“Confirmed hit. Falling back.”
The moment that message came through the comms, the hybrid unit holstered the cannons it had been holding in both hands and began to retreat, arms crossed like the Supreme Ruler of the Century’s End charging ahead on his black stallion, Kokuoh (though, to be clear, only the upper body looked composed—the lower half flailed about with a wildly unsettling gait).
From the beginning of the engagement to retreat, it had taken roughly thirty minutes. The people from the Second Division had been watching the entire time, and they were already deep in discussion about the new model’s performance and combat style.
“…It took out four large, six medium, and over twenty small targets in that short a time? And then inflicted massive damage on dozens more with that last incendiary blast?”
“Unbelievable. What in the world is that thing?”
“More importantly, what was that movement?”
“A four-legged side jump? How are the joints not shredded?”
“Swapping weapons is one thing, but shooting while jumping? How is it managing to hit anything?”
“Right after it took out that large monster with the 120mm smoothbore cannon and thermite penetrating rounds, it whips out two 80mm howitzers, one in each hand, and rains down incendiary shells? What the hell was that thing designed to fight?”
Mwa-ha-ha-ha! That’s right, be amazed! It’s unbelievable! That, my friends, is our latest model—Mikage!
Amid the collective shock of the Second Division officers, Takafumi Mogami, the man responsible for designing and building the new mech, reveled in triumph.
Just moments ago, these same people had been calling his creation a monstrosity. Now they were tripping over themselves to heap praise on it. It was the kind of turnaround every engineer dreamed of.
Granted, it’s probably never going to reach this level of performance again.
Even as he basked in the glory of having his machine finally earn the appreciation it deserved, Takafumi knew better than anyone that this was an exceptional case.
Keita’s remarkable showing had only been possible because this was a trial run, which had let them take a few shortcuts they usually wouldn’t have been able to.
First off, transport. Normally, the unit would have been carried inside a magicite crystal by its user, Keita, but this time, they’d flown it in. As a result, Keita only had to carry it a few kilometers from the air base to the front line. That dramatically reduced the physical and mental strain on him.
Then there was the weaponry. Every gun had already been preloaded, had the safety off, and been stashed away, ready to use. All Keita had to do was draw and fire. Naturally, there were no spare rounds, so reloading was impossible.
And even if it was possible, Keita had no experience reloading mid-combat. It would have taken him ages.
If we’d let them see that, our evaluation would’ve tanked. Though I’m sure some of them watching figured it out… Still, if the initial setup can yield this kind of result, they can’t really complain.
After all, combat was unpredictable. No mech was ever going to be deployed in perfect conditions. That was why the most important thing as far as the military was concerned was adaptability—how well a unit could handle the unexpected.
Which was to say that a test conducted under ideal conditions like this didn’t make for useful reference material.
…Or at least, it normally wouldn’t.
“The pilot has no experience reloading or resupplying in the field. The maintenance crew has never repaired the unit after real damage. The commander has no actual operational experience. There are lots of unknowns that we’ll have to start working through. But if a student who’s had the unit for less than a month can pull this off…”
Yes! This is it!
Takafumi’s biggest miscalculation—as well as his greatest stroke of luck—was crossing paths with someone like Keita, whose whole way of thinking was slightly off.
Using weapons with the upper body while moving the quadrupedal lower half might have sounded simple in theory, but when the top half was humanoid and the bottom half beast-like, the difficulty skyrocketed. Anyone who knew anything about the structure of the mech would have sworn it couldn’t move, let alone fight.
Of course, Takafumi himself had asked Keita how he was able to operate it, considering this fundamental design flaw.
To that, Keita had replied, “I can sort of get it to work by treating it like a third-person shooter. It’s probably a little different, actually—like I tweak the visual inputs a bit. Anyway, it’s sort of like that. There’s some lag, and melee combat gets tricky, but I figure I’ll get the hang of it eventually.”
I had no idea what he meant back then, but I think I get it now. He’s got that rare spatial awareness you hear about in elite snipers. The ability to visualize yourself from above.
