Chapter 272

Chapter 272

The tower at the Kaileer Alliance's flag defense point was very tall, with a spire at the top flying the Keller banner, and the space below could only fit a few people.

Herli and Deenlie stayed there. Grath's members generally preferred high places—it was determined by their way of fighting, as being in the air made it easier to find the weak points of the Zergs.

Herli crouched at the tower's edge like a big cat, while Deenlie stood with his arms crossed.

Herli tugged uncomfortably at her collar. The Keller uniform was white, and she still preferred the black-and-red Grath uniform. She should have listened to her big brother from the start.

She put her hand down irritably, scanned the surroundings as before, and then began to vent her frustration on Baide. "More and more flags are being raised here. Where’s Grath’s? That Baide—is he dropping the ball at a time like this? Time’s running out."

There was less than two days left for flag defense.

The more she thought about it, the angrier she got. "Damn it, we should have made him come and work. We have to get Arnold to complain to Mom."

Deenlie, unusually, didn’t argue with her. He just frowned, also staring into the distance.

…

Baide was still on the road.

He took Cyril along leisurely, not in a hurry at all, and took every chance to tease Cyril while instilling in him the idea of respecting elders and that elders weren’t suited for strenuous activities.

Cyril was a bit anxious, still thinking about his mission. "If we had gotten up a little earlier, we could have covered more ground. Father must be getting impatient waiting."

"Elders need to get enough sleep."

Baide stroked his chin. If Cyril didn’t sleep well while with him, Sylvia would blame him, right? He seemed to recall Adelaide mentioning that children need enough sleep to grow tall. He’d teased Cyril too much before, making him stay up a few nights—wondering if that would stunt his growth.

Having to look after a kid, and Norton pushing him to hurry—he really had his work cut out for him.

Leisa organized the team and gradually picked up the pace.

Zener had gotten bolder and spoke to Leisa over the channel. "Cyril really didn’t lie to me. He really does need to defend the flag and protect the captain. He’s working so hard. Captain, you're the best."

Maybe because everyone was rushing to the flag defense area, they didn't run into any enemies for the rest of the trip.

The viewers flooding into Baide’s perspective grew more confused.

"The captain of the number-one team on the leaderboard has no introduction panel? Not in the top ten of the individual scoreboard? He doesn’t look all that strong either. He’s been spending the whole time sweet-talking his teammates into going first—that’s a bit too direct, isn’t it?"

"Actually, I had a certain impression of Grath from the start, because all their members are unarmed—no mechs or any gear. The only weapon they carry is a melee weapon."

"Why are there only two people in the main Grath team? How did they end up with Kainan? Ahhh! When will the resource battle end? Let us watch the replays! I want to see how they managed to get to first place on the leaderboard. There’s no clue from any of the perspectives or expert commentators."

"Don't get your hopes up too high. I know Deenlie. There’s a clip of him that’s been circulating. It’s not top secret, but it hasn’t been made public yet. It’ll probably get out after this. Let me put it straight: Grath is the most remote and inhospitable place in the entire Star Alliance. They expend a ton of effort every year fighting off the Zergs. Under these circumstances, their tech is really behind, and resources are scarce. It’s fair to call them a small nation. All their members are unarmed partly because of their fighting style, but mainly because they actually don't have mechs. But Deenlie is a true genius. After watching that clip, I knew he could definitely rank in the top tier of the individual competition. At the time, I was wondering which country would pick him up. Turns out it was the Kaileer Alliance, and with Herli too—Kaileer got a real steal. Probably because they share the same roots, there’s some connection. As for Grath’s high score, I’d guess it’s mostly because talented folks from such a small place haven’t had a chance to leave yet, and their fighting style is unique. The contestants used to mech combat haven't adapted—since they have no mechs, they have to go all out, and their hand-to-hand skills shouldn't be underestimated. But they also have a weakness: there won't be many fighters of this caliber. You can tell from how few Grath contestants there are. There’s even a child. Except for Kainan and those who couldn’t find proper contestants, I haven't seen a kid that young. I bet the leaderboard is carried by just a few people. After this resource battle, they'll probably get picked off by other factions."

"So Grath is actually overestimated? Does any expert want to analyze where Deenlie and Herli rank?"

"There's no footage of them going up against other top contestants yet, and they don’t use mechs, so it’s hard to judge. At this level, it’s hard to say. We’ll have to wait for the individual competition."

"Grath? Small nation? I was about to say that earlier. Where are all these random clueless people coming from?"

"Well, it’s true we’re relatively backward. We just got connected to the internet, and who knows what’ll happen next. Grath is the only thing we can be proud of and never lose at."

"This is too chaotic. I’ll go check out Herli and Deenlie at the Kaileer Alliance side. Though I probably won’t see much—those two are too good at hiding."

In the distant Grath palace.

