The Mech Touch

Ves enjoyed the visit to the nearby branch of Three Point Shipping.

The company charged high rates for its services, but they weren't a big deal to Ves.

The Living Mech Corporation had always pursued a strategy of competing in the upper end of the mech market, at least when it came to its business operations in the Yeina Star Cluster.

The competition was much tougher in the Red Ocean. The LMC could only reluctantly compete in the middle segment for the time being.

Even so, the product margins from selling the upcoming batches of commercial mechs should be high enough to retain a sufficient amount of profits.

Ves did not expect the gains to be too high at first. The business environment and industry conditions were too harsh at the moment. He was even willing to settle for breaking even if that was what it took to expand his brand and get his mechs in the hands of more and more customers.

After he and his wife bid farewell to Director Wirtle, they visited a couple of other addresses.

They stopped by the local works of a recycling company, a metal producer and a couple of rival mech companies.

Ves and his group even moved past a facility that belonged to ZZR Heavy Manufacturing.

Naturally, he did not choose to visit it as his relationship with the CEO of the company was not exactly the best. He doubted that Tyana Delcrost was willing to talk to him again!

In any case, Ves and his wife had opened their eyes to the efforts of their rivals and potential business partners. The Larkinson Clan may have been on the rise, but there were many other pioneering organizations that had entered the new frontier with considerably more funding, assets, manpower and business competences!

"There is still a gap between our clan and those other companies." Gloriana told Ves as they finally returned to their unfinished compound. "Based on what we have seen, I think we will remain stuck as middle players for several decades. It is difficult for us to outgrow our immediate rivals in Davute unless our mechs are truly able to take off in a major fashion."

Ves was confident that he and his fellow Larkinson mech designers could design and publish at least one bestseller in the Red Ocean. The previous design round showed a lot of promise and the current one was fully dedicated to commercial mechs.

If that didn't work, then he had the next couple of years to work on other projects. He had so many new and interesting ideas in his head that he looked forward to surprising the people of the Red Ocean with his most creative works to date!

After concluding their tour of the local district, a few days passed by as the new industrial and residential compound continued to take shape.

Gloriana spent a lot of time at the Genesis Lab in order to make sure that her future workplace was built and set up exactly according to her specifications.

Ves on the other hand paid more attention to the other facilities at the compound such as the fabrication plant and the housing for the clansmen who were temporarily or permanently assigned to this branch.

The issue of housing was a fairly difficult matter to resolve.

On the one hand, his clansmen desired to live in a residential district or neighborhood. No one would choose to live among a lot of busy factories and logistical centers. Even if the companies that owned them did their best to make their facilities look more pleasant, that didn't change the fact that these were not the most ideal places to live!

Ves had a different opinion, though.

"I don't approve of buying another plot of land at a nearby residential district just so that we can build houses." He told Chief Minister Raymond Billingsley-Larkinson. "This is a needless expense to our clan. The Cat Nest is already large enough to fit as much housing as we want. Have you forgotten all of the times we got screwed while we were stuck on a planet? If we concentrate as much of our assets on this planet in a single location, then we can more easily defend everything against enemy attacks. Having much of our people in a single place also makes it a lot easier and faster to evacuate them all from this planet in a hurry."

For some reason or another, the compound that was still far from completion had already started to attract an increasing number of cats.

A lot of cats brought by Larkinsons that were stationed at the compound converged inside the Ascension Gallery at first.

When those cats weren't getting spoiled by their owners, the animals started to roam around and pass on word to other sentient cats.

These Larkinson cats at first managed to persuade a dozen foreign cats to visit the giant totem of the Golden Cat in the center of the Ascension Gallery.

Nobody was bothered by the arrival of these foreign cats. They were all smart enough to know when they had to leave and return to their own humans in order to get their food and companionship.

The problem was that those foreign cats started to pass on word to other foreign cats!

When the Larkinsons first started to observe this snowball effect, already a lot of foreign cats started to make the industrial compound their second home!

This was why the people working there started calling it the Cat Nest. Though the cats weren't allowed to roam too close to the manufacturing plant and other important areas, they were still free to roam around in the more public places, hence why more and more people mistook the industrial compound as a cat sanctuary!

Ves kind of liked the name, though, so he did not push for a change at all. It was as good a name as any for the clan's important branch territory in Davute.

"You will also be putting all of our eggs in a single basket." The elderly chief minister retorted. "If a powerful enemy manages to detonate a powerful bomb in our Cat Nest, then we will instantly lose everything and everyone at once."

