After spending two hours in the gym, Xiao finally stopped to take a break. As Puhi promised, she got the young woman a trainer who made a strict schedule meant to build muscles in as short of a time as possible. In addition to the repetition of exercises, her diet had changed greatly too. The young woman had never consumed so much meat in her life but, given enough time, her body adjusted to her diet, similar to her training. While she didn’t have any muscles to show for her hard work, Xiao was still proud of the compliments given by the trainer.

“Xiao, please go to the simulation wing! I got you another match.”

Xiao listened in on the message and, with a sigh, left the gym. She knew that Puhi was doing her best booking matches because Xiao needed to move up the rankings as soon as possible. The sooner the two of them broke the top one hundred rank in the academy, the sooner they could really take advantage of the resources provided by the academy. The young woman didn’t believe it when she first heard Puhi mention it but, after a thorough look through the academy website, she was certain that her squadmate wasn’t pulling her leg.

To think that the academy is willing to reward subcomponents to the top one hundred students. No wonder outcasts are at such a disadvantage.

For most students in the academy, they were given plenty of study materials, access to the MTS and the best instructors the academy offered. The student ranking determined how much access the students were given so there was a lot of incentive on doing well. Meanwhile, the top one hundred students were given actual mech subcomponents that would be stored until the student graduated. By then, the student would have a head start to his or her mech building which mattered in combat situations. In their case, the extra subcomponents could give them an advantage over their competition who had to acquire parts the old fashioned way. From what Puhi heard, some of the subcomponents were rare enough that finding them in stores could be difficult, if not impossible.

If I want to be the best outcast out there, I should help myself to these subcomponents to lessen the financial burden of Zavaso. I know they have money but no one will turn down extra resources.

The young woman pushed open a door to enter the familiar MTS room. Her opponent was already there with a cup of beverage in his hand. As usual, her opponents paid no attention to her, especially when she was an outcast. After her first match, Xiao made a name for herself, allowing her to challenge those higher up in the ranking. Three matches later, her ranking went from 767 to 424. It was still too slow for her liking but she knew Puhi was trying her best. Finding opponents willing to fight her was the most challenging as her opponent didn’t find her worthwhile. Therefore, she had to do it step by step.

“If you two are ready,” said the judge, “please upload your template and take a seat in your MTS.”

Xiao found herself stopping in front of the big screen in the room. Normally, she paid no heed to it as it offered no useful information. The screen provided some basic info on the two combatants along with the number of speculators. She never paid the screen any attention because there were never enough speculators to get her attention. This time, she stared at it for some reason and noticed at least two thousand people were observing.

Are those two thousand spectators all students or are some of them staff members?

For academy students, the attention of an academy staff member could open doors to incredible opportunities. Xiao doubted that an outcast like her could get that sort of privileges. The resources she had been receiving already far surpassed her expectations. As she sat down, Xiao put aside all her thoughts and focused on her upcoming match. She couldn’t afford any losses to slow down her progression up the ranking system. The young woman then put on her headset and moved her mech to the starting position.

“Match begins!”

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Xiao’s ant mech ran towards the opponent which had remained stationary. Considering that she was facing a beetle, she wasn’t surprised to see her opponent staying in one location. With the AC2 slug ammo stuck in her memory, the young woman vowed to never make the same mistake. From time to time, she brushed her jump jet control, allowing her ant to move laterally with ease. Yet, her opponent never once moved which only worried her greatly. She couldn’t imagine what her foe was planning except to lure her closer.

What is he thinking? A beetle mech can only be equipped with light machine guns, machine guns, small lasers and AC2s. It shouldn’t possess anything else that requires me to be so close that isn’t standard on most light mechs.

Choosing caution, she navigated her ant until it was behind the beetle mech. If there were surprises, she would have time to react given the slow turning speed of the beetle. As she closed the gap, there still wasn’t any movement. Wondering if her opponent’s MTS had bugged out, she went in for the kill. Her focus was initially on the beetle’s right torso because she spotted the AC2 in the right arm. As soon as the torso was blown off, Xiao had to quickly back away from the explosion that engulfed the entire beetle.

What…what just happened?

She could tell it resembled an ammo explosion which happened when light machine gun ammo had critical hits on unused ammo, thus blowing them up. However, her simulations had never shown such a large explosion, making her wonder if her opponent was using a special ammo.

And maybe that special ammo is the cause for the beetle’s inaction?

Due to how valuable templates were, she had no way of finding out what ammo was used in the beetle mech. She could, like everyone else, speculate what it could be. After the match, she sought out Puhi to get her squadmate’s opinion on the matter. Puhi watched the explosion a few times before she came to her conclusion.

“If I have to guess, I’d say this is most likely kinetic ammo. They are built for faster velocity shells, making them extremely difficult to dodge. They also achieve their maximum damage output at longer ranges when they reach max velocity. Even a damage reduction for the shells would still be too much for a light mech to handle.”

“Aren’t kinetic ammo seen in medium or heavier mechs?”

“Their flaw is their weight which you noticed in your match. That beetle couldn’t even lift its arms or legs so it was an easy win for you. I suspected someone gave your opponent the ammo without informing him of the downsides of such powerful ammo. This is the consequence of going into matches blindly with a template given by someone else. ”

“The win only moved me to rank 407. I still haven’t broken through the top four hundred yet.”

Puhi comforted Xiao by saying that the young woman was already moving up the rankings far faster than most thought possible. Apparently, there were even rumors of her attracting the attention of certain staff members. At the mention of that, Xiao mentioned what she saw on the screen regarding the many spectators.

“That’s not surprising! If you caught my attention, then it’s a matter of time before others also take notice.” Puhi gestured to the academy uniform on her bed. “If they invite you to join the academy, will you do so?”

Xiao shook her head and said that this was an easy decision. She wanted to be the best outcast so joining an academy was out of the question. She would miss the opportunity but she was certain other doors would open up. Even for sponsors, the idea of supporting a rising outcast pilot would certainly be very alluring for their brand.

“I thought that would be the case,” said Puhi as she passed over her tablet. “That’s the summary for our next match. I think it will be a first for both of us.”

Xiao took the tablet and her eyes widened.

<

Match Type: Casual

Mech Weight Class Allowed: Light Mechs only

Format: 4 versus 4

Arena: Casual Standard

Win Condition: All opposing mechs can no longer continue combat

Attendance: 10000

Salvage Reward: 8

>

“A four versus four battle? How chaotic can that match get?”

“I’ve seen a few in person and they get very chaotic. This will be two squads against two squads so the match might be decided by which two squads can work together the best.”

If that’s the case, I better work with Puhi so we have better teamwork. Now that I think about it, I don’t think we trained together yet.