Mineful Discovery

Planet X10-254-L2.

Or rather, Planet Origin; something Julian wanted to change for himself. It had been three days since he had started training with that dummy robot, spending the aftermath in bed to rest and consolidate more of his newfound strength.

During those days of idling, Avina had been out several times, gathering ores and resources to be utilized in the base. He glanced at the fast-moving EC-101 in front and marveled at the different proto-insects it was releasing from time to time.

She would use the white proto insects to examine an object and use the blue-colored ones to extract the material and store it in the EC-101's subspace storage device. He had seen trees and rocks being harvested like nothing. The process was clean and efficient without delay.

They were now within a narrow valley 600 meters away north of the Base Complex Facility past the jungle terrain, and he, Julian, was wearing another mecha suit, the militaristic-looking MD-101.

PMS-MD-101. A piloted mecha suit intended for intense battles with any creature. It has a variety of armaments, including a 6-barrel rotary machine gun mounted at the back, a close-range laser blaster installed on the mecha suit's forearms, a mid-range small rocket launcher hidden on top of the wrist, and a melee laser cutter for close quarter combat. It could even be upgraded to increase the number of weapon slots used or to further enhance the mecha suit's combat capabilities.

The MD-101 was fitted with a lot of stock weapons, far more than any other mecha suit Julian had used back in the Federation. As far as he could remember, most of the military-issued mecha suits he had driven were equipped with handheld firearms most of the time.

The MD-101's head was designed like the helmet of a marine soldier with full coverage from head to neck. The chest was not bulky, and the four limbs demonstrated a quick reflex from every movement that Julian would do while controlling the suit.

Drowned on the MD-101's beauty, a beep transmitted into his VNI, "Successor, we are approaching a large source of mineral ores, one of which is the luthum ore.", Avina reported.

Their objective was to mark deposits on the map as a reference for future expansion and establishment of resource-gathering outposts. Meeting hostile creatures this far wasn't uncommon and Julian wanted to be on the safe side.

"Avina, is there a way I can use the E-CONN to transfer ammunition from the base to my suits?"

Avina was meticulously looking for something on the ground.

"Successor, we currently do not have remote network coverage to accomplish this."

"And I have to build something for that to work…", Julian sighed.

He took another glance at the list that Intellus gave him. It was the list of the structures he should repair in sequence with the Schematics Complex on top. Should it become operable, he could pre-fabricate buildings and place them anywhere he needs.

"Successor.", Avina's call made him drop the subject for the moment and approach her on the sides, "The mineral ores are behind that block of the mountain. Please use your small arm rocket launcher to blast through it."

Julian glanced at his target before raising his right hand. A small rocket protruded out of the forearm.

< Detecting target. Arming with earth buster warhead. >

The mech suit's AI notified. With a thought in his mind, the small rocket blasted into the air and soon into the wall of earth.

The ground shook and the blown rocks were thrown everywhere. The explosion reverberated for several hundred meters, causing an intense disturbance to the local ecosystem.

"This… won't alert them too much…???", Julian was speechless. He forgot to consider something and blamed himself for slowly becoming senile. 'All those years of training… A scheme! Intellus must be behind this!' Julian should've suggested Avina use that basic Ore Miner module instead!

Despite this setback, an entrance formed out of the explosion. The effect was a cave-in deeper than what Julian expected. Avina quickly rushed inside with the EC-101, "Successor, I will first locate the mineral ore deposit and then harvest a few. This will take plus or minus 3 minutes."

Julian's face was as dark as the scorched earth, 'I should be the one mining!', and deployed the red proto insects within two hundred meters around him. Avina told him that one of its purposes was to act like a scout for dangers ahead.

Not a long while and several red blinking spots could be seen in the northern direction.

< Multiple hostiles detected. Combat mode initialized. The Basic Interfacing Aim Assistant has been booted. >

< Compatible weapon module detected in the PMS-MD-101 mecha suit. The BIAAS has been integrated into the Six-Barrel Rotary Machine Gun. >

The machine gun at the back of the mecha suit suddenly moved and pointed horizontally in front of Julian. Its barrels slowly rotated in anticipation of the enemy's arrival which could already be seen far away.

'I don't need to manually control it?', Julian was surprised. In this case, he could focus on dodging and blasting enemies away. He glanced at the mecha suit's subspace storage device and pondered. 'I am unsure how long 1,450 units of machine gun ammunition will last. I must target the quicker ones and let the machine gun deal with the rest.'

The enemies were now a hundred meters away from him and there were a lot of them. Their body structures were very alien and different from that normal-looking bear from before.

Some of them walked in fours, carrying a bulky carapace at their backs, and making the ground shudder at their rushed steps. Others were excreting venomous fluids from their stings or tails, tearing holes in the leaves that contacted it. It was a bizarre scene that Julian had yet to see before despite his experience in exoplanetary exploration.

< Warning: Detecting at least a hundred hostile fauna creatures heading your way. >

"Hold the BIAAS.", Julian smirked and saw how clustered these groups of animals were. 'It doesn't matter if I create more chaos now. The entire place is riled up as hell!'

