Number One Ace

Approximately thirty hours later, the combined forces convened as

planned, and the imperial military, or rather, the independent antipirate fleet led by Lt. Col. Serena commenced their simultaneous attack

on the Red Flag pirate bases in the Refill system.

"Our target is Pirate Base Bravo."

"Man. To think there were actually two pirate bases on a single star

system. Just how early did they plan for those planetary raids?"

There are various types of pirate bases, but most of them are modified

large asteroids. Their insides are hollowed out first, and then they'd

build simple residential sections within. If expansion was needed,

they'd bring in another asteroid or two, and connect them to the

original one to make a unified complex.

The reason they'd go out of their way to modify asteroids is, of course,

to hide their base from the prying eyes of mercenaries and military

forces hunting for them. A modified asteroid base was a lot more

difficult to find than a regular base. That's because there are just so

many of them in star systems that it was next to impossible to

scrutinize them one by one… Wait. Maybe the independent AIs can

actually do such a thing. It just feels like they'd have a method or two on

hand. Anyway, in SOL at least, the thing I mentioned was one of the

major reasons why pirates built modified asteroid bases according to

game lore.

By the way, it's not like there weren't any special pirate bases that

utilized building materials with a high degree of stealth capability. They

were pretty rare though. I don't know how many players managed to

encounter one during game events in SOL exactly, but anyway, their

outside appearance was very SF-like, and their high stealth capability

made them very difficult to detect on radars.

Once discovered, players always blew them up flashily using anti-ship

reactive torpedoes, EMLs, or missile storms though.

"Building bases isn't exactly easy, and it takes quite a bit of time. The

pirates having two bases regardless likely means they were planning to

hunt elves here for quite some time now. Maybe they found a pretty

rich buyer?"

"A buyer?"

"Piracy is still kind of a business after all. They were serious enough to

build two bases. That means they were pretty confident that they'll be

able to recoup such an investment. It's reasonable to think that they

managed to find a buyer rich enough to be willing to pay an exorbitant

price for captured elves."

After all, elves were generally very pleasing to the eyes, and their lives

were long as well. Also, a lot of them were very skilled in psionic power

manipulation. Hm. Maybe they were still quite the hot commodity in

the black markets even without a rich buyer in the equation?

"Maybe we're just overthinking things. Elves do seem like they'd fetch a

pretty high price in black markets after all."

"There are a lot of beautiful elves after all."

"Look, I know you two meant that as praise, sort of, but it just feels

weird to hear your race being evaluated as having high value as slaves."

Elma, who noticed Mimi and I were focused on her, complained glumly.

Well, that's true, I suppose. I mean, she'll probably fetch a high sum too.

She's really cute after all. But admit that does sound weird.

"Let's just drop the topic of troubles behind the scenes, guys. We'll be

arriving soon."

"Yeah, alright."

Soon, we'll be disengaging from synchronous navigation and arrive

near the location of pirate base Bravo. The main force spearheading the

attack was the independent anti-pirate fleet led by Lt. Col. Serena and

mercenaries like us. By the way, a mixed force composed of the Refill

system garrison, which is composed mostly of Rose clan members, and

imperial detachments gathered from other systems were in charge of

bringing down pirate base Alpha. I've heard that the Refill system

garrison was particularly fired up and wanted to regain their honor by

making this operation a success.

"This is a bit nerve-wracking."

"Really? We'd probably have it easy this time. We still shouldn't let our

guards down though."

"Why is that?"

"We did that whole blockade trap thing, right? The base probably

doesn't have even half of its original forces left."

"Ah, I see."

"What Hiro said makes sense, but we really can't afford to let our

guards down just yet. There's no telling what the pirates might do since

they've been cornered this far."

"That's true. Who knows. Maybe they'd be desperate enough to break a

Singing Crystal or something."

"That's gonna be really troublesome..."

After hearing my example, Mimi's cheeks twitched. A Singing Crystal

was a troublesome object that would attract a large number of crystal

lifeforms to the spot where it gets destroyed. In SOL, it was an item

used to start a Raid event. In this dimension, it's a special-grade

dangerous item that's deemed highly illegal.

Come to think of it, just what is that thing anyway? I mean, isn't it pretty

crazy that the reverberations created from destroying it can cross

space-time in order to instantly generate a breakout of crystal

lifeforms? If its nature can be successfully researched further, it might

lead to another major breakthrough in FTL tech.

"C'mon, focus. We're about to warp out."

"Oops, sorry. Let's get started then."

A thunderous boom echoed all throughout the cockpit, and the

surrounding light streams turned stationary once more.

[Command to all ships. We will now begin the attack and destroy the

enemy pirate base. Large-class ships, silence the enemy base defense

modules with precision long-range bombardment. All medium and

small-class ships will focus on directly eliminating enemy ships.

