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Several hours later.
'Melee can also be used like this, he says.'
The blonde grumbled as she put the big holo screen on top of the hall table. While she waited for it to load the inventory from her student card, she looked at the rough sketch she made earlier.
The weapon was promising because most of its parts could be found in both melee and ranged packs. And that meant that if she got lucky, she would save quite a sum for a sixteen year old.
After the ready sound from the device, she turned back to the screen. After filtering parts by the hybrid melee/range categories she saw that she had seven blues and two purples. Almost all of the parts she needed.
Four alloy pipes were quickly combined into a shaft about as tall as her robot. Taking a hollow cone, she turned it upside down, cut away its sharp point, and fit it on the bottom of the shaft. When the part flashed green and locked on, she moved onto the other end. It was supposed to have a rhombus with bladed edges that flowed into the central spike.
The result was a long and top heavy spear that could both stab and slash. Additionally, the aerodynamic shape, counterweight at the back and relatively light weight allowed it to be thrown.
But that wasn't all she had in mind. The reverse cone could house a power plant that would detonate a big part of the Skeleton King's reactive armor with a big surge of electricity. Which would make it vulnerable to the remaining machine gun.
Could was the key word. The weapon packs she bought a long time ago didn't have any utility parts and as for the money to buy those that did...
About two weeks ago, *Z Cafe* decided to do something special for this winter.
Every day for the entire duration of the cold season they would release a new dessert that would be available for the normal price only during its debut day.
Tsune held out for quite a while, but with such variety there were bound to be a few favorites. And they scored direct critical hits against her weak points.
She recalled the soft mellow texture of the layered cake and its cream that melted in her mouth and licked her lips.
Before she knew it, those sweets made her guilty of the sin of gluttony and also completely broke. What was even worse, her mother noticed that she was spending a lot of money on sweets and refused to give her more.
'You are going to get fat, she says. Everyone has something to say.'
Sulking, she laid back in the chair, watching the floating 3d model cast a dim shadow on the table below.
Tsune entertained the idea of asking her father for a weapon engine. But that choice was soon overwhelmed by the fear of him giving her something too valuable again.
The girl thought of asking Blade, or Rhodes for theirs, as virtual parts could potentially be traded. But the third year would shift the training to live practice and used virtual parts would turn real. And she wouldn't feel comfortable with a constant reminder of being indebted, especially to the sword weirdo.
Finally, she sighed and leaned forward to save the spear as a draft. It would remain in her account's memory until she got the parts. Then she reorganized the inventory to prioritize ranged hardware.
She wanted to remake the machine gun into something a lot more manageable. Perhaps remove the stock, most of the barrel's length and add a hard belt ammo box instead of the long magazine.
-
A month later.
Already in the simulation cabin, Tsune looked down at her assistant device.
Even though it spoke in its debut morning, it kept its silence ever since. She didn't know if it was even supposed to speak.
Maybe it could only act if she connected it to the cabin or maybe it needed a special trigger. After learning more about her father, she wouldn't be surprised if it created a hard light body and turned into a servant.
The thoughts about how it could look, turned into images of a beautiful and elegant maid, or a handsome butler, that followed her around. They made her blush. She would be like a rich young lady from an old and powerful household.
Such a character was present In many, if not most, games she used to play years ago. More often than not, she would be kind, elegant and combine the knowledge of fine art like poetry, dance, or fashion. And maybe hard earned mastery of a science field or an ancestral weapon.
Lyle even created the 'third love interest' rule. It stated that the first character, that you as a protagonist developed romantic feelings for, was always well made if cliché. The second, usually an enemy character that eventually joins the hero, had an interesting story arc. But it was the third hidden character that the developers usually put most of their soul into.
Therefore he always cherished the moment he learned how to unlock that character and the progression of their story.
For example, one of the games was set in a huge planetary tower besieged by an evil force. There you either sided with the queen to seal the evil force, or the shady organization with their secret goal of destroying it at the cost of the world's magic it was a part of.
But compared to characters from these two routes, learning about the third character was an entirely different experience.
At first you learned that that character was forced to become a sacrifice centuries ago, to create the foundation of the world's magic. That the evil force was a desperate attempt to gain freedom.
And the story didn't end there, as the protagonist went on an adventure to see if he could find it in himself to forgive the cause of the war that took his parents. And finally give that character the life that was taken from them even before their birth.
But how did it connect to maids? One of the most popular expansions for the game included an ending where that girl has grown up into a famous lady that helped other unfortunate people by hiring them as her servants.
And Tsune knew that if she tried, she would pull a pretty convincing cosplay. In fact, she wouldn't even need to call it cosplay, as she really was the daughter of the famous scientist. And made her feel even more flustered.
With her hands on her cheeks to feel the heat, she lightly shook her head. With her shoulder length hair in a frenzy, she removed the embarrassing thoughts and refocused on the starting battle.
The ten meter skeleton appeared at medium range and pointed his sword up in a salute. Then it tried to reflect the sun off its blade onto her cabin window.
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After a full minute of goofing around, it made a big step.
