The Mech Touch

The fish-whales were completely caught off-guard!

It wasn't difficult to surprise these feral and uncoordinated beasts, but that wasn't enough to push back the tide of alien monsters.

Only a huge amount of shock power could interrupt their momentum and make them recede!

The initial volley unleashed by the Bolvos Rage happened to kill over a hundred fish-whales outright!

Though Patriarch Reginald was not able to repeat this power move for the moment, the expert mech in his hands continually unleashed death and destruction at a pace that others could not match!

After so many different incidents and battles, the Bolvos Rage finally encountered a battle scenario where its mech type and configuration could fully utilize its advantages!

The fish-whales that showed up so far weren't strong enough enough to overwhelm the Bolvos Rage. Neither their quantity or quality were sufficient as every fish-whale attack simply bounced off its stupendously powerful resonance shield!

In fact, Patriarch Reginald did not even have to worry too much about the response from the alien fish monsters.

With the Everchanger constantly suppressing every fish-whale entering the current battlefield, the Bolvos Rage had it easier than ever. There were so many fish-whales in front that Reginald did not even have to put much thought into aiming his powerful weapons.

No matter where all of the positron cannons and other weapon systems were aimed at, their firepower was bound to demolish tens of fish-whales at a time!

The stupendous might of this single expert mech completely changed the battlefield.

While more fish-whales continued to pass through the portal at an uninterrupted pace, the Bolvos Rage nonetheless succeeded in stopping the enemy offensive by raking through their lines with impunity!

As Ves watched the turnaround from the command center, he gained a completely new appreciation of hybrid mechs.

"This mech type is a bit difficult to employ in the right circumstances, but in situations where there are lots of cannon fodder, there are only a couple of other mech types that are more effective against these opponents."

Swarms of cannon fodder units were hard to deal with for most expert mechs. Most of them were designed to deal against powerful single targets as opposed to wiping out as many weaker targets as possible.

The only mech types that could do better in this situation was an expert artillery mech or an expert striker mech.

Ves was especially keen on adding the latter to the Larkinson Clan's mech lineup in the future.

Although expert striker mechs weren't really great at dueling other expert mechs, they excelled at wiping out entire mech companies in quick succession!

Against a swarm of fish-whales, the expeditionary forces would have never been pressured to this extent as long as there was a single powerful flamethrower-wielding expert mech in sight!

Though it was still questionable whether an expert striker mech could keep spitting out flames for hours on end, it was already enough for it to take action occasionally in order to relieve the pressure.

The Bolvos Rage continued to bull its way forward at a steady pace.

The expert mech had advanced so far from the defensive lines that the fish-whales couldn't resist attacking it first!

Every nearby opponent ignored their prior targets that were further away and mindlessly charged the expert hybrid mech as if they were heat-seeking missiles!

That was exactly the wrong move to make!

No matter whether they were grunts, sergeants or assassins, none of the fish-whales could do anything to take down the Bolvos Rage in a short amount of time. Their misguided aggression not only failed to contain the powerful expert mech, but gave the other mech forces much more room to maneuver!

The latter part was especially important. There was ultimately a limit to what a powerful mech could do to push back the enemy.

Commander Casella's eyes glowed as she infused more power into her Command Field.

"Sentinels! Advance!"

The main shield wall units moved forward with indomitable power!

The Rigid Walls and Bright Warriors no longer held their positions but flew forward with their battered but still-intact tower shields up front.

Any fish-whale that happened to be in front of them were unable to halt the advance.

This was not just because many of them were attacking the wrong target or because they were being suppressed by the Everchanger. The influence from the Minerva massively boosted the effective combat performance of Commandeered mechs!

"We are invincible!"

"None of these fishes can last against my spear!"

"Shove these alien monsters back!"

With the added power and coordination of Casella's Command Field, the mechs advancing at the front make such quick work of the fish-whales up front that it was as if they were clearing a lane of snow!

"Rifleman mechs, clear the way towards the portal!"

The Larkinson mechs armed with luminar crystal rifles shone as Commander Casella did not hesitate to expand her influence towards them as well!

Normally, the energy weapons were not that effective against the fish-whales. The alien creatures weren't particularly tough, but they possessed a lot of body mass that could absorb a lot of energy damage before their critical organs were at risk.

Even switching to kinetic beam mode did not massively improve the effectiveness of the luminar crystal rifle.

It was a different story now that every expert rifleman mech gained a hint of the power of true resonance!

Though Commander Casella was not that strong of an expert pilot at the moment, the modest enhancement she extended to the surrounding mechs was enough to qualitatively transform their damage output.

Their positron beams succeeded in punching through the flesh and blubber, allowing them to scour the internal organs and in certain cases the brain of many grunt fishes.

Other beam types proved to be effective in different ways. The slicer beams were able to penetrate through the bodies of three or four grunt fishes at the same time while the kinetic beams turned out to be quite effective at concussing the sergeant fishes!

With the support of the Commandeered ranged mechs, the mechs forming the shield wall were able to accelerate their forward progress as there were a lot less enemy bodies in the way!

