The Mech Touch



From the moment the glowing skull in Ves' hand began to spread a new glow, the entire battle surrounding the main entrance completely changed!

Ves imitated the performance of the Everchanger once again by utilizing his unique advantages to spread a glow far enough to encompass hundreds of alien combatants!

With the primordial human skull in his hands acting as a facsimile of the Everchanger's Iridescent Mercury, he truly felt as if he was embodying the performance of his favorite and most proud masterwork mech.

The effect of the infamous combination between Zeigra, Lufa and Qilanxo had an immediate effect on the immediate battlefield!

Hundreds of pescans who previously had nothing but fury and hatred in their hearts suddenly groaned and lost their concentration.

These aliens may have or may not have learned what the conquerors of their home planet had been up to as of late, but Ves seriously doubted that they had a clear and meaningful idea of what the glows of the Larkinson Clan represented!

Indeed, many of these aliens had lived a sheltered and isolated existence inside this cold and barren prison facility.

Their unwillingness to venture beyond the upper floors was a sign that they clung extremely close to their fellow pescans.

The first time an individual became exposed to the phenomenon known as glows was always the most impactful.

This was because the person in question had no psychological preparation for exposure, let alone develop any mental tricks that allowed them to maintain relatively clear heads!

As all of these pescans possessed no awareness of Ves' latest move, their reactions were just as exaggerated as he anticipated!

No matter whether they were humans or aliens, any sentient or non-sentient organism became susceptible to glows as long as they possessed the capability to feel emotions!

The high emotional range and sensitivity of the pescans worked against them this time!

"Keeeeeee!"

"Yahhhayyha!"

"Reeeee!"

Dozens of distressed pescans no longer had the focus to train their arm guns at the nearest human targets. They all bent over or swayed as if they had been poisoned.

The mental burden imposed by the infamous disorientation glow that characterized the Doom Guard and the Ferocious Piranha mech lines devastated the cohesion of the nearby pescan lines!

Although Ves found it regretful that his range was far smaller than that of the Everchanger at his full range, he was not embroiled in a battle involving mechs at the moment.

The current range of his glow was more than sufficient to make a major difference in the fight!

The strange and sudden occurrence not only reduced the combat effectiveness of the aliens being tortured by the disorientation glow, but also affected the more distant pescans to an extent!

The brothers and sisters of the affected aliens could not ignore what was happening. They tried to shake the debilitated aliens out of whatever strange effect they had come under, only for their efforts to bear no fruit!

Some even became affected as well as they inadvertently strayed in the range of the glow radiated by David's skull!

With these mysterious ancient remains acting as a medium and an amplifier, the strain imposed by the disorientation glow was only just below the level that could be reached by a typical Doom Guard or Ferocious Piranha mech.

This was more than enough to disable all of the civilian pescans as well half of the professional soldiers among the aliens!

This was a significantly better result than Ves initially expected!

He thought that the pescans had hardened so much over the years that their utter animosity towards the humans would grind their willpower and make them more resilient to external shocks.

While that was undoubtedly the case, the surprise factor played an even greater role, causing many unstable pescans to become disproportionately affected!

As Ves studied the strange behavior of the armored pescans a bit more, he understood why his current glow produced such an exaggerated effect.

Zeigra's perpetual anger resonated a lot more with the current emotions of the pescans.

It was one thing for calm people to get incited by Zeigra's burning fury.

It was another thing for pescans who already harbored undying hatred against the humans to have their strongest amplified all of a sudden!

On top of that, Lufa's glow instantly replaced that of Zeigra, which instantly dragged the furious emotions of the pescans in the opposite direction!

It was as if their burning hearts got doused by a bucket of ice cold water. The sudden loss of strong emotion became jarring to the aliens that had been living with hatred for multiple years.

Not only did it become difficult for them to retain the motivation needed to fight against the humans with all of their effort, but it had also become a lot more challenging for them to maintain their awareness of the current situation!

The civilians among the pescans who were completely unused to fighting became especially affected by Lufa's glow.

This was because as much as they wanted to fight against the humans, they longed to return to the peaceful and idyllic lives they enjoyed before the arrival of the extragalactic invaders.

Their lives weren't so awful in the past. Each of them harbored a strong longing to return to the good old days.

Even if Lufa suppressed all of their emotions, the Angel of Tranquility clearly had a stronger effect on the stronger ones first, causing the pescans affected by it to experience all of the feelings that they had suppressed in the past.

Among humans, the longing for the past and the unceasing desire to return to a state of life that could never be attained anymore could be regarded as a mental affliction.

Right now, a lot of aliens had become so distracted by their recollection of the past for a moment that it was as if the battle didn't matter as much anymore.

It was a pity that Lufa soon made way for Zeigra again before the aliens could properly indulge in those memories!

The rapid switching between their two diametrically opposite glows had tormented millions of humans and aliens throughout the Red Ocean over the last years.

