Chapter 203: Clumsy Giants
———Karra———
<12: 42 pm>
“Umm…” Qyunda let out a confused voice as we finally returned to our seats, seeing the two things on the field.
Two giant mech standing on both sides of the field, one in black and one in white. Very minimalist design with what can be best described as ‘low-poly’. Their heads are a different matter being smooth half oval. It doesn’t even look like there is anything to look through from inside, if it’s meant to be piloted from within and not outside it. Not that I can tell from here.
“I guess they aren’t going for aesthetics." Qyunda remarked. I think deliberately making the mechs so rudimentary is a conscious choice, at least. Low polygon counts isn’t even an actual thing in real life. If they have zero care for it it’d probably be tubes or something, not jagged and blocky.
“There’s a certain charm to it.” Gregori chimed in as more people popped back into their seats. The crowd is filling back up and the place is already lively as people see what was put on display.
The mechs are truly massive like in the shows. Those things could kick away houses and trash them like they are nothing. They are about as big as a bucket wheel… No they aren’t. They’re very big, but I wouldn't say they’re on the same scale.
“So we know who the fighters are for this round, it seems.” I said while leaning back on the seat and ordered a few things before we got started. No idea how this is gonna pan out, but it’s definitely gonna be different from the last three fights in a big way… “I guess they never did specify that every fight is gonna have the same format, now that I think about it.”
“I’d take this over another of the same kind of fight. Let’s be real here, it’s gonna turn into a slugfest of some sort by the end, only some would look more dignified than the others.” Gregori said, showing some dissatisfaction with the repeated format. I wouldn’t say it’s that bad. I think the fact that our perspective skewed the enjoyment doesn’t really help. They’re mostly fighting on a level we all can handle or at least see is within reach. It’ll realistically only take us a month or two to catch up to the current level Cevin and Lebeta were presenting, at least. The first batch… Well, they're at least twice as strong as I am from the feels of things, but it could be a little bit more or less. Definitely not a level I can reach easily, probably taking at least a year depending on what happens in the future.
“<Alright alright alright! Everyone getting back in their seats? Looks like almost everyone is already getting back on time. That’s good to hear. Glad so many of you want to see what this next battle is like.>” Rico is now the one in the commentator seat. “<And you guessed it, this round is not simply two strong fighters at it. We gotta step it up and change it up! Say hello to our two guests piloting these mechs!>”
Two screens popped up in the air and showed the two people piloting the mechs… They are teachers at the school and that’s it. No one special.
“<H-Hey, are you seriously showing us actually piloting these crazy things!?>” Teacher Munsz said, clearly looking extremely nervous.
“<Just pilot the darn thing and get this over with. We’re starting soon. Just wing it.>” Rico said, being completely unsympathetic to his pleas.
“<Alright buddy, time to get your ass beat.>” Meanwhile Miss Scien seems quite enthusiastic about actually piloting the mechs.
“<As a disclaimer, they’re not actually inside the mechs, it’d be quite risky to do so even if I am plenty confident in their durability myself.>” Rico throws in that little fact. “<Right. Teacher Munsz in the white mech, and Teacher Scien in the black mech. We’re starting soon and you two better stay focused and not look like a goof in front of everyone here! Remember to vote for the terrain, it’s gonna be restricted due to the size of these things. See ya in a bit!>”
Mister Munsz looked like he was about to protest further before the screens showing the two were cut off. How much did they rehearse this for. Actually, did those two even practice this at all? One of them certainly doesn’t look super confident.
“Can’t really say if this is gonna be turned into a comedy show or not. Guess we’ll have to wait and see.” Gregori remarked, clearly reserving his expectation.
“I wanna see how strong those things actually are.” Qyunda meanwhile seems eager to punch one to see if it’ll tank the hit.
“It’d probably be more fun to do that.” Malk agreed with her. Of course these two are gonna have the same kind of opinion.
The terrain then shifted suddenly, more rock hills and giant stalagmites. It’s certainly not pretty scenery compared to the others that were chosen. I guess when you have two giants on the field the choice of impactful terrain is quite limited. Quite a different dynamic depending on the size of the fighters.
“<Alright you two, time to start up! One two three go!>” She barely gave them any time to prepare and the match has already started.
*Punch*
It took a while before one of the mechs even made a move. The black one running towards and punching the white mech right in the head.
“<Oooh! First blood!>” Rico said as the white figure stabilized and stopped itself from losing balance.
*Swing* *Evade* *Swing* *Evade*
The mechs finally start going at each other as the pilots learn to better control it. Their speed is actually quite remarkable despite their size.
*Smash*
One of the swings of the limbs smacked into the rocks and caused it to crumble down. There seems to be no loss of speed as they keep going at it and fighting through the many rock structures.
