Chapter 7301: A Quiet Approach As the remaining time passed by, the scouting vessels had begun their daring deception. They all pretended to be another regular scouting unit assigned to uncover the battle moon’s secrets. The veteran spacers all did a good job of underselling the true capabilities of the small and nimble starships. The mutated voribugs certainly had no reason to suspect that this batch of vessels was any different from the ones that approached in the previous hours. “So far, so good.” The Ascended Giants of the Ur-Titan Phalanx and the Faceless Giant Phalanx all got ready to fulfill their missions. While they still remained human-sized, they were ready to unfold their true bodies as soon as the ships got close enough. Before they deployed, Ves decided to address them in person. Although he preferred to let the Dark Apostle speak with them, that was currently not possible. There was simply not enough room inside the starship he was on to accommodate a body that was several times bigger than a mech! Therefore, when the giants equipped with nothing but smart metal suits got ready to deploy into space, a projection appeared into each of their faces. “Men and women of the Ascended Giants.” Ves began. “Very soon, you shall embark on your first formal mission since my takeover. It has taken a considerable amount of time to get you here, but this is it. I am aware that many of you have dreamt of fighting against the phase leaders who answer to the Red Cabal, but the mutated voribugs present their own challenges. Do not underestimate them. The Goliath Hive in particular has not only developed its own Goliaths, but have also unveiled a battle moon of a scale that is unprecedented to the insect race.” The Ascended Giants did not take this warning to heart. Gear or not, they still possessed the confidence to go in and out without letting their spatial barriers fall. Ves felt that they were being way too overconfident. One of his goals with this speech was to burst their bubble in advance. “We are not solely fighting against weak and mindless bugs. If any of you still harbor this stereotype, then I advise you to take a good look. Our enemy has evolved. The Goliath Princess is intimately familiar with our champions and our methods. Even if we have not yet spotted any Goliaths in the vicinity, we cannot rule out that there are several of them on guard beneath the surface of the fleshy moon.” The VOBM looked peaceful and quiet on the surface. However, Ves knew better than to judge a book by its cover, at least in this instance. Who knew whether the surface would explode into action and reveal lots of gun barrels when 30 giants looked as if they were about to raid the VOBM! “Safety first.” Ves emphasized to this audience. “The mission is important to be sure, but it is not critical to us. If you are about to get overwhelmed by the swarms, then you should turn back without hesitation. Do not try to be the hero. Our goal is not to fight. Our objective is to gather intelligence. Nothing more and nothing less. Since we know so little about the battle moon, stay sharp and maintain your caution. Do your best to cover your fellow giants if they are in trouble. None of you are meant to fight by yourselves. Teamwork has always been at the core of your phalanxes. Together, the giants shall triumph.” The response to his speech was lukewarm. The giants respected and answered to the Dark Apostle, not Ves. They sort of gotten used to the reality that their leader possessed a split personality ,but that did not mean they were willing to look up to his weaker human self. Nonetheless, the giants had learned to tolerate Ves, knowing that the Dark Apostle would just back up anything his human self had said. Ves paid attention to the projected plot. The scout vessels had split up earlier so that they could approach the organic battle moon from multiple directions. This introduced a delay and an additional risk. Ves and the Rubarthans were afraid that the mutated voribugs would figure out that they had been approached by assets way more significant than a bunch of small scout ships. Sweat dripped from the brows of the Rubarthan officers as they carefully tracked the flight trajectories of all of the loose voribug patrols. While the nearest bugs had already diverted from their previous flight paths in order to intercept the incoming human vessels, they did not seem too alarmed at what was taking place. All signs showed that the Goliath Hive lazily sent a bunch of bugs towards the ships in order to scare them away. The cannon fodder bugs were not particularly fast. Whatever means they used to navigate in space was not that powerful for the less advanced subspecies. This meant that the patrol had no chance of catching up to the scout vessels, but only as long as the latter tried their best to run away. The voribug patrols still served as an effective deterrence so long as the human ships insisted on getting closer. The deeper they penetrated, the greater the risk of getting surrounded and damaged. This was how a number of shuttles, mechs and starships got damaged earlier on. The Rubarthan scouts couldn’t obtain any critical data if they played it safe, so they pushed the envelope and sometimes suffered for their dedication. Subsequent scouts pulled back a bit, but never ceased their attempts to probe the VOBM. Its size and its unsettling appearance made it impossible to ignore. It made complete sense for the Rubarthans to remain obsessed with the organic megaconstruct. What the mutated voribugs might not know was that the Rubarthans deliberately sought to create a pattern. Ever since they came up with the plan to use the Ascended Giants to gather critical data, the Rubarthan soldiers had already set it up by conditioning the stupid bugs to lower their appraisal of human scouting attempts. The price was not light, but