WeTried Translations x Flame Comics
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
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Chapter 113: 16. The Person Who Travels Abroad to a Conflict Zone During Vacation (5)
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* * *
Let us turn back the clock two days, to when Ivan briefed the state councilors at the command post on the strike east and attack west operation.
“...”
The moment he finished outlining the operation, everyone in the command post stared blankly at Ivan.
Ivan was not particularly good at reading dwarven expressions, but even he could tell this was not a favorable reaction. Their faces plainly asked, Are you out of your mind?
“I have a great many questions.”
A muscular dwarf bearing the title of Director of Military Administration raised his hand. Ivan gestured with his chin, and the dwarf looked at him with a sour expression.
“Is the very first stage even possible?”
“Of course.”
“You intend to reach the other side of the mountain range in two days?”
“I’ve done it before.”
Ivan looked down at the dwarf.
Andgrund lay beneath the vast Sky Mountains, which stretched across the northern front.
The Sky Mountains themselves served as a natural barrier. To reach the demonfolk territories, one had no choice but to pass through the range’s lower gorges.
Several sections of the range were connected by Great Gates built by the Krasilov military, but those were far too distant from their current position. They could not be used for this operation.
This was a strike east and attack west operation. Infiltration and attacks behind enemy lines were essential. In other words, they had to move to the ridgeline on the far side of the mountain range before beginning the operation.
It was not impossible to reach it on foot through the underground passageways within two days. That was assuming they did not have to pass through enemy territory.
To infiltrate behind enemy lines without drawing the hostile dwarves’ attention, Ivan’s plan was simple.
They would leave the underground, climb the mountains, and strike from behind.
Though it was not the tallest peak in the Sky Mountains, the route marked on his operational map required them to scale snowy cliffs with no climbing trail, travel in a straight line, and reach the Northern Fifth Gate.
Even the most capable dwarf scouting party would hesitate before such terrain. The claim that they would cross it in two days was enough to make anyone doubt the plan’s feasibility.
“You said you’ve done it before...?”
“How do you think we infiltrated Aviditas’s fortress?”
* * *
Day One of Andgrund’s strike east and attack west operation.
-Whoooooosh!!
The weather was clear, thanks to the clouds spread out below them, though it was bitterly cold.
Lucia had never looked down upon clouds in their life, so they forced their frozen jaw to move.
“I’m seriously going to die!!”
Ivan did not bother replying. A person truly about to die would not have the strength to speak.
Instead, he pulled Lucia, strapped to his back, closer.
“Can’t you hear me?! Let’s rest for a minute!!”
“We can’t.”
“Why not?!”
Rather than answer, Ivan raised a hand and waved it before Lucia’s eyes. A ticking pocket watch rested in his leather-gloved hand.
“You’re really saying we’re crossing this in two days? We still have to climb down for ages after that. You know humans get altitude sickness, right...?”
“Reinforce your lungs with mana to improve their ability to absorb oxygen.”
“What does that even...?”
“Altitude sickness occurs when blood oxygen levels fall while you are active in an oxygen-poor atmosphere. The moment you get a headache, reinforce your lungs with mana and force yourself to breathe deeply.”
“This is insane! Nobody taught me that!”
“If you can’t do it, you’ll die.”
Rapid ascent caused oxygen deprivation. Ordinarily, it required time to acclimatize or train for it, but Lucia was different.
They could use mana reinforcement, and they had learned blood sorcery directly from Enrika. That meant they specialized in blood-based spells.
They could do it. Ivan had chosen this route because he trusted Enrika’s teaching. He silently drove his axe into the cliff and continued climbing.
-Whoooooosh!!
At a height where a fall would kill them from a heart attack before impact, where loose stones slipping away made no sound when they struck the ground, Ivan steadily climbed the cliff, driving in his axe.
Lucia chattered for a while, but soon clamped their mouth shut and desperately began circulating mana. The headache must have frightened them.
Good.
Ivan hurled his rope-bound axe over the cliff, embedded it, then pulled himself up to increase his speed.
This was among his most recent experiences. Climbing the Sky Mountains to approach one of the Seven Dragon Generals in demonfolk territory.
It had been the final mission he received, just before the Annihilation Unit was disbanded and just before he decided to retire.
Fortunately, his hands still remembered it.
* * *
“Then my second question. I do not know how human operational plans are usually carried out, but have you heard this saying? The first casualty of war is the operational plan. That is...”
“I know.”
“And you still planned it like this?”
The dwarf grumbled as he tapped Ivan’s outline.
