Control Room

"Stop, there's some enemies ahead."

Yuuto raised his arm to stop Stelle who was behind him as he saw a group of enemies roaming in the hallway near them.

So far all they had to handle were some stranglers who were separated but this however was a whole group they had to face. 

While studying the opponents in front of him, Yuuto manifested his white sword from his hand and got into a stance where held the sword parallel to his arm.

'A few Voidrangers and two Antibaryons..'

Noticing the two Antibaryons behind the Voidranger, he decided to target them first as he figured that the beams they shot would be annoying to deal with. 

–SWOOM

Seeing the reaction the Antimatter Legion had towards them, prompted them to get into stance and prepare themselves.

"I'll get the two at the back first."

Leaving those words behind Yuuto darted towards the space between the Voidrangers and slipped past the bladed arms that swung his way.

Getting down low and rotating his wrist, Yuuto swung his arm and pierced one of the Antibaryons with multiple sharp stabs leaving it ridden with holes.

Seeing how the light within its core diminished, he turned around and quickly opted to do the same with the last Antibaryon but he noticed a small point start to glow in front of it.

Noticing how the light was getting bigger as if it was getting ready to fire something, Yuuto created a thin spear from his mist and threw it in the Baryon's direction.

"Yeah I would rather not get shot with a beam, thank you very much."

Watching his spear pierce the core, Yuuto relaxed slightly as he saw it explode and turned his gaze towards Stelle.

Pieces of metal-like shards were spread around her as she bashed the heads of a few Voidrangers who set their eyes onto her.

With each swing of her bat a loud sound followed as Stelle was pretty relentless with her swings against the Voidrangers. 

Not leaving a single one

–BAAM

"Homerun."

Yuuto whistled as he saw one of the heads fly across the hallway they were in.

Not wanting to leave all the work to her, Yuuto continued to slice his sword against the joints of the remaining opponents in front of him.

Dismembering their limbs before they finally disappeared and formed into a ball of energy.

"I should probably try and save my energy for later…"

Noticing the amount of energy he spent during this fight, he made his sword vanish and decided that he would use his mist to fight so he won't move as much.

"Stelle are yo–"

–BAMM

As he was about to call out to her, Yuuto noticed that the sound of her bat continued to echo.

Yuuto watched as Stelle continued to smash her bat onto a Voidranger who was pitifully laying on the ground with a missing arm and leg.

"Do you.."

–BAMM

"Hey I think…"

-BAMM

"Stop! Stop! I'm starting to feel bad for it already!?"

"Hmm?"

Stelle tilted her head with an innocent look on her face as Yuuto pulled her body away from the pitiful minion who took all her beatings.

"Couldn't you have just finished it off instead of beating it?"

"I saw a shiny thing inside it so I wanted to see if I could get it."

"...."

Silence enveloped the two as they stared at each other's eyes.

Yuuto didn't know what to say after hearing her reason so he just pulled her cheeks to somehow chide her.

"I can make shinier things so just finish them off when you can."

"You can? Can I see?"

"Do you have anything in mind?"

"Nope. I'll leave it to you."

Rubbing her slightly puffed cheeks, Stelle caught up to Yuuto who was scanning his surroundings as he noticed that they were getting close to the control room where Dan Heng and March were.

Her eyes began to shine as she looked expectantly at Yuuto who was leading the way.

Yuuto thought for a bit before raising his palm and a small white marble began to form that resembled a bright moon that he saw a certain blindfolded woman make in the past.

"Wow."

Stelle looked at the marble Yuuto gave her and admired its shape with an innocent and happy expression on her face.

Seeing her act like this, Yuuto broke into a faint smile as he found the way she reacted to the marble to be pretty cute.

–VOOOM

"There's a lot of stragglers here."

Seeing how the quiet atmosphere was quickly broken by more Voidrangers, Yuuto quickly released his mist instead of making a sword and began to attack first.

Stelle noticed the situation and placed the marble into her pocket before squeezing the large bat she had.

