As Task Force Predator ventured deeper into the Nyxian Gap, the core of the Komodo Star Sector heated up unabated.

War had engulfed the most prosperous areas of the star sector and every second-class citizen became subject to the effects of war!

The media of the Friday Coalition and the Hexadric Hegemony flooded their domestic audiences with heroic tales and grand displays of valor.

The citizens of both states thought that they were winning!

The truth was a bit more nuanced, however. Due to the relative stalemate and lack of progress made by either side, it became difficult to ascertain the true state of the war.

Not even the generals involved in the planning possessed a complete impression of their own success. Almost everyone involved focused completely on their own war theaters and individual battlefields.

Before the Komodo War could proceed to the next stage, the fortified star systems that both states had spent centuries to build up needed to be taken down!

It was not that simple to topple these locations at the border. The Friday Coalition had already known from the beginning that the Hexadric Hegemony would choose to overrun critical border systems in order to reach the interior of Coalition space.

Since that was the case, the Coalition invested an immense amount of resources to turn those locations into one of the toughest shells to crack.

Nonetheless, as long as the enemy threw enough war assets at these defensive works, even the best defenses could be overcome, no matter what the boastful news articles claimed!

The only question was how many enemy mechs and bodies the defensive works grinded into pieces before they succumbed.

Attacking a fortified star system was inevitably a wasteful proposition. Both states accumulated an immense amount of mechs and mech pilots, to the point that they were still in the process of mobilizing the bulk of their fighting forces!

No progress could be made towards victory until one of the sides depleted their war assets first. The fortified star systems which were located at the sites which the enemy had to pass, all served as meat grinders which had already exacted a very great toll from their opponents!

One notable defensive line was the Crestfallen Stars. Made up of a line of seven fortified star systems, it was situated right at the border between the Carnegie Group and the Vraken Matriarchal Dynasty.

As soon as the war formally kicked off, the Hex Army situated in the Vraken border system had immediately launched a major offensive against the defensive line!

The war became incredibly hard-fought as entire mech army groups slugged it out in a maze of orbital defenses and mines.

The sheer amount of debris and broken wrecks floating in the Crestfallen Stars already surpassed the total amount of military mechs involved in the latest Bright-Vesia Wars!

All of the debris originated from second-class mechs, ships and defensive works!

Yet despite the huge amount of wealth floating around in space, neither the Hexers nor the Fridaymen invested a huge amount of effort into recovering the materials.

It was too dangerous!

In general, a lot of debris in contested space remained untouched until one side completely defeated the other. Only at that point was it safe to harvest all of the bounty.

This reality only raised the stakes of each individual campaign and battle!

If one side conquered too many star systems in the early stages of the Komodo War, they did not lose out too much in terms of materials. Instead, the winner could salvage much of neglected wealth and thereby prolong the use of high-quality mechs!

The Marrakath System was one of the most heavily-contested sites of the Crestfallen Stars.

The Carnegie Group, which feared Hexer aggression for a very long time, invested heavily in the system's defenses.

Almost every planet was ringed with orbital defense networks.

An enormous figure of stealthy minefields had been littered throughout space.

Millions of hidden listening posts were strewn around in random points of space.

Two opposing mech army groups reinforced by other elements from their states had entered into a grueling conflict that resulted in severe losses from both sides.

The orbits of outlying gas giants and moons became littered with wreckage as the Hexers steadily worked their way into the inner system, overwhelming one defensive work after another.

The Wrathful Doves Mech Army Group sacrificed over a hundred-thousand mechs and a significant number of mech pilots to reach the doorstep of Marrakath III, the final defensive bulwark of this contested star system!

If the Hexers managed to conquer Marrakath III, then the Fridaymen would have no way of holding on to the star system.

The Opal Trident Mech Army Group knew that, and had been trying to conserve its strength while bleeding the Wrathful Doves as much as possible!

Both sides knew that the most critical stage of this running conflict was about to begin. The Dosth Orbital Defense Matrix, a ring of tightly-built fortifications, defensive platforms and so on, was the final obstacle that prevented the Hexers from landing their mech troops onto the surface of Marrakath III!

Over 100,000 turrets of different weapon types and calibers spat out death at the advancing mechs of the Hexers.

Against a formidable defensive network such as Dosth, ordinary sieges were not very effective.

This was because the defensive platforms were not only clad with a huge amount of compressed armor plating made out of bulk exotics, but also featured a vast array of shield generators!

Certainly, the cheap, mass-produced compressed armor plating was not very exceptional.

However, unlike mechs, defensive platforms were not required to move, and therefore did not show any concern towards mobility.

This meant that the armor of a typical defensive platform could easily be ten times thicker than the armor found in mechs!

As for the shield generators, while they were pricey, the Carnegie Group had built, maintained and replaced them over many years. The shield generators were also tied to a lot of power reactors as well as high-density energy storage banks.

With all of these potent works, the Opal Tridents possessed a considerable defensive advantage against the Hexers!

Even so, the Wrathful Doves still decided to launch a straightforward assault at Dosth! They were confident they could achieve breakthrough as long as they attacked ferociously enough!

