Robots who beep have higher intelligence than those who boop.


Interdimensional RED-Coded Contract

Beep Beep Boop! Robots And Haircuts


Upon realizing Nepgear had disappeared, everyone panicked and searched the Virtua Forest high and low until Compa pointed out that she may have died and Re:Spawned.

The Nurse didn't notice the brief ghostly look on her childhood friend.

The group rushed back to the hotel where they fortunately found the CPU Candidate, along with Engineer. The two of them helped the others catch up on what happened, Nepgear on her death and Engineer on the assassination attempt.

"Wha-! Really!? Histoire almost got assassinated!?" IF squealed in surprise. In the background Compa hugged Nepgear while apologizing for leaving her to die.

"Such cowardice, attempting to kill someone with such means!" Nisa grit her teeth in anger, trying to keep herself from going violent and throwing the table across the reception. Engineer's eyebrows raised upon seeing the new faces.

"I ain't seen you two 'round here before. I'm Engineer, pleased to meetcha." He extended his gloved hand.

"My name is Falcom, an adventurer and part-time musician." The red-head adventurer wrapped her hand around his. It felt… wrong, but Falcom can't quite put a finger on what felt so strange.

"I am Gamindustri's keeper of justice! Nisa!" The bluenette introduced herself, her soul burning with passion.

"Is Histoire alright, Engineer?" Nepgear suddenly asked, finally wrenching Compa off herself (as politely as possible.)

The Texan nodded and casually took a swig of the bottle of beer. "Yup, but she locked 'erself up in her office, none but you or Spy comin' in."

"I-I have to see her! I'm sorry." The CPU Candidate ran up the stairs, towards the teleporter to the Basilicom.

The Guild agent called out to her. "Gear!?"

"Don't stop her, girl. She needs to check on her." Engineer said, watching the Candidate go.

"I know, it's- I dunno…" The brunette was a little at a loss for words; she actually didn't know what she wanted to do, other than that she was worried for her friend. "Anyway, so what are we doing now? And where are the others? Where's Soldier? He was here just a few moments ago…" The Guild agent asked, her emerald eyes searching for the patriot.

"Didn't Mister Soldier go upstairs?" Compa pointed out.

"Well… y'all free for the rest of the day. As for the others… they're doing their own things." The Texan shrugged. "But I know the Spy's busy infiltrating an ASIC base, so he'll be out for the rest of the day." He added before his gaze fixed on Compa. "And you, girlie, might wanna give that back to the doc now. He's been pissed ever since he realized someone stole that from him."

"Huh?" The nurse's eyes widened from shock and looked at the Quick Fix in her hands. "But Soldier said-"

Suddenly Soldier's cry of pain was heard, its owner painfully falling down the stairs. From the floor above Medic's foot peeked from the hole in the ceiling. "I guess he knows the culprit then." The Texan commented.

Looking back at the Soldier, he seemed to be wearing a silly robot costume consisting of the 'Idiot Box' (A crude robot mask made from a cardboard box with red plastic cups taped on for eyes and a coat hanger for an antennae. Soldier sees out of the mouth hole.), the 'Steel Pipes' (a pair of dryer hoses that go over the arms), and the 'Shoestring Budget' (a pair of shoeboxes with red lids crudely fashioned into a pair of robot feet).

The Doctor casually went down the stairs as if he just didn't kick his teammate down them a few seconds ago. "Yes, herr Engineer, I know whose idea it was." He looked at the girls, registering 2 new faces. The heroine and adventurer shifted nervously under his gaze. "Zhis should be a lesson for all of you. Don't take someone else's things vithout their consent."

"What's… with the robot suit?" Falcom cautiously asked, eyeing the downed man. "Is… he alright?"

"Oh don't vorry, fräulein, this happens all the time." Medic, who didn't care about the new faces, clapped twice. The Tin Soldier-wearing Soldier jumped onto his feet without hesitation.

"Beep-bop-boop! I am a robot!" The (human) robot announced with a robot-like voice. The girls sweatdropped at the display.

