Chapter 392 - It’s Them

In the next few days, Katya and Quinn's interactions became quite strained after their talk.

This was mostly due to Katya because she would always try to run away or avoid talking to him other than the times where she had to during their daily meetings in the morning.

For any time other than that, Katya would do her best to try and avoid Quinn since she felt that it was a bit awkward to even talk to him. In her heart, she still rather liked him and wanted to talk, but upon remembering that the man himself didn't seem too keen on a relationship happening between them, she would grow depressed and run away.

This continued until it became apparent to everyone that Katya was actively avoiding Quinn for some reason. To the others, they didn't care. Only her closest people questioned her out of concern.

Quinn was aware of what Katya was doing. He didn't pay it any mind though because there were more important matters to attend to.

He had been scouting out the area near the Faustus Archduchy's forward base on the island he had last infiltrated. Over the past few days, he noticed that more and more sh.i.p.s and soldiers had arrived on the island.

It was apparent that the Faustus Archduchy was going to launch their attack sometime soon. Even though they had better weaponry to aid in their defenses, Quinn was still a little bit concerned because he had a gut feeling that there was something wrong with the numbers he was seeing.

The enemy numbers seemed to be a little bit too big from what was mentioned in the information he was able to steal from the enemy.

"Tsk, they must have readjusted their plans. All I have to inform Katya..."

Quinn quickly returned from his scouting mission and went to find Katya. It didn't take him long to find her since in the past few days, Katya was always drowning herself in her work.

When he entered her office, Katya was quite busy that she didn't even notice him knocking or walking in. Quinn just silently looked at the girl who was reading and waited until she was finished.

It was only an hour later that Katya finished reading. She pinched her brows and let out a tired sigh, it was also then that she finally noticed that somebody was staring at her. When she looked up to see the cold-faced butler looking back at her, she immediately recoiled in surprise.

"Q-Q-Quinn!!! W-what're you doing here? H-H-How'd you get in?"

"...your secretary told me to just go in after I knocked."

"H-how long ago was that?"

"An hour."

"You should have said something then!"

"You looked busy, so I decided to wait."

"But for an hour?"

"It doesn't matter."

Hearing his smooth and curt replies, Katya once again released a tired sigh. She looked up at the butler and squirmed on the inside.

'Kuuuhhh... I really do like that cold face of his...'

She shook away her distracting thoughts and asked, "So what brings you here, Quinn?"

"I just finished scouting the enemy today, and it seems we have a problem," Quinn replied.

"And the problem is?"

"I made a rough observation and noticed that their numbers are much higher than what was stated from the intel that I stole from last time."

"I see... but is it on a scale that we have to be worried about? After all, we do have those cannons now..."

"I'm not exactly sure how much there are, but it's always best to err on the side of caution. We can't become too complacent just because we've got an upgrade to our defenses."

Katya nodded and replied, "I'll report this to our allies during the next meeting, but how are their movements? Does it look like they're planning on attacking us anytime soon?"

"There are too many patrols near the island so it's hard for me to sneak in now. However, just based on my observation alone, they may attack us, at the earliest, tomorrow, and by the end of the week at the latest."

"Is that so? I'll have all of our men be on stand by and tighten the guard during the night. I don't want them to catch us off guard..."

"They haven't sent even one scout our way...they are underestimating us..." Quinn said.

"It's okay, it's better if they do. This way, we'll be able to shock them with the Storm Howlers and hopefully take out as many of them as we can during their initial attack," Katya replied.

"If they do dispatch any scouts, I'll take care of them."

"Then I'll leave it up to you."

Quinn nodded and excused himself from the room. Once he left, Katya leaned back on her chair and let out a somewhat sad smile. Throughout the entire conversation, Quinn had been so indifferent and had only treated it as if they were talking about business, which of course they were but, the butler wasn't at all affected by what he said to her and didn't even seem concerned about the way she had been constantly trying to avoid him for the past few days.

*****

Another couple of days had passed but the Faustus Archduchy still hadn't attacked yet. By now, Quinn could tell that they were waiting for something, but he didn't know what it was they were waiting for.

They had sent a few scouting sh.i.p.s to scout out the Goldenia's family port, but they were easily dispatched by the Storm Howlers and Quinn made sure to kill anyone who was left alive after the bombardment.

After a few sh.i.p.s had gone and never returned, the Faustus Archduchy no longer sent any scouts. However, their numbers continued to increase on the island. They continued to gather sh.i.p.s and soldiers which they had stationed around the island.

From Quinn's last observation, there was even a fort being built on the island. Since the island was the only piece of land that could be found for a few tens of thousands of kilometers, it was a good place to set up a small port city to act as a waypoint for oncoming ocean traffic.

It once belonged to the Goldenia family but the Faustus Archduchy took over it pretty easily, and after they did, they upgraded the island and had practically turned it into one of their naval bases now.

