019. Remains (1)
019. Remains (1)
Skill Custom.
A process of adjusting a skill module to modify the skill's effects.
In short, the task of creating a needed skill.
......Of course, it wasn't as though you could simply whip up anything you wanted.
It required materials and, above all, the ability to write complex manufacturing formulas.
Customizing a module blindly without that know-how would only break it.
A properly customized skill, however, was far superior to the generic skills manufacturers mass-produced for commercial viability.
Customization could also create new skills that compensated for weaknesses in an existing build or enabled an entirely new one.
That was why Skill Custom was essential for developing a biodroid beyond a certain level.
It was essential.
But it wasn't common.
That was inevitable. Production Specialist Type biodroids with enough expertise to perform custom work were extremely rare.
Even if a biodroid of that level emerged against the slim odds, they weren't supplied to ordinary field bases.
Instead, such units were put to work in military-owned rear-area factories or kept and used by the manufacturers themselves.
For this reason, skill custom was treated less as a standard method of growth and more as an endgame money-sink for veterans.
But.
That extraordinary task.
That difficult, complex, and arduous task.
"Sumire, you know how to do that?"
"......Y-yes."
"Really?"
"......Yes."
"Really, really?"
"......Y-yes."
Maybe she felt pressured by my repeated questions.
Sumire answered with an embarrassed laugh.
Regardless, I kept looking at Sumire fondly.
Maybe she felt something beyond pressure, even distress.
Sumire turned red and blue by turns and backtracked.
"Oh, I-I'm not, like, really good at it...... I just, to a certain extent...... or rather, just a tiny bit....... I didn't even learn custom work properly....... I self-studied here after settling down, using the internet and black market textbooks....... And besides, I only managed my first success recently......."
Even that was plenty amazing! She was the best!
I genuinely wanted to praise her like that, but if I did, Sumire probably wouldn't be able to bear the embarrassment and would crawl right back into the cabinet.
Barely calming my excitement, I returned to the main subject that had almost been forgotten.
"So? What skill did you customize?"
"Ah, that."
Sumire, having finally composed herself, answered.
"In short...... it's a skill that absorbs some of the phase power from a defeated Legion."
"Absorbs a Legion's phase power?"
"Yep. So, as long as you succeed in defeating an enemy...... it depends on the rank of the Legion that serves as the energy source, but roughly, you can gain enough extra power to operate for about 5 more minutes."
After saying that, Sumire added.
"Ah, 5 minutes is really just for running away. The absorbable phase power is truly only a fraction...... if you channeled that energy into combat, a few seconds would be the limit at best."
Even just that would be a tremendous help.
No, more than that, I was getting curious about how such a thing was even possible.
"The base uses the 'Phase Transfusion' skill module developed by Dunkel. But by injecting a material with a 'reverse' attribute into it......."
"Ah, so you changed it to drain energy instead of providing it."
"Yep. That's right."
I could at least see the rough idea.
At least, the two of us could.
On the other hand, Laika, lacking the foundational knowledge, had her eyes spinning round and round.
"Um...... isn't the atmosphere a bit like Laika's the only one being left out right now? Couldn't someone summarize that in three lines for Laika......?"
"It means that if we install the skill module she suggested, I won't have to sling you over my shoulder and carry you back at the end of every battle."
"Euhye—?"
Laika wasn't particularly happy.
Rather, she looked slightly disappointed.
"That's too bad...... Being carried back by Commander was one of the things that made going on missions worthwhile and fun for Laika......."
I'd rather she didn't find her sense of accomplishment and fun in things like that.
Ignoring the glare I shot her, Laika asked Sumire.
"So the only things we need to go get are the part materials? Any idea where we can get all of them?"
"That's...... most of them you could probably buy cheaply from the reseller near Krädel. But, um, I might not have explained myself properly......."
Having spoken that far, Sumire began to hesitate.
"What's wrong?"
"The thing is actually...... I don't have the skill module I just mentioned."
Huh?
"What do you mean? Just a moment ago it sounded like you'd finished modifying it and had it in storage."
Or had she only been rambling about a theoretical 'maybe I could modify it like this'? Was the module imaginary?
To my puzzlement, Sumire shook her head.
"A-ah, no. It's not a hypothetical story, it's real. Actually...... it's true that I picked up the Phase Transfusion module on Trash Island and modified it. I also confirmed it worked properly in the simulator."
"But?"
Sumire faltered again.
She spent a long moment wiggling her hips from side to side in anxious agitation, then squeezed her eyes shut and declared.
"I...... lost the module."
......What.
"I-I'm sorry......."
Sumire knelt down once again.
But this wasn't something she could solve by prostrating herself in apology.
"Where and how did you lose it?"
"Well, um, the location first...... at Trash Island......."
Of all places, there.
"I'm sorry....... Actually, that was the first time I had really succeeded at custom work...... I was so excited that I forgot to put it in the manufactory first, and I headed to Trash Island to find a second skill module to customize, but then...... half-dead Legions suddenly appeared...... I was so surprised that I ran away...... and in the process, I dropped the skill module."
First off, I'd have to retract my earlier profession of faith that Sumire was the best.
This kid, befitting an (unofficial) member of Krädel, was quite the washout.
Still, there was one fortunate fact: her manufacturing ability was A-rank.
I made the request without hesitation.
"Alright. Then let's just make it again."
"E-eek......!"
......Why was she screaming at that?
"Don't tell me you can't make it?"
"A-ah, no. Of course I can make it. J-just, the cost......."
Sumire deliberately scribbled on paper a number she could perfectly well have said aloud, then handed it to me.
And the moment I saw the amount written there, I understood why she had delivered it that way.
