The Mech Touch

The asteroid belt that housed the Palace of Shame was about to get a lot more explosive.

The initial human explorers that entered the Boryan System for the first time plainly registered it as the Boryan Belt.

This meant that this battle would probably go down as the Battle of the Boryan Belt.

Before the first shot was fired, both sides began to generate a lot of interference.

It became a lot harder to observe and communicate from a distance as both sides tried to make it as difficult as possible to target them at longer ranges.

The measures were a lot more effective than usual. This was because the nearby neutron star already produced a lot of interference in the form of a strong and fluctuating magnetic field.

Even if the Boryan Belt was already orbiting relatively far away from the binary stars at the center of the system, the interference was not light.

Now that ships such as the Blinding Banshee and mechs such as the Buzzy Bee began to throw up a lot of jamming into space, it became a lot harder to obtain reliable sensor data.

The projections that previously displayed a relatively clear asteroid base became a lot fuzzier all of a sudden.

Though it was still possible for Ves to distinguish individual ships and other craft, he was no longer able to observe the smaller details.

"The alien jamming methods are more effective than I thought." Gloriana said from her position at his side. "I'm curious to know how the aliens are making it more difficult for our optical sensors to observe the Palace of Shame. We cannot remedy this by observing the asteroid base with our naked eyes."

Ves nodded in agreement. "That is just one of the many interesting pieces of alien tech that can substantially increase the safety of our fleet. Is this jamming effect applied to the entire asteroid base or is it only concentrated on a single side?"

"It appears to be uniform. It may be old alien technology that the Unspoken or another alien group installed throughout the Palace of Shame. Whatever it is, we can partially power through their jamming by using high-powered scanners."

"That will also expose the coordinates of the source of the scanning."

It was like turning on a flashlight in order to see in the dark. The flashlight allowed for its holder to clearly light up a certain place, but also allowed others to trace his position by following the trajectory of the light beam!

The human forces knew that and deliberately baited the alien forces into opening fire first.

The enemies refused to take the bait.

"Hm. They are showing a lot of restraint." Ves said. "I wonder what they are waiting for. Are they hoping that we will call off our attack because we are too afraid to confront the unknown?"

Gloriana disagreed with him. "I do not think that is the case. I think their commanders might not have a good idea of what they are up against. Depending on how well informed they are of the rapid changes that have taken place in the Red Ocean, they may have a general idea of mechs and the division of human powers, but I seriously doubt they have become familiar with the incredible diversity of our fighting methods. Don't forget that we are just as alien to them as they are to us. The side that makes the first move will expose their details first, giving the other side an advantage."

"That makes sense. It's like a turn-based game in a sense. The situation that we are in right now makes it difficult to gain an advantage by taking the initiative. The side that is able to react to a previous move enjoys a considerable advantage."

The human mech forces that essentially boxed in the Palace of Shame from six different sides continued to provoke the alien pirates through different means, but to no avail.

Even if a number of aggressive aliens wanted to make a move, their bosses firmly kept them under control.

Not a single alien starfighter or other craft launched from the asteroid base!

Since this was the case, the human forces had little choice but to make the first move.

"The Geminis are taking action!"

A couple of hundred rifleman mechs cautiously lifted their rifles from the asteroids they were hiding behind and simultaneously fired a loose volley of energy beams and kinetic rounds at their target.

The Gemini ranged mechs did not concentrate their attacks on any particular section of the asteroid base. The attacks therefore landed across the surface of the Palace of Shame that was facing the Gemini Family.

"There is energy shielding!"

Several shimmering energy shields came to life and blocked each and every incoming attack with lots of power to spare!

Ves and many other people straightened up and tried to analyze the form of protection utilized by the alien base.

"It's strong!"

"The Palace of Shame is not covered by a single large energy shield, but several smaller ones that cover their own sector. Each of them partially overlap each other, making them function similar to fish scales."

"Every energy shield also generates a strong spatial effect. The alien energy shield generators are transphasic!"

Energy shielding technology was fairly advanced, but their working principles were not that complicated compared to many forms of high technology.

This meant that the indigenous aliens of the Red Ocean independently invented the same sort of energy shielding technology employed by humanity and other races native to the Milky Way.

While the data soon revealed that the alien version of an energy shield generator was rougher and much less sophisticated than a human equivalent, the Palace of Shame was still covered by a strong layer of defense!

However, the Geminis and the other human forces were not deterred by a thick shell. They all possessed a lot of mechs armed with guns that could keep firing as long as there was enough energy and ammunition to sustain their usage.

"The Geminis want us to open fire with all of our available mechs! They don't want to give the enemy more time to adjust."

