Vol 2 Chapter 12 (1/2)
On the training ground of the Laihiala Pilot Acadeiants faced each other with swords in hand The iron arleam and the sound from the friction of the crystal tissue reverberated in the entire field
What follows next would be aBut for the two pilots riding in the strongest weapon of humanity, this was definitely a battle The at with fighting spirit in the gradually rising tension
“Okay, are you ready? We will be having a duel next!! Both of you have to adhere to the rules of a in!!”
With the cue of the referee’s coed out with a roar
Basically, a battle between Silhouette Knights starts with firing off Silhouette arap, they would switch to melee weapons Because the Silhouette arraved on them, they were structurally weak and would be destroyed easily inthe pilot of the means to attack
Edgar had seen Tellestarle’s back weapon in action Using two Silhouette ar threat That hy Edgar wanted to do aith the long distance battle and moved into a melee battle immediately
But contrary to his expectation, Tellestarle radually closing the distance
What is she thinking? Doesn’t she want to use the advantage of a ranged attack? But that suits me just fine!
Earlecuive it a headstart on the slash But as he inging his sword, Edgar realised he ed the functionality of the back weapon
As the two machines were about to collide, Tellestarle suddenly deployed the Silhouette ar at the reticle displaying before her in the cockpit smiled as her plan worked
“I will use this in place of a greeting The ability to shoot ic rounds even at close distance— the real value of the back weapon!”
The dual Silhouette arms on Tellestarle’s back fired off sih Earlecumber couldn’t evade the attack at such a close distance Its shi+eld blocked one of the shots; the other hit the right shoulder which wasn’t covered by the shi+eld The training shot wasn’t strong enough to blow the right arm off, but Earlecu the attack
“That’s not all!”
Tellestarle swung its blade as it retracted its Silhouette ar the momentum, it attacked the unbalanced adversary Thethan a half assed attack
Edgar didn’t resist the falling ht and pushed out the shi+eld on its left ared to defend the attack, but was alered backwards Earlecumber was in such an aard position because it was unbalanced, and also because of the power behind Tellestarle’s strike
“!! What terrifying strength, so this is the power of the strand crystal tissue!?”
Edgar groaned and leaped backwards to pull away The back weapon could attack froles, and the strand crystal tissue displayed overwhelar repositioned hi
“Eh, really, I a common sense, how unpleasant!”
The holoafter Earlecu its Silhouette ared ahead“But I won’t back down so easily!!”
Simple back and forth ic shots Earlecu out of Tellestarle’s attack range
A heated battle started fro, which puround Cheers erupted every tiiants crossed swords Unlike the audience immersed in the heat of the battle, the maintenance students analysed the battle in low voices
“As expected of Edgar, most pilots would have fallen from the first attack”
“Helvi-senpai is piloting really smoothly”
“Being the test pilot wasn’t just for show”
The ones conversing were Eru and the Boss For these two, Tellestarlein a situation close to actual battle was as valuable as gold They observed carefully, analysing their every move
The two ht the le for quite a while with swords, but Tellestarle had an advantage in power, pushi+ng Earlecumber’s sword back; but Earlecu away fro Tellestarle gain the upper hand
“Helvi seee”
“The difference in power output is significant after all I think this is the best way to gain the upper hand To be honest, the controls have not been optimised yet, so she will lose if she relies on delicate controls to fight”
The Boss accepted Eru’s coy and excellent explosive power But as the control system had not been calibrated perfectly, it couldn’t perform delicate ar could see this and didn’t take the hit head on Even so, Tellestarle, who could attack with the sword and back weapon simultaneously had the upper hand
“How dangerous! I have to stop the Silhouette arms, it's too powerful!!”
