Chapter 126: The Fish and the Net (Part II)

The nearest Morning-class mech to the half-collapsed building was caught completely off guard and struck by the golden light! The speed of this streak of light far exceeded the expectations of the pilots; their once-trusted intuition proved entirely useless against such velocity.

Before the pilots could react, the golden light, having struck the Morning-class mech, retreated into the half-collapsed building at an even greater speed, vanishing from sight.

The attention of the remaining nine pilots was instantly drawn to the mech that had been hit. Having trained and operated together for a long time to build their synergy, they were as close as brothers; when one was attacked, the other nine were deeply concerned.

Had they been on a battlefield, they would not have been so careless, but the intelligence provided to them stated there was only one target. One person against ten Morning-class mechs? It should have been an easy capture. While this sudden turn of events caught them off guard, they were not panicked. Furthermore, none of them had clearly seen what the golden light actually was.

What happened? This question lingered in everyone’s mind.

The struck mech had yet to respond.

Under the gaze of the nine pilots, the Morning-class mech seemed unable to bear the immense internal pressure. Suddenly, gashes appeared where it had been struck, crisscrossing the armor. From these clean-cut openings, a pale cyan glow emerged—a light they knew all too well. It was the luminescence emitted when a mech’s internal engine energy was activated. Why would it appear there?

As soon as the pale cyan light was exposed to the air, it flickered violently and unstably, pulsing like a human heart. After only three pulses, a deafening roar erupted, and a blinding light filled their vision!

The mech exploded! It happened right before their eyes. The force of a high-energy explosion within such a confined space was terrifying. None of the Morning-class mechs had time to deploy their energy shields; the massive shockwave sent the remaining nine mechs reeling, their encirclement shattered.

Naturally, the half-collapsed building could not withstand such a powerful shockwave and came crashing down.

The collapse of the brick structure kicked up clouds of dust that filled the sky.

Amidst this vision-obscuring dust, several tiny black streaks landed silently and accurately onto the mechs that had yet to stabilize from the shockwave.

Ye Chong sat within the ruins of the building, beside Yi. Yi’s massive frame provided just enough space for Ye Chong, who was wearing his miniature mech, to maneuver.

That golden streak had been Ye Chong’s sudden strike.

Even Ye Chong hadn't expected the "Guardian" to reach such speeds when fully engaged. Gu Shaoze likely never imagined the miniature mech he created could reach such a level. The Guardian was originally designed for Number Two, with the ideal goal being for Number Two to pilot it at four Hertz. Who could have known that with Ye Chong’s superhuman leg explosive power, it could reach ten Hertz? Gu Shaoze would never have dreamed of such a thing.

Ye Chong had only been testing the waters, merely trying his best by drawing the two daggers he was equipped with and slashing a few times. He hadn't expected their performance to so vastly exceed his expectations.

In the brief few hundredths of a second that his daggers touched the enemy mech, a line of text flashed like lightning across Ye Chong’s black-and-white digital vision: "Number Two’s daggers initialized. Initialization complete!" The text passed so quickly that had Ye Chong not been sharp-eyed, he would have missed the tiny notification.

Number Two’s daggers! Even in the heat of battle, Ye Chong found it somewhat amusing; Gu Shaoze really knew how to cut corners.

The three-dimensional wireframe diagram of the enemy mech, composed of black and white, magnified and rotated at an astonishing speed in Ye Chong’s vision. Countless points were analyzed simultaneously, and data cascaded down like a waterfall. Ye Chong didn't even have time to process it; by the time he reached the enemy mech, only eight intersecting lines and seven points distributed across the mech’s body remained.

Ye Chong had no time to analyze what calculations had produced these points and lines. In an instant, he chose the eight lines and struck them with his daggers with pinpoint accuracy. His astonishing hand speed, amplified by the Guardian, allowed him to complete this series of operations in a single touch.

He had no time to check the results, nor did he hold out much hope. Using daggers meant for personal combat against a mech was like using a thermal pistol against a space battleship. He retreated like a bolt of lightning. The ten-man encirclement was seamless and tight. He could only hope that Mu, piloting Yi, could find an opening; otherwise, he would be a prisoner by the end of the day.