The situation became tense when it became clear that it wouldn't be easy to crack open the Palace of Shame.

The transphasic energy shield generators might be cruder than the ones employed by humanity, but the Palace of Shame accumulated a lot of them over its long existence!

No matter whether their tech was old and outdated, the sheer quantity along with the abundant amount of phasewater integrated into them meant that the energy shields were extremely difficult to break by relying on conventional attacks.

The Larkinson Clan had already learned in past battles that the most effective way to overcome transphasic defenses was to employ transphasic attack methods!

This way, the phasewater effects of both measures would cancel each other out and allow ordinary attacks to take effect.

"We don't have that many transphasic weapon systems at our disposal." Ves sighed.

He didn't know the exact circumstances of the mech forces of the other pioneering forces. But he figured that their situation shouldn't be any better.

The only mechs in the Larkinson Clan that possessed powerful transphasic weapon capabilities were the expert mechs and the rifleman mechs of the Nullifier Battalion.

The Battle Criers did not field that many Nullifier mechs, though. There were only 200 of them last he counted. Their formidable Godkiller heavy rifles also only integrated 5 grams of phasewater each, which was far from sufficient to shake the spatial defenses of the Palace of Shame.

"It should not really matter." Gloriana reassured Ves. "Transphasic weapons are helpful but not necessary. Conventional firepower can still wear down a transphasic defense system as long as the power or quantity is large enough."

In the case of the Larkinson Army and many other mech forces, they had plenty of quantity to spare, even if the firepower was a bit insufficient.

After receiving a signal from the Gemini Family, tens of thousands of mechs opened fire at once!

The only mechs that did not do so were the ones that could not face the right direction, such as bunker mechs stuck in the wrong orientation, or mechs that were put in reserve, such as expert mechs and ace mechs.

Aside from that, well over 50,000 mechs launched a torrent of energy beams and physical projectiles at the Palace of Shame!

Due to the distance and the limitations of the skill and technical capabilities of many mechs, a lot of attacks slashed across the entire shielded surface of the alien pirate base!

It would have been better if all of the mech forces could concentrate their attacks on a single side of the Palace of Shame, but that was not possible due to the need to form an encirclement.

"The Palace of Shame's transphasic energy shields are still holding! They are being less affected by our attacks than we hoped. We believe that the enemy's first line of defenses is primarily built to defend against warship attacks!"

Ves grimaced. "Great. The attacks of our mechs are the equivalent of small arms fire to the aliens."

The Unspoken and the other alien pirate groups initially built up the defenses of the Palace of Shame to defend against threats similar to themselves.

Since the aliens mainly employed warships and only utilized small craft as a supplement, it was natural for the local pirate groups to invest in large, heavy-duty shield generators.

As a solid minute passed by, the formidable strength of those energy shield generators became abundantly clear as they hardly experienced any strain!

Ves' mood soured. "How long will it take for us to take down a goddamn alien transphasic energy shield?"

"We cannot give you a solid estimate yet, but it will not be less than two hours!"

"Two hours is way too much! Can't we concentrate our fire and overload one of the energy shields faster that way?!"

"We need to bring our mechs closer to make that happen, but that will increase their exposure to enemy counterattacks. We also cannot rule out the possibility that the aliens have another defensive measure in reserve."

There were many good reasons why the Palace of Shame managed to exist for so long, and its incredible ability to withstand punishment was definitely a contributing factor!

Seeing that quantity was far from sufficient to open up a gap in the first layer of defense, Ves quickly concluded that his side needed to bring out the big guns.

He already started to think about ordering Venerable Stark to debut her Instrument of Doom on the battlefield, but he was reluctant to reveal its firepower so soon.

"What are the Geminis thinking about? What is our next move?"

"They are still deliberating on this matter, sir. Ah, they have just passed on a message to all of the ace pilots. Their firepower may be needed soon."

Ves raised his eyebrow but did not feel too surprised.

The human attackers did not want to waste too much time on this siege. The mechs that were all opening fire at this moment were squandering a lot of energy and ammunition without necessarily getting much in return.

If they kept firing their weapons at this rate, their weapons would get worn out and their mechs would build up a lot of heat and other stress.

It was better for the mechs to save the brunt of their firepower on more worthy targets such as enemy warships and other offensive threats.

Perhaps it was not the best to expose the ace mechs so soon, but their incredible firepower was the only convenient solution that could quickly overcome the powerful fortress-grade energy shields that exceeded the performance of human titan shields!

Soon enough, seven powerful energy signatures emerged from six different fleets! Many humans already became hopeful as their strongest heroes finally made an appearance!

"The Seven Saints are about to take action!"

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