Ch.171171. Golden Mane Squadron Commander Leila

Gilbert stroked the healing artifact he had received from the Rose Inn’s manager, feeling his heart grow more generous. The manager who had given away such valuable items now seemed almost angelic to him.

Though the manager’s face contorted each time he handed over an artifact, isn’t that what true penance is about?

He was someone who could rightfully be called a saint, sacrificing himself to bring joy to others.

“Gilbert! Since when were you so good at SWAT?! I’m shocked. I’ve never seen skills like that before!”

“It’s nothing special.”

Camilla’s eyes sparkled as she looked at Gilbert with a gaze bordering on reverence.

Gilbert found it slightly uncomfortable, but didn’t show it. He knew how passionate she was about SWAT.

“Nothing special? When you deliberately discarded the weapon card in the final round, I couldn’t even guess what you were thinking!”

“If you only think about a weapon card’s effects, you become trapped in a box. Breaking free from conventional thinking is what’s important.”

On their way back to the dormitory, Gilbert gave Camilla a brief lecture on SWAT. She listened with complete concentration, repeatedly nodding and expressing amazement.

“I see. I learned so much. Now I realize how trapped I’ve been in my own thinking patterns.”

“I’m glad it helped.”

“Being with you is always the most enjoyable, Gilbert.”

“Is that so.”

Gilbert gave a faint smile at Camilla’s words before looking toward the dormitory building ahead.

Guards were surveying the surroundings with sharp eyes, diligently fulfilling their duties. They appeared exceptionally disciplined, likely feeling responsible after the incidents that had occurred at the academy.

Satisfied with their excellent work ethic, Gilbert passed by them with a word of appreciation for their efforts. He had the strange impression that their gazes became even more intense afterward. His encouragement as their superior seemed to have strengthened their resolve.

“Halt right there!”

As Gilbert was heading toward the dormitory building, leaving the guards behind, he turned around curiously when a commotion suddenly erupted. Someone with raised hands was standing before the guards who had been maintaining perimeter security.

Focusing his eyes to look more carefully, Gilbert found the surrendering figure strikingly familiar. He immediately recognized who it was—Leila, the captain of the Golden Mane unit.

“No need to stop her. I vouch for her identity.”

“Understood… Hey, are you alright?!”

The guard who had relaxed upon Gilbert’s vouching suddenly shouted in alarm after taking a closer look at Leila’s condition.

Gilbert felt a sense of foreboding at the guard’s sudden change in attitude. He rushed toward Leila to assess her condition.

“Captain Leila!”

After confirming Leila’s state, Gilbert called out to her with intense emotion. Her condition was far from good by any measure.

Her clothes were torn in various places, revealing countless minor wounds. Her forearms and legs showed burn marks, and her lips were severely split with scabs forming, as if she had bitten them hard.

Even so, these were relatively minor injuries. They were flesh wounds that could be completely healed with healing magic or potions. If these had been her only injuries, Gilbert wouldn’t have been so alarmed.

But when he saw Leila’s abdomen, he couldn’t help but clench his teeth.

As if she had embraced an explosive, her abdominal skin was completely ruptured. The wound was so deep that her internal organs were visible, causing Gilbert to frantically turn to the guards.

“A priest! Summon a priest immediately!”

“Yes, sir!”

While the guards hurriedly used communication devices to call for a priest, Gilbert searched through Leila’s tactical bag.

As far as he knew, Rangers were frequently dispatched on dangerous missions, so it was protocol for them to carry emergency potions and recovery magic scrolls in their tactical bags.

Damn it!

Unfortunately, the explosion magic had apparently affected the tactical bag as well—all the potion bottles inside were shattered.

“Stay conscious, Leila!”

“Lord… Gilbert…?”

With her cognitive abilities severely diminished due to the critical injury, Leila lifted her head with great difficulty, exhaling weakly. Her voice sounded as if it might crumble at any moment, making Gilbert increasingly desperate.

“I’ve called for a priest! Use a recovery magic scroll first!”

“Lord Gilbert… this, this first…”

With severely trembling hands, Leila handed him a bundle of parchments, charred and soaked in blood. Gilbert took the bundle and pressed a recovery scroll into her hand.

“Leila! Pull yourself together! That’s an order!”

“Lord Gilbert… mission… accomplished…”

After seeing Gilbert take the parchment bundle, Leila smiled with relief and then closed her eyes, collapsing forward. Gilbert caught her hastily and gritted his teeth.

‘I’m tired. I’ll rest a bit. You go ahead.’

Memories overlapped.

All the words his partner, his wingman, his friend had said as he drew his last breath flashed through Gilbert’s mind in an instant.

“I won’t let you die!”

Gilbert’s mind began racing frantically. There were limits to how quickly a priest could arrive. He quickly used the recovery scroll he had pressed into her hand, but it only provided emergency treatment without showing enough efficacy to save her life.

While considering other options, Gilbert’s eyes suddenly widened. A way to save her flashed into his mind.

Gilbert pulled out the healing artifact he had been keeping. This would surely save Leila.

Being a one-time use item, this healing artifact had exceptional power. There was a reason it was called a “spare life.”

Aside from the legendary elixir that existed only in myths, this was the artifact with the most powerful healing effects, so he used it on Leila without a moment’s hesitation.

A bright light burst forth and seeped into Leila’s body. Small cuts and the large wound in her abdomen began healing as if time were being rewound.

Leila’s breathing, which had been so rough it seemed she might expire at any moment, returned to normal.

