Khan felt on fire even if the [Blood Shield] continued to protect his back. The passage was long, and its steepness prevented him from adjusting his position or controlling his descent. He was almost free-falling, but he prepared himself for the inevitable landing.
Many presences drew close as Khan continued to slide on the passage. Pain tried to make him unable to keep track of them, but he suppressed everything for the time being.
Then, when Khan felt close enough to his companions, he forced himself to bend forward and kicked the ground to jump. The long leap made him cross the messy group, and his airborne rotation allowed him to land comfortably without ending on his companions.
Ecoruta's two moons couldn't illuminate the depths of the canyon, but no one dared to stay still. Many tried to hurry forward only to trip on their companions or eventual rocks standing in their path.
"Calm down and use your phones!" Khan shouted when he sensed the clumsy advance of his companions.
A series of gasps resounded among the narrow passage before a few screens lit up and illuminated the area. Khan was already holding the severed hand, his knife, and the Lieutenant's phone in his left hand, so he couldn't rely on his device. Still, his experience of Nitis and his sensitivity to mana allowed him to turn and proceed along the passage without needing sources of light.
The group began to advance steadily. Some had suffered injuries, but the adrenaline running through their bodies allowed them to ignore their pain and focus on the escape. Many doubts had even tried to fill their minds, but no one dared to speak when the threat of the Stal was so close.
Khan didn't have the time to study the environment. He prioritized getting out of the settlement's range, so he advanced blindly, doing his best to memorize every turn or branch that appeared on his path.
The canyon didn't follow a simple route. Its initial narrow passage enlarged and shrunk randomly, and it even revealed multiple paths that stretched in different directions.
Khan didn't want to lose himself, and the paths that stretched to his sides could lead him closer to enemy settlements, so he did his best to advance in a straight line. That hurried and silent march had to continue for an hour before he felt confident enough to take the first turn that led to a relatively large area and rest.
The soldiers behind Khan instinctively followed him. They adapted to his pace, pointed their screens toward him to imitate his steps, and stopped as soon as he turned to face them.
Multiple lights fell on Khan. At first, they moved over his body and stopped whenever they found an injury, but they eventually converged on the gory spectacle in his left palm. Everyone could see the large patch of blood created by the severed hand, the dirty phone, and his phone.
"What-?" One of the soldiers asked, but Khan interrupted him by shaking his head and sitting on the ground.
Khan threw the severed hand and Lieutenant Pouille's phone on the ground before sheathing his knife. His left palm was sticky due to the blood that had fallen on it, but his attention went on his injuries first.
The two explosions had injured his right side and back. Khan soon discovered that his robe had remained in its place due to his intact left side, but it barely offered any protection now. It had turned unto a burned rag that he didn't hesitate to take out to transform into bandages.
Khan did the same for the bandages on his right hand. Most of them had burned, and the skin under them had suffered a similar fate. Still, the injuries didn't go too deep thanks to his prompt use of the [Blood Shield].
His back was in a similar state. Patches of burned skin filled it, but the damage didn't spread to his muscles. The fall through the passage had worsened those wounds, but they remained superficial injuries that a few meditative sessions would fix.
His hair was the only thing that his meditations couldn't fix and the [Blood Shield] couldn't protect. Khan didn't cut it at all, and it had become quite long after his long period on Nitis, but the explosion had burnt many strands, especially those on his right and back.
Khan picked one of the few strands of hair that had survived the explosions and stretched it in front of his eyes. Memories and sensations slowly appeared in his mind as he let his thoughts wander. He could almost sense Liiza's cold hands on his head.
'She really liked it long,' Khan thought as a helpless sigh escaped his mouth. The knife soon reappeared in his hand before shining with azure light and cutting what was left of his long hair.
The soldiers didn't say anything in front of that scene. It felt dumb to mind something as trivial as hair after suffering so many injuries, but something told them that the matter had a deeper meaning for Khan. They felt almost able to read the sadness in his eyes.
"Delia, can you-?" Khan began to ask, but the woman didn't let him finish. She had moved forward as soon as she heard her name.
