While You Weren't Looking (1)

"And if we exclude those?"

"We've got five Azcran-class destroyers and five regular patrol ships. That's it."

"Hmm."

"Honestly, the fact that every ship we own ourselves — carriers all the way down to patrol craft — adds up to a measly twenty vessels feels extremely dangerous to me."

Once upon a time the fleet had numbered well over a hundred and fifty ships. Now it had shrunk to less than a seventh of that, not even a fifth. From Jessica's perspective, watching that freefall, a complaint along the lines of didn't you cut this way too hard? was more than fair.

And yet I still couldn't muster any real sense of crisis.

"Do we really need to worry? We just hired more, and we're running twelve whole mercenary companies as it is."

"The Commander is correct, Jessica."

"Ah — Belial."

One look at Belial's attitude — our base's foremost expert on fleet command — made the situation clear. A full dozen mercenary companies were already handling security for the base and the surrounding space, plus serving as subordinate squadrons, and they were doing the job properly.

Of course, words alone never inspire much confidence. So I decided to show Jessica the current state of every mercenary company under our employ, including the newly hired ones.

"Here, Jessica. Glow-in-the-dark mercenaries."

"…Right."

They chewed through resources like absolute monsters, but pure numbers put a hundred and thirty-five ships under our banner. Looking at the employment roster I'd pulled up, Jessica let out a long sigh of relief and tried to put on a positive face.

"Alright, I get it. But Commander—"

"Yeah?"

"Is there a reason you're keeping those five regular patrol ships around?"

"Excellent question."

Now that she was asking something more practical, I gave her a very simple answer.

"Because every now and then some local-scale pirate gang shows up riding high-speed craft or whatever, and you can't exactly throw a cruiser or a whole mercenary company at that kind of trash."

"Ah."

"They're organized as a five-ship squadron. They do regular patrols of this place, the forward base, and the resource zones — keep out unaffiliated pirates and wild beasts. That sort of thing."

"A splendid idea, Commander."

But no matter how carefully I'd patched the gaps with stopgap measures like these, the fundamental way we'd been handling enemies who came to invade us was simple: Leonard and the pirates handle all the defense, so throw every scrap of combat power into the attack!

Now that the thousands of ships in the elite guard fleet that used to sit on permanent standby at the base and nearby were gone… if we didn't want to get robbed blind, we needed at least three or four mercenary companies parked at the base at all times.

All I could do was hope — and hope again — that for the remaining week until our base defense fleet returned, nobody would look at my infamous reputation on the gallery and decide to come knocking.

I went to sleep with that thought, and the next morning arrived.

Exactly three hours after I'd sent my five small, precious regular patrol ships out on their usual rounds—

"…Huh?"

"Jessica, I told you that starting the day with an ominous 'huh?' burns through your entire daily allotment of luck."

"Commander, that luck is already gone, so would you like to hear the report first?"

I gave Jessica a scolding for that thoroughly ominous death-rattle of a sound — but the way she answered my joke with complete seriousness made me sit up from my sprawl across the command chair, scrub my face dry, heave a long sigh, and open my mouth with forced calm.

"Haaaa… What on earth is it this time."

"Please don't panic when you hear this, Commander."

In situations like this, drawing it out always meant something truly terrible and shocking was coming. The moment I heard Jessica's words, I prepared my throat to unleash the scream of a fifteen-year-old girl.

And then, immediately after—

"Right now, a fleet of roughly four hundred ships flying a clan mark we've never seen before is entering your territorial space, including the resource zones."

"…"

"For reference, the patrol squadron took a full volley the moment contact was made. All but one ship were sunk."

The story was so much more shocking than I'd braced for that instead of the fifteen-year-old girl's scream I'd prepared, I let out the higher, younger shriek of a seven-year-old.

After screaming like a pterodactyl for a solid while, we risked further losses and sent one Azcran-class destroyer on a forced reconnaissance run to figure out who these bastards even were.

That single ship took damage past the point of heavy crippling and held on by a thread right up to the brink of being sunk — and through that brutal scouting, we finally learned who had dared invade my small, precious territory.

The problem was that once we actually absorbed that information—

"It's obviously a brand-new clan. Why the hell would they suddenly invade us?"

"R-right?"

I had no way of figuring out why a five-person newborn clan would decide to come after me.

The closest thing to a guess I could manage was…

"Maybe it's because of this."

I pulled up some rage-bait someone had slapped onto the board and floated the theory. Jessica shook her head hard and opened her mouth in a tone that clearly asked why I'd ever done such a thing.

"Commander, why didn't you just delete this instead of leaving it up?"

"People are allowed to make mistakes sometimes."

Of course, for all that confident front, the real reason ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was far more petty — a small-minded little desire to freeload off someone else's trolling for once. Under Jessica's complicated, unreadable stare, I had no room left for excuses.

But contrary to what Icarus believed, reality was far more complicated.

Just as our protagonist Icarus had been quietly racking up wins behind the scenes by forging a secret alliance between the Pirate Empress Marianne and the beasts — the Earth Federation had someone similar of its ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠own…

"I'd say we've pretty much completely taken over the Earth Federation from the inside by now, right?"

"Yes, Clan Leader."

"Except for the border zones and a few special dispositions, you can basically treat every user inside ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Earth Federation as one of ours."

"Wow."

The clan leader of Humanity — currently sitting pretty at rank one on the clan rankings—