Chapter 3889: Poking Fish
As the battle between the human-alien coalition and angry Phaser fish-whales continued to unfold, the battle lines began to get more blurred.
The situation around the ranged mechs and fish-whales was the most optimistic. The Phaser fish-whales didn't have enough good solutions to counter or contain the ranged units that could persistently fire at them from any range.
The forward mechs and Evolvers had to brave a lot more risks. The majority of Phasers were still clumped together and provided constant support to each other!
Defeating this main group of Phaser fish-whales was key to tipping the battle in the favor of the coalition!
"The Phasers are putting up a tough fight."
The Everchanger took up a position closer to the front of the battlefield. Venerable Joshua was not in a hurry to intervene at this time. He was incredibly aware that his actions directly affected the survival of the patriarch of the Larkinson Clan!
If possible, Joshua didn't want to go into the thick of battle with such an enormous burden looming behind his shoulder, but the Phasers might not allow him to get away with taking potshots at distant enemies with the Everchanger's Vitalus rifle.
"Don't be in a hurry to go in. Our troops are managing well enough on our own." Ves told the expert pilot. "We need your expert mech to act as a reserve in case these Phasers unveil an unpleasant surprise."
Ves also thought it was better to get a greater overview of the two sides before committing one of his strongest assets into battle. None of them possessed a good understanding of the Phaser fish-whales.
Before meeting them into battle, Ves thought that the Phasers were much simpler and more uniform.
This was because Ves and the rest of the expeditionary forces only had a limited amount of information at their disposal. The scouting data provided by Venerable Tusa back then gave the impression that the fish-whales of the Phase Kingdom were all ordinary.
It was only now that they learned that they had underestimated the strength and diversity of the Phasers.
Their ordinary members might not be so exceptional, but the elites that had hidden underneath all of the water pools of the Lake Continent were different!
Their bodies were larger. They absorbed more phasewater. They trained their phasewater abilities to a great degree of mastery. Their coordination and teamwork was not inferior to that of a well-trained military mech troop.
These were the main troops that the Phase King dealt with other powerful and tough opponents. They were the backbone of the Phase Kingdom and had demolished many attackers that had attempted to take over the Lake Continent.
Their battle effectiveness was quite formidable! If the Evolvers only relied on themselves to fight these powerful phasewater wizards, the fight would definitely skew in the favor of the Phasers.
Task Force Fisherman wouldn't fare any better either. There were too few mechs and many of them weren't in the right configurations to counter these alien threats.
Fortunately, neither the humans nor the Evolvers were fighting against the Phasers by themselves today.
"Let the Evolvers take the lead!" Commander Melkor reiterated to his Avatars. "The bodies of the Evolver fish-whales are much bigger and tougher than our mechs. Even if they get attacked, they can handle the punishment. What we need to do is to take advantage of the distraction that they can provide and hit the preoccupied Phasers from the flanks!"
Commander Sendra of the Swordmaidens issued similar instructions.
"Our swords can cut through the bodies of the Phasers, but if we go up first, the enemy fish-whales will definitely smack our mechs with their tails or bite them in half. Let the big fat Evolvers take the brunt of the blows. We'll play the part of the patient hunters that strike only when we see a good opportunity."
Every human commander recognized that their mechs weren't suited to take on the body attacks of fish-whales head-on.
Their power was too great.
Only defensive space knights with sturdy shields and even sturdier construction could tank the blows of the elite Phasers, but it just so happened that Task Force Fisherman was lacking in these mechs. They were deemed too slow to take part in an operation that required a lot of mobility!
Considering the current situation, everyone recognized that it was the right decision to have the Evolver fish-whales play the role of defensive knights in this instance!
No one spoke anything about how it was dishonorable to allow their allies to take the brunt of the damage while their mechs picked off their targets at favorable angles.
The fish-whales were only temporary allies by circumstance. Although there were plenty of humans who had come to respect the friendly and dependable Evolvers, they were ultimately alien beasts.
From the perspective of humanity, indigenonous alien populations were not on the same level. So what if the expeditionary forces exploited the Evolver fish-whales? It was better to risk their lives than the lives of precious human mech pilots!
Due to this deliberate approach, the various mech units did not lose too many mechs at first.
Bright Warriors and Second Swords circled around but kept their distance until they spotted the elite Phasers getting locked into battle against their Evolver counterparts.
The melee-oriented Evolver fish-whales were quite deadly when they were able to get close to their opponents, but the elite Phaser fish-whales weren't necessarily helpless in this range!
Contrary to their initial impressions as wizards, the elite Phasers were able to enhance their battle performance by utilizing their phasewater abilities in a different fashion.
From summoning small spatial tears to covering their bodies with form-fitting spatial barriers, the Phaser fish-whales proved to be quite adept in beating up the Evolvers at closer ranges!
This was where the mech pilots of Task Force Fisherman attempted to make the difference.
Despite being a newlywed who had just tied the knot with the only expert pilot of the Glory Seekers, Commander Sendra of the Swordmaidens had no intention of shirking this battle!
