The Mech Touch novel Chapter 953

If the Vandals and Swordmaidens regained their ability to access the galactic net and communicate with the rest of the galaxy, they could do a lot.

Even if the Comm Consortium and many others listened in to their conversations and data transmissions, it would still be fine as long as Major Verle managed to relay a brief message to his superiors in the Bright Republic.

Just like how the Swordmaidens called upon their friends to back them up, the Vandals would also be able to muster up some help.

The only difference between the two was that help from the pirates would arrive much faster by dint of their proximity. Any help the Bright Republic could offer would be limited by the fact that they could only draw upon assets from home, which was very far away from the frontier.

Therefore, the crucial point in the coming month for the Vandals was to stay in the good graces of the Swordmaidens.

This was the most precarious situation the Verle Task Force ever came across! As long as they crossed over this difficult hurdle, the remnants of this once-great mech force would return home soon enough.

In the next couple of hours, the Vandal and Swordmaiden vessels successfully escaped the envelopment of the pirates attempting to corner them. The hole blown open by crippling the Finmoth Regal’s mobility successfully allowed them to fly to the edge of the star system without bumping into any other human opposition.

As for the sandmen, they mostly congregated towards Aeon Corona VII for some unfathomable reason. Those close to human ships attempted to hunt them down if possible, but such chases mostly went nowhere.

Some human vessels already managed to escape this cursed star system!

Due to the weird behavior of the sandmen, no one wanted to stick around in this star system any longer than they had to! Beside the Dragons of the Void, every other force just wanted to get as as soon as they could before they all got swamped by a swarm of sandmen ships!

As Ves sat in his office and called up the long-ranged scanners pointed towards Aeon Corona VII, he wondered in his head if this was all Sigrund’s doing.

He had the feeling that Sigrund attempted to take control over his fellow sandmen. While the hybrid AI managed to draw the motherships towards him, taking control of them was easier said than done.

If Sigrund already managed to co-opt the sandman motherships, then he would have certainly sent them all out to hunt down all the escaping human ships!

The less humans made it out, the lower the chance that his existence would be exposed! It was already bad enough that the ships that just jumped out of the Aeon Corona System.

As half a day went by, the remnant fleet finally managed to cross the point where the system’s gravity finally fell below the danger threshold.

[ALERT! FTL TRANSITION IS IMMINENT!]

The surviving crew all prepared for the activation of the FTL drives. After locking everything down and securing themselves into place, the Shield of Hispania and all the other ships successfully transitioned into FTL.

Practically the entire crew and refugee Vandals aboard the combat carrier erupted into a spontaneous cheer!

"Yes! We’re finally out of this goddamn dangerous star system!"

"We’re safe! We’re safe! We’re safe!"

"This calls for a celebration! Let’s head to the ship’s bar and drink until we pass out!"

A palpable sense of relief overcame every Vandal as they finally put down their guards for the first time in months.

To some, this respite gave them the opportunity to come to terms with losing so many of their fellow comrades. Not only did they lose virtually every member of the ground forces, they also lost the majority of their space forces as well.

To others, the temporary reprieve allowed them to relax their shoulders and unwind in order to forget their worries. Many Vandals started to drink, gossip, gamble and even entered into fistfights against each other.

In general, the security officers mostly allowed the unruly Vandals to vent and decompress even if they became a little bit too rowdy. The Shield of Hispania picked up way too many Vandals, and concentrating so many people together in a single ship was bound to lead to problems.

Ves watched on as Vandals did their best to... cope. He found that word fit the current circumstances best. All of them incurred some trauma or another in the Aeon Corona System, and they couldn’t be more jubilant when they finally exited this blasted place.

Even Ves felt as if he needed to do something else. However, he didn’t feel the need to lose control like the rest.

He chalked it up to his vastly altered body and mental states. "All the genetic treatments are at least good for something."

The documentation left behind in his CFA comm told him little about the concrete effects. They only vaguely explained that the gene optimization treatments would improve his human nature in a comprehensive and holistic manner.

How this actually translated into benefits differed from person to person. These benefits also affected more than more concrete and measurable variables such as his lifespan, immune system, energy intake and muscle and bone strengthening.

As he projected a mirror image of himself in front of him, Ves studied his appearance and noted that despite the faint increase in maturity, he also transformed in many other ways.

"I don’t look all that different, but there’s something about me that gives a different charm now."

Besides his maturation and his increased confidence in himself, he also exhibited that transcended human quality that made it obvious that he went through many augmentations.

He would never be mistaken for an average baseline human. Ves found that to be a little bit annoying. Even if he thought he looked a little more dashing than before, he would rather prefer to look plain and unassuming.

The more people underestimated him, the more they wouldn’t look too closely into the secrets he tried to hide.

"Still, it’s not as if looking distinct is all that bad."