Aftermath and a Revelation from those Observing from Afar

Lt. Col. Serena sent imperial marines to storm the now-defenseless

pirate base.

"I thought we were going to destroy the base without any mercy?"

"They probably want to gather more data from the base in order to

improve the accuracy of the information they have on hand. That's if

they don't get baited with false info."

While explaining, I continued to control the drones to check out the

downed pirate ships that launched out to intercept us earlier to strip

them of usable or valuable items.

"Yes, yes, simmer down already, will you? I know you're still pissed

about what happened, but try to focus for now."

"...Yeah. I'll try."

Yep, I was still pissed about that earlier stunt. Well, of course, I was.

After all, if things went wrong, we would have died. And not just me.

Mimi and Elma would have died too. I admit that the colonel's orders

were effective. As a result, an extremely efficient bombardment was

carried out, and the defense systems of the pirate base were almost

completely wiped out in one fell swoop. Since Krishna drew most of the

anti-spacecraft fire, their firing lines would have been entirely exposed

to the allied ships in the rear.

And we only survived that ordeal mostly through luck. The shield

wasn't penetrated, and even if it was, we could still rely on Krishna's

armor for defense. Even if the laser fire did punch through our energy

shield, we wouldn't have gone down that easily due to our ship's tough

armor.

"In the first place, you're going up against a bona fide imperial military

lieutenant colonel as well as the main commander of this operation.

She's also our current client. Even if her orders were reckless, it's not

like you can hit or slash at her in retaliation, right? You really can't do

anything drastic, so just calm down already."

"Oh, believe me, I know. That's why I obeyed her order in the end, right?

I only want to get at least one good hit in y'know."

"Please don't... The other party's an imperial noble and the daughter

of a marquis you know."

Elma sighed in exasperation. I know. I know, okay? Depending on how

you look at the matter, one might not find any issue regarding Lt. Col.

Serena's order. But… yeah, that's right. It depends on how you look at it.

"What I'm really pissed about is the fact that she willingly risked my life

and the lives of my crew members by brazenly ordering us to keep our

course to draw anti-spacecraft fire. And as a result, I ended up showing

something unsightly to the other mercenaries, and I basically didn't

have any choice."

If I get called a rookie because of that earlier fiasco, wouldn't I be

unable to refute the naysayers? There's a lot of other mercenaries

present after all. The fact that I took anti-spacecraft fire in the face like a

stupid sitting duck would affect my reputation, okay?

"Well, yeah... that's true. I hope your reputation doesn't take a hit

because of that."

"Is it really that serious?"

Mimi cocked her head to the side after seeing me acting all indignant

and Elma smiling bitterly in response.

"Mimi, a Platinum ranker's reputation isn't something to be taken

lightly. Platinum rankers are the pinnacle of elites among an already

small group of extremely skilled mercenaries. They are at the very top

of the pyramid. The best of the best. The absolute kings of the

mercenary world. If a Platinum ranker performs miserably in an

operation, it could smear the reputation of all Platinum rankers as a

result."

"I see... We can't afford to get underestimated, right?"

"I'm about 70% angry that both your lives were exposed to danger, and

the remaining 30% is exactly due to being forced to display what can be

viewed as an amateurish mistake. Just thought I had to make that clear."

"Yes, yes, I know. You're a captain who cares deeply for your crew

members after all."

Elma gently patted my thigh as she gave me a consoling look. Honestly,

I'm still quite angry about the whole thing, but if I kept this up, it would

trouble Mimi and Elma as well. Let's just try and move on then.

Before long, the pirate base was completely suppressed, and the fleet

was ordered to return to Refill Prime. For the time being, the ships that

were captured were going to be towed and placed in a temporary

shipyard (which was basically nothing but empty space) near the

colony. The Refill star system garrison was assigned to guard the area in

order to prevent scavengers from sneakily stripping off and stealing

parts of the ships.

"Well, we already stripped off the most valuable parts though."

"Yep. And there's a danger of deterioration if ya just left those ships

stranded in space without them bein' airtight and all."

Tina nodded while checking the ship parts she managed to salvage

through her tablet terminal.

"Apart from the hull frame and armor, the other parts are basically

precision instruments after all. If they degrade, it's going to be

troublesome to repair them."

While saying so, Whisker also busied herself with operating her tablet

terminal. Under the control of the two sisters, the maintenance bots

and drones hastily moved about the warehouse, scanning, carrying, and

repairing parts as needed.

"How is it? Can we use them to upgrade our ship?"

"Nn, it's not really that promising. Well, they're above average, sure. But

that's only compared to the parts of other typical pirate ships."

"They aren't on the level of parts used by mercenaries and the military."

"I think it's possible for them to get better parts if they really wanted to.

I mean, can't they target civilian ships transporting high-grade

equipment or capture merchant escort ships for the parts?"

"That's true. How strange."

"Ah, yeah, about that. That kind of high-quality equipment is usually

reserved for the big bosses and those close to them. Unless they were

forced to by certain circumstances, those types of high-quality

equipment usually don't get passed down to the lower ranks."

"I see... By the way, I have another question, Boss."

Tina stopped fiddling with her tablet and looked up at me.

