"What's with the Gaia thing? And I know that wasn't your special ability. that was your starship, right? A weapon from your starship. Were you trying to get us all killed?!"
"No, that's…" I turned to glare at Aegis. This was after we had transported the portal back to the capital, bringing it back in components to headquarters. We were riding in that flying car, and Shang Xiao was in the back. Aegis had returned back to the Crusader, leaving just the portable component, but it was enough for me to grip her tightly in my hand and glare at her. "What was all that about, Aegis?"
"I just thought it would be amusing."
"Amusing, my foot! You just wanted me to pretend to be Chen Jun from Xyrin Empire, didn't you?! What will you do if Bilibili send us a lawsuit?!"
"I knew that looked familiar," Lin Xue muttered under her breath, her hands holding the steering wheel hard.
"What are you guys talking about?" Shang Xiao asked, bewildered. "Honestly, ever since you guys started bickering from a few minutes ago, I've been completely lost."
"Oh, we're just making jokes." I scrolled up the Anime made by Bilibili channel on my smartphone and showed it to him. "Make sure to subscribe."
"Why are you doing product placement so blatantly?!" Lin Xue threw her hands up into the air. We didn't have to worry about her keeping her hands on the steering wheel because the car had a secondary autopilot system that could take over in an emergency.
"Hey, I haven't mentioned The Girl Downstairs, Martial Weekly and Since I Wasn't the Heroine yet…"
"STOP ADVERTISING BILIBILI DONGMAN IN MY CAR!"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Hey, when's the fourth season of Daily Life of the Immortal King coming out?" Shang Xiao asked from behind.
"I don't know, but I heard the sixth season of Versatile Mage is out in June. Wait, at the time of this chapter, it should already be out."
"Can you not encourage him, sir?!" Lin Xue paused. "I didn't know you were a fan of Daily Life of the Immortal King."
"I like it more than War God System, I'm Counting on you! Too bad they took it down, but I wasn't a fan of Li An."
"Okay, stop." Lin Xue clutched her head. "Just…stop. Please. I'm begging you."
"Senior looks more like the kind who will like Since I Wasn't the Heroine."
"Hey! Don't just jump to conclusions and assume I like shoujo-type stories because they have a female lead! I don't even like The Demonic King Chases His Wife! Actually, can we just stop talking about dongman? Please? I'm begging you! Or I'll kick you out of my car!"
Since neither Shang Xiao nor I wanted to be thrown out of a flying vehicle that was over a kilometer above ground, we obediently shut up for the rest of the journey. Lin Xue brought us straight to HQ, tailing behind a convoy of flying cars for most of the way. The portal had been disassembled and spread across the different cars.
The next thing I knew, we were sent to a chamber to oversee the installation of the portal, though we left after a few minutes when it became clear there was nothing for us to do while the nanotech went about their work. We couldn't even see the nanobots unless we placed the thing under a microscope. Not that the portal could fit under a microscope, so we ended up seeing nothing. It was like watching paint dry.
We then went for debriefing, submitting both a verbal and written report to the higherups. They, like Shang Xiao, bought our story about the other world, and they vowed to post a security detail watching over the portal to ensure nothing untoward happen.
"I volunteer to go back through the portal and test things out once the installation is complete," I said, raising my hand. The general who was officially in charge of the Department of Sprue nodded. With several stars on his shoulder, his name tag spelled Jiang Jun.
"You and Lin Xue both." He turned to her, and she saluted.
"Yes, sir! I feel that we are best suited for the task because we already have experience exploring the world. We will be more familiar with Carmarthen than the other agents."
"Yeah, that's why I'm authorizing the both of you." Jiang Jun steepled his fingers and stared at us. "Truth to be told, this is a momentous discovery. This changes everything we know. We normally would have scientists and researchers crawling all over this portal, wanting to explore this alien world that you're talking about. However, for obvious reasons, we're going to limit access to Carmarthen. You say there's already a human civilization living there?"
