33 Risen#re

Media watched the exchange between Lirian and commander Pexes in silence, her gaze slowly drifted across the map of the world as the two of them began to speak.

To her surprise she found that the commander was surprisingly laid back, and acted very courteously to the both of them, and the way he chatted with Lirian about his duties made it seem as if they had known each other for years, but she noticed that he wasn't saying anything of significance that could help them.

She knew the way this worked all the info needed was available to them, but they wouldn't be told a word of it, and they only had fifteen minutes, no scratch that 12 minutes to get all the intel they needed.

She stopped focusing on the conversation between Lirian and the commander and began studying the map she knew that this would be their only chance to see it.

The lines that isolated the areas with different energy levels were the only complete thing on its surface as for the rest of it, it was still a work in process, on some of the more explored areas the details of the landscape were detailed.

It recorded the various mountain ranges, and different fauna found on the planet, and there was even an index indicating all the discovered indigenous life forms, unfortunately from what she could tell there was no new race discovered on the planet, nor were there any ancestral life forms of the common races.

Such a thing could easily elevate the value of the planet, many of the races had evolved a great deal since entering the universe, it couldn't be helped with the great deal of inbreeding between races and with genetic modification being so easily accessible, due to the difficulty in finding a pure bloodline many people would be willing to pay a fortune to find an ancestral form of their race.

She moved her gaze away from the detailed parts of the map and looked at the less detailed parts, it was mainly forest areas of the planet that the satellites and drones couldn't get much information about through scans, those were the areas that needed explorations teams.

She looked through the zone levels and was glad to see that all the zones were classified at level 3 or below, which meant that on this planet there were no readings about any creature being above the third grade.

They would most likely have to do an exploration of a level 1 or level 2 zone, with the numbers they have it wouldn't be too difficult, in fact, it wouldn't be impossible to explore a level 3 zone.

She soon noticed that the room had gone quiet, she glanced up to see the commander looking at her expectantly

As far as information went, this room was all that they would get and, he wouldn't tell them a word, it was up to them to learn what they could from all the information that was present.

Media glanced at Lirian he was standing completely still, with one hand on his walking stick and the other tucked into his pocket, he faced with an expectant look on his face that told it was her time to show him what she could do.

She smiled inwardly, this is what she specialized in, info gathering, she had the techniques beaten into her from the time she could crawl, there was never a time that she didn't stop analyzing and collecting data.

"Commander Pexes," she said respectfully, "If I may ask are there any restrictions on the location of the expedition, that we need to know about?" she asked slowly while casting quick glances around the room to gather any information that could be hiding in plain sight.

It was a common tactic used to hid intel, when intelligent creatures were looking for something important, they would tend to search in hidden places and ignore open areas, and she had seen this tactic of reverse psychology used a million times.

"I suppose I would like to offer you a word of caution rather than a restriction, I do advise you not to enter any level 3 zone, if your group somehow offends one of the creatures in those parts, things can turn bad fast," he said plainly and left her to continue analyzing the room.

As she moved around the room she found some notes strewn about on a table, this was exactly what she was looking for, those notes that didn't seem important detailed ruins left behind by some civilization, but according to the reports there were currently no intelligent races living on the planet.

"Is there anything specific that you want me to find out?" she asked Lirian, his silence was leaving her on edge, and she could swear that in all the years she had known him not once had he ever gone so long without speaking.

"Find out whatever you can, you can tell me what you've learned after we leave the room," he said while stifling a yawn, his tone took everyone in the room by surprise.

Before she could protest, he continued, "The lives of everyone in the expedition are in your hands, what we do will depend solely on the intel you are able to gather."

Media paused as his words slowly sunk in, her heart did a little tap dance as it raced furiously.

She recalled her expedition from the previous year, she only had the duty of leading her single class, it was only twenty of them and yet she still failed so miserably.

Beads of cold sweat poured down her face, and suddenly the clarity she usually had when it was time to observe things vanished, as she was reminded of her failure.

She took deliberately long breaths as she forced herself to memorise everything she possibly could, she made her way around the room for a second time looking through anything she may have missed.

She looked at the contour lines of the map, taking note of the severity of the slopes, slowly deducing the best path for them to take, she knew that they would have to enter into one of the less explored areas if they had any hope of getting a decent number of merits.

Her eyes glossed over every corner of the room, and every nook that seemed capable of hiding something.

After their time passed she heaved a soft breath, "I-I think that I've found everything that I could."

"Good," Lirian said simply and turned to face the commander, "I believe that it's time for you to tell everyone what we'll be doing."

He turned on his heel and walked towards the large steel doors, he wasn't too bothered about what Media had learned, she knew how to gather intel accurately, he was certain of that much after knowing her for so many years, she was even slightly better at it than Edith.

Unfortunately, she was never overly confident in herself, and she had more of a soft personality, it was sadly a bad recipe for leadership, although it would mark her as a capable advisor.

Lirian intended to use this trip to hammer her into shape, over the years he had come to find his leadership position as something that was almost second nature to him, his great deal of experience made it easy for him to exude a confident aura that most people required years to build up.

Due to his extreme confidence in himself, people naturally gravitated towards him as a leader, and currently, the only problem he faced was his blindness, and unfortunately no matter how much he tried he knew that there would always be someone waiting to use it against him.