Chapter 7232: Confronting the Demon The fateful time had come. After converting the Riot Mark III into a D-mech, Ves and Gloriana exited the System Space and brought the machine back into reality. When Venerable Rosa Orfan finally had an opportunity to glimpse at her destined machine for the first time, she fell completely silent. Her body remained frozen while she beheld the magnitude of what her battle partner had become. Nobody who was still present interrupted her. They gave her all the time she needed to process the culmination of the Miracle Couple’s work. The technical specifications of the Riot Mark III were impressive and could easily give the First Sword Mark III a run for her money. The additional enhancements brought about by the Demoncasting process should have elevated all of her parameters by varying degrees. It was impossible for the mech designers to estimate how much stronger it had become. Part of the reason why it was impossible to figure out was because of the odd workings of the Prophecy Imbuement Demoncasting Mold. Unlike the other molds that Ves had used in the past, this one channeled much of a demon’s power into enhancing very specific metaphysical properties of the target object. This meant that any increases in strength, speed and toughness should be a lot less dramatic. Ves did not regret this outcome. He never designed the Riot Mark III to function as a physically superior fighting machine. It only needed to be powerful enough to make full use of its more esoteric advantages. Venerable Rosa Orfan certainly looked amazed. The mech that appeared fundamentally wrong, flawed or broken to most people made a very different impression to the pilot who was meant to make use of it in battle. "It is... more than what I imagined in my dreams." She eventually broke her silence. "It has a very different feel than before. My battle partner... is gone, isn’t he? I have piloted the Mark II for multiple years. I know every detail of him. Even outside of the cockpit, I can still feel where he is and what his mood is. It is similar to my long-standing bonds with Dise and Jannzi. However, this time, I get the unmistakable feeling that I am looking at a stranger who is wearing the skin of my old battle partner." Ves slowly nodded. "Your senses have not deceived you. When we performed the final process, your old battle partner fought to the death against a much more powerful foreign invader. The latter has won the contest and has claimed much of the former. The Prophet’s Bane as we have taken to calling the winner has settled into your new machine. Congratulations, Rosa. The Riot Mark III is officially the first adversarial mech of its kind. It is a machine that exists to test and challenge its own mech pilot. Either you dominate your machine, or it will dominate you in turn." His words might sound like a nightmare to any normal pilot, especially one of the Larkinson Clan. The soldiers of the clansmen had been taught to respect, honor and even love their battle partners. Their mechs were alive and possessed the capacity for intelligent thought comparable to humans once they evolved into third order living mechs. The Larkinson Clan currently had tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of living mechs among their ranks, of which the vast majority had already turned into third order living mechs a long time ago. Each of them had spent months and years interacting with humans. All of this socialization had caused many new friendships to form between humans and their living machines. This phenomena had practically become embedded into the culture of the Larkinson Clan! Therefore, what Ves had done to the Riot Mark III most definitely ran counter to this benign development! Fortunately, Venerable Orfan understood. "I had hoped that he would be able to accompany me into future battlefields, but... his sacrifice shall not be in vain." She slowly said. "He knew the risks. He decided on his own to undergo a similar test as my own. I do not regret that he lost. He simply did not have what it took to help me become stronger at the pace I want. I hope this Prophet’s Bane has absorbed all he needed from my old partner. The more familiar he, or it, has become with his new home, the better. I need my machine running in top form in order to fight the enemies of tomorrow." Perhaps others might find it callous that Venerable Orfan dismissed the death of a living personality so easily. The living mech that she had partnered up with for so long had died in a terrible circumstance. He could have gone on to live for many more years, serving as the indispensable partner and comrade-in-arms of Rosa Orfan. Alas, it was not to be. The living mech had fallen, and another entity had taken its place. As Venerable Orfan stared at the dormant D-mech in the distance, the D-mech stared back. Ves had no doubt that the two were measuring each other up. The Prophet’s Bane had grown so powerful and violent that it would never willingly submit to another, especially a human who sought to subjugate it for the purpose of leveraging its power on the battlefield. Before he allowed Venerable Orfan to interface with her machine for the first time, he gave her a final briefing. "I have inspected the Carmine System as thoroughly as I could, which is not as impressive as it sounds as the Riot’s strange properties makes it difficult to scan its interior. The internal diagnostics all report that the components of the Carmine System are still in order. Whether that data is trustworthy remains to be seen, but I think that the most recent transformation has not fundamentally broken it. The greater concern is whether the Carmine System has become... corrupted. I have tried my best to verify that it is still safe to use, but I cannot give you a 100 percent guarantee. There is a small chance that it may poison you on a biological level. The good news is that I am