.
“I’m sorry! Like I said, I’m just a low-level grunt! I don’t know everyone! At most, it’s just the three guys over there and the soldiers who are supposed to come pick up weapons tomorrow!”
“Hmm.”
A bust.
Werner swallowed a low groan.
It had been a very long time since he had dealt with people in this manner.
Even in the middle of a battlefield where hundreds or thousands died every day, human greed never ceased.
Military supply corruption was child’s play compared to the rest.
When young men and women were conscripted en masse, some superior officers lost their minds and began demanding bizarre things.
It was one of the reasons the Empire had been helpless against the Titans until the quantum computer Akasha was developed and distributed throughout the military.
Brainless, shit-for-brains officers.
Werner knew their ugliness all too well. In one of his regressions, he had lived the life of a vengeful spirit.
The weaknesses he had uncovered during that time eventually allowed him to bury them all without having to stain his own hands with blood.
Heinrich Rendal, who oversaw the Eastern Military District, was stubborn and loved empty formalities, but he was not evil to that extent.
That was why Werner had taken no special measures and why he was trying to stop the upcoming terrorist attack.
If the man had truly been a piece of shit, Werner would have already stripped him of his uniform.
“Then let’s do this. You said your family is being held hostage?”
“…Y-yes!! That’s right!!”
“Then you have two choices. One is to die here. The other is to cooperate with me and help wipe out the Revolutionary Front.”
“The second one, obviously!!”
The answer came immediately.
If he had hesitated this time, there would have been no next chance, but the man clearly had good instincts.
“Will any more people be joining your group today?”
“N-no…! We were originally supposed to be on guard duty here, but we told our friends we’d be drinking all day at our post… so there are no other personnel on duty today besides us.”
What a mess.
The discipline in the Eastern Military District Command had fallen so low it had not only hit rock bottom but punched straight through the mantle and reached the outer core.
Even if it was a festive atmosphere, how could they abandon the basics and commit acts that would warrant a court-martial?
Werner decided he would settle this crime later, all at once, and pulled the man to his feet.
“Your name.”
“Dien. Dien Schmidt, sir.”
And so Werner had unexpectedly gained another local collaborator.
Whether he would kill him or not was something he would have to consider a little longer.
===
Knock knock knock.
“Yes~~! Just leave it in front of the door~~!!”
Leah Gilliard did not move from in front of the full-length mirror even when she heard the knock on her door.
It was a masquerade ball, after all.
She had never attended an event like this before, so Leah was in a state of extreme excitement.
She had always been interested, but never had the chance.
With a dangerous operation scheduled for tomorrow where survival was uncertain, there was no way she could leisurely attend a banquet.
Especially since she served under the fortress commander, who had always maintained a negative stance toward such events.
“I wonder what that man is doing right now…”
The face that suddenly came to mind.
Lutus Edan.
She had heard that after retiring from the military, he had completely vanished.
Arhen had cursed him, saying he must have gone into hiding out of fear that his corruption would be exposed, but Leah honestly didn’t think Lutus was that kind of bad person.
He was gruff, blunt, and irritating to others, sure.
And his appearance had been exactly her type.
“…”
Leah, who had briefly fallen into reminiscence, suddenly slapped her own cheeks and shouted.
“Old flames are old flames! Let’s stop dwelling on them! Today is the day I go out and find my destined partner!”
Leah Gilliard’s main interest had always been men.
That didn’t mean she was promiscuous.
Ever since she was young, she had dreamed of a fairy-tale romance. Now that the war was over, she intended to chase that dream with all her might.
She wanted someone with moderately sharp features, someone cold to others but warm to her, someone tall and well-built, someone dependable and manly, someone who would appear magnificently to save her in moments of crisis…
The list of criteria was endless, but that was only an ideal, after all.
Even if he didn’t meet every standard, she might still meet someone decent.
That was why Leah was so excited about this masquerade ball, where people from all over the country had gathered.
“Still, in the end, this is what suits me best.”
After trying on and taking off countless outfits, Leah finally chose the red dress she had worn at the last disbandment ceremony.
No matter how she thought about it, nothing suited her better than this.
Leah Gilliard smiled with satisfaction as she looked at her reflection in the mirror.
It went perfectly with the red cat half-mask she had been issued.
Lieutenants wore white cat masks, captains wore red cat masks, and majors wore black cat masks, apparently.
She had heard that field-grade officers and generals wore masks symbolizing different animals, and she was looking forward to seeing those as well.
Having finished all her preparations, Leah opened the door.
What lay in front of it was a small letter.
“…Who could this be from?”
She carefully broke the seal and read the contents.
Do not attend the banquet tonight, Leah.
The warning was written in handwriting so messy it was nearly impossible to read at first glance.
