094 Lord's Compilation 6: Strategy Meeting and Operations Meeting

I’d somehow updated up to the 100th part.

Even though it’s still labeled 094 due to the.5 appended to the episode numbers, I noticed the post had already jumped to page two.

The individual entries are short, so the total word count is low, but I’ve managed to update nearly every day and get this far.

All thanks to your support. Thank you.

"Let’s make some real money, you bastards!"

"“““WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!”””"

Earth Force main unit—professional combat gamers, aka mercenaries—racing through space.

They realized it: only SFO gamers were collecting debris.

Destroyed ships and captured vessels had already been recovered.

But the smaller debris? Left behind. And no kill credit assigned.

Pure profit.

Out of Douglas Earl’s fleet of four thousand, one thousand surrendered and were captured.

The one thousand captured ships—excluding Personal Ships—were returned to the factory satellite they’d been requisitioned from.

The remaining three thousand were ravaged by Akira’s fleet of forty-two thousand. No one could say who’d shot them down. Ownership rights? Impossible to determine.

Thus, the large debris was allocated to about one thousand crew members aboard manned vessels.

No massive debris fields were included in that allocation.

Apparently, the mercenaries have already turned their attention to it and begun collecting.

There was a reason the leadership distributed the wreckage this way.

Some of the commanding officers might have ships damaged in battle—needing repairs.

Fixing those ships requires parts… and money.

Parts trading had always been brisk, forming its own little market.

So, salvaging wreckage is basically a reward for individuals who participated in the war.

It’s not just the SFO—there’s an entire economy of parts trading happening right on the battlefield.

Back in the old days, they’d collect armor and weapons from fallen generals.

Same thing’s happening out here in space.

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"I’d like to hear everyone’s thoughts on how we’re going to handle the defense of the 6th Prince’s territory."

We’d just returned to Anoi Fortress.

In that secret meeting room (the anti-eavesdropping chamber), I—Akira—along with Anoi Fortress Commander Sanders, Captain Noah of the Caprius Field Army, Commander Hunter of the Graul Field Army, Commander John of the Minor Territory Combined Forces, General Kanzawa of the Earth Forces, and support AI Ai, were holding a defense strategy meeting.

"First off, where's the most likely spot to get hit?"

Commander Sanders answers my question.

"Given the Dimensional Jump Gate's capabilities, the Anoi System and the Sol System—both considered hubs—look the most vulnerable."

"Hubs?"

I swallow down the joke about "snake's?" before it even forms.

Puns like that don’t translate into Imperial speech. They just fall flat.

Then Ai chimes in—she’s the reason we brought her here.

"Dimensional Jump Gates come in two types: ones that connect individual nodes within a small group, and others that link entire groups together.

Travel within a small group is easy. But the gates that connect different groups? There are few of them. They're called Hub Jump Gates—shortened to 'Hubs.'"

"Back when the True Empire fleet launched a direct assault on the Graul System... what happened then?"

"We jumped our Dimensional Jump Gates all the way to the Anoi System's Hub Jump Gate, arriving in the sub-space just before it."

"Then we moved from the Hub Jump Gate toward the Graul System's Dimensional Jump Gate connected to it."

"The key point here is you can't reach the Graul Gate unless you've already made it to the Anoi Gate."

"You can't get there directly."

"Got it. So if the Anoi Gate's closed, then none of the systems linked to that hub can be reached, right?"

"Yes. The continuity of sub-space breaks."

So protecting the Anoi System means protecting all the systems connected to it.

"What kind of groupings are the smaller groups linked to the Anoi Gate?"

"Yes. The Graul System, Caprius System, and Relic System of Lareth are all part of the same group.

The Aqua System, Tatara System, Fam System, Weizen System, Dens System, Petal System, and Clam System are another group."

"Border group and old Prince territory group, huh. Border group doesn't have much industry, does it?"

"Prince, may I speak?"

John, who’d been quietly listening to Aya’s explanation for me, finally raised his hand to ask permission.

I nod without hesitation.

"Go ahead."

"As just explained, our system and the Weizen System belong to different groups.

