Ep. 155
–
Sanadaev, acting commander of the Nemean Fleet, was on the verge of madness.
There are no cult residents here in the JP-22 system. This is because there are no resources for the cult to focus on.
However, it is not an important strategic point for the empire’s security. Other than the fact that it is close to Star Union territory, there is nothing that can be considered a threat.
‘But why is the imperial carrier ship here?!’
This does not mean that the battle against the cult was not considered at all. Because we have completed preparations to defend against supernatural attacks before leaping to faster-than-light sailing.
But I never dreamed that an imperial carrier would appear.
‘If we fight like this, there will be enormous damage.’
The Nemean Fleet is one of the 12 elite fleets of the Star Union. Since they have the power to devastate multiple planets, it is unlikely that they will lose in a fight against the Imperial Mothership.
However, as the opponent is the opponent, it is obvious that he will suffer great damage. The Imperial Carrier, equipped with the Cosmic Bolt, a planet purification weapon, also has powerful secondary weapons. If we fight such a monster hastily, at least a quarter of the fleet will be destroyed.
‘…Let’s talk first.’
They will know too. The fact that it would be difficult for them to fight and win against the Star Union fleet on their own.
They also seemed quite embarrassed that the elite fleet of the power they had signed an agreement with had invaded their star system. That’s probably why they asked for a conversation first.
“F. “Connect to communication.”
“Confirmation.”
Immediately, an image appeared in front of Sanadaev’s eyes connected to the ship’s computer.
Standing in an ornate situation room decorated with gold and jewels on an ivory background, a middle-aged cult member with yakhorn was glaring at him.
“I am Eshuta, the captain of ‘The Punisher of Gormos 03.’ “Cyborg, please reveal your name and affiliation.”
“…Sanadaev, Acting Fleet Commander of the Star Union’s Nemea Fleet.”
“The Nemean Fleet? “Isn’t it the 5th fleet out of the 12th fleet?”
“You’re right.”
The cultist who introduced himself as Eshtta widened his eyes. He only thought the size of the fleet was large, but he had no idea that an elite fleet would come here.
Sanadaev thought that if he spoke well, he might get over it, but he was mistaken. This was because Eshta’s expression, which seemed surprised, suddenly became distorted.
“dare! “Those in charge of one axis of Star Union can do such a base thing!”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t act like a fool! “Are you saying you don’t know how much damage the cyborgs have caused to our empire?”
“What damage? “I’m embarrassed to say this, but we just got here.”
“That’s shameless. Will you admit it if I show you proof of what you guys did?”
“New communication record file confirmed.”
‘Communication?’
He looked at the file Eshta sent. The communication records contained in the file began to play through his ears.
The contents of the communication were beyond his understanding.
“I am McKay from Star Union’s Population Management Department. I am a cyborg who will give you the honor of becoming one with the Star Union.”
“I am Koshe, a cult warrior belonging to the Judges of Damos 08! If the National Assembly finds out about this…!”
“Hmph, the National Assembly? They depend on weak races and such inferior political institutions. We, the Mechanical Committee, carried out a great work to save useless people like you, but you don’t know how to be grateful.”
“Damn the rain! ” Final word to the cult fleet that receives this news! What happened in the Holy Land was planned by cyborgs! The location is JP-2…”
“Shut up! You’re secretly contacting me! What a bitch!」
「Aaaaaaaah!」
‘What is this?!’
Sanadaev was confused. No matter how many times I re-listened to the communication, I could not understand the content at all.
‘Why is the Population Management Department here? Or rather, what is the sacred place?’
For a moment, I thought that he had not spoken in order to purge himself from the Mechanical Committee, but then he shook his head. There is no way that the Machine Committee, which values efficiency, would use a method that would cause great damage to the Nemean Fleet, which is one of the 12 elite fleets.
However, it didn’t seem like Eshta was lying. Even if the Cult Empire has hundreds of imperial carrier ships, it is not enough to waste them like this.
In other words, that communication is manipulation. And it is very likely that both he and Estana are playing into someone’s hands.
After organizing his thoughts, Sanadaev opened his mouth.
“Look. Captain Eshta. Have you ever thought about this? “That communication is false.”
“Just now our fighter unit member reported a lie? That can’t be possible. Because Koshei used a unique communication network that only the warriors knew about.”
“Think about it. Do you think we would do this if we were really trying to trap them? “The Imperial Carrier must have laid down Gremlin torpedoes before arriving at faster than light speed.”
「….」
Since it wasn’t a mistake, Eshta kept her mouth shut. If the Nemean Fleet had actually set up a trap, they would have suffered massive damage as soon as they entered this system.
“Then how are you going to explain the McKay you sent over there? We are fully aware of McKay’s last active location.”
“That is… please wait a moment. “I’ll look for it right away.”
Eshta clicked her tongue at his words, but did not say anything more. It was clear that there was no will to start a war either.
If he missed this opportunity, he would be in really big trouble, so he hurriedly called F.
“Search with McKay’s brainwaves right now and find out where it is.”
