Chapter 5489 Peak State
Mutated beasts usually had no concept of honor.
Honor was a civilized construct. It restrained the conduct of many beings and helped to maintain order in society.
Exobeasts arguably had rudimentary societies of their own. They all abided by a set of rules that ensured they did not hunt their own species to extinction.
That said, they could still be as cunning, cruel and dishonorable towards other species!
Traps, surprise attacks and more all served to increase their chances of survival and prevent themselves from sliding down the food chain.
The mutated beasts that had transcended their original species and evolved into unique existences no longer had to rely on these dirty methods to maintain their place at the top of their food chains.
However, old habits died hard. A powerful beast like the Giant Stone Eater spent most of its life as a weaker exobeast that constantly struggled to survive in the arid region that compromised the Sorora #390 Hunting Ground.
It had relied upon the advantage of surprise to prey on many hostile exobeasts that had the power to defeat it in a direct confrontation!
At this time, the fight took a drastic turn when the Giant Stone Eater's cunning move had disabled one of the Monster Slayers!
Even though this mech model was supposed to fast and nimble enough to evade most clumsy attacks launched by powerful beasts, Ketis had designed it in a time where the Age of Mechs was still in its heyday.
Back then, exobeasts used to be a lot weaker. Even the rare mutated beasts that evolved from their more common brethren only grew moderately stronger before they hit a ceiling.
These creatures rarely possessed large and powerful attacks that could sweep entire areas. The consumption was simply too great for them at the time.
All of that changed since the Age of Dawn commenced. Gaining access to Messier 87's exotic radiation liberated many mutated beasts. They were able to unscrupulously develop more powerful means of attack without being bothered by their past constraints!
The Monster Slayer that had entered this new age without a comprehensive upgrade to its model was not entirely equipped to handle these changes.
Its relatively weak armor that had been softened up beforehand finally succumbed when struck by multiple heavy chunks of stone!
As soon as the mech of one of the Swordmaidens lost its footing and fell to the ground, the entire hunting team scrambled into action!
"Grenades!"
The Huntmaster had depleted its stash of grenades during the initial probing phase, but it had replenished its stock after the Monster Slayers had entered the fight.
Now, the spearman mech quickly moved to distract and occupy the Giant Stone Eater by tossing its grenades as fast as it could pull them off its bandolier!
The Flagrant Vandal pilot did not toss them at the Giant Stone Eater at random. He had made sure to toss them all into the exposed section of its body that had become exposed once the rock armor at this section exploded into pieces.
The powerful acid formula that was meant to dissolve hardy stone was almost just as effective when applied to the flesh of the mutated beast.
The creature had already inflicted a lot of pain on itself by pulling off this self-destructive move.
Now, the upper layers of its bruised and battered flesh started to dissolve as acid grenade after acid grenade constantly struck this section.
It was not enough!
"This is only a flesh wound for this giant beast!"
The Giant Stone Eater was able to bear the pain and damage by relying on its heavy body and the defensive enhancement of earth energy.
Its more vulnerable organs and body parts were not so easy to damage. No matter how much the mechs beat up the monster, the Giant Stone Eater still retained a lot of combat power so long as none of the attacks penetrated past its exterior layers.
"Go all out, sisters!" Captain Gheri commanded as her Monster Slayer sprinted towards the earth monstrosity. "The Giant Stone Eater has probably exhausted itself. We need to hit it while it is still recovering from its last move."
Her analysis happened to be correct. The Giant Stone Eater exposed a clear gap in its defenses, but otherwise looked as strong as usual.
Only Ves and the living mechs could sense that the mutated beast had fallen into a recovery state.
Its ability to command earth energy remained almost the same as before, but it had to channel much of it to fortify its defenses and regenerate its fleshy wounds.
This caused the beast to lack the energy to fuel all of its attacks!
The catapult arms became more sluggish and formed their explosive payloads at a slower rate.
The rock shard rifles became feebler and fired at a considerably slower rate.
The Swordmaidens smelled blood. They did not hesitate and approached the Giant Stone Eater with fury threatening to overtake their rationality!
Although the female mech pilots were not as clear-headed as before, each of these trained and experienced veterans had mastered the art of skirting the edge to push themselves into their peak combat state!
It was only then that they were able to pull off their strongest moves!
For example, the Monster Slayer piloted by Captain Gheri started to channel more metal energy into the blade of its greatsword.
The energies were not spread evenly. Under the conscious will and direction of Captain Gheri and her mech, the energies started to compress and accumulate at the tip until it glowed with an incredible degree of sharpness!
Propelled by the twin desires to hurt the Giant Stone Eater while also drawing its attention away from the downed swordsman mech, the legs of Captain Gheri's machine pushed off the ground with greater force, enabling it to reach the side of the monster first!
"Sword of Lydia!"
Propelled by the belief and respect towards the founder of the Swordmaidens, Captain Gheri's willpower urged her mech to thrust its sharp greatsword forward!
Just as the mech did so, the concentrated metal energies burst out of the tip like a cannon and briefly produced a manifestation of a much longer sword before thrusting into the body of the Giant Stone Eater!
