chapter 98
The side engines started to ramp up. Everyone else was already inside the ship, but I was outside so I could hear and see how these monstrous engines actually sounded and looked like when they were working.
When they started to energise their propellers so they could interact with the fabric of space, the pitch changed a bit. It wasn't unpleasant, but it also wasn't as good as it was before.
It was time to head out. I gave a final nod to Bob, who was watching us leave. With a few quick steps, I was on the ramp and inside the ship, watching as it started to close behind me.
The ship was already taking off as I was heading to the third floor. When I reached the command bridge, we were already close to the bubble that separated this city from the atmosphere-free moon.
Currently, there was no one in the command bridge. Sam and Dean were busy rechecking everything, as this was our first time entering an F-ranked portal. Lola was also busy as she had taken over the healing duties for not just me but everyone else as well.
Well, technically, there was someone who was always here. “FH, status?”
“Everything's in the green.” The moment she finished saying that, we passed through the barrier, with the ship experiencing turbulence that rocked even me. It was understandable why that happened, as now we were flying outside the atmosphere. The timing was quite nice.
“Did you time that?” she asked me, but I stayed quiet.
We didn't have the precise destination. We were just heading a decent way away from the city, so there would be less competition for portals.
“It is time, Captain,” FH finally said after we had flown for about 30 minutes.
For the first time, I would be able to use our only mana tech device. This would allow us to detect any strong mana signature, and portals definitely went in that category.
Grabbing a hold of the controllers, I channelled my mana into the detection device with my mana sense skill, trying to detect large concentrations of mana far away.
Normally, I could do this only up to a distance of about twice this ship’s length, thanks to all the training I’ve been doing. But thanks to this device, that range extended tremendously.
What this device didn’t do was allow it to convert all this data into something computers could process. What normally happened was that someone competent in this job would input the coordinates for anything important manually, and what types of signatures they detected.
For me, this was a lot easier. I had my own computer connected to my brain and even more so, a lot of bonded AIs. With that, I could transfer all this information in real time and allow them to process everything. This way I could concentrate on sweeping a larger area more accurately.
We only needed a short pulse, so I kept at it for six seconds before pulling back and stepping away from the device.
On the screens all around me, information started to populate. Not everything was clearly marked out, as there were some concentrations that didn't align with a signature a portal would give out.
Those were most likely temporary camps or bases where mana tech was being used. Those we would be staying clear of, as anyone with enough credits to buy stuff like that would be dangerous.
There were also hundreds of portals on the screens, and all of them had a ranking as well. While everything was categorised as different ranks like F or G, it was still quite a wide range for portal strength, even inside one ranking.
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There were a couple of low E-ranked portals as well. Those were a bit too strong for us to tackle right now. It also seemed like almost all of them had some mana tech presence around them as well.
“Let's go with something in the mid-range for an F rank.”
A couple of portals were highlighted, with a few of them being eliminated as they were too close to other mana signatures. Eventually, one stayed lit. A few moments later the ship adjusted its course.
“Everyone, prepare for portal claiming procedures.”
My words rang throughout the ship as I addressed everyone. We had another 5 minutes of flying ahead of us. While I kinda wanted to go and start preparing, it felt wrong to leave the bridge. This was the first time we were doing anything like this, so doing this a bit more properly seemed the way to go.
The closer we got, the more our sensors were being worked. We were not trying to hide our presence, in fact the opposite. No passive sensor sweeps here. We were blasting at full power so nothing could escape our notice, and so that everyone in the area would know this portal was ours.
We touched down facing the portal. It was about 20 metres ahead of us, its height about two of me. It loomed somehow intimidatingly and welcomingly, promising danger and opportunity.
The drone ports opened up with a few squadrons launching to do manual sweeps just in case. It’s unfortunate that they needed to use propellant, as there was no air around here so they could use their propellers.
Eventually, I would want all of them to also work like the side engines, but that would require a lot of credits and engineering I did not know if I was capable of just yet. Miniaturising isn’t as easy as just making things smaller.
