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The Secret beyond the Mines

It didn't need a lot of time for Dairyu to go to the fortified entrance, where Aldnoah's Quick Reaction Force was waiting for him. When they see him, they turned around and made a salute to the Warrior, in which he nodded.

Dairyu moved to the makeshift wall, made of a darkened plasma barrier that prevented the androids to attack them and see them making a strategy. "Smart moves," thought Dairyu. "Wonder if they know how androids fight."

"Warrior, we've been expecting you," said one of the Aqura, a heavily suited shark alien wielding a gun big enough to need carrying by two or three of his race, if not for the giant suit.

Examining the suit, Dairyu said, "You're suited for heavy duty purposes?"

"I am stationed at the front line."

"Alright, so tell me what you got."

"As you can see..."

The Aquros then pulled out a tablet and from the hollow frame came out a 3D schematics of the pressurized tunnel leading to the mine. There were five people outside, all of them were Aquros. Aside from their static condition, they weren't inside a bulky suit, which made Dairyu theorized that they were androids.

"These artificial Aqura destroyed our weapons the moment they see us. I suggest you be very careful when dealing with them, even if you're a famed Terran Dragon Warrior."

"Famed? But I..."

"It's no secret now. A young Aquros named Capisa gave me everything I can understand about how you save him from the Aldor pirates."

At least I got a fan, thought Dairyu. But then, Capisa should know that his rumors could risk some of the Aqura currently stationed in front of the androids, especially if they eventually became dependent on him.

Watching the situation thoroughly, he concluded that the androids had a virtually perfect defense ground that could easily annihilate the group if they were given a chance and full visibility on the targets. The reason they hadn't attacked yet was because of the probability of destruction by the proximity mines planted earlier, which was printed inside their mind clearly. They analyzed the battlefield in regards of the virtual probability, and thus could see if doing a course of action would be beneficial for them or not.

"Hmm...this is hard enough," said Dairyu. "If we're not surrounded by anti-pressure glass, I can make a round turn and ambushed the androids from behind with my sword. Do you have a drone mine?"

"We had one, before they shot it down."

"Do you have any EMP to use?"

"If we have it, we would throw it already. We're at quite a stalemate here, and..."

"Increase the output of your shield, frontline soldier, and be prepared to open this plasma wall on my mark. I have a plan, and it's up to whether your shield can hold around five seconds of damage before recharging."

"But, I'm the only front line here! If we messed up, those guys behind us won't get another chance. Not to mention there are proximity mines behind these walls!"

Dairyu put one of his clawed hands on the Aquros's suit, and said "If you trust Capisa's story, give me some optimism in your part. I've got too much pessimism since getting out from Terra."

Despite some hesitation, the Aquros nodded and maximized his shield output. The soldier nodded to Dairyu, and he de-energized the shield, which quickly attracted the android's view. They quickly shot the group in a ferocity of a robotic killing machine, which quickly overwhelmed both Dairyu and the Aquros. The bulky suit could managed gunshots, but he needed the shield for explosives and laser guns, which quickly consumed too much energy for it to hold, even for five seconds.

Luckily, Dairyu managed to use the five second chance to launch his counter-attack. He gathered a substantial amount of inner energy, and with a roar, blasted it out of his body, which created a shockwave that affected those behind him. Just as the Aquros's shield depleted because of a missile directly hitting him, the shockwave threw the androids off-balance. Since Dairyu wasn't listed as a QRF member, the proximity mine was armed, and because it was armed, it left its anchor and started levitating. The shockwave threw them towards the enemy, and a huge explosion occurred, though not big enough to break the glass and caving in the mine, yet enough to destroy the clustered Android force.

"Well, now that's done, we can clear out this cave from..."

The frontline soldier suddenly drew his gun and pointed it to his head, which was nothing very unusual for the Warrior. He calmly said, "Never had thought you'll betray me this quickly. This Aldnoah's?"