“check. Exploring.”
“What on earth is that crazy cyborg doing…”
“Discovery.”
“Already? where are you?”
「Discovered near the Jonas Rock Ring in the JP-22 star system.」
“The Jonas Rock Ring is around here, right?”
After hearing this report, Sanadaev had an ominous feeling.
This situation is by no means normal. Someone unknown must be pushing them into a trap.
‘no way?’
“Captain Eshuta! Listen carefully! This is all a trap…”
Sanadaev tried to quickly explain, but the video communication suddenly cut off. Not only was communication lost, but Sanadaev’s cable connected to the ship’s computer also stopped working.
“what is this? F? Answer me!”
「Crackling E EMP occurs, crackling and restored after 1 minute.」
“EMP?”
After a minute, communication was restored. As soon as Eshta’s face appeared, he quickly shouted.
“Captain! It’s all a misunderstanding! “Don’t be quick to judge!”
「….」
But something was strange.
Ashta wasn’t looking at him. He seemed to have forgotten that video communication had been restored and was staring blankly into space with bleary eyes.
‘Why are you acting like that all of a sudden?’
Eshta’s face was so pale that even a cyborg would be surprised to see it. A face that says it has seen something extremely scary.
Eventually, Eshuta screamed at the top of her voice.
“It’s a three-headed devil! Everyone, start shelling!”
“Huh?”
「The main gun of the Imperial carrier is being activated. “
Dark matter detected. ”
Sanadaev quickly tried to shout the order to spread out, but at that moment the entire ship shook violently. At the same time, Eph uploaded a video of the enemy ship that attacked us.
「Psychic power attack detected from the ship.」
“Fuck, I know! “Ships, counterattack!”
Sanadaev scolded the black cult frigate in the video.
I can’t stop anymore. After suppressing the enemies as quickly as possible, you must report to the Mechanical Committee what to do.
In this way, the two great powers of the universe, the Cult Empire and the elite corps of the Star Union, clashed in JP-22.
–
「Big baby, can you do it like this?」
[Zuzu zuzuzu zuzu (You’re doing very well)]
「Yes!」
No. 26 was so admirable that he was concentrating hard, so I stroked him with his tentacle. As if it felt good to be stroked by the tentacles, the thing became limp and its entire body glowed red.
[Zuzu (concentration)]
「Ah. right. Concentration. “Concentrate!”
The guy who read my wavelength came to his senses and straightened out the flow of disordered psychic power.
He is currently making cool videos using the fear characteristics of the deep sea. Due to the power of No. 26, our ship is covered in a huge hallucination. It was a hallucination of what the cults called a three-headed demon, which is what I looked like when I consumed psionium and turned into an adult.
‘If the cultists see it, they’ll be very upset.’
As I thought, the imperial carriers and cult warships that came here are losing their minds after seeing the illusion created by No. 26.
‘With this, I can get past the ambiguous parts.’
Among the cult genetic information I saved, there is one warrior belonging to the Imperial Mothership. I am a member of the warrior group that Heavenly Mother hunted while I was in the second stage of transcendence.
Since then, her voice has come in handy when fooling other cults, and here it comes in handy again.
‘I was able to avoid suspicion thanks to contacting the emergency line that only the warriors use.’
I used a password that only she knew to connect to the emergency line and created a false situation by imitating her voice. In the process, Cyborg McKay, who was under my control, played the role of a vicious Star Union villain.
As a result, a large fleet including an imperial carrier came to this star system to rescue Koshei, who was already dead.
‘Normally it wouldn’t have come this far.’
The word ‘holy place’ I mentioned, and a call from a survivor who was completely destroyed while trying to remove the contaminants from that holy place. These two factors became the factors that led to their overreaction.
And to drive a wedge into their illusions, I explained to Number 26 that I was to show them a type of illusion designated as the Terror of the Deep.
The original fear of the deep sea embodies the image that victims of mental attacks fear most. It is unknown whether C-Demon can directly reflect the image he wants. So I thought it might not work, but No. 26 did it.
‘It wasn’t difficult because he remembered what I looked like well.’
I don’t know how the eyeless guy knew, but anyway, he safely created my adult form.
And here the fear that the cult soldiers had towards me also played an important role. This deception operation was successful because they feared the ‘three-headed devil’ who destroyed the entire carrier group.
‘The biggest source of anxiety than this is Star Union.’
Star Union’s cyborgs also have many androids, and their ships are equipped with superpower defense measures. Therefore, it has high defense against various psychic power attacks, including the fear of the deep sea.
So, I guided the cultists to prepare for battle by seeing the vision of the ‘three-headed devil’ and fired a preemptive shot at the Star Union’s fleet. Since I, who had the appearance of a cult frigate, attacked, there would inevitably be a counterattack from the other side.
‘If I just conduct a thorough inspection, my identity will be revealed quickly.’
Can you really afford to do that in a situation where the enemy is right in front of you?
Star Union mistook my attack for an attack by the cult fleet and launched a counterattack. As a result, a space war is now unfolding before me between the two forces.
