The Stargazing Witch & The Dungeon Planet
Chapter 58: Captain of the Ship

Chapter 58: Captain of the Ship

It was just the two of us in the small control room. Different parts and scrap from different companies and ships created a haphazardly-looking control room. 

I heard some footsteps headed our way, so I sent a blast of soul pressure through the back of the ship.

The sound of footsteps stopped, and I yelled back, “That’s your one warning.”

No one continued to come.

The older man grabbed the edge of the table and pulled himself up.

“I wouldn’t try attacking again unless you want another one of your puppets destroyed and a couple of your limbs.”

The man froze for a second before peacefully standing up. My soul pressure had already completely surrounded him, and I felt that he tried using a skill.

I was surprised he even wanted to try anything. Consider the state of the crew and especially how his puppet ended up. The latter of which would be a considerable dent in their time and resources. I had no idea about the actual physical or time cost it took to make one, but it couldn’t be low.

All forms of combat robotics and puppets had a price. Though the latter, due to requiring a great deal fewer parts, was substantially cheaper.

Humanoid robots weren’t commonly used, and on multiple levels they were inefficient. Drones were used plenty, but one had to go well out of their way to find a humanoid one. The main difference between them and puppets was that robots were engineered to move, while puppets weren’t. A puppet couldn’t stand up or even move without a user controlling them, they were basically just short-mid-range weapons. People didn’t need a skill to control puppets, it could be done through effort and training. However, pretty much everyone who did use puppets did have a skill for it.

A couple of his bones cracked, and he asked, “...Why did you leave us alive.”

He looked up at me trying to look for anything useful. I was quite a bit taller than him which most likely wasn’t helping his neck.

I smiled under my helmet, “Cause I can’t be fucked to pilot the ship.”

The man’s eyes widened, they were screaming ‘She can’t be bloody serious’.

“I know the basics, and I have dealt with similar equipment before, but what has saved you is that I don’t feel like wasting the time figuring that stuff out.” 

The man groaned, “We are alive because of that.”

“Yep,” I held back the part of me that wanted to clap. “Be grateful you didn’t end up like the last group of guys I stumbled upon, there wasn’t much to clean up.”

The man sighed. I believed he was trying to figure out if I was telling the truth or not. Leaving everyone alive might’ve added some doubt to his mind, but the absolute state I left members of his crew in and my general strength and combat prowess–one doesn’t get to my level of absolutely effortless destruction without getting their hands dirty at least one–was enough to make him believe I was being serious.

“What is it that you want?” The man asked. I had to give him credit; he was brave enough to not back down, or he was just so jaded from working in this field for a long time.

“Hmm, I’ll get to that in a moment.” I crouched to reach his height. “But what are you doing out here?”

…

The man stayed silent.

“Come on, answer. I’m not going to bite, I’m just curious, no one is this far in the middle of nowhere for no reason.”

The man sighed in annoyance. At this point, I did hear some more people come to the door. 

Not hostile–I could feel the complete utter fear radiating off them–they probably just wanted to snoop on the conversation.

“Ergh, we got the tip-off that there was some valuable lost cargo in this area...” 

“Did you find anything valuable?”

“Just some scraps, enough to make some profit.” The man sighed.

“What did you plan to do with these scraps?”

“Sell them of course.”

“Anywhere specific?”

“Just wherever the next stop would be.”

“And, where do you plan to stop next?” The man clicked his tongue, he clearly didn’t want to give me any specific information by just giving vague responses.

They could be selling the goods anywhere, through legal or illegal means. Plenty of scavengers searched through space trying to find loot, so there were plenty of legal ways to sell their goods. It was also very easy–for the most part–to tell the difference between scavengers and pirates. 

A scavenger won’t carry a weapon, which is something that those who are on the wrong side of space law find hard to do. There were other reasons, like the logos, ship design, and standard protocols when meeting others in space–surrounding someone and attacking them on sight wasn’t one of them. 

“In sector 8 of the Jinlet galaxy… an auction is going to be held in three month’s time.”

“At Jelannax colony?”

“Yes…” The man sighed, “Nexus Marques auction, it was announced four months ago.”

There weren’t many large colonies in the depths of space anymore. After humanity claimed multiple planets that could support life in different far-reaching sectors of the universe, the need and desire to create more dwindled.

Space stations could easily support the people living there and were easily moveable. Smaller colonies did exist on or near mining and hunting operations but they were a very temporary living arrangement for most. There were still exceptions.

