Chapter 229: Thorn (2/2)

”All hail the Black Coves!”

”We shall take over the ship! And teach them who rules the galaxies!”

As they felt victory approaching, something occured. Their expressions changed.

Tick! Tick tick tick tick tick!

The Coxcomb suddenly rolled out a hefty amount of laser firing units. The number was innumerable, as if the warship was the factory of the firing units itself. The Black Covers zoned out for a second, probably they never expected a warship to have firing units this many installed, considering the amount of batteries would be needed to run the show.

Zzzt!

Before they realized, they were already surrounded by a laser web. The laser web? That was something new to the trained pilots, then the supplementary bombs came showering upon them.

The extreme firepower of the Coxcomb was a shocker to Fid and Claudia when they were restoring the order of their fleet.

Folks would never understand the power of electromagnetic cannons, to them it would be just a stream of blue light, that would be it. But unlike the electromagnetic firing, the laser beam coming off like a spectrum shower turned out to be more stunning to them.

The crowding fleet held their engines for a considerable amount of time. The crew members were dumbfounded.

The Black Covers? No one liked being a fish in the net and they were experiencing it. They had been rather disdained towards these normal laser beams, as the beams would feel like a pump of water on their armor. Laser beams this dense however, were an eye-opener to them, a soul-taker.

Laser firing units like this could fire about 20 beams of laser per second. And the units on the Coxcomb, contrary to the tradition, were making the pilots losing their mind as they tried counting the number.

It was a depressing discovery by the Black Covers that these beams were not blind-shot after all, they were more accurate than their own snipers. No matter how sturdy their armors were, when hundreds of beams aiming one single mech, it would only lead to an explosion, nothing else. The addition bombs scattered in the space also had also weakened their mechs before they realized.

The glow of 20 mechs exploding had illuminated the space again. The laser web vanished the very second when people were blinking their eyes in blank dismay, as if the Coxcomb withdrew its fangs like the beast returning to its tamed self after a feast.

The contrast was beyond their comprehension.

...

Ah!

Thorn seemed to have noticed something but … but he was not in the mood to take a look around. His screen, his eyes were all on that skeleton mech before him. Sweats were stuck at his fringe, as his ruffled hair went standing like the bushes on a globe. His body was soaked wet. The stress over the time… it was pushing him to the limits. His hands felt fatigued since it was consuming to maintain such amount of APM even for a strong man like him.

But he would not… he would never have a break. The dark twin daggers from the foe were like twinning serpents, aiming their prey and frantically they attacked. He knew if he were to hold back a little, within that brief second, the twin daggers would get beyond his defense. Not only the daggers, the shield was also a danger to look out for. The shield was similar to those mechs of the Black Coves, having sharp edges.

Pant… Pant…

Ye Chong’s breathing became heavier, although he maintained the greatest hand speed he could imagine. The movements he carried out were highly complicated, the controls were not simple and were obviously more than a tap and slide. It was the first time Ye Chong maintained the maximum speed for such a long time.

Han Jia held the incoming punches with its daggers. The thorns of the dim yellow fist were a wonder, a mystery of they material, for they were unhurt by the edges of the dagger despite all the slashes and slams.

Right when Thorn’s punches were held, he made a thrashing knock with the elbow, the thorns were glowing cold. Ye Chong in his Han Jia believed that his armor could not take the sharp thorn so he backed off like a breeze, trying to dodge.

The few thorns over the elbow were then disengaged and began propelling towards Han Jia. Hah! Thorn was confident that with this twist carried out at such a distance, the foe could never see this coming! These thorns would deal great amount of damage, they would at least inflict something on the foe’s mech even if they could not penetrate the armor.

To experts like the Black Covers warring pilots, one simple plot twist was more than enough to turn the tide.

Klink! Thup thup thup thup!

Han Jia blocked the thorns with its shield. Ye Chong had seen this coming ever since the time when he saw Thorn ruptured the Beauty’s Secretion with its spikes moments ago. The spikes were absolutely something to watch out for, since it was able to shatter Beauty’s Secretion enveloped in skeleton shells.

Ye Chong then felt the delay in movements of the foe, even though he had no idea why, he changed his battle approach anyway, as Han Jia started weaving in different directions frequently, which were disrupting Thorn’s senses. Han Jia’s speed was superior from the beginning so it was a torturing act for Ye Chong to abuse it against Thorn.

Thorn could feel his hands getting spasm soon. His fingers danced madly on the control panel. Man I never knew this skeleton prick could be this sustainable in battle.

Absolutely, no one would know Ye Chong’s inhuman vitality till one tasted it, while his APM was the result of Mu’s continuous training. The marble trainings were once a hell for Ye Chong. Getting spasms was something usual for Ye Chong who underwent the intensive training courses daily. No man would be aware of the torment Ye Chong had undergone in order to get specs like these.

Frankly speaking, from the aspect of techniques, Ye Chong was clearly inferior compared to the experienced foe. Vitality-wise for long-term battle would be a different story. Ye Chong was only exhaling louder than usual, which mostly was due to the brewing excitement inside him.

Ye Chong had long understood the importance of high APM in mech piloting, although not all inputs were effective execution. To a mech processor, its effective input-execution would be limited to a certain amount of figure, which once your APM had overtaken the figure, it would be a mere waste of stamina as you accelerate further while most of your inputs would be neglected.

And to avoid that, Ye Chong had been trying to minimize the amount of inputs to execute a specific action. And his attempt had been proven to be effective in the battle today. If he were to face Thorn in the past, he would be inputting much more commands and probably be drained dead in the end.

The following attacks of Thorn remained its ferocity, although the execution was not as seamless as before. Ye Chong could tell the lethargy within, but the intenseness of the battle had grown beyond their imagination.

Thorn, as his fingers moved on, had never seen a man being able to last this long in a close-combat before. It was then he noticed his weakness being his vitality. Under normal circumstance most players would be knocked out with those sinister tricks of his. But he met the wrong opponent today, as the foe seemed to be well-aware of all kinds of dirty tricks as well.

A sudden urge rose in him to back off and forfeit the battle, as he knew that he would surely lose if he persisted. The skeleton pilot had known most of his moves after exchanging for so long and did not seem to be giving up anytime soon.

Like seriously if there was one moment his hand twitched, he would be stabbed right to his fatality with those daggers.

”Ye, retreat. The remaining 5 warships are heading towards us.” Shang’s voice sounded a little agitated.

Ye Chong had a shock. He looked at Thorn who jumped away, taking a turn and was running away.

Tink! A fine blue lining zapped through Thorn’s body.

Ye Chong could see the blue beam penetrating the armor of Thorn and zapping further into the endless space.

”You are welcomed.”

The voice rang proud in his head as Ye Chong turned back and saw Shang waving his weapon of vanity behind the ajar gate.

”Why can’t he be the expert in style…” muttered Ye Chong, who zoomed towards the Coxcomb without style…

Well. You would do the same.

If 5 warships were behind you.