Author's corner: Sry, i've been procrastinating because i have been reading to much Wuxia and it resulted in me overdoing it these last few days with one of my side projects and my only side projects. The fic is called Martial Land God and its the only Wuxia i made and if you are curious you can find it on my Wordpress by pressing on "Side Projects Site" on my signature. I posted up to chapter 20 of this side project. Please leave comments on both Nebula and MGL.
Enjoy
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The crew was gathered inside the shuttle and we all stare at the large pile of over 700k credits that was earned from the bets.
Havic had woken up an hour after she fell and we were returning to the shuttle at the time and we explained what happen.
She was the most dumbstruck one as she simply sat down next to Alex in the kitchen around the table and stared at the money.
"You guys are bullshiting with me! Your telling me that the small cup I drank was able to make THE Colonel Topaz eat the dirt off the dwarf fighter airfield?!" She said suddenly looking at us.
"No, not one cup, three. It was rather impressive, being able to walk seven meters to the pile of money and then falling." Dad said puffing out his chest and letting loose a laugh.
"I don't believe you! Where did you steal this from!" She exclaimed.
"It really was from betting and winning." Alex said making Havic a bit depressed.
"What I want to know is how you are standing after only an hour? Without detoxifying yourself you should be out like a light for more than a day." Dad commented which made me wonder as well.
"Zastros have a strong metabolism, though that little drink of your floored my metabolism worked to clean out my system. Our home planet had many toxic herbs that our metabolism needed process so we eventually formed a high level of poison resistance. Made us really good drinkers but we are a warrior race so we didn't develop that part until we began space travelling." Havic explained.
It was understandable. A race with no so strong drinking capabilities but a strong metabolism. If they drank from a young age they could definitely compared to a dwarf in drinking capabilities.
"Even if I don't believe this was from that single shitty drink what will you do now?" Havic said a little solemn.
"Good question, what will we do?" Jessica asked.
"Well the proper thing is to equip more weapons. This shuttle can possess a turret on the top as well as having two small weapon slots on the wings. We can definitely improve the laser weapons we have for higher grade models. We also need to figure out how to install that drive thing we obtained." I tell them.
"The drive shouldn't be hard. It's only an "add on" to the engine. It's a bit tricky but the mechanics know how to install such add-on's since most are similar." Havic said.
"Oh oh oh! Don't forget about upgrading that fighter of mine. It's still the most basic model and all those blueprint pads show a few upgrade models." Alex said with a dazed dreamy look.
Havic frowned at the almost turned on expression on Alex's face and pouted as she was losing out to a machine.
"Hey guys, I had Ricky check the mission list available on the station. Since we already did one terraforming mission I found another one that might interest us!" Hilda said and a hologram appeared from a projector on her arm.
Mission: Kelha Terraforming Part two: OceanDifficulty5Kelha II terraforming project has reached a stage where we can proceed with large scale planet changes. Since the atmosphere has been formed in a primitive unstable and toxic form the next stage to make it thicker shall follow.
Request that crews possess at minimum large mining ship for the following.
Crews will scour the asteroid field in search of asteroid with high concentration of water. After discovering such the asteroids must be thrown in a crash course into the region of volcanoes previously erupted in the first stage.
Reward: 40000 credit to crew
Objective: Safely guide asteroids to crash onto the planet "Warning: native space monsters and bandits present in asteroid field. Suggested weapon and defensive upgrades to ship be taken."
Success: Aide in increasing Planet density and humidity level increases to satisfactory levels and whether patterns begin to appear. Job duration 2 weeks.
Failure: Team is killed, asteroid you drop hits camps or towns.
"This is a repeat mission." Hilda said.
"Oh! I didn't know it Kelha II terraforming had reached this stage. It will be quite a few months before this this stage ends. The storms that will come to this planet is a sight to see." Havic said.
"Won't the mining camps be covered in water?" Alex asked.
"Mining camps are always placed in high grounds. Even if the lowest grounds had the highest quality goods they will wait until the terraforming is done before building a mining camp down there where they can properly set up the supply base at the water's edge. No one knows how far the water will rise since the planet still has its own water underground." Havic explained.