"Now, Compa? Ready for another lesson?" Medic asked the nurse, completely ignoring Soldier's shenanigans. The busty blonde perked up and skipped to her teacher with an enthusiastic "Mhm!", following him to the medical bay for another lesson, leaving the group to deal with the brain-dead mercenary…

…who's currently standing in front of the mirror with his hands raised in surrender. "Oh no! That robot is a ghost!"

"Is this… normal?" Nisa asked with a raised eyebrow.

"It's actually kinda funny." Falcom commented.

"The natural enemy of robots are hippies!" The 'robot' picked up his mighty weapon of mass destruction! (A flyswatter.)

"Yes." IF admitted with a sigh. "It's quite normal with them."

"That's what happens when you piss off the doc. Either you wake up on an operating table, or that." Engineer pointed at Soldier beating hippies to death (slapping leaves of poor potted plants with a flyswatter.)

"Beep beep boop. Maggot!"

IF simply let the insanity continue, defeated, and reached for an unopened beer bottle while the group watched the comedy of Soldier trying to convince the plant into living with him. "Come with me if you want to live. With me. In my apartment. I need a roommate."

"Stay on your Medic's good side, duly noted." Everyone nodded to Nisa's statement, and eventually the heroine of justice and adventurer also went for drinks. At least they got some free entertainment.


Miss Pauling stared at the BLU Spy with wide eyes. No it couldn't be, they failed BOTH objectives!? The Administrator is going to be SO pissed. Her right hand gripped her hair with both hands and started pulling it. 'Th-There must be something we can do! Th-There's no way they pulled out an entire damn control point from the ground!'

While Miss Pauling was having her panic attack, Saxton HALE!1! scratched his ear. "Hold on, Frenchie. What did this teleporter look like?" He asked, having an idea but it needs confirmation.

"It was a control point, but modified." The assistant sighed, not getting a single idea on how to save this mission.

An unlit lightbulb appeared above Saxton Hale's head. The Australian patiently waited a moment for it to light up but to no avail. With a confused expression the CEO of Mann Co. poked the bulb, but the only thing he got was sparks coming out of the broken bulb. With a snap of his fingers he threw the defective lightbulb away and pulled out a brand-new one from his mighty chest hair to replace it. The new lightbulb lit up and a goofy smile appeared on Hale's face.

He turned his back towards Miss Pauling and BLU Spy and shoved his arms back into his Australia-shaped chest hair. BLU Sniper's eyes widened from shock and surprise when he saw this moment, a wave of jealousy washing over him, knowing he'll never be even half the mann Hale is.

For a few seconds Saxton searched within the insides of his chest hair for the item he wanted, occasionally pulling out some random useless things like the Shahanshah or The Shasahahsnahshanshanshahasnsha or whatever it's called because he can't pronounce its damn name for god's sake! (Said stupid thing was basically a scimitar with a leather hilt that is reinforced by dull golden bindings and a gold hand guard.)

Hale forgot how it even ended up there, so he threw it out. Moving on. An Aperture Science Combustible Lemon, a sandvich (Still looks tasty, nom), a bar of Australium…

Err… This goes back into his chest hair, that's too valuable to lose.

Finally he found what he was looking for and pulled it out; the moment it left the confinement of his mighty chest hair, the item became so large that Saxton Hale had to spread his arms around to hold it. It's bigger than him! But that's not a problem for him and his mannly chest hair!

"Hale…?" Miss Pauling gasped, rubbing her eyes to see if it's not a dream. How did he…?

"Mon dieu…" BLU Spy's jaw dropped, releasing the cigarette inside. Its loss brought him back from the awe, and the Frenchie replaced it with a new one.

"Surprised, huh? I believe this what we were looking for." Saxton Hale peeked over from the control point/teleporter Spy said the robots stole.

"B-But… How did you…?" Miss Pauling stuttered, pinching her arm repeatedly to see if she's dreaming. So far no suddenly waking up.

