86

As long as their language differs, their skin color differs, their ancestors are deemed to be of different tribes, they will be found pigs taking on the appearance of humans. By suppressing and slaughtering them, surely there is no issue per say with regards to human rights violations.

The moment every person rationalized it, the moment every person deemed it as appropriate, the Republic of San Magnolia began its descent towards destruction, and at the same time, that was its demise.

~Vladlena Millize (Memoirs)

The remains of the five Republic units were leaning upon each other, enclosed in a case of hardened glass, remaining there for eternity.

The location was along the streets of the city controlled by the Republican Geade Federation. Under the blue sky that was as clear as the best sapphire was a beautiful, fleeting scenery, as though isolated scenery. It was along the border of the old San Magnolia Republic and Geade Empire, a little closer to the latter.

Standing in the glass protection zone she was permitted to enter was eighteen year old Vladlena Millize, looking up at the remains of the "Juggernaut" that resembled a headless knight. A tinge of red was on her flowing silver hair, landing upon the shoulders of her now black Republican Army uniform.

Before they were encased in glass, the had been white armor thoroughly weathered, covered with scars of various sizes. The burn marks from cannon blasts or lingering heat remained distinguishable, and the severely contorted frames could barely be pieced together to its original form. The "Scavenger" lying by the side of the remains had a line of words that could barely be seen.

Fido. Our loyal— the rest of the words were swallowed by the blast, never to be known again.

However, she could guess whatever it was.

Why did Shinn not give that cat a name, yet named the "Scavenger?" Only then did she realize.

To them, who lived and died as fated on the battlefield, only the ones that fought alongside them and died along with them were their comrades. Only those that managed to survive the same battlefields, fought until the very end in a corner of the battlefield, and experienced the same war, could be considered a comrade.

The five additional containers Fido transported were all discarded. Each container would be discarded once depleted, so as to ease the load. It was said that the container within Fido was almost empty, and given that it was still controlled territory, the distance travelled probably added up.

The five of them, expected to last no more than a few days, spent an entire month, used up a month\'s worth of supplies, and reached the very end.

They crossed the contested area on the side of the Republic, even passing through the controlled area, and approached the contested area of the Federation. It was at this point that they had finally ran out of supplies… and probably died in battle.

This was where their journey ended.

Shinn left behind the plates with the five hundred and seventy six names engraved upon them, and it was said that the plates were discovered amidst the wreckage of the "Juggernaut." That plate was taken out temporarily when the glass coffin was made, duplicated, the names recorded, and returned.

Two years ago, Shinn came here. However, the Republic could not follow in their steps.

The Republic was wiped out. As Shinn had predicted back then, it fell due to its arrogance.

Since then, Lena was appointed as Handler for another squadron, in charge of commanding its operations.

She did not fight alongside them. She knew very well that all she could do on the battlefield was sacrifice. If they died, that was it, and given that she could not fight alongside Shinn and the others until the very end, the image of a tragic heroine did not match her at all.

She had submitted her report on the "Black Sheep," "Shepherd," and the long distance cannon, but her superiors had dismissed them as the ramblings of the Eighty Sixers and unconfirmed rumors, discarding them aside. Even the lack of maintenance of the interception cannon was never resolved.

The battles in that zone were just as intense, the Processors were sacrificed one after another. However, Lena did not simply have them die, but personally led the battle, commanding her subordinates without mercy, squeezing out every bit of their blood. Before she knew it, Lena had gained a moniker.

"Bloody Regina."

It was probably derived from her name. Though it resembled an antagonist from a third rate movie, Lena was not particularly concerned with it. She had trampled upon them, forced them to battle, and yet was unable to save any of them. Such a moniker was befitting of her cruelty and arrogance.

However, the survival rates of her squadron was far superior to the others, and even after a year, there was no need for reshuffling. Slowly, the squadron under her charge were dubbed "The Queen\'s Men."

Whenever there were no missions, she went about visiting those that had opposed the containment, those that had hidden their friends or relatives, ex-Handlers who resigned when facing the retribution of their conscience, and recorded the names of the Eighty Sixers they remembered, their stories, their words. The country had purged their existence, but it could not purge their memories. So she thought, if one day, the Republic was to be wiped out, she wanted the whole world to know of this history.

And the watershed moment happened.