Now, the pescans had become the latest group of victims to learn that the rules had changed since the introduction of living mechs.

"EEEEHHH!"

"Rughwa aaiiiii!"

The keening and shouting of aliens sounded completely incomprehensive to the baffled human soldiers pushing forward, but they quickly adjusted their mentality and broke through the blockade of pescans with much greater confidence!

The weight of fire from the armored pescans combatants had dropped dramatically. The difficulty of going through with this assault had eased to such an enormous degree that the honor guards no longer experienced any significant pressure anymore!

As long as hundreds of armed pescans no longer focused their fire on the eye-catching red-coated infantry troopers, the elite honor guards could still rely on their battered but intact first-class armor plating to withstand the remaining attacks!

Despite their names, the elite Battle Crier troops did not need to call out to each other or shout any meaningless slogans.

They cherished this precious reprieve and hastened their pace in order to breach through the blockade of the pescans as soon as possible!

Suddenly, the air around them flashed in bright red as a pair of powerful laser beams instantly  surged forth and demolished a pair of defensive installations that stood in their way!

The heavy weapon specialists in the rear had never stopped providing fire support to the advancing human troops.

Although their portable laser cannons had already grown so hot that the surrounding air started to grow hazy, their users did not hesitate to overstrain their weapons because they knew this was the most crucial moment of this assault!

A thinner but stronger laser beam struck a well-protected machine gun nest that had been suppressing the weaker troops for too long.

Although Ves wanted to be more frugal about the firepower of his Amastendira, he nonetheless aimed his first-class laser pistol at a crucial target and fired a high-powered laser beam whenever he felt it was necessary!

The occasional shots caused the more sober and resilient pescans to pay more attention to him. Ves had moved a bit more forward than he liked in order to enable his glow to affect more pescans, but that also turned him into a viable target!

He tried his best not to flinch when laser beams and kinetic projectiles started to slam into his Unending Regalia.

Ves knew exactly how much damage his combat armor could safely withstand, and he already dismissed the majority of attacks.

Qilanxo's reassuring influence also gave him a lot of mental encouragement, allowing him to suppress his fears even as he made himself more vulnerable to enemy fire.

The few turrets and heavy weapon analogues in the hands of the aliens had already been taken care of for the most part.

The only aliens that could truly pose a threat to him were the elite pescans armed with integrated transphasic guns, but the Davutan sharpshooters had become a lot more skilled at taking them down before they could do much damage.

Every elite soldier wore a battle suit that was slightly bulkier and was covered with considerably more decorative markings.

The pescans had not done anything to camouflage the status of these elite troopers!

Once the sharpshooters or other human troopers took these aliens down, there was no need to worry about the threat of their guns anymore.

Due to the unique physiological constraints of the pescan race, they were unable to make effective use of handheld external weapons.

The aliens predominantly merged their weapons into their battle suits, which meant that once one of their soldiers had been felled, the weapons he carried became useless to the survivors because they could not be transferred in the field!

Ves sneered contemptuously at these aliens. Although integrated weapons had their advantages, there were good reasons why infantry and mechs still made use of external weapons in most circumstances.

The ability to switch weapons or pass them on to others was incredibly valuable. Being able to replace a broken rifle with a spare one that was intact could ensure that a combat unit could still make useful contributions during the same battle.

It also made maintenance and combat power retention a lot easier during long and grueling campaigns!

"These aliens clearly haven't fought a real war." Ves contemptuously sneered.

He revelled in the chaos and disruption he produced. With Lufa and Zeigra working in tandem as they had always done for years, the glow exuding from the glowing skull continued to torture and torment the weak and vulnerable mentalities of the surrounding pescans.

Only the most elite and professional soldiers among the aliens could maintain a sober mind under all of this pressure, and even they found it difficult to keep their aim straight or listen to the frantic instructions of their confused superiors.

Under the current circumstances, the only pescans that remained truly unaffected were those that were positioned further away.

This had always been one of the major weaknesses of glows.

However, Ves did not feel overly threatened by these distant combatants as they didn't have a clear line of sight on his position.

As long as he did not fully ascend up the ramp that led to the next floor, it became nearly impossible to target him unless they possessed guided munitions or smart weapons.

The lack of sophistication of the armaments employed by the enemy along with other constraints meant that it was unlikely for Ves to get confronted by them. The aliens would have used them by now if they actually possessed this capability.

Just as Ves thought that he could single-handedly turn the tide of this battle, a large and tall presence approached the front of the pescan defensive line.

Although the solid floor did not shake at its approach, the tall mechanical construct nonetheless loomed over every other fighter, no matter whether they were humans or aliens.

Of all of the people that became shocked by this alien construct's appearance, no one was more surprised than Ves!

"Oh hell… the pescans built an imitation mech?!"

Before he could do anything else, the alien 'mech' lifted up a large and intimidating kinetic arm cannon and aimed its large muzzle straight towards Ves!