An earthquake erupted in the crater from the moment this extraordinary sword attack punched deep into the flesh of the Giant Stone Eater!
The large energy blade primarily managed to cut through the intangible earth energy that reinforced the flesh, thereby softening up the latter just enough to allow the physical sword to cut through layer after layer of alien biomass with much greater ease.
In the end, this power move enabled the Monster Slayer to thrust its greatsword deep enough to damage a couple of internal organs!
Yet it was because of this critical blow that the Giant Stone Eater briefly lost control over its own power and channeled all of its might into the ground, thereby producing a highly disruptive earthquake that disrupted the footing of every mech in the crater!
Two Monster Slayers lost their rhythm as they had been forced to make hasty corrective moves in order to prevent them from falling onto the ground.
The other two Monster Slayers managed to adjust their footing despite the unexpected quakes. Their training enabled them to step forward with light and deft steps that enabled them to adapt to the powerful queakes.
"Beheader!"
One of the Monster Slayers slashed its greatsword at one of the exposed legs and managed to inflict a deep cut that most certainly disabled the limb!"
"Double Chop!"
The other Monster Slayer leapt off the ground and committed a risky attack that enabled it to chop at a catapult arm twice in quick succession!
Due to the temporary weakening of the Giant Stone Eater, the arms were less protected than before, enabling this strike to successfully cut off the entire limb!
Alien blood spilled from multiple wounds as the mutated beast moved for the first time. Seven of its thick, intact legs produced smaller quakes as the monster struggled to regain its composure.
This was the first time that this powerful creature suffered so much pain since it had grown to this scale!
"Press the advantage!"
The Monster Slayers continued to stab, chop and slice at the Giant Stone Eater.
The mech pilots did not have time to accumulate their power and execute any powerful moves, but their ordinary strikes cut through stone armor and vulnerable flesh well enough.
The Giant Stone Eater began to bleed more and more while rapidly losing its remaining stone armor.
With the Monster Slayers descending upon it from multiple directions, it took the creature far too long to decide how to respond against the relentless sword attacks.
The powerful mutated beast began to feel desperate enough to abandon its tough and steady posture.
Instead of trying to reform its defenses, the Giant Stone Eater became so overtaken by its instincts that it decided to give into its ferocity!
"Watch out! The beast is drawing in a lot of earth energy again! I think it is about to blow up its remaining stone armor!"
The cut and fractured stone armor sections that still covered most of its body began to glow just an instant before they exploded and launched outwards with lots of kinetic force!
However, the remaining Monster Slayers in the field responded a lot better to this move now that they had witnessed it once before.
The Monster Slayers closer to the vulnerable side simply backed off, knowing that there wasn't any stone armor pieces launching in their direction.
The others simply dropped onto the ground with their backs facing downwards despite how such a move would rattle their internals and tried to stay as flat as possible.
The vast majority of the empowered stone chunks that launched away from the Giant Stone Eater simply passed through empty air before colliding against the sides of the crater.
They had effectively done nothing useful!
The few stone chunks that managed to strike the mechs laying on the ground mostly struck the wide and flat blades of the greatswords.
Though they were not designed for this purpose, the greatswords were just wide and sturdy enough to function as makeshift shields in these kinds of situations!
Though the Monster Slayers in question still endured a lot of impacts and concussive shocks, their well-tuned mech frames managed to endure all of the forces just enough to preserve their combat power!
"My mech is still in fighting shape!"
"Mine as well!"
The only Monster Slayer that risked greater damage was the one that fell as its leg got crippled.
However, the remaining combat mechs occupied the attention of the Giant Stone Eater long enough for the two Hymenopterans to quietly launch their magnetic hooks and steadily drag the partially crippled swordsman mech out of the dangerous crater.
Since Ves was riding along inside the cockpit of one, he found it fascinating to witness this operation from this angle.
Despite working with only two mechs, the veteran Heavensworder mech pilots controlled their humble machines so well that they maximized the force exertions of their strengthened frames.
Industrial mechs were not known for being fast, but they always stood out for their ability to lift heavy loads.
The downed Monster Slayer managed to make it out well in time before the Giant Stone Eater could threaten it yet again!
One of the auxiliary mechs remained on standby while the other cracked upon a case filled with a set of simple parts and field repair equipment.
The mech pilot proficiently picked up a few plates and slapped it onto the damaged leg of the crippled Monster Slayer.
After a few procedures that lasted no longer than a minute, the broken leg section became surrounded by a thick metal brace!
The crude fix was not enough to fully restore mobility of the damaged machine, but the Monster Slayer at least regained its ability to stand upright and retreat on its own power!
Though the aggrieved Swordmaiden mech pilot would like nothing more than to jump back into the crater and support her fellow sisters, her damaged mech would do more harm than good in this situation.
Now that the Giant Stone Eater had purged all of its heavy stone armor, the fight had entered its final stage!
The beast had become completely exposed to the attacks of the remaining combat mechs!
However, shedding all of that heavy stone had also caused it to regain a lot of mobility!
The powerful beast had completely abandoned its prior posture and began to fight more proactively, trading blows for blows without any restraint!