Chapter 17: Captain on the Bridge
"Dan Heng?"
"Mm."
"Mr. Yang?"
"Mm."
"Himeko?"
"Mm."
"Alright! Everyone is in position! Today, this lady is going to see exactly what he's turned into!"
March 7th reached out and grabbed the handle to Rekka's room.
Yank!
Time to turn the tide! This daily routine was infinitely more exciting than opening blind boxes.
Instead of a weird creature or a glowing deity, the figure standing by the starlit window looked strikingly human. Rekka wore a pristine, stark-white naval uniform, complete with a crisp peaked cap resting neatly on his head. Emblazoned across the front of the cap was a single, bold character: Ship.
Hearing the door slide open, he turned around.
"You're here."
March 7th blinked, leaning forward to inspect him. "You... are you Rekka?"
"It's me." He gave a slight nod, a gentle, amused curve rising at the corners of his mouth. "But for today, you can also call me... Captain."
"Captain?" March 7th tilted her head, her pink hair bouncing. "Captain of what?"
Rekka didn't answer with words. He simply raised a white-gloved hand and pointed out the viewport.
The Express crew followed his gaze out into the cosmos.
Instantly, every single one of them froze.
Just beyond the coordinates where the Astral Express was currently docked, floating in a sector of space that had been completely empty just hours prior, a colossal battleship rested in quiet majesty.
The vessel was entirely silver-white, boasting a slender, elegant, and dangerously simplified hull. Even in a static, moored state, the massive thruster arrays at its rear emitted a low, pulsing blue glow that illuminated the surrounding vacuum. Its sheer scale was staggering, dwarfing the Astral Express entirely, its bulk rivaling, if not surpassing, the entirety of the Herta Space Station.
It was the battleship Hyperion.
"Hyperion... Hyperion?" Himeko read the striking, massive identification letters painted across the hull. A rare flash of genuine shock rippled through her golden eyes.
"How is this possible..."
Welt Yang's voice shook. It didn't just waver; it fractured. While the rest of the crew stared in awe and surprise, Welt looked as though he had just seen a ghost step out of the void. The color drained from his face, his jaw slackening.
"Mr. Yang? What's wrong?" Dan Heng immediately picked up on the older man's distress. The stoic guard stepped closer, lowering his voice. "Do you recognize this ship?"
Welt slowly reached up. His fingers trembled slightly as he pulled his glasses from his face. He wiped the lenses with a piece of cloth, as if trying to clear away a hallucination, before sliding them back onto the bridge of his nose.
"That is... the Hyperion."
"That's right. The Hyperion."
Rekka adjusted the brim of his navy cap, his eyes gleaming with a quiet, knowing smile from beneath the shadow of the visor. The chaotic, mild-mannered aura he usually projected had been completely neutralized by the sharp cut of the uniform, replaced by an air of absolute, unquestionable authority.
"This is my battleship. The Hyperion."
Before transmigrating into this universe, Rekka had been a dedicated Honkai Impact 3rd player. In that sense, he truly was the Captain of the Hyperion, a high-dimensional observer who had watched the plot unfold from beyond the screen. Right now, he was simply merging the concept of the Player Captain with the lore of the Captainverse Captain. Strictly speaking, it wasn't a stretch.
This was the terrifying power of a Fictional Historian of the Enigmata: weaving nearly flawless, reality-bending lies out of a web of half-truths.
Of course, he had absolutely no intention of revealing that this entire setup was a localized fiction. Rekka hadn't even begun to have his fill of playing the role of Captain.
"I know this is hard for everyone to process," Rekka said, his tone smooth. "After all, according to Mr. Welt's knowledge, this ship should be firmly anchored in his home world. But I must correct one assumption. A story never truly ends. It simply continues to exist in a different form."
He turned around, leaning his back against the cold glass of the viewport and crossing his arms over his chest.
"Allow me to formally introduce myself. I know I did this yesterday, and the day before that, but today's identity requires a bit of special context."
He cleared his throat, straightening his posture into a crisp, military stance.
"I am Rekka, the newest Trailblazer of the Astral Express. But simultaneously, I am the Captain of the Hyperion, and the Ferryman of the Sea of Quanta."
"Ferryman?" Welt latched onto the unfamiliar title, his brow furrowing.
March 7th scratched her cheek. "So, what does Ferryman mean... like, someone who rows a little wooden boat?"
"Mm, essentially, yes," Rekka chuckled. "There are countless World Bubbles drifting within the Sea of Quanta, and my battleship possesses the ability to handle freely between them. Occasionally, I take in strays, people with nowhere else to go, survivors from World Bubbles that are on the brink of total annihilation."
Sea of Quanta. World Bubbles.
Those terms were agonizingly familiar to Welt. They were carved into the very foundation of his life. The grueling days spent trapped in the Sea of Quanta, clashing against Kevin Kaslana, felt as vivid as if they had happened only yesterday.
Well, perhaps trading blows was a generous way to describe his encounters with Kevin.
