The Mech Touch

5942 Inopportune Time

Though Gloriana faulted Ves' judgment and complained about his choices, she ultimately did not have too many objections over most of his acquisitions.

The Alpha Lifeguard was a powerful first-class masterwork mech that could provide ultimate protection to both mechs and people.

It had only grown more relevant than ever since Ves amazed red humanity several times during his now-infamous business trip.

"We do not have a qualified mech pilot who can make full use of this powerful support mech." Gloriana commented. "We will have to borrow a mech pilot from the Bluejay Fleet in order to enjoy its protection."

Ves nodded in agreement. "I have already issued a request. In the meantime, I have charged our clan with training or recruiting suitable pilots. It will not be easy to find the right pilots because the Alpha Lifeguard requires special training in order to make full use of its remote shielding capabilities. All of the good first-class mech pilots are tightly bound to their employers. Even if our clan manages to poach them, their loyalty and commitment are always in doubt. The less qualified first-class mech pilots often possess slightly inferior genetic aptitudes, which makes it more challenging to maintain full control over a first-class mech that is very dependent on micromanagement in order to realize its full potential."

"Are you telling me that it will take years before our clan is fully able to master the Alpha Lifeguard?"

"Maybe longer than that." Ves admitted. "I also want to upgrade it and convert it into a living mech, but that is a huge undertaking. This is an advanced first-class masterwork mech. Any upgrades we come up with must surpass a high quality standard in order to retain the Alpha Lifeguard's special properties. Neither of us are ready for this. We need to promote to first-class mech designers and build up a sufficient amount of experience before we can tackle such a project."

Gloriana briefly grimaced. "That is too long of a duration. It is not ideal to depend on a mech that clearly has room for upgrades, yet will not receive any due to our own incompetence. However, I am confident enough that we will be able to give this powerful mech the attention it deserves from us in a handful of years. Until then, we can depend on the protection that it can already cover. Master Goldstein is an excellent mech designer by all accounts, and the work that he has adapted for private use still retains the essence of his design philosophy."

While Gloriana clearly appreciated the Alpha Lifeguard regardless of whether it could be upgraded, she harbored greater concerns over the tier 3 Destroyer mech spear.

"I know what this weapon can do." She said as she stared at the container that barely manage to keep the volatile weapon tame. "Out of all of the melee weapons that we can equip onto our mechs, I cannot think of anything more outrageous than this Destroyer weapon. What I find questionable is the timing of this acquisition. You paid a heavy price to secure a weapon that no one in our clan is qualified to wield at this time. Even if one of our heroes finally manage to break through to ace pilot, it is not certain whether they are suitable to wield a spear."

"I think you are giving ace pilots too little credit, dear." Ves gently retorted. "Ace pilots can easily master the use of any weapon due to their superhuman capabilities. While I would have preferred to obtain a Destroyer sword, the blade is far more expensive to fabricate than a spear that only needs a powerful speartip. Personally, I am willing to keep this Destroyer spear unused for a decade. Venerable Rosa Orfan is the most suitable candidate to wield this weapon. As soon as she completes her second apotheosis, I will not hesitate to give her the privilege to wield this weapon into battle. The native aliens won't know what they have in store. An ace mech armed with a tier 3 Destroyer spear should be able to overload any transphasic energy shield with much greater ease!"

Destroyer weapons were not optimized to neutralize energy shields, but that did not mean they were terrible at it. They still inflicted far greater damage on energy-based defenses mainly due to their raw destructive potential.

This was a strong reason for Ves to pay a lot to transfer it to his possession!

"The recent grand auction gave us a priceless opportunity to obtain a genuine tier 3 Destroyer weapon. It is unlikely the Terrans will give up any of the powerful Destroyer weapons since they appear to be having trouble with producing more of them. Don't forget that the Terran Alliance only has a fraction of the high-end infrastructure of the Greater Terran United Confederation."

Red humanity did not lose a lot of knowledge, but getting cut off from humongous resources and high-tech industries of the Milky Way was devastating.

There was a lot of tech in the Red Ocean that had become irreplaceable and in many cases unrepairable.

It was still fine for the time being as the Great Severing was still relatively fresh.

The technical problems related to getting cut off from the Milky Way were bound to become much greater in a decade or two! Red humanity had to speed up its technological conversion to ensure that all of the most critical machines and devices remained functional over the long term.

Speaking of outdated Milky Way-derived technology, the Otalon Sprius was by far the most representative relic of the old galaxy.

"The state of the juggernaut is better than I expected." Gloriana said as she continued to examine the immense physical construction that was standing in a field next to Diandi Base. "That does not mean it is in a usable condition. The Evolution Witch clearly did not appreciate this trophy well enough to arrange proper maintenance in the decades it remained in her hands. Juggernauts may be built to withstand extreme stresses, but they should not be able to prevent the decay of its more delicate electronic and mechanical systems."

