Arknights, but the Family Had Fallen Yet Again

Could a shark drown in water... Apparently, it wasn't entirely impossible?

"Just... a suggestion."

Some scraps of biological knowledge stirred up from the depths of his mind, and Oute entered the room Folinic had just mentioned.

This was most likely an ordinary examination room, used to triage patients and handle the most basic, trivial aches and pains.

Oute instinctively sat behind the desk—and casually slipped the pen on the desk into his breast pocket.

He flipped through the documents still lying on the desktop, instinctively judging them, before suddenly realizing... he had never actually been a doctor.

The familiar feeling that had unconsciously driven him vanished at once.

Oute, Oute! Focus! There was no point thinking about that now!

Specter had already taken off her clothes, yet she still refused to truly let go and allow Oute to leave the game controller.

Instead, she seemed to have sensed Oute's moral dilemma. A broad curve rose at the nun's lips as she leisurely and greedily swept her eyes across her own lovely body.

A few coffee stains marked her fair, smooth skin, pale enough to be called bloodless.

The coffee stains resembled a group of sensible mountaineers. Seen from above, they had merely sampled the snowy peaks before resolutely turning back down the mountain, taking the ravines between the peaks.

Specter smiled and shifted her gaze, filling her vision with the sacred tips at the mountaintops that the coffee stains had not touched.

Oute tried to take control of Specter's movements and close her eyes.

But Specter's subconscious still stopped him.

The nun revered Oute deeply. She was willing to obey every command from him, whether spoken aloud or delivered through their mental link.

But that did not mean the nun truly agreed with Oute's views.

On the contrary, she might oppose Oute in her heart while opposing her own opposition, forcing herself to obey the "divine oracle."

Yet this was precisely when that contradiction revealed itself.

Because Specter so desperately did not want her link with Oute to be severed, even if she forced herself to comply, the resistance in her heart still prevented Oute from smoothly withdrawing this part of his thoughts.

And because she wanted to show herself to Oute, while the Proxy Protocol was active, Oute also found it difficult to directly take control of her body.

He still had to force his way through that mental barrier.

Other mind-control Bosses broke through heroes' mental defenses to control them, but what about me!?

Am I supposed to punch two holes in her head just so I don't control her!?

That's insane, isn't it?

Specter, let me go!

Oute sat in the office with both hands pressed to his forehead.

Specter still looked like someone saying, "I agree, but I disagree with agreeing."

By the principle of moral conservation, Oute, a grand strategy player, held vastly different moral views toward war and private life. To him, unforgivable crimes were everyday activities, but this kind of behavior was absolutely voyeurism—tasteless, vile, and utterly contrary to his personal aesthetics.

He forced his brain to switch tracks and not think about the scenery outlined across Specter's lower abdomen by the coffee stains running through the valleys between those peaks.

This experiment had yielded plenty. The obstruction during withdrawal suggested another possibility...

If the other end of the mental link did not agree to my takeover, I could still force my way through its mental defenses.

I just need to find a suitable lab rat to test it on.

Without question, breaking through such mental defenses would have an enormous effect on a hero's psyche...

Scalding streams of water bounced across pale, creamy skin as the nun's delicate hand slowly advanced from the end of her other arm toward the valleys between the peaks.

As an Abyssal Hunter, Specter's physical capabilities far surpassed Oute's, including not only her sight but also her sense of touch.

The skin felt by her fingers, and the fingers felt by her skin, echoed through Specter's precise brain before harassing Oute's thoughts through their mental link.

Think, Oute! Think!

Forceful breach... forcibly breaking through mental defenses to take over a unit's body—this experiment could be carried out on any random enemy on the battlefield!

If there were effects, they might be long-term or short-term!

Testing directly on enemies would only let me confirm whether an effect existed!

There would be no quantitative value!

The bathroom was hazy with steam, and the glass had already been covered in a thick layer of mist.

"I'm undressed too, Miss Specter! Is the hot water ready?"

Through the blurred glass, Specter saw Folinic's slender figure.

And the catgirl was approaching the bathroom step by step.

Keep thinking, Oute!

That's it!

Mental defenses exist to stop my consciousness from entering and leaving!

But taking over a hero's body requires the existence of a mental link!

So!

I only need to!

Oute let out a long breath.

Savoring that inevitable sense of loss, Oute looked up at the ceiling light. Come to think of it, the Sun Ring's effects needed testing too. If I thought about it carefully, could Sankta activate the spotlight effect under any circumstances?

Meanwhile, in the bathroom, Specter's expression immediately darkened.

As the Sun Ring left, Specter's mental link with her "Lord" bypassed her mental defenses and was severed directly.

Emptiness and loneliness assaulted this fish that had come ashore once again.

"Miss... Specter?"

Folinic, who had already entered the bathroom after opening the glass door, hesitated.

This Feline could only feel a dangerous aura surging from Specter's body.

Salt Potatoes in the Cold Wind

"W, are the potatoes done?"

A Sarkaz mercenary hugged his knees, looking comically well-behaved in contrast.

Many other Sarkaz gathered around the campfire as well.

"Quit yelling!" W irritably poked the mercenary's foot with a branch. "The water hasn't even boiled. How could the potatoes be done!?"

She cursed, "That bastard Garson!"

"It'd be one thing if he docked our pay! He even makes us spend money to buy things in the city!"

This was an old mercenary trick.

It was the same not only on Terra, but on Earth as well. Most of the wages mercenary captains paid their men were funneled back into the captain's pockets through traveling merchants, peddlers, and technical workers accompanying the army.

And because they were on the battlefield, the prices of those services tended to be "just a little higher."

The "well-behaved" Sarkaz did not chime in, because to him, this was more or less only natural.

Mercenary captains had done things this way since ancient times.

They took startup funds from their employers, then used the roster in their hands to return home or go elsewhere, half recruiting and half looting as they formed a regiment.

For the Sarkaz as a group, many unnecessary steps could be skipped.

No matter where they were, as long as another Sarkaz could pay the price, they could pull most of the local Sarkaz into becoming mercenaries.

They were strong, fearless in the face of death, seasoned in war... and generally did not even require pensions.

As the pressure cooker shrieked, W cursed while releasing its steam.

"If we could live in the city, why would we need to buy this piece of junk from him!"

"What are you doing!?" W lightly smacked the well-behaved Sarkaz's arm with her branch.

"Didn't the water boil?"

"But the water hasn't boiled away yet!"

The Sarkaz burst into laughter, though no one knew what they were laughing at.

As usual, W continued mocking Garson.

"He's just another stinking mercenary like us, yet he really thinks he's serving Theresis!"

"We fought so hard to take the city!"

"And now? He stations his personal guard inside the city while we guard outside it!"

"The cold wind doesn't blow his tent over, does it!?"

"Oh! That bastard doesn't even sleep in a tent!"

Ines glanced at them from afar and asked Hedley, "Do you really think this works?"

Hedley neither confirmed nor denied it. He rubbed his hands together, then opened them to reveal a ball of warm ash.

"Everyone really is used to tents."

"So it doesn't work, then?" The pretty mother-in-law placed her fair, delicate hands into that pile of ash, making conversation for lack of anything else to say. "There have been plenty of colder days than this."

The wild historian clasped his hands together and wrapped Ines's small hands in his rough, large ones.

"Weren't you complaining about my ash?"