The Mech Touch

5872 Cooperative Spirit Combat

From the moment Caramond began to inhabit Blinky as if the companion spirit was a shell, the entire battle changed forever.

For the first time since the lightning tribulation began, the output of the Spark Reactor finally found a somewhat worthy user.

The Dominion of Man was a well-constructed starship in every aspect as far as the fleeters were concerned. The best minds, technologies, materials and care had been put into making her and her sister ships the pride of the Common Fleet Alliance.

Though the CFA's initial experiment with dreadnoughts ultimately failed to justify the insane amount of resources investing into her development and construction, she still served as one of the 8 mobile bulwarks of the Red Ocean.

Unfortunately, the dreadnoughts of the Red Fleet suffered from the same flaw as any piece of hyper technology.

Red humanity had a spotty track record with cultivation.

The vast majority of cultivators and scientific experts on this subject remained behind in the old galaxy. While the big players made sure to bring plenty of copies of historical archives and such, having access to all of that obscure knowledge did not mean that there were enough people who understood all of the esoteric theories.

The Dominion of Man may have received more attention than most other warships, but her integration of hyper technology was ultimately far from reaching her full potential.

The good news was that more and more researchers and developers worked to increase the effectiveness of hyper technology. They were making constant progress every month.

That did not help the Dominion of Man in her current state, however. The ship could not wait for future improvements to upgrade her powerful systems to another level. The Dread Marines who fought on her behalf all had to do their best with the imperfect hyper technology integrated into their Dread Armors.

All of this meant that before Caramond descended onto Blinky, the Dread Marines working to overcome the communal energy barriers of the strange metal-attributed insects had been squandering much of the fire energy flowing in their direction.

No more.

As Caramond gained command over the nearby fire energy that was flowing at an increasing rate due to adjustments made to the energy transmission system of the dreadnought, Blinky was finally able to ensure the Dread Armors harnessed this power in a more effective manner!

It was difficult. Blinky had to split his focus to an insane degree. If not for the fact that he was an incorporeal entity who cultivated his own internal universe, it would have been much harder to pull off the mental gymnastics required to help the Dread Armors channel more fire energy into their attacks.

Ves had worked on plenty of hyper technology to know how it worked. The fleeters clearly utilized the best hyper materials in more advanced technological systems, but he was a good enough mech designer to understand the basic gist of most of the tech incorporated in a Dread Armor.

His knowledge as a mech designer augmented Blinky's ability to figure out better solutions and enhance the power of every hyper weapon.

The problem was that there were too many different models of Dread Armors.

There were Light Dread Armors that relied on stealth to land painful blows at unsuspecting targets.

There were Medium Dread Armors that were equipped with emergency smart metal repair tools that could fix most forms of battle damage within seconds.

There were Heavy Dread Armors that were equipped with lots of missile launchers and advanced targeting systems.

Each of them harnessed E energy in different ways. What was interesting was that the fleeters overwhelmingly tried to utilize fire hyper materials, so Ves did not have to worry too much about attribute clashes.

Still, there was way too much stuff for Ves and Blinky to keep track of. There were too many Dread Armor models, too many complicated hyper parts and too many individual Dread Marines to keep track of. Mortal minds were simply not equipped to handle so much work.

Fortunately, they had a True God on their side.

Caramond may still be in the middle of his ascension process, but his capabilities had already grown to such an extent that he was easily able to keep track of thousands of moving parts at the same time!

It did not take much for them to cooperate with each other. There was no need for explanations as Blinky and Caramond were in a fused state at the moment.

Their teamwork also proceeded without issue. Caramond had formed a spiritual network out of fire energy with a couple of thousand Dread Marines. Their Dread Armors had practically become extensions of his own body.

As the seconds passed by the Dread Marines that looked as if they were on fire started to dim. Their impressive Dread Armors no longer looked as if they were on the verge of melting into slag.

This was an evolution rather than a devolution.

The illusionary flames were a manifestation of wasted energy. The bigger the spectacle, the more energy went to waste.

While the Dread Armors did not look as impressive as before, their auras had grown hotter and more intense.

It was impressive how much progress Ves, Blinky and Caramond made over the span of a single minute. Each of them pooled their own advantages together to produce a result that truly empowered the Dread Marines that the ancestral spirit had claimed for his first Bloodfire Legion!

The fire-blessed Dread Marines that had given in to the control of Caramond took full advantage of their superior firepower. Each of them struck the metallic energy barrier protecting the metallic insects with greater fervor. Every attack wave produced noticeable results as the energy barrier shook increasingly more despite all of the effort put into restoring its integrity.

The leading insect champion exerted greater effort into reinforcing the barrier. More and more mysterious runes started to light up on the surface, but these measures failed to compensate for the damage produced by more potent fire-

empowered attacks.

"The energy barrier has lost half of its integrity!"

"Some of our most penetrating transphasic attacks are starting to get through!"

"Concentrate our attacks on two opposing points. The energy barrier can only reinforce one direction, but never two or more at the same time!"

After so many frustrating minutes of attacking an energy barrier that simply wouldn't go down, the Dread Marines felt exhilarated when they finally produced concrete results!

Caramond was clearly having the time of his life. The swung his black scepter like a conductor of an orchestra and continually utilized his expanding multitasking ability to keep his Dreadfire Legion operating at a higher state of efficiency.

