The Mech Touch novel Chapter 7260

Half a dozen Goliaths flew forward while surrounded by at least hundreds of thousands of voribugs.

There was no rigid order to their formation. The Goliaths moved forward at their own pace while their attending voribugs flowed around them as if they acted as a biological parody of an energy shield.

The Goliaths made a profound impression on the humans. Each of them appeared monstrous in very different fashions. The Hive Princess who crafted them and shaped them into specialized organic fighting machines most definitely possessed a sense of savage artistry.

Their advance meant that the skirmish had entered its most dangerous stage.

All units went into high alert. More reserves were being readied while ships such as the Tarrasque had begun to arm their weapons in case they needed to open fire due to an unexpected development.

Yet despite preparing so many reserve forces, the Goliath did not sustain any form of bombardment.

This was odd.

As the Goliaths crossed an invisible threshold, the Rubarthan defenders finally sent out numerous champions, one for each enemy Goliath.

Among them were a mix of expert mechs as well as a single Ascended Giant.

They all separated from each other and approached the Goliaths that they had been designated to fight against.

What was notable was that they received no backup and no reinforcements. The orbital defenses and other defensive units deliberately diverted their fire from the Goliaths.

"It seems eerie." Ves voiced.

He had moved to the command center of the Tarrasque by this time. Lord Richard Brownstone still accompanied him, but they were now joined by the Divine Harpoon.

The strategist did not see fit to deploy on the battlefield this time.

"The Goliaths are preparing to fight separately from each other." The Ascended Giant said. "What is interesting is that our expert mechs and one of my Faceless Giants are reciprocating."

Lord Richard Brownstone offered clarification.

"This is how most skirmishes have developed over the week. We have noticed that whenever the mutated voribugs send its Goliaths, the enemy Hive will adjust the deployment of its swarms based on our response. If we try to deploy more expert mechs or ace mechs than necessary to defeat a single Goliath, then the voribug swarms will go crazy and assault our champions like mad. Just imagine it. Millions if not billions of bugs will abandon all sense of strategy and order so that they can madly crash into our high-ranking mechs for the purpose of clogging them up and draining their resonance shields. Demigods or not, no demigod can withstand this kind of pressure for long."

Ves frowned. That sounded like a really scumbag way to win a 'duel', not that it could be called this way due to the interference of so many voribugs.

"So what does that have to do with the current pattern?" He asked the Rubarthan mech designer.

The Brownstone scion adopted an uneasy expression. "Through trial and error, we have found out that if we send out a single champion that is on the same level or weaker than the overall power level of the Goliath, the voribugs will form an unusually lenient response. Their assault on our defensive platforms will slacken. They will send only a handful of millions of voribugs to escort their Goliaths. They will even retreat and refuse to press their attack despite how extensively the Goliaths have managed to damage our high-ranking mechs. If we try to stack the deck in an unreasonable manner, then the Goliath Hive will deploy larger swarms and attack with greater ferocity, causing our forces to incur greater damage."

"So you formed an unspoken accord with the Goliath Hive." The Divine Harpoon spoke in a half-accusing tone. "The bugs used a combination of incentives and punishments to train you into helping them test their Goliaths in individual combat."

Lord Richard Brownstone spread his arms. "I am not in charge of the defense of Philaster Crestia III. I can tell you that the commander in charge here has made the most rational choice. Our primary objectives are to hold this territory as long as possible and buy time for the Rubarthan Pact to enter into a stronger war footing. I can tell you that our defenders here are not the only ones who are 'cooperating' with the Goliath Hive in this manner. The forces tasked with defending all of the other fortified star systems under attack by this hive have made the same choice."

This was a consequence of lacking enough power. The mutated voribugs paid a lot of attention to their human adversaries, and were willing to keep them around longer if they could give their Goliaths high-quality sparring partners.

A minor lull descended on the battlefield as everyone's focus shifted to the stronger units as opposed to the weaker ones.

It was as if most of the mechs, warships, orbital platforms and enemy voribug swarms did not matter anymore.

While neither side ceased fire, they fought at a lower intensity, as if they were only fulfilling their duty in a perfunctory manner.

"They look powerful." Ves remarked as he created separate projections that highlighted every visible Goliath. "Only 4 of them have shown up this time, but each of them possess a distinctive look and dare I say design philosophy. How strong are these Goliaths?"

His Rubarthan liaison had a ready answer for that. "The four are all equivalent to a mid-tier expert mech or high-tier expert mech in strength. We currently rely on a combination of different sensor systems to capture a large amount of emissions that change depending on the strength of the Goliath in question. So far, we have done the math and formed a simple 10-point scale to quickly categorize the threat level of every voribug monstrosity."

Lord Richard created another projection that showed a line divided into many pieces.

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