The Mech Touch

"The glows of the Ferocious Piranhas are having an effect!"

"The pressure against our forward mechs has dropped. The fish-whales in the front are being debilitated by suppressive glows of the Flagrant Vandals!"

"Damn! The fish-whales are too mad and bloodthirsty! Their desire to attack us is too strong!"

Ferocious Piranhas or not, the hyper-aggressive hybrid creatures did not let a painful and disorienting glow stop them from biting through the mechs that stood in their way!

Still, the harmful glows acting upon their berserk minds helped a lot in disrupting instinctual behavior.

Their movements, their reaction time and their attacks deteriorated by at least 20 percent, causing them to become less scary opponents!

Some of them even slowed down to the point of frustrating the fish-whales pressing from behind.

The latter even resorted to biting the vulnerable tails of the monsters that had stalled!

"These monsters are cruel and heartless!"

"Keep killing them, then! Letting them live will only threaten our lives even further!"

Hundreds of white fish monsters had appeared on this side of the mining tunnel by now. There were so many meaty creatures in the way that many of them were actually pushed into the direction of the kilometers-long tunnel that the Larkinsons had initially dug!

The congestion grew so bad that more and more feral creatures that had been pressed to the periphery started to bite the tunnel walls!

"Ranged mechs, focus your fire on the fish-whales pressed against the tunnel walls. Do not let them reach the surface or the other mining tunnels!"

The vast quantity of fish-whales were beginning to become increasingly more unbearable to handle, and this was when the Golden Skull Alliance faced them in highly favorable conditions!

As soon as the hordes of fish-whales spread out and gained a lot more maneuvering room, the difficulty in stopping them and defeating them would skyrocket!

Even if their bodies weren't particularly strong, their vast numbers along with their aggressive behavior meant that mechs could easily succumb even if they defeated a lot of fish-whales!

"We can't allow them to play their game! Only by stopping them here can we deal against them in a controlled manner!"

The weaknesses of the stupid beasts had become increasingly more evident during this crazy tide. The fish monsters were too stupid to organize themselves and employ any hint of coordination in their offensive.

If they actually had any intelligence, they would have coordinated their movements to force a breakthrough at a specific location.

Their lack of ranged attack methods was a huge shortcoming. Although the growing numbers of fish-whales looked increasingly more formidable, the truth was that only the monsters at the front could inflict damage onto the defending machines.

The ones that were milling behind could not inflict any damage from a distance!

It was under these conditions that the Golden Skull Alliance slowly gained the upper hand.

While there was only a limited amount of space for their melee mechs to play a role, their ranged mechs had a lot more leeway.

Although the fish-whales could easily cope against heat and energy damage, the mechs armed with luminar crystal rifles weren't helpless in this situation.

"Switch to kinetic beams! We need to punch these monsters in order to disable them! Try to hit them on their heads. Knocking their skulls will concuss them long enough to turn them into prey for the fish-whales pressing from behind!"

The ranged mechs carefully fired their shots through the gaps in the shield walls. Their kinetic beams struck like getting hit by giant sticks.

The flesh of the monsters deformed upon impact. Any black eyes popped apart when a kinetic beam up close.

In certain cases, the ranged mechs succeeded in knocking the skulls of the fish monsters!

Although the beams rarely penetrated through the bone matter, the strikes often damaged skulls to the point where the fish monsters were no longer able to tell up from down!

In this situation, slowing or stalling the fish-whales  bought valuable time for the mechs confronting the disabled creatures. Even if it only took a dozen seconds for the healthier monsters to tear the crippled monsters apart, this was more than enough time to rotate another mech to the front!

As the Golden Skull Alliance continued to adjust to the current crisis, Commander Melkor began to feel uneasy about this situation.

Though his Avatars were holding the flanks, he could not help but grow concerned about the future.

How many fish-whales did they need to kill in order to stop the tide?

If millions of fish-whales waited their turn on the other side of the portal, then the expeditionary forces would definitely get exhausted before they could win the battle!

"This is turning out to be a battle of attrition!"

If that was true, then the Larkinsons were not in a good position. Battles of attrition just happened to be one of their weak points as all of their elite forces were trained and equipped to fight quick and decisive battles!

The mechs of his Avatars weren't configured for long sieges and drawn-out offensives. The ranged mechs would run out of energy cells quickly while the melee mechs would begin to malfunction due to their accelerated wear and tear.

Although the mech forces could probably last for a few hours by rotating their mechs at the front on a regular basis, what if the tide never ended?

"We can't go on like this, general!" Commander Melkor voiced his frustration over the command channel. "We need to cut off the fish-whales at the source!"

"We are not ready to act, Commander. We are still trying to understand the threat and what went wrong with the second portal. Acting rashly has got us into this mess. We cannot repeat our mistakes and move before we figure out a way to resolve this problem by the root."

"Our mechs will get chewed apart by these fish-whales before you are done with 'analyzing' the situation!"

The Gold Beacon hovered closely behind a company of his Avatars. The custom ranged mech barked out one kinetic beam after another. Though only a portion of the shots hit the more critical parts of the alien bodies, the added punch of its custom rifle's attack was quite formidable!

