Characters for Reborn as a Space Mercenary: I Woke Up Piloting the Strongest Starship!
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Crew of the Krishna (Main Characters)
Hiro
Captain Takahiro "Hiro" Satou
I can't say I came from an alternate dimension, otherwise people are going to think I'm nuts!
Our Stock Light-Novel Hero, a network administrator from a Japanese corporation who spent most of his off hours gaming. One night he went to bed, and woke up in the captain's chair of his ship from his favorite Elite Dangerous clone.- Ace Custom: His ship, the Krishna, is a prize won from a rare in-game event, which he's gone on to customize out the wazoo. It may be a light fighter, but it's got top of the line military grade armor, shields, generators, engines, and weapons. Under the right circumstances, it can even take on a battle-ship and win.
- Ace Pilot: When Stella Online was just a game to him, he was among the top players in space-flight, first-person shooting (winning a custom laser gun as a result), and Power Armor piloting.
- Almighty Janitor: He starts at the bottom of the mercenary guild but quickly rises through the ranks with his accomplishments in space battles.
- Always Save the Girl: He gets Mimi and Elma in his crew because he came to their rescue when they were in extremely dire straits, and he truly expected nothing from them in return.
- And Then What?: After he rescues Mimi from a gang-rape, Elma hits him between the eyes with the question of what he's going to to with her next. If he lets her loose, the rapists will just go after her again, or maybe she'd find herself in an even worse situation. Seeing no better option, he welcomes Mimi to his crew, and gets boinked silly that very night.
- Anti-Hero: Hiro will massacre pirates till the last one unless they immediately surrender, even then if he is in a hurry or simply doesn't feel like it, he won't listen and will murder them likewise. Hiro is also likely willing (he has not done this yet) to destroy those pirates no matter if they claim to have innocent hostages, even kids inside their ships.
- Attack Reflector: With assistance, he can use his untrained Psychic Powers to produce a psionic Deflector Shield, reflecting off laser beams.
- Benevolent Boss: He genuinely loves his crew and bends over backwards for them, showering them in luxury and affection, sometimes literally, and far more often than not seeks out their input and advice, but he is still the captain and ultimately calls the shots.
- Blood Knight: He's a serious adrenaline junkie and is at his happiest when he's plunging himself and his crew right into the thick of battle, blasting his way through waves of enemies.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He doesn't have a lick of the local common sense, but he's possibly the greatest spaceship pilot in the galaxy.
- Buxom Beauty Standard: Looking at Mei's design, customized by Hiro himself, the girls assume he prefers large chests. His response is to insist that he doesn't discriminate between bust sizes.
- Can't Hold His Liquor: He has a very low alcohol tolerance. One bite of the "wine fruit", i.e. a grape genetically modified to produce more alcohol without fermenting, and he's already tipsy.
- Chekhov's Armoury: If he mentions an item, tool, or device is in his possession or his arms locker, it will be plot relevant, no exceptions. The "Singing Crystal" is probably the most straightforward example.
- Chivalrous Pervert: Frequently admires attractive ladies in his POV and loves it when a woman presses her boobs on him.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: In spite of his claims of being a Punch-Clock Hero who's Only in It for the Money, he often goes out of his way to help innocents at personal risk and expense, especially if those innocents are beautiful damsels in distress.
- Combat Clairvoyance: Part of the reason that he is so skilled. He can briefly sense an opponent's Killing Intent, so he already knows where to dodge before they even shoot.
- Combat Pragmatist: He's not afraid to fight dirty if the situation calls for it. For example, if he's being ganged up on by multiple enemies, he may fly close to one ship in their blind spot so the others can't easily target him without risking friendly fire.
- Defensive Feint Trap: Since his Krishna is a light fighter, with its primary weapons hidden away until active combat, many antagonists think he's easy prey. Then out comes the four high-power pulse cannons.“The bastard just transformed!!!”
“N— No! I don’t wanna die! I don’t wanna die! I don’t—!!!”
“S— Stooop! Mommy—!” - Doom Magnet: Trouble tends to follow him around like a recently hatched duckling. The Emperor lampshades it, saying that him and a handful of others throughout the empire seemingly bend the laws of causality around them.
- Dual Wielding: He takes a long and a short sword as battle trophies from Balthazar Dalenwald. Initially they're just for show, but Mei trains him to fight with them.
- Experienced Protagonist: He starts the story with four years of experience piloting the ships provided by Stella Online, which helps immensely when he finds himself piloting one for real.
- Fatal Flaw: It's very easy for a girl to guilt trip him into sexual relations with her. Mimi, Elma, and even Mei all just showed him some Puppy-Dog Eyes and said "don't you want me?" and that's all she wrote. He was able to resist laying hands on Chris when she tried the same because she's younger than he'd prefer, and he's aware her grandfather wouldn't take that lightly.
- Good Is Not Soft: Come after him and his, and he won't have any issue blasting you to atoms.
- Harem Seeker: Once he learns about the local custom where a woman who willingly sets foot in a man's spaceship is pretty much making herself sexually available to him, he still has no hesitation about asking pretty women unto his ship to be in his crew. It's not just the sex he's interested in, though: he does look for a crew that makes his merc career easier with the members' respective skill sets, even seeking Dr. Shouko to deal with unexpected medical emergencies.
- Helping Would Be Kill Stealing: Averted. He does come to the aid of other mercs in distress, but first announces his intention to help and gets their consent before firing on the attacking pirates, so nobody complains that he's just there to steal the bounty.
- Heroic Neutral: He's a good guy, but he has no personal stake in the war between the Empire and the Federation and doesn't want the risk of actively joining the military. He just wants to earn money for a planetside house so he can finally have some damn carbonated cola.
- Hypocritical Humor: He's a serious adrenaline junkie and loves to go hunt down pirates, even once being caught trying to sneak out on the Krishna when he's bored. But he has to hunt on his terms. If the battle comes looking for him, he gets mad and protests that he doesn't like getting into trouble or dealing with problematic situations.
- I Know Mortal Kombat: He quickly becomes a master space pilot and combatant thanks to 4 years of playing Stella Online. The only difference is adapting to using joysticks and foot pedals instead of a mouse and keyboard, which he finds fairly simple.
- Instant Expert: After a few weeks of Training from Hell with Mei, he's able to match blades with nobles who've practiced the sword for years, even before using his time-slowing ability to tip the balance in his favor. Mei later notes the oddity and speculates that his Psychic Powers were giving him a boost.
- Internal Reveal: Once he's been cohabiting with Elma and Mimi long enough that he feels safe, he shares the fact that he's not a native to whatever galaxy or dimension the story takes place in, and his cover story regarding amnesia isn't exactly honest.
- Karmic Jackpot: Treat him well, and good things will ultimately happen to you. Treat him poorly, and your comeuppance is just a matter of time.
- Lack of Empathy: Hiro has had a disturbing lack of aversion to killing pirates and enemy soldiers in battle since the beginning. He took his first 3 kills against humans totally well. He also can hear them screaming in fear and asking for their lives before massacring even the last one of them while feeling nothing and even mocking them for it. Is a more perturbing fact knowing he was a completely normal officer-worker guy on Earth that never fought or hurt before. Then again, he is in a universe where survival of the fittest and most pragmatic is law here.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: He claims to have suffered this as the result of a "hyperspace accident" as an excuse for his lack of knowledge of the galaxy and its customs. Elma quickly figures out it's BS.
- Leave No Survivors: Hiro tends to destroy even the last one of the Pirate Ships not caring about their pilots retreating or begging for their lives. In his view, they are murderer maniacs that have killed innocent people and will do it again if he let them escape. He also has a policy of 'take no prisoners' if they find pirate survivors while looting damaged ships, no matter if they resist or not.
- Manly Tears: He starts crying after Mimi and Elma profess they really do love him, and they affirm their feelings by dragging him to a threesome.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling: He has a psychic ability to sense Killing Intent, well above average.
- New Life in Another World Bonus: Not only does he start off with a powerful starship and retain his in-game skills and (partial) knowledge of the setting, he also gains the ability to slow down time while holding his breath. He is later revealed to have latent Psychic Powers.