The work was strenuous to every party involved, but the rush of combat motivated each of them to keep up their collaborative efforts.

The energy barrier eventually endured so much damage that it was on the verge of breaking.

"<nullb>Fire cleanses all! No alien can withstand the might of humanity!"

The barrier shattered, causing every tribulation manifestation to suffer a momentary backlash!

This exposed the insectile lightning soldiers to the fiery attacks of the Dreadfire Legion!

"<nullb>Burn the aliens! Teach them the folly of resisting the human race! Each alien you kill will save at least ten times as many human lives!"

The Dread Marines hardly needed any encouragement to slaughter tens of thousands of disoriented and exposed lightning soldiers.

Thousands of Melee Dread Marines crashed right into their foes and crushed the insects despite the fact that they were no slouches in melee combat. Without any energy barriers in the way, the human soldiers proved why they were the best of what the Red Fleet had to offer.

With the blessing of fire energy and the enhanced coordination bestowed by Caramond, each and every Dread Marine demonstrated considerably greater skill and power that already transcended their old performance levels.

Many Ranged Dread Marines coordinated their firepower and strategically bombarded key sections of the enemy formation. While they slaughtered plenty of lightning insects, their main job was to disrupt enemy coordination and hinder them from launching an effective counterattack.

They adopted the right actions and completely managed to suppress the lightning insects. No cluster of alien soldiers received enough of a reprieve to perform a communal cultivation technique. Every tribulation manifestation had to fend off the relentless alien troopers by themselves!

The rewards were magnificent. Each eliminated lightning insect released an explosion of tribulation energies that damaged but also upgraded the Dread Armors across a fairly generous area.

When thousands of explosions took place in quick succession, all of the units of the Dreadfire Legion got upgraded in real-

time!

Even Ves benefited from the bounty as he had decided to move closer despite all of the risks it entailed. His Unending Regalia, his true body as well as his various gadgets sucked in all of the juicy destruction and creation energies to work away their various imperfections and restore everything to a better state than before.

However, the opposition did not go down without a fight.

"Ahhh!"

"The alpha insect is too strong!"

"I need an emergency evacuation!"

A storm of lightning-infused blades erupted from the center of the enemy formation!

The alpha insect uttered a silent cry that went lost in vacuum before it began to rampage through the nearest squads of Dread Marines.

Its two limbs ended up in sharp and penetrating spears that never failed to penetrate the Dread Armors and puncture the flesh underneath!

While the alpha insect was only one of many lightning soldiers, the champion's cultivation was at least an order of magnitude better than its brethren.

The difference in strength was so huge that none of the Dread Marines could outduel the powerful alien!

"Concentrate our firepower!"

"Keep your distance from this threat!"

"Engage expert mech protocols!"

The Dread Marines had never fought against such a powerful cultivator before, but the Red Fleet already possessed an existing template on how to fight against such a threat.

Every Dread Marine in the vicinity distanced themselves from the alpha insect.

This not only prevented the alpha insect from eliminating so many Dread Marines at a time, but also exposed the alien champion to massed attacks from a distance!

Explosions and energy beams engulfed the immediate area surrounding the alpha insect! So many attacks swamped the site that all of the other lightning soldiers got obliterated without mercy!

Yet as the attacks started to abate, the alpha insect turned out to be fine!

The champion had managed to avoid serious harm by conjuring up his own metallic energy barrier!

Before the Dread Marines could unleash another salvo of concentrated attacks, the alpha insect whipped forward and instantly skewered two different Dread Marines!

Though the Rubican Spatial Transfer System managed to teleport the humans inside the Dread Armors away at the last second, it was still humiliating for the Dread Marines to get taken out without any opportunity for resistance.

More attacks lanced in his direction, but the alpha insect moved too quickly!

In the past of half a dozen seconds, the alien powerhouse had managed to wipe off 16 Dread Marines off the board!

"It's too fast!"

"Our ranged weapons cannot land a hit when it is constantly on the move."

The alpha insect showed how individual powerhouses had the ability to turn an entire battle around by themselves.

Before the alien champion was able to jump into a formation of Heavy Dread Marines and crush them before they could unleash another salvo of missiles, a fiery shape dove down like a comet and crashed against the fast-moving enemy!

"<nullb>You shall terrorize my soldiers no more, alien!"

Much to Ves' surprise, Caramond chose to challenge the alpha insect in person!

More and more fire energy from the Spark Reactor engulfed his energy manifestation. Much of it started to concentrate into his scepter.

Just as the alpha insect dashed forward with unnatural speed, a ray of fire energy struck the creature with pin-point accuracy!

A blast of flames knocked back the alien champion and inflicted severe damage to the personal energy barrier that it had activated at the last instant.

Before the alpha insect could launch another attack, Caramond preempted this sequence by charging forward while thrusting out a lance made out of fire energy!

"<nullb>Death to the aliens!"

The concentrated fire energy was too powerful for the alpha insect. The metallic barrier broke. The exoskeleton of the powerful alien cultivator failed to hold back the power of a True God-like entity and succumbed to the penetrating attack.

The alpha insect had been felled!

"<nullb>Humanity reigns supreme!"

"HUMANITY REIGNS SUPREME!"

The Dread Marines quickly capitalized on the outcome of the duel to eliminate the remaining lightning insects, each of whom behaved as if they had lost a central pillar of their faith!

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