The Mech Touch

Pairixan succumbed to the wounds inflicted by the shelling and lasers fired from an obnoxiously long distance away.

While Qilanxo’s supreme defensive ability surprised the Flagrant Swordmaidens enormously, it didn’t change the fact that the sacred gods remained vulnerable to attacks from a very long range.

Engaging an earth manipulator like Pairixan in close range where he could make the best use of his powers was pure stupidity. Though the Swordmaidens hunkered for a melee confrontation, the Vandals remained sober.

They really couldn’t afford to lose a lot of mechs at this stage!

Every mech was precious and couldn’t be replaced. While the same thing applied to the power generators as well, in the worst case the fleet would supply them with a substitute or two. While it wasn’t simple to fabricate a new power generator from scratch, it was still a lot easier than fabricating a new mech.

The fleet may have arrived in the Aeon Corona System with an ample amount of supplies and materials, but it couldn’t afford to waste them too much.

Once the Vandals confirmed Pairixan’s death, the artillery mechs and laser rifleman mechs already started to aim their weapons towards the heavily-injured form of Qilanxo.

"Wait! Hold your fire!" Captain Byrd ordered before turning to an exobiologist. "Is it possible to take Qilanxo captive?"

This surprised the Vandals. This beast hindered the Flagrant Swordmaidens enormously. However, Qilanxo’s power was extremely formidable. If they could turn Qilanxo into their pet, they might be able to benefit from her supreme defenses!

Once they got around to this idea, a couple of Vandals looked at the projection of Qilanxo’s heavily injured form with greedy eyes.

This was their chance to tame a sacred god!

The exobiologist in the command center didn’t immediately answer Captain Byrd’s question. He held out a palm and accessed a private comm channel. After a quick discussion with Dr. Tillman and some other exobiologist, he gave out his answer in an uncertain tone.

"Captain, according to what we know of the physique of the wild gods, Qilanxo may be far too injured to survive. It is a question whether she will be able to live for more than a few hours. If you wish for us to capture her, then we will first need to treat her wounds and insure she lives past this day."

"What are the drawbacks of doing so?"

"We will need to draw upon a large amount of medical supplies. Some are easily reproduced, but some of the medicines can only be sourced from the pharmaceutical companies. If we expend more medicine on making sure that Qilanxo can survive, we’ll have less to draw upon once our own men sustain injuries. In fact, it is not certain yet if our intervention will be sufficient enough to save Qilanxo’s life."

This decision required some consideration. After Captain Byrd received a document that contained an estimate on how many medical supplies would be expended in an attempt to save Qilanxo’s life, she fell into a brief dilemma.

"Ma’am, we just lost three power generators." An engineer spoke. "This will shorten our range and affect our future operations. Right now, our research into the god crystal and murky crystal haven’t been able to turn up any concrete results. If we have a living sacred god such as Qilanxo in our custody, we can study the exobeast’s method of activating her god crystals and find a way to replicate the process."

The exobiologist also displayed his eagerness. "Qilanxo is one of the Eastern Samar Pantheon’s most powerful sacred gods, and is on par with Hokaz from Mulak. As an old, powerful sacred god that has received a lot of nurturing, it is extremely useful for us if we can study her body while she still remains alive."

The exobiologists were already clamoring to dissect the burned and broken corpses of Pairixan and the other sacred gods, but no matter how well-preserved they may be, there was only so much to learn from the autopsies. A living subject would be able to reveal much more about the strange and abnormal god species, especially under long-term observation!

Of course, practical problems also emerged. The site around Qilanxo and the corpses of all the other sacred gods was surrounded with heat and radiation. How would the exobiologists get close enough to treat the beast? Would Qilanxo remain docile? How would they be able to move the giant beast?

"We will have to perform triage on-site and restrain her in place." The exobiologist said. "Unless the engineers can move something as heavy as an older sacred god, we will have to construct a treatment facility on-site."

There was no way to move something as big and heavy as Qilanxo. Her size surpassed a hundred-year old wild god, and was significantly heavier than a heavy mech. Unless the Vandals cobbled up a customized construction designed to move extremely heavy loads, the only other way to move the defeated sacred god was by getting her to move under her own power.

In the end, Captain Byrd decided that all of the trouble would be worth the payoff. It was important to note that Qilanxo’s god crystals still remained in place and even appeared to feed a small amount of energy into her body, helping it maintain her life.

After consulting with Commander Lydia, they both agreed to save Qilanxo’s life.

"Move out and secure the site!"

The exobiologists began packing up their supplies while the engineers readied a small prefab facility to form a temporary lab. Chief Dakkon already prepared to construct a bigger temporary facility to cover up Qilanxo’s form and to provide a more controlled environment to facilitate her recovery.

A large amount of melee mechs emerged to come into close proximity to the defeated attackers. One of the Swordmaiden Devil Razors even poked at Pairixan’s corpse, only to elicit no response.

"Hey, woman! Don’t poke a hole in that corpse! That’s valuable research material!"

"Don’t call me woman, you filthy Vandal!"

A lot of mech pilots couldn’t resist posing next to the fallen beasts and have their comrades record an image for posterity.

