----Kouki Arakawa's Point of View

　The attack from the New World has begun, and the area around the old Moscow station where I am located is filled with the impact and sound of enemy artillery shells landing. If the report from the communications team earlier is correct, there should be quite a few suits deployed in the vicinity, but will this place last?　No, but how can you fight a defensive battle when you can't contact each unit before that?　Perhaps this concern was evident on his face, but Captain Yuliya spoke to him in a somewhat amused tone of voice.

'Volka, you probably learned the methods of modern warfare from your father, Colonel?'

'Well yes. Even the battle I participated in not long ago, I experienced modern warfare using power suits as the mainstay.

'Hmm. So, do you know how the world was at war before you were born, i.e., 150 years ago, when there were no power suits?

　Should we talk about the world 150 years ago, meaning the world before I died, or should we talk about 150 years ago in 'this world', based on which standard? Well, it doesn't make much difference either way when you don't have a suit, so I'll talk about it based on the world before I died....

I believe it was in the form of overwhelming air power to take control of the airspace, and then air-supported ground forces taking over key targets.

'Hmm, around 70 points. To be exact, it involves all troops, including naval forces, but we'll leave that for now. Now the next question, how do you think a country with an overwhelming power gap with an enemy country fought a defensive battle?

　I don't understand what in the world the Captain is trying to say. An overwhelming national power differential?　The only way to do that is to conduct guerrilla warfare like we're doing now. What I want to know is not about tactics or strategy, but how to get in touch with the other teams...
　Wait....?　There are other things that didn't exist 150 years ago. For example, my personal device........this was not the world I lived in. In that era, mobile phones were used in place of terminals - that's right!　That's what it means.

"Phone line....

'A hundred points this time. After all, geniuses are somewhat unusual, they don't usually come up with the word 'telephone' in today's conversation. I'm rather surprised that you, as a researcher, know the telephone, a relic of the past.

　I don't know exactly how long it's been since there have been no phone lines used, either. From what I've seen in my mom's room before, all commercial voice communications should have been migrated to a satellite network around 2020, with very few emergency lines left. About eighty years later, surely it would be unusual for someone my age to know a telephone, as the Captain says.

I was originally going to ask you a few questions, but I hope you came up with some answers. The current situation is that our communications team is trying to communicate with other units using the telephone lines that surround the old Moscow city. The situation is going as expected, so don't look so worried. I have more to ask you than that.

What is it?

'I was referring to your earlier statement. What is this interspecies war you participated in with Noah?

I can't tell you all the details without my mother's permission, but I'll start with the founding of Noah...

　I explain to the Captain what Noah really is. I also tell him, while slurring my words, that they were originally looking for a place to take refuge but have grown in scale, and that the Hakone base is not Noah's headquarters, but actually a fortress to protect the gate that leads to the other world.
　Well, there won't be a problem since I'll know about this area even if I don't want to once I officially join Noah. When I went further into the subject of interactions with non-human species and alliances with other species in the other world G-88, the captain listened to my words with a difficult look on his face.
　As usual, ignoring the shells landing near the administration building, the conversation helped me calm my mind, which helped me regain my composure under the unusual circumstances. Perhaps the captain is trying to calm me down with his questions and conversations. I'm the one who is being saved....





----Yuliya Viewpoint.........

It's hard to believe...

　As soon as I finished listening to Arakawa, I couldn't help but let the words slip out of my mouth as if I were talking to myself. The boy in front of me is smiling gently without any unpleasant expression of displeasure even as he hears my words. Probably, everything I just said is true. If he were to lie, he would say something a little more sane, and above all, Arakawa's current calmness proves it. A person who has not experienced battlefield can't talk calmly under the circumstances of shrapnel raining down around him, then everything this boy says is the truth.

Captain, we're online.

　As I was meditating and thinking, one of my subordinates had just set up a nostalgic shaped phone on his desk. Oh no, I have to concentrate on the battle at hand now.... I pulled myself together and gave orders to the communications team to report the current status of the squad.

First and second squads, no enemy sightings. Standing by.

Outpost sniper team is on the line. Enemy power suit squadron in sight, moving into attack position.

The snipers are about to engage the enemy and if we can only distract them from here, we can move on to the next mission. But what about the 3rd Squad?　Why didn't we hear from them?

Let me know what's going on with the third squad!

Hold on, we just got through. The 3rd squad is engaging the enemy's power suits!　Due to the size of the platoon, we are in a disguised withdrawal to blast point 1-3 as planned.

　You're an idiot and you're fast on your heels and that's where you're going to end up. We can't destroy your power suits with conventional explosives, but we can do a lot of things, including blowing up the subway and crushing them with rubble to crush them out of action. In the meantime, we need to remove as many enemy troops as possible before this strategy is discovered by the enemy, or we will be destitute. At this point, my other orders are to prepare the helicopters.

'Get the choppers ready!　Look, you want to position them so that they look like a tiger cub, okay?　You're not going to use it anyway, so disguise it to look like tasty bait. And of course, keep plenty of explosives around it.

Yes, sir!

　Okay, okay somehow the battlefield is still under control, now it's just a matter of when to send Arakawa out. Speaking of which, he's gone quiet all of a sudden, what's up with that?　I craned my neck to look for it in question, and I caught sight of him looking intently at a pamphlet that I thought had been dropped on the station's premises.

'What's up?'

...Operation High Jump, the German Third Reich... No, no way.

What do you mean by that?

　Arakawa turned at my question and asked with a panicked look on his face.

'Captain, has the United States of 'this world' sent troops to Antarctica since the 1940s?　Officially or unofficially, it doesn't matter!

Antarctica?　Hmm, if I remember correctly, they sent it in '48 and '51; I remember the '51 one was unofficial.

How big?

I don't know much about it. But the records said it was a large force, including many aircraft carriers. What's wrong with that?

'Wait a minute, I haven't sorted myself out yet. I have one more question.... Your mother is probably going to ask for a UN force to rescue me, and I'm sure other countries will join in to ingratiate themselves to Noah, and in that case the main force will be...

The United States Army.

　Arakawa seems to be meditating and thinking desperately about something as I answer. In the meantime, I'm getting word from the units under my command every minute. I'm sure the situation is in our favor, but if we are fighting so well against the power suits, it should be right there in the tactical textbooks.

Captain, we can't retreat. We will probably.... no, we will definitely be killed.

What... what do you mean?

　Without hesitation, the genius in front of me, who asked me a question while unintentionally glaring at me, began to tell me the reason without hesitation. And I was finally reminded of the reason why this guy in front of me was called a 'monster'.