It was the National Day of the Republic. The high school valedictorian that year stood on stage, delivering a speech at the rally. That boy was of similar age to Lena, and she could only remember his eyes filled with rage.

"Of my classmates, many of them fought against the , and died."

There was some slight commotion in the audience, showing their sympathies to the speaker. Some of them wept.

The boy coldly lowered his gaze upon them, and suddenly roared agitatedly.

"They are derided by this country, called Eighty Sixers. —They died on the battlefield, but the one who sentenced them to death is this country! How long is this going to last!?"

Nobody in the audience agreed with them.

Some mocked him for not knowing the difference between a human and a pig. Some were as outraged as he was, but quietly bit their lips. Most of them remained callous, however, and paid no heed to his words, acting as though they were corpses.

The enemy attacks from the North had always been the weakest, but that night, an unprecedentedly massive army suddenly launched an assault.

The defenses were immediately overwhelmed by the massive differences in numbers.

They did not relay information to the Handler that their forces were all wiped out. It was not due to revenge, but because the Handlers who should have fulfilled their responsibilities were all partying away and celebrating, not one of them synchronized with their subordinates. Since not a single one did fulfill his duty, there was no need for them to report.

Most of the interception cannons could not be activated, and the few that could fire normally were blown apart by the Scorpions, along with the landmine zone. The few shots that barely got out were shot down by the Stachelschwein before they could explode.

And even the last line of defenses, the , was easily penetrated.

The Morpho.

A railgun type that shoots projectiles at an astonishing speed of eight thousand meters per second.

It was a new type of enemy Spearhead Squadron had encountered and reported, only for the report to be discarded by the superiors.

Faced with the nightmarish destructive power of the railgun and the heavy bombardments, the defensive fortifications were simply a sitting duck, targets that were instantly obliterated. By the time the government had understood what was going on, the had invaded the Eighty Five Zones.

Over the past eleven years, the citizens had left all fighting responsibility to the Eighty Sixers, so naturally, they could not fight.

A week after the had fallen.

The Republic was wiped out.

It was no punishment, for none of them died regretting their degradation and callousness. Most of them begrudged the incompetence of others, lamenting their innocence and untimely deaths. For the sinners who knew not of their deeds, death was no punishment to them.

As she was in the first area, Lena managed to avoid the assault from the north. At the same time, she was amply prepared, and managed to implement countermeasures.

She had all the heavy cannons near the landmines fire at the latter, blasted a path through, and opened the gates of the . With the hidden function Arnett had implemented, she had all surviving Processors synchronized, and requested for them to fight within the Eighty Five zeons.

"The Queen\'s Men," members of the squadrons under her charge, and other forces responded to her call.

Of course, not all of them were willing to fight back out of the goodness of their heart. Most of them were aiming for the better living conditions inside the Eighty Five areas, including the electricity and the production plants, and others came along to help their comrades who were stuck in other squads and Concentration Camp.

Once these forces were gathered, Lena led the defenses.

A few Albas rode on the spare "Juggernauts" and went into despair, and more citizens were too busy tripping over, falling into despair. Some unabashedly showed their rage and disdain for the Eighty Sixers, but this time, the situation had changed as compared to how it was back then. The powerful weapons and firepower were not in their hands, but in the Eighty Sixers\'.

In the face of the ferocious enemy, the Eighty Sixers continued to focus on battling, and endured, wanting no part of any foolish infighting. If the battle continued a little longer however, the consequences would have been unpredictable.

Two months into the defensive battle, they received reinforcements from a neighboring country.

Their reinforcements came from a country in the Far East that had crossed the controlled territories, and their borders.

The Geade Federation, which had vanquished the Empire, and was reborn as a Republic. While most of the was concentrated in the north, they broke through the thinned eastern battlefront.

Soon after the Empire declared war, it was destroyed due to a civilian revolution, and what the other countries heard was a wireless transmission of the last stronghold. It seemed that in their efforts to eliminate the Empire, the Federation had deemed the as enemy, and had been fighting for ten years. Many of its people voluntarily joined the army, for it firmly believed that protecting their country, their compatriots, was their duty as citizens, that they admired the ideals of a Republic, so much so that they could destroy their own country, and slowly regained their lands.

With the most advanced weapons and an elite military, the tide began to change. The first area was reclaimed, but there was friction between them.

The citizens of the Republic celebrated the arrival of the Federation, but things did not end there.

