Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume3 Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 13===

Meanwhile, the princess was breathing shallow breaths as she piloted the Baby Magnum.

The situation was changing from moment to moment. A dizzying amount of new information was constantly being displayed on the large monitor in front. Even with the device that read the movements of her eyes and sent commands based on them, it did not seem she could keep up with it all. The 200,000 ton mass moved quickly to the left or right to evade the Information Alliance Rush’s attacks. The great pressure of the inertia brought on by those movements wore down her stamina. Her brain had been optimized to pilot that Object, so she brought out its full processing power even while more than half of the air she breathed in could not be taken in by her body.

The struggle continued.

Sometimes she seemed to have the upper hand, other times she did not.

However, the princess could tell something was different about this battle. She had only 1 of her 7 main cannons. If that one was taken out, it was all over. However, that was not what she was worried about.

It was more along the lines of the vague luck of a gambler.

She had an odd feeling that the state of the battle was sliding to the side. It was supposed to be a struggle purely along a straight line. However, she had a premonition of a new vector appearing that would greatly change the flow of the battle.

(This is bad…)

The signs pointed towards things changing for the worse.

If the situation changed, it would be like she was a toy ship floating in the bath when the drain plug was pulled out. The danger of things growing worse would rise drastically.

The princess knew that, but she had no way of changing the flow in that direction. She had her hands full keeping up with that high speed battle. She did not have time to focus on anything else.

But then…

“…Quenser to…Baby Magnum…”

The voice sounded like it was being squeezed out.

It was coming from the communications device installed in the cockpit. However, it was not coming from a Legitimacy Kingdom military frequency. It was the same frequency that she had been arguing with the Information Alliance Rush over.

(So is he really aboard that Object…?)

As that thought entered the princess’s head, Quenser continued his transmission.

“I-I’m cornered over here. Can I ask you a favor just in case?”

“What?”

“If I kick the bucket here, I want you to return the engagement ring in the maintenance base zone barracks to my childhood friend Angelina from my hometown…”

“…”

The Baby Magnum fired its main cannon while completely ignoring the flow of the battle.

The Rush evaded the low-stability plasma cannon blast with a quick movement.

The princess was still expressionless, but her pupils were larger than usual, letting the piloting lasers in even more.

With an extremely calm voice, she said, “I am sorry, Quenser. I forgot to ask you if you would rather be shot with a coilgun, a laser, or a low-stability plasma cannon.”

“Ugehhh!? The inertia from these evasive maneuvers is doing horrible things inside my body! You idiot! Don’t fight seriously!! At this rate, you’ll meet the same fate as when you were easily taken out by the Water Strider that is strewn about here!!”

“Quenser, now you are digging up things from the past that would best be kept buried? …And ‘easily’?”

The increased firing and evading left Quenser only able to reply with groans.

“By the way, Quenser, if you would like to say anything else, now is the time.”

“Ugh. R-really? Okay, then. Various things happened with this foreign girl named Etta who worked as efficiently as an AI at a restaurant back in the safe country, so could you give her the necklace I have in the barra-..gbheeeehhhh!?”

This time, the Rush took evasive actions back and forth that did not seem at all necessary to evade anything. 

The Information Alliance Elite said, “…Oh ho ho. I too would like some questions answered about this childhood friend and these ‘various things’.”

“Bfh!? S-stop! Don’t move back and forth like that!!”

Quenser seemed to be enduring unreasonable torture, but then he suddenly shouted, “Now’s your chance!!”

“?”

“Quenser to Baby Magnum!! Can you hear me!? The Rush’s Elite is taking actions not needed for the battle. This is your only chance to escape this bad situation! Evade to the right! Evade way to the right!!”

“…”

“Don’t get so mad!! Please just listen to what I’m telling you!!”

The princess frowned at his instructions.

They did not fit into the strategy she had put together. As the Object’s pilot, she knew it best. That was why she hesitated to immediately obey the piloting instructions of a boy who was more or less a complete amateur. But…

“At this rate, you’ll be cornered against the cliff face and shot with her main cannons once you can no longer move!! Trust me! I have a way to win this!! So evade to the right! Way to the right!! You’ll be blown away if you don’t!!”

It was true that she would soon be cornered.

And it was highly likely Quenser had made it into the Rush’s cockpit. He might have read something about the Rush’s strategy from something displayed on the monitor.

“…”

She made up her mind.

She moved the lever she was gripping tightly.

The Baby Magnum took a great evasive action to the right and the intense power of inertia struck her slender body.

But…

“Oh ho ho. Even if you are greatly mistaken, hearing that still pisses me off.”

A slight chill had entered the Elite girl’s voice.

The Rush spun around which must have created quite a bit of inertial power. Over the radio, the princess heard a pained gasp presumably from Quenser.

The bullets of light fired by the rapid fire beam cannon Gatling gun grazed the Baby Magnum’s body slightly. The beam cannons continued to fire, crushing one of the princess’s main cannons and sending it flying through the air.

Ignoring that, Quenser shouted, “…Gh…!? N-next, make a slight turn to the left!! Switch to the low-stability plasma canno-…gh!? Fire at the front of the Rush!! And…the Killer Squall sub-cannons!! Aim for the Water Strider wreckage…the the left!! Cough. If you melt the snow around it with the lasers…it can be used as cover!!”

“Oh ho ho! Oh ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho!! I do not know what you are after, but you are too slow!! Even if you are trying to get my strategy across to her using information from the cockpit, you are too slow! By the time the unrefined Legitimacy Kingdom Elite can take action, the command will already be complete!!”

The enemy was exactly right.

Quenser’s instructions would essentially waste the princess’s last chance to attack. It was like knowing you would be checkmated in 100 turns, and then wasting half of that time. Even then, a thin portion of the Baby Magnum’s armor had been peeled away and several of her cannons had been blown off to litter the Alaskan snow. Several warning windows had appeared and she could hear shouts from the operator monitoring the situation from the maintenance base zone.

Suddenly, the Baby Magnum’s movements came crashing to a halt.

The enemy’s main cannon had struck her near the core. Thousands and even tens of thousands of beams fired from the Gatling gun-style weapon. The thick armor glowed orange and the beams dug through it in no time. Sparks flew, the air explosively expanded, and a violent wind burst from the “wound” like it was a jet engine. That great wind kept the Baby Magnum from moving properly.

“I hope you have prepared yourself. Oh ho ho,” said the Rush’s pilot Elite with the tone of someone who had just placed their queen in a crucial point. “This settles it!! You can regret not raising your readily available white flag while you burn in the depths of hell!! Oh ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho!!”

The princess gritted her teeth.

She hesitated over whether she should stop the ejection device that had automatically started to power up.

“Trust me.”

But…

Quenser’s voice over the radio had not given up.

“You can win like this.”

A great noise like a thick gear breaking rang out.

The princess had no idea what had happened.

That was not surprising.

It had not come from the Baby Magnum. As it was not something wrong with her own machine, it was completely natural for her to not understand what had happened.

But that meant…

“Quenser…?” muttered the princess.

Yes.

The Information Alliance Rush had been the unopposed ruler of the battlefield just a moment before, but it had completely stopped in the middle of the snow.