Ye Chong smiled bitterly to himself. The Guardian was powerful, but its weaponry was truly lacking. If he had a weapon that could threaten an enemy mech, and given how tightly they had closed their circle, he might have had a chance.

Suddenly, Mu’s voice echoed in his ear: "Ye, come here!"

A situation? Ye Chong’s heart skipped a beat, but he immediately relaxed. Could anything be worse than the current situation? Despite this, he leaped to Mu’s side instantly. Before he could ask what was happening, a thunderous roar erupted, followed by a massive force. Ye Chong nearly stumbled but managed to stand firm. Above him, countless grid-like blocks of stone fell. The Guardian automatically analyzed these blocks, and the terrifying flow of data hit him like a high-pressure hose, flashing past so quickly it made him dizzy.

Ye Chong groaned inwardly. The Guardian’s analysis was entirely automatic and beyond human control; when the situation in his field of vision became too complex, the sheer volume of data was enough to drown a person. Unable to adapt to the lightning-fast speed of the data, Ye Chong focused solely on the three-dimensional wireframe map. In fact, his approach was perfectly correct. To speed up the internal computer, Gu Shaoze had boldly replaced the popular holographic imagery with ancient black-and-white, focusing on the wireframe analysis. The optimization of this data was something Gu Shaoze had intended to do last, but he had been targeted by the Mech Pilot Association before he could finish.

The Guardian Ye Chong was using was an unfinished product—though only in terms of data optimization and shielding. In every other respect, it had met all of Gu Shaoze’s expectations.

Protected by Yi, Ye Chong was spared from being buried by the collapsing building. Unaware that his own strike had been the catalyst for this chaos, he watched blankly as Mu piloted Yi to raise the vase-shaped ejection pod and fired all the auxiliary shells in one go.

The moment Mu raised the pod, Ye Chong was ready for battle. The synergy between them was flawless.

Indeed, the moment the last shell left the pod, Yi and Ye Chong moved. Mu’s timing was breathtaking; not a single moment was wasted.

Yi and Ye Chong started simultaneously.

The difference between them quickly became apparent. In short-range sprints, the Guardian had an incomparable advantage. When they burst out of the ruins, Ye Chong was several meters ahead of Yi. What he saw was the shattered encirclement and the dust-filled sky.

The Guardian’s black-and-white vision was unaffected by the dust, and Ye Chong quickly located the nine mechs. *Eh, where is the tenth?* He hadn't realized his previous attack had destroyed one of them.

The auxiliary shells fired by Mu landed with precision, not a single one missing. The thick dust provided the best cover for these already stealthy projectiles.

These shells were incredibly insidious. Caught off guard, the nine mechs fell into chaos, with several being struck by multiple shells at once. Master Fred’s work was truly reliable! Ye Chong grew quite fond of these auxiliary shells.

"This way!" Mu urged.

Ye Chong, already having rushed in front of an enemy mech, forcibly stopped his dagger mid-swing. He kicked off the enemy mech and darted toward Mu. The force of his kick, amplified by the Guardian, was immense; the Morning-class mech couldn't hold its ground and staggered backward.

Looking toward Mu, Ye Chong was left speechless. Mu was truly formidable! Even piloting Yi, it seemed Mu had managed to tap into its absolute deepest potential. Compared to when he piloted Yi himself, it was like an entirely different machine. Whether in speed or other metrics, Yi was currently fierce beyond measure.

Yi had lost an arm, so the only usable weapon was the overclocked oscillating blade. Yi stepped between two Morning-class mechs. Before firing the auxiliary shells, Mu had already calculated these two as the breakout point, so they had been hit by the most shells.

A simple Thomas maneuver, performed with a perfection that made Ye Chong envious! The oscillating blade was hidden behind the roaring energy shield and, like a viper striking, kissed the vital points of both mechs.

In the blink of an eye, two mechs fell at Yi’s feet. The power of the auxiliary shells was now fully apparent; in the hands of a master like Mu, these status debuffs were fatal. The Morning-class mechs were not designed for solo combat to begin with, and having lost their coordination and being hampered by the debuffs, they had no chance to react to Mu’s sharp attacks.

Ye Chong arrived just in time.

The once-tight encirclement was now completely useless. The path in front of Ye Chong and Mu was clear—the opportunity to escape was right before their eyes!