District 11.
Academy City did not border the ocean, so materials could only be brought in and taken out via either land or air. District 11 shared a border with the outer wall and functioned as the entrance for the land route.
The members of Block and Unabara Mitsuki were there.
Rectangular buildings were lined up in the area. Unlike normal buildings, these buildings lacked walls and looked like parking garages. Academy City-made electric cars were parked in them in preparation to be shipped out.
District 11's warehouse district was large and over 7000 tons of materials were brought in and out of it each day.
The area around the gate that directly managed what came in and went out was quite strictly controlled, but the warehouse district couldn't be guarded from end to end. The district resembled a typical harbor wharf. It was the kind of place where shady deals often went down night after night in old mafia movies.
And…
(That's the outer wall…)
Unabara moved his gaze in that direction.
Even though he was easily more than 500 meters away, the wall looked almost majestic in its great size. There was a pathway on top of the Great Wall of China-like wall and using binoculars they could tell that drum-shaped security robots were going to and fro on top of it.
Some magicians had made it across the outer wall, but that was because the wall was protected by "scientific" sensors making it susceptible to "magical" tactics.
(That's what I hope anyway. I'd rather not think about the possibility that Aleister calculated out that far and was just letting us in.)
However, due to the surveillance from the satellite being out, the strength of the security had fallen greatly. Now normal people who couldn't use magical methods had a chance as well.
On the other side of the wall, the 5000 mercenaries Saku had called for should be waiting.
They must have been waiting for Academy City's security satellite to go out while scattered around hiding in nearby buildings and vehicles.
Unabara knew all that, but he hadn't been given a chance to pass that information along.
The rest of Group did not know about all this. He didn't know whether the upper classes of Academy City knew or not. It was highly likely that they were breathing a sigh of relief for stopping the attack on the satellite.
(So Block called these mercenaries in to obtain their goal… But what could that be? Where are they going to attack…?)
"Are you worried, Yamate?" said Teshio Megumi suddenly as she stood nearby.
Yamate was the name of the man who Unabara was disguised as.
"Not really…" was Unabara's short reply.
Normally, he would follow the person he wanted to disguise as for at least a week examining them. If he didn't have a good grasp of the person, it was best not to speak carelessly.
Teshio didn't seem too worried about how Unabara was acting.
She probably thought he was nervous about their big plan.
"We took out the satellite, but those damn security robots are still moving around," said Saku Tatsuhiko.
Teshio turned her head towards the large bear-like man.
"Is that a problem?"
"No. Robots like that aren't equipped with guns, so they can't harm us. They can get over the wall if they time it right."
"Why aren't they armed?" said Unabara deciding to join in the conversation.
Saku glanced over at him.
"There are various reasons. Those robots are usually used to guard the outer perimeter. If they malfunctioned and shot someone walking outside of the wall, it'd be a huge problem. There's also a problem with reloading. That model of robot can't change out a magazine, so once they're out, they're out."
"So if we're spotted, they'll sound the alarm, and that's it?" said Teshio Megumi in a disappointed sounding voice. "In that case, couldn't we have just broken our way through without going to all this trouble?"
"No. The security robots on the outer wall have a special communications line. When they sound the alarm, it's sent directly to the control area in District 23 and the unmanned attack helicopters are sent in. It would mostly be 'Six Wings', the latest model that was shown off at the Interceptor Weapon Show. Things won't be easy if we're spotted."
Saku looked down at the watch wrapped around his thick arm.
"In 10 minutes, the security robots will change rotation."
"…"
"They're powered by electricity, so they can't continue moving for 24 hours. They have to recharge somewhere. That's why they're split up between the active group and the recharging group."
Apparently, due to this switching out, there was a 20 to 30 minute gap in the security.
Normally, that wouldn't be a problem because Academy City's satellite would still be watching over the city and the area around it.
But that currently wasn't so.
Those 20 minutes would be a true blank space.
"Prepare as many vehicles as possible. Don't forget to change out the license plates." Saku Tatsuhiko instructed one of the men from Block's subordinate organization. "Use the electric cars scheduled to be shipped out that are parked in the parking garages. We need to use them to transport 5000 people."