"That's right." I saw no point in
"Then we have to be careful. We don't want to trigger any unnecessary political conflicts or diplomatic problems with the powers living over there. We probably shouldn't let the public know about this. If they find out that…humans are living on other planets, they'll probably…not believe us. They will think us mad."
"Yeah…and I don't think the natives will welcome any random visitors. They don't want us rushing in to exploit the resources there, or have to deal with refugees and migrants. It might even cause an ecological catastrophe."
"It's not like the portal can teleport people on a large scale anyway. From what you've told me." Jiang Jun stared at me. "And if they're so hostile, how were you able to convince them not to…kill you?"
"We proved our strength through combat," I explained. "They are a very…militaristic people. A knightly order, to be more precise. Living in a feudal society with lords and retainers."
"Even more of a reason not to send bumbling scientists over there." Jiang Jun sighed and rubbed his forehead. "They'll get themselves killed."
With that, he dismissed us, and I could finally go home after a long while. As I expected, my parents were pretty worried. Even though Sprue had taken care of informing them that I was away on a mission, my sudden disappearance had them all concerned. Particularly when they couldn't contact me at all.
It was only natural. I was literally in another star system. There was no way my phone would receive any signal from Earth.
"What happened? Where did you go?!"
"The Gobi Desert," I replied half-truthfully, trying to assure my mom that I was perfectly fine. "There was no reception there, so I couldn't contact you. But we were involved in an archeological dig."
That was the cover story. It was also the same story that Sprue had fabricated and told my parents when Lin Xue and I disappeared.
"Archeological dig?" Tian Yang asked curiously. "What did you find there?"
"Ruins from an ancient, as of yet unidentified civilization."
"But you're not an archeologist, are you?" Dad furrowed his brow. "If I remember correctly, you chose to major in literature. Why would they send you there?"
"Hey, I'm studying history as well. At least that's what I want to say, but I haven't gotten into university and actually studied undergraduate level history yet, so they wouldn't call me for my historical knowledge. Nah, they asked me to serve as security."
That was also what they told my parents, but they didn't seem convinced.
"I've asked them about that too, but it makes no sense. Why would they send you to be security? You're not a security guard." Mom frowned. "You're not even military or anything. Can't they send someone else?"
"I'm more of an intern," I explained. "Civil service. They expect us to be flexible and take charge of multiple roles."
"What roles? Why do they have to send you to a desert and do security? Can't they hire other people for that? Actual security guards?"
"Uh, government official thing. They want us to toughen up, explore the world, and get exposed to more people."
Mom wanted to ask more, but dad cut her off.
"Okay. It's been a week, you're exhausted, right? Tian Xing, you should go rest. You look exhausted."
"Oh, don't worry. They made sure we have enough sleep and rest during duty." I said that, but it was more like I spent most of my time onboard the Crusader sleeping because I had nothing better to do. I did make use of the training facilities aboard the cruiser, but there was only so much time I could spend training in a day without getting burned out.
"Yeah, I know, but you should still rest."
"Okay, thanks." I was grateful to get out of being grilled, so I took the opportunity to slip away. Going into my room, I threw myself onto my bed, took my glasses off and closed my eyes. It didn't take long before I jolted back awake after drifting off and I couldn't go back to sleep again.
Tian Yang had already gone to bed by the time I woke up, and feeling a little bored, I flipped my laptop on and switched on my computer.
"It's been a while, hasn't it? Never mind the Gao Kao and all those months I spent studying for exams. I thought I could game immediately after I finished the Gao Kao, but I ended up spending an extra week on another planet. I can't take it anymore!"
And so I launched Starcraft 2 and began playing furiously.
"Who called in the fleet?" I chuckled as I picked Terran race and began playing. I used to play Random, but I sucked at playing all three races, and in the end, I settled on Terran because…they were the humans in the setting and I loved giant robots.
That was right…I might choose Terran, but I never played with biological units. I sucked at micro. I wasn't a big fan of infantry, stimulant packs and floating medivac dropships. Rather, I preferred mechanical units, so lots of giant robots, supported by tanks capable of transforming into artillery that could launch high explosive shells from afar.
