The Mech Touch

A vast swathe of land around Veoline descended into hell!

The entire city district disappeared in flame and ashes as an energy beam that was as powerful as the main battery of a warship swept across the war-scarred tree structures without rhyme or reason.

"UUUUUURRRRAAANNNNNUUUUSSSSSS!" The biojuggernaut cried as it became swept by its overpowering emotions!

The creature showed no inkling of self-control at all. It was like a newborn designer beast that was just learning how to cope with its new existence.

The only difference was that Uranus was at least a hundred if not a thousand times bigger than a typical designer beast!

When Uranus grew hungry, he devoured every juicy biomech within range without caring for what side they were on. No matter if the mech pilots inside fought for the preservation of the current tradition or supported radical change, the voracious giant cared not for their ideals.

The primal consciousness controlling the massive giant simply found it interesting to sample biomechs with different colors and markings on their surface. It was just like a kid who just discovered the pleasure of eating candy!

Naturally, the titanic monstrosity drew plenty of opposition for its action. No matter who made it or where it came from, it had clearly gone horribly out of control. Both sides of the civil war implicitly stopped turning their weapons against each other in order to take care of the greater threat.

The higher echelons of the warring factions knew that there wouldn't be any LRA left fighting for if this walking example of the horrors of unrestricted biotechnology continued with its rampage.

Though no melee mech pilot dared to get close to the immense biotitan, a large amount of ranged units opened fire onto the very large and obvious target.

This was one of the few instances where its massive size worked against its favor!

Yet even after hundreds of rifle and cannon-wielding mechs turned their weapons against the monstrosity, the damage they inflicted were practically as trivial as bee stings to humans!

The hard skin layer that Uranus had recently grown was actually thicker than the frontal armor of heavy mechs. It was only thin relative to its titanic stature. Perhaps a warship-grade cannon might be capable of penetrating its surface layers straight-away, but the biomechs that looked like toys in front of the massive horror were simply too weak to inflict serious damage onto its enormous mass!

"What does it take to make it bleed?!"

"Concentrate our fire, goddammit! Focus on the throat or the joints! Contact the enemy and get them to coordinate our fire. We're not getting anywhere if we're spreading our attacks!"

The biotitan might possess unsurpassed strength, but speed was not its forte. Each movement it made looked agonizingly slow for a human. It was as if Uranus was a human who moved two or three times slower than everyone else.

Yet with arms and legs stretching for hundreds of meters, its plodding movements easily allowed it to traverse a lot of distance. This threw several mech pilots off as their biomechs got caught by the gluttonous biojuggernaut.

"Don't stick around! Just eject as soon as it becomes clear you're next on the menu. We can't allow this giant to eat any more humans!"

As time went by, the different factions managed to bring hundreds more ranged mechs to bear. The pinprick attacks they accomplished against the juggernaut did not immediately result in any persistence despite concentrating their fire, but the desperate mech pilots never let up on their assault.

Both sides had united for a cause that was greater than their political and societal ambitions.

No matter whether they were traditionalists or radicals, no matter whether they advocated for peace or clamored for war, at this moment in time, every mech pilot in the area was part of the same side now.

"Fight for the future of the Life Research Association!"

"Fight to preserve the Supreme Sage's Legacy!"

"Fight for the continuation of our biomech industry!"

Their individual differences no longer mattered. At this horrible time, the mech pilots all stepped up and resisted the urge to flee. Their duty to their state compelled them to stay and do their best to stop the calamity from unfolding any further.

It was too bad that bravery and heroism alone wasn't enough to stop a biomonster whose physical strength and capabilities vastly exceeded that of a second-class biomech.

The Supreme Sage poured decades worth of high-quality resources into its growth process. Though only a small fraction of the materials consisted of low-grade first-class exotics that were extremely hard to come by, the sheer amount of high and medium-grade second-class exotics stuffed inside its huge and dense body magnified its power beyond belief!

"Are we fighting against a mech or warship?!"

The awesome resilience and disproportionate power exhibited by the bioconstruct known as Uranus was exactly why ambitious but unsatisfied mech designers originally came up with the juggernaut concept.

Some of the people who invested in this ambitious new war machine sought to challenge the supremacy of warships. There were even rumors that the MTA aimed to challenge the hegemony of warships when it came to top-end destructive war potential with this radically new mech classification.

Though the sheer amount of practical problems eventually caused the supporters of this initiative to give up their plans, technically speaking, the juggernaut concept was never proven weak.

As long as someone was crazy and obsessive enough to spend an endless amount of money in making a juggernaut, the results were literally mind-blowing!

"Damn, it's continually regenerating its wounds! Just look at how fast it restores its broken skin. We can't slack off our attacks at all if we want our attacks to cut deep!"

Compared to other juggernauts, the gigantic biological monster solved one of the greatest shortcomings of its type.

Its enormous size made it easy to attract concentrated firepower, so damage kept accumulating at a rapid pace. Yet with the high-speed regeneration technology applied to its enormous frame, the biojuggernaut was constantly able to negate the incoming damage, thereby ruining any attempt at wearing it down over time!

As long as Uranus continually fueled its rapid healing process by ingesting more flesh, it could continue to persist even if the entire planet turned its guns against the monster!

Though every biomech in the vicinity had long flown out of the reach of the hungry beast, there were other kinds of high-energy foods available to the undiscerning biotitan.

Its enormous eyes gazed across the lands before its feet. The advanced biosensors and other detection systems integrated in the protected eyeballs and other organs embedded into its frame rapidly recorded and processed a lot of data.

