The Mech Touch

Semdam & Sons was one of the largest companies based in the Pelsa Ryndover System. It was headquartered in Talulah Silver and had grown into one of the foremost ship vendors of the port system.

S&S managed to beat out multiple local competitors through a rather admirable fashion. Instead of pursuing unrelenting growth of aggressive business opportunities,the ship vender kept its head down for most of its history.

In the past, it had never been the market leader of the Pelsa Ryndover ship market. Larger, more well-funded companies dominated this sector for a long time, causing S&S to be relegated to the background.

However, no giant lasted forever. For one reason or another, these market leaders fell from grace. Perhaps they broke the law and got caught. Perhaps they backed the wrong faction. Perhaps they invested in a major business venture that subsequently incurred immense losses.

Whatever the case, none of these ship trading companies survived the test of time. Instead, the mid-sized player that had long played second string gradually filled the void and silently grew to become the main player in the local ship market.

The company's primary business model was nothing complicated. It purchased pre-owned starships at a considerable discount. Most of them tended to be damaged or severely worn out, though there were also instances where organizations had to get rid of their better ships quickly.

Regardless, what S&S did to the ships it bought with a lot of money determined the profits it could earn from them. The company possessed an extensive amount of shipyards and repair facilities in and around Talulah Silver that were all dedicated to repairing and refurbishing the damaged vessels.

Though the effort and expenses were considerable, the markup was even greater! Even if S&S mainly sold second-hand ships, there were many buyers who needed to obtain suitable starships in a short timeframe. The cost and hassle of ordering custom starships from shipbuilding companies was not always the best solution, and recent events had made it a lot harder for customers to get the shipyards to accept their orders.

The second-hand ship market was booming at the moment. S&S keenly understood the market trend and was already regarding its large and diverse stock of pre-owned starships as treasure troves!

Gillian Semdam was the second-generation chairman and CEO of Semdam and Sons. While he was not the founder of the ship trading company, he was the principal leader and businessman responsible for allowing S&S to become the market leader after many decades of steady growth.

Due to Gillian Semdam's shrewd but stable leadership, the company possessed an extremely firm foundation in the Pelsa Ryndover System. Its financial strength was robust, it operated a strong mech security force, it formed a symbiotic bond with supportive politicians and it never sought to expand beyond its familiar region.

For this reason, Semdem & Sons managed to avoid the fate of its predecessors. The company was very difficult to assail because it was simply too stable and secure in its current condition.

Even if some terrorists blew up a large chunk of precious inventory, S&S was sitting on such a big mountain of money that it could easily weather the setback.

If the company's finances were drained for some reason, it still wasn't a big deal because it could just sell a bunch of ships to solve its liquidity problem. In fact, the company's leverage was low enough that it could easily take out more loans instead.

Gillian Semdam supported multiple sides of the local political scene by spending lavishly on campaign contributions. No matter who came into power, S&S would always have their bases covered.

The company even developed a friendly relationship with the Ivena Federation's military by purchasing their old and outdated starships at higher prices.

Faced with such a stable company led by a careful leader, it was immensely challenging for the Larkinson Clan to apply any leverage in its business negotiations.

Shederin Purnesse and his negotiating team had already spent months trying to progress the stalled talks. However, instead of moving the deal forward, it actually showed signs of sliding backwards!

The incentives to hold on to the precious capital ships and reserve them for more lucrative business deals grew stronger with each day that passed.

Even entering the Pelsa Ryndover System didn't seem to make a difference. Face to face talks went nowhere as not even Shederin's personal charm was able to penetrate the armor of the Semdams.

While the Larkinson Clan experienced fewer difficulties in procuring supplies and recruiting thousands of vital personnel, the continual failure to acquire the four capital ships that Semdam & Sons had in inventory served as a glaring disappointment.

At the end of the one week deadline, Shederin Purnesse had no choice but to return to Ves with his head bowed in defeat.

"What's the problem?" Ves asked as he did not bother to turn around while he was assembling an experimental human-sized energy rifle.

Ever since he accepted Gloriana's challenge, he had been working intensively on trying to develop a powerful weapon that was potent enough to serve as the main armament of the Sentry Project.

He did not slack off even if he was tempted to pay more attention to what Talulah Silver had to offer. There was no time for him to go on a vacation when he still had to complete several important expert mech designs.

"Semdam & Sons has become increasingly more unwilling to sell its capital ships to us." Shederin straightforwardly answered. "After our clan has performed some investigations around Talulah Silver, we discovered that the ship vendor is already in talks with multiple local organizations about selling the relevant vessels."

Ves frowned. "Didn't we offer enough money? How much is our latest offer?"