"STOP TURTLING!" my opponent screamed at me as his swarm of alien bugs charged into my line of siege tanks, planetary fortresses and giant robots…only to die. Hound-like creatures sprang forward, only to crash into shield-bearing robots with shoulder mounted flamethrowers. They incinerated the horde of clawed creatures. Spine-spitting serpent bugs hung back, only to be blown apart by the sieged-up tanks. Winged behemoths that hurled broods of bugs at my lines from afar were targeted by massive bipedal walkers with 250mm artillery cannons and obliterated.
Of course, as powerful as my mechanical army was, packing immense firepower capable of ending worlds, they were slow and relatively immobile. I couldn't easily move my cumbersome robots and tanks across the map. The moment I moved out, the much faster and more numerous alien swarm would strike my bases from multiple angles and wipe out my infrastructure…my production facilities.
"Not only that, they can max out their army near instantly with multiple hatcheries, but my mech units take pretty long to build."
Cursing as I lost another giant robot, I tapped a hotkey and began building a replacement, but he would be 60 seconds away. Short in the grand scheme of things but an eternity in game.
I checked my mini-map and noted the red icons of enemy signals in the distance, thanks to my sensor tower. Rotating my army around, I dispatched them to protect my flanks.
Unfortunately, my playstyle didn't endear me to my opponent, who was raging at me.
"Stop hiding like a cowardly turtle! Come out and fight like a man!"
"And get myself slaughtered?" I typed back. "I'm not that dumb."
"I'm the only one attacking for the last thirty minutes! This is a toxic gaming style! I hope you Terran turtles suffer cancer and DIE!"
I raised an eyebrow when I saw the angry text flash across the screen, and smirked. All the more to dig in and defend more deeply. I slowly moved toward one side of the map, swallowing the resources and denying my opponent expansions. Pushing my glasses up my nose, I grinned and fortified my expansions, filling them out with more planetary fortresses, siege tanks and missile turrets.
"JUST FUCK OFF, TURTLE NOOB!"
I typed back, "NO." And upgraded a Command Center into a Planetary fortress right in his face. Right in front of a colony of spore crawlers and bugs. In a rage, he sent what remained of his army at me, only to watch them get annihilated by immense firepower.
My victory didn't come without a cost, of course. Half of my robots lay mauled and shredded across the ground. My tanks were wrecked hulls, smoldering next to a shell of a burning planetary fortress. The titanic giant bipedal mechs lay in ruins, with only four or so limping away from the ferocious engagement, escorted by the smaller flamethrower-wielding robots.
At least I had a few surviving units. I swiftly began rebuilding my army from the multiple factories I had scattered across the map, but it would take a while before I could re-max. Glancing at the mini-map, I ran several calculations. Was it best to give up the outlying bases and pull my remaining forces back to regroup and consolidate? Should I risk separating off a smaller unit to protect that expansion? Were the limited resources still available there worth the sacrifice of that sentry squad of robots? How much gas did I have? Should I spend the surplus of minerals on more flamethrower robots?
…and then the victory screen flashed across my monitor.
"…eh?"
Oh. Apparently, my opponent left the game. Not even a "gg" (good game). Not that I expected it from him. But hey, it was hilarious to watch him rage quit. And that meant my ladder ranking improved.
"…oh, wait, I'm still in my placement matches." I stretched myself and groaned. Yup, this was my first game of the day, and it took me thirty minutes. Damn. Well…that was my playstyle. Slow, steady, meticulous and cautious. An emphasis on macro over micro, and teching up instead of rushing, going for tier 3 mech units instead of tier 1 biological infantry.
If my opponents didn't like it, they could suck it. Heh.
Scratching the back of my neck, I smiled and clicked "Search for game." The next match awaited, and I was going to try out several new strategies I had in mind.
Beside me, the tiny portable components of Aegis and Arondight watched silently.