"What? You expect me to just blindly charge in when the chain-smoking seductress asked specifically for this?" The CEO of Mann Co. laughed and hid the control point back into his chest hair. "I just took this with me when we arrived and went back to the good ol' brawl!"

A hand clapped down on his knee, and the CEO of Mann Co. looked down to see it was a Robo-Soldier's metal hand. "Beep… boop…" It said weakly. Saxton casually finished it off by stomping down onto its head and gritting his boot against it.

Miss Pauling simply starred at him blankly, her brain not knowing if she should kiss him for saving her from Helen's wrath, or shoot him for making her worry like that.


"Umm, Histo-AHH!" Nepgear dodged a sudden icicle coming to meet her face. The attacker turned out to be a frightened Oracle who was hiding behind her desk, with only her hand and the top of her tiny head visible.

Only after firing the ice did Histoire notice who was entering. Her eyes widened from shock as she raised herself from cover. "N-Nepgear!? I'm so sorry, are you alright? I didn't hurt you, right?" The fairy asked, concern and shame in her voice. What sort of Oracle was she if she attacked her own Goddess like that?

"I'm fine, just. Y-You surprised me." Nepgear cautiously stepping into the room, tense and on guard in case of another attack.

"I apologize. I've been a bit on edge ever since the press conference. A lot things happened there." Histoire sighed, resting her forehead on her adorable arm.

"I know, I heard from Engineer what happened. Are you alright?" The CPU Candidate dropped her guard and replaced it with worry.

"I'm fine. The mercenaries did a good job defending me. Anyway, welcome back, Nepgear." The fairy forced a smile, a perfect façade she was used to putting on so many times during the ASIC outbreak. "How did the quest go?"

"We managed to defeat the Ancient Dragon, but…" Nepgear raised her hand to her chest. Time for more uncomfortable information… "But I died, during the fight…" She said weakly

Histoire blinked. She heard it correctly and she knew it, but the fairy still needed to hear it again for confirmation. "Pardon?"

Nepgear sat down on the chair and told her Oracle about the Viral Ancient Dragon, her and her friends' fight with it, how she met Nisa and Falcom…

…and how she died.

In detail.

It was a little hard for Histoire to take it all in, but she patiently listened as the CPU Candidate described in detail her demise. As much as the Oracle hated it, the only thing she could do in this situation was apologize. "…I'm sorry for what happened. I'm glad the respawn system worked as intended, but I shouldn't have let you fight such a dangerous foe when we don't even know the full extent of changes to your HDD. I was reckless, and you paid for it…" Oracle said worriedly, resting a comforting hand on the lilac-haired girl's own.

"It's okay, Histoire." Nepgear smiled. "Yes, it was painful, but… I feel like I learned something from it. The respawn's true advantage: Learning from death to not die anymore. I can save Neptune now, Histoire. Not even death will stop me!" The CPU Candidate announced with a determined smile.

The surprised Oracle looked at her with amazement. 'She's certainly grown a lot since IF and Compa brought her back from the Graveyard. I can remember her apologizing over every little thing before the ASIC outbreak, and here she is now, not even afraid of death.' Histoire thought to herself. It filled her with pride to see one of her CPUs grow so much, but there was still a pang of worry nagging her.

What if after ASIC is defeated and their objective finished, the mercenaries pull the plug and disable the Re:Spawn System? It would be a disaster if Nepgear died then, thinking she'll simply respawn as always. There's also the possibility of malfunction, even if the mercenaries had assured her the odds were near non-existent. The Re:Spawn System's power is great, but over-reliance on it could end in disaster…

She mentally took note of it before pushing her worries back. The road is still long, there's no need to worry herself or Nepgear with it for now, especially when the Candidate finally got a much needed confidence boost.

"I'm glad to see you're determined to rescue your sister. On that subject, I was actually doing some research, and I believe I've found something that might help us." The Oracle said, searching for the right paper in the pile of paperwork.

