The Mech Touch

The days after bringing the Everchanger to life brought a much-needed time of rest and relaxation.

The Design Department had mostly turned from an active workplace to a study hall as most assistant mech designers showed up in order to learn.

The eager students exchanged their Larkinson merits to borrow valuable textbooks or receive personal instruction from one of the Journeymen. They exchanged ideas with each other or challenged their rivals to brief and simplified design duels.

Ves spent a bit of his time on the people he had neglected as of late. His all-consuming focus on his expert mech design projects had caused him to fall out of touch with the current situation of the Design Department.

More than half a year ago, a large batch of Apprentices joined his ranks. Each of them hardly had the opportunity to get in touch with the lead or head designers, but that was not a problem as they mostly received guidance from the earlier batches of assistants.

So far, none of the mech designers stood out from the pack. Miles Tovar, who Ves had designated as a Journeyman candidate, had made no appreciable progress despite his best efforts to progress his design philosophy.

The aerial mech specialist even went out of his way to exchange his precious Larkinson merits to receive repeated instructions and advice from Juliet Stameros. Despite the fact that she was a Hexer, she knew more about aerial mechs than any other Journeyman in the clan.

Though Miles benefited considerably from Juliet's expertise, Ves could clearly see that his spirituality had remained virtually the same. It did not improve in quantity or quality.

Whatever he was doing, it wasn't working.

"Strange." Ves commented.

He talked a few times with Miles to figure out what was wrong.

The former member of the Tovar Family of the Bright Republic might have enjoyed a privileged upbringing, but he knew the value of hard work. He hardly took any breaks and consistently spent his time on deepening his foundation, designing new aerial mechs and even went down to the lower decks to try his hand at fabricating and repairing mechs.

Nothing worked.

His lack of progress stood in stark contrast to Ketis, who used to be a Journeyman candidate alongside him. Ever since she broke through, she fully shed her marginal role as an assistant and turned into a worthy and equal contributor.

Though her accumulation of knowledge and experience still fell behind her peers, she had proven herself to be worthy enough to become the definitive authority on swords and sword-wielding mechs in the Larkinson Clan!

Ves found it to be a pity that his clan did not gain any other Journeyman in the last year. Despite employing over 150 assistant mech designers, of which 25 of them possessed spiritual potential, none of them rose above their station.

The only progress that Ves had observed was that 5 more Apprentices developed spiritual potential since he last surveyed them. He had no idea what caused them to become spiritually active one day, and that frustrated him a lot.

Without deciphering the trigger or underlying reasons behind their subtle transformation, he was unable to perform targeted research into replicating this process.

In any case, even if the assistants gained spiritual potential, that didn't necessarily mean they were guaranteed to become Journeymen.

Ves thought back on his own breakthrough and also what Ketis had gone through to obtain her own chance.

He came up with a tentative theory why Miles and possibly many other promising mech designers in the Design Department stagnated.

It was enough of a reason for him to call over the struggling Apprentice Mech Designer.

"What do you require, sir?"

"Sit down for a moment." Ves instructed and waved to the chair beside his workstation.

When Miles attentively sat down while maintaining a proper posture, Lucky glided down on his lap and asked for pats.

"Meow."

As the man relaxed a bit, Ves began to share his theory.

"I can feel how badly you want to become a Journeyman. You certainly have the drive and diligence to become one. Your knowledge base is solid enough and your dedication to our profession is undeniable. It's just…"

Miles looked uneasy as he petted Lucky's metallic back. "Just what, sir?"

"I can only speak anecdotally, but… you need to stop acting as if you're working in a normal office."

"Pardon?"

"Mech design is more than engineering. It's also a creative art. Do you understand what I am trying to convey?"

The former Brighter wasn't stupid. He only needed a single nudge to understand what Ves was trying to say.

"Are you suggesting that my approach is wrong and that I should act more like a struggling artist?"

Ves softly chuckled. "I guess you can say so. I wouldn't put it that way but it is an apt description of what I think will help your case. You see, back when I was in your shoes, I did not just sit around doing regular stuff. I went out of my way to explore new opportunities, see new sights and experience plenty of thrills, some more life-threatening than others. If there is one thing that our former home state is right about, it's that plucking mech designers out of their comfortable labs and dumping them into warzones is a great way to shake them up and force them to experience new stimuli. I believe that is the key to their subsequent success, assuming they survive their ordeals."

Miles looked rather taken with the theory. "So I should start acting like a Brave."

"There's a reason why I support gutsy mech designers." Ves smiled. It was nice to talk with smart people, and most mech designers tended to fall into this category. "I believe I have said enough to push you into what I believe to be the right direction. In my opinion, you are so entrenched in your ordinary routine that you simply won't be able to make a drastic change due to all of the inertia you are stuck in. You need to become exposed to strong stimuli in order to break you out of your current shell."

