Chapter 86: Introspection While Clearing a Minefield

A good two days had passed since the inception of the shaky and temporary alliance between Abyssal the Dawning Star cores. Abyssal didn't know what to think about the matter, but one thing was for sure, it felt good being a part of a joint fleet. A fleet that currently consists of one battlecruiser, two cruisers, one destroyer(Abyssal) and one super-advanced cheat fighter. The bigger ships of said fleet made a formation, triangle in shape with Abyssal as the core, while Astral scouts ahead of the whole fleet. Seeing everything in motion with everyone doing their jobs in the fleet made Abyssal very amused. The whole thing reminded Abyssal of the games that she likes to play so much in her 'previous' life.

This formation was meant to blanket the core with as much point defence as possible while also providing enough space to manoeuvre around. The whole setup was meant to keep Abyssal, or rather, Meica who was inside Abyssal, safe from any kind of threat that Sensenmann could pose. The whole group did a small discussion on what they all know about Sensenmann's tactics and decided on a formation which could counter the abundance of missiles that Sensenmann seemed to favour. Any actual way of beating said reaper wasn't figured out. That was something that they would have to figure out in combat should it occur.

The joint fleet was currently taking their time to clear out all the mines blocking their path. As a matter of fact, they have been doing it for almost two days now. The numerous mines deployed by Astral and Abyssal were specially made mines that were small and had a stealth shell, preventing ease of tracking— deployed with a sort of clustered system. This made it hard to simply clear the minefield with their powerful point defence as they were dealing with small unseeable mines in the hundreds of thousands. It was the kind of mine that was easy to deploy but hard to remove. A certain ship and technology were required to clear it effectively and they simply did not have that technology.

Progress was slow but steady, and so far they were only halfway through the huge self-made minefield. Abby calculated at their progress, they would be out of the minefield in one or two more days. Astral was probably to be credited for doing most of the work as her mobility and advance point defence systems made short work of the mines in the area. Though, that's not to say that Jinko and the cruisers didn't contribute at all. Jinko and her abundance of fighters cleared a bulk of the mines while Hikari and Yoake's point defence made enlarging their path easier.

Abyssal, being the core of the formation, couldn't help clear the mines. Well, the Shark-class couldn't, but the blue swallow, the Fierca class could and that's exactly what she did. The Fierca have seen some upgrades compared to the old piece of broken scrap that it was almost a year ago, but it was still nothing compared to the cheat that is Astral's ship, the Phoenix. Still, it had the capabilities to shoot out laser beams strong enough to outright destroy the mines. Although Abyssal's speed at clearing the mines was slow compared to the behemoth that is Jinko and Astral, she still contributed enough to significantly speed up the entire endeavour.

"It is a team effort, after all!" Abyss said out to no one in particular.

She was currently in front of a set of mines and was currently charging up her laser gun on the small Fierca. With a single shot, she instantly destroyed one of the round spiky objects. The whole thing let out a huge explosion that released huge shockwaves vibrating the small ship. Once done with that single mine, Abyssal instantly went for another one and another one and another one, causing a chain of explosions.

However as she was too busy shooting down the mines like it was some sort of game in the arcade, she had forgotten to control her ship and got too close to one of the mines in the area. The mine activated before pointing towards Abyssal and accelerating towards the small Fierca class.

"Crap!" Abyssal yelled out as she tried to shoot the mine before it hit her. It was unfortunate that she wasn't able to turn her ship and gun fast enough to shoot it. Once she figured out that she couldn't shoot it down in time, she instantly engaged her thrusters and tried to manoeuvre out of its way. It was unfortunate that it was too late for Abyssal. Once the mine locked on, it was extremely hard to avoid in time. The mine crashed into her shields breaking it. The big explosion hit the hull of the Fierca class pushing her away with the waves of the bang.

"OUCHH!!!!!" Abyssal yelled out in her bridge as she curled herself into a small ball, touching her stomach as if she was punched in the abdomen.

This scream alerted everyone on the bridge. Meica woke up in shock while the normal apathetic Yoake moved her head towards the drama queen.

"Master, are you alright?" Kuon rushed towards Abyssal's side before kneeling towards her.

Abyssal still in pain crawled to Kuon's thighs before burying her head in them. "Muu… It hurts… muuu. Taking damage sucks!" She yelled out.

