A special submarine vessel was running silent through the pitch-black ocean depths.
Like a ghost, it was almost impossible for any major nation to detect—after all, the technology it carried was at least ten years ahead of this world.
And this advanced submarine did not belong to any country. It belonged to an armed organization that stood outside national authority: Mithril. (From Full Metal Panic!)
They were not terrorists. They were a mercenary force formed to strike international terrorist activity.
Yet who would guess that the captain of such a warship was a young girl?
"This is ridiculous. That's going too far."
The figure seated in the captain's chair spoke in an unmistakably angry voice.
Even in anger, the voice was still pleasantly clear—almost beautiful.
That was why the exquisitely delicate silver-haired girl, as if carved by an artisan's hand, puffed her cheeks and stood up, issuing a string of orders to the rest of the crew in the command room.
As the commander of Mithril's Western Pacific Battle Group, and the captain of the Assault Landing Submarine TDD-1, she was about to lead an operation to purge a terrorist organization.
Under normal circumstances, a girl who looked fifteen or sixteen could never be a warship captain—but she was a special case.
Her name was Teletha "Tessa" Testarossa, a Whispered.
A Whispered looked no different from an ordinary person, yet their brains were born with blueprints for "black technology."
When she was six years old, she produced the closest numerical solution to Einstein's ten-variable coupled nonlinear partial differential equations—and went on to design the TDD-1 Tuatha de Danaan, the very warship she now commanded.
So as the designer who understood this vessel better than anyone, she was, in a sense, the most fitting choice for captain.
Of course, that alone would never convince people. A designer and a commander were two very different roles.
But she used her intellect—used her capability—to win her subordinates' recognition.
In combat command, she was calm and accurate to an exceptional degree, and so she was honored as a "princess," even called Mithril's "goddess."
"Hah…"
Tessa took a sip of coffee and let out a small, satisfied breath.
For the next stretch of time—until the operation began—there was nothing but downtime. So she decided to log into that Superdimensional Channel again.
Hm? What's this—live stream?
She tapped it open, and the moment the picture appeared, Tessa's expression turned serious.
Mechanical spiders. That kind of high mobility, that kind of agility—this was terrifying.
If those things were released into a city and reached a high-density population zone… just imagining the scene made Tessa's scalp prickle with dread.
Even in powered armor, trying to fight those mechanical spiders head-on would probably require an elite soldier of the highest tier.
With a quick estimate based on the movement and flexibility she was seeing, Tessa judged that aboard her own ship, the number of fighters capable of taking one of those spiders in a one-on-one fight would not exceed ten.
So she watched the spider-clearing team intently.
The central perspective—this should be Miss A2, right? That level of combat performance didn't feel like something a human being could do.
The human body—muscles and bones—simply would not withstand that kind of output.
Unless… it was an artificial human, built through inhumane special modifications.
It was also only because Tessa was a Whispered that she could keep up at all—her dynamic vision was better than normal. If an ordinary person watched this battle footage, they would probably see afterimages, unable to track the motion.
Then there was that figure wrapped head-to-toe in heavy metal armor. That was a machine too, wasn't it?
It was hard to imagine something that bulky moving with agility and mobility that didn't fall behind Miss A2's.
And those guns—crude, almost like something made in an unregulated workshop. The rounds exploded on impact.
Unfortunately, just from the on-screen blasts, she couldn't confirm the precise destructive yield.
Without being there in person, she couldn't judge the true strength of that giant machine's metal body—its density, its structural reinforcement, its tolerance thresholds.
Oh—and a blade.
It was carving through mechanical spiders with alarming ease.
That sharp?
Wait—that wasn't a normal sword. It looked like a high-tech cutting edge.
Was it high-frequency vibration cutting?
It didn't quite look like that.
Tessa also saw Miss A2 and another silver-haired blindfolded woman using blades to cut down the spider machines. Their weapons seemed to share the same underlying technology—but it definitely wasn't the same as the blade used by that humanoid "tin-can" metal machine.
That tin-can's blade looked sharper—more lethal.
Also, the gunfire—she wasn't seeing any ejection.
Caseless ammunition?
Hm? The humanoid metal tin-can was being focused. Clearly it posed a greater threat to the giant machine, so it was drawing more spider attacks.
…Huh?
A bat-like mechanical creature suddenly burst into frame, clamping onto the tin-can and diving straight toward the ground.
It looked like a near-miss—yet just before the impact, the tin-can managed to break free. Even so, dragged by inertia, it hit the ground brutally, smashing out a fairly large crater.
Tessa immediately began calculating again—estimating the ground hardness at the site, estimating the falling speed and impact angle.
In the end, she arrived at a rough mass estimate for that humanoid metal tin-can.
Around 800 kilograms.
Of course, that estimate assumed the local environment matched Earth's—gravity, atmosphere, and geological composition close enough for the same approximations.
Hm?
Air support—clearly support for Miss A2's side. A fighter craft entered the fight.
Based on its maneuverability, Tessa realized that even the most advanced fighter aircraft in her world couldn't compare.
But what happened next made her eyes widen.
The blindfolded woman leapt toward that fighter craft—and was caught.
Then the fighter craft transformed into a humanoid mech.
The technological sophistication was far beyond what she'd imagined.
And in that form, its agility became even more terrifying.
If it fought against their AS units… what would happen?
AS—short for Arm Slave, the humanoid mechanical weapon platform of her world: Armored Mobile Master-Slave System.
Mm. In pure mobility and agility, their AS units still wouldn't match the other world's—especially since that one could fly.
But if it were their next-generation AS model still in development, equipped with the Lambda Driver system… then who would be stronger would be hard to say.
Back to the stream: with that transformable weapon joining in and interfering, it did create an opening for the humanoid tin-can to attack.
With many of the spiders no longer swarming it, the tin-can used that blade to dig into the giant mechanical monster—cutting open a massive breach.
Just as it was about to force its way inside, something abnormal happened.
On the tin-can's back—was that an energy unit?
Suddenly, sparks crackled violently. The tin-can's movements slowed, as if it had lost power.
Seizing the opportunity, the spiders surged in, dragged it out, and pulled it down toward the ground.
Before it could hit, several spider machines piled on and wrapped around its entire body, locking it down—
—and then they began to glow.
Tessa's expression changed.
That was a textbook—
Boom—!
A self-detonation.
(End of Chapter)
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