5 "The truth of Renza"
"This is the fleet's flagship, the stage battleship " Burst Squirrel " kaguya happily commentated
It was a battleship shaped like an aircraft carrier that was anchored in a dedicated large dock 200 meter in size.
"What do you think of its Flower passage? It's more then fit for legendary Godly Knight like yours."
"... ... Flower passage?"
Under this circumstance, it was a very uncomfortable phrase that Seina never expected to hear.
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A flower passage is a kabuki theater stage feature...
to learn more about it look up hanamichi.
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"We are going to take out the Armored cavalry on this ship so i have to show you how to battle in a one on one fight." Souren explained
"... ...me?"
"we must teach you how to fight with honor, and since you have a godly night naturally we have to teach you how to enter into battle from the flower passage"
"uhm but ... ...."
"seina why are you so confused?"
"Hahaha ...... Souren I'm sure he's not that confused, There are many stories where people use humanoid weapons on the Earth where Seina is from."
"What? I heard that the earth was an early stage civilization, do they have humanoid weapons?"
"no, it's all fiction. Actually I have some tapes, I'll show you some time."
"Oh! That sounds interesting.
"wait a second! It's true that we have mecha show, but they don't do anything with flower passages ... ...."
"How do they fight in earth fiction then?"
"usually enemies appear and begin attacking the city and rampaging through the streets and then the pilots get in a huge mech and march in to fight them ... ..."
"Hmmm ... I see." Seina looked at the ship again, mostly to look away from Souren.
It was an ordinary battleship except it had a deck with a big runway. It was like an aircraft carrier. Of course the ethnic designs adorning the outside was very gaudy compared ships in the Galactic Federation, compared to Jurain ships, Kamidake, Ryo-Ohki though it wasn't that out of place.
"Captain Kaguya, what other ships are there?"
"Oh, sorry ... I got distracted stories of humanoid weapons."
"for now our fleet is pretty limited."
"you have God Knight ZINV. so there isn't much need, let's go up to the bridge the captain Sajyu is there she should be able to explain more. "
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the bridge was a normal shape. here, too, a large case of a tropical botanicals was set up, and there was also a tank for an aquatic race operator. it wasn't that different from the bridge of a royal ship. However, it didn't feel like a battle ship rather the lounge of a passenger ship.
"Well,its about time you got here. ♡" Sajyu in captain's seat turned to face to Kaguya when they came in. the chest of her uniform was opened and messy. seina wasn't sure if this was a separate body or her normal body, but there was a tree intertwined with the tropical plants in the large case behind here and it was planted in a mossy medium as if it had been rooted there permanently.
"... ... weren't you in a different plant earlier?"
"Oh, Sajyu's body moves through from the roots." Sajyu 's tree pulled its roots out of the ground and started walking like a spider.
"hehe I can also move on the ground and swim underwater, the only thing I can't do is fly in the sky."
"...wow that's neat."
" Sajyu don't keep us waiting" Souren's signal caused the window of the bridge to become blurred and the color of the lights changed instantaneously.
"!?"
"don't worry I've just put up a barrier that's all." Souren brought him self closer to Seina to put him at ease. But for Seina that was counterproductive.
"Commander Souren, please step away from Seina (and come help me? *is what he is assuming she said probably*)" Sajyu turned red
"Oh, yes, be there in a bit..."
Souren moved away from Seina, but didn't not seem to understand the real meaning of what Sajyu said.
"I called you all here because I can't explain this very complicated story safely in the HQ, although the Kaou nation is leading this experimental unit, auditors are coming in from other sources, and I don't want to spread this information too far ... .... " Souren stared at Seina with a serious look. It was with glowing eyes that seemed to be making a confession of love. Of course it was certain that Souren didn't feel that way, it was no doubt just his natural look. even so Seina's heartbeat unexpectedly.
(............ Ahhh, dont! He's a dude. quit it.) Fortunately the crisis was avoided by the amazingly strong spiritual power of Seina and the decisive fact that the other party was a man, but he completely forgot the issue of Maya trying to get him to have an affair and that he should not be cheating in the first place, So Souren's power was still terribly strong. However, in the next moment he forgot about it completely.