Which means transportation will take time.

We’ve been granted this territory, but being a collection of small holdings, we’re struggling with logistics."

"Can’t we just build a large transport ship and send it over?"

"Yes. But since it’s all small holdings, the burden would fall unevenly depending on which territory operates it."

"Then why not unify the small holdings under Lareth?"

"Whatever you command."

(—Sorry, that was a joke. Don’t take it seriously.) Just kidding. Let’s explore developing the frontier and spreading out the holdings.

First, list all terraformable planets. We’ll modify them one by one using the Genesis System.

Incidentally, how are the small holdings divided?

"We, the Lareth clan, bear, lion, tiger, ox, horse, and rabbit clans—seven territories."

The first four clans are warrior clans, right? The last three are more suited to farming?

"Want them to be self-sufficient out on the frontier. Add surveys of nearby star systems to the plan.

We’ll need about two livestock, two agriculture, one mining, one fishing—should be enough to split across seven territories?"

"W-well, are we becoming planetary lords?"

"Exactly. But when that happens, you’ll have to hand over Wesen IV. Need to start some industry on Caprius too.

And we’ll just have to work out the resource sharing."

“Hah… hah.”

“Well, since we’re including the development of a new system, it’ll take some time, I guess.”

The conversation had veered off course.

This isn’t a defense strategy meeting—it’s a land development conference.

“Back to the point—fortifying the Anoi System and the Sol System, right?”

“The Sol System’s hub Dimensional Jump Gate is at the farthest edge. But it’s special. Probably, given enough time, it could link to any other hub Dimensional Jump Gate.”

“Right, I’ve heard the physical distance is insane.”

“Yes. That’s why the Empire considered it of little practical value. But in terms of connecting hub to hub, there are cases where it actually cuts down travel time.”

"Take the route from Hub A to Hub E, for example. Normally you'd have to connect A–B–C–D–E. But with the Sol System Hub, you can go A–Sol System Hub–E instead."

"That's strategically significant. Conversely, if you can freely access the Sol System Hub, you could launch direct assaults on any hub."

"That's what Prince—well, he's not a prince anymore, so we're just calling him that out of habit—figured out."

Oh, great. Another handy hub. Only flaw is time. That's it.

They say shutting down a Dimensional Jump Gate severs the subspace continuum beyond it. So the ultimate fallback is closing the Gate. But if we don't interfere with Earth, we could just let them pass through freely.

"If it's Anoi Fortress, we could handle the defense duty with twice the current force."

Then maybe we should just bring the factory carrier to Earth after all."

"The factory carrier can't pass through the Dimensional Jump Gate.

Even with dimensional warp, it could take years to reach Earth—physically too far away.

Besides, the Empire doesn’t even know Earth’s coordinates. Warp is impossible."

"Right, we never did figure out which galaxy Earth is in, did we?"

So we’ll need to keep our forces concentrated at the station, then.

"Hmm… maybe we should consider deploying Fortress Cannons to Earth."

"Then Akira’ll be stationed at Anoi Fortress permanently?"

President Kamizawa—no, Lord Kamizawa—spoke, and doubt flickered in me.

I wanted to send everyone back to safety. Earth.

But is Earth really safe?

We were already planning to return to Earth for a comeback in entertainment.

But which one’s more dangerous—Earth or that Anoi Fortress?

The sticking point was getting entertainment activities back on track.

So… could we just do entertainment stuff at Anoi Fortress?

I had an idea.

“Boss, I’ll travel between star systems from Anoi Fortress to manage my territory.

You and the other members can stay at Anoi Fortress too.

We’ll have the members perform there, broadcast the footage back to Earth.”

“Yeah, I get it—Anoi Fortress and Earth are equally risky.

But Akira… what about Kirara while you’re gone?”

“I’ll call in Kaede. She and I are triplets—same age, same look. She’s practically Kirara’s twin!”

“Now that’s a clever move… but we should check with the rest of the crew first.”

“Besides, the boss still has that unpaid baronial debt to settle, right?”

“Alright, let’s go with that.”

Important things getting decided without them around.

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