Kuon let out a sigh before giving Abyssal a gentle smile and rubbed her head. "There, there."

* * * * *

"The blue swallow flies

as it approach, blown apart

her feathers ruffled

That was a rather interesting incident," Jinko said as she looked outside a window.

Jinko was currently sitting down on a chair next to a small table. On the table was a teapot and a set of teacups. Sitting down next to her was Hikari and Yoake sitting on similar chairs, also enjoying the view of the outside. Within the window was the view of Abyssal's damaged ship. It wasn't that badly damaged, but it definitely won't be able to move around in space without some repairs.

"She's more of an airhead than I thought… Just how exactly did she evade you so many times, Jinko-senpai?" Hikari looked outside the window with a wry look.

"There are times where the cosmic universe is simply against you, Hikari. In those situations, the best option is often to just simply go with the flow," Jinko replied as she sipped a cup of tea.

"If that's what my subordinates say to me after failing a mission, I would punish them for three weeks of being target practice," Hikari replied, giving a deadpan look towards Jinko.

"Well, it's a good thing that I am not your subordinate."

"..."

"Don't give me that look. I can assure you, there is more to her than meets the eyes."

"I find that hard to believe," Hikari looked outside the window, looking at the now damaged blue swallow slowly returning to the blue-shark.

"Just keep an open mind. Do not treat one as a fool just because they act like one."

"I… understood."

"Good. Now Yoake, what can you tell me about Abyssal and her crew?" Jinko looked towards the third person on that table, Yoake.

"Indeed, I would like to know more about this core and her allegiance."

Yoake didn't reply at first, taking a moment to process the information that she was about to say. Her face was just as cold as the space outside of the window. "As far as I can see, she only has two other crew members. Our target, Meicanika Libera, and another core named Kuon that seemed to wear outfits akin to those worn in New England. Said core is always wary and is monitoring my movement constantly. Both of them seemed to have some sort of rivalry or conflict against each other and didn't look to be in close terms."

"Another core? Two in one vessel? Interesting. So this Abyssal is a core from New England as well?" Jinko asked.

"Negative. No proof suggesting that has been found as of this moment. I theorised that she may be from Freedom United, but other than her general ship design and ideology, there hasn't been any proof towards that theory either."

Hikari let out a hum, she then moved her fingers towards front lock hair, messing around with it. "What about Abyssal itself? Is there something special about her?"

"Due to my limited time and constraint, my conclusion may be incorrect and outright misleading."

"Just answer us with what you know."

Yoake nodded. "The ship itself is very minimal in design and she controls almost every aspect of the vessel relatively well. It appears that she doesn't need any assistance regarding the steering of the ship. Subject Abyssal also seems to talk to herself a lot, although, to whom, I am unable to identify. During my time within the ship, I felt relatively weak on my spare body. I am under the assumption that I am being suppressed by her in some form. Thus, I am unlikely to do anything more than observe my surroundings."

"Nothing else? What about her physical capabilities? Anything special that you can identify?" Hikari asked further.

Yoake simply shook her head before replying. "No, nothing that I can observe that is out of the ordinary."

"She's good at keeping secrets at least. I wonder what is her speciality, to warrant a lone class of her kind. Or perhaps… is it all just a ruse? Is she even special at all?" Hikari asked.

"No, she's special alright. Perhaps different than the kinds we are used to. Not too long ago, She was only a tanky freighter ship. Just barely a week ago she was just a large scale corvette and now without any visible dock or support ship, she has upgraded herself into a respectful destroyer, the designs of which I have not seen before."

Jinko paused for a moment before looking towards Abyssal. "It is possible that she is a first-generation core. Or perhaps even further beyond. Plus, she's quite ahead in terms of emotions, good signs of a core that had been through quite a lot. I suspect that she may be a rapid deployment type with adaptation as her speciality."

"Well… that's true, I guess. But I still have doubts, Jinko-senpai. Like this is all some elaborate ruse or fluke…" Hikari voiced out.

"I am not discounting that possibility. Either way, it's going to be a fun journey. The most interesting soldiers are often the one who fake it till they make it," Jinko let out a chuckle as she looked towards Hikari.

Hikari merely let out a sigh. "You have very bad habits, you know that, Jinko-senpai?"

Yoake, on the other hand, tilted her head, unable to understand what they were talking about.