I guess I should explain to you how pirates really work in the soldar plains. Don't worry, it is not going to take long. I am sure much of this you already know but there are protocols.

Every pirate gang have four types of ship. The first is the crown ship. Every pirate ship has one that acts as a mobile headquarters for them. This is the beating heart of a pirate ship. It is kind of like the head office in that regard. Anything that they need to do has to go through the crown ship. If you manage to destroy the crown ship of a pirate gang, you have essentially destroyed that gang. After all what is the point of having all these ships if you cannot give them any commands.

The second is the brawlers, slower and heavier ships (though not as slow as the crown ship.) that are meant to be used for fights. These are meant to be used to fight other gangs and even us actually. One of our main duties in the soldar plains is to actually attack pirates. This is where all the real members of a pirate gang (the ones that will be able to fight) are stationed at.

The third type is the crawler, slow ships that act as the treasury for the gang. Not every gang has these. For most pirate gangs, their crown ships also tend to act as their crawlers. Only the really rich pirate groups tend to have a separate crawler. After all, if you have a crawler you really need to be able to afford the necessary defenses for it. Otherwise you are giving others a free meal. Most crawlers tend to be repurposed grain ships.

The last type is the patrollers. Small ships that are pretty fast and are used for patrolling and scouting. Most tend to be lightly armoured and lightly equipped. These are the most common pirate ships that you will be able to find.

The reason that I am mentioning all this now is since I forgot to add all of this information in the previous logs and I have a patroller following me. If even one person complains about my records, the head office will kick me out . I know those bastards very well.

Technically, this all is supposed to be present on the log after the briefing since this is a majority of what I have been reading from the documents I have been provided. I had other things on my mind as you must have read. Regardless, I am not starting a log just to tell you this bit of information. The reason for that is we have entered into mayfire territory a couple of days ago and the patroller has been following us for a while now. I am sure that most of you must not be understanding why that is weird.

Most patrollers tend to be useless ships, often on the verge of being scrap. The people on it are nearly useless, most being either new recruits to the gang or the one that have been injured so bad that they can't recover. Most well to do gangs have hundreds of such ships. They send these patrollers to look for potential ships to be stealing from.

After all most ships that run in this place are grain ships, sending grain to the hexmountain. They tend to be like turtles, often without any real defenses of their own. If such a ship is found by the patrollers, then the patrollers can return, sending information to the brawlers who will be able to reach the ship before it can fly away to safety.

This way, the brawlers can be reserved for only when they are needed. After all, brawlers that are good at combat must be pretty mana intensive to move. They must go through mana stones like crazy.

Also, you can mitigate some of the risk you tend to face when looking for a target, from both us and other pirate gangs. For example, we or other pirate ships might hide in a grain ship, waiting for somebody to attack it. It is a good ambush. Other pirate gangs might be looking at the same ship as a target and if two brawlers were there it would have lead to heavy losses to both gangs. (This is the main reason that two pirate gangs fight it seems.) Maybe a travelling expert might be in that ship, destroying you with a single move. (Well, that is a occupational hazard for us all.)

As I have said, these ships tend to be close to scrap anyways. You can lose a hundred of these and you won't notice their loss. You cannot say the same about the brawlers.

As for why what is happening to me is so weird, most patrollers would usually disappear by now, reporting to their nearest brawlers once they have confirmed my travel route. Well, the ship has been following me for a while now. They could retreat any second and If that were to happen, I would be in a pretty sticky situation. I am not capable of fighting a brawler right now.

As for why this ship has yet to retreat, I have a theory. They must be looking to raid my ship. I kind of expected something like this to happen. Their ship is roughly as big as mine and it has been after us for a while now. I am not driving the ship at its full speed, so it must look like a weak target. (I am entering an active combat zone. There is no way that I am going to risk my life by going at full speed.)

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So the other side must be considering me as a potential victim. Anybody with a bit of brain would know to be careful of a lone ship travelling alone in the soldar plains, but greed and stupidity have no limits. Well, to give the other side credit, this might just be their first time. Maybe they have no idea what they are supposed to be doing here. After all not everybody can be like me, getting to study detailed documents on enemy behaviour, even before coming out here on our first mission.