It was as if they had personally helped slay the sacred gods, which was very far from the actual truth!

Ves shook his head at their behavior. At the very least, their constant poking and prodding tentatively confirmed that Pairixan wouldn’t wake up and engulf the entire area with earthquakes.

"Please inspect Qilanxo if she’s conscious."

One of the mechs walked in front of Qilanxo’s huge lizard-like form. Now that their mechs had all gotten close, they clearly saw Qilanxo drawing breath. It must have been hard to breathe in the dust and heat-laden air, but the god species could easily handle worse. They possessed resilient, adaptable bodies that could survive many different environments.

This was also why the exobiologists were reasonably certain that she’d be able to survive!

"Qilanxo isn’t responding to our actions." Captain Orfan who was also on site reported. "I think this big beast is too injured to care about us. Do you want us to nudge her or something?"

An exobiologist became alarmed. "Please don’t disturb Qilanxo’s rest, Captain Orfan! Qilanxo is incredibly pained right now and regaining her consciousness will only exacerbate her injuries."

"Fine! Whatever you say, doc!"

The exobiologists and other medical experts already loaded a fast transport with as much medical supplies they could bring on short notice. They took their seats and let the legged transport take them towards the dangerous site.

Though the heat and radiation posed a threat to their bodies, their hazard suits provided them with sufficient protection against the aftermath of the furious blasts.

A few questions began to pop up among the men.

"Why did Pairixan die while Qilanxo managed to stay alive? Isn’t she weaker than her mate?"

"She’s oriented towards defense while Pairixan favors offense. The space barrier also completely centers around her, protecting her body the best from the initial blast until it couldn’t withstand the damage anymore."

It took some time for the Vandals and Swordmaidens to wind down from the battle. One concern remained, though.

"What is the status of Pailanon and his subordinates. Have they come closer?"

"Pailanon has taken his subordinates and reentered the city as soon as he witnessed the explosion. He lost his courage, ma’am."

The Vandals couldn’t replicate such an explosion without crippling their energy generation, but Pailanon didn’t know that. If the enemy could strike with such force once against Pairixan, what did that mean for Pailanon if he took up his younger brother’s mantle?

He’d be crazy to attack a force with such a devastating weapon!

Besides, now that Pairixan was likely dead, the eastern side of the city instantly became ownerless! The junior sacred god that Pairixan left behind was the only living member of the Eastern Samar Pantheon, which would likely be dissolved this day. There was no way Pailanon would let a single sacred god stop him from claiming the ancient city of Samar once and for all!

With the older brother preoccupied with raiding Pairixan’s belongings in the city, the Vandals and the Swordmaidens rested a little easier. At the very least, they didn’t have to fight another powerful exobeast after expending a great amount of effort to defeat Pairixan’s group.

There was one other faction on the planet that the Flagrant Swordmaidens needed to take note of. "Has the Starlight Megalodon launched any weapons?"

"We’ve detected no abnormalities on our long-ranged sensors. The fleet hasn’t sent down a shuttle to inform us of any threats they detected from orbit either."

The Vandals still felt uneasy. The Starlight Megalodon continued to loom over their heads as a latent threat.

Fortunately, as several hours went by, their fears subsided as nothing happened. The explosion evidently fell within the battleship’s tolerance range.

It wasn’t wise to test the Starlight Megalodon on this matter. Hopefully, their next encounter with the natives wouldn’t be so fraught as what happened today.

With the alert level lowering down from red to yellow, the Vandals and Swordmaidens stopped holing up in their bunkers and shelters and began to pick up their duties again. Ves yearned to see Qilanxo up close but he had no reason to do so. Mech designers like Ves wouldn’t be able to help in any of the duties. He’d only be in other people’s way.

As some of the exobiologists already started treating some of the surface wounds of the unconscious sacred god, others started beginning their preliminary studies on the remains of the four dead sacred gods.

The engineers even approached one of the god crystals and began to take a large amount of scans.

A lot of work needed to be done to process their spoils of war. The researchers among the Vandals long dreamt of obtaining the corpses and the sole surviving sacred god. While the explosion caused a lot of damage, there was still more than enough left intact to perform extensive studies.

Everyone wanted to see what made the sacred gods tick! What distinguished them from the wild gods? How were they able to manipulate the god crystals while Chief Dakkon couldn’t even get his own specimen to glow?

All of these puzzles might soon be answered, especially with the help of Qilanxo, whose breath grew a little more even now that the exobiologists had begun to treat her wounds and sedate her with a potent substance.

As Ves returned to the mech workshop to prepare for the inevitable raft of repairs as some of the mechs had been affected by the shockwave, Ketis also entered and plopped her armored form onto an available seat.

"I wanted to go off and see the beasts up close, but they wouldn’t let me!"

Ves chuckled. "If they let every random Vandal or Swordmaiden up close, there would be no one left to man the camp. Besides, you’ll get your chance soon enough."

"How so?" She frowned. A mech designer had nothing to do with a living beast.

"If my guess is right, they’ll eventually want to put someone onto Qilanxo’s back, if she will let us. That will be my time to shine."