Fated to Die to the Player, I'll Live Freely with My SSS-Class Ship!-Chapter 41: Hunter and the Hunted

Princess Cassandra Meyers was a legitimate "Princess" of a certain solar system. In that place, the monarchy was the ruling system, and Cassandra was the first daughter of the current king—the firstborn and first in line for the throne.

As such, she was raised to maintain an extremely likable "façade" despite having a heart as dark as gutter water—or at least, that was how it was in the original plotline. From my recent interactions with her, I was still split between whether she had become better at hiding her dark side or if she never had such a side in the first place.

Anyway, her storyline shouldn’t be relevant until around chapters 12 to 15 of the main story. But she was already here right now when we were barely off chapter one; it was way too early for her to step in.

"Hmm..."

Just as I was lost in thought, I saw Eva’s eyes flicker. Her long eyelashes shifted as she slowly opened them, then winced in pain, clutching her left shoulder.

"This... it’s dislocated," she whispered, calmly analyzing her situation. "And this place is...? Arthur?" She asked while scanning her surroundings.

"A random abandoned warehouse," I replied, shrugging.

After that, I gave her a brief rundown of what had happened after she blacked out.

"...I originally wanted to head straight for the orbital elevator, but our little guest here is too conspicuous to smuggle through," I said, begrudgingly.

"Huh?"

Eva curiously turned to the person I was pointing at—the woman still asleep beside her. "Who is this...? Your acquaintance?" But for some reason, she didn’t recognize the other party at all.

"... Don’t you watch the news?" I asked, a bit taken aback.

Eva just glared at me before scoffing. "Do I look like I have time for that bullshit? The news is mostly monitored and controlled, anyway. It’s pointless to watch it."

I wanted to shake my head but decided to skip it. "She’s Princess Cassandra Meyers. Not sure if you’ve heard of her, but she’s supposed to be famous. She was also the one being kidnapped—the one you tried to save." I kept my explanation brief.

"I see..." She nodded.

Her reaction made it clear she had no clue who Cassandra was. Well, it didn’t matter anyway.

"Still, what’s wrong with you? Your hands... they’re trembling," Eva noted, her gaze zeroing in on my hands, which rested on my knees.

"And here I was, trying to ignore it..." I sighed.

As a good citizen in my previous world, of course, I had no experience "offing" people. The adrenaline rush coursing through my veins earlier had let me take the hoodlums’ lives without hesitation—treating it as if it were a game.

But this world was "reality" in the truest sense. The people I killed weren’t mob NPCs that would respawn after some time. They only had one life, and I took it. The sensation of crushing a skull with a stomp, the mushy texture of flesh beneath my suit’s feet—it was still fresh in my senses.

Just recalling it made me queasy again.

Of course, space fights were different. No matter how many lives I took in battle, it never felt quite "real" because I wasn’t the one delivering the final blow—my ship was. And with enemies dying at a distance, I never had to witness their final moments. The guilt never reached me.

But now, the scenes from just an hour ago kept replaying in my mind, no matter how much I tried to suppress them. Eyes filled with confusion, shock, and fear. The bloody holes I opened with my blaster... My limbs trembled even as I ran—and I was honestly starting to get fed up with it.

"...!"

My body jolted in shock. Suddenly, Eva grabbed my hands and held them tight. Even through her suit’s gloves, her warmth seemed to seep through, calming my uncontrollable shaking.

"Stupid bastard," she muttered, but there was no malice in her words. "Either be a heartless bitch like usual or some weakling who can’t even kill a man—choose one. Not both. You acting like this is throwing me off..."

"Eva..." I sighed, calling her name.

But peace didn’t last long.

The sensors I had set up all over the area suddenly went off, alerting me to approaching movement. No, not just one—dozens from all directions.

"Shit!" I cursed.

Eva immediately reacted. "What the fuck?! I was just trying to be nice for—"

"No, not you!" I cut her off, dashing toward the still-sleeping princess. "Enemies! They’ve surrounded us!"

Eva gasped, her expression turned serious in an instant. Her eyes narrowed as she sensed the presence closing in—only to grit her teeth in frustration.

"Damn! There’s over a hundred of them this time...!"

"Hun—?!"

Suddenly, we were in a pinch.

