The Mech Touch

Few Larkinsons could understand what was on the Cross Patriarch's mind right now. The truth of the matter was not as complicated as they thought.

Aside from wanting to compete and measure himself against the second-strongest fish-whale of the Evolution Kingdom, Patriarch Reginald was also eager to baptize his new Whale-Cutting Saber in fish blood!

"COME AT ME, FISH WHALE!" He roared even though he knew the aliens didn't understand human speech. "I'LL SLICE YOU INTO SUSHI!"

The combative expert pilot's fighting spirit peaked as his expert mech had advanced close enough to collide against the champion fish-whale!

Though Patriarch Reginald did not participate in this campaign with the intention to duel against one of the powerhouses of the indigenous alien population, when he gazed at the powerful alien beast, he could recognize a challenge when he saw one.

Some forms of communication were universal to all races. At least that was what Reginald believed. Beasts were competitive by nature and he had no doubt that these fish-whales fought amongst themselves to see who deserved to be on top.

"Since you fish-whales understand the language of the fist so much, let me show you why expert mechs are revered in human space!"

Patriarch Reginald had studied parts of the footage brought back by Venerable Tusa like most people.

He skipped a lot of the boring parts but rewatched the battle between the Swarmers and the Evolvers multiple times.

The strength and abilities displayed by the Evolvers completely fascinated him! Although the Evolver fish-whales were completely different from humans, he saw many parallels with expert pilots and expert mechs from their individual power expression.

Each of these fish-whales functioned akin to a permanent union of expert mechs and expert pilots!

Although they did not harness the power of true resonance, the power derived from phase whale bioscience was not weak. This was especially when the fish-whales in question surpassed the size of an ordinary mech!

Though Patriarch Reginald knew better than to accept a challenge from the humongous fish king, this bladed fish-whale looked just right.

At 10 times the size of a mech, the creature that excelled at chopping enemies apart up close exuded pressure that was akin to a powerful expert pilot, but did not surpass it to the point of entering the range of an ace pilot.

In other words, the bladed fish-whale was a great sparring partner! Patriarch Reginald saw a great opportunity to practice and master the use of his new Whale-Cutting Saber!

"Accept my blade!"

As the Bolvos Rage finally closed the distance, the powerful expert mech had flared its resonance shield while raising its large and heavy saber at the same time!

The bladed fish-whale did not remain idle at this time. It maintained its challenging gaze as it prepared for the incoming in its own way.

The powerful beast was old enough to experience numerous battles where powerful enemies attempted to charge it head-on in an attempt to break his body apart.

How could he not have countermeasures against this simple tactic?

The bladed fish-whale did not make any attempts at avoiding the charge. Even if it did, it was futile as its speed was not comparable to that of the Bolvos Rage.

Instead of doing all of that, the bladed fish-whale's hide squirmed until a black substance appeared onto the surface.

Soon, they solidified into bone armor that completely hardened the front of the bladed fish-whale's body!

That wasn't the end of the transformation. The bladed fish-whale concentrated deeper and began to squeeze out additional bone material from its giant skull.

Soon enough, a long black bladed horn had extended out of its head!

This sharp horn was considerably larger and more menacing than the other blades that extended out of its body!

"Damn, that horn is long enough to impale a heavy mech with plenty of length to spare!"

"The Bolvos Rage is hastening its own destruction if it collides head-on against that horn!"

Shortly before impact, Patriarch Reginald briefly considered whether he should try to test his expert mech's defenses against this menacing horn.

"No. It's too dangerous!"

His powerful intuition detected a lot of threat from this horn. It was not as simple as it looked to his senses.

If his expert mech attacked as he originally intended, then he would just be taking the initiative to impale it onto this menacing horn!

Therefore, the Bolvos Rage ultimately veered to the left, causing it to miss the horn and the main body of the fish-whale.

The way wasn't cleared, however. There were many other blades sticking out from the rest of the fish-whale's body.

"You will serve as good target practice!"

In an instant, the expert hybrid mech zipped along the length of the bladed fish-whale and swept its heavy saber straight against the blades in the expert mech's path.

Over a black bone blades burst away from the massive organism after the Whale-Cutting Saber completed its first strike against a whale-like creature!

"Is it that easy?!"

"Those blades impaled so many Swarmers without breaking that I thought they were unbreakable. How could they have been cut with so much ease?!"

"That's easy. Our patriarch's expert mech has true resonance while that big fish-whale only has ordinary bones. There is no way that they are on the same level!"

All of the fish-whales gazing up at the duel from a distance were surprised at how easily the Bolvos Rage managed to cut off all of those sharp and hard bone blades with ease.

This was the first time a fish-whale fought against an expert mech. They were completely unfamiliar with true resonance and did not understand how such a 'small' metal fighting beast was able to display such an absurd degree of lethality.

"Haha, look at those fish gape! They truly have no idea of the power of humanity. If we had an ace mech on our side, we could have taught them a lesson more directly."

As the Bolvos Rage flew past, the bladed fish-whale looked shocked but not distressed.