- Oblivious to Love: Downplayed. While he's initially surprised by his harem's interest in him, he's a lot less dense about it than many Harem Genre protagonists, and a lot more willing to take the girls up on it.
- One Dialogue, Two Conversations: Hiro offering to pay off Elma's debt and have her join his crew leaves her a blushing mess, to his confusion. He didn't realize at the time that he was also propositioning Elma when he tells her "one more is fine" and "I expect you'll work hard".
- Phlebotinum Overload: He has to be careful dealing with psionic technology, since most such tech isn't built to withstand the sheer amount of mental energy he releases.
- Ping Pong Naïveté: When it comes to anything related to combat (save for his extremely limited skill in hand-to-hand), Hiro is a true master, coming up with cunning strategies, and executing brilliant maneuvers that allow him to absolutely dominate, especially when he’s behind the controls of the Krishna. However, when it comes to anything related to the customs and social mores of the universe he finds himself in, he’s completely clueless. This is justified as, while the universe he ended up in contains most of the same ships, technology, and equipment that he used in Stella Online, none of the factions or locations matches anything found in the setting of the game, leaving him with almost no frame of reference to work with.
- Power Armor: He's got a suit of it, and it's a good thing too, otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to provide assistance when strange creatures were attacking his home base in the Alain system.
- Power Incontinence: Hiro refuses training for his Psychic Powers until Kugi shows up, and even then, it's a slow process. As a result, he keeps using them subconsciously, which among other things keeps dragging himself into trouble thanks to his Winds of Destiny, Change! power.
- Properly Paranoid: While on vacation on Cierra III, waiting for their SOS to reach Chris's grandfather, Hiro puts forward several vectors of attack Chris's Evil Uncle could employ to overwhelm the vacation resort's defenses. While the rest of the party (and Miro, the AI assigned to oversee their stay) take the threat seriously, they all pooh-pooh that Hiro's scenarios are extremely unlikely. Turns out Chris's uncle is desperate enough to employ all of them including setting asteroids on a collision course with the planet.
- Psychic Powers: It's subtle, he doesn't have enough conscious control to do anything flashy, but he has extremely powerful psychic ability. He can sense Killing Intent from quite a distance and apparently manipulate fate to an extent. If his powers were to be properly developed, he would become a Person of Mass Destruction. An elf says he could probably destroy mountains, and when Kugi opens his Third Eye, she has to take great care to make sure he doesn't break time throughout the entire star system. The Perils of Being the Best is why he is reluctant to develop them, since power so far out of common sense would result in the Empire keeping him under a tight leash, or failing that, killing him out of fear.
- Punch-Clock Hero: He does good deeds, but he expects to be paid for it since keeping a starship operational and stocked with ammunition is expensive.
- Real Men Cook: His harem is impressed he knows how to barbecue skewers. It's particularly impressive in this futuristic setting where artificial food synthesizers are commonplace and real meat is an expensive luxury.
- Red Baron: "Psycho", for all the crazy, risky maneuvers he pulls off with his spaceship. Serena was the first to call him that, and the name spread.
- Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: His default plan when things get too intense is to simply hop in the Krishna and jump to another star system.
- Serious Business: His ultimate goal is to buy a planet-side home with a garden, because he can't get carbonated soda in space.
- Sex God: Elma and Mimi actively enjoy having sex with him, and say so.
- Sexual Extortion: Unintentionally. When he chances upon Mimi and Elma in some very dire straits, he offers them to become members of his crew, until they get back on their feet. Even paying their debts from his own funds. He was unaware that when a woman agrees to come on a guy's starship, as a member of his crew, she's agreeing to be his sex-toy, in addition to whatever other duties she might be assigned. It's not until after Mimi and Elma have come into his quarters, wearing sexy lingerie and pressuring him into having sex with them that he learns this. He does feel some pangs of regret at unwittingly using their debts to get them into his bed, but then shrugs going "what's done is done" and strives to treat them with civility and care, and enjoy the fact that they actively enjoy boinking him like rabbits in heat—though going forward, he makes clear with all his Bridge Bunnies that sleeping with him is not a job requirement.
- Sexual Karma: He rescues Mimi from gang-rape and then buys out her debts, welcoming her into his crew. She guilt-trips him into sex that very night. He does the same with Elma, with the same results. He is the MVP in repelling a major pirate and rogue military unit on Cierra III and winds up with Mei, the maidroid, who also takes to boinking him silly. If she wasn't 12 and the granddaughter of Earl Dalenwald, Hiro wouldn't have had an issue with doing the same with Chris Dalenwald. In fact, Mimi was devastated that Chris couldn't join the sexy-fun times. Tina and Wiska wind up joining the crew as interns then as full-timers after they provoke him into knocking their boots off. In short, it's rare for a girl Hiro is on good terms with to not join his crew and his bed.
- Shoot the Dog: Likely. Hiro said that he would destroy pirate ships even when they claim to have hostages with them. Kids, women, philanthropists, etc are considered dead meat by law when they are taken by pirates, so mercenaries will not be punished if they decide to shoot down said ship, killing the captives.
- Sickening Sweethearts: He dotes on and flirts with both Mimi and Elma so much, it's glaringly obvious that he loves them, and it's entirely heartwarming and full of fluff to watch.
- Skilled, but Naive: Hiro is an excellent pilot and gunfighter, but he knows essentially nothing about galactic culture and has to be helped through that by Mimi and Elma.
- The So-Called Coward: When he posits the question if a tactical retreat is permitted during the mass pirate subjugation mission, most of the other mercs look at him with disgust and even Serena scowls at him, implying he might be a troublesome coward. Then he points out that the battle formation, and the Empire's Honor Before Reason might make the imperial warships command the mercs "fight to the death!" When this is pointed out, Serena is shocked, 30% of the mercs begin to view him with respect, 20% still resent him, and the rest are indifferent.
- Stock Light-Novel Hero: He's dragged into the universe of his favorite video game, with an OP "cheat" ship, and winds up with a harem of lovely ladies who all adore him one way or another, for various reasons.
- Super-Reflexes: When he holds his breath, he sees time slow down for him, giving him super fast reaction time. Nobles can do something similar with brain implants, but Hiro somehow does it without.
- Tempting Fate: He can't go through a single chapter without raising a flag, which inevitably comes to pass. All the characters around him repeatedly lampshade it, to which he replies Never My Fault.
- That Didn't Happen: Not wanting to have an embarrassed and outraged noble to deal with, he happily tells a blushing Serena that he and his crew will pretend that they never saw her passed-out, shit-faced drunk and had to put her in their own private med-pod until the alcohol was out of her system.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Soda pop, to the point where the entire motivation for his mercenary career is to earn enough money to buy a planetside house where he can drink it without worrying about the carbonation making a mess in microgravity. More specifically, cola, which he is extremely disappointed the resort on Cierra III doesn't have despite having other sodas, including obscure ones such as bland name Cel-ray.
- Translator Microbes: When he finally manages to get that physical checkup he'd been wanting at the best medical facility available, the Arein system, he and the doctors learn that he doesn't have the translator implant most people get in infancy, yet he still can communicate just fine (Hiro just perceives all dialogue as Japanese). Like everything else he doesn't understand, he just shrugs and goes "I don't have to know how it works, all I have to know is that it does." It is later implied to be a benefit of his Psychic Powers.
- Uncle Pennybags: Good mercs can earn a lot of money very quickly, and Hiro has no problem using it to buy his way out of problems. He gets Mimi and Elma as crew members by buying their debts: with Elma he gives a pretense of having her Work Off the Debt as his first mate, but with Mimi he mostly does it to piss off an annoying bureaucrat.
- Unluckily Lucky: He starts the story in an asteroid belt, navigation computer completely blank, all data corrupted, including his ID and his ship's, his Ener account lost (i.e. no funds), and a cargo-hold full of rare-metals, making him look suspicious as heck. He gets jumped by a trio of pirates as a direct result. Blowing up the pirates gives him Plausible Deniability as to the fact that he's got legal, but heavily regulated cargo, and the loot he collects from the pirates also includes the coordinates of their base.