"Watch out! Four assassin fishes have just emerged from the portal!"

The distinctive red fish-whales stood out so much from their white brothers that it was impossible to miss their arrival.

Though the assassin fishes paused for a moment as the Everchanger's disorienting glow affected them from afar, their urge to attack the opposition was too strong for them to remain distracted!

As the assassin fishes prepared to make their signature teleportation attacks, Commander Casella was already attempting to preempt their moves!

A torrent of empowered slicer beams passed through the bodies of any grunt fishes in the way and struck the heads of all four red fish-whales!

Though the elite creatures were too tough to get taken out by the slicer beams that had weakened after penetrating through multiple bodies, the attacks still interrupted the actions of the assassin fishes!

This bought more time for the Minerva to take action itself. With its Irvan rifle in its most powerful firing mode, the expert command mech fired one powerful beam after another that possessed enough power to demolish the brains of all of the high-priority threats!

"The current wave of assassin fishes are no more. Keep up the advance!"

More fish-whales were being defeated than the new arrivals could make up for, but Commander Casella didn't feel comfortable with the current pace.

If a fish-whale with a different color showed up, the momentum of the expeditionary forces might get stalled again!

This was why it was important to reach the portal and secure a beachhead on the other side before more variables came along!

"Swordmaidens, strike the fish-whales and clear a path forward!"

"With pleasure, commander!"

Two Swordmaiden mech companies advanced from the rear. With the help of Commander Casella's intimate control over the mechs under her command, the shield wall units perfectly parted whenever the Swordmaidens mechs were about to pass through.

The greatsword-wielding mechs soon went into action!

With the shield wall close at hand and always ready to provide support, the Swordmaiden mech pilots had few scruples about this fight. They boldly drove machines forward and used the biggest and most brutal moves to chop apart these meaty targets!

"Don't hit their skulls! It takes too much power to crack them open."

"Try to tear through their bellies. Their internal organs are vulnerable from below!"

The Swordmaiden mech pilots quickly figured out the most effective ways to eliminate the grunt fishes. Their thick flesh and blubber parted easily enough when struck by the sharp and heavy blades of the Second Sword and Bright Warrior mechs.

Compared to the all-rounder mech model that the Swordmaidens had long been dissatisfied with, the new Second Sword model completely met their expectations!

Their added power, control and fit were so much better that the few lucky mech pilots assigned to the new model were fighting as if they were experiencing nirvana!

The Swordmaidens had assigned their limited quantity of Second Swords to the best and most skilled of their pilots.

As a result, the Second Swords were killing the stalled grunt fishes twice as fast as the greatsword-wielding Bright Warriors!

"There's no comparison between these two mechs. The Second Sword is literally made to fight like this! All my moves are flowing so much better that I can't go back to my old mech!"

Not everything went right for the Swordmaiden shock units. The fish-whales weren't completely paralyzed and they began to muster up more and more power to eliminate the Swordmaiden mechs that were on the attack.

It didn't help that Commander Casella wasn't able to Commandeer the Swordmaiden mech pilots as effectively as with other groups.

The Swordmaidens developed a persona that disdained looking up to gods or any other higher authorities.

They only worshiped their own strength!

As such, Commander Casella wasn't able to sync up with them as much as she did with her Sentinel mech pilots.

Fortunately, the Swordmaidens were confident but not stupid. They were quite aware of how their mechs might not feel so good anymore after getting smacked head-on by a fish-whale tail.

Whenever their circumstances turned dicey, they did not hesitate to retreat. The defensive mechs under the influence of Commander Casella always moved quickly to support the troubled Swordmaiden mechs and relieve their pressure.

Through these tactics and more, the human mech forces not only mowed down an unprecedentedly high amount of fish-whales, but also managed to get close to the stabilized portal!

"Hahahaha! None of you fishes can stop my expert mech! If I was piloting my Mars Project already, you weaklings would have made way a long time ago!"

Patriarch Reginald was enjoying himself as he rendered many fish-whales into scorched and cooked piles of flesh.

The dead creatures fell into the diagonal tunnel beneath in droves and slid downwards under the pull of Iron Crusher's weak gravity.

Thousands of the beasts must have slid down the seemingly bottomless tunnel as the expeditionary forces did not give the living fish-whales the opportunity to satisfy their cannibalistic urges!

After wiping out a wave of blue fish-whales head-on by blasting them with an empowered shotgun blast, the Bolvos Rage finally arrived in front of the portal!

"Get out of my way, fishes!"

The powerful expert hybrid mech had already fired all of its weapon systems at full power, but it still had a lot of power left in the tank. Patriarch Reginald did not hesitate to fire multiple powerful volleys right through the portal despite not knowing what was on the other side!

In fact, no one knew whether any of their ranged attacks would even reach the other side of the portal.

"It's working! The portal doesn't allow for the transmission of visible light, but all of those attacks must have struck the fish-whales that were above to arrive!"

With no fish-whales clogging up the way forward, Patriarch Reginald did not wait any longer.

"See you on the other side!"

The Bolvos Rage fearlessly passed through the large portal and instantly reached another destination!