The Mech Touch

Developing a modification plan for the Aurora Titan plan did not take as much time as he thought. Ves and Gloriana both borrowed substantially from the two variants developed by the design teams and refined the solutions from there. This saved them a considerable amount of time and allowed them to skip entire steps.

Another reason the redesign sped up was because Ves mainly aimed for easy gains and convenient modifications. The Shield of Samar needed to be upgraded quickly, so Ves tried to refrain from going overboard on the design and material aspects.

Replacing the power reactor with a vastly-upgraded one increased the mech's endurance and mobility, though not by a fantastic margin. What was much more interesting was that the Shield of Samar would get a lot more use out of its polarizing module, though its relative importance had dropped due to the mech's vastly-upgraded armor system.

Ves tried to be as smart as possible in applying Breyer alloy to the mech. Though he really wanted to replace every major support structure with superior alloys and metallic exotics, the Scarlet Rose only accumulated a certain amount of Breyer alloy so far. The production loop had already been sped up to the limit!

Therefore, Ves only applied the Breyer alloy to the armor system, critical internal support structures and the cockpit.

He paid extra attention to the latter. Though he didn't think that Jannzi would ever lose the Shield of Samar, Ves wanted to be sure that she would be able to survive the attack that managed to fell her insanely resilient mech!

Naturally, the mech retained its character as a pure spaceborn mech. While there was no fundamental objection to adding landbound capabilities to the Shield of Samar, it was best for Jannzi to focus on excelling in one mode of battle. This was one of the nuggets of wisdom that the Larkinson Family generated after studying the factors increased the chances of promotion for their mech pilots.

The extraordinary were regarded this way due to their insanely good performance which reached superhuman levels in some aspects. How could a mech pilot ever expect to become exceptional if they bit off more than they could chew and spread their training across too many areas?

That said, it wasn't impossible for a mech pilot who dabbled in everything to advance to expert pilot. Many second-rate and first-rate mech pilots managed to do so with ease. It was just that their climb was at least twice or thrice at hard than if they focused on delving a single specialty.

To be honest, designing the upgrades for the Shield of Samar was so effortless to Ves that he spent more thinking power on updating its aesthetics!

The current appearance of the mech still reflected its former allegiance to the 7th Apocalypse Heralds of the Mech Corps. Aside from hastily painting over its regimental markings and other military badges, the mech still bore the red-black-brown camouflage pattern of its former mech regiment!

"This has to go." He stated.

Just like any other exceptional mech pilot, Jannzi transferred to the Avatars of Myth, so Ves applied the distinctive golden coating to the minor revision.

The default color scheme of the Avatars looked very attention-grabbing with their reflective golden coating interspersed with black elements and navy blue accents.

For some reason, Ves found this plain color scheme to be rather gauche. He wanted to add a spark of originality to the Shield of Samar's appearance so that it looked a bit special than the other Aurora Titans assigned to the Avatars.

"You could break up the monotony with a pattern." Gloriana suggested. "The Apocalypse Heralds did just that. Maybe we can go for something more sophisticated than a generic camouflage pattern."

"Ah, good idea!"

Appearances mattered. The image a mech conveyed could make or break a battle. That was what Ves believed.

He applied gold and black on the Shield of Samar in uniform, diagonal strips. This had the very interesting effect of disguising some of the exterior contours of the mech, thereby making it harder to distinguish key components or vulnerabilities!

In order to break up the monotony of the pattern, Ves applied navy blue coating on specific external components.

Overall, the mech still looked impressive and premium, but in an entirely different fashion now! It stood out from all of the other Avatar mechs, which was exactly what Ves intended!

For the tower shield, Ves decided to go apply the same colors in a diamond pattern. This caused it to stand out more and hopefully attract more enemy fire.

"We can't forget about the markings."

The Avatars had already settled on a distinctive style which Ves fully agreed with. He applied the emblems of the Larkinson Clan and the Avatars of Myth onto the upper right chest. He also added a larger version of the clan emblem to the front surface of the tower shield.

The emblem of the Larkinson Clan consisted of a stylized golden cat head. So far, the emblem hadn't been spread around too much. The Shield of Samar would be the first mech to bear this symbol with pride!

The Avatars of Myth adopted their own emblem some time ago. Ves recalled Commander Melkor submitting his proposal for approval. The emblem which he settled on consisted of a Vitruvian mech, which looked fairly strange but also deep.

With both of these markings adorning the Shield of Samar, its allegiance became undeniable.

As final visual touch, Ves and Gloriana both added their signature looks to the forehead of the Shield of Samar. The glowing third eye surrounded by the crystal hexagon conveyed a mystical quality to the mech, which added yet another dimension to the custom mech's distinctiveness!

Due to the Shield of Samar's extreme importance, Ves whimsically decided to splurge on the third eye. He ordered a high-quality crystal from the Ylvaine Protectorate that cost as much as a premium mech in order to make sure it was strong enough to resist a huge amount of damage!

Not only that, he upgraded the lighting mechanism that allowed the third eye to glow at varying intensities according to the alignment between the mech pilot and the design spirit of the mech.

