Chapter 71: Unexpected Encounter

"*Sigh* What did I say about playing with a maiden's heart, Ray?" Raynare stood in front of the person who was sitting in seiza position with both arms on her hip while looking at him with a disappointed look.

"But you never said that." Ray tried to defend himself from the court consisting of his wives, all looking at him with different expressions, some supportive, some not, like Raynare.

"Shush, you! Did I say you can talk back?" Raynare scolded Ray while trying to hide her embarrassing mistake.

"No, ma'am." Ray replied immediately with a respectful tone before shutting his mouth because Raynare always found a chance to give him 'punishment' which always ended up with him waking up the next day with a sore body. Not that he disliked it but Raynare tends to return to her root as Fallen Angel and force him through full course BDSM roleplay with him on the bottom.

"Good. Now, how are you going to take responsibility for your actions?"

"Uh, apologize?" Ray replied but Raynare obviously isn't satisfied with the answer because she is giving him a death stare that makes him gulp.

"Uh… um… err… I… I don't know…" Ray tried to wreck his brain to think of something but nothing came to mind.

"Tsk tsk tsk, Ray. Do you know that you broke that poor girl's mind and ruined her confidence? That's why you should take responsibility and fix her back. If you let it fester, you will ruin that poor girl's future." Raynare explained with his other wives behind her nodding in agreement.

"Besides, Kalawarna and I did some background search on that girl. Turns out she became arrogant like that because of her useless abusive father and then her parents died of the virus years ago. High expectations and growing up in a hostile environment made that girl have such an attitude. She also has to fend for her family's fortune that others tried to steal from her. She has to become a successful IS pilot for that and what you did to her basically ruined her life and future. So be mindful of what you do next time since everything you do has an effect, good or bad." Raynare huffed before dropping the matter.

"Also, one more topic before we dismissed this meeting." Ravel suddenly said to grab everyone's attention.

"Did anything happen with the company?" Ray said because Ravel mostly manages the company with Roseweisse and Kalawarna.

"No, not about the company. But the company is doing very well if you are interested. We have multiple clients contracting us to manufacture IS parts using the Grade-A Industrial 3D Printers." Ravel shared before quickly realizing she went off topic. "Anyway, it's about the Umbrella organisation. They lay low after that time they raided our place with Phantom Task but they recently resurfaced and seems to have increased activities, specifically targeting the IS Academy. I'm not sure about their goal or their cause but our mens did find out they are obsessed with viral related stuff. Especially the artificial virus before the war that killed the majority of the human population."

"Virus and IS Academy… perhaps they are terrorist group made up of men survivors. It's not uncommon since a year ago we managed to take down a lot of those groups of people obsessed with getting revenge on the society that wronged them. Well, just keep an eye on them and send more of the boys if needed. They were probably bored to death on the island anyway." Ray said before sighed because those violent groups obsessed with revenge never died down as they kept coming back like grass which hinder his mission of achieving peace.

"Also, manufacture gears for them if you are deploying them. I didn't want the repeat of the incident a year ago that killed 5 of our mens. Give them exoskeletons and those clones of my guns I made with the 3D printers. Should have them in the armory in the basement." Ray remembered before they finally dismissed and went to have dinner together.

Ray actually teleported himself back home the same day of the duel. He went back home at 8pm after the curfew to consult with his wives about what he did to Cecilia. He panicked because after the duel, he heard from the gossip that Cecilia went back to her dorm after the duel and someone heard she cried for a few hours. What's worse is that he was blamed by every student after the rumor circulated and by the end of the school, students looked at him with hostility except Laura. Yes, even Houki did but not as worse as other students since she still let Ray explain himself that he was clueless of what he did was wrong until the very end then he realised.

————

The next day at class, Ray looks over to Cecilia's seat and it's empty. He sighed and spent his time listening to the boring lecture. Yes, he is actually listening instead of pretending to.

After the class, Ray asked few of his classmates about Cecilia's room number so he can paid her a visit but all of them flat out refuse him and accuse him to trying to do something bad which bring him to Chifuyu who was the dorm mother of the academy and the only person that would actually help him.

During the rest period, he dragged himself to the teacher's office before knocking on the door then entered to see the office was empty. This is to be expected since they might be having lunch. Then he walked to the cafeteria but still no presence of Chifuyu or even Maya which is weird. In the end, he resorts to using his AI to hack into the academy cctv to help him search for them and tracking their personal devices.

Tracking proved to be successful when he immediately saw Chifuyu and Maya show up on the minimap which is located in one of the maintenance hangars. He wondered what they were doing there as we walked toward the place.