"Will we do this?" Jessica asked.
"We should do like the warning said. Let's upgrade the hull, and weapons and buy the turret. After that we will have stronger combat system for the ship to take on this mission. Since its not going anywhere we can do this for a while." I told them.
"You should invest money into your robot then. It's still only basic model without space flight technology. Also those shotguns I noticed in the area are basic kinetic weapons. In a gunfight between dwarf fighters you would be extremely weak with just those. A psionic shot gun single bulk shots that can easily destroy a fighter ship with a single shot. There is no need to keep kinetic weapons though the sword is fine since its Psionic metals and circulates psi to strengthen but it still needs upgrades to allow long range psi slashes." Havic said.
"Not ta mention ya needs a betta containa for ya psi!" Said a high pitched girls voice with a strange way of talking that makes you think of a tomboy.
"Oh right, I never introduced you all, this is Baal. He is my AI." Havic said and over the very sleek and high grade communicator a hologram appeared.
The hologram showed a small child, no bigger than a 10 or 11 year old. Flat as a board, with two ponytails, a girly face and what can only be called a futuristic magic girl costume. On the forehead of the AI were two small horns similar to Havic and the same skin color which revealed that her communicator made holograms with color.
"Hi~!" The AI waved.
Seeing the AI we were all a bit shocked and frozen by the surprise but we snapped out of it when a deep voice began to laugh. It came from Alex's direction.
"Hahaha! I finally understand why a lesbian like you fell for alex!" Xeno said laughing. "You are actually interested in traps!" He shouted and started laughing again.
From that all the AI began to laugh but the rest were silent in shock looking at the dangerous trap AI.
"Thats mean! I totally love girls, don't think otherwise it's only to bad that Baal can't alter his shape to a girls. It only takes a bit more yet that final step is so far." Havic said with a sigh.
"Your mean Havic! What do ya mean meh change ma sex! It is because ah your hacking ah mah systems an changing mah clothes an inserten ah personality altering virus that made meh like this, Hmph!" Baal said and crossed his arms while pouting.
This made everyone wake up. Hack an AI? How good does the person need to be to do that?
"But I'm amazed what did she do to hack you?" Lia's voice called out.
"She first trapped me in a small robot ball with no ability to move and resist. Then she connected me to a supercomputer that already had her twisted virus programs prepared, she had spent several thousands of credits to make that computer. The first virus scrambled my thought processor so I couldn't resist then the others slipped through the firewalls we built and then began to change me and after an hour she was done." Baal said with crouching and making circles in the air he was floating around in.
I'm sure all the AI's shuttered at this while the rest of us could only pity to the poor AI.
"Sis? What did you look like before?" Ricky called from Hilda's direction.
"I looked about 85% like Frethir." Baal said sad by the massive changes.
The room went quiet again because the change was just so extreme. Frethir is a cold calculative merchant with a heavy fist. His is cautious even of those of his race yet this AI that should have been similar was turned into a trap mahou shoujo, the fate was simply to sad to imagine.
"Let’s... drop this, it seems to be a sore spot for him." Lisa says a bit worried seeing the little AI's sad expression.
"Alex go look for some of the low rank and cheaper upgrades we can afford at the moment. Havic, can you come with me and Dad to purchase the upgrades at a lower price hopefully. Lisa you still need medical equipment right, you can go buy what you're lacking. Jessica and Hilda, please keep Alex from choosing the most expensive and impossible to obtain upgrades." I sat and everyone nodded and we left to do our respective roles.
The Hangar was the place to go for all upgrades to a ship and so we head that way. Meeting the usual Hangar Master Vincent we started to talk about the upgrades. It goes without saying that he was completely shocked with seeing Havic. It seems she had a large reputation and he recognized her instantly and after hearing why she was with us he somewhat paled after he heard why we were here.
Havic smiled flirtatiously and “sat” in mid air with one leg over the other after her magnet boots were deactivated.
“Eh… your current hull is standard Shuttle plating, upgrading that will employ Cesogen alloy plates." Vincent replied.
