chapter 141
POV: Remi
Finally, I was away from those powerful elves. My body relaxed, and I could walk normally. All three of them… I do not think I could win in a one-on-one fight with any of them, so it's best not to fight them like that. Numbers had a big advantage, and I will make sure that my AIs can support me when needed.
My mind flashed back to the elven woman, and I quickly squashed those ideas. It’s better to avoid her at any cost. Fortunately, my 6th sense didn’t trigger, so they shouldn’t be trying to do anything underhanded.
The battle barge was large, and it took a while for me to reach the main hangars, which were incredibly busy with people constantly running and transporting tons of materials.
The chaos that was here made me understand why it would take two days for the loot to be distributed.
“Bob, I am going to need your help.” I got a feeling back of confusion, and then I sent him some of the images of what was going on.
“Oh boy, let’s see what we can do.”
Bob and I were able to communicate from a longer distance, as I only needed to barely touch his consciousness for him to reach back, understanding that I wanted to contact him.
Currently, my ship was drifting alongside the battle barge with about a thousand other ships, all of whom wanted loot they had claimed, but the battle barge only had so many airlocks.
It seemed that everything also needed to be registered and confirmed, and then rechecked before they were sent from these hangars to any ship. Bob soon got back to me as he figured out that we could use our drones to ferry cargo, which would make things a bit easier for us.
What followed was nearly two days of pain. Every so often, I got the faint feeling of something being wrong, but it quickly disappeared. Most likely, it was some ship captain who tried to smuggle some of my loot into their own ships. It was quite a common occurrence during these past two days.
Fortunately, now the hangars were pretty empty with only a few ships remaining close to the battle barge.
Looking at the list of the loot always brought a smile to my face. While my understanding of how to make hard light technology was a bit shallow at the moment, I at least now had the raw materials to basically convert everything over.
My mind was already running through the different designs when I was interrupted by one of the higher-up elves. I believe he was the personal assistant to the Baron or the second-in-command of the battle barge. I hadn’t had the time to properly understand their hierarchy.
“Greetings, Captain Remy Graves. I managed to catch you. I have some good news: we are almost done with the cutting process. How would you like to receive your cut of the main crystal?”
At that moment, all of us felt as we passed through the space portal, leaving it and returning to the real world. This meant that the raid was officially over. It would also mean that the details of the raid would be released, and a furious discussion on the quantum net would follow.
FH was going to be quite busy monitoring it to the best of her ability. Most likely, it was best to just leave this place. We could be out of this system and in a safe spot in less than a day, where no one was going to find us.
“You could send it here. I will then bring it to my ship.”
“Oh please, don’t tell me you’re planning to skip out on the party. I assure you, my Baron knows how to throw a fun evening.”
I tried to look into his eyes to understand if the offer was truly genuine without any hidden meanings. But there seemed to be something. He also seemed to notice that I noticed, and actually relaxed because of it.
“You have a sharp eye. I will be truthful with you, you fascinate me. But not just me; every elf that’s on board. Well, perhaps that’s an exaggeration, as not all have grown up with stories of humans as we have. You are sure to not be the last human we will see, but it would still be a shame to let this opportunity go.”
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“I guess my crew can handle bringing on board the pieces of the main crystal. The real problem is that I don’t really have any other clothing besides this, and I’m not sure that’s going to be good enough for the party.”
The laugh that followed was so reminiscent of what I had heard back on Earth when conversing with friends that I let myself go a bit and relax.
Soon, I found myself in his quarters. “I will be honest with you, I do not have many party-going clothes myself, but some traditional clothes will be good enough for this type of event.”
He came out of his closet holding what looked to be extremely fine Asian-style robes for men. The fabric was unfamiliar to me; it wasn’t as fancy as silk but not as fluffy as cotton. It was something in between—extremely refined yet still completely natural.
“This feels quite incredible. But I think I will go with the simple dark grey one, if you don’t mind?”
“Not at all, but you don’t seem too surprised about this style. Are you familiar with it?”
“Back on Earth, we had nations that had similar, although a bit different, styles of clothing in the olden days, which made a comeback a couple of times.”
“Truly? I can understand what you mean about styles coming back. While this has remained quite a staple amongst the higher-ups throughout the years, there have been many ‘current styles’, so to say.”
Our conversation came quite easily, like we had been old friends who had just rediscovered one another and were enjoying some small talk. Still, just the fact that I was currently on board a massive spaceship talking to an elf about clothing styles of our home worlds was a bit mad.