"What did you find, Histoire?" Nepgear blinked, looking over the pile as if she could spot it.

"I was searching for the Mascot's location here in Planeptune. Mascots are beings born from the ancient goddess, normally they oversee the balance and order of our world passively, but when needed, they will also assist the CPUs in ridding evil's influence from Gamindustri. There's one in each nation, and if we can find them, we can request their assistance." The fairy explained. "I have already spoken to Spy about it, and he's currently conducting his own investigation inside one of the ASIC's facilities. While currently I have nothing of note, I'll inform you if I or Spy finds something. In the meantime, please keep working on restoring Planeptune's shares." She finished with a nod.

Before Nepgear could even open her mouth to speak, the doors to Histoire's office were kicked open! Soldier (still wearing the Tin Soldier set) stood in the doorway; he pointed his finger at the CPU Candidate. "I found you. That's what I do. That's all I do. Shutting down…" Then his arms and shoulders dropped.

Nepgear and Histoire shared a confused glance before IF ran onto the scene. "Sorry, Histoire! Um, Soldier?" The Guild agent lightly poked his shoulder, but she got no response from the 'robot'. Sighing, she clapped 2 times.

"I am a robot! Bloop! What is love?" The robot-mercenary came back to life, and even did a little Robot Dance.

The only response Histoire could utter from her mouth was a very confused "What?"

"He's been like this ever since Medic did something to him, just ignore him." IF explained, understanding the Oracle's confusion. God forbid the day Neptune and Soldier meets, IF's patience may be big due to years of babysitting the Planeptune's CPU, but she can't help but feel she'll go crazy with those two together.

"I run on blood! I take jobs from American vampires!" Soldier randomly announced in his robot-like voice.

"Umm, are you sure he's alright?" Nepgear sweatdropped.

"I dunno, doc says he'll be fine, but he refused to say what he did to him. He could've blended his brain into slushie for all I know." IF shrugged.

'I see little difference with his usual self really…' Histoire snidely thought.

"Anyway, Gear and Histoire, Medic wants both of you on the training grounds. With the Spectator software." Said the Guild agent.

"Robot noises!"

"What would Medic want from me?" Histoire muttered with a confused frown, but she did as she was told and took the laptop with the specified software to the training grounds.


"Ow! Ow…" Nepgear groaned in pain. The Basilicom staff was kind enough to escort her and her friends back to her room. Nisa and Falcom, who were unfortunate enough to not have any bionic enhancements and weren't used to the mercenaries' level of training, had to be carried there.

The reason Medic called all of them was because he was interested in the reason why Nepgear had a heart attack during the fight with the Viral Ancient Dragon. His experiment to find out why involved having them fight bare-handed with Heavy Weapons Guy while the German, Soldier and Histoire watched.

To be perfectly honest? It was a disaster… Everyone could get an idea how strong he was just from a look, but no one but Medic and Soldier knew that Heavy was once a professional wrestler and boxer on top of his raw strength. IF and Nepgear swore to never fight against Heavy again… They could take on any other mercenary anytime but not the Heavy. He was a nightmare, strong enough to overpower all kinds of defenses, and without Sasha the Russian was surprisingly fast on his feet. There was a point where during the fight the Russian juggled them! Literally!

Histoire couldn't help but wince when Heavy finished his juggling by throwing them into the bullseyes placed all over the area to practice archery and marksmanship. That surely had to hurt a lot.

"That was the harshest and most painful training I have ever participated in. Ahh~ Thank you kind worker." The Basilicom worker placed the sore heroine down on a chair in Nepgear/Neptune's room. The bluenette thanked the kind Basilicom worker and got herself comfortable on the furniture, trying to endure her pain from the countless bruises across her body.

"My bruises have bruises!" Compa tearfully complained, slamming her body onto the soft bunk bed, bottom bunk to be more specific.

"I never thought I'd say this, but I miss training with Soldier…" Nepgear collapsed on the same bunk bed, next to Compa.