Soon enough, the juggernaut took a few steps before bending down. It punched through the surface of a ruined tree structure and pulled out a fleshy orb that used to be an industrial organic power generator.

As soon as it ingested and digested the food that ended up in its stomach, the juggernaut's wounds healed at a much more rapid pace than before.

The mech pilots who turned their guns onto this monstrosity began to despair as they saw their efforts come to naught!

"Don't stop firing!" A desperate commander shouted on an open communication channel. "We can't give up! No matter how many times it regenerates its wounds, there has to be a limit! We'll fight day and night if we have to. We'll exhaust every single one of its cells as long as we persist!"

Yet Uranus soon showed why their plan of trying to exhaust it over time was likely to fail. After enduring continuous pinprick attacks from opponents that were too distant for it to reach in a short amount of time, the biojuggernaut proved once again that it did not lack any weapons.

It stretched out its arm while causing it to morph into a different shape. After a slight moment of aiming, it unleashed a powerful energy beam that instantly slammed into a distant formation of artillery mechs!

That wasn't all. While the arm continued to unleash enough energy to wipe out an entire city, the tall biomonster rapidly tilted the arm in many different directions. A tracking program had taken over the energetic limb as it precisely directed the arm cannon to wipe out a succession of different ranged mechs units!

No matter whether they were on the ground or in the air, Uranus exhibited a disturbing degree of accuracy as its advanced targeting and firing systems allowed it to destroy distant targets with great efficiency!

If the biojuggernaut was piloted by a sane, obedient human, then this could have been used to great effect in any war or conflict.

Yet now that this capability was being harnessed by an inhuman consciousness, the damage it dealt went far beyond eliminating the ranged mechs that caused Uranus to feel pain.

As the powerful energy beam kept sweeping from area to area, anything in its path was laid to waste. Entire city districts turned to ash or became swept by flames as the excessive energy was too much for the tree structures to bear. Millions of citizens burned or vaporized from existence as the uncaring Uranus did not exhibit sympathy for the plight of the ants beneath its gaze!

As Veoline and its surroundings exhibited long burn scars that were so large and extensive that they could be seen in orbit, the biojuggernaut finally ceased fire.

Though it possessed considerable internal power generators that were able to restore its energy levels, it could not squander its power without limits.

Its hunger had reemerged stronger than ever. The biojuggernaut strolled over the areas it hadn't burnt to a crip and began to dig through the ruins for any high-energy biomachines. No matter whether they were power generators, industrial production equipment or anything else, as long as they held a sufficient amount of energy, they were edible in the giant monster's mind.

The ground shook with each step it took. The few survivors who were unfortunate enough to survie its rampage up close had to hold onto nearby furniture in order to prevent their bodies from flying all over the place due to the miniature earthquakes the half-kilometer tall giant generated by walking.

In fact, the mass of the giant biojuggernaut was so immense that the Supreme Sage had to exaggerate the size of its feet in order to prevent it from caving in the ground too easily!

As it continued its process of hunting down rich energy and nutrient sources, the Life Research Association's counterattack had finally come.

While the forces in the service of the political factions may have failed to fell the giant biomonster, there was a stronger force present in orbit and on the surface of Prosperous Hill VI.

After someone issued a command, thousands of laser beams descended from the skies and struck the biojuggernaut and the land around it! Even though all of the air in the way reduced the integrity of the energy beams as they passed all the way from high orbit to the surface of the planet, the sheer volume of fire still caused Uranus to heat up at a worrying rate!

Soon enough, an enormous salvo of fiery hot kinetic rounds bombarded the entire area occupied by the biojuggernaut! Though these rounds were considerably less precise, they nonetheless hit harder than regular rounds!

Uranus uttered a wordless cry of pain and frustration! Just as its eyes began to scan the upper reaches of Prosperous Hill VI's orbit for targets, a salvo of different glowing energy beams slammed into the eyes of the biojuggernaut!

While the simultaneous attack failed to breach the protective energy shields projected over these critical organs, they somehow stressed the barriers a lot more than previous attacks.

"The military has finally made its move! Our expert pilots have come to save us all!"

"Our expert mechs will definitely prevail over this evil beast!"

Far above everyone's heads, a rapidly-descending organic combat carrier struggled to maintain control as her underside heated up from the friction of her extreme trajectory.

It didn't matter if the vessel broke up from her descent. Her only purpose was to deliver her cargo. As her hangar bays opened up, more than a dozen expert biomechs flew out in quick succession.

Some of the best and most impressive mech pilots of the Life Research Association had mobilized to take down the bioterror that had the potential to ruin their entire state.

"Onwards, Venerables! Let us slaughter this rogue experiment and bring the purpose to justice! Via Veritas Vita!"

"VIA VERITAS VITA!"

Yet just as the expert biomechs started to spread out and employ all of their strength to fell the biggest biomachine they had ever fought in their careers, Uranus keenly recognized the elevated threat from these powerful opponents.

It raised its arm yet again and fired a searing energy beam into the sky!

After a dozen seconds, its biological warship-grade cannon ceased fire.

Every expert biomech that had descended from orbit had turned into charred and flaming wrecks. They descended uncontrollably from the air and crashed onto the ground with not a single hint of life left in their once-impressive frames!

Moments later, the split pieces of the burned and ruined wreck of the biocarrier rained down onto the devastated city, inflicting additional destruction onto an already-wounded planet.

"Our expert mechs…" Someone shakily said.

"No…"

"What will it take to fell this monster?"