CH 355

“Let’s put aside my situation and talk about proper business first. It doesn’t look like both of us have a lot of free time.”

“That’s true.”

“Oh, by the way, the guy being grilled by Lieutenant Robbitson is Wells. He’s a civilian scientist like me. He works for Eagle Dynamics as a bot designer.”

“Hmm, Eagle Dynamics huh? I employ combat bots manufactured by Eagle Dynamics myself.”

They were also regularly used by Tina and Wiska as maintenance bots. They were also installed with Eagle Dynamics maintenance bot data so they were pretty versatile, or so they said.

“It’s you we’re talking about Hiro-kun, so I bet you purchased some pretty expensive ones.”

“I got the full package including maintenance systems and all optional equipment.”

“That does sound expensive.”

I raised my index finger as I replied, and Doc Shouko placed her hand on her mouth as she giggled in response. She seemed to be trying not to break into a laughing fit.

“Oh, I also heard you actually had a talent for psionics. Is that true?”

“Uh, I…… can’t exactly deny that, but the expert on that topic is actually this girl. She’s my newest crew member, Kugi. She’s from the Vuelzarus Holy Empire.”

“Hee, she’s from the Holy Empire huh…… I see. By the way, can I touch your ears and tails for a bit? Please?”

Doc Shouko approached Kugi and circled around her. She closely observed her entire body. Actually, I think she was getting a bit too close.

“Umm…… I’m fine with it if it is just the ears.”

“Thank you. Fumu…… Her skeletal structure is close to that of a typical humanoid’s, but her cranium’s shape is a bit different huh? Is it possible for your race to reproduce with humans, Kugi-san?”

“H-Huh? U-Um, yes, it is.”

Doc Shouko didn’t hold herself back and touched Kugi’s ears as much as she liked. Kugi’s cheeks turned bright red as she answered Doc’s question while shivering. I had no idea why the good doctor asked such a question.

“Interesting. Are all the citizens of the Vuelzarus Holy Empire just like you? And there are plenty of psionics among you, correct? Can I take a DNA sample from you later?”

“Alright, that’s enough Doc. Get back. Get back, please. Touching her more than this is no good, ma’am.”

“Aaah, the key to human evolution is–”

The doctor did look disappointed, but she was probably half-joking. Err, that did mean she was half-serious though. If I ignored her actions, she might really press Kugi to provide her with a DNA sample.

“You said we need to talk about proper business, right, Doc Shouko? You’re straying from the topic y’know.”

“Oops, you’re right. I’m sorry. I just found her too interesting…… Anyway, let’s take a look at the specimens first. Please follow me.”

With that said, Doc Shouko turned on her heels and started walking ahead. Mr. Wells, who was inputting something on his tablet terminal under the supervision of Lt. Robbitson, sent Dr. Shouko a reproachful gaze, but she simply ignored him. He was a grown adult, so he had to take responsibility for the mess he caused.

“We’ve been trying to communicate with『them』for a while now, but we haven’t had any breakthroughs so far. They showed no response to any transmission waves including sound.”

We passed through a double-layered shield and came inside a vast space.

“Whoah…… This is pretty amazin’.”

“You really didn’t hold back when putting up this space. The equipment’s pretty high-end too. As expected of the imperial military. You guys sure are loaded.”

There were more than twenty of those spheres inside the vast research space. They were contained within individual energy shields. Some stayed in the form of a sphere, some have already transformed into their killer spider forms but were inert, while some repeatedly slammed the energy shield imprisoning them with their sickle-like appendages.

“The inert ones are fine, but the ones that keep hittin’ the shields sure are intimidatin’.”

“They sure are, Big Sis. But no matter how much they hit them, there’s no way they’d break those energy shields.”

“Their physical makeup is really interesting. Their resistance to energy weapons in general is especially extraordinary. When we analyzed some samples, we found that their bodies were composed of crystal structures that we’d never seen before. The energy transmission efficiency of the material is quite significant. Even when exposed to high-output laser or superheated plasma, the energy is transmitted and diffused before evaporation or disintegration occurs, greatly reducing the damage incurred.”