"Beep, boop!" Soldier randomly commented, alerting them of his presence. He had followed the girls and workers here for no reason in particular.

"You're here, Soldier!?" IF (who's lying on Neptune's favorite gaming sofa) snapped, before her eyes widened.

"I am a robot! I am programmed to give you a sensible haircut!"

Somehow the patriot got his hands on a pair of scissors, which he opened and closed while slowly approaching the Guild agent. Snip, snip. "Wha- No! Soldier!" The Guild agent desperately struggled against the mercenary to keep him away from her hair. Quickly the Basilicom staff tried to aid the brunette but Soldier was too strong for regular mortals!

"Blarp-a-barp! Your hair is mine! Give it to me!"

"No!"

"Yes! I'm going to give you a haircut, and you're going to like it!"

"Noooooooooooo!"

The struggle intensified, and with IF's friends being too sore to help her, they were forced to uselessly watch as the robot cut down IF's hair strand by strand.


"Medic, do you mind if I ask you something irrelevant to what you're doing?" Histoire suddenly asked.

"Vhat is it?"

"You have several guns that can heal any kind of wounds in a matter of seconds, technology to make people literally immortal and you're able to bring them back from death in seconds too."

"And? Frau Histoire?" Medic asked, not knowing where Histoire is going.

"Yet I have noticed that the Demoman is still missing one of his eyes. Don't you think you could give him another eye back?" The fairy frowned. A man of his knowledge, with feats such as bringing people back from death, can't grow a single eye back?

"Oh, of course I could. Zhe procedure is quite simple really." Medic casually said, his eyes not leaving Nepgear's medical report printed from the spectator's software.

"Oh, I see- Wait what?" Histoire blinked. He could? And it'd be easy!? "Then why haven't you done it? I recall he wasn't happy with only one eye, surely he's asked you to heal him before?" She frowned in confusion.

To her surprise the doctor snickered. "Frau Histoire, I have given him his eye back at least eight times." Medic finally dragged his eyes away from the report and looked at the wide-eyed Oracle. "And every time it functions normally until a Full Moon or Halloween, at which point it grows vings and attacks us." The german added, his eyes starring ahead in a thousand-yard stare. "We have several times fought giant flying eyeballs vhich can teleport and shoot rockets."

Histoire looked at him in confusion. 'An eyeball, with wings?' Histoire can't help but mentally picture a small eyeball creature with bird-like wings trying to attack Medic by poking him with its pupil. A quite silly picture, even if she knew the reality was… a bit less cute.

"Anyvay, I think I understand our problem now." The German interrupted his story to announce, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

"You know why Nepgear died back then?" Histoire raised her eyebrows.

"Vell, zhis is only a theory, but zhis HDD is very exhausting for zhe CPUs, yes?" Medic waited for Histoire to confirm it, and she silently nodded and waited for the mercenary to move on with his explanation. "Well, my theory is zhat Nepgear's body, her heart specifically, is too weak to keep up when she's gravely injured, resulting in total heart failure."

Histoire stared at the German in shock. If what he said is right then that means every time Nepgear goes HDD it's basically certain death for her! "But then how can we fix it? Should we remove the bionic upgrades?"

"Oh ho ho ho, no." Medic immediately disagreed. "Zhat vould make our problem worse. Besides zhey're stuck there permanently, I can't remove them now. Zhere are two options ve could do; zuerst, heal her with zhe Medi-Gun every time her heart stops. Zhis should force her heart to start beating again and make her able to keep fighting. Zweite, exercise. Zhe only reason why it's happening is because her body is too weak to handle zhe augmented HDD, but with enough training she should be eventually fine and less heart-attack prone."

'So a healthy lifestyle and constant medical watch.' Histoire mentally noted. "Will it work?" She questioned. Safety of her CPUs are her priority afterall, she needs every bit of information she can get.

"Vell I'm not completely sure, but it can't hurt, can it?" The german smiled. "We should also inform Nepgear of zhis, do you know where she is?"

