The Mech Touch

When the Lionheart flew towards the plasma sword-wielding lesser phase lord, its ace pilot continued to receive epiphanies.

He reflected on his past and felt ashamed for his many failings and shortcomings.

It was wrong for Ark to demand attention for attention’s sake.

It became especially bad in the last few years. Everytime a younger and more talented Larkinson expert pilot became a saint, Ark felt more and more jealous at their fortune.

Despite having received an amazing modern high-tier expert mech himself, Ark still failed to break through with the ease that he initially envisioned.

This caused him to doubt himself at times. What was wrong with him? Why was he unable to get past his bottleneck like Saint Tusa and Saint Commander Casella Ingvar?

As much as he hated to admit it, the fact that those other Larkinson ace pilots managed to reach their current ranks under similar or significantly worse conditions meant that his willpower was ultimately not up to standard!

He hated this conclusion!

The thought that he was inferior to them on this critical aspect ate into his heart like a persistent worm.

Ark tried his best not to think about it or affect his mood, but there were times when he could not help himself.

What was he missing that would allow him to close the gap with the ace pilots?

He had been wondering about this question for a long time.

Ark had been afraid that he would never be able to find the answer until he was beginning to age and fall from his prime condition.

Fortunately for him, he finally managed to find the correct answer.

The answer was duty.

Just as it was the duty of the soldiers of the 77th Warborn Mech Division to follow the orders of their superiors, it was also the duty of General Ark to lead them to victory and keep them alive as much as possible.

Ark recognized that it was impossible in most serious battles to reduce his losses to zero, but he should at least do whatever he could to minimize this figure.

This became especially important for the high-ranking mech pilots under his command. The other expert pilots had placed their trust in his leadership.

By taking pilots such as Venerable Rosa Orfan and Venerable Imon Ingvar under his wing, he had a duty to supervise their development and prevent them from meeting fatal endings on the battlefield!

It was a pity that he had overlooked this responsibility as of late.

The more frustrated he became at his inability to break through, the more he focused on himself rather than his mech division.

That was a mistake.

He was a mech commander, not a mech pilot.

The two may share a lot of similarities, but they were ultimately different!

It was only now that he realized that a deep relationship existed between him and his subordinates.

General Ark needed the 77th Warborn to provide him with a strong base of admiration and worship.

The 77th Warborn needed his protection to fend off enemies that were far too powerful for them to defeat with their meager power.

In other words, there was a purpose for his strength.

Wanting to become stronger for the sake of puffing up his chest was a vain reason to pursue power!

It was no wonder that Ark repeatedly failed to break through in the past.

Only now did he set aside his vanity and understood his true purpose and intention for becoming the brightest champion on the battlefield.

Why did he yearn to become a saint?

It was because he could do a far better job at leading and preserving the lives of his subordinates and everyone else he felt responsible towards!

All of the soldiers that were currently participating in the fight against the alien armada were doing their duty despite the fact that they were outnumbered and outgunned.

One of the reasons why they still risked their lives to defend this doomed star system was because they looked up to the champions that possessed the capacity and willingness to bear the greatest burdens on the battlefield.

General Ark had previously been one of them, though he did not realize it at the time.

His lack of strength meant that he had little choice but to rely on the protection of the few ace pilots left in the star system to shield him from greater danger.

Before, General Ark felt worthless because his valiant attempt in challenging the Lower Herdmaster ended in utter failure!

If not for the fact that Saint Dise and Saint Commander Casella Ingvar occupied most of the attention of the greater phase lord, his Lionheart would have been impaled by the Saint Piercer within a couple of minutes at most!

This was not the role that Ark envisioned for himself.

Now that he recognized his true calling, he finally had a chance to transition from a soldier that needed saving to a champion that became powerful enough to save others!

The first people that he sought to save after he made these realizations were Rosa Orfan and Jannzi Larkinson.

One of them was his direct subordinate. The other was his trueblood niece.

No matter what, General Ark had to save them at all cost!

Only by doing so would he be able to redeem himself for letting Venerable Imon Ingvar die on his watch!

As the Lionheart to charged towards the offending lesser phase lord, his bright and shiny expert mech rapidly built up more momentum!

As General Ark grew more desperate and committed to saving the two expert pilots, his willpower continued to condense up to a hard limit that he had never managed to surpass in the past.

It was not until his Lionheart finally pierced through its target’s weakened spatial barrier and slammed the lesser phase lord’s body away that his willpower had finally reached critical mass!

After spending many years in hell, General Ark finally entered heaven.

The power of an ace pilot was his to command. His willpower had undergone a qualitative transformation. He founded his own Saint Kingdom and immediately expanded its borders several hundred meters around his bright and shining machine.

Even his expert mech went through an invisible transformation. The masterwork expert command mech became stronger and more aligned towards Ark. The affinity of the post-living mech towards the light element grew by a considerable margin, thereby enabling it to finally become powerful enough to turn the Lionheart into the brightest presence on the battlefield!

