The Mech Touch

The new luminar crystal cannon was complete.

Maow.

As a slightly tired-looking Alexandria retracted her design network and dove back into Gloriana's head, the entire workshop fell into silence.

The two mech designers already shut off all of the production machines and the assembly system had also returned to its dormant state.

The work that they had created over the course of a day rested majestically on a reinforced horizontal weapon rack that they had especially designed to accommodate the new creation.

The new luminar crystal cannon certainly needed it because it was both big and heavy.

"Wow." Gloriana uttered. "It is not a masterwork weapon, but… it possesses its own brilliance despite its imperfections. It is certainly the most beautiful weapon that I have ever helped to develop."

It was rather odd for her to forgo her complaints about falling short of making another masterwork mech or product, but she wasn't too concerned about that. Her god body application should ensure that the weapon should slowly be able to absorb enough worship to upgrade its physical qualities over time.

This way, time and energy would complete the work that she had failed to do during this design run.

It was an approach that Gloriana stole from— er, that is, gained inspiration from her husband.

In any case, if she wanted her new weapon to evolve into a masterwork over time, then it needed to acquire fame and earn the admiration of many different people.

This would require the Larkinson Clan to put conscious effort into making exciting recordings of the AMaranto in battle. The Larkinsons then needed to edit and propagate the footage in a way that put plenty of emphasis on the Amaranto's new ship-killing cannon.

Gloriana smirked. She knew that it wouldn't be as difficult to accomplish this goal as it sounded.

This was because she and her husband had already taken this need into account and designed the weapon accordingly!

Not only was the weapon meant to output powerful piercing energy beams, it had to look fantastic while fulfilling its primary purpose!

Ves had especially let his creative juices flow when he worked the luminar crystal exterior to make it as imposing and symbolic as possible.

First, its size and dimensions already conveyed a lot of threat and power by itself.

Every human and alien could instinctively sense the danger posed by weapons, and it was undoubtedly a certainty that a weapon that looked as if a small warship cannon had gotten loose was capable of generating plenty of vigilance!

Second, he added in a lot of light sources that would allow the crystal weapon to shine in different colors along different points.

Though they weren't doing anything when the cannon wasn't being used, Ves knew that they would generate quite the lightshow once the Amaranto made use of the new weapon.

Third, Ves had added a lot of decorative elements to the weapon, causing it to look as if he had recreated a part of the Phase King in a crystalline form! 

The torpedo-shaped muzzle of the giant cannon especially evoked the impression of a powerful phasewater-manipulating beast.

This was because Ves had worked hard to shape it into an exquisite reproduction of the head of the Phase King!

To be more precise, the crystal muzzle looked as if the powerful fish-whale king had opened its maw in order to release a powerful energy blast.

Though only the Cerebral King demonstrated this particular ability, Ves didn't quibble too much over it. The visual design he came up with was the only way to make the luminar crystal cannon look incredibly cool while also increasing its compatibility with the Phase King.

"It's a work of art." Ves praised his own work. "Blessed weapons such as the Gray Lotus and now this new luminar crystal cannon should always have a clear association with the source of their special power. If nothing goes wrong, this design approach will probably be the new standard for high-quality weapons in our clan."

Gloriana turned towards her husband. "That reminds me, you have yet to bestow a name on our latest work. Are you waiting for Venerable Stark to come and name her new weapon herself or will you provide it with your own label?"

He smirked at her. "We connected our minds to each other during the entire fabrication run. You should already know my decision."

"You have a shortlist of names in mind, though you haven't been able to make the final decision. You intended to wait until you completed the run and utilize the emotions that you are feeling at the moment to drive your final choice. What does your heart tell you, Ves?"

"My heart… is urging me to kiss you right now!"

"Wait, what?!"

Ves dove in and surprised his wife by capturing her lips with his own!

As the pair briefly exchanged their affection, Ves finally pulled back with a smile.

"Okay, that's enough. You have had your fun now. What is the name that you have settled upon?"

The mischievous husband grinned as he turned back towards his imposing whale-themed energy cannon.

"The Amaranto's first weapon is called the Instrument of Vengeance." He spoke. "It makes sense if Venerable Stark's second option follows an established pattern. Aside from that, the name should also reflect the cannon's relation to the Phase King. Given these requirements, I have settled on calling it the Instrument of Doom."

His wife contemplated the name and found that the luminar crystal cannon certainly looked the part.

Just a single full-powered shot from this massive weapon ought to be enough to convey the meaning of doom!

"Why did you choose to use the word doom in the name?" Gloriana asked. "When I peeked into your mind, I saw that you thought about using other words instead such as freedom, liberation, dissociation, separation and so on. Why did you settle for a grimmer choice instead?"

