“The cannon’s full! We can fire off!” Leen’s communication came through, causing me to look back at the Peacock.
It was starting to stand back up.
It seemed to have noticed the Brionac cannon, which was pointed right at it. It spread its wings out and started firing surfboard-shaped crystal feather projectiles toward Leen and Linze.
The feathers fired with intense speed, but Sue appeared out of nowhere in her Ortlinde. It had activated its Overlord mode and stood tall.
“Stardust Shell!” The great mech held its left hand up and formed a defensive barrier. All the incoming missiles thudded against it before falling to the ground.
When it came to defense, Ortlinde just couldn’t be beaten. Sue was the youngest, after all, so I made sure her Frame Gear could never get her hurt.
The feathers began to regenerate on the Peacock Phrase, and I saw my golden opportunity.
“Let’s finish this... Meteor Rain!”
This time the projectiles fell down solely toward the Peacock Phrase. It spread out its tail and began to prepare its interception attack.
Just like before, the lasers scattered out and took care of the incoming attack, but that’s exactly what I was waiting for.
“Do it!” Helmwige and Grimgerde activated the Brionac on my command, sending out the massive bullet with a mighty roar.
The drill bullet kicked up dust and sand as it flew straight ahead toward its target.
It impacted the Peacock Phrase’s body and began to work its way inside. Eventually, it drilled its way through the orange core in the middle of the creature’s chest and smashed its way out the back.
The Peacock Phrase stopped moving entirely, and cracks began to course through its form. In a matter of seconds, it screeched and collapsed into crystal debris, leaving nothing behind but a mountain of Phrasium.
“That’s one down!” I turned to see steam rising from Brionac, Grimgerde, and Helmwige.
“You two okay?”
“I-I’m okay, yes... No problems.”
“I’m quite okay... Somehow. My magic is almost completely spent, however...” I sighed in relief, knowing that their engagement rings would be able to replenish their exhausted mana pools at least a little.
Still, the physical fatigue from suddenly draining their reserves wasn’t so easily mitigated. Physical strength was necessary to keep going while you were running on empty, after all. Firing the Brionac took a lot out of them, so they still needed their rest.
Helmwige and Grimgerde were also damaged due to the recoil, so they wouldn’t be able to do much going forward.
“I’ll have you both warp back to the base immediately. Flora will help you out, okay?” It wasn’t just Rosetta who was standing by at HQ, Flora was also there to treat the injured combatants who were sent back.
I opened up a [Gate], sending the girls back to base along with Brionac and their Frame Gears.
Only the Nautilus was left.
“Touya!” I suddenly turned around at Yumina’s exclamation. What I saw shocked me. The Nautilus Phrase was still bobbing up and down in the air, but several of the metal devils were clinging to its body.
They were gradually wearing away at the creature, as if melding their own bodies to it, partially melting themselves in the process.
It continued to struggle against them, using its tentacles to swipe them to bits, but they had the advantage of a swarm.
There were just way too many for it to deal with. The Nautilus Phrase’s body was slowly dyed a muddy gold as more and more of the Mutated Constructs melded into it, ultimately converting it to their species.
Eventually, it fell to its side, screeching loudly as its tentacles lashed out at random targets.
...They’re not eating it... They’re converting it!
“T-Touya-dono, look at that!” Several gnarled spines began to grow from the Nautilus’ shell, and its thin tendrils bulked out and became squid-like tentacles.
Its body was transforming. It had a metallic sheen to it now and was completely muddy-gold. Its entire body seemed more angular, ominous, and sharp.
The Nautilus began to move erratically, slowly, and rose up.
It was wrong to even call it a Nautilus at this point. It had taken on a disturbing new form, like a cross between a squid, an octopus, and a snail.
Its body seemed a lot larger, too. It must have grown in proportion to the number of Mutated Constructs that invaded its body.
It wasn’t done shifting its form, though... Gradually as it contorted, its shell split down the middle, exposing several sharp, thorn-like protrusions.
