Chapter 17

Volume 1, Episode 8

The interior of the power plant was relatively clean. Since no human hands had touched it for a long time, there were specks of dust and debris scattered in the corridors and rooms, but considering the absence of employees for years, it was clean enough.

"Clear," said Rapi, who had performed a safety check clearing around the corner of the corridor in a manner similar to cutting pie crust, indicating that there were no hidden enemies in the blind spot beyond the corner. She relayed this information to him, who remained a "wet rat" at the back.

Agreeing with the report, he shouldered his assault rifle and followed her, with Anis and Neon following closely behind. The route to the control room was being communicated to them step by step through their earpieces by Shifty, which was much appreciated. It saved them the trouble of stopping to confirm their location each time.

Soon enough, a sign indicating the control room appeared in the corridor they were walking down.

While their infiltration into the power plant had gone smoothly so far without encountering any Raptures, it was strange to have such a smooth journey. The lack of any undue caution was puzzling.

"Enemy Rapture sighted ahead!" Rapi's warning prompted Moore to lightly tap her shoulder as a sign of acknowledgment. He immediately took cover behind some equipment that had been set up. Rapi herself hid in the shadow of the equipment he was behind, while Anis and Neon headed to the other side of the corridor, seeking refuge behind some other equipment.

"They have it all under control just like it's expected to. I wonder how they managed to come down even to this underground place," Anis muttered as she peeked from behind cover to observe the enemies.

"Did they break down a door? It's not like some sci-fi movie... Why would the Raptures be using human technology?" Neon joined in.

"Anis, take a closer look," Rapi suggested.

Rapi, too, popped her head slightly out of cover, wearing a beret cap. She directed her gaze towards the control room. While it was evident that there was a group of Raptures ahead, upon closer inspection, they noticed that the Raptures were clustered around control panels inside the control room. Using their multi-jointed limbs, they adeptly manipulated buttons and levers on the control boards.

"Seriously?"

"Has something like this ever happened before?"

<No, it hasn't happened before!>

Neon sought confirmation from Shifty, but the voice that came back was tinged with undeniable unease. The fact that Raptures were acting in this manner was entirely unexpected.

"Commander... I suggest we propose returning to the Ark. The 'investigation' mission has been completed."

"Yeah, you're right. Let's quietly head back."

Rapi's report led him to nod in agreement. The mission they were given was now accomplished. Staying any longer wouldn't yield any further benefits.

However, the questions obviously arose in him: Was it safe to leave them like this? Why had the Raptures occupied the power plant and been using its facilities to generate electricity? His mind conjured a hypothesis. If they were using the electricity for some reason, it would make sense for them to control and operate the facility.

Up until now, it was inconceivable that the Raptures, who had shown no interest in human civilization's tools, would be operating and controlling equipment in the power plant. If that were the case, there must be some kind of reason or purpose behind it.

"Shifty, secure the rear route—"

Even if only for a moment, he got lost in thought. Consequently, he missed something.

"They've noticed us!!"

"Commander! Behind me!!"

The moment one of the Rapture's red single eyes turned toward them from the corridor's shadow, a beam of light was fired. Triggered by the first shot, multiple beams of light were shot out from other Raptures in succession.

Just as he was a moment behind Rapi and Anis in reacting, he was trying to disengage the safety mechanism of his assault rifle.

In Moore's field of view, the trajectory of the enemy's fired beam came into sight. The instant he captured its destination, his outstretched left hand grabbed Rapi's shoulder, and he tried to roll her and himself to the floor in response to the incoming beam.

However, it was a moment too late.

While collapsing, the beam hit Lapi's left arm. The beam that struck the opposite side of the shoulder he had grabbed hit Goddesium's skin, searing it and melting away the frame of her left arm from the shoulder area.

"Are you okay!? Tch…!"

Falling to the floor, Moore ended up with Goddesium's body covering his own. He observed Lapi's condition as he absorbed the impact. Simultaneously, as soon as he confirmed the loss of her left arm, a sharp pain shot through his head.

For some reason, Rapi's condition seemed to overlap with something else in his mind. Shaking his head left and right to dispel the pain, he cleared the annoyance away.

"CoM...mAn...Der..."

"Anis, Neon! Provide cover fire!"

