In the early morning, the air in the siege camp outside Suvano still held a slight chill. Thin mist drifted between the wooden fences as Home Alone controlled his character and relieved himself behind a patch of bushes.
Even while taking a leak, Home Alone kept glancing around, watching out for the Military Police.
The Military Camp had communal latrines, but so many people used them that the stench was overwhelming. Home Alone would rather piss in the bushes a short distance behind his tent than go there.
Finished, he gave himself a satisfied shake and hummed an off-key Cantonese song, thinking about sneaking out of camp to hunt some game and stretch his legs.
Home Alone ambled over to the perimeter fence on the eastern side of camp, looking for a gap to slip through. Then he glanced left. Hey, wasn't that Mia, the strange little NPC girl who rode Big White Pig?
She was crouching on the ground not far from the fence, her little head bent close, staring motionlessly at the earth like a small stone statue.
"Well, hello, Mia-chan!"
Curious, Home Alone approached and crouched beside her.
"What are you looking at? Counting ants moving house?"
Mia looked up at his voice. Instead of her usual expressionless look, her little face wore a frown, with a touch of confusion and... nervousness? She pointed at the ground with a small, mud-stained finger.
"Not ants. Look at this."
Home Alone followed her finger and looked closely. About a meter in front of her, between the damp soil and flattened grass, lay a broad, unmistakable track.
It looked as though something long and heavy had slid along the ground, crushing the grass and leaving a shallow, winding groove in the mud. The trail stretched from the camp all the