The world of NieR:Automata.
Location: the android base on the Moon.
The colossus before Kain's eyes could already be considered half-finished. It was an interstellar warship nearly five kilometers long.
It had been built using the technology for the Lunar-class cruiser he had obtained from the Warhammer side. The moment he acquired it, he sent it over to A2's world.
Afterward, he had gone to Tifa's world, then returned to the Warhammer side for more than a week before coming here again. Yet in barely half a month, they had already built nearly half of it.
At this rate, it might be ready to launch in less than a month.
That speed seemed astonishing, but one had to remember that the technology the Great Sage had given him had already been optimized. Even on a savage world, a cruiser could be built in a dozen years or so.
Granted, that kind of construction ignored consequences, costs, and all environmental damage. But it was still a savage world, a place where the humans could practically be called barbarians, yet they had still been driven to build such a vessel.
A2's world, by contrast, was at an industrial level so far beyond the savage era that the gap was impossible to measure.
On top of that, android construction efficiency was extremely high. Unlike humans, they did not need to factor in rest periods during construction.
And when it came to resource allocation, there was no interdepartmental bickering, corruption, or bureaucratic rot.
As for Lacus's side, if all of humanity were truly united, they could probably launch a ship within a month too. The problem was that such a thing was impossible.
No, if Orb went all in and ignored costs, perhaps it really could manufacture one in a month.
The problem was that mobilizing that many resources would be far too obvious. Would the other nations simply sit back and do nothing?
They might directly block the purchase of certain resources.
Besides, building a five-kilometer warship on a nation the size of Orb would be far too conspicuous. Everyone would know they were manufacturing some enormous piece of equipment.
Returning to the warship before him, its design was no longer the baffling style used on the Warhammer side. Instead, it genuinely matched the word "sci-fi."
Now, under the guidance of A2 and the others, he entered the warship's internal core chamber.
A special device would be installed here: the same kind of core equipment used in Tessa's submarine. In other words, an application of the λ-DRIVER system.
The physical body of this system's equipment had been completed on this side, but the software-like components needed engineers from Tessa's side to help install them.
And now, Kain launched a special invitation.
Cross-Dimensional Support was activated.
This was a new function of the Superdimensional Channel, and for the moment, it was a function only he could use.
It was like playing a game where new functions unlocked after one's cumulative spending reached a certain amount.
By now, he had already consumed more than one thousand energy coins, so this function had been opened to him.
It was a new application based on the link between his personal space and the personal spaces of the group members.
Previous teleportation between both sides had been like transmitting data over wireless Wi-Fi. Now, it had become more like a wired connection, with no physical distance separating them.
So after he activated it and the other side accepted, his personal space visibly manifested in reality. A square film of light appeared two meters in front of him.
Because he had opened a space of one thousand cubic meters—that is, a space ten meters long, ten meters wide, and ten meters high—the square film before him was also ten meters by ten meters.
However, it seemed he could change the shape of the light film according to his thoughts. He could turn it into a circle if he wanted, but the total area could not change.
Someone was coming.
The light film looked like a sheet of plastic as someone seemed to force their way through, tearing across from the other side. A human silhouette could be seen running toward him.
The next second, that figure passed straight through.
Judging by the amount of force they used, it was not because they were worried they would fail to break through the light film. Rather, the situation on the other side was probably unclear. Slowly crossing over would only have made them more uneasy, so they had simply charged through.
As a result, unable to brake in time, she crashed straight into his arms.
Then the light film vanished. In truth, it had merely turned invisible while maintaining the wired connection to the other side.
"Th-thank you."
"Don't be so reckless next time."
"What reckless? Tessa pushed me."
Kaname Chidori immediately protested, displeased.
She was the engineer sent over here, as well as the test subject for the function he had opened.
The reason Tessa herself had not come was simple: it was impossible. If the person serving as the anchor was no longer in her own world, how could she teleport anyone else?
The next second, Chidori looked around like a curious child.
"Is this really the Moon?"
As she said that, she even jumped a little, apparently noticing that the gravity felt different.
"Yes. This is our lunar base."
The one who answered was a blonde girl with braided twin tails. Through Tessa's livestream, Chidori knew who she was: 6O.
"You're 6O, right?"
"Mm-hmm."
"That thin, obscene-looking protective suit that needed his fingerprint to unlock—this guy said you were the one who set it up. Is that true?"
Chidori immediately questioned her about it.
"What? I didn't do that."
"6O did it."
"She did it."
6O denied it, but the other two confirmed it was her. Those two were A2 and 2B.
"What the heck? You two are no fun at all, selling me out immediately. Besides, it wasn't my idea. It was the Commander's."
"6O, when did I ever order you to do something like that?"
The tall, blonde beauty was Commander White. She frowned slightly and spoke in a calm tone, as if this truly had been 6O acting on her own.
"Commander, don't pretend you didn't know, okay? You were clearly the one who told me to do it. You said it would stimulate ambiguity between men and women and speed up the two of them moving into S—Mmph! Mmmph!"
6O was unable to continue. At a signal from the Commander, several people stepped forward, covered her mouth, and dragged her away.
So Chidori stared at the Commander with dead fish eyes.
Come to think of it, what had 6O been about to say?
Was that "S" the start of an English word?
Sex?
The moment Chidori thought of that word, her face turned red, and she glared at a certain guy who looked completely innocent.
Actually, it would be more accurate to say he had no real expression and remained perfectly calm.
"Um, how does that forty-seven-energy-coin consumption work?"
Chidori asked with a slightly more serious expression.
"For now, with only you coming over, it costs one coin per hour."
Kain gave that answer.
"That expensive?"
As a member of the Superdimensional Channel, directly teleporting to another world cost one hundred hours' worth of currency.
But for her, a non-member, coming over through this method cost one coin per hour. It really was expensive.
This was charged by time, unlike them buying a fixed duration directly. That instantly dispelled Chidori's original thought of staying for a while.
"This may be purely the cost of maintaining the channel connection. However, as more items are added, and as the mass of things coming through increases, the energy-coin consumption will also accelerate."
Within the function Kain had activated, an hourglass marked with the energy-coin icon appeared.
According to the text description above it, if additional mass crossed over, the hourglass would speed up. Once it emptied, one energy coin would be consumed, and the next coin would begin being consumed.
At the same time, some energy coins would be locked in as a guaranteed minimum.
That was the guaranteed traffic cost for directly teleporting Chidori back when the channel closed. At present, one coin was locked, likely because anything less than one coin was counted as one coin.
In other words, Chidori did not necessarily have to walk back through the light film to return. Even if she were somewhere else, once the channel ended, she would be directly teleported back.
And this activation of the Cross-Dimensional Support function made Kain foresee a future where he could summon fleets from other worlds to provide support and carry out strikes.
(End of Chapter)
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