Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume3 Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 1===

There was once an Object known as the Water Strider.

It was a cutting edge Generation 2 Object. The monstrous Object had travelled smoothly across the snowy plains using static electricity, and had been able to pierce the armor of enemy Objects with two low-stability plasma cannons on either side even though not even a nuclear weapon could do the same.

A normal Generation 1 Object would have had a hard time standing up to the Water Strider, but a battlefield student who had come to study Object design and a noble radar analyst who had come to amass valiant deeds had managed to blow it to pieces. That was 2 months ago.

And now…

“We’re back, Alaska. I’m glad to see you’re even colder than when I saw you last.”

“Hey, Quenser. Let’s ditch this work and go look for Santa Claus’s house or something.”

“I thought Santa lived in Scandinavia.”

“You’d have to ask the Faith Organization about that one. Wait, he changed the color of his clothes in a soft drink commercial, so would he be with the Capitalist Corporations? He might actually be relaxing in some company’s health facility.”

Quenser and Heivia of the Legitimacy Kingdom chatted as they walked through the snow.

One had blond hair and the only way to determine his gender at first glance was whether he was wearing pants or a skirt. He was a commoner battlefield student named Quenser.

The other had short brown hair and a somewhat muscular build. He was a noble radar analysis specialist named Heivia.

They were not walking through a white winter scene that filled one with the wonders of nature.

It was true that there were not any areas where the bare ground was visible. The white covered the ground all the way to the horizon.

However, strange metal pieces of art were scattered about.

That was the remains of the Second Generation Object known as the Water Strider. A small screw would be buried beneath the snow, but these masses of steel were 20 meters or more across. Main cannons that looked like bent metal bridges created a large wall blocking the way along that plain.

“I’ve gotta admit, this is pretty damn amazing,” muttered Heivia as he scratched at his head. “It looks like a volcano erupted. There’s wreckage as far as the eye can see. That blast was pointed up, but I think some of these things flew a few hundred meters away.”

“Some things probably flew kilometers. But it was a 200,000 ton Object. It isn’t that easy to retrieve the parts. And that goes for us as much as it does for the other side.”

“I was wondering what those gloomy intelligence guys were so busy doing. I guess they must be analyzing the technology on site as well as stripping it of any rare metals.”

“We can leave all that to them, so let’s get on with our own job.”

Quenser then half-slid down a relatively gently sloped cliff. He was heading for a spot a few meters down. Fragments of the Water Strider could be seen glittering there, but either due to the area that exploded or the direction of the wind, no pieces larger than 10 meters were there.

That was the problem.

And Quenser had been called in as a combat engineer to solve that problem.

“Okay, okay.” Quenser gently tapped the cliff he had come down from with his palm. “The surface is already crumbling. It seems like a waste to use this expensive Hand Axe on it.”

“Everything looks fine up above too,” said Heivia when he came sliding down shortly thereafter. “Just open up a 5 meter crack and all the wreckage should come sliding down. And that includes an entire leg belonging to that damn Water Strider.”

“And we can use that to hold it back,” replied Quenser offhandedly as he assembled an electric drill.

It was a model used for road construction rather than for work around the house, so the actual drill itself was 50-70 cm across. He held the electric drill about level with the cliff slope and pressed the trigger-like button.

After drilling a few holes in the cliff face, Quenser said, “Stick a bomb in the areas I mark. Afterwards, cover them up with the metal plates I gave you beforehand. Then cover it all back up with dirt. That way the energy of the bomb will be directed into the cliff.”

“Fine, fine. Honestly, this is as much of a pain in the ass as squeezing whipped cream onto a cake. A gram of this explosive is more expensive than a gram of platinum, right? It’s really powerful stuff, so can’t you just place it wherever and have the cliff collapse?”

“Are you complaining this much because you had to carry around all the spare batteries for the drill?”

“I’m complaining because I’m a radar analyst and yet am out in the snow working with drills. Can’t we just blow it up already so we can head back?”

“Surely you know that you set up bombs differently for different situations. Even a powerful explosive won’t do much damage if all of the energy escapes.”

“Didn’t you come here to learn about Object design?”

“I’m not doing this because I want to, but I have to make myself useful if I’m going to stay here. And the same goes for you, you delinquent soldier.”

After creating all the small pockets in the cliff, Quenser too began setting up the bombs.

But then he frowned.

Heivia had realized it too.

“Hey, I put just a fuse inside to test the detonation signal receiver, but it isn’t responding to the radio signal. Is the dirt or the metal plate cutting off the signal?”

“Dammit, this wasn’t my plan.” Quenser clicked his tongue with a puff of white breath. “Froleytia’s an excellent commander, but she has a tendency to make up the small details on the fly.”

“We can grope those giant tits of hers over this later, but what are we supposed to do now, Quenser?”

