The Eleventh Squad had drawn a lot of attention when they returned to Planet K-J100. After the meeting, they became a laughingstock not only within Vanguard, but also other hunter regiments. After all, they were the B Squad where hundreds had received orders to join them, but only five had actually decided to stick around. If this wasn’t funny, what was?
Some people thought that the Eleventh Squad opted for an elitist approach and absorbed only the cream of the crop. Some people also thought that they opted for a democratic approach and was punished for their naivety. Regardless of what the truth of the matter was though, the general consensus was that the newly formed squad with a total crew of less than thirty was ill-equipped to survive any circumstance, much less the current world. They also believed that they were an absolute embarrassment to Vanguard.
Subjectively speaking, their opinion wasn’t unfounded. A squadron’s strength was determined by its fleet size and manpower, and Vanguard was no Blue Butterfly. As a result, the Eleventh Squad was quickly listed as the weakest B Squad of Vanguard.
Cillin, the commander of the Eleventh Squadron, had nothing to say about the matter. Words held no power over him, and the Eleventh Squadron had plenty of time to prove the naysayers wrong. If anything, he was extremely pleased with the decisions he made that led to recruitment of their five new members, especially after Xi Mu passed him their armor.
As of now, the armor Xi Mu issued for them was the standard type that didn’t take their strengths and weaknesses into account. It was because they were still under the observation stage. If they performed excellently in their missions and left the silver-haired genius with a good impression, he would customize their armor into something more fitting. The flip side was equally true. If they did something to damage the Eleventh Squad’s interests, not only would he not design a custom armor for them, he would take back the five standard issue armor as well. Naturally, he had ways to reclaim the gifts he had given away.
Six of the eleven B Squadrons that returned to Planet K-J100 to attend the general meeting had already departed to somewhere. Cillin too applied for departure after telling everyone to be ready.
“Hi, Little Eleven! We finally meet!”
Mogas greeted Little Eleven after arriving at the space station and standing in front of the starship.
“I’m very happy to meet you all too. Oh right, I’ve already prepared your rooms. Feel free to decorate them to your liking,” Little Eleven said to the five new recruits.
Thanks to the creation of Little Eleven, the crew no longer needed to deal with miscellaneous stuff like this personally. They could leave it to the super AI to handle things.
The six B Squadrons who left earlier didn’t know this, but they had helped the Eleventh Squadron to plot the path of least trouble toward their destination. More speed = less time wasted = good vibes overall. After informing Little Eleven of their flight route, the Eleventh Squad embarked on a new journey once more.
Thanks to all the preparations they made before the departure, the Eleventh Squad didn’t encounter any trouble until they left Sector K. Not even the random hunter regiments they encountered along the way had tried to attack them, much to the disappointment of the crew. They had really wanted to test out their new armor.
The Eleventh Squad had their own exclusive confidentiality code, of which the five new recruits had no problems with whatsoever. Not everything should be shared with everyone, and this was especially true for a unique circle like the hunters. Who would want to share their resources with other people when most of the time, they didn’t even have enough for themselves? All eleven B Squadrons of Vanguard had developed their strength through their own abilities and efforts. Hunting had always been a risky profession, and no one in this circle was a philanthropist.
The more the five new recruits interacted with the Eleventh Squad, the bigger their astonishment grew. It was because the Eleventh Squad’s abilities were completely at odds with their crew size. The armor and the starship’s super AI were already pretty surprising, but the Eleventh Squad received a message the moment they left Sector K. A short time later, a transport ship made contact with the Eleventh Squad and transferred a ton of resources to them.
While running back and forth between the many, many boxes of food, Mogas asked, “Do we have an affair with the smiley-face company or something? Considering the current market, these stuff could only be described as luxury! Not even the A Squad gets to enjoy this quality of food all the time when they’re out on a mission!”
Mogas grabbed a bag of jerkies from a box and gave its contents a taste. A blissful expression covered his features until he saw Cary smirking at him and hurriedly wiped his mouth. He then ran over and asked him how the Eleventh Squad was able to afford all these.
Still smirking, Cary replied enigmatically, “Let’s just say that the reason we are able to obtain these resources at a low price is thanks to the commander, not us.”
Mogas shot a glance at Cillin. The young man was speaking with the person in charge of the transport, while Wheeze was walking back and forth with its tail held high and ordering the robots to carry its fish biscuits.
“Our commander cares this much for his pet?” It didn’t take a genius to know that the dozen of boxes of fish biscuits were incredibly expensive.
“Oh, that? That didn’t come out of our budget. Sir cat had ‘negotiated’ it all by itself.”
Mogas scratched his chin and muttered to himself, “I’m starting to think that the five of us got really lucky when we chose to join the Eleventh Squad.”
After receiving the resources, the Eleventh Squad traveled straight away to their first mission destination. On the way, they stopped near Sector E and dropped Cillin, Czedow and Shusag for their top secret mission. Three decoy robots would be covering from them until they returned.
