Freedom fight

"If you can fix the Mammoth, I guarantee no one in the district will dare to touch you again. But if you're playing me,"

"Then I'll probably die a very ugly death, right?"

"No, it'll be worse than death."

At the exercise yard, near the storeroom door.

The exercise period had already passed, and the prisoners had returned to their cells. On the vast exercise ground, there was only one mech, along with Thomas, Simon, and LCH.

Thomas was inspecting the mech known as Mammoth, while Simon and LCH watched.

"One piece of good news, one piece of bad news,"

Moments later, Thomas jumped down from the mech, approaching Simon as he wiped the oil off his face:"The good news is I do have the skills to fix the Mammoth. The bad news is that under the current conditions, I can't fully repair it. Many intricate parts can't be manufactured in this simple workshop. At most, I can get it to function simply, but that level is far from enough for intense combat."

"Can't be used in combat anymore..." Simon muttered, glancing at LCH with an inquiring look.

Although Simon was strong in combat, he knew nothing about mechanics. He needed to confirm whether Thomas's statement was credible, and LCH was the only expert he had.

His real name was Disen. Known for his naturally curly brown hair, he was nicknamed Little Curly Hair.

Meeting Simon's gaze, LCH subtly nodded in agreement.

As the saying goes, an expert knows the intricacies, a layman simply enjoys the show.

Although Thomas hadn't started the actual repair, his inspection procedures and methods clearly showed that he was a true mechanic, and even more skilled than him.

Here's the translated version of the provided Chinese text:

"Alright, what do you need?" Simon, having received the response, turned back to Thomas and even patted his shoulder:"As long as you can fix the Mammoth, whatever you want in the district, I can provide. A private cell, delicious food, even beautiful women, as long as you desire it."

"No need for women. Just get me some substitute parts for infantry-level mechs, especially the main control chip."

"That's not possible."

Thomas:"… What, you think I'm joking around? The prison tyrant of the T area, a man more authoritative than the warden to some extent, who can even get women into the male prisoner area, it's obvious you have a powerful background outside the prison. You even managed to bring a mech into this prison, and now you're telling me you can't get mech parts?

"You don't know the purpose of the Mammoth?" However, faced with Thomas's confusion, Simon retorted with a question of his own, eyeing Thomas suspiciously.

"What else can a mech be used for…" Thomas slightly raised an eyebrow. It's like a car, what else can it do besides being operated? Most importantly, what does its purpose have to do with whether you can get a chip or not? Do you even have a brain? You don't have a single hair on your head... Thomas unconsciously glanced at Simon's bald head.

"It seems you really don't know." Receiving Thomas's reply, Simon suddenly showed a somewhat amused expression, as if he had encountered something novel, leaving Thomas quite perplexed.

"Boss, let me explain it to him."

At that moment, LCH stepped forward. He first looked at Simon, and after receiving a nod, he turned to Thomas and said,"This matter is both simple and complex. To explain it clearly, we have to go back over sixty years ago…"

LCH gestured for Thomas to sit down with him and began his narration. As he spoke, Thomas began to understand why there was a field mech in the prison.

According to LCH, more than sixty years ago, the Ninth Prison, occupying nearly half of a planet, was a strict penitentiary. It was well-secured, heavily armed, and designed to detain the most dangerous criminals captured by the Carl Star Nation. No one had ever successfully escaped from it, a record that made it a benchmark in the Carl Star Nation's prison system.

However, the problem arose with this so-called benchmark. About sixty years ago, the Carl Star Nation captured a special prisoner. This individual was a notorious interstellar criminal who had committed multiple major crimes within the nation, stirring widespread public outrage.

Normally, such a criminal would be sentenced to death without any formal procedure. But the issue was that this criminal was also a noble of a high-ranking federation, a power much stronger than the Carl Star Nation.

To give an analogy based on our world view, it was like a small country catching a misbehaving general from a powerful and influential nation. Letting him go would upset the public and be a face-losing move. Sentencing him... was something they dared not do.