Whether due to the heat of the beams or the severed section, no catalytic blood was seen flowing. Acknowledging this, he gently placed Lapi's body on the floor and stood up.

Raising his assault rifle and firing about ten shots in rapid succession at the Raptures that kept shooting beams, he then bent down on the spot again.

He lifted the assault rifle she still had grasped in her right hand, hung the sling belt around his own neck, and then grabbed Lapi's right arm.

"Com...Man...deR..."head"...oNly..."

As he anticipated what he was trying to do, a feeble voice leaked out of Lapi's lips, possibly due to the damage or some error in the system.

He understood what she was trying to convey, but ignoring that, Moore lifted her upper body, slid his head under her chest, and rose with force. With Lapi's body still strapped to his back along with his backpack, he carried her by grabbing her right arm and right leg, assuming the fireman's carry position. Then, he shouted loudly toward Anis and Neon.

"We're retreating! Hurry!!"

"Understood! Shifty—Wait, what!?"

As he conveyed the message of retreating to Anis and Neon, instructing them to keep firing shotgun and grenade rounds at the approaching Raptures, he also held the assault rifle with his right arm and pulled the trigger while in a crouched position.

Several Raptures were destroyed, and for a brief moment, he thought they had bought some time. But then, just as he felt a vibration as if the floor was being pushed upward, Anis and Neon looked down at the floor. Right after, Shifty urgently warned of a new approaching threat.

<—Tyrant-class detected! Identification signal confirms Grave Digger!>

"Why does it have to be a Tyrant-class like Blacksmith at a time like this...!"

Followed by a curse, a bitter murmur escaped his lips. He should be mindful of his actions in everyday life already, so why did everything always go wrong at such inopportune moments?

"Com...Man...dEr...coMbat...Imp...eDe..."

"─Quit your fussing! Just be quiet and let yourself be carried! I won't leave my valuable subordinate on the battlefield ever again!! Shifty! Retreat route!!"

Normally, he admired the owner of that composed, elegant voice who softly spun words by his ear. Well, only when they were in bed, that is.

Otherwise, it was quite bothersome, especially in situations like this.

Shouting at Lapi, he engaged the safety mechanism on his assault rifle, then let go of her and reached for a pouch. Extracting a grenade, he briefly released his grip on her arm and leg, pulled the pin, and immediately threw it into the operation room where enemies were gathering.

A few seconds later, the fragments and blast of the exploded grenade assaulted the control panel and the Raptures. It would likely only momentarily stagger the enemies, but the control panel was showered in sparks, more than sufficient to fulfill its purpose.

"Anis, Neon! Keep firing! Don't let the enemies get close! Shifty! Operator! Has the analysis finished!?"

<Y-Yes! The facility's minecart appears to be operational! You can exit through the external rails!>

"That's our only option!? Understood! Guide us!"

The only escape route held great risk. If the minecart were unusable, there was a high possibility that everyone would meet their demise here.

But there was no other way. Understanding this, he ordered Anis and Neon to provide covering fire and suppress the enemies as they retreated. The two of them, acknowledging Moore's loud command, continued to support him as he carried Lapi.

"─Commander! New threat incoming!"

Drawn by the gunfire and explosions, they must have come. Shortly after dashing out, a group of Raptures approached from behind.

Reacting to Anis's shout, Moore turned around, pointing his assault rifle at the approaching Raptures, disengaged the safety, and pulled the trigger.

The bullets spat out smashed into the front of the group, piercing through the shattered bodies and striking the ones behind. However, not long after the gunfire started, with a metallic click, the gunshots ceased.

"Reload!"

Announcing to them that he was out of ammunition and implicitly urging them to provide cover, Moore let go of the assault rifle with his right hand and took out the last grenade from the pouch, pulling the pin and throwing it.

Then, he crouched down on the spot, wedging the depleted assault rifle behind his right knee. The sling belt was choking him, but there was no time to care.

He ejected the magazine and tossed it to the ground, then took a new one from the pouch, inserted it into the magazine well, and lightly tapped the release button with the palm of his hand, chambering the first round.

He repositioned the assault rifle, aimed again, and pulled the trigger. Despite the difficulty due to his crouched stance, by following the trajectory of the tracer rounds, he could generally maintain his aim.

<─The staircase over there! There's a minecart two floors down!>

"Understood! Anis, keep firing! Neon, come over here! Lead the way! Cover us!"

