The Mech Touch

Chapter 6893  Depth of Sword Formation

After the conclusion of the meeting, Ves lingered behind in order to talk to the Saint Commander in private.

"How is Saint Dise holding up? Will there be any problems going forward?"

"No." Casella confidently replied. "When Dise initially received her First Sword Mark III, she had developed a large amount of conceit. Every ace pilot tends to develop a conceited mindset due to how much power they gained all of a sudden. In her case, the difference in power between the Mark II and the Mark III is so much greater that she had become wildly overconfident in her own strength. This is clearly an unwelcome development, so she needed this reality check. The Wind of Destruction has done us a favor by serving as the instrument that brought Saint Dise back to her senses."

Ves nodded in understanding. "I suppose that this is one of the hidden dangers of receiving a superdimensional mech. The advantages of superdimensional technology are much greater than phasewater technology and hyper technology combined. It is very easy to get caught up in the massive advantages that mech pilots tend to overlook their remaining shortcomings."

"No matter what rank mech pilots have attained, the attitudes that they must hold should be different depending on whether they are close to the start or the end of their current stretch of the journey. New ace pilots must never feel too confident in their own combat power because they must invest in their training and other growth measures in order to grow stronger. Peak ace pilots on the other hand must develop the most absolute possible sense of confidence in themselves, because their willpower is the only force that can sustain them when they attempt to traverse the road to no return."

In other words, mech pilots had to modulate their confidence in themselves based on the strength at their current ranks.

Saint Dise should not feel too comfortable at her current level. She needed to recognize in her heart and not just in her mind that she was incredibly weak as far as ace pilots were concerned.

Only then would she earnestly throw her heart and soul into genuine training.

"The Wind of Destruction did a good job at recognizing and exploiting the shortcomings of Saint Dise and the First Sword Mark III." Ves remarked. "Certain problems will be easier to solve than others. For example, I expect that the RA will complete the development of the initial versions of superdimensional energy cells and superdimensional flight systems within two years. That is still an unfortunately long delay given that we are in a crucial period of time, but we don't have to do anything special in order to secure these upgrades."

"I am more concerned about the sword fey, sir. It is clear from the design of the First Sword Mark III that they have become a core aspect of the ace mech's combat system. It is highly unusual for a mech pilot to go from controlling zero spurs to controlling 33 spurs at once. Most professional drone mech specialists are not as extreme in making this transition. It is much more typical to start off with single digit spurs before slowly building up to 24 or 36 units. During this time, they spend years on learning and mastering increasingly more advanced drone control skills. From the basic extra limb control technique to the spurs-as-fingers technique, there is a well-established progression for mastering drone mechs."

"And Saint Dise arrogantly skipped this gradual progression, thinking that her extraordinary willpower will allow her to quickly master and control the sword fey by relying on brute force." Ves spoke.

The ace commander grimly nodded. "This is pure hubris on her part. Saints are indeed superhuman in many ways, but that does not necessarily mean we can master any combat or control skill in a matter of days. Drone mechs are deservingly considered one of the most difficult mech archetypes to master. The decision to turn the First Sword Mark III into a hybrid between a swordsman mech and a drone mech is ambitious, but also asks much more out of Dise. She must step way beyond her comfort zone and learn an entirely different set of skills from nothing. That is a challenge of its own."

Saint Dise was one of the foremost swordswomen of the Larkinson Clan. She rivaled Ketis in pure swordsmanship skills. What was important was that she knew how good she had become and always derived a lot of pride and satisfaction in this truth.

It was therefore a big hit on her ego to discover that her ability to control and employ living fey was actually inferior to the mech pilots who had already grown accustomed to piloting the Fey Fianna!

Despite her enviable rank, resonance strength did not necessarily correlate with skill.

Her upper boundary may have risen way beyond the human limit, but her lower limit still remained untouched!

This meant that it was very much possible for Saint Dise's drone control skills to be far inferior to that of experienced drone mech pilots.

"Now that Saint Dise has fixed her mentality, I think it won't take long for her to catch up and master the art of controlling her sword fey the proper way." Ves speculated. "The real learning curve does not lie in controlling the sword fey by themselves. It is the art of using them to channel sword formations. This is a completely new discipline that relies on using the sword fey to harmonize with the power of heaven to enhance their effects. During the sparring session, I hardly noticed any amplifications derived from sword formations."

The Larkinsons already had a pretty good idea of how formations worked. Both battle formations and the more recent qi formations practiced by Commander Melkor showed how positioning different elements into certain patterns generated a mysterious sense of harmony.

There were plenty of clues that stated that sword formations could generate power far in excess of what individual sword elements could accomplish as individual units.