Even an hour-by-hour plan would have been absurd enough to deserve ridicule as fantasy, yet this document contained a densely packed timetable measured down to the minute.
It listed tactical symbols, movement routes, and projected engagement routes all over the operation map. Not even a first-year tactical academy student would play such games. It was the work of dreamers who had never conducted even a basic war game.
Ivan nodded.
“Is it too much for you?”
“Too much, my ass!! Are you saying this makes any sense?!”
“Enrika and I can do it. The only variable is you people.”
“I don’t know whether that is confidence or arrogance, but understand this. This map was made before the civil war began! The actual terrain may be completely different from the map!”
“This is underground. There may be additional tunnels, but the tunnels marked on the map cannot be easily demolished. Especially not dwarven structures.”
“...That is true. Since you destroyed the Earthweb Excavator, it has been... true.”
“Then your tactical map is the easiest field map to predict. It depicts artificial structures, where deviations are extremely limited.”
* * *
Day Two of Andgrund’s strike east and attack west operation.
Lucia turned the map this way and that as they studied it, then furrowed their brow. They stared at the wildly spinning compass and bit their lips.
“Senior, didn’t we take a wrong turn? There shouldn’t be a fork here...?”
“That’s right.”
“But...”
“Look.”
Ivan swung his axe into one branch of the fork. With a sharp crack, one of the tunnel’s large support beams split apart.
Running a finger over the break, Ivan spoke quietly.
“The construction method here differs from that tunnel.”
“...It’s not like I’m familiar with dwarven civil engineering.”
“This is worth knowing. A tunnel with support beams was made by hand. Do you see how that tunnel has no support beams?”
“Huh? Ah, yes. But why does that matter?”
“That means it was excavated when the Earthweb Excavator still existed. The Earthweb Excavator uses a compression excavation method. It doesn’t require support beams. Unless there is an earthquake, the tunnel will not collapse.”
Lucia’s mouth fell open.
“Then this tunnel...”
“Was excavated recently. It would not be recorded on the map. Any other questions?”
“If I keep learning from my master, will I start thinking like you?”
“You can do that without having a teacher as good as Enrika.”
Ivan nodded firmly.
Any properly trained agent could make that deduction. It was simply a matter of experience.
Ivan could not become a good teacher like Enrika. Even with his knowledge of advanced twenty-first-century educational systems, that was an area he found difficult to imitate. He did not possess any special talent for teaching.
Still, there was one thing Ivan could offer: experience. As he had done with the other Hero Party descendants, rather than teaching specialized skills and knowledge, he excelled at giving them experiences as close to real combat as possible.
Satisfied by Lucia’s nodding, Ivan began walking again.
Once this mission ended, Lucia would become a good rival for the others in the new Hero Party, someone who stirred their competitive spirit.
* * *
The dwarf who had been staring at Ivan’s face asked again, his confidence visibly diminished.
“But in the end, does this entire operation not mean... you will be used as bait?”
“It does.”
“Can you return alive?”
“Is that important to you?”
“...My apologies. That was the wrong question. If even a small deviation occurs in your plan, if the operation does not unfold as you expect... must we still follow this timetable?”
If Ivan suffered injuries severe enough to prevent him from carrying out the operation while infiltrating behind enemy lines, should they still follow the plan?
Ivan gave a firm nod.
“Even if not only I but Enrika also fails, this plan must be followed.”
“Why?”
“Once the operation begins, Enrika and I will have no way to contact you.”
An operation based on improvisation and clever tactics still had to be carried out beneath a thoroughly prepared grand strategy.
Even if a field commander changed the direction of an operation at their discretion, headquarters had to maintain the original operational line to preserve the overall framework. Only then could those in the field respond according to schedule.
The dwarf gave a short nod at Ivan’s words.
“In two days, we will advance on schedule.”
“We’ll meet here again in one week.”
“I hope you return alive.”
Ivan left without answering.
* * *
Day Two of Andgrund’s strike east and attack west operation, 19:30.
-Click.
The dwarf at the very front silently drew and chambered his long rifle. Like the opening note of a marching song.
-Click, click, click.
The response followed. Behind him, the sound of heavy infantry chambering their weapons filled the entire plaza, the soldiers packed densely beyond the broad square.
Rumble, rumble, rumble. The enormous gate opened. Andgrund’s northern gate, which had never been fully opened since the civil war began, was opening.
The loud grinding of interlocking cranks echoed through the vast underground cavern, making the advance conspicuous to everyone and all the bolder for it.