Though Ves did not provide any proof that his theory was true, Miles already decided to commit to it. What he was currently doing yielded no results. Instead of repeating the same activities that produced the same results, it made more sense to adopt a different pattern.

At least then he had greater hopes of obtaining a different result.

"I'll think about it." Miles gratefully said. "There is not much I can do while I remain attached to our fleet, though. I can't possibly follow your example and go on a dangerous adventure. I'm not a fighter like Ketis either so I won't be dueling any swordsmen anytime soon."

This was indeed a problem. If the Larkinson Clan was based in a fixed location, it was fine if its members went on an excursion.

However, since everyone was based in the fleet, it was not as practical for people to go about their way, especially when the Larkinson Clan did not linger in a fixed region.

"I'll see about organizing a number of exciting activities once we reach the Red Ocean and stabilize our situation." Ves promised. "I'm already thinking about holding tournaments and giving limited approval for certain fleet elements to go on independent tours. Some of these ideas are only viable in the long term though so don't wait on us to give you the opportunities. Find them yourself. If our clan doesn't offer you enough stimuli, then try and seek them out on the galactic net. There is an entire community of mech designers out there that you can challenge, collaborate or exchange with. Just do something different."

With that, Ves dismissed the Apprentice. He sent a brief message to the Black Cats to keep a closer eye on Miles.

If the frustrated Apprentice made actual progress, then Ves wanted to know everything Miles had done in order to catch his own opportunity.

"I really hope you'll succeed. We could always use more Journeymen." Ves whispered.

The mech legions all needed a lot of new mech models that were tailored to their own strategies and mech doctrines. Four Journeymen couldn't possibly meet the huge demand in the short and medium term.

"If we have double the amount of Journeymen, then we won't be so swamped with priorities."

The Larkinson mech designers not only needed to meet the demand from the Larkinson Army, but also design numerous new commercial mech designs in order to create more revenue sources.

Although Ves hadn't paid much attention to the LMC lately, he was vaguely aware that its monthly sales were starting to slide. The excitement surrounding established models such as the Desolate Soldier, the Doom Guard, the Ferocious Piranha and the Crystal Lord Mark II was dropping. They had all reached market saturation in the Yeina Star Cluster a few months ago as the most eager customers already got their hands on the new machines.

The competition hadn't been sitting still either. Even if third-class mech designers had less options available than their second-class counterparts, they could still be inventive if they needed to be. Not only did they design competitive alternatives that could give the LMC mechs a run for their money, the mech industry also came up with targeted counters.

Ves wasn't sure whether it was worth his time to keep designing third-class mechs. He might delegate that responsibility almost entirely to his design teams.

What he was certain about was that the Larkinson Clan's growing pile of debt necessitated a drastic increase in income. The easiest way for Ves to address this problem was to enter the second-class mech market.

He rubbed his smooth-shaven chin as he leaned back on his chair. "It's been a long time since I designed a mech that is meant to sell. I have to come up with at least one cash cow in order to alleviate the worsening financial position of my clan."

This was an interesting challenge to Ves. Unlike designing a mech for his clansmen, he needed to take a larger, more eclectic and more diverse clientele in mind. All sorts of people who came from many different states and cultures were potential customers to him. What he needed to do was to focus on a broad target audience and develop a new mech concept that strongly appealed to their needs.

This was pretty hard even for Ves. While he had a lot more options available than a few years ago, all of this choice slowed down his decision-making process. He had to make a careful consideration on what he was willing to add to his commercial products and what he should reserve for his clan.

For example, it wouldn't take a lot of time for him to publish the second-class version of the Ferocious Piranha, but right now it functioned as one of the key mechs of the Flagrant Vandals and a few other mech legions that deployed light mechs.

It would cheapen their advantage and their special identity if their signature mechs were sold en masse to the public!

"This is why the Larkinson Army needs at least 21 exlusive mech series."

At least Ves had already made a head start in fulfilling them with models such as the Transcendent Punisher and the Eternal Redemption.

For now, he wanted each mech legion to obtain three exclusive mech models which they could base their essential strategies around.

Once the Avatars, Sentinels and other mech legions received their core mechs, Ves was open to expanding their mech roster with additional mech models that added more flexibility and options to their fighting approach, though this could wait until later.

Just thinking about how many projects all of this entailed already gave Ves a headache.

Should he relax his own rule and become more open to hiring external Journeyman Mech Designers?

Although it would be a lot more difficult to guarantee their loyalty, they provided immediate value to the Larkinson Clan… Perhaps Ves should explore this idea further.