Vol 2 Chapter 2.3 (1/2)

“I-I’m sorry. I’ve made a terrible mistake.” Admiral Luise apologized for angering the enemy leader.

“That’s alright. You wanted to dig intel out of her by making her angry, right?” Ensign Meihowa did not blame Admiral Luise. She understood that the Admiral taunted the enemy so that they might slip useful information.

“So, now what do we do, Lezirth? Sergeant Aroha is taken by the enemy, so…”

“We have to rescue her, of course.” I shrugged, and began some quick research on Saika from my PDA. It took only a single search with its name in a search engine to find information on the Kis.h.i.+n. Shouldn’t something like this be kept as a closely guarded military secret…?

I had no idea how, but it seemed like there was a lot of information about Saika available on public networks. There were many videos of it in action, and a few blogs for a.n.a.lysis on its machine specs. Some of the videos were fan-made compilations of Saika’s achievements.

“Saika has always been piloted by Asa’a princesses.” Ensign Meihowa spoke as she performed quick maintenance on her Colion rifle.

“Princesses?”

“The women of the Harakal-cla.s.s in their caste system, the ones who have not yet produced an offspring are called princesses. I don’t know the specifics myself, but what is known is that the pilots of Saika are the most powerful people of the Asa. The culture of the Asa is the survival of the fittest-- only the greatest of the Asa are allowed to pilot the Kis.h.i.+n.”

“Is that so? Would that mean the Asa have a very militaristic culture?”

As I asked that question, the city’s civil defense siren blared throughout the area. Only the sirens around the streets surrounding the casino were active.

[Attention! If you are currently situated within the hotel, you must relocate down to the end of Twentieth Street.]

With the announcement, multiple military cars entered the street. Admiral Luise looked through the security cameras around the hotel and found that at least a single platoon was transported there, and multiple Tri-Walkers could be seen.

“What is this? Trying to control the civilians themselves?”

“I found the Kis.h.i.+n’s location, Lezirth. Their Kis.h.i.+n is to the south of this street, down Twentieth, and stationed inside Hyondai Stadium.”

“Erk. A sports stadium?”

The rebels must have been trying to gather the civilians at the stadium. The stadium’s purpose may be for playing sports, but that was going to be changed if the rebels were sending people there; in places like a stadium or a concert hall, a small military force could effectively control a large group of people by blocking the key exits. Forty Tri-Walkers armed with Colion rifles could shoot down about fifty thousand people before they could escape the building. Perhaps the rebels were going as far as thinking about executing the civilians.

“I doubt they will try to kill the civilians. I believe their objective is to transport every single civilian on Critik-4 off the planet.” Admiral Luise a.s.sured me confidently.

I became curious. “Hmm? How can you be sure?”

“I asked her a few moments ago, remember, if they could guarantee my family’s safety even if I had a huge family. But she was very quick to agree to my demand, without asking how many people I had with me, as if the number of people was of no concern as long as they were on Critik-4.”

“Ah! Of course.”

“The Elcro army used a technique called the Gate to transport their troops from one place to another, yes? Maybe the Asa have another special way to do the same thing. Or maybe Kis.h.i.+n Saika was equipped with a special technology?”

I nodded. Admiral Luise’s plan from before seemed to be finding out from the enemy leader if any of those guesses were correct.

Ensign Meihowa had not yet understood that. “Hold on, why would they move the hostages? To where?”

“To the Alliance, right?”

“Then they’re aiming to kidnap civilians? What in the world?! That’s a serious war crime!” Ensign Meihowa exclaimed.

They were committing a war crime, admittedly-- however, they also did not have the same history as Earth’s humanity. Before the eighth century, humans went as far as having a culture of burying prisoners of war alive, but humanity’s culture had evolved to find that to be horrifying.

“Calm down, Meihowa. You can think of them as having an old human culture. The Alliance needs manpower the most right now. Their civil production should be severely weak with only the Replicant rebels and two factions that failed the s.p.a.ce race. You can see that from the way their weapons are mostly from Federation rebels.”

The Alliance was limited to weaponry from the Replicant rebels-- the same weapons and armours issued to the Federation. While they were certainly capable of producing their own equipment, they did not have the economy to support a stable production. They had to fight with severely limited ammunition and equipment, and so they were very willing to take dangerous shortcuts like using Duskbringer to wipe out the Federation fleet.

They had to do whatever it took to survive.

And to support their unstable production, they had to invest more manpower. The quickest way to do that was to kidnap educated people from the Federation who were exposed to high levels of studies in science and culture. By putting educated people into work, they could facilitate quicker growth in their infrastructures.

“What about the rebels here?”

“They’ll likely be sent off to the Alliance, too. I don’t know how, but…”

“Then Sergeant Aroha is in danger, too. Could she be taken by the Asa?”

“Probably.”

I sighed. It was foolish to fight Kis.h.i.+n Saika with my bare hands. I had to find an Alter-Armour of my own… “... What about Dawnbringer Minor...?”

“It’s currently being held at Ipis Sector.” Admiral Luise responded to my quiet grumble.

