“…True enough. After all, the ‘Dimensional Quake’ phenomenon that began seventeen years ago and has kept occurring ever since, it has truly changed this world far too much…”
At his side, Shione nodded, silently concurring with a somewhat somber expression.
“Yeah. If I remember correctly, your country was also… ah, my apologies.”
Realizing his slip of the tongue, Kalinin turned back around with a trace of apology.
“I’ve brought up something that must be unpleasant for you, haven’t I. I didn’t mean to. I was simply too absorbed in my thoughts just now… please forgive me.”
At this, Shione merely shook her head.
“It’s quite all right, Mr. Kalinin. I already overcame that grievance long ago. The current Shenzhou… no, the Human Reform League, that is my second homeland.”
Then she lifted her gaze, resolute, tinged with a faint sorrow.
“So I, too… absolutely will not allow the tragedy of Remonesia to repeat itself a second time in this world.”
“…That’s good. That’s good.”
Deeply moved, Kalinin repeated the same phrase twice.
But then his tone shifted.
“Now then, Miss Shione. There is a task I’d like to assign to you at once.”
“All right. What might it be?”
Shione inquired with a somewhat cautious air.
“Go and make contact with that boy named Yu Xiao. Then find out his true situation.”
“No problem… wait. Eh? You want me to…?”
“That’s right. After all, you happen to be that boy’s class teacher, and you’re also a direct witness to that incident…”
Kalinin clasped his hands behind his back.
“There’s no one more suited to the role than you, is there?”
Even so, a home visit is really something I just can’t quite manage…
Shione was about to say as much, but the very next second her eyes met Kalinin’s gaze, which was filled with utter seriousness and gravity.
…Though it carried not the slightest hint of aggression, Shione inexplicably felt a chill run down her spine.
She recalled that the man before her…
Before becoming the commander of “Alvis,” the central organ of this Penglai Island…
He had apparently been the commander of a special forces unit within the HRL.
Perhaps that sharp, commanding air cultivated during his military days was precisely why she couldn’t voice any words of refusal.
“…Understood. I’ll take it.”
And so she swallowed down all her myriad complaints and thousand-fold refusals.
Shione spoke her words of assent, then turned on her heel and slunk away in defeat.
If only she could have avoided it, she didn’t want to work overtime either…! she thought with a hint of resentment.
Open the door, boot up the console, insert the disc.
These were the three actions Yu Xiao performed, in order, after returning home.
No words were even necessary; from the fluid, practiced way Yu Xiao moved, one could tell just how impatient he was.
After all, he’d been thinking about it so much he’d even seen those things in his dreams.
As for the unpleasant and awkward experiences from the daytime, those had already been cast to the back of his mind.
Something that lets a person forget all their troubles for a time.
Perhaps that is the charm of a game that’s fun enough.
…And naturally, after entering the game’s main menu.
The first thing he opened was still that “Real Battlefield” mode.
And when the screen before his eyes arrived at that somewhat familiar, crude main interface.
Yu Xiao, with a bit of anticipation, selected the button that read “Sortie.”
Or will it be the same as yesterday: a pop-up appears, and then it just fizzles out…?
Yet, contrary to his expectations, the answer was neither.
[Please select the next battlefield]
The very next second after pressing the sortie button, along with this prompt, what appeared before Yu Xiao’s eyes was actually two different selectable stages?
Yu Xiao focused his gaze and looked: they took place in Winterland, in the northern territory of the HRL, and in Shenzhou Nation, in the central region of the HRL, respectively.
And it wasn’t just the maps that had changed.
Apparently, the hostile forces he would face were two different groups as well.
On the Shenzhou Nation battlefield, what he’d have to repel was, naturally, the “Beta” from last time.
But in the Winterland stage, what he’d be fighting was another, entirely different swarm of golden monsters called “Festum.”
…At this, Yu Xiao was a bit surprised.
Just then, he noticed that in the upper right corner of the stage-select screen, there was a small, inconspicuous question mark.
Might as well, Yu Xiao thought, and clicked it open to read.
And indeed, it turned out to be the background setting for the battlefield mode of “Super Robot Wars VS.”
…So it turned out the alien monsters that invaded this world weren’t just one group.
They were split into two waves, one after the other.
The first force to come to Earth—its name was Festum.
Yu Xiao had some recollection: these were the alien lifeforms from “Fafner in the Azure” that possessed mind-reading abilities.
Twenty years ago, the Festum, led by their leader the “Star Core,” first appeared in outer space.
They destroyed the three orbital elevators that humanity’s three great nations had built on Earth.
Then they descended upon the Arctic Circle, and using it as their base, launched ceaseless invasions against the far-northern regions under the HRL’s jurisdiction.
Fortunately, by then the HRL had already mastered mecha production technology, and its military capability had grown to a considerable degree.
Thus it was able to construct an unbreakable line of defense, safeguarding the people’s safety across every inch of land within its borders.
