"Alright. Everyone knows the drill." She began. "We've managed to locate a wild god that is two days away from the camp by our faster mechs. It's a feathered lizard that is closely related to the species of some of the sacred gods, and may even be a subrace. Dr. Tillman, please tell us about the region we have found the exobeast."
The exobiologist stood up and commanded the conference room to project footage of the lush green fields of grass and shrubs. Occasional trees dotted the lands, expansive herds of herbivores derived from earth stock such as sheep, horses and other familiar-looking animals grazed to their heart's delight.
Small groups of predators stalked the herds, preying upon the sick and old at their leisure.
All of the animals exhibited slow movements. Without the benefit of an antigrav field, the beasts moved slower and with more deliberation. Their builds were generally a bit smaller but their numbers made up for it. Each herd numbered from the low hundreds to tens of thousands!
In addition, a couple of species looked completely foreign from anything human. These must be the aboriginal species that somehow survived the drastic changes spurred by the terraforming process.
A couple of surviving species from the old biomes always manage to slip through the net during every terraforming process. As long as they were able to metabolize the Earth-compatible foods, they may be able to fit in with the intruders who have taken over their planet.
"As you can see, the prairie region it's located in is rather sparse in dense vegetation. However, don't underestimate these grasses. If they consist of the same nutritionally-fortified strains as the other flora we've sampled so far, then they can support more than enough life to keep a wild god fed."
The mech pilots frowned when they took in the sights. They didn't care so much for the animal herds, but focused on the uneven elevation of the terrain. Some of the hills angled rather steeply. This hampered the mobility of their mechs somewhat and forced them to be more mindful of their route.
"That terrain doesn't look like a great place to fight." A mech officer spoke aloud what his fellow mech pilots thought.
"We probably don't need to employ our mobility advantage against a wild god." Captain Byrd emphasized. "Unlike a sacred god, these wild gods aren't embedded with the so-called god crystals that have displayed the capability to interact with the astral winds. Without a way to accumulate higher-dimensional energies, they shouldn't be capable of calling down a lightning storm or the like."
The Vandals poured over the sensor data they captured during the duels and still haven't really figured out what went on. The interference in the air led reduced fidelity and a lot of scrambled data. Another part of the problem was that the Vandals didn't bring the right sensors, or ones that were good enough to capture the phenomena with precision.
Chief Dakkon and Ves hastily upgraded the sensor suites of some of the mechs and transports, but neither of them felt confident they installed the right sensors. The Vandals lacked the necessary technologies that allowed them to understand an interact with higher-dimensional energies.
To put it in a different way, it was like trying to observe gamma radiation with the naked eye. You simply couldn't, and trying to mess with things you didn't understand risked incurring radiation sickness!
This was why most of their sensors attempted to capture the spillover effects of any interaction with higher-dimensional energies. The light they threw out, the spacetime distortion they produced and the heat they generated during certain transformations allowed them to generate estimates of their potency and effects.
If the wild god possessed any means to harness higher-dimensional energy, then the Vandals would be ready for that this time!
"What is our objective?" Another mech officer asked. "Are we going to kill or capture the beast?"
Capturing a beast alive was a lot harder than killing it! None of the mech pilots wanted to tussle with the beast with one of their arms bound behind their backs.
Fortunately, Captain Byrd didn't express any interest in capturing a beast alive. "We don't know much about their biology and capabilities. It's irresponsible to capture it. Besides, even if we subdued it, it's far too heavy for us to transport safely. Unless we can keep it sedated, it can break through any cage we can build."
A lot of logistical problems emerged when trying to bring a captured wild god along with them. While they possessed a lot of research value, studying them and taming them was not part of their mission. The Vandals couldn't afford to be distracted by their existence.
Captain Byrd outlined a plan where they would attempt to slay the beast from a distance by peppering it with lasers. Under the heavy gravity, they didn't expect the beast to be able to close the distance before it succumbed. It was simply too slow for that!
"We'll bring out our best marksmen for this task, including Venerable Xie." Captain Byrd said. "If nothing else, it will be good practice for him and allow us to witness the Pale Dancer in live combat. Mr. Larkinson, is his mech ready to be deployed?"
"Well, the maintenance team hasn't worked out all the kinks, but if I help out personally I can rush it within a day." Ves simply stated. He knew that speed was of the essence right now. "As long as the expert mech's gravitic backpack remains functional, the Pale Dancer won't suffer any ill effects, ma'am."
"Good. Make sure to get the Pale Dancer and the assault company ready for an extended deployment. After we kill the beast, we need to maintain guard over the site to let Dr. Tillman and our other experts perform an autopsy. Several fast transports will tag along to bring in temporary labs as well as freezing containers to bring back large samples of meat."
Captain Orfan raised her own request. "Can we bring some cooks as well? I want a taste of that wild god meat! The yokals back at Mulak mentioned something about how it's the best tasting meat on the planet!"
