The Mech Touch

The Life Research Association changed forever this day.

The state had already undergone a lot of turmoil after the opposition to the dominant conservative faction sparked off a violent rebellion.

The descent into anarchy and lawlessness seemed to bring out the worst of the Lifers. Any gang member or criminal who previously felt oppressed by the authorities suddenly found that the sword hanging over their heads were no longer there anymore!

In fact, many law enforcement units got swept up in the civil war. They were compelled to join specific sides and tasked with fighting against their former brothers.

An uncountable amount of civilians suffered, especially on Prosperous Hill VI. The principal trade planet of one of the LRA's most important port systems had turned into a wartorn hell for both locals and visitors.

In the meantime, the factions that were responsible for unleashing all of this suffering became completely embroiled in their struggle for power.

The powerful biomech designers, beast designers, geneticists and other renowned biotech researchers no longer competed against each other in the academic arena.

Instead, they began to play general and leveraged the considerable networks they built up over the years to deploy whatever troops they commanded onto their enemies!

What was most notable on Prosperous Hill VI was the strange obsession that both sides acquired.

For some reason, the two factions kept fighting over an ostensibly worthless piece of territory centered around a mech arena.

Even though Ruuzon Arena used to be a famed competitive and entertainment venue in the Prosperous Hill System, its worth had plummeted since the outbreak of the war.

In fact, when its giant tree tentacles came to life and cruelly massacred hundreds of thousands of unwitting spectators, the factions bombarded the entire venue until there was nothing left on the surface!

The heavy shelling directed towards the murderous arena was so severe that even its tunnel network had partially collapsed! The first five underground floors had completely caved in while the floors underneath had become incredibly unstable.

Yet despite the precarious conditions underneath the ruined arena, the conservatives and the opposition members continued to deploy mechs and soldiers through the few intact tunnel entrances that were left in order to gain total control over the shambling site.

No one knew what the rulers of the factions were thinking. Not even the commanders who led the fighting knew the reasons why they were sending good men to die. Yet the decisions of the mighty biotech researchers had to be respected, because that was the custom in the Life Research Association.

Today, everyone knew what the different factions were fighting for. The emergence of an incredibly tall and incredibly powerful 'biomech' laid most questions to rest.

"What is that tall thing in the distance?"

"It's bigger than my father's trading ship."

"It's a juggernaut! A biojuggernaut!"

The skin-covered flesh titan that emerged from a giant hole underneath Ruuzon Arena towered over almost every tree structure in Veoline. While there were a number of gigantic tree structures that exceeded the height of the biojuggernaut, there was a profound difference between the two different products.

The tallest tree structures were marvels of bioarchitecture. It took a lot of planning, calculation and problem solving to grow tree structures that massed so much and extended so far up into the sky. They also demanded an enormous amount of high-quality resources in order to make them viable.

Yet the difficulty of designing and growing a tree structure was nothing compared to creating a biojuggernaut!

Even regular juggernauts made of conventional technology were much easier to design and build than their fleshy equivalents.

Special Project 'U' was a monster project that took an immense amount of time, effort and resources for the Supreme Sage to bring to completion. He spent decades trying to keep his work on the project a secret. He secretly siphoned resources from other research projects and deliberately made himself as unapproachable and unavailable as possible so that he could work on his greatest project in peace.

Not even Master Mech Designers could have engineered a bioproject as immense as the biojuggernaut. Its successful growth and creation was a testament to the Supreme Sage's legendary intellect.

Yet all of the people who initially witnessed the emergence of the giant flesh construct were mistaken about one factor.

A juggernaut, whether it was made out of metal or biomatter, was defined as a war machine that operated under the direct control of a specialized juggernaut pilot.

The monstrous creature that had briefly paused before moving in to capture and devour biomechs in rapid succession was anything but a biomachine that was controlled by a rational human pilot.

"UUUUURRRAAAAAAAANNNUUUUUUSSSSSS!"

The roar that announced its name to the entire planet was so loud that the pressure waves emanating from his throat caused the nearby biomechs to briefly falter.

This allowed the berserk biojuggernaut to easily catch up to the next batch of fleeing biomechs and pick them up only to stuff them into its blood-soaked mouth!

Even though the gigantic biotitan wasn't always able to stuff every mech into its abyss-like mouth in one go, its sharp, gigantic teeth along with its extraordinary powerful jaw muscles allowed it to bite any helpless biomech into pieces!

As the gigantic Uranus chewed through half-a-dozen biomechs, the runaway biojuggernaut even started to savor its meals. The monstrous titan's eyes glowed brighter as it started to pick up a biomech that had been a tad bit slow in fleeing.

Instead of biting through its torso straight away, it tore off an arm before tossing it into its mouth. The pleasure on its face was evident as it started to learn how to savor its meal.

"What kind of a biomachine eats other biomachines?"

"That's not the worst part. You know what is even more depraved? Some of the mech pilots of those biomechs that got caught never managed to eject!"

"Monster. It's a monster."

Though there weren't many people living in the city districts that were close to Ruuzon Arena, the immense titan was so tall that its enormous body along with its actions could clearly be seen from kilometers away.

Millions of citizens and refugees in Veoline watched on with horror as the greatest and most sophisticated 'biomech' produced by the Life Research Association also happened to conform to one of their worst fears.

Biomechs were supposed to be under human control at all times. Every biomech designer who graduated from an educational institution knew this lesson by heart.