The giant mechs clashed and fought with no clear end in sight. Not even a single blemish on either of them as the fight dragged on. The maneuvers aren’t anything special either. It’s clear that the ones handling these giant mechanical humanoids are very out of their depth.
“...Getting boring faster than I thought.” Gregori remarked.
“I think we should get up and go trash them so we can move on with our lives, how does that sound?” Qyunda proposed something that sounds extremely dangerous.
“Don’t even think about it. Please.” Orrel quickly spoke up just to make sure no one gets any weird ideas. In the first place, I’m pretty sure the invisible walls are still in place, and that means all that would happen is someone crashing into it and looking extremely pathetic in return.
“...The others looked entertained, at least.” Useph pointed out while the others looked rather bored. I think the actions of these mechs, while rather slow and clunky, still look like high octane action to a lot of people. Now if only they actually got someone who knows how to pilot these things efficiently…
“So… I guess we can expect the two other matches to have something quite different?” Useph said as we watched the fight unfold. Despite the sheer size of the two mechs and how clumsy they are being handled, I’m surprised they didn’t trip up.
“That would be what they implied, though their rather whimsical ways makes it hard to pinpoint what they’re actually planning.” Orrel replied. It’s indeed hard to tell. We got two fights left, and after that we presumably just go back home and chill until the next day where we’re actually going back to school for real.
*Blast* *Punch*
“Whoa! They actually have other functions besides punching and kicking?” Gregori said as the black mech shot out an energy blast from its hand. “What’s taking them so long to show that off?”
“Probably incompetence. At this point it’s rather clear that they deliberately gave them very little guidance.” I said since it’s clear that they are basically making light of the fight. Probably under the assumption that if they were to actually put someone competent in charge the fight might move too fast and hard to follow, but it could also just be them taking a piss at the whole thing for laughs.
“Thinking about it, the design of these mechs kinda make it clear that they’re not taking this super seriously. I bet these two giants are basically junk to them in the grand scheme of things.” Gregori gives us his observation.
“Hard to think that these giant bots are supposedly some low-end stuff, but yeah, that’s probably true.” Useph said in response.
Compared to everything they have created these two metal giants are certainly not particularly impressive outside of the size and how even amateurs can control them… What do they even use to control these things, now that I think about it. The screens earlier only show the two people with no equipment in sight.
Right now they are still throwing simple attacks at each other despite the earlier showing of quite an impressive function. I guess what she did back there was more of a fluke, and it does look like she is trying to find out how she pulled that off.
*Smash* *Punch*
The black mech is actually on the backfoot right now as she tries to figure out the controls. Probably is far from the best time to try figuring that out.
*Kick* *Punch*
But quickly enough, she regained the advantage and pushed the white mech back quite substantially.
Looks like the fight is nearing its conclusion as the black mech keeps hitting the white one and makes it lose balance and start to fall. It hasn’t even been that long yet and the fight is already almost over.
“You think there’s another fight with big fighters coming up?” Useph asked as the crowd grew louder.
“Probably not. I’d imagine that they’re shifting to a different format for the last two matches.” Orrel replied. I guess that’s the common consensus between us at this point.
*Blast* *Tumble* *Crash*
The white mech finally fell down after another point blank energy blast to its face, and looks like it won’t get back up easily as it struggles to even push itself back up. Guess she finally found whatever controls allow the mech to perform that type of attack.
“<Looks like the fight has come to a swift end! Give it up to Teacher Scien for her victory! Do you want to share your thoughts with the adoring fans?>” Rico said. It seems the match is already concluded. Just like that? From one side falling and unable to get up? I guess they never made it clear what the win condition even is, and neither of them look like they have really been damaged at all, just hitting each other without so much as a scratch being seen.
“<Huh? Uh?>” She doesn’t seem to know what she should say after that win. It was pretty clear from the start who was going to win, but I guess she didn’t quite realize that. “<Well… That was easy! Suck it!>”
“<Fighting words right there! That’s what I wanna hear!>” Rico said in response. “<Alright, now get the heck outta here, we need to prepare for the next battle.>”
*BOOM*
“Huh?” Suddenly, the two robots suddenly combust without any warning and leaving nothing behind, and the playing field reset to zero. Also, that was really freaking loud, please have a noise warning or something.
“<Alright everyone! Time for the next match to start pretty soon! Now this is very very important, please look at your screen right now.>” Rico instructed… Hm? War match? “<We have put one half of the audience on one team and the rest in the other. Please talk with each other and use the limited budget to make a monster army to fight each other! You have forty five minutes. Go!>”
Huh!? What kind of match is this!?