Caught between a rock and a hard place, the Carl Star Nation's leaders decided to detain the criminal for the time being, leaving the problem for future generations to solve.

So, where would they detain him?

"The Ninth Prison..." Thomas involuntarily responded upon hearing this.

Clearly, as the model prison within the Carl Star Nation, the Ninth Prison was the top choice of the nation's higher-ups.

"Smart!" LCH gave Thomas a thumbs up, then continued his story. Since the arrival of the first 'super prisoner', it was like opening the floodgates. After that, the Carl Star Nation would capture a criminal similar to the federation noble every so often, someone they dared not deal with.

Perhaps due to habitual thinking, or maybe because those in power needed political achievements, they never considered secretly releasing these people. Instead, they made a big show of their capture, gained public support, and then stuffed all these criminals into the Ninth Prison.

The prison then became a lively place. Its originally stable structure was shaken by these super prisoners, with almost every section having one or two untouchable tyrants. Simon was one of them.

And this was just the change inside the prison. The situation outside was even more severe. As the number of super prisoners detained by the Carl Star Nation increased over the years, the nation's politicians suddenly found that while they gained public support, they had also offended many powerful forces.

These forces united and began to pressure the Carl Star Nation's politicians, hoping to get their key members released. At first, it was just one or two forces, but now with so many heavyweights involved, the politicians couldn't withstand the pressure.

So, they transferred this pressure to the warden of the Ninth Prison, Jenna Downs. They demanded that Jenna come up with a solution to appease these forces and even to have direct talks with the heads of these organizations.

According to rumors, Jenna was almost scared to death at that time.

"You make her sound so pitiable..." Thomas sneakily glanced at the distant alloy building. The floor-to-ceiling windows were still there, but Jenna's figure was no longer visible behind them.

He could imagine the immense pressure Jenna must have faced. A situation even the rulers of the star nation avoided was being shouldered by a woman over fifty. It was nothing short of a miracle that she could withstand it.

"What happened next?"

"Then, Jenna Downs really came up with a plan..." LCH walked over to the Mammoth, knocked on its exterior armor, and smiled in admiration:"This is the plan. Jenna decided to hold a competition on the Death Star. Can you imagine? She's simply a genius."

LCH's demeanor became noticeably more excited as he continued enthusiastically. Jenna Downs, although an ordinary person and already fifty-five years old, was undoubtedly a capable and intelligent woman in her menopause years.

Just as LCH said, Jenna organized a competition. The core of it was mech battles. She found many infantry-level field mechs on this garbage star and had them repaired to ensure they were battle-ready.

She then assigned numbers to these mechs and gathered all the prison tyrants together, determining through a lottery which mechs would belong to whom. Finally, these mechs would participate in a capture-the-flag battle in a specially constructed arena.

There were no rules in the battle; all combat styles and methods were allowed, even killing was irrelevant, as long as one ensured their mech captured the flag by the end of the match.

A mech that won seven capture-the-flag battles or eliminated all other competing mechs would allow its owner, the prison tyrant, to win. The only rule was that the mechs were not allowed to be equipped with parts sent by the various powers from outside.

This accelerated the pace of the matches, quickly and visibly eliminating some mechs while also preventing the super criminals' backers from sending over-spec parts that could disrupt the balance of the competition.

"So, Simon is one of those 'super criminals,' and Mammoth is the mech under his name, and you..." Thomas looked at LCH:"You're the Iron Rider responsible for piloting this mech?"

"Yes."

LCH shrugged, confirming it, and then said:"I specifically stole a high official's spaceship, but it turned out the crime wasn't severe enough. Our leader had to bribe with several million Star Sea currency up and down, just to get the Carl Star Nation's government to sentence me to a heavy penalty and send me to the Ninth Prison."

"You are so interesting," Thomas couldn't help but comment, almost choking on his words with sarcasm.