The Mech Touch

When Gloriana dutifully performed her job and identified the weak points of the opposing mechs before inputting her findings in the fleet's network, she always kept an eye on her brother.

She knew that Brutus was in the fight of his life. She didn't want her brother to square off against the infamous Unit L, yet there was no other alternative.

The Charlemagne and its Scarra had proven their capacity for slaughter many times over the course of the Komodo War.

Unless they were constrained by an enemy expert mech, the numerous ranged mechs empowered by Venerable Ghanso could easily tear through entire formations of Hexer mechs with ease!

Venerable Brutus did what was necessary to constrain the Friday Coalition's experimental unit. His Star Dancer, the mech and partner that had served him well over several years, turned into a wreck because of his sacrifice.

The loss of an expert mech was a traumatic loss to any expert pilot. If not for the acute threat he was subjected to, the Hexer expert pilot would have mourned for the loss by now. As it was, his life was anything but guaranteed at this time!

Venerable Ghanso already had a history of shooting down enemy cockpits. The Fridaymen put bounties on the heads of every Hexer expert pilot. The Coalition deliberately encouraged its mech pilots to shoot down the ejected cockpits whenever they could in order to weaken the power of the Hex Army.

An expert pilot that fled from the battlefield intact was one that would doubtlessly show up in a new mech at least half a year later!

Since Ghanso had dozens of powerful rifleman mechs at his disposal, he had become very proficient at shooting down cockpits, even the higher-performing ones that were utilized in Hexer mechs.

The ejected cockpit of an expert mech was highly resilient. Some of the same high-quality armor that clad the exterior of an expert mech also encased the cockpit in order to preserve the life of the pilot as much as possible.

Expert pilots were just as valuable as their expert mechs, if not more! They were scarce resources to a state, so they enjoyed the protection that was commensurate to their degree of preciousness.

Since the Star Dancer was an expert mech commissioned by the Wodin Dynasty, the protective capabilities of the cockpit was a bit better than a machine of its tier was accustomed to. It was no problem for the cockpit's armor to fend off a multitude of attacks from standard mechs, especially with the help of a one-use shield generator!

Yet the attack that the Charlemagne snapped off with as little delay as possible was still powerful enough to crush the cockpit!

The power output of an expert mech was not comparable to that of a standard mech. Not even premier mechs such as the Valkyrie Brunhild could come close to matching the power of just a casual attack from the Charlemagne.

They were basically two different species of mechs!

The only upside was that Venerable Ghanso didn't bother to coordinate with his Scarra to launch this next attack.

First, it wasn't needed. The maneuverability and evasion ability of the cockpit was really incomparable to that of a true mech. While it was a lot smaller and more compact than a multi-ton mech, the cockpit's capacity was tiny as well. Its designers opted to load it with a one-use shield generator in order to protect it better against attacks from regular mechs as opposed to adding more movement capabilities.

This meant that Venerable Ghanso hardly had to employ any effort to land a solid hit on the fleeing vehicle!

He did not grow complacent and assume that killing Venerable Brutus was already a done deal. He already spotted nearby Hexer mechs changing their course to put their frames in the way of his shots.

While there were too few Glory Seeker mechs left to be sacrificed like this, the remaining ones knew it was incredibly crucial to preserve the life of an expert pilot.

Even if Venerable Brutus was a boy, he was still a treasure to the Wodin Dynasty!

Every Glory Seeker was a diehard loyalist to the dynasty that nurtured them and still took care of their families. They were trained to accept death as long as it advanced the cause of the Wodins.

Besides, even if they used their own mechs as shields, there was no guarantee that they would die for certain. As long as their cockpits were intact, they could make it out alive as well!

Yet even as the nearby Glory Seeker mechs moved to support and cover for the Star Dancer's cockpit, Venerable Ghanso wasn't willing to give his opponents any time to mount a rescue.

The snap shot the Charlemagne unleashed almost instantly reached the vulnerable cockpit. Its cockpit desperately activated its side boosters in order to get out of the way of the incoming attack, but the range was too short and the beam arrived too quickly for it to work!

As the occupant of the cockpit was already smelling death, another beam struck the Charlemagne's attack!

A searing, hellfire-red laser beam fired from far away had intercepted Venerable Ghanso's latest attack!

What was surprising about the intercepting beam was that it managed to overpower the attack launched by an expert mech!

Venerable Ghanso looked shocked as his seemingly surefire kill was pulled out of his grasp.

Gloriana froze as she looked at the projection depicting the flight of her brother's cockpit.

Ves and many others who paid attention to this side of the battle were flabbergasted as well.

Who managed to rescue Brutus' cockpit?

"It's Venerable Davia Stark!" Ves quickly realized as he used his implant to access the relevant data in an instant. "My Bright Beam Prime managed to intercept the Charlemagne's attack!"

Far behind the main lines of the battle, a number of Larkinson mechs stuck close to the expeditionary fleet. The mechs stayed behind in order to act as both a reserve and a final line of defense against any attackers that were determined to reach the heart of the Golden Skull Alliance.

