Chapter 6261 Specialized Phasefighters The C-Man was in a lot of trouble after getting entangled by over a dozen nets! These nets were not made out of ordinary metal cords. They were surprisingly tough and difficult to tear even if the C-Man exerted all of the brute force that it could generate through its limbs. "What the? These nets are transphasic! They used actual phasewater to make them stronger." Venerable Vincent reported with amazement. "That is nice to know, but you need to get out of there, Vincent! Your C-Man is being targeted by the primary and secondary armaments of at least half a dozen warships! The Ghirard Fleet intends to saturate your coordinates with concentrated warship-grade cannon fire!" Even though there were tens of thousands of nunser phasefighters that could open fire at the trapped C-Man, many of their attacks would only end up damaging the net and allowing the expert brawler mech to go free. This was why the native aliens were willing to spend a bit of additional time so that their warships could bring their huge guns to bear against Venerable Vincent's immobilized machine. Try as it might, the C-Man was unable to dislodge itself from the net. Its loadout was not suited for this at all, which was probably the main reason why the green net-throwing fighters chose to target the expert brawler mech first. As the distant enemy warships were about to open fire on the immobilized C-Man, Venerable Vincent let out a frustrated grunt. "Fine! I didn't want to resort to this, but I will if I have to! A man can never be stopped in his tracks!" The C-Man's muscular form began to convulse. Its exterior layers actually began to distort in shape until much of the outer plating began to grow a lot of sharp blades all of a sudden! That was not all. The blades actually began to buzz before moving across the exterior of the C-Man as if they were chainsaw teeth! The C-Man was easily able to reshape its exterior because most of the mech frame was actually made out of smart metal as opposed to conventional metal parts. The C-Man was actually quite similar to the 80th Element of the Cross Clan! The biggest difference between the two smart metal mechs was that the latter had a higher proportion of nanomachines than the former. This meant that the C-Man couldn't simply extrude itself out of the successive nets as if its mech frame was entirely made out of liquid. Even if it was able to do so, it was doubtful that the mech pilot could go along for the ride. The best way for the C-Man to resolve this problem on its own was to cut through all of the bonds that kept it in place! The change in shape helped to accomplish this. The sturdy transphasic cords that kept the C-Man in place started to snap in rapid succession as the sharp smart metal blades continually grinded against the bonds. Meanwhile, the other expert mechs made a lot of progress in shooting down one green phasefighter after another. The larger craft were protected by considerably stronger azure energy shields than usual, but the firepower from expert mechs such as the Lionheart was too much for these machines to bear. They could only endure one or two hits at most before they were downed. The other expert mechs such as the Riot Mark II and the Blade Chaser Mark II both arrived as well. The two expert mechs primarily focused on cutting the lines that were mostly responsible for immobilizing the trapped C-Man. All of this sounded as if it took a herculean effort to free up the C-Man, but the reality was that it took a lot less time than that to help the C-Man break out of its trap! By the time the other expert mechs managed to cut through half of the lines, the C-Man managed to get rid of enough nets to regain enough movement speed! Five green phasefighters that still maintained their grip on the C-Man found themselves involuntarily pulled in different directions as the smart metal expert mech began to get moving again. The remaining lines quickly got cut off as the Lionheart quickly shot down two of the special phasefighters while the other lines got cut by the Riot and the Blade Chaser. "I'm free!" It couldn't happen a moment too soon. Although the C-Man hadn't been able to avoid all of the incoming attacks, it had managed to get away quickly enough to only endure five powerful blasts. Unlike the 80th Element, the C-Man was in a much better position to resist the attacks! Its TESMAS was not even required to physically resist the powerful attacks as the C-Man's powerful resonance shield easily blocked the powerful attacks. "I'm okay, at least for now!" "Good." General Ark said. "Finish off the green phasefighters. I will try my best to shoot down any I can spot with my energy cannon. Be wary of the other unfamiliar nunser phasefighter models. I have a strong suspicion that the Ghirard Fleet has prepared more anti-expert mech countermeasures." The native aliens fought against humans long enough to get thrashed many times by the high-ranking mechs of the latter. While it was difficult to defeat a human ace mech without fielding champions of their own, the native aliens had a much better shot at countering expert mechs by relying on mundane solutions. The green phasefighters was just the first of many such attempts. The use of nets to immobilize expert mechs was fairly crude and simplistic. Once the expensive transphasic nets got cut, they practically turned useless, so in that sense, this experiment had clearly failed. The nunsers did not seem too upset at this result. The bulk of their phasefighters began to swarm all of the expert mechs at once. Perhaps the main reason why they did not choose to mob one or two expert mechs was that al of the craft would just get in the way of each other. Even so, every expert mech was forced to weather thousands of incoming attacks. The lack of regular mechs accompanying the expert mechs meant that the enemy could