Cry "First Strike Wins," and It Never Ends Well (1)
It struck me that it wasn't so much a lack of prejudice as curiosity winning out over it — but rather than open my mouth and complicate things, I decided to keep quiet and simply watch how the situation unfolded.
Seeming satisfied with that, Oxianor made a gesture of approval and got to the point.
"In that case, Commander Icarus, I believe a more in-depth discussion with your base and fleet would be most welcome."
And the moment that telepathic message left our eye-gentleman's head—
> Trust with the Space Kaiju has increased by 5 points!
> Current trust relationship with the 'Space Kaiju': +14
Ooooh.
Including the trust that had been creeping up little by little, it had finally hit double digits. A pleasant feeling welled up inside me.
Of course, as nice as the trust increase was, it still didn't mean much just yet. So after wrapping up that agreeable meeting, I returned to the command center with Jessica and immediately opened the status window to check what functions trust unlocked.
I had a rough idea from memory, sure — but relying on fuzzy recollections and getting burned was a lot worse than taking the trouble to look it up properly, even once.
Unfortunately, I couldn't see everything yet. And among the still-locked entries, the one players used most after joining a faction — the fleet production functions — wasn't even visible. I felt just how far I still had to go, and how much work was piled up ahead of me like a mountain.
That didn't mean I could sit around staring into space, though. Same as always, I decided to keep grinding levels for the kids and the fleet, and chip away at base upgrades one by one.
But one week later—
"Commander! Another commander's fleet is attacking our base!"
"Ah, shit."
An Earth Federation player had launched a completely unprovoked assault, and just like that, my healing time was over.
Rewinding slightly from the moment Icarus received news of that sudden player invasion.
About four days earlier.
"If you're human, you pick Earth, right? Your home planet?"
"I quite agree, Commander."
A commander named Pierre had dug through the gallery thoroughly and was thoroughly satisfied with his choice of the Earth Federation — the faction most players picked, and the one easiest for newbies to use.
And why not? The stability of a well-rounded, hexagon-stat faction already appealed to him. Compared to the Zenobia Empire's avant-garde ship designs, the grotesque Space Kaiju, and the ragtag Pirate Union, the Earth Federation's vessels actually looked normal.
The gallery's constant mockery about their lack of distinctive visual flair meant nothing to Pierre. And after joining, while chatting with his assigned officer, the occasional glimpse of the Earth Federation's pride — the massive Jormungandr-class Super Dreadnought and the Yggdrasil-class Super Carrier — more than filled that classic sci-fi craving for big guns and bigger ships.
The thought that someday he'd be cruising around in one of those monsters made every day a pleasure.
That happy life didn't last long. Once faction selection wrapped up for everyone, he happened to learn about the players in his surrounding region through another Earth Federation user.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
"C-Commander."
"Why — of all places — does a player from a completely different faction have to be right next to my base, and why does it have to be rank threeeeeee?!"
"Perhaps you should calm down first, Commander?!"
The closest player to him belonged to an entirely different faction — the Space Kaiju — and was ranked third overall. Pierre felt his mental fortitude trembling like a leaf.
For now, with no inter-faction conflict to speak of, it wasn't an immediate problem. But as every player had quietly realized, a clash between factions was inevitable sooner or later. And when that happened, wouldn't that rank-three Space Kaiju player come after him — an Earth Federation commander — first? It was a perfectly rational fear.
But Pierre didn't stay paralyzed by terror for long. As with every commander, an adjutant stood ready at his side to shore up his morale in situations exactly like this.
"Commander, please calm down first… and perhaps ask for opinions on the gallery or in chat?"
"Ah… you're right! I should ask other people how to get through this!"
Taking his adjutant Maya's advice to heart, Pierre immediately posted a whining thread about his current situation on the gallery.
[Fleet image taken from afar by a recon ship], [Ranking table confirmation image]
And of course they're a completely different faction from me
What am I supposed to do about this?
If rank 3 comes after me, how the hell do I stop that?
"Whew. Th-this should be enough, right?"
"Excellent work, Commander."
Before long, a considerable number of comments piled onto the whining post…
…and so on.
There were a few dissenting opinions mixed in, but the overwhelming majority of replies said the same thing: cowering just because someone was a ranker was lame, so don't do it.
Bolstered by that, Pierre pulled himself together and immediately dispatched a recon-configured patrol ship into Icarus's territory. It was a cheap scout loadout with terrible durability, so he sent several, accounting for losses.
The result:
"Maya, doesn't their fleet look… really small?"
"It does, Commander."
Despite holding an overwhelmingly higher rank, the fleet found in the territory of this player called Icarus was surprisingly sparse for someone sitting at rank three. And it wasn't just the numbers that were low…
"Tsk… but why are the only ships showing up from the gacha the Overseer-class Heavy Cruisers? Nothing else?"