"I did not acquire the Otalon Sprius to serve as an immediate boost to our defenses, Gloriana. Its present state is not good, but it doesn't really matter when we intend to redesign and rebuilt it from the ground up. In fact, I can even argue that the physical juggernaut is not as valuable as the permit that comes with it. Buying this big machine has granted us a license to field a single juggernaut."

So long as the dimensions of the Larkinson juggernaut did not diverge too much from the dimensions of the Otalon Sprius, it was very much possible to produce a brand-new juggernaut!

The Larkinsons just had to destroy the Otalon Sprius in order to comply with the terms set by the Red Association.

Gloriana became thoughtful when she heard that. "That presents us with much greater leeway than I initially thought. Do you prefer to invest additional effort into preserving a part of the Otalon Sprius, or do you prefer to design a completely new juggernaut?"

There were pros and cons to both possibilities, but Ves had already made his choice.

"It will be troublesome, but I think it is ultimately worth it to overhaul and upgrade the Otalon Sprius." Ves answered. "Its history may be rather ignoble, but it is still a decades-old machine. The juggernaut had not been alive for all of this time, but its age is a form of accumulation in itself. I can make use of that to give the new and improved version of the Otalon Sprius a powerful head-start."

He did not have any concrete ideas to share with Gloriana. Whatever experimental ideas he came up with so far were not solid enough.

Gloriana practically despaired when she thought about all of the time she needed to devote to redesigning such a powerful monster of a machine.

"There is not enough time in our schedules to work on this juggernaut. Our workload is already high. There are far too many expert mechs that urgently require upgrades. Meanwhile, I expect our clan to produce more expert pilots in the following years. I am obliged to design proper expert mechs for all of them. In the meantime, I have to devote enough time on my studies, research as well as raising our children."

Ves faced the same issue. The problem with the Otalon Sprius was that it required a massive time investment in order to convert into a powerful addition to the Larkinson Clan's war arsenal.

"Let's just leave it here for the time being." He decided. "It doesn't matter if we don't touch it for a decade or so. We can tackle this ambitious project when we have finally freed enough time in our schedules to upgrade it properly. By that time, we should have also mastered enough high technologies and new advancements to make it a lot stronger than if we embark on this project right away."

His wife had no objection to this decision. It helped that there was no acute need for the juggernaut for the time being.

Ves had also earned the right to colonize a valuable star system, but his clan was not even ready to do so. The preparations would likely take years even if the Larkinsons enjoyed additional subsidies and support.

Once the Larkinson Clan established a proper first-class colony settlement, there was finally a reason to put a juggernaut to good use. The Otalon Sprius was designed to excel in planetary combat. So long as Ves and his wife added a lot of anti-orbit weaponry to its massive frame, it should be able to repel starships in orbit as well!

Since there was no intention of upgrading the juggernaut, there was little point in sticking around any longer.

Both mech designers decided to turn around and head back inside Diandi Base.

While Gloriana went back to the design lab in order to apply her latest insights on archetech on the Dark Zephyr Mark III Project, Ves did not join her right away.

He had a more important priority to deal with. His blood became increasingly hotter as he counted down the seconds.

When Ves returned to his personal abode, he sat down on a chair and petted the gem cat that was dozing on a table.

"Meow…"

"Hey again, buddy. I need you to guard me and remain alert. I don't know what is going to happen, but be ready to respond to anything."

"Meow…"

Lucky's condition had not been fully restored, but he was looking better than a week before. His digestion system was still working hard to digest the super-class alloy that continued to remain obstinate.

Once Ves completed his preparations, he took a deep breath and settled in for an indeterminate wait.

Roughly an hour later, he finally received the notification that he was waiting for all of this time.

His entire consciousness shifted to a blank space.

A vast gulf of emptiness spanned before his disembodied existence.

[The Mech Designer System has successfully updated to Version 3.0. The submission of EE-343F-00334R served as a powerful catalyst that has resulted in a large improvement of the underlying foundation and structure of the Mech Designer System. It has become more complete and less flawed compared to its prior state.]

Ves was glad that his efforts weren't in vain.

[The Mech Designer System still has further room for immediate improvement. The user is given a choice to select a specialized upgrade direction to further specialize and define the role of the latest version of the Mech Designer System. You are allowed to choose from 1 of 7 Upgrade Tracks, each of which share a relation to EE-343F-00334R. They shall be presented to you one by one.]

If Ves was present in his physical body, he would have smiled by now.

He had been looking forward to this moment!

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