all of the effort paid off when the mutated voribugs still behaved in a manner that suggested that they had no clue of the dangerous passengers that were secretly standing by inside the small ships. Ves couldn’t help but curl his lips in amusement. He and the Dark Apostle never thought about employing their human phase lords in this manner. For too long, both of them had gotten used to the open and upright manner in which the native aliens deployed their own phase leaders. To them, their phase lords and phase whales were gods. It was incredibly shameful and dishonorable for gods to deliberately hide their presence and skulk about as if they were thieves. The high-and-mighty alien leaders who deluded themselves into thinking that they were gods could not stand for such behavior! In fact, the same applied to the Ascended Giants as well, but to a lesser degree. Since they used to be humans and had not yet become indoctrinated to a strong galactic-wide institution that had lasted for eons, the fresh and inexperienced human phase lords could still be redeemed. “How long?” Ves asked. “Minutes. Seconds. Any time now.” A Rubarthan commander responded. Time continued to pass by. Ves counted every second that passed without incident. He already felt proud that his ‘boys’ managed to hold themselves back for so long. Under the deliberate control of veteran helmsmen, the scout vessels tried to maneuver around the intercepting voribug patrols. The ships managed to press closer and closer while delaying interception. While their agile maneuvering succeeded in dancing around the initial patrols for a time, they slowly got boxed in as more and more voribug patrols arrived from different angles. When it looked as if a collision became inevitable, the Rubarthans finally issued the fateful command! “Now! Scramble all human phase lords! Good luck!” The hatches of all of the scout vessels slid open. 30 Ascended Giants who had been holding themselves back all this time finally jumped into space! The entire situation drastically changed! The mutated voribugs did not appear to realize what was happening at first. Its cannon fodder bugs did not try to squeeze their potential to the utmost as they lazily enveloped the scout vessels. It was only when a couple of dozen humans turned into Asended Giants and smashed apart the nearby bugs with their fists and legs that the Goliath Hive seemed t do a double take! “The cat is out of the bag!” “Finally!” “These bugs are disgusting.” “Don’t waste time! Advance! Stick to the mission plan!” “Pick up your sensor spikes before you move!” The frustrated giants had been holding themselves back for a long time. Now that they finally commenced their mission, they eagerly crushed the last of the bugs within their reach before flying towards their assigned coordinates with as much speed as they could muster! As they distanced themselves from the scout ships, they did not forget to pick up the bundles of rods that had also been ejected from the cargo holds of the small ships. The Ascended Giants fumbled with the components. They had to unbundle them from each other before slotting their ends to each other. This eventually allowed them to assemble segmented spears that formed complete sensor spikes. The custom-made devices lit up in green to confirm that they had properly been put together. Ves and the Rubarthans sighed in relief when they saw that none of the giants had botched thai step. For all of their unruliness, they were still professional soldiers at heart. They knew how to follow instructions when it was time to get serious. The giants looked very different from each other. Though they all wore silvery smart metal suits that automatically bore the emblems of the Red Collective and the Phase Lord Department, their sizes were not uniform. The main reason why the Ascended Giants had to abide by a uniform scale was due to equipment constraints. Their raiments were made out of rigid alloys and could not change in size, so the human phase lords had little choice but to conform to the limitations of their equipment. This time, there was no need for them to do so, so the giants did not hesitate to unfold their true bodies to the limit. As expected, they were all able to grow beyond the limitations of their gear. The ones that showed the smallest increase in stature were the members of the Faceless Giant Phalanx. That made sense. The Faceless Giants were too numerous. The Phase Lord Department couldn’t spare too many resources for them. They only received the necessary amount of phasewater before they had to work hard to earn subsequent servings through hard work and distinctions. The Phase Lord Department already had a rudimentary reward structure in place. The more excellent giants could always find a way to earn more phasewater by reaching and exceeding performance targets. Even if the quantities of phasewater earned through these methods was not great, every contribution helped. So long as they remained dedicated, even the most ordinary giant could grow exceptional one day. Many Faceless Giants possessed plenty of motivations to pursue more growth. One of the prerequisites of transferring to an elite phalanx was to meet their minimum size requirements. This meant that they needed to digest a lot more phasewater if they wanted to become more than the giant version of cannon fodder! It was clear to see that the Faceless Giants possessed a lot of ambitious soldiers. Outside of the Divine Harpoon who was clearly the largest out of the bunch, over half of them exhibited significant growth that far surpassed the confines of their wargear. These should definitely be the future talents of the Phase Lord Department! Once the elite phalanxes suffered losses, they could easily replenish their ranks by requesting transfers from the Faceless Giants. 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