Chapter 61: Kill Stealer ACE
With the first shot of Genesis, the lunar forces that were roaming in the distance began to advance rapidly. The first shot, as Ade guessed, probably hit the Earth Federation army. If possible, he hopes that the Federation's chain of command is not completely paralyzed and commands them to fight back rather than retreat before the second shot of Genesis is ready. In that way, ZAFT's side would put much less pressure on the Lunar forces.
Of course, this is ideal, and everyone had better be prepared for something less than ideal.
Inle advanced with Jegans until they heard Ghingham's order and stopped. This distance was well out of the opponent's attack range, but already within the attack range of Inle's main gun. The other side should have also discovered the lunar troops and started to approach slowly.
"Lingus, I'll leave the first snipe to you." Ghingham's voice rang out in the friendly channel, "All troops, prepare for the enemy's surprise attack after sniping. Kid, you protect Inle and let him focus on sniping."
"Yes Sir!"
The end of the field of his view is dense with MSs. Ade took a deep breath and began to aim. He chose the densest location of MSs, estimated the distance between the two sides, the spacing of enemy MSs, and the range of Inle's cannon, and then gently pulled the trigger. A blinding stream of high-energy particles instantly illuminated the space, exploding into a trail of fireworks wherever it went.
Faced with this kind of firepower and range, the only right thing to do is to push forward with the life of pilots. The opposing commander obviously understood this, and the MSs advanced at full speed towards this side, and it didn't take long for the two sides to enter the attack range. Ghingham drove his top-of-the-line Jagan, and every shot of his attack could destroy an MS. The enemy's side was surprisingly devoid of ACE, and no one was able to stop Ghingham. Relied on the performance gap of MSs and Ghingham's activity, the lunar forces gained a brief local advantage.
Ade didn't have to think about this. All he had to do was to use Inle's high output to try to weaken the enemy's numerical advantage. He left his side completely in the hands of his teammates and fired two more shots before the two sides entered the close battle range, but the enemy MSs had scattered alertly, so the effect of the two shots was not as good as the first shot.
What followed was tense and boring, as he navigated the battlefield with full attention, looking for enemies in his field of view that were alone or clumped together, and sniping them off. Occasionally, a few MSs would be able to rush up to Inle and being quickly destroyed by Shinn.
"Shinn, do you think the number of hits went up too fast?" Ade spoke to Shinn in his free time while waiting for the cooldown of the cannon.
"Adrien-san, it's a good thing you're not a trooper, or you'd get ostracized." Shinn only had to protect Inle, so his task was the most leisurely, "The instructor said that this behavior is called 'kill steal', the biggest obstacle blocking everyone from becoming the next ACE."
Ade did not know how to answer, simply closed his mouth.
Relying on Inle's nearly unlimited energy supply and the continuous ultra-long-range attacks, the number of enemies in the engagement area continued to decrease. The battle line continued to advance in the direction of the target, and Genesis could already be vaguely seen at the end of the visual field. The Earth Federation side seemed to be organizing an effective counterattack, and the pressure on this side did not suddenly skyrocket.
"Lingus, well done, it's time for phase two." Ghingham's voice was still powerful, not showing any fatigue, "Kid, don't drop the ball for me!"
"Yes!" Shinn was frightened.
Ade detached himself from the sniper state, exhaled the foul air from his lungs, and moved his somewhat stiff wrists, "Shinn, it's going to be fast, keep up."
Fieber's thrusters turned on, Inle transformed and looked like a small, slender warship from a distance. Ade proceeded at high speed along the path he and his friends had cleared, with F91 following close behind. The enemy forces in the distance concentrated their fire towards Inle in an attempt to organize a breakthrough, Ade drifted to avoid their attacks, while firing back with precision. Several Zakus exploded in his view.
The duo quickly flew past the main battlefield, and Genesis gradually grew larger in the field of view, and the density of enemies around them gradually became sparse.
"There doesn't seem to be any more reinforcements?" Shinn made a surprised sound, "It seems that the enemy's ACEs are all on that battle line, what luck."
"You had to say that, didn't you?" Ade's mind suddenly flashed with alarm as Alice's prompt rang out almost simultaneously, "Shinn, get out of the way!"
Shinn executed his command without hesitation, Inle and F91 pulled away at high speed to both sides, and a one-meter-thick particle torrent passed through the middle of the two.
"Freedom Meteor?" Ade smacked his lips, the feeling of being hit by something he himself made was really unpleasant, "It's a pain in the ass to fight it. Time is running out, let's try to make it quick."
"It's this guy again! It's all Yamato's fault." Shinn looked at the approaching Freedom Gundam in the distance and razzed, "Let me deal with it. Mr. Adrien, you go first."
Ade looked at the Genesis in the distance. He could vaguely see small dots moving on the surface, they should be the MSs in the process of changing lenses. He hesitated for a second, then flew forward, "Leave it to you, Shinn!"
"It's nothing more than defeating him once more." Shinn dodged another cannon shot and unfolded his beam shield to burst towards Freedom, "Does the pilot on the other side remember me?"
"That Gundam the last time? As I guessed, it's made by Lingus." Athrun was very reluctant to stop in place, but he didn't dare to chase after Inle against F91's attacks, "I've seen through your moves. I won't be defeated by the same trick twice."
