Chapter 5: Time Skip and Negotiation with JSDF

A week passed rather peacefully. The Princess left with her knight order the day after they arrived. Ray had been focusing on recovery of Italica, especially their commerce and agriculture.

Thankfully the citizens weren't killed or fled during the bandits' attack. Ray only needs to convince them to get back to work as usual. The farmers were easy to deal with but the merchant was near impossible with the interference of other nobles.

Since the Count Formal died, many vassals already conspired on Myui, the current Countess Formal who lost most of her vassals' loyalty. The vassals only needed a reason to openly conspire on the countess and the final act that set the stone is when Countess Formal surrendered to a foreigner that isn't even a nobleman. The foreigner now has full control of the town and even openly declared that Italica is no longer under the Imperial's rule.

Just two day after the current owner of Italica declared itself an independent, free from the Empire's and Imperial's rule. The surrounding vassals lead their soldiers and march to Italica to free the town from the 'clutch' of outsiders but only to be cruelly woken up by death that rains upon them.

Ray finds them more as an amusement than a threat. An army of tens of thousands of former soldiers turned bandits cannot even pose a challenge to him. What made these allied armies of less than 2 thousand think they could achieve?

Ray even invites the people of the town and the countess herself to look at how he can dispatch the invading army effortlessly. His feat cemented his position in the heart of the people as a strong and merciful leader. The merciful part is because the Empire taxes its people at severe rates under the excuse of raising an army for war. Ray however only taxes 15% which is more than twice cheaper. He also excluded taxation for 4 months for the citizens to recover from the recent attack on the town.

Ray's relationship with Countess Formal also improved greatly and also among her maids and other servants. Ray treats them greatly and rarely interferes with whatever they did unless it badly affected the town. He also appointed the countess as the governor of the town and gave her freedom to govern with Ray's approval.

For the other vassal towns, Ray wanted to attack and capture them but he didn't have the forces to occupy those towns. He could only ignore them and let them be for now.

…

Sitting in his office room within Countess Formal's mansion, Ray is with Cheshire who are taking a nap on his lap while Yao, Myui and her head maid is assisting with the paperwork.

"Well, this is the last one for today. Still, how are you going to attract merchant into Italica, Brother Ray?" Myui who address Ray as brother asked curiously since Ray seems very confident with his act even when she cannot find anyway for the merchant to dare enter Italica due to hostility of other nobles that put pressure on the merchant guild.

"Don't worry about it, my main goal isn't the merchant from Empire anyway. My real goal is to gain cooperation from the people from Alnus Hill." Myui nodded and continue to listen without interfering.

"The JSDF are still struggling to establish themselves due to unfortunate circumstances and they still didn't have time to achieve their goal. Their relationship with the Empire is still hostile."

Piña supposed to went to Japan and forge political relationship with Japan but it was delayed because the Water Dragon somehow went enraged near Alnus Hill and Ray's interference in Italica. Everything is behind schedule if according to canon anime which is advantageous to Ray.

Ray have time to prepare himself to increase his worth. The Water Dragon is still rampaging near Alnus Hill according to his constant monitoring with satellite.

"Did I forgot to tell you that I slain the Flame Dragon that terrorised the area near Koda village?" Ray said with a smirk.

Ray proceed to recite his story of slaying the Flame Dragon with Yao help and some of the materials. Myui and her head maid is very shocked because Flame Dragon is a mythical creatures that even apostle struggle to kill on their own. Ray is basically a hero who conquered the most fearsome beast that roam this continent that can destroy evem the Empire single handedly. The very notion of confronting the dragon is impossible much more killing it and according to Yao, Ray slaughter it like a helpless sheep.

Ray will be hailed as hero and paraded in any nation in this continent with just this feat alone. His fame will be no less than the Emperor of Empire if this news is released to public.

"You know what? Let's put the Dragon head in the town to parade it to the public rather than keeping to collect dust." Ray said which Yao immediately agreed and Myui express her agreement since this will boost her town's fame.

Ray tried to lift Cheshire from his lap but she instead catch his arm and hugged it tightly while mumbling in her sleep. Since she will not release his arm, Ray just bring her along in his arm. Truly a clingy kitten and her sleeping face is too cute which Ray like to watch.

…

Ray found a perfect place for it which allow all citizen of this town to see it. Ray display the dragon's head on the side of Countess mansion which located in middle of the town and the tallest building in the town.

(Note: Sorry, Italica is a town and not city. I edited for this chapter but previous chapter already posted and I didn't change it.)

The townsmen look in awe of the fearsome beast's head while also have deeper respect on Ray who slain the Flame Dragon. His popularity and fame elevated once again which borderline fanatism, definitely not due to Yao's preaching Ray as a god. However the news stay within Italica only for now because there is no outsider entering the city.

When Ray satisfied with his handy work, he retired to his personal quarter with Yao and Cheshire. Surprisingly Myui also joined because she wanted to play with the already awaken Cheshire.