Then almost jumped forward, with its sword held with both hands. The explosive start helped Blade to quickly reach the top speed, but Tsune winced as she imagined how harsh the g force simulation must've been for him. But sympathy aside, even the most generous outcome would still rattle him and it'd be foolish to waste that opportunity.
Gunner made several steps back as it half bent its right arm. Now the tip of its spear pointed straight at the enemy's thickest point.
Her mech's torso was two thick boxes put on top of each other and then turned downwards on their horizontal axis. And while its top part overlapped with the bottom for more engine protection, Skeleton King's power source was openly visible in the top half. And the pilot rode in the head stylized as a worn medieval helmet.
Her weapon was longer than the sword, so she had an advantage. Even if her enemy was to suicidally skewer itself, hoping its engine cover was tough enough to redirect the blow, the spear's blade rhombus was too thick to get stuck inside. Coupled with the electricity blast from the spear's own engine that would remove the reactive armor, it would be enough to set up the killing blow.
Or that's how it would go in a perfect scenario.
Blade robot suddenly stopped about two spear lengths away. Then it made several quick steps and tried to grab the spear. Tsune answered by pulling the right lever to withdraw her weapon and quickly pushed the lever back into neutral.
The stab almost succeeded in reaching her opponent's chest, but it was parried. Seeing the two weapons clash made her finger dance over the lightning trigger, as there was a chance that electricity would arc from the sword to torso. But relying on a chance with a single charge was not safe and both parties took a step back.
Skeleton King slashed at the spear, trying to bash it out her robot's hand and was rewarded with another barely parried stab.
-
The fight went back and forth for a while already. Tsune did short stabs, while the swordsman redirected the spear away from itself, or pushed it down to the ground in an attempt to bind it.
Finally, the girl overextended and with step to the side, Blade slashed down. He aimed to clash with the spear behind the rhombus and then use the opportunity to close in.
She was almost too late to recognize the intention to slide the blade alongside the shaft. Whe she realized that it was too late to evade, or use the sword as a rotation axis to counterattack, she pushed the trigger.
A sparkling arc of electricity connected both weapons. Moment later, a blinding flash, accompanied by the sound of an explosion, threw both weapons away from each other.
Before her opponent could recover its stance, Gunner started to retreat. At the same time, it opened fire and a chain of explosions covered her enemy.
Undaunted by the ranged attack, his robot came charging out of the smoke cloud with the sword held high.
Fearing that he knew that her spear was empty, the girl blocked his overhead slash with the shaft. And held the block instead of going for a stab, while firing straight into enemy's skeletal structure.
But what she thought of as a stalemate was suddenly broken when vertical cracks appeared alongside the sword's edges. And the solid blade turned into a chain saw.
Screeching from pressure, the rotating teeth cut through the spear and chewed into Gunner. Tsune shielded her eyes from the volcano of sparks that filled the screen.
-Training end-
-Tsune Red. Enemy destroyed.-
The electronic announcement cut through the metal grinding noise. The girl looked through her fingers to the battle score screen, then to the main screen where her mech was about to collapse.
Opponent's real state slowly pushed through the veil of adrenaline and fear.
Skeleton King's armored engine remained unharmed. But with the larger ammo storage, the damage to the internal structure accumulated until it failed.
Gunner lost the spear arm and most of the shoulder, but still functioned. While the swordsman stood motionless, its saw rotating but no longer with a purpose.
Tsune pushed the opponent with Gunner's smoking barrel. At first the movement was slow, but then the giant skeleton robot crashed backwards, buried by its white vapor.
-
'Haah.'
Back in reality, the girl weakly pushed the helmet off her head. Her chest barely rose as she tried to inhale more air than she could. The light headwear just landed near her assistant when she heard a call from her opponent.
'Good job, Red. And I was the one to give you praise, you should take it seriously.'
'Yeah, of course. I'll go out a bit later, so you go on without me.'
She took long and calm breaths while resting her head on the console. As power slowly returned to her body, her eyes drifted around the cabin, meeting the metal ball all too often.
'So, what did you think of my battle?'
The question was meant to be rhetorical, just a way to pass the time. But the ball clicked and answered.
-Only partial analysis is complete. Do you wish to hear the current suggestions?-
Tsune sat straight as an arrow, feeling like a fool. Even though the device could talk, she assumed that it would talk only whenever it wanted. It never occurred to her to command it like a tool.
The *Intelligent Logic* being useless helped her keep the relationship with her class neutral. But the price of avoiding the image of a princess, that was downright spoiled by her parents, was that her competitive spirit often rebelled against the inability to use it as an advantage. And now she could have both of them.
'Yes, I want to hear it.'
-Listing-
Camera on the front of the ball glowed, turning into a projector that used the cabin's ceiling.
-Position of your body has shifted to become suboptimal for chosen controls at these time marks...-
-Performing this movement has prevented you from a follow up counter attack-
-This sequence and your expression during this time mark signaled that you came to a correct decision, but acted upon it seventeen seconds too slow-
-Judging by the enemy action at this time, the preliminary suggestion would be to perform this series of actions-
.At first she tried to understand the machine's monotone voice and monochrome visuals. But after several minutes she overstuffed with information and tuned it out.
'Well, at least I now know how to use you.'
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