The Mech Touch novel Chapter 785

The biggest question in everyone’s mind was whether the survivors of the Starlight Megalodon artificially cultivated these exobeasts. It seemed too preposterous to the Vandals and the Swordmaidens that the descendants managed to tame these powerful and savage exobeasts by relying on their charm.

Everyone paid a lot of attention to their local exobiologist Dr. Tillman, who endured a lot of pressure trying to figure out as much as possible from their appearances.

None of them expected the locals to use mounted exobeasts as war machines!

"Taming and mounting exobeasts is more common throughout the galaxy than you think." She remarked. "Those action dramas where exobeast riders are battling against each other somewhat reflect the truth. When people get stranded on a planet with giant exobeasts, their first thought is to defend against their aggression. Their second thought is to harness their power for their own uses. If they succeed, they have secured what is in all purposes a warbeast that can contend against mechs."

"So.. that makes it unlikely that the city fields any mechs?" Chief Dakkon asked.

"It isn’t easy to keep an exobeast docile. Look at how big those creatures are. None of them appear to be herbivores either. These are apex predators who have grown close to the theoretical size limitations on unmodified organisms. I cannot tell whether the genes of the exobeasts in front of us are tampered with, but so far I have not detected any traces of human-directed optimizations."

That did not rule out that these reptilian-like exobeasts received some tune-ups. Those who tampered with their species had been very conservative in their intervention if someone did interfere in their evolution.

"Isn’t this planet terraformed by the crew of the Starlight Megalodon?" Ves asked. "If that is true, then shouldn’t these beasts be croaking or something?"

"It may be that the terraforming is less extensive than we initially expected. At the very least, the changes in the ecosystem and the change in air mixture may in fact have benefited these beasts more than others. Perhaps they are one of the few surviving apex predators that have survived the transition."

Too many explanations existed for them to make a solid conclusion. What mattered to the Vandals and the Swordmaidens was that A27 fielded ten formidable exobeasts, each of which massed more than a heavy mech!

While that did not necessarily mean they possessed the combat prowess of a heavy mech, their deadly appearances did not suggest that they grew to such a size because they enjoyed the heavy gravity.

On Aeon Corona VII, growing larger should have been a bad evolutionary path for most species! Those who evolved into larger creatures likely relied on something special to negate the drawbacks of enduring such a heavy gravity, and all of the clues so far pointed to the strange yellow crystalline growths embedded in their foreheads, limbs and other parts of their body!

Some only featured a couple of crystals while other creatures boasted more than a dozen of them! The center-most exobeast and the largest among them carried seventeen lustrous crystals.

"The big guy in the center must be the top dog of this bunch. It’s the biggest creature by far and looks like it is keeping the other beasts in line."

"Those crystals serve as both energy reservoirs and antigrav modules." Chief Dakkon confirmed as he poured over the sensor readings directed at the exobeasts. "The crystals are holding a strange form of energy. I can’t readily identify it. The antigravity effects they exert is almost identical to the field affected by an obsolete antigrav module. Those crystals are almost certainly designed by humans!"

"Are those crystals grown by the exobeasts or have humans embedded them into their flesh?"

"Implanted." Dr. Tillman stated after a few seconds. "I can see the remnants of crude surgery marks in the scales and hides surrounding the crystals. They’ve likely been implanted when these exobeasts were young or adolescent. However, I’m not sure how the crystals have grown to such a size. The readings suggests that the crystals have grown in tandem with the exobeasts."

This was the first definite clue that humans interfered with the growth of these exobeasts. For what purpose, though?

"The crystal closest to the rider is constantly emanating a small but concentrated field. It is shielding the riders from the brunt of the planet’s gravity."

Well, that was one reason why humans went through the trouble embedding the crystals into the flesh of the exobeasts. Where did those crystals come from, and how had they been synthesized?

Even if Ves experimented with crystals before during his development of his Crystal Lord design, that did not mean he knew what was going on here. Each crystal possessed unique properties in the same way any metal different from each other.

Iron, lead, gold or titanium all fell under the category of metals, but they exhibited dramatically different attributes and applications.

While the experts conferred with each other and shared their observations, Captain Byrd conferred with Captain Clarissa of the Swordmaidens over short-ranged comms.

Both of them recognized that the exobeast riders issued a challenge against the Flagrant Swordmaidens!

Even though culture and language may have diverted over a span of thousands of years, some patterns of behavior remained constant throughout time. Not just humans, but many sentient alien species valued the concepts of duels.

Duels were basically the most primitive and direct way to establish superiority over others without resorting to a full-scale conflict. The leader or a champion put their life or honor on the line in a duel that would have far-reaching effects in the relations between the two parties.

The fact that the exobeast riders evidently demanded a duel showed even if the inhabitants had been largely uncommunicative towards the visitors, both sides still shared at least one common language!

The language of the biggest fist!

The contention between Captain Byrd and Captain Clarissa grew when they tried to decide how to respond.