Shifty's guidance echoed from deep within the housing. Understanding this, Moore ordered Anis to continue firing grenades and instructed Neon to fall back and provide gunfire against the enemies in the meantime.

Realizing they had bought themselves a tiny bit of time, they hurriedly descended the stairs. They could feel the impending presence of the approaching Rapture group as they moved downward. At the end of the staircase, they spotted a minecart resting on the tracks.

Neon leapt into the locomotive pulling two minecarts ahead, beginning to check if the engine was operational.

"Master, the battery's alive!"

"Good! We're getting out of here!"

As much as he wanted to set explosives to delay the pursuit, there was no time for that luxury. After helping Rapi, who was wounded, down into the minecart, Moore urgently ordered Anis and himself to board.

"─Commander, what about Rapi!?"

"Lapi's... not okay, but she's alive."

"Thank goodness...! Hang in there, Rapi!"

Assisting Moore in placing the injured Rapi inside the minecart, Anis's expression changed as she inquired. She must have been holding back her concern during the retreat, but it seemed she was still worried about Rapi's condition.

Neon started the engine of the locomotive, and just as it began to accelerate toward the open mouth of the tunnel,

──At the very moment the intense shaking started to rock the locomotive and the minecarts on the tracks, a massive object burst out from the wall of the tunnel.

Its appearance resembled a mechanical centipede. Its head was covered in multiple rotating gears, presumably for digging into the ground, and if it was analogous to a centipede, its mandibles repeatedly opened and closed from side to side.

It definitely wouldn't let them leave so easily.

The Tyrant-class Grave Digger appeared in the tunnel and began its pursuit, targeting the retreating group.

"─Neon, fire it off! Anis, grenade! Stop its movement!"

He couldn't imagine they could halt this opponent, with its entire body, with the projectile output of just assault rifles and the firearms their current squad possessed. However, if they could keep it at bay, they would be the ones to win.

As ordered, Anis readied her grenade launcher, aiming it at the position where the Grave Digger would likely pursue as it crawled. She pulled the trigger using the technique for deflection firing, resulting in a lackluster gunshot sound like a cork being popped, and the launched grenade landed exactly where she had predicted.

Simultaneously with the explosion of the grenade, the gravel and rocks in the tunnel shattered, and carried by the blast, assaulted the Grave Digger. Unintentionally, alongside the fragments of the grenade, gravel turned into pellets and showered down on it.

"Is the entire body a tunneling machine or something...!?"

Whether startled or annoyed, the Grave Digger momentarily eased its pursuit by lifting its head.

At that moment, the lower part of the massive body seemed to be constructed with a gigantic drill in Moore's eyes. Was it made solely for tunneling purposes?

While Blacksmith had a somewhat biological appearance, which was also why Moore's first impression of him could be summed up as "creepy," there was not a trace of any living presence from this Grave Digger.

Perceiving it as an inanimate machine, Moore, just as he had done when defeating the previous Tyrant-class, shot while holding his assault rifle ready to find a weak spot, but...

"Where is it...!"

─He couldn't see that red single eye.

It happened once again when the assault rifle's magazine ran dry.

"─Watch out! Commander, get down!!"

With a roar, the countless gears growing like teeth on the Grave Digger's raised mandibles swung down towards the minecart.

The moment Anis's warning made his eardrums vibrate, Moore reflexively bent over, and she fired the grenade.

Perhaps due to the proximity of the explosion, even the sound of the blast felt louder. Due to the effect of the explosion, the colossal body slightly deviated in its trajectory, and the mandibles merely crushed an unmanned minecart attached at the rear, stopping short of hitting them.

Countless gears, spinning right before their eyes, scraped and shattered the metallic minecart. In Anis's eyes, it looked almost like garbage fed into a grinder.

On the other hand, Moore, crouching while leaning weakly against the minecart, detached a grenade from a pouch strapped to his waist. He had a few extra grenades in his backpack, but he didn't have the time to drag them out.

He gripped the trigger of the safety mechanism, pulled the pin, stood up a bit, and threw it forward as if in shot-putting. The target was the countless gears that formed the head of the Grave Digger, which were spinning and grinding right in front of their noses.

"─Anis, get down!"

