At the center of the Main Shaft, the decoys Lin Cuo and Tabane had created had already stirred up the core defense layer.
More than three thousand Tank-class BETA converged on the middle along the Mineralized Platform and unfinished Production Chambers. Seven Fortress-Class BETA began readjusting their support positions, pulling enormous tentacles out of the rock as they moved toward the high-energy area by the shortest route, even trampling over others of their kind that had not yet been fully infused.
Shen Hu Mech's radiation fluctuation module was glowing so brightly it was nearly out of control. Blue-violet arcs kept racing along its left arm, shoulder, and chest armor, while Tabane's Technical IS deployed an entire set of Sensor Floating Units, generating more high-frequency electronic, thermal, and simulated G-element signals around the two machines.
Lin Cuo glanced at the steadily rising overload figures.
"Are you sure this won't burn the core out outright?"
Tabane answered with a grin, "Of course not. Right now, we're more like people banging gongs and lighting fires on its doorstep. It'll send someone out to chase us away first."
"You're awfully practiced at metaphors involving other people's doorsteps."
"It's not like your big sister never tore apart someone else's laboratory when she was younger."
"That's not something to be proud of."
"As long as the result is right!"
"Usually, I'm the one who says that."
They exchanged a look, then laughed at the same time. Tabane raised her hand first.
"Left first, then?"
Lin Cuo glanced at the BETA gathering around the core's perimeter.
"Right. Going left would seem too normal to it."
"That's what I thought, too."
Both machines swerved sharply down and to the right at once. Cecilia, following behind, almost failed to keep up.
"You could at least give us some warning!"