I Have Returned, but I Cannot Lay down My Gun

Chapter 687

-[Setting visual blackout timer. This message will not be visible to the trainee.]

-[Two unarmed personnel, five armed enemies to be deployed in succession.]

-[5 seconds until Hood Box simulation starts. // Trainee - Lorenatina Christopher Brenner.]

Swish!

As soon as the pre-procedure of the Icarus Gear, which had blocked out all light, was lifted, Lorenatina’s red eyes immediately focused.

She began scanning her surroundings at an incredible speed. She checked the front first, raised her weapon, and assessed the presence behind her. From there, Lorenatina gathered two pieces of information.

One behind her.

Two in front.

A civilian woman, unarmed, was running towards her with both hands raised, and behind her, an armed assailant was chasing her. In that moment, Lorenatina pulled the trigger twice, once to the chest and once to the head, aiming at the armed assailant.

As the hologram of the armed assailant disappeared in an instant, she sensed the presence behind her and immediately turned to confirm the man’s figure. A sturdy man, but unarmed.

Without hesitation, she drew her pistol from the holster, switched the ammunition to non-lethal shock rounds, and shot him in the knee. The hologram collapsed to the ground, looking strikingly lifelike.

At that moment, another enemy appeared.

“Die!”

Pick! Pick!

With a sharp metallic sound, an enemy’s head flew off from the side. The muffled sound of the gunshot echoed through the box, passing through the silencer.

She confirmed the two unarmed personnel and had already killed two out of the five enemies. Next, an enemy holding a grenade without its pin barged in. Lorenatina shot both of his knees, breaking his legs and ensuring that the grenade he carried would detonate by its own force.

While this happened, she killed two more enemies in succession. The moment the grenade exploded, sending the man’s body into pieces, Lorenatina ignored the explosion and aimed at the hologram of the woman, firing once more.

She picked up the handgun that had fallen to the floor.

With the metallic sound, the simulation ended, and a voice, seemingly astonished, came from above.

Lorenatina chuckled softly and looked up. There was a balcony above the Hood Box, and about three people stood on it, overlooking the simulation.

They were Alpha-level mutants.

Logan spoke up.

“She’s not training, she’s shooting a movie. Who blocks a grenade like that?”

“A crazy person who charges with a grenade in hand is a natural disaster. Pretending not to protect the unarmed man behind her was a small deduction, though…”

“You know your stuff.”

“If I were the chief instructor observing this training, I would have deducted points for that.”

The Green Team.

A group formed to test whether Tier 2 - Navy SEALs - are qualified to join Tier 1, such as DEVGRU.

Even with the gunfire still smoking, Lorenatina swept her bangs with one hand and sighed, watching the hologram of the man melt away as it disappeared.

Logan added notes to the data plate before speaking.

“This is ridiculous. How the hell did Task Force Blue - another name for DEVGRU - let this insane person rise to Gold Squadron?”

“What’s wrong with putting a hole in the civilian’s hologram head after picking up the gun?”

“You were waiting to grab the gun, you crazy bastard.”

“And you, being a high-ranking grunt, would know it’s more reasonable to blow up the problem rather than try to disarm them during a heated engagement.”

As he said, Lorenatina didn’t cross the line but certainly toyed with it.

Logan was experiencing the absurdity of the situation in real-time, but surprisingly, it seemed like she was just barely managing to stay within the boundaries.

It was a justified action. In any engagement, no exceptions were made. Whether they were kids, the elderly, or women, as soon as someone grabs a weapon, they’re treated as armed, and they had to be eliminated.

Logan just felt uneasy.

Shark added:

“I get what you’re worried about. To you, it might seem like I’m enjoying these kills. You’re not wrong. That’s why I ended up handling all the black ops and earned my second lieutenant rank at just 36.”

“...And they probably gave you that rank because they trust you to control it. This is driving me crazy. When the military police show up at our quarters, I’ll make sure they take you away.”

“I’ve never had that happen in 16 years of service, so rest easy. If you’re that curious, ask the owl guy I worked with on the operation.”

To his surprise, during the operations, he had never intentionally put a hole in a civilian’s head. He just did his duty as a soldier... killing people.

“I got it, I got it. Let’s not talk about it.”

Logan wondered if this team would ever really come together.

