Chapter 3: Monoz

One large unit, two medium units, three small units.

That’s the breakdown of my subordinates.

Six units total.

The number of subordinates I’m allowed to have.

I was counting them off on my fingers in the dark when a yawn slipped out.

The truck bed we were crammed into for transport wasn’t exactly ideal for sleeping. Maybe it was the light leaking in through gaps in the tarp, or maybe it was the rocking. Or maybe it was just plain hard. Now I understood why some of the senior employees had brought cushions or blankets. I’d have to bring some next time.

No signal to wake up yet. In that case, I might as well close my eyes. I shut them.

One thing I learned in six months of training was the importance of taking breaks.

Don’t slack off during them. Take them properly.

Otherwise, when the time comes to move, you won’t be able to. For infantry, breaks are sacred.

“…”

—And yet.

A gray sphere rolled up to my feet, beeping pi, pi, pipipi! as I dozed sitting up. Apparently, one of my subordinates had detected I was waking up and came over.

Monoz. Round, metal friends of humans. Inside their plastic casings, they house a living mineral called a tree crystal as a single central eye. They love looking at the sky.

They work under contract with humans.

In this era of labor shortages, they’re an indispensable workforce.

And the number of Monoz a person can contract with is fixed for life. For me, that number was twelve.

For now, Dub-C had issued me three units for my first assignment, but Yuri had added another three “because she was worried.”

All of them had combat-model bodies, but because the Monoz’s tree crystals gave them life, their abilities, preferences, and dislikes varied a lot.

For now, I’d loaded cargo onto the large unit, tasked a small one with scouting the surroundings, and let the rest do as they pleased. As a result, one of them had apparently taken on the role of my alarm clock.

‘He… might be suited for reconnaissance.’

I had that vague feeling.

I’d need to match each one’s personality with their crystal and shell. According to Yuri, figuring out the traits of my Monoz subordinates was my real first assignment.

My first assignment. Yeah, my first assignment.

Once your spine’s replaced with plastic, you can wear the powered exoskeleton—the centipede. And if you can wear the centipede, you can work.

That’s the company’s policy.

They say we’re not a black company, since we do get a training period. Probably.

***

“Get your asses up, soldiers! It’s work time! What? You’re too carsick to get up? Then die! I’ll kill you myself, you worthless pieces of trash!”

…Probably. Maybe.

As the sergeant barged in shouting, someone—not me—who’d still been sleeping got kicked awake. Probably. Maybe. Maybe we’re not a black company.

Well, it’d suck to get kicked for dawdling.

I stifled a yawn and, eyes bleary from the effort, staggered toward the light and jumped down from the truck.

The ground I landed on was reddish and bare of vegetation. Apparently, green was scarce in this era; naturally, the combat fatigues issued by the company were dirt-colored to match.

“…!”

Just raising my gaze a little from the ground made the sun painfully bright. I really wish I had my headset—the goggles doubled as sunglasses. But since roll call wasn’t done yet, I couldn’t wear it. Couldn’t stretch either. I had no choice but to stand at attention. Subtle, but grueling.

“Left hand—forward!”

At the sergeant’s order, I held out my left hand. There was a feeling of connection as the embedded crystal accessed the network. Authorization granted. My skills were uploaded to the sergeant’s tablet. From here, we’d probably be grouped based on our skills.

Incidentally, my skills were:

【Stealth: 1】, 【Sniping: 4】, 【Monoz Command: 1】

Ranks go from 1 to 5. One makes you qualified, five makes you a master. Something like that. For Dub-C rookies, it’s “normal” to have at least five skills, and if even one of them is a 2 or higher, you’re considered useful.

Looking at it that way, I guess I’m what they call a specialist.

In terms of skill count, I’d be a washout. But I had one skill that stood out.

It was kind of sad that, despite having Yuri—a melee specialist—as my supervisor, my talents were so blatantly suited for long-range combat.

“With numbers this obvious, nobody’ll get confused about how to deploy you.” That was Yuri’s take.

I figured I’d be used as a sniper. I was confident.