Noer's Helplessness

"Beep beep--"

Just as Noer was questioning life while looking at Heliopolis, his communicator suddenly rang.

Noer glanced around, silently pressed the connect button on his earpiece, and said, "Who is it?"

"Hello, may I ask if you are Mr. Noer Cassia?" a stranger's voice came through the earpiece.

"It's me," Noer replied.

"One moment—"

After the man in the earpiece finished speaking, he directly hung up the communication. Before Noer could wonder why, the sound of a car horn blared from the side of the road ahead.

Seeing Noer's gaze turn towards him, a middle-aged man wearing sunglasses opened the car door and got out.

He then raised his right hand, showed two fingers, and beckoned to Noer.

Noer glanced at the car's license plate and, confirming it was correct, silently adjusted his shoulder bag and walked towards the sedan.

If he wasn't mistaken, this was the person who had come to meet him, the so-called informant.

Soon, Noer, carrying his shoulder bag, reached the sedan, pulled open the door, and got in.

"Hello, Mr. Noer, this is my information identification code."

The middle-aged man got into the driver's seat and took out a box containing a small chip from his pocket, handing it over.

Noer cut to the chase, took out the identity verification device Cruze had given him, and inserted the chip.

The middle-aged man simultaneously extended his finger and pressed it onto the verification machine.

[Identity Verified!]

After about three seconds, a mechanical synthesized prompt sounded in Noer's earpiece.

Hearing this, Noer silently pulled out the chip and handed it back.

"This is some intelligence we've gathered, you can take a look." The middle-aged man put away the chip and took out a stack of paper documents from a storage box beside him, handing them over.

"Paper?" Noer took the documents and couldn't help but be stunned.

It was the interstellar age, and people were still using paper to record information? But he had to admit, these paper documents felt quite familiar to the touch.

The middle-aged man said nothing, simply starting the car and driving Noer around Heliopolis.

Seeing that the other party was unwilling to say more, Noer識趣ly lowered his head and began to read.

The intelligence contained the most information about times, places, and details about various people, as well as various professional terms and factions.

The ones that appeared most frequently were—Orb, Akatsuki Industries, Project G.

"Hiss—"

Noer still held a sliver of hope in his heart, but when he turned to the third-to-last page, that sliver of hope was finally defeated by reality.

The title clearly read: Orb's Akatsuki Industries, in conjunction with the Earth Alliance, is developing a new type of MS (Codename G) and has already achieved considerable success.

The second-to-last document had no numbers, but a red and white photo. Although the photo was not very clear and only showed half of the object, it was enough for Noer.

This was because he was far too familiar with what was in the photo.

"Is there something wrong?"

Seeing the strange expression on Noer's face, the middle-aged man couldn't help but ask.

"It's nothing, thank you for the intelligence."

Noer heard this, suppressed his emotions, and silently put the intelligence into his shoulder bag.

Something wrong? It wasn't that something was wrong, it was that everything was wrong!

Although the photo was only half, and the lighting was somewhat blurry, only allowing for a general outline to be seen.

Just those pair of red and white long legs were enough to reveal its identity.

In the entire SEED world, besides the Archangel, what other space battleship captain was like this?

Although Noer didn't remember the plot of SEED, he could never forget this space battleship that was so active in the first and second seasons.

Seeing Noer put the intelligence into his bag, the middle-aged man silently changed direction.

Two minutes later, the middle-aged man stopped the car outside the Aohua Hotel.

He got out of the car, came to the passenger side, opened the door, and handed Noer a room key card, saying, "This is a room prepared for you in advance. I wish you a pleasant journey!"

"Pleasant journey? Heh, I hope you're right."

Noer took the room card and got out of the car with a bitter smile. A pleasant journey?

If it weren't for that bastard Cruze tempting me with a month's worth of medicine, you could kill me and I wouldn't come to this hellhole!