What’s more, during battle, some reports indicated that the Festum were in fact a form of intelligent lifeform.
So some among the HRL’s upper echelons even entertained the notion of opening a dialogue with them.
After all, in the study of aliens, there were also terms like “fourth kind” and “fifth kind” of close encounters.
Perhaps by changing one’s thinking, by not taking the path of battle, the problem could also be solved?
And so, in this optimistic atmosphere, a whole series of related plans were put into motion.
Things like “Alternative 3,” which aimed to create artificial ESP manifestations possessing mind-reading ability, or the “Super Soldier Research” that developed the field of human brain quantum waves, and so on…
But no one could have anticipated it.
Three years after the Festum descended upon this planet, a new crisis arose.
Its name was the “Dimensional Quake.” It was a disaster capable of tearing open rifts between dimensions, causing things from different parallel worlds to intersect.
Taking the brunt of it, that Dimensional Quake that occurred in the western part of Shenzhou Nation within the HRL not only completely destroyed the local residential areas, it also brought monsters from other space-times over.
Those monsters were the Beta swarm he had once fought before.
Though their raw strength was inferior to the Festum’s, with their overwhelming, sky-blotting numbers, they were no less a troublesome foe.
…In any case, this sudden upheaval further increased the pressure on the HRL to defend its homeland.
Faced with a suddenly stretched battle line and a rear under attack, the HRL had no choice but to contract its defensive perimeter for the homeland…
And misfortunes never come singly.
That New Continent United States, which had always stood by idly, watching the armed conflict with the alien creatures from the sidelines…
Yet after the Dimensional Quake occurred, it suddenly changed its tune entirely, and struck a posture of fierce resistance.
While declaring that it would “fight to the bitter end” against the evil creatures far across the ocean.
They further condemned the HRL, which had previously announced it would consider the possibility of dialogue with the Festum…
As having committed so-called “acts of betrayal against humanity.”
And if the HRL continued stubbornly down this path, then they would have no choice but to “on behalf of all rational humankind,” bring down the “hammer of sanction” upon the “traitors of humanity”! Follow the newest chapters on novelping.com.
…Anyone could see that this was the New Continent United States, seizing the opportunity to exploit the situation, issuing a naked declaration of provocation.
Their aim was nothing more than to once again covet hegemony over the world under the tripartite structure.
Or perhaps, they simply didn’t want to see the HRL achieve an alliance with the alien creatures and thereby gain a technological leap forward, or something of the sort.
Even so.
However, at that time the HRL had no spare capacity to deal with them…
After all, for them, in the end, under the internal and external pressures of various factors combined, they were forced by circumstance to abandon the original plan of dialogue.
The result of choosing to throw themselves fully into a two-front war was that the HRL was dragged into a bottomless quagmire.
Because this ceaseless war continued on for fifteen years thereafter, all the way to the present.
No matter how they tried to eradicate the Beta swarm, there was no way to wipe them out entirely.
As for the Festum, they seemed to possess a troublesome capacity for learning.
They could respond to the HRL’s new tactics, imitate the HRL’s new weapons…
And ultimately apply them to themselves.
And so the fighting developed in the direction of despair.
The economy declined, industry collapsed, territory was lost, the population plummeted.
The gradually exhausted HRL seemed to have no hope of victory in sight…?
The above was the further world background introduction included with the stage descriptions in “Super Robot Wars VS”‘s battlefield mode.
…How should I put it.
“Hmm…”
Yu Xiao propped his chin on his hand and pondered long at the screen.
For a rousing game themed around piloting mechas to kill bugs, this worldview…
Wasn’t it a bit too detailed, and a bit too bleak?
After all, saying that humanity couldn’t unite even in the face of a common enemy and instead fell to infighting…
That somewhat underestimates the goodness and wisdom of human nature, doesn’t it.
Yu Xiao thought.
And it wasn’t just that.
The degree to which the settings from various works had been fused together was also a little…
Though Yu Xiao wasn’t the type to go around saying things like “adaptation isn’t random rewriting, dramatization isn’t nonsense.” But the Tieren losing to the Festum, how could anyone dream up something like that…
Ahem.
I’m getting off track.
Yu Xiao shook his head, and put his focus back on what was in front of him.
For now, purely as a player.
His critique of the setting ought to be kept to a taste only.
That’s right.
What he ought to be considering now was which stage to sortie into, so as to proceed most smoothly and comparatively efficiently?
The Beta were a somewhat familiar opponent by now.
The Festum on the other side, those monsters, were comparatively unfamiliar; fighting them would offer more of a fresh sensation.
That said, in a game with RPG elements like this, it wasn’t necessarily the case that the newer the enemy, the better.
In fact, if it was an enemy you were seeing for the first time, it was even easier to end up wiping out…
…And to this, after only a short while of deliberation, Yu Xiao had his answer in his heart.
Thereupon he pressed the D-pad, and placed the stage-selection cursor upon one of the options.
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