The other red-haired girl, Hilda, stared intently at the DRAGON that had appeared, but spoke with some displeasure. "Hey, hey, hey, just tell me plainly—which is stronger, the new model you made or that tacky princess's machine?"
Luo stood in the hangar and scratched his head, answering ambiguously, "Well, that's hard to say. If possible, the performance of the new machine I oversaw should be better than Ange's, but who knows what unknown systems that machine might still be hiding? And even if I could build a stronger machine, with your skills, you wouldn't be able to handle it. The one best suited to you is the best one."
"Tch." Hilda had not gotten a definite answer from Luo. Instead, he had shifted how much combat power a machine could display onto how strong its pilot was, making her curl her lips in annoyance. Still, Hilda knew that the pilot was indeed the key factor in determining how much combat power a machine could truly bring out.
Hilda had experienced that more than once during daily training. Even when piloting exactly the same machines, Nalo and Graham each had the ability to take all of them down alone. It was the same no matter how many times they tried. A gap in Pilot Level like that could not be made up for just by having a better machine.
The other of the two new models was piloted by Elsa, the gentle pink-haired woman. Elsa had been chosen precisely because her personality was completely opposite to Vivian's, in hopes of using their entirely different piloting styles to gather more data on the new machines and create more suitable new PMs.
Only then did Elsa notice the most important question. She spoke with a puzzled expression. "But why does DRAGON have machines