After everyone had received their mecha, my attention quickly shifted from control details to modifications. I wanted the machine to match my fighting style more closely, to be more practical and more flexible, to hide my weapons and strike unexpectedly at the crucial moment. A bold idea came to me: give the mecha wings for extra mobility, and embed several concealed weapons so it would be more than armor, more like an extension of myself.
After school I often went to the village weapon shop to buy parts and hunt for tools. The shop owner, whom I had not seen for a long time, greeted me warmly and handed me some repair jobs. He assumed I would take the items back to the scrapyard's so-called "master" to be tuned, but in truth I did the work with my own hands. Those small jobs paid for parts I needed for the mecha upgrades. Adding wings and hidden weapons was not cheap.
At the underground duel arena I worked in the armorer's workshop and carried out the modifications myself. The workroom held a welding torch, screw kits, crimping pliers and an old power test stand. Sketches of my modification plans were nailed to the wall. I used the parts money from the weapon shop repairs, but every piece of real modification was my own work: cutting alloys, welding fittings, tuning hydraulic lines and rewriting the mecha's control mapping. Every circuit and every parameter were repeatedly tested, annotated and adjusted by me.
Since buying the material, progress on the whip had steadily advanced. Now it was finished. It was long and supple, covered on the surface with overlapping scale-like plates. When swung loosely it behaved like a soft rope, but the moment it snapped tight it became as rigid as a steel wire. When the scales struck skin they cut like fine needles and produced a breath-stealing pain. The whip could restrain at range and hook in close combat, exactly in line with my "few but precise, use skill to win" approach.
I made the whip myself. I wrapped the purchased segments one by one, threaded memory-alloy wire through the core, and fitted simulated scale plates on the exterior. By day I ground the scales into shape with a wheel, at night I tack-welded connections and adjusted the whip core tension until it behaved as I wanted: soft and flexible during a swing, instantly hard when tensioned. During target tests I kept changing scale angles and thickness until each hit tore through target cloth like a needle, inflicting pain that could not be ignored. Every repair and every adjustment made me feel more certain. This was my weapon, built by my hands, not a completed product bought from someone else.
I planned to integrate my existing meteor dagger and the whip into the mecha storage system. The idea was simple: use the weapons normally in combat and retract them into the mecha for concealment when needed. If the mecha was destroyed or I was separated, these weapons could be taken out from the cockpit immediately and become my final line of defense. I imagined piloting the modified mecha, whip arcs and dagger flashes cutting through the battlefield, and felt my blood boil with excitement.
I personally designed and welded the storage and ejection mechanisms. I arranged the short dagger, meteor dagger and whip positions, created mechanical arms for rapid extraction and retraction, and wrote simple control scripts to bind the retrieve actions to mecha gestures. The debugging produced endless errors: jammed hatches, winches with insufficient torque, signal delays causing unsynchronized motions. I worked late into the night fixing each fault and then took the system to the test field.
The modifications cost me time and money, but every penny and every weld brought me closer to my ideal fighting style. The mecha is the shell; my hands and weapons are the soul. The thought of entering the arena wearing a suit I had personally modified, deciding victory with my own whip and blades, filled me with an indescribable satisfaction.
That night I finally stabilized the hidden compartment. The welds had not yet cooled and the air smelled faintly of scorched metal. I took a deep breath, powered up the mecha and walked into the empty training ground.
I entered the command.
"Storage bay, open."
With a click, the chest-side hatch slid open. Hydraulic servos hummed as the long whip I had built smoothly extended and was presented into the mecha's hand by a mechanical arm.
I had the mecha grip the whip handle and the mental interface relayed feedback to my mind. The familiar, cold weight felt even more precise through the machine than it did in my bare hand.
I gave a light flick.
Whap.
The whip cracked through the air. The scale blades flashed in the night and struck a steel target ten meters away. A high-pitched scrape filled the air as the target earned a deep furrow.
