But the thing was, finding a place to summon the spaceship seed to be a serious problem, one that Tatehan had been turning over in his mind for weeks now without finding a satisfactory solution.
The spaceship was not just so ordinary piece of salvage. It was a really powerful artifact, a relic of a war that had destroyed Earth, a vessel built to fight beings that could level cities with a thought.
Summoning it at a random place could pose the risk of it getting noticed by the wrong people, and that was a risk Tatehan could not afford to take.
He rembered the Spaceship’s AI warning him, back when he had first awakened in the wreckage, that there were hundreds of people who were still searching for this ship.
And now that he thought about it, this would be governnts, corporations, scavengers and even warlords.
The Space Dragons that had ravaged Earth had been looking for it during their invasion, tearing through cities and continents in their desperate hunt. But they had never found it. And if those impossibly powerful creatures had failed to locate it despite their best efforts, then it was only reasonable to assu that the ship had to be out there sowhere, hidden, waiting to be discovered by soone who knew where to look.
It was the best assumption to assu.
And now Tatehan had it. In his inventory. A massive, half-functional warship that could change the course of this entire conflict if he could just figure out how to repair it.
But first, he needed sowhere to summon it.
Tatehan leaned back in the pilot seat of his Skyblade, his eyes staring out at the Martian landscape rushing past below, and he thought about where he could possibly summon sothing as dium-to-large as that ship without drawing unwanted attention.
The only sensible place that ca to his mind was a large garage. Sowhere large and empty, a space that could contain the ship and allow him to work on it without being interrupted or observed. A place where he could summon the spaceship, open it up, assess the damage, and start making repairs as usual.
He kind of missed the wastelands where he had been before, back when the spaceship had been sitting in that remote, desolate stretch of nothingness, perfectly positioned to not be noticeable. Out there, he had been able to work in relative peace, with nothing but the wind and the dust and the occasional scavenger creature to worry about.
But the occasional ’scavenger creature’ were only brutenecks: with their different variations that is. Then they had proved to be slightly hard to fight, but now..., he could kill multiple of them with one punch.
That was to show you how powerful he had beco.
But even then, the Spaceship’s AI had always cautioned him that he needed to be fast. Even though there was a 99.9 percent chance of it not being found at that mont, the AI had warned that soon it would beco possible to locate the ship.
The wastelands were the most unexplored region of the planet at that ti, but that would not last forever. Eventually, soone would venture out that far. Eventually, soone would stumble across it.
And sure enough, just days after Tatehan had left, he had heard reports that the Obscuron had sent forces into that side of the wastelands. A raiding party, maybe, or a scouting expedition. Tatehan did not know the details, but the timing had been unsettlingly close.
If he had still been there when the Obscuron’s forces arrived, he would have been caught in the middle of it. He would have been forced to either abandon the ship or defend it against an enemy he was not yet prepared to face.
So, thank goodness he had left when he did. Thank goodness he had moved the ship into his inventory and gotten out before things went bad.
But now, finding a large empty place in Waython Hollow seed sort of impossible. The city was occupied, densely packed with buildings and people and infrastructure.
Every available space was taken, every district filled with housing or comrcial zones or industrial facilities. He could not just buy a piece of land and start constructing sothing without displacing the people who were already living or working there. And even if he could, the construction process itself would draw attention, it would raise questions and it would make people curious about what he was building and why.
He could not do it here. Not in Waython Hollow. Not in the heart of the Red Crest Clan’s territory where every movent was scrutinized, where every decision he made as Battle Commander was watched and analyzed by the people who followed him.
He would need to do this in another city. Sowhere outside the five cities he was currently in alliance with, sowhere neutral or remote enough that he could operate without raising suspicion.
Maybe when all this was settled, when the Obscuron was dead and the threat had been neutralized, Tatehan could relocate. He could buy a piece of land sowhere quiet, sowhere isolated, and build a proper facility. A garage large enough to house the ship, equipped with the tools and equipnt he would need to perform the repairs.
Or maybe he could rent an existing structure, sothing abandoned or underutilized, and revamp it, converting it into a workspace where he could finally finish what he had started.
That was the dream, anyway. The long-term plan.
But for now, that plan was on hold. And the reason was simple: he needed to wrap up this Obscuron matter real quick.
Because as long as the Obscuron was out there, as long as his forces were raiding cities and building bases and preparing for so apocalyptic final strike, Tatehan could not afford to focus on anything else.
He could not afford to take ti away from the war effort to work on a personal project, no matter how important that project might be.
And yet, there was another possibility. One that Tatehan had been turning over in his mind more and more lately.
Maybe the spaceship would play a big role in defeating the Obscuron.
Maybe, if he could find a way to repair even part of it: maybe just the weapons systems, or the defensive shields, or the propulsion, it could tip the scales in their favor.
The ship had been designed to fight beings far more powerful than anything Mars had ever seen. If he could get it functional, even partially, it could be the weapon they needed to breach the West, to break through that invisible force barrier and to strike at the heart of the Obscuron’s operations and end this war once and for all.
But that was a big "if." A lot of things would need to go right for that to happen. He would need ti, resources, expertise, and most importantly, a place to work.
And right now, he had none of those things.
Tatehan sighed, his hands tightening slightly on the controls of the Skyblade as he brought it in for a landing on the outskirts of Waython Hollow. The city spread out below him, its lights glowing faintly in the dim Martian evening, and he felt a strange mix of frustration and determination settle over him.
He did not know how this was all going to play out. He did not know if he would ever get the chance to properly repair the spaceship, or if it would remain in his inventory forever, a powerful but inaccessible relic of a war that was no longer being fought.
But he knew one thing for certain.
He was not giving up. Not on the ship. Not on the fight. Not on goddamn anything.
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