Unfortunate Accident Flag is Raised

"Uh, you alright girl…?"

"I- I'm f- f- fine sir…"

"Looks like it's no good huh."

Did I just say it was time for battle earlier? That's kinda not the case. Not

yet anyway. There was still an hour left until we sortie. I had the onboard

AI do a routine maintenance check on the entire ship and went to the dining

area with Mimi in order to try and relax a bit before the big battle, but it

isn't going so well, apparently.

"T- T- The- There's absolutely no p- problem y'know."

"It really doesn't look like that's the case though."

It kinda felt awkward to see Mimi fretting about like a newborn fawn or

chihuahua. Well, we're diving headfirst into a dangerous, life-threatening

battle soon, so I guess being nervous and terrified like her would normally

be how most folks would react. Mimi's current state is understandable.

On the contrary, I seem to be the abnormal one for not feeling the least bit

nervous or afraid. Later on I'd surely be taking a lot of lives. It's a bit

unsettling that I feel practically nothing from the prospect of participating in

a dangerous battle where there was a real danger of dying.

But why am I not nervous or pressured anyway? There are a few factors

I'm considering to be the reasons for this.

One major reason should be because, based on my research, I've surmised

that my trusty ship, Krishna, was of a different league altogether compared

with the ships of most other mercs and possessed uncommonly high combat

capabilities.

I managed to come to this conclusion after reviewing the performance specs

of other ships out on the market along with the overall firepower of their

weapons, the latest weapons, and equipment issued to the military and

compiling various other data about this world's standard warships.

Of course, the latest military warships employed by the Graccan Empire

and the Vereverem Federation were of entirely different size classes. But

even so, I surmised that we still had a fair chance of matching them in

battle.

The other factors I considered were my performance against the pirates I

fought soon after being transported to this world and the shocked reactions

of the receptionist uncle and Elma after watching my mock battles via the

simulator. Judging from their reactions, I surmised that my piloting ability

using the Krishna was somewhat out of the norm and unexpected. Of

course, a major factor for my performance can be attributed to Krishna's

considerably high specs. However, no matter how high ones ship's specs

were, if you couldn't pilot it properly, then it would just be a fancy moving

coffin. At the very least, my piloting skills could ensure that Krishna won't

end up being an aforementioned moving coffin.

Considering all these, I concluded that this upcoming pirate subjugation

mission won't pose that much of a threat to us. I ended up thinking as such.

So I managed to remain cool as a cucumber as a result. Or maybe I was

simply just a born daredevil who didn't feel much when faced with this sort

of dangerous stuff.

Y'see, I still couldn't shake the impression that this world really resembled

Stella Online. In other words, it might be that I still subconsciously saw all

this under the lens of a "gamer".

There was practically no danger of dying in battle. As a result, the sense of

reality was next to non-existent. That's why feeling the fear of death in this

situation didn't come naturally to me. I understood the fact that I'd die for

real if I got shot down. At least, I tried hard to internalize this fact.

However, the only times I have been shot down in Stella Online happened

during my newbie days, when I wasn't all that familiar with the gameplay

and controls yet. The repair costs after getting shot down were astronomical

after all. Insurance would help cover some of the expenses, but you'll end

up losing all your cargo anyway, so the resulting deficit would still be

enormous. That's why I always ensured that I acted with enough of a safety

margin.

If you misread the timing for retreat, you'd likely pay a steep price.

This much still won't cut it. That's what I always reminded myself back in

the day. As a result, Krishna ended up equipped with three layers of energy

shields and military-grade armor apart from its considerably tough main

hull.

Furthermore, it's also equipped with shield cells that could instantly

recharge the energy shields quickly. Once used, the shields could be brought

back up to full capacity after just a slight time lag. But the shield cells

would be useless if the energy shields ever became completely depleted

though.

Now then, about these shield cells – one or two would usually be equipped

on standard ships, but Krishna actually has a whopping five of these babies.

This practically meant that the ship's main body was fully protected until all

five shield cells were used up if you managed it well.

Whenever I engaged in battles in Stella Online, my rule of thumb was

making a retreat once the number of active shield cells was reduced to one.

As long as I had one active cell left, the odds of successfully escaping from

my enemies were rather high.