Logan thought about it, but unfortunately, Lorenatina couldn’t figure it out herself.

Tier 1 wasn’t just about being good at fighting, having great physical abilities, or being smart enough to put holes in people’s heads. Psychological tests and social background checks were the basics.

And Lorenatina passed all of those, reaching the top 0.001% of the elite members of Gold Squadron among the seals...

‘...The world’s a mess, but she’s still doing alright.’

Logan shook his head, walking toward his mental sanctuary.

Of course, there was no need to mention that his mental sanctuary was Eugene, and the “polar bear” was fondly squeezing the soft cheeks of the harmless anaconda she had turned into, murmuring:

“You shouldn’t get too attached to that bad seal.”

“Uweeh-?”

“Hey, ground dog! Put our rookie down! She needs Hood Box training too!”

“If you’re mad, come up here.”

Their bodies were strong enough to jump 2-3 meters to grab onto something, so the shark, carrying a 30kg military pack, jumped a meter with a sergeant’s jump, grabbed the balcony railing - which bent under the weight - and climbed up, punishing Logan, who was playfully squeezing Eugene.

Eugene, with a somewhat disgruntled expression, went down, and the highlight of the day—the final Hood Box training for Eugene—began.

As the team’s rookie walked down the stairs with a nervous expression, the three evaluators shared a laugh and added:

“Tier 1 leaders chosen from all branches? If I were down there, I’d be so nervous I’d bite my tongue.”

“Damn, thinking about it brings back memories from Green Team. It was pretty awful…”

“We don’t do that kind of thing. Instead, we cause hell in the field. If you don’t do your training, you’ll get shot in close combat, but here, if you mess up the coordinates, you’ll get shot and blown up by our own team.”

“Let’s get started. Set the timer.”

Click.

At the same time, the timer ticked down, which Eugene couldn’t see. How long had it passed? The holograms began to form. As enemies and unarmed civilians were created, the three of them watched Eugene, who was nervously tapping his fingers.

The Hood Box training had an extremely high difficulty, so much so that even Lorenatina had some difficulty with it. Moreover, Eugene had never experienced anything like this just a few weeks ago.

However, once the Icarus Gear and mutant traits were combined, Eugene began performing above expectations.

“...Oh?”

“Is it just me, or is the hesitation bothering you?”

“It’s unavoidable. But even with the hesitation, he’s faster than the Green Team guys.”

“Because of the Icarus Gear and mutant traits, is he compensating for his lack of situational judgment? If he keeps at it, he’ll improve quickly.”

As they said, Eugene was far beyond the limits of human auditory and visual reaction speeds—0.1 seconds for hearing and 0.2 seconds for sight. He was surpassing those limits, just like everyone in the room.

They could react as quickly as 0.01 seconds. Logan, Lorenatina, and Olivia all experienced the sensation of seeing the world in slow motion. In close combat, they could even dodge bullets by seeing the movement of a finger.

But they weren’t dodging the bullets themselves.

In any case, as they said, Eugene was thinking and making decisions during those split-second moments that would normally be governed by muscle memory and instinct. He was acting on those decisions with impressive precision.

Simply put, he was already good enough to match a Tier 2 special forces performance.

Of course, the only one who didn’t know that was Eugene.

Despite that, the three of them started marking down points for improvement.

In less than 10 seconds, the first session was complete, and they added with satisfied expressions:

“Better than expected?”

“You’ve got a lot of work ahead of you, rookie. Let’s keep going.”

“Uweeh…”

Someone laughed quietly, but fortunately, Eugene didn’t hear it as he started preparing for the next session.

Though it was a little embarrassing, it was genuinely cute.

Today, as always, the trio was laughing thanks to their rookie.

“Artemis Technologies is a defense contractor that betrayed its country to work for an enemy state. They were making prototypes of drones and various UGVs for the military. Now, all their personnel are designated for extermination.”

“They hacked into the networks of anti-aircraft bases in Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and other states in the early days of the Omega virus outbreak. They separated them from NORAD. It’s believed that enemy states used this opportunity to send reconnaissance teams.”

“...What’s NORAD?”

“It stands for North American Aerospace Defense Command. I told you to study, right? That’s one ball-tuck credit for you.”

