The Mech Touch

5938 Soul Protection

Now that Andraste took her father's side, Cynthia no longer insisted on pushing her ambitious idea.

Mastering the power of life and death might turn Yaika into an extremely powerful companion spirit, but the difficulty of doing so was too great.

Though Ves had high expectations for Andraste and her companion spirit, he did not want to turn into one of those overbearing parents that were all too common in first-class society. The pressure of competition was so great that children were being pushed to their limits far too early in their lives.

Cultivation was not child's play. It was the process of guided self-evolution through generating and absorbing extraordinary energies. Too much could go wrong for Ves to take this matter lightly.

His mother agreed.

"In my experience, it is always better to encourage a cultivator to follow his or her own path, rather than practice an objectively better method or technique. When you engage in the pursuit for power and longevity, it is vitally important to retain your sense of self. If your cultivation diverges far too much from your natural inclinations, you are at risk of losing yourself to your own cultivation method. If you do not pull back from the brink in time, nothing of your original self will be left. The being who occupies your body, dominates your mind and took over your soul will be a different person that is fundamentally different from yourself."

That was a deep and profound lesson. Ves had a feeling that his mother pointedly gave him a warning for fear that he might cause a mistake in the future.

He could ponder over her words later. For now, he needed to provide Yaika with a proper cultivation method that would allow her to accelerate her growth in the next decade.

Ves and Cynthia joined hands to develop an appropriate cultivation method.

Though Cynthia was doing much of the heavy lifting on account of her much greater knowledge base and comprehension of the relevant concepts, Ves tried his best to pitch in whenever he could.

As the creator of companion spirits, Ves possessed a better understanding of their fundamental nature. This allowed him to better attune Cynthia's work to Yaika's extremely specific conditions.

Still, Ves had no illusions that Cynthia's work was significantly better than what he managed to make for his oldest daughter.

The Valkyrie Guardian Method that she managed to put together in a matter of hours was significantly faster, more powerful and more optimized than the Beacon of Hope Method!

Compared to the relatively simplistic mechanisms of the latter, the former was superior in almost every aspect.

The Valkyrie Guardian Method was predominantly a qi cultivation method that emphasized the strengthening of the spirit. One of the express goals that Ves had set was to enable his daughter to withstand hostile cultivators that were much harder to defend against.

The most recent lightning tribulation had exposed Ves to the terror of cultivators who possessed the frightening ability to bypass one's material defenses and directly target their spiritualities!

For all of the Dominion of Man's excellent combat power, the dreadnought clearly was not sufficiently prepared to put up a fight against tricky cultivators.

The mirror beast had almost caused the downfall of the Dominion of Man by relying on its unreasonable ability to hoodwink any living entity up to and including True Gods!

The fact that even the likes of Caramond and Furia failed to put up an adequate defense against such attacks said a lot about the importance of protecting one's spirit.

Ves himself suffered due to this shortcoming.

When the Subjugation King managed to hijack the tribulation storm, he managed to plant his soul mark onto Ves with disturbing ease.

What pissed Ves off the most about this disastrous occurrence was that he never had a chance of defending himself against this attack in the first place!

Sure, the gap in strength was so enormous that Ves would have ended up with a soul mark if he was better prepared, but he should at least be able to put up a better fight!

Given that the Subjugation King was most definitely on his way to the Red Ocean, there was a decent chance that Andraste might encounter the powerful being in her later career.

She needed to be ready. No matter whether she served as a mech pilot or a military commander, she needed to possess the ability to protect herself and possibly others from the Subjugation King's less tangible attacks!

Yaika happened to be in an excellent position to serve as Andraste's soul protector.

"The early stages of this cultivation method is primarily centered around accumulation." Cynthia explained to her granddaughter. "Yaika will not be able to wield any special powers yet, but she will deepen her connection to the concepts of death and protection. Your companion spirit will also undergo a gradual transformation that will make her more sensitive towards dying and deceased beings. It will take at least several years to build a solid foundation based on Yaika's current talents, but it is necessary for her to obtain the qualifications necessary to connect with the power of heaven and borrow its power to amplify her abilities."

Andraste tilted her head. She understood her grandmother's words, but failed to comprehend the underlying purpose and context.

"Yaika alone is not strong enough to do a lot of cool stuff, and she won't be for a long time." Ves succinctly explained for his girl. "This is why the Valkyrie Guardian Method uses a shortcut. It will change Yaika to make it easier for her to take control over the surrounding E energy radiation. There is a lot of energy flowing through this region of space. If Yaika can leverage just a fraction to it, she should be able to perform feats such as killing enemies by snuffing out their spirits and harvesting all of the remnant spiritualities that have gotten loose on the battlefield."

"Oh. I understand! This is real cultivation!"