"It's over 10 times our budget."
"A-ah, no. It's about 9.8 times......."
I know that. That was a rhetorical expression.
"We can't pay 9.8 times our budget either. And didn't you say earlier that we'd only have to push things a little?"
"I meant we'd only have to push ourselves a little by searching Trash Island......."
Unbelievable.
"You call that just a little push? Trash Island is huge."
"R-regarding the location, I roughly remember it. Besides, it was just a few days ago, so if several of us search, I think we can find it within three or four hours......."
Haaaah.......
"Got it. Might as well try looking for it."
"I-I'll help too."
Sumire declared with a clenched fist.
I was grateful for the sentiment...... but hmm. Would a coward who dropped this expensive thing and ran from half-dead Legions really be helpful in a search operation?
I was worried that taking her along might just create more trouble.
On top of that, we had plenty of parts to procure besides the skill module.
It wouldn't be very efficient to put all those other parts aside and have everyone search for the module first.
Rather, it was better to split roles instead——
"Sumire, you stay here and buy materials from the black market and make the other parts. I'll look for the module with Laika."
"Euheung~ So it ends up like this again~"
Laika grumbled as if annoyed and stretched.
Following Laika, I rolled my shoulders back and forth for a moment.
"Right. What's the skill name?"
"Y-y-y-y-yes......?!"
"The name of the skill module you modified. Since you essentially created a skill that never existed before, you probably gave it a new name, didn't you?"
More than that, why was she so startled?
"Did you not name it?"
Sumire shook her head wildly.
"......I-I did name it."
"Then tell me. We need to know what to call it so we can communicate quickly in an emergency."
Sumire entered the 'hesitation' status abnormality again.
Then a moment later, she brought her lips to my ear and whispered.
"I-it's, 「Crimson Blood Play: The Irony of Fate Born from Iron and Returning to Blood」......."
I simply renamed it Phase Blood Absorption for clarity.
***
We arrived at the coordinates Sumire had given us.
Roughly the northwestern tip of Trash Island.
A location quite far from the base. Even Laika and I, who had performed quite a few missions on Trash Island, had never reached it.
As for my first impression of the place...... well.
"The scenery's surprisingly decent."
"It really is~"
Laika agreed.
Ah, of course, the scenery of Trash Island sprawling behind our backs was literally trash.
The scenery I thought was decent was on the opposite side.
Beyond the edge of Trash Island, the vast western sea stretched out.
"I wonder what lies beyond that~"
Laika murmured idly to herself.
I gave her an answer that immediately killed the mood.
"A battlefield."
"Eeh, really?"
Of course it was real.
Not just any battlefield, but the fiercest battleground on the western front—the one called the Shandong-Liaodong coastal front.
"Euhye~ Hard to imagine such a hell lying in wait beyond this peaceful vista~"
"Strictly speaking, this place is part of that hell too."
Or you could call it a 'byproduct' of hell.
Because the wreckage of biodroids and Legions consumed in that fierce battleground was mixed in here on Trash Island as well.
Ah, but proportionally speaking, it was only an extremely small fraction.
And even then, most of it was damaged beyond recognition.
There were several reasons. Some had been battered apart by the currents on the way here, while others had been torn open by Legions drawn to their phase power.
Slum vagrants might also have crept in and stripped them for parts. Biodroid bodies and Legion corpses were valuable, after all.
Of course, that was only true for 'most' cases.
Meaning, there were occasionally cases that were different.
This time was one such case.
"Euh."
How long had we been searching for the skill module?
Laika, who had been rummaging through a pile of junk, made a strange sound.
"What's wrong? Did you find it?"
"Yeah. Found it, but......."
Laika trailed off.
When I went over to check, the skill module we were looking for was indeed there.
I reached out unconsciously, then suddenly noticed something.
Right next to the skill module.
Something alien was mixed in among the pile of junk.
"This is......."
It was a biodroid.
She lay there quietly with her eyes closed—dead.
......It wasn't a particularly gruesome sight.
Human corpses made of organic matter decayed, but a biodroid's body—even its artificial skin—was made of super-phase material and did not rot.
Thanks to that, the body before my eyes looked less like a corpse and more like a broken, discarded doll.
"What should we do about this?"
Laika asked, bewilderment in her voice.
We had found arms and legs a few times during search operations before, but this was the first time the whole body was intact.
But it wasn't much different from those times.
"What do you mean, what do we do. We have to salvage the parts."
"Euk......."
Laika was disgusted.
I didn't like doing this either—far from it.
I disliked it, but it couldn't be helped. If we left it like this, Legions drawn by the phase power of the parts would swarm in and tear the body apart recklessly.
To prevent that, retrieving the core parts with high phase power was the established procedure.
Therefore, I didn't hesitate to 'dismantle' the biodroid.
The method was extremely simple.
I held the commander's card key against the back of the biodroid's neck.
A living biodroid would respond only to her assigned commander's key, but once dead, the lock would open for another commander as well.
Once it opened, I pulled out only the core components inside and closed it again. That was all.
But it seemed Laika thought even that was cruel.
"This is too much...... looting organs from a dead person......."
"I'll say it again, this is the lawful processing method. And those aren't organs."
"Might as well be. From a biodroid's perspective."
If the biodroid herself said so, I had no retort.
Since I had nothing to say, I ignored Laika and hoisted the dead biodroid onto my back.
Laika was flustered by my action.
"Euhye? What are you doing?"
"Can't you tell by looking? I'm taking her with us."
"Why? ......You're not planning to sell her whole body too, are you?"
"No."
I retorted as if asking what nonsense she was spouting.
"To bury her."
She must have had a hard time, in many ways.
So she could finally rest now.