- Uriah Gambit: As a result of The So-Called Coward entry above, he's assigned the sector with the most pirates in the subjugation mission. Initially hesitant, once he's in the battle, he laughs as he's getting the most kills! The rank-up to Silver from Bronze doesn't hurt either.
- What You Are in the Dark: He could have dumped off a completely smashed Serena at the military base, destroying her reputation and getting her out of his hair. But instead, takes her to his ship and has Elma and Mimi put her in the med-pod and watch over her until she sobers up.
- Winds of Destiny, Change!: Why does he keep running into so many Contrived Coincidences? He's subconsciously using his Psychic Powers to manipulate fate. He has no conscious control over it, making it a mixed blessing and him Unluckily Lucky.
Mimi
Mimi
I'll do my best, Hiro-sama! (Guts pose)
Position: Operator
Share: 0.5 —> 1%
The first crew member that Hiro recruits. Mimi was a student in the station's middle-class Second Division when her parents were killed in an industrial accident. The corporation pinned it on them, saddling Mimi with a ridiculous debt that left her homeless and forced down into the Third Division slums, where Hiro rescued her (against Elma's advice) from a gang trying to kidnap her for prostitution. He bought out her debt and hired her as a trainee crew member—not finding out until way later that, by local customs, he was also taking her aboard as a bed-warmer.Share: 0.5 —> 1%
- Age-Gap Romance: Hiro is twenty seven, Mimi is fifteen (which is barely above Japan's national age of consent, and below the age of consent in most prefectures).
- Anything but That!: She has no problems sharing Hiro with Elma, but when it comes to the existence of a maidroid though, she immediately sulks and starts saying "it's no good." Though she does warm to Mei after they talk things through.
- Ascended Fangirl: Since she was a small child, she dreamed of catching the eye of a mercenary and flying off to see the stars, doubly so when she found herself in the slums, trying to survive and avoid being gang-raped. When she's rescued by Hiro, she has no reservations about joining his crew, even knowing that she'd have to give up her virginity in the process.
- Attempted Rape: Hiro encounters her and rescues her from a gang-rape.
- Brainy Brunette: She's a brunette and is actually pretty smart, picking up on her bridge bunny duties with remarkable speed and efficiency.
- Bridge Bunnies: She was just a college student when her personal disaster struck; Hiro begins training her as a crew member once he takes her aboard. Her specialty is communications, watching the radar, and providing a tactical overlay.
- Buxom Beauty Standard: She's busty and everyone is envious of it.
- Cleavage Window: Her shipboard uniform consists of a coat and off-the-shoulder mini-dress that has a cut-out on the upper side of her breasts.
- The First Cut Is the Deepest: She had a boyfriend prior to Hiro, and they were close. One day, he received a maidroid as a gift from his parents. He very quickly grew distant and eventually just stopped seeing her at all (in the manga she claims this happened to her classmates). So when Hiro gets roped into buying a maidroid, she's not happy.
- Happily Married: She is Hiro's official wife after the events in the Grakkan Imperial Capital, to add an even bigger deterrent to some idiot noble trying something, and Mimi is all too happy to let everyone know about it. She still sees no problem sharing Hiro though, as long as she remains his number one!
- Have We Met?: Count Dalenwald asks Mimi this in Volume 4, and nobles at the Imperial Capital Double Take upon seeing her because she has Uncanny Family Resemblance to the royal family.
- Living Is More than Surviving: Hiro asks her what her overarching goal is in life, seeing as living purely for the sake of living is boring. After a bit of back and forth, she eventually settles on touring the galaxy so she can sample the delicacies of far-off places she's never seen before.
- Love at First Sight: From her POV chapter, it's clear that she came onto Hiro of her own volition, and her feelings for him are genuine, falling in love with him the moment she laid eyes on him.
- Please, Don't Leave Me: She has abandonment issues after suddenly losing both of her parents and ending up homeless, and although she understands Hiro isn't going to abandon her, she struggles with feelings of inadequacy when she first joins Hiro's crew and there isn't much she can do to help, so she visits Hiro's bedroom after he gets out of the shower. When Hiro tries to gently turn her down, insisting that sex with him is not a requisite of being his crew-member, she insists on sex with him, and guilt-trips him into it.
- Really Royalty Reveal: In web novel Chapter 177 (volume 7 of the light novel), Selena Holz notices that Mimi is the spitting image of Princess Luciada, who has just made her first public appearance after coming of age. To get on top of things, she contacts the palace and gets Mimi genetically tested. She turns out to be closely related to the Emperor and likely Luciada's second cousin: her grandmother seems to have been the Emperor's sister, who become something of a romantic folk hero after running away from the palace.
- Rescue Romance: She falls in love with Hiro after he rescues her from sex slavers.
- Shipper on Deck: As long as Hiro doesn't neglect to smother her with affection, especially where it involves boinking her silly, she openly pushes for Hiro to hook up with any woman who shows him affection. When Chris's aristocratic duties pulled her off the crew, thus keeping Chris from joining in the sexy-fun times, Mimi was devastated and spent several days crying herself to sleep.
- Support Party Member: Apart from being the Krishna's operator, she researches destinations ahead of time and sells their pirate loot. After Hiro purchases a mothership and starts transporting supplies, Mimi also handles purchases and sales of those supplies.
- Their First Time: She and Hiro trade virginities the very same night she sets foot in his spaceship, at her insistence.
- Took a Level in Badass: After working and training with Hiro for a few months, she still shows no talent at piloting a ship, no matter how hard she tries, but she does prove somewhat competent at handling a pistol for self-defense.
- Weight Woe: She thinks she's too fat and needs to lose weight. Hiro, in return, thinks she's too skinny and needs to put some weight on!
- Work Off the Debt: Hiro hires her as a crew member to pay him back for buying out the catastrophic debts she inherited from her parents. Since she lacks any actual skills at the time, he has her trained as an "operator" (i.e. sensor and communications officer).
Elma
Elma Willrose
"You haven't got a lick of common sense, Hiro! What crazy stunt are you going to pull today?!"
- Position: Copilot
Share: 3%
- A-Cup Angst: Downplayed in that she's not really ashamed of having a small bust, but will get embarassed when Hiro points it out.
- Action Girl: She's a decent pilot and shooter but is envious of Hiro's skills in both, though she has him beat in hand-to-hand combat.
- Alcohol-Induced Stupidity: After touring a brewery and getting drunk from the samples, she splurges a whopping 100,000 Ener on top-shelf liquor without regard for her debt. Hiro punishes her with a 1 week ban on drinking, though he relents after 3 days.
- The Alcoholic: She lives for booze of all stripes and is prone to dealing with stress by getting blackout drunk.
- Ass Shove: After Elma teases Hiro about having had a semen sample taken through a prostate massage, he has anal sex with her off-page, and then later threatens her with further sessions to keep her from getting blackout drunk.
- Blue Blood: Though her family has no peerage, she is of noble blood, the daughter of an administrative viscount.
- Boobs-and-Butt Pose: Is depicted this way in the Dramatis Personae of volume 1.
- Bystander Syndrome: When she and Hiro saw Mimi being sexually assaulted by at least three men, she actively tried to stop Hiro from coming to her rescue.
- Cloud Cuckoolanders Minder: She's got the unpleasant task of trying to keep Hiro's ignorance of the local common sense from getting them into too much trouble.
- Drowning My Sorrows: When she learns her mishap on the subjugation mission has her facing a fine way, way too big for her to pay, with too little time to scrape up funds before the deadline, she goes and finds a nice, quiet corner and tries to drink herself into a coma. Fortunately, Hiro finds her and offers to pay her debt if she joins his crew.
- Expressive Ears: Her long ears perk up or down depending on her mood, and turn red when she gets embarrassed.
- Fashionable Asymmetry: Her customary street clothes include a trouser bottom with a full-length left leg but the right leg cut off at her upper thigh, with a thigh-high stocking below.
- Green-Eyed Monster: She's a veteran mercenary with at least five years under her belt, and just barely managed to get to Silver rank. Hiro, a complete newbie, shows up and passes the test for Gold, without realizing they gradually cranked it up to the highest difficulty, as part of his assessment test. Elma is not amused when she sees it.