Histoire briefly considered Medic's question. "The Basilicom staff should've escorted her back to her room, I could lead you there." The fairy summoned her book and rode on it, as Histoire nodded for Medic to follow her and the both of them left the office.


When the Oracle and Medic entered Neptune's and Nepgear's room, the first thing they saw was Soldier playing tug-of-war with everyone else in the room. The item they're fighting for is actually IF who tearfully clutched her head. On the floor Histoire could see several patches of brown hair.

"What… is happening here?" Histoire hissed. The girls and Basilicom staff let go of IF. Soldier didn't expect this and fell onto his back, with IF falling on top of him and instantly scarpering back before the crazed patriot could grip again the remains of her hair.

"I was programmed to give people sensible haircuts." Soldier admitted in robot-like voice.

"You cut off my hair!" IF yelled, trying to cover her ruined hair, there were even bald patches!

Medic sighed and adjusted his glasses. "I think zhis is quite enough." The German clapped 2 times, walked over to the 'robot'…

"Shutting down…"

…and casually broke his neck.

The sickening snap silenced everyone. Soldier's body fell limp on the floor before being consumed by the Re:Spawn System. The most confused and terrified were Nisa and Falcom of course, being their first time seeing this team's Medic killing his own teammate.

"W-What have you done!? He may have been insane but he didn't deserve death!" Nisa yelled, pointing at Medic. She's too tired and sore to do much more but it got her point across. However the German simply scoffed.

"He isn't dead. Vell he is, but he'll respawn in a few seconds. With his entire brain intact this time."

The sudden reveal shocked everyone (except Compa, who Medic revealed the information to during the lesson), even Nisa couldn't form any sort of rebuttal to this. "…Does that mean you operated on his brain, Medic?" Histoire once again took up the responsibility of questioning the mercenaries.

Doctor nodded with a smirk. "Ja! I scooped out part of his brain so he'd believe he's actually a robot." The German finally explained, going as far as to pull out a small jar filled with water with a small pinkish piece of meat floating inside.

Everyone (except Compa) blanched upon the sight of the brain piece, the color draining from their faces even while Medic hid the small jar and pulled out the Amputator instead. "Anyway, let me fix your hair." He said as he brought the weapon up to his shoulder, leaned on his right foot, and played a Medicating Melody, treating the saw like a violin while holding an invisible bow. As he played the tune (somehow even emitting a soothing melody from the saw), everyone around him started emitting a red glow around their feet.

Suddenly everyone felt their fatigue and wounds disappear! Even IF's hair quickly grew back to how it was before!

Falcom started to stretch, suddenly feeling great. "I have no idea how you did it, but thanks! I feel great!" She cheered. And here she thought Compa saving Nisa was amazing enough, this was on a whole new level! He simultaneously managed to heal an entire group in seconds! Healing spells with area-of-effect are available to only the best of the best healers, and the Medic managed to heal faster than any kind of healing spell she's encountered so far!

In short: He earned her respect.

"With zhat dealt with, Nepgear, zhere is something you need to know."

Medic and Histoire explained the German's theory to the CPU Candidate, as well as how to prevent it from happening again. Everyone else also listened carefully, absorbing the information like sponges, especially her two best friends.

"I see, so that was it." Nepgear closed her eyes, sorting out the information. "But will daily exercise really help prevent it?" She questioned, not really sure if something so simple could prevent something so major like a total heart failure.

"Either way, this is something really dangerous. Maybe you shouldn't use HDD at all, Gear?" IF suggested, but the CPU Candidate simply shook her head.

"No, I need it to save Neptune." She said firmly. "I'll try anything that'll help. After all, with Soldier's daily training and going out to raise Planeptune's shares, it's not that big a change." The lilac-haired girl scratched her cheek.

"That was all. I'm going back to my office now. You girls are free to stay for the night if you would like." Histoire smiled and left the room with Medic in tow.

