I let out a groan as I climbed out of my bunk, my feet landing on the cool, steel floor. For a moment, I closed my eyes, allowing myself to enjoy the low hum of the engines. We had been stationary for so long, I had missed the feeling of being on the move. However, my moment of peace was interrupted by a buzz from my door.

“Yeah, I’m up.” I called out, knowing that the electronic speaker would catch my voice. I walked over to my locker, retrieving a pair of metal bracers and slapping them on my wrists. “Suit on.”

As my voice fell, a familiar energy rushed along my skin. Following procedure, I kept my arms at my sides without performing any excessive movements. Once the energy passed, a tight, armored suit appeared over my skin. This was our standard uniform, contained within a highly portable device to make it easier to equip.

My uniform was black with red highlights, marking me as a pilot of the Fox Troops. After the armor was equipped, I briefly checked the mirror to confirm that there were no faults. Seeing that my black hair hadn’t gotten caught in the suit, and my tail was still free, I nodded my head. All that was left was the outer layer, consisting of a jacket and belt within my locker that I put over my armored suit.

The jacket served as the storage for my various cards, both recreational and those I needed for my job. Meanwhile, my belt had a pair of pistols. One was a standard ki blaster, while the other was a card reader. The card reader’s only purpose was to fire off whatever card was loaded into it before refueling the card with the user’s mana. This improved both its accuracy and reusability.

The buzz rang through my room again, and I let out a faint groan. “I got it, I’m coming.” I muttered, turning and opening the door. As expected, it was Miles, one of the engineers of the ship and a good friend of mine. “What’s up?”

“The captain wants to make an announcement.” Miles jerked his thumb down the hall, clearly signalling me to follow. “She said everyone has to attend this time.”

I let out a sigh, shaking my head. Normally, I wouldn’t go on duty for a few more hours, but if it was a ship-wide announcement, then I didn’t have a choice. “Couldn’t she just use the intercom or something?”

Though I asked that, I knew that there were several reasons why that wouldn’t be feasible. The first, and most prevalent being that a large portion of the crew was likely logged into one of various online games at the current time. I myself had been hunting through the woods in Natural Seed when I got the message to log out.

“Cafeteria, then?” When I asked that, Miles gave a quick nod. The two of us broke into a jog as we ran down the halls. Along the way, we passed various doors that began to open and reveal tired occupants. Although it was still fairly late in the morning, a good number of the crew had only just gone to bed. After all, we had to keep a sizable late shift in order to maintain readiness against any dangers we might face.

At a jogging pace, it took us about two minutes before we arrived at the cafeteria. This was the only single room large enough to house the entire crew without creating issues, aside from the hangar. Through the floor, I could feel the engine’s hum declining, showing that we had gone into a brief lull to prepare for this announcement.

Looking around, I didn’t see our captain anywhere, but that wasn’t all too surprising. Even as more people began to enter the room, we all simply waited. Only when the last of us entered did a large projection appear along the wall. A woman in her thirties appeared with short, silver hair and deep blue eyes.

Like the rest of us, she wore an armored suit that tightly hugged her frame, but she also wore a thinner vest over it to display her rank. Her armored suit was silver with black highlights, while her vest was entirely black. Her eyes scanned over the crowd, and she nodded her head. Clearly, she was still on the bridge, in case an emergency broke out during this announcement.

“You all know me, so let’s skip the formalities. As of this moment, we have left Deckan controlled space. The Emergence has once more begun its voyage.” There were a number of cheers within the cafeteria when she made that proclamation, though I just gave a small chuckle.

After a moment, the captain lifted her hand to call for silence. “However, there is one significant difference between this voyage and our original one. For this matter, I would like to call Jocelyn and Casey to everyone’s attention. The two of you, please head to the front of the room.”

I was a bit confused, noticing how the captain did not attach any rank to the names of these two. Moreso when I saw that they were two figures I was unfamiliar with. Two lycan women, one with blonde hair while the other was a brunette, but otherwise appeared to be sisters. Their armored suits denoted them as priests, white with silver highlights.

“These are officially the two most important members of this crew.” The captain spoke in an entirely serious voice, causing most of the crew to be taken aback, myself included. “If you have to choose between saving myself or them, I want you to choose them every time.”

“Now, I know this decision won’t sit well with many of you, so allow me to explain. Some of you may recall that the reason we delayed our departure from Deckan was to await new crew members while we remodelled our temple. However, a lot of you did not pay close attention to this matter.”

“All of you should long be aware of the Stellar Goddess, and simply brushed aside the remodelling of the temple as something natural now that there was a goddess we could call our own. These two are priestesses of that goddess. However, that alone does not warrant the importance I have given them.”

“Shortly after the ‘birth’ of the Stellar Goddess, a new organization was formed between her followers and those of Ryone, the Goddess of wealth and magic. These two are similarly her priestesses as well, which makes them a part of this new organization, the Boundless Caravan.”

