The Mech Touch

Venerable Tusa Billingsley-Larkinson did not feel good at the moment!

Though he may act a bit careless at times, he wasn't a stupid expert pilot. He trained diligently and also studied plenty of books in order to increase his understanding of other mechs.

Light skirmishers generally fared badly against hybrid mechs. The latter were usually armed with a multitude of ranged weapons. Although these guns weren't particularly powerful, their quantity meant that they could output a lot of shots at a target.

If enough of this rain of fire struck a light skirmisher, the latter machine would definitely get into trouble due to its light armor and low damage tolerance!

It spoke a lot that the Mars did not even engage any of its weapon systems against the approaching Dark Zephyr.

This left the expert light skirmisher free to move close enough to enter the range of Patriarch Reginald's Saint Kingdom.

It was only at that point that Tusa realized why so many people advocated against this action.

An expert pilot trying to approach an ace pilot was no different from a mouse creeping up to a cat!

Tusa felt completely suppressed when he entered Reginald's domain field. This went beyond technology. Even if his Dark Zephyr was stronger, it hardly wouldn't have made a difference.

No enemy expert pilot could ever make him feel so utterly helpless and without power!

"It's not only that…!"

There was more to Reginald's willpower expression than straightforward suppression.

The man's unique upbringing, battles and other harsh experiences had shaped him into a warrior that pursued both glory and victory and battle.

This not only shaped his prototypical domain back when he was an expert pilot, but also affected its traits now that he had advanced to ace pilot.

This was what made Saint Kingdoms so special and compelling. The unique traits of ace pilots were much more obvious after experiencing so much growth and evolution!

There were some Saint Kingdoms that embodied fire. Any mech that entered these fields would spontaneously grow hotter and overheat even if they weren't running any intensive systems!

There were other Saint Kingdoms that centered around controlling time. They could literally freeze time in an area so that every incoming projectile or energy beam froze as soon as they entered into range.

Weirder and more unusual Saint Kingdoms also existed. There was one that enhanced the performance of every friendly expert mech. There was another one that rapidly drained the energy reserves of opposing mechs. There was even a Saint Kingdom that could convert enemies into allies!

The one that Patriarch Reginald acquired wasn't as perverted as that, but it was still hard to deal with by opponents who entered into his range.

Tusa gritted his teeth as he and the Dark Zephyr tried their best to resist the overwhelming mental pressure exerted by Reginald's powerful presence.

Yet all the expert pilot could do was to make sure he did not bow his head and admit his inferiority in front of Reginald.

"I… won't… submit!"

Patriarch Reginald's Saint Kingdom centered around battlefield domination.

The ace pilot considered himself to be a leader, a champion and a warlord in the same vein as his late father.

As such, he developed an obsession of achieving martial superiority on the battlefield!

Though Reginald wasn't interested in the finer points of rulership and governance, what he truly valued was to become the strongest and most powerful warrior in any battle!

He not only wanted to become the top dog, but let everyone know it, especially his foes!

This strong and persistent desire turned into an obsession that shaped his Saint Kingdom into one that not only acted on the minds of living mech pilots such as Venerable Tusa, but also acted upon both mechs and attacks!

No matter whether they were alive or not, Reginald demanded the submission of all of them! The fact that he did not even let off light photons was a testament to his need for recognition!

As the other expert mechs entered the Saint Kingdom shortly afterwards, they too became directly exposed to the same effect.

The Riot with its unusually chaotic resonance shield fared a bit better against the pressure. The mech was not only thicker and more powerful than the Dark Zephyr, it also happened to have a defensive design spirit in the form of Qilanxo.

Qilanxo was able to provide a decent amount of help in allowing the Riot to maintain control, but the design spirit's influence only extended up to a point.

As Reginald actively noticed the Riot's increased resistance, he concentrated more and more of his formidable willpower onto the expert spearman mech.

Eventually, the Riot lost control as well as its resonance shield broke apart after being subjected to the overwhelming power of an ace pilot!

"Agh!" Venerable Orfan roared in frustration. "Goddammit, Riot, move! The Mars is just over there! At least get close enough so that I can land a single hit. This is embarrassing!"

While the Riot got stalled due to Reginald's active efforts, the First Sword was able to move forward, much to everyone's surprise.

Part of it was due to the protection granted by its design spirit. Qilanxo shared a special relationship with both Orfan and Dise, so she was able to provide more assistance to their expert mechs.

However, this was not enough for the First Sword to maintain control under this extreme pressure.

The true reason for the First Sword's continued resistance was due to the special qualities of the expert pilot!

Just like Ketis, Venerable Dise was a Swordmaiden who had trained her entire life to overcome enemies that were stronger and more intimidating than herself.

Dise excelled as a hunter and got more excited when she confronted more formidable opponents.

Though an ace pilot was well above her ability to defeat, she did not want to suffer defeat so easily!"

"If I can't pass this test, how can I ever protect my fellow sisters in future battles?!"

Venerable Dise's protective desires along with her thirst to challenge the most powerful opponents on the battlefield combined into a form of resistance that was a bit more effective against the mental suppression that Reginald exerted from his Mars!

However, once the ace pilot directed more and more of his formidable will towards the First Sword, the expert swordsman mech slowed down its advance.

Venerable Dise might be strong enough to prevent total paralysis, but her expert mech was not as resistant!

By forcibly freezing the First Sword in place, Reginald effectively took the expert mech out of action!

Right now, none of the Larkinson expert mechs demonstrated any effectiveness towards the Mars!

Though Reginald's Saint Kingdom became easier to destabilize now that he was forced to split his concentration and willpower to support numerous simultaneous actions, his recent advancement had strengthened him so much that he was still able to support this herculean effort!