On his way there, he noticed the hallway is awfully quiet when normally there will be plenty of his senior class students using those hangars. Sensing the strangeness of the situation, Ray asked the AI to do full hacking and search for what is happening. Then he heard the sound of sword clashing, although not very obvious if he didn't have enhanced sensory. Perhaps the sound comes from the underground part of the Academy where sensitive information, projects and stuff are locked. He does remember someone said the underground part of the academy is where they store many IS, IS parts and research papers.

Then he quickly finds a way down to the basement through an elevator used to transport IS that his AI hacked to give him access to the elevator. Immediately when he is inside the underground facility, Ray hears muffled IS firearms gunshots and sound of sword clashing which are actually louder than the gunshot noise.

"A student?" Ray heard someone talking.

"Wait, it's the male students. He is one of our targets!" Another said Ray already turned his head enough to see a group of dozens pilots in their IS and weirdly all have darker colors of black or gray.

"Heh, the rat snooping around turned out to be the target. Capture him ladies. We will be needing his IS. Also boy, don't you move a muscle unless you want a bullet in your skull." One of the pilots said before pointing her railgun rifle on his head, trying to intimidate him.

The few pilots surround Ray trying to tie his hand up to capture him but Ray really doubts they would pull the trigger if they wanted his IS because normally, a closed form personal IS will not open up unless the owner is the one opening it. Killing the IS owner is counter productive if they are trying to get his IS. That's why Ray isn't complying to the threat and summoned the demonic form of Arondight and made a quick but shallow slash on the IS around him.

"Tch! Apprehend him by force but don't kill him yet." The leader ordered and the other pilots nodded and tried to move their IS only for their IS to be stuck and unresponsive. From the shallow cut made by the demonic Arondight, black and red taint spread like a festering wound until it covered the IS and override all the control on the IS like a virus to make the IS attack their unaffected allies. Chaos spread within the group and the pilot shouted and cursed that their IS isn't responding to their control and tracked their allies to spread the corrupting taint.

"Surprisingly, Knight of Owner works that well on IS. Capable of moving themselves with absolute mastery and only need a single thought from me to control them." Ray said to himself with unhidden amazement.

"Indeed, Ray. The noble phantasm when corrupting the IS, it corrupted the core and forced the AI to follow your order since they are similar like a sentient weapon but controlled by AI instead of soul." Lancelot replied to Ray's mind using telepathy.

"Then, do I even need the pilots?" Ray asked which made the angry pilots all silent and looked at him for a moment because they all knew this would be their execution even without understanding the context.

"No, the noble phantasm already has full control of the IS core and the pilot isn't needed at all."Lancelot replied

"I see… Well, kill the pilot then. I don't need them for anything since they are probably here to rob the stuff the academy kept below here.

Then Ray along with two dozen IS that are piloted by dead pilots walk down the dimly lit path toward the location where battle is ongoing according to the red dots on his minimap. Along the way, he found several killed pilots with gunshot wounds or sword slashes and a lot of spent bullet casing.

Then when he was about to reach the end of the path, he found a lot more dead bodies alongside a door that was blast open from outside. Inside are several dozens more IS fighting against what seems to be Maya in an IS that has a badass double gatling gun and Chifuyu that wears only bodysuit and half a dozen swords on her back and more littering the ground.

Ray ordered his corrupted IS to help Chifuyu and Maya by killing off the enemies in IS. Thanks to the noble phantasm effect, the IS he corrupted was able to perform with peak fighting technique and even enhanced capabilities since this cheat noble phantasm turned everything it tainted into noble phantasm too!

In Chifuyu's and Maya's perspective, group of weird IS covered with pulsing veins that come straight out of horror alien movies, suddenly appeared and defeat the IS they were fighting against with great mastery that even herself have to applause the pilots mastery in piloting the IS but the pilots are all dead. Then Ray calmly walks in like he is walking through a supermarket, looking at the goods when in actuality he is walking over a battlefield littered with dead pilots that died in gruesome ways. Mostly torn apart by the IS wielding double gatling gun.

"I- Ray! What are you doing here?!" Chifuyu instantly shouted and runned to check on him because his uniform was stained by blood, almost drenched his body.

"Oh, Miss Orimura." Ray called and didn't call her teacher because they were outside of the classroom. "I was searching for you regarding a question."

"What! What question is urgent enough for you to come all the way here looking for me?" Chifuyu asked angrily but on the inside is happy that her Ichika is needing her help.

