Chapter 7342: The Coincidental Counter Morale across the remaining human defenders surged after witnessing the spectacular performance of the recovered ace pilot. Saint Rosa Orfan may have disgraced herself by losing control over her psyche in the middle of a battle, but she had fully redeemed herself now that she had come to the rescue in the nick of time! As soon as the Riot Mark III severed the stolen superdimensional plasma halberds from the Ixith Goliath, the monster posed no realistic threat to the ace mech anymore. Unlike the other combatants on the battlefield, happened to be the only full superdimensional ace mech around. Sure, the Dark Apostle happened to be clad in high-grade superdimensional raiment as well, but given the serious battering it had received, the leader had been unable to exploit this advantage effectively against this opponent! The story was completely different for the Saint Rosa Orfan. She was a genuine champion. She had been honed and tested beyond all reasonable standards. She had built up her spearmanship step-by-step until she developed a unique style that perfectly suited her dynamic if haphazard approach towards combat. Her willpower, though far from perfect, surpassed that of Ves and the Dark Apostle countless times! She possessed the awesome ability to distort reality to literally give her an advantage in many ways, from moving faster to spreading destruction across her entire domain. Combining all of that with a cutting-edge mech frame whose raw performance exceeded that of all of the Rubarthan ace mechs on the same battlefield, the sum total of all of these advantages resulted in an absolute disparity in the final phase of this lengthy and exhausting engagement. Every exhausted soldier felt jealous and gratified that Saint Orfan decisively took over their final burden. Perhaps the Riot Mark III may not have been suited to counter endless swarms of weak but persistent voribugs, but against single enemy champions, the D-mech was clearly in its element! Ves could finally rest easy now that his latest and greatest work finally fought the way he intended it to perform. "This is why I chose to investigate the Goliath Hive." He said through Blinky’s form. "It is the only group of voribugs that can give Saint Orfan a stage to perform at her best. There were many twists and turns in this battle, but from the moment the Goliath Hive committed to investing in the Incubator, I already had a feeling that it would end this way." The Dark Apostle did not look so happy at how events unfolded up to this point. His mood was a lot more complex. Unlike his mech designer self, the leader of the Phase Lord Department had hoped that he and his men would have made a better first impression on the battlefield. Unfortunately, their lack of adaptation against an enemy as different as the mutated voribugs cost them greatly. Two more Ur-Titans had died as a result of his overconfidence and rash strategic decisions. Though he regretted the loss of two strong and capable subordinates, he believed that the Ascended Giants would ultimately learn from their mistakes. At the very least, this heavy result should have curbed their ego and made them a lot less eager to strive for independence. After all, if just a single Level 8 Goliath could inflict defeat on them, how could they possibly have the capital to set up an independent empire in the dangerous Red Ocean? While the Dark Apostle thought about how he should handle the setbacks suffered by the Ascended Giants, the Riot Mark III continued to dominate the Ixith Goliath. Although Saint Orfan had been distracted for a significant period of time, she was not ignorant about the threat posed by this powerful alien opponent. She had already received a dense information package that summarized all of the important pieces of information that the humans had discovered so far. They highlighted the transformed Goliath’s reaction speed, judgment, fast regeneration and abundant vitality. The condensed briefing also contained brief speculations about the distributed intelligence and the mechanism behind the Ixith Goliath’s strange ability to generate stolen resonance. She processed all of that information and put it to the test. The results were evident. The Riot Mark III circled around the larger and relatively more clumsy Goliath. Every so often, the machine thrust its tier 3 Destroyer spear forward, striking a resonance-empowered blow that inflicted far greater damage than what it should have produced. The exoskeleton of the Ixith Goliath was actually not that difficult to penetrate for an ace mech. What was truly troublesome was its large scale and abundant biomass. A superdimensional weapon was completely overkill in terms of penetration. The tier 3 Destroyer spear was therefore a much more suitable armament, especially when used by a machine like the Riot Mark III. With a perfectly matched key resonating material in the form of Terran Destroyer Amplification Material, Saint Orfan was able to amplify and expand the destructive potential of her main weapon. She just had to refine her technique. With every strike, the ace pilot became a little more proficient in channeling destructive energies outwards. Saint Orfan consciously shaped her Saint Kingdom in a more offensive direction. There was no need to prioritize defense. The Ixith Goliath was not fast enough to land a hit on the Riot Mark III. Even if it managed to land a claw on the ace mech, the latter’s Chaos Armor could completely withstand an errant blow. The only danger that Saint Orfan needed to take into account was the remote possibility that her opponent would suddenly envelop her machine and surround it with crushing biomass in every direction. Although she was confident that her new D-mech would be able to handle this scenario and tear apart the Ixith Goliath from within, it would be an insult to her skill to allow this travesty to happen. She had enough of taking risks. If there was a way to deliver victory without causing any accidents, then she would take it