- Hourglass Plot: They first met Mimi when she is completely down on her luck in the middle of the slums. Later, after her ship crashes into a military vessel and forced to go broke to pay it, Hiro and Mimi find her down on her luck in the middle of the slums. Elma even points out how the tables have flipped.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Literally. Unaware of her ship's Fatal Flaw, she goes into a major pirate suppression mission and gets hit with a massive Maser. When her White Swan "goes berserk" as a result, the out-of-control craft crashes into one of the military vessels enforcing the blockade, wrecking both. She gets hit by a fine way too high to pay, even after liquidating all her assets, including her ship, and spending all her savings, with a deadline way, way too close for comfort, putting her right into the same situation Mimi faced earlier, or worse, that she actively tried to ignore. Fortunately for her, Hiro was sympathetic to her plight too, and also welcomed her to his crew...
- Morton's Fork: After the pirate subjugation mission goes badly for her, she's got three or four options, all bad.
- Go to a Penal Colony and face the constant threat of Prison Rape, or worse, since most of the inmates are pirates and she's a mercenary who fights pirates professionally.
- Go into the slums to flee the military, but wind up like Mimi, sooner or later getting gang-raped and forced into prostitution, for drugs and then thrown away.
- Suicide, preferably by alcohol poisoning. (She actively vies for this one.)
- Sign on with the crew of the Krishna under the newbie she's jealous and dismissive of. She eventually goes with #4 and is shell-shocked at how luxuriously he lives and how benevolent he is to his crew.
- Ms. Exposition: She's Hiro's most trusted go-to source for the common knowledge of the universe he's been thrust into.
- Muscles Are Meaningless: Despite her slender frame, she's physically stronger than the more muscular Hiro, on top of being more skilled in martial arts. This is later explained as having some cybernetic enhancements as a former noble.
- Older Than They Look: She's 53 years old when she meets Hiro but looks 20. Space Elves typically live around 500 years.
- Only You Can Repopulate My Race: During a medical checkup, she finds out that Hiro can get her pregnant, which is extremely difficult for her species, as only those who Marry for Love are fertile. When Hiro learns of it, he wonders just what kind of Bizarre Alien Biology space elves have, especially since they aren't even the same species.
- Perfect Solution Fallacy: Since there's no way Hiro can rescue everyone who winds up in the slums facing a rape experience, then he shouldn't rescue anyone. Especially if he's not going to take measures to make sure the person he rescues doesn't get in trouble again. Fortunately, Hiro thought differently, or else Mimi's fate was not going to be kind.
- Pervert Revenge Mode: Often smacks Hiro when he ogles her outside the bedroom or teases her about their sex life.
- Psychic Powers: Elves are psychic as a species, and hers are just strong enough to create a lighter's worth of flame.
- Romantic Wingman: She's the one who pushed Mimi and Hiro together, even providing the former with medicines to make the encounter pleasant, successful, and safe.
- Runaway Bride: En route to the imperial capital, Mei discovers that Elma is actually a blue-blood, and when asked about her circumstances, Elma reveals that she fled from an Arranged Marriage, taking up a mercenary career as inspired by Imperial Princess Cecilia who did the same to escape her imperial duties and live a life of adventure.
- Space Elves: Which gets lampshaded on a repeated basis. She's an elf and lives in space.
- Spotting the Thread: After a short time living with Hiro aboard his ship, Elma quickly figures out his "memory loss" story is a lie, and confronts him about it. She notes his complete lack of common sense knowledge any spacer should know, his Mundane Object Amazement reaction to the futuristic tech around him, and his Deliberate Values Dissonance all peg him as coming from somewhere very far away.
- Tsundere: In the "uses violence to hide their embarrassment" kind of way. Mimi, of all people, calls her out on it.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: She and Hiro bicker and quarrel almost constantly, but they are indeed very, very close and cover for each other when things get rough.
- Work Off the Debt: Hiro recruits her as his de facto Number Two by paying off the multimillion-Ener fine she incurs from an accidental collision with a police cruiser during the raid on the pirate base. As this wipes out most of his savings, he plans to have her pay him back out of her share of their subsequent takes.
- You Didn't Ask: She doesn't bother to tell Hiro about the local "if you're a guy who asks a girl aboard your ship, and she accepts, that means she's consenting to be your fuck-buddy" custom, until well after she's the one who came into his bedroom and propositioned him! She presumed he already knew it, even though he repeatedly claimed to have "amnesia" and acted like he didn't understand many of the local customs to begin with.
Mei
Mei
"I am here to serve, Hiro-sama."
A custom maidroid Hiro and crew acquire on Cierra III while escorting Chris.- A Dog Named "Dog": A Robot Meido named Mei.
- Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Invoked. Hiro chose settings where she would have very subdued emotions and long, flowing, black hair.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: She is smitten with Hiro, not because it's her programming to serve (though that is a factor), but because he treats her like a sentient being. While the law regards AI's like her as people, the enforcement of said law leaves much to be desired.
- BFG: In addition to melee weapons made of a heavy alloy, she can wield a laser rifle as big as she is.
- Bodyguard Babes: Hiro's primary motive for purchasing her is to be Mimi's bodyguard.
- Cool and Unusual Punishment: Being ordered to do nothing. Due to her high processing speed, even a few minutes of doing nothing feel unbearable to her.
- Declaration of Protection: She takes her duty to guard the lives of Hiro, Mimi, and her crewmates dead seriously from the moment he takes her into his service, pledging to defend their lives at the cost of her own if necessary.
- Debt Detester: She sees her purchase price from when Hiro bought her on Cierra III as a debt that she owes him and pushes Hiro into giving her more duties so she can pay it off as fast as she can. This, aside from her competence, is why she pilots the Black Lotus, giving all the proceeds of her pirate kills to Hiro to pay off "her debt" as quick as possible.
- Difficult, but Awesome: She makes the primary weapon on the mothership she pilots an EML Railgun. Such weapons have impressive fire-power but terrible accuracy, which is why they're not normally equipped by the Imperial Military, but with her insane processing capability, she makes it work.
- Do You Want to Copulate?: Once she's finished with her upgrades, she gives Hiro Puppy-Dog Eyes and asks for a "fitting" to make certain she's "fully functional." Hiro's resistance collapses like a crushed paper cup.
- Eating Optional: She's able to taste but abstains from meals since she cannot process food.
- The Glomp: One of her favorite ways to show her affection for Hiro.
- Hypercompetent Sidekick: She captains Hiro's mothership, the Black Lotus.
- Inconsistent Spelling: Her name was initially translated as "May" in the web-novel, but is officially translated as "Mei" in both the light-novel and manga.
- Ninja Maid: Invoked. Hiro chose a maid with high combat specs in addition to thorough knowledge of house-keeping skills.
- Purely Aesthetic Glasses: One of the accessories Hiro put in her package is a set of red-rimmed glasses that serve no function other than to look pretty.
- Robosexual: Yep, she's "fully functional", and just as in love with Hiro as the rest of the female cast. Hiro designed her according to his own sexual fantasies without actually planning to place an order (in gaming terms, he was playing "Space Barbie"), but the resort management AI on Cierra III had her built anyway as a marketing ploy.
- Romantic Wingman: Assures the rest of Hiro's crew that she won't get in their way, and advises Chris that she'll be able to take Hiro as her lover after she comes of age and becomes the next Countess Dalenwald.
- Sink or Swim Mentor: She's also equipped with training programs for swordfighting, dancing, etiquette etc., and does not go easy on Hiro.
- Submissive Badass: She's as strong as Hiro in power armor, but she's eager to serve.
- Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Per Hiro's request, she's very emotionally subdued and highly professional, but still a good and kind woman.
- Super-Strength: Hiro had her outfitted with a skeleton made of starship-quality alloys and military-grade artificial muscle tissue. As a result, despite looking like a woman of average proportions, she possesses several times the strength of an ordinary human, being able to fling a solid projectile with enough power to punch through Power Armor like cardboard, and wave around a BFG laser cannon like it's a plastic baseball bat.
