The Mech Touch

The Wodin Warriors detachment under the command of Colonel Alexandria Wodin continued to escort the remnants of Task Force Predator.

As the combined fleet exited Maynard Fields and entered the much sparser Wreckage Paradise, no pirates dared linger in the vicinity.

The aggressive Wodin Warrior patrol mechs accurately sniped any pirate mech that attempted to scout the combined fleet.

With their superior sensor, targeting and weapon systems, the Hexer mechs severely outmatched any pirate mech by a huge margin!

Unless a major faction similar to the Allidus Alliance stepped forward, the paltry pirate groups based in Wreckage Paradise stood no chance of winning against the Wodin Warriors!

Even if they all pooled up their mechs and mustered up their prohibited superweapons, there was no doubt the audacious pirates would suffer crippling losses. While pirates weren't known for their intelligence, they were some of the shrewdest people in the galaxy when it came to judging the profitability of a potential raid.

The pirates would have to be idiots if they decided to attack the powerful Hexer fleet head-on! The significant commitment by the Wodin Dynasty succeeded in preventing a lot of unnecessary trouble.

No troublemakers rose up and attempted to bar their path. They did not even waste their time on setting up traps and mines that the powerful Hexer scanners could easily detect from a distance.

In fact, many of the local pirate gangs instead converged on the previous battle site.

While the survivors of Task Force Predator captured the most valuable pirate ships and swept up the most valuable salvage, plenty of untold valuables were still floating and spinning through the battlefield!

Scuffles and skirmishes had already erupted in the battlefield the Larkinsons had left behind. Unruly and greedy pirate gangs fought among themselves to claim the most valuable pieces of trash. Additional pirate groups were also heading over, ensuring that the area would doubtlessly be showered with more debris!

Throughout all of this chaos, any notion of 'punishing the Larkinson Clan' or 'defending the pride of the Nyxian Gap' had disappeared.

The tentative unity that held the pirates together had collapsed the moment one of the strongest pirate factions paid the price for taking the initiative!

With bloodthirsty rivals like the Krella Alliance invading the territories of the loser, it was only a matter of time before the Allidus Alliance collapsed!

Meanwhile, the mysterious Hallowed Abyss Temple fell silent. Its shrines closed their doors and its main temple rejected every visitor.

Seeing that the Nyxian pirates no longer possessed any appetite to fight the Larkinsons, Ves let go of his concerns and continued to devote himself to completing his design projects.

Over the course of a couple of weeks, several more design projects reached completion.

Ves focused on finalizing the Sanctuary design after he completed the Crystal Lord Mark II.

As an offensive space knight, the Sanctuary did not possess a lot of complexity. The biggest challenges the design teams faced was trying to hit the right sweet spots. This was a purely technical challenge that didn't require Ves' intervention.

He mostly spent his time on expanding and fine tuning the ruleset that governed the behavior of its glow. The Sanctuary possessed the ability to neutralize or suppress every glow other than its own. Such a mech had the potential to wreak a lot of havoc if it was left to achieve this effect indiscriminately.

Aside from perfecting the rules he formed beforehand, he also added some additional instructions for future-proofing reasons.

For example, the Sanctuaries shouldn't be allowed to suppress the glows of any expert LMC mechs. No matter whether they were piloted by Larkinsons or clients, the expert mechs designed by Ves should not be so easily suppressed.

"I don't even know if it makes a difference." Ves muttered. "Expert pilots mainly rely on resonance. The influence of glows on their strong wills should be minimal to non-existent."

He sneakily added another rule to the Sanctuary's glow. When piloted by a Larkinson mech pilot, the Sanctuary invalidated almost all of the rules and restrictions that Ves had set. This meant that the third-class mech could negate the glow of every mech by non-Larkinsons!

Theoretically, this meant that a single Sanctuary had the potential to neutralize the glow of a first-class multipurpose mech!

"This is silly. I haven't even designed such an extravagant mech yet." Ves shook his head. "Even if I did, the first-class mech possesses so much power that it can easily wipe out entire armies of Sanctuary mechs!"

Nonetheless, the principle remained. The Larkinsons weren't obligated to play by the same rules as everybody else. This was his prerogative as a mech designer and a Larkinson. His customers were welcome to lodge a complaint with the LMC, not that it would have make any difference.

"Don't like it? Then don't buy my products!"

He didn't want any business from anyone who thought about using his own products to fight the Larkinson Clan. He would gladly wipe out anyone who was stupid enough to do so. Let's see them issue any complaints after that!

The final prototype phase proceeded smoothly as expected. With Lufa presiding over the mech design, the Larkinsons even managed to test how its neutralizing glow performed against the glows of other mechs.

In general, the newer LMC mech models fared better than the older ones. The strength of the design spirit also played a significant role. The stronger the design spirit, the more effort the Sanctuary had to exert in order to negate its influence.

In practice, the Sanctuary was able to invalidate almost every glow. If one was not enough, then two might do the job.

This indirectly meant that anyone wishing to leverage the glows of LMC mechs would have to field more of them in order to ensure their effects remained active!