For some reason, the Federation knew very well of the atrocities that the Republic did to the Federation\'s people and the Colorata deemed as Eighty Sixers.

Before they attacked the Eighty Five Zones, the Federation saved the surviving Eighty Sixers from the Concentration Camps and frontline bases, and they had witnessed the tragic fates of the oppressed.

Since you hate other colors, you can dye your flag completely white. So the Commander of the reinforcements barked at the President and Inner Cabinet of the Republic.

The Federation decided to prioritize the protection of the Eighty Sixers, that if they were willing, they would be granted citizenship, unconditionally.

The Albas too had the bare minimum of support, but the investigations into the extent of oppression was prioritized.

They found a vast amount of personal particulars files in the underground warehouse of the national military headquarters, and these files were considered to be relatively well preserved. A certain official of the human resource branch had secretly preserved and hidden the records of the KIA. The Federation was stunned by the vast amount of information, and was skeptical that the recent batches of KIA were all young soldiers, but they kindly accepted the understanding that there were a few kind souls in the Republic.

However, they found the records of those detained in the Concentration Camps, heard the survivors describe their circumstances, and found a vast amount of bones near the Camps and bases that were not buried in time. Their attitude became much colder as a result. Also, once they came across the records of human experimentation, trading of infants and babies, and footage of soldiers slaughtering them, the Federation deemed the citizens of the Republic as no different from trash.

The Federation could have ceased all aid to the Albas, but they continued to provide the bare minimum.

Perhaps this aid was a form of punishment. Scum you may be, but we shall not do the same thing to you, or we too will become like you.

Those who knew their own sin would be ashamed. Those swines that did not were no different from being dead. This was a silent judgment.

After reclaiming the zones to the north of the first zone, the Federation required officers of the old Republic to bolster their ranks, as a commander for the counterattack forces, or an adviser.

Most of them hesitated, but Lena answered the call. Thus, she stood here.

Lena left the glass case, and from the street, she picked up a little bag along with a cage containing a black cat with white legs, returning to the ranks. Standing in this garden of a spring rhapsody were the remains of the "Juggernauts," along with the stone plates containing five hundred and seventy six names. These were their gravestones that had reached this place, after all the battles, after all the time they had survived.

As she had no idea the graves were here, she had not prepared any flowers, and could never do so.

She did not arrive here on her own strength, and had no right to present flowers to them.

Faced with the higher ups of the Federation awaiting her, she lowered her head slightly.

"My apologies, Your Excellency. I have kept you waiting."

"Not at all. In no way is giving time to mourn the dead waiting."

Showing a calm smile was a middle-aged, high ranking Jet, who resembled a scholar more than a high ranking government official. His round framed glasses had high degree in the lenses, his black hair had some white in it, and he was dressed in an ordinary red.

His kind eyes that showed no offense were narrowed at Lena, who was dressed in black, a part of her hair dyed red.

"Red symbolizes the blood that flows, while black represents the sending off of the dead, \'Bloody Regina…\' .in fact, many in the Federation felt there was no need to save the scum of the Republic, that they should simply protect their Colorata compatriots — but seeing people like you make us think that yes, our decision remains correct. Welcome, Colonel Millize. The Geade Federation welcomes your arrival."

Seeing his welcoming smile, Lena showed a perturbed one, shaking her head. The flowing blood belonged to others, and the ones who died were all her subordinates. For the black clothed Queen who was stained in blood, such praise was hard to accept.

The Federation official watched her body of purity in a doting manner. Before she knew it, there were a few young Federation officers standing behind him, all dressed in the steel-colored Federation uniform.

"Please come. I shall introduce you as the commander of our new squad."

"Understood."

Before she walked off, Lena again looked back at the graves behind her.

The four legged spiders and the remains of those that followed were leaning upon each other, sleeping silently. That was where the footsteps of those youths ended, the youths who fought their way through this cruel life, and smiled on along the way through their journey.

The war had not ended. The forces still occupied a majority of the continent. At this moment, there were still people who continued to fight, yearning to live.

Fight. Until the very last moment, until the last unit is defeated.

For them, only those that struggled until the very end, for the sake of arriving at their destination, could enter the promised land.

Lena turned her head around adamantly, and took a step forward. The five officers of similar age saluted in unison. She walked towards them, towards another battlefield awaiting her.

For the sake of fighting on, for the sake of survival.