Myui is still 11 years old despite how mature she show herself. Since she see Ray as an older brother to her who treat her kindly, she also see Cheshire as her sister who she befriend and play with. Her head maid also show her approval since she feel pity for Myui who forced to should the responsibility as the countess and sole heir of Formal. She didn't have time to play and act befitting her age. That's why the head maid and other maids who only wish for Myui's wellbeing is happy that she have a playmate although Cheshire look 4 years younger than Myui.

Ray who spoiled Cheshire rotten is willing to give her whatever she wanted. He made few simple board games for them to play and let the use the projector in his Combat Suit to watch some anime and shows that stored in his PD. Sadly he didn't have much that is suitable for their age. At least the full anime of One Piece can last them for a while with almost two thousands episodes.

Beside doing his job to guide and oversee Myui with governing the town, Ray also religiously grind in Mission to upgrade himself. His progress is slow at first due to the increasing needed exp to level up and his low efficiency in grinding cash. However, with better equipment that he obtained along the way and skills to increase his grind efficiency, he made a great progress.

He currently sit at level 76 after countless sleepless nights of abusing the mechanic of Mission function. Turn out that when he enter a Mission, he will enter at peak performance and he will not gain any physical fatigue even after it ended. He basically spend the nights grinding mission and only taking few naps in the daytime.

(Note: the Mission allow Ray to enter all the available stages in the game like contract, single player campaign and nightmare.)

———

Stats

Name: Ray

Level: 76

HP: 5400 (+4 HP/S)

EN: 100 (+1 EN/S)

SAS 4 $: 24.5m

SP: 0

———

(General Skill)

Fast Reload (0/25)

Fast Movement (0/25)

Toughness (8/25)

Health Regen (1/25)

Energy Boost (0/25)

Energy Regen (0/25)

Recovery Time (0/25)

Pay Grade (25/25)

Body Armour Expert (0/25)

Field Supplies (0/25)

Grenade Damage (0/25)

Critical Shot (0/25)

———

(Heavy Class Skill)

Hold The Line (15/25)

Heavy Gear (15/25)

Tough Body (0/25)

Die Another Day (1/25)

Brute Strength (0/25)

Concussion (4/25)

Aerial Bombardment (7/25)

——

With higher level, the difficulty also increased which allow Ray to fight stronger enemies that have higher chance to drop better strongboxes, more cash and other loots. Thanks to the BLACK Proposition which upgraded to levels 7 on all augment, the bosses isn't impossible to challenge but the nightmare Mission stages is still outside of his capability since he have to fight alone without abilities to use Elite Squad or Mercenary operators.

His Proposition is definitely a formidable weapon but certain bosses have innate resistance to certain damages and they also can have elite enhancement which further adding resistance or abilities to the zombies and bosses. His bane are chitinous hide elite enhancement that give 75% physical resistance and bosses like Zombie Mech and Devastator that have physical resistance.

If he encounters such bosses, his Proposition will become very ineffective and his Sub-Light COM2 also is the same.

Ray tried his best to grind cash to buy Nantonium strongboxes to get weapon that can compensate his weaknesss but his luck is rather bad. To date, he already bought 12 Nantonium strongboxes which cost almost 13 million each but none of them have weapon that deal other type of damages and 8 of the boxes give him armor.

He at least able to outfitted those equipments on his operators to enhance their fighting power. His frustration cause him to grind more because he feel like he would had wasted his efforts if he stop halfway. Like a typical gacha addict that accumulated mountain of salt, Ray only keep on relentlessly plunging himself into the abyss of gacha.

Cheshire is the only one aware of Ray's silent suffering and she tried her best to always cheer Ray up. However she didn't need to because just by seeing her everytime he finished his grinding session, his accumulated negative emotions will vanished.

This didn't stop her from trying her best to cheer up her owner by following the footsteps of Royal Navy as a maid. Since she is originally a Royal Navy maid, she have this mentality and even learn from Myui's maids on how to prepare breakfast for Ray which they tell her it is too early for her to learn such task. The maids is very supportive of her and let Cheshire bring the meals for Ray and other simple tasks that the maids think she can do.

Even Yao feel troubled because she is Ray servant but her job are taken over by Cheshire. She cannot defy the 'apostle' and have to gave up on it when Cheshire insisted that she will do those tasks. The other chores already been taken care of by Myui's maids which left her with nothing to do other than task like paperworks, Ray's representative and etc.

…

Two days later, Ray saw an armoured convoy from JSDF arrived at Italica that bring a high ranking officer of JSDF along with Third Recon team as escort to meet Ray.

Due to Itami's report about Ray, the higher up is paranoid of another attack and the Water Dragon that wrecking havoc around Alnus Hill also didn't help in that matter. In the end, the couldn't stall it any longer and decided to dispatch an officer to acertain the threat Ray pose to them. They are afraid that the other military force that Ray belong to might attacked them and invade Japan.

