Time passed quickly.
Once again, the Forward Base's forecast proved accurate.
The Mining Window arrived right on time.
No signal was needed. The moment the Mining Window opened, both Wang Dong's Mine Overlord Type II and Old Shi's Close-Space Dominator I fired up their engines.
They piloted their ships with practiced ease, breaking through the turbulence layer and entering the mining zone without hesitation.
Inside the cockpit of the Mine Overlord Type II, a Magnetic Tether securely held Wang Dong in place at the console seat.
Before entering the mining zone, Wang Dong had already disabled the ship's onboard artificial gravity system, rerouting the saved power to the eight lateral maneuvering thrusters lining the sides of the Mine Overlord Type II.
Gripping the eight-directional flight control stick, he pushed the engine thrust to one-third.
A sense of genuine joy welled up in Wang Dong.
There was nothing like the feeling of piloting a ship with his own hands.
The only pity was that beneath him wasn't the Battleship from his past life, but just a humble Mine Overlord Type II Low-Altitude Mining Vessel.
A Low-Altitude Mining Vessel was only marginally better than a space shuttle.
Compared to a Deep-Space Mining Vessel—outfitted with combat-capable armor and powerful enough to contend with lightly armed ships—a Low-Altitude Mining Vessel was truly the runt of the fleet.
Compared to the Battle Axe-class destroyer he had piloted in his previous life, the Mine Overlord Type II was pitiful in terms of thrust, acceleration, directional control, and overall maneuverability.
But it had one clear advantage.
Without needing armor or weaponry like a Battleship, the Mine Overlord Type II could devote more real estate to maneuvering engines—eight in total, double the usual four on most standard Battleships.
Even among Low-Altitude Mining Vessels, this configuration made the Mine Overlord Type II particularly nimble.
Old Shi's Close-Space Dominator I, for example, only had six directional thrusters.
And as Wang Dong reacquainted himself with the controls, the memories of flying this type of Mining Vessel came flooding back.
Effortlessly, the Mine Overlord Type II pulled ahead of Old Shi's Close-Space Dominator I at a pace visible to the naked eye, gaining a clear lead in the duel.
Wang Dong fully exploited the advantages of his ship's eight directional thrusters.
Amid the tightly packed and unstable gravitational conditions of the asteroid belt, his Mine Overlord Type II weaved skillfully through narrow channels, executing subtle course corrections without sacrificing thrust or speed—darting smoothly through the Asteroid Belt Mining Zone.
Old Shi gritted his teeth and clung close behind.
In terms of piloting skill, Old Shi—who had nearly twenty years of experience—was no amateur. Within the mining community, he was a respected veteran.
In past duels with Wang Dong, although he usually lost, the difference was always small—never decisive.
But this time, things felt different.
Wang Dong's Mine Overlord Type II seemed noticeably more agile than usual.
His maneuvers—though subtle—were smoother, more refined.
Each of those small refinements might not mean much on their own, but stacked together—dozens, hundreds of them—they became a real, measurable gap.
Ordinarily, on the outer edge of the mining zone, Old Shi could still keep up.
But in less than ten minutes after entering the field, Wang Dong's ship had seized total control of the lead, leaving Old Shi trailing behind.
And this still wasn't Wang Dong's full potential.
He had the presence of mind to sort through his memories while flying.
"How did I deal with this last time? Oh, right—I got so fed up I went all in and set a trap."
Wang Dong frowned, recalling his exact maneuver before his rebirth.
The Close-Space Dominator I that Old Shi was flying today had a flaw: its No. 3 directional thruster—located on the lower port side—hadn't been properly maintained.
The ever-present scan overlay from Wang Dong's auxiliary system had already flagged this—displaying it in yellow instead of the ideal green.
That meant the component was in poor condition.
Once they entered the mining zone, Wang Dong took the lead and carefully controlled the pace of the flight, executing several sudden directional changes.
Throughout the flight, he deliberately maneuvered in a way that stressed the faulty thruster, aggravating its condition.
Just thirty minutes in, the overworked No. 3 thruster overheated and failed.
Ordinarily, a single thruster failure wouldn't be catastrophic.
The remaining five could compensate, albeit with less agility.
But this wasn't normal space.
This was the Asteroid Belt Mining Zone.
Under Wang Dong's lead, they had already ventured deep into the belt.
In such a perilous and dynamic environment, even a minor system failure could prove fatal.
The moment Old Shi's thruster failed, his ship lost balance—and collided sideways with an asteroid it should have narrowly passed.
The impact wasn't too severe—just a side-swipe that scraped off some armor plating.
But what followed was a chain reaction.
The initial impact disrupted the ship's posture completely.
In open space, he might have regained control slowly.
But not here.
The Close-Space Dominator I spun out of control and was quickly caught in a gravitational current.
It bounced repeatedly off nearby celestial debris before smashing into a thousand-meter-wide asteroid.
Old Shi, seasoned and experienced, immediately activated his escape pod protocol.
He was lucky enough to eject just in time, avoiding his ship's complete destruction.
Wang Dong had a chance to help.
And he did.
As annoying as Old Shi was, Wang Dong wasn't heartless enough to let him die outright.
One crash was enough to teach him a lesson and let Wang Dong vent his frustrations.
But Old Shi's luck ran out anyway.
A cluster of fast-moving meteoroids, scattered by the earlier wreckage, slammed into his escape pod.
The impact obliterated it instantly.
There was nothing Wang Dong could do as the wreckage of Old Shi's pod drifted off into the asteroid field.
Such was the funeral of an interstellar miner.
It had been, technically, the perfect trap—an elegant way to eliminate a pest.
Wang Dong hadn't directly caused Old Shi's death.
Both his ship's black box and Old Shi's would confirm that.
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