Khan inspected his companions while Delia crouched next to him and started to patch him up. Everyone was mostly fine. He had been the only one to survive or manage to reach the passage after facing the large bullets. That was good news since no one in the group would slow him down, but it also meant that many had remained behind.
The group only had twelve survivors. Some had also lost their rifles in the messy escape, so the situation wasn't ideal. Yet, Khan couldn't help but focus on the positive aspects. It would be easier to remain hidden with a smaller team, and the same went for preserving order among the ranks.
"Oh," Delia softly exclaimed as her timid fingers touched the tattoo on the back of Khan's right shoulder. "You might need to retrace this."
Khan dismissed those words. The tattoo was part of him. He believed that it would reappear even if the entire patch of skin were to blow up.
"You can leave something in the open," Khan whispered. "Most of these injuries will go away in no time."
"It's fine," Delia said while compensating for what remained of Khan's uniform with part of her clothes.
Delia was almost done, so Khan began to prepare his next move. He cleaned the screen of Lieutenant Pouille's phone with what remained of his pants before pressing the severed hand on it. The device lit up, and he quickly browsed through the various menus to search for useful functions.
Khan couldn't always use his fingers to browse the phone. Some menus required the constant use of Lieutenant Pouille's hand due to their classified nature. The martial arts, training programs, and some reports wanted that disgusting process, and they refused any attempt to transfer them to other devices.
Instead, other menus worked perfectly, so Khan transferred to his phone everything that sounded interesting. He only had to place his device on top of the screen to begin the process, and he obviously started from the information obtained in the underground structure.
"Is this really the time to steal?" Gloria asked when she saw that Khan had no intention to address their current situation.
"Don't worry," Khan exclaimed while waving the severed hand. "I'll pass it around once I'm done."
"I wasn't talking about that," Gloria complained. "We are still deep into the enemy territory, and the Stal know our location. Leaving should be our priority."
Khan sighed before inspecting his companions again. He could see that many soldiers shared Gloria's thoughts, and even Delia avoided his gaze now that she had completed the bandages.
"We don't know how to leave," Khan explained. "We don't know where we should come out, and we also lack a proper plan. I'd rather spend the night recovering and studying the Stal's battle tactics instead of walking blinding inside this canyon."
"What if the Stal search for us?" Gloria continued.
Khan pointed at the opening above him before explaining his idea. "We are at least twenty meters under the surface. The canyon is narrow in many areas, which offers natural protection against bullets. The environment doesn't allow the passage of numerous platoons either, so we can hold our position if the situation requires it."
"The Stal know this area better than us," Gloria didn't give up.
"They won't be able to take us by surprise as long as I'm here," Khan stated, and the intense confidence contained in his words left the group speechless. Even Gloria found herself widening her eyes in surprise in front of that bold announcement.
Normally, no one would trust such a young companion right away. However, Khan had done nothing but prove his prowess since his arrival on Ecoruta. Moreover, everyone had read about his achievements on other planets, so they knew he had experience in those situations.
Khan waited for his device to complete downloading everything before going back on the classified information. The training methods for Lieutenant Pouille's element were useless to him, but he decided to read their descriptions anyway. The same went for the martial arts, but he didn't have any luck there either. His techniques weren't only better. They also conflicted with anything that sounded vaguely interesting.
Instead, the reports were different. They were simple and contained orders that Khan wouldn't normally be able to access. Some didn't even involve Ecoruta, but they were too old to have any relevance to his current situation.
'The Global Army is as uncaring as ever,' Khan commented in his mind after skimming through the reports.
The orders weren't too explicit, but they often pressed the Lieutenant to hold specific places at all costs, even if that led to the destruction of his platoon. Khan learnt the position of some important mines or the reason behind a few trenches, but most information didn't help his situation. The only valuable reports involved the allied troops, which could help him decide how to approach the rest of the escape.
"Pass it around," Khan eventually said while handing the severed hand and the phone to Delia. "Download what you want and try to take turns if you are interested in the training programs. Still, let's prioritize coming up with an escape plan. We must compare the battle tactics to decide where to go."
Delia stared at the severed hand for a few seconds before slowly taking it. She was clearly disgusted by the action, and she even had to gulp a few times to suppress her retches, but her eyes gained determination every time they fell on Lieutenant Pouille's phone.