Ves shrugged. "That is true, but we will just have to make sure to beef up the defenses of our new Cat Nest as much as possible. The threshold to inflict damage to our clan must be as high as possible to deter troublemakers. It makes little sense to split our attention and resources across multiple facilities."

"There is also the Open Consortium, you know. We built its headquarters in the Financial District a few months earlier."

"There aren't a lot of Larkinsons assigned to the Open Consortium. We should easily be able to replace the losses if any incident occurs."

He did not budge from this issue no matter how much Raymond and the other Larkinson leaders pleaded to provide a better housing location.

Ves even gave up the opportunity to buy and build an opulent mansion in the most elite and expensive district of Kotor City!

He would be lying if he claimed that he wasn't tempted. Gloriana had been nagging him to build a classy mansion at the Austere District that was located in the very center of the capital city!

This was where most of the founders and major leaders of the various pioneering organizations made their homes. Despite its contradictory name, the Austere District was filled with excess and splendor. The luxury shopping mall that Ves and his wife had once visited was typical of this expensive area!

However, the reason why he eventually rejected this option was because of security concerns.

Ves and his immediate family might be living in one of the most protected areas of Davute, but he would have to put his trust into the local military and security forces, which was hardly reassuring to someone who got backstabbed on a regular basis in the past!

The rules in the industrial district were much more generous in comparison. The Larkinsons were allowed to station a much more formidable security garrison in the Cat Nest, which meant that Ves could rely on the protection of his own troops if he decided to settle in this compound!

Ves reached out his hand and patted Raymond's shoulder. "Look, I know you are close to retiring. I can fully understand that you wish to buy a quaint home to reminisce about the past with fellow retirees who live in the neighborhood. However, only a small proportion of our clansmen are at retirement age. There are plenty more who have a lot of years of work ahead of them. If the star system is under any threat, I want to be assured that we can quickly evacuate our clansmen with minimal delay. Have you forgotten about events such as the Sand War and the outbreak of civil war on Prosperous Hill VI? I don't want our clan to ever get caught like that again."

In the end, his paranoia outweighed everyone's desire to live in greater comfort.

Ves at least approved of greater efforts to make the Cat Nest more livable and pleasant. The abundant greenery and the attraction of lots of cats had already done wonders to lift the moods of the first batches of clansmen to arrive and settle in the temporary dormitories that their clan had rushed into completion.

The Blue Cat Estates as people started to call them was a series of planned and constructed housing units that were divided by several tiers or categories.

The apartment buildings were the plainest of all. Even though they were all roomier and better furnished than the cabins in different starships, they weren't too special at the moment.

Higher-ranking Larkinsons received the right to inhabit the standalone houses and estates that were also under construction.

They could house a single household or a dozen ones depending on their design and other variables. Someone like Chief Minister Raymond Billingsley-Larkinson or his grandson might choose to live in these classy estates if they were stationed on this planet.

Of course, there was one mansion that stood far above the rest.

It was situated on a low hill that was supposed to be surrounded by a small forest. Its traditional architecture along with its excellent location caused people to refer to it as the Royal Mansion.

Ves wasn't so sure whether he wanted to keep this name for the opulent estate, but he hadn't come up with a better alternative at this time.

The Royal Mansion was where the director of the local branch of the Larkinson Clan would reside under normal circumstances.

If Ves had stopped by for a visit, then he would be taking it over for as long as he remained.

In practical terms, that meant that the Royal Mansion would essentially be Ves and Gloriana's primary home for the next five years!

He had paid a lot of attention to the design and planning of the Royal Mansion. In order to make sure that Gloriana became happy enough to settle for the place, he had allocated a lot of money to make it look more impressive.

He even planned to add a few totems and handmade artwork to it to truly turn it into a grand abode that was fit to house the leader of a growing clan!

"All is going well." Ves smiled as he swept his gaze across the Cat Nest and surveyed all of the rapid construction efforts.

Although he didn't particularly like the phrase, he had to admit that it was truly satisfying to build a business empire.

He had done it before in the Yeina Star Cluster, but Ves didn't really take his business activities in his former home region seriously.

Back then, he had been extremely reluctant to enter the second-class mech market.

His eyes glinted in determination. "This time will be different. This time I will properly compete against rivals who can match or exceed my efforts."

The Cat Nest played a crucial role in his upcoming plans!

"A new age has begun for the Larkinson Clan!"