The Mech Touch novel Chapter 3105

Chapter 3105: Perception Distortion

Armed with modified low-powered laser rifles, the Bright Warriors configured for ranged combat all fired at the Dark Zephyr with no restraint!

A forest of bright beams lit up the surrounding space as they instantly attempted to strike the Dark Zephyr.

However, much to the surprise of the Larkinson mech pilots, most of the beams that were supposed to strike the expert mech simply surged past without hitting anything solid!

"Impossible!"

"What? The expert mech didn't even move!"

The rifleman mechs fired additional volleys at the elusive target. Though the Dark Zephyr kept zipping around the cordoned space like a nimble sparrow, the mech wasn't trying its best to dodge incoming attacks at the moment.

As long as the mech pilots worked together and fired their weapons in unison in a grid pattern, the chances of at least one of them striking their targets always went up. With enough mechs firing their weapons in a coordinated fashion, they could box in nearly every possible target!

Yet even when the Avatars, Sentinels and others leveraged their training to increase their hit rates against powerful opponents, not a single laser beam managed to land for real!

Every laser beam that reached the mech actually phased through it without encountering any hindrance. The ineffective beams innocently traveled further until they either hit something else or dispersed at extreme ranges.

"What is going on?! Are we fighting against a projection or something?!"

"My sensors are telling me the expert mech is certainly where I aimed my weapon at. My attack should have struck the chest plating!

To their credit, the Larkinson pilots soon figured out that they were affected by some sort of trick. They began to disperse their fire and attempted to cast a wider net.

It was at this point that the Dark Zephyr was feeling truly pressured. With hundreds of mechs firing in its vicinity, it took Venerable Tusa a considerable amount of effort to become aware of the attacks before they came and activate the right boosters in order to quickly displace his expert mech from the path of an incoming attack.

"We're firing at an illusion!"

"Keep dispersing our fire. The real expert mech must be under stealth or something!"

The hundreds of ranged mechs tried their best to poke in the dark, relying on random chance and coincidence to succeed in landing a hit.

So far, none of the ranged mechs managed to strike the Dark Zephyr, and that was a considerable embarrassment for the well-trained mech pilots!

Even if they were targeting an expert mech, it should not be this difficult to land at least one lucky hit. Yet the fact that the coordinates where the mech was visible and emitted plenty of heat and other energy emissions turned out to be empty was a considerable frustration to them all. The mech pilots simply didn't know where to aim their weapons!

Back at the design department, no one showed any confusion. The mech designers were all smiling as one of the strongest features of the Dark Zephyr was making full play at the moment.

"The resonance ability derived from Perfidious Steel is amazingly effective." Ketis remarked in an impressed tone. "I would hate to be the enemy who is tasked with intercepting this expert mech."

It didn't actually matter if the Dark Zephyr got hit by a shot in the dark. The fact that the expert mech's actual coordinates deviated extensively from its apparent coordinates meant that it was difficult to score continuous hits.

The way that Perfidious Steel took effect was not a straightforward distortion that could be expressed with a neat mathematical formula. There was an element of randomness in it, especially when Venerable Tusa adjusted the magnitude of his resonance with Perfidious Steel.

He could dynamically make the distortion weaker or stronger, which according to the telemetry he was currently using to good effect.

"The strain on Venerable Tusa and the Dark Zypher has reached a peak, though." Gloriana spoke in concern. "I'm happy that the expert mech lives up to its promises, but according to the data I don't think he can keep up this state for long, especially when he is also doing his best to keep his mech as evasive as possible."

Indeed, Venerable Tusa was not feeling as relaxed as before. His mind and will came under great strain as he had to concentrate fully on the movements of his mech as well as that of all of his opponents.

He continually resonated with both the flight system and the Perfidious Steel integrated in the mech in order to maximize the Dark Zephyr's evasion ability to the limit. Occasionally, a number of boosters activated in order to quickly push the expert mech out of the firing line of an incoming laser beam.

These boosters were amazingly fast, responsive and effective, but they were also constrained by the limited amount of potent booster fuel the Dark Zephyr was able to carry.

More than five minutes passed before Venerable Tusa and his expert mech started to flag. While it was incredibly admirable that the pair had succeeded in remaining untouchable for such an impressive period of time while under heavy fire, neither of the two were omnipotent.

However, seeing that neither Tusa nor his new expert mech showed any alarming signs, Ves and Gloriana decided to expand the stress test.

"General Verle, is the Eye of Ylvaine ready?" Ves asked with a grin.

"They are ready, sir, but the risks are considerable."

Ves dismissively waved his hand. "I don't think we need to worry about that. With all of their advanced targeting and firing systems, the Transcendent Punishers won't hit one of our own mechs."

"What if they succeed in hitting our expert mech?"

"Heh, you'll see what happens then. Don't worry. Everything is under control."

Under his instructions, the Transcendent Punishers stationed inside the bunkers on the hulls of the Spirit of Bentheim and the Graveyard activated their twin positron cannons.

Unlike the rifles held by the Bright Warriors floating in open space, the energy weapons of the artillery mechs were not depowered. While the Eye of Ylvaine pilots had set the power setting to its lowest possible point, there was no way for them to weaken the output of their weapons any further.

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