not too afraid that it will harm your spirit because your extraordinary willpower should be able to resist such influences." Venerable Orfan did not look too concerned. "When I become an ace pilot, my Saint Kingdom will become powerful enough to reinforce my body and neutralize the dangers of my own machine." "If, not when." Ves warned her. "Confidence is good, but no outcome is certain. Otherwise we wouldn’t be treating this situation so seriously. This is the last window of opportunity for you to reconsider and back out. I know you don’t want to think about it, but please take this seriously. Do you agree to participate in this dangerous experiment and serve as the test pilot of the first adversarial mech that I have brought into existence?" The expert pilot grinned as her fighting spirit only grew stronger after being questioned. "You don’t need to ask any further. I am in. You don’t need to feel responsible if I fail. Just like my old battle partner, if the Prophet’s Bane has overpowered me, then that just proves that I am not ace pilot material. I would rather end my suffering quickly and die than to linger on for several decades while my progress remains frozen. I am envious, Ves. I am jealous of Tusa, Stark, Dise and Casella for being able to continue growing stronger while I am left out in the cold. This will hopefully change by the end of the day." She stepped forward. Ves accompanied her but remained on guard. His wife and Alexa had already activated numerous safeguards and were currently in the process of installing additional restraints. They had even thought about deliberately sabotaging the mech so that it could not move, but they ultimately decided against it for fear of botching Venerable Orfan’s possible breakthrough. They would just have to put their faith in other safeguards. As Venerable Orfan stepped close to the machine, both sides remained dormant. The Prophet’s Bane appeared relatively calm, though it was hard to tell what it was doing considering its amorphous nature. The true contest would only begin once the pilot attempted to interface with the D-mech. By then, the Demoncasted entity gained a chance to connect with a powerful expert pilot and gain an opportunity to come back to life! It all hinged on whether Rosa Orfan was able to muster the strength and will to unlock her greater potential. Ves placed his hand on her shoulder. "Good luck. We have done our jobs. Now it is your turn. I am counting on you to overcome this challenge and gain control of the Riot Mark III. Once you succeed, you shall be assigned to the Bluejay Fleet and fight against the enemies of red humanity. There are a lot of good fights in store. We may have taken on 30 Ascended Giants, but there are enemies that only you can defeat." Venerable Orfan’s heart swelled with hope. "If your mech can help me make the jump, then I will gladly put myself in your service. My spear shall be yours." She ascended to the entrance of the cockpit. She already changed into her custom superdimensional alloy piloting suit. It featured special orifices that would allow the suit to form a complete connection with the Carmine System of the Riot Mark III. Ves and the others retreated to an adjacent control room. They began to man the workstations and began the preparations for the first test. They first inspected and activated all of the precautionary safety measures. Ves even called over a squad of Ascended Giants who were currently waiting outside in their human forms. "Check the energy cells. They are at 10 percent charge, right?" 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂 "Correct, sir. No more, no less." The Riot Mark III did not need to expend as much power in the first activation. If it ever went out of control and managed to overcome all of the safety measures, then it would run out of energy pretty quickly. There was a chance that Venerable Orfan needed more time to win her contest of dominance against the Prophet’s Bane, but if that was the case, then she was not truly ready anyway. She needed to secure a quick victory. The nearly empty power reserves became another source of pressure to her. If she ended up in a stalemate against the powerful D-mech, then that was as good as failure. After completing the final checks, Ves and his wife exchanged one more deep glance before focusing on their job. "Begin." The Riot Mark III slowly began to activate. The machine performed the mandatory initial checks, which meant that the first start up process would take a long time to run its course. Even as the expert spearman mech slowly roused to activity, Venerable Orfan began to hiss as she felt needles poking into her body. Foreign blood circulated in her bloodstream while her native blood entered the artificial veins of the Carmine System. Both mech and mech pilot exchanged their blood with each other. This crude ritual exchange started a mystical process that brought the two together on a level that went beyond the material realm. A sense of weight and gravity descended into the chamber and control room as those present understood that history was being made here. The very first D-mech and adversarial mech was about to put its pilot to the test. "Mrow." Blinky emerged out of Ves’ head and used his excellent senses to observe the initial contact. The willpower of Venerable Rosa Orfan did not collide directly against the Prophet’s Bane. Both sides exercised an unusual degree of restraint. Seconds passed in relative stillness as the Riot Mark III continued to test and confirm that all of its components and systems were in order. It was only when the machine neared the end of its extensive self-checking cycle that the Prophet’s Bane finally made its move. The eyes of the newly completed mech shone in ominous red as the unwilling artifact spirit surged towards its pilot and attempted to destroy her like it had done to many other demons! "It is starting!"