Junyou laughed heartily upon watching Hiei's memory of the beat-down that occurred yesterday, the fast battleship at her side and sulking while holding a ramune bottle, Houshou consoling the fast battleship over her humiliating loss at the hands of the Ise-Class battleship.
The bar was empty at this time of night, with the duo being the only ones still up to enjoy each other's company while Houshou kept the bar running for as long as she could to accommodate anyone who needed a quick snack or drink.
Junyou asked Hiei whilst wiping away the tears that were starting to form at the edge of her eyes.
"Sheesh, did that cannon really knock you out in one hit? How did you not see that coming?"
Hiei huffed, taking a sip out of her ramune bottle while speaking up in her defense.
"To be fair, I was fighting against the crazed sister of the Ise-Class. She's more unpredictable than her sister in combat. I made the mistake of underestimating her big-time just because she goofed around more than Hyuga and made us think they weren't anything special. And I think that her obfuscating silliness is by far the most dangerous aspect about her, seeing how she defeated me, my Onee-sama and Bismarck by fooling us all."
Houshou nodded, empathizing with the sulking battleship as she consoled Hiei.
"I understand where you're coming from. Ise is also a battleship, and therefore a respectably powerful opponent in her own right. But she did her best to make herself look incompetent, leading you all to think that she was weak, which eventually turns out, she wasn't. Her fighting style is unorthodox and wild, which may have contributed to your downfall."
Junyou drawled as she took another sip of her wine bottle, offhandedly asking about the motherly light carrier's abilities.
"Maa, since the seniors of this base are so damn powerful, what 'bout you, Houshou-san?"
Houshou's eyes widened a fraction before settling down to smile at the two ship girls, revealing cryptically.
"Well, all I can say is that I at least know how to hold my own in combat."
Hiei nodded as she asked Junyou about her day, to which Junyou cheerily replied.
"Oh, it was a blast! I hung out with Ryuujou after coming out of the docks, and we had quite the talk over lunch! Ryuujou taught me that our flames were basically like an unofficial 'super power' that we have! Apparently, it was less like magic, and a lot of science-y stuff that boiled down to the paper cut-outs that we carry being shikigami and somehow containing the soul of the plane. Our planes consist of a body and soul, but has no mind of its own as it is piloted by a Fairy pilot. The scroll that we carry deconstructs the body of the plane and breaks it down into easily-stored resources that's hidden within a layer of the scroll."
Junyou then pulled out a paper cut-out styled in a way that was reminiscent of a plane, with the basic hull of the plane and two squarish wing designs sticking out on its sides.
"The soul of that particular plane is then stored in a shikigami, a method of physically storing the plane's soul and acts as a foundation for the plane to build itself on. And with my flame…"
Junyou produced a small pinkish-purple fireball on the tip of her index finger, the flame flickering about softly and had two Kanji characters inside that spelled "勅令", or "Imperial Edict".
"I run the paper shikigami along the deck, and the flame basically calls forth the specified plane to assemble itself back together on the shikigami as it leaves the scroll and takes off. Isn't that amazing?!"
Houshou nodded sagely, commenting as she cleaned a glass cup with a wet towel, Junyou shaking her hand to extinguish the flame.
"Thus, it is a very advanced technological process of sorts, and not magic as you initially believed?"
Junyou nodded, but Hiei had a "Thinker" pose, looking up to ask Houshou about carriers and how they used their equipment in battle.
"But how do the carriers summon planes? I know that they practice archery at the shooting range, but how exactly do they summon their planes if there is no plane mounted at the tip and the arrows themselves look rather ordinary?"
Houshou nodded and answered in a way that a senior ship girl who perfectly understood her own equipment was able to.
"The fins of our arrows are colored in a way that it corresponds to certain bomber planes, and there are small buttons that we can press on our long bow to order our mechanical arrow quivers to extrude a certain type of arrow for easy access instead of simply fishing around for the right arrow to arm. The plane is deconstructed and forms the shaft of the arrow, while a variant of the paper shikigami forms its fins.
The arrow turns back into a plane when the arrow is fired far enough to transform safely in a small burst of fire much like the flame that you can form, Junyou-san."
Looking down at the two of them sagely, Houshou continued on as Hiei and Junyou listened silently.
"All of this is accomplished through cutting-edge technology that the Fairies introduced to the humans. One thing to note is that the Fairies that pilot the planes are summoned through the paper shikigami. This is merely speculation that I heard, but they are summoned from the realm where the Fairies come from into this world via technological means with a seal stored in the paper shikigami, and the pilot lives and dies by the plane."
Both members of the 1st Fleet were surprised to hear this, thinking about how the Fairies themselves couldn't actually be stored in the scrolls or arrows.
And the bombers were unlike the Reconnaissance Planes, general-use planes that were available to a light cruiser and above and could be stored in the battle backpacks and riggings of most ship girls.
Hiei raised a hand to ask Houshou a question about the technological prowess of the Fairies, the ones who had appeared from nowhere and introduced futuristic technology into this world to fight the Abyssals.
"Just how powerful are the Fairies to be able to accomplish such advanced engineering feats like summoning and the creation of ship girls, amongst others?"
But Houshou simply shook her head in resignation, explaining.
"No one, not even the Fairies themselves, know. All they know is that they were dropped into this world with all this knowledge but no memories of where they came from, and they knew that they had to help out humanity in their time of need."
Junyou mulled over that interesting and slightly horrifying thought about their unknown origins, and how their creators literally appeared from thin air with knowledge of advanced technology to build the ship girls.
It made her wonder what what secrets the Abyssals kept close to their chest, to be able to retaliate with entire armadas of their own with seemingly limitless resources to combat the ship girls on a global scale.
She also thought about what would have happened to mankind had the Fairies not appeared to introduce ship girls into this world.
All this was before Junyou took a hearty swig of her beer can, determined to forget about these morbid thoughts and made a resolution to do better the next time she sortied.
After she got wasted tonight.