Test Run (Weapons Chapter)

"Aaah! We're getting shot at! They're firing at us, boss!"

"I-I-It's okay, sis! With this ship's shield output, lasers of that intensity

won't–"

"Missiles! Seeker missiles are heading straight for us! Missiles are bad

news, right!?"

"M-Missiles are no good!"

"They sure are getting lively over there."

"More like noisy."

"Ahaha… So I was like this too back then."

We ended up encountering a small fleet of ships as soon as we plunged

into the asteroid belt. Are they mining ships? I scanned them just in

case, but it looks like I hit the jackpot and they turned out to be pirates

in disguise. It was a whole group of 13 pirate ships. They even had a

medium-sized combat ship within their ranks.

"Man, we sure got lucky."

"No, no, no! This is definitely bad luck boss! Encountering pirates right

off the bat is definitely bad luck I tell ya."

Tina was making a ruckus at the back, but I ignored her and continued

to scan the ships.

"T-They have thirteen ships you know? And that medium-sized combat

ship looks fairly heavily armed. Isn't it too dangerous to provoke such a

group, big brother…?"

"No, it's okay. This will be a cinch for Hiro-sama."

"No, that's just crazy! No matter how cutting edge this ship is, it would

still go down if it gets showered with a rain of missiles you know."

"It won't matter if we don't get hit."

I quoted a famous line from a certain Red Comet and activated

Krishna's weapon systems. With this, our trusty heavy laser cannons

and ballistic shot cannons are ready to go as always. Prepare for combat

guys.

"You said we won't get into combat right away boss! You liar!"

"W-Wait! My heart isn't ready yet… Hyaaaaaaaaa!?"

And so, we plunged straight into combat.

Krishna with its weapon systems fully deployed immediately attacked

the rear of the fleet and successfully finished off two small pirate ships

placed at the very back.

[W-What the hell!?]

[Enemy attack! Break up! Break up!]

"Like I'd let you."

The pirates tried to break formation in a panic, but Krishna had already

managed to close down on the fleet. I fired the two ballistic shot

cannons in succession and brought down three more pirate ships with

a hail of submunitions.

[N-Nooooo! I don't wanna d–]

One of the pirate ships which got turned into swiss cheese exploded.

Maybe we managed to hit their fuel cells. The other two ships got

caught up in the explosion and followed suit as well.

But as expected, these pirates won't simply go down without a fight.

The other pirate ships turned around and started counterattacking with

laser cannons and multi-cannons. Of course, most of the weapons

sported by these retrofitted civilian ships were as good as peashooters

to Krishna, so we could just shrug them off. That's also made fairly

obvious by the ship condition displayed by the HUD's holography

model.

I, Mimi, and Elma already knew the drill, so we didn't mind, but we can't

say the same for Tina and Whisker.

"Aaah! We're getting shot at! They're firing at us, boss!"

"I-I-It's okay, sis! With this ship's shield output, lasers of that intensity

won't–"

Compared to Tina, whose face was already flooded with tears and snot,

Whisker was keeping herself together better. Her voice was shaking

though… As I amused myself with the sister's reactions, an alert rang

out inside the cockpit.

"Missiles! Seeker missiles are heading straight for us! Missiles are bad

news, right?"

"M-Missiles are no good!"

"They sure are getting lively over there."

Tina's panicked screams were funny, but hearing Whisker say missiles

were no good while desperately trying to act calm was interesting as

well.

In any case, we scattered flares in order to shake off the seeker missiles

hot on our tail. I then fired up the thrusters and performed a sharp

evasive maneuver.

"Fugyaaaa!?"

"Hiyaaaa!"

Due to the Gs which couldn't be fully prevented by the inertial control

system, each of the sisters let out distinct screams.

"Are we going for the medium-sized ship first?"

"Nah. If we shoot it down, those small fries will just run away. We'll take

out the small ships first."

The medium-sized ship did sport higher firepower, but it was equipped

mostly with missile pods, so we just had to pay attention to the seeker

missiles. There are still plenty of flares left, and I can always just shake

the missiles off without using them anyway, so there's no problem.

"Hyahaaa! I'm gonna turn you all into space dust–!

[D-Dammit! What is this thing!? Fire, fiiire!]

Wahaha! If you want to take me down, then at least bring military ships

with you, idiots!

But even if they did, I had no intention of getting done in by mere

pirates.

"…We just went through hell and back."

"…Uuu."

After the battle, the sisters, who quieted down halfway through, started

making a fuss again. Tina looked pretty burned out, but Whisker was

muttering awkwardly with a red face. She must have taken a leak. Well,

she did put on you-know-what before we headed out, so at least she

didn't make a mess inside the cockpit. Good for you, girl.

"We managed to get quite a haul today, Hiro-sama… Let's check them

out later."

"There's a lot of refined rare metals too. We'll be making a tidy sum for

this one."

"How much do you estimate our profits are?"

"We'll be getting 112,000 Enels for the bounties alone. The bounty for

the medium-sized ship was quite sizeable as well."

"112,000 Enels!? S-Seriously…?"

"That's amazing… And there's also profit from selling the loot, right?"

"Yep. We don't know how much we'll be getting from selling them for

sure yet, but I estimate it to be at least 20,000 Enels."

"So that means the total profit would be 132,000 Enels… This is your

regular income…? Are you kidding me?"

"How many months would it take for us to even come close to that

amount…?"

I don't know how much their monthly salary is, but since they were

first-class engineers, I'm sure they were being paid a pretty tidy sum.

"Um… We get a monthly salary of 3,700 Enels, right…? So that means

it'll take at least 35 months or so."

"So it'll take three years…"

The sisters were having a conversation with a gloomy atmosphere

hovering over them. You didn't factor in the risks involved guys.

Working as an engineer may still get you involved in accidents, but it

was still a lot safer than what we do. High risk, high rewards, as they

say. That's mercenary work in a nutshell.

"Do you guys wanna quit working for Space Dwerg and become full

crew members? I'll give you a reasonable salary."

"Uuu… I'm sorely tempted."

"It won't go so easily, big sis. Our unrestricted travel passes already cost

200,000 each… Our entire life savings don't even come close."

"Muh… I know that. But y'know…"

The big sister pouted at her little sister's calm retort. We finally finished

recovering all the loot. There was no damage to the hull this time as

well. We tanked everything with the shields and annihilated the small

pirate fleet. It was a complete victory.

"Yosh. This should be enough for today. Let's head back, guys."

"Yes! I'll set the coordinates."

"Let's have a celebration party tonight. It would be nice to go to a place

that serves some good liquor."

I turned the bow toward the direction of the Brad Prime colony and

started accelerating. For the time being, the overhaul seems to be a

success. I'll give Sara a call once we get back to the colony.