The Marshal’s Little Fairy 8

The result of the mock battle was, unsurprisingly, unsatisfactory. Instead of a duel, the two divisions ended up getting eliminated by either the Parasites, simulated mechs, or the asteroids themselves. Survival-wise, the first division won with Aiden being the last one remaining.

"Marshal," Bai Liang showed Dantalion the list of improvements needed for the new recruits.

Dantalion took his tablet and read it with a frown, "Gather all the generals. Tell them to bring 3 senior recruits with them to be their division representatives."

"Yes, Marshal," Bai Liang promptly went away to contact all the generals' assistants and relay Dantalion's order.

30 minutes later, everyone gathered in the simulation ground in a neat line. Ivan also joined after hearing the situation and stood with Dantalion and Oster in the observation deck. The atmosphere was tense as everyone could feel the marshal's heavy mood.

Dantalion didn't say much and only said that he wanted to evaluate their aerial piloting skill. They would go through the simulation one division at a time while the rest waited outside. They could decide the order themselves.

This time, Ivan was the one who set up the simulation with the improvement points Bai Liang made as a reference. Since they were senior recruits, of course, the difficulty was much higher. It wasn't brutal, but it was the bare minimum requirement they should have to be worthy of the new mechs.

The thirteenth division's mechs were already exclusive mechs which were made out of rare materials that could support an awakening dragon's power. All they needed was to update their program with the new one which was why they didn't need to have the mech itself.

Still, it didn't mean that the new mechs were worthless. They couldn't let them be turned into scraps of metal robots in the hands of incompetent soldiers.

Dantalion, Oster, and Ivan watched the performance of every division and their expressions turned increasingly severe, scaring the wits out of the generals behind them. Compared to the new recruits, they were indeed infinitely better, but only two divisions could complete the simulation with blood, sweat, and tears.

Ivan fixed his glasses, "Although their skills are unrivalled on land, it seems like we have been overestimating their aerial skills. Special training is required."

"Magnum Corps is the expert in fighting Ether Parasites while Glory Corps fight best on middle terrain," Oster added. "If we let this be, only our thirteenth division can go against them in the evaluation."

Dantalion looked at Bai Liang, "Cain, what do you think?"

"As Marshal and Admiral Ivan said, special training is indeed required," Bai Liang nodded. "With the new mechs' specs, a single mech should at least be able to fight against level 5 Ether Parasites with ease, but with the soldiers' current skills, they will only be delivering themselves on a silver platter. Literally."

"What should be the minimum bar they must achieve in the special training?"

Bai Liang hummed in thought, "I believe it is best if they can at least single-handedly defeat a level 3 Ether Parasites with the current model. If that is not possible, then at least, they should be able to move as agile as they are on land."

The generals who had been listening could only look at Bai Liang as if he was crazy. Each level of Ether Parasites was 3 times bigger than the level below them. A level 3 Ether Parasite was practically 9 times bigger than their mech. It was like telling a baby to fight against 5 dragon soldiers.

Yet, Dantalion, Ivan, and Oster nodded in agreement.

"Sister-in-law, you have good eyes, don't you?" Oster looked at Bai Liang with sparkling eyes. "You've never piloted a mech before, have you? I think you can pilot one just fine! Why don't you show them how it's supposed to be done?"

Bai Liang glanced at Dantalion in askance.

"Are you familiar with the controls?" Dantalion first asked.

"I have only studied them in theory," Bai Liang answered. "Other than that, I have been following the new mechs' progress update and studied some more things from the engineers here as well."

"Do you want to try piloting one?"

Bai Liang was honestly interested. It looked fun after all.

Seeing the small, embarrassed nod, Dantalion had the urge to hug the little fairy and pet him like a cat. He lowered the brim of his cap to hide his desire, "Go. You'll be doing the same simulation."

Bai Liang nodded and handed his tablet to Ivan before leaving the observation deck to go down. The generals thought the marshal and admirals were going mad from anger and only Joan knew how accurate Oster's words usually were.

The soldiers below watched the marshal's assistant entering the simulation ground and looked at each other unsurely. They were dumbfounded when they saw the fairy enter the mech without any hesitance.

Bai Liang sat down on the pilot seat and wore the safety belt. 3 screens enveloped him on his front and sides with a smooth, black control panel attached to them. On the seat, there were 2 metallic controllers in a shape of a ball embedded into the right armrest while the left armrest had a control panel.

He tapped on the chair control panel twice and the mech turned on. The screen in front of him soon loaded the view outside as if it was merely a window that had just been cleaned. The mech's internal information was shown on his left while the external information of his environment outside was shown on his right.

Once Ivan saw that Bai Liang was ready, he started the simulation.

Bai Liang immediately felt his body became weightless along with the mech and he used the front panel to put in some commands and calibrate the mechs to his preference.

Because this was a simulation, he couldn't use his spiritual sense. The level 3 Ether Parasites were still big and easy to spot, but they consequentially overshadowed the simulated mechs. With that, he decided to take care of the mechs first since the Ether Parasites were set to not attack the simulated mechs.

When everything was ready, he set out to start his hunt, nimbly rolling the left ball on the armrest. His speed was swift and his manoeuvres were sharp.

He encountered the first mech straight ahead and, without slowing down, he rolled the right ball and aimed his plasma gun at the enemy mech. His left hand swiftly tapped on the armrest and shot several bullets consecutively.

The first enemy mechs exploded and he hid himself nearby, on the lower side of the asteroid belt. In reality, all mechs could locate both Parasites and other mechs, but the simulated mechs were set to not have this feature to give them a handicap.

Once the enemy mechs appeared to check, he massacred them all.

There were 2 groups of 3 simulated mechs, so he still had one more group to do. One of the Parasites spotted him first and quickly chased after him. Instead of running away, he went full speed towards it with his canons up.

As he expected, the Parasite disappeared from its spot. He skillfully rotated his mech and shot the plasma cannons to it that appeared behind him. Parasites didn't have any particular weaknesses, so he could only keep shooting until it was riddled with holes and turned into dust.

Getting a reading behind him, his fingers danced on his armrest and he manoeuvred the 2 balls at the same time. His mecha flew up sharply just as plasma bullets shot towards him while increasing his own shots per second towards the Parasite.

2 mechs immediately chased after him from behind. The Parasite timely died and he quickly rushed away. 3 enemy mechs tailed behind him and he went straight into the middle of the asteroid belt to challenge them.

The 2 groups of mechs were calibrated based on Magnum and Glory Corps. The first one he eliminated was the Glory Corps' mechs. The one chasing him right now was Magnum Corps' mechs. They were more difficult to handle, so he could only resort to some tricks.

While everybody was stunned and questioning their existence in the universe, Oster had a big grin on his face as he watched Bai Liang fly and fight as swiftly and sharply as a hummingbird.

Ivan was also mesmerized by the sight reflected on his lens. His eyes couldn't intricate themselves away from the beautiful and precise manoeuvres that were impossible to be replicated by any artificial simulation program.

This was how a fairy would fight. It was a form of art itself.

On the other hand, Dantalion felt that it was only a matter of fact that his little fairy was strong and special. His eyes following the mech were a pool of deep and possessive love that he himself didn't even notice.