That white thing, the BETA with an exposed organ resembling a woman's, was a Soldier-class, the weakest grade of BETA.
Although it was the weakest, its ability to detect humans was extremely high. It seemed to exist specifically to search for human beings. The strength of its arms and jaws was several times, even over ten times, greater than a human's.
After the Soldier-class came the Warrior-class BETA, the smallest confirmed bipedal BETA species.
Its head and arms were fused together into a single structure, almost like an elephant's trunk. Its strength allowed it to tear off a human head with ease.
After the Warrior-class came the Tank-class BETA, the most numerous small, multi-legged species among the BETA swarm. Its body was bright red.
They had something like four legs and two arms. On the underside of their abdomen, the lower half of a head seemed to be fused into the body, with a huge mouth that could easily chew through concrete and metal.
They could reach speeds of eighty kilometers per hour, adapted to almost any terrain. If a tank could not outrun them, its armor would be bitten apart, and the people inside would be dragged out and eaten.
At the same time, this species was also the BETA type that had killed the most humans.
After that came the Grappler-class BETA. Its shape resembled a scorpion somewhat, but human-like structures could still be seen in it. Its two massive pincers had a Mohs hardness of 15.
Although it was slow, it possessed the strongest close-combat capability. Its body was roughly the size of two fighter jets stacked together.
They followed closely behind the Destroyer-class. Once the Destroyer-class tore through the enemy's defensive line, they moved in to destroy the enemy.
As for the Destroyer-class, it was a large species that served as the vanguard of the BETA swarm. It advanced at 170 kilometers per hour, destroying everything in front of its charge route.
The armor shell on its front was extremely tough, sturdy enough to withstand large-caliber artillery fire, and it also had a certain degree of regenerative ability.
Then another type appeared, one that caused intense physical discomfort: the Laser-class BETA.
This thing's torso resembled the male organ's storage sac. Beneath it were two legs that closely resembled human legs, while its head consisted of two large eyes growing from the top of that sac-like body.
Those two eyes could release laser attacks powerful enough to destroy aircraft, TSFs, and tanks. They could accurately lock onto flying objects 380 kilometers away at an altitude of 100,000 meters.
And once the Laser-class appeared, the vanguard reconnaissance force was struck by its beams and crashed, falling into a swarm of Tank-class BETA.
One machine whose signal had not yet been cut off continued transmitting. The footage showed Tank-class BETA tearing open the cockpit. The screaming pilot was seized and stuffed toward the huge mouth in their abdomen.
It was like watching a tomato being bitten apart. The image was deeply horrifying.
As the machine was further dismantled and chewed by the BETA, the signal was finally lost.
With that, the reconnaissance force was completely annihilated.
And this unit had clearly been doomed from the beginning. There had been no way back for them. They had used their lives to obtain more intelligence for the grand fleet.
During the process of their destruction, Lacus was finally able to clearly judge the combat ability of the TSFs.
The TSFs' mobility was greater than that of MS. Even the Gundams developed with Orb's technology could not match them.
In other words, in mobile close combat, MS were no match for TSFs at all. If the distance were opened up, that was another matter.
In addition, the TSFs here could not fly too high, while MS, if equipped with flight units, could carry out high-altitude strikes.
However, if MS combat power were brought to this world, their performance would be inferior to TSFs.
On one hand, their ground mobility was lower than that of TSFs. On the other, MS batteries meant their sustained combat time was shorter than that of TSFs.
As for firepower, they were superior to TSFs, because beam fire was stronger than the physical shells used here.
Correction. It should be said that in pure single-shot attack power, MS surpassed TSFs. But in terms of overall output, they would be weaker than TSFs. The issue was the energy pack, because beam fire also drew from the machine's battery.
Right. The Phase Shift armor on machines like the Strike Gundam should be able to withstand Laser-class irradiation as well.
However, Gundams could not currently be mass-produced.
So Lacus ran a simulation in her mind, imagining how her world's current overall military strength would perform if it were brought here to fight the BETA. If the battle were calculated according to the combat data on the BETA provided by Kouzuki Yuuko, the result would still be tragic.
Because according to Yuuko's data, if the beam threat could reach that kind of level, then the space warships from Lacus's side would also become mere targets.
Of course, the Laser-class could not threaten them, but the Heavy Laser-class would be enough to damage space warships.
Especially since there was supposedly a Super Heavy Laser-class as well?
Unless her side had also developed energy shields. As for the technology, they did have it, but miniaturizing it onto MS and mass-producing it would take at least two or three years.
If it were an experimental machine, then based on the technical progress her father had told her about, they should be able to produce one in roughly half a year.
In the end, the issue was that the Laser-class BETA was somewhat unfair. Without them, the other species would not be too difficult to eliminate.
Still, in overall terms, if the two sides were swapped, her world's forces at least would not allow the world to deteriorate into this state.
If it were the power displayed in the second season of the "fan animation," meaning the forces after C.E. 73, then dealing with the BETA should be possible.
But the premise was that the BETA would not evolve along with them and produce new species.
Returning to the main issue, it was a problem with this world itself. Lacus could somewhat see it now. Even at a time like this, the humans of this world still could not unite, and were still scheming against one another.
Ugh.
Mr. Kain appeared in the livestream comment section and explained exactly what the upper echelons of humanity in this world were like.
After reading the description, Lacus was utterly speechless.
One piece of information in particular stood out. With the world on the brink of destruction, humanity still had the leisure to develop TSFs designed specifically to fight other human TSFs. What exactly were these people thinking?
The countries that had not yet been threatened by the BETA acted as if they were still in the Cold War, as if the BETA did not exist in the world. Humanity was still exhausting itself through internal conflict.
Unable to unite, with resources and technology kept secret from one another, even weapons production and research amounted to each side holding the others back.
Seen this way, one reason the BETA had devoured so much of humanity's land so quickly was humanity itself.
Hm?
The BETA began surging out of the Hive on a massive scale, pouring forth like a tide. The scene resembled when Mr. Kain had faced the Tyranids before, as if they were endless.
This sudden preemptive movement by the BETA was because the combined human fleet had drawn very close.
These alien organisms were most easily attracted by electronic devices. It was as if they had smelled the "scent" of those warships, TSFs, and other weapons, and were now rushing over to begin the battle.
In response, the combined human fleet was also about to enter combat.
The viewpoint shifted toward the sky. The signal to attack would sound from above.
It came.
A vast number of points of light appeared. Those were the warheads launched by the orbital bombardment force.
Countless warheads rubbed against the atmosphere at high speed, glowing and heating up, like a sky full of stars shining in broad daylight.
Looking carefully at those glittering points of light, one of them was the largest.
That did not seem to be a warhead.
It looked like a machine.
(End of Chapter)
[Get +30 Extra Chapters On — P@tr3on "Zaelum"]
[Every 300 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter Drop]
[Thanks for Reading!]