Chapter 111

Liner sat in front of the bonfire lit at the entrance of the large tent, wrapped in a blanket and sneezing constantly. While others were about to collapse from the heat, seeing him shivering alone with his mountainous physique made Charlotte think the muscles attached to that body were utterly useless.

She looked at her superior, who was foolish but cool for risking his life to jump off the cliff following the Council Commander, then filled a canteen with warm water and handed it to him.

When his saliva splashed on her hand as he tried to receive the canteen, she wanted to throw it right in his face, but she let it pass by roughly wiping her hand on his combat uniform hung on the chair, highly regarding his hard-earned survival. Instead, as she handed him the canteen, she spoke to him in a slightly pathetic tone.

"Please stop making a fuss. The Council Commander isn't showing any signs, so why are you the only one acting like this, Battalion Commander?"

"Hey, seriously, you try being with me. You'll die of hypothermia before lack of oxygen."

Liner glared at Charlotte, who sat next to him and spoke nonchalantly. Charlotte avoided his gaze, turned her head toward the inside of the tent where the Council Commander was, and said,

"Still, it's thanks to the Council Commander that we survived."

"What are you talking about? It's because I followed him that we both survived."

Liner, who deliberately added a remark, drank a sip of water and followed her gaze.

There, the Commander, 1st Battalion members, and even the medical team were gathered in large numbers.

Liner was basically a person with an exceptionally strong physique, so apart from some symptoms of oxygen deprivation and hypothermia, there were no major problems with his body.

The reason why Hugo and Liner were able to endure even in the crevice of the pouring rocks was partly due to Hugo's solid ice wall created to secure oxygen and protect their bodies, but also thanks to Liner, who had the ability to harden substances and parts of his body that touched him, blocking the rocks and making a path.

However, unlike the relatively unscathed Liner, the medical team gathered near Hugo was quite busy.

It was because a fairly deep wound remained on Hugo's right arm, which had been grazed by sharp rocks, too deep to be healed with ordinary recovery magic. Because of that, the medical team officer was in a state of tension as he performed surgery for the first time in a while.

Still, there was one fortunate thing. If it were an ordinary person, bacteria could have multiplied in the wound at the point of being buried in the hot ground for a long time, leading to tetanus and skin necrosis, but Hugo had rapidly cooled the injured area immediately after the wound occurred, so the preservation state was quite good.

Thanks to that, after washing and disinfecting the wound, stitching the skin a few times with a large needle, and removing the external injury with regeneration magic, the medical team officer looked satisfied with the surgical result as he looked at the Commander's arm.

However, since the internal injury had not yet fully recovered, the officer wrapped a compression bandage and repeatedly advised him not to use his right arm excessively.

After meticulously checking the 8th Platoon Leader's forehead and swollen wrist, she moved out of the tent to treat other injured people. As the medical team all disappeared following the officer, a suffocating silence flowed inside the large tent.

Seeing the unusual atmosphere of the 1st Battalion members, Charlotte, who was sitting near the entrance, signaled to Liner with her eyes to go somewhere else. Although Liner had a reluctant face, he also read the mood and followed her to move.

Hugo put on the compression armor and combat uniform that he had briefly taken off for treatment. Only the sound of his clothes brushing against each other lingered in the stillness.

Flynn didn't cry, but he held out a handkerchief to the Commander with a face that somehow seemed to be holding back tears. It was because beads of cold sweat had formed on Hugo's forehead, even though it was a short suture surgery, because it was performed without anesthesia.

Hugo, who had fastened the last seam of his combat uniform top, received the handkerchief Flynn offered and sat on the cot, lightly wiping his face. His shadowed eyelids looked quite tired.

The atmosphere was extremely gloomy.

After hearing about the situation just before the ravine collapse from the platoon leader, all the 1st Battalion members were gripped by a sense of guilt.

Most of them had heard Kenis's radio sound, and some had gone to support the scene, but in the end, only the platoon leader and Leonardo Blaine were by his side.

It was because the monsters rushing in like a flood seemed to particularly chase the newcomer, so most of the members who went to support chose to stay and kill the creatures on their behalf rather than staying by his side.

It couldn't be said that the judgment was wrong, but it ended up being the decisive factor that prevented them from arriving in time when their feet were tied in the most urgent situation.

It was a big mistake for the Council to not consider the outsider who was with the newcomer as a target of vigilance at all. If he was a guy who was suddenly found alone in the middle of the peninsula, he wouldn't be an ordinary fellow, but as a result, they had left such a guy alone with the newcomer.

Moreover, in a situation where the guy had even committed a terrorist act against the Council, the fact that the one who disappeared together while trying to save the newcomer was Leonardo Blaine, whom they couldn't say they hadn't rejected, made them struggle even more with guilt.