"eh?" Seina was confused by the sight in front of me. Souren, Kaguya, Sajyu, and even Hakuren even knelled deeply in front of Seina.
"First I must apologize to you Seina it is an apology from my heart, I'm sorry for having brought you here." hakuren said
"What !?"
"It may be frustrating, but i will make it up to you as everything is over, but for now please, i need your co-operation." seina and hakuren were friends, and he wasn't upset, but it was also true that she had disturbed his wedding ceremony. such a troubles were the norm for seina. Nevertheless, as a formality since she represented her nation she needed to formally apologize to him .
"OK, I accept your apology as a member of the GP, I see the urgency in your circumstances and i agree this was an emergency"
"I appreciate you saying that ... "
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Seina moved to a large space around a huge plant case.
"So exactly is up with this empty area?"
"It's for the royal Tree"
"do the people of renza understand that the tree's have emotions and are related to one another?"
Kaguya shook her head a bit confused.
"What do you mean?"
"no, these trees are in the lower generations, they have never shown any signs of sentience in the first place , so there many people who don't know that the trees are advanced lifeforms, Those of us from the founder's families, had a feeling that they deserved our respect, and they were still considered just parts of the ship."
"so they're just treated as weapons here, I was worried about that..."
"Currently most ships are sixth generation and lower, so most are just treated as low ranking ship parts."
"Parts ......"
"It's an embarrassing story, we actually became seto's officers because we didn't know...until we actually met Mikagami-san and other tree's we didn't know they were sentient, that's a big part of why we went there to get them. "
"...... i see, you just figured they had really powerful ships..."
"In other words,you want to know how our attitudes towards the tree's differ from yours?"
"Yes, commander Souren, I think that might be the biggest difficulty for him... ...."
Hakuren aimed her eyes at Souren.
"Jurai thinks of the tree's as sisters, family even, do you feel that way too seina?"
"yes... that is uhm……" Seina got confused about how talk about ZINV.
"please give a detailed statement to Commander Souren "
"Ok .... ZINV is age fixed for some odd reason and has shown some odd abilities. I do not know if it is a result of that or not, but it is somewhat different from other Trees.The first thing to know about the trees is that they hate fighting, they are sensitive to the other people deaths.Of course they hate when it's one of their sister tree's too. But ZINV doesn't seem to be hesitant to fight in such a fatal manner, that may be the reason why its age is fixed."
"that was the opinion of the investigators, youthful people are sometimes capable of being incredibly cruel, like a human children."
"Normally, the Tree's are pure, calm and gentle people, they don't like fighting, but they are willing to do what ever it takes to deter it."
"So do you not want to use zinv in battle?"
"I understand that I have more than enough power to fight, I will also exercise that power if necessary, but I won't use it without limits, I'll try everything I can not to. "
"Many of the people of the Kaou nation have a strong empathy with nature, so even though they are subordinates, there are many people who are sensitive to the tree's wishes and respectful of their existence.This time in particular though we had to carefully select highly skilled staff from whom that wouldn't be a problem "
"I can feel a proper will even in the lower generations, especially as a plant type life form I know what that power is like, I'm sure Kaguya somehow feels it too."
"I think that all the cavalry of the Kaou feels it more or less ... but still I will not hesitate to destroy the opponent's armored knights... however it is actually rare in a battle to completely destroy the opponent. we revere them here, that is practically sacrilegious ... ... but there are many people who disregard that in battle. pirates only view them as tools. but for them, It's an expensive part, so they take good care them still in a way. "
"Is that so"
For a moment, seina remembered Fuku and clones being used as experimental materials on Tarrant Base, but he immediately shook his head to drive out that memory.
"I don't care, I want you to treat ZINV properly whenever I'm involved."