Dawnbringer Minor. It was originally a Minion-cla.s.s Alter-Armour that was a.s.signed to Ensign Meihowa, created from sampled cells from Dawnbringer. However, during the battle in the Azoran system, it was able to evolve to Minor-cla.s.s after consuming a part of Dawnbringer’s Alter-Core that was integrated within Kis.h.i.+n Diablo.

Admiral Luise’s studies found that the Alter-Armour had visibly grown to a Minor-cla.s.s size, but the potential power resting within was much higher than any other Minor-cla.s.s, and it could even use Dawnbringer’s abilities if it was for a brief moment.

If I could use that, then I had a chance against Kis.h.i.+n Saika. But I had no time. As long as Sergeant Aroha was taken hostage by the enemy, if she doesn’t get tortured and killed, she was going to be taken out of reach by the Alliance.

“Lezirth.” Admiral Luise called to me, as if she read my thought.

“Colorado.”

“Hmm?”

“If we can get Colorado back… we’ll challenge Saika then.”

“...” Admiral Luise lowered her head in thought.

Ensign Meihowa was shocked to hear what I said. “What?! Did you just… are you actually trying to fight Kis.h.i.+n Saika with your bare body? No way, Lezirth! Even with your powers, that’s suicide!”

“But we don’t have time to waste if we want to rescue Sergeant Aroha. I have to earn time for us until Dawnbringer Minor can get to Critik. And no, I’m not trying to fight Saika with nothing to help it.”

Take back Colorado, and use it with an Alter-Armour stolen from the enemy. That was my plan.

“But… hold on.” Ensign Meihowa fiddled around with her PDA. Soon, noises of gla.s.s shattering came from somewhere, and soon a big object climbed over the broken walls of the suite room. It was her bike that she had bought before, called over here remotely.

“”Let’s go together!”

“A-alright!”

We jumped out of the hotel. Outside, there were many armed soldiers and Tri-Walkers guarding the surrounding area… Hmm? Why are there so many soldiers here?

“P-put your hands up!” One of the soldiers shouted, his arms quivering. The soldiers’ faces here looked very awkward to me-- they weren’t familiar to me, yet I felt some sort of deja vu.

Wait a minute, these are the protesters from back then! William Mayer’s groupies!

“Y-you!” Mayer made his appearance, wearing a very unfitting black beret. He looked distraught that I showed up here. “Hold it, don’t shoot him!”

“But he’s holding a weapon!”

The soldiers were afraid of the Colion rifle that Ensign Meihowa had been carrying around.

Mayer jumped down from his military transport. “These guys and I know each other!”

“If chief comrade knows them, we’ll hold.”

Wow, what an embarra.s.sing choice of words! Who calls each other “comrades” nowadays? It makes me cringe just hearing them!

They weren’t rebels, nor were they the resistance, so they seemed to be inducted into the rebel forces after the government’s counter-attack reduced their numbers. I was wondering why the rebels were so devoted to Mayer’s words; he seemed to be Kasik’s mentor after all.

‘It took a guy like him to start this rebellion?!’

Well, the coup would have happened regardless of Mayer’s presence. The local population was clearly against the Federation’s rule, and the Federation was clearly corrupt in their dealings with them. At least, Kasik might not have become the leader of the rebellion and taken as a complete fool by the Federation’s civilian news team.

The strangest part of this moment was that I felt like I was talking to an actor in a perfect costume-- someone in a convincing outfit that was unmistakably a soldier’s, yet could not have been more apparent that he was only acting in the end. William Mayer was that man.

“I have turned my back against the Federation for the future of Critik and have joined forces with the Alliance. You… we’re far from strangers, so I will not stop you if you quietly went back into the hotel.” Mayer spoke coldly, but obviously with good intentions. He apparently kept in mind that I stood up for him last night, when he was working for us as a tour guide.

I suppose this is what they called the ‘tsundere’ archetype, but at the moment, exploring that side of the world wasn’t going to be any more helpful than going back to exploring the world of Shanghai mitten crabs.

“Eh, about that.” I raised my hands above my head. The bike broke through the hotel walls and dropped on my hands. It was a very light bike, weighing less than twenty kilograms, but it had dropped from sufficient height to create cracks on the surrounding ground below my feet.

“Whoa!”

Surprised, the protesters scrambled for their guns. These people were definitely unsuited to act like they were soldiers. Tsk. I almost worried for the state of the rebellion’s lack of proper military personnel myself.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

“What? Wait, why not?!”

“What are you people going to do after transporting the civilians over to the stadium? You’re not going to kill them, are you?”

I definitely knew they weren’t going to, but I asked to seem like I was suspicious of them. Any stuck-up people like Mayer were guaranteed to reply in fury. He had great education but always felt underrepresented in society. He felt that he deserved more from this world, going as far as mentoring for a rebel leader to gain respect. It was obvious what he would say next.

“Don’t make such stupid a.s.sumptions! That’s not it at all! I am a part of this rebellion for a greater cause!”