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: The first time she goes pirate hunting with the Black Lotus, she nails a fleeing pirate with the EML. What makes this fit the trope is that the EML was designed to deliver heavy damage to large, slow targets like battleships. The fleeing pirate was piloting a light corvette.
- Violently Protective Girlfriend: She's a bit too devoted to Hiro and will easily become extremely violent in response to any perceived slight against him. This is a part of her personality that was not requested by Hiro, in any way.
- You Are a Credit to Your Race: Despite her hatred for maidroids, Mimi adores her, though their first meeting was rather rocky.
- You Remind Me of X: Dr. Shouko almost immediately proclaims that Mei has a striking resemblance to herself, something Hiro himself failed to notice, and is visibly pleased at the implications. She also palpably deflates when someone points out that Mei has a different air about her than the dear doctor does.
Tina and Wiska
Tina and Wiska
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: After the fiasco's over, Hiro points out that if they wanted to hire him as a test-pilot, the company could have put a quest through the Mercenary Guild and then Hiro could have reviewed it at his leisure and chosen whether or not to participate. Since they tried to do it on the sly and word got out, the engineering bay devolved into a free-for-all where all the rival divisions literally tried to nab him for themselves, resulting in a situation that could have cost the company greatly in its reputation.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Tina used to run with a criminal guild to survive, but cut ties with them after meeting Wiska. This comes back to bite her when said gangsters kidnap her sister for ransom.
- Fastball Special: Tina throws Wiska at Hiro to try and nab him for their test project, after calling him to the engineering bay early in the morning. This has predictable results.
- Fiery Red Head: Tina has red-hair and is extremely hot-blooded.
- Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Tina is the foolish, while Wiska is the responsible, but since Tina is constantly dragging Wiska around, this does the poor girl no favors.
- Honey Trap: Tina drags Wiska to Hiro's apartment, both wearing sexy lingerie, and tries to have them prostitute themselves to Hiro to "apologize" for their little stunt earlier where Hiro was injured after Wiska was thrown into him. Enraged, Hiro slams the door in their face.
- Long-Lost Relative: They were separated at birth and met for the first time 25 years later.
- Older Than They Look: While all dwarves look like children, these two proclaim that they are actually 27-years-old when prompted by Sara.
- Please, I Will Do Anything!: After the door is slammed in their face, they begin wailing that if they don't make things up to Hiro, they could lose their jobs, and Mimi's experience showcases how bad that can be. Mimi convinces Hiro to at least hear them out as a result.
- Promoted to Love Interest: Since they're only provisional members of his crew, as opposed to full-timers like Mei, Mimi, or Elma, not to mention they look like kids, being dwarves and all, Hiro desperately resisted their repeated sexual advances. One day, they goad him into finally giving them that wall-banging sex they've been wanting. They've pretty much moved into his bed at that point.
- Rich Language, Poor Language: Tina was raised in a lower-class district and speaks in kansai-ben.
- Reassigned to Antarctica: After the fiasco, the company wants to get rid of them, rightly so, but firing them would leave a bad taste in Hiro's mouth, so the two get placed as part of the package for Hiro's mother ship as on-board mechanics. Hiro is understandably conflicted about it.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: Tina is red-headed, loud, flamboyant, and reckless. Wiska is blue-haired, quiet, subdued, and responsible.
- Relationship Upgrade: In chapter 324, they discuss quitting Space Dwergr to join Hiro's crew full-time. Hiro gives his consent. By the time chapter 330 rolls around, they've actually done it off-screen.
- Shrinking Violet: Wiska is subdued and shy.
- Sibling Team: Tina and Wiska are twin sisters, and they work together.
- Toxic Friend Influence: Tina is always dragging Wiska into trouble.
- Womanchild: They may be 27, but they act like hormonal teenagers.
Kugi of The Holy Vuelzarus Empire
One of many emissaries sent out by the Holy Vuelzarus Empire to find lost wanderers sucked into the new reality, like Hiro. Or so she claims.
- Beast Man: She's got wolf-ears atop her head and a fox tail.
- The Chosen Many: She is but one of many emissaries sent out to find people like Hiro who were sucked into this new dimension, as a result of the empire's own experiments in psionic energy.
- Contrived Coincidence: Played with. She just happens to be at the space station Hiro and company dock with after the Refill System (Aka Theta Prime) arc. But since she's one of many emissaries, Hiro meeting one of them should have been only a matter of time.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling: She has a psychic ability to sense Killing Intent, well above average.
- Please, Don't Leave Me: Per her testimony, if Hiro refuses her services, her home country will dispose of her, so she pleads and begs for him to take her into his crew, and all that comes with it, knowing about the Grakkan Empire's sex-friend custom...
- Psychic Powers: She's an expert psychic, and part of the reason she was sent to Hiro was to train his own extremely powerful psychic abilities.
Dr. Shouko
- Ambiguous Situation: In chapter 376, she stuns both Hiro and her foster father, Mr. Dixon, by dropping the relationship bomb regarding the former's harem. Was she being ditzy, trolling them, or genuinely trying to understand her place in the pecking order. One thing's for sure, Mr. Dixon was not amused.
- Artificial Human: She's a Designer Baby, derived from the DNA of some of the smartest humans and grown from an artificial womb.
- The Bus Came Back: She returns to the story in chapter 354, over 200 chapters after she and Hiro parted ways at the research station.
- D-Cup Distress: She doesn't like the fact that her breasts are large. They give her back and shoulder pain, and they attract the wrong kind of attention.
- Damsel in Distress: Gets saved by Hiro multiple times in Volume 2.
- Designer Babies: She reveals to Hiro that she considers herself an "android" since she was grown in a test-tube and programmed as a fetus to be the research fanatic she is today.
- Did Not Get the Girl: Hiro offers her a job as his ship's medic. She appreciates it and their attraction is mutual, but she's Married to the Job she has now.
- Subverted as of chapter 372, where she joins Hiro's crew and occasionally shares his bed, to her amusement.
- For Science!: Like most of the researchers in the system, research isn't just her job, it's her passion, because what she's working on is "interesting."
- Happily Adopted: Chapter 376 reveals that her direct supervisor, Mr. Dixon, is also her foster father.
- Hospital Hottie: Works in the hospital with patients, in addition to the lab, and is gorgeous.
- I Owe You My Life: Though it was merely a paid job to Hiro, protecting her from pirates and then some bizarre new life-form that apparently escaped the cultivation meat plant, she is still immensely grateful that Hiro came to her rescue on a repeated basis.
- Mad Scientist: Although she's at least ethical about it, practicing the Hippocratic oath "do no harm," she gets downright giddy when she encounters a new branch of medical research to pursue, like Hiro's uncharted DNA...
- Smart People Wear Glasses: She's a brilliant researcher and wears glasses.
- The Tease: She's hot, knows it, and flirts with Hiro very aggressively once she realizes he finds her sexy, but when asked point-blank to join him as a member of his crew, turns him down since she's Married to the Job.
- Averted when she does later join the crew and graduates from just being a tease to being a full on bedmate.
- What Is This Thing You Call "Love"?: Since she's a test-tube baby, she has no concept of "romance" and challenges Hiro to show her what that means, a challenge he heartily accepts.
Grakkan Imperial Military
Serena Holz
Lieutenant Commander Lady Serena Holz
I never let my prey escape, my dear Hiro!
Hiro's first contact with a named military official.- Abhorrent Admirer: Downplayed. Hiro doesn't outright hate her and does consider her attractive (especially when out of uniform), and they work well together professionally. But she has a definite possessive streak towards him and tends to be manipulative, and he very much prefers his freedom and keeps her at arm's length as a consequence.
- Arranged Marriage: Defied: she signed on with the Imperial Navy to avoid getting forced into one. This is also part of the reason for her pursuit of Hiro: his mercenary career has the potential to make him an acceptable match, should he happen to earn a title of his own.
- Beneath the Mask: When she's on a bender, she lets it all out, that she's actually a very lonely and overworked woman and is jealous as all get out that Hiro hooked up with Mimi and Elma first.
