As the Hex Army and subsequently the Golden Skull Alliance finally put their melee mech units into play, the Sundered Phalanx did not remain still. The Gaugers sent forth their own melee mech units in order to stop the enemy from charging too close to whatever was left of the Kosic Ring. Though a lot of orbital space stations had already lost their titan shields and most of their turrets, the enormous metal constructs were still intact mostly. It was not profitable for the attacking to continue to break down these huge fortifications. It took way too many concentrated volleys to blast the sturdy space stations to pieces. Hence, even if the space stations had lost almost all functionality, their physical mass still provided the Sundered Phalanx with a considerable amount of hard cover where friendly ranged mechs could shelter behind. Just like how the Hex Army and the Golden Skull Alliance's ranged mech units continued to utilize nearby starships as cover, the Sundered Phalanx ranged mechs still depended a lot on these remaining hulks to fight while minimizing their exposure to enemy fire. All of that would instantly become invalid if the melee mechs dispatched by the Hexers and the Golden Skullers managed to get into point-blank range! Therefore, the Sundered Phalanx deployed their melee mechs out in force despite the fact that they would be exposing themselves to a lot of ranged attacks as a result! Certain people such as Ves sighed in relief when they saw that the enemy had redirected their fire away from starships. The only mechs that continued to concentrate their firepower on the combat vessels of the invading forces were the heavy artillery mechs of the Witch Shatterers and other siege-oriented mech units. Though Ves would have preferred it if the Eye of Ylvaine focused their heavy firepower on the Witch Shatterers, he understood that it was better for his Transcendent Punisher Mark II's to shoot down the incoming waves of enemy mech units. "This is going to be a lot more interesting." "Meow." Lucky echoed. The gem cat floated next to where Ves was seated and remained fairly alert. "Do you think our mech units will be able to overpower their Fridayman counterparts in the upcoming clashes?" "Meow meow!" "Hahahaha! You're right! The Gaugers shouldn't be prepared for everything that we have in store for them. I am especially looking forward to the performance of the Battle Criers and the Swordmaidens in this engagement. The Avatars of Myth and the Flagrant Vandals shouldn't be too bad either." A lot of years had passed since the Larkinson Clan fought its last major battle. Every mech legion underwent a qualitative and quantitative evolution. Unlike years before, the Design Department had made sure that every Larkinson mech legion came equipped with a synergistic collection of exclusive mech models. Along with the mech doctrines and exclusive strategies and tactics that the servicemen designed around these signature mech models, the Larkinson mech units gained much more power from synergy, coordination and teamwork than before! As Ves studied the battle map, he noticed that the flanking units of the Hex Army and the Golden Skull Alliance were about to collide against their opposition first despite the fact that they had to swing around. The flanking units traditionally consisted of faster and more maneuverable mechs, so Ves wasn't surprised to see that the Flagrant Vandals become the first Larkinson mech legion that was about to collide against their direct opposition! "Taking control of the flanks will provide us with a lot of initiative." While it was important for his forces to be able to achieve a breakthrough in the center, if the elite Sundered Phalanx mech divisions were tougher than expected, then it was crucial to take control of the flanks! If the Flagrant Vandals and their Hexer equivalents were able to overpower their immediate opposition, then it was hard to imagine the Gaugers being able to regain the upper hand in those circumstances. "Once our flanking units are free to do what they want, they can spread an untold amount of chaos!" They could either dive towards the remains of the Kosic Ring to destroy a lot of vulnerable ranged mechs, or circle around and strike the Sundered Phalanx mech formations from the sides or the rear! Ves turned his attention to the right flank in particular. He noticed that Venerable Tusa Billingsley-Larkinson had opted to accompany the hundreds of Flagrant Vandal mechs approaching from this side. The number of Larkinson mechs looked awfully limited compared to the tens of thousands of Hexer mechs that moved ahead of the Flagrant Vandals. However, Ves expected a lot from them. The number of mechs dispatched by the Fridaymen was a little less because the defending forces didn't quite have as many light mechs. This meant that as long as the Hexer light units could lock at least an equal number of Fridayman light units in place, the small but elite Flagrant Vandal mech units could make use of their many advantages to quickly achieve local superiority! This could form a tipping point where the Hexers and the Flagrant Vandals could continue to multiply their numerical advantage at an accelerated rate. Soon enough, the leading units from both sides began to attack each other! The mechs armed with light ranged weapons opened fire on each other. Though their hit rates were so low that hardly any mech experienced any difficulties, this was just the opening move for both sides. It wasn't until the light skirmishers and other melee light mechs started to meet each other in the middle that the fight immediately reached another intensity! Tens of thousands of light mechs on both the left flank and the right flank locked horns with each other. It was extremely difficult for light mech units to maintain large and rigid formations under these circumstances, so they mostly didn't bother to make the attempt. The different units mostly broke up into smaller squads and fire teams in order to maximize their mobility while at the same time maintaining at least some measure of coordination. Legion Commander Abis Firelight commanded the Flagrant Vandals from the rear. Though he was still capable of piloting mech and leading his troops