Faint blue sparks began to emit itself from the surface of her bat before she dashed towards her enemies for yet another pummeling.

***

"Thank you once again for assisting me in the evacuation. I greatly appreciate it."

"No! It's totally fine so you don't need to bow like that."

In a room where multiple computer screens were present, March quickly gestured for the person in front of her to stop bowing his head.

The short boy hesitantly raised his head back up and noticed how his actions caused March to be slightly flustered so he stopped.

Arlan— the head of the security department on Herta's Space Station was in a previous anxious state as he had to act as fast as possible in response to the attack the Antimatter Legion brought.

Fighting against the minions while also ensuring that the researchers evacuated safely on Asta's orders, made him rush towards the enemies with no regard to his safety.

However with the sudden assistance from Dan Heng and March had helped him greatly as the extra pairs of hands made the whole operation way smoother than it previously was.

"Luckily we also had someone to help us evacuate the researchers in the base zone so it's just us now that need to get back to where Himeko and Asta are." 

Dan Heng who was briefly looking at a message on his phone, voiced his thoughts as he looked at March to say something.

"Yuuto said he's close and he's with another person."

"Oh! It looks like his bathroom break was a bit more eventful than what he bargained for."

March giggled when she thought about the reason they were separated in the first place.

"He's your ally right? I also need to thank him…"

Quietly listening to the two, Arlan mumbled as he also wanted to show his appreciation towards Yuuto who had also helped.

"We're finally here. I hope there's some snacks in the monitoring room…"

"I also want some too."

"Right?"

The three people inside the monitoring room suddenly heard a few voices come from the other side of the metal door. The door separated and the image of Yuuto and Stelle promptly entered their view.

"You guys seem well."

"And you seem to be pretty busy yourself."

"I can't believe that it happened during my trip to the bathroom but I experienced a couple of interesting events so I don't regret it."

"Welcome back!"

Yuuto smiled as he approached Dan Heng and the excited March who instantly noticed Stelle who followed behind him. "Who's this?"

"She's Stelle and I found her during my trip around the station."

"Hello."

Stelle briefly introduced herself and March rushed towards her as she did the same.

Seeing that Stelle had her attention occupied, Dan Heng walked up to Yuuto to talk about the current situation.

"Who knew that your request would be pretty helpful considering the situation."

"I know right. I just wanted to learn more about how the station protects itself from the rocks passing by."

Yuuto nodded his head with a sigh as he agreed with Dan Heng's words, hiding his expression.

Before he separated from the other two, he left Dan heng with a 'few words' stating that he was curious about the holographic shields the station had.

He asked Dan Heng if he could ask the people if he could look at it more closely, bringing the situation where the two would be nearby so they could help with the attack more quickly.

"So what do we do now?" Yuuto shifted the topic to another one as he noticed Dan Heng looking out the window.

"The security system suddenly failed prior to the attack so the elevator towards the Master Control Room is currently inactive. "

"Lady…I mean Head Researcher Asta briefly met you guys before you guys helped me right? So she must have given you an encryption key for the system… "

Arlan who was quietly listening added onto Dan Heng's words as he was familiar with how the elevator system worked. 

However before saying anything else, Arlan bowed his head to Yuuto who felt strange seeing him do this.

"However before that, I want to express my gratitude for helping the people in the base zone."

"Don't worry about it. But the Antimatter Legion is still here so don't thank me just yet."

"Ah! That's right."

Yuuto chuckled after seeing how Arlan's eyes widened at the realization before he placed a determined look. 

"We need to get back quickly so we can plan a counterattack! Do you have the encryption key on you so that I can activate the system?"

Arlan's mood suddenly fired up as Dan Heng turned his attention towards March.

"March can you give me the…"

"Ahh!! Don't stick your hand in there!? It's dirty!!"

The three guys heard the flustered voice of March just as Dan Heng was about to call out to her and tried to see what the cause of this was.

Yuuto couldn't help but feel his mouth twitch as he saw March pulling onto Stelle's coat who was earnestly searching a trash can at the corner of the room.

'Like a moth to a flame…'