- Blue Blood: She's the daughter of a marquess, but is a good, honest, and honorable woman, even if she is a bit manipulative.
- Can't Hold His Liquor: The moment her lips touch alcohol, she tends to overindulge and become a ranting drunk who makes a complete fool of herself. Fortunately Hiro didn't take her up on her "date" alone and brought both Mimi and Elma to help with the aftermath.
- The Cavalry: When Hiro and crew are being sorely pressed by a fleet of over 100 pirates and some asteroids slapped with FTL drives bearing down on Cierra III, she shows up with her independent anti-pirate fleet and aids the planetary defenses to shoot them down.
- Defensive Feint Trap: She hired Hiro to train a special fleet exclusively for pirate hunting, but since the fleet's composition was ill-suited for most anti-pirate forays (taking a battleship or heavy cruiser into an Asteroid Thicket is an expensive form of suicide), she asks him for options. He suggests disguising the larger ships as asteroids and buying up a civilian freighter, which then conveniently has "engine trouble" in areas where pirates are known to operate in large numbers. 200 pirate ships are completely obliterated before the plan stopped being effective! This prompts Serena's superior officers to reimburse her 5 million Ener purchase as legitimate military spending, with plans to use the freighter as a troop transport when its effectiveness as bait ends.
- Entitled to Have You: Once she admits that she has romantic feelings for Hiro, she forces her way onto his ship every day she has off and tries to monopolize his time. She does not take "no" for an answer.
- Expy: She's Esdeath IN SPACE!, with a few tweaks to her personality that make her a bit more sympathetic.
- First Girl Wins: Subverted. She may be the first girl Hiro meets in this new dimension, and shows strong interest in him, but the first girl he hooks up with is Mimi—and he actively avoids Serena's attempts to take their relationship further. She lampshades the subversion, and hates it!
- Green-Eyed Monster: She's very jealous of the freedom enjoyed by mercenaries like Hiro and his crew, specifically their ability to fly off at will while she's stuck handling paperwork, noble politics, and commanding space fleets.
- She's also very jealous of Mimi and Elma for hooking up with Hiro, though she doesn't attack or try to screw them over.
- I Love You Because I Can't Control You: She is absolutely fascinated and fixated on Hiro, and would bend herself into a pretzel if she has to, if she believes that will get him to serve under her, in every sense of the term, because he's a Blithe Spirit who will actually chew her out when she steps out of line despite the fact that she's a daughter of a marquess.
- Inconsistent Spelling: Her surname gets corrupted to the nonsensical-in-context "Hoarz" in the manga. Whether to use 'r' or 'l' is a recurring problem in English translations because they're the same sound in Japanese.
- Manipulative Bitch: She's great at getting others to bend to her will, by pushing the right buttons, even managing to snare Hiro a couple of times, but her hold on him is tenuous and fleeting, which is why she's so, so fascinated by him.
- Nominal Hero: She is morally upstanding, but the only reason she's in the list of heroes for the story is that she's fascinated by, and wants to control, Hiro, and she's learned that helping him in his pursuits is the best way to do it.
- Not a Date: She invites Hiro out under the pretense of a business lunch while he's contracted to her pirate-hunting fleet. To her annoyance, he brings his crew along "since it's work-related" and she drops the pretense afterwards.
- Proud Warrior Race Guy: She loves being in the military and fights with nobility and honor. Hiro's Combat Pragmatism does tend to chafe her on occasion.
- Rank Up: She's a Lieutenant when she first meets Hiro and gets promoted to Lieutenant Commander for the successful defense of the Tarmein System, in no small part thanks to Hiro. She ranks up to Commander after the battle against the Mother Crystal, which also elevates Hiro's mercenary rank to Platinum.
- Reasonable Authority Figure:
- When Hiro first shows up at Tarmein Prime, she bends a few rules to get him out of interrogation (in the LN; in the manga, she blackmails the customs officer by implying he's on the take), and allows him to go on his way, selling the rare metals the colony needs, giving him the bounty for taking out the pirates and locating their base.
- When Elma crashes her ship into one of the military vessels maintaining the blockade, she gives direct orders to not give Elma punitive fines because it was a bonafide accident, due to a situation beyond Elma's control. In this case, though, her orders were ignored by a petty bureaucrat with a raging hate-boner for mercenaries. Serena responds to that by sending the pig to a Penal Colony, but can't get the bureaucracy to refund the fine, since the fine itself was legit.
- Red Baron: A Flash Forward reveals she will later be known as the Princess Admiral.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: Downplayed. She's got eyes red like blood, and she's very calculating, cold, and cunning, and has a bit of a yandere streak, though for all that she's still a pretty decent person.
- Sore Loser: In chapter 330, she and Hiro happen to meet in an "invitation only" weapons shop where he was getting his newest Power Armor fitted, and she had an appointment there as well, for the same reason. She insists on a "friendly spar" with him. She gets spanked no less than 7 times because she just refuses to admit her loss, until Hiro lets her win just to make her stop, and she's still complaining about that.
- Stalker with a Crush: Double subverted. At first glance, it looks like she's keeping tabs on Hiro and chasing him around purely because he's the best pilot she's ever seen, and she wants to monopolize him, at least to keep him out of enemy hands, foreign or domestic. After maneuvering him into a "date" once she manages to strong-arm him into becoming a temporary pirate-hunting subordinate, she gets herself completely smashed and admits that she does have romantic feelings for him and resents the fact that Mimi and Elma got to him first.“Unfair! It’s so unfair–! I was the one who first had my eye on Captain Hiro you know–!”
She then stamped her feet while still sitting on her chair and cried loudly.
“That’s right you know. I helped you out, ‘kay. I’m the one who first met Captain Hiro…… But why is it that when I met him again, he already had other women sticking to him!?” - Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Cold and aloof on one side, sweet and sympathetic on the other, though the "sugar" side tends to come out only when she's shit-faced, about to hit the floor, drunk.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: While she and Hiro do like each other on a personal level, their professional relationship is horrible. So whenever they wind up having to work together, they just can't resist bickering and backbiting with Serena constantly trying to rein him in and him constantly trying to break away.
Captain Bariton
The imperial officer who countermanded Serena's orders and not only slapped Elma with a punitive fine, but made the deadline as short as possible, hoping to send her to an orbital prison.
- Bob from Accounting: An accounting officer mentioned and dealt with offscreen after causing grief for Elma and Serena.
- Bothering by the Book: Rumors were circulated among the mercenaries in Serena's pirate subjugation mission that this bureaucrat was itching to ship the mercs to an orbital prison for Indentured Servitude on the smallest mistake. These rumors prove true when Elma loses control of her ship due to an internal defect and accidentally crashes into a military battleship, wrecking both, with the deadline for the cost of repairs and fines being set way, way sooner than the repairs were scheduled to be completed.
- Bullying a Dragon: Serena not only has a higher rank than he does but is the prestigious daughter of a Marquis house, yet he doesn't hesitate to harass her. When he's caught red-handed countermanding her orders for no reason than simply to be petty, he gets his comeuppance, but this doesn't help Elma, his victim, in the slightest, as the orders he handed down were legal to obey.
- Fat Bastard: Elma calls him a "fat pig" in her POV chapter.
- Laser-Guided Karma: He was fond of shipping mercs to an orbital prison, for the slightest excuse, real or imagined, every chance he got. At the end of his courts-martial, he's shipped off to an orbital prison, full of pirates and mercs he sent there, all of whom would like to have a nice face to face with him...
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: He hates mercenaries and Serena who is very, very skilled at employing them cheaply and effectively. As a result, he's fond of Bothering by the Book to try and sabotage her, and them, every chance he gets.
- Tempting Fate: You, in a military organization, give your superior officer(s) grief every chance you get, purely to be petty, but squeaking by on technicalities, get cocky and countermand orders higher on the chain of command to get the worst possible result? Enjoy your courts-martial and the heaviest possible sentence upon your inevitable conviction.
Captain Eugene Herasmus
The captain of the Vuestor, the flagship of a rogue military unit that targeted the Krishna on Balthazar's orders.
- Better to Die than Be Killed: He commits suicide rather than be taken into custody, supposedly.