“It is this organization which I place such importance in. Through these two, we have access to a trade platform that can be utilized at any point in space. As long as they are safe, we can freely commence trade.”

“Yes, I realize that we are independent, and that we should focus on what we can produce ourselves, as opposed to outside resources. So, allow me to ask you this. If the ship were to experience a critical failure, and we were lacking in the materials needed to produce the parts to fix her, should we succumb to the whims of fate? Or should we purchase the necessary parts and materials from this platform?”

“That is why I place such value in these two. If it ever truly comes to a situation where you must choose between saving myself and them, then it will also be the time when their connection to this platform will truly show its worth. As long as they survive, we have a chance. If they are lost, then we will truly only have ourselves to rely on.”

After she finished her explanation, her expression loosened. “That’s all I have to say. Those of you that need to return to your quarters, please do so. Everyone else, I’m sure you all have something to do.”

With that, the projection ended, and the crew was left murmuring amongst themselves. As for the two priestesses, they were left with rosy cheeks at the front of the room. It was quite clear that they weren’t used to being the center of attention so much.

I saw Miles letting out a low sigh, shaking his head and turning to leave the cafeteria. He was currently on his shift, so he had to get back to the hangar. As for me, I was still free for a while, so I walked over to approach the two. “I didn’t realize that Leowynn already had so many followers.”

The blonde sister turned to regard me, letting out a shy smile. “To be honest… we were something of an unofficial church before all of this. We knew she was real, because of the clues left behind in the Keeper’s first release.”

From there, the brunette gave a somewhat bitter smile. “We didn’t know she wasn’t actually a goddess yet, though. Our church has been looked down on forever because we followed a ‘false god’.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “Feels good to have your work validated now, doesn’t it?”

When I asked that, the brunette nodded her head firmly. “Damn right it does! After I had the dream… I suddenly shot up by over a hundred levels as a priest! Jocelyn was the same. All of us who had genuinely followed the teachings left in Vision Expanse were recognized for our efforts.”

Casey seemed to be talking more casually now that the conversation had gotten going. I gave a nod of understanding, smiling towards her. “To go from worshipping a ‘false god’ to being someone in such high demand… It’s got to be a pretty big shock.”

Jocelyn shook her head slightly, looking around. “More of a shock to be here, if I’m being honest…”

When she said that, a thought occurred to me. “Lycan girls… you wouldn’t happen to be from Kione, would you?”

“Yup!” Casey nodded her head proudly. Kione was a rather underdeveloped world when it came to exploration of this scale. However, there was one aspect that no other world could match them in.

“Where are your familiars, then?” I asked curiously, glancing around the room. It wasn’t uncommon for crew members to have trained in Kione’s magic as a secondary system, though I myself preferred to use my cards. Still, for the people of Kione, a familiar was something everyone had.

“Left ‘em in our rooms.” Casey shook her head. “Didn’t wanna spook everyone before the big reveal. I’ll probably keep mine with me after today, but Jocelyn’s…” She turned to look at her sister with a small smirk. “It’d be a bit awkward for her to bring hers around.

Seeing Jocelyn’s face burning bright red, I couldn’t help but grow curious. “Why’s that? It’s not like a succubus or something is it?”

“Oh, now that’d be rich!” The brunette let out a raucous laugh. “No, no, nothing like that. Jocelyn’s got a suit of armor as her familiar. Living armor, at that. Makes her look all big and scary when she puts it on, but it’s just as big on its own.”

“It should be fine as long as I keep him inside of me…” Jocelyn muttered weakly. It would certainly be a sight to see a hulking suit of armor walking down the halls, but it would also cause quite the stir. I could understand why they’d rather keep it hidden.

“Well, let me introduce myself. My name is Caesar Burns, or Fox Troop Six. I’m one of the defense pilots here.” As I said that, I extended my hand to the two of them, only to find Casey grabbing it with wide, sparkling eyes.

“Those giant robot things, right!? I saw pictures of those back home. You gotta let me see sometime!” Despite her noncombat position on the ship, her grip was actually quite intense. It was enough to make me, someone with over seventy points each in stamina and strength, wince as the bones in my hand shifted beneath the armored suit.

“Case, you’re squeezing too hard.” Jocelyn spoke up in exasperation, causing her sister to blink in confusion before letting go. “She was a warrior monk before the Goddess appeared. Her grip’s a bit strong…”

A bit? She’d have to have over a hundred points in strength to make me feel like that… I muttered inwardly, but didn’t let it show on my face. It wasn’t unusual to meet people like that, especially those particularly gifted with a class, or who practiced multiple classes that enhanced a stat. I mentally classified Casey as a decent combatant, since she had trained her classes high enough to have that much strength.

“Well, how about we grab a bite to eat, since we’re already here?” I asked, moving my hand behind my back to massage it with my other one.