Reincarnated As The Heroine?! I refuse!

118: Being taken under an Admiral's wing

Lea's straightforwardness can be considered fierce. So fierce that once she decides upon something, she would right away execute the steps to achieve the end-goal. Preferably as soon as possible.

Thus, under the watchful man-made blue skies in the underground world, an unlucky fellow was knocked out and buried alive with only his head sticking out of the ground. From his neck down, he was naked with only his innerwear spared. 

Looking at him from above with the sun shining down behind her silky black hair, Lea wore a neat military uniform. The man was ranked as trainee, but she really had no other choice as there were of abundance nearby. She also examined the card and assured that there was no problem of her using it.

With one last look of the unconscious fellow, Lea puffed and left, hiding half of her face with the hat.

*

"...hey."

"...Hi?"

"..Wait...."

She called out several times, but none turned around to pay her any heed. Flabbergasted, she ended up grabbing one forcefully by the arm. "Can I ask for directions? I'm lost!"

The person frowned, but finally looked her in the eyes. However, his response was as such, "Don't stop me. Everyone's busy, can't you see? The admiral is finally coming for an inspection and we can't fail at this today else we suffer with our heads off! Get off." Then he slapped her pale hand away.

"......" 

Lea paid his attitude no mind, lost in thought. She then followed after the crowd, slowly assembling wherever they were assigned by roles. Being a recruit, Lea easily joined in with the recruits close to the front rows.

All around her, she saw several faces painted with nervousness as if a demon was coming down to take their souls. Resting her eyes on a familiar officer whose lips were pale as snow, she smirked helplessly. He looked rather embarrassed trying not to open his mouth at all, but as an officer, he had to respond to others.

She amused herself for a while by studying other people's behavior, paying close attention to gossips. 

"Young Admiral is gonna inspect us again.... I wonder who are gonna die this time... We are just recruits!!"

"Stop being a sissy, will you? The higher up shouldn't let many die... They still need people for the yearly purge that's coming next week. The more people alive, the better chance of coming up first, right?"

"Y-you think Admiral cares? He can command his personally trained legions. What does he care about us? Such luck... We haven't trained much at all, and now this demon is going to eliminate a bunch of us. I heard from a senior that survived last year's inspection... that... only a few hundreds out of almost a couple of thousands! Can you imagine how many died? Can you imagine his ruthlessness now? Can you see how extreme his methods are? I-I don't think I can survive... I shouldn't have been sent to Military District!!"

"...I-It's not like you can choose. They see you having the aptitude, they send you over... But I thought I also heard that as long as you can manage to show your talent, you might catch Admiral's attention and skip going through the evaluation.."

"Imagine, I only found out I have good physique for combat, I can't think of one talent besides following simple orders!"

"Bless your soul...."

"Wait... you have a choice?"

"I'm pretty good at running.." He grinned nonchalantly, then continued speaking. "We've arrived here for almost 3 months. Surely you didn't spend yours looking at clouds?"