- Cornered Rattlesnake: When Serena showed up to protect the Krishna and the Pelican IV, the freighter Hiro was "guarding," the Colonel ordered his fleet to become more aggressive to the Krishna, rather than stand down as Serena commanded, to her ire.
- The Ghost: He never makes an on-screen appearance, though his orders to attack the Krishna are heard by the main characters.
Lt. Commander Romando Kestrel
The Vuestor's first mate.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: After Serena's anti-pirate unit disabled or destroyed the rest of the fleet led by the battleship Vuestor, with only the Vuestor itself still combat capable, he orders the fleet to stand down to avoid further meaningless sacrifices.
- One-Shot Character: Appears only once in the battle attacking the Krishna to try and get at Chris and is never seen again.
- Unreliable Expositor: He claims the captain of the Vuestor committed suicide rather than let himself be taken into custody. This testimony has to be taken with a grain of salt since the actions aboard the battleship are never shown.
Grakkan Empire Nobility
Abraham Dalenwald
Count Abraham Dalenwald
"As both head of the family and her grandfather, I am grateful to you all."
Chris's grandfather, The Patriarch of House Dalenwald and a powerful and extremely wealthy Imperial nobleman. Once he catches up with Hiro and Chris in volume 4, he formally hires Hiro to continue acting as her bodyguard until they can return to their home system.- Foreshadowing: When he asks Mimi "Do I know you from somewhere?" As it turns out, she's related to Grakkan royalty, though he doesn't make the connection until much later.
- Fiction 500: A gold-ranked mercenary under contract typically commands a fee of 80,000 Ener a day. Abraham offers Hiro over two-and-a-half times that to stay on as Chris's bodyguard for the trip home; the crew ultimately leaves them with 16 million in their pockets.
- Old Soldier: He's in his fifties or sixties but is still able to hold his own in a Duel to the Death: it's unclear who would have won between him and his rebellious son Balthazar had Hiro not intervened to ensure his employers would still be around to pay him. He also has a sizable personal fleet.
- Parental Marriage Veto: While he otherwise likes Hiro and is very grateful to him for rescuing his granddaughter, he does his level best to put the kibosh on her Precocious Crush on the Captain which doesn't really work due to her determination.
Chris Dalenwald
Lady Christina "Chris" Dalenwald
"You may keep it [my necklace] with you. You haven't finished protecting me, after all... my knight."
A pre-teen girl rescued by the Krishna from pirates and found in a stasis pod. She turns out to be the granddaughter of Count Abraham Dalenwald, orphaned during a coup attempt by her father's younger brother.- Because You Were Nice to Me: Hiro doesn't just rescue her from pirates and an escape pod, keeping her safe. He also treated her with caring, compassionate, and genuine kindness, even giving her some much needed therapy to cope with her loss. As a result, she fell for him, hard.
- Deceased Parents Are the Best: Her father and mother shoved her into an escape pod to rescue her from "pirates" that were trying to wipe out her family.
- Fallen Princess: Though she has no hard evidence, she's convinced her Evil Uncle sent his personal troops disguised as pirates to seize the cruise ship she was on, murdering all the passengers, including herself, so he could claim her father's rightful inheritance.
- Fille Fatale: Despite being 12, she has tried various Honey Trap ploys on Hiro that would be very, very effective on just about anyone else.
- This almost comes to a head when she demonstrates how an unscrupulous noble will entrap someone powerful like Hiro: when she and Hiro are alone in her room, she partially strips and almost alerts the guards. She stops at the last moment to warn him not to meet other noble ladies in private.
- Jailbait Wait: Inverted. Hiro isn't interested in her that way, but she's interested in him, and when they part ways she plans to wait until she comes of age at fifteen, at which point she'll be legally entitled to pursue him whether her grandfather likes it or not.
- Living MacGuffin: If her testimony is accurate, her uncle would like to remove the "living" part.
- Lady and Knight: The Lady to Hiro's Knight, which they had fun lampshading.
- Marshmallow Hell: When Mimi hears of her circumstances, her head gets shoved into Mimi's ample bosom until she almost suffocates!
- Mundane Object Amazement: As an aristocrat, she's never had "commoner" food like hamburgers and pizza. So when she's exposed to it while aboard the Krishna, she eats it with gusto!
- Precocious Crush: Yeah, Chris falls for Hiro, too. He likes her well enough, but he studiously refuses her advances both because of the politics involved and because she's way too young for him.
- Protectorate: By law, Hiro's tasked with protecting her for at least a week. Considering his character, even it he wasn't legally required to do so, he would anyway.
- Seppuku: Implied, but avoided. When her grandfather's mothership is boarded by her Evil Uncle, she mentions having had a small knife concealed; Hiro (probably correctly) infers she would have performed jigai with it had Balthazar won.
- Sole Survivor: Of the entire crew and passengers of the cruise liner she was on, she's the only known survivor.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: She very much wants to pursue a romantic relationship with Hiro, but while he's not opposed to it, her aristocratic duties won't let that happen, and if they try anyway, her grandfather will chase down Hiro across the galaxy, something he'd never survive.
Princess Luciada
Luciada on the left, Mimi on the right.
The granddaughter of the Emperor via the current crown prince.- Gilded Cage: Was never allowed outside the palace until her coming-of-age.
- Prince and Pauper: "Pauper" is a bit of a stretch given how wealthy Hiro's crew are by the time they meet Luciada, but in any event she prevails on Hiro to help her dress as Mimi so she can sneak out of the palace for an afternoon, with Hiro and Elma as escorts.
- Reluctant Fanservice Girl: Mimi's customary minidress turns out to be a lot more revealing than Luciada is used to, much to her embarrassment. Mimi thinks she looks great in them but allows her to add a jacket over the dress and black shorts under it.
- Silk Hiding Steel: It's implied that she's trained in the sword and keeps a hidden dagger. She's also calm when threatened and attacked by Alexander, partly thanks to Hiro protecting her.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Before Luciada's introduction, many Imperial nobles remark that Mimi looks somehow familiar to them. It turns out Luciada is Mimi's second cousin and looks almost exactly like her (aside from having a different hairstyle and slightly smaller breasts).
Inagawa Technology
Mr. Dixon
Dr. Shouko's direct supervisor and foster father.
- Boyfriend-Blocking Dad: In addition to being the one who can decide if Shouko can or cannot resign from her position at Inagawa Technology, he's the one who can give or withhold his blessings if she decides to engage in romance.
- Parental Substitute: Since Shouko doesn't really have parents, he adopted and raised her.
Antagonists:
Earl Balthazar Dalenwald
Chris's Evil Uncle.
- Absurdly Sharp Blade: His personal sword sliced through Hiro's gatling laser mounts on his personal power armor like a hot knife through warm butter. Seeing this, Hiro whips out a shield designed to repel spacecraft debris and micro-asteroids then bashes him unconscious with it. For good measure, Mei then goes and stomps on his limbs, crushing them.
- Ambition Is Evil: He will happily engage in any villainy to get more power, prestige, and wealth for himself.
- Arc Villain: He's the main antagonist of Volumes 3-4.
- Battle Trophy: Hiro is awarded Balthazar's swords after defeating him.
- Cornered Rattlesnake: After Hiro and Serena have repeatedly foiled his plans and Chris manages to get to her grandfather, he pulls out all the stops and launches himself, along with a commando unit, at his own father, even attacking Hiro's power armor with a sword. He has several cyborg upgrades that managed to make that battle a close fight.
- Cutting Through Energy: While fighting Hiro armed with power armor, he used his sword to cut through Hiro's laser fire!
- Fantastic Slur: He angrily calls Mei a "sex-doll" when she shows up to stop him from murdering his father and niece. Mei retorts that while the term is technically accurate, it is still derogatory and demands that he retract it.
- Hypocrite: He calls Hiro a "dishonorable boor" for interfering with his duel to the death with his father Abraham. This, coming from the man who hired fleets of pirates, corrupt soldiers, and even threw a damned asteroid at a resort planet to kill a harmless young girl for her inheritance money.
