"Let go of me!"
On the island of Lachefania, the Silver Wing Angel was sprinting with Lily in its grasp. The beautiful and sexy female host struggled desperately, but under the cold alloy hands of the Silver Wing Angel, her resistance was futile, akin to a lamb's feeble struggle, bringing a sense of mental pleasure to the viewers.
Ignoring Lily's struggles, the Silver Wing Angel rode for over twenty kilometers on Lachefania Island before finally setting her down.
"Bastard, lunatic, pervert!" When Lily landed, she let out a sharp scream, "You dare to kidnap me, this is abduction! You've lost your qualification for the competition!"
Reno manipulated the mecha, half crouching in front of Lily.
A finger pointed at Lily's face, "Perhaps I should correct a few mistakes for you, Miss Lily. First, you're just a host, you have no right to revoke my qualification. Second, the competition doesn't say attacking the host is prohibited, so I haven't violated any rules. Third, you're not as important as you think. From the moment I caught you until now, twenty minutes have passed, and the league hasn't stopped because of you, nor has any force attempted to rescue you."
"You damn bastard..." Lily gritted her teeth.
"Lastly, the live broadcast is still ongoing," Reno said coldly and mercilessly.
Those words reminded Lily, and she shivered, instinctively looking around, although she couldn't see anything, her rich hosting experience made her understand that countless pairs of eyes might be watching her.
Just a moment ago, Lily was full of anger, but now she quickly regained her composure, a professional smile appearing on her face. "You're right, Mr. Shadow. I have to admit, although your skills are not that great, your reaction is quite clever. You even thought of using me as a shield to escape the plaza. However, I doubt whether you can escape the chase that follows. After all, cleverness is only effective for a while, isn't it?"
"I don't need your concern," Reno piloted the mecha backward.
He ran towards the jungle, using the terrain to conceal himself, although he knew it wouldn't be of much use.
Behind him, on the holographic terrain map of the Expedition starship, every mecha appeared as a red dot in various corners of the map.
A middle-aged man in a blue captain's uniform was watching the big screen intently.
An aide approached, "Report, all mechas have escaped from the plaza. The first round of preliminaries is complete, with eighteen percent of mechas eliminated, twelve drivers dead, and one hundred and twenty-eight seriously injured."
"Give them ten minutes. After ten minutes, send out the disc-shaped fighters to begin cleaning up, initiate the first stage of weapon unlocking, and increase the attack intensity by five percent."
"Increase the attack intensity by five percent? That means there will be more casualties."
The middle-aged captain replied absentmindedly, "Because of that damn host, the firepower was reduced later on, leading to a lower death rate. Without enough death rate, there's not enough excitement in the league."
"But this time the host was kidnapped, and the audience satisfaction is high."
"The problem is that the data won't explain this. The death rate is an important indicator of the league's excitement. If kidnapping the host is a momentary climax, then the death rate is the long-term proof of the league's excitement... The death rate of the league must be maintained at around one percent, neither decreasing nor increasing is what we want. The former reduces profits, and the latter increases risks."
"Understood, sir, I'll arrange it." The aide turned and left.
As the orders were conveyed, a swarm of disc-shaped fighters flew out from under the Expedition's huge hull, whizzing around in the sky, heading in all directions.
These disc-shaped fighters were unmanned attack aircraft, numerous in number, agile in flight, but with weak firepower. In a real starry battlefield, their mission wasn't actually attacking but defending, primarily used to intercept attacks, including lasers, missiles, space torpedoes, various high-energy cannons, and so on. If the superalloy deck and energy shield were the ship's body defenses, and the laser emitter was the long-range active defense, then the disc-shaped fighters represented the ship's middle defense circle. It was like the fence outside the house, providing important defense that was sparse but not leaking.
However, here, these modified disc-shaped fighters, breaking away from their passive role of being beaten up, began actively hunting down mechas.
The disc-shaped fighters swarmed out from under the ship's hull like a swarm of bees, forming a huge group in the sky, bringing with them lasers that filled the sky.
Below were countless mechas running like a fleeing army, covering the mountains and plains.
Every now and then, a mecha was hit by a fighter, igniting flashes of light one after another. The disc-shaped fighters fired small micro-fusion bombs, which caused hydrogen and helium atoms to undergo fusion reactions, resulting in intense explosions but causing no pollution, making them the most commonly used conventional weapons in interstellar warfare.
The explosions caused by small micro-fusion bombs on Lachefania Island lifted one mushroom cloud after another, and the powerful shockwaves flattened everything within a hundred meters, with the precision as if measured with a ruler.
And in the sky above Lachefania Island, the Expedition was like an iceberg slowly drifting over from a distance. The huge hull, as well as the densely packed gun barrels on it, made people feel intimidated. It was like a high-ranking general, coldly watching the chase of the soldiers, occasionally taking action to clean up some annoying fellows.
