Chapter 106 – You May Consider Yourself Commended, for Understanding My Power So Well

"What's wrong, Letaria?"

On the other end of the comm, Grain responded at once. The other corps members were already deep in preparations for withdrawal, relieved that the operation had wrapped up.

"Grain, I sense something strange, from that direction."

As if answering her own words, the deep-purple Arden slowly raised its arm, pointing a finger toward a single spot in the pitch-black void.

At the end of that finger, as far as anyone else could tell, there was nothing at all -- only darkness, stretching on and on.

"Hmph..."

Grain fell silent for a few seconds, turning Riese's sensors toward that same direction, but nothing of note came back. Even so, he didn't hesitate -- he opened a channel to the whole group.

"Everyone, Letaria and I have a separate matter that's come up we need to investigate. The rest of you, head back to Seldia as planned. Aland, you have command for the return trip."

At the sudden order, Aland answered with surprise. The rest of the corps had let Letaria's earlier murmur pass by unnoticed, entirely unaware anything was amiss.

"Yes... understood, but Captain, did something happen?"

"Might be nothing to worry about, but there's a chance something's out that way. ...Rajel, keep an eye on Herta and Steshia on the way back -- their machines took damage."

"Copy that."

"You got it. I'll look after those two."

As Aland and Rajel each answered in turn, Steshia cut in over the comm, sounding flustered.

"Wait, Captain! My Rasta can still move too! I can come along--"

Grain cut off her half-panicked protest gently, but with a tone that left no room for argument.

"Minor as it is, Rasta took damage to the left shoulder too. Head back, don't push it. Besides, I'd imagine Ms. Ichinose is already itching to look over your combat data and the damage report, right this minute."

"Ugngh..."

The moment Milea's name came up, Steshia seemed to have nothing left to say, and fell obediently quiet.

"Sorry to ask, but leave a couple of your spare energy tanks behind for us before you go."

"Understood!"

The corps members each sent back their acknowledgment, ejected the tanks, and set off for home in a tidy formation.

◆

Now, only two machines remained -- Letaria's Arden, and Grain's Riese -- pressing forward side by side through the pitch-black expanse of space.

Drawing energy from the spare tanks left behind, trailing thin lines of thruster light through this silent world.

"...Feels pretty quiet, huh."

At Grain's murmur, Letaria voiced a question she'd been holding onto in her cockpit for a while now.

"Grain, why did you believe my words, without a single question?"

Back when they'd captured Blang's crew, there had been a clear trigger -- Zein receiving a distress signal immediately. But this time, there had been no signal, no reaction of any kind. It was nothing more than Letaria's own "hunch," and even the corps members who'd headed home surely harbored some quiet doubt about it.

"It's your magic, isn't it? If you're picking up something distant through Arden, that's not exactly strange to me."

Grain's answer came with total, unshaken conviction.

That's right, Letaria remembered. Grain already knew about her "magic." In this world, such a power would be called something like "esper" or "psychic ability" -- an unknown force most people would dismiss out of hand as nonsense. But Grain and Milea had already accepted it as the real thing.

"That is true. Fufu, you may consider yourself commended, for understanding my power so well?"

Surprised as she was, expressing gratitude honestly felt a touch embarrassing. As always, Letaria answered in her usual haughty, composed way.

"I'm honored, my lady."

Grain answered with a smile, and for a while after that, silence settled between them.

Checking the heading coordinates displayed on both machines' main consoles, Grain spoke up again.

"Keep going straight in this direction, and... you hit the 'Restful Sector.' Is that where you're sensing this from, by any chance?"

Restful -- the great mechanized weapon Escado had left behind, the being Letaria could only call a "demon god." That same stretch of space had been the very battlefield where she'd fought that monster to the death.

By now, all the significant wreckage and salvageable parts had already been recovered; there shouldn't be any technical value left there at all. But given the sheer gravity of what had happened there, it had been designated as one of Seldia's most strictly enforced restricted zones within its administered space.

"...Likely so, yes. At first, I could only tell the direction... but comparing it against the map, I fear it may be exactly what I suspect."

Letaria stared at the complex map displayed on Arden's console. Having spent some time in this world now, piloting a Makina, she'd already come to grasp the basic functions of this kind of electronic equipment.

"Hmph. Might be some worthless ruin some curious fool or petty thief wandered into, but given that particular location, better safe than sorry."

Holding Riese's output steady, the two machines pushed their speed up further still.

Before long, traces of that old, fierce battle -- twisted armor plating, the frozen wreckage of machinery long since dead -- began to come faintly into view in the distance, and the two machines crossed into the Restful Sector.

Amid the eerie silence of that drifting debris, the remnants of a former battlefield.

Letaria's magic caught something stirring.

"Something is here...! Yes, it is lurking, deep within!"

Letaria's voice rang out clearly.