After finishing his words, Mo looked around and noticed the crowd in the distance.
Everyone wore completely bewildered expressions.
As though he had discovered some kind of treasure, Mo excitedly waved them over.
The Infected had been looking around in confusion, completely at a loss.
But when they noticed Mo beckoning them over, they looked at one another.
After a brief silence, they began frantically communicating through hand gestures.
One pointed at Mo, then at himself, before using one hand to imitate walking on the other.
(Boss Mo is calling us. Let’s go over.)
Another nodded, pointed at Roman, who was still sitting on the ground in a state of self-isolation, then twirled a finger beside his temple before spreading his hands.
Finally, he pointed at the other Infected and then back at Roman.
(Yeah, Roman’s brain is completely fried. There’s no helping him. Who’s going to wake him up?)
Everyone looked at one another.
Then, in perfect unison, they pointed at the person closest to Roman and waved him over.
(You’re close to him. You go.)
With no other choice, the chosen Infected cautiously approached Roman.
And then—
Slap!
Roman was instantly snapped out of his daze.
His face was filled with disbelief.
These little bastards actually dared to slap him!
Roman turned around and glared fiercely at the Infected.
But the other party immediately looked away and began solemnly discussing geographical matters.
“Wow, look at this rock. It really is a rock.”
“Isn’t it? It really is a rock.”
They were clearly playing the “This has absolutely nothing to do with me” card.
Roman was so angry that he actually laughed.
But there wasn’t much he could say, so he simply led everyone toward Mo.
When Roman arrived in front of him, he looked at the devastated landscape and the Emperors’ Blade buried in the ground, his face full of question marks.
Just as he was about to ask what had happened, Mo interrupted him.
“Did you bring a camera? Lend it to me.”
Looking at Mo, who was rubbing his hands together with an eager expression, Roman knew even with his eyes closed that Mo was definitely up to no good.
Still, he opened the camera function on his terminal and handed it over.
Mo excitedly took the terminal and began photographing his masterpiece from every possible angle.
After finishing, he returned the terminal to Roman with satisfaction.
“Now your terminal is actually worth something. This is exclusive footage you probably couldn’t find anywhere else in all of Ursus.”
Roman was completely speechless.
Yes.
It was valuable.
Definitely valuable.
But who would dare accept it?
Even if someone did dare to ask for it, Roman wouldn’t dare give it to them.
After a brief silence, Roman looked at Mo, who was standing in a pool of blood and had started bleeding again.
He hesitated before finally speaking.
“Are… are you okay? You’re still bleeding.”
“It’s nothing serious. It’ll heal soon.”
“And them…”
Roman looked at the Emperors’ Blade buried in the ground.
The corner of his mouth began twitching uncontrollably again.
“Knowing too much won’t do you any good. I think you know why.”
While Mo and Roman chatted casually, the Blades were having an absolutely miserable time.
Back when Mo had been taking pictures with Roman’s terminal, the Blades had already begun waking up one after another.
After all, they were the elite soldiers of a nation.
How could they remain unconscious forever?
Mo naturally noticed them waking up.
And as a result, he became even more brazen, shoving the camera directly into their faces.
Don’t open your eyes.
Please let this be a hallucination.
Looking at Mo, who had just beaten them senseless, and the terminal in his hand, the Blades instinctively closed their eyes again.
Then they began pondering the three ultimate questions of life.
Who am I?
Where am I?
What am I doing?
This time, they had truly lost all face.
Not only had they been crushed in a frontal confrontation, but they had also been buried in the ground and filmed like some kind of spectacle.
This humiliation would probably become a lifelong stain on their records.
The voices outside gradually became quieter.
When the noise completely disappeared, the Blades, who were trapped in their vortex of self-isolation, finally realized that something was wrong.
They cautiously opened their eyes a sliver.
What greeted them was a group of more than a dozen people silently staring at them.
Whoa.
This time, they really needed to enter self-isolation.
Whatever.
Just destroy everything already.
Realizing that everything had been exposed, the Emperors’ Blade simply stopped pretending.
They stared ahead with dead-fish eyes, looking as though they were prepared to accept whatever fate awaited them.
“Tsk. Alright, stop acting. The Emperors’ Blade shouldn’t be this helpless.”
Mo looked at their broken expressions.
“If I didn’t know how tough you guys really are, I might have actually believed you.”
“Get yourselves out. Don’t make me dig you out.”
The Blades exchanged glances.
Then, decisively, they pulled themselves out of the ground.
They quickly lined up in formation and stood at attention, waiting for their superior to inspect them.
“Are you planning to fight me again?”
Mo looked at the Emperors’ Blade standing in perfect formation and raised an eyebrow with a smile.
The leader of the Blades hurriedly waved his hands.
Then, without anyone knowing where he had produced it from, he pulled out a document and handed it to Mo.
“You have already proven your strength to us. By His Majesty’s decree, if you defeated us, His Majesty would no longer pursue your previous acts of overstepping.”
“He will recognize the legal status of your camp within Ursus and grant you the right to move freely throughout Ursus.”
“The specific terms are all listed in this document. Please take a look.”
Then he tossed it to Roman and sighed.
“Your Emperor really did prepare for two possible outcomes. The terms in these two documents are completely different.”
“Ursus is a nation that respects strength. Naturally, we must treat the strong differently.”
The Emperors’ Blade gave a serious explanation.
“After all, not just anyone can defeat us.”
“Fine. I accept His Majesty’s terms.”
Mo waved his hand.
“Go back to wherever you came from.”
Upon hearing this, the Emperors’ Blade immediately saluted in unison.
They packed up their belongings and prepared to leave.
“Wait. One more thing.”
Mo suddenly remembered something.
He quickly walked over to the leader of the Blades and flicked him hard on the forehead with two fingers.
“Remember to send me a new lounge chair.”
The leader of the Emperors’ Blade covered his forehead, wincing from the pain.
“Understood. I’ll have one delivered to you.”
With that, he turned around and ran off with his squad, charging into the snowfield without looking back.
It was probably going to be quite some time before they showed their faces again.
“They sure ran fast.”
Mo watched as the Blades disappeared into the distance.
They looked just as pathetic running away as they had looked imposing when they first arrived.
“So, what exactly happened? Aren’t you going to explain?”
After reading through the document Mo had thrown to him, Roman looked at the retreating, bedraggled Blades and turned toward Mo.
“It’s nothing.”
Mo shook his head indifferently.
“If you want to establish a foothold here in Ursus, you naturally need the Emperor’s permission. It was just a test.”
“Fine. I’ve read the document.”
Roman put it away.
“The terms can be considered a special favor. I’ve never seen such favorable policies anywhere I’ve been, and we even received official recognition from Ursus.”
“I have to hand it to you.”
Now they finally didn’t have to worry about being surrounded and wiped out by Ursus.
That was a considerable relief.
Roman looked at Mo, who was covered in blood.
After thinking for a moment, he happily patted him on the shoulder.
Mo immediately grimaced in pain.
“We’ll deal with the stupid things you did later. Clean yourself up and let’s go back.”
“You’ve lost so much blood. Just wait until little Ivan gets a look at you.”
“…Understood.”
“Heh.”
The sun slowly sank toward the horizon.
In the fading afterglow of sunset, two figures walked into the distance.
Behind them, the Infected whom Roman had called over remained standing where they were.
They looked at each other with wide eyes.
After a brief silence, they happily trotted after the two men, catching up with them on the way back to the camp.