5685 Thicc Mech
As a secret cosmopolitan, Cory Grimly liked to think he developed an open mind.
He studied the histories, technologies and cultures of many different alien races.
He developed an admiration of how they evolved under vastly different circumstances before finally making their way into space.
He developed a yearning when he heard how so many alien races managed to reach a tenable state of coexistence with each other.
Sure, not all intelligent races managed to gain a foothold in a galactic community, but the fact that it was possible should have been a signal for humanity to follow the prevailing trend and blend in with the harmonious multi-racial society that the aliens had built!
Cory Grimly hated the fact that he was born in the wrong timeline. Instead of living in a reality where humans such as himself could interact freely with aliens without suffering any condemnation, he lived in another version where such actions were considered taboo!
To a genuine cosmopolitan like Cory, this was as absurd as forbidding people to breathe!
Cooperation and coexistence were universal ideals. In both the Milky Way and the Red Ocean, the aliens of those respective galaxies had managed to reach a state of partial integration with each other.
Their borders still existed, and so did their territorial rivalries, but they no longer bothered to wage all-out war against each other anymore.
The intelligent and enlightened aliens all came to the conclusion that cooperating with each other was less costly than trying to wage endless war against their rival species.
There were enough wise and far-sighted alien leaders among them who successfully managed to find common ground despite their many racial differences.
By emphasizing what they had in common while compensating for each other's weaknesses, the aliens of the Milky Way and the Red Ocean had been well on their way of building true galactic communities where many different races worked towards common purpose.
If humanity could become a part of those communities, then Cory would have been able to explore the cultures of other alien races by visiting their planets in person!
He would be able to make friends of individuals of vastly different species. No matter whether they looked like three-fingered frogs or amorphous balls of slime, as long as they were civilized members of the same galactic community, he had no doubt he would have been able to become best friends with any intelligent alien!
It had always been a dream for Cory and his brother to explore the wonders of every alien race and make use of their new technologies. Human mechs could have become a lot stronger and more diverse if his own race became open-minded enough to allow aliens to assist in their development.
Alas, such a reality was too far away for the cosmopolitans living in this reality. Cory Grimly had little choice but to keep this dream to himself and his fellow cosmopolitans.
At this moment, Cory wondered whether one of his dreams had come true.
Instead of expecting an experimental version of the Ultimatum where the designers had gone crazy in trying to boost its power, he became confronted with a mess of a machine.
The Ultimatum was still vaguely recognizable as one, yet it looked completely wrong on every level.
It had grown thicker and fatter. It lost a leg but the remaining ones all grew in different shapes and lengths. Its heavy artillery cannons had been replaced by a random collection of weapons, one of which happened to be a completely useless hair follicle that his mech had already cut in half!
The creepiest part about the machine was the human-like head that appeared to be locked in an eternal scream.
Even though the head was mounted towards the front, it was somehow able to rotate and turn so that it directly faced the intruder that had jumped on top of its back.
The second-creepiest part about this abomination of a mech was that parts of it had been replaced by organic matter!
There was no rhyme and reason for this substitution as many parts had been replaced with disgusting biomatter for no clear reason.
It made Cory feel as if his space knight was standing on top of an alien that had undergone a failed cybernetic transformation.
Whatever the case, the situation at the moment did not give him the luxury to get to the bottom of this mystery.
All that mattered at the moment was to put an end to this monster mech's existence!
Since the bunker was exposed to vacuum, no noise propagated throughout the surroundings.
Each time the transphasic axe hacked against the thick back armor of Ultimatum One, it left another thick cut through the hyper alloy plating.
Though the axe inflicted serious damage with each strike, heavy artillery mech was designed to resist a lot of damage, so it was not easy to break past all of the armor layers!
It did not help that the mech's unknown transformation had caused its exterior to gain additional mass, some of which happened to be organic!
After breaching through another layer, the axe started to cut through flesh. A copious amount of red blood spurted from the cut that the space knight had made.
From the moment the axe cut through this layer of flesh, the monster mech started to thrash a lot more violently!
It was as if the mech was in pain!
The machine redoubled its efforts to repel or destroy the intruding machine, but its options were too limited.
Its Onyx Cannon was only able to aim forward. It was impossible for it to angle its massive barrel backwards. Even if it did, Cory Grimly had many different ways to counteract this move.
The triple-barreled laser cannon battery may have been able to strike at the space knight if not for the fact that the latter had simply placed one of its feet on top of the weapon mount!
The strange mortar was even less of a threat because the space knight had already chopped the weapon apart.
The only weapon system that could do something about the enemy mech was the black tentacle.
It had entered into a wrestling match with the arm of the space knight. Both sides tried to overwhelm each other, but found it difficult to gain the upper hand.
Frustrated by the interference produced by this alien-like limb, Cory commanded his mech to chop at the trunk of this limb, only for the transphasic axe to barely produce a cut.
For whatever reason, the durability of this tentacle exceeded that of the rest of the mech frame!
While that made it difficult for the space knight to get rid of it, there was no problem in holding it in place for the time being.
Its physical power was inferior to its resilience!
Cory went back to attacking the back surface of Ultimatum One. As long as he managed to get deep enough, he would definitely be able to crush the power reactor and other essential internal systems!
He just had to be a little patient.
"This is taking too much time!"
He was pretty sure that the Ultimatum model wasn't supposed to be this tough. The abnormal machine was twice or maybe even thrice as damage resistant as the thick layers forced the space knight to do a lot of work to get past all of the armor layers.
After hacking its way through multiple layers of alloy and flesh, the intruder mech finally managed to breach its way into the internals!