One of the greatest impediments of the popularization of biomechs was the persistent if misguided fear that they spontaneously came to life and went out of control. It was largely a myth as biomech designers took exceedingly great care in preventing their mechs from developing any sentience or functional intelligence.

Yet the biojuggernaut known as Uranus did not just stray from this rule. It utterly broke this consensus! The bestial intelligence that controlled all of its actions was like a nightmare come true for the Life Research Association's fairly disciplined biomech industry.

There was no human consciousness in control of its actions!

All of its decisions were driven by an inhuman mind that was completely irrational and driven by primal emotions!

There were no safeguards and restraints in place that could stop it from engaging in the forbidden act of eating human flesh!

Its entire existence was a walking violation of every ethical principle that the LRA's biomech industry painstakingly enforced in order to lower everyone's vigilance towards its principal product.

When footage of this rampaging biotitan would surface on the galactic net, which will assuredly happen, the biomech designers who observed this calamity already knew that their industry was ruined.

No one in the star sector would consider buying biomechs again!

The entire biomech industry in not just Majestic Teal but every other star sectors across human space where biomechs were sold would suffer an enormous setback after this man-made disaster spread far and wide.

Even though this unfolding tragedy took place in a rather marginal state at the edge of human space, the horrifying size and majesty of the biojuggernaut was so awe-inspiring that it was already assured that it would enter into the galactic news cycle.

Forget about being mentioned in renowned regional news portals such as the Rimward Star Herald. It was already certain that snippets of dramatic footage would show up in Galaxy News One, the most bland but widely-watched news portal of humankind!

Even the colonists exploring the Red Ocean would know about this terrifying new bionightmare within twenty-four hours!

Meanwhile, the person responsible for reviving and unleashing this terrifying experiment gone wrong was grinning like a shark.

After he and his team barely managed to make it back to the warehouse complex before the final portal and the entire pinnacle lab collapsed, Ves had lots of reasons to celebrate.

"I hit the jackpot!"

Safely ensconced within his Unending Regalia were five vials of high-grade life-prolonging treatment serum. Though Ves already knew that the Supreme Sage must have synthesized more serum over the years, much of it had already been expended on special Project 'U'.

It was actually an unexpected surprise that the Supreme Sage had that much spare serum left. Evidently, even though he constantly complained in his research notes that the yield was too low, he did not suffer a shortage of expert pilot bodies.

Ves completely disregarded the fact that his loot was tainted. The Supreme Sage was the one responsible for defiling the bodies of heroes, not him. The ancient bastard deserved all of the blame for being the biggest hypocrite in his own state!

"I'll make good use of your products. Don't you worry." He chuckled under his breath.

An arguably even bigger harvest from his loot run was that he also managed to secure all of the research files pertaining to Project Cain and Special Project 'V', along with a handful of other related research projects!

Though Ves was sure he missed a couple of essential projects that were housed in the upper floors of the pinnacle lab, he knew for certain that Cain and Vita were the key projects that the Larkinson Clan absolutely needed in order to reconstruct the production product one day!

While Ves was already dreaming about secretly breaking the monopoly on high-grade life-prolonging treatment serum, Dr. Perris looked completely hollowed out at this time.

The successive revelations and impacts she received was too much for her to bear. Though adrenaline had managed to keep her together when they were venturing in the pinnacle lab, now that she made it back, she collapsed onto the floor.

"What have we done…?"

Fear, guilt and other negative emotions roiled through her mind. The final part of their exploration impacted her especially hard. Unlike nearly everyone else who would soon learn of the feral biojuggernaut, she happened to know some of the truth about the consciousness that drove it to slaughter and devour every biomech within reach.

Uranus was supposed to be the Supreme Sage's replacement body. If all went well, the founder and leader of the Life Research Association should have ascended into a greater kind of existence by transferring his consciousness to a titanic vessel!

This god-like body should have created the perfect biological lifeform according to the Supreme Sage. As long as he was able to transfer his entire mind, knowledge and intellect to the most powerful physical humanoid body he had ever created, the combination between the two should have resulted in a new form of life that completely transcended the human race in every possible aspect!

"If this experiment succeeded… would that mean the Supreme Sage attained immortality?"

Dr. Perris didn't miss the principal reason why the legendary researcher worked so hard to grow such an exaggeratingly huge body. Though she hadn't been able to access too much documentation about Special Project 'U', she nevertheless managed to infer that the main reason why Uranus was so huge to begin with was because it possessed amazing vitality!

The implications were just as massive if the Supreme Sage actually succeeded in his risky consciousness transfer procedure.

Sadly, it didn't work out. The Supreme Sage failed at the most crucial juncture.

The ground suddenly shook. Half of the people milling about in the ruined warehouse complex almost lost their footing.

"What is going on?!"

"Are we under attack?"

"Look over there!"

A huge cloud and shockwave spread out from the direction of downtown Veoline. Soon enough, the Larkinsons began to hear distant roars and explosions. Several bright teal energy beams soared in various directions.

Some launched straight into orbit, but others swept across the surface, destroying thousands of tree structures and killing lots of hunkered citizens at once.

One energy beam even came awfully close to sweeping the current location of the Larkinson airfleet!

If not for the distance from the disaster site being a bit too far, thereby causing the energy beam to fly over everyone's head due to the curvature of the planet, the airfleet might have suffered horrendous casualties!

Alarms began to ring throughout the airfleet. A calamity had set upon Prosperous Hill VI and everyone needed to flee as far as possible from the city!