It suddenly began firing those protrusions off in several directions, blasting them like rockets. They exploded in the air like fireworks, resulting in a rain of small, sharp debris that began to pelt the desert sand.
“[Shield]!” I managed to block the sudden downpour with magic.
The clustered attack reminded me of the fight against the Crocodile Phrase in Yulong.
The attack was indiscriminate, aiming for friend and foe alike. The debris rained down on Phrase and Frame Gears both. The Upper Construct had been converted to the side of the mutants, so it was no longer affiliated with the regular Phrase.
I looked around the battlefield and saw several Lesser Constructs break apart as they were impacted, I also saw several Frame Gears lose limbs. The Phrase would be able to regenerate so long as their cores were intact, but our soldiers weren’t so lucky.
“Rosetta! Give me a damage report!”
“Twenty-nine Frame Gears received considerable damage, sir! Seven were obliterated, sir! Fortunately, all seven pilots were recovered safely. Two of the pilots have been critically wounded, however. They won’t die, but they will need serious medical attention!” Shit, they must’ve been hit in the cockpit... At least they’re not dead.
“Touya! Look out!”
“Huh?!” I turned my head to the sound of Lu’s voice and saw the Mutated Upper Construct prepare another volley.
It launched its spiny missiles again, scattering the crystal debris throughout the desert. Knock it off, you bastard! Nineteen units were badly damaged, and eight more were taken out of commission. Three more men were severely injured, and could no longer take part in the battle. If this kept up, we’d be in major trouble...
“Touya, you hear me?”
“Doc?” A sudden transmission came from Doctor Babylon. I wondered what she wanted at a time like this. “It doesn’t exactly have all the kinks worked out, but I don’t think you care about that. I’m sending your Frame Gear down there!”
“What?! It’s finished?!”
“More or less... Around ninety percent. You won’t be able to use it to its full potential, but it’s ready to be piloted.” Particles of light began to form into the desert before they scattered to reveal my very own Frame Gear.
The body was coated in Phrasium armor, and golden veins ran through its transparent parts. It was around the same size as a regular Frame Gear. It had something on its back that looked like folded wings, but they were actually part of its support equipment.
It had a katana at each waist side, leaving no room for a shield. It was an offensively-oriented Frame Gear, after all... Two mighty horns protruded from its head, giving it an intimidating aura.
This was my Frame Gear, the multi-purpose combat mech, Reginleif.
Gleaming in the desert sun, my very own war machine stood tall. Seeing it like that made me believe it was truly worthy of its secondary title, “The Successor of the Gods.”
I was almost moved to tears by the sight of my long-awaited Frame Gear, but I had no time to lose.
I flew through the sky and opened up the cockpit. I sat down in the hatch and closed it, while savoring that new-mecha smell. I placed my smartphone down on the console in front of me.
A low rumble began to emanate as the various gauges and meters inside Reginleif began to come alive. The wide monitor turned on, showing me a broad field of vis
ion. It wasn’t a three-sixty degree view, but it was close.
I grabbed the control stick in front of me and began to channel my magic through it. Reginleif turned its head as if to answer my call. It was completely synced up with my intentions.
Taking on an Upper Construct alone was no simple feat... But I had faith in my new ally.
“Alright, let’s go then... Fragarach... Activate!”
“Initializing Fragarach System.” My smartphone spoke back as the wing-like structures on Reginleif’s back unfolded themselves and broke off until they orbited my mech. There were now a total of twelve crystal slabs surrounding the machine.
“Switch to Sphere Mode.”
“Recalibrating Fragarach... Sphere Mode activated.” The slabs immediately turned into orbs, floating around Reginleif like satellites. This was thanks to the power of my [Program] and [Modeling] spells. It could easily shift modes, much like my Brunhild gun.
Alright, then... This seems good to me.
