Chapter 2656: Old Survivors Two different fleets were locked in struggle! Task Force Umbra along with extra forces dispatched by the Praetor Clan and the Planat Clan barreled down onto the Golden Skull Alliance's fleet with hatred driving them onwards. The Fridaymen hated the Larkinsons and their leader! The Praetors and Planats resented the Crossers! Much of the excitement that took place in the beginning phases of battle centered around the Komodans. The result of the artillery duel between the Transcendent Punishers and the elite ranged mech troops of the Friday Coalition had far-reaching effects. Despite involving a relatively small quantity of mechs, the clear advantage secured by the Ylvainan artillery mechs left them free to train their prodigious firepower against the advancing carriers and mechs of the opposition! That did not necessarily mean that the thousands of other Fridayman ranged mechs were incompetent. They just excelled in a different form of combat. They placed less emphasis on long-ranged precision and more on medium-ranged suppression and skirmishing. The rifleman mechs of the 1002nd Holvein Grenadiers, 77th Corundian Giants and other elite mech regiments numbered much more than the contingent of 125th Destiny Hammers and 219th Witch Slayers. Yet much of their laser beams and gauss rounds slammed ineffectually against the thick hulls of the opposing starships. While the damage onto the Larkinson vessels kept accumulating, the lifespans of the targeted combat carriers in question did not diminish fast enough! Even if the combat carriers finally succumbed under all of the weight of fire, their destruction accomplished little else besides robbing their owners of a bit of cover. Escape pods launched towards the rear minutes before the vessels drifted out of control or ruptured when their structure was methodically torn apart. Billions of pieces of debris flung in each direction as other starships exploded as critical power reactors or other volatile components reached critical levels! Not every evacuating crew member managed to make it back to the Spirit of Bentheim. Plenty of escape pods were shot down by errant attacks or deliberate shots. Deadly debris could also shred the vulnerable shells keeping their occupants protected against the hazards of space. Sometimes, escape pods arrived at the flagship of the Larkinson Clan intact, only to deliver a corpse as an intense burst of radiation turned its occupant dead! The battle was becoming more and more tragic as the range between the two fleets continued to shrink! As destruction rained down on both sides, a group of expert pilots gathered together in the hangar bay of the largest capital ship on the battlefield. The Hemmington Cross was at least a kilometer longer than the Spirit of Bentheim. The fleet carrier was also considerably thicker, though that came at the expense of mobility and other properties. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎 The ship endured significant attacks from the beginning. The Praetors and Planats had focused much of their firepower on the pride of the Cross Clan, but their bombardment only resulted in surface damage. The ship may not be as well-armored as other fleet carriers, but she was still a vessel built for war! It was not a problem for the huge vessel to endure the firepower outputted by thousands of enemy mechs for an extended amount of time! If that wasn't enough, the Crossers also adopted the same tactic as the Larkinsons. Numerous combat carriers flew in front of the Hemmington and used their considerable bulk to block the enemy from compounding the damage inflicted onto the Crosser flagship! Of course, the Crossers did not have much luck in felling the enemy capital ships eithers. Both the Praetors and Planats had committed one fleet carrier each to this operation. The Praetors had dispatched two different capital ships. The first one was the Vindicator 35, a fairly average fleet carrier with a total capacity of 500 mechs. Despite her lack of strengths and weaknesses, the Vindicator 35 was a versatile and useful capital ship that served the Garlener clan well. The second fleet carrier was even bigger. Capable of carrying 700 mechs, the Palmis Crislin was almost just as ludicrous as the Hemmington Cross. She also happened to possess the same faults as her armor and mobility were not very good. The Planat Clan dispatched just a single capital ship. Compared to the other capital ships, the Soaring Eagle performed below average, reflecting the relative weakness of the Planat Clan. Capable of holding 450 mechs, the Soaring Eagle was a fleet carrier that was past her time. Her aging hull may still be serviceable in contemporary battles, but she was destined to be replaced at any time! If the two clans of the Becker Tribe only brought these capital ships, then the Crossers would have gone on the offensive by now. Yet the clans that had turned their coats had also brought 51 combat carriers, though several of those vessels were already taken out of action! Both sides knew that this was just the prelude. They had clashed many times after the Cross Clan lost its warlord and ace pilot. They roughly knew what both sides were capable of. As clans who used to be part of the same tribe, the intelligence they possessed on each other mechs, starships and mech pilots was still relevant. The Crossers knew that they were the disadvantaged compared to their opponents, but they were already used to these circumstances. Different from before, the Cross Clan now gained the confidence to reverse the expected outcome! Patriarch Reginald Cross proudly stood before three other expert pilots. All four of them exuded aggressive force of wills. Despite their nature, they peacefully existed alongside each other. The battles the Crosser expert pilots had been through had forged an undeniably close relationship between them. These seasoned warriors wouldn't have been able to make it out with the remnants of the clan if they didn't learn how to trust each other's backs. "The traitor clans have made a very grave mistake this time." Reginald grinned. "They only dispatched a portion of their forces. We weren't able to beat them when entire mech divisions hounded our tails, but now that they have brought less than 4000 mechs, we