The report Itami written that Ray is a person that claimed to came from a future Earth of another parallel timeline. They could only imagine what military strength the non-existence future Earth could pose to them when just six of them(Ray+operators) can defeat opponents that outnumbered them by thousands. Especially the particular report that stated Ray able to drop bomb from the sky without presence of any aircraft to deliver the payloads.

Itami suggested Ray probably have support of real invisible stealth aircraft since Ray claimed to came from future Earth. If that is true then their base is basically naked to their possible enemy. There is no impossibility that ther enemies aircraft can evade all their detection devices. Just the thought is enough to make the commanding JSDF officer to have sleepless nights.

…

The JSDF convoy stopped in front of the gate under the stationed operators order. The Third Recon team and the officer agreed and exit their vehicle. Only few will enter the town while the rest will stay guard near their vehicle.

"Follow me." One operator leave his post and lead the people to a room for meeting important guest in the Countess mansion.

When they arrived at the town centre, the JSDF are dumbstruck by the head of the Flame Dragon that they encountered near the forest.

"Did he killed this dragon…" The officer is shocked because they have large amount of military personnel and weaponry but still fail to kill the Water Dragon but Ray and his group of less than a dozen can kill one.

"There is no doubt this is a dragon similar to the one that harassing the area of our base." Itami added. Itami also look at the dragon head in awe like his two team members and the officer.

Akira Tomita suggested that maybe they can acquire Ray's help to takedown the Water Dragon which Koichiro Hazama, the commanding officer and the highest rank commander for the special region operation, agreed that if Ray can help them, they definitely can consider it because they suffered losses and great delay with their operations due to the Water Dragon. The last Third Recon member is Shino Kuribayashi who also express her agreement that acquiring Ray help is the best option for them instead of waiting for their extremely slow government to approve their request for better weaponry.

When they reached the door, two non-human maids opened the door and invited them in. The maids serve a cup of tea for everyone before retreated to the corner of the room. Koichiro Hazama take a seat on the empty side of the table which facing Ray and Myui who sit opposite to them. Behind Ray is Yao and his medic operator that equipped with RED Phantom assault rifle manufactured by Shotlite. The three escorts also did the same and stand behind Lieutenant General Hazama.

"I am Lieutenant General Koichiro Hazama that representing the country of Japan."

"I am Major Gunner Ray or equivalent to rank Major of your world and I represent myself."

Koichiro Hazama frowned when Ray said he represents no forces but only himself. This is a big relief but also greater mystery to him.

"You represent no country or organisation… Are you perhaps a mercenary?" Hazama ask to satisfy his curiosity and also gain some information from Ray.

"Yes and no, my military system is quite complicated. I does represent an organisation but we have great freedom to do whatever we wanted. For mercenary, yes, our organisation is similar to mercenaries." Ray tried to explain using the game as reference.

"As you might know, I came from a future world and our time already reached the fourth millennium. We are a space faring civilization that conquered multiple planets. To build army for the colonies isn't cost efficient which lead to our military system. The military will have soldier like me to fight any battle they need in exchange for money, equipments and ranks. I am sort of a mercenary, personal one that only can be hired by the government." Ray use bullshit no jutsu to explain.

(I explain with the mechanic of the game. The player are similar to a mercenary but not really one because only the government can hire you until faction war come about.)

"But you represent yourself right now. Does that mean that you broke off from your organisation?"

"Sort off, I didn't actually arrived here through the gate like you did. I was initiating random jump(random world travel) on my spacecraft but ended up here instead." Ray answer truthfully.

He might present himself with weakness by revealing his secret but he isn't afraid of JSDF because he is assured that he can steamroll them if he needed to. Probably not now but he can go into hiding to grow stronger if needed. Or simply just unleashing biological weapons and causing a zombie apocalypse on the JSDF homeworld if he is desperate.

"Spacecraft you say…" Hazama frowned while looking down.

Ray just revealed something very alarming to JSDF and connecting the dots isn't difficult. The bomb from the sky and spacecraft. Ray just openly revealed that he has orbital bombardment capabilities and probably spying too. The JSDF didn't have a method of countering this and Ray basically had a sword hanging over their head. Even the three escorts exclaimed in surprise.

Hazama knew that Ray purposely revealed this information when he could keep it hidden. Ray is showing them his goodwill yet also tells them to not mess with him or he might drop some surprise on their head.

"Yes, a spacecraft which people from the fourth millennium have access to due to our technology advancement." Ray bluffed again since the SAS 4 world didn't even have spacecraft available to anyone unless its government, military or mega corporations. He made use of the fact that the JSDF cannot verify his claim and have to accept them at face value.

"I see…" Hazama feels like he turned 10 years older just by hearing this information. He could only sigh because his opponent literally had a gun pointed at them constantly. If by whim Ray feels like attacking them, they have little to no protection since their base didn't even have any interceptor for missiles or whatever Ray will throw at them. If Ray wants, he can just threaten them and make demands that they are forced to comply.

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3.1k words

(Note: Rush job, this morning I have irl stuff to handle so I finish this chapter early since I probably can't write for the whole day.)