“Go get him!” The twelve crystal orbs blasted toward the Mutated Upper Construct. It transformed several of its appendages into blade-like limbs and tried to cut them down, but the spheres simply smashed right into them and left them shattered. They then pelted its muddy-gold body.
Each of the Fragarach Spheres was over a meter in diameter, and I’d applied [Gravity] in order to make them far heavier than they had any right to be. They weren’t as powerful as a shot from the Brionac, but it could easily obliterate most Phrase structures.
The grotesque mutant floated in the air as it continued to receive a pounding from all twelve spheres. It was like watching a suspended punching bag being knocked around by a boxer. Its body was dented and crumpled, kind of like a car after a bad accident.
“Switch to Blade Mode.”
“Recalibrating Fragarach... Blade Mode activated.” The crystal spheres immediately reformed into blades. They began to dance through the air, slicing freely at the Mutated Upper Construct’s limbs.
While it was distracted, I took the opportunity to spear its body with half of the Fragarachs. They weren’t able to reach its core, however. Due to its muddy-gold body, it was harder to see where the core actually was.
“If that’s how you wanna play it, fine!” I called all the Fragarachs back, converted them into their base forms.
“Switch to Lance Mode!” The twelve crystal slabs all began sliding into each other until they formed a massive lance.
Reginleif grasped it and leaped into the sky before flying toward the Mutated Upper Construct. Unlike Linze’s Helmwige, Reginleif didn’t need to transform to become airborne. It was capable of using [Fly] as an extension of myself.
“[Accel]!” With a single word, my speed boost caused Reginleif to blast forward at supersonic speed, driving the lance into my foe. The mech charged forward faster than a speeding bullet, pushing the lance tip through the creature fully, impaling it entirely. Its body began to splinter and crack, before falling to pieces.
I looked at the golden fragments until I finally found its blood-red core.
“Switch to Blade Mode!” The lance in my hand changed into twelve separate blades, and immediately they ran themselves through the core.
A crack ran through the middle, and the core shattered into pieces.
After a few moments, the metallic shards of the Mutated Upper Construct melted into goop.
I was already high above the ground at that point, gazing down at the liquid as it seeped into the sand.
Reginleif was unlike any other Frame Gear I’d ever handled... It moved just like an extension of my own body.
“What a display... How was it, Touya?”
“Incredible, Doc... Really incredible.”
“Wonderful! That’s to be expected, though... It has all the features of the other Valkyries and more. I even included something that’ll surprise you.”
“...It isn’t a self-destruct feature, is it?”
“I’ll admit I thought of implementing something like that, but I canceled it. It would be a waste to destroy my masterpiece.” That’s your reason? How about having a little consideration for me?! I’m the pilot!
Either way, the Mutated Upper Construct was finished. All we had to do was mop up the rest of the battlefield.
I brought up my monitor and had it display the remaining enemies. There were a lot to the north and east. My sisters were headed eastward... So I decided to head north.
The Fragarachs changed back into their slab forms and docked back on to Reginleif’s back, giving it its winged appearance once more.
“Yumina... Could you and the other Valkyries take care of the mutants? I’ll handle the Phrase in the northern area.”
“Copy that. Please take care.”
“Mhm.” I had Reginleif give the girls a thumbs-up before taking it through the air toward the northern part of the desert.
As I got closer, I noticed that the Frame Gears under the control of Lihnea and Palouf were the ones engaging the Phrase in this area.
The Paloufean knights weren’t quite as talented as the Lihnean ones were, but they were trying their best to support. Still, they were clearly overwhelmed in terms of numbers.
I saw a prone Paloufean Frame Gear about to be blasted by a laser-firing Mantis Phrase.
“Switch to Reflector Mode.” The twelve crystal slabs quickly slid off Reginleif’s back and immediately formed a wall in front of the fallen Frame Gear.
The laser hit the wall of Fragarachs, bouncing it off at a random angle into the sky. If the attacker hadn’t been a Phrase, I would’ve just directed the laser right back at them.
