Tsuchimikado Motoharu, Accelerator, Musujime Awaki, and Unabara Mitsuki gathered in the warehouse district of District 11. Unabara had been out of the loop for a bit, so he asked Tsuchimikado a question.
"What is the External Connection Terminal?"
"It's just a little facility. All of the formalities got to be a pain in the ass, so Musujime and I blew up the center of the facility. But there are 3 other terminals, so there won't be any connection problems."
This time, Musujime who had taken action along with Tsuchimikado asked Unabara a question.
"Can we really say this Block organization was behind everything? Didn't we conclude that School was behind the sniper attack on Oyafune Monaka?"
"It doesn't seem Block and School were directly working together. The two have their own plans and they caused separate incidents. They just happened to have a point of contact with Management."
"Tch. And with those Member bastards sneaking around, this turned into a real pain in the ass."
Tsuchimikado moved his gaze elsewhere while listening to Unabara and Accelerator speak.
The area near the outer wall had blood and flesh scattered all over it, but there were still some survivors. These mercenaries hadn't been killed, couldn't get away, and had been left there by Block.
"Okay, question time," said Tsuchimikado bluntly. "Where exactly were you people going to attack with 5000 mercenaries?"
"Wh-what are you talking about?"
"5000 sounds like a lot, but it isn't enough to defeat Academy City. I'm asking you what you were hired for, mercenary. What plan did you have that used that many people?"
"…"
The mercenary looked at the faces of the 4 members of Group one at a time.
He seemed to be conflicted.
Whatever he was hesitating over, the disastrous scene around him must have led him to believe that Block had failed or that they had been intending to betray the mercenaries from the beginning. Finally, he slowly opened his mouth.
"…District 10."
"District 10?"
Land prices in that district were the cheapest and it didn't have any major facilities. It was filled with things like disposal areas for experimental animals and labs related to nuclear power.
The mercenary continued speaking.
"We were supposed to attack a juvenile hall in District 10."
"!!"
Musujime Awaki was the one that reacted to his words.
She grabbed the mercenary's collar.
"Why were you attacking that place…? Is there some VIP criminal you're trying to rescue!?"
Accelerator thought while watching Musujime as she was overrun with impatience.
Academy City's juvenile halls were used to house criminals who used psychic powers. He didn't know the details, but he had heard that they had some kind of esper counter-measure there. If that was true, having a force made up of normal people would raise their odds of success.
The mercenary, who Musujime was holding by the collar, finally said one more thing.
"Our target was…Move Point."
Musujime Awaki's eyebrows twitched.
The mercenary must not have known who the woman in front of him was.
"We got some information that Move Point's companions are being held there. If we capture her comrades, we can negotiate with her."
(What reason do they have to single me out?) thought Musujime.
But then she realized the answer.
"The guide to Aleister's 'windowless building'…"
"Right. The identity of that guide is confidential because she's a direct line to Aleister. But Block got their hands on the information that the guide is Move Point. So they had her thoroughly investigated in order to find some materials to use in a negotiation."
"What were you going to negotiate with the guide about?" asked Tsuchimikado.
"We wanted information on the route through which materials are brought into the windowless building. Not even a nuclear weapon can destroy it from the outside, but from the inside it's an entirely different story. It's said to not have an entrance or an exit, but materials have to be taken in and out. That can be used to blow up the windowless building from the inside."
"Blow it up?"
"Block said they have a synchronous multilayer bomb prepared. It's some kind of tactical weapon that you've created here in Academy City."
A synchronous multilayer bomb was a large bomb that had high power explosives arranged in a regulated manner. A normal tactical weapon spread an enormous blast over a large area while the synchronous multilayer bomb was made to focus a highly destructive blast on one small target so as to utterly destroy it. It was created in order to bomb an enemy stronghold in an urban environment with no civilian sacrifices.
"The chaos in the world needs to be stopped. I'm a mercenary, so I know what I'm talking about. The world is at its limit. Infighting is going to begin before long. War needs to be stopped before it begins." The mercenary spoke while matching his gaze with each of the members of Group one at a time. "Bringing Move Point herself on our side would be difficult. Someone you can't trust will always be someone you can't trust. That's why we didn't go after her too much. If our information on Move Point's power is accurate, this would all go much faster with her help, but there's no helping that. We went ahead on the assumption that she wouldn't-…"
"That's right," said Musujime interrupting him. "By the way, do you know who you're talking to right now?"
The mercenary momentarily frowned in confusion and his face turned pale shortly thereafter.
"N-no way. You're kiddi-…!!"
Before the mercenary could finish speaking, almost 10 of what looked like metal stakes pierced him all over his body.
He passed out from the shock of the pain, but it seemed he was still alive. Musujime removed her hand from the tattered mercenary and looked down while gritting her teeth.
What she wanted to protect more than anything, what she wanted to protect no matter what she lost in exchange was being taken from her. The other 3 remained silent. As they each had something they felt the same way about, they couldn't say anything.
Most likely, Aleister was using some kind of strange technology to watch all of this from above. However, he wasn't about to lend a hand. He had to be watching these people struggling in his garden and smiling.
"Let's go."
Finally, Tsuchimikado urged the others on.
From here on out, this was about Musujime Awaki instead of Group as a whole. But none of them made a single complaint about that. Just like when Unabara had mixed in with Block, the members of Group saw this as a different situation than having to get out of predicament that was part of a job someone else had imposed on them.
"We need to go to District 10. Block still has around 100 mercenaries at their disposal. We don't know what kind of equipment they have, but it clearly isn't a good situation."