"My apologies for the wait," Arion finally began, his voice not very powerful, but mysteriously piercing nonetheless. As his voice rang, his icy eyes trailed over the faces of the men and women in the room. "I appreciate your patience."
He waited for a brief moment, as the large screen on the main wall of the room suddenly flashed to life. It glowed a luminous green, then dimmed to a gray screen on which a map was displayed.
"As many of you may already know, our destination is the city of Sakura," Arion continued, nodding to add clarity to his words. "If you look here, you will see the lay-out of the town." He extended his right arm to gesture towards the map on the screen. The eyes within the room followed.
"The city is structured somewhat like a cross, with its branches being almost as long as the neck. The port, from where we will enter, is located at the base of the cross. From there, the market stretches out, which is lined with shops and bargaining centers."
Arion traced the neck of the cross with his hand, then used his finger to circle the joint of the three branches and the neck.
"Then the town splits off into three districts: the East, the West, and the Central. The East District is where the average civilians live. The wealthy homes and the town hall are located in the Central District. And the West District is where you can find Sakura's military quarters."
He glanced around at everyone in the room, making sure he still had everyone's attention. Then he continued.
"Our purpose here is to investigate the entire town in search of mass-destructive weapons, which Tsunami speculates to exist in the form of Core-Capsules."
Arion tapped the screen with his right palm, and it changed to display a strange-looking, metallic sphere. It was silver-colored, with dark red orbs entrenched in various spots on its surface.
"This is a Core-Capsule. It is highly explosive, able to decimate an entire city within seconds. This is what we are trying to find. There may be one, two, any number of these hidden. We cannot stop looking until the entire city is searched."
A coil of anxious whispering and murmurs encompassed the room, as the soldiers all spoke amongst themselves. From what Nimbus could hear, they all sounded pretty overwhelmed, and somewhat confused.
Arion brought up his hand to slowly stroke his chin, and to Nimbus it almost looked as though he was fighting back a smirk. "Are...there any questions or concerns?"
"Yeah, I got some concerns!" the red-haired soldier spoke up almost immediately. "Why the hell would Sakura have a weapon like that!? It's the most peaceful city in the nation! Not to mention the fact that their military is much too incompetent and weak to operate such a weapon."
The soldier with glasses joined in, his mouth spraying spit into the air as he forced his words out. "Yeah, and where did Tsunami get this ludicrous accusation anyway?!"
General Pedallus and Cassandra hushed their companions, although they shared similar concerns.
Arion waited until it was absolutely silent to give his response. "Do you doubt Tsunami's intelligence agencies? We have our sources, you should not worry about that," he explained. "Although we are not 100% sure that such a weapon is being hidden in Sakura --" The bald soldier let out a loud scoff at this. "--we certainly have legitimate grounds of reasoning for our claim. Information which is none of your business."
The red haired soldier was about to shout, but he met the highly-serious eyes of his General, and submissively sat back calmly in his seat.
Nimbus leaned over to Mizu to whisper, "Tsunami sure can put on an act. You guys are just a bunch of crooks, aren't you..."
Mizu whispered back, "We're not crooks. We're simply willing to do whatever it takes to achieve our goal. In this world, there are many people that want to get in our way. We have to fight, even if it means lying to get what we want."
As the audience quieted down, Arion tapped the screen once more. It flashed back to the map display. "Well then...Are there any more questions or concerns? I would like everyone to fully understand the situation."
(( Okay, is Shinamori still in this RP or not? I think I might wanna take over his RpC for the next couple parts of the story. ))