[1-200] THE MECH TOUCH

Chapter 93: Abnormal Mech

The battlefield became crowded with mechs, both active and disabled ones. The majority of mech designers had pushed their works onto the field. Even if they were unwilling, they had to release their mechs in order to stand a chance to win some coins.

While the latest wave of mechs were built a lot more solidly, the quality of their pilots had deteriorated. This led to absurd situations like Alyssa Fill's rabbit mech demolishing a couple of mechs that had enjoyed twice or thrice as much design time.

A third of the crowd paid no attention to the other mechs as they rabidly followed Cadet Lovell's ingenious methods. His performance proved that while the quality of the mech mattered a lot, an ace pilot was able to work miracles with even the trashiest of mechs. While he hadn't managed to gather a lot of coins, his future was already bright.

Barakovski's light mech also entered the stage. As a supremely built machine, it acted like a crane among chickens the moment it descended onto the battlefield. Its pilot made great use of the tools at hand. While he generously made way for better armed mechs, it ruthlessly hunted the shabby light mechs that managed to eke out a meager existence. The light mech easily snatched a couple of coins with this strategy.

On the other hand, heavy mechs also entered the field. Their stupendous amounts of armor and prodigious firepower deterred many mechs from engaging them. Getting dragged into a head-on fight would always be a losing proposition. These heavy mechs simply lumbered around and whenever they found an unclaimed coin, they simply picked it up and walked to the delivery point without challenge.

As for the Unicorn, Cadet Lovejoy was forced to squirrel like a rat and avoid any encounters due to his damaged state. With a leg that was almost crippled, Lovejoy had to crawl through the most desolate terrain in order to avoid the crowded spots of the battlefield.

"I'm almost there. Only a kilometer to go." He muttered as he vigilantly paid attention to his sensors as well as his intuition. "This last stretch is going to be the hardest. The delivery point is right in the middle of an open plain."

The delivery points were decided semi-randomly. The battlefield had a couple of thousand potential spots where the systems governing the match could turn it into a delivery point. All of these spots were relatively open and accessible, meaning that some devious pilots might wait in the bushes nearby.

After inching closer, Lovejoy sensed no ambush nearby, but that didn't mean much. All of the cadets learned how to minimize their emissions by lowering their heat to a minimum in order to blend their thermal signature in the environment. Some extreme pilots liked to turn off the power reactor entirely, which meant they were completely exposed to damage if someone noticed them before they became active.

Lovejoy had to make another judgement call. He decided to rush to the delivery point without reserve.

The Unicorn burst into the open and jogged as best he could without completely allowing his leg to collapse. The stresses on the damaged leg increased, but his actions proved his worth as he managed to skim away from a small kinetic projectile.

"Haha, is that pistol shot supposed to stop me?!" Lovejoy taunted as he jerked his mech a little to the sides. "Your accuracy sucks!"

If his ambusher piloted a competent mech, he'd surely pay for his words. Yet from the scattered shots, Lovejoy already determined his ambusher's mech was nothing impressive. With grace akin to a drunken dancer, the Unicorn reached the delivery point and let go one of its coins, keeping the other stuffed in its log. The coin successfully ascended into the skies, which meant that Lovejoy gained another score.

"Haha you're too late! Keep firing if you want to, but you've already lost your chance to steal my coins!"

The ambusher stopped firing his pistol. Lovejoy guessed the enemy mech retreated even though he still failed to spot it on his sensors. He smirked at his successful gambit. The idiot thought he only had a single coin and did not know about the second one that was still sitting snugly in his log.