episode_0645
by admin
Whew…
A dust storm rose across the desolate land, illuminated by the faint light of a giant red dwarf.
The clouds were sparkling like metallic shavings, as if the sky was saying that there would be no rain for the time being.
The station on the planet Chiprote, the capital of the Dostov planetary system, one of the remote planetary systems.
The tavern ‘Sand Wind’ located in a corner of the place was bustling as always.
Squeak-
The creaking ventilation fans and dusty neon signs from the ceiling gave evidence of those who had worked to colonize the remote planets.
The interior of the tavern was filled with the sounds of talking, laughter, and the noise of old machinery.
The immigrants and sailors sitting in a corner were whispering, drinking with serious expressions on their faces.
Among them, an old sailor, usually of soft speech, began his story in a low voice.
“Did you guys hear that story? The story about the Paladins appearing on a nearby planet a while ago?”
In the Nova Empire, where there is no faster-than-light communication technology, you must warp your spaceship directly to send news to other planets.
So much so that in some central planetary systems there were separate lines of communication that operated regularly.
If that’s the case for the central planetary system, then what about the peripheral planetary systems? In these areas, cargo ships that had to stop by frequently for trade had no choice but to also serve as news relayers for the surrounding planetary systems.
This old sailor was also one of the crew members of such a cargo ship.
“I haven’t seen it with my own eyes… but judging from the rumors going around, it seems real. He learned that martial art from the saint and can heal people just by touching them. One of the veterans who lost his legs in the battle with the bugs can now run around with his cyborg parts off?”
“Are you talking about the Luminaris Knights or something?”
The Knights Templar the old sailor was talking about were the Order of Luminaries, which Minho had formed by teaching his subordinates martial arts.
The Luminaris constellation was a religion spread across the universe, so its organization was quite loose. Of course, it was a different story in the central planetary system, but in these periphery planets, it was impossible to apply strict discipline.
So it was nothing new for people without formal permission to form groups under the name of a religious order.
Although the group that Minho created was not actually a knight corps, nor was it created by a saint, and even if they had learned martial arts, they didn’t really have a way to heal others unless they used their internal energy to heal them.
As is often the case with rumors, they tend to spread little by little, exaggerated and inflated.
The young immigrant who had been listening put down his glass and snorted.
“Treatment? Don’t make me laugh. I’ve heard that they wipe out criminals, but where on earth is that magic? It must be some elaborate prosthetic limb.”
“Huh, do you really think so?”
At that moment, a man sitting far away raised his head with a smile of conversion.
The young immigrant asked rudely, slightly offended by the fact that his conversation had been overheard and by the laughter that seemed somewhat mocking.
“What are you?”
“… Judging by their attire, they seem to be crew members from another cargo ship.”
The old sailor guessed the man’s identity.
A man with several rings wrapped around his fingers, who had laughed at the young immigrant, leaned against the sunken bartender’s counter and spoke in a low voice.
“That’s funny. I just got back from the Orca-9 system yesterday. I saw the Paladins destroy a bunch of bugs there. Was it a feat? They wiped out dozens of bugs with some fancy trick. And they blew up an entire small nest with some kind of unidentifiable bomb.”
“Orca-9!”
His words caught the interest of not only the immigrants and sailors with whom he was talking, but also of everyone gathered in the tavern.
The Orca-9 system was a marginal planetary system not far from the Dostov system where they reside.
However, the reason this place, which is not much different from the Dostov planetary system, is receiving so much attention is because Orca-9 was waging a war against bugs due to the small bug nests that were scattered all over the place.
The only thing the Frontier Planets were most wary of, aside from space pirates and disasters caused by poor infrastructure, was bugs.
Natural disasters require preparation, and space pirates aim for moderate plunder, but bugs won’t stop until they’ve swallowed up an entire planet.
Of course, to eliminate such a group of bugs, troops are needed, and troops consume a lot of materials.
No one goes to a planet that’s at war for fear of dying from bugs, but there are those everywhere willing to take the risk for money.
The captain of the cargo ship that man was on seemed to be that kind of person too.