Naturally, however, if I attempted a retreat in a sloppy manner, then I'd just

get my ass handed to me. So I really had to be careful when making my

escape. Basically, if I cut the power from the ship's weapon systems and

rerouted the generator output to the thrusters and shield, then it won't be

that difficult to shake off an enemy who had to keep supplying power to

their weapons instead.

"Um, Hiro-sama…?"

"Hm? Ah, sorry. I was just thinking about some things."

Mimi hesitantly called out to me in a worried tone after noticing that I've

clammed up. I smiled at her and shook my head to show that nothing was

wrong.

"You don't really need to worry all that much y'know. I'm fairly confident

in my piloting skills and this ship packs quite the punch. And I've also

made things clear in the briefing earlier right? I'll promptly high-tail it if I

feel that it's getting a bit too dangerous. I operate with enough of a safety

margin. Plus, I'll have to consider you now too, Mimi."

"Oh, no. I really am okay."

"Right. Just please do something about that pale, bluish face before saying

something like that. But I guess this is just how it is. You'll have to get used

to it soon though. Oh, and before I forget, it's best if you don't eat much

right before a battle. It'll be a disaster-in-the-making otherwise."

"Uhh… I'll keep that in mind."

I didn't want to see the cute Mimi throwing up y'know. I probably won't

mind it much if that disappointing space elf did it though. And well, if we

really ended up vomiting inside the cockpit, the odor might cause my

concentration to drop or cause the equipment to malfunction. Nah, maybe

not. This stuff's military-grade after all.

"Looks like the routine check's just about done… Uh, Mimi, if you're

really feeling scared, would you like to stay behind in the colony instead?"

"N- No! I'll definitely go! I still haven't done anything useful for Hirosama. And if I run away here, I don't think I'll have the right to be by Hirosama's side anymore."

Mimi squeezed both her hands into fists and made a guts pose. Her ample

chest assets jiggled from her actions. Today, Mimi looked the part of a

regular mercenary. She wore tight-fitting spats and a durable-looking shirt.

She also wore a jacket over her other clothes. Personally, I can't help but

feel that she was pushing it with the merc get-up, but I'll get used to it soon.

Probably.

Looks like Mimi's more or less okay now, so we moved to the cockpit and

started preparing for launch. The routine maintenance check's finished and

the results are green. Looks like we're in the clear.

"Mimi, we're initiating launch procedures. Please contact the hangar

control center."

"Y- Yes!"

Mimi plopped down on the Operator seat and clumsily fiddled with the

console in front of her in order to obtain launch clearance. After a few

moments, the main monitor displayed the launch count down. Unlike the

docking procedure, the entire thing was apparently handled automatically

by an A.I.

I activated Krishna's thrusters after the countdown finished and launched

out from the hangar bay. The landing gears were retracted back inside the

hull, and the ship finally exited from the Termaine Prime Colony back into

outer space.

"Amazing…"

"The scenery out here in space is great huh. There's an ocean of stars

anywhere you look."

"Ah! So the colony… actually looked like that."

"It looks a lot like a bicycle wheel right?"

"Bicycle?"

"Uh, well, it's a vehicle which used wheels that kinda looked like that."

"Is that so."

Mimi doesn't seem familiar with a bike. But it's quite eco-friendly y'know.

I think it'll do great as a mode of transport inside colonies. Maybe it didn't

function well under artificial gravity or something? It's a mystery. When I

checked the sensors, I found several other mercenary ships already on

standby outside the colony.

The ships piloted by mercenaries were quite varied, and there were no two

ships that looked exactly alike. Strictly speaking, some were of the same

models, but their details were drastically different because each of them was

heavily customized according to personal taste.

"Wow, there's a lot of colorful ships!"

"They look like that in order to stand out. Gotta make an impression on

potential clients and all that."

By the way, Krishna's paint job was matte dark blue which doubled as

camouflage. In Stella Online, there was a high degree of freedom when it

comes to customizing a ship's coloring and decals. There were quite a few

quirky looking ones such as a transport ship that had anime characters

plastered all over its hull. I honestly didn't subscribe to the idea all that

much.

"What the-? Now that's quite the rare article…"

There was a conspicuous-looking pure white ship among the mercenaries. It

had an elegant and streamlined frame reminiscent of a swan. Its large rear

thruster gave it the impression of being considerably fast. In fact, it really

was a unit geared for speed.