I would have already attacked the ship if it had come closer to me, but it is keeping it's distance. I could try and attack now, but with such distance (about ten kilometres) there is a chance of me missing. If that happens, I will be spooking the other side. If they were to run away and report me, things would become bad for me pretty quickly. After all, if I were to end up fighting a brawler in mayfire territory it would attract attention that I would not want on me. That is considering that I would be able to survive the fight.

Anyways, I have been studying the ship for a while now. There are only two strong enough mana sources. The first is the propulsion formation. The other is most probably some kind of a cannon. It is not a strong cannon, of that I am sure. If they had a good cannon, then I would be able to detect it even now. This kind of cannons are the only ones that would be able to do any damage to me. At most, It is going to be a really shitty class seven cannon or a really good class eight cannon. (Neither capable of taking me down in a single shot. Hence why I am so calm.)

So, I can allow them to come closer to me, if they are stupid enough to do so. Then I just need to pepper them with my cannons. This is about the best way for me to deal with this situation.

I am still making my way to the mayfire castle, so having that ship behind me is not hurting me at all. I will continue the log when the other ship ends up doing anything worth noting.

(After about half a day.)

Well, the ship is coming closer to us. I don't know why they suddenly decided to come after us. I swear that for a moment they looked as if they were about to retreat. Right now they are ten kilometres from me.

I need them to come just within five kilometres of me. With that distance I can just let lose all of my cannons and hit them with certainty. It is a bit risky to allow them to come that close, but it should be worth it.

At least the other side is not suicidal. They are creeping closer to me but they are careful about it. The instant that I show them any intent of attacking, I am sure they will bolt away.

Right now they are nine kilometres away. I mean I could stop my ship to allow them to come closer, but that is going to spook them away as well. After all, why would a ship suddenly stop mid chase. Let's just hope my act of trying to run away is good enough to fool them for a bit longer.

This is harder than it looks. The other side is not coming at us with their full speed. This close, it is more likely to crash into us if they were to do so. Right now, they are accelerating their ships. I am trying to go at a speed that is just a bit slower than theirs. Not enough that it looks like I am stopping my ship just to let them come closer and not fast enough that I leave them in the dust. That would certainly spook them into retreating.

Right now they are seven kilometres away from me. I wonder if I should attack them already. well, I can feel the second mana sources of theirs flair up. It looks like they are readying their cannon. Right now, that means that they intend to come closer to me to shoot at me. Their reasoning on this must be similar to mine, that is to shoot me before I do so.

Well, with the strength of their cannons, I am sure that there will be a few holes in the ship but it should be nothing serious. At least compared to what I am about to unleash on them. It is going to be worth the effort and cost of patching up these few holes if it means I can safely get rid of the other side. I really don't want to get embroiled with a pirate gang before I even find out what exactly is happening at the castle.

Wait a second, if I am able to sense their cannons they might be able to sense my cannon preparing as well. Fuck, I did not think of that. If they were to detect my cannons, it would be enough to spook them. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Calm the fuck down, they would have been running away already if that was the case. Now that I calm down a bit I realise that for it to be a problem they need to have a mana sense first of all. I am sure that most people on that ship have never felt any mana except their vital mana. Well, most pirates in this place tend to be farmers that could not pay their debts. (Well, there tend to be many reasons for it. A bad crop, a pirate attacking, or most commonly, the lord of that region suddenly deciding to increase the taxes.) I tell you, that most people in that ship must have held a sword for the first time.

Even if they have a mana sense, most people do not have enough experience with sense enhancing formations to be able to sense the other side as precisely. Anybody capable of sensing mana would at most think the spike in mana would be due to my propulsion formation. I am just so used to having a mana sense way greater than the average, that I don't need to worry about things like this. Even injured, my mana sense is comparable to a person at the later stages of the foundation level.

Well, the other ship is six kilometres away from us. I need to be ready, so I prepare the coordination matrix. The instant that the ship is five kilometres away, I will set it off. There is a significant chance that it will fail, but I have Andrew and Jacob ready at the cannons. The failure of the coordination matrix will be enough to alert them to manually adjust the cannons.

There it is, the five kilometer mark. I flex the coordination matrix feeling it ready as I se.......