Both my ship and Amber’s ship landed in one of the available docking bays within the hangar before I boarded the Verlandi again to take off the space suit.

The girls and I then gathered in the hangar bay after we were all properly equipped and ready.

Speaking of which, if it wasn’t clear that this station was a mining station beforehand, the ships that were docked here would have given that away considering pretty much all the ships here were mining ships with the exception of about half a dozen ships.

Those six ships seemed to be combat ships that I assume to be patrol ships guarding this station.

They seemed to be quite well equipped too so I don’t think they were attacked by pirates or the enemy ships since they weren’t even launched to defend the station.

"It’s... Quiet," Yumiko commented, her ears twitching cutely above her head. "Unnaturally quiet..."

I nodded, "I thought so too... And it feels unnerving for some reason. I don’t even know why I feel that way."

Ries peeked at me, "Probably because this is supposed to be a mining station and yet we don’t hear the sounds of machinery working, Boss."

Hmm... That might be the case I suppose?

"So I guess we should figure out where the people inside the station are?" I suggested.

Lea tilted her head, "They might have left the station already though, Mistress..."

Amber looked around the hangar, "Considering that most of the ships are still here and completely intact... They should be somewhere within this station I suppose?"

"That is also assuming they weren’t launched out into space," Mara pointed out.

"Maybe there was a mutiny and they killed each other before the survivors flew off..." Yumiko muttered, making me believe that she still wasn’t over the fact that her crew betrayed her.

I cleared my throat, "Ahem... Well... Either way... Let’s just head inside first and just be prepared for any ambushes."

The other girls nodded and we proceeded towards the only door that led out of the hangar bay and into the station.

The doors slid open when we went up to them and everything still looked normal.

No blood, no burn marks indicating a shootout happened, or even overturned crates or improvised barricades. Additionally, there was also no sound that might indicate there was anyone nearby either.

Well... I wouldn’t say the place was clean considering this was a mining station and the aesthetics were the same as the forge station we came from earlier... Even though the place was quiet, there was still the smell of smoke, oil and metal that clung to the surface of everything around us.

Still, the silence was definitely eerie.

Just where is everyone?

A thought suddenly came to me and I turned to Renata, "This isn’t like the last time we found those shadow monster thingies on that ship, right?"

Renata tilted her head, "Hmm... I do no sense anything that is related to me around this area so I do not believe that is the case, Daddy."

Right... So we don’t need to worry about those shadow monsters appearing I guess... But I’m still wondering what exactly happened here? It certainly felt like there was something out of the ordinary since there isn’t a reason a station like this would be so quiet.

I nodded at the girls, "Alright then... I guess we’ll do the same thing as before. We’ll head to the security room and I’ll hack into their systems to see what we can find. With any luck, we might be able to find out what happened here through the security recordings."

With that decided, we started to head down the corridor to look for the path that would bring us to the security room, which didn’t take long since there was literally a sign just a few steps away that showed where the important points of the station were.

Unfortunately, it looks like the security room was quite deep inside and it looks like we would need to pass through several places before we could even reach there.

Well... We might as well just check those places out to see if there’s anyone there as well.

On the way there, we passed by what appeared to be their mess hall and we were greeted with another confusing sight.

There were half eaten food just left on the table but it wasn’t like they were left there in a hurry either. It looked like whoever had been eating here just left the place as though they were expecting to come back and finish the food later.

But judging by how the food looked, they had been left here for quite a while.

"Daddy?" Renata called out, tugging on my arm. "Can I eat those?"

"Err... Let’s not. This stuff isn’t ours so unless the people that live here give us permission or if they’re all dead... Then you can eat it."

"Okies~"

I continued to lead the way forward, keeping an eye out for any movements while making sure we were on the right path.

We approached an intersection and the path diverged into three different directions with the security room supposedly being on our right.

But when we turned towards that direction...

A large armoured door blocked our way.

I was just about to start hacking it until I realised that the door itself had no power.

That’s odd... Why would this one specific door not have power? Was it intentionally cut off from the power grid?

"Do we find another way around it?" I asked.

Amber cracked her knuckles, "Let me, Tera~"

I guess we’re just going to barge right in then? Well, go ahead then.

I stepped aside and Amber clapped her hands together before slowly pulling them apart like she was pulling the door open herself.

There was a metallic groan before the two doors started to slide open, slowly opening up until there was just enough space for a person to fit through.

I’m pretty sure she could just tear off the doors if she wanted to but I guess we should avoid breaking their stuff as much as possible while we still don’t know what is going on here.

We squeezed through the gap and seeing that the lights were still functioning on the other side, it meant someone specifically cut the power to this door in particular for some reason.

"Could they be locking people out from coming in here?" I asked no one in particular.

Mara looked at the door with a serious face, "Or... They might be locking something in here instead..."

Great... You just had to make it sound even scarier...

I hefted my shotgun and nodded at the girls, all of them also holding their own weapons close and ready as we continued to advance towards the security room.

But we only managed to take a few steps in before something jumped out from the corner, prompting all of us to point our weapons at it.

The thing turned out to be a Zwerger and he had his hands raised to show that he was unarmed.

"Woah, woah! Friend! Friend!" He cried out.

I narrowed my eyes at him, "Are you a miner on this station?"

"Yes! Yes! You’re all Mercs right? I knew they wouldn’t abandon us!! They would have definitely known something was wrong when the deliveries stopped being shipped out!"

Despite what he was saying, I still kept my gun levelled at him just in case while I continued to question him.

"What is going on here? Where are the others?"

He grimaced, "Alright... I understand why you are suspicious of me so I’ll just give you a quick explanation of what happened. One of us had found some kind of weird looking rock while he was out mining and kept it secret from us. That weird rock turned out to be some monster and it has basically taken over the station. There’s only a few of us left and we have been hiding in the security room for the past few days."

I frowned at him, "A monster? We saw no monsters on our way here though. Are you sure it’s still on the station?"

"I’m sure! I’m sure! In fact, it’s even more surprising that you didn’t see it at all! There were a few of us who had tried to get supplies from the kitchens and most of them ended up getting captured by the monster before they could even reach there!"

"What even is this monster that managed to take over the entire station without you all being able to fight back?"

He made a face before gesturing down the corridor that he had appeared from, "Let’s go meet the others first... We can show you what we managed to record in the security room... Then you might have an idea of what you’re up against... Like it or not, you’re in the same situation as us now..."

Right... I suppose we did come here expecting some enemies to fight so this still falls within expectations...