Artist's commentary
◆Unit Explanation◆
In order to strike a decisive blow against the giant Neuroi units that appeared one after the other during the mop-up operations in Orussia in 1989, the Karlsland military began development of the "variable combat unit mk. 3" for navy and air force use under the command of then-Kapitänleutnant/Lieutenant Franzisca Hartmann, technical officer in the Karlsland Navy. The Messerscharf company was granted manufacturing rights. As it's essentially a larger version of the Strikers used by most Witches, it still uses the Witch pilot's magical energy as its power source.
The basic design followed the path of the top-secret Warlock project developed by Britannia during WWII; all of its systems include parts manufactured from captured Neuroi cores, but the risk of it going out of control or turning into a Neuroi has been eliminated. The fighter is larger than usual, but since all of the cores are controlled by the thoughts and magic of the pilot its command response time is greatly enhanced, and the energy released by the cores themselves serve to reduce the physical and magical burden on the pilot. The magical engine's output also surpasses that of traditional Strikers.
The finished trial prototype saw action in the end of the Orussian operation and was given the codename "Zauberer" (Magician). Franziska herself flew it as a test pilot, launching from the aircraft carrier "Von Braun" in the White Sea. Cracks appeared at a number of points on the machine, but in its initial sortie it scored 10 kills against Neuroi of various sizes. Thanks to the long-awaited other-dimensional weapons bay and the newly developed (also in part by Franziska) ether cannons, it carried a massive amount of firepower that could take down even a large Neuroi in one attack.
This drew the attention of several other militaries, which resulted in additional development funds being available. In 1990, when the Gulf Neuroi War broke out, prototype mk 2 was loaded aboard the carrier "Prinzessin Wittgenstein", and Franziska's sister Lt zS Greita Hartmann was selected to be its pilot. The live combat tests produced results much greater than expected, but the development costs were very high due to the use of rare captured cores, and either the unique control system or repeated piloting was found to have a psychological effect on the piloting Witch; Franziska resigned from the project out of a sense of responsibility for these troubles. Development did not progress as well after her resignation.