Reno maneuvered the mecha swiftly through the jungle of the deserted island, evading the pursuit of the disc-shaped fighters by leveraging the terrain.
He still stumbled occasionally, looking like a complete novice unfamiliar with mechas— the massive demand for stability from the control system made Reno unable to adapt immediately under pressure.
However, he was quickly adapting.
Pressure could make people panic, but it could also drive progress and even spark brilliance.
He ran desperately, operating quickly, and the familiar feeling gradually returned to his body. The Silver Wing Angel dodged skillfully through the jungle, becoming more and more fluid. He didn't know how many pairs of eyes were watching him at that moment; he just kept driving the mecha, running non-stop.
Boom!
A micro-fusion bomb came flying towards Reno.
Just as it was about to hit Reno, the Silver Wing Angel leaped suddenly, covering a large distance in an instant. The fusion bomb exploded behind the mecha, sending shockwaves towards the Silver Wing Angel. Then, the energy shield on the Silver Wing Angel lit up, blocking the impact. Taking advantage of the shockwave, it surged forward for a distance, then rolled on the ground, narrowly avoiding a laser beam overhead, and escaped unscathed into the jungle.
"Beautiful!" The audience cheered together.
The tactical evasion just now was executed very coherently, not commonly seen even among experienced players. It was unexpected to see it demonstrated by a rookie.
This was the advantage of the control system. While losing stability, it provided Reno with more tactical choices. What might be considered a relatively complex tactical evasion for others was much simpler for Reno.
However, the spectacular performance brought about greater trouble. At least four disc-shaped fighters were now chasing after Reno.
The belly of the aircraft opened, revealing four launchers, each carrying two fusion bombs.
"Damn it!" Seeing eight fusion bombs appearing, Reno's nerves tightened suddenly.
"No!" Nora, Spheer, and others exclaimed together, even many spectators shouted out— they hadn't seen enough of this rookie's performance and didn't want him to be taken out so soon.
Reno's pupils dilated, and his tension rose to the extreme.
At that moment, he heard an angelic voice in his ear.
"Weapons unlocked. You can choose to unlock a weapon with an attack intensity not exceeding ten standard Pu."
Pu was the unit of energy intensity. Named after Larryson Pu, the inventor of the energy shield generator two thousand years ago. The power released by the first energy emitter invented by Pu was taken as a standard Pu, becoming the universal unit of energy intensity. Until now, it was still widely used.
For example, the standard energy intensity of a Guardian-class interstellar battleship was one million Pu. The attack intensity of a regular space mecha was usually between five hundred and three thousand, which meant, using five hundred as the standard and not considering the energy recovery of the starship, a space mecha needed two thousand attacks to destroy the energy shield of a starship. The attack intensity of a ground mecha usually ranged from ten to fifty, with the killing power only about one-fiftieth of that of a space mecha.
Although the value was so low, it didn't diminish the fact that mechas were still the strongest weapon on the ground.
As the voice of the smart brain sounded, Reno loudly said, "Unlock the High-Frequency Blade Mesh."
At the same time, eight fusion bombs were flying towards Reno.
Reno raised his hand, and countless crescent-shaped high-frequency blades shot out from the right arm of the Silver Wing Angel, flying in the air with a whistling sound, forming a mesh of gears.
If the disc-shaped fighters were the mid-level defense net of the starship, then the blade wheels formed by these high-frequency blades were the mid-level defense net of the mecha. As these high-frequency blades flew out, a dense net of blades appeared in front of the mecha. At the same time, the Silver Wing Angel swiftly retreated.
The eight fusion bombs came whistling towards the low altitude. The welcoming blade net automatically intercepted all the fusion bombs, causing a series of smoke explosions on the island.
"Beautiful!" All the spectators shouted out together.
A beautiful defense lay not in the means of response but in the moment when this rookie player made the most accurate choice.
"Perhaps his hands and feet aren't agile enough, but his mental reaction is very quick," an offstage host laughed into the camera.
But for Reno, the battle was not over yet.
His right hand raised again, and another bunch of high-frequency blades flew out rapidly, this time directly towards the four disc-shaped fighters.
Many people didn't know that Reno had already prepared at the moment of choosing to unlock the weapon. He chose the high-frequency blade because this type of weapon had a wide range of applications, not only for defense but also for offense. The attack intensity of each high-frequency blade was only three points, but when they attacked collectively, they were enough to deal with disc-shaped fighters that served as cannon fodder and had no defensive energy shields.
The whistling high-frequency blades streaked across the air, crashing into the disc-shaped fighters. In a wave of tremendous impact, the four disc-shaped fighters shook and fell towards the ground.