The Mech Touch

The Sentinel Kingdom beckoned to Ves. After getting out of the mud pool that was the Chuko Republic, he expected to make a much bigger harvest in the strong and powerful third-rate state.

Ves and his staff already made a number of orders and reservations at Sentinel. He also had a number of goals in mind while he traveled from system to system conducting various exchanges with local mech designers.

From overhauling the Barracuda at a waiting drydock, illicitly obtaining the key materials required to build an ultracompact battery, accessing a lab to study the properties of P-stone, buying a remarkable pet for Ketis, finding a source of geril spice, investigating the circumstances of his father in the nearby Nyxian Gap, begging his girlfriend to procure a batch of pure ASMAS and harvesting a spiritual fragment related to tigers, Ves had a lot on his plate!

"I also have to design the Devil Tiger!"

The scope of his design project grew to an unimaginable degree. From his original intention to design an affordable, disposable experimental mech to creating a legendary machine from scratch, Ves had needlessly made things difficult for himself!

However, the reason why he broke his own rules and let his imagination run wild was because he became extremely passionate about the project!

"Sometimes, pursuing my passion is more important than sticking to practicality!"

If his goal was to earn money by designing a commercially-viable mech, then Ves would definitely have second thoughts.

"But that's not the case right now."

His primary goal was to complete the Upgrade Missions from the System. Once he accomplished this, his Metallurgy and Mechanics Skills would finally reach a level that would enable him to design mechs that could potentially capture a significant amount of market share.

"The gap in performance between my models and the mainstream mech models will further decrease!"

Nonetheless, Ves never aimed to compete over specs. Who cared if a competing mech performed ten percent better than his own. The unique selling proposition of his mechs could not be replicated by anyone!

"No one can design an LMC mech that out-LMC's the LMC!"

Perhaps a number of weird Class IX mech designers existed somewhere in the galaxy that could manipulate human emotions as well. Yet Ves strongly believed that even then, those who worked directly with spirituality must number extremely few.

The belief that he was pioneering an entirely new dimension in mech design always sustained his pride! His entire career was based around developing something new and unprecedented!

"And my upcoming Devil Tiger design will exemplify the innovations that I'll introduce to the market!"

Of course, as an illicit mech design based on pirated licenses, Ves did not want the Devil Tiger to be associated with his public identity. He'd have to modify the X-Factor of his mech in a way that largely focused its influence inward. He also had to obscure some of the mechanics related to his specialization.

Perhaps in time a very clever and inquisitive mech designer might be able to uncover Ves' fingerprints in the Devil Tiger's design.

Ves didn't particularly mind this possibility. He just had to obscure enough evidence to make it difficult for him to be directly tied to the mech and its design. As long as he maintained enough plausible deniability, nothing would come out of it. At most, he could simply say that someone stole a prototype of a confidential design project.

"It wouldn't be the first time someone stole a prototype." He muttered.

Time passed. As his fleet quietly exited the Chuko Republic, Ves and everyone breathed a sigh in relief.

Ves had not envisioned his visit to the Chuko Republic to be so problematic. To be fair, he pretty much asked for it by traveling to such a troubled state in the first place.

Despite cutting his visit to Chuko short, Ves was already satisfied with the gains he made. Not only could he look forward to wearing a second shield generator once he replaced its spent battery, he also gained the insights he needed to elevate his design project to a higher level.

The Devil Tiger continued to consume his attention in the following days and weeks. It was unlike anything he had ever tackled before. Working with newfangled ASMAS tech that played a key role in enabling the Devil Tiger's many functions forced him to hit the books.

He swamped himself in academic literature. With his Intelligence, his reading and comprehension speed allowed him to devour book after book and paper after paper. His view on smart metal technology and ASMAS technology grew by leaps and bounds in a very short amount of time!

"All of this is necessary if I want to reduce costs and increase efficiency! Pure ASMAS are simply too expensive for me to waste!"

Ves particularly focused on the properties of substitute ASMAS. He read up on a lot of material-specific papers to see what kind of materials and exotics functioned as the best building blocks of substitute ASMAS.

"Substitute ASMAS is meant to be the disposable kind of smart metal." He summed up. "If I want to make the Devil Tiger last as long as possible, then I have to enable it to replenish its substitute ASMAS from all the exotics that are prevalent in the Nyxian Gap!"

Longevity, sustainability and ease of supply dominated his concerns about his design project. He did not expect the owners of the Devil Tiger to march up to a populated trade system and order a batch of rare exotics imported from another star cluster to make up for any material shortfalls.

"Whoever possesses the Devil Tiger has to be able to scrape up minerals from a planet or asteroid and dump it near the mech so that it can perform its own repairs!"

Despite the many difficulties he faced, Ves nonetheless enjoyed the novelty of designing something different. He was working with an entirely different mold of mech design. Both the smart metal and bestial mech aspects of his design project forced him to revise many of his assumptions and move out of his comfort zone.