It was a skill that was referred to as having a “hawk’s eye.”
In other words, he’s combining the live feed from the camera with his own innate ability to track his position from a third-person perspective. That’s probably how he builds a 3D mental map of the battlefield and predicts enemy movements.
That was why he could see when attacks were coming.
If he could see attacks, he could dodge them.
If he dodged them, he could keep his cool.
And if he kept his cool, he could aim properly.
Once he was locked on a target, pulling the trigger was easy.
The recoil from landing and jumping caused the mech to shake, but the unit had been built heavy to absorb that. So long as the sights were precalibrated, that shouldn’t pose any major issues. Plus, it was no doubt a huge source of reassurance having the elite Second Division right behind him as backup—another factor not to be overlooked.
This performance was a result of those ingredients coming together.
Of course, Keita didn’t actually have any fancy third-person perspective skills. All he did was zoom out on his eye-cam feed and try to replicate the feeling of a certain video game as much as possible.
Nonetheless, the fact that he could accomplish this with that single trick proved one thing: Keita was hopelessly infected with FromSoft-brain.
No one in this world knew what FromSoftware was, of course, so they couldn’t possibly have realized that his very soul was corrupted by some otherworldly element.
But putting aside Keita’s incomprehensible condition…
Right now, we’re relying entirely on his unique skills, but if the Second Division backs us with funding and actual battlefield trials, we’ll be able to gather more data. Then even if future models perform slightly worse than the prototype, we can mass-produce units that are more than satisfactory!
Thus, Plan V—which, so far, had only ever existed in a madman’s mind—began to take shape in the real world.
If Keita had been around to hear this, he would have immediately pointed out how ridiculous it was and started coming up with a proper plan. But sadly, not one person present had enough classic mech anime knowledge to keep up.
There was no one to rein things in, and Takafumi, who did know the machine’s flaws, had no intention of revealing them here. So what would happen next?
“Tell me, Mogami. There’s only one of that unit so far, correct?”
The conversation moved on—right in the direction the madman wanted.
Here it is!
“Yes, it’s just that one for now. If we reallocate some spare parts, we could probably put another one together soon. However, as you saw, the machine is riddled with issues even at this stage. It’s also extremely picky about the pilot. If we rush into building a second unit before resolving those problems, it might cause more harm than good…”
“It is a prototype, so some issues are to be expected. That said, let me be clear: While it’s impressive that it has the firepower to bring down a large-class monster solo, what really caught our attention was its evasive capabilities. This kind of unit will be the envy of the corps, especially for pilots stuck in cannon coffins. We’ll submit a formal request as well, but please proceed with the second unit. Of course, we’ll assist with pilot testing and field evaluations. Feel free to reach out to us at any time.”
“I’d be honored to!”
Their once-ignored prototype was now in the spotlight.
For Takafumi, this was more than personal vindication—it was a professional breakthrough. The Second Division, which was always in need of weapons and munitions, had just become a valuable business connection.
Yes! Now I can keep my employees fed!
Sure, building a passion project like this was a romantic idea, but if no one bought into that romance, it was just an expensive piece of trash.
We still need more trials, and I don’t know how the second unit will go, but the Second Division has essentially already bought Unit 1 along with all its weapons and ammo! That’s more than enough for now.
With the demonstration a clear success, the prototype’s value had skyrocketed. Now they could pitch their other products as well. And it was all thanks to Keita.
You did great, kid. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Just rack up a few more wins and outrank the rest of your class!
“Now then, let’s talk about dates and locations for the next round of tests…”
Takafumi had recently been on the receiving end of frosty looks from his wife, his daughter, and even the finance department. Yet now he was eagerly coordinating the next test schedule with the Second Division, hoping to finally bring some profit to the company and repay Keita for his help. He was unaware, of course, that Keita’s real dream wasn’t to find glory on the battlefield and rise through the ranks, but to quietly serve as a test pilot and eventually secure a nice, safe desk job.
Thus ended the debut mission of the hero who would one day be known by allies as the Harbinger of Death and “weirdo,” and by his enemies as the Black Deviant.