The Jelannax colony wasn’t a simple small colony on a small planet but was a massive, multipart space-faring station. However, it couldn’t be compared to the normal space station as its size and equipment dwarfed them so many times over. It was created six hundred years ago and at the time, it was still incredibly advanced. For years it moved around, but around two hundred years ago it stopped at its now permanent residence in the Jinlet galaxy. It still does technically move around but in a smaller contained area.

“Fair enough, are we relatively close to Jelannax then?”

The man raised his eyebrow, so I just answered, “Just got into a teleportation accident, nothing too crazy.”

“We… are relatively in a way. There isn’t much… well any traces of civilization in these parts, but with this ship, we will be able to get to one of the outer transport tunnels in nearly three months time.”

I said, “Cutting it close.”

“We’d rather be in and out.” 

Hmmm…

To be honest, I didn’t want to leave these guys alone after I reached whatever location that would get me home. However, if they knew that–well they probably thought I would contact the authorities if we reached anywhere that allowed me to do that–then they would have nothing to lose by fucking with my journey home. 

Maybe I should’ve just killed them.

“Surprised you’re going to Jelannax, I would think it would be too big for your profession.”

The older man just replied, “Sometimes when something becomes too big, it becomes even easier to hide.”

“An auction is big, yeah, but not that big, there is still no chance Jelannax security would let you pass.”

He raised his eyebrow again, this time not questioning my reasoning or motives but in just genuine confusion. 

I sighed. “Something big is being sold there, isn’t it?”

“‘Big’ isn’t even close.” The man shook his head, “Multiple works of Craftalot.”

I swore under my breath, “What the fuck…” 

Craftalot was a powerful man with a dumb name. It was something he gave to himself, probably due to ego, but it was well deserved.

He was one of the few individuals left in the world who had surpassed level 400. The gap between–50~100 was decently big, 100~150 was large, and the 150~200 range was so massive that reaching it was a pipe dream for many–this kept going all the way up. 

From what I knew, there were only twenty-ish people alive that surpassed level 400. I wouldn’t have been surprised if there were more who just decided to distance themselves from society but still, their numbers were really low.

Craftalot was a terrifying Wizard who specialised in crafting powerful artefacts, making some of the greatest ones in existence. Some were even said to rival the top-end natural artefacts found extremely rarely in dungeons. 

However, for people looking to get one of these artefacts, getting one was a nearly impossible mission. One needed to be–on his good side, request something that was interesting for him to make, and somehow contact the bloke. Like most famous high-level individuals, he was tough to track down. Besides that, he was known to be a massive hoarder of his non-direct requested items.

“How the fuck did that even happen?”

“Apparently, ‘It was time to clear out the storage.’ So he was convinced to just sell some of his older items, but on the rumour mill, just by doing this he is getting a large amount of rare material.”

“...That makes sense.”

Give him something that lets him craft better gear, for some of his old junk. That still must’ve been an absolute pain in the arse to make him agree.

I was curious, “Did they show off any of the products?”

The man laughed, “Yep, even for ‘Old crap’, they are better than most stuff I’ve seen across my entire life.”

…

There were still a lot of questions I needed to ask, but a simple conclusion appeared in my head.

Dominous Hood would be after these items…

I needed to see the products that were shown, but if they were anywhere near as good as what the tales said they were, then Dominous Hood would for sure attempt to steal them. The question then landed on whether they would try stealing before the items were given out or go after them individually. 

The opportunity to get so many… at once… the opportunity cost has to be too great, right?

I made a decision, “How long have you been in the business for?”

The man–matter of factly–replied, “Most of my life.”

“You got any family?”

“No.”

“That’s a lie.”

The man just questioned me, “Huh?”

What he didn’t know was that my soul pressure had completely surrounded him this entire time. I knew it was theoretically possible–if one was an expert–to sound out lies with soul pressure, however, I was far and away not skilled at that. I was good at other aspects of it, but I never had the practice in that skill set and didn’t know what to look for. Monsters weren’t exactly a chatty bunch.

But his heart skipped a beat. I didn’t know if this was a correct sign, but I decided to play along. Worse case I was wrong, and I would be considered stupid and weird. Hurray, nothing was lost.

“I also have a lot of tricks up my sleeve.”

I kicked and broke his right arm, then stepped on his left leg, causing another loud crack.

“Argh!” He fell to his side. His crew stayed at the door, afraid to enter.

“I said don’t try anything, remember?”

I created a starlight claw, punched through the floor, and dragged up a puppet he was moving under me. It had a long black blade attached to its arm–a more specially made variety compared to his others.

Still, I promised.

“You’re lucky I didn’t say I would kill you the next time you tried something.”

The puppet erupted in a deep crimson flame. 

“Cause you see, I got a deal for you.”