Even so, Melkor did not feel as if he made any difference with his new and pristine custom mech. The Gold Beacon was more of a command and control mech anyway, so he paid more attention to the ebb and flow of mechs and fish monsters than on his personal contribution to the battle.

It was because he was viewing the battle from multiple angles that he grew concerned about the sustainability of their current approach.

He briefly directed his attention to the nearby expert mechs that had not done much since the outbreak of hostilities.

The Minerva was hovering close behind the Sentinel mechs but had yet to extend its iconic Command Field.

The Blade Chaser hovered protectively besides the Minerva but otherwise did not sink its twin swords into any beast flesh.

The Shield of Samar and the Everchanger were only providing moral encouragement to the units stationed at opposite sides of the wide tunnel.

The Amphis and the Bolvos Rage were hovering in the far back without displaying any intention to attack the fish-whales.

There were a few other expert mechs on hand, but each of them were keeping their distance from the ongoing battle.

"Why aren't our expert mechs making a move?" Melkor wondered. "They can demolish dozens of these beasts at a time!"

"Our current mech forces can handle the pressure." General Verle replied. "We need your Avatars and the other mech legions to hold the line as long as possible without increasing our consumption. While our expert pilots can make a difference, it is a waste to expend their combat power on cannon fodder. Their power is great but their endurance is not endless."

The logic was sound but the people fighting against these violent beasts didn't care about that. It became increasingly harder for the defensive mechs to hold back the advancing beasts.

As numerous minutes went by, an alert sounded inside the Gold Beacon's cockpit.

"We have detected several variant fish-whales!"

Melkor immediately split his attention so that he could view the footage of a handful of abnormal hybrid whale monsters.

These ones clearly stood out from the swarm of white and pale fish-whales due to their size and different colorations.

Larger than an ordinary fish-whale, these crueler and older-looking monsters possessed dark blue hides that clearly attracted the notice of their lesser brethren.

In fact, the white fish-whales acted differently around the larger blue monsters!

As Melkor observed how the slightly smaller fish-whales pooled around the larger monsters without biting or bumping against each other, his body chilled for a moment.

"These blue ones… are commanding their younger brothers!"

The influence of the blue fish-whales wasn't great. They could only command the attention of around a dozen or two-dozen lesser fish-whales at most.

However, this was enough to turn a mindless mob into a more focused attack unit!

After ther blue fish-whales managed to get their bearing, they released a soundless roar and charged forward with its fellow 'subordinates' acting as its spear!

"Careful! The blue fish-whales are approaching!"

The blue fish-whales not only advanced with greater momentum, but also possessed an invisible quality that caused any berserk white fish-whale in its way to move aside!

This gave the blue fish-whale and the rest of its formation a clear corridor to slam into the shield wall of the Living Sentinels!

"Ahh!"

For the first time since its completion, the Rigid Wall model failed to hold the line!

The blue fish-whales were not only larger, stronger and tougher than the ordinary fish-whales, they also used their limited control and intelligence to pull off several uninterrupted charges at once!

The power of these alien creatures along with the fact that numerous of them broke past the shield wall at the same time completely caught the defenders off-guard!

"Plug the gaps and annihilate the ones that broke through before they can disrupt our formations further!"

It was critically important for the defensive lines to hold against this type of swarming opponent!

Fortunately, there were plenty of reserves that took action.

The mech units dispatched by the Penitent Sisters and the Battle Criers had been waiting to respond to situations like these. Since firing any ranged weapons at the alien shock troopers could easily lead to friendly fire in this narrow and congested battlefield, only their melee mechs flew forward.

Spears and swords relentlessly attacked the white fish-whales from multiple directions. Even if they were following the orders of their betters, they were still fairly weak and vulnerable against determined mechs!

"Aghhh!"

The blue fish-whales on the other hand were much harder to deal with! Their hides were much harder to cut or puncture and they displayed significantly greater speed and combat acumen.

Their cruel eyes glinted as they feinted an attack on a Rigid Spine mech only to dart to the side so that they could use their extremely hard teeth to chomp through the rear armor of a Rigid Wall mech!

Although the Rigid Walls were able to take a lot of abuse at the front, their rear protection was a lot more limited.

The biting force of the blue-fish whales was so great that the monster easily tore through the rear armor with its first chomp.

After it chomped another time, its sharp and lethal teeth bit through the rear half of the cockpit and crushed the Sentinel pilot into pieces!

The Larkinson Army suffered its first loss since the start of this battle!

"Nooo!"

"Slaughter these blue monstrosities!"

An expert pilot could no longer hold back. Venerable Imon Ingvar grew furious as his Blade Chaser darted forward and sliced the body of the closest blue fish-whale!

Other mech units were beginning to handle the blue monsters as well, but not before the alien creatures successfully eliminated half-a-dozen defensive mechs!

The defensive lines became disarrayed, thereby giving the main body of the fish-whale horde a greater opportunity to push their opponents back!

"Alert! We have detected a second wave of blue fish-whales! This time, there are 17 of them! Each of them are preparing to charge our lines!"

"Stop them before they can pull off their attack run!"