Rhodes Island does not exist.

Because all the officers in their positions did what they were supposed to do, and even did it better than usual.

However, in the face of natural disasters, these excellent qualities are gradually being diluted into meaningless actions.

Let's get back to Provence.

The day after she made her prediction, the doctor had already ordered her to evacuate the observation tower. However, she refused, saying, "Tomorrow is the last day the Cataclysmic Cloud will remain, and then there will be no problem."

However, as you all know, things have changed.

On the third day, the natural disaster cloud did not disappear; instead, it seemed to have taken root and remained in place.

All predictions about it were ignored as if they were a joke.

Provence then declared that it was her responsibility to remain in the observation tower and take remedial measures to provide more accurate secondary predictions.

The doctor agreed.

He even had to agree.

For a messenger of natural disasters, such actions are indeed their duty. Provence was simply doing the absolutely right thing; he couldn't even use his doctoral authority to order her to relinquish her post.

Moreover, he couldn't forcibly take Provence out of the observation tower.

After all, the structure of the observation tower is extremely unique even in the context of Rhodes Island as a whole—it is not part of Rhodes Island as a whole, but rather independent of Rhodes Island.

Provence, who is inside the observation tower, can seal off the tower's only entrance from the inside, and once she does so, it will be impossible to enter unless the door is forcibly blasted open with industrial-grade weapons.

But the current situation is more unique.

This unusual situation also marked the beginning of the Doctor's request for Provence to evacuate from the observation tower—the connection between the observation tower and Rhodes Island had become loose due to the Originium dust storm.

Therefore, precisely because of this special circumstance, the Doctor cannot force the door open. Doing so would only cause the observation tower to loosen even more completely, ultimately causing it to break off from the Rhodes Island main ship and fall into the vast sea of ​​Originium dust.

In other words, everything was subject to Provence's personal wishes.

Only if she is willing to voluntarily relinquish her duties and leave the observation tower can she escape from that coffin that could fall off at any moment.

The only thing that could still convince the doctor to let her stay in the tower was that there was still enough food and water inside.

For the Catastrophe Messenger, who needs to make effective observations of natural disasters over a long period of time, the observation tower is like another small world separate from Rhodes Island, and they often stay there for a week at a time.

Therefore, the observation tower is always stocked with many of the survival supplies they need on a daily basis. For example, Provence still has enough food and water to survive for a month, as well as medicine to suppress her Oripathy.

If it weren't for the loose connection in the observation tower, the Doctor wouldn't have even considered letting Provence leave the tower, but instead let her hide safely inside until the chaos on the ship subsided.

But the situation eventually reversed.

Provence insisted on staying at her post, while the Doctor begged her to return to the ship.

On the third day, due to a miscalculation, the doctor was forced to agree to her request.

On the fourth day, the doctor considered suggesting that she return to her home ship again, but in the energy-saving mode where resources were scarce, the limited time they had for a phone call was almost entirely spent on communication and comforting each other.

On the fifth day, facing a distraught Provence, the doctor's words were limited to words of comfort.

He knew that no matter what he said, she would not accept it in the face of such a Provence.

So, what about the sixth day?

There will be no sixth day.

The events that occurred on the sixth day are the reason why Ms. W is currently so angry in front of the Doctor.

Do you remember that sentence I mentioned earlier?

Because the disaster messengers need to stay in the observation tower for extended periods, the tower is always stocked with a large amount of survival supplies they need, enough to supply them with food, water, and medicine for about a month.

That's right.

If the trigger for the Doctor's current anger is the events of the sixth day, then the trigger for the events of the sixth day was a document from the Logistics Department regarding supplies for the observation tower.

The observation tower is now surrounded by refugees.

Everyone is eyeing the resources in the observation tower.

Although they had no idea what the observation tower meant to Rhodes Island, or to the life inside.

-

Thank you segment.

Thank you for the monthly pass.

Chapter 176, Chapter 175: The Eve of War

w rarely gets angry.

Because she is almost always smiling, her smile can express almost any emotion she needs to express.

But now, there's no smile on her face.

“Provence is now surrounded in the observation tower by that bunch of ungrateful bastards.” W sat directly on the Doctor’s desk, looking down at him. “What do you suggest we do?”

The doctor knew very well the cause of all this.

There was a mole in the logistics department.

After all, if recovered refugees and Reunion members want to join Rhodes Island, they can only start as trainee operators in the logistics department.

Even if these positions are far away from important supply warehouses, they will inevitably come into contact with relevant intelligence.

No matter how much the decision-makers try to conceal it, in the end they will still let the grassroots do it.

Thus, the issue of insufficient survival and medical supplies swept across Rhodes Island like a storm, becoming an open secret.

"The special operations team is on its way." The doctor sat in his chair, expressionless.

He didn't know what kind of expression to wear in the face of all this.

Perhaps it was a mistake to choose to accept these two groups of disaster victims from the very beginning?

No.

His behavior was not the problem.

He was not wrong.

He desperately wanted to tell himself that he was not wrong.

But he can't.

As the supreme commander of Rhodes Island, all of this was inevitably his responsibility.

