Shadow Slave

Somehow, almost everyone in the convoy was still alive. Looking at it from the roof of the Rhino, Sunny felt both burdened and surprised. He had not really expected to get this far into the mountains without suffering severe casualties.

Was he supposed to feel proud of himself?

'...Let's try to keep it this way, then.'

By now, his shadows had already climbed the nearest peaks, allowing him to observe the surrounding area. The tunnel they had escaped from might not have been endless, but as it turned out, it was actually quite long. More than that, it cut straight through the mountains instead of meandering its way around the gorges and canyons. As a result, and due to the previous days of travel, the convoy had managed to cover a lot of ground and was more than a third of the way to Erebus Field.

Sadly, the good news ended there.

'That... is troubling.'

Sunny glanced at the screen of his communicator, then climbed back into the interior of the APC and opened the map of the Antarctic Center as a projection in the command suite.

They had reached the edges of the section that he had marked back in the abandoned bunker. From here onward, all Sunny had to go on was the stock map, which was not very detailed, and outdated on top of that. The battle between the Saints and the Titans had changed the topography of the entire region, and there were the effects of the Chain of Nightmares itself to consider, too.

Of course, he could always repeat the process and update the map with the help of his shadows again. Which was exactly what he had been planning to do...And why his mood was currently so foul.

With a sigh, Sunny started to put new marks on the projection. Soon, the position of the convoy was surrounded by a sea of red lines and symbols that stretched far to the north, with barely any green in between.

'Damnation.'

The path ahead... was going to be rough, to say the least. They must have been relatively close to the place where the three Saints of the First Evacuation Army had battled the Winter Beast, the Goliath, and the Whispering Legion, eliminating the latter Titan. The resulting earthquake had destroyed a good chunk of the mountain range and made a mess of the surrounding area.

Sunny was trying to come up with a way to get the convoy through that mess, but it seemed all but impossible.

Most of the roads were destroyed, and those that remained were buried under heavy debris. Avalanches, landslides, and rockfalls were everywhere, reshaping the landscape. The damage was much worse here than Sunny had expected.

And there were Nightmare Creatures, of course. The whole area was seething with them, and he had already spotted at least two dozen active Gates, with more probably hidden from view by the overturned terrain.

Sunny was not sure if the Rhino would be able to make it through, let alone the civilian vehicles. No matter how hard he tried to find a safe route, there seemed to be none to be found.

His mood turned dark.

After a while, Sunny decided to get a fresh pair of eyes to take a look at the map, or better yet, several. He ordered the Irregulars to gather in the APC, and invited Sergeant Gere as well. Professor Obel was already there, so Sunny simply asked the old man to join him in the command suite.

Soon, everyone arrived, and an improvised strategy meeting started. The result was about as disturbing as Sunny had expected. No one seemed to have a good idea on how to proceed. Dorn was currently pointing at a certain point of the map:

"... if we can use our Echoes to lead the Nightmare Creatures deeper into the gorge, we might be able to drive past this Gate without being swarmed by enemies. From there, we can follow the auxiliary road to the pass and get some breathing room."

Samara shook her head.

"Even if we manage to avoid the Nightmare Creatures, you are overestimating the civilian transports. Most of them won't make it on this extremely rough terrain. We are already struggling to keep them from falling apart, and this whole stretch of the mountains is basically a high intensity obstacle course."She sighed, then looked at Sunny with a somber expression.

"There is one more thing everyone is forgetting about, too. Fuel cells. They are not exhausted yet, but going through a gauntlet like that will put them under strain, which I don't think we can afford. Driving through the mountains is one thing... driving through this disaster zone is another."

Sunny frowned, then glanced at Sergeant Gere.

"Can't we improvise something to charge the transports up?"

The soldier hesitated for a few moments. Eventually, he sighed.

"We can cannibalize the military vehicles, if need be. The power systems are not exactly compatible, but with the help of Awakened Kim and Samara, some sort of converter can be rigged. The soldiers can join the refugees inside the transports... but, apart from the obvious loss of defensive capability, there are other factors against that solution. We are not too high on energy reserves ourselves, and the transports are much more power-hungry. So it won't be a drastic change... maybe a difference of another hundred kilometers or so, in this cold."

Sunny let out a heavy sigh, thinking of other solutions.

There were all kinds of wild ideas in his head, like hitching one of the transports to Nightmare and letting the black steed pull it like a mundane drudge. The Rhino could manage one, too.

...Hell, with a proper harness, Sunny would probably be able to pull one of the transports himself. That would be a sight to behold!

He grimaced.

'Join the army, she said. You will earn lots of contribution points, she said! Curse it all...'

Was that why he had become an officer? To be strapped into a damned yoke and pull a wagon like a glorified ox?

The idea was ridiculous, anyway. Sure, it was theoretically possible to pull the civilian transports in case they lost power, but what about heating? What about light? How would the civilians survive hundreds of kilometers of traveling through the mountains, in the middle of a polar night, without those things?At that moment, Luster suddenly spoke:

"There is an option that we are all overlooking, isn't there? One that is not only viable, as far as terrain is concerned, but will also get us to Erebus Field within a day."

The others looked at him with confusion, while Sunny's face darkened.

The young man smiled sheepishly, then added:

"I mean, I know that it's risky... but it's right under our noses."

With that, he pointed at the map. There, at the very edge of the mountains, a thick red line was stretching far north.

The coastal highway.