Cesogen is a metal found in space only in 1 out of every 3 solar systems earning it a rank 2 in rarity. The Cesogen Alloy plate is Steel and Cesogen processed together to make the alloy and its about two times stronger than steel for factory brand and three times for really high quality goods.
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“Oh? Just Cesogen?” Havic said mischievously.
“...The full hull cost replacement would cost 30,000 credits.” He said.
“Wow that's expensive!” Havic said in a fake shock then her face grow a bit serious.
“15,000, the metal is only rank 2 and its most likely factory brand, not only that making the alloy isn’t any different than making steel except with a secondary metal. Price of Cesogen mining ship cargo goes for 500 credits a cargo while iron goes for around 200. At this ration the processing price would be at 10,000 and manual work is 5,000 which is the same price this station charges for full ship hull repairs.” Havic says blunt and merciless.
The skills of an experienced merchant is scary and her beautiful face makes it scarier because she doesn’t put on that much of a serious expression but it gives a chill seeing that subtle change.
“T-that price….” Vincent was at a loss for words. This was the most blunt of prices where the station wouldn’t lose anything or gain anything besides the 5k from the outfitting they would gain nothing for the alloy the station purchased.
“2...25,000 credits.” Vincent said.
“The highest I will go is 18,000.” She replied bluntly.
Sweat covered Vincent's face. He was never one for negotiating and normally only accompanied the others to choose out the needed parts while leaving the price negotiations to the higher ups who were experienced in politics like this.
“Oi girly! Stop bullying this weak ass!” A shout from the communicators on Vincent's wrist announces his AI’s participation in this.
Relief instantly surfaces on Vincent’s face as a huge burden was lifted and passed to a much better person in this area.
“Oh? So you're the smart one of the pair? Mind telling me how much a Plasma Cannon turret cost?” Havic asked.
“One of those cost 130,000 credits market price, the ones we have come from the trade ship so you should know it’s quality.” the AI said.
“Of course, that is why I asked for it and wanted to know the stations price. The trade ship sells them for 90,000 since we make our own weapons so there is a 40% increase in price for profit. If we purchase both the hull and turret I would be willing on 21k for the hull and 115k for the turret.” Havic said.
At the prices Vincent was a bit more relaxed. Against a true merchant neither him or his AI could win but the AI definitely knew the pricing better than Vincent and made up for his bad parts and knew that asking for more from such a demoness like Havic would be wanting to much. To negotiate with her they would need to bring Major Snocon or Mr Mores himself to handle this to get beneficial terms over this demon. Mr Mores was even more wicked since he had to negotiate with Wynebia merchants for high performance parts for the station without being too much at the disadvantage less the merchant leaders completely remove the station from his possession. That is how ruthless those men are. In their eyes Havic is just a little newborn.
With that taken care of Havic moved on and accessed the Hangar system and shifted through the shuttle laser category and started to talk with us. Alex soon arrived with the Shuttle in the hangar and stopped it over the designated zone.
We eventually choose from a targeting turret type laser that would install a targeting system into the ship and allow Alex to target another ship and the two front Lasers and the two wing ones would follow it. The wing lasers could change sides from above and below so that blind spots wouldn’t appear and could fire at angles below the ship. This cost 70,000 credits but like most weapons it was built on the trade ship and Havic knew the original price and drove this to 60k. The total we spent 196k, if she wasn’t here we would be paying 230k credits. A saving of 34k. That is quite a substantial amount that we would have spent as opposed to just buying.
It made me realize exactly how lucky we were. It also sent some alerts in my head.
”We got seriously lucky with her… but luck has to end and with everything that has happened recently being so beneficial to us I fear what will happen when our luck runs out!” I couldn’t help thinking. I just hope this doesn’t end up jinking us later on.
We left the upgrades to them and began to examine what Alex wanted to upgrade with the fighter.
The first and foremost he wanted was the engine improving and a larger air tank or more of them so that he can fly longer in space and planets with developing or no atmosphere. After that would be remaking the controls in a completely different model which he designed and would make things more efficient for him but it would be hell for anyone else trying to fly it since the controls would be completely different to the conventional model. Lastly he wanted to upgrade the weapons and make them more potent.
