“Well... alright, I'll share my thoughts.”
Saying that, Shulim broke off a branch and began sketching on the ground.
“This is where our camp is.”
Shulim used curved lines to represent the forest and river, a circle to represent their own camp, and then marked several triangles near some of the lines.
“These are the camps of the other teams.”
“And then, this area—”
Shulim pointed to an area in the sketch where several triangles were clustered together.
“This is the camp of the allied teams. As you can see, they've even set up their camps together. It looks like they formed an alliance long before the assessment began.”
The other four members of the team stared at Shulim's casually drawn sketch, stunned into silence.
“S-So amazing! You're incredible, Shulim! Did you really figure out everyone else's locations in such a short amount of time?”
Niya looked at Shulim with sparkling eyes, admiration shining in her gaze.
“Hehe! Of course, this is my Shulim after all!” Fran hummed proudly.
Although Ander and Klein didn't say anything, the shock in their eyes was no less than Niya's.
When Shulim had mentioned earlier that some teams had formed an alliance, they hadn't thought much of it, assuming she had simply spotted a large group of people from the treetops by chance.
But they hadn't expected that it wasn't just a simple matter of spotting a crowd. The enemy's camp location, the fact that they had set up camp together, and even the positions of the other teams' camps—she had figured it all out.
And she had only been observing from the tree for a brief moment!
She had actually tracked down every single team?!
“Um...”
Shulim realized she might have overdone it a little, but she couldn't help it; old habits were hard to hide.
“...It's not that big of a deal. They're just not very good at hiding. Besides, that tree happens to have an excellent view, allowing me to see basically the entire area. That's how I managed to find them.”
Well... she had chosen the tree herself, so of course it had the best line of sight.
“That's still incredible! If it were me, even if I saw those people, I wouldn't be able to remember their exact locations,” Klein said, shaking his head.
Ander studied the map Shulim had drawn before looking up to ask, “Shulim, what should we do next?”
“Well—”
Shulim pondered for a moment before speaking slowly.
“My thought is, since the enemy will find us sooner or later, why don't we let them find us on purpose?”
The four of them looked at each other in bewilderment.
“Letting them find us? Won't we be in danger then?”
“It's not what you think.”
Shulim shook her head and drew a semicircle elsewhere on the ground.
“What I mean is, we establish a decoy camp here, deliberately expose it to them, and lead them to it.”
“I've already scouted this location. It's roughly equidistant from several other camps. As long as we intentionally stir up some chaos, the people in those other camps will mistake them for attackers, and there's a high probability they'll end up fighting each other.”
“Oh! We can actually do that?!” Klein slapped his forehead in awe.
“But how do we set up a decoy camp?” Ander asked. “To make them believe it's our camp, we'll need some convincing proof, right?”
Shulim nodded, then pointed to the triangle closest to the circle on her sketch.
“That's why we need to take down this one as quickly as possible.”
“According to the rules, a team is disqualified once their flag is captured, but it never said another team can't use that flag. We just need to take this flag and use it to set up our decoy camp.”
...
The others exchanged glances.
Finally, they all nodded in agreement.
“Alright, let's do it!”
“In that case, let's divide up our tasks. Just to be safe, someone must guard our real camp. Fran has poor stamina but is highly capable, so she's not suited for a long-distance raid. Therefore, the crucial responsibility of defending the camp falls on her. Ander is our general—if our general is seen guarding the flag, the enemy definitely won't doubt the camp's authenticity.”
“Then there's Klein and Niya. You two will need to draw the attention of the allied teams and the scattered teams respectively. You don't need to engage them; you only need to lure them to the decoy camp and this spot here...”
After explaining her plan in detail, Shulim looked around at the group.
“Do you have any other suggestions?”
They shook their heads.
“No, it's a very detailed plan.”
Ander pulled a folded piece of paper from his shirt and quickly copied the drawing from the ground.
“Let's not waste any time. We move immediately.”
...
In the forest, a boy and a girl stood beside a small flag planted in the ground.
“No monsters are going to jump out at us suddenly, right...?” the girl asked apprehensively as she looked around the quiet woods.
“N-No way, right?”
Although the boy also felt a bit of fear creeping in upon hearing her words, he forced himself to act brave.
“Aren't they saying this forest is very safe? Besides... look, the teachers are watching from the mountaintop. There are two C-Class fighters up there! Even if a magic beast shows up, they'll defeat it in no time, right?”
“But... didn't rumors go around two years ago about an unidentified magic beast spotted here?”
“...Can you please stop saying such terrifying things? You're giving me goosebumps.”
Rustle!
Suddenly, the bushes behind them rustled.
“Aaaaah!!!”
“Aaaaah!!!”
Both of them shrieked in terror.
“It's here!!!”
With that, the two scrambled away on all fours, completely forgetting about the flag they were supposed to defend.
Ander poked his head out from behind the bushes, watching the fleeing pair with an utterly bewildered expression. He turned back to look at the others.
“...Am I really that scary?”
The others shook their heads, equally perplexed.
“More importantly, the flag is ours.”
Shulim stepped forward and yanked the flag from the ground.
“That was incredibly easy. I thought we'd have to fight, but those two just screamed and ran away on their own. How bizarre.”
Klein looked in the direction the duo had fled, still unable to comprehend what was wrong with them.
“Alright, let's go, Klein. We don't have much time.”
“Oh, coming!”
Seeing his teammates already moving decisively toward their next destination, Klein quickly caught up.
Meanwhile, somewhere in the forest.
A dozen or so boys and girls had formed a marching formation, slowly navigating through the woods.
This scene happened to be captured by the eyes of the teachers observing from the mountaintop.
“An alliance, huh? It's not a bad approach~,” Collette commented with a smile. For her, this assessment was nothing more than a perfect way to pass the time.
Beside her, Kunon, who stood with his arms crossed, let out a cold snort.
“The weak always huddle together for warmth, putting their hopes in others without even realizing they're walking into a trap. A team so lacking in wisdom and resolve is nothing but a mindless mob!”
“Haha~, how harsh! Well, you do have a point. Things aren't looking good for these little guys~!”
...
Rate on N.U.