Eva’s left shoulder was still dislocated, preventing her from displaying her beast-like martial prowess to the fullest. I, on the other hand, had to carry Cassandra, which put me out of commission as well. Neither of us could fight back properly—but even if we could, there was no way we could take on a hundred enemies at once.

’What to do...’

Right now, thinking was all I could do. But in an abandoned warehouse like this, we had nowhere to hide and nowhere to run. All around us, only dust and empty crates filled our view.

"Wait... Dust?"

An idea struck me like a bolt of inspiration.

"Eva! What do you have on you right now?!" I asked immediately.

Though slightly confused, she quickly checked her inventory. "I only have one blaster, same as you..."

I frowned. We had almost nothing to work with. I quickly scanned the area using my powered suit’s visor, analyzing the contents of the crates. There had to be something we could use in this pile of junk.

"This is...!"

As if Lady Luck herself were smiling at me, I found exactly what we needed.

"Listen up..." I turned to Eva, my expression serious as I laid out the plan.

---

"Sir, teams Alpha to Foxtrot are in position!"

A short distance from the dilapidated warehouse, a group of soldiers gathered inside an armored truck, coordinating the operation. Their forces had surrounded the warehouse—120 troops in total.

"Good," the commanding officer, a man as wide as a couch, grinned from ear to ear.

"Remember, we only need the package alive—the other two don’t matter." He waved his hand, his movements causing the dozens of medals hanging on his chest to release a faint chime.

"Yes, sir! Relaying orders!"

The soldiers inside the truck were already convinced of their victory. After all, the enemy only had two people. There was no way they could stand against 120 trained soldiers.

"Storm in—!"

Just as the commander gave the order, a sharp, blaring siren erupted from outside. Everyone jolted in shock, some nearly panicking.

"What’s that?! Silence that damn thing!" the commander growled.

It took less than ten seconds to trace the source—one of the remote sensors set up around the warehouse. Upon receiving the report, the fat commander scoffed.

"What a futile effort! Even if they distract a few of my men, we’ve surrounded the entire place! There’s nowhere to run!"

{Team Alpha charging in— W-What is this?!}

The sudden confusion in the team’s report made the command center tense.

{The entire warehouse is covered in dust clouds. Visibility is near zero. Switching to thermal vision.}

"Dust?" The fat man raised a brow. "Did they panic after realizing how many troops I sent?"

But such things didn’t matter. His men were equipped with multiple vision modes—night vision, thermal imaging, and everything they needed to adapt to any situation. A simple smokescreen wouldn’t stop them.

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{Heat signatures detected in the middle of the warehouse, at ground level. Approaching the target...}

The confident grins of everyone in the armored truck widened. Everyone was already in a celebratory mood as if they had already succeeded.

"Surround them securely," the commander ordered, the corner of his lips almost reaching his ears. "Make sure they have no escape! With this, our one-billion-credit payday is secured!"

{Roger. Leaving half of each team at the entrances, the rest are moving in. Everyone, charge on three! One... Three!}

Of the 120 troops, 60 charged inside. They moved fast, experienced, undeterred by the poor visibility. They didn’t hesitate as they neared the center of the warehouse—a mistake that cost them dearly.

{W-Wait! The heat signature—it’s just a heated metal plate!}

That was the last report from Team Alpha’s leader—

*BOOOOOM!*

—before the entire warehouse erupted in a fiery explosion.

The soldiers outside were thrown back, rolling disgracefully across the ground. The shockwave and shrapnel alone injured nearly half of them—it wasn’t hard to imagine what happened to those inside.

The explosion caused the warehouse’s support beams to buckle, causing the entire structure to come down on top of the teams. With gravity twelve times stronger than Earth’s, the falling ceiling was almost the same as an entire mountain falling on top of them!

For a moment, chaos reigned. Then, an information officer snapped back to his senses.

"R-Reporting... Half of the strike team... Vitals lost!"

"Impossible!!!"

The fat commander slammed his greasy fist against the armrest of his chair.

"A diversion—so we walked straight into their trap?! Dammit! Find the package’s location now! We can’t let this failure be for nothing!"

His men scrambled to obey, everyone rushing to figure out the next location of the "package"—none of them considered, even for a second, that someone could have survived inside that explosion and collapse.

Without their knowledge, beneath the warehouse, three figures huddled together in the darkness, waiting for the right moment to emerge.