Chapter 100 – The Snowstorm Arrives (4)

Entering the hunting squad building, I was enjoying a long-awaited rest. Though it might not be the case for others, the snowstorm that swept the world was a blessing in disguise for me. Since I had spent almost all my journeys so far on the snowfields, I had never rested properly in body or mind, but this had forced me to rest.

“This is what you call a sweet potato, try it. It is hot, so eat slowly, blowing on it.”

“Thank you, mister!”

“I am not a mister, though…”

Thanks to that, I could also enjoy the peace of sharing the roasted sweet potatoes thrown into the bonfire with the children.

“This is really sweet!”

“Right? It is the most delicious thing I have ever eaten!”

“I want to eat it again. I want to eat one more…”

The children of Randolph’s ember had never eaten, let alone seen, a relief crop and luxury food like a sweet potato in their entire lives. Since all they could eat in this ice age was meat, they could not have eaten something that grew from the ground.

Of course, even for our ember, it was a food item that could not even be dreamed of if not for the aid of the Immortal Ember.

The children ate the steaming sweet potatoes deliciously, even the skin. Having devoured a hot sweet potato just pulled out in an instant, the children were even eyeing the sweet potatoes inside the bonfire.

“Do you want to eat one more?”

“Yes! But… is it alright? It is precious.”

“No matter how precious food is, it only has meaning when it enters your mouth.”

“Still…”

“So, you are not eating it?”

“Ah, no. I want to eat it!”

“Please give me one too, mister!”

“I will not give any to those who called me mister.”

I handed out even my share of the sweet potatoes to the children who rushed around me, calling me older brother. It was a precious food only to the people of this era; to me, who lived in the modern 21st century, it brought no special feeling.

Of course, if the children who lost their parents could forget their sorrow even for a moment with just this sweet potato, I was more than willing to give them as many as they wanted.

While I was having a hard time surrounded by children in that manner.

“Aylen, let me see you for a moment.”

When someone tapped my shoulder and I looked back, Jeremy, who was assigned to the magic engineering department shelter, was standing there.

“Why did you come here? Even while getting hit by all that snow.”

Jeremy was in a terrible state. Even though the distance between the hunting squad and the magic engineering department was not far.

Brushing off the snow that had settled on his head, he spoke.

“It seems the snowstorm has gotten closer in the meantime. The radius of the Eternal Embers’ influence seems to have decreased a lot too.”

“Except for the three closest shelters, the situation in the outer areas must be more serious.”

“To be exact, snow was piling up with the rear of the shelters as the boundary. Beyond that must be completely covered in snow.”

“I see…”

Picturing the snow removal work that would continue for days after the snowstorm ended, a sigh naturally escaped.

This was not happening because the snowstorm was powerful. It was happening because the ember’s magic engineering capacity and productivity were low, preventing them from modifying and reinforcing the Eternal Embers.

In a normal, proper ember, even if the heat of the Eternal Embers could not cover this entire vast basin, it would at least reach the size of a village or city. Otherwise, the scale of damage would grow uncontrollably. That was also why city planning was designed to match the level of the Eternal Embers.

“How about forcing the output higher? It is a temporary measure, but I heard it is a method frequently used by skilled magic engineers.”

Jeremy spoke, having noticed what I was worrying about. Though not a magic engineer, he was a former leader of a top-five ember and knew a lot.

However, I shook my head.

“It might have been so in a general situation, but it will not work now.”

“Why?”

“Since it has not been long since we replaced and operated the core, forcing the output higher will cause problems later. At that time, problems will arise in both the core and the mechanical devices.”

It was not a method I had not considered. In the early stages of , when magic engineering power was not sufficiently high, forced output release control was like a virtue for players.

However, that was only possible when the operation of the Eternal Embers was stable.

“Even so, it will be about a month after the snowstorm ends, so it is a method worth considering then.”

“I see.”

“So, why did you really come? You look like you have something else to say.”

I asked, moving to a corner. Then, Jeremy glanced around the shelter personnel and spoke with an understanding expression.

“I had my doubts, but as I thought.”

“What do you mean by ‘as I thought’?”

I looked back following him, but I could only see Randolph and the citizens enjoying peace, eating, sleeping, and resting. Since I could not find any problem in this pastoral scene, which was extremely hard to find in the ice age, Jeremy spoke.

“Did you not think the personnel composition is strange?”

“The personnel composition… is strange?”

“Yes, the personnel composition of the Hunting Squad Headquarters Shelter. How could the five hundred people you brought all be assigned to one shelter? Is that really a coincidence? And why you of all people were appointed as the director?”

“That is…”

I did suspect the part where I was given the heavy responsibility of being the director. Because Yan, who had to fight over who would take over the ember, had given away an influential position instead of keeping me in check.

However, I had not even thought to suspect the personnel composition of the shelter. I thought gathering Randolph’s people in one place was the leadership’s consideration for public sentiment, a show.

“It could be for such a reason. But to my eyes, it isn’t.”

