Xiao Ran could tell how wary everyone aboard the Frontier was of the Giant God, which was why he deliberately acted relaxed to reassure them. In truth, even though he knew the Giant God he had to face was merely a defective unit and a berserker without a pilot, while he felt relieved, he remained extremely cautious.
He understood that everyone aboard the Frontier felt heavy because they had witnessed the Giant God wipe out Axis with casual gestures. But Xiao Ran knew that this burden had actually been brought upon them by him, because he had never, ever wanted to suffer excessive losses when facing an enemy. Just as El-Elf had said, such losses were something he could not bear.
This was not a war, and they were not expendable soldiers in a war. They were Participants, Participants from Prometheus, Participants who would pass through one world after another and face increasingly powerful enemies. If they had to pay such a terrible price even against a defective unit this time, what would they do when they encountered stronger enemies later? They might as well all die here and be done with it.
Everyone knew the Giant God could not be confronted head-on, but even if they could not fight it directly, they could not suffer unbearable losses. They could not have a group of pilots who had no means of dealing with the Giant God clearing the way for the stronger ones. Thus, the difficulty had already been raised in another sense from the very beginning. Finding a way to deal with the Giant God without sacrificing anyone in the team was the true source of that heaviness.
After watching all the recorded footage, Basak frowned as the two battleships cut communications and prepared to launch another probing attack.