I can’t believe I’m actually doing this… Assaulting a pirate base with just two people? I must be crazy.

In the game, this would be akin to a raid event and you’ll have an entire group of NPCs supporting you as you storm the base with them.

Unless you were ridiculously overpowered or using cheats, you probably can't storm a base by yourself.

But right now, I can already see the asteroid which served as the pirate's base floating in the void of space displayed on my screen… Too late to turn back now…

We weren’t even using any tactics either, we’re just straight up charging towards the base.

Unsurprisingly, we were spotted by the pirates and four ships flew out of the base to try and intercept us.

One of them was a medium sized corvette while the other three were small corvettes.

“I got the small ones, I’ll leave the big one to you, Tera!” Amber’s voice came from over the comms, right before her ship boosted away from me towards the enemy ships.

I directed my ship’s power to the weapon systems, already aiming my guns at the medium sized corvette.

The moment I got the alert that my weapons were powered, I pulled the trigger and my photon laser was fired.

The pilot of the medium sized corvette must have thought we did not have any long range weapons because my laser encountered no shields of any kind and pierced through its hull directly.

Or maybe, going by what Amber had been saying about pirate ships so far, it might not even have a shield module to fit in some other kind of modification for the ship.

Either way, the laser pierced through the centre of the ship’s hull, completely disabling it from the fight and leaving only three more enemies for us to deal with.

The three pirates were obviously not expecting their medium corvette to get destroyed so easily and were also similarly unprepared for Amber’s speed as she boosted past them, her ship’s guns blasting two of them apart instantly.

She turned the ship around even while the last pirate was still panicking, also reducing the pirate ship to scrap in an instant.

The whole engagement lasted even shorter than it takes for me to prepare a meal for myself…

Maybe I really was being too cautious of them?

Nah… The last thing I need is being too overconfident and then falling into a trap or meeting an enemy that was stronger than I thought.

“The way is clear! Let’s go for the hangar!” Amber’s voice came from the comms, her ship already angling towards the hangar bay.

I followed her in, landing my ship right behind hers.

There was a pirate at the end of the hangar who saw us fly in and immediately started shooting at my ship with his rifle.

Not that it did any good since my ship’s shields were still up and the bullets bounced off it harmlessly.

I switched on the controls for my ballistic cannon and targeted him, the pirate only having time to widen his eyes in fear before I pulled the trigger.

He turned around to try and run but the kinetic shells ripped through the air and tore him to shreds in an instant, leaving behind a mist of blood as his body was practically eviscerated by the fast moving projectiles meant to rip open ship hulls.

My only reaction to that sight was to switch off the engines and get up from the pilot seat to grab my equipment and leave the ship.

Descending from my ship to the hangar bay, I did a quick check on my weapons and spare magazines before activating the console to open the doors.

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I made sure to hide myself behind the wall first as the door hissed open, anticipating an attack from pirates that might be there waiting for me.

Seeing nothing happened, I peeked my head out to double check to make sure the coast was clear.

Once I was sure of that, I stepped out of my ship with my rifle held at the ready.

Amber was waiting for me near her ship, the woman raising an eyebrow at me when she saw how I was walking there.

“You have a shield belt, Tera… Or did you forget about t? Even if there’s some pirate hiding somewhere waiting to ambush you, you can still take a hit.”

I rolled my eyes at her, “I specifically took this shield device off a pirate I ambushed, so do forgive me for being a little more cautious. Also, this is my first time storming a pirate base like this, ok?”

She waved at me, “You’ll be fine, trust me. Let’s go!”

Amber didn’t even wait for my answer before moving towards the exit of the hangar with her own blaster held loosely at her side.

I sighed and followed after her, jogging to catch up to the blonde haired woman.

That was when the door we were walking towards suddenly slid open, revealing four armed men with not so friendly expressions on their faces.

Amber reacted immediately, shooting her blaster from the hip and nailing two of the men. One of them got shot through the head and died instantly while the other was shot in the chest, the latter falling onto the ground and groaning in pain.

The last two men immediately duck back into the corridor they had just walked out of to take cover, shooting their guns in our direction blindly.

I rolled behind a few crates as bullets whizzed past us, my companion casually sliding herself behind another set of crates on the other side.

The hailstorm of bullets continued for a second before going still and, without any previous communication between us, we both stood up from our cover to train our weapon at the doorway at the same time.

One of the pirates peeked out from the corner I was aiming at and I squeezed the trigger, nailing the pirate in between his eyes.

The other one remained hidden behind the doorway and Amber started running towards it.

I watched as she did a running slide through the doorway, probably surprising the pirate hiding behind it right before she shot him with a few blasts from her gun.

There was silence for a moment before his dead body crashed down onto the ground and into view.

Amber stood back up and fired a round at the guy she had shot in the chest, ending the pirate’s misery before turning to give me a thumbs up.

I managed to stop myself from rolling my eyes at her and followed her out of the hangar.

Of course, my experience as a player did not allow me to just leave the dead pirates just like that and paused to pick up a few more magazines for my rifle and also took the opportunity to see if they had any spare Credit Chips on them.

I found a few but simply pocketed them for now. I can store them in my Codex later on.

Joining Amber who had moved ahead, I nudged her with an elbow, “Do you know where you’re going?”

“Yes? Just go around and kill any pirate we see before leaving, not that hard right?”

I blinked at her, “Wait… You’re being serious right now? Shouldn’t we… I dunno? Locate their security room or even their armoury to disable them before dealing with the others?

“Pfft, like these pirates are even big enough to need that sort of thing. We’re dealing with nothing more than small time crooks, Tera. These guys are pretty much like some stupid bullies who think they are worth shit because they’re a little meaner than everyone else. If you dare to fight back against them, you’ll realise they ain’t as mean as they think they are.”

“How do you even know all this?”

“Pfft, fight enough of them and you learn how to recognise losers like this, Tera. Don’t worry, you’ll learn on the job. Just follow my lead.”

She continued strutting down the corridor, now even worried about any potential traps or ambushes.

We came across a door by the side and she did not even hesitate to activate the panel that opened the door to burst inside.

“Surprise motherfuckers!” She yelled, shooting her blaster through the doorway in quick, short bursts.

She paused for a moment before nodding to herself and continuing down the corridor.

When I peeked inside the room, I found three dead pirates inside.

That wasn’t even the strange part…

It was two guys and a girl, all three of them completely naked and… Yeah… You can guess what they were doing inside before Amber burst in there and killed all three of them without giving them a chance to react.

I also noted the numerous bottles of alcohol and what appeared to be syringes scattered around the room, clueing me in that these three were most likely inebriated. Which would explain why they were still going at it despite the fact that their base was being attacked.

I would like to say I pitied them… But the truth was that I didn’t really feel anything despite seeing this.

Well… Now is not the time to be sentimental anyway… Let’s just move on.