After the grand event at the Land of Rebirth came to an end, everyone was thrown into chaos.
Sunday stared at the Bai Ze standing in front of him.
He had no idea how this little creature was supposed to keep him safe.
The reason everyone else was in such an uproar, however, was because...
"Sora is gone!"
Truth be told, when they first heard the news, most of them were not particularly alarmed.
It was hardly the first time Sora had done something like this.
Dropping a single sentence before charging headlong into some disturbance was practically routine for him.
But once they learned what had actually happened, they suddenly realized...
"Sora really is gone!"
And this time, he had vanished without leaving so much as the faintest trace behind.
The last time Sora's body disappeared, even Terminus had deliberately left behind a sliver of information.
This time, however, there was not even that.
They did not even know where he was now.
"This footage is the last thing he left behind."
Everyone watched the surveillance recording from the spacecraft maintenance shop.
In the footage, the Silver Radiance inexplicably started up on its own, flew off into space, and gradually receded until it vanished from sight.
That was the final trace Sora had left behind.
Once the ship disappeared into the vastness of space, they lost all contact with him.
"Can't we locate the ship through its positioning system?"
Spacecraft all had dedicated tracking devices. Perhaps they could use that to determine where the Silver Radiance was now.
Unfortunately, that idea was quickly ruled out.
"We received word from the IPC. They said the ship's tracking device was physically disconnected from the network before it launched."
"Physically disconnected?!"
Everyone was stunned.
If it had been physically disconnected, then that meant...
"Could Sora have staged his own disappearance?"
Had Sora run into some kind of problem, found the tracking device and destroyed it, then abandoned them and left?
That seemed like the most plausible explanation.
But the theory was quickly rejected.
"Impossible!"
Robin dismissed the idea outright.
"Then let me ask you this. You're stationed all over the ship all the time. Do any of you know where its tracking device is?"
At those words, the Iron Cavalry exchanged looks.
If anyone knew the Silver Radiance best, it would undoubtedly be them.
After all, the ship held special meaning to them.
No one here knew it better.
And yet, despite their intimate familiarity with the Silver Radiance, none of them knew where its tracking device was installed.
Which made it all the less likely that Sora could have found it himself.
"More importantly, the Silver Radiance uses the newest tracking device developed by the Intelligentsia Guild. It's only the size of a screw."
Unkyō found the relevant specification while looking through the ship's manual.
A tracking device no larger than a screw was practically a needle in a haystack aboard the Silver Radiance, a ship hundreds of meters tall and wide.
"And this newest model is equipped with an electrostatic charge-particle energy conversion function."
The "electrostatic charge-particle energy conversion function" could capture free static electricity from the air and convert it into energy, allowing the device to keep operating.
"In other words, under normal circumstances, this device operates independently of every other system aboard the ship."
That meant even if the spacecraft itself completely ran out of power, the tracking device would continue to function normally.
Yet this tiny, concealed device had somehow been physically disconnected from the network.
"Don't you think that's strange?"
The whole thing practically screamed that something was wrong.
"So that means..."
After thinking it over for a while, Hotaru suddenly arrived at another possibility.
"Someone kidnapped Sora?!"
And whoever did it had to be extremely familiar with every aspect of the Silver Radiance's configuration. Otherwise, there was no way they could have located the tracking device so precisely.
Following that line of reasoning, the IPC seemed highly suspicious.
After all, they were the ones who sold the ship. They had access to the engineers and the blueprints.
Finding the tracking device should have been easy for them.
But the IPC quickly distanced itself from the matter.
"The IPC is only responsible for distributing and promoting this model. We are not its actual manufacturer."
When they learned this, everyone found it difficult to believe.
If it was not the IPC, then who could possibly manufacture a spacecraft containing such advanced technology?
Some of the technology used in the ship even touched upon the Path of Trailblaze.
And if there was one place in the entire universe that should still possess records concerning Trailblaze, it was the IPC.
Even the Intelligentsia Guild could hardly compare in that regard.
After all, the Interastral Peace Corporation was the longest-standing major power in the entire universe.