This was why Ketis readily agreed to add so many sword fey to the First Sword Mark III.

"I have yet to hear of any other notable attempts of leveraging the power of sword formations." Casella said. "This is understandable as this is a completely new discipline that has yet to prove its strength in the modern era. In a period where we are all struggling to hold back the invading aliens, most groups are prioritizing design applications that can produce immediate results. This is why there is so much enthusiasm for superdimensional tech. As long as you have superdimensional matter in your possession, you can quickly convert it into an immediate power boost for any mech."

That was indeed a huge shortcoming of sword formations. Even if they truly held great potential, it took an extensive amount of time and effort to figure out how to draw it out. This could take years or even decades. That was far too distant for the people who prized short-term benefits!

"Do you think that Saint Dise needs help in order to discover effective sword formations?"

"It would help, sir. Given that not many parties aside from the Red Collective hold any interest in sword formations, it is up to us to advance our understanding in this field. Ketis and her 'reformed sword practitioners' may be able to pioneer the application of sword formations. Even without mechs, they can make use of superdimensional sword-shaped drones to leverage sword formations on a smaller scale."

"That… actually sounds quite promising. These sword drones can do wonders indoors and in urban environments. That said, I think that soldiers are better off using regular firearms in open terrain."

The application of sword drones only made sense if using them in special formations could produce far greater results than regular weapons.

If the Swordmaidens and other sword practitioners could truly derive a lot of strength from the use of sword formations, then this could turn into a new specialization of the Larkinson Clan.

Even if others picked the fruit of the Larkinson Clan's labor and learned how to employ sword formations as well, the Larkinsons would always be able to maintain a lead in this combat method!

"This is a big investment." Ves said. "If our clan is large and prosperous, it is no problem to divert enough manpower to this task. However, if the native aliens keep making progress, it is questionable whether we can retain enough manpower and resources to explore how to make better use of sword formations. Saint Dise will have to be prepared to do most of the work."

"Perhaps that is for the best."

They talked a bit more about the positioning of the First Sword Mark III in the Premier Fleet.

"Do you think that Saint Dise is enough to form a solid high-level core for the Premier Fleet, or should we look into recalling Saint Tusa or Saint Stark?"

"No. That should not be necessary." Casella shook her head. "It is better to let them roam around and fight where they think they are most needed. Saint Dise may have struggled to keep up with the Wind of Destruction during the last practice session, but her First Sword Mark III is much more suited to fight against phase leaders. She will do wonders once we confront a fleet that is protected by lesser or greater phase lords."

"Are you sure about that? What if the enemy brings way more phase lords and phase whales than we can comfortably handle?"

"Then our superdimensional ace mech will chop them to pieces one by one." Casella grimly smiled. "As long as our remaining forces are not under imminent threat, it is completely viable to send out the First Sword by herself and allow her to dismantle the enemy champions one by one. Her superdimensional armor system is highly resistant against both spatial and conventional attacks. Her superdimensional greatsword can easily part spatial barriers and cut through physical defenses with ease. Saint Dise will become a terror to the enemy phase lords. They are more liable to get in each other's way if they attempt to repel her ace mech."

Ves could sort of imagine this happening. A superdimensional ace mech was the worst nightmare of phase leaders.

Yet that did not mean that the First Sword was invincible. The Black Lord had ultimately won the sparring session.

"I think that your words may ring true under ordinary circumstances, but the story may be different if the phase leaders are armed with Saint Piercer arms. The native aliens have continued to supply their phase lords and phase whales with highly lethal spears. They have also shown off the capability to form other equipment such as physical shields. This tells me that the native aliens are gradually beginning to ramp up their production of their own form of superdimensional gear."

"Good." Saint Commander Casella grinned. "That will give red humanity an additional source of superdimensional matter. Relying on the Blue Dimension alone remains an unacceptable bottleneck to our civilization. I imagine that many more groups have begun to set their sights on phase lords that are equipped with Saint Piercer arms. Even if they are much more dangerous to defeat than other alien champions, the benefits of vanquishing them in combat are far greater. The only caveat is that the quality of their superdimensional gear is… mixed."

Saint Piercer arms were not all made out of armor or weapon-grade superdimensional alloys.

There were also alien pieces of equipment that were clearly made out of inferior hull-grade superdimensional matter.

While they still possessed a huge advantage over conventional materials, hull-grade armaments were liable to break when struck with other superdimensional arms.

Beggars couldn't be choosers. Ultimately, few groups cared about the underlying quality of the Saint Piercer arms. Even low-grade superdimensional matter could still prove useful to the right groups.

However, the real question was how the native aliens were able to get their hands on all of the superdimensional matter. Red humanity deeply wanted to figure out their source!