The secret to better relationship is to sit in the same chair whenever possible.
Translator: Narane
Editors: MadTix
Please enjoy.
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The landed Dawnbringer Minor still had room for just one person. Unfortunately, only specially designed Alter-Armours and Alter-Gunships allowed for double-seater or tandem configurations, and these types of land combat models usually did not. The small cockpit space was inevitable for Minion or Minor-class Armours, after all.
I had to get in the pilot seat first and Sergeant Aroha had to sit on top of me. She hesitated before taking a seat, looking around the cockpit. “Lezirth... this is what Meihowa had to co-pilot? You said 'no' when I asked if you wanted to get in the Spider APC with me!”
“Get in, quickly! There’s no time to talk about this! We only have twenty minutes to defeat Saika and cleanse the Hyperspace corruption from the area.”
“Alright, fine! Damn it!” Sergeant Aroha reluctantly sat on my lap, grumbling. I felt an enveloping pressure around my legs.
...But, wouldn’t it have been more appropriate to sit in parallel to my own direction?
Sergeant Aroha sat on my legs, facing towards me. She continued to mutter to herself, her cheeks turning rosy. “I never thought you’d be this perverted, Lezirth. I can’t believe you fought Diablo while Meihowa sat in this position for the whole fight.”
“But, uh, wait... Sergeant?”
“Hey, c-careful! You’re breathing in my face as you talk.”
I-I’m sweating all over! Sweat dropped from the bottom of my chin, flew onto Sergeant Aroha’s chest, and soon disappeared down into the valley in the middle.
Sergeant Aroha turned increasingly redder and pouted. “I swear, there’s no helping you. Well, whatever-- I understand, Lezirth.”
“No, you don’t-- ngh... s-stop it! Stop squeezing on my sides with your thighs!”
“Hold on, I’m trying to steady myself so I don’t fall off.” Sergeant Aroha answered bluntly.
I honestly did prefer to have her be this way while I piloted the vehicle. ...Piloting with her back against me was fine, too, but this had its own benefits.
But the reason I needed to pilot in tandem with another was because I needed the help. To get any help, it would have been more helpful for her to turn around.
But then, as Dawnbringer Minor stood up, the cockpit shook wildly. When the body of the Armour accelerates at great rates, ten G to twenty G, the G-cancelers should normally activate to reduce the cockpit shaking, but those systems were unavailable during the starting sequence of the Armour.
As the cockpit shook, so did Sergeant Aroha.
As her body shook, parts of her body, the ones that carried a huge portion of her total momentum back when we were on the bike, shook in accordance to the natural order (?) of physics and struck my face.
“................”
Have you ever seen some old murder mystery films, where the murderer suffocates the victim to death by pressing a pillow to the victim’s face? For some reason, the thought flashed through my mind at that moment.
I... I can’t breathe!
[What are you two doing?! We don’t have much time, so get moving!] Ensign Meihowa yelled over the communicator. The screen turned on, too, so she could see what Sergeant Aroha and I were doing... [Wh...What are you doing?!]
“Oh, Lezirth... careful with your teeth, there. I said that hurts, geez!” Sergeant Aroha giggled, unexpectedly. Oh no, she was going to end my social life forever!
“Sergeant Aroha! T-turn around already!”
“Turn around? Are you saying that you want to...”
I immediately let go of the controls and put my hands over her mouth. I had to stop her from saying anything crazy at all costs!
“Hpfh! A-alright, I get it! Don’t be so rough on me, Lezirth!”
[What are you people doing?!] Admiral Luise joined in the yelling.
Damn it, what did I do?! We wasted a minute with this already!
“Okay, Aroha! Open those energy gels and insert them into the bottom of the cockpit deck!”
“Roger!” Sergeant Aroha began her work, filling Dawnbringer Minor with energy. She leaned down to reach the bottom of the deck, and her hips...
No, shut up! I can’t afford to be distracted! It’s not the time to play around!
“Let’s go, Dawnbringer Minor!”
Dawnbringer Minor became fully operational, getting a running start. It sprinted forward, gaining momentum for a great leap in the air towards the stadium and Kishin Saika, who had been surrounded by the Hyperspace Corruption while fighting off the attacks from the cruisers above.
Kishin Saika turned its attention to us. [Fools! What do you wish to accomplish with that flimsy Armour?]
Saika flung the deadly discs from its metal skirt. Dawnbringer Minor evaded it mid-air, kicking against the disc to spin around. I could feel the huge acceleration weighing down on us, but the G-canceler mitigated any danger. I continued approaching Saika without slowing down.