The 1st Battalion members were unable to say anything, each reflecting on their faults. Among them, with their heads deeply bowed, the 8th Platoon Leader hesitated, moving her lips as if she wanted to say something.

She knew well that she was not in a position to ask. Moreover, the situation was already clear at the point where only the Commander and the 9th Battalion Commander of the Southern Branch had returned, but she still wanted to ask with a glimmer of hope.

After looking down at the floor for a moment, biting her lips hard, she raised her head as if she had made up her mind. Then, looking at him in front of her, she slowly opened her mouth.

"Commander."

At the 8th Platoon Leader's voice, the hand holding the handkerchief stopped after passing over his straight forehead. His hand lingered around his eyebrows for a moment, then went down. Then, as his hidden blue eyes were revealed, his gaze slowly turned toward her.

As she faced that slow gaze, the 8th Platoon Leader's words, which she had struggled to open, got stuck in her throat.

The revealed eyes were terribly cold as if they had sunk into an abyss. The always upright gaze was stained with deep futility, representing his state of mind.

Now that she had called him, even though he was looking at her, her closed mouth wouldn't readily open. Finding it difficult to face that heavy gaze, she lowered her head as if avoiding his eyes.

The words she was going to say only lingered in her mouth and disappeared. It seemed she could know even if she didn't ask.

She couldn't dare to ask, 'You couldn't find them, could you?'

Her face gradually distorted with bitterness. Trying hard to hide her trembling voice, she quietly opened her mouth.

"I'm... sorry."

Hugo silently stared at her like that.

"I should have stayed conscious until the end. I have no face to show."

Her inner self was constantly berating her own incompetence for not being able to protect them. And the more she blamed herself like that, the more complicated her feelings grew toward Leonardo, who had held onto her and Kenis until the end and never let go.

Why was it that whenever she got involved in matters related to him or took on missions related to him, she became so pathetic? It was just frustrating.

"I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry."

Following the platoon leader, the members repeated their apologies one by one, clasping their hands in front of them.

Seeing the members voluntarily coming forward as if to receive punishment, Hugo found it difficult to say the same words he had used to encourage Liner. It wasn't because he thought it was their fault.

His eyes, which had tried hard to find composure, once again flickered, mixed with worry and confusion. He also bowed his head, looking at the members standing in front of him. Then, deep shadows fell on his face that had looked tired, as if darkness had settled.

With his head bowed, he quietly opened his mouth, looking at the dirt-covered military boots of the members that came into his sight.

"It's my fault."

As his low voice rang out, all the 1st Battalion members, including Flynn, looked at the Commander. Hugo, who was sitting on the bed, leaned his upper body forward a little, clasped his hands together, and quietly looked down at the floor.

The elegant eyebrows on his side profile, which could be seen at a glance, were heavily furrowed, and although they couldn't see properly as he had his gaze lowered, it was obvious what emotion would have settled in his two eyes. The always calm and steadfast appearance of the Commander looked quite precarious.

In Hugo's mind, from the back of Leonardo leaving with a tired look to his final appearance reaching out his hand toward him, everything was extremely vivid.

He was clearly falling, and his mana was hardly felt. If he had fallen in that state, even if he had spread a minimal barrier, the impact would have been considerable. Moreover, he was carrying one more injured person who had lost consciousness, so the load Leonardo felt would have been more than twice his own body weight.

Thinking that far, strength filled Hugo's clasped hands, and thick blood vessels rose brutally. Eventually, his thoughts led to regret for his own previous actions.

When Hugo pulled up the water stream from the cliff, seeing that only the 8th Platoon Leader was tied to the end, he had assumed that Leonardo had hung her up and let go of his hand voluntarily.

And he had also assumed that the reason was to save Kenis, who had disappeared together due to some unexpected situation.

However, now that he had confirmed through the 8th Platoon Leader's words that the hypothesis was true, he had to painfully realize once again that his previous thoughts and actions were wrong.

Leonardo Blaine was a person who put the safety of others before himself if there was someone he wanted to save.

So even if Leonardo's control had been unstable before, causing unintended situations to occur, he would have acted in that situation, prioritizing the protection of others first.

And his own complacency, relieved by that, had rather become the decisive opportunity and poison that led him to send Leonardo away.

It was because he had never even thought that the one trying to save someone would rather be put in danger.

Hugo released his clasped hands and rubbed the area around his furrowed eyebrows, roughly enough to feel a bit harsh. His thick Adam's apple moved slowly following his hand.

'I shouldn't have let you go alone.'

Hugo's low breathing sounded unusually loud.