It was difficult to evade dwarven eyes and ears underground. Their enemy now was also made up of dwarves.
The same thing was happening all across the broad front. Preparing for all-out war, the dwarves took up rifles, axes, and hammers, dragged artillery behind them, and began their advance.
Toward the north, toward the rebel main force. Across every cavern beneath the mountains, throughout Andgrund’s vast domain.
“Being used as bait, huh...”
Legri Groeldi, the Director of Military Administration, looked down at the legion advancing along the road beneath the citadel and smiled bitterly.
The Black Widow’s operation was simple. It was an idea anyone could have. Wave bait around, then launch an offensive from another direction.
What made his operation special lay one step beyond strike east and attack west.
Enrika, rescuing the Secretary’s son.
Ivan, assassinating Aviditas’s agents.
The dwarf main force, pretending to advance from the front.
Each of the three was bait for the others, and at the same time, each was a core objective of the operation.
One could not deceive dwarven eyes underground. Whether it was Enrika or Ivan, once their operation reached an irreversible point, their location and purpose would inevitably be exposed.
A perfect surprise attack and retreat had never been possible from the start. Therefore, they moved under the assumption that they would be discovered.
It did not matter who was exposed. Whoever it was would become bait to support the operation in another direction.
The enemy would be forced into deep thought. What was their true objective? Ivan infiltrating from behind? Enrika infiltrating from the flank? The legion advancing from the front?
Wrong. All of them were key objectives, and every operation across every sector was bait for the others. Each individual operation existed on the tactical level, but they also interlocked tightly according to a precise timetable on the strategic level.
Whichever direction the enemy command chose, the operations in the other sectors would continue as planned. It did not matter who failed. On the other hand, if the confused command made the wrong judgment, every objective might be fully achieved.
Still.
Enrika infiltrating from the east has a retreat route close to our formation, but...
Ivan, infiltrating from the north, would be isolated in demonfolk territory even if he withdrew. It was the most dangerous position.
The Director of Military Administration thought with a bitter expression.
With people like that crawling all over the human side, perhaps the demonfolk had never had a chance from the beginning.
That was why even the mighty Demon King and the Seven Dragon Generals, who had called themselves gods, had lost the war. Perhaps they had chosen the wrong side.
-Rumble, rumble, rumble!!
Andgrund shook. The rebels had begun responding to this sudden advance as well. Before long, the two legions would confront each other throughout the caverns beneath the mountains.
In any case, all we have to do is hold on.
For the next five days, they only had to keep the tension of war alive among the enemy and follow the timetable.
The director looked at the timetable Ivan had written.
“By now, he should have entered the road directly below the Fifth Gate.”
If this entire operation finally succeeded, if he even returned alive afterward.
What would the Black Widow be recorded as in the nation’s history?
Would he remain an outside hero who ended the long civil war and restored the lands beneath the mountains?
Or would he remain a nightmare, the one among the living who had killed, and could kill, more dwarves than anyone else?
The director could not tell whether he wanted Ivan to succeed and return alive, or whether he would rather see Ivan fail and disappear.
The same was true of every dwarf remaining at the operations command at that time.
* * *
-Rumble, rumble, rumble!!
Inside the tunnel trembling as though an earthquake had struck, Enrika checked her pocket watch and gave a faint laugh.
“Sly bastard. Who taught him that, I wonder?”
From the beginning, there had been two operation plans. One for the dwarves, and one for Enrika and Ivan, for the outside world.
She sent a pigeon with a letter tied to it into the sky beyond the tunnel, then brushed off her hands.
Strike east and attack west. Ivan had said it meant making noise in the east, then striking in the west. A similar tactical concept was already well known. A traditional bait operation.
Yet Ivan had announced that the operation consisted of waving bait in three directions at once. That was not wrong. That was how the operation would proceed inside the underground.
And outside the underground, in our world, the operation was called...
“Hammer and Anvil.”
What an extreme traditionalist.
The skill of conducting a double operation with a tactical outline straight from the basic curriculum of some tactical academy was exactly what one would expect from that old-fashioned Annihilation Unit.
Enrika giggled and snapped her pocket watch shut.
In one week, once the iron block resting on the anvil had been heated enough, the hammer would come down.
The minute-by-minute timetable had been prepared for that moment.
What was it that guy always said?
“A good agent does not plan an operation around a single objective... was it?”
What kind of field agent even came up with something like this? Enrika laughed brightly as she stepped beneath the tunnel’s shadows.
* * *
Footnotes:
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