Ves waved his arm at the dormant but eager cannon. "Because this weapon is meant to herald doom. It is meant to inspire fear in enemies and deter rivals from trying anything against us. Our luminar crystal cannon is designed for the express purpose to fell the largest enemies that we may face. Warships, astral beasts and phase whales are usually accustomed to dominating the battlefield due to their immense size and power, but the Instrument of Doom will make them experience the threat of destruction by striking their literal or metaphorical hearts!"

The new weapon was meant to strike and cripple a large enemy target with a single overpowering attack.

Ves truly believed that the Instrument of Doom would be able to bypass a lot of hull plating and damage vital components buried deep inside the interior of a warship.

He had performed a lot of data analysis on the test results of smaller blessed weapons and gained a preliminary understanding how the Phase King amplified the spatial effects of phasewater technology.

He extrapolated the data and roughly estimated to what extent an energy beam attack could penetrate through solid alloy when launched by a weapon as large as the Instrument of Doom.

The results he received firmly indicated that he should be able to witness a weapon that would break the mech industry if it showed off its prowess to the public!

"The next testing session will be crucial for us." Ves reminded his wife. "While our new Instrument of Doom must definitely accumulate a lot of fame in order to fuel its physical transformation, for now we should keep its specifications as secret as possible. We need to retain it as a trump card in order to take a potential enemy by surprise."

His wife didn't like this decision. "God bodies aren't meant to remain obscure. They deserve to be known and worshiped by all who admire excessive firepower. Don't forget that it is a living weapon that has just come into existence. How will it grow if you starve it from the energy it needs to properly support its god body?"

She made a good point. Ves hadn't thought about this when he should have. Every living product was alive in a sense, which meant that they deserved to be treated with the respect of a living entity.

Ves recalled how the growth of a number of his living products had become warped due to the lack of care they received during their earlier and more formative years of their life.

Just as how children could easily grow up into awful delinquents, mechs and other living products could also end up growing up the wrong way if they were treated badly!

However, Ves wasn't too concerned about this issue.

"I will allow our clan and our allies to witness the upcoming testing session." He told her. "There are around half a million of Larkinsons spread throughout our ships. All of them will provide enough spiritual feedback and other energies to give the Instrument of Doom a starter course."

"I am not certain whether that is enough, Ves. I developed the god body with the intention that each of them enjoy the worship of trillions of people at the very least. What we have falls far short of that. It will take forever for the Instrument of Doom to climb up to the second rung of the craftsmanship ladder at this rate."

Ves shook his head. "Don't forget what our expeditionary fleet is doing right now. We have just entered a turbulent border region where hundreds if not thousands of pioneering fleets are bumping into each other. There are also alien warships and planets occupied by indigenous alien races. Each of them will present us with a possible opportunity to debut the Instrument of Doom in battle for the first time. It won't take long before we can introduce our powerful new whale-themed weapon to the public for the first time."

That was enough to resolve Gloriana's concerns. Though she hadn't contributed too much to this product, it still incorporated her greatest design solution up until this date. She wanted the Instrument of Doom to do well so that she could gather a lot of specific data about the weapon's gradual changes.

She needed this data to speed up her attempts to advance to the rank of Senior Mech Designer!

"I cannot believe that I am saying this, but I hope that you will be able to find and provoke an enemy as soon as possible." Gloriana said in a bewildered tone. "The Instrument of Doom doesn't deserve to be buried in our fleet. It must capture the imagination of the public."

Her urgency on this matter reflected the downside of the god body solution. Much of the additional work and effort in a design would go to waste if nobody took advantage of its possibilities.

Not every mech or piece of equipment was worthy enough to become a god body.

In fact, it might even be detrimental if too many god bodies were concentrated in a single mech force. 

Humans ultimately possessed a limited amount of strength. Each potential worshiper could only transfer a small quantity of energy to god bodies.

The more god bodies that vied for the admiration of the public, the more the energies from that group would be divided among many different recipients.

Ultimately, everything would slow down.

This was why Gloriana started to think on how she should be more selective about applying this design solution to different projects.

It was out of the question for her to turn mass production mechs into god bodies!

The machines and their pilots frankly didn't earn the power of a god body.

"When will I be able to commence this test?"

Ves referenced the time. "We should drop out of FTL travel in 14 hours. Let us retire and conduct the test the next day."

"Very well."

Both of them held high hopes for the next day.

This would be the time where Ves could prove that his latest invention had the power to break the established rules concerning the limitations on the firepower of mechs!