Charlie then remembered. "That reminds me. When will personnel from the research base come back?"Heiji thought about it. "There is a fuel transport team that comes and goes, maybe a couple of days to move fuel. They should arrive in another two or three hours."The research station's fuel consumption was enormous. Even during the Antarctic summer, their research station had burned through their reserves to this degree. In fact, despite having such a big crew, the research team members were never this busy either.Currently, almost all vehicles and helicopters were operating continuously outdoors. Radar scanning required a large amount of electricity, so the internal combustion engines on these vehicles and aircraft consumed an additional amount of fuel for power.In the Antarctic winter, the Japanese research helicopters were equipped with ice radar and consumed approximately two tons of fuel per hour—truly fuel guzzlers.And to ensure operations continued without interruption, t

Merlin read through the translated conversion and quickly noticed certain points that should be taken notice.The Japanese research crew was searching in four different teams with different callsigns. Moreover, team one to three were ground teams, while team four was airborne.While that meant they were searching far and wide for something, there were plenty of mentions of a hidden city, while confirming through comms if the radar detected anything under the ice.As he promptly fed Charlie the information, Charlie quickly pieced together everything and realized that they were scanning the ice caps for a city under the ice.Logically speaking, these ice caps formed long before human civilization. Even with modern technology, humans can't build a subterranean city beneath the ice caps just yet, so that was even less likely for the ancients.Charlie was hence convinced that the ancients were most likely just going to die here without sufficient equipment and supplies… when he suddenl

Kohei replied, "Well, mainly by airdropping special forces and military hardware. If the situation calls for it, they could even drop lightly armored vehicles here, while their bomber aircraft and artillery can bombard specific locations from another continent with almost pinpoint precision, and keep bombing it around the clock.""Fuck," Barlin muttered in exasperation.And here he thought he just became the king of this continent, only to be told that foreign forces can come and go as they please.And since there's almost no chance of convincing the Japanese military to deliver aviation kerosene, that means the helicopter is grounded for all intents and purposes… unless?Having yet another bright idea, Barlin blurted, "Alright, if banditry is a no go, then we can do it quietly, yes? So tell me, which country has the biggest research crew team on the continent? Just tell me and I'll head over, control their minds and steal all their fuel and supplies… Perhaps even make them assist

Knowing what Barlin was about to pull, Merlin promptly sent the processed media to Charlie, who watched it with Vera, Ruby, and Penny.Charlie flashed a lopsided grin as he murmured, "Guess our geezer is really taking a gamble on this one. He just might succeed and keep his plans hidden from both the Japanese and Americans if he takes control of the two hundred Americans in McMurdo Base. However, their large-scale search will inevitably cause a huge fuel shortage and equipment wear and tear. When summer comes and the researchers and tourists arrive, he's not hiding anything then!" "At that time, the governments in both countries will both be in for a nasty shock. Where did all their fuel reserves go? What is with that stupidly high number on their vehicle odometers? Even if they reset the odometers, the wear and tear on vehicle tracks, tires, engines, gearboxes, drive shafts—basically every part of their vehicles can't be hidden. "Frequent vehicle use will also rapidly deplete the

Otherwise, none of their vehicles would cover the 1,800-mile distance.The harsh cold also meant more fuel consumption to keep the heaters and other equipment on—either way, they were burning through whatever fuel they had left.After some final checks as the fuel truck joined the convoy formation, Kohei finally approached Barlin. "We can depart now, my lord."Barlin nodded. "Then let's go!"With that, four snow tractors and a single oil tanker departed in a U formation along the Antarctic Coast, heading southwest before turning northwest.The two-way trip would take sixteen days, and since Charlie had the fuel tanker bugged, he could track their movements in real time.Four days after Barlin's departure, Charlie called Heiji again. "Repair the buoy now.""Yes, sir. Right away, sir," Heiji promptly replied, and hung up.Hearing straight to the ship's fuel reservoir, he rewrote the microcontroller program for the buoy sensor system, and then returned to his cabin.Five minutes