「IED (Improvised Explosive Device)」
Just as its name suggested, it was a homemade bomb assembled from readily available materials, with countless variations in both design and recipe.
This was not merely a relic of the past.
Not only terrorist organizations like the Red Hand that had grown into full-fledged warlord factions, but also countless nameless terrorists, space pirates, separatist independence movements, and even radical protesters made frequent use of them.
Nor were they difficult to make.
One could build one with nothing more than fertilizer.
There was a reason they were called “the terrorist's sweetheart.”
Of course, Ner's objective was merely to buy time and divert attention, so she had no need for a particularly powerful explosion.
‘Increase the flammability and produce as much smoke as possible.’
There was no need to search for instructions.
The necessary knowledge surfaced naturally whenever she dug through her memories.
Obtaining the materials was equally easy.
Although Lillian's laboratory and research room had been temporarily sealed off by the Military Police, the Level-1 security card Ner had been issued for the research building had never been confiscated.
‘Ammonium nitrate... and this can serve as the detonator...’
She occasionally crossed paths with Military Police officers.
But they merely looked at her with pity or deliberately avoided her gaze out of an odd sense of guilt.
Naturally.
They knew the rumors about Ner.
Her guardian, for all intents and purposes, Instructor Jin Crow, was gone.
Professor Lillian, whom she had followed like a teacher, was gone.
Chief Researcher Naomi was gone as well.
How lonely must she have felt?
Soldiers were not emotionless machines.
Several of them even had daughters around her age.
As a result, Ner was able to hide the improvised explosive device inside the women's restroom of Building F, the one farthest from the rear entrance and monitored only by outdated hallway CCTV cameras, without arousing even the slightest suspicion.
KABOOOOOM!
That night, immediately after the explosion echoed—
〔Fire alarm activated. Fire alarm activated. Sector F-7. All researchers are requested to evacuate immediately...〕
Smoke rapidly filled the corridors of Sector F.
Seeing the situation, the Military Police concluded that the fire was larger than expected and immediately requested reinforcements.
“What? Reinforcements? Where did the supervisors go...? W-What the hell is that?”
“The fire's much bigger than expected!”
“Shit!”
The smoke even poured out through a slightly opened window.
Eventually, even the Military Police guarding the external research facility hesitated briefly before hurrying toward the disturbance.
“Hey! You two stay here!”
“Y-Yes, sir!”
Of course, not all of them left.
But Ner had never expected every guard to abandon their posts.
Crouching behind a nearby trash bin like a stray cat, she observed the visibly flustered Military Police with her signature golden eyes gleaming.
‘Two.
Ordinary humans.’
It was her first real operation.
Anyone else might have been nervous.
But after calculating every possible variable, Ner calmly pressed the activation button on the high-voltage stun gun in her hand.
Crackle.
A brief spark danced through the air.
Even uniforms woven from high-elastic reinforced fibers offered no protection against enough electricity to pierce through and render someone unconscious.
‘It's single-use.
But it should handle two people.’
Even if it proved insufficient, it would not matter.
She had brought spares for precisely that reason.
The calculations were complete.
Now all that remained was execution—and identifying any bugs afterward.
Ner lightly pushed off the ground.
An instant later, she reached the guards' blind spot with a speed utterly impossible for an ordinary little girl.
Stepping onto a nearby crate beside the research facility, she leaped upward and instantly grabbed the Military Policeman standing guard by the back of his neck.
“Gaaah!”
Crackle!
“W-What—? Guaaaargh!”
The flash erupted.
The burst of electricity immediately collapsed the first officer.
The second, who had instinctively turned his head toward the disturbance, suffered the exact same fate.
The two men hung limply on the ground.
At first glance, they looked dead.
In reality, they had merely lost consciousness.
If anyone had witnessed the scene, however, they would have been shocked for an entirely different reason.
The movement Ner had displayed moments ago was not that of an ordinary young girl.
Even Jin Crow would probably have asked,
‘You had abilities like that?’
‘Stero Mer.’