He didn't think this would deal a fatal blow. He just hoped to unsettle it. The grenade he threw landed on the head's countless gears and got caught, causing a crack in the shell.

Just before being crushed to pieces, the ignited explosive created a blast, sending countless fragments flying, while the gears, now disintegrated into shards, assaulted the walls of the tunnel and the minecart.

"─Ugh!"

Some fragments collided with the minecart, and the shattered fragments of the cart pierced Moore's left arm. A brief, intense pain shot through him, but gritting his teeth, he endured it, pushed himself up, and resumed firing at the colossal body.

Whether those shots became the decisive blow or if it had already reached its limit was unclear. However, countless gears covering the head and the side parts that resembled the forelimbs of a centipede shattered. From within, a gigantic drill emerged.

He instinctively sensed that was the main body. It was because he had spotted the red single eye-like core at the top of the spinning drill.

"─Anis!"

"─Got it!"

"─Sensei! Me too!"

Neon, who had been operating the locomotive, also jumped into the minecart with a shotgun in hand.

Without needing to say where to aim, it seemed they had all figured it out. The trio of assault rifles, grenade launchers, and shotguns resounded throughout the tunnel.

-----

[──Confirmed silence of the Tyrant-class Grave Digger! It's been defeated!!]

Before Shifty's excited report came from beyond the housing, they could see the core of the Grave Digger pierced and the massive body within the tunnel gradually receding.

Letting out a deep sigh, Moore sat down on the minecart's floor and exchanged the magazine that had just run out of bullets. While he was in the middle of this, Anis approached.

"─Commander... that..."

Before he could ask what she meant, he followed the gaze of her hazel eyes. Following her gaze... there was a piece of metal lodged in his upper arm. It was exposed from the area not covered by his body armor, so there wasn't much he could do about it getting lodged there. He was grateful it hadn't been torn off.

"...Sorry, could you pull it out?"

"You got it."

Slightly tensed, Anis nodded, then settled down beside him. She took out a pouch she had with her.

However, first they tried to pull out the fragment. It was stuck quite deep and the part that was exposed outside his body wasn't easy to grip with his fingertips.

Seeing her struggle, Moore, who had been watching, took out a knife he had hanging on the side of his body armor and offered her the handle.

"But...?"

"...Anis. This is healing. Understand?"

Nikkes were forbidden harming humans. Such was their creation. Even Anis, for a moment, hesitated to accept it, the essence of it having permeated her very being.

Perhaps understanding that, or to push her past her hesitation, Moore emphasized "healing" once more, and Anis nodded slightly.

"...Good girl. Go ahead."

"Yeah... ─Here I go? ─Does it hurt?"

"It's okay. Keep going. ─Anis, on the way back, could you play that song again?"

"─Got it. Alright. ...On the way back, you can smoke, so..."

"Ah, thanks."

During the brief exchange between the two, in the power plant they had just escaped from, an anomaly was occurring.

The single grenade Moore had thrown into the control room had destroyed most of the equipment, but some of it had survived.

Normally, in the case of sensing an anomaly, the system should automatically initiate an emergency stop. Somehow, though...

The pressure inside the pipes carrying steam from the boiler, which burned coal, to the turbine had drastically increased.

[We're about to reach the outside! Raptures will gather here, so just run, please!]

"Ah, got it. Once we get to the car safely, and...----!"

BOOOOMMM!!!!

Soon after hearing this, as they were getting ready to disembark and run, a deafening explosion echoed from deep within the tunnel.

"...Huh? What was that?"

"Did the defeated Grave Digger explode?"

It felt like the explosion sound came from a far distance for it to be that. As they, including Moore, tilted their heads in confusion, from beyond the housing, Shifty screamed.

"──The power plant building got blown away! This is... a steam explosion...?"

"──Huh?"

─Blown away? What does she mean by that?

While being shaken by the impacted movement of the minecart on the rails, Moore was momentarily taken aback by Shifty's report.

"...By the way, Master... about the hand grenade in the control room..."

"Ah? Was that...my fault?"

(Tl notes: YES. Yes, it is.)

With an expression that seemed to say just that, Moore looked at them, but he didn't need them both turning their faces away to realize that his bad prediction was right.

----

Author Notes: If I were to give it a context, it would be something straightforward like "Did I Screw Up!?"