“……In other words?”

“Energy weapons basically concentrate a huge amount of heat energy on one point in order to cause damage via instantaneous evaporation, right? The bodies of these spheres disperse that heat energy all throughout them, greatly diminishing the energy’s intensity.”

“I think I get it.”

It’s kinda like forcefully converting a high-damage single-target attack into a weaker AOE one.

“It’s kinda like a physical version of an energy shield.”

“That description really hits the mark. The problem is that when the material is used as starship armor, it’s incredibly durable against energy weapons, but there’s also a high chance of it breaking down all at once when the attacks exceed its tolerance level. It really resembles an energy shield getting saturated and going down.”

“Even so, it still sounds pretty useful.”

Even if they weren’t used as armor material, their unique property of energy dispersal still has a lot of value. After all, machines often had problems due to overheating.

“If it can be artificially synthesized, it can prove useful in a wide variety of fields. When viewed as armor material, its hardness and durability are inferior to the current armor materials, but its unique property makes up for that weakness.”

While explaining away, Dr. Shouko brought us in front of a sphere that was transformed into its killer spider form.

“This one is the most behaved among all the specimens here. However, it’s too quiet and shows no sign of responding to our attempts at communication at all.”

I looked at the killer spider-mode sphere behind the transparent energy shield. This is the first time I’ve taken a close look at this mysterious creature(?) It had six legs and was black in color. Its armor or carapace was smooth and shiny-looking.

“Come to think of it, these things actually let out weird cries during battle. So, doesn’t that mean they can communicate through sound after all?”

“Oh, the marines who fought them also mentioned that in their report. Our scans revealed that they actually have what seems to be a degenerated vocal organ inside their bodies. However, we haven’t observed them communicating using sounds so far.”

While Dr. Shouko and I talked, Kugi stared intently at the killer spider-mode sphere, and the mechanic sisters went around the isolation shield and began checking the sphere out from various angles.

“Is it possible for you to communicate with them, Kugi?”

“……I am very sorry, My Lord. I have been rejected. It appears that it is because I am not of their kind.”

“But since you got rejected, that means you’ve gotten a response, right? This can be considered as good progress. Mmhm.”

Kugi apologized with her ears drooping down, but Dr. Shouko nodded satisfactorily beside me. I get why Kugi’s depressed, but why did this person look so happy instead? I don’t get it.

“Can you really call that progress?”

“Confirming that their communication method uses the same thought waves that psionics employ is plenty good enough. But the problem is that without psionic amplification equipment, there’s no way for non-psionics like us to communicate with them.”

“Oh, we actually prepared those just in case. Hey, Tina.”

“Hoi hoi. Oh, but you can’t touch these, okay, Boss?”

“Yeah, I know.”

After all, they might shatter to pieces if I touched them. Yeah. My power was apparently too strong for them to handle. And because of that, I ended up destroying exhibits in that elven museum and even caused a flying vehicle to crash, so I really need to be careful.

“Y-You prepared some……? Eh? What do you mean by that?”

“We had the chance to visit the Refill system before. Elma’s an elf, right?”

“Oh, right. So, you got those from the elven home planet? But I thought it was pretty difficult to bring out those sorts of materials from their home system?”

“Well, a lot happened…… In short, I ended up getting along pretty well with the elves of that system.”

“Hmm…… Well, I guess it’s better not to ask you about the details right now. But you have to tell me all about it when we have the chance, okay?”

“Okay.”

Tina lowered the hard case she was carrying on the floor and opened it.

“Oooh?”

“Oya oya?”

The moment the case was opened, the sphere that was previously inert approached closer with tremendous momentum. The sphere creature(?) got as close to the energy shield as much as possible without touching it. It seemed quite taken with the contents of the case. And it looked like the other spheres also showed interest in them. Even the ones that were hammering the shields containing them with their sickles stopped and turned their attentions toward us.

“Now this is quite interesting.”

Dr. Shouko observed the situation and grinned in delight. It resembled a villain’s smile.