The Magician of Sound

As planned, the fourth phase began in two hours. The attackers, who were left behind by Kai, got a lecture from Nathan himself. He wanted them not to lower their guard just because the enemies were too lower in number. 

If these were Yuki or Henry, who lectured them as commanders from Attacker teams, they wouldn't really think about it that much other than saying they would reflect on their action. However, it was different for Nathan. His achievements were already well known and so high that only a few could talk equal to him under normal conditions.

The soldiers could only heed his words and not talk bad unless they wanted to get court-martialed. Even so, they were still humans, and some of them lost their comrades in this war.

Nathan said, 'the only way to get revenge is to go according to the plan and kill those insects.' Luckily, most of the soldiers would adhere to those words because Nathan warned them that if they did not heed this word, there wouldn't be a punishment because he would end their lives as soon as he met them.'

The rule and threat of Nathan were proven to be effective. Col ton and Faith, who were the commanders for Vanguard teams, had created special units to make sure no one would actually go to the front line and ruin their entire plan.

Luckily, the soldiers had been instructed for the whole operation, so they knew they could get their revenge. It wasn't like a mission where they couldn't investigate the real reason their friends died, and they were forced to stand by, so no soldiers actually acted that foolish. 

In the headquarters, Nathan sat on his chair, waiting for the time to pass. It was a silent two hours because none of the soldiers fought.

Kai and his group had dinner with Yuki's group. This was their bonding period because they formed a platoon in short notice. They praised Kai for his hearing and map while Sanae and Yuki got teased because of their friendship. It was a warm dinner nonetheless. 

Sanae decided to talk with Yuki first and asked Kai and the others to go ahead. Having nothing to do, they decided to end the day and go back to their room.

Today, Kai had relaxed a little bit from the tense situation that plagued him. Even after a day of fighting, nothing seemed to be abnormal, so he could safely assume there was nothing there. 

He got a good sleep this time and woke up with a fresh mind. The others also woke up the same time as him, but he only told them he would meet them after finishing his matter in the headquarters.

No one said anything to him, and waited like yesterday. This matter was very important to him because the one who needed to ensure the entire operation was him. Nathan could only oversee everything from the surface, but couldn't check whether it went wrong or not. 

The moment Kai arrived, he was greeted by Via.

"Good Morning. How are you feeling right now?" Via asked with a smile. 

Kai took a glimpse of the room and found Nathan, Ria, Yuki, and even Henry waiting for him. He smiled at them before turning back to Via. "Yes. Good morning. I had a good sleep last night, so I'm ready for today."

Via nodded and stretched her hand to the others. "Let's start the morning briefing." 

"Yes." Kai nodded.

They walked toward the table in the middle where a map of this nest projected above it.

"We have finished the Fourth Phase early in the morning. Out of ten rooms that we could use, seven of them already became our temporary base. The other three were different than we expected, so we chose not to use them." Via pointed at the seven purple dots.

Kai looked at the map and the seven dots. Ria seemed to have updated the map with green color in the northern area to tell them it was fine. These had been distributed to the soldiers since yesterday to let them know their current plan.

"Alright. We can use these seven small bases to relay some supports to the Vanguards and Attackers." Kai nodded, finding no trouble with the arrangement. His minimum was five anyway, so having an additional two strengthened the defense force alone. 

"Yes. We are planning to send the Vanguard in two hours according to the schedule." Via paused for a moment and said. "This Underground Nest has a round shape. If we split it into three, we would get ten thousand and fifteen thousand in the northern and southern parts respectively, which means there will be twenty-five thousand in the middle.

"The problem will be how we can sweep the twenty-five thousand, and your answer is to sweep them from the right. This is the most crucial part of the mission." Via stopped before looking at Kai with a serious expression.

"Yes. I split the middle party into three, making them western part, center part, and eastern part of this nest. They were numbered seven thousand, ten thousand, and eight thousand respectively." Kai pointed at the western area. "I wanted us to strike at them, starting from the western part as they were the smallest in terms of number.

"We can train the soldiers, especially our vanguard, to watch out. It's simple to see that the Vanguard needs more extra work because they are not only fighting to defend from the middle area; there must be some monsters that would come from the northern area. Hence, I was planning to use the support to make a temporary base so the vanguards could ask for help at any moment.

"On the other hand, I want to replenish our soldiers with the Reserve army. We should have one to two hundred casualties yesterday. The essence of this plan is time, and this reinforcement is for speed. We will do the same thing as yesterday." Kai explained as he took a deep breath, staring at Nathan and the others. 

"I don't mind. With another two hundred from the reserve army, our attackers group will have two thousand soldiers again." Yuki nodded.

"Yeah. The Vanguard should have isolated them. If we can't kill them all within the time limit, I think we should retire." Henry shrugged. "Though I bet we don't have any specific strategy other than killing them, right?"

"No." Kai shook his head. "We should be able to take the middle region on the third day if everything is going well. Depending on the number of our soldiers, we can speed our process up."

"I doubt it is possible." Nathan shook his head and sighed. "It's not like I am underestimating our soldiers. Still, I can say it is impossible to have more than five thousand five hundred soldiers remaining after the third day. From the first day alone, we have lost around two hundred thirty people. With another three days…"

There was no need for Nathan to explain it. Kai's plan was to attack the east region and the south region at the same time if their number is still more than five thousand and five hundred. After all, they still need to fight around twenty-three thousand magical beasts. Kai thought it was impossible to do it unless they have more than a fourth of that number. Of course, it would be a different matter if Nathan chose to sacrifice more soldiers than he needed to.

He also objected to this to ensure the lives of soldiers despite hearing the benefit of this plan. 

Kai smiled and nodded. "It will be one day different anyway. We can have it more relaxed."

"Yeah. It's not like we have a difference of a month or something. It's just a day. We can wait that much." Nathan nodded. He began prioritizing the soldiers' lives and said. "We are going to the original plan."

He thought about conserving soldiers because he learned that there would be another big movement from the government pretty soon. As for whether he would involve Kai again in this matter was still unknown because the danger was greater, so he didn't tell him anything about it yet.

"In that case, we will keep doing this until we conquer these three middle-regions before attacking the southern area with all of your forces like the original plan. Is that alright with all of you?" Kai asked.

"Yes. I am sure you will be like a hot potato after this battle. The top brass will-" 

Before he finished his words, killing intent spread across the room. On the side, Ria Ross already crossed her arms and looked very pissed. "As I said, I don't mind fighting a government. If they are going to involve him without my permission, you can see me revolting."

"Haha… they won't be able to sleep at night if you fight them." Nathan laughed. "Don't worry. I also want him alive."

"Humph." Ria snorted.

"Alright. We have set up the plan for the second day. You are free to go with your group to prepare. There are still five hours before your groups move anyway." Nathan ended the meeting and sat back on his seat as it was not wise to continue about the topic.

Kai and the others nodded their heads and left the room. However, Kai stared at Ria and shook his head first, telling her there was nothing wrong on the first day.

This action confused Nathan. He wanted to ask about it, but Ria already sent a cold gaze at him, stopping the words in his throat. She then waved her hand to Kai, telling him he could leave.

Kai bowed his head and left the room.