He raised his left hand and popped out another rocket on its forearm. It flew in a straight line and bombarded the center of their formation, blasting tens of beasts at once.

The sheer firepower made the other beasts cower in fear and hesitate.

"Fire the MG!" Julian ordered.

The slowly rotating machine gun suddenly spun so fast and let out a barrage of bullets at the stupefied beasts. They were immediately ridden with multiple bullet holes in their fragile bodies. Even the thick carapaces could not hold under the endless hails of large caliber bullets.

Julian didn't let go of this opportunity and fired another rocket with his right arm, splashing debris, carcasses, and blood all over the place.

The explosion finally frightened the minds of the hostile beasts, sending them running away with their tails on their legs.

The machine gun stopped spinning but did not go back to its position. After the short battle, Julian received a few prompts from his VNI.

He had used 10 units of machine gun ammo, and 3 subunits of small rocket ammo, leaving him with 1440 machine gun ammo units and 49 small rocket ammo units in his subspace storage.

'2 machine gun ammo units every second? This should last me for about 12 minutes or so.', Julian calculated, 'And every unit of the small rocket ammo is made up of 3 subunits. This is good.'

He had a hunch that the way the ammunition was calculated was based on a different scale. Otherwise, he would've lost far more than a hundred or so ammo just for the machine gun alone.

"Avina, any progress? I don't mind teasing them for a bit more, but I don't want to be surrounded sooner or later."

Avina's call connected to his VNI, showing her current camera feed from her left shoulder, "Successor, Avina is currently mining the ores underground. This should take a few more minutes. Please hold on."

"You want to fill up the subspace storage?!", Julian was at a loss. Just how crazy was this AI of his? They were even more determined than him when it came to doing such menial tasks.

< Luthum Ore deposit has been marked on your map. >

Julian ignored the prompt and waited for Avina to answer, "Avina plans to do so."

He staggered and almost fell to the pool of beast carcasses, "Avina, don't. Just don't. There are carcasses here so save some for them." Another beep appeared on his VNI, this time in the eastern direction opposite the mountain Avina was in. 'But that's a hill over there…'

Several small red square symbols appeared on his VNI, marking the approaching beasts. They were accompanied by aerial beasts with speeds not slower than thirty kph.

"Can the missiles target lock?", Julian asked. The enemies were a bit trickier this time around.

< Current settings and equipment do not support target locking. >

His eyes furrowed. "Then set the BIAAS to target the air. Leave the ground to me." A strong surge of laser beam appeared on the edge of the mecha suit's forearms, extending for about half a meter. 'This is not your basic laser cutter...'

Information about the equipment appeared, describing its high energy consumption rate of 1% energy per minute.

'Should I even use this?', Julian pondered. The fuel for his mecha suit's core wasn't easy to find nor fabricated, and it would cost him a lot more to replenish it all.

The intense ray of light vanished from his suit's forearms as he shook his head. He could replenish his ammo stack earlier than his mecha suit's energy core fuel.

Julian scrutinized the mountain where the beasts were coming from. His virtual scanner marked some areas where he could advantageously utilize his rocket launcher. One of them was a long and unsteady cliff.

"What's the rocket's max effective range?", he asked.

< 200 meters. >

Julian glanced at his VNI and made up his mind, "Avina, I don't have much time now!" He was worried that the resulting landslide would roll through the underground where Avina was. Or worse, the explosion would attract even more attention further away.

"Exiting the underground!", her hurried voice reported.

"Set me a course for a good exit path!", Julian ordered. A pathing made of distinctive white lines was soon reflected onto his VNI. Seeing that Avina had walked out, he gave her another order to harvest the carcasses before leaving in a hurry.

The angered beasts rushed downhill, pursuing the culprits who blatantly invaded their space.

< Warning: Hostile creatures are nearing your position. ETA: Plus or minus 45 seconds. >

"Equip the laser blaster and ready the BIAAS! Avina, time to fly!"

Avina stopped and watched as Julian raised his arms high. Energy concentrated on the center of the MD-101's palms and released a huge blast that cleared away all vegetation above them.

"Go!", the two mecha suits launched in the air and headed straight into the Base Complex Facility's direction. Julian glanced at his energy meter and saw how fast it was dropping.

89%... 88%...

His unnerved mind didn't have to suffer for long once the Base Complex Facility appeared in their vision. The two landed squarely behind the tall concrete walls; Julian couldn't help but look back. The aerial beasts relentlessly pursued them and charged head-on from the skies.

A weird-looking aerial beast with eagle-like wings and a streamlined brownish body swooped down only to be met with the pointing of the then dumb-looking machine gun towers.

The guns straightened in attention and immediately released a burst of fire upon the unwelcome guests.

Bullet casings soon rained down alongside the fallen beasts. Their bodies were filled with holes and despite some aerial maneuvers mid-air, the machine guns blanketed an entire area of the sky with bullets, showcasing the futility of their actions. Not long after, the machine guns stopped firing and everything became quiet once again.

"Let's not do that anytime soon." Julian reprimanded Avina. "Store these ores up and those carcasses as well. Time to repair some buildings."