‘It’s not over yet.’
The trick prepared for Star Union still remains. I plan to use it when the battle is ripe.
At that time, Heavenly Mother murmured next to me.
“I never thought this would really work. “I can’t believe it.”
She and Adhai are watching what’s happening outside through the tempered glass I made.
“Because people’s thoughts are simple.”
“…I thought about it before, but you’re really good at acting.”
She looked at me as if she was fed up.
Well, since she was constantly being bullied by me in the game, I can guess how she feels now. What did she think when she saw me imitating Koshei into the communicator? It must be quite a complicated feeling.
‘Acting.’
Considering her family history, her thoughts are likely close to the truth. Maybe that’s why I’m good at fooling people in games too.
‘…get rid of useless thoughts.’
It’s a battle now. After shaking off the memories I didn’t really want to remember, I looked at the situation outside.
The cult’s ships lined up in a diamond-shaped formation around the imperial carrier. And three purple heat rays were fired from the main gun on the ship.
Rays of light fly while oxidizing all the rocks and space debris floating in the black space.
Meanwhile, the cyborg fleet was not idle either.
Small white drones poured out like a waterfall from large and small rectangular ships. The drones moved in unison and spread out in front of the ships. The sight looked like a matador waving a cloth in front of a charging bull. In this case, it is white, not red.
Soon, the purple heat rays clashed with a group of white drones. Anyone would have thought that the heat rays would destroy the drones, but the results were different.
The name of the drone launched from the Star Union ship is APD (Anti Psychic Drone).
It is a drone made of black silver, a metal with strong defense against psychic power, and galleonium alloy, a metal that absorbs various types of energy. It is mainly used when fighting beings such as cults or gallagons that mainly use psychic power like now.
A purple flash so intense that an ordinary human would be blinded occurred in the middle of space. Star Union’s APDs blocked the enormous impact of ‘some’ of the cult’s naval gunfire.
The reason why I said “some” is because the cult’s attacks are not over yet.
The heat rays fired from the cults’ main guns looked like they were three-pronged, but in fact they were fired three times quickly. Because there was a time lag between the launch of the heat rays, APD successfully blocked the first attack, but was not able to adequately defend against subsequent attacks.
‘Because APD is vulnerable to time-lapse attacks.’
As I expected, some of the purple beams passed through the drone swarm and pierced the cyborgs’ warship. Where the light passed, explosions occurred one after another and the warships were torn apart.
Star Union’s fleet, which lost several of its ships, launched a counterattack with no sign of retreating.
To put it simply, Star Union’s ship has a rectangular hull with a bunch of spiky guns similar to thorns attached to it. Those naval guns stuck like thorns are not decoration.
Countless naval guns began operation. Tens of thousands of torpedoes, precisely controlled by androids, flew towards the cult.
The cult ships maintaining a diamond-shaped formation simultaneously emitted purple light. The purple shields that appeared at the front of the ship were connected to each other and transformed into a huge diamond-shaped shield.
The torpedoes that flew first were blocked by the huge shield and exploded.
Cults holding the shield without any damage. But it is still too early to be reassured. This is because some of the torpedoes flying towards them turned sharply and hit the side or rear of the cult ship.
With the explosion, several of the cult’s ships broke out of formation. As the shield shook slightly, other ships rushed to fill the space left by their broken comrade.
Seeing this, Star Union attempted to fire torpedoes again to strengthen the offensive. If the Imperial Mothership had not stepped forward, the damage to the cult would have been greater.
‘Is this the beginning?’
A crack appears in the refined diamond-shaped imperial carrier. The part corresponding to the corner opened and a pitch black sack appeared inside.
A total of 8 batteries are black cannons, which are secondary weapons built into the imperial carrier. Like the Cosmic Bolt, it is a powerful weapon that uses dark matter as an energy source.
The Star Union ships also scattered in a hurry, as if they were aware of the power of the Black Cannon. A black cannon was fired towards them as they moved around.
Unlike other cult ships, instead of having a heat ray, a black sphere left the Black Cannon and flew towards the Star Union ships.
The black sphere reached the moving ship late. At that moment, the ship distorted and was sucked into the sphere.
After consuming one ship in less than a few seconds, the sphere continued to move forward, quickly engulfing other ships as well.
‘also.’
The Black Cannon is a weapon that creates an artificial black hole and shoots it.
If you get hit, that’s the end of it, so it’s very effective in disrupting the enemy’s battle line and sniping the flagship.
However, the disadvantage is that the duration of the black hole bullet is not long and it is impossible to control it.
After seeing the Imperial carrier use black hole bullets, the Star Union fleet spread out and approached the cultists.
The intention is to narrow the distance to the imperial carrier and induce a melee. Black hole bullets are a weapon that does not identify enemies, so it is an appropriate response.
‘good. Then, shall I go too?’
When a melee begins, there is work to be done. If that work is completed safely, you can leave this star system without being pursued by them.
I quickly advanced with the commanding cult frigate.
A melee between space fleets awaits me.