"Here, in fact, one procedural node could be cut, and the efficiency would rise by 1%."
"And here — the dwarf race's production and manufacturing ability is very strong, granted. But if our Spider Queen tribe were put in, a work post such as this one spider could handle. Which would also raise the production efficiency by at least 3%."
...
Spider Queen Iris, guest turned host at this hour, went on with her unbroken working of the consoles while she began expounding and analyzing.
Annie, huddled behind Zhao Chen, heard this, and then looked again at the Commander-in-Chief in front of her; she plainly felt that the Commander-in-Chief's gaze upon this spider was a very ardent one.
Which produced in her a sense of crisis.
But wish as she might to refute this spider, there was no place whatever in which to refute her.
Because everything she said was correct… without one flaw in it.
Which left Annie more unable than ever to sit or stand still, and she could not help clutching tight at the Commander-in-Chief's trouser leg.
She seemed to see this spider seizing her office, seizing her work, while she herself was bound with spider-silk and trodden beneath this big spider's foot, for all the world like a loser.
"That will do. This time I brought you to look round, not to work. We have another place still to go and see." Zhao Chen spoke up, cutting short Spider Queen Iris where she was immersed in her work.
Spider Queen Iris looked at the several dozen operating interfaces before her, and at those holographic screens hanging about her, and stopped her work with some reluctance.
It was not that she had meant deliberately to display herself before Zhao Chen; it was that these systems, software and hardware alike, were truly far too excellent.
It was for all the world as with a swordsman who, seeing a finer sword than his own, cannot help stepping up to swing it a time or two.
And if… if he could possess it always, better still.
"My lord, I am willing to bring my tribe and join your Owl Dragon Legion! Set your mind at rest — as for the work here of yours, I have every confidence that I am equal to it." Spider Queen Iris came straight to the point, driving directly for the heart of the matter.
Annie's body stiffened; she felt that she was facing a crisis.
She screwed up her courage and darted out from behind Zhao Chen.
Both hands on her hips: "Hey! I warn you, don't go too far. I am the chief engineer here now, and this place is my patch. And you stand on my patch and say such things! Do you take me for nonexistent?"
Spider Queen Iris looked down upon Annie and said teasingly, "Then by the rules of us beast-folk — shall we have a fight?"
Annie looked at those spider-lances of Spider Queen Iris's, and at those spider-lances drawn back behind her.
At fighting, 10 Annies would likely be no match for this big spider.
"We are a technical trade — what fighting is there to do!" Annie's short legs quietly retreated a step, but her mouth stayed as stiff in its retort as ever.
"Then a match of technical ability?" Spider Queen Iris smiled and pointed at those holographic screens all around.
Annie: "…"
Going by the working ability this Spider Queen Iris had just displayed, never mind a midnight-to-midnight, seven-days-a-week schedule — chop Annie in half and she would likely still be no match for this big spider.
"Then what would you like to match?" Spider Queen Iris looked at Annie and asked with a smile.
Annie was at once at a loss for words, not knowing what to say.
"A match of height?" Spider Queen Iris teased.
Height?
Annie's stature came to about the height of the Spider Queen's lances.
Annie's face went black.
"A match of figure?" Spider Queen Iris said it while folding her arms across her chest, and pushed them up deliberately besides.
There was, astonishingly, a certain bouncing quality to it.
Annie looked down at that chest of hers upon which interstellar warships might take off and land, and forced down the impulse to give a hop or two; never mind hopping — an earthquake, at a guess, would produce no ripple whatever.
"A match of standing, then? I am the chieftainess of the Spider Queen tribe; at a single word from me the Spider Queen tribe can serve my lord. And I hold half a star region besides — territory of 27 star systems. The annual output value of that territory reaches 300 billion star coins." Spider Queen Iris set out her added value item by item.
Annie opened her mouth several times over, but… found that she seemed unable to get anything out at all.
"Commander-in-Chief." Just at this moment a figure appeared in the doorway.
Nana, the second chief engineer of the Owl Dragon industrial system, had arrived.
Seeing her own sister—
Annie burst outright into tears and flung herself upon her. "Sister… boo-hoo-hoo-hoo… we… we're going to be out of a job… boo-hoo-hoo… your big sister… pbbt, pbbt, pbbt… has let you down…"
It was with no small trouble that Nana pushed Annie off her; she looked with some distaste at Annie, all snot and tears.
"What's the matter?"
"The Commander-in-Chief has brought back a spider from somewhere or other—"
"It's arachnid," came Spider Queen Iris's voice.
Nana's gaze went over to her — but unlike that look of terror Annie had worn on seeing Spider Queen Iris earlier—
Nana's eyes lit up at once, for all the world as though she had discovered some treasure.
"The Spider Queen tribe? Within the Galactic Alliance's present map, one of the top five interstellar races skilled in industrial production! And by all-round ability, they might even rank first." Nana walked straight up before Spider Queen Iris.
Annie was dumbfounded; she watched wide-eyed as her own sister went round her and up before that big spider.
This… how was this not the right way for it to open?
Was her own sister not supposed, at this point, to hear out her grievance, comfort her, and then fight shoulder to shoulder at her side?
"Nana, you know of the Spider Queen tribe?" Zhao Chen looked at Nana in surprise.
Nana nodded, and pointed at the harpy Avina, who stood in the corner of the room and had all this while said nothing. "That is the Harpy tribe. Owing to factors of the individual, they can survive and fly for long stretches in the oxygenless conditions of open space. Which suits them exceedingly well to the extraction of raw-material ore at mineral sites unfit for life to inhabit. All this I looked up in the Goddess Academy's database."
"What did you look these up for?" Zhao Chen was curious.
Nana said, "I think that besides the professional skills and knowledge of our own line, we ought to study related knowledge systematically as well. Before this, we interstellar dwarves had no such resources; but now that you, Commander-in-Chief, have provided us with resources of this kind, we must naturally take hold of them — and among them are these things bound up closely with interstellar industry, which I have read and committed to memory. These materials I have made up into study documents besides, and sent to all the interstellar dwarves, and to the staff working in this line. For which Dean Xiong Xiangxiang of the Goddess Academy has expressly engaged me as a lecturer besides; every month I go to the Goddess Academy-class starship to give a lecture. Dean Xiong Xiangxiang has also had me serve as the Goddess Academy's honorary vice-dean." Nana set it out point by point.
Annie was dumbfounded to hear all this; she felt that her own sister's figure had somehow all at once grown towering.
For all the world as though a great mountain had risen before her!
How… how was it she had not known her own sister had done so many things?
And served as an honorary vice-dean besides?
While her own sister was doing all this, what had she been doing?
Eating… drinking… sleeping?
All at once she felt the frustration of one struck a deep blow.
And what broke her the more was that she then saw her own sister and that spider open a discussion upon technical questions — the two of them discussing away with relish, while Commander-in-Chief Zhao Chen beside them put in an opinion from time to time.
Set beside them, she… seemed to be the superfluous one.
Annie felt for all the world as though she knelt in the wind and snow, both knees to the ground, both hands raised high, crying aloud: No!