"Go there? What can you do if you go there?" W leaned forward, his eyes wide with anger as he glared at the Doctor. "The observation tower has been locked from the inside by Provence. All the rioters who turned from refugees have split into two groups. One group is surrounding the entrance of the observation tower, while the other group has entered the maintenance passage next to the observation tower and is threatening her and us with the separator."

“As long as Provence doesn’t open the door, they’ll just pull down the separator, separating the already crumbling observation tower from Rhodes Island…right?” The Doctor quietly finished her sentence.

The doctor knows everything that is happening right now.

But even knowing this, he couldn't stop it.

Because the opponent has grasped a weak point: the life of a dutiful Scourge messenger from Rhodes Island.

"If you ask me, we shouldn't have let them join the internship group so early!" W rubbed his temples, his tone almost hysterical. "It would have been so much better if they had just been lying in their hospital beds like corpses! Not only did we make them lie there like corpses, but we also controlled them! Ah, I really—"

Her second half of the sentence clearly lacked strength; her anger did not make her tone more assertive, but instead deflated at the last moment, like a punctured ball.

The doctor knew why.

"You... haven't eaten for days?" His eyes finally broke free from the helpless deathly aura and turned to meet W's gaze calmly.

"Are you still concerned about this kind of issue now?" W shook his head, his expression icy. "Right now, I just want to see how you're going to solve this problem."

"There is a solution..."

The doctor leaned back in his chair, his eyes returning to their previous lifeless state.

“Refugees… I’m sorry, I still don’t want to use the word ‘mob,’ but anyway, their representatives came to negotiate with me.” The doctor slowly began, “Yes, they made their demands.”

"Negotiations?" W's gaze shifted from anger to suspicion. "When did this happen? How did you negotiate? Through shipboard communications?"

“…Yes.” The Doctor nodded. “Kroos helped me connect the wires.”

"What did they say?" W asked. "Although I don't think they'll offer anything reasonable, I'm willing to wait for you to speak in order to hear what else could make me even angrier."

"They said they would release Provence, but only if three conditions were met."

The doctor's tone was completely calm, a calmness akin to that of a dead person's lifeline that reminded him of a female friend far away.

Unfortunately, I may never see her again.

"The first condition is that all the supplies inside the observation tower be allocated to them."

Discarding the memories that had just surfaced in his mind, the doctor continued his explanation to W.

w listened attentively without interrupting.

"The second condition is to make public all the remaining supplies on Rhodes Island."

The anger on W's face intensified.

"And the third condition... is that they demand the killing of all Reunion prisoners currently existing on Rhodes Island."

Upon hearing this, W laughed.

She finally smiled.

"These three conditions are all incredibly shameless," she shook her head, her laughter growing increasingly vulgar. "And what's with the last condition? Are you planning a reverse massacre?"

The flower branches trembled wildly.

"Hey, Doctor." She leaned closer to the Doctor with an expression that was incomprehensible to ordinary people, and asked from the edge of his hood, "The solution you just mentioned, it's not that you agree to these outrageous demands, is it? If you actually agree to even one of these demands, you will be more outrageous than all three demands combined."

“I didn’t agree.” The doctor shook his head.

"So what's your solution?" W asked.

The two faces were very close together.

At this distance, the Doctor's eyes could see nothing but W's skin.

But what he observed was not just her skin.

Rather, it was the abnormal, sickly white color beneath her skin, and her lips, cracked and bleeding like barren earth.

The creature in front of me, w, has not eaten or drunk anything for a long time.

"Hey? Stop pretending to be deaf and mute, okay? Answer my question, thank you." W ignored the gaze from under the hood and just urged.

"My solution is on its way."

The doctor's eyes traveled up her cheeks to her amber-red eyebrows.

"On the way?" W chuckled. "You mean that special operations team you mentioned at the beginning? Ah~ I get it, you're planning to abandon Provence altogether, right? What's that military strategy called again, mutual destruction? So even the Holy Spirit of Babel, the most benevolent doctor of our Knights of the Tower, would use such a strategy of sacrificing the individual for the greater good? What's going on? You've suddenly become enlightened in the face of such a desperate situation?"

"Do not."

The doctor shook his head, opened the drawer on the lower right side of his desk, and slowly began to speak.

"I went to save Provence."

A small metal can lay in the drawer compartment, sealed very tightly.

“The situation is still under control.” He silently took the metal can out of the drawer and handed it to W. “Because neither the Reunion Movement, the refugees, nor Rhodes Island have officially broken out into conflict yet. Even now... it’s just the eve of the battle.”

"Hey, what are you doing...?"

“Bottled water, for emergencies.” The doctor shook his head, interrupting W. “I originally had three bottles in my drawer.”

"What about the other two cans?"

"I gave it to Amiya."

-

Thank you segment.

Thanks to 997ToolmanAhLianYa for the blades and monthly tickets from Tobio, thank you.

Chapter 177, Chapter 176: The End of Idealism

In fact, W knew in her heart that what the doctor had just said was correct.

The three factions on Rhodes Island are currently in a tense standoff, but that's about it.

Driven by the need for survival, the refugees took control of the observation tower.

In an effort to seek justice, the Reunification Movement assassinated several refugees.