The scene shifts to a short time ago, on the Moon.
The red-and-white Zorin Soul was being loaded into the cargo bay of a shuttle.
Char had changed into a red pilot suit and stood outside the bay, watching the Anaheim workers secure the unit. Beside him stood an elderly man with heavy dark circles under his eyes.
"Old man, didn't you sleep last night?"
Char stood by the elder, watching the Zorin Soul being locked onto the sliding rails.
"Whose fault do you think that is?!"
The old man took a sip of his coffee and grumbled irritably, "It's because you said you were leaving today! I had to pull two consecutive all-nighters just to assemble the machine and run emergency tests!"
Char listened to the old man's rambling complaints with a calm expression.
No matter how much his Newtype potential might have waned, he could still sense that while the old man's words were sharp, his emotions held no trace of actual loathing—it was mostly a sense of worry.
"Don't go dying."
Toward the end, the old man's voice grew low. "...But then again, even if you do die, it's none of my business."
"Yeah. I'll stay alive," Char replied, reaching out to pat the old man on the shoulder.
Char began walking toward the Zorin Soul.
"Just like when I took the Zeong from you back then, I'm taking the Zorin Soul now."
Upon hearing these words, the old man's movements suddenly froze.
The red pilot suit followed Char's stride like a flickering flame. For a moment, the old man's mind blurred as if he had been transported back to the past, seeing the same high-spirited Colonel Char Aznable.
He opened his mouth as if to say something, and finally, as if reaching a resolution, he spoke.
"Char!"
The old man tremblingly raised his right hand, calling out that name from the depths of his heart, putting every last ounce of his strength into his cry: "SIEG ZEON!!!"
Inexplicably, a single tear fell from the old man's eye, drifting through the low-gravity hangar as he moved.
"Mm..."
Char lowered his head slightly, looking at the red helmet in his hands.
"For Lalah... and for everyone."
Char donned his helmet and boarded the cockpit of the Zorin Soul without looking back.
Shortly after, the transport shuttle—officially filed by Anaheim Electronics—successfully took off, blending into the regular lunar airport flight schedules.
Meanwhile, a pre-prepared Anaheim hangar suddenly exploded, and a shuttle significantly larger than the one Char was on launched from within.
Using the shuttle's external cameras, Char watched with his own eyes as that decoy shuttle was torn apart by the Federation's air defense network, turning into drifting wreckage in the void of space.
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Back to the present. After the Zorin Soul detached from the transport shuttle, it began a continuous dive toward the targets scanned beneath the cloud layer.
The sensation of being captured by Earth's gravity was a novel experience for Char.
Though it caused slight discomfort, the operation of the Minovsky Craft System ensured that such interference was not a major issue.
"All unit data nominal, OS parameter adjustments complete..."
Char flicked through the Zorin Soul's settings with his left hand before returning it to the spherical grip and pressing several buttons.
The Zorin Soul's long-wing funnels deployed, their trailing ends carving several white streaks through the air like a crimson phoenix.
As the Zorin Soul punched through the lowest layer of clouds, trailing wisps of vapor, it caught a clear view of its objective.
"The Celebes Sea... looks like they haven't been out for long."
It was a transport plane flying toward Australia, flanked by four Galcezon units carrying a total of eight Jegans.
To ensure safety, Kenneth had mapped a slightly circuitous route for this transport to keep the high-ranking Federation officials under the constant protection of the Circe Unit—the former Kimberley Unit.
Since it was a military transport, "comfort" was non-existent. At best, they were given some soft cushions; the luxury and service found on the Haunzen were out of the question.
Fortunately, after the Haunzen incident, this arrogant crowd had humbled themselves slightly. They hadn't complained much during the journey, knowing full well that Kenneth would truly ignore their status and open fire if pushed.
As the Zorin Soul locked onto the transport, the two Jegan escort squads spotted it. Faced with an aggressive unit bearing absolutely no identification markings, the squads reacted instantly.
One Galcezon carrying two Jegans flew above the transport to maintain cover while beginning to report back to the Circe Unit base in Davao via a relay station.
The remaining three Galcezons, carrying six Jegans, began their ascent.
