The Mech Touch

Chapter 7565 The Blackwater Summoner

Not many people noticed what was happening at first.

Those that did manage to catch sight of the transformation of the Poison Willows thought that this was a benign event.

After all, the Poison Willows and their bonded pilots suffered greatly. They had sacrificed too much in order to grow their precious poisoned fruits. To see them regain their life and vitality should be regarded as an honest reward for services rendered.

Yet the problem was that their physical restoration did not end at this point.

Even after the weird biomechs regained their moisture and restored their many cracks and atrophied parts, the Poison Willows continued to absorb large amounts of life energy.

It was as if their limits did not exist anymore!

In the face of such enormous temptation, none of the Poison Willows obeyed their instructions.

Despite the fact that Ves had installed plenty of safeguards meant to prevent this exact situation, the living mechs simply outgrew these chains by relying on brute force!

The pressure of growth was too great to be contained!

Each and every Poison Willow had become so drunk with power that their greed could not be stopped anymore.

These crazy machines no longer listened to any orders. Neither the voices of the Saint Commander nor the Second Elf registered to them anymore.

"These machines have gone rogue! All 30 of them are no longer listening to orders! They have even cut off their connections to our command net!"

That last part had to be a conscious decision on their part. There were multiple ways to cut off their data connections to the central net that assisted with command and control, but the Poison Willows most likely cut them off proactively in order to block the shutdown commands.

"What is the state of their pilots?! Are they still alive?!"

Nobody could answer this question. Not even Ves, who was observing this ongoing disaster from afar, could offer much insight.

He deeply wanted to approach one of the Poison Willows that he had modified in person and see what went wrong.

However, he was not in control of his true body at the moment.

The Dark Apostle and his troop of Ascended Giants had no interest in investigating a bunch of malfunctioning Poison Willow mechs.

This was because the native gods had finally made an appearance!

In order to prevent the Ascended Giants from approaching one of the orbital fortresses and wreck the superdimensional siege cannon, a host of well-equipped alien phase whales and phase lords had finally emerged to block the way!

The Dark Apostle and the Fiery Axe both stopped in their tracks as they observed the forces directly arrayed against their group.

Two greater phase whales.

Ten lesser phase lords.

A complete native alien warfleet.

Though none of them possessed any obvious presence or enhancement from the deathborn race, they still constituted a serious threat.

This was especially when Ves could clearly ascertain that all of the enemy champions were equipped with full sets of Saint Piercers and Saint Armors!

While the properties of alien-grade superdimensional armor sat between the human versions of medium-grade and high-grade superdimensional armor, the differences did not matter too much in a direct confrontation.

A strong thrust from a Saint Piercer arm could punch through hull-grade superdimensional armor with relative ease!

As for the tougher and denser armor-grade superdimensional armor that the Dark Apostle happened to enjoy, the increase in protection might be able to save the giant leader from a few fatal blows, but it would definitely incur a growing number of dents and holes with every incoming strike!

Compared to the phase leaders standing in the way, the remaining alien phasefighters and warships did not pose that much of a threat.

But only under certain conditions.

Their firepower was virtually useless so long as the Ascended Giants maintained intact superdimensional raiments.

However, once the enemy phase leaders managed to wear out a few parts and create gaps, the alien assets could easily exacerbate the situation by launching mass attacks onto any exposed flesh!

No giant could withstand concentrated firepower from a powerful fleet for long.

There were already Flesh Choppers who looked forward to bypassing the enemy champions in order to tear apart the enemy mechs and warships.

Though the Ascended Giants did not have anyone that could match the strength of a greater phase lord, they still outnumbered their alien counterparts by two-to-one. It shouldn't be too difficult to divert a few giants for extermination duty.

Yet the aliens already anticipated this possible response. They were no fools. They adopted similar tactics used to cope with high-ranking mechs and spread out their units as much as possible.

Any giants trying to wipe them out would have to waste a lot of time on traveling back and forth!

All of this put the giants in a dilemma of sorts. Should they concentrate all of their efforts on killing the enemy phase leaders?

Doing so would expose them to a huge amount of sustained firepower, which could gradually inflict a huge amount of damage if left alone!

Sending out their fastest giants to hunt down the biggest and most threatening warships may be able to ease the pressure, but that may also leave them short-handed in their attempts to defeat the most powerful aliens.

What the Dark Apostle hated the most was that neither option allowed them to get any closer to the orbital fortress and shut down the superdimensional siege cannon once and for all! The enemy would never allow any straggler to sneak away on their watch!

The two sides therefore confronted each other in silence, heedless of everything else.

Neither side could afford to take their attention away from their immediate adversaries.

This was why Ves could not spare as much attention as he wished on the ongoing mutations of the Poison Willows.

As much as he felt bad about this malignant event, he had no immediate solution in mind. A part of him had already written off the lives of the Poison Willows and their Terran pilots.

The test pilots knew the risks and still agreed to participate in this experiment anyway. This was their duty. They all knew that a deadly outcome could never be ruled out. It may be sad to see each of them suffering from out-of-control mutations, but the rest could do nothing aside from honoring their sacrifice.

Instead of wasting his time on this lost cause, Ves much preferred to help the Dark Apostle overcome his most immediate adversaries.

The two sides continued their silent standoff.

It was not until one of the greater phase whales fully clad in dark and ominous Saint Armor flew forward that the two sides finally began to communicate.

His superdimensional raiment, which clearly contained many features derived from human technology, transmitted an open signal to the giants.

"#$&@#&@."

"I AM THE BLACKWATER SUMMONER. I AM THE SON AND HEIR OF THE TIDE CALLER, THE GOD YOU HUMANS HAVE SLAIN. I AM THE DEFENDER OF THE RED OCEAN. THE RED CABAL HAS HONORED ME AND MY FELLOW GODS THE HOLY RIGHT TO BEAR THE BONES OF ELDER GODS. I HAVE MADE A PROMISE TO ERADICATE THE ENTIRE RACE THAT IS RESPONSIBLE FOR SLAYING MY DIVINE FATHER. NOW I STAND BEFORE YOU, THE THIEVES WHO HAVE STOLEN THE SECRET OF GODHOOD FROM US. I REFUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE YOU AS GODS! YOU ARE DEMONS WHO ARE JUST AS FOUL AND EVIL AS YOUR FALSE GODS!"

The native aliens had a very dim view of human high-ranking mech pilots.

The Red Cabal especially hated it that god pilots took up the mantle of divinity!

Even getting beaten black and blue by every god mech in a direct confrontation was not as bad as contesting the very notion of godhood!

To the entire class of phase whales and phase lords in the Red Ocean, their claim to godhood had always formed the most solid basis of power.

Therefore, the arrival of humans and their distinctly different notions of what constituted a 'god' represented nothing less than an existential threat to their entire legitimacy and power base!

The Dark Apostle flew forward in response to the Blackwater Summoner's 'friendly' greeting.

"I am the dark apostle, the polemarchos of the phase lord department of the red collective. Perhaps that is too complicated for you, so let me identify myself in a different way. I am the leader of the ascended giants. We are the new gods of the red ocean. you and your ilk are outdated as far as i am concerned. We have come into being to replace you and take over everything that you have claimed for yourself. your phasewater, your heritage, your worshipers, your lands and everything else shall become ours in the future. submit to me and I may spare your life. defy me and I shall slaughter you with my spear."

Those were fighting words!

The Dark Apostle was itching for a fight. He did not want to waste too much time on talking!