Chapter 659 The Hero's Hope

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

When she finally got the confirmation that the last of their 'destruction pods' had been successfully deployed in one of the enemy territories, Noelle couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. "Luckily, we didn't get intercepted."

Had any one of their thirteen submarines been discovered and forced to retreat, the effectiveness of this 'counterattack' would definitely have been lowered by an order of magnitude.

After all, the lethality of this move lay in its element of surprise.

Emilia was also relieved when she received the confirmation of their plan's success from Noelle. "Now we just need to wait and see how effective these gangsters can be when they're fully armed and desperate for their lives. Hopefully… they won't be too disappointing."

As she expected, none of the thirteen nations that formed the Federation had much in terms of defense forces deployed to protect their borders, since most of it was in the process of being redirected to take her empire down as fast as possible. And that was what gave Emilia's side this opportunity.

The fact that they didn't have to bother with the 'retreat' of these people also helped.

Of course, assembling large metal containers around the gangsters before they woke up was something they did just to throw them all off, but Emilia didn't really care if the enemy discovered they were brought there by submarines.

After all, even if they found out, it wasn't like they could do anything about it now.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Unlike Dixie, Michelle, and even Penny, Crystal wasn't someone allowed to wander too close to the front lines without heavy escorts, and the blonde girl was obviously reluctant to put that kind of burden on their already stressed forces.

Naturally, she understood that the reason for these restrictions wasn't that Emilia didn't trust her, but that her 'vulnerability' was simply much greater than anyone else Emilia cared for.

Of course, smart as she was, Crystal didn't allow this fact to bring her down. Instead of wasting time arguing with Emilia or futilely trying to raise her abysmal combat strength, the blonde girl preferred using her skills to help them in her own way.

In just the past few days, not only had she been on the constant lookout for any spies and the like, but Crystal believed she had also managed to greatly pacify the people of Blue Dawn.

Although she was happy to see them raging and thirsting for blood for Emilia's sake, the blonde girl knew that such a frenzied state would only lead to their empire exhausting its potential sooner, and if they didn't manage to overcome their foe in that time… they might as well be doomed.

Instead, if the people were able to calm down and continue their daily lives even in the presence of such a war, the vitality of their empire would definitely be boosted greatly, and even if they had to fight for a long time, Crystal believed they would be able to keep going.

"Emilia said that she won't let this war last long… but there was still this worry in her heart. Hopefully… she will be able to breathe easier now."

Though Emilia's influence on her people was one of the main reasons why Crystal's moves were so effective in the first place, the blonde girl obviously wouldn't mind such a thing.

"Since I'm pretty much done here, let's see how that idiot is doing…"

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

With all their preparations, the war actually didn't have much of an impact on non-border areas of the empire, and Crystal was able to easily use the high-speed railway to get back to the capital faster.

Of course, she knew she would be scolded for doing such an 'unsafe' thing by some, if not all of her friends, but the blonde girl could only bear with it for the sake of efficiency.

Unfortunately, the crimson-haired girl wasn't in the Blue Lotus Palace to welcome her.

"I hope she's not sneaking off to fight on the front lines without telling anyone else… nah, even she wouldn't do that. She must know we'll find out sooner or later."

Nodding to the guard who opened the door for her, Crystal strode into the 'detention chamber', and noticed that the silver-haired boy inside was too focused on the TV to even notice her arrival.

His eyes stared unblinkingly at the headlines that scrolled past the screen as if he wanted to burn them permanently into his head, and for a moment, Crystal couldn't help but pity him.

After all, his entire existence seemed to revolve around hating Emilia at this point, and there was no way such a person would ever truly be happy.

'Why does he even exist? It would be better if he just—!'

Crystal quickly shook her head to clear such 'stray thoughts' as she coughed to attract the silver-haired boy's attention. "Being so happy while watching the news… I'm guessing you're quite 'optimistic' about the results of the war, huh?"

The silver-haired boy almost jumped in fright before realizing it was Crystal and not one of those other devils, but once he finished listening to her words, he couldn't help but laugh. "Of course, she's finally going to get what's coming for her now. How can I not be happy? Look, you're completely surrounded, and everyone says things are going to get worse, what do you think will happen?"

Instead of sneering as she usually would have at his words, Crystal actually chuckled as if amused. "The thoughts of the ignorant, huh? How funny. I suppose I've been a little depressed the past few days, and since it should be out pretty soon, I might as well stick around and watch your reaction."

Amos didn't really understand what she meant, but assuming that it must all be a facade to fool him, he scoffed. 'She just doesn't want to admit that she picked the wrong side. If that stupid bitch hadn't been so outrageous, how could she have managed to provoke so many people? There is justice in this world, after all!'

Just a few hours later, however, the smile on his face completely evaporated, and the silver-haired boy's expression turned ashen. "N-No way—!"

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━