The side that wanted to make use of Sanctuaries would therefore have to bring even more copies in order to succeed.

No matter what, the LMC ultimately benefited by selling more mechs!

"Hahaha!" Ves laughed as he looked forward to seeing this chain of events play out. "Since my counter is more effective than others, I'll definitely be able to displace most of my competitors!"

He was slightly careful in his expectations. While he possessed a lot of confidence in his Sanctuary design, he knew that the Masters of the Friday Coalition still hadn't revealed their full ability.

Even so, despite all of the rules that restricted the Sanctuary's effectiveness, it was probably the most effective counter to glows in the private market. Every other counter developed by others so far were either costly or difficult to implement.

Compared to an unwieldy counter such as the Glow Crusher, the Sanctuary possessed an undeniable advantage.

It did not have to do anything to charge up its effects. Its glow was constantly active, and also took effect in a wide radius around the mech.

Such a convenient effect was by far the most convenient alternative out of all the counters currently in existence!

The Larkinsons attempted to keep the test results and the existence of the Sanctuary close to their test. Just as with the Crystal Lord Mark II, Ves and Gloriana did not believe the time was right to publish this extraordinary new mech design.

"We should wait until our rivals and competitors have wasted even more time on designing their counters." Gloriana vindictively suggested.

Ves agreed with her decision. "The demand for counters from the private sector isn't high enough yet. Our mechs are still making their way into the hands of customers throughout the neighboring star sectors. Once more people have suffered at the hands of our products, demand will definitely soar."

When someone's house was on fire, their demand for firefighting services multiplied by at least a million times.

To most people, their houses were just starting to smoke. It still took some time for a proper blaze to form. Publishing the other mech designs such as the Crystal Lord Mark II first would definitely fan the flames!

As the arsonists, Ves and Gloriana eagerly directed their attention to the remaining four mech design projects.

With the Crystal Lord Mark II and the Sanctuary out of the way, Ves concentrated on the next low-hanging fruit.

The Chiron long attracted his fascination. While its actual performance was far worse than any of his other mechs, its durability and longevity was exceptional in relation to its budget.

As a training mech designed to produce the next generations of Larkinson mech pilots, Ves went all out. His spiritual engineering had advanced considerably since he initially conceived of the mech design.

With several new innovations under his belt, he discovered that several problems that used to stump him in the past no longer hindered him as much. As long as he wanted to accomplish something, he more or less found a way to do so after a bit of thought.

While Gloriana quietly worked to refine its complex, self-adjusting limbs, Ves proceeded to mold the Chiron's spiritual foundation.

He added several new functions and enhanced its existing abilities that it derived from the Golden Cat.

Ves held the Larkinson Mandate in his hands as he openly altered the Chiron's spiritual design in front of the Golden Cat.

"Watch closely, Goldie. The future stars of the Larkinson Clan will definitely pass through this mech before they rise. I need your cooperation in order to maximize the Chiron's results."

Nyaaaa.

The Golden Cat still hadn't fully recovered from the time when Venerable Joshua summoned her energy projection to do battle against the dark gods.

Even with the power of Unity of Man and Machine at their side, the expert pilot and the ancestral spirit failed to overpower their opponents.

Together with all of the losses the task force suffered, Goldie still hadn't recovered her old cheer.

"Come on. Don't feel so glum. We survived, didn't we? The Larkinsons who sacrificed themselves for us wouldn't want us to feel depressed all the time. We should cherish our lives."

Nyaa. Nyaaa.

Though Ves failed to cheer her up, she at least became more invested in the Chiron. To her, the training mech would make the Larkinson Clan stronger in the long run. With superior mech pilots that possessed greater foundations than the older generations, Goldie wouldn't have to experience the sensation of losing contact with thousands of Larkinsons at once!

As Ves worked on the Chiron with occasional input from Goldie, the training mech finally distinguished itself from the pack.

The mech channeled its design spirit in a more targeted fashion. Ves theorized that his implementation produced several positive effects.

The mech constantly reinforced the loyalty of its pilots towards the Larkinson Clan. The Larkinson Network already did an adequate job of that, but Ves believed it was very important that the mech pilots of the clan remained committed!

The Chiron also fostered greater trust in the mech cadet's fellow classmates and other Larkinsons. Hopefully, this resulted in greater and more sophisticated teamwork among the mech pilots.

The Chiron also served as a channel for the Golden Cat to pass on some of the more difficult-to-learn insights and instincts. Goldie was connected to every mech pilot in the clan, so she should theoretically be able to propagate what made them strong to the mech cadets.

Ves was still a bit unsure whether this function actually worked. He had a good feeling he nailed it this time.

As long as this spiritual knowledge sharing function came into effect, the mech cadets might also be able to derive other benefits. Perhaps any aspiring mech pilot who struggled to learn how to pilot a new mech type might suddenly gain some help from the Chiron.

"Whatever the case, in time, every Larkinson mech pilot should be shaped by their experiences with the Chiron!"

This was very important to Ves. The Chiron served as an essential channel for him to mold the mindset and ability of the soldiers of his clan. The mech was an excellent way for him to instill honor, loyalty, kinship and other desirable traits!