Inside the pirate ship were a bunch of humans and hobgoblins, with a few goblins who were mainly the labor force of the pirates. Servants.
"Xander, that ship looks fat. We can get some good things from it, whatchu say?" Goran said. Most of Goran's green skin was visible as he wore an exposed battle outfit.
Goran's outfit consisted of an X-shaped thick belt made of some hardened exotic leather material on his chest and flexible pants with two filled-up dagger slots at the sides of his waist.
The man he called Xander was a human. Xander didn't have his left eye indicated by the eyepatch and wore a black outfit with a long coat, hiding who knows behind that sinister coat.
Xander's muscled physique didn't look buffed but condensed and robust, giving one a steely feeling.
Narrowing his only eye at the ship's magnified image, Xander nodded, "You are right. Prepare to raid them."
Goran and Xander were leaders of this pirate group. Six of the fifteen people on this pirate ship were Exceeds, all of whom were inferior seals, but their ranks differed.
Goran and Xander were Adept-rank Exceeds, while the rests were Exeedier-rank, like Rei and others. But they had already created the catalyst for their 1st Seal.
"They are coming at us instead?" Goran uttered in surprise. Turning to Xander, he asked, "What do we do?"
"Their ship looks capable and bigger. But if we go space warfare, both will receive significant damage," Xander muttered, his eyebrows creasing a bit.
Another hobgoblin frowned and said, "Our pirate ship can easily scare regular folks. We even have big guns installed out there. But they still dared to come here. Goran, I think we shouldn't do this."
"Let Xander make a decision," Goran said before turning to Xander, who was in thought.
After three seconds, Xander nodded, "Let them come. If they attack us, then we strike back. If they just pass by, then we'll see."
…
"Terra, tell me their weapon's fire range if you can scan them," Rei asked as he sat on the commander's seat, observing the enemy ship.
"I can make 100% perfect deduction based on an image of their spaceship. The longest-range weapon they have is Libra Rail Cannon. It's also their most powerful weapon. It can easily damage our ship, but our barrier can block four shots, maybe five."
"Its max range is 200 km, so we are already in the range, but they haven't fired it yet, probably because of our barrier and their indecision to take action on us yet."
Rei thought for a second and nodded, "What is our hook cable's range?"
"Five hundred meters."
"Then don't shoot anything. Just pass by them at less than three hundred meters distance," Rei said, a mischievous smile forming on his face.
"So close?" Leo was startled.
"What do you mean?" Lia asked. She didn't know what Rei was planning.
Alice thought of something and suddenly smiled. She somewhat guessed what Rei wanted to do.
"Haha, I get it," Leo said with a laugh. "Our ship is bigger and more capable than theirs. It's obvious if they have knowledge about spaceships and their specs."
"Since they were indecisive about taking action, they want to see what we do and counterattack," Rei said, nodding with a smile. "But this means that they are not stupid and have the confidence to tackle us if, by chance, we do something."
"So, do we invade or not?" Alice asked.
"Terra, do we have any powerful weapons like them?" Rei asked.
"Not as strong as their Libra Railgun Cannon, but we have Omen Blast Cannon. However, doing space warfare against them is not advisable unless our lives depend on it because their barrier can also block four or five of our shots."
"So our barrier is better, but the weapon is worse while their weapon is better and a barrier is worse," Lia muttered before saying, "should I use my ability in standard activation to scare them?"
"Nah, it could have an adverse effect," Rei shook his head. "If we try to scare them, they might understand the intention and go all out on us instead."
"Not just barrier, but our ship's material is stronger, so we are more durable. As such, not knowing our individual capabilities, they didn't attack since we moved towards them instead of escaping," Terra explained. "They must not find out your individual abilities, or they will surely attack with full force because that ship has Exceeds for sure."
Everyone nodded.
"We are closing it," Leo said somberly, preparing to invade them as he put both of his right hands on the dashboard. "I can disable their ship with Terra's help if we invade them."
"Do it. We might get an interesting conversation with them once their ship is hacked," Rei said, lightly laughing as he predicted something based on what had happened so far, which he hoped would come true.
…
"Brother, they are closing in," said a man in his late twenties to Xander.
"Point our weapons at them," Xander ordered, surprising everyone.
"Are we going to attack them?"
"No. Just point the weapons at them. I want to see their reaction," Xander spoke indifferently.
"Hahaha, do it," Goran said with a loud laugh as he understood Xander's intention. "Let's see if they are sheep or wolves."
…
"They p-pointed their weapons," Lia said, stammering as she saw those big weapons pointed at them.
Even Alice and Leo started sweating bullets.
"Relax and continue. Terra, pass by them calmly and shoot the cable after passing them a bit," Rei said calmly, his eyes showing no ripples.
"They will not attack now since they didn't attack previously. But they will most likely attack when Terrana shoots the cable," Rei turned to Leo and continued, "We can block one or two of their barrage, so quickly hack their ship."