without hesitation. She resisted the temptation to intensify her attacks and adopted a more sedate offensive rhythm. This put the Ixith Goliath in an awful situation. Its bulk and mass, while still reduced compared to its initial appearance, worked against the megavoribug. More importantly, it also lacked the skill and intuition to predict and counter Saint Orfan’s attacks. The exchange of blows this time clearly showcased the difference between a genuine champion that climbed up to her current height step by step and an artificially-bred abomination that relied completely on bioprogramming and stolen resources to fight at the same level. Minutes passed by as everyone else sat by and maintained their distance. Saint Orfan did not ask for their assistance and clearly did not need any. Nobody wanted to get in the way and ruin the moment. As the Riot Mark III continued to thrust its devastating spear into its target, the Goliath became increasingly more pathetic. Heavy injuries continued to accumulate. Much of its exoskeleton had become cracked and broken. An expanding amount of flesh and organs suffered varying degrees of erosion due to the continuous injection of destructive energies. All of these debilitations made its counterattacks increasingly slower and more feeble, thereby making it even more impossible for the megavoribug to gain the upper hand. The overall performance of the Ixith Goliath also dimmed due to the persistent exposure to the Riot Mark III’s domain field. The Saint Kingdom’s wonderful effect against a Goliath controlled by a distributed intelligence of sorts proved many conjectures about this new strain. Red humanity did not necessarily fear the Ixith Goliath. As long as they gathered enough intelligence and made use of it to develop countermeasures, their subsequent contacts with this Goliath strain would definitely result in fewer losses! It was just a coincidence that the Riot Mark III just happened to possess the right combination of properties against this specific Goliath. Nobody looked surprised when the Riot Mark III ultimately managed to reduce the once-scary and deadly megavoribug into a broken and diminished lump of biomass. While the Ixith Goliath still retained plenty of redundant organs, none of them were in good condition anymore. The Riot Mark III had already sliced off or eroded significant chunks of its exterior. What was left could still recover and restore the Ixith Goliath to full health, but the Larkinson ace pilot clearly did not want to give it an opportunity to make a comeback. This was why her machine methodically began to spread its destructive power to the tissue that surrounded the all-important Mentalist Crystal. Before the Riot Mark III had an opportunity to damage this vital component, multiple parties urged her to be careful. "Rosa, don’t damage the crystal!" Gloriana was urgently transmitted from the Tarrasque. "The Red Three, the Cybernetic Empire and the Rubarthan Pact have jointly designated the Ixith Goliath’s Mentalist Crystal as a vital research sample. We need it as intact as possible! Please do not destroy or compromise it in any way!" The commands irked the ace pilot. "What do you expect me to do, then?" "Defeat the Ixith Goliath, but do not kill it. You can shave away the unimportant biomass at the exterior, but try to preserve the tissue surrounding the Mentalist Crystal as much as possible for research purposes. It is not just the crystal that is valuable. How the mutated voribugs developed a bioconstruct to leverage its properties in such a novel and creature manner is even more fascinating for us. As long as we decipher its secrets, red humanity will benefit greatly from our gains. Our clan will be among the chief beneficiaries with your help. We are already negotiating with the other big players about participating in this high-level research project. Only you can reduce the Level 8 Goliath to a controllable state without annihilating it entirely." The Larkinson Clan possessed a huge amount of leverage at the moment. None of the remaining combat assets could do what the superdimensional ace mech could do at the moment. If the Riot Mark III retreated, the Ixith Goliath would definitely be able to rejuvenate itself and beat the other combatants black and blue. Its foundation as a formidable Level 8 Goliath was still real despite its ragged appearance. Therefore, the mechers, the fleeters and all of the other major players had little choice but to offer significant concessions to the Larkinson Clan in order to secure its cooperation! The potential gains may sound a little vague, but Gloriana had a strong suspicion that they would definitely pay off the insanely high expenditures invested in the Riot Mark III Project! This was pretty much a dream situation for the Larkinsons. There was no reason for them to refuse this beneficial deal. "Very well. I will do my best, but if you don’t have the means to contain this big insect, then that is not my fault." "The Rubarthans are already dispatching a warship that is capable of putting the Ixith Goliath in stasis." Gloriana responded while also transmitting a technical document to her. "The premise is that you can not only cut the enemy down to a smaller sphere, but also weaken and immobilize it. The stasis effect is not too strong. As long as the Goliath can still protect itself with stolen resonance, it will likely be able to resist this effect. You will need to crush and break its willpower even further." "No problem." If Saint Orfan still had control over her corporeal body, she would have smirked by this time. All of the damage she inflicted so far had created so much damage to the distributed intelligence that it had become a shadow of its former self. Not only had so many sentient organic components died by her hand, but her Saint Kingdom continued to disrupt their coordination even further! The resonance meter already showed that the Ixith Goliath was only able to generate stolen resonance at a magnitude of 12 or so laveres. This was a far cry from its peak!