However, Jeremy shook his head and continued speaking, as if seeing something I could not.

“I felt something was strange from the moment everyone associated with you, like me or Natasha, was assigned to the magic engineering department, and not a single leadership figure was in the hunting squad or magic engineering department shelters. If he wanted to keep you in check, he could have kept you in the leadership; why leave you freely in places he cannot even monitor?”

Hearing it, it was indeed strange. Not putting a close associate in each shelter despite being able to, and not keeping Jeremy, whom he had appointed as vice-captain with his own hands, in the leadership.

He had excluded everyone who was ambiguous to call on his side. Scraping together only his own side looked as if he was preparing some insidious plot.

“Hearing it, it is indeed somewhat strange. For someone so suspicious…”

“If my guess is correct, a fight will occur. Not a verbal fight, but a real fight where we kill and get killed.”

Perhaps because he was a man who stood at the peak of a place where all sorts of schemes and power struggles were rampant. Jeremy was sharp in this aspect.

“Do you have a rough idea of when it will be?”

“How would I know that? Though one can predict when the snowstorm will come, a person’s heart cannot be predicted. However…”

“However?”

“The day he calls you is your funeral. That is all you need to keep in mind. And… it seems today is that very day.”

“Yes…?”

Finishing his sentence, Jeremy signaled behind me. When I looked back, Nikolai, Yan’s strategist and minion, was standing there with a calm expression.

“Aylen Vale, it is an instruction to inspect the Eternal Embers before the snowstorm worsens. Since the Magic Engineering Department Head has also agreed to come out leading his members, make sure you come out by midnight too.”

He left without even giving me time to reply, only saying what he had to say. When I looked back again, Jeremy was gone. Since they would surely change their plans if they caught us contacting each other, he vanished with that ghost-like movement he showed in the food warehouse.

‘So it’s a trap I have no choice but to step into even while knowing…’

Now that my suspicion had turned to certainty, I knew they did not summon me and the magic engineering department because of the Eternal Embers. In his own way, to reassure me, he dropped the words that the entire magic engineering department was also summoned.

‘If that is true, he has really made up his mind.’

To me, it looked like nothing but a dirty trick to eliminate everyone who was an eyesore at once.

At the same time, I reached the conclusion that Yan’s patience had reached its limit. While he had kept Demian and the members alive partly because he minded the Immortal Ember’s eyes, magic engineers were not common labor that could be obtained just anywhere.

Seeing that he had summoned even those people, he had truly set his mind to it.

And in that choice, there must have been the calculation of isolation between embers due to the mutants.

‘A fight to kill and get killed.’

Even though I saw through what his trick was, a sense of foreboding crept in.

Since the day of the decisive battle was brought forward, it was a point where Jeremy had not swallowed the hunting squad. Furthermore, even while we were on the expedition, Yan had reinforced the hunting squad to stubbornly fill the quota of one hundred. They were all our enemies.

Of course, among them, there were some who had received help from me. There was also Sullivan, who was skeptical yet righteous. But even if they took my side, it was a drop in the bucket compared to the personnel Yan had gathered.

‘Are all of them really on Yan’s side, and evil by nature? Not at all.’

However, the current hunting squad was a place where cohesion, belonging, and bond were low due to repeated reinforcement. It was even more so because they were selected suddenly in line with the changing situation. That was why outliers like Sullivan appeared.

I did not think all of them were with Yan with one heart and mind. Some might be swept up in the atmosphere, and others might have been dragged in reluctantly because they would die if they did not follow.

And didn’t Jeremy say that a person’s heart cannot be predicted? I would have to see, but I might be able to turn about half of the hunting squad involved in this matter to my side. It would be even easier if Demian helped.

However, I had to think of the aftermath.

‘I must win without fighting. Except for the leadership like Yan and Nikolai, the killings of the rest must be minimized.’

Winning by killing would be difficult and dangerous, but it was not impossible.

But why does the phrase ‘a war with only wounds’ exist? The real problem of war is that not only the enemy dies, but allies die too. And in a broad sense, even the hunters are not targets to be divided into friend or foe, since they are members of the ember.

This ember is the one where I will soon stand as leader. In a small ember no bigger than a mom-and-pop shop, I have an obligation to cherish every single person.

‘A way to resolve the fight without anyone dying…’

With not much time left until midnight, I continued to ponder over and over.

However, a scenario where no one dies was not drawn at all. Because Yan was too firm, and I was also firm. It was a fight that must end only when one side died.

Yes, a fight where one must die…

“…!”

It was right then that the solution came to mind.

Clack!

I went outside, carrying Jeremy’s mana gun in my holster.

Contrary to Nikolai’s words, at the Eternal Embers where I arrived, Yan was waiting for me alone.

‘They hid a lot.’

I could feel figures hiding behind the building caught in the mana I spread for search.

My pulling the trigger happened simultaneously with that.

Bang!

While the armed hunters rushed out urgently, Yan was collapsing before me.

If one had to die, I just had to make it so.