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“Hoo… This is tough…!”

“Hick?!”

Even if her build wasn’t particularly large, even if her face wasn’t contorted and her eyebrows weren’t raised high.

Helena, the 3rd Gate day shift leader, was famous for her airtight adherence to principles and skills that wouldn’t be out of place as a mercenary. When she personally stomped through the hallway, growling, the perceptive employees cleared the way… and even those who weren’t perceptive didn’t try to get involved.

What was the point of bickering amongst themselves… when the city police were ultimately the ones who resolved most disputes, and there was nowhere to complain, so they had to cover it up internally.

…There weren’t usually people with enough adventurous spirit to want to personally experience the truth of the urban legend about her splitting a visor in half with a single knife-hand strike in a profession like public service.

• This is 7th Gate. Search of the barracks area and confirmation of recorded footage complete. …No unauthorized intruders were found. –

• 5th Gate, same here! But… do we really have to keep doing overtime until we find someone? Are the higher-ups in command… crazy?! –

• ……Ditto. 1st Gate requests that the description of the suspicious person be distributed, or if even that’s difficult, that the search area be narrowed. –

• 3rd Gate is… still searching. Except for the two engineers who are on a business trip, we’re inspecting the vicinity of the barrier and the roads attached to the gate as ordered. ……Team leader, please… come back soon.

“……Tch.”

She clicked her tongue in displeasure as she listened to the incoming reports.

However, even in a situation where the communication channel was noisy with emergency calls and replies about an accident, she wasn’t reckless enough to prioritize her personal doubts and sense of responsibility.

…In fact, to put it more accurately, no matter how unusual it seemed, suspicion was still just suspicion.

She wasn’t stubbornly insisting on it because she hadn’t actually found anything out yet; Helena Valentine was the type of person who would just charge straight in.

Especially now that doubts about the command were also rising.

“……”

Even as she calmly turned her steps and returned to her assigned area, the thought she had harbored didn’t disappear.

Originally, Helena had no prejudice against the combat police, Mega Corp, or Paradise.

Her grandfather, who raised her, was a broker who made citizen IDs as long as you paid the Credits, so she considered the work of the gate guards to be about identifying serious criminals who threatened the city’s safety, and she was engaged in it.

The oppression of corporations… she didn’t like it, but she understood it because even in a small settlement, there were rules made for people to live together.

But… at first, they said there was an accidental accident in the heavy weapons armory, so why are they mobilizing the entire force now, saying there’s an unauthorized intruder?

“Haa… Should I stop here for today?”

She sighed deeply and unconsciously deleted the message she was writing to Anastasia and closed her Cyberware.

She felt sorry for constantly overworking her sister, who had been almost twice as busy lately, accommodating her stubbornness in many ways.

In this case, it would be better to ask Anne, who often visits the underground for work, to find out the situation.

• …Anne? How is it over there? Can you share even a little bit about what’s causing the commotion right now? –

• Ah, I’m sorry…! I also have a very urgent matter, so I’m on my way to the command…. –

• …That’s a shame. I guess we low-level employees are always thrown into the field ignorant. –

Oh dear. The timing was bad.

She reassured her gentle friend, who had always been somewhat timid, as she trailed off and apologized repeatedly, telling her it was okay.

Everything in the world doesn’t always work out perfectly. It would be better to use the current disappointment and unease as nourishment and try harder tomorrow… Just as she was pondering this, Anne cheered her up, sensing Helena’s frustrated mood.

• But if Lena tries, she’ll definitely be able to find even a small clue. ……You always have. –

“Uh… Yeah, thanks…?”

Thinking it was quite a strange encouragement, she expressed her belated gratitude even to the disconnected communication.

On the other hand, she had only intended to ask about the intruder, but it also sounded strangely like she was pointing out the context of the problem that Anastasia and she had been pondering lately.

It was hard to regard it as a simple coincidence, and she wondered about the source of such specific advice….

“Cough! Cough…! Sniff…!!”

“……?”

Her sensitive hearing detected a subtle noise.

An unusual sound to hear in a police garrison where it’s common to pretend to be strong and bold behind anonymity… Sobbing?

The source… Judging by the echo, it was the bathroom right next door.

And that too, the one mainly used by the 3rd Gate staff.

…She knew that everyone had moments of weakness, but there was no point in being holed up in a corner crying when a mobilization order had been issued.

Whether it was a day shift subordinate who was so sad that they wanted to cry secretly because they couldn’t leave work, or a night shift worker who had just started work and was overwhelmed by the time left.