"It was about Cec- *Boom* -ilia… anyway, let's finish these people first before we talk. The intruders are more urgent than my question." Ray suggested as he walked toward the door the previous group of intruders was defending without even giving Chifuyu a chance to reply.

"Wait, Ray. You shouldn't be involved with this." Chifuyu called but Ray ignored her and walked through the door with a group of alien looking IS that increased its number from the previously attacked group.

"We are going in, Maya!" Chifuyu informed Maya before they both chased after Ray.

———

Within the database center in the underground facility, 16 intruders are busy copying crucial information regarding IS, mostly is data of personal IS that is stored in the servers.

"Tch! There is no information about that male pilot's IS here." One of the pilots smashed her arm at the terminal after failing to find any information about Ray's IS.

"Captain, we need to leave now! The group defending the entrance had been unresponsive since a minute ago and the other detached group also went silent."

"Fine, pack up everything that you can and we leave in another 30 seconds."

Then exactly thirty seconds later the group left the database room and fled immediately. Though weirdly the hallway became pitch black as all the light went out but their IS can provide nightvision anyway which they didn't need to worry about in a dark environment.

When they were about to reach the entrance where a group was supposed to guard, they were suddenly being fired at from the front, forcing them to retreat back a bit to take cover in the previous corner but suddenly another group somehow appeared behind them too and boxed them in the hallway without place to hide.

———

Ray manages to trap the intruders by placing half of the corrupted IS in his control to hide in another branching path while waiting for the intruders to reach the blockade he created before the one hiding came out to flank the intruders from the back.

"Kill them all." Ray ordered while hiding behind a barrier along with Chifuyu and Maya. They watch as the horrified intruders killed by IS are still being piloted by their already dead comrades. Occasionally stray shots fired to them but the barrier blocked the stray shots.

"Should I leave a few alive for interrogation?" Ray asked the teachers at his side and Chifuyu nodded while Maya returned from her confident and playful personality to her usual meek and timid self after unequiped her IS, also nodded along with Chifuyu.

"So, about what I wanted to say previously. I need to ask Miss Orimura for Miss Alcott room number." Ray continues the interrupted conversation while mentally telling the corrupted IS to leave three alive for interrogation later.

"You come all the way here just for that?! Couldn't you just ask your classmates?" Chifuyu exclaimed after hearing his reason while massaging her brow.

"I did but none of them would tell me while Houki and Laura didn't know." Ray explained with a sigh after remembering how harshly he was treated by his fellow classmates when he asked for Cecilia's room number.

"Shouldn't we be concerned about what he did down here rather than his reason for coming down here?" Maya reminded Chifuyu which caused Chifuyu to release a longer sigh.

"I guess you can be trusted with this secret…" Chifuyu said to the confused Maya. "Actually, Ray is the pilot of the infamous IS code name 'Reaper'." Chifuyu sighed before dropping a bomb to Maya which leave her speechless while alternating her eyes between Chifuyu and Ray while she is flustering noise.

"Uh, Miss Orimura." Ray reminding Chifuyu about his request.

"Third floor and fifty room from the left." Chifuyu said and Ray immediately thanked her before speeding away before he was put through a lecture about not stepping into dangerous matter like this or given punishment by Chifuyu for engaging dangerous act.

"Sigh, somehow asking for Cecilia's room turn into an adventure and fighting against intruders that snucked into the academy." Ray sighed before dismissing the noble phantasm effect on the IS while making his way back up, hoping he isn't late since the lunch break is only half an hour long.

—————

Might be a filler but did it to sort of do it to show what Ray's ability can do but got carried away and ended up with half of it being Ray killing a covert ops member trying to steal his IS data which actually never existed at all because he never made any maintenance.

Also I have mixed feelings about adding a heroine from an IS anime to Ray's harem when he already had more than enough and didn't need more. Maybe Laura because I'm biased but the others… Maybe also Charlotte but the others will probably not. Like they will show love interest to Ray but he wouldn't reciprocate or even flat out say he didn't want to.

Also for those that worried about me leaving a trail of destruction like I usually do with my fics, there will be no zombie apocalypse. Even if it did, I doubt it would leave a lasting effect since this world already had a virus epidemic once and prepared for another plus an abundance of IS with firepower that can level a city in minutes can do the same on zombies. Special infected? They have railguns and plasma/laser rifles that can melt metal much less flesh for god's sake. There are more with rockets, lightsabers, impact cannons and many more. Unless we are talking about a supernatural kind of zombie apocalypse, the normal one will be a cake walk with those mini gundam knockoffs.