"Yes, of course, of course, but sometimes, when a unit is captured, some of the pilots are forced to escape by themselves, in that case they usually self-destruct to keep them from getting their units, and in some cases it will even destroy the enemy's units. so please know there might be a circumstance like that. "
"does that really happen !?"In a sense, it was the most shocking thing he heard since coming to renza.
"even knowing they are sentient, that is still the best course of action, we don't want them to get into the hands of others."
"To begin with, we keep an information about tree's after the 4th generation secret,and we keep the technology used in the knights secret as well, we even have multiple companies who make the parts for the core to keep it secret, no one but the heads of the five houses know how they're made. "
Seina's naturally looked to Gyokuren.
"Unfortunately I'm still not officially queen."
"How do they do maintenance on them?"
"Although the body maintenance can be done here, the core part requires maintenance from a specialized manufacturer from a major family house once every several years"
"are there a lot of companies that produce the cores?"
"there are only five manufacturers."
"... .... Then how are the pirates getting them?"
"we don't know but it's impossible for them to get the needed info from each company, but tree's below the tenth generation are very loosely regulated, so it it could be that they are using those in combination with an ordinary engine "
"We are also currently developing technology to use those trees as booster parts. we've been slowly rolling them out."
"so you mean it's not just the 5 companies handling them anymore."
"that is correct"
"How are you doing maintenance on ZINV-san 's unit? we may be able to fix it up for you"
" I will not let you or these manufacturers mess with ZINV, it's too risky ... ..."
"If you hand it to them, they may give you various excuses and never return it."
"Yes, I know."Souren nodded deeply and turned his face to Seina.
"So what do you think of the situation now that you know about it?"
"To be honest, I'm surprised,this is not a very pleasant story to hear, but I must thank you for telling me."
"There is not much time to make a decision, but you still have till tomorrow to think about it..."
"uhm.... well... I guess I'll help"Seina responded promptly as soon as possible to Souren.
"what?"
"As a member of the GP I won't turn down those who need my help and if the Trees are being used like that, I think that I may be the only one who can something, so please let me help you."
Seina did not take care whether airi seto, mikami, or hakuren wanted him to do this, he was doing this because he wanted to do this.
"Thank you, Seina,"everyone knelled again.
"Because you have decided to participate, I'd like to talk about the matter of compensation."
"What? like a Reward?" Seina looked at Souren surprised
"Of course, you will be working here, so you'll get a reward."
" I heard from the GP that this is treated as a business trip, so my salary is already being paid out ..."
"But we don't have a partnership with the Galactic Federation here, there's no choice but to treat it differently from the salary paid from there, we don't know what kind of activities you do will be treated as part of the mission However, the compensation you will be paid here will be from us. that way there are no tax problems under the laws of renza.... " Souren said looking at Hakuren.
"Since there's no diplomatic relationship between the Renza Federation and the Galactic Federation, there are no laws related to taxation. while the GP had deemed this as being treated as a business trip for Seina, that doesn't cover how tax matters will be handled here. "
"Our accountants are very eager for us to get this matter settled as soon as possible." Souren looked at Hakuren's group with a troubled face. Looking at it, Seina remembered the face of Ringo.
(Even in this world the accounting officials are no joke, ...).
"but there was an unexpected blind spot, since your salary has been managed by Kiriko-sama up till now... ...." Hakuren said
"I don't want to have to handle such things on my own, it would only cause trouble."
"Well, i imagine that's true. however..."
"what Commander souren is trying to say is we have no choice but to give you, Seina, the reward, but your case it's dangerous to have a lot of money due to you're probability bias, and there are other reasons too ... .... "
"so it's not just a matter of money?"
"we just don't want you to fall victim to fraud, or any other thing that might happen, you are known for causing some very odd phenomena"
"so?"
"you're going to need someone to manage that money for you." kiriko can't do it as she is a member of the Galactic Federation, and well... we can't do it either ... "
"remaining neutral becomes a problem if we do, so we think it's best a third party does it, don't you?"
"Ok, then let's us Recepushi's service ... surely that will fix the problem ..." Souren launched Recepushi's business directory.