Edgar, as trapped, analysed the situation calrasped the feature of Tellestarle, and used the most effective ways to attack, to cover its weakness Even though Edgar had noticed that the movement of Tellestarle wasn’t polished, but he couldn’t take advantage of it If this was a fight between norar would be about to lure the opponent to attack and counter But it's anotherTellestarle
Thein the difference in ar’s movement with unexpected timed attacks He had less ways to attack, and will lose in ter to do with skill; that’s how big the difference in machine performance was
The students watching knew that Earlecu a handicap Hence, even though itsthe strongest ht the excite point
Earlecuradually forced into a corner If he doesn’t take a gaar will definitely lose
“I don’t like ga anything”
Seeing Earlecu, Helvi mumbled:
“ He is getting i on the next attack”
Helvi knew her skills were not at his level, so she had to fight by relying on the perforar’s objective
“He can’t make up for the power output of the strand crystal tissue… he is probably ai for the back weapon”
If Edgar takes the back weapon out, no ap in the power output was, he had a chance to aim for the weak point with precision and turn the situation around with his skills Because both pilots knew this, the e was decided
The twoThe silence after the heated exchange was like a tightened string, and the tension greith it Before they realised, the audience had turned quiet, waiting for the end of the battle with bated breath
The sharp sound of intake of air was suddenly heard, it was Earlecu the ether reactor at full power That sound was akin to the battle cry of the Silhouette Knights, and the tensed situation changed— Earlecuar chose a direct assault The iron Knight dashed with heavy steps which alround
“Going head on in such a situation, that’s just like you! Good, I will do my best too!!”
No matter hoide the power difference was, if its momentum doesn’t match her opponent, Tellestarle won’t be able to take the hit That’s why Helvi ordered Tellestarle to advance too The scene of both e was re of the battle
Tellestarle used the attack which was to her advantage, the two Silhouette arms on her shoulders fired at Earlecuing its sword to deflect the shot The sword ic shots was co with the ene up the chance to attack Even the audience could tell Tellestarle closed in on Earlecuhty blow Everyone, including Helvi, thought that this ending was a letdohen Edgar, who took the initiative to attack, is being cut down like that
Of course, Edgar didn’t swing his sword because of carelessness He had decided to use the sword for defense right fro the crucial shi+eld, it moved its fist near its shoulder to secure its hold Earlecumber lowered its posture and threw the left side of its body forward“ What!? shi+eld bash!+ He wants to clash head on!?”
Helvi sensed Earlecumber’s intention at the last e if she used her sword against Earlecumber’s shi+eld
Edgar’s plan was simple, even if his means of attack and pure power output loses to his adversary; Earlecuht’ He used speed to ed at Tellestarle like a bullet
Piloting skills aside, Tellestarle had the advantage in terth— Helvi had absolute confidence in this and decided to take the attack head on When she discovered Edgar’s e She had already started to accelerate, and had to take the same actions
Tellestarle raised its shi+eld and the two Silhouette Knights collided shortly after
At that h the entire training ground The shi+elds taking the full brunt of the i the two machines to the side on offense and defence
Helvi, who hesitated because of the unexpected attack and Edgar, as ai— His objective was to enter the e, that’s why he threw hio the chance it gained after its heavy sacrifice, lifting its right ar into the Silhouette arms on Tellestarle’s shoulders
“You are good!! But I won’t fall for that again!!”
Earlecued and couldn’t ly, Tellestarle’s left ar after that collision The strand crystal tissue was da Earlecumber easily
“What!? Not just the power, even the toughness was enhanced!? But I can’t miss this opportunity…”
“Just a bit more!! Tellestarle!!”
Earlecumber’s quick attack went over its opponent’s shoulder, destroying the Silhouette arms But that’s the lily endless strength pressed back at Earlecu Earlecumber, as in an unstable position due to the previous attack staggering backwards
“Ugh! Did I push it too much?!”
“I got this! Edgar-!!”Tellestarle charged at Earlecuhtily The off balanced Earlecumber couldn’t evade the attack, its wounded left hand was unable to lift its shi+eld Tellestarle raised its sword high, and was about to hack at the helpless Earlecumber—
But the sword didn’t fall, and Tellestarle knelt onto the ground
It was hard to described the atround, maybe ‘dumbfounded’ and ‘stunned’ would be appropriate Why did Tellestarle, which was about to deliver the final blow kneel down? Just by looking at the stunned reaction of Earlecumber, it was easy to tell this wasn’t the result of Earlecumber’s timely counterattack No one expected this result just as the match was about to be decided at the very climax No one kne to react to this finale, and the entire training ground was shrouded in silence
“Ah! The mana had been exhausted!”
