Five hours had passed since Kiriha, Clan, and Ruth were shot down. In that time, they had traversed eleven kilometers, which was around the distance that Grevanas had estimated. In another two hours they would reach the hideout.
“Things appear to be going well,” Kiriha noted.
“The frequency of the Liberation Army’s communications has increased, and there are also a number of spatial distortions detected,” Ruth reported.
There had been several near misses with enemy squads. Fortunately, they’d been able to get past them by putting their heads together.
“Haha, it appears the only problem is my lack of stamina...” Clan said. “What’s with the long face, Kii?”
The situation was good, but Kiriha didn’t look happy. “I was thinking that things are going too well.”
She had expected the situation to be more dangerous. But for some reason, it hadn’t been so bad. Normally, safety was something to celebrate, but not in their current situation. Since the objective was to get the enemy to communicate as much as possible, she didn’t want them to give up because they had failed to catch her.
“You think the enemy is giving up on the pursuit?” Ruth asked.
“If that is all, that is fine, but I am worried they might lose patience and take action,” Kiriha said. She was worried that the enemy might do something more dangerous than giving up. She imagined Maxfern and Grevanas would lose their patience and use the waste to infect the forest wildlife. If all the animals were infected, there would be no point in hiding. She also didn’t want to imagine what would happen afterward. But she only knew of Maxfern through hearsay, so she couldn’t say for certain.
“I see. This is Maxfern,” Clan said. “Considering his abnormal obsession, it doesn’t sound impossible.”
Clan herself had actually met Maxfern, so she knew him best out of the three. From Clan’s point of view, he was an insane man obsessed with complete victory, and he would do anything for it. Even after being defeated, he had tried to spread a disease through the world.
“Sorry to interrupt, but there are spatial distortions all across this area!” Ruth suddenly cried. “Something relatively small is appearing in several places!”
There were dozens of spatial distortions within ten kilometers of the crash site. The size of the distortions suggested that several meter-large things were coming out of them.
“There’s mana all over the area, ho! At the very least, it is covered in magic, ho!” Karama yelled.
The haniwas had something like a horn on their foreheads. Those horns were actually crystals that vibrated in response to mana. Karama had felt that vibration.
“Oh no, ho! Whatever came out is following the path that we took, ho!” Korama said. “They found a way to track us, ho!”
Korama and Karama compared the information they’d gleaned from their horns to get a rather accurate location of the mana. Based on that, it was safe to say that the enemy had found the path Kiriha and the others had taken.
“Is that for certain?” Clan asked.
“The probability is over ninety-five percent, ho!” Korama answered.
“Karama, how many enemies are there, and how fast are they?” Kiriha asked.
“With their speed, they will reach us in twenty minutes, ho! There are probably fewer than three of them, but they are grouping up as they move, ho! Ane-go, we should make a break for it, ho?!”
Compared to their group’s pace, their pursuers were moving more than twice as fast. The girls would be caught in no time at all. More and more pursuers were joining the hunt as well. It was impossible to guess how many there would be once they caught up. Because of that, Karama recommended that they run. Even if they were less than a meter in size, the enemy would be dangerous if they attacked in a group.
“Korama, bring out the map!” Kiriha said. “We need to find a place to escape to!”
“Got it, ho!”
Kiriha had determined that they wouldn’t be able to reach their hideout in time. So she stared at the map that Korama projected to find a place where they could take cover or fend off the enemy.
“Okay, we’re going to run!” Kiriha announced.
“Understood!” said Ruth.
“This has gotten troublesome...” Clan complained.
Kiriha only looked at the map for a few seconds, but in that time she gathered her thoughts and took the lead, breaking into a run. They had almost no time to spare. There was no guarantee that they would survive if they escaped to the place she had found on the map, but they earnestly ran all the same. Since they had a future they wanted to achieve, they couldn’t give up on a chance to survive.