It turned its massive body around and exerted a strong energy field onto the separated bones.

As soon as the energy field enveloped the blades that had been cut off from the bladed fish-whale's body, the bones quickly flew back in the other direction and seamlessly merged back onto their original places.

"Damn, that's cheating!"

"This is nothing. If Patriarch Reginald can cut them off once, he can cut them off again!"

The Bolvos Rage did exactly that. Its next three attack runs were the same as before. Since Reginald was not eager to impale his expert mech against the exaggerated horn of the bladed fish-whale, he could only steer his expert pilot to the sides of the massive creature in order to avoid its sharpest edge.

The problem was that every bone blade his expert mech damaged quickly restored to normal as if they had never been cut. Other than expending a bit of energy and other resources, the bladed fish-whale did not actually suffer a lot of losses.

Patriarch Reginald did not miss the lack of progress he was making. With the size of the bladed fish-whale's body, his dueling opponent probably had an enormous reserve of energy to draw upon. There was no point in trying to win the fight by turning it into a battle of attrition.

"I need to inflict real damage!"

This time, he adjusted his tactics. He no longer tried to charge nearly straight towards the bladed fish-whale but instead opted to circle around the massive creature.

As a fish-whale that was at least ten times the size of a regular mech, the bladed fish-whale's ability to move and turn around was a lot more limited, especially when it clearly didn't excel at mobility.

The bladed fish-whale looked aggrieved as it tried and failed to keep up with the circling expert mech.

Under normal circumstances, this rarely became a problem. Even if an enemy fish-whale reached its less-protected rear or bottom side, so what? Every part of its body was protected by wicked blades that could straightforwardly pierce through most fish-whale bodies.

The expert mech it was facing was different, though!

Even though Patriarch Reginald did not possess any passion for swords and sabers, he was proficient in the use of many different weapons. He was able to resonate with his new Whale-Cutting Saber to a decent degree, causing its resilience and extremely sharp edge to reach another level!

This was the saber that Ketis and Professor Benedict had invested a significant amount of time, effort and resources in developing!

The original purpose of this blade was to be as hard and hard as possible so that Patriarch Reginald maximized his chances of cutting through the giant phase whale bones in the Royal Tomb.

With such an ambition target in mind, how could the Whale-Cutting Saber's sharp edge be defeated so easily?

In addition to its sharp properties, the Whale-Cutting Saber also provided Reginald with another benefit, one that he was just starting to appreciate during this duel.

While Ketis was just a young and inexperienced Journeyman, her swordmaster powers were no joke.

She had embedded a basic but highly effective set of extraordinary techniques onto the Whale-Cutting Saber.

Reginald had already come in touch with them and learned them earlier, but did not notice how much easier they allowed him to cut through obstacles until he tried the cutting techniques onto the blades of his opponent.

"The techniques actually maximize the potent cutting potential of this saber."

This was an incredibly useful benefit that instantly allowed the Whale-Cutting Saber to surpass the cutting power of his old heavy axe.

The difference between performing an extraordinary technique and not was quite massive.

In the case where Reginald did not pull off any extraordinary techniques, the Whale-Cutting Saber wasn't able to condense and carry true resonance as well as it could.

Only by familiarizing himself with the weapon over many years would Patriarch Reginald truly be able to wield it as an extension of his body.

There was way too little time for that, but executing the techniques that Ketis had prepared for this creation successfully allowed Patriarch Reginald to close the gap!

"Face my cutting blade!"

The Bolvos Rage went from circling around to launching a direct attack on the bladed phase-whale's flank!

With its powerful resonance shield, the expert mech crashed through the blades in its way and was just about to slash its glowing heavy saber across the thick and meaty hide of the bladed fish-whale.

Yet just before the expert mech succeeded in spilling first blood, the bladed fish-whale's body contracted faster than everyone could see.

Patriarch Reginald's intuition sensed a great degree of danger. He barely had time to adjust the stance of his expert mech before a massive fish-whale tail smacked the side of his Bolvos Rage!

Though the expert mech's resonance shield had absorbed much of the damage, the blow was so massive and powerful that the Bolvos Rage could not stop itself from bouncing away like a pinball!

"Damn!"

A large body had many disadvantages, but there was a reason why most of the Evolver fish-whales strove to grow their bodies as large as possible.

Their immense power could be put to use in many ways!

As Patriarch Reginald stabilized the flight of his expert mech, he studied the bladed fish-whale with a greater appreciation of the power of its body.

While the large and powerful beast could simply rely on its many blades to kill the Swarmer fish-whales en masse, that didn't mean this was its only attack method.

The bladed fish-whale's large and bloated body actually shrunk to a small extent!

Not only was its body growing denser and tougher, its ability to retaliate against enemies up close had grown. Its tail and maw was able to reach out in a remarkably fast and flexible manner and cover up all of its weak points with surprising alacrity!

Though the newly-transformed fish-whale still moved forward as slowly as ever, its brawling capabilities had actually grown twice as strong!

"How can I make this fish-whale bleed?" Patriarch Reginald frowned.