Chapter 3853 Task Force Fisherman
As much as Ves enjoyed his long and extensive discussion with Venerable Joshua and the Everchanger, they eventually had to set their personal matters aside.
After a fairly quiet and cautious journey, Task Force Fisherman had finally come within plain sight of the Evolution Kingdom.
Though the Swarmers had never shown much interest towards the distant mechs passing through their territory, that didn't necessarily mean the Evolvers were just as nearsighted.
As the mechs and shuttles halted well outside of the suspected engagement range of the Evolver fish-whales, everyone who took part in this mission grew serious again.
Ves had to cast aside all of his earlier thoughts and distractions and recall his own planning and preparation.
Together with Calabast, Shederin and other clever people, he had developed dozens of contingency plans.
Although that sounded like a lot, many of them consisted of branching paths that compelled Ves to make different choices based on the behavior and the attitude of the Evolver fish-whales.
Who knew how the events today would play out. If the fish-whales felt threatened and immediately opened fire on the strange metal objects, there wouldn't be any opportunity for Ves to speak!
This was why the initial plan did not state that Task Force Fisherman should approach the Lab Continent as a single whole.
The mechs first parked a distance away from the site of the Evolver fish-whales in order to announce their presence while showing no obvious sign of hostility.
Still, the presence of so many combat machines already conveyed a certain degree of threat.
While the task force could have parked well away from plain sight of the Lab Continent, Ves and the others eventually decided against this course of action.
Ves wanted to get on friendly terms with the Evolvers, but without showing enough strength, there was a large chance the fish-whales would look down on the foreign visitors.
Therefore, showing up with a considerable force of mechs but also maintaining a respectful distance was probably the right approach.
Then again, the humans knew too little about the fish-whales, particularly the ones who occupied the Lab Continent.
Ves manipulated the interface and accessed the sensor feeds of the Everchanger.
He zoomed in the projected view and took in the asteroid on display.
Just like the other landmasses, the Lab Continent was a brown-ish asteroid that was rich with certain resources. These resource points attracted plenty of fish-whales. Since these resource points were scattered across the surface of the landmass, the fish-whale population was wrapped around the entire ovoid continent.
That essentially meant that there were even more Evolver fish-whales on the asteroid! They were just roaming on the far side at the moment.
Just as Ves had observed from the footage brought back by Venerable Tusa, the Lab Continent was just as barren and devoid of any growth as the other continents. There wasn't any air in Purgatory so the environment wasn't friendly towards flora in the first place.
"Still, wouldn't it hurt to plant a bit of green in this dreary place?"
The alien creator of this pocket space did not think like humans at all. The same applied to the fish-whales. Ves had to be careful not to make too many assumptions based on human thought patterns.
Due to an enormous lack of useful and relevant data, much of the plan that Ves had in mind was built on assumptions and educated guesswork. This did not instill him with a lot of confidence, but what could he do? If he wanted to go forward with his plan, he needed to make contact with the Evolver fish-whales one way or another.
Ves waited for the light mechs of the task force to do their work.
Numerous Flagrant Vandal light mechs had spread out to keep watch over the immediate surroundings. Each of them were tasked with keeping their sensors peeled for any threats that approached under stealth. Though the fish-whales hadn't shown any stealth fish-whales, the expeditionary forces couldn't assume the other party was unable to master this capability.
He didn't forget that the miners of his clan dug out a deposit of Hulivaster. In the unlikely event that the phase whales and by extension the fish-whales were able to make effective use of resonating exotics, then there might be a secret group of threats in the vicinity!
After a while, the Flagrant Vandal mechs reported their findings to the officers of the task force. So far, the light mechs had not detected any signs of suspicious activity.
Everyone paid attention to both the Lab Continent and one of the expert mechs accompanying the task force.
Though the Living Sentinels weren't assigned to this mission, Commander Casella Ingvar and the Minerva were too useful to be left out of the lineup.
Given her abundant qualifications, no one had any objection to putting Commander Casella Ingvar in charge of the task force.
Although various people such as Ves knew that would make Commander Melkor bitter, no one cared about his feelings for a mission of this magnitude.
As long as Ves or Patriarch Reginald didn't say anything, the Sentinel Commander made all of the important decisions.
As Casella carefully parsed all of the transmitted data and reports, she judged that it was safe to proceed with the next step. ꜰʀᴇᴇᴡᴇʙɴoᴠᴇʟ.coᴍ
"Venerable Tusa, are you prepared to approach the Evolution Kingdom and greet the king fish again?"
"I am ready to move out, ma'am." Tusa seriously replied.
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