Kiriha had chosen a narrow valley to escape into—specifically, a narrow ravine. The area was rather hilly with interlocking ridges without much difference in elevation, but there were some ravines scattered around. Kiriha and the others escaped into one of them.
“I see... From here, the enemy can only come from one direction,” Clan said in satisfaction as she looked around.
In a ravine, the enemy couldn’t attack from all sides; they could only chase from behind. The girls could get stuck in a pincer attack if the enemy got ahead of them, but that was still better than being surrounded. Moreover, they just needed to be on guard so that it didn’t happen. In fact, they had already sent an unmanned craft ahead and found no signs of any enemy present.
“Not to mention, they’ll struggle with such limited formations,” Ruth added.
The ravine was steep and narrow. At most, a few people could walk side by side. In a battle, two or three was the limit. Since their group was few in number already, only the enemy would be fighting at a handicap. It was a well-thought-out escape plan.
“It would be ideal if there was more cover above...but we can’t be picky about that,” Kiriha noted. She was concerned about the open space above them. They could be attacked by unmanned craft from above, though there was no chance of being shot at by aircraft flying even higher than an unmanned craft. All told, it was the ideal choice when their options were so limited.
“Karama, Korama, watch above us just in case,” Kiriha instructed them.
“Leave it to us, ho!” said Karama.
“We can do it in our free time, ho!” Korama agreed.
“I’m not sure what to think about that phrasing,” Clan muttered.
“That’s harsh, Clan-chan, ho!” Karama cried.
With Kiriha at the front, the girls passed through the ravine. Even if they were to fight or escape, they would need to go a little deeper first.
“But Kiriha-sama, why was the Liberation Army suddenly able to track us?” Ruth asked. “Just a little while ago, it seemed they’d completely lost sight of us...” This question was on her mind. If they didn’t know how the enemy was pursuing them, they would struggle to evade them.
“Based on the data and their movements, it is likely a pack of beasts,” Kiriha explained. “They are using sharp senses to follow us. Seeing as they are moving downwind from us, they are not machines, and they are intelligent.”
Based on the mana reaction at the start, it was likely magical beasts. Based on their formations, Kiriha surmised that they were beasts that hunted in groups. In particular, a pack had picked up their scent and moved downwind. That was a sign of intelligence. Machines didn’t have to concern themselves with such thoughts, and they wouldn’t know to go downwind either.
“So...basically, wolves or hyenas?” Ruth asked.
“Indeed.” Kiriha nodded. “They should be magical beasts that look something like that. It was a good idea on the enemy’s part.”
She believed that Maxfern and Grevanas had switched to a more basic method of chasing them down. They must have felt that it would have a better chance of success than relying on science or magic, which the girls had countermeasures for. The beasts also had far more experience when it came to hunting, and considering their instincts, they could probably produce better results than modern technology. In fact, that was being proved true already.
“We don’t have any experience surviving in the wild either,” Clan noted. “I can only vaguely guess at how we are being chased.” She could tell that the beasts were picking up faint smells and small sounds and wouldn’t overlook anything. But she didn’t know what kind of smell, which sounds, or what other clues they were using to follow them. It might have come naturally to beasts, but the three girls had no experience with those matters.
“In other words, we won’t be able to escape by running normally,” Kiriha replied. “We’re here, so this is where we will intercept them.”
Their pursuers were fast and could track them easily. So even if the girls tried to run, they would need to stop at least once. If not, they would clearly be overrun.
To the Liberation Army, the past few hours had been a lesson in patience. Not only could they not find their targets for assassination, but they were also in the middle of enemy territory. If they did anything that drew attention, they would be wiped out. In fact, the squad that had gone to check the landing craft at the crash site had been discovered and taken out. They couldn’t let their guard down. They’d had to endure frustration and fear for five hours, so naturally the soldiers were exhausted.
That was when they received a report that beasts had been deployed and were pursuing their targets. That report stirred the soldiers to life. They were still in as dangerous a situation as ever, but their odds had improved. Nearby squads linked up to join the beasts in their pursuit.