I stood stunned, my chest surging with excitement. This was the fruit of my own labor.
A defiant thought rose in me. So what if it was an A-class mecha sponsored by others? What mattered was that this modified suit and these weapons belonged to me.
I continued testing: draw the meteor dagger, retract it; swap to the whip. The transitions were smooth and nearly instantaneous. At the moment the mecha and my weapons fused perfectly, I allowed a small smile inside the cockpit.
"Success," I murmured.
The underground duel arena smelled of oil and rust under dim lights. Shouts and cheers reverberated as the crowd awaited blood and steel.
Tonight I signed up to fight, still under a low-profile name, but I felt unusually calm. This was my first match wearing the modified mecha and weapons.
My opponent was a level 3 mecha warrior, a hulking machine with thick armor and a double-bladed axe, built for raw power. Someone at the edge muttered, "That rookie is finished. How could they stop that iron bull?" I said nothing and quietly brought my mecha online. The moment the mental link engaged, the familiar surge of force entered my mind.
"The match begins."
The iron bull roared forward and the ground trembled. I did not meet him head on; I slid aside and watched for an opening. When his great axe came down, I whispered the command.
"Hidden bay, deploy whip."
Click.
My chest hatch popped and the whip I had modified extended into the mecha's hand.
Whap.
The whip sliced through the air. The scales screamed and struck the iron bull's wrist joint. Metal split and sparks flew. The crowd gasped.
The iron bull froze and snarled, "You dare hit me with a whip?" He raised his axe and struck again.
I let the corner of my mouth curl. With a mental adjustment I synchronized the mecha. At the instant I tightened my control, the whip snapped taut and wrapped around the axe handle.
"Now it's my turn," I said inwardly.
I drove the mecha with every ounce of mental power, spun and locked the whip like a steel cable, wrenching the great axe clear from the opponent and flinging it to the arena edge with a thunderous crash. The crowd paused and then erupted into a roar.
I reeled the whip back and said coldly, "Next."
I expected the iron bull to concede, but he surprised everyone. In the moment I was reclaiming the whip and my mental focus briefly eased, his mecha released a hidden thrust and fired a small impact dart at my rear underarm.
Time elongated. The crowd noise dulled. My mecha was rocked, balance threatened. Danger closed in, but my reflexes were quicker. Instinct made me lash the whip out. The silver arc wrapped like a serpent and snagged a vulnerable spot on the opponent's outer shell.
Rip.
The sound of metal being cut was piercing. A hard yank and a plate tore away, revealing a small, precision component inside, shining faintly. It was a high-speed energy stabilizer valve. Under the arena lights it reflected with a blinding glint.
The iron bull tried to counter, but the stabilizer had been clawed free by my scaled whip and tumbled to the floor at my feet. My mecha arm extended and gripped the component firmly.
The arena fell silent for a beat, then erupted. Some shouted about how brutal the move was; others clamored to buy the part. The iron bull's mecha, having lost its stabilizer, suffered system fluctuations. Thrust dropped and movements stiffened until the machine slowly collapsed.
I held the stabilizer up to the light and felt a complicated pride. This part was not only a prize to sell for credits, it could be installed in my own mecha to boost thrust or energy output.
Back in the workshop that night, the stabilizer glowed faintly in my hands beneath the lamp. Plans began to form. I could integrate it into the wing propulsion system to greatly improve mobility, or use it as the power core for the whip winch to speed retraction and stabilize retrieval. The thought made my lips curve. What had been intended as a surprise attack had instead handed me a key component to change the game.
Across the arena, the defeated iron bull did not collapse in spirit as the crowd assumed. His mecha knelt with smoke rising from its chest. The pilot inside clamped his teeth and stared at me and the raised stabilizer as if it were an affront. His eyes did not show surrender but a vicious, burning resolve. Fingers dug into the control stick until knuckles whitened. Even with communications cut, I read a silent vow in his contorted expression. He would take that stabilizer from me, even if it cost everything.