"... ... Oh, it looks like we are working with a financial organization called The MMD on the Galactic Federation side"
"The MMD!"
"Do you know about them? all we know about this is limited to our activities within Recepushi,should we leave it to them?"
"Yes, that would be preferable" Hakuren said, she looked to seina to confirm that.
The MMD was originally a philosopher's asset management organization. Even now it was the most reliable bank within the Galactic Federation, there was no objection from Seina.
"ok then that brings us to the next matter: What about the specific amount of compensation?"
"As this is an experimental unit, there is not much we can do about the pay rate, you will be paid the same as a member of the naval cavalry"
a displayed number was converted to value that it would be worth in the Galactic Federation and presented to Seina. it was about a hundred times the base salary Seina made as a GP crew member.
"This amount is very small for a Master of a Godly Knight ... ...."
"No ... ...well ... ...."
"what seina is trying to say is for now he will be fine with being paid that about, but it is too low and will have to be adjusted later, also he wants to be treated like an operator of a heavenly knight. "
Hakuren who noticed Seina was trying to say it was too high prevented him from doing so.
"oh, yes, that is what i meant... other then that it's fine for now."
Seina felt confused, but he nodded towards Souren. Well no matter how much money it was, he had no use for it. It would just go into his savings.
(I'm sure kiriko will freak out when she see's that when it goes to the mmd)
Even she was no longer handling the purse strings directly, there was no doubt she would be amazed by such an amount.
"Thank you, so we will delegate monetary affairs to the administrative department of Recepushi, so please fill in and submit to us the required documents later and we'll make sure you are provided the same working conditions as normal heavenly knight operator."
"Seina, I've already confirmed that there's no problem complying with the employment contract to the GP, but do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions about it or experience any inconveniences."
"We apologize for the trouble"
"When this experimental unit is made officially a full scale operation, we'll review the terms and conditions again and re-contract, I think when that time comes we will be able to prepare to give you more. I apologize for the inconvenience for now. "
"understood."
now that the matter was settled, the tension in the room relaxed.
"Well then Let's talk about our what we will do moving forward, Captain Sajyu, if you please."
Sajyu nodded to Souren and lifted the barrier around bridge. Sajyu moved to the captain's seat, Seina and others also followed.
"First of all, we will go over the placement of each member on the flagship bridge, the front left is Seina and the right is Kaguya, the high-level operator's seat in front is my favorite position but I'll leave it to Hakuren's group. Seina's seat if activated by biometric authentication, will also be able to move up to the first level.At this time, are there any objections? "
"no... ... I think that will be fine" seina sat in the seat, it seemed that the others had already seated and started up their terminals, Seina also hurriedly activated his terminal by registering his biometrics. a Registration mistake happened twice, but it was going well.
By the way Souren stood next to Seina because he had no seat.
"Well then... first off ..."
Sajyu launched a monitor that showed the ship and the others. There were thirteen ships in all.
"This is the capacity of our fleet, we will be using the flagship mainly, we have 2 escort ships, we have 2 cruisers for carrying the armored cavalry into battle , 4 destroyers , a reconnaissance destroyer, a the water seas machinery ship, 2 goods transport ships. In any case, this fleet alone makes it possible for long-term non-port operation. "
"it hardly compares to the Kamidake."
"Even so its more then enough for ordinary mission work. in a worst case scenario it should be at least enough to buy you enough time to withdraw if you encounter an enemy and your unit is destroyed, as long as you and Hakuren's team are safe, we can rebuild."
"I hope that will never happen"
"The basic battle method more or less what you're used to but just replace the ships with humanoid weapons and that the fights are more or less one on one, There are several theories about how that battle method emerged, but mostly it's thought that it's a remnant from the era of the prehistoric civilization, the founders were greatly influenced by that after they found the original 5. "
"If the battle is ultimately decided by a one on one fight, then isn't it everything as good as settled as long as i have zinv?"