After the Oracle left the room. Compa suddenly pulled everyone into a group hug. "Aww~! We can have a sleepover! Just the 5 of us!" The busty nurse chirped, completely ignoring the poor group of Basilicom staff. Her suggestion was quickly agreed with everyone, though it resulted with her embrace quickly broken.

"I'll make the tea and cookies!" Nepgear jogged towards the kitchen.

"I'll turn on the game console!" IF retrieved a few random games and turned on said thing.

"We will clean the floor!" The Basilicom workers suddenly pulled out brooms and started sweeping off the strands of hair scattered on the floor.

"I'll set up the furniture!" Falcom started moving the chairs and sofa closer to the TV, with Nisa aiding her.

"And I shall lend you a hand!"


With all preparations ready, the 5 heroines played some video games on the Planeptune's signature console. Well, technically 4 because that's the limit of the console but they do constantly switch over.

This was the most fun Nepgear's had in a long time. Sure it's been a long while since she played video games, so there weren't many matches she won when playing games like 4 Goddesses Online (Goodness, her old profile's still there!), but the amount of fun she had made it all up by a huge margin.

Nepgear felt… safe. Truly safe for the first time in a long time.

Surrounded by close friends, with very strong allies watching a little further away, the CPU Candidate let all her worries briefly disappear as she pressed the buttons on her controller. She lost… Nisa playing as Green Heart beat her with her superior range over her Purple Heart.

But that's okay.

Passing the controller to Compa, the amethyst eyes spectated another match starting, with IF as Black Heart avenging the CPU Candidate. The Guild agent chuckled when Nisa's avatar was immediately 'killed' by getting thrown outside of the map. The brunette and lilac-haired girl subtly fist bumped and Nisa with a smile on her face passed her controller to Nepgear.

If only for this night, Nepgear felt happy, forgetting all the hardships of real life and simply focusing all her attention on blocking Falcom's (playing as White Heart) barrage of attacks.

One day, nights like this will become the rule again, not the exception. Just like they used to be. Together, they'll make sure of it.


Interdimensional RED-Coded Contract

Beep Beep Boop! Robots And Haircuts


Fun Fact: It took me two days to write this chapter. And that's adding few hours of choosing between 'Catch-up'-style of chapter filled with more information over this. To be honest I'm more satisfied with this one.

Crazy huh? Well the MB will turn this chapter into even better one.

Responses:

- Piggyslayer1235

Nah… I figured out how I'll do it. You just wait.

- BreadNotDead

Yup, death and more death is what awaits on her path. But as you said with the type of insanity the mercs are causing, she won't be able to think too much on it.

Yes the talk with Engineer was a nice touch, he also played a big part in shaping her mindset on death. Now her fear of death is considerably dulled out, and she'll be even more eager to throw her life away if it means getting little bit closer to saving Neptune or protecting her friends.

- Lady Vroom Vroom

Yes the Re:Spawn Timer was bullshited too, but the 33 seconds actually have a reason.

The Re:Spawn System works in waves, with each wave usually coming regularly every 10 seconds, but these numbers varies basing on the team and amount of held capture points. The team who's attacking (BLU in Attack/Defense or Payload) or is holding more control points in 5CP and KotH have shorter respawn time than those defending/having less CPs.

The reason why Nepgear's timer was so big is because she's a CPU, and as one of my rebalancing ideas she have increased respawn time. That's because she's much more complex than normal human, the Re:Spawn machine needs to not only fix the organs usual for humans, but also the hardware in charge of HDD. That takes additional time.

As for the soundtracks, I find boss themes/fight themes working for me. The few things I can recommend are:

Metal Gear Rising:

- The Only Thing I Know for Real

- The Hot Wind Blowing

- Rules of Nature

- A Soul Can't Be Cut

Hyperdimension Neptunia:

- Dancing Girl

- Scamper

- Uranus

- Encounter of Destiny

Killing Floor:

- Abandon All

- Abandon All (End of the Line mix)

I hope you enjoy them.

- Harmless Orange