The Mech Touch

"This place sure is hot."

That was an understatement. Venerable Tusa was not a science geek, so he had no idea what he was talking about. All he knew was that if he pointed the sensors of the Dark Zephyr towards the giant blue torch in the center of the star system, his mech would quickly convey sensations of pain and blinding!

The Dark Zephyr along with the rest of the expeditionary fleet hadn't actually come close enough to get dangerously hot, but it was not easy to dispel the illusion that everyone was roasting in a blue oven!

Even if this was the case, the Dark Zephyr was less susceptible to getting burned despite its smaller frame. Its frame was covered by a substantial amount of Unending alloy which possessed a high heat capacity.

If this wasn't the case, the material wouldn't have been able to resist a lot of energy attacks!

As the Dark Zephyr continued to fly along its patrol route, Venerable Tusa directed his attention back to the expeditionary fleet.

He thought it was a bit reckless to bring hundreds of ships closer to one of the planets of the Garimel System. Who knew what they might find over there?

If he was in charge, he would have kept the main fleet in a neighboring star system. There was no need to send the entire gang to the Garimel System when just a couple of combat carriers were enough to get the lay of the land.

If the initial scouts found a rich and accessible resource deposit, the Larkinson Clan could choose to dispatch the Andrenidae along with additional escort vessels, but only a handful.

Ves had separation anxiety and refused to follow this strategy. Splitting the fleet sounded abominable to him. His past actions already showed that he would rather risk his entire clan than to dispatch a smaller group of clansmen into potential danger!

"Hm. The actual reason why he wants to keep everything together is because he wants to be at the forefront of every exploration!"

Tusa pretty much figured Ves out. The patriarch couldn't help himself and if he chose to go forward, then he better bring as much protection as possible!

As the Dark Zephyr continued to fly along the outermost perimeter of the expeditionary fleet, Tusa looked up as another mech was slowly approaching his position.

"Tusa." Imon Ingvar greeted. "How's your patrol?"

"It's as boring as ever. Blue supergiant or not, space is still mostly empty. The only thing I can't get used to is the blue tint on every ship and mech."

"Hehe, you're not the only one."

The two continued to chat as their respective mechs flew alongside each other.

The Dark Zephyr was a familiar expert mech to the Larkinson Clan. Although it received a number of minor upgrades and tweaks since its creation, it had essentially remained unchanged in terms of combat power.

It hadn't grown that much as a living mech either. Even though it was paired with an expert pilot, the Dark Zephyr was still a second-order living mech according to Ves' classification.

Sure, Venerable Tusa may have piloted it long enough to provide a lot of spiritual feedback, but it was not so easy for a second-order living mech to develop true sentience and life!

The expert pilot wasn't in a hurry, though. He would be lying if he claimed he wasn't jealous of the masterwork mechs of his fellow peers, but there was no use crying about it when he couldn't change the outcome.

Tusa used the optical sensors of his Dark Zephyr to glance at Imon's mech.

The latest expert pilot of the Larkinson Clan was both lucky and unlucky when it came to his mech.

The lucky part was that Imon received an impressive custom mech back when he was just an expert candidate.

The unlucky part was that Imon broke through only a short time later! This quickly made his Blade Chaser obsolete before it could participate in a proper fight!

Since the Larkinson Clan was nowhere ready to complete another powerful expert mech, Venerable Imon had no choice but to continue with piloting his custom mech.

Tusa knew how uncomfortable it was for an expert pilot to be confined to a lesser machine. It was like taking a space walk with a suit made out of paper!

"It's rare to see you away from your sister these days." He remarked.

"I vowed to protect her. That does not mean I'll die if I stay away from her for more than an hour! Why can't people figure that out?!" Venerable Imon spoke in an exasperated tone. "This is why I chose to accept this patrol assignment. Everyone will see that I am not obsessed with my sister!"

Tusa wasn't too sure about that, but he bid his fellow expert pilot good luck in his attempt to change people's perception.

"What's it like to pilot an expert mech?"

"Didn't your sister already tell you that?"

"She did, but I want to hear what others think." Imon said. "I keep trying to imagine my future expert mech, but I don't know enough to sink into my fantasy."

"I was like that as well at first. I heard stories from my relatives back in the old family, but they didn't go into detail. Besides, each of them piloted more conventional expert mechs. The ones from our clan are different."

Imon understood what Tusa was talking about.

"They're alive."

"Yes. Your Blade Chaser ought to be alive as well, right?"

"Yeah. It's actually more impressive than I thought. The patriarch told me it's because it is a custom mech that I piloted during my breakthrough. It is because of this reason that he has promised me to upgrade my current machine into an expert mech."

Even Venerable Tusa understood how troublesome it was to pull off this upgrade!