Cillin flew into Sector E on a small spaceplane. The sector was a lot busier compared to the last time he visited it.
Ever since the chaos began, big and small battles had been happening throughout the GAL galaxy. Naturally, many wealthy and well-connected people came to Sector E, the sector famous for its medical prowess and reliability, to nurse their wounded. However, the price of everything including medicine and treatment had skyrocketed as a matter of course, so almost everyone who came to Sector E for treatment were wealthy to a certain extent.
On a related note, the big families didn’t need to rely on Sector E to enjoy the highest quality treatment. They had their own professional medical teams to treat their wounded. After the chaos began, they redoubled their efforts to absorb excellent medical practitioners into their ranks, and where better to hunt for such talent if not the prestigious Sector E? The massive outflow of talent was another reason why the medical costs of Sector E had hiked up considerably.
Cillin checked out the price booklets of some sanatoriums. What should’ve been enough to cover for a comprehensive induction therapy, follow-up care and rehabilitation was now only enough to cover for a localized induction therapy.
Shusag was very curious to know more about Sector E. A function-based Sector like this didn’t exist in the empire, and a large majority of its medical practitioners were practicing under the nobles. The rest were either practicing under the medical department attached to the RAS or some hidden corner of the galaxy.
Shusag was speechless when he saw the prices. “Holy shit, and here I thought that the saying ‘can’t afford to get hurt’ is just a figure of speech. This completely screws over the normal person who lost a limb or two but can’t afford the medical fee for better treatment, doesn’t it?”
“Pretty much. At these prices, those who could pay for this treatment could afford to get themselves a robotic limb until their therapy is ready. Those who couldn’t afford even that, couldn’t,” replied Cillin.
Coincidentally, a news report related to what they were talking about was displayed on the billboard. Basically, the news was about a self-proclaimed wealthy showboat who encountered a group of space robbers on one of his trips. After his legs were cut off, he managed to escape with his remaining wealth and travel to Sector E, only to discover that he just barely have enough money to cover for the induction therapy and rehabilitation cost of one leg. He wasn’t able to make a proper living after he recovered, and the people around him took shots at him from time to time. In the end, the person couldn’t handle the pressure and committed suicide.
Shusag said after watching the news, “I think there are only two types of people in life: Those who can accept the shit life throws at them, and those who cannot. After I escaped the nobles with my son, I had had to live like a rat in the sewers. I couldn’t use my background, my identity, and all the connections that were associated with it, so I had to beg on the streets just to keep us both alive. All my efforts and achievements had been denied by the very people I served, and I didn’t know to do anything besides hard labor.
“I had had to endure people shouting at me all day when I was working. I couldn’t show any displeasure, retaliate or reveal the fact that I was an alien, because it would get me fired or worse, alienated. It was endure, or starve to death with my son. Other people got to relax and buy gifts for their children when it was a holiday. Me? I was still working at the construction site just like any other day for a pittance. I was as humble as a piece of dry bird shit. I had fallen from the sky and shattered into a million smaller shit.
“Those years were the hardest years of my life. I aged like crazy during that time, and even that tiny bit of pride and ferocity I managed to cultivate during my years in the army all turned into memories… anyway, my point is, I had survived those days despite everything. Meeting you and that cat was the luckiest thing of my life, hehe.”
Shusag put his arms across Cillin and Czedow’s shoulders and pointed at a certain fat cat with his chin. “Say, what do you think its view of life is? Those that can be eaten and cannot be eaten, maybe?”
Cillin shook his head. “No. That may be true for other animals, but to Wheeze? There’s only the tasty and not tasty. I doubt that there’s anything in the world that it cannot eat.”
Meanwhile, the subject in question was crouching low, pulling back its ears, and making some last adjustments to its forelimbs. Then, it abruptly leaped toward a pigeon who stole its bread crumbs and smacked it to the ground. After it retrieved the dizzy pigeon, it bit a hole on the back of a flying car, stuffed the pigeon inside, and sealed it with a chunk of metal it bit off a nearby building. That was how the pair of man and woman who were rocking the car were forced to unwind their hood and chase the pigeon away. Right now, the car owner was wondering out loud why the alarm hadn’t triggered at all, not knowing that Wheeze could render it useless with its brain if it felt like it.
Cillin grabbed the silly cat by the nape and resumed his walk toward a large sanatorium.
The treatment cost of this sanatorium was several times that of the average sanatorium, but it still enjoyed a plethora of patients. The person Cillin came to look for was at the back of the sanatorium where the recuperation area was.
“First floor, room 108, Flanders?”
The guard let them into the room after verifying their identities and obtaining permission from the patient himself. He thought they were just there to visit the patient.
Flanders was the only patient in the recovery ward. He was also their contact man. He was currently enjoying a massage from a specialized treatment instrument and watching the news.