Damn.

  I felt… a little embarrassed, honestly.

  Thinking back on it now—unlike when I used to play this game on my phone, just tapping through menus—or later, when VR became an optional gear setting—this was different. Now, I wasn’t watching a rendered world. I was inside it.

  And besides, the ship wasn’t even powered up yet.

  I let out a groan and facepalmed out of habit—only to instantly regret it. My metal-plated hand smacked the faceplate of my helmet with a hollow clunk, rattling my head like a struck bell.

  I winced.

  “…Yeah. Nice move, genius.”

  But then—just as the pain settled—I remembered something.

  When I first played this game and had to operate my very first ship—wasn’t there a voice command I had to say?

  I closed my eyes, digging into long-faded memories. There was a phrase… a trigger. Something every newbie player had to say—like a rite of passage. A verbal key to unlock the stars.

  It had been over four years since I last said it. Back then, I was too focused on mining and crafting modules to sell for RMB just to cover daily expenses. I stopped caring about the ceremonial stuff.

  But I remembered the videos. Streamers fumbling with it. Some laughing, some shouting it like a battle cry. Everyone had their own dramatic variation.

  My memory clung like fog—thin, half-there.

  Vestiges.

  That was the word.

  If I was right, I had to call out the ship’s name—the one I personally entered when I first customized my character.

  So I whispered, almost instinctively,

  “Minerva… system… start up!!!”

  The last words came out louder than I expected.

  For half a second, nothing happened.

  Then—

  A low mechanical hum spread across the dome.

  It vibrated through the chair, into my spine, and across the chamber. Soft lines of light traced along the armored interior walls. The inner surface of the sealed bridge shimmered—then dissolved into a full panoramic projection.

  Deep space unfolded around me.

  Endless void stretched endlessly in all directions. An asteroid field drifted in the distance, rotating slowly with quiet indifference. And beyond it—

  A vast aurora rippled across the void. Not planetary. Not atmospheric. Just raw cosmic radiation bending like a luminous ocean.

  I stared.

  I had played the game for 12 years and had Minerva with me for 9 years already, yet this breathtaking scene still impressed me.

  Yes... This was the command bridge of my flagship.

  No glass windows. No dramatic open observatory nonsense. Just reinforced armor and full-spectrum projection panels feeding real-time data across the interior hull of the command bridge dome surface.

  Why expose a weak point? What’s the point of showing off a giant glass window on a warship? That’s just asking to be shot.

  Monitors were safer. And in my case, better. A seamless 360-degree projection. No blind spots.

  It wasn’t for style.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  It was practicality.

  And I loved it.

  But seeing it now—actually standing here instead of circling my phone to fake immersion—or using the VR helmet I owned—

  It felt different.

  The thought barely formed before a crisp, feminine voice echoed through the chamber—clear, layered, perfectly synchronized with my helmet’s internal audio.

  “Good evening, Captain. Cargo ship class juggernaut, Minerva online. Is there any command you wish to issue?”

  And then she appeared.

  A humanoid projection formed right beside me—composed of soft white light and faint golden outlines. Long white hair flowed down her back in soft waves, puffy and light. Her eyes shone gold—bright and intelligent—yet her face remained calm and emotionless.

  She wore a pristine white military uniform reminiscent of an old German general’s attire—structured coat, gold trim, polished insignia. But instead of formal trousers, she wore a fitted mini skirt, paired with long white thigh-high stockings and heeled boots.

  The contrast between strict military discipline and stylized design was unmistakable.

  Mimi.

  I blinked.

  “…You kept the default avatar.”

  Mimi tilted her head slightly, with her usual expressionless face. But to me, it looked like there was a giant question mark floating above her head.

  “This appearance matches the Captain’s original configuration preference.”

  She looked at me, then briefly at herself, as if checking whether anything a miss on herself.

  Meanwhile, I could only stare at her.

  The wavy white hair drifted gently, fluffy as it moved in an unseen current.

  …Wavy.

  I wonder why she’s like that.

  I prefer jet-black hair—long and straight with straight bangs—over silver hair.

  Not this soft, flowing look… fluffy…

  Why did I choose this appearance again?

  I narrowed my eyes, trying to dig deeper into my memories—

  —and a sudden spike of pain shot through my head.

  “Ah—”

  My hand rose to my temple—well, to my helmet—as a sharp, throbbing pressure pulsed behind my eyes, like something resisting being dragged to the surface.

  Fragments flickered.

  A character customization screen. Sliders. Color palettes. Someone laughing in voice chat.

  Then static.

  The memory slipped away.

  The pain faded just as quickly.

  “…Right,” I muttered.

  There is something wrong with me... It seems like those damn feelings back when I was asleep have something to do with it~

  Mimi’s golden eyes observed me without blinking as she suddenly flew in front of me, full of concern.

  “Captain, your neural signals show minor instability. Would you like me to initiate a diagnostic?”

  “…No. No—I’m fine. Thank you for your concern, Mimi.”

  Seeing her eyes made me flinch, and somehow a deep feeling of I don’t want her to worry ran wild in my heart...