The three Galcezons moved in a triangular formation, attempting to pincer the Zorin Soul.
Watching the enemies close in, Char let a slight smirk play on his lips and slammed down on the pedals.
The Zorin Soul's thrusters erupted with even thicker flames. Assisted by the Minovsky Craft System, the unit closed the distance to the three Galcezons with incredible speed.
At that moment, the six Jegans raised their beam rifles and began pulling their triggers repeatedly at the Zorin Soul.
But the Zorin Soul in cruise mode was simply too fast. Before the Jegans could even react, the unit had already bypassed them.
The purplish-red beams fired by the Jegans formed only a loose, useless net in the sky behind it.
"Truly... incredible performance." Feeling the G-force from the machine's acceleration, the smile on Char's face became increasingly radiant.
"But it's still not enough! At this level, I'll never be able to defeat Amuro!"
As Char spoke, the Zorin Soul tore through the final line of defense of the Jegan squad, vaulted over the Galcezon hovering above the transport, and positioned itself beneath the transport's completely defenseless belly.
Despite having a face similar to a Gundam, the sheer pressure of such a giant machine descending from the heavens, combined with the frantic blaring of alarms, caused the transport pilots to feel an instinctive sense of suffocation.
In the cargo bay where the high-ranking Federation officials were located, the situation spiraled out of control.
The urgent alarms stripped everyone of their usual elegance; they scrambled desperately to find a way out, only to realize they were trapped in a thin-skinned, oversized iron coffin.
"Well then... I offer my condolences to everyone who died because of you."
As he spoke, Char maneuvered the Zorin Soul into a reclined posture, skimming at low altitude over the sea. He raised the electrochemical gun in his right hand and aimed it at the transport's underbelly.
"Go to hell, you arrogant fools."
Char's thumb pressed the firing button on the spherical grip.
The electrochemical gun activated instantly; a multi-stage shaped-charge explosive, moving like a beam of light, pierced through the transport's belly and detonated inside the cargo hold.
The violent impact and high temperatures tore the "dignitaries"—who had been huddling like quails—into bloody shreds.
The transport, snapped into two pieces and belching thick black smoke, began its terminal plunge toward the ocean surface.
Pshhh—
The upper and lower covers at the front of the electrochemical gun slid open, venting a large volume of searing gas to quickly dissipate the heat.
"I didn't expect a physical projectile weapon to be this powerful. Not bad at all, old man."
Glancing at the results of his work, Char piloted the Zorin Soul through a graceful arc to begin his ascent, effortlessly dodging two beams fired by the remaining Jegan escorts.
Indeed, unlike the current era dominated by beam weaponry, the Zorin Soul's electrochemical gun was a kinetic weapon, firing multi-stage shaped explosives as ammunition at extreme velocities.
"Now then... next are these mobile suits."
Char slammed down on the pedals and closed in on the scattered Jegans.
Presumably receiving new orders, the Jegans leaped from their Galcezons one after another.
Hovering in mid-air using their thruster backpacks, they ceased their desperate pursuit of the Zorin Soul and shifted instead to suppressive containment fire.
To Char, however, even if his Newtype abilities weren't top-tier, he could still discern the general presence of killing intent and maneuver his machine to evade.
After dodging a succession of purplish-red beams, Char pulled the trigger again. A multi-stage shaped-charge explosive turned into a streak of flowing light, slamming into the shield of a Jegan that had raised its guard.
The shield was pierced through by the massive impact. Once past the shield, the explosive detonated violently; the resulting shrapnel and shockwave slammed into the Jegan, snapping the mobile suit clean in two.
The missiles mounted on the punctured shield also cooked off due to the explosion. This secondary blast and shrapnel nearly tore the Jegan's mangled upper torso to shreds.
Faced with such a gruesome sight, the Jegans did not fall into the chaos typical of the Kimberley era. Instead, they rapidly reorganized their defensive line to fill the gap.
"It's different from before... Has their combat style shifted?"
Seeing a squad with such strict discipline, Char raised an eyebrow in surprise, recalling the battle at Oenbelli. "I didn't expect such a massive change just by swapping commanders."