stand a good chance of crushing our current opposition!" The other expert pilots looked fired as well. Many Garlener tribes and clans had all conspired to tear the Cross Clan apart. The Praetors and Planats had behaved especially reprehensible because they had switched their allegiances to the enemy as soon as the Cross Clan no longer possessed its invincible momentum! "The two traitor clans must not be doing so well back in what remains of the Becker Tribe." Venerable Linda Cross, an older and grizzled female expert pilot surmised. "While we aren't privy to the details of the peace treaty brokered by the Empire, the Praetors and Planats are probably more on guard against their neighbors than us. We are little fish compared to the giant sharks that are swimming right next door." Just because the traitor clans switched over to the side of their former enemies didn't mean they were buddies now. The Billard Tribe and the Chardon Tribe still harbored great suspicion and greed towards the remaining territories of the Becker Tribe. The Praetor Clan and Planat Clan had to keep as much of their strength at home in order to guard against any untoward actions. Venerable Banner Cross, another old expert pilot, frowned. "Perhaps the Praetors and Planats have already put us out of their minds. They succeeded in preserving their clans at the cost of our own. In our current state, we pose no threat to them anymore." "What do you think, Imaris?" Reginald asked. The fourth expert pilot let out a weary sigh. "We are already beaten. We used to rule over entire star systems. That time is past. We have been reduced to a single fleet, and a diminished one at that. I wish.. I wish.. we could have saved more Crossers. I still mourn for our expert pilots. They were too young to sacrifice themselves during our retreat." A heavy mood descended over the gathered expert pilots. Their force of wills grew calmer as the four old expert pilots painfully recalled the desperate flight that caused them to lose so many comrades. One of the biggest tragedies of their initial flight from Vicious Mountain was that they lost all of their younger expert pilots! None of the Crosser expert pilots that survived to this day was younger than 50 years old. Those with brighter futures and greater talent had all met their end prematurely as they gave up their lives to hold back the enemy expert mechs. Patriarch Reginald's force of will suddenly grew intense as he raised his fist! "We can't tear down the traitors entirely today, but we must not let their dishonor go unanswered! We must not let our descendants grow up hearing that we have fled Vicious Mountain like craven rats. We must beat our enemies today if only to regain our honor and build a better future for the subsequent generations of our clan! Let us smash the traitors and let the entire Garlen Empire know that the Cross Clan can still earn glory!" The expert pilots all boarded their mechs. Even though they weren't actively developed anymore, the expert mechs were all formidable in their own right. The only Crosser expert pilots who survived up to this point were all strong, experienced and tricky without exception! Venerable Linda Cross was a space knight specialist. With a piloting career spanning over three decades, she and her expert mech were countless times more formidable than Venerable Jannzi Larkinson and her Shield of Samar! Venerable Linda's expert mech, the Amphis, was a formidable medium space knight that boasted unparalleled defense but also considerable offensive capabilities. The most notable weapon system on the Amphis was its compact shoulder-mounted laser cannon arrays. Able to output 6 powerful laser beams at the same time, the Amphis was capable of suppressing powerful enemies or wiping out many weaker opponents without needing to close the distance! Venerable Banner Cross was responsible for providing more powerful ranged solutions. The Leskin, his expert rifleman mech, was armed with a special heavy multi-rifle that was able to output many different types of damage. The Leskin was also incredibly fast and mobile, allowing it to outpace every other expert mech aside from lighter machines! The oldest surviving Crosser expert pilot also happened to pilot the fastest expert mech in the possession of the Cross Clan. Venerable Imaris Cross may be over 80 years old, but his slightly-declining reflexes was still good enough to pilot the Conavis Mer, a very agile light skirmisher. Even if Imaris fumbled for some reason or another, his expert mech's formidable active and passive ECM systems had always managed to rescue him from a difficult situation. As for Patriarch Reginald Cross, his expert mech was the most formidable and most valuable expert mechs of them all. He boarded the cockpit of the Bolvos Rage, a hefty medium hybrid mech that possessed a myriad of close and medium range solutions! The Bolvos Rage's most formidable weapon was an axe made out of mysterious exotics and other materials. The weapon did not possess any special gimmicks, but it didn't need any. The axe was both hard and sharp, allowing the Bolvos Rage to hack through most shields in a single blow! The hybrid mech also carried a shotgun. The weapon was notable for its huge threat against other expert mechs. It was capable of firing specially-manufactured pellets that was very effective in exhausting resonance shields! The only downside was that the defection of its high-ranking mech designers left the Cross Clan with no means to produce additional shotgun shells. The Crossers had lost the formulas. Patriarch Reginald had already requested Professor Cortez to reconstruct them or develop a viable alternative. That would take time, however, so the expert mech only had a limited amount of shells at its disposal. The Bolvos Rage actually integrated several other weapons and modules in its frame. The high-tier expert mech surpassed the narrow specializations that the local mech community favored. Hardly any enemies knew what to expect when they faced the expert hybrid mech in battle! Patriarch Reginald Cross briefly closed his eyes before fury entered his gaze! "Our time has come. Let us launch and meet our old enemies!" Four glowing stars rocketed out of the hangar bay of the Hemmington Cross and formed up in front their fleet!