Jannzi's bond with Qilanxo was so powerful that the third eye couldn't glow bright enough to reflect this strength! Ves therefore amplified the upper range of the third eye's glow until it resembled a beacon in the dark!

As Ves continued to add miscellaneous little flourishes to the Shield of Samar's upgraded design, Gloriana continued to look on with a look of amusement.

"You really enjoy this, do you?"

Throughout this entire design session, Ves constantly had a smile on his face! He had to admit that he truly did get caught up in redesigning the visuals of the Shield of Samar.

"I've been swamped with work lately." He told her. "I'm also shouldering a lot of responsibilities. I've just founded the Larkinson Clan and already the Larkinson Family is sending more relatives to us due to recent developments. Both the sandmen and the Fridaymen are constantly looming over my head. I'm under a lot of time pressure as well. It's rare for me to find a moment of pure enjoyment in my days."

"Isn't designing mechs enough?"

"It's more than sufficient to carry me through to the day. Don't misunderstand me. It's just that mech design is mostly work, while visual design is largely an expression of art. They're different to me. It's not necessary for me to invest so much effort in the latter, but I've decided to do so anyway because I enjoy it. I guess you can call it my hobby."

"You should consider building figurines of mechs." Gloriana suggested. "I know some mech designers dabble in it as a means to relax and to sober their minds."

"I've considered this option multiple times. I'm not sure I have the time to spare on such frivolities. Working on actual mech designs is far more interesting than working on miniature fakes."

Her questioning did prompt Ves to rein himself in and finalize the project. Once they completed the revision, they passed it onto the design teams and tasked them with subjecting the new design to various stress tests in order to determine its theoretical performance.

Once the revised design didn't show any obvious flaws, Ves wanted to upgrade the Shield of Samar right away. He had no idea what the latest movements of the sandmen hinted at, but Ves faintly had a feeling that the climax of the Sand War might be getting closer!

Finishing the minor revision to the Shield of Samar came just in time to Ves. After a couple of days, William Urbesh should have undergone a thorough examination. Both his mental and physical state were highly important to his future as a mech pilot!

They visited a temporary treatment center set up by the Ves Larkinson Foundation for Wounded Veterans and met with Ranya and Lupo.

"So what are the results?" Gloriana asked her cousin.

"Mr. Urbesh is..physically healthy." Ranya Wodin hesitantly answered. "Aside from some strange abnormalities concerning his central nervous system, he is as healthy and strong as any second-class mech pilot. His augmentations are all working fine."

"What's the problem then?" Ves asked.

Ranya briefly directed an unreadable expression towards Ves before turning back to her cousin. "The main issues we have with William are related to his abnormal mental state. Compared to the files we have on him before he participated in the Sand War, he was by all accounts normal, if a bit quick to fright."

"He was a coward." Ves bluntly stated.

"Yes.. Well, somehow, he experienced multiple personality changes over the course of his stay with the Larkinsons. I contacted Commander Melkor Larkinson to hear what he thought about Mr. Urbesh. Evidently, another shift has occurred because Silent William has become much more reticent to communicate than before. In the past, he was at least willing to communicate nonverbally or make his opinions clear through his actions. Now, he just sits or lays on his bed while ignoring virtually every attempt to communicate."

Ves grimaced while Gloriana looked at him with a doubting expression.

Had he botched the correctional surgery? Did he go overboard with amplifying the silent part of William's personality?

"Tell me something else. Is there anything about him that is better?"

"He's an expert candidate now!" Dr. Lupo shouted, interrupted the Hexer exobiologist. "It's fascinating to examine an expert candidate in the flesh! We've detected all kinds of interesting brain activity! It's unfortunate that none of us specialize in neurology, but the data we've gathered is doubtlessly interesting!"

Ves' eyes lit up. He was already confident that William had reached the standard of an expert candidate, but it was nice to hear independent confirmation from another source.

"How strong is his resonance strength?"

"Has his brain activity increased or decreased in the last few days?"

"Has he shown any desire to pilot a mech?"

As Ves rapidly peppered Dr. Lupo with a number of questions, both Ranya and Gloriana shared a deep look with each other. The latter nodded her head minutely before shaking her head a moment later.

Their silent communication only lasted for a short moment before they turned their attention to the conversation held by the boys.

Once Ves gained a better sense of Silent William's state, he moved to recovery room and faced him in person.

The Urbesh clansman looked at Ves in silence. The mech pilot's eyes reflected very little emotion as Ves examined him both visually and spiritually.

Though it was a bit unnerving to face an eerily silent mech pilot, Ves actually found William to be a bit more pleasant than before.

The old influence from Nyxie had disappeared. The William that underwent the latest corrective surgery may have inherited William Urbesh's memories, but his personality and consciousness was completely detached from his former self!

To all intents and purposes, the William of the past had died! A new William had taken his place, one who didn't carry the baggage of the past!

After confirming this shift, Ves grinned and stepped forward to extend his hand. "Welcome to your new life, Mr. Urbesh. I hope you can live up to your potential and bring your clan back to power."

Everyone else looked surprised when William responded to Ves by shaking his hand!