The five Cutters touched down on the East side of the city at the same moment, and the Thunder Guns could be heard the second that the doors opened, with the Battalion Commanders leading their forces out.

The Drone Fighters combined with Max’s [Unified Force] System Talent gave them precision targeting data on every detected Omwat Mecha Company, and the Battalion Commanders were determined to thin their ranks as much as possible using High Explosive shells before the enemy had even realized where they were being attacked from.

Thanks to the high-capacity organic power cells in the new Augmentic Armor, all of the infantrymen were equipped with Ion Cannons as well as sidearms, letting them take out Light Mecha with relative ease once they were in range, but for now, they were taking the back lines, and spreading out to make sure that nothing got past the lines of Mecha using terrain to block their presence.

[Incoming Artillery] Max’s onboard computer warned him as rapidly approaching targets appeared on his screens.

That was sooner than expected, so the Omwat must have realized just how poorly things were going to go for them and set up their artillery before they had secured the area.

The Laser arrays on Cleansing Light burst into action as Max rapidly selected targets, destroying the artillery shells in mid-flight. Nothing got past him this time, but that was a serious workout, given the number of calculations he had to make at once.

Auto targeting, using only Lasers, on every enemy target that approached at high speed would take a lot of the load off of his mind and keep the additional targets for his Regiment active, so Max made the adjustments to his targeting parameters and shifted his Mecha to stand in front of the defense trenches on the side where the Omwat had landed.

With the Regiment out there, they wouldn’t be able to encircle the city, so he only had to defend this position for the moment while the others got to work.

[Contact on the left flank. Moving to intercept.] Major Miller, in charge of the First Battalion, announced, and the sound of Mecha combat became clear even to the unaugmented ear, filling the city’s residents with fear and sending even the most reluctant scrambling for a spot in the bunkers.

One after another, the Battalions engaged, using their superior firepower to drive back the Omwat Mecha and move them closer together, intending to encircle the entire Regiment before they went looking for the second.

There would be no search, though. Nico’s Drone force found the others only minutes after the first battle, sheltered under camouflage nets which had hidden them from detection by orbital scans.

[Omwat forces on the move from the North.] Nico reported, and Max watched a number of her fighters blink out of existence as the Mecha counterattacked.

[Defense Force, hold your positions. I will take Cleansing Light and deal with the other Regiment while my forces hold the Eastern Front.] Max informed his allies, then began to fly across the city, keeping close to the ground so that the Omwat Mecha couldn’t target him.

The shielding on Cleansing Light was incredible, but fifty or a hundred Heavy Mecha attacking him at once had a very good chance of breaching his shields, and once that happened, he was only a little more durable than the usual Super Heavy Mecha due to material limitations.

Once he was clear of the city, Max moved to fly just above the ground through the valleys between the rock outcrops, sneaking up on the position where he had found the enemy Mecha. Or at least doing as well as a Titan Class Mecha could do to sneak up on anything.

A powerful energy signature appeared in front of him when he was three kilometers away from the force, and Max saw a drone shatter against a shield. The Omwat Mecha had erected a forcefield on par with a small city’s Orbital Bombardment shield to protect their Mecha, and Max could see it advancing his way as the Mecha Regiment raced toward the city.

The two shields would interfere with each other when they reached the city, making it easier to breach the city’s defenses. Max couldn’t allow that, but he didn’t want to draw too much attention to himself yet.

[Nico, send in the drones on a low trajectory and drop some bombs from high altitude at the same time. I want them to think that they have met with a Mecha Battalion trying to break their shield, not more drones.] Max ordered.

[Copy that. We have some replacement fighters incoming now. I will have them bomb from low orbit with Sabot shells.] Nico replied.

The Sabot shells were essentially an ultra-durable slug intended to deal maximum kinetic damage to a shield, but they were easily countered by the layered armor of a Heavy Mecha, dispersing the impact energy.

Max waited and watched the enemy advance for a few seconds until the whistling and flames of the sabot rounds approaching at orbital entry velocity filled the air.

Nico might have forgotten that the enemy could see the shells if they were burning the atmosphere around them and that there would be no way that they would mistake that as artillery, but the bombardment was enough to shatter the shield in an instant, with the last few rounds slamming into the ground and sending up huge clouds of dust before Ion Blasts came from the West and North sides of the Omwat position, low on the horizon, as if the invaders had encountered a Mecha force.

[They are taking up a defensive encirclement, heavy on the west and north. I believe that they have fallen for the diversion.] Nico informed Max before more bombs, these ones at more normal supersonic velocities, shrieked through the air.

They exploded in a storm of metal fragments and small explosions designed to cripple Light Mecha and infantry at the same moment that Max charged, priming all six Disruptors to fire as soon as he had direct line of sight.