Sylvia, who had been closely watching the resource battle, furrowed her eyebrows, but they quickly unfurrowed.

It was true, indeed. Their country had risen from barren lands, with no advanced tech or abundant resources, and plagued by zerg swarms. They had nothing except themselves.

From the very beginning, when their ancestors marched out of the old Grath lands, it had been like this.

Back then, their ancestors raised the Grath banner over heaps of zerg corpses and proclaimed their existence to the world. Now, they can do the same.

There's nothing to fear—just grip the sword hilt tight.

…

Kainan’s team gradually approached the flag defense area.

The area was not large, and the buildings were dense.

As the mech chariot lowered its altitude and sped along just above the ground,

Cyril heard a synthesized voice in his ear: "You have entered the flag defense area. Remaining defense time: 29 hours."

The second half of the match is all about flag defense, which was fast-paced compared to the first half. To force them to reach the defense area quickly, only forty hours were given from when the area opened. If you were unlucky and far away, you’d have barely any time left by the time they arrived, inevitably leading to conflicts.

Cyril gripped the flag and stood up. The Grath banner fluttered in the wind.

The flag defense points were generally high. From here, he could see banners everywhere.

"We need to hurry. Two flag points close together, and we've got to hold them for 24 hours."

Inside the mech, Zener looked up in surprise.

Leisa was about to say something.

Beside him, Baide also stood up, patted Cyril on the shoulder, and said lightly while contacting Arnold, "You have to work hard, Cyril."

Cyril kept scanning both sides and answered, "Mm."

Up ahead, Leisa was in the cockpit. His hand hovered over the communication button, moved away, then went back. After repeating this several times, he finally lowered his hand and left it where it was.

Cyril stared at the distant banners. "Zener, follow the main road."

"Roger."

Baide exerted his mental energy and spoke simply in the channel.

"Stop fooling around. Get to work, kids. Norton is pushing me. I don’t really want to stand around like an idiot for 24 hours."

At the same moment, Arnold, who had been on the move, stopped.

Adrian gripped his sword and looked up.

Jacob, who was hiding in a high tower, sighed. "Since my brother is urging, there's no helping it. I also need to check on how Cyril is doing."

Elia paused for a moment, then dealt with the enemy more quickly.

A few people replied, "Received."

……

Ye Mo's gaze locked onto a high tower where two flags were close together.

Leisa, however, became tense; over there was Buston's flag, and the flag beside it was their ally's.

There were several mechas guarding Buston's flag, and they watched the group approaching.

Before he could speak up to remind, Baide placed his hand on Ye Mo's face, making him look in another direction.

"Ambitious, aren't you? But this is still a bit too early for you. Let's come back after we've grown a bit taller."

Ye Mo was stunned for a moment, then quickly began scanning other directions.

Lakeley, who had been watching them, breathed a sigh of relief. Although Baide had shown extraordinary strength, that was Buston after all.

Baide, however, turned his head and looked in Buston's direction. After a long while, he withdrew his gaze with some regret.

Sylvia, still watching from his perspective, snorted coldly. She had certainly noticed Baide's restlessness.

Herbert, beside her, refilled her teacup, smiled, and patted her hand reassuringly. He wondered if Baide himself had noticed it, but Baide was actually quite indulgent towards Cyril. Grath was born in blood and fire; no Grath has ever grown up without shedding blood. When Ye Mo went back to find Kainan, Baide would return to watch because he was worried about Cyril getting hurt. This was the first time he had seen such close guarding.

Normally, Baide would instigate the children to go first, not even flinch if they got hurt, and only intervene when there was a life-threatening danger. After saving them, he would mock them, and then Sylvia would scold him.

Herbert, who had once witnessed Baide taking care of the children, was impressed by this. He refocused his attention on the competition.

Leisa had already led the team quickly past Buston along the main road, driving forward.

Buston didn't move either; they seemed to just be guarding the flag. After watching Leisa's group go far, they withdrew their attention.

Over at Buston.

A blue mecha was still watching them.

A teammate spoke up, "What's the matter, Orka?"

"Over there, the two people on that mecha vehicle aren't equipped with mecha suits."

"Sometimes small countries don't have enough funds and only equip some of their members. It's normal to give weaker members and technical personnel inferior equipment. You've always been in Buston, Orka, with the best of everything, so of course you wouldn't know about such things."

The companion, getting interested, said, "Should we send someone to chase them? Our score is a bit low compared to previous competitions."

"This time, for some reason, we encountered fewer teams than usual. The flag-guarding areas are densely packed, making it easy to run into people, but once we raised our flag, who would dare come over? So we had to split into two teams again: one team guarding the flag, the other harvesting more points."

Orka turned around and responded to his teammate, "Let's focus on guarding the flag."

He was still recalling the gaze of that man he had just faced; that man didn't seem like a weakling.