The Mech Touch

　　The entire creature must have led a long and difficult life as it slowly grew up in the Red Ocean. As the Lifer exobiologists kept investigating the Titania's enormous carcass, they gathered more clues about its nature, its biological mechanisms, and its life trajectory.

　　This allowed them to construct a plausible story about the Titania's life from birth to its demise at the hands of the Golden Skull Alliance.

　　"In human terms, the Titania is 6344 years old." Director Ranya's projection stated as it floated next to Ves. "In astral beast terms, this is also an impressive age. Most astral beasts eventually end up dying to space hazards, predation from other astral beasts, starvation due to an inability to find sufficient sustenance or getting hunted down by sentient alien races. If we are able to keep it whole and transport it back to a developed trade system, we can easily sell it for a fortune."

　　"How much of a fortune?" Ves asked as he hovered above the research teams that were working to figure out as much as they could of the fascinating astral beast.

　　"It's hard to give you an exact estimate, but the true value of this beast to collectors is much greater when it is in a whole and in an undamaged state. Considering all of the destruction that we have inflicted on it, its value has already dropped by 70 percent. That doesn't make it worthless, though. I estimate that we can potentially sell it off for as much as 40,000 to 60,000 MTA credits."

　　"That much?!"

　　The Titania's corpse was as valuable as a good capital ship back in the old galaxy! This was an amazing prize for what amounted to a short and quick victory!

　　Payoffs like these were one of the greatest reasons why people flocked to the Red Ocean so much. It was much easier to stumble upon a lucky find and earn a huge fortune!

　　Of course, it was easy to forget that opportunities never fell into people's hands so easily. If the expeditionary fleet wasn't so strong and if it didn't possess so many trump cards, the Titania may have been the ones to scour over the remains of the Larkinson Clan instead!

　　Director Ranya adopted a helpless expression. "Don't be so quick to celebrate, sir. The Titania in its current state may be worth as much as a capital ship, but our fleet doesn't possess the means to bring it to a marketplace where it can be sold for that amount. The Titania is far too big to fit into the cargo holds of any of our capital ships. None of them are equipped with FTL drives that can allow them to tow larger objects through superluminal travel. Certain warp drives and superdrives are capable of doing that but we do not possess any of this advanced tech. This means that the Titania's carcass is more akin to a fixed fortification rather than a movable ship to us. The only way we can take it away is if we break it up into many pieces and store them in the cargo holds of many different ships."

　　All of that was true. The expeditionary fleet contained plenty of capital ships that were all useful in their own way, but none of them possessed the capability to drag space station-like objects from one star system to another!

　　Ves began to feel pained when he realized how much of a loss his fleet was suffering due to lacking the necessary tools for the job.

　　"Have you found the Titania's equivalent of a warp drive yet? If we can find it, we might be able to make it move to a destination under its own power."

　　Ranya shook her head. "I wouldn't dream so much if I were you. We have already searched the Titania for several hours but found no trace of either phasewater or an organ that can possibly function as the warp drive. Not even the inspection performed by your cat has found any sign of them so far. Our current theory is that the Titania must have overburdened it in order to escape pursuit from its original attackers."

　　That was another piece of bad news. Although the Larkinson Clan hadn't suffered any significant losses in the process of killing the Titania, the inability to earn the best profit left a sour taste in his mouth.

　　"What can we do with it if we can't drag it to a marketplace in a single piece?"

　　"There are several possible options we can take, of which I would seriously consider two of them. The first is to employ the most obvious solution and break up the Titania entirely. This creature has lived for six millenia and it has managed to devour a lot of valuable exotics and other prized materials throughout its lifetime. Although the Titania is more akin to a garbage dump where much of its minerals comprise of relatively low-value bulk exotics, we have found organs and bones that have been laced with inconsistent compositions of medium-grade and high-grade exotics."

　　The Titania was still worth a lot of money due to all of the materials locked in its body. The only downside to breaking it all down in order to extract these valuable exotics was that the astral beast would no longer exist as a complete carcass. This meant the expeditionary fleet would basically throw away all of the added value of a creature that had lived for an impressively long time.

　　Regardless of how much value the expeditionary fleet could obtain from dismantling the Titania, its valuation could have easily been five to ten times as much if it remained whole!

　　This dynamic applied to any other sophisticated product. A painting made with cheap composite canvas and mass-produced synthetic paint could easily be sold for dozens of MTA credits if it was made by a famed and prestigious master!