Among the mechs that hung back were the Shield of Samar and the Bright Beam Prime.

Although the mechs weren't designed to mate together in a combination mech like the specially-designed machines of the Corundian Giants, the two mechs had already adopted a similar approach.

The Bright Beam Prime stuck behind the Shield of Samar as best as possible. This was not that difficult due to the relative differences in their sizes.

The Shield of Samar was considerably bigger than a typical medium space knight. Even if it wasn't able to cover the prime rifleman mech fully, it was still capable of projecting both a resonance shield and an energy shield to cover any gaps in its coverage.

From the start of the battle, the Shield of Samar did nothing but hold position and block the handful of incidental attacks that were aimed in its direction.

While Venerable Jannzi Larkinson wanted to advance her mech forward, her mech was too slow to keep up with all of the maneuvers.

The only way she could contribute to the battle at this point was to lend as much cover to the Bright Beam Prime as possible. This way, Venerable Davia Stark would be able to launch her attacks without any other concerns.

The older woman never did anything, though.

The Bright Beam Prime remained still as its mech pilot constantly kept a vigilant eye on the battle.

"Why aren't you doing anything?" Jannzi eventually lost her patience with her current partner.

"I am biding my time." Venerable Davia calmly replied. "My prime mech can only fire three full-powered attacks according to its maker. I cannot waste these opportunities."

"That.. sounds ridiculous. Who would cobble together a rifleman mech that can only fire three times in total?"

"Hehehe.. don't underestimate the Bright Beam Prime, young woman." Davia smirked even as she kept observing both the left and right sides of the unfolding engagement. "To be honest, my new mech can also fire regular laser beams, but they're not that powerful and wont make that much of a difference. I would rather lay low and avoid drawing attention to us. A battle of this scale never ends quickly, so don't be concerned."

Her time had eventually come. She had kept track of the Star Dancer all this time. Even though she harbored no good thoughts for the Hexers, Venerable Brutus had sincerely taken care of her for many months.

Even though she despised his pathetic Hexer personality and pathological deference towards women, he was not an awful human being.

The time she spent under his care and attention may not have changed her awful impression towards the Hexer people, but it at least caused her to develop a soft spot for the young and horribly misguided Hexer expert pilot.

Davia briefly shook her head. "You're a brainwashed fool of an expert pilot, Brutus, but you're probably one of the better humans in the galaxy. I will try and save you this one to repay all you have done for me. Decency must always be rewarded."

Once she realized that Venerable Brutus was in trouble, Venerable Davia became serious and resonated with her new mech.

The P-stones embedded in the mech reacted to her aggressive force of will. The entire mech became surrounded by a dark red glow that stood in stark contrast to the Shield of Samar's gold-coated frame.

The rifle of the prime mech began to glow brighter than the rest of the mech when Venerable Davia pooled as much power as possible into her weapon.

She held her fire when Venerable Ghanso unleashed a salvo that resulted in the elimination of the Star Dancer!

Davia intuitively judged that the Bright Beam Prime was too weak to affect Venerable Ghanso's fully-charged attack.

Besides, as a bystander and a rifleman mech specialist herself, she already guessed that Brutus was able to save himself.

He did not disappoint her expectations. His cockpit managed to escape intact.

It was unfortunate that Venerable Ghanso did not leave it at that! As soon as the Charlemagne adjusted its aim, Venerable Davia already deduced what the enemy expert pilot had in mind!

A lot of calculations went through her mind and her mech as her fully-charged rifle minutely turned.

The Bright Beam Prime unleashed its beam just before the Charlemagne executed Venerable Ghanso's command.

A powerful dark red beam that made anyone who observed its passage feel threatened down to their souls traversed all the way from the rear of the expeditionary forces to the front!

The prime mech's attack was just powerful enough to do its job. Venerable Davia and her new mech managed to precisely cancel out an attack that was incredibly challenging to intercept by any normal human mech pilot!

Venerable Davia had done her utmost to accomplish this nigh-impossible feat!

If her aim was even a centimeter off, then a part of the Charlemagne's attack might still go on to strike the vulnerable cockpit!

If her timing was off by a second, then much of the power of her attack would go to waste, thereby giving the Charlemagne's strike enough uninterrupted time to end Venerable Brutus' life!

"He's safe now." Venerable Davia wearily said as she tried to recover from her arduous exertion.

On the other side of the battlefield, Venerable Ghanso was furious! His attempt to finish off the opponent who annoyed him so much had been ruined by some random marksman mech who fired an odd attack!

His Charlemagne was about to fire again, only for him to widen his eyes before attempting to dodge his mech to the side!

A rain of beams and explosions impacted the Charlemagne's resonance shield!

Ves had personally commanded the surviving Transcendent Punishers to set aside their current actions and hinder Venerable Ghanso's mech as best as possible!

Even though none of the attacks launched by the artillery mechs posed a serious threat to the Charlemagne in the short term, they still caused Venerable Ghanso enough trouble to force him to abandon his earlier intentions.

The Scarra mechs also came under bombardment!

"Blast you, Ves!"