After quickly surveying her surroundings, Ner entered the hangar-like facility while silently repeating his name.
The false prophet who had called himself Noah and sought to shoulder the fear of humanity's destruction.
That accursed name had become a painful memory.
Yet Ner's body itself was also the product of containing a large amount of his DNA.
No.
Perhaps it would be more accurate to call it stolen freedom.
Within the creation born from the desire to possess a body equal to the Penta Gear, she had secretly made her own preparations as well.
“It's cleaner inside than I expected.”
With that thought, Ner shook away her memories and sat before the main terminal.
The interior looked surprisingly similar to what she remembered.
She had roughly ten minutes.
Hoping to uncover something within that time, Ner began reviewing the files at a speed that would have made either Lillian or Naomi drag her straight into Fundamentum's graduate program.
Tap tap tap.
One hand typed across the keyboard while the other rapidly sorted through holographic documents and data.
The timeframe was the day before the Bishop incident.
Several minutes passed as she sifted through the enormous volume of records.
Eventually, Ner frowned at a set of data that felt strangely out of place.
‘This is the data from 2:00 a.m.
And this is from 2:05 a.m.’
Not only Bishop's, but every Creature's biological signals and synchronization values were stored on the server.
Naturally, those values were managed to remain within consistent ranges.
The problem was that the readings at 2:00 and 2:05 matched perfectly.
‘Training Dummies are machines, but their defining characteristic is that they imitate biological signal patterns.
Five minutes is far too short for those fluctuations to stabilize this perfectly.
Ten minutes might be understandable.
Five is impossible.’
It looked exactly like...
‘Copy and paste.’
Had Ner known nothing about Training Dummies, she might have dismissed it as a simple system error.
But she had learned directly from the foremost authority herself—Professor Lillian.
Nor was that the only issue.
‘The CCTV footage too.’
The surveillance system had also rebooted during that exact timeframe.
After copying the relevant files onto the device she had brought, Ner quietly left the facility.
“So it wasn't actually a fire?”
“No.
Just an unbelievable amount of smoke...”
Avoiding the returning Military Police, Ner concealed herself before circling around the facility and leaving the research building.
There were suspicious circumstances.
But they were merely suspicious circumstances.
If Ner had truly been nothing more than an exceptionally intelligent child, she might have taken this evidence straight to Ideale or Obia.
But Ner understood the current situation.
‘Factional conflict.
There is a high probability that Headmaster Ideale's Kukenhauzen Family is the target.
There is a 97.6% probability that accomplices among the instructors and cadets orchestrated this incident.’
That conclusion was based on information she had obtained by hacking messages exchanged among instructors, soldiers, and cadets through the academy's Blind community and various internal networks.
Simply proving Jin Crow's innocence would solve nothing.
This had become a political matter.
That was precisely why Ideale and Obia could not be trusted with the evidence.
No matter what proof they presented, the moment they became involved as one side of the conflict, the opposing faction would always find grounds to reject it.
After reaching that conclusion, one man came to Ner's mind.
‘The Pilgrim.’
For now...
He was the only answer.
Ten cadets dead.
The emotions that surged through the academy upon hearing those words were anger, grief...
And fundamental doubts regarding the Creature lectures conducted by Jin Crow.
“Let's admit what's obvious.
The Creature lectures are necessary.
But do we really have to use dangerous Training Dummies?
I heard the simulation rooms already have Creature scenarios.”
“Aton and Martin weren't completely wrong.
Hell, the instructor's the type who shoots cadets in the head just for talking back a little.
Anyone watching would think we're already fighting a war against Creatures.”
“I just feel sorry for Headmaster Ideale.
I heard every time Instructor Jin Crow walks into the headmaster's office, all anyone hears is them arguing.”
Whenever something terrible happened, human nature dictated that people first looked for someone to blame.
This incident was no different.
From the public's perspective, Jin Crow's offenses appeared obvious.
Excessively harsh training.
An excessively demanding curriculum.
Poor management.