No, if I had known the Archangel was here earlier, even if you gave me a year's worth of medicine, I... might have considered it.

Led by a hotel attendant, Noer arrived at his luxurious room.

However, facing a luxurious guest room he had never seen in two lifetimes, Noer felt no joy, only deep fatigue and confusion.

He tossed his shoulder bag aside and fell straight onto the bed.

The worst had happened; he was truly caught up in the front lines of the war.

According to the intel provided by the other party, the object in the photograph was indeed the Archangel, and judging from its condition and the information Cruze provided, the Archangel had already been completed.

The completion of the Archangel meant that the five MS units were also complete.

Coupled with its current location—the Orb colony.

Without a doubt, this was the starting point of the anime plot in the SEED world, and the border between the two factions.

"Beep beep—"

The communicator's sound cut through Noer's thoughts.

"What's the situation?" Cruze's voice came from the communicator.

"I've already made contact with the terminal personnel," Noer replied.

"Then your next task is to confirm whether the intel is true. It's best to provide photographic or documentary evidence. Once you obtain sufficient evidence, you must report it immediately!" Cruze's tone was unusually serious.

"Yes!"

Noer might be lazy, but he wasn't an idiot. He knew when to be lazy and when to be serious.

However, confirming the intel... was there even a need to confirm it?

And photographic evidence, where was he supposed to find that?

"The gift has been delivered to you. As for whether you can get your hands on it, that's up to your Atlantic Federation."

January 23rd. On the Atlantic front, Kaohsiung fell. At the same time, Noer left the hotel with a camera and a button hidden camera, heading towards the Institute of Technology.

After a night of deep thought, Noer ultimately decided to give it a try. After all, it was a month's worth of medicine, and that stuff was very expensive.

January 24th.

Thousands of kilometers away from Heliopolis, deep in space, Cruze's Nazca-class battleship, the Vesalius, was slowly heading towards the PLANTs.

"What the hell is this, they're even sending fake intel!"

Inside the changing room, Yzak, who had just returned to the battleship after piloting an MS, angrily threw his clothes onto the sofa.

The others were already accustomed to Yzak's tantrums, so they pretended not to see anything.

"Oh right, speaking of which, where did that kid Noer go?" Latis, who had just finished changing, suddenly realized he hadn't seen Noer for a long time.

"That kid definitely ran off somewhere to fool around again!"

Yzak grumbled, "That guy has no military bearing at all!"

"Military bearing?" Diakka, who was preparing to put away his clothes, said incredulously as if he had heard something incredible, "Yzak, you actually know what military bearing is?"

"Diakka, what do you mean by that!" Yzak wasn't an idiot; he knew immediately that something was off.

"Isn't that the truth? Weren't you the one who caused the most trouble during that operation? We had to clean up your mess!" Diakka retorted.

Yzak's temper was too volatile, and he easily acted on impulse, which often led to problems in team coordination.

It was fine when Noer fought with them before. Although Noer was only in a green uniform, it was because his basic and theoretical knowledge was too poor.

If you were to talk about MS combat capabilities alone, Diakka admitted he wasn't Noer's match.

The only ones who could reliably defeat him were Athrun and Nicol; even Yzak wasn't necessarily better.

So it didn't matter if Yzak didn't cooperate back then, as the main force of the team was sufficient, and there were no major issues.

But now that Noer was slacking off, the problem immediately surfaced.

"When did I cause trouble? Didn't we complete the mission in the end!" Yzak perfectly embodied the saying "a dead duck's mouth is hard."

"That's because the enemies we encountered were too weak," Diakka said without giving Yzak any face.

"Are you saying I'm not good enough?"

"Nonsense, don't you know what kind of person you are?"

"Diakka! I've tolerated you for a long time!"

"Do you think I'm afraid of you!"

"I..."

[All five of you, get ready and come to the bridge!]

Just as Diakka and Yzak were about to fight, Cruze's voice suddenly came from the loudspeaker beside them.