Ohhhhh!

Torvan's eyes widened, understanding dawning on his face almost instantly.

"Wait," he said, his voice rising slightly with excitement. "You're saying you'll use your gravity manipulation to make the mech lighter? So the Thrust Anchor can actually lift it?"

"Yes," Tatehan said, a faint smile almost touching his lips. But it didn't though. He couldn't imagine laughing in a time as this.

Torvan's mind was already racing, running calculations, adjusting parameters and imagining the execution. His expression shifted from doubt to cautious optimism.

"That... that could actually work," he said slowly. "If you can reduce the mech's effective weight enough, the Thrust Anchor should be able to generate enough lift to send it skyward. And if it reaches a certain altitude..." He paused, his grin widening. "...the structural stress alone might tear it apart. Or we could detonate the Anchor mid-flight. Either way, it's down."

Booyah!

Tatehan nodded.

Before, when his gravity manipulation ability was still low-level, the thought of using it on something this large would have been laughable. It would have been impossible!

Back when he'd first arrived on Mars, freshly awakened in the Red Dragon spaceship with no idea where he was or what had happened to him, his gravity manipulation had been pathetically weak. He could barely affect pebbles. Small rocks even. Things he could hold in his hand.

Then, slowly, through combat, practice and sheer necessity, he'd upgraded. Boulders became manageable. Then enemies: he could manipulate their body weight, make them heavier so they stumbled, lighter so they floated helplessly. He'd used it to redirect attacks, to control trajectories, to turn the battlefield into his playground.

And then there was the fall.

The moment he'd plummeted from the sky after killing Cherak, his survival had depended on his ability to manipulate his own weight, to make himself light enough that the impact wouldn't kill him. It had been one factor among many, but it had been critical.

And now?

Now he was about to use it to control the weight of a twenty-meter-tall, sixty-ton war machine.

The progression was staggering. The scale of it almost dizzying.

But Tatehan didn't have time to dwell on that.

They had a plan. And they needed to execute it. NOW!

They left the commander's office in a rush, moving with purpose through the corridors of the Red Crest Clan base.

Lyra and Riven were assigned to aerial support. They'd each take a Skyblade, the fast, agile one-pilot crafts equipped with plasma cannons and missile pods, and circle the mech, drawing its attention, harassing it with hit-and-run attacks while Torvan and Tatehan set up the real strike.

Torvan would pilot another Skyblade, staying at a safe distance from the mech while remotely controlling the Thrust Anchor device. His job was simple: attach the Anchor to the mech's back and wait for Tatehan's signal.

Tatehan's job was the hard part.

He had to get close. Close enough to focus his gravity manipulation on the mech, to reduce its weight, to make it vulnerable. And he had to do it while avoiding the mech's weapons, its attacks and its destructive power.

Simple…maybe…

——

The eastern district was a warzone.

As Tatehan's Skyblade roared over the city, he could see the full extent of the destruction below. Entire blocks had been leveled. Buildings were nothing but smoking rubble. The streets were cratered and torn apart, littered with debris and abandoned vehicles.

And in the center of it all, the mech stood like a titan, unstoppable and relentless.

It turned, its sensors tracking something, and its rotary cannon spun up with a mechanical whine. A second later, it unleashed a torrent of fire, the rounds tearing through a building and reducing it to shrapnel.

Tatehan's bravery tightened a bit.

"Lyra, Riven, you're up," he said into his comm. "Draw its attention. Keep it distracted."

"Copy that," Lyra's voice came back, focused and actually calm.

"On it," Riven added, her tone surprisingly edged with excitement.

How was she excited in a time like this?

Crazy stuff!

The two Skyblades peeled off, diving toward the mech from opposite angles. Plasma bolts lanced out, striking the mech's armor and leaving glowing scorch marks but doing no real damage.

The mech's head swiveled, tracking the movement, and its weapons shifted, locking onto the Skyblades.

Good. It was distracted.

Tatehan pushed his Skyblade forward, descending rapidly, heading straight for the mech.

As he approached, he summoned his armor, the silver plating flowing over his body in an instant. His helmet snapped into place, the HUD lighting up with targeting data and tactical overlays.

After he upgraded the armor thanks to Riven at the weapon's room, it had felt kinda like Iron man's lol.

He brought the Skyblade in low, skimming just above the rooftops, closing the distance fast.

And then he saw it.

The mech's left arm, the one tipped with the plasma cutter, began to glow, the heat intensifying, the weapon charging.

And it was aimed directly at him.

No. Not at the Skyblade.

At him!

Tatehan's heightened perception kicked in instantly, the world slowing to a crawl as his mind accelerated. He could see every detail with perfect clarity: the plasma cutter's barrel glowing white-hot, the energy building inside it, the exact trajectory it would take when it fired.

It was aiming for his left hand.

The one gripping the Skyblade's controls.

If that plasma beam hit, it would melt through his armor like butter. Through his hand. Through the controls. The Skyblade would crash, and he'd be dead before he hit the ground.

He had maybe half a second to react.

Tatehan's mind raced, options flickering through his consciousness in rapid succession.

Dodge? No time. The beam would track him.

Armor? The kinetic absorption wouldn't help against energy attacks.

And then it hit him…

In a fire time as this, the only option was…

Phase Shift!

He'd never used it in combat before. Never tested it under real pressure. But it was his only option.

The plasma cutter fired!

A beam of superheated energy lanced toward him, cutting through the air with terrifying speed.

Tatehan unsummoned his armor, just the gauntlet on his left hand, exposing the flesh beneath.

And then he activated Phase Shift.

His left hand flickered, becoming translucent, shifting out of sync with reality.

The plasma beam struck.

And passed straight through.

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