　　The reason why there was such an enormous price disparity between the two was that it was a lot easier to obtain the raw materials than a finished product made by the same goods!

　　This process of creation and transformation generated a lot of value as the final product was oftentimes a lot more scarce and functional.

　　When Ves gazed around at the giant walls of grayish flesh, he could see that the Titania was truly a marvel of biological growth and evolution. To destroy it was like shattering a priceless historical treasure.

　　"What's the second option, then?" He asked.

　　"Well… just because we don't possess the capabilities to tow the Titania's carcass away doesn't mean that others are as helpless. If you are willing to remain in this star system for several weeks or months, we can wait until a fleet dispatched by a third party has arrived to bring the whole carcass away."

　　This was an interesting suggestion. The problem was that the Golden Skull Alliance didn't have the best negotiating position since it was a relatively small player in the Red Ocean. It would also be clear to anyone that the expeditionary fleet had no other choice but to resort to other people's help. This meant that the Larkinsons would have to give up 30 percent of the earnings if not more.

　　Of course, if there was no better option, it was perfectly acceptable to give away a third of the potential earnings.

　　What Ves couldn't accept was the amount of time it took for a third party to come all of the way here. Until the Titania's carcass was handed over to a partner such as the Wild Fighter Association, the expeditionary fleet had to remain stuck in place for months.

　　There was so much of the Red Ocean that Ves wanted to explore. He was especially cognizant that the MTA's 2-year protection period continued to expire with each day that passed. If he wanted to make the most of this valuable immunity, his expeditionary fleet should be moving as far away as possible!

　　"I don't want us to wait around." He told her. "We need to leave within a week at most. Not only do we need to make more active use of our time, I'm also concerned with encountering the enemy that has originally put the Titania in such a sorry state. The longer we linger here, the greater the chance the astral beast or alien warfleet might catch up to its prey!"

　　Director Ranya furrowed her brows. "That does sound concerning. So you wish to proceed with cutting the Titania apart, sir?"

　　"Ah, I can't make this decision alone. I'll have to confer with the leaders of the Glory Seekers and the Cross Clan to decide upon a unified course of action, but I don't think they will choose any differently."

　　The Larkinson Clan contributed the most to the defeat of the Titania. In addition, the clan held much more weight in the Golden Skull Alliance than the other partners. For all intents and purposes, Ves led the entire alliance.

　　He contacted the other leaders after he concluded his discussion with Director Ranya. Just as he expected, neither Marshal Ariadne nor Reginald Cross rejected his recommendation. It made the most sense and it also avoided any further complications that might arise.

　　The only issue that resulted in a bit of contention was how to divide the spoils.

　　Ves wasn't confident enough to negotiate on the clan's behalf, so he delegated this responsibility to Minister Shederin Purnesse.

　　After the old man had a good talk with his counterparts working for the other two alliance partners, they came up with a fairly satisfying split for every party involved.

　　"The contributions of our clan is the greatest and most pivotal to the defeat of the Titania, so we are entitled to 65 percent of the total harvest." Shederin's projection told Ves some time later. "The Glory Seekers have been more influential despite their smaller numbers so they can lay claim to 20 percent of the harvest. The Cross Clan will have to make due with just 15 percent as their ranged mechs along with their two expert mechs did not play a great role this time."

　　Ves was quite happy to hear that his clan lay claim to such a large proportion of the useful organs and materials that could be recovered from this massive organic garbage dump. If he negotiated this deal, he doubted he would be able to give his clan more than 50 percent.

　　"Good job, Shederin. Are there any special conditions that I should know about?"

　　"Certain high-grade exotics are useful in both starship and mech construction, but their quantities are relatively limited. We have agreed to form an internal auction of sorts where we can all bid on the materials that we are truly interested in. The allocation of high-value materials will be uneven as a result. Perhaps it would be a good idea for you or your wife to bid on the goods."

　　Ves nodded. "I'll be sure to do so. This is a good opportunity for our clan to acquire high-value materials that we can use to upgrade our existing expert mechs or build new ones like our upcoming Minerva Project."

　　He had always dreamed about designing and building mechs based on salvaged materials. There was a rustic sort of romance about it that harkened back to humanity's initial foray into the galaxy.

　　Though it was a shame to break up such a large and ancient astral beast for this, if it allowed his clan to strengthen all of its high-value mechs, then it was ultimately worth it in the end!