“...”

“This is all for the future of Critik…!”

Just as planned.

Though, there was truth in his words. This man had gone through the trouble of acquiring a doctorate, yet he had to resort to a job as a tour guide that was not suited for him. For most citizens of Critik, their biggest source of income was the spending and tips from rich Federation tourists. Just to survive, they had to sell their smiles and souls, while their hatred for the Federation grew.

I wondered how strongly he must have felt that the Federation owed him. It wasn’t difficult to understand why he would have done the things he did-- but that was then.

I thought about Sergeant Aroha, and what kind of trouble she might be in…

Following that thought, a large digital sign on a distant building began displaying Sergeant Aroha’s face. She had bruises on her face and bled from a cut, likely injured when she was forcefully ripped out from the building before. Her injuries seemed pretty light if that was the cause, but…

[Smile, traitor!]

A young lady’s voice came from the speakers around the sign.

Sergeant Aroha was restrained to a chair with ropes, and multiple ladies surrounded her, armed with a sword each.

I was surprised at how beautiful the ladies were. They had amazingly pearly-white skins as if they were physically glowing, and their bodies were slender and enchanting like a white lotus. These stunning ladies surrounded Sergeant Aroha.

The camera turned around to then focus on a different lady, with silver-blonde hair and dark-brown skin, laughing at Sergeant Aroha. Her healthy tone, sizable chest yet thin waist, and her Alter-Armour pilot suit that tightly wrapped around her body to reveal every detail and curve were enough to possess any man. Despite all that, I found myself wanting to see more of the other girls.

W-wait, that’s not important right now!

[An Asa, willingly working for the Federation military?! I haven’t seen a more despicable thing!]

The silver-haired lady chopped the top of a bottle on a nearby table with the side of her hand. The top section of the bottle cleanly fell away, causing its content to bubble out and drip down. Bubble champagne? She picked up the bottle and began chugging it down voraciously.

...Huh? She’s going for a wild-wolf-style att.i.tude with an appearance like hers? It was cool how feisty she was, but she was failing at instilling fear-- I was confused, instead. Maybe because she had none of the elegance of her appearance. A quiet, gentle-looking girl appeared next to her and cleaned after her.

[Now, pay attention, everyone! Ahem. I am a princess of the Sentosa system and a pilot of Kis.h.i.+n Saika, Rear Admiral Riznah Eresiki-gal of the Alliance!] She shouted, pointing the broken bottle at Sergeant Aroha. Sergeant Aroha moved back in surprise, and the lady almost contacted the broken edge of the bottle onto Aroha’s face. If she moved the bottle further, it was sure to cut a new wound on Aroha’s face. But the Asa princess called Riznah played around with the bottle rather than cutting her, spinning it around dangerously. [This girl is an Asa just like us, yet she claims to be a soldier of the Federation. That is worthy of a punishment, yes?]

[Yes.] [That is correct, Harakal.] The elegant girls to the side simultaneously agreed.

Suddenly, a line of text appeared on the screen to accompany her speech.

---Harakal: Royal ranks of the Asa, the top of their caste system.

“....”

What was that for?! I thought this was a horrible public execution, but now it just looks like they meant it to be a reality show!

“Ugh.”

“Man…”

Even the protesters beside me groaned. I couldn’t say anything, either.

But the lady on the screen, Princess Riznah smiled in satisfaction, spinning the bottle on her hand.

Hey, lady, you can’t seriously be happy with that kind of acting! I wished I could have told her that, but she spun the bottle only an inch away from Sergeant Aroha’s face. If she slipped even by a tiny margin, Sergeant Aroha may have ended up with her face full of gla.s.s.

[Agh, what do you think you’re doing?] Sergeant Aroha began speaking. Unafraid of the situation, she looked at the camera and grinned. [If you’re going to show my cute face on television, at least dress me up first! And clean up these scars, while you’re at it.]

Her confident, smiling face gained a fresh, b.l.o.o.d.y scar at that moment.

The Asa princess grimaced, pointing the bottle at Sergeant Aroha’s face. [Are you trying to look brave?]

[Not at all, I’ll gladly beg for my life if you’ll let me live.]

[But?]

[But it doesn’t look like you’ll let me live regardless, you see? So, what do you want? My deepest, sincerest apologies? Or… a wild, hot show for the audience?] Sergeant Aroha took a look at the camera, and purposefully entwined her legs together. She was still in her hot pants, and her new pose accentuated her athletic, well-crafted hips.

--Gulp!

The bunch of hastily formed soldiers simultaneously gulped nervously. Men.

And the caption did not fail to show up again.

--Ooh~!

...What am I supposed to think of this?

[You seem to want to get something out of this, if you’re broadcasting all of it. Why don’t you tell me what you want, Harakal?]

[Hm.... yes, that’ll be nice. Umea!]

--Umea. The warrior caste of the Asa. Third highest rank.

Of course, the caption showed again. ...Also, Umea? I had little idea how the caste system worked, but it sounded like Sergeant Aroha was a part of a highly respectable rank.