A huge amount of projectiles crossed the space around the orbital defense matrix. The Wrathful Doves had decided to split their assault forces in several prongs in order to split the attention of the defenders.

They committed to this plan despite knowing that the Hexer mech divisions would face off against a lot more defensive platforms!

"Devos Maniacs, the time has come! These uptight women think they can trample over us and treat us differently because of how we were born. Let's show them what our 'boys' are made of! For Freedom and Fortune!"

"For Freedom and Fortune!"

"For Freedom and Fortune!"

"For Freedom and Fortune!"

The soldiers of the 363rd Devos Maniacs all echoed the motto of the Fortune Legion!

As the primary mech military of the Carnegie Group, the Fortune Legion's composition and doctrines reflected the relatively open-minded nature of the Coalition partner.

The Fortune Legion was one of the rare military forces that openly recruited a significant number of foreigners. The Carnegie Group had the money to spare but was slightly deficient in terms of population base.

Supplementing its combat forces with foreigners from other star sectors was a risky but viable solution to strengthen its numbers.

Though the quality and personality of these foreign warriors were not very consistent, the Fortune Legion succeeded in its objective of trading wealth for military power!

Not even the Hexers looked down on the Fortune Legion.

The 363rd Devos Maniacs had stood out as one of the mech divisions that hired a prominent breed of foreigners.

Many of them consisted of violent criminals and exiles!

More than a few of them originated from the Vicious Mountain Star Sector. There, these well-trained second-class mech pilots lost out in the many power struggles between warlords.

When it became inconvenient for these mech pilots to remain in Vicious Mountain, various recruiters dispatched by the Carnegie Group eagerly offered them a new life where they could redeem their honor.

The foreign mech pilots of the Devos Maniacs did not enter this mech division in order to chase after something as nebulous as honor.

They just wanted to shed blood!

Spilling the blood of arrogant female Hexers and cowardly male Hexers excited the Maniacs to no end. Despite the losses they suffered since the start of the war, the Maniacs brilliantly used their defensive advantages to slay at least twice as much Hexers!

Now, an opposing Hexer mech division had been assigned to break the Maniacs and breach their portion of Dosth.

The 1345th Trivaxis Helldoves was just as ferocious of the Devos Maniacs, but differed from the Fridaymen mech division in an important aspect.

The Trivaxis Helldoves was one of the more premier assault divisions of the Hex Army. Their spaceborn mech were noticeably stronger than the mechs fielded by the Maniacs!

This was what gave the Helldoves the confidence to break their Fridayman opponent in a single assault!

The huge offensive soon intensified as the Hexer mechs closed the distance!

The Helldove mechs approached by the thousands but had to work their way through an extremely voluminous amount of defensive fire!

Tens of thousands of turrets and bunkers spewed out a wide variety of attacks. Laser beams, positron beams, plasma bolts, gauss projectiles, corrosive missiles and much, much more slowed down the Helldoves and inflicted fatal damage to numerous mechs!

Even so, the Helldoves did not relent!

Having already prepared for the offensive, the Helldoves fielded a considerable number of space knights. Piloted by obedient male Hexer mech pilots, these space knights held thick tower shields and a robust flight system that allowed them to advance while building up a significant amount of momentum.

If that wasn't enough, the mechs also incorporated shield generators which helped with repelling a large amount of attacks!

Hexer support mechs regularly rotated back and forth in order to swiftly recharge or swap out the depleted energy cells of the space knights as they advanced relentlessly.

No matter how much fire these space knights endured, their loyal mech pilots did not halt their advance or seek to avoid danger.

They pushed forward until their mechs sustained enough damage to automatically eject their cockpits!

Even so, many of these male mech pilots met an unfortunate end when their cockpits ejected into space.

The Devos Maniacs took sadistic pleasure in shooting down the vulnerable objects. Not only would they be able to satisfy their bloodlust, they also weakened the Hex Army by depriving them of bodies they could put into other mechs!

"Hahaha, these Hexers only care about protecting their women! Their 'boys' are easy pickings!"

The commanders of the Trivaxis Helldoves cared nothing for the boys under their command. As cannon fodder, it was their job to attract enemy fire. By leaving their ejected cockpits exposed, the Devos Maniacs focused heavily on shooting down these easy targets, thereby leaving the cockpits that held women alone!

The space knights succumbed at a rapid pace, causing hundreds of boys to die in a span of just a minute.

Nonetheless, the Helldoves did not allow the Maniacs to bleed them with impunity. The ranged mechs of the Hexer mech division had already worked their way through numerous turrets and defensive platforms!

No matter how much armor plating and how many shield generators they faced, it was impossible for them to hold once they became the target of hundreds of ranged mechs!

The Dosth Orbital Defense Matrix began to sustain serious damage!

The Devos Maniacs that manned this section of the defensive works began to sustain casualties as well!

As the Helldivers advanced closer, the destruction intensified! Soon enough, the Hexer melee mechs would be able to land right in front of the Fridayman mechs, thereby heralding a new and bloody phase of this grand assault!