Destroyers, focus on defending our large-class ships.]

"Roger. Alright, let's do this."

"Aye, aye, sir. Switching sensor range to combat mode."

"Switching generator output from cruise mode to combat mode as well.

Weapon systems, activate. Sub-systems, stand-by. Whenever you're

ready, Captain."

"Yosh, let's aim for number one Ace. Elma, activate the heat sink."

"Wai-!?"

I punched Krishna's thrusters to maximum output and charged straight

at the pirate base. Yep, as expected, it was a modified asteroid type. I

spotted something that looks like a maintenance dock. So was this their

main base?

"Multiple energy readings detected from within the enemy base. The

defense modules have activated! Anti-spacecraft fire, incoming!"

"Chaff and flares!"

"I know!"

The emergency cooling system kicked in coupled with a beeping sound,

and while the cockpit's temperature rapidly cooled down, Elma

deployed the flares and chaffs. At the same time, I fired the afterburners

that sent the ship screaming past the high-caliber laser cannon

bombardment that inundated our previous position. The laser

bombardment was from the defense systems of the pirate base. It looks

like we managed to throw their aim off with the chaff and flares.

Oh, no, I think they actually managed to graze us a bit. It wasn't a direct

hit, so we're safe.

"Hey! We just got grazed, didn't we!?"

"It's okay, we're fine. C'mon, we're going in."

The large-caliber laser cannon arrays equipped on these bases had high

power and accuracy, but they weren't capable of precise and quick

adjustments. It would be difficult for them to get a lock if we kept

moving around and gradually shortened the distance. There's also a

risk of friendly fire if they forced it. And with Krishna's superior speed

and agility, once we've thrown their aim once, we'd be able to close in

with no problems.

The moment I got my groove on and prepared to unleash hell on the

base, a call suddenly came in. It was Lt. Col. Serena.

[This is your commander. Krishna, please maintain your current

course. Countdown. 5, 4–]

"Are you serious!? Elma, activate the shield cell!"

"Aah, mou!"

Even if we've shaken off the heavy-caliber laser cannons, there were

still the medium and small-caliber cannons for close-range defense to

worry about, as well as multi-cannon turrets, and seeker missiles. If we

kept our course, we'd be eating those in the face y'know!?

"W-We're taking hits!?"

"Dammit all! Hold! Hoooold goddamit!"

While keeping a straight course, I kept pushing the afterburners to

rapidly close in on the pirate base at maximum speed. But, after all,

since we were advancing in a straight course without making any

evasive maneuvers, we couldn't help but take in anti-spacecraft fire. We

were steadily getting pounded.

Stop! We're gonna die at this rate! Wait, the shield cell barely managed

to recharge in time!?

Huh? Isn't the energy depletion less than I expected?

[3, 2, 1–]

The moment the countdown finished, a storm of large-caliber laser

cannons fire launched from behind us and landed squarely on the

pirate base, causing crazy explosions everywhere. It looks like the

large-class allied ships managed to destroy all the anti-spacecraft

defense modules that were aiming at Krishna.

[You did a good job. You can move around the battlefield freely now.]

"You better remember this, dammit!"

Unfortunately, I didn't have any more leeway to rant any further. That

lady really was bonkers.

[Of course, I will. I'll make sure to give you a suitable reward for your

excellent services. Command, out.]

"That's not what I meant! Hey, wait–!"

"The transmission's been cut off."

"I'm about to lose it too..."

I feel like this was the first time my life was truly at risk ever since I got

sent to this dimension. If it wasn't for Krishna, we wouldn't have

survived that.

"Anyway, just calm down for now. We're entrusting our lives to you right

now after all."

"I know! Dammit!"

Anyway, I probably wouldn't be satisfied unless I hit that beautiful face

at least once. Depending on how it goes, I'm even up for a duel.

"But the shield really held out well... One mistake and we would have

been goners."

"Yeah... It unexpectedly held out."

Elma cocked her head in wonder. What did she have to cock her head to

the side for? She's the one who was in charge of the shields.

"Maybe the defense modules of the pirate base were weaker than we

expected?"

"Ah, right. That's certainly possible."

Maybe they weren't being maintained properly so their output got

drastically lowered. If the lens part of the laser cannon was dirty, it

wouldn't be able to properly focus the laser projectile and the power

would get reduced.

"Oh well. Let's just focus on the battle right now."

Although we were unfortunately used as a decoy, the defense modules

of the pirate base were almost completely destroyed as a result, and the

remaining pirate forces in the base didn't number a lot due to our

previous baiting tactics. Now we only needed to crush the remaining

defense modules while watching out for the remaining pirate ships.

Let's get this over with then. So I can sock Lt. Col. Serena later. That's a

promise.