This was the terrifying, intoxicating charm of the Enigmata. As long as the internal logic remained self-consistent, a lie became indistinguishable from the truth.
Welt let out a long breath, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders as a relieved, nostalgic smile touched his lips. "Yes... I should have considered that possibility sooner. After all, if I could cross over and end up here, why couldn't the Hyperion?"
Rekka gestured toward the colossal silver vessel outside. "So, would you care to come aboard and take a tour of my ship?"
"Go! Of course we're going!" March 7th pumped her fist in the air, her eyes sparkling with excitement. "Such a massive spaceship! It has to be even bigger than the Herta Space Station, right? Let's go, let's go!"
The Hyperion's main elevator ascended rapidly toward the Bridge, the hum of its anti-gravity engines vibrating softly beneath their boots.
[Captain on the Bridge.]
A crisp, mechanical female voice echoed through the comms system.
Pshhh...
With the sharp hiss of equalizing air pressure, the heavy blast doors slid smoothly apart. The full, stunning view of the Hyperion's Bridge revealed itself to the Express crew.
Rekka stepped forward, his posture calm, composed, and utterly flawless. He looked like he had walked these halls a thousand times.
Cold, polished silver-white metal dominated the aesthetic of the command center. Countless holographic screens floated in mid-air, projecting dazzling, cascading streams of tactical data and environmental readouts. The massive forward viewports curved perfectly around the room, embracing the endless sea of stars outside in a panoramic display of cosmic beauty.
Rekka spread his arms, a warm smile gracing his features. "Well then, welcome to my home, everyone."
March 7th was like a hyperactive child let loose in an amusement park. Her eyes widened to the size of saucers as she let out a loud gasp of wonder. She sprinted straight for the command railing, leaning over the edge to peer down into the lower operational decks.
"Wow! This is way too cool! Is this really the Bridge of a battleship? It's even bigger than I imagined!" She spun around, pointing at the floating displays. "And these screens... are they all touch-controlled?"
Curious, she reached out a finger to poke a light-blue data frame floating nearby. Instead of meeting solid glass, her fingertip passed right through the interface, stirring up concentric circles of glowing virtual ripples.
"It's a hard-light holographic projection, not a physical screen," Welt's voice drifted from behind her. His tone was heavy, thick with an irrepressible, aching nostalgia.
He stepped onto the deck, his eyes sweeping over the consoles, the bulkheads, the lighting fixtures. It wasn't a cheap illusion. It wasn't a hollow projection. The metallic scent of the air scrubbers, the specific hum of the reactor beneath their feet, it was all perfect.
"It really is... the Hyperion," Welt murmured, his voice dropping to a whisper. Behind his glasses, his eyes swam with complex, conflicting emotions.
With the advanced technology available across the cosmos, constructing a replica of the Hyperion wouldn't actually be that difficult for a major faction. But to Welt, standing on this specific deck made his eyes sting. It felt as though he had stepped directly into an old, treasured photograph. The atmosphere was so painfully accurate that he half-expected the elevator doors to hiss open again, revealing his former student, Himeko, carrying a fresh cup of coffee.
"Want to try it out?" Rekka asked, gesturing toward the central command throne.
"Eh? Me? Can I really?" March 7th pointed at her own nose, looking incredibly flattered but hesitant. "This is the Captain's seat! Wait... what if I accidentally press the wrong button and, whoosh, launch a barrage of anti-matter missiles and accidentally blow up a star system?!"
"Hmm? That won't happen," Rekka said, offering a dry, amused shrug. "The weapons systems are locked. I'm simply offering you the chance to sit in a highly advanced, ergonomic massage chair."
While March and Welt reacted in their own ways, Dan Heng quietly walked over to the massive forward porthole. He stared out at the vast, glittering sea of stars, his expression unreadable. He raised a hand, his fingertips lightly brushing against the freezing cold surface of the reinforced glass.
"Rekka."
"Hmm?"
Dan Heng didn't turn around, his gaze locked on the void. "This ship... does it truly exist?"
"Of course," Rekka replied smoothly, not missing a beat.
By now, March 7th had thrown caution to the wind and hopped into the Captain's chair. Her entire body sank into the plush, high-tech leather of the wide seat. She kicked her legs, spinning the chair around in excited circles.
"Wow! This chair is unbelievably comfortable!" she cheered, her voice echoing across the Bridge. "It's even softer than the bed in my room!"
[Inorin's Note:
Enjoying the story? Dropping a quick review, comment, or Power Stone means the world to me and keeps these daily updates flowing!
Want to read 50 chapters ahead or just want to help keep a shameless translator alive? (My livelihood actually depends on this, haha 😭). You can support me directly here:
(P.S. Just remove the brackets and replace the [.] with a regular dot . to use the links!)
✨ Patreon (50 Advanced Chapters): patreon[.]com/InorinTL
☕ Ko-fi (Support / Sponsor): ko-fi[.]com/InorinTL
Thank you so much for reading and keeping this project alive!]