Yet now the IPC was telling them that another organization had developed the ship.
"The Silver Radiance's true manufacturer is the Research and Development Department of the Third Mechanical Nebula."
"However, if you intend to contact them, you may run into some trouble at the moment."
The IPC even gave Robin and the others a friendly warning.
"The Mechanical Nebula's main control system recently suffered a serious malfunction. They've even called in a member of the Genius Society to repair it."
The nebula was currently in danger of grinding to a halt, so its personnel might not have the capacity to respond at all.
"So you'll have to rely on yourselves."
With that, the IPC's advice came to an end, leaving everyone staring at one another.
The spacecraft had vanished, and now its manufacturer was also caught in a crisis.
Every lead seemed to have gone cold at once.
"What do we do now?"
For a moment, silence settled over the group.
The universe was vast and the sea of stars endless. Finding a single spacecraft and one person within it was even harder than finding a needle in a haystack.
"What in the world did Sora go off to do?"
Everyone gazed into the star-filled sky, wondering where he could possibly be now.
...
Sora wanted to know the answer to that question too.
"Where the freaking hell am I?"
He stared at the scene before him and froze.
All he could see was an unfamiliar starfield.
There was no Land of Rebirth, and none of the familiar people who normally accompanied him were anywhere nearby.
For a moment, he seemed to be swallowed by lonely silence.
He could not get a signal on any of his communications either. Even after taking out his phone, Sora had no way to contact anyone.
If he had not still been aboard the Silver Radiance, he might have assumed he had transmigrated for a second time.
Which left one obvious question...
"How did I get here?"
They had apparently invited him to participate in some event earlier. The instant Sora saw the Bai Ze, he understood what was going to happen.
So he immediately used the excuse of having the ship serviced to turn them down.
Then a minor complication arose during the maintenance.
Apparently, the manufacturer of his spacecraft had recently run into some trouble, so the maintenance shop at the Land of Rebirth temporarily had no original replacement parts available.
The maintenance shop needed to transfer the parts in from elsewhere and asked Sora to wait for a while.
So he lay down aboard the ship and waited quietly.
Then the spacecraft started playing music.
Under the soothing melody, he inevitably began to feel sleepy.
"After that, I think I told the maintenance shop to wake me up once the parts arrived..."
And when he opened his eyes again, he was already here.
"Did the maintenance shop try to kidnap me?"
Sora considered the possibility.
The Silver Radiance was worth enough to buy several barren planets.
So it was not exactly strange that someone might try to abduct him and steal it.
"If that's really what happened, looks like I'll have to get physical again."
Sora stretched his arms and legs.
With his current strength, even without drawing on any special powers, he could still handle most enemies.
If that really was their plan, then he would have to show them what a Showa man was made of!
But when he reached the cockpit, he found it completely empty.
Every instrument was autonomously carrying out some kind of command. The ship's engines were running at full power as it hurtled in a single direction.
Beyond that, there was no sign that any other living being had been there.
Sora entered cautiously, but found nothing.
"WTF? So they're not here?"
Naturally, he suspected that whoever had abducted him was hiding somewhere else aboard the ship.
But when he accessed the control console and pulled up every surveillance feed, what he saw baffled him.
There was no sign whatsoever of any outsider moving around the ship.
Even when he rewound the recordings, all he saw was himself sleeping peacefully while the ship's music played.
Aside from that, the autonomous robots aboard the Silver Radiance had continued operating normally.
While he was asleep, one robot brought him a thin blanket, while another prepared a cup of plain water shortly before he woke up.
Everything aboard the Silver Radiance was operating normally.
The only anomaly was that the ship was speeding through space.
And more importantly, Sora could not stop it.
[INSUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES. PLEASE UPGRADE YOUR AUTHORIZATION LEVEL AND TRY AGAIN.]
"Insufficient privileges? What the hell?"
He stared at the message in surprise.
If he remembered correctly, when ownership of the ship had been transferred to him, he had been registered as its highest-level administrator.
And yet the spacecraft was now telling him that his privileges were insufficient.
