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Although the Federation never disclosed the fact that one of their outposts had been inexplicably wiped out overnight, with the existence of satellite and long-distance imaging, it was impossible to completely conceal it.
This was especially so given that so many eyes were currently focused on the border of Blue Dawn, and the outpost Emilia targeted was barely a few miles away.
Of course, with the dead bodies having been moved away and much of the site ‘cleared’ already, all that people could really tell was that some sort of uncontrollable fire must have broken out there, forcing all the soldiers to flee.
As for the number of casualties… with the Federation keeping silent, there was no way to be sure.
Naturally, compared to the continued stalemate at Blue Dawn’s border that had already become ‘boring’ for their audience, certain channels found this much more ‘spicy’, especially when it was handled the ‘right’ way.
“Not to mention some sort of fire, most soldiers are trained well to be able to handle even explosives going off near them. Even if a few die, it’s impossible for them to panic and fail to control the situation. How could this kind of ‘uncontrollable’ fire that burned everything to the ground have broken out, then?”
Even for people who could care less about the conflict between Blue Dawn and the Federation, this was a topic of great interest, and the media didn’t fail to keep hyping it up in order to maximize their own revenue, much to the annoyance of the Federation leaders.
“I agree that it makes no sense… if you only think about it normally. But what if that outpost was housing some sort of new chemical weapon that can burn easily but is incredibly difficult to put out?”
“Ohh, scary! In that case, we’ll be seeing a lot of charred corpses in Blue Dawn soon, huh?”
“That is if the Federation can learn to handle their own new weapon properly, which they clearly haven’t.”
Naturally, compared to a ‘routine’ conflict between two forces that held back from using ‘real’ weapons, the possibility of one of them using experimental weapons that could doom them all was much more exciting.
Though certain ‘experts’ still preferred to take another route to generate more interest.
“I think it would be too rash to conclude that a new type of weapon must have caused this based on what little we know.”𝑶𝑽𝗅𝒩xt.𝑐𝞸𝓂
“Oh?”
Obviously, although his words were more reasonable than his colleagues, that was only to make his latter ridiculous argument seem more credible.
“The type of weapon you were thinking of resembles certain banned chemicals too much, and I don’t think the Federation would risk giving Phoenix an excuse to start supplying Blue Dawn with weapons of mass destruction at this point.”
The man pushed up his glasses with a faint smile, looking smart enough to make most people fully believe whatever nonsense he might have come up with. “… In fact, there are other explanations for the Federation’s outpost to have been destroyed like that. Such as… betrayal, internal conflict, sabotage!”
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Naturally, the people on Emilia’s side were able to ‘figure out’ what was going on much earlier than the media outlets, and with Emilia’s support, they quickly became certain that this strange ‘ally’ might prove to be quite useful in the war.
Of course, given the scale at which they operated, it was impossible to deal a decisive blow to the Federation, but sometimes, all it took was a single hole to sink a ship. And with this new ally constantly making trouble at the enemy side, wouldn’t it be much easier for their empire to make a breakthrough?
The main reason no one suspected that this strange ‘ally’ was just Emilia being a menace was of course due to Dixie’s constant presence by her side. Those most familiar with her obviously never expected that the dark-haired girl wouldn’t even let them know that Emilia was doing something so absurd.
As for the rest of the higher-ups… since they weren’t fully familiar with the otherworldly abilities of their empress, and also had complete trust in her words, they never had any strange doubts from the beginning.
Noelle and the military higher-ups did their best to put pressure on the enemy side while keeping track of the weakened locations where there was a temporary ‘gap’, and significantly reduced their daily casualties.
Crystal was also glad to have more materials for her regular dose of despair to Amos. Though she wasn’t sure exactly how ‘helpful’ her actions were, so the blonde girl only paid him a visit when she was free from her other duties.
But while others were happy and did their best to take advantage of the situation, whether on or off the battlefield, Dixie could only sigh ruefully. “Today as well?”