Many observers grew awed by the display.

Regardless of how effectively the Lionheart fought on the battlefield, it at least managed to draw more attention than the Amphis Extremis, the Minerva and the First Sword!

General Ark knew that most of it was because of the novelty factor. He had become an unknown variable to the masses. Everything that people knew about him in the past had become outdated information.

This presented him with a priceless opportunity to redefine himself!

He wanted to get rid of his image as a loser, an expert pilot who continually failed to defeat his bottleneck and a leader who wasn’t strong enough to save his subordinates.

Ark Larkinson set his sights onto Zren-Divar.

The lesser phase lord looked a lot less comfortable than before. The stab attack had not inflicted that much damage due to how shallowly it punctured through his raiment and hide.

The collision did not inflict much damage either.

What truly frustrated the lesser phase lord was letting two of his prey slip out of his grasp because other enemies had intervened!

Though Zren-Divar was in a much more precarious situation than before now that his armored body became vulnerable to massed ranged attacks, he was still able to cope with them by remaining on the move and spreading much of the attacks across the surface of his raiment.

The most logical decision that the lesser phase lord could make at this point was to withdraw or seek refuge with another lesser phase lord.

However, his continued failures and denials had driven Zren-Divar to such a rage that he did not permit himself to back off against this latest challenger!

Despite the very real threat posed by a newly ascended saint, the orven phase lord charged straight towards the shining mech that had denied him the satisfaction of killing a valuable expert pilot!

General Ark grinned. Drawing the attention of the enemy away from his subordinate and his niece was exactly what he wanted.

He did not fear the lesser phase lord any longer now that he had finally reduced the gap in strength between the two of them. Even if his Lionheart was still an expert mech, it was much better off than the First Sword!

The Lionheart was a secon skin mech that Ves and Gloriana had designed for Ark when he was already an accomplished high-tier expert pilot. Its ceiling was inherently higher, and Ark only felt moderately constrained and limited due to the relatively weak resonating exotics integrated into the machine.

As Ark resonated with the Lumosium embedded into his machine, the power of light further enhanced all of the physical properties of his Lionheart.

Its armor became tougher, its integrated energy cannons became deadlier and the Cleansing Light that had once again fallen into the Lionheart’s hands became a dazzling torch that promised to burn everything it touched!

As his fighting intent rose to a new peak, General Ark decisively directed his Lionheart to charge towards Zren-Divar!

The two powerful champions quickly met each other when their plasma swords collided against each other!

A considerable explosion of heat and light spread from the point of contact as both weapons were determined to overpower the other!

Despite their diverging sizes, the two weapons actually had a lot in common.

Both were derived from advanced human science and engineering. Both were made out of exotics and hypers of similar grades and quality levels.

What made Zren-Divar’s plasma sword so difficult to resist was its far greater size. Its edge was much longer and its absolute energy output was higher. It was practically a siege weapon masquerading as a melee weapon!

Despite the enormous disparity in size, the Lionheart’s Cleansing Light still managed to hold its ground and resist the alien weapon due to the forced resonance and abundance of light energy amplifying its limited performance!

It was like witnessing a contest of power between a giant and a dwarf.

The dwarf should had lost due to the enormous difference in size, mass and hard power, yet magically the two were even in strength!

The plasma sword wielded by the lesser phase lord was a physically more powerful weapon, but the Cleansing Light still held on due to the disproportionately high light energy and forced resonance empowerment!

At this moment, the two plasma swords were driving each other to their limits as they continued to press into each other. The plasma edges shimmered and burned as their magnetic contaminants grew unstable.

Seeing that the Cleansing Light in its normal active state was not able to gain an advantage, General Ark decided to activate a function that he had been saving up for just this occasion.

"Giantslayer Mode."

The Cleansing Light removed some of its limiters while reducing the remaining ones.

The expert mech’s plasma sword instantly surged in size, heat and brightness as its energy output multiplied by several times!

The Giantslayer Mode was an extreme setting that Ves had added to the Cleansing Light for fights against enemy phase lords, but he strongly recommended that Ark waited until he became an ace pilot before activating it in battle.

This was because the Giantslayer Mode was so damaging to the Cleansing Light that it would get scrapped within half a minute if it wasn’t being empowered and reinforced by enough true resonance!

Right now, the temporary state of forced resonance allowed General Ark to confidenly maintain the Giantslayer Mode with no short-term concerns about destroying his own plasma sword.

The power that the Lionheart currently held in its hands was intoxicating. The expert command mech looked much stronger and more impressive than before now that it wielded a plasma sword with an edge that was considerably thicker and taller than the length of the mech frame!

The latest display of power not only boosted General Ark’s fighting spirit even further, but also caused Zren-Divar to start to doubt his ability to win this bout!

It was too bad that General Ark had no intention of letting his opponent go! He immediately drove his Lionheart forward!

"Let my light cleanse you of your sins! I will never allow you to threaten a Larkinson ever again!"

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