"Did some hacker mess with my access privileges?"
That seemed like the only possibility.
Otherwise, why would it suddenly tell him he lacked authorization?
So where was the hacker who had changed his permissions trying to take him?
"I'd like to see who has the guts to pull something like this."
At that thought, Sora stopped worrying.
For now, watching and waiting was his best option.
He wanted to see exactly what a galactic hacker hoped to accomplish by hijacking his spacecraft.
And so he quietly watched as the Silver Radiance raced endlessly toward the distant sea of stars.
It was then that he noticed something crucial.
Whoever was behind this also seemed intimately familiar with the Silver Radiance's unique capabilities.
Whenever the ship was about to run out of energy, a star would invariably appear ahead, allowing it to replenish its reserves.
Even the time required for recharging was calculated precisely to the second.
The instant Sora saw the energy indicator return to full, the ship would set off again and resume racing through space.
Such precise calculations...
"It's practically like a robot."
After watching this happen several times, Sora could not help remarking on it.
That level of precision was far too reminiscent of a machine.
Could whoever abducted him be a robot—and a hacker?
But just as he was considering the culprit's identity, the spacecraft suddenly began shaking violently.
The jolt threw him forward against the control console.
"What happened?!"
Had they entered an asteroid belt?
But when Sora checked the surroundings and the radar, he found no unusual objects nearby.
So what the hell was going on?
The sudden turbulence left him baffled.
But he soon put the matter aside, because he noticed that the ship was gradually slowing down.
At the same time, a dark silhouette came into view in the distant void.
Seeing it, Sora understood that this was where the hacker had wanted to bring him.
"I'd like to see what you dragged me all the way out here for."
As the ship slowly drew closer, the shadow in space revealed its true form.
It was a space station anchored in the void, its exterior shrouded in optical camouflage meant to conceal its shape.
However, something seemed to be wrong with the camouflage. Only a small portion remained functional, while the rest of the station stood out starkly against space.
No.
It was not that the optical camouflage had malfunctioned.
Rather...
BOOM!!
A sudden burst of fire illuminated Sora's face.
So that was it.
The optical camouflage had failed because the space station was under attack.
"Did someone hear about my sterling reputation for doing good deeds and summon me here to punish evil?"
Otherwise, Sora really could not explain why he had been brought here.
Perhaps to prove his guess—or perhaps because that had been the plan all along—the Silver Radiance slowly came to a stop beside the space station under attack.
A prompt appeared, announcing that the hatch was open.
Whoever was behind this was practically spelling it out for him: they wanted Sora to get off here.
But he was not that stupid.
"You're not planning to fly off with my ship the moment I step outside, are you?"
The Silver Radiance responded by gently rocking from side to side twice.
The motion was so slight that it almost looked as though the ship itself were shaking its head.
"Good lord, you can control the ship directly?!"
Then what had that violent turbulence earlier been about?
The spacecraft gave no further response and simply opened and closed the hatch once more.
Fine.
It seemed whoever had abducted him had no intention of answering.
"Then let's see what kind of show you've prepared for me."
Since the other party had already made their intentions so obvious, Sora decided to see what they were up to.
The moment he stepped off the spacecraft and entered the space station, an announcement rang out nearby.
"Boothill, some random guy just entered the station. Are you done yet?"
"For fudge's sake! You know what that monkey Dr. Primitive's like. Can't ya find some way to blast him outta here? Forget it—Rappa, tear this door down!"
Boothill?
Dr. Primitive?!
Sora caught a couple of familiar names.
Before he could think any further, the announcement rang out again.
"You dumbass outsider, if you don't want to get caught up in Dr. Primitive's atavism experiment, get the hell out of here."
"And if you still refuse to leave, we'll have no choice but to give you a couple whacks with our gunstocks and knock you out!"
Sora fell silent.
He waited until the other person finished speaking before replying.
"Is it possible that... I'm actually on your side?"
Silence.
Aside from the explosions, there was nothing but silence.
Sora's words clearly caught the other party off guard. The next thing he heard was a startled cry.
"Gwah?!"
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