"Still, this is the perfect chance to test these funnel missiles on them."
As Char spoke, his hands never stopped moving as he tapped several commands on the spherical grips.
Four ports on the Zorin Soul's waist—which looked like attitude control thrusters—suddenly unlocked.
Blade-like funnel missiles, trailing yellow flames, detached from the Zorin Soul and streaked toward the Jegans.
Char closed his eyes slightly as the Quasi-Psycommu system began to rapidly frame and lock onto the Jegans and Galcezons.
As Char snapped his eyes open, the funnel missiles, which had been cruising leisurely, completed their locks and accelerated to extreme speeds toward their targets.
"That trajectory... the enemy is using remote weapons! Fire! Fire!"
Seeing the blade-like funnel missiles closing in, the Jegan pilots instinctively engaged their head-mounted vulcan cannons, spraying fire in an attempt to shoot them down.
But as a Newtype, Char's mastery over remote weaponry was beyond what any ordinary person could rival.
Char pulled the trigger once more, and another multi-stage shaped-charge explosive flew from the muzzle of the electrochemical gun, accurately striking a Jegan and blowing it to pieces.
As that Jegan was torn apart, the defensive line hadn't even had time to contract before the four funnel missiles dove through the gap, slamming with incredible speed into the four Galcezons.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The continuous string of explosions sent a jolt of dread through the remaining Jegan pilots.
With their extraction craft destroyed, the remaining Jegans faced a dire situation; with their limited propellant, it was a question whether they could even find land to set down on, let alone survive against the Zorin Soul.
Even while controlling the funnel missiles, Char maintained more than enough composure to continue firing the electrochemical gun, relentlessly sniping at the evading Jegans.
"Evade! Break away! The remote weapons are too fast—AH!"
"They're everywhere!"
"Head vulcans are Winchester... out of ammo—GAAH!"
At that moment, the terrified screams of the pilots crackled through the Jegans' comms, distorted by Earth's heavy Minovsky particle interference.
In stark contrast to their chaotic panic, Char leisurely adjusted his aim with the electrochemical gun and struck another Jegan.
As the multi-stage shaped-charge explosive pierced the unlucky Jegan's armor, it detonated across the upper chest, compromising the reactor and triggering a violent secondary explosion.
Char focused his mind. The funnel missiles, which had been performing high-speed "harassment and containment" maneuvers, suddenly executed sharp, acute-angle turns.
They slammed into the remaining Jegans from a series of bizarre, unpredictable trajectories.
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"Faster... just a little faster..."
Inside the cockpit of the Odysseus Gundam's Penelope flight unit—now repaired with spare parts—Lane Aime gritted his teeth and slammed his foot onto the pedal, forcing the machine into its high-speed cruise mode.
"The Celebes Sea... I'm here!"
Having reached the designated coordinates, Lane immediately activated his sensors.
A chaotic array of boxes flashed across his screen, many flickering with "Unknown" markers as they intersected with the icons representing the Jegans.
Right before his eyes, the wreckage of Galcezons, the transport plane, and a handful of Jegans drifted upon the surface of the ocean.
In the next second, the remaining Jegans were struck one by one by flying, red-and-white remote weapons. They detonated in mid-air, forming patches of thick, acrid smoke.
As the sea breeze slowly dispersed the haze from the explosions, Lane finally beheld the silhouette of the attacker. It was a red-and-white machine, roughly the same size as the Penelope, hovering silently in the sky.
Its yellow mono-eye glared sideways at the newly arrived Lane.
"...A mono-eye!"
Seeing his teammates wiped out by the Zorin Soul, and witnessing that mono-eye so reminiscent of the Sinanju, Lane's eyes snapped wide. With a roar, he stomped on the pedals.
The Penelope opened the missile bays on its multi-purpose shields. Sixteen conventional missiles streaked out as the Penelope entered its flight form, closing in rapidly on Char.
"Perfect timing..."
Watching this massive, unfamiliar machine—one that matched the Zorin Soul in scale—Char let out a small laugh.
"Let's see what you've got. Show me the performance of the Federation's newest MS."
......................