The shabby tavern, bathed in gray light, exuded the stale, worn-out air typical of a remote planet. Added to this was the brief silence, and the background music did not create a particularly pleasant atmosphere.
“Ha, but there’s no way that having a strong weapon would allow you to grow legs out of thin air! I think that’s only possible on the Seraph planet… ”
The young immigrant blushed and retorted, perhaps feeling embarrassed.
Everyone’s eyes were focused on the man.
“Well, I haven’t seen the treatment myself. There weren’t a single casualty on the battlefield where the Paladins went. I only saw them blow up the nest from afar. But I’ve heard rumors. They treated almost all the wounded, enough to fill a village. From children to the elderly. And since it was a rumor that came from a planet the Paladins visited, it’s pretty credible.”
“I wish you would visit our planetary system sometime.”
The tavern owner sighed and joined the conversation.
“There’s always a shortage of useful doctors on these remote planets. And there was also talk of a suspicious trace being found near the asteroid belt last week.”
“Suspicious signs? Could it be space pirates? Or maybe a bug… ”
The young immigrant now has an anxious look on his face.
“And the Knights Templar wouldn’t do that for free, right? Maybe they’d pillage resources like space pirates?”
“Well, the Paladins are criminals… That’s another story. On the contrary, in Orca-9, as soon as they showed up, the city gangs disappeared overnight. There were no gunshots or bloody battles. They literally just disappeared. It must have been a buggy area, so the gangs must have been well-armed.”
The tavern was filled with commotion again at the man’s words. Some people wanted them to come and help, while others seemed to be afraid of a group with a strong outside force entering the place.
Just then, someone opened the door of the tavern roughly as if he was going to break it down and came in.
Boom!
“Everyone run away! Bug, bug! ”
“… … .”
The man who suddenly appeared had blood all over his clothes. He didn’t seem to be injured, so it seemed like it wasn’t his own blood, but his breathing was ragged, as if he was about to suffocate.
Everyone in the tavern froze for a moment, unable to accept the situation.
In their heads, the phrase the tavern owner had mentioned about suspicious traces near the asteroid belt echoed.
“Could it be… that trace was a trace of a real bug?”
“It spread from Orca-9 to here?”
“Maybe it came from somewhere else… ”
“You don’t think that male sailor was attached to the cargo ship he came on, do you?”
“There’s no time to babble now! Right now… !”
Kwajik-!
“… … .”
Just before the man who came to warn the tavern could step inside, a bug appeared from the side and attacked him.
“Ugh… Eeeek!”
The tavern that saw that sight instantly became a mess.
Even the inhabitants of the remote planets who have lived a rough life have rarely actually seen bugs.
From their perspective, this was something more frightening than a tiger suddenly appearing in the village.
Naturally, those who were panicking could not escape in an orderly manner.
puck!
“Ugh!”
As the young immigrant was running away from the tavern, he was elbowed in the face by someone and fell to the ground.
Krrr…
In front of him was a bug that had just attacked the man who had come to warn the tavern.
The man attacked by the bug did not appear to be dead immediately, but was bleeding heavily and convulsing.
“Ugh… ”
The young immigrant froze stiffly at the low cry that sounded like that of a wild beast.
I wanted to get up and run away right away, but my legs wouldn’t move.
The bugs seemed uninterested in their already subdued prey.
The boy looked away from the man he had attacked first and turned to the young immigrant.
And when I finally made eye contact with the guy, he shut his eyes tightly.
Phew!
In an instant, a dull thud was heard and hot liquid was sprayed across the young immigrant’s face.
He thought the liquid was his blood.
But as time passed, the pain did not come. All I could feel was the numbness in my face from getting hit with an elbow while running away.
Jeokbuk- Jeokbuk-
The sound of someone’s boots walking broke the silence. It was a sound that stirred the heart of anyone who heard it.
The young immigrant relaxed his tightly shut eyes, opened them squintily, and looked ahead.
There was a dead bug standing there with a hole in its head.
Slap-
Beyond the corpse of the fallen bug, a troop dressed in coats came into view.
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