"Unfortunately he's not a crucial member of our group. That QRF you're talking about is gone, and we have removed every single witness to this operation, including that storyteller of yours, and the mayor."

"So I'm walking in a trap? What a cliché..."

The frontline soldier suddenly kicked Dairyu in the back, prompting him to grunt as he fell to the sandy floor. The frontline soldier then held the gun to his head and said, "I'm not taking hostages, Dairyu Tsukasa. No witnesses and that pirate thing is just a situational lie. We put the androids there to make an impression that this mine is occupied. Not only that, the mine itself contains something we want."

"If it's a dangerous thing, just let me put it in better hands than in your goddamn hands. If you're not the pirates, then who the fuck are you?"

"Why do you even care, you're going to die anyway."

"And that's why I'm saying this is just a cliché..."

Suddenly the soldier felt something weird, as if he was drinking something unnatural and very salty. Suddenly, he felt himself choking in contaminated water, with many others having the same sensation. They were suffocating inside the suit, and with its primary functions off, they couldn't move the bulky suits. Dairyu stood up over them, trying to act cool while he didn't know what happened. His first strategy was to fill his sword with magic and throw it to the Aquros, cutting his hand before making a counter attack, but who did that?

Just then, a moving figure came from between the dead Aqura, with a slimmer suit but no helmet, just like what Aldnoah had. Since Dairyu had seen how untrustworthy the Aqura he just met can be, he quickly drew his gun, but the smaller Aquros was clearly scared and exclaimed, "No, wait! I'm not your enemy! It's Capisa! Do you still remember my stripes' patterns?!"

"You're lean and have lighter scale color, so I'm convinced," said Dairyu while slowly putting down his gun. "Did you tamper the suits?"

"Yes, I injected high level of salt into the suit when I was walking into the barracks with them when they wanted to tell me about your story. I figured it was a trap and I'm no storyteller, so I changed the injection canister to a high saline one we used in non-salt aquatic colonies, but it still needed time."

"They said they killed you."

"That's why I bought a special suit that had a shield layer besides the artificial aquatic environment nanites. At least that saved me."

"Okay, I don't want to stay here hearing of your account surviving and mercilessly killing a whole fucking army. Right now, you're safer with me than in the colony. The mayor is dead and I bet the colony is overrun by pirates."

"What are you going to do?"

"Trying to find out about what those pirates wanted to get with that elaborate trap."

Dairyu and Capisa walked past the broken remains of the androids into the partly collapsed cave. Due to the earlier proximity mine, the platform into the mine was partially crooked and broken, making both of them cautious around the rusted metal platforms.

A little while walking down and they had found the bottom of the mine. Just like what Aldnoah said, the mine was flooded and it's abandoned for...maybe a decade or so. Most of the equipment partially submerged in the blue water was old drilling models, and they started to rust on the salt water. Some minerals were left unchecked, and based on Dairyu's knowledge, they were raw Trilium.

Just then he heard a scream, and reactively ran to the voice. When he finally reached the source, he saw Capisa on the floor scared on something down the pit. When the shark alien turned, he said, "There's a naked Aquros down there!"

"Calm down, Capisa, what's the problem with a naked shark alien?"

"He's dead!"

Dairyu quickly put Capisa behind him, and he saw what horrified the young Aquros.

There was a black scaled Aquros beneath the pool, stripped from every garment possible, wide-eyed, unfocused, and static. Pool of red blood was on the surface of the clear water, gushing out from the shark's head. He was dead, and by the looks of it, he wasn't someone that's unknown either.

"So I'm talking to an impostor," said Dairyu to himself, when Capisa said, "This is some kind of a sick murder scene I read in Terran works! Who the hell is he?"

"He's the real Aldnoah Sidhe, the mayor of Arron town. Guess I won't get the fifty thousand."

"You made a deal with him?!"

"Guess I'm that typical jack of all trades."

"No, I mean...nevermind. Just what was he doing in here? And did you say about an impostor?"

