Chapter 357

357 Search & Rescue, Pt The first enemy squadron was immediately alarmed when the first two were picked off without any warning. They attempted to perform active scans all around them, even as a few more were shot down.

But all they saw were vague signals coming from the distance.

It was only when the two Oni cores were within 3500 meters that they even came on their targeting lists and sensor reports. Even then, the information seemed warped and garbled and hard to completely pin down.

Surprise filled each of the pilots – Imperial sensors were top of the line in the entire galaxy. How these ships were able to scramble them was beyond their ability to accept.

“Yunsza squadron! Intercept!” cried their bladechief. “Now, now!”

The first squadron quickly formed up with the bladechief, who charged straight towards Freya and Lucifer. They quickly bore their stinger-like weapons on the spherical cores as best they could, though their aim kept wavering due to the constant disruption that hit their targeting systems.

They filled the air with dozens of devastating dark orange beams regardless. Not that any hit their target.

The Imperial pilots were immediately humbled as they watched those two cores easily evade their beams – they simply wove around them with incredible speed and agility. As though beams were easy to evade.

To further add to their humility, the two Oni cores kept on going and buzzed past the intercepting Drogar squadron. As though they weren’t important to bother with in the first place.

.....

As though their efforts were completely in vain.

At which point each of them slowed as they banked and turned around as fast as their bodies could handle it. They all felt massive pressure from the g-forces of their extremely hard turn, but ultimately pushed through, leveled off, and continued their pursuit.

Once they had fully spun around, they saw exactly how far the cores had gone. The two of them had already engaged with the second squadron far ahead, and began to dismantle them.

“What devils created those ships?!” muttered one of the pilots.

“Let’s get ’em!” cried another. “We can’t let Vyesta squadron take all the hits!”

“Wait!” cried their bladechief. “Slow down to flanking speed. Split in two and circle around. And start pin-point scans. It’s clear the Hegemony’s deploying experimental fighters. We’ll need to analyze them first and determine their weaknesses. If we can get fresh intel on new technology, and send it up the chain first, we might even get rewarded for it.”

“So we just watch as the Hegemony kills our brethren?” said one of the pilots. Shock was deep in his voice.

“Once we have enough data to send to the analysts, then we engage. If Vyesta falls in the meantime, then they only have their weakness to blame.”

Far ahead, Freya quickly adjusted her trajectory and maneuvered aggressively. And in doing so, avoided multiple beams from the frigates stationed nearby. A second aggressive maneuver shook off numerous beams from the fighters jockeying around her.

She felt a heavy pressure set down on her chest as her blood was pushed around her body, as the extreme g-forces washed over her in various directions.

It was a feeling she hadn’t experienced in a long, long time.

Freya had long since trained her body to the point of controlling every fiber in it. To the point that handling even the most extreme maneuvers in the best fighters and mecha were relatively easy for her to do.

Almost all other ships in the galaxy were designed around powerful main thrusters, and supplemented by multiple weaker maneuvering thrusters. Even the ones developed by the Empire. It was, in essence, a galactic standard.

But this new core with its higher speed and acceleration was a whole different beast. Because each of its drag vents were equal in power, and distributed uniformly, they could maneuver quickly in every direction. And with unbelievable speed and agility.

As a result, Freya very nearly g-loc’d a few times from blood getting pooled to her hands or feet. She was forced to use Ascendant Form, if only to regulate her blood flow as best she could.

She quickly zero’d in on the closest fighter, gracefully wove her way over to it, then began to circle. And as she did so, she fired on it with her heavy plasma lance. And similar to standard thermal beams, the plasma immediately superheated the chitin on contact.

But unlike standard thermal beams, it didn’t just soften the armor – it also ripped apart any metal ions embedded in the composite.

She scored the chitin with her plasma lance, and left deep, blackened trenches all around it, even as she circled aggressively.

Not that her target took it all without a fight – he did his best to scramble and evade out of her grasp. But no matter what he tried to shake her off, Freya easily outmaneuvered him at every turn. Because both ships were so intertwined with each other, and were flying evasively, any supporting fire from the rest of the squadron or the frigates were of little use.

Any accidental hits did almost nothing to the rapidly spinning omnitronium rings surrounding the core. They spread out the damage so quickly that they were easily repaired over the next few seconds.

Once Freya was satisfied with the gridwork she had carved into the fighter’s surface, she bore her mortar right in the middle, and fired.

