Gate: Thus, the Kovenant Empire fought there.

A Fateful encounter.

(Hours later.)

The third platoon stood on guard as the sun began to set on the horizon, following the instructions of General Engel, Lieutenant Skrosamzy and his troops had moved out and secured an area that blocks off major road junctions leading to the second Gate, that structure in question stood upon a place the locals knew as "Alnus Hill" The Vrinngrenadiers made good on their time, having arrived hours earlier than expected, the troops had set up a little bastion of defense. Trenches and fox holes, freshly dug into the ground crisscrossed a small hill overlooking the road that the platoon was supposed to guard, littered with machine gun nests and nests for their sharpshooters, the troops were able to have a small rest while still being able to keep an eye on the road.

Sitting at the center of the trenches, Dian popped another cigar while Jonas looked around, taking in the atmosphere before sketching once more.
"Sketching again, eh?"

"Ja, there's nothing much to do and we're done with making these trenches, so, we may as well kill the time," Jonas said.
Jonas's handy work was showing itself once more. The speed at which he can complete an art piece and the realistic, hyper-detailed manner of his sketches was remarkable and though Dian had seen her brother draw many times over, the other soldiers around them were enthralled by it.

Dian looked over to the right and saw Michael and Bernhard, sitting close to their machine gun, listening closely to the Comms network.

"What are you two doing?" Dian asked, puffing halos of smoke into the air.

"Trying to hear if there's any word from General Engel about that girl she's questioning. It's been a few hours already and I am pretty curious!" Bernhard replied.
Michael added.
"Ja could be useful for us too since she's going to spill the beans on some prominent locations and about the... Magic these people use, I bet that Magic is just what they would call Psychic power, in which case we are already familiar with that."

"No need to wait that long, Lieutenant Skrosamzy has just received the information from Engel and has ordered all his subordinates to disseminate the information to the troops." Turning to the left side of the trench, the group saw Sargeant Conrad walking towards them, the troops gave the Sargeant a salute.
"Sir!"
"At ease, at ease... Ms. Lelei has disclosed a lot of information about this world to us and in exchange she is being treated as an informant under our protection."

Suddenly, familiar laughter came from a nearby foxhole. Jojo, who had been listening from the sidelines then said.
"Well let's just hope that some of the information tells us more about the Alter-Humans of this world, who knows we might encounter a few Nekos here, like Luna!"

Luna, who was silently admiring her weapon on a nearby crate scoffed and glared at her fellow squadmate.
"Is that genuine or is it just an excuse for you to indulge in your... Interest in Nekos?"

Jojo couldn't help but smile and laugh. He walked up to the Neko sharpshooter and replied. "Come on now, you make it sound like it's a bad thing, I just think Nekos are cute is all... Much like you."

Luna blushed as red as a tomato, her cat ears and tail raised to the sky upon hearing that. "Oy! There's a time and place for that!"

"Oh? Does that mean you like it then?"

"W-what? No!"

"Then why the blush?"

"Ugh... Not this again." Luna said, covering her face as she gripped her weapon with her legs.
"S-so, what did they have to say, Sarge?"

Conrad replied.
"Miss Lelei told us about how this Empire works, as well as how politics in this place works, and she revealed a few other prominent cities other than Italica, there's a city that goes by the name of 'Rondel' supposedly it is the center of magic research in this world and therefore is a city of interest, it is a city where learning about the art of magic is taken more as an academic pursuit if anything else."
Conrad looked up for a bit, at the right side of the trench and there, he saw Lieutenant Skrosamzy himself approaching.