Though medical assessment wasn’t his specialty, Gilbert, having survived countless wars and brushes with death, could instinctively tell that Leila had passed through the critical danger.

“Gilbert, what’s going on…?”

Camilla, who had been watching Gilbert’s emergency treatment in a daze, asked as she looked at Leila cradled in Gilbert’s arms, her expression now much more relaxed.

Unfortunately, Gilbert himself didn’t fully understand the situation, so he couldn’t answer her question.

“I don’t know either. But one thing is certain—Leila must have discovered something.”

Gilbert looked at the bundle of parchments with complicated feelings. Seeing the densely written text, his anger boiled up again.

He had clearly assigned a mission to the Golden Mane captain and two squad leaders: to find the traitor at the academy who was colluding with the New Resistance, and they had immediately set to work.

And now, after several days…

Only Leila had returned from the completed mission, critically wounded. Gilbert knew all too well what this meant.

The deaths of the two squad leaders, Johnson and Roel.

That must be it.

“Over here! You need to come this way!”

The voice of the guard who had gone to find a priest was heard. In the distance, a priest in white clerical garments could be seen running toward them, dripping with sweat.

Only after seeing the priest did Gilbert feel some relief. Although he had treated Leila with the healing artifact, she still needed continuous treatment.

Given the severity of her wound, which had exposed her internal organs, it seemed she would need quite a long time to recover.

***

“Mmm…”

Leila barely managed to lift her heavy eyelids and open her eyes. Her entire body ached so much that even getting up was difficult. The abdominal injury from the explosion seemed quite serious…

Wait, abdomen?

Her gradually awakening mind snapped to full alertness at the keyword “abdominal explosion.”

“Ugh!”

As her consciousness fully returned, Leila reflexively tried to sit up but immediately fell back onto the bed due to excruciating pain.

Though her abdomen wasn’t punctured anymore, she had been severely injured by Horizon’s magic just before her escape. With her abdominal skin completely ruptured and her internal organs nearly spilling out, Leila had abandoned hope of survival.

To heal such a serious wound would require a high-ranking priest, but it was impossible for such a priest to be at Demeia Academy.

So she had made it her final goal in life to deliver the information secured through the sacrifice of two comrades to Gilbert.

Though even moving caused her pain, she headed toward the temporary dormitory where Gilbert was staying. She wanted to find him quickly, but with her battered body, crawling was the best she could manage.

With each step, unbearable pain flashed through her mind like sparks, but remembering the final moments of Johnson and Roel who had sacrificed themselves for her escape, she gritted her teeth and pressed on toward Gilbert.

Finally meeting Gilbert and handing over the documents she had aimed to deliver, she closed her eyes with the relief of having completed her final mission and not letting the sacrifice of the two men be in vain.

Though she had thought she would never open her eyes again, somehow she alone had survived.

“You’re awake.”

“L-Lord Gilbert?”

Leila, who had been thinking about the fallen Johnson and Roel, was startled by Gilbert’s voice and turned her head toward the sound.

Gilbert was sitting in a chair to the right of her bed, arms crossed. He seemed to have been waiting a long time for her to wake up, as the bundle of parchments she had given him was visible.

“Why are you here, Lord Gilbert…?”

“That’s what I want to ask. Captain Leila, what exactly happened that night?”

“…”

Leila took a deep breath and reported everything that had happened that night to Gilbert without omission.

How they had deduced the culprit by observing the restored security barrier.

How they had investigated the suspect but found little information.

The discovery of the hidden underground cavern and the information obtained there.

Leila reported only the essential details to Gilbert in a calm, concise manner.

“Professor Horizon…?”

Learning the identity of the academy’s insider from Leila left Gilbert feeling almost disembodied. The underground cavern she mentioned was the same place where Fresia had appeared in Tactical Combat, so there was nothing special about that.

But the fact that Grand Sage Horizon was the insider came as a great shock to Gilbert. He was someone Gilbert had never once considered a suspect.

Although it was just a game, in Tactical Combat, Horizon was merely a mysterious NPC who never intervened in the story. At most, his only direct influence on the game was providing side quests.

Gilbert tried to hide his confusion.

The documents she had handed over contained information that wasn’t available in the game.

However, the author of the parchments had thoroughly concealed any mention of themselves, so hearing the unexpected name had caught him off guard.

He took several deep breaths to calm himself.

“What about Squad Leaders Johnson and Roel?”

“Squad Leaders Johnson and Roel have fallen in battle, sir.”

“…They sacrificed themselves to deliver the information?”

“Yes, sir.”

“May God’s peace be with them.”

Gilbert made the sign of the cross in this world’s custom, briefly mourning their deaths. A proper funeral would have to wait until their bodies were recovered, but he couldn’t help but pray for their souls at this moment.

Their deaths had resulted from the orders he had given.

“Captain Leila. Your body hasn’t fully recovered yet, so just tell me the exact location of the entrance to the cavern. I’ll report about Horizon and then recover their bodies.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“Don’t push yourself.”

“No, I’m fine. If we’re recovering their bodies, I must do it with my own hands.”

Gilbert looked at Leila, whose eyes were wide open. Though she didn’t say it, he could see the burden of two lives and the grief she carried. Having felt that same feeling to the point of nausea, Gilbert nodded in understanding.

“Then be ready. I’ll go meet with Her Highness the Princess.”

“Understood.”

Gilbert immediately set out to find Seraphina.