This ship's official model name was [SSC-16 Galactic Swan] – among the

Stella Online players, it was otherwise known as "White Meteor" (in the

sense that it'll eventually turn into a shooting star), "Fe***ri" (since it was

akin to a disgustingly expensive luxury sports car), "Runaway Super

Express" (to Hell) and so on.

"Wow, what a beautiful ship!"

"You think so?"

"What's the matter?"

"No, uh, well…"

Fastest top speed and mobility, decent firepower and powerful shield output

– judging solely from these, you'd think it was an excellent model. But the

problem lies with its aforementioned mobility.

Plainly speaking, it was just too lopsided of a design. Its acceleration was so

peaky to the point that it could only go in a straight line most of the time

and was an absolute nightmare to control when executing complex

maneuvers. A friend of mine let me try it out a while back, and I couldn't

pilot it properly no matter how I tried. Another bad thing about it was its

price-performance ratio. In order to achieve its insane acceleration, it

utilizes a lot of high-end parts which are quite expensive and the purchase

and repair costs are ridiculously high as a result. Heck, its repair cost even

trumps that of a full-fledged battleship.

And the final and arguably worst thing about it was its tendency to go

"berserk" under certain conditions. And it going berserk doesn't mean that

you'll curbstomp all opposition. No sir. It won't accept any control inputs

and would just keep going straight with tremendous speed until the fuel

runs out. And finally, it explodes.

When this feature was first discovered, people were screaming "Is this a

Bug devs!?" and made quite a ruckus in-game. But when the said crazy (in

a good way) devs investigated it, they found that it only occurred on this

particular unit and won't happen with any other ship. So they wrapped it up

as a kind of quirky hidden feature and left it at that.

Its tendency to go out of control coupled with its bad handling, high

purchase cost, and repair fees eventually made players treat it as some sort

of joke unit… And there was actually a merc who'd take such a machine to

a life-and-death battle. But I guess if they could handle the thing properly, it

wasn't actually a bad machine to use. Both its speed and maneuverability

exceeded Krishna's after all. Then again, it did have this tendency to go

berserk and explode to bits afterward. That's a huge demerit.

"Is it a bad ship?"

"Well, not really. If you can use it well, it's a formidable machine. But it's

handling leaves a lot to be desired… If I were to say it straight, it's a

defective machine."

"Defective machine?"

"If some conditions are met, it'll go wild and fly straight ahead until it

explodes. Well, as long as you don't push its speed past a certain point

during combat maneuvers and don't fire off or take hits from a barrage of

high-density optical weapons, the conditions for it going berserk won't be

met."

"Isn't that plenty dangerous though?"

"Really dangerous. So the one piloting that thing either has to be a very

experienced veteran who's aware of the dangers or a fool who chose it

merely due to its specs."

"I see."

I tapped the display to bring up that ship's info and the owner's name was…

Captain Elma.

"Oh…"

"What is it?"

"Um, it seems that's Elma's ship."

"Eeeh!?"

"Well she did say she was an experienced veteran, so I guess it's alright?"

It won't go bonkers unless it's armed to the teeth with laser weapons.

Maybe. Probably. I hope…

Oh, who am I kidding? Of all things, it was that disappointing space elf

who appeared piloting that kind of joke machine. Looks like the incident

flag was already standing tall.

"Let's pray for her safety… It's your first sortie after all Mimi."

"Yes, lets. I'm sure Elma-san will be fine."

I didn't really want to see any of my acquaintances kick the bucket, but I

guess there would be more of that coming as long as I continue to work as a

mercenary. The moment you board a starship, you'll be responsible for your

own wellbeing. As much as I'd like to help out, I really couldn't afford to

right now. There's not much I can do at this stage anyway. There's no other

choice but to simply pray for her safety.

"Thirty minutes until the start of the operation. The coordinates of the target

point have been sent to each starship. Please move out once the mission

countdown finishes."

The Operator of the System Armed Forces transmitted the coordinates of

the target point to each ship. Looks like recon drones have been deployed

earlier and the enemies' overall strength and composition were quite

detailed.

"The heck…"

"What's the matter?'

"Nothing. It's just a bit troublesome, that's all."

The coordinates we ended up getting assigned to was one of the points

where the enemy units were densest. Was this assigned randomly? Or

maybe… Captain Serena's fox-like smile appeared in my head. It felt

strangely lifelike.

"Well, it'll work out anyway."

I could always just escape when things got dangerous anyway. Though I

doubt I'd have to, in any case.