Xiao Ran's hands danced through a string of afterimages inside the cockpit, bringing every movement of the Aegis Dagger completely under his control. He drove the machine's performance to its limits in an utterly suppressive manner. Every capability of the unit operated under perfect control and overload conditions, allowing the Aegis Dagger, clearly only a C+-rank machine, to display performance far beyond the limits of an ordinary C+-rank machine.
At this moment, Xiao Ran's eyes shone with the golden light possessed only by Innovators. His gaze took in everything about the White Zaku Phantom, even the movement of its fingers. The Aegis Dagger closed in on the Zaku Phantom with movements neither it nor the Zaku Warrior could lock onto, approaching like a demon god. Its elusive maneuvers rendered every attack from the two machines futile, leaving them without even an opportunity to escape.
Just as the Aegis Dagger descended directly from above the Zaku Phantom with movements impossible to track, a pink flash flickered at the Zaku Phantom's head. At the same moment a bright line appeared across its head, the Aegis Dagger instantly transformed into its winged cruising form. As its nose rose and every thruster behind it lit up, the rapidly descending force achieved a bizarre balance through the combined action of its nose and tail. The three forces merged into a forward charge, driving the machine forward at high speed while tilted roughly forty-five degrees, head up and feet down.
From inside the cockpit, Xiao Ran could hear the steel groaning and trembling under the immense strain. He could even feel the force pulling at his body. Yet to someone with Xiao Ran's exceptional physical attributes, that force was insignificant. It did not affect him in the slightest; not even his hands trembled. After roughly two