In the early morning, Gawain received an urgent message from Winter's Wrath. Half an hour later, a more detailed second report reached his hands.
The rising sun shone over Elven Outpost No. 112. The town standing in the valley gradually awakened in the warming spring breeze. Sunlight streamed through the crystal window on one side of the room, casting a bright streak across the exquisite elven-style tapestry. Gawain sat beside his desk, with the intelligence Amber had copied lying at hand, its letters appearing especially clear and sharp beneath the sunlight.
Amber stood beside him, the half-elf wearing an unusually serious expression. "...Further reconnaissance showed that the Typhonians had built outposts on at least fourteen islands or large reefs. Basically, wherever the wind and waves were still bearable, black flags could be seen flying. The furthest outpost from land had even reached the edge of the dangerous zone of Chaotic Turbulence. All the outposts were small. The largest was no more than a wooden shack, while the smallest was merely a tent. It was obvious they had all been thrown up in a short time—considering the existence of Engineering Mages, those things might have appeared in a day or two. After all, Winter's Wrath had not failed to scout those islands before."
Gawain's fingers lightly tapped the tabletop beside him without conscious thought. His tone was calm and natural. "No matter how small they are, they prove 'effective control.' There are people on them, there are flags, and more importantly, those islands really are in Typhon's waters. We cannot claim they are ownerless islands. In the end, there is currently no universally recognized international standard for determining the ownership of distant islands, since humanity has been away from the sea for far too long."
"Perhaps we could try to deal