The deep black mortar immediately struck the Drogar fighter and burst open. At the same time, the blue-white halo of electric energy swept across its surface. Multiple arcs of electricity danced across the armor plating, dug further down into the exoframe, and began to overwhelm all of its liquid circuitry.

With a sudden burst of energy, every system on the ship was filled with power, and their signals flared out.

The pilot panicked as he tried to limit the energy damage and vent excess energies into his thrusters. However, devourer nanites that spilled from the mortar spread up and down each of the trenches etched across the chitin.

They chewed into the armor and exoframe and systems with absurd ease. One by one, the fighter’s systems failed, and all sorts of warnings and alerts filled every screen. Eventually, it all went dark and all systems wound down.

The pilot’s eyes widened in horror as he hit every control he had. But nothing he did worked.

His ship was dead.

Then, the Drogar fighter careened towards the ground and crashed into the dirt with great force. Shards of chitin of all sizes were thrown in the air from the impact, and numerous cracks spidered across the armor’s surface.

Inside, the exoframe had severely deformed inward, and numerous systems had been torn into pieces. The top of the fighter had also caved in from the impact, and crushed the pilot amidst mangled equipment.

He groaned in pain as his life was squeezed out over what seemed an eternity.

“Got us some juicy data,” said Freya. “Took a snapshot of a fighter just as it flared out. Which means we might have a great view of how their ships work.”

“Didn’t they tell us to stop flirting?” said Lucifer. “And yet here you are, dangling sweet datasets at me.”

“You wanna see it or not?”

“Obviously, yeah.”

Freya immediately sent the data to hir core, which began to scroll past at the edges of hir 180 degree screen. Lucifer immediately began to drool at what ze saw.

“This is too good to be true,” ze said. “Better send it up to the fleet for analysis.”

“Already did,” Freya retorted. “And also, if I’m not mistaken, I’m ahead of you by two kills. I think you’ve got some catching up to do.”

“Easy for you to say,” ze retorted. “You don’t have to worry about running out of ammo with your fancy energy weapon.”

“Excuses, excuses.”

Lucifer tsk’d loudly, then dove towards the closest Drogar fighter. Similar to Freya, ze completely outmaneuvered hir prey. No matter what technique they employed, hir core’s absolute agility was more than enough to cancel it out.

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So as it zigged in any given direction, Lucifer zagged right after.

Also similar to Freya, ze too controlled her own bloodflow using the energies of hir True Harmony. It was the only way for hir to counter the immense g-forces hir body endured from the extreme maneuvers.

It was rather exhausting for the both of them – even if it was a minimal amount, it was also constant.

Ze exhaled slowly as ze regulated her blood flow, then turned hir core aggressively. Ze made absolute sure that hir aim was centered on the exact same spot, and fired bursts of flak straight into it.

The superheated 20mm balls ripped into the chitin and tore off large flakes with every cluster that struck. More than that, many of them embedded into the armor, and softened it further and further.

And the more ze dug in, the easier it got.

Until ze broke all the way through the chitin and ripped into the pilot inside. He was literally torn apart by the flak and cooked by the heat. He barely had time to scream from the pain.

The fighter quickly lost all control and careened towards the ground. One of its stingers snapped off when it struck the dirt and bounced off, then another bent inwards the second time it landed. Shards of chitin were thrown in every direction along the way.

By the time it came to a stop, Lucifer had already sped towards yet another Drogar fighter, which ze unloaded a burst of flak into. At the same time, ze angled hir corrosion sniper at another fighter, charged it up, then fired.

The round ripped into the chitin and ate its way past the exoframe and deep into the ship’s cooling systems. Nanites flooded the coolant chains and began to eat away at every module along it, bit by bit.

And as they chewed into the cooling paths, every major module and system began to overheat. Their operating temperatures rose up higher and higher, even as the cooling system failed more and more.

Alarms and alerts flashed on the Drogar pilot’s screen as his systems failed one by one as the seconds passed. With swift movements across his holographic controls, he rerouted as much energy as he could towards his repair modules. Then he forced all of his repairs to focus solely on the cooling systems.

But the damage was done, and his systems were fried. The heat built up more and more, beyond his ability to control and contain.

Numerous systems quickly reached their absolute maximum and completely shut down on him. His screens began to wink out one by one as his fighter dropped down towards the dirt.

Darkness swallowed him when the ship hit the ground, and the exoframe wrapped itself around him.

“There, that’s two more, making us even,” Luci exclaimed. “Happy now?”