The tragic nature of the situation almost forced Delia to put aside her disgust. Khan had offered her something that the Lieutenant had never wanted to share. He had given her the chance to be a part final decision.
The other soldiers didn't miss that detail. The few who still had faint doubts about Khan's leadership found a new confidence. They couldn't complain when their voice already had value.
Khan stopped caring about his companions while they were busy with the phone. He could close his eyes and enter the meditative state to deal with his injuries.
The burning feeling slowly vanished and allowed Khan to appreciate the [Blood Shield] even more. He almost couldn't believe that an attack capable of blowing a second-level warrior away had only left him with superficial injuries.
Eyes started to fall on Khan and eventually forced him to come out of the meditative state. A few soldiers had sat around holograms coming out of the Lieutenant's phone. The others had formed a circle that included him and had drawn a simple map on the ground.
The map was simple. It used circles to mark the human troops and squares for the Stal, creating an accurate description of the current situation on the battlefield. That had rendered the phone superfluous, allowing the soldiers interested in Lieutenant Pouille's techniques to focus on them.
A few soldiers in Khan's group appeared completely lost. They managed to look at the map only for a few seconds before glancing at their companions to check whether they were doing better.
Instead, other soldiers had already made up their minds. The battlefield only had a few valid paths, and their character had been enough to pick one of them.
Khan could see that Lieutenant Pouille's initial indecision remained as an issue. The group had the chance to reach the frontlines directly and hope that their allies on the other side would help them or resume their attempt to leave the area stealthily. Yet, the second option felt unreal after the recent events.
Both options involved huge risks, but Khan immediately felt inclined to move toward the frontlines. That had also been his initial idea, and the recent developments had only pushed him in that direction.
More and more soldiers raised their eyes, but no one spoke. Many wanted to hear their companions' opinions before voicing their ideas, while others simply didn't have the confidence to state their thoughts over such a difficult situation.
"We should reach the frontlines," Khan said to shatter the silence. "The Stal might be stupid, but we are still on their side of the world. They must have dispatched troops to patrol the area before the trenches."
"I agree," Gloria stated. "Though I'd avoid separating. Lieutenant Pouille was right. We can't trust the other platoons. We have to take the trench or at least create suitable conditions for a victory."
"Maybe we can hide here for a while and wait to be rescued," Clara stated. "This canyon is quite safe, especially with our rifles. We can even try to disturb the Stal if we learn this area well enough."
"You forget food and water," Khan contradicted. "Besides, this map is our only advantage, but it loses value quickly. We might have mere days before the situation changes again."
The explanation removed every idea connected to plans that would take many days to unfold. Everything would be different if they had access to food and water, but the canyon was too barren for that.
"We attack then," Delia announced. "Nice talk."
A few soldiers chuckled but sighs soon followed. They didn't need words to decide that the end of the night would mark the beginning of their attack.
Khan used that chance to take out his phone and browse through his gains. The Lieutenant had been far from rich, but his device contained many books that involved various topics, and he had taken all of them without bothering to read their titles. Still, now he could see many interesting labels, some about subjects connected to the role of an ambassador.
Khan only spent a few minutes on the screen. He wanted to prioritize his meditations and maybe even sleep a little before tomorrow's battle. The morning wouldn't take much to arrive, so he couldn't waste time studying.
No one added ideas to the battle plan, so Khan approached the frail wall and laid his back carefully. It hurt a little, but he could endure it. The other soldiers imitated him and prepared themselves to rest.
"It's almost intact again," Delia said while sitting next to Khan. "Did you trace it with mana?"
"The Niqols do very little without mana," Khan revealed while glancing at his tattoo.
"What does it mean?" Delia asked.
"It depends on the day," Khan lied as he closed his eyes.
"What about now?" Delia continued.
"Pain," Khan sighed before falling into his meditative state.
****
Author's notes: I don't really know what to say. I'm finding myself busy and sleepless even for reasons that don't involve writing. I can only rely on your understanding today too since this will be the only chapter tonight.. I'll try to go back to my usual schedule or at least that number of chapters asap.
