The Mech Touch

The squad of ultralifer biomechs should have been able to defeat any frontal assault. Yet the single disruption that occurred when one of its knight mechs suddenly shut down not only caused the formation to expose a flaw, but also leave the rest less prepared to receive the charging mechs!

Right now, the double column formation entered into complete disarray as the more agile and tricky Roving Hunter mechs employed their strengths to the best of their ability!

"Finish off this knight mech first!" Captain Rivington shouted as his swordsman tried to thrust its sword through another weak point. "Don't let it catch a break!"

Mech athletes were very sensitive towards displays of weaknesses. After getting slammed into and losing grip of its weapon, the remaining enemy knight mech came under so much pressure that its wounds rapidly increased!

Amazingly, it still held up. The mech even tried to grab and entangle the weapons that struck its frame. The mech pilot was so determined to occupy the attackers that it didn't seem to matter if the knight mech incurred more damage!

There wasn't any good solution available to the Roving Hunter mech pilots. They knew they wouldn't be able to attack the more vulnerable enemy biomechs if this large and intractable obstacle was in the way. Even if they were aware of its weak points, since the most critical ones were positioned at the rear, it was impossible for Captain Rivington and his second to take the enemy knight mech out in an instant!

Due to the disrupted formation, the spearman mechs positioned in the rear needed some time to get into action. Yet just as one of them attempted to stab at the Taragon, the Perringer surged forth and slammed its shield against the enemy's shield!

Different from Oliver Vlambeer's shield charge, Venerable Jannzi charge was not only stronger, but exerted its force at such an angle that caused the stricken spearman mech to disrupt its stance, causing it to lose its balance for a moment!

The Perringer took advantage of the opening to stab its sword through one of the weak points on the chest of its current foe.

Although Ves had identified the area in the front as a weak point, in fact it was still quite strong and resistant against damage. It was just weaker to a relative degree.

This didn't seem to faze Jannzi though. She attacked so hard and fast that the Perringer's sword sank deep enough to inflict substantial internal damage!

Even though the spearman mech retaliated remarkably quickly, its short spear bounced against the Perringer's shield.

This allowed Venerable Jannzi to press her offensive knight mech forward and launch numerous stabs at a range that was too close for the spearman mech to utilize its primary armament!

The enemy mech pilot was aware of this. The spearman mech dropped its weapon in order to pull out a backup knife, but Venerable Jannzi already predicted this move and commanded the Perringer to kick at the reaching arm!

As the spearman mech failed to pull out its secondary weapon, the Perringer plunged its sword at the holster that held it, causing it to rupture and drop the knife to the floor before it could be used!

In an attempt to relieve the spearman mech of its dire condition, the two rifleman mechs overloaded their weapons and fired a pair of extraordinarily powerful beams at the Perringer!

However, the mech piloted by Venerable Jannzi quickly lifted up its damaged and dented shield. Due to all of the attacks it absorbed and the collisions it endured, the supercharged beam shots blasted the shield apart!

Though the Perringer incurred moderate damage due to this event, everything was already within Venerable Jannzi's calculation. The blunt of the attacks had been blocked.

Now that the Perringer lost its shield, the offensive knight mech became even faster and more agile. Even though the expert pilot wasn't accustomed to piloting such a fast mech, she was not a slouch.

Through some clever maneuvering, her mech circled around so that the Perringer was able to hack its sword at the shield arm of the recovering spearman mech.

Even though the blow failed to sever the arm that was carrying the shield, the wound weakened the limb to such an extent that its hold became shaky!

"That's mine now!"

The Perringer's free hand grasped the side of the shield and forcefully attempted to pry it away from its current owner. Since the spearman mech still hadn't been able to grasp a weapon, its weak punches and easily avoidable kicks failed to deter Venerable Jannzi from stealing its shield!

With another expertly-aimed stab, the spearman mech was no longer able to hold on to its own shield, thereby allowing the Perringer to pull it away and appropriate it for its own use.

This was a shameful outcome! Losing one's weapon or equipment to an opponent was one of the worst humiliations that a mech pilot could suffer!

As long as the performance of the mechs didn't diverge too much, then an incident like this meant that the victim was completely outclassed!

"Who the hell am I fighting against?!"

It was too bad that Venerable Jannzi wasn't in a talking mood. After gaining a new shield, she faced the enemy's ranged attacks with greater confidence. The hijacked bone shield provided the Perringer with another buffer to block the ranged attacks.

Since the rifleman mechs exerted no pressure towards Jannzi at the moment, she felt free to finish off her wounded and weaponless opponent!

With one kick from the Perringer, she stopped the spearman mech from bending down and picking up a weapon. The knight mech bashed its stolen shield forward, causing the already-unstable enemy mech to turn and expose its side to such an extent that a sword plunged straight through a weak point that Jannzi had already attacked!

This time, it was too much for the poor spearman mech. Even though it was still able to put up a fight, its performance had dropped to such a degree that Jannzi easily struck its back and caused it to shut down.