[Hmph! Pretty good.]
[I’ll end this quickly since we don’t have time!]
Saika’s height was about thirty-eight meters, while Dawnbringer Minor was a mere fourteen. There was a massive size difference between the two Armours-- as we approached each other, the difference became far more noticeable.
“Are you gonna be fine, Lezirth?” Sergeant Aroha asked, probably intimidated.
But I had a past record of fighting Diablo with an even smaller Armour.
Of course, my current opponent was a far more competent pilot than Diablo’s. And I hadn’t been at my top condition after losing a lot of blood from a previous fight, where I rushed to kill Princess Riznah without knowing of her abilities, and then got punished by being forced to cut off a part of my body.
Still, I had to toughen up. Nobody wanted to see Critik-4 and its millions of inhabitants die. “Don’t worry, just believe in me! I fought Diablo with a Minion-class, remember?”
I used the momentum from jumping off of throwing discs and rolled forward. Many more skirt-bits flew towards us to cut Dawnbringer Minor into pieces, but they were too predictable to overwhelm my piloting abilities. I hopped around, disc to disc, evading the rapid assault. These kinds of barrages were difficult to evade upon a glance, but the density of the barrage actually allowed me to form a safe path through it by pushing away and causing a chain reaction of projectiles colliding against each other.
And so, Dawnbringer Minor dove straight through the metal storm and approached closer to Saika.
Kishin Saika immediately accelerated backwards.
[Aaaaaaagh!] Princess Riznah suddenly screamed. Hmm? Did I really scare her that much by managing to get close to her? [Agh! H-hold on! Time out!] She requested.
Her reaction was so sudden and strange that I froze in place for a few seconds. “What’s she saying?”
“Saika’s cockpit was ejected, right? Wasn’t she remotely controlling Saika from point-blank range?”
“Ah.” I realized what had happened thanks to Sergeant Aroha.
Cockpits that weren’t equipped with G-cancelers left the pilot’s own constitution to resist the effects of acceleration. Superhumans like me would have no problem, but Asa magic must have been too destructive and unwieldy for such utilitarian uses.
Then, this battle was already closer to victory for us. Before when I had fought Diablo, although the pilot had laughably awful maneuvers compared to Saika, it was at least extremely resilient against my attacks. This fight was very different-- although Princess Riznah was far more skilled, since Saika’s cockpit was no longer properly in place, a small amount of force on Saika could easily kill the Princess. The Kishin would be mostly unharmed, but the pilot within would be violently pulled apart as if the cockpit were a centrifugal separator.
“Huh! Then we pretty much won already!”
[Kuh!]
The fate of this match was decided in the moment she began fighting without a cockpit! Saika wasn’t even able to withstand its own speed. It felt like an empty victory, but a win’s a win!
I glared at Saika. “Surrender, if you don’t want to become a bloody mess!”
[D-don’t make me laugh! I could withstand this much, if I put in a little more effort...]
Before she finished, I kicked at Saika. It was a psionically charged kick that could connect up to a hundred meters farther than it appears to be able.
Saika shot up into the air to dodge my kick, and another scream echoed from within.
“You think fruits could avoid being crushed in a juicer if they put in a little more effort to it? Give up already! It’s terribly wasteful for a fine lady like you to go on a suicide charge like this! You should really help me with the Hyperspace corruption first--”
“Lezirth! Are you really going to let a Harakal live? The Harakal is the Asa’s pride! Even if you let her live today, she’ll come back for you as long as they live! Once you prove that you’re more skilled than a Harakal, the only thing you can do with her is kill her for good or impregnate her!”
I-- Hey, what was that just now? I thought I must have misheard her somehow. I almost thought Sergeant Aroha had spoken something incredibly unspeakable.
Ensign Meihowa joined in to urge me further. [Lezirth! Now’s the best chance you’ll ever get! Kill her now and take the Kishin for yourself! Even if it’s different from Dawnbringer, you should have an easier time finding Dawnbringer’s Alter Core with it!]
The ladies were getting restless. But I shook my head.
Was I letting her live simply because she was a lady? No, it was nothing like that this time. The Harakal had caused a Hyperspace corruption that killed many people, and she was a leader figure of my enemy. She was a war criminal who participated in kidnapping noncombatants. Yet, there was a great reason for me to let her live.
