Chapter 1295: Sitting Ducks

To say they were looking rather gray honestly wouldn’t have been accurate.

Because by the time Luca finished explaining how a few small modifications could help them in the long run, several cadets, along with the supposedly silent observers, looked closer to purple.

"We’ll have to use some of our anti-LME coating to make sure everything is properly sealed again after the alterations," Luca explained, already considering how much more difficult any modifications would become once they entered an active hostile zone.

Without their personal space buttons, their tools and supplies would be limited to whatever the Academy had provided.

And since Luca wasn’t planning to rely on the dungeon space unless there was an emergency...

Better to do everything they reasonably could now.

"But I really think we’ll be able to maximize both our current and future energy supplies this way."

"..."

Admittedly, energy efficiency wasn’t even Luca’s only reason for wanting to make the changes.

A large part of it came down to something much simpler.

Quality of life.

Yes.

Luca Kyros, of all people, was genuinely considering quality-of-life concerns when he proposed spending some of their already limited preparation time modifying equipment.

Sure, to anyone who didn’t understand his reasoning or simply didn’t care to hear it, the heir to one of the Empire’s infamous duchies probably sounded like a spoiled brat who had his priorities completely backward.

But before anyone could actually reach that conclusion, Luca tilted his head and explained what was bothering him.

"Besides, would any of you actually be comfortable sleeping in the capsule cabins knowing how defenseless they are?"

"Huh?"

The reaction was practically unanimous.

Everyone stared at him.

Theo was the first to ask, "Luca, are you saying we’re not going to use the capsule cabins?"

Now that he thought about it, Theo had become so accustomed to sleeping inside the dungeon space that he’d almost forgotten what it was like to worry about finding somewhere safe to rest!

"Well, not exactly," Luca replied. "We’ll still have to bring them. Maybe we can use them underground or anywhere with enough cover."

He pulled up the relevant inventory.

"But if you noticed, there aren’t that many coated capsule cabins in our supplies. If any of them become compromised, we’d either have to use our remaining coating allocation to repair them or risk having them deteriorate too quickly."

"...Compromised?"

One cadet couldn’t help muttering the word aloud.

Unfortunately, the room had gone quiet enough that everyone heard it.

The embarrassed cadet immediately shrank into his seat.

To his surprise, Luca simply nodded.

Then he stood.

A few quick movements across the battleship’s holographic interface projected a full-scale model of a standard geodome capsule cabin into the open space before them.

The familiar structure was designed to accommodate five people.

Nothing particularly alarming about that.

At least, not until Luca duplicated it.

Then duplicated it again.

And again.

Five glowing capsule cabins soon occupied most of the available space.

"I can’t fit all of them in this room," Luca pointed out.

"..."

Obviously.

"But even if we divide everyone into two sleep shifts, we’d still need around fifty of these deployed at the same time."

Several people looked at the projections differently now. Then again, if they only knew what the returnee was considering, they’d find their scenario even more absurd.

Ordinarily, sleeping bags or even basic sleeping trenches would’ve solved the problem of five hundred people needing somewhere to rest.

Unfortunately, Luca was very much aware that Caldris Minor-7 wasn’t Tesseris.

They couldn’t simply throw sleeping bags onto the ground, or dig some trench and sleep beneath the stars.

Outside controlled settlement areas, they needed substantial equipment just to maintain a safe breathing environment. That made even something as basic as sleeping considerably more complicated.

"And even if we stagger our sleep schedules," Luca continued, "we’d still be sitting ducks unless we’re planning to carry the opened capsules around everywhere we go or split into much smaller groups."

He didn’t even want to imagine how dizzying the first option would be.

But aside from the likely motion sickness, Luca didn’t think it was smart to assume they’d always find somewhere safe enough to establish a temporary settlement. Depending on what they encountered, there was a very real chance they’d have no choice but to keep moving together as a group.

"!"

Hmm...

That sounded bad.

Luca tapped his chin.

"Though maybe I’m thinking too much."

Several cadets immediately suspected he wasn’t.

"But everyone was given similar equipment, right? So they’ll probably have similar drones and detection systems too."

He looked toward the glowing collection of geodomes.

"If we set up this many capsules together, wouldn’t we stand out like sore thumbs?"

"..."

"And if someone attacks while everyone’s inside, how quickly can the people resting get out and defend themselves?"

Another pause.

"And how do we protect the capsules at the same time so we can reuse them again?"

The room became progressively quieter.

Because even if the arrangement worked perfectly for the first few days, what happened once they started encountering other battalions searching for the same intelligence, supplies, and objectives?

Or the hostile forces already occupying the planet?

If their shelters were damaged, they’d either have to use part of their limited anti-LME coating to repair them or eventually lose the capsules themselves.

And then what?

Luca frowned thoughtfully.

Actually, maybe he really was getting ahead of himself.

They hadn’t even reached the allied outpost yet, and he was already worrying about where five hundred people were going to sleep!

But when Luca finally looked back at everyone, he was surprised to find the entire room staring at him with an almost alarming level of focus.

"?"

Why did they suddenly look so intense?

Of course, the answer was rather simple.

Because now that Luca had forced them to actually imagine the situation, those capsule cabins didn’t seem nearly as reassuring as they had before!

The cadets could suddenly understand why their commander wanted an alternative.

They just didn’t think the Kyros heir would really be crazy enough to attempt such modifications with the limited amount of time they had left!

__

Well, if the cadets of Battalion 10 had any idea what everyone else was currently dealing with, perhaps they wouldn’t be quite so worried about their own situation!

Because as ridiculous as it might sound, they were already receiving some of the gentlest treatment of all the participating battalions.

Only a handful of teams with enough experience coordinating operations of this scale had even started considering the same long-term problems Luca was already trying to address.

Most of the others?

They had far more immediate concerns, like figuring out how to divide responsibilities none of them had ever expected to handle as bright-eyed first-year students.

Then again, even the more experienced cadets had problems of their own.

Some were still nursing their bruised pride after the disaster at the Training Hall, while others were already plotting revenge against whoever had humiliated them before departure.

And as the battleships gradually closed in on the allied outpost, more than a few battalions had begun wondering just how much useful information would even be left by the time their respective groups arrived.