The Mech Touch

The team formed by Sara Voiken and Dulo Voiken had managed to make it to the second round, which reflected their overall strength in mech design.

They had improved a lot since they last competed in Chance Bay!

Joining the Larkinson Clan, gaining access to a lot of learning resources, receiving a lot of autonomy in their schedule and work tasks had done much to advance their design philosophies and expand their repertoire.

However, Team DeVos was no slouch as it consisted of a pair of brothers who were 2 generations older than the Voikens!

Perhaps the DeVos siblings might not be as brilliant as their current adversaries, but what they lacked in talennt, they made up for it with experience and diligence.

Their melee mech consisted of a swordsman mech that was armed with a shield.

Although it looked like a knight mech on the surface, it was actually designed and built like an offensive mech. It could not absorb attacks as well as a more solid defensive mech, but it would be able to go on a tear as long as it got rid of its thick and heavy shield.

The swordsman mech currently used its shield to form a defensive barrier!

The mech constantly pivoted its facing as it tried its best to keep up with the circling of the opposing ranged mech.

The light javelin mech designed by the Voikens was an odd machine to say the least.

It was not the only mech that relied on a throwing weapon in the tournament, but unlike the Furia whose throwing axes were more of an afterthought, the javelins of the Voiken ranged mechs actually posed a serious threat!

This was due to several reasons.

The javelins were heavy, weighted and enhanced in different ways.

The arms along with the rest of the mechanical frame of the ranged mech was optimized for throwing.

Most importantly, the Voiken ranged mechs also incorporated a spear-throwing mechanism that enabled it to exert greater leverage and force onto every javelin it held in its right hand!

The mech demonstrated this capacity by withdrawing one of the dozen javelins attached onto its back.

The mech did not hold the javelin in the middle of its long shaft, because doing so was a relatively inefficient means of throwing a lengthy projectile forward.

Instead, it held the javelin by its end, causing it to look as if it would tip over and fall to the floor.

The firm grip of the javelin mech's right hand prevented this from happening.

"I need an opening!" The pilot of the javelin mech called.

"I am working on it!" The other pilot replied.

Accompanying the javelin mech was a heavier and more solid shielded spearman mech that surged towards the two mechs of Team DeVos, heedless of the gauss rounds fired by the opposing team's rifleman mech!

Sara Voiken might not be able to apply any fancy adaptive modular armor systems to her own mechs, but her alloy formulas and solid metal defensive constructions were superior enough on their own!

Even if the advancing shielded spearman mech received plenty of dents in its armor and physical shield, it could keep taking them on without suffering any internal damage!

Once the spearman mech came close enough, it attempted to circle around the shielded swordsman mech and poke its long spear at the enemy rifleman mech huddling behind its partner.

Naturally, the swordsman mech could not let this happen and was forced to use its sword to deflect the incoming spear jab!

The Voiken spearman mech did not let this failure suspend its attacks. Instead, it started to adopt a more aggressive posture. The unrelenting spear stabs continually struck the shield that the swordsman mech used as a barrier. The spear even came close to bypassing the shield!

Eventually, the two melee mechs became embroiled in their own little world. They could not disentangle themselves from each other without creating a huge opening for their immediate opponents!

This caused the initiative to shift to the ranged mechs. They could either choose to target the opposing melee mech or decide to eliminate their own counterparts first!

The Voiken javelin mech sought to target the enemy rifleman mech right away. This was because it only had a limited amount of javelins before it could fall back onto its relatively weak submachine gun to deal further damage.

The pilot of the javelin mech knew that it would take quite a decent amount of javelins to break past the defenses of the enemy swordsman mech.

In contrast, the light rifleman mech designed by Team DeVos looked so fragile that it would probably take three or so javelins to deal crippling damage!

As such, the javelin mech aggressively advanced towards the enemy ranged mech. Though it held a throwing projectile in its throwing arm, the pilot was not in a hurry to throw it out at this time.

It was too easy for a small and agile light mech to evade the spears at longer distances.

As the two ranged mechs circled around the arena, the rifleman mech did not simply try to run. It also brought its weapon to bear against the javelin mech and fired relatively powerful gauss rounds that could deal a significant amount of damage onto other light mechs!

The javelin mech had to evade as best it could, but it was weighed down by the spare javelins it carried onto its back.

At this rate, the pilot of the javelin mech could only ensure that the incoming attacks missed the weak point at the center of its chest.

It needed to lighten its load right away!

The attack happened in an instant. The javelin mech had already kept its right arm in a throwing position for a time. When it finally decided to attack, its arm levered forward as if it was the arm of a catapult!

As the arm swung forward and down, the hand extended into a surprisingly long mechanism that folded out of its entire wrist.

The entire hand deformed and folded out as if it was the claw of a dinosaur!