- Inheritance Murder: Despite being very, very wealthy, he sponsors pirates and disguises his personal guard as pirates in order to murder Chris and her family so he can claim her inheritance for himself.
- Murder in the Family: Attempts to kill off his entire family to make himself the next patriarch of House Dalenwald.
- Nothing Personal: As he finishes communicating with his underlings, just before the scene ends, he states "I have no grudge against you, Christina, but I need you to die here for my sake!"
- Plausible Deniability: He tried to pass off his men attacking a cruise liner as the work of pirates. It might have worked if said "pirates" didn't get greedy and seize Chris herself in an escape pod and then yanked Hiro out of FTL with an interdiction system.
- Rank Scales with Asskicking: Gives Hiro a much tougher fight than all of his Mooks combined, partially thanks to his cybernetic implants. Hiro needed the assistance of his power armor and Mei to even the odds.
- Spanner in the Works: Hiro and the Krishna crew manage to repeatedly thwart his plans to kill Chris, no matter how elaborate and expensive they are.
- Sunk Cost Fallacy: The more his plans are foiled, the more desperate and vicious he gets, throwing more and more resources at making sure Chris is dead. What's worse is that in his mad dash to kill her before his father, her grandfather, finds out, he's getting sloppy in covering his tracks, and now the Imperial military is on to him.Serena: "Military grade stealth drop-ships? You're right, Captain Hiro. This is something the Imperial Military can't ignore."
Space Dwergr:
The primary maker of spacecraft, and the place where Hiro and company go to purchase a mothership. As a whole
- The Alcoholic: They make Elma look stone-cold sober by comparison. Cutting them off and making them abstain is the worst possible punishment one can deliver unto them.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: They are the best mechanics and engineers in the galaxy, but calling them "eccentric" is putting it mildly.
- Gratuitous Foreign Language: Dvergr is Old Norse for "dwarf".
- Mad Scientist: Their dwarven racial traits make them obsessed with researching spaceship designs, and they will got to extremes in their competitive drive to be the first and the best.
- Our Dwarves Are Different: They look like human children, as opposed to the short, stocky, bearded humanoids of other works. They still obsess over forging and alcohol though.
- Paparazzi: Deconstructed. As Hiro and crew are at the Imperial Capital planet, en route to the award ceremony where he is to receive his Imperial Cross medal for meritorious service in the subjugation of the Mother Crystal, Wiska and Tina are besieged by a gaggle of PR agents from the local branch, some of the employees are even human. They pressure the two mechanic girls to let them into the Black Lotus, and while Hiro tries to greet them in the airlock, they shove their way right past him, start taking pictures of every room, force their way into the crew's personal quarters, and start trying to rip open the cargo containers to see what's inside. Enraged, Hiro, Mimi, Elma, and Mei subdue them and wrap them up like bag-worms with the anti-intruder defenses. While the leaders of Space Dwergr are begging, head to the floor, these yahoos are screaming and shouting about their "rights" until Hiro points to his Silver Wings Sword Assault medal, meaning he's nobility, and tells them that an official complaint has already been sent to their bosses, at which point they quiet down, so Hiro reminds them about several critical things:
- Hiro and crew have final say about how and when anyone comes onto their ship or what is publicly revealed.
- Hiro agreed to Space Dwergr having exclusive access to their story in return for a discount to purchase the ship, so he can return the discount and pretend the agreement doesn't exist, cutting off all access, permanently.
- They have competition, and there's nothing preventing Hiro from selling the ship's on-board camera footage, showcasing Space Dwergr's abominable acts. For these Yahoos, Hiro has nothing to gain from employing them, so if they find themselves unemployed and in the slums, too bad.
- Pint Sized Power House: Space dwarves tend to be several times stronger than humans despite their size difference.
Sara
- The Face: She's the company's primary point of contact with customers.
- Only Sane Man: She may be well-grounded and understand common sense, but the rest of her company is staffed by obsessive-compulsive engineering whackos whose idea of "recruiting" a test pilot is fighting over him, and when they see him, mob him with a "first come, first served" declaration, to the point one of them even throws her co-worker at him to nab him. When this happened to Hiro and he was injured as a result, the next couple chapters involve the company bowing and scraping to try and appease his wrath.
- Stepford Smiler: During her introductory chapter, she spends the entire negotiation over the sale price of the mothership wearing a "zero-yen smile" after Hiro had mistook her for a "little girl"
House Willrose
Elma's family. In general
- Let Her Grow Up, Dear: Elma's mother and older sister are accepting of her being part of Hiro's crew, and all that entails. Her father and brother, not so much.
- Like Father, Like Son: Eldemois also challenges Hiro for besmirching Elma, only being stopped by his wife and daughter knocking him out.
- Mum Looks Like a Sister: Elma's Space Elf parents look young enough to be her siblings.
Ernst Willrose
Elma's older brother.
- Berserk Button: Doesn't like being called Hiro's "brother-in-law". However, the most he can do is seethe inwardly, lest he draw Elma's wrath.
- Big Brother Instinct: He did help Elma escape an unwanted Arranged Marriage and keep the groom-to-be from going after her.
- Knight Templar Big Brother: He's a raging sis-con and doesn't want any other guy near Elma. Even after Elma herself chews him out for demanding a duel the instant Hiro sets foot in the Imperial capital, he keeps on coming. Losing to Hiro doesn't sway him in the slightest.
- Throwing Down the Gauntlet: In his first onscreen appearance, he challenges Hiro to a duel and gets mad when Hiro turns it down.
Crimson Mercenaries:
"Lucky Looter" Marie (UNMARKED SPOILERS)
A gold-ranked mercenary that greets Hiro almost immediately after he helps Serena deal with a major pirate outbreak in the Theta system. Hiro smells a rat and is immediately suspicious of her. His suspicions prove right at the end of the Theta System arc when she tries to assassinate him.
- Evil Counterpart: And Distaff Counterpart. She is also from Earth but is a fan of Stella Online's expansion, Stella Online: PIRATES, and wound up in this new universe as The Mole for the Red Flag pirates, who were the primary antagonists of the Theta System arc. She also has a reverse harem, as the sole female of a fleet composed of mostly males. It is ambiguous if they're all sex-friends or not.
- Exact Words: Her final "parting gift" transmission is a promise that she will treat the Theta System incident as "water under the bridge." Hiro lampshades the many, many loopholes in that statement, not the least of which is that the Red Flag Pirates could still come after him for Revenge Myopia. Because Hiro and company shot them down as they were trying to raid Theta prime while he was there visiting Elma's family.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: After trying to shoot down Hiro and missing 9 times in a row, she realizes he's way, way better than her and she'd better lay off.
- Pirate Booty: How she gained her nickname, having the good fortune to discover numerous hidden stashes of pirate loot. Of course, there's a good explanation for her string of "lucky" finds.
- Plausible Deniability: She stalked Hiro very, very effectively by pretending to be doing pirate-hunting patrols. She also managed to get out of being arrested when she ambushed Hiro by claiming that she was fighting Crystal Lifeforms and Hiro's ship was just caught up in the collateral damage "accidentally."
- Red Baron: "Lucky Looter"
- Red Herring: Invoked with her red and pink Color Motif and the fact that the Crimson Mercenaries are introduced right after the Red Flag pirates are dealt with. Of course, it turns out they're Connected All Along.
- Sarcastic Confession: After she's left the Theta System, a time delayed recording goes of in Hiro's email where she all but confesses to being with the Red Flag Pirates and trying to kill him, but the wording is just vague enough that it's inadmissible as proof.
- Unfriendly Fire: As Hiro is trying to leave the Theta System, en route to an appointment with the Grakkan Military, she sets off a Singing Crystal in his path and while he's fending off the incoming swarm, tries to shoot him down 9 times before the Theta System sentries show up to rescue him. When the sentry patrols arrive, she plays it off as Trial by Friendly Fire instead. She gets away with it because Hiro has no hard evidence. In fact, Hiro is the one who gets detained and questioned for hours instead.
- Villain with Good Publicity: She rubs Hiro the wrong way, but the mercenary guild doesn't have any dirt on her. She turns out to be very good at covering her tracks.