fully concentrate their firepower on the select amount of enemy champions. The repeated low caliber attacks steadily drained the resonance shields of all expert mechs. Every expert pilot had to endure increasing strain on their minds and will as they struggled to resist each and every attack that threatened to strike their respective machines. "We need to get down to the surface of the planet and complete our mission as soon as possible!" "Advance! Don't try to evade every attack. It is futile. Just go forward!" Although the expert mechs tried their best to begin their angled descent to the surface of Duqaste XI, the native alien did not let them do as they wished. A new set of enemy phasefighters appeared. Larger than the previous special craft and coated in yellow, the newly emerged small craft looked a lot larger and sturdier than all of the other craft. What was even more important was that the front of their fuselages ended in flat metal surfaces! The purpose of these large metal surfaces could not immediately be discerned. The Lionheart and the other expert mechs armed with backup pistols started to shoot them down in order to preempt their threat. The yellow phasefighters were oddly resistant towards damage, but the firepower of the Lionheart proved to be too great for them to bear. The reason for this became quite evident when they did not attempt to slow down all that much as they approached their respective targets! "Evade the yellow phasefighters! Their functions are probably similar to the nets shot by the green phasefighters! As long as multiple of these craft manage to collide into your expert mech from different directions, you'll get squished between their frontal plates!" It was difficult for the expert mechs to deal with the yellow phasefighters as the latter was a lot more resistant to damage than the other phasefighters. The good news was that they were heavier and slower than the other craft as well, which meant that it was still possible to avoid collisions. The expert mechs were still forced to divert from their course and found themselves unable to proceed to Duqaste XI unless they managed to overcome the blockade of yellow phasefighters. The only expert mech that was effectively able to take them down was the Lionheart. The integrated energy cannon of the powerful expert command mech possessed an abundant amount of firepower and easily managed to cripple or destroy the shielded and armored craft. The Riot Mark II, the Blade Chaser Mark II and the C-Man Mark II were unable to match the performance of the Lionheart in this regard as they only had access to weaker backup pistols at best! "This is no way to fight!" Venerable Vincent spoke in a frustrated tone. "I'm not afraid of these lumbering yellow fighters. We can take them out with ease as long as we don't attack them from the front!" The C-Man blasted forward, much to Ark's chagrin, but the sudden maneuver successfully diverted the attention of a lot of yellow phasefighters. The special nunser craft began to spread out in an attempt to envelop the C-Man from every direction. Vincent registered what was going on, but trusted in the C-Man's ability to navigate through this perilous trap. As soon as the C-Man got close to one of the yellow fighters, the expert mech abruptly began to roll and juke to the side before quickly circling back to strike at the special craft from its underprotected side! As the C-Man was about to launch its attack, its active space suppressor was already working at full power to weaken the yellow craft's transphasic defenses to the maximum possible extent! "PUNCH!" Though the C-Man lost a lot of momentum due to this, the expert brawler mech was still able to launch a devastating punch that crushed the yellow craft's azure energy shield and punched a large hole in the fighter frame! Vincent deliberately commanded his C-Man to punch next to the cockpit. This meant that the fist had successfully crushed the nunser pilot into meat and launched the pieces into space! "These yellow craft aren't so tough after all." Vincent grinned. "Their defenses from the front are insanely tough, but I bet that their protection is mostly directional. As long as we can flank them, we can disable them with ease!" However, as the C-Man got rid of one yellow phasefighter, three more had already converged on the expert brawler mech's position from three directions! Vincent's eyes glinted as his C-Man boldly charged towards one of the yellow phasefighters. Before the two could make contact with each other, the C-Man pivoted until it was able to kick itself off the flat surface of the yellow phasefighter's exaggeratingly large nose before launching itself away! Moments later, the three yellow phasefighters all collided against each other, having failed to squish the C-Man in the middle! The expert brawler mech was constantly forced to evade and maneuver around in order to prevent the yellow mechs from trapping it in place. Though Vincent was able to rely on clever maneuvers to eliminate a handful of these annoying craft, the problem was that a third batch of special phasefighters approached from afar! These heavy fighters were coated in purple, and each of them stood out due to the fact that they all carried heavy missile loadouts! "Careful! The aliens are about to make use of their more expensive munitions! Intercept or evade those missiles as much as possible!" The sensors of the expert mechs detected that the phasewater content inside the warheads was insanely high. That was bound to pose a large threat to the expert mechs regardless of the state of their resonance shields! Due to the interference from all of the yellow phasefighters, the C-Man was unable to get away from the purple craft, allowing the latter to gain a solid lock and launch all of their potent missiles at a range that made it difficult to escape the deadly warheads!