This was the atlatl-like mechanism that Dulo Voiken had designed in the throwing arm of the javelin mech.

It was derived from a relatively ancient spear-throwing tool that enabled ancient hunters to throw their spears a lot further and harder!

This time was no different. The leverage that pushed the butt of the spear forward was amazingly strong, causing the long and heavy projectile to launch forward with life-threatening power!

The rifleman mech had to abandon its latest attempt to fire its gun in order to hastily jump out of the way of the powerful javelin!

Even as the long projectile barely missed one of the arms of the ranged mech, the explosive charge integrated inside its hollow shaft exploded, causing the light mech to jerk aside while incurring light surface damage onto its thin armor!

Dulo Voiken sighed as he watched this happen from the ready room. "If the tournament gave us access to stronger explosives, the arm of that rifleman mech would have been crippled."

His sister shrugged. "It was your stupid idea to go back in time and base our ranged mech on a throwing weapon. I don't think we'll be able to get much further in the tournament with an unconventional mech."

"At least it is memorable, don't you think? A lot more people are paying attention to our javelin mech than usual."

He was right. Many mech designers loved the novelty of a javelin mech even as they dismissed it for being impractical in a real battle situation. For example, it ran out of ammunition way faster than any decent rifle-wielding machine!

This was pretty obvious as the javelin mech had thrown three of its long projectiles without much to show for it. Aside from blackening the armor of the rifleman mech, the exploding javelins failed to produce any further results!

[The velocity of the javelins are too low. Any rifle can fire rounds at much higher muzzle velocities. There are good reasons why there are hardly any mechs in use that fall back to such an archaic method of combat.]

[They make for great-looking mechs in the mech arenas. They are more common in public matches as it is an exotic mech that is truly challenging to master.]

[Don't forget about stealth. Mechs armed with javelins are also fairly common in hunting parties operating in complex terrain. Rifles often tend to make loud noises that can attract scary predators, but a mech that is designed well enough can launch a javelin without producing too much noise. The projectiles themselves can also be built to penetrate through biological armor and inject anesthetics inside the body of a resilient exobeast.]

There was a surprising amount of niche uses for javelin mechs, but none of that really mattered to the current contest.

The javelin mech threw a fourth projectile which the opposing machine smoothly dodged.

In turn, the enemy rifleman mech continually retaliated by firing back with its rifle. Some of the gauss rounds missed the mark, but enough of them struck the javelin mech!

For now, the Voiken ranged mech managed to hold on due to the surprising resilience of its light armor.

Sara Voiken may be able to do more to enhance the resilience of heavier mechs, but she was still able to optimize the defenses of lighter mechs as well!

As the javelin mech withdrew a fifth javelin, it started to bend its arm backwards before it suddenly turned around and threw it straight at the back of the enemy swordsman mech!

The pilot of the melee mech of Team DeVos wasn't stupid, though. He had made sure to maintain enough situational awareness to track the positioning of the Voiken javelin mech.

The swordsman mech quickly let go of its shield in order to jump away at greater speed.

Its shield had already been riddled with holes anyway, so it was only right for the swordsman to go on the offensive!

The opposing Voiken spearman mech was caught off-guard. It belatedly threw aside its own shield in order to pursue the swordsman mech, but its heavier armor weighed it down!

"Careful!"

The swordsman mech did not bother to spar against the Voiken spearman mech any further.

Instead, it charged straight at the javelin mech, which happened to have circled a bit too far away from its supporting comrade!

While the javelin mech tried to distance itself, it quickly retracted another javelin and threw it straight at the advancing swordsman mech at a lower angle.

The pursuing machine could see the projectile coming well in advance and already dodged to the right.

Yet before the javelin could pass by, it had actually changed its orientation mid-flight, causing it to extend as if it was made out of sections connected by chains!

This chained javelin entangled one of the legs of the swordsman mech, wrapping around it as if it was trying to turn into a lock.

This strange action did not seem to hinder the swordsman mech all that much, but the javelin mech quickly fired another javelin!

This time, the swordsman mech hadn't been able to evade the next attack as well as before. Its other leg became entangled in chains as well!

The third javelin that flung forward seemed to home in on the legs as if they were attracted by magnetism. It ultimately formed a strong bar that connected to the two chains.

This made it seem as if the advancing swordsman mech had suddenly been locked by a spreader bar!

Though the strong mechanical strength of the legs quickly caused the hasty locking mechanisms to warp and tear apart, the damage had already been done!

"Huh?!"

The swordsman mech lost its balance due to the interruption of its steps and tripped!

"Hah! It actually worked!"

Before the swordsman mech could push itself upright again, the Voiken spearman mech finally caught up and thrust its spear straight through the exposed rear of the fallen machine!

[Team DeVos has lost its melee mech!]