into battle, he was no Casella Ingvar. As the Larkinson Clan grew in size and scope, the responsibilities of a legion commander became a lot more burdensome. Since the Flagrant Vandals predominantly favored skirmishes and independent action, Commander Firelight concluded that it was not that important for him to lead his troops at the front anymore. Despite not entering the cockpit anymore, Commander Firelight still maintained the respect from his men. He had spent a lot of time on shoring up his leadership and administrative skills in order to make sure that the Flagrant Vandals reached the best possible state to participate in battles like these. Now was the critical moment where Commander Firelight and many others would see whether their efforts yielded enough results. The commander leaned forward and studied the projections that displayed the incoming enemy mech troops. The Hexers showed enough ability to hold back their immediate counterparts for the moment, so Commander Firelight was not in a hurry to send his Flagrant Vandals forward. Soon enough, he spotted a second wave of incoming light mechs. The commander's eyes narrowed as the command net revealed that many of the incoming machines hailed from the 6161th Nidin Vergers. The Nidin Vergers was one of the six modern Sundered Phalanx mech divisions that the Golden Skull Alliance were supposed to target. As the mechs that came from this new but powerful mech division attempted to swing around to flank the flankers, the light mechs dispatched by the Cross Clan and the Glory Seekers already moved forward to block the elites from messing up the Hex Army units. Commander Firelight raised his armored hand and drew a few maneuvering orders with his finger. "Work together with the Crossers and Glory Seekers to block the Nidin Vergers and stop their advance. Show what your training and your mechs are worth and roll over the Sundered Phalanx light mechs as soon as possible!" "Yes, sir!" "Take what is ours!" According to the intelligence gathered on the mobility-oriented mech division, the Nidin Vergers fielded a plethora of light mechs among its different mech regiments. The most iconic among them that defined the Nidin Vergers was a light marauder mech model called the Remo Targ. Designed predominantly by Master Xeona Reizen of the Gauge Dynasty, the Remo Targ was a quick, agile and versatile light mech that could fight from fairly close range to point-blank range. It was quite similar to the Valkyrie Redeemer model in that regard, but the Remo Targ model was lighter and possessed much less shock value. Despite these shortcomings, the Remo Targ was not only a lot faster and more maneuverable than the Valkyrie Redeemer, but also infamously hard to hit in combat. The reason for that was because of Master Xeona Reizen's design philosophy. She had dedicated her life to developing boosters and flight systems that excelled at performing an atypical form of evasion that involved brief, discreet and instantaneous evasive maneuvers. Any mechs equipped with her mobility systems typically exhibited stuttery movements that made it seem as if reality itself was lagging! Though Master Reizen's signature 'stutter boosters' and 'stutter flight systems' were notorious for being costlier and more expensive than more conventional alternatives, the results they achieved in battle made them worth the investment! Indeed, as the Crosser and Glory Seeker light mechs began to tangle against the Remo Targs, the latter's stuttery and jerky movements caused a lot of attacks to miss! "Hah! Our stutter movements always throw our enemies off-guard." A Nidin Verger mech pilot boasted. "These paramilitary groups are fools if they think they can stand a chance against professional military forces such as ours. We have fought countless more battles than these pampered private sector goons!" However, the Nidin Vergers celebrated too soon. As the Remo Targs and the other Nidin Verger mechs capable of performing stutter movements continued to dogfight against their opposition, they soon discovered that their foes quickly started to get accustomed to the jerky evasion moves. Despite the fact that the Remo Targs focused more on evasion than on launching attacks, they found that the enemy mechs were able to track them and land their attacks on their fragile frames with rapidly increasing proficiency! "What?! How come they have become so good at hitting our mechs?!" "They must have trained to fight against us in simulations." "That's impossible! Our Remo Targs are equipped with the latest generation stutter flight system. Our enemies shouldn't have learned about the evasion specs of our new mechs." "Isn't the answer obvious? They figured our mechs out anyway!" As the Remo Targs found themselves unable to shake off incoming attacks as well as they expected, the mech pilots pretty much confirmed that their opponents trained intensively to beat them in this battle! What exacerbated the problem for the Nidin Vergers was that they were only partially familiar with the mech models fielded by their current opponents. The mechs of the Glory Seekers were easy enough to figure out as many of them were regular staples of the Hex Army. The mechs fielded by the Cross Clan were relatively unknowns. The Crossers had used them sparingly in battle over the years. Aside from deploying them on mercenary missions, they hardly had any opportunity to fight against enemies, hence the Sundered Phalanx knew too little about these fast but fairly robust light mechs. However, even as the Nidin Vergers tried to cope against their opposition as best as possible by adopting radically different evasion patterns, the Flagrant Vandals assigned to the right flank finally made their entry into battle! "The Larkinson Clan is finally moving in on us. Watch out for their annoying glows!" The Fridaymen and the Larkinsons were old enemies. Though the Sundered Phalanx had not fought against the Larkinson Clan in many years, the former never forgot the defeat it suffered at the hands of the Larkinsons who seemed to have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. "Stay sharp! Don't take their mechs lightly and make sure to firm up your minds. This is going to be a wild ride, men!"