Quinn wanted to go in and infiltrate their base once again, but it seemed to be impossible now. He could try but he'll have to report it to Katya and he figured that the woman wouldn't let him.

******

Tonight was the last night of the month, the skies were covered with dark clouds and a torrential rainstorm was ensuing. Without any lighting on the bay area, no one would be able to see too far out since it was far too dark.

Quinn had a gut-wrenching feeling that the Faustus Archduchy might attack during this time. They were waiting for something over the past few days and he had a hunch that it was the weather.

The weather conditions on this night were just too favorable for a preemptive night raid. Any sounds of sh.i.p.s moving or cannons firing would be covered up by the rainstorm. The seas were churning and it was a dangerous time to even sail out on a boat, but Quinn had a feeling that the Faustus Archduchy would to exactly that.

He asked Katya to keep the men alert and ready. Many of the soldiers were a little disgruntled because of this. However, they couldn't go against their orders.

Quinn only hoped that it was just a bad feeling of his, but unfortunately, that feeling turned out to be true. When the rainstorm grew even heavier, a loud crash of thunder was heard followed by the lightning.

To others, it was only thunder and nothing else, however, in the next instance multiple explosion began bombarding the harbor.

"Sound the alarm, the Faustus Archduchy is here!" Quinn roared out. The soldier who was closest to the alarm bells immediately began ringing them.

At the sound of the bells, everyone in the harbor immediately became alert. After the first bell rang, more alarm bells followed suit until the ringing alerted the entire city. They had already prepared safety protocols for all of the citizens.

Because of the knowledge that there was going to be a war coming to their territory, the Goldenia family had built bunkers near the outskirts of the city to evacuate and keep the citizens safe there.

Back at the city walls overlooking the harbor, Quinn had to applaud the Faustus navy. They dared to sail set sail even when they were under such horrible weather. The violent waves that were crashing and churning could easily capsize any medium-sized ship. Yet, from the looks of things and judging by how much explosions were occurring at the harbor, a majority of the Faustus Navy had come.

Through the intermittent flashes of lightning in the skies, Quinn was somehow able to make out the figures of the enemy sh.i.p.s. In the heavy rain, the movement of their troops was slow and the cannon squadrons weren't at their post so the Storm Howler Cannons weren't even firing back at the enemy.

Quinn quickly went to search for Katya to ask why the cannon squadrons weren't at their post today, especially when he specifically advised that everyone should be ready and on standby tonight. He was able to quickly find her hastily trying to get the men ready at the nearby barracks.

"Cannon Squads 1-20, hurry and get to your stations! Dammit, we should've just had them stay near the cannons 24/7!"

"Katya!" Quinn called out.

"Quinn, it's them, isn't it?"

"Yeah, I just had the feeling they would attack us tonight..."

"Well, your hunch was correct. It's a good thing we already had some of our troops on standby earlier, but they attacked us right as the cannon squadrons were changing shifts for dinner..."

"...there's a traitor in our ranks..."

"Huh?"

"I now understand why the Faustus Archduchy didn't even send any sh.i.p.s to scout out the city...it's because they might have already known."

"..."

"Think about it, there's no way that the Faustus army would wait for this exact specific time to attack us. It's nearly midnight, yet they chose to attack us now, especially when earlier the storm wasn't this bad but our visions were already severely limited."

"Dammit, we'll have to worry about that later. If there is a traitor, then we can assume that the enemy already knows about our defenses..."

"Most likely, it doesn't matter now. We'll just proceed with the plan and coordinate our troops. You did receive those communicators that your father purchased from the Silvaria Kingdom, right?"

"Yeah, I already distributed them to all of our generals, captains, squad leaders, and lieutenants."

"Good, we'll communicate and coordinate with that. You go to the command center and overlook the situation, command us as you see fit. Also, I'll be moving independently to help out anywhere I can, just keep me updated on the places that need support."

"Alright."

Quinn turned around and noticed that the bombardments from the enemy sh.i.p.s had somewhat eased up. Although it wasn't as powerful as his Young Master's, but Quinn was able to spread out his senses to the harbor. When he did, he noticed that a few small boats carrying soldiers were able to land on the shores.

"Shit, their troops have already landed on the beach. Hurry up and organize our troops. Then, dispatch them as quickly as possible to support our men stationed at the harbor. The beach was a foresight so we didn't have many stationed to guard the area there, so make sure you send additional reinforcement over to their side," Quinn urgently said. After he made sure that Katya had processed all of that, he continued, "After you've sent the reinforcements, have the rest of the troops form a containment perimeter around the harbor and beach. Don't let any of the enemy soldiers get past. Once they get too close to the city, our cannons won't be able to support our troops and we'll be overwhelmed by their numbers!"

"O-Okay!"

"I'll get going now."

"Quinn!"

"?"

"B-Be careful, alright?"

"..."

Quinn replied with a slight nod before he dashed away and his visage disappeared in the torrential downpour.