A couple of Vandals laughed. Captain Byrd didn't seem so amused. "I'll allow it since we have the passenger capacity to spare. However, I'll only allow the cooks to process the meat once Dr. Tillman and her team declares the meat to be safe for consumption. Standard rules concerning the treatment of exobeasts apply."
Humans couldn't eat everything that looked like an animal in the galaxy. Just because the wild gods possessed enough similarities with Earth-based life to be able to eat and digest the wildlife spurred about by human terraforming didn't mean the same relation applied the other way.
Tales abounded in the galaxy of adventurous humans eating newly-discovered exobeast species only to drop dead because their bodies absorb poisonous substances that reacted badly to their physique!
Ves actually possessed a huge advantage in this matter. The drastic changes to his body that he gained from his misadventure on Groening IV allowed him to eat a lot of alien crap that would have poisoned a baseline human to death.
He wasn't exactly enthusiastic about taking advantage of it, though He'd rather eat nutrient packs instead.
After Captain Byrd finished getting everyone up to speed, they dispersed to make some quick preparations.
Ves assisted Lisbeth Eta-Denmersken in rushing the Pale Dancer to readiness. The half-crazy mech designer didn't like Ves very much and tried to hinder him as much as possible, but once he sicced Ketis on her, he managed to complete the work several times more smoothly.
The other Vandals prepped the assault company for a multi-day jaunt to the prairie region. The fast transports that could somewhat keep up with the mechs carried a plentiful amount of energy cells to keep their gravitic backbacks going while also carrying enough lab equipment to facilitate the autopsy of a giant exobeast.
Naturally, the Vandals also managed to stuff jumbo-sized barbecue equipment, because the idea of eating wild god meat turned into an incredibly appealing notion to the Vandals and the Swordmaidens.
All of them wanted to come away with a story they could brag to their friends about eating the flesh of a literal god!
The next day, the transports and mechs began to depart. Eighty mechs from both forces escorted four fast transports, of which only one of them belonged to the Swordmaidens. The pirates generally didn't bother with maintaining a science department, so the Vandals bore the responsibility of researching the remains.
Inside the somewhat more crowded passenger compartment of one of the transports, Ves sat behind a terminal attempting to figure something out from the garbled sensor readings they took last time they witnessed the might of a sacred god.
He developed a theory that had caught on with the Flagrant Swordmaidens, one which stated that the wild gods and sacred gods could be directed by their beast riders akin to how mechs pilots controlled their mechs.
Some of the more boastful Vandals even claimed that they could tame the wild god as long as they sat on their backs!
Safe to say, many of the saner Vandals immediately smacked some sense into these crazy mech pilots. Who would want to risk their lives by riding on the backs of those incredibly strong and deadly beasts?!
Many people remained fascinated however, including Ketis, who tagged along with Ves this time. Mayra remained behind in camp to ensure all of the Swordmaiden mechs would be ready to march in time.
Compared to all of that boring stuff, Ketis rather preferred to tag along with the hunting party!
Still, it took at least two days to reach the prairie, so she currently idled away her time by twirling her green hair around her finger.
"What are you looking at, Ves?" She asked in a bored tone.
He grimaced. "I'm trying to figure out the nature of the connection between the beast riders and the sacred gods. To be more specific, I'm keeping my eyes out for any clue that might suggest that this is a natural or engineered phenomenon."
"What does that matter?"
"The answer is extremely important. Most of us believe that it can't be a coincidence that the exobeasts are able to interface with a human mind. They all think that some crazy exobiologists from the Starlight Megalodon had spawned them out of nowhere or modified an existing alien species into the monsters they are today."
"Isn't it obvious?" She frowned. "There's no way a creature like that has evolved the ability to interface their minds with a different species out of the blue. And the tricks the sacred gods showed off are just like how expert mechs show off their resonance abilities. Do you think the exobiologists worked together with some really smart mech designers into designing these gods? It's like they are made to be living mechs!"
That phrase triggered Ves a bit. Over the preceding days, Ves tried to process the existence of exobeasts capable of interfacing with the human mind. Was this a potential direction for development?
Eventually, he rejected this approach. Although a final product already existed, these exobeasts truly couldn't be called mechs. Exobiology was very different from mech design!
He issued a firm correction to his former student. "Don't call them living mechs. That brings out a flawed association between mechs and exobeasts. The wild gods and sacred gods of Aeon Corona VII are living, thinking organic creatures. The biggest difference between mechs and these beasts are that the latter are already functional and dangerous on their own. Don't underestimate the threat they pose. I bet this wild god has some tricks up its sleeve in order to survive the harsh conditions of this planet."
The natives didn't call them wild gods for nothing. While they hadn't been entirely forthcoming about the capabilities of either types of gods, the fact that they considered them to be divine should be deeply concerning to the Vandals and Swordmaidens about to hunt one of them down.
Mortals weren't supposed to challenge the gods!
