The Mech Touch

Chapter 7299: Fearing Escalation

"So what do you think of our plan, Ves? We have tried our best to improve the conditions for your giants, but this is the best that we are able to present to you on short notice."

The plan had guts, that was for certain.

Yet what peeved Ves was that the Rubarthans conveniently evaded most of the risks.

If the plan completely collapsed, then their losses amounted to nothing more than a couple of cheap and easily replaceable scout ships.

The Human Phase Lord Department could potentially lose a lot more!

Ascended Giants were expensive. Though Ves did not bother to figure out the exact numbers, he could easily visualize the huge amount of phasewater, biotech support and equipment needed to raise a human phase lord from scratch.

The loss of a single Ascended Giant was already painful for his department. The loss of a dozen of them would be a catastrophe!

Ves narrowed his eyes. He did not expect for the Rubarthans to try to take advantage of him and his personal forces that brazenly.

"The risks and rewards of this ’reconnaissance mission’ are completely out of whack, Richard. The dangers of approaching that huge battle moon is immense. What if it contains lots of firepower? What if it possesses the capacity to engulf nearby phase lords? What if it is surrounded by far too many enemy Goliaths? Sending 30 phase lords into the field may sound impressive, but you should know quite well that all of them are much more heavily gear-dependent than alien phase lords. They are too young and lack development in terms of phasewater organs. I would be much more open to your idea if their phasewater organs are more developed, but that is not the case."

Much of the strength of phase leaders were tied to their phasewater concentration, their training, their combat experience and the quantity as well as quality of their phasewater organs. These variables all happened to apply to a phase lord or phase whale regardless of the presence and absence of any gear.

Unfortunately, the Ascended Giants who only showed up for a very short amount of time did not score high on any of these aspects. They relied much more on good gear and superior numbers in order to put up a good fight. What was worse was that this was all based on theory, not practice. The human phase lords had yet to prove whether their doctrines actually worked.

Committing the Ascended Giants to this mission was extremely reckless from that perspective.

To strip them of all of their combat gear before commanding them to get in close proximity to the most dangerous alien megaconstruct that Ves had witnessed this year sounded like a recipe for disaster!

The probability that a single Ascended Giant would encounter an accident and die was far too high in his estimation!

To Ves, the loss of even a single one of his precious human phase lord subordinates was too heavy.

So what if his men managed to retrieve a lot of valuable data in return?

It was not as if understanding the enormous biological structure of the VOBM would make much of a difference to him. He was a mech designer, not a battle moon developer. The main beneficiaries of this risky mission were the Rubarthans.

Lord Richard Brownstone knew this as well. He observed Ves closely and understood why his guest felt peeved by this sudden request. The Rubarthan scion made a disarming gesture.

"We are aware that we are asking much from you and your men. Trust me, we prefer to fulfill this mission by utilizing our own assets in the star system, but the success rate is too low. Our previous probes have already revealed that without a formidable amount of strength, it is impossible to send any probes close enough to perform detailed scans and transmit all of the valuable data back to us. Only by relying on this hasty plan do we think we can gather the data we need to prepare proper countermeasures against this latest surprise."

Ves furrowed his brows. "Is it truly necessary to go this far just to understand the details of the enemy battle moon? I mean, you guys have seen how it has formed. I do not believe that your biotech experts are incompetent to the point where they have no clue what all of the enemy input is doing. Even if you can’t figure out anything complex, you can still hope for the best and prepare for the worst."

The other mech designer shook his head in disapproval.

"Making hasty decisions based on speculation and fears is not a good decision-making approach, Ves. We need solid and verified data even if it is risky to gather it. Do you know that our experts and analysts are so fearful of what the mutated voribugs may have created that they believe it may be justified to bombard it with antimatter bombs?"

"What?!"

Lord Richard activated a projection that displayed a potential doom scenario.

In this simulation, the VOBM did not approach Philaster Crestia III at close range, but instead maintained distance well outside of conventional engagement range.

The battle moon, surrounded by dozens of Goliaths and millions of cannon fodder, began to transform from top to bottom.

It lost its spherical shape and began to morph into a gigantic moon-sized organic space cannon.

Soon enough, it began to accumulate a huge amount of hot plasma. Ves had no idea where it was drawing all of that energy from, but once it had reached full charge, it launched a cataclysmic plasma bolt forward with great power and momentum!

Nothing could stop that plasma bolt from traversing across space. Even as it lost power as it left the barrel of the moon-sized artillery construct, nothing the humans threw at it could stop or divert its trajectory.

Ves looked horrified when the apocalyptic plasma bolt engulfed half of the defenses in orbit before almost immediately bathing the surface of Philaster Crestia III with the fury of a star!