"It's a long story. First thing's first, we gotta try to find something of importance in this cave, then get the hell out of this planet before we run into another trouble."

"Does that include your scouter?"

"Don't worry. It's well-protected enough...I guess."

Both of them ventured deeper into the cave. It wasn't infested with feral aliens, but the cave was eerie enough since it's underwater and only some of the mine was not flooded. Capisa was more comfortable when diving underwater, though, and he helped Dairyu to find something underwater, which couldn't be called a success.

They went on for a while, relying on any senses they could, until a call from deep inside the cave gave hope of something. Though Capisa was eager to find out, Dairyu held him and shook his head. He then walked forward and carefully unsheathed his sword when the voice rung out again, this time with a greater intensity than before. Dairyu managed to fight off the mental attack when he finally found the source of the attack.

A glowing ruby sat on a pedestal in the middle of a vast room. The room itself had a distinctive red glow on its own, all of it was sourced from the precious stone. Its structure wasn't like something Dairyu ever seen on Terra; it's alien, and it's age was evident from the dark hue of the ruby. It's polished into a neat oval cut, and it's around the size of a native ostrich's egg.

Dairyu knew its beauty and size would appall a Western, especially to some of his old comrades with a craving of gold and any precious matter. For Dairyu, those things were merely a trade item, and once he got one, he would directly sell it for the credits he needed to repair his ship, with a hope that he could buy a new one. If one of the dragon warriors wanted it that bad, he would just give them, for a hefty amount of price that sometimes made them shook their heads. One of them even commented that his greed was "far worse than the old dragons", which was taken by the Orient as something to be proud of (since being released from official military duty, the Warriors needed money from anything they could do in the galaxy).

Yet, despite of knowing that the alien ruby would cover the credits he lost after being betrayed, he felt something weird. The sounds were inside his head like he was in the middle of a crowded trade colony. It was lively and full of energetic and optimistic mind. But, the next moment, it all faded, and all he could hear were screams and death of the aliens. Betrayal and panic soon filled his mind, and fragments of pictures depicting the destruction flashed in front of him, as if it's directly at his eye. It was all overwhelming for Dairyu. All the feelings and minds mixed into his head were too much. He felt like his head was going to explode, and he roared as strong as a feral dragon would, with all of his memories jumbled by the mental images. The attack blacked him out, and all he could see was darkness.

*********

Dairyu heard a faint voice calling him. It was like a young teenager trying to call him, yet it had a distinct accent that was like someone he recently knew.

He opened his eyes, and Capisa's green slit eyes were in front of him.

"Oh...," said Dairyu with a grunt. "How long did I pass out?"

"Not too long," said Capisa. "I dragged you out to the cave entrance, and you're so light so it didn't need that much of energy to lift you."

Dairyu knew that Aqura had great strength compared to the strongest beast race in Terra. He put that fact aside and said, "Did you get attacked?"

"No...but you should see what happened to Arron."

As the warrior struggled to get up, he felt a very different atmosphere from before he passed out. Aside from the saltiness of the air in the cave, he could feel dense air coming from Arron. It looked indifferent from the dark sea, but he knew it mean trouble when he couldn't see any lights coming from the bustling colony.

"What the hell's going on?"

"I don't know for certain, but..."

Dairyu could see that Capisa was trembling, and he could see why.

An Aquros was floating outside of the tunnel, eyes wide. His body was wrecked, and his blood made most of the ceiling dark with red blood. His head was blown at the side and he was charred, a victim of explosion. This particular morbid scene made Capisa think; did the fake mayor went into a rage after he knew his 'QRF' were all killed, or did he try to cover everything and kill any witness?

Both way, aside from the dead Aqura lining the tunnel still inside their suits, Dairyu and Capisa could see the carnage, and they were slowly convinced that they weren't dealing with a mutiny or a pirate raid, but a full scale invasion of a vicious alien race that like to gut out an alien's insides.