The Mech Touch

Though General Verle talked a big game, he could not guarantee that the upcoming battle would proceed as straightforward as the battle simulation suggested.

There were more than enough examples in history where a numerically and qualitatively inferior force managed to overcome a superior opponent.

The Fridaymen possessed a defensive advantage and could count on the Kosic Ring as well as other local amenities to prop up their mech divisions.

In contrast, the Hex Federation and the Golden Skull Alliance had to dispatch their main force far away from friendly lines and deep into the space claimed by the Friday Colonies!

It was unrealistic for the Hexers to be able to provide any additional reinforcements or supplies over such an excruciatingly long distance.

This meant that everything needed to be done as quickly as possible. The more the defenders were able to stall and inflict pain on the invaders, the greater the chance of everything else going wrong!

Neither the Sundered Phalanx nor the Hex Army were incompetent. The brutal Komodo War exposed many flaws. The soldiers and leaders from both sides had to adapt to the war in order to avoid elimination.

Though the Larkinsons assumed that the Hex Army was competent enough to respond to any unusual moves and stratagems of the Sundered Phalanx, there were no guarantees on the battlefield.

The rank-and-file mech pilots did not need to hear about all of this. General Verle already prepared a separate briefing for the mech officers to prepare them for any complications that might ensue.

Assuming the attackers were able to break the backs of the Sundered Phalanx and demolish the Kosic Ring, the rest of the invasion plan was rather simple.

"The hardest part will be behind us if we are able to get past this point." General Verle explained as the surface of Pima Prime V became visible behind his back. "Depending on how much damage we have sustained and how many of our mechs are still battle effective, we will probably take part in the attack on Pima Prime V's planetary defenses."

As a large trade and industrial hub, Pima Prime V's development was spread across the entire globe.

Arrows came into view that roughly showed the extensive mech deployments of the Hex Army.

The Hex Federation's greatest goal was to destroy as much of the industries and infrastructure of the planet as possible, so not a single major city was allowed to remain intact!

If just a single of Pima Prime V's major settlements remained intact, then it became a lot easier to rebuild the colony to its former glory in a short amount of time.

While the Larkinsons didn't care too much about this, the Hex Federation were absolutely keen on undermining the foundation of the Friday Colonies as much as possible.

The Hexers did not wish to launch a risky and costly assault only to delay the development of Pima Prime by only a couple of years at best.

They wanted their forces to return from the Friday Colonies with the grandest of prizes that they could obtain from Operation Saturday Market!

As such, the planetary assault on Pima Prime V was an elaborate and detailed affair that involved a lot of complex mech deployments.

"Don't worry." General Verle quickly explained to his mech pilots. "The Golden Skull Alliance is not expected to split up its forces and spread out our mech units across many different geographic locations. Our Larkinson Army is at its strongest when our units can all act in unison and support each other. We have not trained with the units of the Hex Army, so the chances are too great that we will just get in their way."

That was another major relief. The Larkinson mech pilots would rather trust their backs to each other than to rely on the protection of strangers.

General Verle gestured at the largest and most developed city on the planet. The view zoomed in to display an overhead view of the expansive settlement.

"New Amblum is the capital city of Pima Prime. Just like Kotor City where we lived in the past, New Amblum is split up into multiple districts that have varying strategic value and defensive measures. The most valuable among them are covered by their own titan shields. Each of these protected and guarded districts must be breached, plundered and razed in order to consider this invasion a success, and this is where we must pitch in. You can expect to face a lot of planetary defenses and a moderate amount of landbound mechs that will do their best to resist us, but we must push through even though we are not entirely optimized for planetary combat."

The Larkinson Army was primarily geared to protect the Larkinson Navy and fight in space.

While the Design Department had made sure to equip the mech legions with mech models that were technically able to operate on land and in the air, there was no denying that the Larkinson mechs would suffer a considerable handicap when fighting on a battlefield that was not in space.

Compounding that problem was the fact that the Larkinson mech pilots simply didn't have a lot of training or experience in executing these kinds of operations.

Fortunately, they didn't need to do anything too complicated. They just had to attack a couple of New Amblum's vital industrial or military districts.

"If the intelligence we have is accurate, then the resistance that we will face when we attack New Amblum should not be as great as during the assault on the Kosic Ring." General Verle stated. "What is different is that we will be fighting in a dense urban environment that is home to a population of over 7 million Fridaymen. If they are all smart and sensible, they should have evacuated to the well-protected underground emergency shelters ahead of time, but there are always idiots that ignore all of the warnings and haven't been hauled away by the local security forces."

This caused various Larkinson mech pilots to feel disturbed. They did not serve in the Larkinson Army to kill civilians by mistake.

It was a pity that mass collateral damage was an unavoidable reality in any planetary assault. The Larkinson mech legions needed to utilize heavy firepower in order to break the titan shields and quickly destroy all of the fortified defenses and industrial facilities.

