At the southern border, before Black Rock Mining City.
The ground trembled violently.
The seventy-two-meter-tall Mountain-Crushing Giant Armor advanced toward the mining city, one step at a time.
Its entire body was covered in rock armor seventeen times denser than steel. With every step, the ground split open with a massive trench, and layers of rock collapsed like cookies crushed beneath a giant's foot.
The human army's tank positions and missile positions had already been completely flattened by it, leaving behind only twisted scrap metal and scorched marks.
Genos stood before the mining city's walls.
The armor on his legs had warped badly, creaking under the strain.
The Core Furnace in his chest shone painfully bright, its energy reading having dropped to 47%.
He had just fired his maximum-power Energy Beam Cannon at the giant armor for a full ten minutes, yet had only burned a pit less than half a meter deep into the armor on its chest.
And the giant armor's plating was over three meters thick.
Worse still, it could regenerate.
Wherever it was pierced, the rock armor regrew at a visible speed, becoming thicker the more it was attacked.
"Target defense exceeds expectations. Probability of conventional Energy Beam Cannon breaching its defenses: 0.3%."
The red lights in Genos's eyes flickered wildly as data rapidly scrolled across his vision.
"Core Furnace energy remaining: 47%. Under sustained output, it can support operations for twelve more minutes at most."
"There are 1,247 miners still awaiting evacuation inside the city. Estimated evacuation time: fifteen minutes."
He had to hold on.
At least until everyone had evacuated.
Boom—!
Mountain-Crushing Giant Armor raised its enormous foot and stomped viciously down at Genos.
The weight of ten thousand tons came crashing down, compressing the air until it detonated with a deafening blast.
Genos