The Mech Touch

5949 AP Sinks

Ves grew a lot more enthused about the Universal Gate Network than before.

Although there were many reasons to malign it, Ves valued this upgrade path for offering the most direct and straightforward possibility to reopen the greater beyonder gate.

Of course, it wouldn't be easy. Ves believed that he not only had to persuade red humanity to construct an entirely new gate, but also convince original humanity to change the settings of its old greater beyonder gate and open it up for business again.

This would probably require Veronica and Cynthia to make contact with the Big Two. There was no guarantee that the mechers and the fleeters from the old galaxy would be willing to play along, especially if they found out about the huge threat posed by the powerful alien civilizations of Messier 87.

A more serious issue that Ves was worried about was the bad blood that built up between the two branches of humanity.

Red humanity felt abandoned by original humanity. Many surviving communication channels went dark as original humanity recognized that their isolated and displaced cousins became targeted by enemies that they could not withstand.

Not only that, but the leaders of the Red Association had witnessed how the Polymath conspired with their counterparts of the Mech Trade Association to sever the Kingdom of Mechs from the new frontier!

These were all serious issues that did not bode well for any possible reunion.

"Even if there is the possibility of reenabling two-way intergalactic travel, the two sides might not be able to bring themselves to reconcile with each other."

That would result in a lot of tension and awkward situations. The political struggles would intensify, leading to a lot of infighting that ultimately distracted the humans from fending off the collective alien threats.

"Universal Gate Network can give me the power to reconnect the two galaxies, but it can't help me unite the two branches of humanity."

That was one of the greater faults of this upgrade track. It relied too heavily on external help, and did not provide a lot of direct benefits to Ves himself. He could not use this option to directly improve his personal power. The most he could do was to negotiate concessions in exchange for his gate-related services.

"In fact, this option may actually slow down my progress!"

At the beginning, this upgrade path probably wouldn't allow him to build gates that were impressive enough to be valued by the Red Two. Ves would have to invest a lot of AP into this upgrade track to make it useful enough.

Besides, Ves doubted he would be able to open up gates to other galaxies without building a portal at the other destination.

This was a huge logistical shortcoming. It meant that it was far too difficult for him to create a passage leading to Messier 87 or one of the many dwarf galaxies that orbited around the golden galaxy.

Ves ultimately shook his head. "I don't mind it if I have to make sacrifices to strengthen everyone else, but this is too cumbersome."

There was a limit to his altruism. From his perspective, repeatedly sacrificing his interests was not noble. It was foolish behavior. He would have nothing left if he kept up with this behavior. By then, the people around him would not hesitate to betray him and abandon him due to expending all of his value.

He was realistic enough to understand that if he wanted to make enough changes to society, he needed to expand his personal power. This was why he could not ignore this priority when he chose his next upgrade track.

"As far as personal power goes, Phasewater Generation, Portal Exploration and Random Being Acquisition are good choices."

That was not to say they were only relevant to himself. He had the ability to choose whether to share his bounty to others. The important part was that he possessed most of the initiative.

Of the three options, Phasewater Generation is the least versatile. It did not actually introduce anything new. It just solved a resource shortage in the most direct fashion possible.

Phasewater held a lot of value. It was unlikely to become useless or irrelevant over time. Being able to obtain more of it was always advantageous.

"Yet… it is too simple."

Ves disliked the lack of versatility and expanded options. Phasewater was powerful, especially if he was able to accumulate ever-increasing quantities of it, but its usefulness was eventually constrained by human technology and other limitations.

The development of phasewater technology was still in the early-to-mid stage!

Human researchers managed to copy a lot of simple and readily available phasewater tech from the native aliens, but it would take centuries before they managed to develop truly amazing applications in this field!

That was far too great of a timeframe for Ves. If the best uses of phasewater only became available several centuries later, he probably wouldn't need to depend on this upgrade track anymore!

If Ves wanted to convert his spoils into more immediate benefits, then Portal Exploration and Random Being Acquisition sounded like promising options.

Both of them shared a lot in common. Ves would still need to conduct a lot of research or delegate this work to others to convert his gains into useful benefits.

However, the sheer variety of spoils meant that it would be possible to obtain benefits that Ves could use to boost his power in a shorter time frame than usual.

"There's still a risk of failure, though."

Portal Exploration only had the power to create one-way portals at the beginning. This was a serious constraint. Ves would either need to prepare an alternate evacuation channel, or invest enough AP to unlock the ability to pass through the portal he originally came from. It was unacceptable for him to become stranded behind enemy lines!

