Assessing the Situation
Assessing the situation.
Chapter 103: Assessing the Situation
Right now, getting a clear picture of what was going on mattered more than anything else…
Choice 2: Figure out what's going on first!
(Chaos within the Holy Sevelian Empire increases; additional linked events related to Warp Gate malfunction proceed)
✓ SELECTED
I immediately picked Choice 2 and released the pause.
The very next moment, both my terminal and Riel's chimed with simultaneous alerts.
"…"
"Why's it going off for both me and the Minister at the same—whoa."
The contents were almost identical to the event message I'd already seen.
"This is bad, yeah? Don't tell me the gate's actually broken?"
But hearing Riel toss that out so casually made me realize I wasn't in any position to start fretting about the Grey Nightmare just yet.
Right. Like Riel said, maybe it really is just a malfunction?
Sure, in the game the thing never broke down once even after centuries of use. But this was reality, not a game—who could say when or where something might go wrong?
Even fleet flagships, or just plain battleships—far smaller than a Warp Gate—had accidents all the time that left them dead in space. Stories about a flagship's generator failing mid-fleet exercise and nearly plunging into a star were the kind of jokes that floated around every fleet command.
So how much more could go wrong with something as massive as a Warp Gate?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!
What's wrong with that guy?
He's a gate technician. Says the internal integrated circuits got scrambled and it linked to some weird gate.
Just from what I could dredge up in my own memory: the Ministry of Technology and Science bureaucrat who'd written a whole apology report after installing one circuit wrong and connecting to some bizarre location…
I was reminded all over again how different the results looked when you watched from the omniscient game-player viewpoint versus living it as a bureaucrat stuck in the middle of these people.
Anyway, having chosen Option 2, I casually brushed aside the alert—basically the same content as the event message—and turned to Riel as she asked about our next move.
"Minister, how should we respond in a situation like this?"
I nodded and answered.
"Assessing the situation comes first, of course. Media control can wait!"
"Got it, Minister."
About a week later…
"Minister, I brought the investigation results!"
The moment I took the report from Riel, a new event message flooded my vision.
[PAUSED]
At least the game automatically paused every time an event message popped up. That was a relief. If one of those things suddenly blocked my vision without a pause, who knew what kind of disaster would follow.
Ugh, damn.
With that idle thought, I gently pushed the event message—hovering way too close to my face—a little farther back until it sat at a comfortable reading distance, then started going through the contents.
When one node of the Warp Gate network—the pride of the Holy Sevelian Empire—went dark, the Empire's finest minds and personnel gathered to determine the cause.
What they discovered was that, for reasons unknown, the structure and materials of the gate itself had transformed into something never before seen.
Understanding this problem will require far more time and resources.
Choice 1: Why are you even telling me this? Still, I should send support… (Linked event proceeds)
Choice 2: That's enough assessment—focus on containing the domestic chaos first. (Linked event proceeds)
Once I'd finished reading, one conclusion settled firmly in my mind.
This doesn't quite match the Grey Nightmare event I know.
Probably because of the mod, I figured, and turned my attention to the two new choices.
Both of them say the event continues either way… What's going on?
Normally one option would end the event or something. Yet here both choices were basically "the event proceeds no matter what."
Interesting…
In cases like this, the direction of the linked events usually diverged. I sank into deeper deliberation, agonizing over which pick would actually benefit me.
After what felt like roughly five hours of choice paralysis…
Alright. Decision made.
I finally reached a conclusion and selected my option.
Choice 1: Why are you even telling me this? Still, I should send support…
(Linked event proceeds)
✓ SELECTED
Imperial chaos? It always settles down on its own if you just wait long enough!
Of course, that wasn't exactly the kind of thought the minister in charge of the secret police—the ones supposed to contain and control that chaos—ought to be having…
But both in the game and in reality, Sevelian public opinion was a classic flash-in-the-pan. Toss out a few other distractions later, quietly drag the ones who crossed the line off to a black site, and that would be the end of it.
[PAUSE RELEASED]
With a rough plan in place, I released the pause and set about putting my choice into action.
"Got it. But the investigation's gonna take at least a week—you planning to just wait that long?"
"I doubt I'll be free enough to sit around doing nothing for a whole week."
Even as I said it, I privately assumed nothing much would happen. In fact, the very act of saying those words out loud practically guaranteed the opposite—that the week would pass in perfect peace.
But not long after I issued the orders…
"Riel, why didn't you stop me?"
"…You're seriously dumping the blame on me for that?"
I was now stuck nursing a splitting headache over the Warp Gate public-opinion crisis, which had turned out far messier than expected.
To be precise, the problem wasn't domestic opinion inside the Empire. It was the damned information war being waged by the surrounding nations.
"They're all piling on the second they smell blood."
"So what? It's just a bunch of nobodies who don't even have a gate of their own running their mouths."
"…"
From the average Imperial citizen's perspective, the Warp Gate network was simply too magnificent a achievement to tear down over a minor accident.
"How dare they insult the greatest Warp Gate in the galaxy, built by our own sovereign?"
Try telling people like that "Warp Gates are dangerous garbage!" and you'd be lucky to get a snort of contempt. The Sevelians—the Empire's primary species—were especially quick to dismiss foreign media campaigns as nothing more than jealousy toward their superior Empire.
Their pride ran so deep that even the people from the Ministry of Propaganda or the Ministry of Defense's decorations office sometimes turned away in embarrassment at the sheer intensity of it.
The real problem, though, was everyone who wasn't a Sevelian—the other species that made up the Empire's foundation. Especially those whose original nations still existed in some form, or recently annexed groups like the Zeltechs. They were far more susceptible to that bittersweet foreign agitation.
So the Foreign Executive Ministry—myself included—was once again working overtime with the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of the Interior's public-security units, busily "managing" public opinion.
If there was one silver lining…
We were so frantically busy that the week flew by in a blink. Thanks to that, I received the report that had supposedly taken a full week, yet felt like it had arrived after only a single day.
—Ding♪
With continued support and additional personnel, the investigation team finally confirmed the presence of a spatial energy barrier inside the gate.
Within the gate's interior space, unknown particles and energy flows were also detected.
The team then entered the gate facility, where not a single sign of life could be felt.
They confirmed that no living beings of any kind could be detected anywhere inside the facility—including the central control center.
So who sealed the gate, and how did they use it?
And where did all the original gate technicians disappear to?
Seeking answers, the investigation team intends to open a small hole in the spatial containment barrier sealing the gate.
Choice 1: Punch a hole and check what's on the other side of the gate! (Linked event proceeds)
Choice 2: There must be a reason it was sealed. (Event ends; this gate becomes permanently unusable)
Faced with yet another needlessly secretive and mysterious event message and its choices, I let out a long sigh.
There's no reason to pick anything but Option 1, even if I hate it.
Sick of these "there's only one real answer" events, I still selected Choice 1 without hesitation.