“If we take the Kishin, then our identity will definitely be discovered. I don’t like that.” I spoke into the communicator.
Suddenly, I felt something flying at me from behind. I immediately jumped away.
--*Kaboom*!
A hail of cannon fire came from the cruiser at a distance. Damn, did we lose control over it?
[Riznah! Are you okay?] The Alliance chief known as Eiredith asked Riznah.
Ah, I almost forgot that my PDA was still in Alliance channels. But how could I overhear them? When did William Mayer have the right to a general-level security? Had Admiral Luise already have a hand in this?
[Gah! I need the cockpit back! And a medical device! I have little time before the corruption overtakes me!]
I could see Princess Riznah on the channel view. Her left eye and arm had gone, filled in with some sort of Hyperspace beings. Unlike me, who had to sever the affected area to be rid of it, Princess Riznah had stopped the injury by combining with a symbiotic parasite. It couldn’t have been much safer, however.
[I’ll send a new cockpit with a Portable Medic inside it! It’ll be a special version that can’t be hacked! Do you think you can reinstall the cockpit with that guy after you?]
[To be honest... it’s going to be difficult! He’s a real monster! He mowed down Hyperspace creatures like grass with his own power, and he flew past my Skirt Bit Formation like it wasn’t even there! He must be the man who defeated Tenseron in Azoran!]
[The Federation had a pilot with that skill level? It’s not ringing any bells! If it’s not an Old Blood, or the Children of Letix, who could have such a power?]
Hm? I was indeed one of the Children of Letix, but what was the Old Blood? Maybe they were calling the True Blood as the Old Blood instead? Fanatics of the Cult of Humanism?
While they talked, an object ejected from the cruiser and began falling down. It must have been that cockpit.
“The best time to strike is going to be when they’re exchanging the cockpit, Lezirth.” Sergeant Aroha advised. Indeed, Saika was going to be completely exposed at that stage.
If we took Saika then we were in danger of making our identities known, but I had no choice. I couldn’t just let my enemy repair her biggest weakness right in front of me.
I bided my time, dodging or blocking the cruiser’s bombardment, waiting for the new cockpit to approach. Saika raised its hand and grabbed the cockpit. But, to place that in its chest, Princess Riznah had to get out first to make room. And if I attacked during that time... she was surely going to die.
I squeezed on the controls, waiting for my time. But then...
--*Crash!*
On the ground below me, where the stadium once stood and was replaced with the Hyperspace warp, a huge arm ripped through the ground and reached into the air. It was about forty meters long, appearing to be composed of a material resembling obsidian. If it were real obsidian, it would have shattered to pieces if it attempted to make any arm-like movements, and it did not.
--Gwuuaaaaaahh!!
An unseen creature below the monstrous arm cried. Then, a powerful force erupted and shook the earth. It was as if the ground was a carpet and the arm was dusting it off, clearing the earth with the magnitude of a 9.0 earthquake.
The atmosphere shook in unison. A great tornado formed in the middle, causing the snail-like beings and tentacles to be flung around in the air and get concentrated into the center of the stadium.
“Gah!” I kicked away the arm that nearly grabbed me and dodged to the side. The kick from Dawnbringer Minor could knock away a proper Kishin if it properly connected, but the monstrous arm did not seem to be fazed.
“What on earth is that?!” Sergeant Aroha screamed.
I raised my altitude to escape the black arm.
The Hyperspace creatures were being eaten. It was like a humpback whale inhaling in a group of krills-- drinking, almost, instead of eating, like a huge, huge creature would when consuming a much more insignificant creature. Even those snail creatures were great annoyances to me, so I couldn’t imagine what manner of creature would feed on them so effortlessly.
[Archdemon?!]
“Archdemon!”
Princess Riznah and Sergeant Aroha shouted simultaneously.
“It’s an emergency, Lezirth! A higher-form Hyperspace creature appeared!”
“Really? How much trouble am I in?”
“If we can’t take that thing down, then the portal is going to grow large enough to cover the entirety of Critik-4 with Hyperspace creatures! Even if I use my ability... if something like an Archdemon shows up, it’s useless! We’re already at the worst possible level of the Hyperspace corruption! Even the Black Sisters would give up on this star.”
“I have to defeat that creature to stop the Hyperspace corruption, then?” I asked, glancing to my side.
Princess Riznah was still holding onto the cockpit, watching for my next move. She couldn’t replace the cockpit with me around, since she could be killed the moment she decides to do so.
I gestured at her to go ahead.
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