"Could this ancient ruin actually be a military base? This clearly looks like a storage hall for robots!"
Staring at the neatly arranged robot army, Mirei Shinohara once again voiced her amazement.
Shiraori nodded in agreement, her beautiful crimson eyes flickering with excitement.
In her past life as a hardcore gamer, Shiraori had always been fascinated by robots and similar things. If possible, she even wanted to bring one out of the ruins to play with.
Unfortunately, the robots weren't about to give her that chance.
Most of the machines in the hall were still inactive, though there were many empty spaces in the front rows—clearly the slots where the ones she and Mirei had just dismantled had once stood.
Of course, that was only because they hadn't stepped fully into the hall yet.
The moment they entered the hall, the inactive robots instantly activated, converging on them all at once.
At the same time, the walls of the corridor behind them split open, releasing another swarm of robots hidden within.
In an instant, they were engulfed in a torrent of steel, while countless energy bullets filled the air in a wild crossfire.
If any human or monster without strong defenses had appeared here, they would have been turned into a sieve by stray fire in seconds.
But even with thousands of robots, Shiraori and Mirei were not troubled in the slightest.
In less than ten minutes, the robots followed their "predecessors" into scrap, reduced to nothing more than heaps of broken metal parts.
"They're not hard to fight, but having so many of them really is a pain." Floating above, Mirei glanced down at the ground, now carpeted in robot wreckage, and couldn't help but complain.
Shiraori nodded in agreement, though her eyes carried a trace of regret.
"Ahhh, they were such cool robots… and now they're all just scrap metal. What a waste."
Just as she was lamenting, a massive energy shell suddenly shot out from deep within the hall.
At the same time, she heard Mirei's startled cry not far away.
"Watch out!"
But the warning came a moment too late. The energy shell slammed into Shiraori's forehead before she could react, the impact hurling her backward several meters.
Seeing this, Mirei rushed to Shiraori's side, looking down at her in worry.
"Shira, are you okay?"
Shiraori didn't answer immediately. Instead, she rolled to her feet.
Despite the direct hit, her body was unharmed. The only mark was a faint red spot on her forehead.
"Uwaa, seriously? A headshot on a beautiful girl? If my defenses weren't this strong, I'd be disfigured for sure!"
"I've said it a million times already, but Pain Nullification really is god-tier!"
"Without it, I'd definitely be bawling my eyes out right now. Definitely!"
"Thank you, Pain Nullification, for letting me fight without holding back!"
After her quick inner rant, Shiraori turned to Mirei and shook her head.
"I'm fine."
"Phew, that's a relief." Mirei sighed, reassured by Shiraori's intact state. Then her gaze shifted toward the direction from which the energy shell had come.
"What was that this time?"
Following Mirei's words, Shiraori also turned her gaze toward the source of the energy shell. Soon, they saw something emerge from the far end of the hall that exceeded even their expectations.
It was a war chariot—a massive steel vehicle, its entire body encased in heavy armor.
Mounted on top was a huge turret.
It was obvious that the energy shell that had just struck Shiraori's forehead had come from that cannon.
Compared to the guns wielded by the robots, the difference in power was like night and day.
Though the shell hadn't injured Shiraori, it had still blasted her several meters back when she wasn't guarding herself—something the robots' weapons could never achieve.
From the impact alone, Shiraori estimated the shell's power had exceeded 10,000 points.
That kind of force could easily one-shot most monsters—and nearly all humans.
As the chariot rolled toward them, it didn't stop firing. One energy shell after another blazed from the massive barrel.
The projectiles were fast, but not fast enough. To Shiraori and Mirei, dodging them was effortless.
They countered with their own abilities—Mirei unleashed thunder, while Shiraori used her Dark Magic: Dark Spear.
But the moment their attacks struck the chariot, they vanished without a trace, as though they had never existed.
Both of them froze.
"What's going on? Why didn't my attack work?" Mirei cried out. Refusing to accept it, she tried other skills, but every strike disappeared upon contact with the chariot.
Memories of countless isekai light novels surged in Shiraori's mind, and she thought of a universal cheat skill.
"Could the chariot be covered by some kind of mysterious barrier that nullifies attacks?"
She immediately voiced her suspicion to Mirei.
"That's a problem. If our attacks don't work, doesn't that mean we'll just have to sit here and take it?" Mirei grumbled. But then her eyes lit up.
"Not necessarily. We've only tried magic so far. What about physical attacks?"