With the first sweeps done, a larger drone lifted off. It was about four times bigger than the standard drone. It was a bit shorter than me in length, but it was in a square shape with the height almost being 45 centimetres.
It was a massive drone and flew like it. It meandered, as it was in no hurry, to the back of the portal. As it got into the correct position, it started to extend four legs towards the ground. It was almost two metres above the portal, so there was a lot of length to extend, but it could position itself even higher if it needed to.
When the legs were fully extended and secured, between the legs support formed, interlacing everything. This way it would be firmly anchored and extremely stable. Now it started its calculations of just how its shield would form. If it needed to, it could do all of this in mere moments, but right now it needed precision, not speed.
When the shield snapped up, it covered a circle almost 30 metres around the portal. When it hit the ship’s hull, there was no gap between for the air to escape. The portal should now be inside an area where atmosphere could be maintained.
Next, the airlock started to expel atmosphere, with the sensors registering an increase in pressure outside the front ramp. The pressure continued to rise until it equalised with the pressure inside the ship.
Next, the ramp lowered and drones flew out. They were carrying flooring materials and the expanding pillars. It took them some time, and I could see how we could make this process faster, but the floor was finally finished about 10 minutes later.
Next, the pillars were set up at the edge of the circle. They were firmly connected to the floor, and only after that did they start to expand, stretching upwards in a curve, meeting in the middle just above the shield drone. When that connection was secured, everything was strong enough for the walls to extend and connect between each pillar.
From start to finish, we had a secure housing for the portal in under 20 minutes. With a little bit of work, we could probably shave that down to about 10 minutes.
Finally, power cables were extended and connected to the shield drone so it wouldn’t have to use its internal power source to keep it active. With it now connected, it also hardened the shields a lot more, making them actually defensive instead of just something that held atmosphere inside.
It was time for me to suit up. I was a bit nervous, as our gear wasn’t overpowered in this type of portal. While we could dominate G-ranked portals, F-ranks are where traditional weaponry would still work, but are a lot less effective.
We should be able to overwhelm with numbers if we run into anything truly dangerous, but the resources we will hopefully be getting should start us on a journey of improving all our gear.
When I reached the cargo bay, a large portion of it in the front was turned into a command centre. There were screens, a protective wall just in case anything rushed out of the portal, with a lot of firepower behind it.
As I approached, everyone stood at attention. “Relax, this isn’t that serious. We are not a military outfit.”
My words relaxed everyone. I moved behind Sam, who was sitting behind the desk with a few displays on it.
“We are ready to send the scout drones in,” Dean said.
“Let's begin then.” And with those words, the small drones entered. After 5 seconds, a few flew back out so they could transmit what they found.
No signal could escape a portal, so that was the only way of doing things. Those portals really were a separate reality only connected by that bluish portal.
The images we got back revealed a sweeping grassland. Every five seconds we got updates on what was going on. We managed to identify three different types of flying monsters that were quite bird-like.
Almost immediately, as we received images of those species, FH used her assembled database to identify them and listed everything we needed to know about them.
The area inside the portal was quite big, at least five kilometres in length, although it seemed to snake a bit. The time inside was quite close to night, but there was still plenty of sunlight.
Inside the grass there seemed to be two different types of monsters, although they are yet to be identified. The way we know that there are two different ones is that one shifted the grass a lot more than the other, so there should be two different types.
Unfortunately, none of them are big enough to be the storage skill monster. We lost a few drones to the aerial monsters, but they were built to be expendable. They were cheap to build, and none of them had AI cores, only regular programming.
Still, we wouldn’t want to lose too many of them. “Let's head in and start clearing out those fliers.”
“Understood, Captain,” echoed throughout the area as Dean and Sam's squads said it in unison along with Lola.
We would also be bringing along two squads of combat drones. Let's see how many we could actually get through the portal. Hopefully, the squad members won’t count as individuals. If they do, we might need to make ourselves a set of droids designed to go into portals with weaker AI cores.