The Mech Touch

Chapter 6777 The Most Insidious Enemies

Saint Stark liked the speech.

She liked it even though its most important points were lost to her. Stark was not a Rubarthan, so she had never grown up and learned to take pride in a Rubarthan identity.

That did not mean she was ignorant of how much the citizens as well as many immigrants took pride in their Rubarthan identity and citizenship.

It was a very big deal in both the Milky Way and the Red Ocean.

Davia Stark merely found it unfortunate that she lacked the context and emotional ties to experience the moment herself.

She felt as if she was relegated to the role of a neutral bystander. She simply had no stake in the life and death of the Rubarthan state.

She felt envious of the Rubarthans for maintaining their love and reverence for a common identity.

It was one of the many aspects that Davia Stark had lost along her difficult journey of transcendence.

She had lost the capability to feel pride in one's state, culture, people or nation.

Ever since her former state had perished along with most of its population, Davia had gone adrift.

Though she spent a lot of time with the Larkinsons, she could never bring herself to blend in with them. She was incapable of living a normal life.

These days, her heart burned with vengeance instead of love. So long as that remained the case, only her duty remained.

She briefly closed her eyes and centered her thoughts. Though she did not care about the Rubarthan Pact in any way, she was more than willing to fight to preserve the lives of the civilians who relied on the protection of the soldiers at the frontlines.

Not all first-raters were stained with sin. The ordinary folk were almost just as powerless as the civilians of second-rate and third-rate states. These people were still worth protecting as far as Davia was concerned.

Besides, the strategic outlook remained clear. Defending the Upper Zones was vital to keeping at least some Middle Zones and Lower Zones alive. The fall of the Kayana System would cause a chain reaction that might spell the end of the Monroe Upper Zone and all other adjacent zones!

"Davia." Saint Alo said as his voice maintained its transcendent quality. That was a sign that he was bringing his full power to bear against the advancing enemies. "The enemy forces should have entered your effective range some time ago. You have our permission to take aim."

The guest pilot grinned. The Amaranto Mark III, which currently took shelter on the hull of a Rubarthan combat carrier, cautiously began to inch forward and aim her Instrument of Vengeance towards the distant enemies.

"Target?" She asked as she refrained from channeling her full power just yet. "Do you wish for me to prioritize a phase lord, a flagship or one of those mystery ships?"

"Are you confident that your firepower can disable one of their flagships fast enough before they respond and provide cover? Every alien flagship of importance usually possesses the strongest defenses out of a fleet."

"I cannot guarantee an climination. I don't have enough information to make that judgment. I am confident I can penetrate the azure energy shields and drill into the hull."

"Hm. The 'mystery warships' that you refer to are easier targets. They are smaller and most certainly less well-protected. The lack of intelligence concerning their roles and payloads are of great concern to our commanders. It is more important to dispel the cloud of uncertainty around them, and the best way to do that is to peel open their hulls and expose their interior. Please target one of these vessels and make sure you inflict enough damage to open up a gap in one of their cargo holds."

"Understood. This will not take long"

The Amaranto Mark III began to light up. Her Solus Gas-infused exterior was able to hide her emissions for now, but the mech frame soon started to emit so much heat and light energy that the distant aliens most certainly detected the activity!

As the Instrument of Vengeance started to charge up at a considerably faster rate than before the Amaranto's latest upgrade, the native alien armada already began to respond to this obvious threat.

More important warships began to fall back. At the same time, less important warships began to make up the vanguard and used their bulk to provide shelter to the ships and phase lords hiding in the rear.

The Divine Maw on the other hand made no attempts to make himself less easy to target. He still retained the size of a small moon, so much so that he had formed his own gravity well that unbalanced the gravitic environment even further!

As the Instrument of Vengeance charged up to full power fairly quickly, Saint Stark quickly activated almost all of the means she could employ to augment her next shot.

True Resonance.

ChargeMate.

Phasewater technology.

Hyper technology.

Blessed weapon.

The combination of true resonance empowerment and light energy empowerment caused the Instrument of Vengeance to glow with so much light and power that it was beginning to turn into a miniature sun!

There were still measures that Stark held back. Given the range and lack of mobility of the mystery warships, there was no need to engage the Ultimate Module.

The Two-Step Execution Module should only be used in situations where her base marksmanship was not adequate enough.

She also held back her companion spirit. Vail was much more useful when attacking enemy powerhouses than big warships.

Aside from that, the Amaranto Mark III was ready to unleash the power of an ace marksman mech that had been lovingly designed by the Larkinson Clan!

Moments before Saint Stark was ready to pull the trigger, she only had to pick her target.

Her weapon minutely adjusted its angle from side to side. Several mystery warships had not taken long before they successfully took shelter behind a less important.

enemy warship.

There were those that moved a little slower due to lack of coordination or differences

in ship class parameters.

Davia randomly selected a mystery warship that had almost moved out of the Amaranto's line of sight, but could still be struck if she pulled the trigger sooner rather

than later.