"How long will we stay on the surface, sir? How much are we responsible for destroying?"

"That is dependent on many different factors. Speed and safety are important concerns, but the Hexers will likely refuse to retreat before every important district and facility in New Amblum is destroyed."

It was difficult to predict what would happen at this stage of Operation Saturday Market. The ability to destroy Pima Prime's infrastructure depended too much on the outcome of the battle in orbit.

The Larkinsons needed to be prepared for scenarios where they had ample battle strength left as well as scenarios where they suffered a lot of losses.

In addition to explaining the narrow responsibilities of the Larkinson Army, General Verle briefly touched upon the activities of the Hex Army.

"A large amount of critical infrastructure and strongholds are built underground. Our clan is not equipped to break or breach these underground facilities, but the Hex Army is different. They are bringing ample enough tunneling machines, breaching bombs and mechs that excel at fighting in confined spaces."

Underground strongholds were difficult to break, but their biggest shortcoming was that they were completely stationary.

As long as the Hexers brought enough hardware, it would only be a matter of time before they could break open these buried eggs.

Once the troops received the call to retreat, they had to return to their carriers with as much loot that they could carry and return to orbit as soon as possible.

"We do not know how Pima Prime will look like, but if the Hexers have done their jobs, then there shouldn't be enough opposition left in the star system to hound our fleet and delay our departure. Our combined fleet should easily be able to travel to the nearest or safest Langrange point and leave the star system before reinforcements dispatched from neighboring Fridayman colonies are able to get close."

This was Operation Saturday Market. It was a powerful show of force that appeared quite straightforward at first glance but possessed a lot of nuances that General Verle did not explain.

For example, he could have mentioned that saboteurs and infiltrators were ready to assassinate key leaders and disable crucial defensive facilities.

General Verle was not certain that these additional measures would make a significant impact on the upcoming battle. They sounded great during the planning phase, but whether the operatives on the ground could actually pull off these daring stunts remained to be seen.

There were just too many Fridaymen, too many mechs and too many defenses for incidental sabotage to weaken their defenses.

Still, as long as the panic and uncertainty generated by attacks from the fear surpassed the actual damage, then the Sundered Phalanx should definitely feel more uncomfortable in battle!

Once General Verle finally ended the main briefing, he answered a few more questions before dismissing the majority of the Larkinson mech pilots.

They could all familiarize themselves with each stage of the battle plan.

The Larkinson Clan also updated the MSTS to allow for them to practice with fighting against each of the known Sundered Phalanx mech divisions.

The hope was that once the actual battle commenced, the Larkinson mech pilots would be more familiar with the properties of the enemy mechs and the habits of their mech pilots than the Fridaymen themselves!

Only a small handful of people remained behind.

Aside from Ves who had remained a spectator all of this time, the soldiers left all happened to be expert pilots!

Venerable Tusa, Venerable Stark, Venerable Orfan, Venerable Dise, Venerable Jannzi, Venerable Joshua, Commander Casella, Venerable Imon, Venerable Vincent and Venerable Isobel all understood that General Verle left out a very important element in his briefing.

The leader of the Larkinson Army did not have to work so hard to maintain an air of confidence and invincibility in front of his current audience.

Each of them were strong-willed veterans and champions that did not need to be babied. They could handle a few harsh truths.

"I won't lie to you all. If the numbers we have are correct, it is likely that we will be entering into battle with less expert mechs than our opponents." General Verle plainly stated.

None of the Larkinson expert pilots were happy to hear this. The Komodo War amply showed how getting outnumbered at this level could have profound effects on the outcomes of entire battles!

However, the Larkinson expert pilots did not feel too distressed after they heard this news.

"How strong are the enemy expert mechs and their expert pilots, exactly?" Venerable Tusa eagerly asked.

His anticipation for battle was strong! Ever since the Dark Zephyr received its massive upgrade, Tusa became a lot more confident in his ability to defeat strong opponents!

"As far as we know, the strength of the enemy expert mechs vary considerably. The low-tier expert mechs of the Sundered Phalanx are generally not impressive by our standards, but their medium-tier and high-tier expert mechs are well-designed even if their design budgets are not as high as the design budgets of your mechs. What is important to note is that while the Gauge Dynasty has not put a high priority on military spending, it has directed a notable amount of funding, resources and mech designers to equipping every expert pilot with modern heartland-level expert mechs. That means that you can expect none of the ones we are about to face in battle to be aged and outdated. There is even a chance that the high-tier expert mechs have incorporated phasewater technology."

That meant that the most powerful expert mechs fielded by the Sundered Phalanx were much tougher and more destructive after gaining transphasic properties!

Mechs such as the C-Man and the Mars had thoroughly shown the Larkinson expert pilots how much of a game changer phasewater technology could be! The prospect of challenging these enhanced machines in battle was anything but trivial!