Out on the open ocean, a fleet had just finished a show-of-force exercise.
It was a demonstration aimed squarely at their enemies.
And exercises like this were guaranteed to draw hostile reconnaissance—so it was only natural that warships from the opposing camp were loitering beyond the training area, watching from a distance.
Still, even an exercise demanded vigilance. Precautions had to be taken as if it were a real war plan.
Because who knew? The other side might actually strike—and one likely method would be from below, via submarines.
So the fleet's undersea assets were on alert in the surrounding waters.
And yet, neither side noticed the enormous presence moving beneath the seabed—something so vast it slipped through the exercise zone like a ghost.
"How did they even plan this drill? That kind of oversight is ridiculous."
With the threat eliminated, the young-looking captain, Tessa, leaned back in the captain's chair and slipped out of "command mode," pouting and grumbling with the unfiltered emotion of a girl her apparent age.
The warship under her command—the TDD-1—had successfully defused a crisis that could have spiraled out of control.
During this exercise, someone had tried to provoke a catastrophic misjudgment between the two major global blocs and spark an outright war.
Fortunately, Mithril caught the intel in time. Deep underwater, they dealt with the danger—neutralizing a warhead that had been planted in advance and would have activated automatically at the chosen moment.
As for who was behind it, the investigation had already confirmed it: Mithril's sworn enemy—Amalgam.
They, too, possessed technology ahead of the world's curve, and some of their developments even surpassed Mithril's own level.
Their main operations were research, development, and production of new weapons—then quietly feeding them into regional conflicts as live-fire field tests.
You could say most of the world's wars and unrest had Amalgam's fingerprints somewhere in the background.
The organization had been growing for half a century. Its tentacles reached into every corner of the globe and every industry, covertly nudging the course of the world itself.
That alone showed how powerful it was—so vast that even it couldn't fully grasp the "true" bodies of its membership.
In the beginning, it had started from lofty ideals. But time corroded it. It rotted, bloated, and became ugly—until it finally turned into a selfish apparatus devoted only to self-preservation.
A massive malignant tumor on the world.
"Thank you."
Tessa gave a polite nod to the man who handed her a cup of coffee in the lounge.
She took a slow sip, letting the caffeine jab at her tired nerves.
Setting the cup down, Tessa's gaze slid to one person in particular—Lieutenant Commander Richard Mardukas, her executive officer.
Tall and slender, glasses on his nose, skin a touch pale—he looked less like a soldier and more like a technician.
"Go on, Captain," Richard said, pushing up his glasses. "Did you get some new technical support from Mr. Golden Toilet again?"
After speaking, he withdrew his eyes, set his own coffee down, and returned his attention to the documents in his hands.
Judging by the way she hovered there with that half-girlish, half-reluctant expression, he was probably right.
As for that earlier "Earth Elixir," they'd already tested it—and they hadn't managed to reproduce it.
But it hadn't been a complete waste, either. The experiments had unexpectedly produced a few new compounds, and those actually showed serious promise in medical applications.
"Uh… well… it's just… um…"
Tessa stalled, words catching in her throat.
What she wanted to ask this time was… awkward. She was afraid they'd think she wasn't taking her job seriously.
Now that Black Cat had confirmed it—making the livestream content public, letting more people watch, could increase the energy gauge, and she herself could get at least a tenth of that—
Tessa wanted to do it, too.
But she needed a justification. If she suddenly asked them to help launch something in the film-and-media space, they'd almost certainly assume she was slacking off.
And come to think of it… if spreading Mr. Golden Toilet's world's livestream content could increase the energy gauge, then what about her own livestream?
Could she download her own stream and publish it herself?
No—sorry. Even if it were possible, Tessa couldn't do that.
Mithril was an organization that could never be exposed. Doing something like that would be an act of spectacular stupidity—handing the world a clear view of who and what they were.
So she could only download and distribute other people's footage.
Suddenly, Tessa's expression hardened with resolve.
Hesitation only made things worse.
"Lieutenant Commander Mardukas! Major Kalinin!"
In that instant she snapped fully back into captain mode, and the two officers she'd called rose at once—focused, serious, eyes locked on her.
"Come with me."
Neither of them hesitated. Neither asked a question. They simply followed their captain.
In the end, they arrived at the place Tessa considered the most secure on the ship—
The Lady Chapel.
No—more accurately, a place where eavesdropping simply wasn't possible.
Even though Tessa trusted the crew and didn't believe enemy moles could exist aboard, she still believed in caution. If she was going to say what she was about to say, it had to be in an environment where the conversation could not leak.
Yes.
She'd decided to reveal the secret.
If, one day, she performed a cross-world invitation with other members—or had someone come to her world—then having preparation in advance would prevent panic and chaos.
"About the order I gave a month ago," Tessa began, "when I commanded a full sterilization of the Lady Chapel. I never gave you the real reason. I'll explain it now."
Back then, Tessa had been in the ship's "heart"—the Lady Chapel—where special equipment allowed her to synchronize with the vessel, as if the ship became her own body. Through it, she could directly access the deepest layers of the control system.
She'd been just about finished with ship control, but instead of leaving immediately, she'd lingered—feeling like a fish in the sea, swimming freely.
Then she'd gone online for a moment. Chatted a little.
And someone had invited her. Out of curiosity—without thinking—she accepted.
Honestly, at the time, "cross-world invitation" sounded absurd.
And yet… she really was pulled over there.
It scared the life out of her.
When she returned, she still didn't leave right away. Instead, she gave the two of them an order that left them baffled: treat the entire area as an emergency response scenario for the highest-grade bioweapon viral leak.
Only after confirming there was no contamination did she finally leave.
Now, before explaining the secret, Tessa planned to do something that would shock them first.
Right in front of them, she was going to download a video onto the computer—out of thin air.
So she logged in, entering Mr. Golden Toilet's livestream.
Hm?
What was this?
Tessa had been planning to download the footage first and then return to reality to brief them, but the scene on the stream hooked her instantly.
He was wearing power armor?
And it looked like he'd been driven into a corner—trapped.
In the next second, Mr. Golden Toilet suddenly leapt toward a bottomless-looking pit.
Even with power armor assisting his jump, he could only manage four or five hundred meters at most.
There was no way he could clear it.
Worse—an abrupt beam of light lanced straight at him.
In an instant, the livestream turned into a sheet of blinding white.
Then the image went black.
Tessa's heart clenched so hard it nearly stopped.
N-no…
Don't tell me he just—
Huh?
The picture came back.
And the moment the new scene filled the screen, Tessa froze.
Mr. Golden Toilet was in a completely different environment now.
It looked like… a bridge.
(End of Chapter)
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