Exploring different avenues and keeping things fresh and interesting helped him a lot.

Some mech designers believed that they achieved the best progress by narrowing the scope of their work. By focusing on a few mech types or mech concepts, they could refine their proficiency in designing these kinds of mechs to a level beyond a generalist.

"Ketis is likely pursuing this path." He rubbed his chin. "However, this approach is not for everyone."

Ves differentiated mech designers between those who sought to broaden their capabilities and those who narrowed them down to a laser focus.

"There are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches."

A mech designer who wanted to narrow themselves down to a smaller variety of mechs could design fantastic mechs that fell within their area of interest. Every mech designer with Class VI and Class VII design philosophies fell under this category.

However, the biggest shortcoming of these mech designers was that they couldn't really design a mech that fell outside of their specialty.

Oh, they probably possessed enough of a foundation to do a decent job at it, but a mediocre mech design didn't cut it in a competitive market environment.

"It would be like asking Ketis to design a rifleman mech! I know for sure it will end in tears for everyone involved!"

On the other hand, a mech designer like Ves who was insatiably curious very much enjoyed exploring new mechs. With regards to mech design, he did not fear the unknown. Instead, he embraced it! If he didn't have the courage to tackle something new, then he wouldn't have the guts to design a hybrid mech, a super-medium mech, a hero mech and now a bestial mech!

All of the aforementioned mech types gave lots of mech designers headaches! Ves too sometimes wished he worked on something easier, but he persisted because he always made a lot of gains after he completed a difficult design project.

There was no right or wrong answer with regards to which approach worked better.

"It's just like the debate about specialization versus generalization in mech types. The best option depends on the circumstances."

In his perspective, someone like Ketis would probably do fine if she became a generalist. However, she would probably do so much better if she pursued her interest in swordsman mechs and specialized in them. Her experiences, knowledge and passion all laid down a very favorable foundation for her to go far if she went down this road.

As for Ves, his design philosophy did not favor any specific mech type over another. Even though he mostly designed expensive mechs up till now, that did not rule out designing cheaper mechs in the future.

For him, specializing in a narrow range of mech types made little sense. The gains he could make from specialization would not yield more results than those who truly dedicated themselves to their narrow range of interests.

A generalist approach suited him much better as his competitive advantage was very broad and not limited to a handful of specific mech types.

He always knew he was inclined towards this direction, but now that the System pushed him to explore outside his comfort zone did he gain a new understanding about this approach.

"Even among generalists, there are differences!"

Some mech designers merely branched out because they wanted to form a complete mech catalog that covered all the conventional mech archetypes. They wanted their mech companies to be the one-stop solution for all the products a mech buyer could ask.

For a long time, Ves held this stance. His intention was to slowly increase his repertoire until he covered all the necessary mech archetypes. Once he completed his mech catalog, he no longer intended to explore something new.

"This is fine for most mech designers, but is it really the best direction to take for me?" He asked himself.

The System obviously didn't want him to grow comfortable anytime soon. Ves understood the logic of it all. By constantly tackling strange new design projects, he trained his mind in becoming more creative in solving problems.

If he just expanded his repertoire up to a certain point and no longer explored new methods and techniques, he risked becoming more complacent. His problem solving skills would solidify until he only became capable of solving problems that fell within his comfort zone.

"On the other hand, if I keep exploring something new, then I'll be so much more capable when I reach the point where progressing my design philosophy becomes difficult!"

This was the overall lesson he learned from Seniors who tried but failed to innovate their way to Master. A vast gulf existed between the two ranks, and only the most hard-working, creative and ingenious mech designers stood a chance of bridging this immense gap!

His passion for his Devil Tiger design project already indicated that he was heading in the right direction. If he didn't enjoy the process of learning something new and expanding his horizons, then he wasn't suitable to climb higher up the ranks.

"I can't cheat my way into becoming more competent!"

He called up his unfinished design and studied the progress he made. With increased understanding, he became a lot more clever with how he intended to utilize ASMAS in his Devil Tiger.

Though Ves did not create a specific image to guide his design process, his passion and his singular focus was sufficient to empower it with a preliminary degree of X-Factor!

Nonetheless, obtaining a spiritual fragment and forming it into a suitable design spirit for his Devil Tiger became a higher and higher priority for the design project. His mech would never reach its full potential without including this crucial element!

"Fortunately, I've got just the place where I can obtain something suitable!"

Within the Sentinel Kingdom, there existed a peculiar tourist planet. Its entire surface had been terraformed into a terrestrial paradise.

Along with seeding it with many ordinary Terran and alien species, the state also seeded it with a large variety of cats, tigers, lions, leopards, panthers, and other cat-like species!

The government even dumped various exobeasts that resembled cats in this wild and savage environment!

"Our next destination is Felixia, the Planet of Cats! Lucky will love it there!"