The shout of Eru, who figured it out echoed through the silent training ground
“Well then, time for the maintenance department’s first after action review”
Eru announced the start of thewith a serious expression Inside the workshop, Eru, the Boss and their athered here, everyone had an aard expression Even Eru who always does as he pleased looked distracted— he hesitated a moment and peeked at the reason of the aardness What he saas Helvi, as squatting gloomily in a corner of the workshop
The kanji ‘aard’ could al out of her body It wasn’t her fault, but ending it so abruptly after such a stellar performance, she would rather be defeated in battle It’s no wonder she was sulking
It ithin their expectations for the prototype to have flaws, but it picked an aard time to act up— That’s how one would frankly describe the feelings of the audience No, the probleht before the conclusion of the battle But these facts couldn’t console Helvi
“Ed, Edgar-senpai, could you please cheer Helvi-senpai up…”
“Hey, why h, ahh, I will do my best…”
Eru, who couldn’t stand it any longer forcefully pushed Edgar to Helvi’s side After seeing hio with a selfless expression, Eru turned his head back refreshi+ngly
“Phew, that should do Let’s think about tackling the new problem that surfaced”
“Don’t die, Edgar… Well, the probleer the consuical”
Everyone looked at Tellestarle which was placed on thestrand crystal tissue to increase the power output led to a higherthe mana reserves at a faster pace
With the Silhouette arher than expected On the other hand, the a the strand crystal tissue htly This resulted in the flaw of shorter operational ti of this problem was bad, but it made sense when you think about it
“Considering all these factors, the operational tiht?”
“The worst It could be considered a fatal flaw…”
The point of emphasis for thisSilhouette ars that consume mana, so the imbalance of the , the Silhouette Knights were designed to store as n couldn’t be changed easily
Thatwouldn’t help either In order to not let Helvi’s honourable sacrifice go to waste, they had to think of so to overcome that flaw
“The main point is that the mana supply couldn’t keep up with the consumption rate… But it’s difficult to modify the source— the ether reactor Or rather, it’s impossible”
Even Eru couldn’t do anything about the mysterious reactor His words made the students around him relax secretly If Eru could customise that too, they would have all fallen over in shock
“What about lowering the output? But, even so, it wouldn’t change the fact that the structure burns a lot ofthe horse before the cart”
“Another ould be increasing the e capacity… How is the capacity increased?”
“Si the amount of crystal tissue”
“Can’t we do that, then?”
“If we increase the crystal tissue, the consumption rate would increase too”
There would be no end to this
“The strand crystal tissue has an intangible flaw The amount of tissue didn’t increase much, that’s why the power output and capacity is unbalanced”
This serious issue gave everyone a headache; this wasn’t so that could be resolved easily But hope came from an unexpected source
“How about using your idea?”
As everyone was silent in thought— Ady who didn’t say anything spoke up Hearing Ady, as usually quiet during conference voice her opinion, Eru asked:
“My idea?”
“That’s right, ‘it’s fine even if the appearance is not human’! We can increase the tissues, but we don’t need to stick with the huht?”
“It’s fine… even if it’s not huet it Correct, you are correct”
For her, this was just repeating so Eru said But the one who said it was surprised with his eyes widening, and he slowly squinted his eyes
“Ugh, you are correct, but for Ady to enlighten me… I can’t believe it”
“How mean!! Why—!?”
The Boss ignored the raging Ady and Eru, as being chased Ady’s comment reminded the Boss too, and they ca fine even if it’s not in the shape of a human, doesn’t mean you had to use a shape that was inhuman
“That’s it! Increasing the crystal tissue doesn’tthe silver nerves to it, and pushi+ng it into excess space, it would be fine if we could increase the ‘mass’ of the crystal tissue!”
“Ke! I said, I aht? Boss, we should e, so we shouldn’t use fibre form but sheets… I think it would be best to employ the form of a sheet”
Hearing Eru’s proposal, the Boss lifted his head
“Alright, it’s decided Next would be negotiating with the alchereet them, leave it to me!”
After finding a solution to the critical issue, the air around thehis head, thinking of ways to soothe the piqued Ady