  Heart???

  With an expressionless look, Mimi could only nod to my explanation as she said, “I understand, Captain.”

  Then she shifted into a sitting posture as rows of holographic panels formed around her. She began running diagnostics and reporting toward me.

  “There seems to be multiple damage points on my current body, Minerva… and—”

  Mimi paused as she looked at the screen panels around her with doubt.

  Rows of data streamed across my HUD.

  And somehow—I understood it instantly.

  Reactor integrity. Structural load. Heat dispersion. Dormant module status.

  Normally I would’ve squinted at three different menus just to check this. Now one glance was enough.

  It felt like my mind had synced with Minerva herself.

  Does my avatar body affect my cognition too?

  I exhaled slowly.

  Most systems were still initializing. Only the Energy Core and AI Nexus were fully active. All external combat modules were offline.

  From what I could tell, most of the ship’s facilities were beginning to initialize—probably due to the Energy Core booting up. That made sense.

  The ship’s internal structure followed the same logic as the base-building modules from Astral Core: Armada Protocol. Every hull started as a framework, and before you could attach high-grade modules, you had to install essential facilities: power, navigation, fabrication bays, and so on. It was like the old “Gummi Ship” system I used to mess with years ago—where you pieced a ship together block by block.

  But here, there are two main parts the flagship has: the Facilities and the Modules.

  In this ship-building system, the Energy Core is the beating heart of the Facilities, powering all central ship operations—life support, command systems, and base automation. Facilities can level up, up to level 25. This is the core of the ship and where NPC crew members and Heroes reside. And of course, the player’s main avatar lives here as well.

  The Facilities consist of:

  Core Operation Facilities:

  Energy Core, AI Nexus Core, Command Bridge, Communication Center, Navigation and Sensor Station, ECM/ECCM Station, and Engine Control. These form the beating heart of the flagship, managing power distribution, tactical command, sensor arrays, and defensive counter-measures.

  Manufacture & Engineering:

  Engineering Bay, Research Center, Fabricator, Mech Bay, Bot Bay, and 3 Shipyards. These are where workshops, components, designs, and research are handled—where drones, heavy-grade armor, modules, and small spacecraft are manufactured.

  Resource & Logistics Facilities:

  Storage, Fuel Tank, and 2 Armouries store most facility supplies and necessities. Meanwhile, production facilities generate main materials daily: Hydroponic Plantation Bay, Water Treatment Facilities, and Smelting.

  Crew & Social Facilities:

  Canteen, 2 Crew Cabins, Medical Bay, Library, Gallery, Guild Hall, Trade Center, and Recruitment Office.

  The Recruitment Office enables the discovery and enlistment of Hero-class personnel—individuals with traits and potential similar to the player’s avatar. Meanwhile, the Guild Hall and Trade Center support inter-player interactions, alliance management, and high-tier resource exchanges—mirroring the player-driven economy and social structure of the game.

  The Facilities are where the base stats of the flagship come from.

  Meanwhile, Modules—like reactors, weapons, shields, armor, and warp drives—form the main body of the ship. These follow the Item system, graded from F to SSS rather than leveling like Facilities.

  If the Facilities serve as the body of the flagship—its organs and systems—then the Modules act as its equipment and armaments, granting the player versatility, specialization, and freedom in configuring the ship’s overall composition.

  By selecting a Ship Blueprint, you can place the HEART block of the default Facility inside, then build the ship using Modules within the limitations of the blueprint to form your flagship—your main ship.

  You can even make a fleet using modules and ship blueprints, but those ships don’t have the Facility block.

  And since there’s no revive here, it goes the same way with NPC crew and Heroes. They can die for real. And even the fleet you make—once destroyed—it’s nothing but debris and scavenger loot. You’ll have to build it again from scratch.

  This game is literally Pay2Win.

  And right now, only the Energy Core and Facilities seem to be online. All my ship Modules are still offline.

  But despite that, there’s one thing I need to know first—

  Which meant—

  “Mimi,” I said, narrowing my eyes slightly.

  “Is there any data explaining how we got here?”

  Mimi, who was checking the ship’s status, briefly paused.

  “Negative, Captain. No transitional data detected. Current coordinates do not match any known server star map either.”

  Then, with a bit of hesitation, Mimi continued.

  “It seems that during the middle of FTL travel toward our delivery destination, all systems suddenly shut down—”

  Then Mimi looked at the panels around her with doubt, clearly full of questions.

  My stomach tightened. Because what showed on her panels also appeared in my HUD.

  A hundred and nine years.

  That’s how long the system had been in offline mode.

  So it wasn’t just immersion.

  This wasn’t the game.

  Or at least—not the version I knew.

  I straightened in the command chair and let my eyes track the diagnostic flow, thinking it through the way I always did back when I tinkered on my phone or in HUD.

  I leaned back slightly, staring at the aurora stretching across the void.

  This game was Pay2Win.

  But this?

  This felt like something else entirely.

  And I still didn’t know how the hell I got here.