72. The Counterattack Is Underway

The Counterattack Is Underway

“Is that so?”

Despite the absolutely stunning, possibly supernatural beauty of their armed escorts, the young man slowly regained his composure.

His usual cynicism came back with it.

“Then what are the other two reasons?”

“The second reason is cooperation,” the other twin told them as she led them toward the kitchen, turning her almost bare, beautifully curved back toward them.

It felt a little condescending. She had not even disarmed them!

Then again, maybe not. The four of them were in no position to attack a group of unknown enhanced people who outnumbered them ten to one.

“Then what’s the third reason?” Tumbleweed almost demanded, before remembering to soften his tone.

These people were no longer civilians. After surviving alone in this hellscape for two weeks, they had stopped being civilians.

From what he could see, they were resistance fighters, armed and empowered.

“That is classified information. Sorry,” the other woman told him with an easy smile, clearly not sorry in the slightest.

He did not press further, since alienating someone who obviously had influence among these people would be stupid. Instead, he changed the subject.

“How did you survive?”

In his experience, young, combative people who had not yet been crushed by violence were often very easy to lure into bragging about their achievements.

“This fortress is obviously an important position. The enemy must have targeted it immediately.”

He did not add that they would have done so even if only to break morale.

“And yet you must have been here for days.” They had to have been, to build this enormous metal structure even with the help of powers.

“Almost two weeks, actually,” the brown-haired twins said in unison, their voices harmonizing so well they sounded like one person.

Then they sat behind a desk buried in sticky notes and maps, a desk that practically screamed operations command to him.

“This used to be a school. Our school.”

“You’re college students?” Big Guy looked dumbstruck all over again. “But…”

“Magic has opened many paths to ability, and some people would consider those abilities… less than natural,” the young woman on the left said, leaning back in her chair and stretching with both hands over her head.

The other woman only rolled her eyes.

“If you could become more beautiful, wouldn’t you?” she asked, instead of commenting on her twin sister’s shameless display.

“I would rather survive,” he said with a frown.

“Trust me, beauty helps with that too,” the other twin said with a wink.

He was not going to take her word for it…

Because she was right.

Tumbleweed looked around the room and noticed how, no matter what people were doing, their eyes flicked toward the brown-haired twins again and again.

Wonderful. They were the leaders here.

“I would not make that bet if I were you,” one of them said.

They switched speakers whenever they liked, and they looked so much alike that he was beginning to lose track of which one was which.

And then there was that…

“No, I am not reading your mind,” the same young woman interrupted before the thought had fully formed, obviously lying. “It is just superhuman intuition, cold reading, empathy, and social skill.”

Fine. Maybe she was not lying.

The alternative was not much better. It was effectively mind reading, only she could honestly claim that it was not mind reading.

“All right, I’ll concede that much,” he said. “But surviving here takes more than social tricks. The undead don’t care how pretty you are.”

“True. That is where duality comes in,” said the woman on the left.

“Duality?”

If only he knew.

The other brown-haired woman handed the original rocket launcher back to Big Guy, who accepted it silently.

Reality split again, and the rocket launcher became three.

“Everyone, listen up!” the two women called in unison.

Tumbleweed was beginning to suspect that they were not identical twins at all.

“An undead army of three thousand is twenty minutes from our gates.

“By the time they arrive, I want everyone to finish their preparations and come to us for a rocket launcher, a bag of grenades, or a copy of your favorite destructive weapon.

“Once those invaders show themselves, I want every enemy that appears to receive two explosives or two magical attacks!”

The crowd erupted into cheers.

Old Zhao Linshou, holding his shotgun, looked younger than I had ever seen him.

He had not actually become young again or anything like that. He still wore his old leather duster, boots, and cowboy hat, but magic had changed him the way it had changed all of us.

Most of his beer belly had disappeared. The old broken blood vessels and redness in his face were gone. His face had become slightly more symmetrical too, no longer twisted like a potato someone had stepped on.

He had grown taller as well, though his hunter’s outfit had automatically adjusted to fit his new five-foot-seven frame, and his limbs were as thick as tree trunks.

The biggest difference was that his smile came more naturally, his steps were lighter, and a new vitality filled both his appearance and the way he moved.

No one was going to call him handsome anytime soon, and if they did, he would happily shoot them, but he no longer looked like a nearly seventy-year-old man whose body was falling apart.

Instead, he looked dignified.

“Hey, brat?”

Naturally, his manners still needed work.

Then again, for several years before the invasion, we kids had talked trash about him behind his back and made up stories about how insane he was, despite never really seeing him up close.

“Did you get bigger?”

I mean, his directness was almost refreshing.

When he came into the cleared area, he still gave his habitual grunt despite now moving with far more ease. He rested his favorite oversized gun on his shoulder, sat down, and waited for the others.

“What’s wrong, old man? Afraid I’m getting taller and stronger than you?”

Unlike my coach, I found joking with this guy easy. Relaxing, even.

The two of them had the same inner grit, but Zhao Linshou the hunter was, even in battle, a cheerful old man rather than someone eternally gloomy and furious at the world like my coach.

Talking to him after that recent conflict… felt good. Comfortable.

His carefree attitude was refreshing.

“In some ways, you’ve already passed me,” he said with a laugh, patting his chest. “What has Lia had you doing lately? You girls still preparing to claw each other’s eyes out?”

“Not that badly anymore,” I sighed, sitting in midair with my feet hanging half a meter above the ground. Unsupported flight was more comfortable than any chair.

“Taking down lightning towers, stopping small demon armies, handling family matters.” I shrugged. “You know, ordinary stuff. What about you, old-timer? How’s the hunting going?”