"well that was biggest reason why they had such overwhelming power, but i agree with you we shouldn't make zinv fight unless absolutely necessary. "
"I agree"
"Of course, even the most basic of current heavenly knights are able to oppose a small fleet on their own, depending on the operator.with someone skilled like Kaguya,we can easily win without resorting to using it."
"So specifically, how do you engage in a battle?"
"It depends on the scale of the battle, the location is decided by the commander who leads the battle and they appoint a heavenly knight operator, so you will need to use your best judgment depending on the chosen battlefield. "
"are you sure that's a good idea to place me in charge of that?"
"You'll be fine, there's hardly ever any large scale battles, and at worse we loose our cargo from loosing the battle."
"are you sure... I've heard though that recently there have been incidents of pirates with humanoids of their own."
"well... that's why we have you isn't it. It's shouldn't be a problem the fights are supposed to be one on one, but there is the issue lately of cross over."
"cross over?"
" We'll there's going to be a lot of people who want to fight you just because you have a godly knight... but some of them might not play by the rules, we've been seeing a huge influx of foreign pirates who don't know or care to follow the rules. It's been happening more and more, but it seems like there's also a set of pirates who are very defensive about playing by the rules, so it's not without consequence but never the less some refuse to do it. There's also the issue of fraud lately."
"Fraud?"
"There have been times lately when we've shown up only to fight a humanoid actually made of several of them fused together.... they seem to be using an expensive KZM bio alloy to do it also some of the units are sometimes equipped with magic users."
"……What!?"
"I understand you having such a reaction, but I assure you it's really not as big a deal as you think."
"... Really?but you said magic?"
"well it's probably not what your thinking of Seina-sama see that plant we have in here?"
"what about it?"
he had almost completely forgotten about them."
"it's A special plant called Magi that generates and releases "magic ".
The enemy ships can use it to have their ship move instantaneously from one point to another. "
"... ...But it's still magic right? can any one use it?"
Seina was excited like a small child. his eyes sparkled.
" only If you have a ceremonial organ in your body, those who can use big amounts magic are rare, and magic is incompatible with science and technology and those kinds of civilization in the first place, for some reason in civilized area's where those things develop it usually isn't found. I'm surprised you are familiar with the concept maybe it's because you are from an early civilization zone? "
"wait why doesn't it grow in more advanced civilized area's?"
"we don't know we think it's to avoid it causing friction in advanced civilizations that have developed. But we don't know for sure, because there's a slight problem with it. "
"Problem?"
"when put in an artificial container like this, safe breeding is possible, and bringing it to higher civilizations is not a problem, but the magi will dramatically change a planet's ecosystem if it's not stored like this, Transplanting is forbidden, and some sometimes it even erodes the equipment holding it. "
"Is that so ... that's too bad." Seina was a bit disappointed
"But Seina, magic is kind of pointless ... you can do the same things it can do much more easily with science and technology, it's not like there is really much of a demand."
"Oh ... ... I guess... I've heard that magic is pretty much the same as highly advanced science and technology,"
" it can Generate fire, let you breathe in water and heal the human body .... Even if some can do that with magic, with science and technology all people can receive those benefit far more easily. but There are also exceptions,some magic is more convenient than technology, and that's why we cultivate the magi plant here. "
"no matter what you say the ability to teleport is pretty amazing"
"It is possible to move in an instant to places that take days by super spatial navigation you need to use a lot of witchcraft and those who can do that are quite rare, and it's not like they can do it without enough magic ... ... but were off topic, fighting pirates who can do that is a pain " Sajyu said
seina wanted to hear more about magic, but he knew it was pointless because he wouldn't be able to use it anyways without a magic organ.
"I fell victim to a fraud battle recently and I was able to repel them, but it was an intense struggle. I barely escaped."
"……Ah, I see
"If i ever find those pirates ... ..." Kaguya clenched her fist and her skin changed color ...
"relax Kaguya" Sajyu tried to calm her down
"I'm sorry, regardless, seeing them fuse together was pretty cool."
"Enough of this, we need to see how seina can fight before we go any further."
"we should have hakuren get the simulation up and running."
Kaguya and Sajyu nodded.
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