“Of course, I have to make them pay ten times for every death on our side.” Emilia smiled coldly as she motioned for the exasperated Dixie to follow her.
At this point, she had no doubt that even if they lost the war or were forced into hiding, Emilia would continue slaughtering people on the Federation’s side every time she could. Though luckily, it didn’t seem like such a day would ever come.
Over the past few days, all of their ‘expeditions’ into the enemy territory had been more or less successful, after all. And while there were times when Dixie had to join in and open fire, so long as they didn’t allow anyone to escape alive, it wouldn’t have any impact on their future ‘missions’.
Even if the Federation desperately increased the individual strength of each outpost… all it did was give them a better yield per attack.
In fact, the most trouble Emilia had was when the outpost they were ‘clearing’ had a surveillance system in place, but once they figured out it only worked in a ‘closed circuit’, the crimson-haired girl quickly let go of her worries.
Emilia wasn’t sure if the Federation’s leaders were worried about their soldier’s morale, or if they just didn’t want to take additional risks, but it didn’t seem like anyone in their army was aware of the unexplainable ‘tragedies’ taking place around them.
Of course, since it made things easier for her, she wasn’t complaining.
This time, too, didn’t give her much trouble. The soldiers were slightly tougher, and she seemed to have misjudged the amount needed to put them all to sleep, so she ended up with a few more wounds than expected, but they were all gone before anyone could notice. Luckily, none of them scored a headshot.
Aside from Cynthia’s whining, everything was good.
Emilia happily went about setting everything on fire. ‘Don’t worry so much, it was just 0.03%. Once we complete the next mention, we’ll have plenty extra.’
Cynthia sighed. “I wasn’t worried about the energy—!” She paused. “You know what, forget it. Just be more careful not to waste any in the future.”
Even if she tried her best, the raven-haired girl knew just how stubborn Emilia could be, and how difficult it was to change her mind once she’d decided on something, so she just gave up. It was… too much effort.
Since the crimson-haired girl was distracted setting the outpost on fire, she failed to catch her partner’s hidden meaning. ‘…? Oh, sure…’
Unlike Emilia, however, Dixie couldn’t help but be worried as they made their way back. “M-Maybe we should stop now, princess. Y-You’ve already taken down six outposts, and we can’t rule out the possibility of walking into a trap next time. Plus… what if our next target has cameras that broadcast outside?”
Emilia snorted. “Let them figure it out if they can. It’s not like they’ll know it was ‘me’ for sure, and they’ll still have to keep up their efforts in preparation for future attacks. We can use that to our advantage, and… there’s a reason why those cameras weren’t hooked up to a bigger network in the first place, you know?”
She might not be as technologically adept as most of her girlfriends, but the crimson-haired girl still understood that it was possible for people to peep into cameras if they were hooked onto a network they could access.
Emilia wasn’t sure how it was done, but she didn’t need to know how a cow was milked to drink a cup of coffee, did she?
Of course, she knew that there were ways to prevent such a thing from happening, but she’d also read that they were far from infallible.
The crimson-haired girl believed that with Noelle and Crystal’s abilities, it shouldn’t be impossible to find people who could take care of such a thing for them.
And if they were able to acquire the details of all the activities of the Federation’s soldiers… the tradeoff for not being able to continue her ‘expeditions’ would be more than worth it.
Dixie also seemed to have realized such a possibility after Emilia mentioned it, and she couldn’t help but nod. “I guess that’s true.”
Emilia sneered in disdain. “People fear the unknown, and I refuse the believe that the leaders of the Federation still don’t feel anything about some unknown enemy continuously taking down their men like this. It shouldn’t be long before they do something stupid… we just have to make sure to take full advantage of it.”
Although the dark-haired girl agreed, as they were making their way out of the enemy territory, her princess was still in her ‘little Emi’ form, and her expression made her look more like a smug brat than an arrogant empress, making Dixie chuckle.
“Hmm?”
“N-Nothing.”
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