"Why are there still a lot of space pirates even now? I mean, starships

aren't exactly cheap. And besides, mercenaries and the military keep

hunting them down, right? So why haven't they been eradicated yet?"

"That's because lots of people from space colonies end up joining their

ranks and replenishing their numbers constantly. There are those

desperate folks from the slums and those so-called outlaws."

The degree of political corruption in the Graccan empire isn't that high

mainly because of the secret maneuverings of the independent AIs in

the background, but despite that, there are still quite a number of

people who fail and drop out. Termaine Prime, where I first went when

I got thrown into this world and met Mimi and Elma, was a hotbed for

such incidents. The future of the people forced to live in those kinds of

slums is simply far too hopeless. There aren't that many who fell but

managed to crawl their way back up. The people there would often

form gangs and commit crimes to scrape a living. And the extension of

that is turning to piracy.

"No matter how much they struggle, they just can't get back up. If that's

the case, then they'd rather become the ones who take away from

others as well. The pirates also capitalize on this as much as they can

and throw around a lot of money in order to buy off crucial info

circulating within colonies. And if the pirates deem someone useful,

odds are they'd try to recruit him or her. If they're not willing, they'd

just kidnap them. After all, no one would give a damn if people from the

slums or some outlaws go missing."

"Ah... I see. Yeah, I think stuff like that happened in my old stompin'

grounds too. I knew guys who built some connections with space

pirates, and suddenly, we don't see 'em anymore."

"Yeah. They either get forced to join a pirate crew or just get scammed

and sold off as slaves."

"That's terrible..."

"They still wouldn't get a good end the moment they become pirates

anyway. As you guys already know, pirate ships are almost always

stolen modified civilian ships. Their equipment isn't really of good

quality by any stretch of the imagination. They're technically all free

though. That's cause they're all stolen."

But they also had to consider manpower, energy for operating the ships,

and ammo. Well, I suppose they get the parts and funds for repairs

through plundering too. And also, I've heard that some pirate inmates

in prison colonies get reported as deceased and released in secret as

well. It seems there were several instances where such schemes got

discovered and everyone who was involved got summarily purged.

"Well, that's how it is. Unless all humans in the known galaxy get

completely controlled and society gets turned into a utopia or dystopia,

pirates probably won't ever truly disappear. Even if a pirate

organization or two gets eradicated, chances are, some other

organization will just move in to take over after some time. And once

that happens, everything just returns to square one."

"It's a deep-seated problem, isn't it?"

"Yeah. Ah, I have another question, Boss."

"What is it this time?"

"Does Krishna have some sort of special energy shield system or

something? I don't remember encountering one when we perform

maintenance on it though."

"Maybe it's a hidden black box installed somewhere around the

generator?"

The two of them cocked their heads to the side as they gave me

questioning looks. As far as I knew, something like that doesn't exist.

Before I came to this dimension, I used to fly Krishna around a lot in

SOL, but I never had a hidden system like that activate even once. Of

course, that only applies to before I got shoved here.

"I don't think it does, but why'd you ask anyway?"

"Huh? Oh, well, that's cuz the anti-spacecraft fire from the pirate base

got bent like crazy whenever they hit Krishna's shield, Boss."

"...? I'm sorry, come again?"

They bent away? The anti-spacecraft fire?

"I think it's probably just limited to laser shots, but they did get bent

and deflected like they were avoidin' Krishna or somethin'. I haven't

heard or seen of a workin' laser deflection shield system until now

though."

"...Seriously?"

"Seriously. You didn't notice, Boss?"

"Weren't you flying the ship, Big Brother?"

"Uh, we did think the shield held up surprisingly well under all that fire,

and Elma found it strange too... So something like that actually

happened?"

Just what the heck's going on here? Did Krishna truly have a hidden

laser deflection shield function, and I simply just wasn't aware?

Krishna's pretty mysterious after all, and it was a unique ship without

anything remotely similar to it in SOL. I'm not sure if a similar unit

really didn't exist though.

"It looks like you really had no idea huh, Boss. If that's the case, then

what the heck was that then? We're really, really curious here."

"It's unknown tech after all. How about we check Krishna out again

later, Sis?"

"Yeah. We can check it out after maintenance, right?"

"Sure, I don't mind, but don't mess around with it too much because we

might have to sortie again soon."

"Leave it to us, Boss."

"Thank you very much."

With that said, the two of them headed straight for the hangar where

Krishna was currently parked.

An unknown function… A laser deflection shield huh... If there really

was such a thing, it's strange that we haven't noticed it until now. No

matter how it actually worked, it would take a huge amount of energy

to bend and deflect laser beams from cannons like the ones installed on

the pirate base. If that laser deflection shield system activated, used up

energy from the generator like crazy, and caused Krishna's energy

output to drop rapidly, Elma and Mimi should have noticed. Of course, I

would have too.

"But since it actually did happen, just where did that amount of energy

come from any– Ah…"

There really was something. There's something that can probably

provide the huge amount of energy required. I was even asked to bring

it with me and ended up stashing it inside Krishna. I didn't stuff it

inside the cockpit, of course. I should have left it in a corner of the

dining room.

"It can't be... But there's no other possible cause."

I've heard some distant galactic countries did make use of such tech to

power their starships, so it's not implausible. Anyway, let me check it

out first.