Chapter 1288: What Did We Miss?

Ada was actually right about the arrangement.

There definitely were far better combinations they could’ve used, especially if the Academy’s only goal was to have its students finish the exercise as quickly as possible.

In fact, with the right grouping, the instructors had a terrible suspicion that certain cadets might’ve completed CREX faster than anyone had ever recorded.

Unfortunately, that was precisely why the increasingly cornered instructors of the Royal Military Academy hadn’t been able to allow it!

Admittedly, splitting them up hurt.

There was a benchmark against cadets from other academies now, and whether anyone wanted to admit it or not, the Royal Military Academy’s reputation was very much on the line.

But what would happen if they simply gathered their strongest students into one ridiculously overpowered battalion and sent them out to crush everyone else?

Sure, they’d probably win.

They might even win spectacularly.

But if all they proved in the process was that the Academy’s current prestige rested on nine students from one brand-new guild, most of whom barely attended enough regular classes to credit the Academy for their abilities in the first place, then that victory would raise an entirely different set of questions.

Questions the Academy administration would rather not answer!

So between accepting all those petitions demanding a fair competition and trying to give the rest of their freshmen a genuine chance to pass the evaluation, the instructors had practically killed themselves balancing the battalions.

They couldn’t make everyone equally strong.

That would’ve been impossible.

But they could at least distribute their most capable cadets well enough that each battalion had someone reliable to anchor it.

Would that make CREX comfortable?

Absolutely not.

Would it produce the fastest possible victory? Assuming they were even victorious at all?

Probably not that either.

But if their first-years could hold their own against seniors from some of the Empire’s best military academies, then the instructors would already consider that a respectable outcome.

Even if they failed to hold their own against those guys.

Because in the minds of the increasingly worried instructors of the Royal Military Academy, the most dangerous competition wasn’t even standing inside the Training Hall.

They were already waiting for them on Caldris Minor-7.

__

Deep within the subterranean briefing room of Caldris Minor-7, heavy metallic clicks echoed against the reinforced steel walls.

A group of young but surprisingly adept soldiers sat scattered around a low table, their hands moving with terrifying, practiced speed as they inspected their weapons.

Chambers were racked and magazines slammed into place. Sight lines were checked almost absentmindedly, each movement so smooth that it was obvious they’d repeated the same motions thousands of times before.

One soldier casually raised his rifle and tracked an invisible target across the room.

Click, click, click.

Three mock shots in less than a second.

"Doesn’t this whole exercise feel a little... new?" he muttered, lowering the barrel. "Maybe the uptight higher-ups finally decided to shake things up after making us run the same old drills over and over."

Another soldier sitting nearby immediately looked at him strangely.

"What? Is this your second time or something? You sound awfully familiar with mock battles."

"Bah! You know what I’m talking about."

The first soldier scoffed as he flicked the safety back into place.

"We’ve been stuck here for over a year. I know they said closed-door training when we got pulled in, but shit... zero contact with the outside until last week would make anyone way too familiar with everything around here."

He gestured vaguely toward the room.

"Hell, every time they change the flavor of the nutrient solution, I can tell immediately, even if they dress up the supply drops in the same blasted packaging!"

Several people snorted.

"So how could someone suddenly showing up in person to give us a mission right when our training’s about to end not feel suspiciously special?"

He leaned back and started twirling a high-grade sidearm around one finger.

"Sure, when they recruited us, I expected hot weapons and actual life-or-death scenarios. Instead, we ended up with modified ones that can’t really kill anyone."

He glanced toward the equipment scattered around them.

"But at least this proves the Empire’s probably still standing when we finally get out of here. I mean, look at all the stuff they sent over for this whack-ass mission!"

His eyes practically lit up.

"We even got modified mechas! And from what I remember, the Empire’s been struggling with materials since forever. Where I came from, these things would fetch a ridiculous amount of money."

He whistled appreciatively.

"They’re clearly not playing around."

Thwack!

"OW!"

Another soldier reached over and smacked him across the back of the head.

"Polish that properly," the man reprimanded, pointing toward the sidearm still spinning around his finger. "Or maybe they’ll take the damage out of your completion bonus."

"Hey! Shit!"

The offended soldier immediately clutched his weapon protectively.

"Wash your mouth, will ya?! Don’t say things like that!"

The others laughed.

Amid all the banter, however, one person hadn’t joined in.

A quieter soldier remained near the holographic map glowing in the center of the room, his attention fixed on the terrain and marked sectors displayed before him.

Then, almost as though he were speaking to himself, he muttered, "Shouldn’t you be asking who we’re preparing all of this for?"

The room gradually quieted.

Several heads turned.

Apparently, the man spoke rarely enough that even his comrades weren’t accustomed to hearing him voluntarily join their conversations.

"What?"

The soldier with the rifle frowned. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ

"Who we’re preparing for?"

The quiet man finally turned away from the holographic map.

His eyes were cold and sharp.

"We’re the current Vanguard candidates."

That alone was enough to make several expressions become more serious.

"So who exactly are we supposed to be wary of enough that even the Operators have gone over the setup three times now?"

"..."

No one answered.

The soldier continued.

"Better question. What kind of group matches us closely enough that the higher-ups are willing to put this much into one exercise?"

He gestured toward the map.

"This isn’t a quick duel. The exercise is supposed to run much longer than that, so whoever they’re sending can’t possibly be a small group."

That made far too much sense.

The earlier laughter disappeared as a heavy silence settled across the briefing room.

For the first time, several of them seemed to seriously consider the sheer amount of preparation that had gone into what they’d initially assumed was simply another unusual training exercise.

One soldier finally broke the silence.

"Yeah..."

He grimaced.

"That actually makes sense."

Then his expression became even stranger.

"Especially since the people coming here would only have fragmented intel and maps, right?"

Nobody immediately responded.

Aside from being directly responsible for preparing the defenses and the actual training grounds, the Vanguard candidates had already spent an entire year training on Caldris Minor-7. They felt they knew the terrain, the facilities, and practically every miserable corner they’d been forced to live in.

Meanwhile, whoever was coming had none of that.

If that wasn’t already a considerable handicap, then what else could it be? Consideration?

So just how capable were these people supposed to be for the higher-ups to consider this fair?

And perhaps even more concerning...

Just how much had the Vanguard candidates missed after spending an entire year cut off from quite literally everyone?