While Venerable Jannzi wanted to move on to attacking the rifleman mechs and the odd auxiliary mech at the rear, she noticed that her fellow mech pilots were having a hard time dealing with their current opponents.

While Jannzi downed the second enemy mech, the Taragon and the Bluestar attempted to finish of the sole remaining enemy knight mech.

They had actually accomplished quite a lot since they were able to gang up on the isolated enemy defensive mech. Yet soon enough, one of the flanking swordsman mechs had arrived to come to relieve the pressure.

The Bluestar was forced to turn around and use its mace to block an incoming sword chop!

At this time, the enemy knight mech seemed to have gained a second life. Without the need to face off against two opponents at once, it began to entangle the Taragon even harder, preventing Captain Rivington from pooling his strength with other friendlies.

Not too far away, the Optimon faced off against the other enemy spearman mech.

Unlike Jannzi, Oliver Vlambeer was much less skilled in combat. Even though his fit with the Optimon was high, his inexperience along with the pressure of actual combat affected his combat performance.

His opening moves had been strong because he employed set piece moves that were in the playbook of the Roving Hunters.

However, after his opponent recovered, Oliver found that he was unable to take advantage of his opponent anymore!

The ultralifer mech pilots weren't inexperienced. This allowed the second enemy spearman mech to perform a lot more even against the Optimon!

The best Oliver could do was to match blow for blow against his current opponent. "I need help over here! I can't beat this spearman mech alone!"

No one was able to come to his aid, sadly.

Vincent was particularly in dire straits! Although the powerful shotgun blasts inserted a lot of painful pellets in the uncovered frame of the enemy biomech, the weapon ran out of shells before it could finish the job!

This meant that even if the swordsman mech was in a bad shape, it still retained enough battle effectiveness to pose a threat against his striker mech!

"Damnit! I don't know how to fight up close with this biomech!"

The Rotenring moved slower than Vincent had wished. The biomech attempted to raise its shotgun so that its chainsword was able to grind into the flesh of the incoming enemy.

Unfortunately, the swordsman mech was able to sidestep the obvious attack with and slash its blade deeply into the Rotenring's side!

If the striker mech wasn't covered with thick bone plating, this strike could have inflicted severe damage to a limb!

In fact, if the enemy swordsman mech wasn't so damaged, it could have pierced through this layer of protection. Unfortunately for the ultralifers, the continuous shotgun attacks weakened the biomech to the point it was only able to muster up 60 to 70 percent of its strength and speed!

This merely caused the performance of the enemy swordsman mech to fall in line with that of the current Rotenring.

"Damn! Why are biomechs so difficult to work with? Whoever came up with this stupid idea?!"

Vincent barely managed to lift its combined weapon in time to block the continuous sword strikes.

However, once his enemy figured out that the Rotenring wasn't able to move quickly, the swordsman mech started to flank and attack from tricky angles.

Soon enough, the Rotenring began to get more and more beat up! While its bone plating was very helpful with mitigating incoming damage, they were not as tough as knight mech armor.

As long as the enemy swordsman mech attacked the same plate several times, it would definitely crack or split!

Blood began to pour from various points of the Rotenring as Vincent continually failed to leverage the full strength of his borrowed mech.

It didn't even seem to matter whether he was an expert candidate! His unfamiliarity with the Rotenring, his discomfort with biomechs and his missing limbs all contributed to such an awful performance that Vincent failed to hit anything with the chainsaw attached to the Rotenring's attached shotgun!

When the enemy swordsman mech attempted to perform a powerful chop, Vincent urged the Rotenring to lift its weapon to block the incoming attack from above.

However, the attack turned out to be a feint as the chop from above never went through. Instead, the swordsman mech veered to the side and instead chopped at the upper leg of the Rotenring!

As a slow mech that moved even slower due to the deficiencies of its mech pilot, the lower half of the mech became an obvious target.

"Ahh! You bastard! You just had to hit the leg!"

While the devious sword chop wasn't capable of amputating a leg with a single blow, it pierced through the bone plating with such force that it cut a decent portion of organic muscle.

When the swordsman mech pulled out its blade with a bloody splash, the Rotenring almost fell over because its damaged limb wasn't able to support its entire weight onto it anymore.

The swordsman mech darted in against and attempted to land an identical blow to the other leg. As long as both legs sustained severe damage, the hefty striker mech would no longer be able to support its own weight!

The fear of getting his legs cut off again frightened Vincent to no end. Even if it was just the legs of his mech, in this situation he was so caught up in the battle that his fears inadvertently caused his immersion to deepen.

As someone who suffered the misfortune of losing his legs, Vincent never wanted to relive this experience again.

Due to his trauma and urgency, several mental blocks that previously prevented him from piloting the Rotenring to a deeper degree melted away.

His eyes seemed to burn as the mech under his command moved substantially faster!

"I WON'T LOSE MY LEGS AGAIN!"

Even though Vincent wasn't able to prevent the swordsman mech from sinking its blade into the other leg, the Rotenring still managed to whip its chainsaw out fast enough to cause it to sink into the chest of the enemy mech!

Once the chains began to whir, a large quantity of blood and flesh began to tear away!