Sure, her new hubby Brutus vehemently tried to convince her to pull out of the Purgatory Campaign, but Sendra was a Swordmaiden, not a Sentinel!
If her overprotective spouse thought that his attempt would work, then he clearly didn't understand the Swordmaidens well enough!
Even if she and her sisters shared many similarities with the Hexer people, the Swordmaidens were ultimately different!
Right now, Commander Sendra completely put her sappy new husband out of her mind. She pursued and married Brutus for fun and to fulfill her ambitions, but these were matters that didn't pertain to the battlefield!
Right now, Sendra held back her new Second Sword mech and observed how her small unit of Swordmaidens were approaching their hunts.
She became satisfied when she spotted that none of the mech pilots under her command showed any impatience.
They carefully chose their targets and stalked them while maintaining a low profile.
It was only when the Phasers truly started brawling against their Evolver counterparts that the Swordmaidens struck!
Their large greatswords were normally considered to be too large and unwieldy to be employed in battles against other mechs, but in this situation their superior reach and damage potential happened to convey great advantages!
Four of the new Second Sword mechs showed what they were capable of by attacking a large elite Phaser from both sides. The sword-wielding mechs dove in and used the momentum of their short charges to put a lot of extra force behind their attacks!
The first pair of Second Swords that charged towards the exposed Phaser fish-whale performed nearly identical chops!
Blood gushed from the parted flesh as the extremely sharp blades parted through the hide and underlying tissue without encountering too much resistance!
The Second Swords that successfully wounded the Phaser fish-whale didn't stick around and retreated quickly enough to escape the retaliatory tail smacks from the injured creature.
When Commander Sendra studied the effect of the attacks on the big fish-whale, she frowned in disappointment.
"These fish-whales are built to take a lot of hits. Chopping and slashing these big fat bodies isn't enough!"
The injured Phasers even managed to stem the bleeding, thereby preventing them from becoming weaker over time.
"If slashing them doesn't work, how about stabbing them? There has to be a way for us to cripple these big fish!"
The subsequent pair of Second Swords performed straightforward lunges that allowed their long blades to sink deep into the body of the target.
Even if the elite Phaser's body was larger than that of a heavy mech, the creature definitely suffered a grievous blow as the greatswords pierced through a lot of fat and meaty tissue before puncturing a few of the key organs that directly affected the fish-whale's battle effectiveness!
The creature let out a silent roar of pain as it somehow lost control of its powers due to suffering crippling damage to one of its phasewater organs!
Unfortunately, the Second Sword responsible for inflicting this critical attack became affected by an outburst of unstable spatial fluctuations, causing its frame to warp and bend while at the same time lose its grip on its greatsword!
"Pull back, Ennegan! Leave the greatsword behind!" Commander Sendra hastily ordered.
The Second Sword jerkily tried to move away fast enough to escape the violent tail thrashing from its opponent, but the damage to its frame had crippled its mobility!
Sendra winced as the violent Phaser managed to smack the mech in question with a large and meaty tail!
The blunt force trauma inflicted on the Second Sword had exacerbated its existing damage, causing numerous parts to fall from its frame while its entire left side had become deformed to the point where they were rendered useless!
The damaged mech already flung away as if it had been hit by a giant rod. When Sendra studied the Second Sword's telemetry, her heart sank a little.
"Ennigan, eject from your mech! It's useless now!"
Seeing that she was not receiving anything from the crippled mech, she drove her own Second Sword forward and moved to intercept her subordinate's machine.
When she saw that the rear of the mech had been damaged and deformed to the point where its cockpit was unable to eject, she regained her hope.
Sendra's mech took great care in removing the obstructions.
"Can you eject now, Ennigan? Just eject from your cockpit."
When the damaged but still intact cockpit finally shot out of the back of the ruined Second Sword, Commander Sendra finally sighed in relief.
She returned to a more central position and continued to study the attacks inflicted on the fish-whales.
While the Evolvers were able to inflict massive damage by smacking the bodies of their opponents with their prodigious bulk or using their mouths to bite off huge chunks of flesh, the mechs of the task force had to be more precise about their attacks due to their more limited damage potential.
Eventually, the Swordmaidens and the other mech forces learned that the only way for them to truly hurt the elite Phasers was to target their internal organs!
"Don't bother slashing the Phasers with your swords. They can take cut after cut without losing any wind. Work together to puncture their bodies. As long as we sink our blades in the right angles, we might get lucky enough to damage something important! Just be careful about hitting their crucial phasewater organs. The backlash from damaging them is both random and dangerous!"
As the Swordmaidens increasingly learned how they could effectively cripple the elite Phaser fish-whales, they finally lived up to their reputation as killing machines!
Even Commander Sendra decided to go in. Newlywed or not, her thirst for battle was no less than any other Swordmaidens!
"Hahaha! I wish Brutus was here! I bet I can kill way more fish-whales than him! A blade is much better than a rifle when fighting against these giant fish!"