Random Being Acquisition offered a more specialized service and allowed Ves to capture a lot of useful aliens. It could probably become really good at its only function as long as he sunk enough AP into this upgrade track.

Yet it was precisely because of its narrow functionality that he disliked it. The upgrade track did not introduce any means for him to move to another destination. It was not able to capture non-living subjects as far as he could tell. It also became difficult to guarantee that the AP spent on activating the Time and Space Gate produced a profitable result.

"It would be rather painful to invest a hundred AP, only to kidnap a useless low-caste orven laborer."

Then again, the randomness of this option also made it possible for Ves to hit the jackpot. A slight investment might allow him to capture a phase lord or phase whale if he was lucky!

Words mattered. If the System used the phrase 'Random Being Acquisition', then the random factor was a core part of this upgrade track. Ves doubted that he could negate it entirely. Each use of the Time and Space Gate was another time he pulled the lever of a slot machine.

Ves did not find this to be undesirable in itself. What truly bothered him was that it became difficult to obtain exactly what he needed in a relatively short time frame.

He could pull the lever a hundred times, yet fail to obtain a single alien captive that possessed the properties he needed!

However, if Ves was not in a hurry, then the sheer variety of alien beings that got kidnapped by the System would allow him to amass a collection of useful prisoners over time.

So long as Ves was able to keep them under control, he would eventually be able to amass a large and diverse collection of useful captives!

Due to his affinity for life, he was confident he could find ways to extract a lot of value from them. He could obtain all kinds of wonderful biological organs that he could implant into his mechs.

He could indoctrinate the more pliable prisoners and have them fight on his behalf.

Ves could even harvest the spiritualities of the more extraordinary beings to use as ingredients for his other projects.

"This is an excellent option if I want to design more biomechs."

However, that was not in his consideration at the moment. That made this option a lot less attractive.

"I can already obtain all manner of powerful mutated beasts by acquiring them from hunting teams. I can also obtain plenty of alien prisoners from the expeditionary fleet. Random Being Acquisition doesn't actually present me with new possibilities. The only way to change that is to upgrade its acquisition range so that it can steal beings from other galaxies."

How much AP would that take? Probably a lot!

Even when the Time and Space Gate became powerful enough, Ves would still end up paying lots of AP just to activate its acquisition function a single time!

He mentally frowned. "This is the greatest problem with Portal Exploration and Random Being Acquisition. They constantly demand AP in order to show their value."

The neverending demand for AP was not a big deal if Ves opened up the Mech Designer System and inducted other people.

If he continued to monopolize it, then that was a different story. Earning AP was difficult and took time. He already had trouble with accumulating enough Ascension Points to purchase expensive but powerful enlightenment fruits. He could not bear an additional burden.

"If I want to earn the most profit for the least amount of AP investment, which one should I choose?"

Phasewater Generation was an obvious choice, but aside from that, Dimension Breach Creation sounded really promising.

It was not quite clear how safe it would be if he started to open dimensional tears in random places. Who knew if there were monsters lurking on the other side.

However, his expedition to Aeon Corona VII a long time ago had personally exposed him to the possibilities of deriving strength from strange dimensions.

He became more enthused about the possibilities of this upgrade track. It had the potential to transform red humanity's critical lack of resources on a wider scale!

"System, are the dimensional tears generated by Dimension Breach Creation temporary or permanent?"

[Dimensional walls will attempt to repair any breaches as they appear. You must restore an existing dimensional tear or create a new one if you wish to maintain a status quo. It is possible to create fixed dimensional tears after investing enough Ascension Points. They can still be removed through external intervention, but they will not close by themselves. If you invest a large amount of Ascension Points, the dimensional tears can become impervious to damage, but they cannot be closed after they have been opened.]

That was both good and bad news. Dimensional tears possessed the same vulnerabilities as gates if that was the case. They needed to be protected at all times to prevent others from destroying a lucrative source of power.

The ultimate dimensional tears should be permanent ones. Ves had no idea how it was possible, but the prospect of creating a permanent breach to a dimension rich with powerful energies could be an enormous game changer for humanity!

However, Ves was unsure how much AP he needed to throw into this giant hole in order to get to this point.

A part of him was also afraid of unintended consequences. There were good reasons why the different dimensions remained separate from each other.

If Ves started to undermine the fundamental structure of the universe, the damage might become so great one day that reality itself would unravel!

"Maybe I need to rein in my ambitions and settle for temporary breaches for the foreseeable future."

Dimension Breach Creation would operate a lot similar to Portal Exploration if that was the case.

The biggest difference was that the former allowed him to mine for resources in a different dimension, while the latter allowed him to harvest resources in a different material location.

"Either one is good."

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