"Leave it to me," Leo said, grinning with excitement but nervous as well. 'Leo, this is a new challenge for you. You gotta do it! Everything was easy, and you were feeling bored below, but it's different now in this bigger stage.'
'Goddess of Victory and Luck only smiles upon those who are daring.'
Of course, just being daring was never enough. One must have skills to back one's actions, and Leo believed that he had them.
…
"They are passing by us," Goran muttered with an unpleasant expression. "There's much space in this direction, but they still choose to pass by us closely, humph."
"If we want to survive in this cosmos, recklessness should be minimal," Xander said, his only eye twitching a bit upon remembering something.
He had paid the price of being reckless by losing his one eye and his family.
Xander's gaze was intently focused on the ship passing by them.
"Tsk," Goran clicked his tongue. He wanted to hunt, but he knew that recklessly attacking a random good ship in space without identifying the people inside was a bad call.
They would usually target merchant, traveling, and transporter ships and then continue their adventures to rise as Exceeds. They thought this was easy prey, but it turned out differently.
"Let's continue," Goran ordered his men to continue moving their spaceship.
But they suddenly felt a strong impact as the vibration spread to them.
"Damn! Light those fuckers!" Goran shouted in anger and pressed a red button. Since their weapons were auto-aimed at Earth Omen, he just pressed the button to launch Libra Rail Cannon.
Xander also frowned but didn't say anything and took a knife from his coat before drawing a bit of blood from his palm.
'First Seal: Ravager Hunter. Quirk: Mark of Prey,' Xander activated his First Seal's effect.
His eyes turned slightly red upon activation while the blood he drew vanished. He turned to Earth Omen, who had pierced a cable into their ship's back, and focused.
"Damn it! Their barrier is tough!"
"Continue attacking."
…
On the other hand, Leo's eyes were closed as he had already invaded the enemy ship. But...
'No way…' Leo thought, dumbfounded upon entering the pirate ship.
Just as the enemy had finished the first round of attack on them, Rei and others saw Leo opening his eyes. "It was too easy. Their ship is hacked," he said, smiling wryly.
Indeed, the pirate ship was in chaos as their ship's engines were turned off and weapons and the barrier deactivated.
"Rei, they are sending a communication request. Should I accept the signal?" Terra asked.
"Haha, of course," Rei said with a grin. "Also, put only me on the screen, but mask my face with a random digital mask. I am sure you can put that on with your capabilities."
Terra nodded, accepting their communication as Xander's hologram appeared before Rei.
Alice, Lia, and Leo went aside to prevent the opposition from seeing them.
Rei and Xander saw each other's hologram, but Rei's face was hidden with a dark silver mask with a wide but creepy smile arc.
"What do you want?" Xander asked, his voice as cold as always.
"What I want depends on you, though I doubt beggars like you have anything decent that catches my eyes," Rei unhurriedly replied, his face indifferent.
"Understood. Since you've hacked the ship, I'm sure you got data that passed through our ship's scanners. On top of that, here's the list of other valuable things we have. Tell me what you want, and give us our control back," Xander replied, straight to the point.
Meanwhile, Goran was losing his top. "Let's just fucking wear our suits and jump on them!" He shouted.
Xander turned to Goran and glared intensely, "You know my Seals, right? Then shut up. Let me handle this."
"You're fucking boring, man." Goran raised his hands and left the control room. "But when you find them again, I will take their leader's head."
On the other hand, Rei saw the list of items, but he had to choose carefully. First, he saw if there were any items that were required for his First Seal, Seer, because he decided to go with Seer instead of Joker.
'I can't take more time to choose things,' Rei thought.
"All of those things are useless to me. Just give me 1 billion Milky Way Credits, and we'll go," Rei said in an utterly nonchalant voice.
However, his demand caused Xander's lips to twitch. He suppressed his anger, speaking stiffly, "Are you sane?"
"Tsk, poor fellows. What amount can you give then?" Rei asked, his voice indicating how bored he was getting.
"500k Milky Way Credit."
Hearing the amount, Alice, Lia, and Leo almost jumped up.
Only a selected few people held such an amount on Earth. Even Rei's all properties left by his parents could barely get him 5k-6k Milky Way Credits.
"At least go in millions, duh." Rei shook his head, continuing his act.
"We barely have over one million. Take it or leave. I don't care if you don't give us back our ship's control," Xander coldly said. But on his palm, a strange pattern of blood was forming.
"Jeez, fine. Transfer it and go. Let's hope you are a bit stronger next time we meet." Saying that, Rei cut off the communication.
"They transferred the amount after I gave them a dummy wallet. I'll transfer them to you," Terra said to Rei.
"Got it. Oh, and don't give them back their control," Rei said with a chuckle. "I am sure they can take it back themselves."
Rei didn't want to risk getting retaliation from them by giving them back their control.
"You really are a nasty fellow to your enemies," Leo said, shaking his head wryly.
"They will likely regain their ship's control after several days or a week, but we'll be far gone by then," Terra said, smiling a little as she had new experiences today.