“We’ll have to use a timed fuse rather than a radio one. The signal doesn’t matter then.”

“What should I set as the detonation time?”

“1700 hours. That’s about 20 minutes from now.”

There was a reason they set it to detonate at a specific time. If they set it to detonate after a certain number of minutes, the time spent between setting up each bomb would result in them not detonating simultaneously.

After setting up all of the bombs along the cliff face, Quenser and Heivia quickly left. After all, they had fewer than 10 minutes left.

“Hey, Quenser. With that much explosive, how far away do we need to get in order to be safe?”

“The blast is directed inward, so 50 meters should be enough to avoid being deafened given the shockwave. But it couldn’t hurt to be extra safe.”

“Froleytia wouldn’t shut up about not leaving footprints, but it’s not like we can help it with this snow.”

“With the blizzard today, it should all be gone after a few minutes.”

While chatting some more, the two boys made it about 100 meters away.

Heivia suddenly looked like he had just realized he had forgotten to lock the front door after heading out.

“Hm? Oh, I think I messed up!!”

“What is it, Heivia?”

“I might have entered the number without switching the fuse mode first. So instead of setting the timer, I might have set the frequency to 1700. I-I need to go check.”

“Now!? They’re going to detonate in less than 10 minutes!!”

“I just need to run over and check, then run right back!!”

“You can’t!! Just wait until 1700 hours. If they don’t detonate then, we can go back and check. Okay, okay!?”

“You’re the one that said the bombs have to be set up to match the situation. If the ones I set up don’t do anything and yours blow up properly, we won’t get the results we want, will we?”

“You’re right…” Quenser trailed off.

“C’mon, c’mon. We just have to get it over with real quick. Hurry up!” urged Heivia.

“Eh? Me too? This was your mistake, not mine!!”

With Quenser being dragged along in bewilderment, the two of them started back toward the cliff.

They were about 100 meters away.

After travelling 30 of those meters…

A huge explosion suddenly erupted from the cliff before 1700 hours had arrived.

As Quenser and Heivia approached defenselessly, the sudden shockwave knocked them onto their backs. Quenser had said they would be safe as long as they were 50 meters away, but that was only if they were crouched down preparing for the shock. He had not been talking about if they were defenselessly standing straight up.

While the two of them were sinking into the snow on the ground, Quenser started beating Heivia with his fists.

“You idiot!! You idiot, idiot, idiot, idiot, idioooottt!!”

“Ow!! My bad, my bad!!”

“You didn’t just forget to set it properly! You set the time too soon!! You did the ones in that area, right!? And you didn’t set the metal plates right either, did you!? If you had, the blast wouldn’t have reached this far!!”

“Yeah, but we would’ve been killed if I hadn’t set the time so soon. It all turned out all right in the end.”

“Depending on the situation, this kind of mistake could ruin an entire military operation! That could lead to an entire unit being killed!!”

“Quenser! Hey, Quenser!”

“Don’t interrupt me when I’m just getting warmed up!! I’m legitimately mad here!! Look, the cliff only partially collapsed. Our first objective for today was completely-…!!”

“No, it’s almost 1700 hours!! The bombs you set are going to detonate!!’

“Eh?”

Quenser looked over blankly.

In the next instant, the second wave of explosions occurred.

Those two idiots had finally managed to lift their upper bodies from the snow, but they were knocked back into the exact same position as before due to the shockwave. A pain ran through their heads like spikes were being stabbed into their brains through both ears.

After a short silence, Heivia finally managed to clench his fists.

“You idiot, idiot, idiot, idiot, idioooottt!! You didn’t set up the metal plates right, either!! If you had, that shockwave would never have reached us!!”

“My bad, my bad!! Ow! I’m sorry about acting so full of myself when I was rushing things, too!!”

However, the cliff still collapsed thanks to an unexpected coincidence.

The collapse of the cliff brought Water Strider wreckage down with it. Among the wreckage was a leg that looked like a twisted steel pylon and a mass of armor that was over 10 meters long.

The two of them had gotten into a scuffle in the snow, but they froze in place at that unexpected result.

Quenser spoke up first.

“Hmm. It seems the wreckage rolled down far enough to plug up the area between cliffs.”

“And that will block the path of the convoy trying to pass by below.” Heivia frowned. “I know they can’t move things this heavy so easily, but will this really work? Using such huge pieces of wreckage for a wall also means the gaps are huge.”

“There’s an ambush set up to deal with that.” Quenser pointed out into the snowy plain. “There are tiny fragments a few centimeters or a few millimeters across scattered all over the place. That’s why we can’t just send in giant cranes to deal with this. Those caltrops would blow the tires.”

“So I guess stage 1 was a success.”

“Yes.” Quenser disassembled the large electric drill that was no longer needed. “We have the foundation we need to confine the Information Alliance Object.”