"Ace pilots are too unreasonable." Ves bitterly said.

Though he already foresaw that this result could happen, to see how an ace pilot was completely able to dominate the champions of his clan was like rubbing salt in a wound.

Ves already intended to invest fairly big in the upcoming upgrade projects for his older expert mechs, but now it became truly obvious how much he needed to put in a lot more money and resources to bring the expert mechs closer to parity!

"Benedict, can you tell the new Saint to give our expert pilots a break?" Ves asked. "Although it is nice to observe this interaction, we aren't collecting any further data at this point."

"I will pass on the word."

Soon enough, Saint Reginald slowly retracted his Saint Kingdom. Though it had suffered a lot of repeated attacks, it was far from reaching its limit.

"C'mon!" Venerable Orfan suddenly roared over the communication channel. "Stop moping about and put up a fight! The Mars should be a lot more beatable now that we don't have to resist a Saint Kingdom anymore!"

The Larkinson expert pilots all regained a bit of morale and began to assault the Mars in earnest!

They followed Casella's original plan and used a combination of ranged suppression and hit-and-run attacks in order to grind down the defenses of their formidable opponent.

At first, this routine proceeded decently enough. While the Mars was far from defenseless at close range, the three Larkinson expert melee mechs brilliantly coordinated their maneuvers and always attacked the Mars from three different directions!

This way, Patriarch Reginald needed to choose which expert mech he wanted to block and repel.

If not for the fact that the Abasis Armor easily resisted every ranged and melee strike, this combat approach would have distressed any powerful opponent!

"What kind of nonsense is this?!" Venerable Orfan complained as the Riot's spear bounced away from the exposed rear of the Mars. "Even the flight system is protected by its own phasic shield! How much tech and power did the mech designers manage to cram into this unreal machine?!"

Even though all of the Larkinson expert mechs aside from the Shield of Samar were in the process of pounding the Mars with attacks, the machine covered with a state-of-the-art transphasic armor system easily withstood all of the energy and forces that would have crushed any other expert mech at this point!

No matter whether the Larkinson expert mechs concentrated all of their attacks on a single point or dispersed them across the frame of their target, none of their efforts succeeded in inducing any stress on the Abasis Armor!

The brand-new high-tier expert mech remained as spotless as ever!

The Larkinson expert pilots tried out almost every solution in their arsenal.

For example, Venerable Joshua resonated with Helena and imparted the Everchanger's next ranged attacks with death energy, only for the gray energy beams to splash harmlessly across the red-dotted surface of the Mars.

Venerable Dise also channeled her most powerful and penetrating sword techniques as the First Sword swung its masterwork mech sword.

Yet no matter how much First Sword struck the Mars with its sharp sword, the war god in the form of a mech did not display even a single scratch.

The transphasic defenses of the Cross Clan's new flagship mech was simply too strong!

It was not for nothing that Professor Benedict and the Cross Clan resolutely invested 11 whole kilograms of phasewater in order to equip the Mars with a full application of Abasis Armor.

The Mars had no weak points! Every single part of the expert mech was as resilient as the shield of an expert heavy mech, if not more.

Compared to a much larger and more massive machine like the Shield of Samar, the Mars was a much more convincing defensive powerhouse!

This was rather ironic as the Mars was actually an offensive mech.

After letting the Larkinson expert mechs hit its Abasis Armor without achieving any significant results, Patriarch Reginald finally decided that it was time for him to reciprocate the attacks.

The Mars did not utilize its shotgun nor any of its other powerful and unusual attack methods.

It simply employed two different weapons to fend off against two types of opponents.

First, the Mars employed its transphasic axe to overpower the melee mechs that sought to attack it up close!

Second, the Mars warmed up its ARCEUS System and fired its liberal amount of integrated energy weapons at the distant ranged mechs!

"Ahh!"

The transphasic and resonance-empowered attacks hit hard!

The Shield of Samar lost its formidable resonance shield after suffering repeated attacks from the ARCEUS System.

Though its massive Unending alloy tower shield was not as easy to overcome, its surface rapidly heated up as a multitude of powerful energy attacks pounded against its surface.

What was worse was that the transphasic nature of the incoming attacks also bypassed a portion of the armor!

Other expert mechs fared much worse against these powerful energy attacks. The Minerva was forced to hide behind against the Everchanger, which in itself had switched over to a brand new design spirit in order to take a bit of the edge off the incoming energy beams.

Venerable Joshua found that while Qilanxo and the Phase King were both capable of bolstering the Everchanger's resistance against transphasic attacks, the absolute gap in power between the two mechs was simply too great!

"How is it able to turn so fast?!"

If that wasn't ridiculous enough, even the Dark Zephyr wasn't able to gain any advantage at close range!

The Mars was not only capable of chopping the thinly-armored expert light skirmisher in half with a single heavy swing, it was also able to rotate and accelerate at a much more accelerated pace than normal!

By activating the Pulsvar V-1 flight system's transphasic mode, the Mars moved almost as quickly as the Dark Zephyr.

This not only allowed the Mars to catch up on expert light mechs, but also enabled it to maneuver around other melee mechs only to strike them at unblockable angles!

Suffice to say, the sparring session did not last much longer at this point.

By the time the Mars slowly powered down its active systems despite not having reached the limits of its endurance, each and every Larkinson expert mech looked completely listless!

Perhaps the expert mechs still had plenty of fight left in them, but their expert pilots were thoroughly convinced they could do nothing against their horrifyingly powerful opponent!

The Cross Clan's new superstar and his fantastic masterwork mech were simply too dominant in battle!