"This...."

"The Plasma Shaper is capable of building Masterwork Installations of this scale that are capable of performing similar feats." Richard Brownstone stated. "If we can do it, so can the mutated voribugs. In theory. Perhaps their own rudimentary attempt at interplanetary siege warfare may not be as powerful and efficient as ours, but the enormous scale of the VOBM is forgiving. Even a half-baked attempt at developing a siege weapon of this size is enough to completely unmake all of our attempts to defend this star system. This is not even the only doom scenario that we have devised."

The projection continued to play other potential instances where the VOBM could completely neuter the human defenders.

The VOBM could form into a giant energy weapon battery that bombarded Philaster Crestia III with unblockable laser beams.

It could also turn into an kinetic artillery gun that launched a continuous stream of asteroids at the planet.

One of the more disturbing doom scenarios was for the VOBM to turn into an exceptionally powerful single-use mass driver that somehow accelerated a large projectile to relativistic speeds, thereby gaining the capability to shatter the planet in a single hit!

"This... is a definite sign of escalation." Ves noted. "If the mutated voribugs dare to destroy our planets with their own version of a weapon of mass destruction, then that will give us the right to retaliate in kind."

The Rubarthan liaison looked pained. "That is exactly what we wish to avoid. A mutual war of annihilation will not benefit either of us. While we possess the capacity to destroy all of the planets of the neighboring star sectors, the devastation will be immense. These are all star systems that are meant to become our future territories and economic heartland if there are better times ahead. To irrevocably damage them to the point where we can no longer gain much value in holding them is an extreme measure that will cripple the long-term viability of the Rubarthan Pact. For the sake of the future of my people, we must nip this threat in the bud. We... are prepared to enact extreme plans and put a great amount of lives in danger in order to make this happen, but in order to justify this response, we need to know for certain whether these actions are justified."

"..."

This sounded a lot more serious than Ves expected. His perspective still remained on this star system. He had not yet put much thought on the greater implications of the appearance of a potential moon-sized organic siege engine.

He had to admit that the Rubarthans may be correct to fear a potential escalation. If the Goliath Hive truly embraced this extremely destructive method of warfare, then red humanity could not afford to hold back anymore.

A war where both sides readily deployed planet-destroying assets against each other was a conflict that would only produce losers in the end.

Not a single side would truly be able to ’win’ such a devastating clash. The final years of the Age of Conquest had deeply ingrained this lesson into the DNA of the human race.

This was why red humanity still remained extremely reluctant to unleash their arsenal of nuclear weapons, antimatter weapons and greater horrors.

While it could be argued that the methods of god mechs easily exceeded the horror created by these conventional arms, neither the humans nor the native aliens thought this way.

Their actions could still be excused, especially when there were not that many god pilots to begin with. It was only when mass destruction could be perpetrated on a galactic scale that all of the combatants needed to show restraint.

Ves began to understand the importance of this scouting mission.

"By figuring out whether the mutated voribugs are ready to escalate their methods of warfare, you hope to send a clear and obvious message to the Devourer Queen that the Rubarthan Pact, no, red humanity will not tolerate this development, is that right?"

Richard began to smile. "You are beginning to understand now. Since conventional means of communication are ineffective against the mutated voribugs, we can only let our actions convey our intentions. However, in order to know for certain whether we have formed the correct response, we must be absolutely certain whether the VOBM is built to enact any of the doom scenarios. There is still a good chance that our fears are overblown. There are also scenarios where the VOBM fulfills very different roles that each require a dedicated answer. The more we know, the better our preparations. Do you understand the value of gathering the data now, Ves?"

"Kind of." Ves said in a half-certain tone. "What I am hearing now only truly matters to you guys, though. No offense, but I don’t see how the Human Phase Lord Department and I can benefit from putting all of my Ascended Giants at risk."

The Rubarthan mech designer maintained a serious expression. "We will not let your efforts go unrewarded. We are prepared to offer the Red Collective a great amount of compensation in phasewater and high-grade resources for the loss of any Ascended Giant. We cannot restore the lives that may be lost, but we can at least cover the direct cost of raising their replacements."

"That is not nearly enough." Ves scowled.

"We are also prepared to offer one or multiple minor favors to you." Richard revealed. "These minor favors are valid for all of the tier 1 galactic citizens of the Rubarthan Pact. You can redeem any of these favors from our god pilots or Star Designers whenever they are available. While you cannot make any outrageous demands, you could ask the Plasma Shaper to supply you with a design of an incredibly powerful giant-scale plasma rifle, or request the Spacelock to cooperate with Swordmaster Ketis on an experiment related to creating a longer-lasting tunnel to another dimension."