"That's a great commitment! Venerable Jannzi received the same treatment, and look where that got her. Maybe getting a masterwork mech and catching up to your sister is just around the corner." A ll N OVE L FU LL. c 0m

"I don't dare to assume that much, Tusa. Compared to a new and impressive expert command mech like the Minerva, an upgrade to my Blade Chaser is a lot more boring."

"That shouldn't matter. From what I know about our mech designers, they always put in their full effort in every expert mech. Besides, I don't think your upgraded machine will be as boring as you think. Ves is anything but ordinary."

The expert mechs of the Larkinson Clan were definitely more eccentric than most. They also happened to pack more of a punch as well. Even the Glory Seekers and Crossers requested the cooperation of the Larkinsons to design their own expert mechs!

As the two expert mechs continued on their patrol, the discussion between the two demigods strayed to the new mechs that recently entered service.

Although not a lot of copies of the new mech models had emerged, the latest works had already demonstrated their capabilities in the initial field tests.

"What's your favorite new mech model that our clan has released in the last month?" Tusa asked. "Not including your own Blade Chaser, of course."

That was a difficult question for Imon to answer. None of the new models showed how they would perform in an actual battle as of yet. It didn't help that many of them were only effective against enemy mech forces. It had been a long time since the Larkinsons fought a proper mech force.

"I like each of them, but there are a couple of them that I think are more interesting. The new Second Sword mechs look formidable. You just know that their blades can cut through a lot of armor. They look especially fitting when they are accompanying the First Sword in their deployments."

"With names like that, they better be moving in sync." Tusa remarked. "I think Ketis specifically made them similar so that the Swordmaidens would have an easier time with activating their battle formation."

"I wouldn't know. I've never been a part of them, unlike Joshua."

"Join the club. I would love to lead one of those as well, but Ves told me that the Flagrant Vandals are completely unsuited for them. They're too different from each other or something."

Imon frowned. "That can be changed, right? If you approach the Vandals one day and tell them to shape up, I think they will do their best to fulfill your demand. They all look up to expert pilots, and you're pretty much their idol since you are the only light mech specialist in our group."

Venerable Tusa kept silent for a moment.

"I wouldn't want to do that. The Flagrant Vandals have their own way of doing things. The times where I hung out with them has made me appreciate how loose and free they behave. It's kind of strange why this is so since they used to be part of the Mech Corps of my former home state."

"Are you saying they're unprofessional?"

"Nah. They can be serious when it matters. They just like to be less constrained most of the time. I don't want to break the good thing that they have going for them. If they do their best to become more disciplined, they won't be the Flagrant Vandals that I prefer anymore."

He made a decent point, though Imon still thought the Vandals could put in more effort in their image. He much preferred to spend time with the Living Sentinels. They were much humbler and more attentive.

"The Vandals sure are lucky to receive two useful mech models at once." Imon said as he continued to think about the mech legion with former military roots. "They're not as monotonous as before."

"Yeah. The Light Hunter looks interesting but the Stingripper is the real prize here. It's always funny to see all of those mech pilots stumble when practicing against it. They always get fooled and miss all of their attacks."

The effect of the Stingripper went against common sense. Not a single mech pilot figured out how it worked!

That didn't stop the Vandals from embracing it, though!

If not for the fact that the Vandals had to dump a lot of Ferocious Piranhas, they would have obtained a larger batch of Stingrippers!

The two continued to chat about the merits of the Stingripper model until the Dark Zephyr detected a faint reading!

Tusa instantly became alert.

"Wait! My mech has detected a trace of metal!"

"How big?!"

"I don't know, but it shouldn't be big if your Blade Chaser's sensors haven't picked up on it. Let me send you the data so you can try and pin it down yourself."

"My mech can't see it, Tusa. My Blade Chaser is designed for fighting, not for scouting."

Venerable Tusa had already transmitted his findings to the main fleet. Half a minute went by before General Verle directly issued an instruction.

"Investigate the reading. Get closer, but maintain your caution. The risks should be low, but we can never rule out the possibility of danger."

"Roger that."

The Dark Zephyr cautiously flew forward while the Blade Chaser followed from a distance.

As the expert mech got closer, its sensors finally managed to resolve enough details to get a clearer image of the distant object.

"That's not an ordinary space rock."

The object discovered by his expert mech initially looked like a tiny asteroid the size of a hand.

Such objects were not too rare in deep space, though the chances of encountering them were still low.

The reason why Tusa was taken aback at the sight was because the identified object looked like more than just a random asteroid. One of the sides of the black rock looked as if it had been sliced by a giant blade! The surface of the cut side was so smooth that Tusa could hardly imagine that a natural process was responsible for downsizing the space rock!

"General? I think you need to see this…"