Various forms of abuse.
Some of those accusations had been exaggerated by the Kukenhauzen side.
Even so, under the current circumstances, public opinion among the cadets deteriorated rapidly.
Of course...
Not everyone thought that way.
“His methods are extreme, but the lectures are necessary.
Why's everyone making such a fuss?”
Inside the lounge of the training grounds, which had gradually become their hideout, Dokgo Ran scratched his head as he spoke.
“...Ten people died.
It's not strange that people would react like this.”
Famille answered in a subdued voice while organizing the assignment displayed on her device.
Hino Kanae spoke next.
“And none of them have ever experienced a real battlefield.”
“...I agree with that.
But I can't blindly take the instructor's side either.
Bishop was simply too fast.”
“Still...”
“I'm not trying to argue, Kanae.
That's just how I see it.”
Meanwhile, Beatus carefully disassembled and cleaned his firearm while adding his own opinion.
Even among the Riders of the Stars, opinions had begun to split.
Watching them all in silence, Baek Hwi-young furrowed his brow.
‘This never happened before.
Targeting Jin Crow to bring down Ideale...’
The mastermind was not difficult to identify.
What unsettled him was the fact that the target had been Instructor Jin Crow.
Nothing like this had ever occurred during his previous regression.
Naturally.
Jin Crow had never once taught Creature lectures before.
And above all...
Everything was happening far earlier than it ever had.
‘That too must be because Jin Crow's actions raised Ideale's reputation.’
Sometimes, a subordinate's achievements alone could elevate their superior's standing.
From Atla Colony onward—and especially after Mercato—Ideale had become publicly known as the headmaster who had successfully tamed the mad dog called Jin Crow.
From Kukenhauzen's perspective, that was intolerable.
They had even delayed supplying her with Penta Gear-exclusive Special-duty equipment in an attempt to keep her under control.
Yet thanks to an instructor from an opposing faction, Ideale's position had steadily strengthened.
If this continued, the outcome was obvious.
Jin Crow would lose his position as an instructor.
Ideale would be removed as headmaster and demoted to a garrison stationed near Planet Kering, the Kukenhauzen Family's homeworld.
‘If I intervene... how?’
Several methods came to mind.
He could reveal the Kukenhauzen Family's atrocities to Ideale and set her into motion.
Or he could involve a third party to shake the Kukenhauzens.
The problem was that he still could not determine which course would ultimately benefit his own plans.
‘If he's just going to go berserk again...
Maybe it's better to eliminate him now while I have the chance.’
More precisely...
Jin Crow's future.
Even now, Baek Hwi-young could still remember the sensation of piercing Jin Crow's heart.
That memory alone forced him to proceed with caution.
“What are you thinking about?”
The moment Miel, who had been quietly watching him with wide, blinking eyes, asked—
Knock knock.
A knock echoed from beyond the tightly closed lounge door.
The cadets exchanged glances.
Then Beatus, who happened to be sitting closest to the entrance, walked over and opened it.
“Hm?”
He stared for a moment at what appeared to be an empty hallway.
Then he sensed a presence below.
Lowering his gaze, he found a familiar little girl standing before the doorway.
“Hello.”
Holding a device tightly against her chest, Ner politely bowed.
After slipping past Beatus, she quietly closed the door behind her and spoke with a composure utterly unbelievable for someone her age.
“I want to save Instructor.
I would appreciate your cooperation.”
Naturally...
Everyone could only stare at one another in silence, blinking.
‘She's not human.’
‘The Pilgrim.’
Meanwhile, Ner's gaze met none other than Baek Hwi-young's ash-gray eyes.
The two silently measured one another.
Then, almost simultaneously, they both spoke.
“Please.”
“Alright.”
Meanwhile, at that same moment inside the Headmaster's Office—
“......Sigh.”
Ideale rolled the small device Jin Crow had given her more than half a year ago between her fingers.
Then she quietly muttered in a self-mocking voice,
“The Empire.”
Those two words alone were enough to send a chill down one's spine.
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