“In your culture, do you smoke something?” I asked at one point.
“It is no longer common, as we lost the leaves we used for smoking when we lost our homeworld.” There was pain in his voice whenever we approached the subject of his own world, and I guess mine mirrored him in that.
He offered me tea instead, which tasted different but not bad. It seemed that elves were still quite traditional even after being in space longer than the dwarves, who had more easily accepted change, at least compared to the elves.
At one point, I got confirmation that Bob managed to get everything on board and that, technically, we were ready to leave. If the party was a couple of hours away, I would have left, I was certain of it, but it was just half an hour away, so why not?
When we reached the party itself, I was surprised by what I saw. It wasn’t as traditional as I thought it was going to be, as there was electronic music with quite a nice beat permeating throughout the large room, but there were some more traditional elvish things as I’ve come to learn.
There was a bar for alcohol, but also a different bar for tea. There was also food absolutely everywhere. My eyes quickly picked up on the fact that there was indeed chicken here.
“Excuse me, but my stomach is calling for me.”
“I must find my Baron. Let’s meet up later.”
And just like that, we separated. The chicken tasted heavenly, but there were other delicacies here that I didn’t know what they were, but since elves seemed so similar to humans in physiology, they should be safe to eat.
Having had my fill, basically tasting every type of dish there was, I headed towards the bar to find out what alcohol they had. The music was nice, everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, and there was even some dancing happening. So overall, not a bad party.
My steps faltered as I caught a glimpse of a certain Princess entering. To my other surprise, I found out that the third elf, the woman who was standing beside the Baron, was actually a Princess. But right now, I wouldn’t care if she was the Emperor or a random citizen, because she was looking way too good.
Those dwarves weren’t lying when they said elves looked amazing, but right now… just damn. The clothing she was wearing looked awfully similar to Japanese traditional women’s clothing, but instead of the traditional light colours like pink, hers had a pattern of different shades of black.
Her lips were also coloured black, which would easily classify her correct look as gothic. Then there were her violet eyes that matched everything else perfectly, and those extended ears that had multiple small chains running through them, seeming to bring everything together.
Well fuck me, is she trying to trap me or something? I don’t think I could have thought up a more attractive person. But those eyes… I could see what lay behind them. Better to keep away.
Yet before I could turn and head to get a drink that I now desperately needed, our eyes met, and she smiled.
“Always remember your past relationships when you come across those eyes.” Lola’s words brought me back as I remembered our conversation so long ago when I started to speak to her about my past relationships.
One curse that I had never been able to break was picking the wrong woman. Each time I saw what was hidden behind those eyes, and each time I thought that I could handle it. In that I was correct, but they always got worse, and it always ended messily.
“Greetings, Princess Verrona. You look like a vision of loveliness today.”
Wait, were those my words? When the hell did I even approach her?
“I did not expect you to dress up like this, Captain Remy Graves. It is a surprise, and a pleasant one.”
She was bullshitting me for some reason. That voice sounded so fake.
“I am no one noble. You don’t have to be fake around me,” I said to her as I leaned in a bit so no one else could hear.
She pulled back a bit, showing surprise.
“Well, fine. What you were wearing before suited you better. Made you look like a handsome captain who cared little about how good he looked, yet somehow still looked delectable.”
Now that was the real her. Her voice was a bit lower and didn’t have that bubbly, happy quality from before.
“You seemed to know that I was a human while others did not?”
“Most don’t read the missives the Dominion sends out to everyone. I do not dismiss them.”
“A good practice. You never know what you might find in information most think unimportant.”
She once again smiled at that, but also touched my arm at the same time. There’s no way.
We continued to small talk as we walked away from the entrance. It was made clear to me almost immediately that she was interested. To test it further, I said some stupid jokes, and she actually giggled at them.
Now, was her interest something more serious or just having a fun time during this party remained to be seen, but before all of that, there was a question I needed to answer.
Should I continue to talk to her or not? She was definitely stronger than me, which made things a bit harder to decide, but would I be letting all of humanity down, especially all of those who died on Earth, if I literally didn’t take a chance to get with a literal elven Princess?
My 6th sense wasn’t telling me anything bad, but it was strangely quiet. My own instincts knew that this was going to be trouble, but women like this always were—and most of the time, it was worth it. Fuck it. If I ended up dead, I would have gone down while trying to fulfil the dreams of so many.
“Would you care for a dance, Verrona?”
She reached her hand out, and soon we were on the dance floor.