Ves smiled and leaned over to plant another kiss on Andraste's red hair. "It is more than that. It is also a powerful form of protection. Yaika doesn't have Mana's purity element, so your companion spirit has to resort to a different means to defend your spirituality against external influences. The full mechanics are a bit too complicated for you to understand, but a big part of it involves turning ambient E energy into a giant shield for you and the people you care about."

"A Valkyrie Guardian." Andraste said in an awed tone as she looked down at her small companion spirit. "Can my companion spirit truly become so powerful?"

"She can, but only as long as she is disciplined enough."

The young woman was no stranger to this. She diligently kept up both her swordsmanship and marksmanship practice, all the while making sure she kept up at school.

"Maaw!"

The black spiritual kitten sounded extremely eager to get started with this cultivation method!

"Let's get started."

Since the Valkyrie Guardian Method was more advanced, it took Ves and Cynthia a bit more time to ensure that Andraste did not misinterpret anything. She also had to receive instruction on how to practice the more obtuse parts of the Valkyrie Guardian Method.

Once Ves grew assured that Andraste and Yaika gained enough understanding to work out the rest of the cultivation method by themselves, he retreated to a secure chamber.

The manifestation of the Superior Mother followed suit.

Ves had already dismissed his guards, but he also activated a suite of security measures that jammed the surrounding area and made it a lot harder to eavesdrop on his conversation.

The Superior Mother channeled greater power into her manifestation and deployed a tentative domain that should help with blocking more esoteric spying methods.

The measures were not completely foolproof, but they should suffice for the time being.

Ever since Ves had returned from his extremely eventful business trip, he was already aware that he had attracted a lot more attention. His attempts at remaining low-key did not deter a lot of spies from trying to infiltrate Diandi Base and spy on his work.

The mechs and soldiers dispatched by the Bluejay Fleet as well as the planetary branch of the Red Association had strengthened their presence in Diandi Base as a response.

Its relatively isolated location in a remote region that was completely owned by the Larkinson Clan already helped a lot in making it difficult for spies to infiltrate Diandi Base.

Alas, plenty of well-equipped infiltrators and high-tech bots still tried to get past all of the security measures every hour!

Ves needed to become even more careful about sharing sensitive information, especially when the mechers had already placed themselves in the perfect position to steal his secrets!

He developed an increasing desire to obtain a starship that was built by a shipyard controlled by the Larkinson Clan from beginning to end. He believed that living on a ship that had not been built by relying on outside help was the only way to gain a true measure of privacy in his life!

His new darkness affinity practically screamed how unwise it was for him to remain in the light by residing in a relocated base that was originally built by the Terrans!

"It is safe for us to talk, my son." The Superior Mother said as she continued to channel her domain at great cost.

Fortunately, the incarnation could easily bear the consumption since she was a True God.

Ves knew better than to take his mother at her word. He had learned the hard way that she was more than willing to deceive him in order to teach him that he should always be prepared for treachery.

Ves pulled out a multiscanner and diligently tested the more technological security measures.

Meanwhile, Blinky appeared out of his head and began to check whether the chamber was devoid of any spiritual probes.

The precautions were very much necessary in his opinion. Once he ascertained that it was unlikely for third parties to penetrate this room, Ves finally addressed his mother.

"Please take a closer look at the soul mark and tell me what you think."

The manifestation of the Superior Mother floated closer and began to press into Ves.

He had to put a lot of effort into suppressing his own Spirituality while his own mother examined it in a direct and intrusive manner.

He could feel her roaming in his head and inspecting a lot of stuff aside from the soul mark.

Ves gritted his teeth but kept his mouth shut. If he could not trust his own mother when his own life was at stake, then he was truly doomed.

"You have grown in many ways." She said.

"LIghtning baptisms are really good at that. The premise is that you can survive the punishment raining down from above."

Once Cynthia gained a better sense of Ves' current state, she cautiously started to examine the soul mark.

She did so with excessive care. Not once did she try to touch or alarm the soul mark in any way. She did her best to reduce her presence and observe the parasitical construct without giving it any cause to trigger an unknown routine.

20 or so minutes passed before the Superior Mother withdrew her presence and floated back.

The expression on her face looked anything but good.

"You can't do it?" Ves asked even though he already knew the answer.

The manifestation shook her head. "It is indeed a genuine spell cast by an alien God King. You are lucky that it is likely the most stripped down version of a soul mark. It is clear to me that there are more complete and powerful variations of this mark. The one planted in your soul primarily contains two dominant components. One of them is positioning. The alien is likely aware of your location relative to his own at all times. The other component is entrenchment. The soul mark becomes increasingly harder to remove as it digs in further. This ensures that you can never remove it by advancing your cultivation."

"Ugh."

Ves already figured out these effects, but they really started to sink in now that he obtained verification from a more qualified source.

"So you can't remove it all, mother?"

"No. The answer remains the same even if I become ten times stronger."

Damn!

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