“Uh, I’ll pay it back now…”

As always, Eugene was sitting there, cheeks puffed up in embarrassment.

After all, he had to train hard to repay the punishment of those cheeks. He couldn’t help but feel both thankful and guilty.

But in this situation, it was actually easier to understand. Knowing who they would be fighting and their backgrounds turned out to be more interesting than expected.

During the Omega virus crisis, he never imagined there would be people willing to sell out their country. But here it was.

He had never expected such treason to actually happen, and he was reminded of the time Korea had gone through something similar.

However, sadly, the current situation was even worse than the Japanese occupation period. With Russia and China planning a double assault, the odds were overwhelmingly bad. It was as if he were facing a natural disaster.

The only difference was that there was no national-level disaster insurance for a country like his.

“So, what are we going to do next?”

“It’s simple. We’ll give a grand welcome to these guys who confidently stepped into America. Let’s stop them from reporting back to their home country and crush their toys. I can already see how happy they are.”

“Enemy size?”

“About two company-sized units. We’re just four people. With a full team, maybe eleven. Including Eagle Team and EX Squadron.”

“If one person takes down twenty people…will that even work? Seriously, this operation is insane.”

“Instead, we’ll have all the air support we need. Once we confirm that there are no civilians around, we can crush them unilaterally. The problem is, we need someone capable of Special Reconnaissance for that.”

At the same time, everyone turned their gaze to Olivia.

Eugene followed suit, glancing around reflexively as everyone else did.

Later, Eugene would learn that the 24th Special Tactics Squadron, to which Olivia belonged, was divided into Combat Control Team (CCT), Pararescue Jumper (PJ), Special Reconnaissance (SR), and Tactical Air Control Party (TACP).

What they needed now was Special Reconnaissance, and Olivia was the only one who had expertise in that. Lorenatina and Logan had to pull personnel from the 24th Special Tactics Squadron instead of learning those skills themselves.

It was a lot to process, but the important fact was that Olivia was the only person with reconnaissance capabilities essential for the operation.

Particularly—night reconnaissance.

She spoke up.

“It’s not impossible, but it’s not my specialty, so I’m not as proficient.”

“Eagle Team?”

“We don’t have anyone who specializes in SR right now, and they’re all on light duty. Plus, in a big city like this, Special Reconnaissance is almost meaningless. As soon as you hide in a building, thermal imaging and standard equipment are useless.”

“So, we need something beyond standard equipment. Maybe you and Logan should come with me?”

“Logan’s still adjusting to the Icarus Gear, so he can’t. As for you… if I assign you to the Special Reconnaissance mission, it would mess up the strike team’s balance.”

“You’re suggesting we bring the rookie?”

“…”

Wait a second?

This wasn’t how I imagined it, but the conversation was moving quickly, almost without my input.

As I was fumbling over my words, they continued talking.

“I still think it’s a bad idea.”

“It’s true that only Icarus Operators can properly operate the drones linked to the gear.”

“Damn, is it really that bad? Maybe it’d be better if I went with Olivia.”

“We might not need the rookie, but the Icarus Gear is necessary. You still can’t handle it properly, so you’re out. We have some time before the operation, so think carefully before making a decision.”

At the same time, Olivia came up behind me and added,

Soft and gentle… or rather, I should say, her big chest was pressing against my back.

She spoke.

“Don’t worry, rookie. There’s still about two weeks until the operation, so things could change by then. Let’s do our best until then.”

“…Ugh.”

At that moment, I was caught between the desire to be a useful member of the operation and the urge to send someone else instead.

My journey ahead still felt so long.

“Wow, that’s some serious thickness. What’s this? A TACP manual?”

“That, along with the Special Reconnaissance material. You’ll need to learn it eventually, so I’m giving it to you now.”

“Should I be the one saying this? Isn’t it a little harsh to be giving this to a kid?”

“Maybe, but we’ll find a way to help you heal, somehow.”

“Heal?”

“…Never mind. It’s not something I can explain right now.”

A few hours later, the three mutants were sitting together while Eugene wasn’t there.

As they fiddled with the thick manuals on the table, Olivia realized she had made a mistake and avoided Logan’s gaze.

It was a healing method she couldn’t reveal just yet.

It would be a while before Logan discovered what that really meant.