She thought she should persuade them one way or another so that it wouldn’t affect their performance evaluation, and she stepped inside.

“……This?”

“……!”

The acrid smell of iron, the stench of blood, stabbed her deeply in the nose.

On the other hand, whether she heard the soliloquy that the visitor had uttered, the groan of pain stopped abruptly along with the noise of inhaling.

The figure hiding their appearance was clearly injured, and perhaps their identity was presumed to be the intruder that the entire gate force was frantically searching for.

Creak….

Helena, who had grabbed the entire scabbard so that she could use it as a blunt weapon for suppression, began to push open the closed stalls one by one.

She was guessing the location where the person she was aiming for was cowering based on the telltale signs that they hadn’t been able to hide… But what she wanted to see was the other person’s attitude.

Therefore, she didn’t even request basic support, let alone send a radio message that she had found the enemy.

Thump… Thump….

She let the approaching footsteps be heard openly.

It was an action closer to consideration so that the wounded beast wouldn’t be surprised, rather than preparing for an enemy to fight. If someone asked why she was doing such a troublesome thing, it was an act that she could never explain logically.

“……”

“Hngh… Hngh…!!”

Squeak—!

Concentrating on the man’s rough breathing, which had become rough in anticipation of an emergency, she carefully twisted open the locked stall door. As if exchanging places with Helena’s hand that had stepped inside, a shard of glass covered in blood was pointed at her.

…It was a pathetic weapon for someone who had infiltrated the gate alone.

Moreover, the red lifeblood seeping from the torn flesh was running down his wrist and soaking the bathroom floor, as he was holding it so tightly with his bare hands.

It already seemed like a fragment of information that the command had intentionally omitted from the police was visible.

“…Could you please calm down first? I only received an arrest warrant, and I have no intention of harming your life.”

“Sniff… Damn it…! Who would believe what a demon is saying!!”

It wasn’t just blood from the wound that was flowing down to the ground.

The first thing that caught her eye was the man’s attire. The thin surgical gown was so conspicuous that it couldn’t blend in anywhere.

Also, his abdomen was fixed with one arm wrapped around it so that the crack wouldn’t widen, as if he had escaped in the middle of being cut open.

Tears in his shaking eyes, saliva in his mouth that was clattering together, eaten by fear.

One hundred out of one hundred, he was unmistakably a patient who had escaped recklessly.

“…Didn’t you try to get in by boarding a trailer’s secret compartment about four days ago…?”

“Sniff… Hngh…! Yes!! I’m the livestock that you guys captured…! Why?! Didn’t you know that a product with legs would escape from the deep underground?!”

…Yes, if he wasn’t one of the illegal immigrants she had been searching for with all her might for several days, she would have contacted the medical area and told them to take him away, and it would have been over.

The fact that there were no records of the missing people, including the man, being hospitalized in the medical area was a fact that she had reconfirmed several times through the data that Anastasia had obtained.

…Then where on earth did this seriously ill patient come from?

Each time his anguished shout continued, his remaining life was scattered everywhere with a patter!

Since it was clear that she would lose the opportunity and the witness she had barely found without calming him down first, Helena showed her palm and slowly placed the scabbard on the floor tile.

In a gesture of completely abandoning hostile intentions and purely wanting to talk, the breath that had been almost completely gone changed to be a little more even.

“…If it’s deep underground, is it the heavy weapons armory? Were you hiding there all this time? How…?”

“What armory…? I’m talking about the Harvesting Area that you corporate bastards proudly marked with the initials HA.”

“……”

As soon as she heard the answer that contradicted the common sense she had believed in for a long time, Helena sensed it.

…Ah, if I find out the other side of the mission here. If I exchange words, I won’t be able to turn back.

However, she had absolutely preferred a clear form of ending rather than a disturbing facade, and she would continue to do so in the future.

But… She couldn’t allow the misfortune of her close people getting caught up in her selfish willfulness to happen.

“Here, take this hemostatic agent first.”

“?!”

Clang…!

The shard of glass that had been almost stuck in his hand fell and shattered as the medicine was thrown without warning.

Whether he was wary of the unexpected favor or not, she was busy manipulating her Cyberware.

A message to her sister, who would be waiting for her to finish work and return home, to take refuge for a while.

Advice to her friend, who might be harmed by the remaining communication records, to deny any connection if things went wrong.

“Then… How did you escape, and what happened? Can you tell me in detail?”

…The river had been crossed, and the dice had just been cast.

Helena Valentine, who faced the mud smeared on her beliefs that she had believed in all her life, was quietly furious.