Without hesitation, Mirei charged at the chariot. Reaching it, she twisted her body and slammed her massive tail against it.
Boom!
With that single strike, the enormous steel chariot collapsed into a heap of wreckage.
"Looks like physical attacks still work~" she said smugly, flying back to Shiraori with a satisfied smile on her dragon face.
Shiraori ignored her words, instead clenching her fist.
"So I really do need a physical weapon too. At first, my webs worked fine, but now that I've got a half-human body, they're not really fitting anymore."
Lowering her head, she began to think about her future weapon.
Then her gaze fell to her spider forelegs, shaped like scythes.
In her mind, the image of a stylish weapon surfaced—her eyes lit up instantly.
"Right! I can make a reaper's scythe. That would look way cooler!"
"And I can use my forelegs as materials. With healing skills, I don't even have to worry about becoming crippled."
She immediately resolved to craft her future melee weapon—so eager that she nearly wanted to make it right then and there.
But at that moment, the floor of the hall suddenly began to quake violently.
The tremors grew stronger, equivalent to a magnitude-seven earthquake, and only intensified with each passing moment.
Thankfully, Shiraori's lower spider body provided excellent stability, keeping her from falling. As for Mirei Shinohara, she floated in the air, unaffected by the shaking ground. If not for the walls around them trembling and cracking, she might not even have realized the ground was quaking.
Suddenly, a piercing alarm blared once more.
"This isn't good, Shira. Let's head back to the surface. Looks like something big is about to come out from below." Mirei's expression turned serious as she spoke.
Shiraori didn't object. Clearly, now wasn't the time to keep exploring.
With a nod, she turned and bolted toward the exit.
Just as they began retreating, the ground shattered, and a surge of blazing flames erupted upward, sweeping rapidly through the passage.
Compared to Mirei, who flew easily through the air, Shiraori had a much harder time sprinting on the trembling ground. Though she possessed a space-mobility skill that let her move in midair, it required constructing magical footholds and wasn't suited for navigating tight ruins. For now, she could only rely on her eight long legs to dash across the ground.
Even so, her speed was immense, and the rushing flames never managed to catch up.
Before long, the two burst through the ancient ruins' gate and climbed up through the vertical passage back into the ant nest.
Moments after they emerged onto the surface, the ant nest collapsed entirely.
Then, directly ahead—above where the robot hall had been—a massive, dazzling pillar of fire burst skyward.
The scorching heat spread rapidly through the wilderness, and though Shiraori and Mirei were at a fair distance, they clearly felt the hot wind rush over them.
But neither had the mind to worry about heat. Their gazes were locked in shock at the sight before them.
In the center of the fiery pillar, an octopus-shaped mechanical construct shot into the sky at high speed, vanishing from sight.
Then, a colossal object followed, bursting from underground and halting in midair.
A massive, disk-shaped flying object—several kilometers in diameter—now loomed above them.
Both Shiraori and Mirei stared blankly, their voices overlapping in disbelief.
"UFO?"
...
"So the Appraisal wasn't exaggerating. It really is a UFO. I thought it was just some kind of codename for a strategic weapon of this world…"
Mirei looked up at the hovering object in shock. Beside her, Shiraori was equally stunned, her thoughts in complete disarray.
Even after seeing robots and a war chariot in the ruins, neither had ever truly connected the word "UFO" with an actual UFO. The level of technology was on an entirely different scale.
"Forget it, this isn't the time to think about that. We need to figure out how to get inside and find the bomb." Mirei steadied herself, shot Shiraori a look, then flew upward.
Shiraori quickly followed, using her space-mobility skill to leap through the air as though stepping on invisible platforms.
From the ground, the UFO had looked relatively close. But now, flying toward it, they realized it floated thousands of meters up. As they reached its underside, the craft seemed even more immense, blotting out the sky.
"How do we get in? I don't see any entrance." Mirei frowned, scanning the seamless underside. She considered brute force, but the risk of detonating the bomb inside held her back.
Once again, it was time for Appraisal.
At Shiraori's quiet cue, they both cast Appraisal on the UFO.
[UFO — Actual designation: G-Fleet. Equipped with a GMA Bomb capable of destroying an entire continent. Contains tens of thousands of combat robots and numerous war chariots, prepared to launch indiscriminate attacks against the entire world.
Additional Armament: G-Meteor — a strategic weapon capable of pulling asteroids from the moon's orbit to crash down. Launched into space one minute ago.]
Reading the results, Mirei swallowed hard.
"Uh, Shira… I think we just caused big, big trouble…"
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