Веер.

"FIRE." The living mech crowed.

The ace pilot pulled the trigger without hesitation.

An overflow of light flooded a lot of sensors as a bright white energy beam tore across

space and instantly crossed over to the alien armada!

Although almost no one was able to notice it, the energy beam was not entirely straight. The complex gravitic environment and the interference produced by energetic exotics could subtly cause an energy beam to go slightly crooked.

This was why no one else had bothered to open fire with their own energy weapons. They were more likely to miss all of the time.

The Amaranto Mark III was different. Not only was she incredibly precise at incredibly long ranges, Saint Stark had meticulously calculated and optimized her firing solution in a short amount of time!

The thick and bright beam only lasted for an instant, but it successfully reached the

alien fleet and struck the target vessel at the exact right angle!

The mystery warship's segmented multi-layer azure energy shields flared, but succumbed almost immediately!

The power and penetration of the Amaranto's first full-powered shot against a real enemy since her ace pilot's breakthrough vastly exceeded the resistance of the ship's

defenses!

One segmented azure energy shield crumbled after another. It happened so quickly

that there was practically no delay!

The alien warship immediately lit up as her hull got struck by the

resonance-empowered light beam.

The hull plating did not stand a chance!

Even if the exterior consisted entirely of transphasic human-developed alloys, the

power of the recently upgraded Instrument of Vengeance was still too great to

withstand for any mortal vessel!

The improvements that Saint Stark had made over the last week had borne a lot of fruit. Not only had her resonance strength grown by a substantial degree, she had also developed a closer understanding and appreciation of the power of light.

One of the small but impactful gains she made was to add a modest purging aspect to her energy weapon attacks!

Just as she relied on the purging qualities of light to cleanse her mind of mental afflictions, she was also able to use the same property to negate the effects of hyper

technology!

It was for this reason that the azure energy shield succumbed faster and more easily

than it should. The powerful light energy had purged the energy barriers of their

water energy!

Now, the same aspect was purging the alloys of their metal energy and other reinforcing energies.

The bright white energy beam continued to drill into the hull until it had finally

reached one of the large cargo holds before punching a hole straight to the other side!

As the sensors recovered their normal states, many people paid close attention to the

target.

The mystery warship had been cored. The Amaranto had managed to destroy enough power generators and other critical components to cause the vessel to lose control!

"What is that?"

"That looks familiar..."

"Those are... mechs..."

"What?! That cannot be! How can they be mechs!?"

"Have the aliens managed to crack the secrets to our neural interfaces?!"

"No. Those aren't alien mechs. They are too human. I fear... that the cosmopolitans

have come to hasten our own extinction."

"That's crazy!" "Are these cosmopolitans blind?! It is not enough to steal our tech and give them to

the aliens. Fighting directly alongside the aliens is a step too far! Don't they know they will get killed once we are gone?!"

"You are trying to apply logic to the Cosmopolitan Movement. That never works

because sanity doesn't exist among their cells."

The surprise reveal of cosmopolitan mechs shocked every human defender. Each of them were ready to fight to defend the Rubarthan Pact and red humanity. Whether they were selfish or not, right now they were united by their collective responsibility

to their people.

To encounter humans who were shameless and depraved enough to completely go against this sacred duty was betrayal of the highest order!

All reason had left the cosmopolitans as they were still willing to side with the aliens

even when red humanity was on the verge of losing the Red War!

Shock quickly transitioned into rage as the Rubarthans had become motivated by fury

as well as duty!

"KILL THEM ALL!"

"LEAVE NONE OF THESE TRAITORS ALIVE!"

"NO COSMOPOLITAN IS ALLOWED TO LEAVE THIS BATTLEFIELD!"

The rank-and-file soldiers had already grown rabid at the sight of active human

treachery.

The cosmopolitans no longer bothered to hide their presence anymore. The cat was already out of the bag.

More and more cosmopolitan mechs launching out of the other mystery warships.

None of their pilots responded to any hails. They remained completely unmoved by the pleas and insults of the Rubarthan defenders.

As far as they were concerned, the human supremacists were irredeemable. Only by wiping out 50 to 90 percent of their population or more would it be possible for the remaining survivors to finally let go of the foolish notion that humans were superior

to other alien races!

Whatever twisted justifications they used to turn their mechs against their own kind, the cosmopolitans could never be persuaded to switch sides! Meanwhile, the Amaranto began to glow brighter. The sight of cosmopolitan mechs incensed Saint Stark!

Of all of the possible enemies she could encounter, none earned her ire more than

human trash that were actively colluding with genocidal aliens!

Her eyes began to glow with light while her mind became filled with fury!

Her hatred blazed so hot that she finally couldn't hold in her anger anymore! "TRAITORS!" She roared while at the same time her Instrument of Vengeance spat out

another destructive light beam!

This time, another capital warship got cored!