"So it's true that you will respond to the chat! I thought Mr. Adrien was joking."
"Are you making a fool of me?" Athrun was angry, "You're the Moon Force, right? Why are you fighting without declaring war?"
"Don't you have any guesses in your mind?" The opponent's accuracy was only average compared to Mr. Adrien, and even worse when chatting. Its only advantage was its guns. Shinn talked while lifting the shield, flying closer to Freedom. It would be a waste of energy to shoot against this kind of armor, "Did you not think about what the moon would do when you built that kind of thing?"
"No matter what we did, you should not attack our territory directly like this!" It was dangerous to be drawn closer by that strange Gundam, so Athrun kept moving while trying to increase the frequency of his attacks, "This is aggression!"
"Look at you, a country that exterminated Orb Union and built a superweapon that can wipe out a city in one shot. Are you qualified to say such things? Are you really stupid or have you been brainwashed?" Although Shinn was taught to do more trash talks when facing ACE, he was really pissed off at this time. "Are all of ZAFT's ACEs with your kind of intelligence?"
"People like you don't understand the greatness of Mr. Aznable!" Athrun said righteously, "I am for-"
"Oh, you are brainwashed, and I have nothing to talk about with the brainwashed." Shinn decisively turned off the public channel. This distance is enough, and under Mr. Adrien's intense scientific training, he has been able to control his S.E.E.D ability, "Go to hell."
F91's mask opened, the heat sink on the shoulder extended, and F91 moved at an incredibly high speed, so fast that only a trail of afterimages could be seen.
"Again?" Athrun was alerted, the last failure was still fresh in his mind. He gritted his teeth and fired all the cannons on Freedom Meteor at the same time, and for a while, the universe became colorful by the various beams.
"Are you dreaming? Can you hit me?" In his S.E.E.D state, Shinn manipulated F91 in the beam storm, and the various beams can only hit the residual images behind. This feature of F91 is simply a nightmare to anyone who wants to shoot him.
Freedom Meteor's armor was so thick that he needed a very close range. After dodging Freedom Meteor's huge beam saber once, Shinn finally touched Freedom Meteor from behind with a dive acceleration.
"What?" F91 suddenly disappeared from his view, and Athrun felt bad at once. It was already too late to turn around, and he directly tried to disarm Meteor from Freedom.
"It's too slow!" Both VSBRs were adjusted to F91's waist, and Shinn pressed the muzzle directly against the Meteor's tail interface. "Feel the skill I learned from Uraki-san!"
Two shots of VSBR in the highest power mode penetrated the armor at zero distance, and F91 jerked backward a bit to avoid the explosion. The whole Meteor was torn apart directly by the tremendous power. Shinn deliberately angled the shot at Freedom Gundam, and along with it, the entire lower half of Freedom's fuselage was directly destroyed.
"Oh, run out of energy. It would be perfect if it doesn't consume so much energy." The long high-speed flying state and the last two cannons almost bottomed out F91's energy. F91 flew next to the wreckage of Freedom Gundam, and Shinn was surprised to find, "I can't believe I didn't blow up the cockpit?"
Now I have to return to replenish energy, and I can have to leave the rest to Mr. Adrien. Shinn thought about it and dug out Freedom's cockpit, heading in the direction of friendly forces.
…
After flying away from Athrun, there was no enemy MS in sight at all. It was too strange. The only explanation is that ZAFT's main force was attracted away by the Federation army, and the Federation army probably had a very strong counterattack. Did I really guess it? All the Earth Federation's big shots were dead and only one smart officer survived?
"Ade, is it okay to leave Mr. Shinn there?" Alice asked worriedly. "That Meteor looks a lot like me."
"No problem, F91 is Freedom's natural enemy. Inle will do no use to stay there." Genesis is already in range and it looks like the mirror replacement is about to be completed, "Alice, help me stand guard."
"Okay, Ade."
"Luckily I come." Ade whispered to himself with some anxiety, "Saving a minute is a minute, right?"
He directly re-erected his ultra-long-range cannon in a high-speed burst and aimed at the slow-moving MSs at the end of his gaze. Pulling the trigger, that Zaku exploded, but he also exposed himself. The other MSs surprisingly did not run away but continue to work? No matter, he changed his breath intending to continue sniping.
"Ade, an enemy at ten o'clock!"
He put down the cannon and looked sideways, only to see an MS with a large turtle shell on its back appear in the field of view. He understood its design at a glance: a close-combat MS equipped with a lot of beam pods. It's just a simple and crude copy of Freedom and Justice, with no beauty of the design at all.
This poor-quality copy must be full of bugs, a variety of problems will appear as time went by, but it will be super strong when just driving it.
"Providence Gundam…" he took a deep breath hatefully, "I hate this kind of troublesome MS. There is no time."
"This MS! Adrien Lingus, right? I never thought that it would be you who appear at the last moment. It must be fate." Creuset started his public channel speech as Ade expected, "Weaver of war and violence, maker of jealousy and hatred, coming to hinder me from ending the chain of sins. A being like you-"
"Stop trash talking!" Ade glanced in the direction of Genesis as six drones separated in sequence with his roar, "Who understands what you're saying?!"