Ordinary Days (1)

In the middle of all this, a veteran posted his trust-level proof — and some presumed newbie posted one right alongside it. The result was a full mental breakdown from a top-two ranked veteran, among other things.

As always, the gallery was a complete mess. I nodded to myself, thinking yeah, this is how a gallery should look, and kept scrolling.

Ordinary Days. (1)

After spending the rest of the day browsing various shitposts about faction trust relationships, the next morning arrived.

— Beep-beep-beep ♬

I'd realized that the old alarm had become so familiar I could sleep right through it, so I'd switched to a new one. With the fresh ringtone, I managed to greet the morning feeling properly rested.

From there, my routine hadn't changed much since getting dumped into this place. A quick wash of the face, into the base commander's dedicated uniform, and straight to the command center.

Once there, the usual daily-quest grind.

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"Jessica, today's long-range mining expedition?"

"I dispatched them the moment you powered on the command console, Commander."

"Good."

Resource mining fleet reorganizations and expedition deployments, handled.

"What are we building this time?"

"One patrol ship that got sunk fighting a Zenobia Empire patrol is currently in production, and the ship that got towed back half-wrecked is scheduled for scrapping."

"Hmm."

Ship construction and dismantling quests, likewise cleared within a minute of arriving at the command center. Satisfied, I decided to browse the gallery.

The first thing I saw upon opening it was talk that the factions seemed to have more or less settled.

I ignored the comments drifting into their usual weird territory and mulled over the information the anonymous poster had shared. Jessica, who'd quietly come up beside me, read the gallery post as well — and her expression turned rather serious.

"Commander, if this is accurate, doesn't that completely shatter the power balance between factions?"

"The power balance, you say?"

"Yes. If a major war between factions ever breaks out… the commanders' fleets might not function as meaningful military forces."

Jessica trailed off, but I didn't need her to finish. I knew exactly what she was getting at. I shrugged and answered in a tone that said there was no point fretting about it right now.

"That's a valid concern, but there's nothing we can do about it at the moment."

"Is that so?"

"Think about it. When we fought the pirates, what was the maximum force players — commanders like me — managed to scrape together?"

"About 1,500 commanders gathered and fielded close to 12,000 ships…?"

Jessica dug through her memory for the answer. I nodded and continued.

"Right. And the so-called Pirate King and the forces that joined him numbered over 10,000 ships, so even combining both sides, the total didn't reach 30,000."

"Yes, that's right."

"Now, do you know roughly how many ships the Zenobia Empire fleet has — the smallest of the major factions?"

"Um… I'm not sure."

I dredged up the lore of Astral Lagrange, a game I'd once been so deep into that I'd even spent real money, and shared what I still remembered with Jessica.

"At least ten million. That's every ship of every class combined, mind you."

"…"

Jessica's face went blank, as if she couldn't process what she'd just heard. She made a gesture that said did I mishear that?, but her rabbit ears perked up with clear interest. Rather than wear out my throat explaining further, I took a different approach.

"Here. The answer you want is right in this box."

In the tone of a pilot drawing a sheep inside a box for a little prince, I opened the mass mail from last time and showed it to Jessica.

Over ten million pirate fleets massacred. More than 125 million "pirate ships" sunk.

"Whoa."

Jessica looked thoroughly stunned. I wondered if I'd never shown her this before, and kept going.

"One hundred twenty-five million, Jessica."

"…"

"At their peak, the pirates used over a hundred million ships just to invade the bases of more than ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a hundred thousand commanders."

Of course, if you stripped away the fluff, those weren't ships the pirates "actually" owned so much as something the operators or developers had injected through the game system. But the point was that the sheer volume of ships mobilized was insane — this world's scale of material production was completely unhinged.

"Of course, with that many ships blown up, the overall numbers have dropped significantly for now."

"Yes…"