The Envoy's Secret

But before he could do any of that…

Griyanaar had latched onto Oxianor — freshly hit by a TS beam and turned into a woman — with all the dense, clinging tenacity of a particularly amorous slug.

"I-Icarus, would you kindly restrain Griyanaar for me!"

"Ohohoho… When am I ever going to see such a precious specimen again? Just a little. I'll only take the tiniest of samples… ohoho."

"Stop this at once, Griyanaar! Aaaagh! Icarus! Jessica!"

"…"

Oxianor was throwing him looks of pure desperation, as if her very virtue were under siege — but Icarus barely registered any of it. He was already scrambling to open the trust-related function table and check the new entries.

And through that faction table, he could roughly see what he stood to gain now.

Right, so… the functions open to me are about that much?

The shared function for recruiting a faction's "Supers" was one thing. But the fact that he could now — by the barest of margins — rent an entire fleet… that was the part that set his romantic little heart racing something fierce.

Still, right this moment, something even more important than any of that had opened up.

Ohhh.

The very function he'd been aiming for when he chose the kaiju faction had finally opened. A quiet little thrill of satisfaction settled in his chest —

"Commander, if this keeps up, Miss Oxianor is going to melt under Griyanaar."

"Ah."

—and he turned, as naturally as breathing, to deliver a righteous smack to the mad scientist currently trying to drag the kaiju envoy off ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠for human experimentation.

"Quiet down!"

"Kyaaht!"

After putting a stop to the various chaotic scenes, they took a moment to reorganize things in a somewhat calmer atmosphere.

And of course, present for that was Oxianor ver.TS — no longer in her "kaiju-style birthday suit," but dressed in something that almost resembled formalwear, complete with a frock coat, and topped with what was commonly called a silk hat: a top hat.

The only catch was that Oxianor's clothes weren't clothes in the sense of anything the rest of them were wearing. She had draped herself in a kind of living, mimicry-type symbiont that merely acted like clothing — which meant strange little things kept poking out of it at odd intervals. It was, for Icarus, deeply distracting.

The person in question, however…

"Ah, Icarus. Do try not to stare quite so intently, would you?"

"…Mm."

"I will admit I was rather flustered at first, finding myself suddenly possessed of this body without so much as a word of warning…"

Having said that, she rose from her seat, lifted one arm slightly, and turned a full circle in place. Then she planted what looked like a boot heel against the floor, came to a stop, and spread her gloved (or glove-shaped) hands to either side.

"In the end, is this not simply because Her Majesty judged this form the most suitable for me?"

"…Hmm."

"Then as a matter of the proper bond between sovereign and subject — and as one who upholds Mother Queen's will — it is only right that I accept this body and adapt to it."

"Hrm."

Whether to call that optimism or just pure, resigned surrender was, personally, a deeply open question. But the party concerned had declared there was no real problem, so Icarus decided not to worry about it any further.

Or more precisely — he couldn't have worried about it even if he'd wanted to.

Something that reeked of the blackest corporate practices had just been slapped up in front of him. With a mental constitution as fragile as his, there was simply no way he could bring himself to treat Oxianor poorly after that.

The event was still ongoing. (1)

At any rate — after Oxianor had abruptly gone from eye-monster gentleman to lady-monster, and after he'd stopped Griyanaar from launching into sticky, dense biological research with the newly minted "her" — he spent the next month putting the newly unlocked biological modification special functions to work, pouring serious effort into strengthening his Supers.

At the same time, it was quests and quests and more quests. An endless loop of quests and grinding. Somewhere in the middle he bought a few destroyers from the event shop, and even picked up a solid-performing Kanhel-class Light Cruiser — named after something out of some old myth, apparently. All in all, it had been a very busy stretch of days.

And as mentioned above, even after buying this and that over the course of a full month…

I've still got a surprising amount left.

Looking at the leftover point total, he found himself starting to wonder whether it might be time to drop another gacha pull.

Of course, Jessica — who had been diligently playing adjutant this whole time — immediately shut that down.

"Commander, didn't you say last time that you were done with the whole causality-lock conversation?"

"Ahem…"

That was entirely his own fault — he'd ordered Jessica in advance to stop him whenever he lost the plot and went full throttle. And thanks to her merciless fact-checks every time his gacha cravings started twitching, those urges had somehow managed to stay more or less under control.

That said, Jessica still had more on her mind. Her expression and body language made that clear enough.

"Commander… have you truly given up on entering the rankings?"

"Uuugh…"

At that, he nodded ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and answered evenly.

"I told you before, didn't I? I've at least given up on climbing the rankings."

"But Commander. You've already gathered nearly nine hundred thousand points even while buying all sorts of things from the shop… isn't that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠enough to make a real run at it?"

Even so, Jessica wouldn't let go of the image of her commander as a ranked player — or maybe she simply looked at the nearly nine hundred thousand points sitting right in front of them and figured that was more than enough to aim for a ranking spot. Either way, she kept circling back to the subject.

"…Jessica. I know what you're thinking."