Chapter 40 Handicaps

"We are going to get that irritating kid fired and get ourselves practice mechas to play with. Give me your gold token." Emma said.

I narrowed my eyes and glanced at the fifty to sixty people in the room warily. "Are you nuts? I can't fight with fifty people at once!" I hissed.

"You won't be fighting anyone. Fighting is strictly prohibited here, so it's completely safe. Give your token to me, quick!" Emma said impatiently.

"Oh, in that case, okay then!" I fished out the token from my left pocket and gave it to her.

Emma took it, turned around and slammed the token on the receptionist's table.

"I want to talk to the office manager. Now." She glared at the receptionist fiercely.

The receptionist looked at the gold token and frowned. "What is that?"

"That is a Gold Whitefrost Family Token. It represents the Patriarch's will and person. I am Harold, the Office Manager on Duty. How may I be of service, Lady Emma?" A tall and handsome middle aged man walked out of the door behind the receptionist and gave Emma a deep bow.

Apparently his attention had been drawn by the less-than-polite words of the receptionist and had already approached us, just in time to see the gold token being slammed on the table.

"Mr Harold. Thank you for coming out to see me. I want two practice mechas for me and my friend here." Emma said as passed the gold token back to me.

"Of course." He snapped his fingers and summoned an aide. "My aide will lead you to your practice mechas. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"Much appreciated." Emma smiled at him. "I also want this stupid receptionist here fired and banished from all Whitefrost owned operations effective today."

"What? Wa-wait…" The receptionist blanched and sputtered.

"As you wish. I apologize for any discomfort that she may have caused you." Harold said courteously.

"That will be all."

"Have a good practice match then, Lady Emma." Harold bowed respectfully once more.

"WAIT!" The receptionist shrieked. But a couple of guards immediately grabbed hold of her and knocked her out.

And with that, she was gone.

Have I mentioned that you shouldn't piss Emma off at all costs?

"Come! Let us have a match!" Emma gave me a triumphant grin.

"Yes!" I pumped my fist once in excitement. I knew I totally looked like a country bumpkin then, being so excited over a mere practice match, but I didn't care. I was about to pilot a real mecha!

"Let's watch the mecha battle first though!" I reminded Emma.

"Right. Bring us to the VIP viewing gallery." Emma told the aide.

"As you wish, Lady Emma." The aide replied respectfully.

Within a few minutes, we entered a small but luxurious room which, like the balcony, was made completely out of glass and jutted out of the side of the "Training Room" walls.

Such a design gave us a full and perfect view of the main training grounds.

Five hyper luxurious sofas were placed in the middle of that room, and each sofa had several screens that could have their sizes and positions adjusted at will.

"Neat!" I exclaimed and immediately hopped into one of them. I tinkered on the screens for a few seconds and realized that they could give me all sorts of viewing options!

From point-of-view perspectives of any of the mechas involved to various bird's eye views from the many cameras positioned all around the training ground!

It was perfect.

Sitting on one of those sofas and getting ready to watch an epic mecha battle felt heavenly.

I felt complete bliss.

Just right when I thought life couldn't get any better, the Aide handed me a menu.

"Heaven! I am definitely in heaven right now!" I thought to myself.

PIAK! I slapped myself really hard, much to Emma and the Aide's EXTREME shock!

"OW!! Okay. It's not a dream." I muttered in satisfaction.

My smile widened to its maximum stretch as I placed an order for steak, fries, and lots of interesting looking drinks.

"What are you ordering?" I turned to look at Emma, who had a rare, soft and gentle look on her face.

"I uh… I'll have what he's having." Emma told the Aide quickly.

He bowed and left the room.

Ding! A massive hologram of a countdown appeared in the middle of the training ground.

5 Minutes 00 Seconds.

4 Minutes 59 Seconds.

Five minutes to go!

"Let me explain to you how mecha battles work." Emma offered.

"Sure!" I agreed enthusiastically.

"There are three main types of mecha battles. Team battles, like the one we're about to watch, Battle Royales, where you fight to be the last mecha standing, and handicap battles, where a stronger team purposely start with less mechas." Emma began.

"Battles involving up to twenty mechas are called small battles. Medium battles involve up to one hundred mechas, large battles involve up to a thousand mechas. Any battle involving over a thousand mechas are called Grand Melees."

My eyes shone brightly at her words. She had only begun and already, I was extremely intrigued!

Somehow, watching training battles felt much more exciting compared to watching the old man's personal guard attacking the European Embassy.

That fight was just stressful for me to watch.

I guess the prospect of me being able to participate in the training battles myself made it much more relevant and thus exciting for me.

I was already imagining myself standing victorious among an entire field of broken and defeated mechas!

"So we're about to watch a medium team battle." I noted.

"Yes." Emma nodded. "What's interesting about this match is that this is a variant of the handicap battle I mentioned earlier. Usually, handicaps involve the stronger team fielding a smaller number of mechas.

In this case however, the blue team, which is composed of higher ranked mecha pilots, is fielding the same number of mechas as the red team, but are handicapped by their mecha grade. They are only fielding light and medium mechas, while the red team can field heavy mechas.

As you can probably guess, grade handicaps are extremely difficult to overcome, much more than number handicaps."