"We offered to purchase the four ships at the equivalent of over 12 trillion hex credits. This is at least double the ordinary market value for a collection of non-combat capital ships. Their age, physical conditions and functional capabilities are serviceable, but not particularly impressive. They are ordinarily worth around 1 to 2 trillion hex credits in calmer times."

"It's too bad that times have changed." Ves sighed as he continued to tinker with his test rifle. "Do you think we can still solve this problem with money?"

The chief diplomat hesitated for a second. "We believe this option might still be viable. Currently, Gillian Semdam is aiming to barter his trade goods for intangible benefits in order to increase chances that his company will be able to survive the worsening trend, but enough money can accomplish that as well. The problem.. is that the sum will plunge us deeper into debt."

"How. Much?"

"At least 15 trillion hex credits. This is the minimum sum that will match the inflated value of the capital ships once we extrapolate the explosive growth in market price. Mr. Semdam would rather delay the sale of his starships by one or two years in order to sell them at comparable prices than to trade them away too early at a lower price."

No one wanted to be scammed if they could help it. If Ves was in Mr. Semdam's position, he would make the same decision. Only an idiot or someone desperate would sell a hot good when prices were still trending upwards!

From what he heard, Gillian Semdam was not an idiot, so the only viable way to persuade him to sell his ships at fairer prices was to make him desperate somehow.

A darker mood settled over Ves. "Have you considered.. alternative solutions to the problem? We can probably make a lot more progress as long as we apply more pressure."

"I would advise against that, patriarch." Shederin took a firm stance. "We have considered this option as well, but the circumstances are not right. First, the security situation in this star system is high. S&S directly employs thousands of mech pilots to secure its expansive assets and industries. While we are strong enough to overrun their guards, the consequences of taking goods by force are extremely severe. Our credibility will sink to the bottom and we will end up in the blacklist of numerous powerful organizations. This one mistake will make it a lot more difficult to conduct transactions and make deals with willing trading partners for at least several decades. We cannot sink to the level of pirates!"

Well, there went that idea. Shederin made a good point. The Larkinson Clan was far from self-sufficient. It depended heavily on trade and could not afford to acquire a stinky reputation.

Fortunately, Ves also had another angle in mind. If an overt solution was not good enough, then what about a covert one?

He activated his comm and hailed a specific person.

Calabast's projection soon showed up in front of their faces.

"Ves. Mr. Shederin. I heard that you have encountered a particularly thorny problem."

"Since you know that much, you probably know why I've taken the initiative to contact you." Ves said.

The woman smirked. "I already saw this situation coming light-years away. I've been preparing for this situation for quite some time. I already planted my agents in the right positions."

It did not surprise Ves that Calabast became so involved. She had personally appealed to him to secure the Blinding Banshee. If they let this espionage ship go away, the spymaster might have to wait a lot of years before the Black Cats obtained a suitable base of operations!

It had become increasingly more untenable for Calabast and her staff to operate from the Spirit of Bentheim. While the factory ship offered plenty of space for her offices, her unit lacked the facilities needed to perform their jobs at high efficiency.

With Gloriana hogging all of the available processing power on the factory ship, Calabast was left scrambling for any remaining computing resources that she could scrape. Since a lot of intelligence work involved number crunching and data processing, the Black Cats were effectively working at reduced capacity all this time.

There was no way that Calabast was patient enough to tolerate this situation any longer!

"How long do you need to accomplish a breakthrough?"

"Three days at most."

Ves raised his eyebrows. "That's faster than I expected."

"I might be able to achieve some results sooner, but I've added a safety margin to account for any unanticipated surprises." Calabast confidently stated. "However, if you're willing to lend me a hand, I can promise that our clan will be able to close the deal within 24 hours."

That was a hefty boast!

"What do you need?"

"Lucky." She answered.

"Meow?"

Though Lucky had been lounging on a nearby work table all this time, he suddenly paid attention now that someone called his name.

Calabast's projection grinned. "I only need your help for a couple of hours. In fact, you'll be spending more time on transit than performing your mission. I just need you to do a quick job before you can go back."

"Meow…"

"Just do it, Lucky." Ves commanded his cat. "We need those ships quickly before Semdam & Sons has sold them to other customers. Get moving!"

"Meow!"

Though Lucky was not particularly enthusiastic about performing a risky infiltration mission, he was by far the best infiltrator of the Larkinson Clan.

Ves quickly packed Lucky off for a quick trip to Talulah Silver before returning to his current project.

The rifle he made was substantially different from anything he created before. The only major shortcoming was that he wasn't able to incorporate Opticonium in the design of this test weapon.

That heavily curtailed its value as a reference for the Sentry Project. Still, the weapon still contained numerous improvements that would hopefully allow him to meet Gloriana's expectations.

"Hehe.. who says I can't develop my own energy weapons?" He smirked.

The most notable difference that caused the weapon to stand out was that nearly its entire body was made out of enhanced luminar crystals!