The model was common enough that the station actually had the parts we needed for the ship and life support but the it was still uncommon enough to make the upgrades expensive enough to charge 10k for the engine, 70k for all the parts and equipment needed to remake the cockpit and 50k for the laser weapon upgrades.
The cockpit will take even more time since the model is completely new and its something that we can build ourselves with the parts which is better since we need to keep our own secrets and if the mechanics of the station saw it they could figure out the workings faster if needed.
As a result we just bought the parts for the upgrades, that included the shuttle that would undergo an even more intense reform but only after we leave here. It would take nearly 1 week to remake both the cockpit of the shuttle and fighter in Alex’s designs since we need to take each wire and place them properly and extend them to the new locations. Until then we can’t start the Terraforming mission but that can wait since its better to be safe then sorry and since the mission was put up two days ago it means that the location of ice asteroids haven’t been found. Also this mission is difficulty 5. If the bandit outpost raid was rank 4 then how difficult will this be with just these few upgrades.
The galaxy is huge so there will always be a force greater than yours even if you don’t know. Never think you are the strongest because it is the starting point of your downfall.
As such we get on with the start of these upgrades while the others go and upgrade their own gear.
Jessica gets a new plasma pulse sniper and tries to find someone to upgrade the rail guns while Hilda finds several weapons that she was interested in but only purchased a new swords, a higher quality Plasma sword that.
Dad got some armor but that was all. That said the armor seems to have a strength boost so its something good for him.
The final thing we purchased was something I was against because we are still “poor” relatively but Havic said it was the best investment and that was a large number of parts and components for my Robot as well as several more advanced part blueprints beyond basic model like larger Psi Containers and a basic wing model.
I need to upgrade the containers first before I think about wings because they eat up a lot of psi and I also need to go back to training a lot with Psi to make the lost of it. Oh right I also had my sword improved a bit and made the flow of Psi a bit better. The first thing I improved was the shotguns like Havic had suggested but I also made it different I left the current ones and simply added the other. This way I have a spread shot and a focused one.
As expected, the 700k we made went all into improvements of our gear. Mine and Alex’s gear were obviously the most expensive and took most of our funds and only after a week we were set up better. Alex had his improved cock pits that he working even more rapidly in. This was probably a set up he made in real life for something.
As for me the first new container is almost done. I will leave the old ones as spares to quickly recharge.
Besides that I was also building the parts I would be using for the wings but it's quite far away because it's much more complex than any arm or leg I made. To even attach the wing I will need to upgrade the robot as a whole a bit. The size will probably increase a bit as well as a result and even then I will still only have the most basic model wings that will allow me to move at the speed of a tiny ship like a tug which can only achieve 90 to 100 kilometers per hour.
Its a start at least and it will allow me to mine with much more ease since I will control my movements with more freedom.
“Son, logout, remember I promised I would go meet an old friend. Your coming, I told the others. The girls already have their own plans, heh, so we will start the mission tomorrow.” Dad says through the mic outside of my capsule.
I clean up the workshop and head to bed. Not before warning Alex to watch over the ship and put Lia on alert since you never know what can happen.
Leaving the capsule I stretch and hear the cracking from the joints as I go through the routine of stretches to make sure every muscle group was stretched.
Leaving the room I went and took a bath and as I was leaving dad walked in.
“Oh, you're out, good! Put on some decent clothes, get something to eat because the ride over is about two hours long.” Dad said.
“Who are we going to see?” I asked dad.
“You will see when you get there.” dad said with a smile.
I look at him as he leaves with a wry expression but could do nothing about his childish nature. I take off the shorts I had on and put some slack jeans and a comfortable shirt with collar then tidied up my hair and shaved leaving a clean washed face before heading down to eat.
After that we get ready and make sure nothing is missing. I do something extra by connecting the Capsule to my phone so that Lia can directly contact us as long as there is internet.
From there we leave by car heading off to who knows where my dad is taking me.