I unsheathed a katana and used it to cleave the Mantis Phrase in half with a single strike. I didn’t even have to aim to take out its core, it was laughable.
“Switch to Dagger Mode.” The wall of Fragarachs split back into twelve pieces, and then each piece split into four. The small pieces then turned into pointed, dagger-like objects. This mode effectively turned twelve slabs into forty-eight daggers.
The daggers began to orbit around Reginleif.
Let’s do this!
“Gladius!” The forty-eight projectiles immediately broke out of orbit and descended to the battlefield below, penetrating Phrase cores over and over again. They glittered in the sunlight as they continued to hunt down their prey.
Gladius was the name I’d given to this attack, one that was ruthless, omnidirectional, and all at once.
Technically speaking, I have to manipulate the Fragarachs by myself. Even though there were support systems in place, I’d say my upper control limit would be about six swords. The more you try to control, the sloppier your control over them would become. In the worst case scenario, they’d start hitting each other, or things other than your targets.
However, Reginleif was an extension of myself and thus was subject to the accelerated mental processes that [Accel] granted me. Thanks to that, I could freely control all forty-eight blades at a time.
If I lost my focus, however, I could still miss. Originally I planned on using my smartphone’s auto-target function, but I realized that it wouldn’t let me change my motions on the fly, or react to situations effectively in real-time.
It was still cumbersome, though. Forty-eight definitely felt like overkill, too. Plus I had to take care not to become too focused on the weapons to the point where my control on the main mech became loose. Fortunately, this mode was just for big clean-up situations.
Lesser Constructs could easily be destroyed with just a single strike, but Intermediate Constructs required me to fuse four or so into a larger blade to pierce its defenses.
Before I even knew it, at least five-hundred Phrase died to my sudden attack.
I recalled the daggers, and they began orbiting Reginleif again like satellites.
“Whew...” I heard celebratory cheers coming from the nearby knights, but I just slumped back in my chair and let loose a relieved sigh.
Man... That was a little more stressful
than I expected.
But it wasn’t over, the battle was still raging elsewhere. I needed to support people in other areas of the Desert, too. I was about to move again when I heard the systems around me begin to power down. I wondered what the hell was happening. Even the lights on the dashboard in front of me were going off.
I continued to look around in confusion as my mech began to descend. Even the little daggers combined back into wings and quickly sat on Reginleif’s back.
“What’s going on here?!”
“Don’t panic, Touya. You’ve simply gone beyond the Operational Limit.”
“The what now?!” I glared in exasperation at my smartphone as Doctor Babylon spoke through it. I wasn’t told about this! Reginleif finished descending. It took a knee in the desert, so I manually opened the cockpit hatch. I immediately regretted my decision, as the desert heat was almost suffocating.
“Reginleif doesn’t work like the other Frame Gears. It moves by taking in your magic directly. However, it can’t fully endure the depth of your mana pool, Touya. That’s why we have the Operational Limit in place, to shut it down before it overloads like the Dverg did... Clearly, the system still needs fine-tuning.”
“Oh come on...” It seemed like I couldn’t use it for over ten minutes at a time. But that was a preferable alternative to having it detonate like the Dverg did... I definitely didn’t want to be responsible for trashing the best Frame Gear we had.
Hmm... I wonder if we can make it run longer if we have it save some magic in reserve... But damn, what about the fight? Ah... Whatever, the others should be able to take it from here. I’m just glad I didn’t hit the limit before defeating that big one.
The limit meant that Reginleif had to be more carefully considered in terms of timing. It was possible we could end up expecting an Upper Construct only to deploy Reginleif and have no Upper Construct appear at all.
It was possible that we could have a situation like this battle, where two appeared without warning... It’d be really bad if there was a long delay between their emergences, too.
I took my smartphone from the console and hopped out of my cockpit on to Reginleif’s shoulder. The sunlight was only intensifying, and it was uncomfortable.
In Another World With My Smartphone: Volume 14 Page 5
