The Mech Touch



Just as he predicted, it was far harder for his scanning equipment to figure out the details of the primordial human remains than normal.

The first-class lab machines and instruments shouldn't have been defeated so easily. They were so good that they could easily decipher the alloy formulas for all of the warship debris that the Larkinson Clan had collected from the battlefield.

Yet when they started to examine the bones that remained pristine despite existing for so long, they yielded remarkably little results.

Sure, the scanners were able to use their basic sensors to gather obvious data such as the mass, density and dimensions of the bones.

Yet when Ves wanted to learn what materials they consisted of and how their internal structure looked like, he obtained no information at all! None of the MTA-issued equipment could peer beyond the surface of all of the bones!

The results actually didn't surprise him that much. Primordial humans wouldn't have been so highly regarded if they could be figured out so easily.

Ves still had to go through the motions and exhaust every available test that he could perform.

"Since these bones are so damn hard, I should try out the more dangerous and destructive tests as well."

He subjected them to all kinds of examinations that should ordinarily break many other kinds of materials.

For example, he conducted impact tests where he slammed the bones with a giant metal spike.

He threw them into an extremely hot furnace to see whether they would melt or crack.

He submerged the bones in highly corrosive acids to see if any chemical reactions occurred.

He even exposed them to high levels of radioactivity!

Nothing he did seemed to harm them in any fashion! Their mass and dimensions remained exactly the same after he cleaned them up and measured them again.

"This is ridiculous!"

Not even the hardest first-class materials that he had gotten his hands on could match this level of resilience!

The endurance tests he conducted were not average in the slightest. He had to pay hundreds of MTA credits in order to obtain the required materials to conduct a few of them, yet none of them produced any meaningful differences.

Ves finally accepted the tentative conclusion that the primordial human skeleton was indestructible by his current means.

While he suspected that an all-out attack from the Amaranto or the Mars might be able to cause the bones to show weakness, he did not dare to call over those powerful high-ranking mechs.

He needed to keep the ancient human remains as secret as possible, and he did not actually want to pulverize all of the bones just to satisfy his curiosity!

"There is something weird going on here." He frowned. "Are the bones so awfully dense and resistant towards damage due to their material composition alone, or are their defenses being boosted by other factors?"

When Blinky appeared from his head and dove deep into each and every bone, the companion spirit only encountered a lot of emptiness.

This was not the emptiness of non-existence. The best way that Ves could characterize Blinky's explorations was that the Star Cat had entered enormous swimming pools that had been drained thousands of years ago. They were completely empty of water, but the space they used to occupy still conveyed a sense of empty space.

When Blinky poured spiritual energy into these bones, their 'swimming pools' became filled again, though only by a tiny measure.

Adding other varieties of spiritual energy into the same bone caused it to automatically partition itself into multiple smaller swimming pools.

This was an incredibly fascinating process to him. It happened completely automatically, so much so that Ves couldn't find any consciousness or programmed routine that caused this to happen!

Try as he might, Ves could not detect any surviving spiritual remnants or spiritual constructs in each of the bones. He had already found this out when he initially discovered them inside the ancient alien prison, but now that he was able to conduct his examinations without a crisis hanging over his head, he was able to confirm his original observations.

"They have truly turned into empty slates." Ves said with a hint of wonder in his voice. "The power of time is strong. Whatever spiritual qualities they had before have fully faded due to the erosion of so many years."

Ves was unable to determine an accurate assessment of how old they were, but the primordial human bones had to be over 100,000 years old given the age of the ancient prison facility.

He had a lot of questions concerning these remains, but his inability to gather more data heavily restricted the amount of answers that he could gain.

He either needed much better lab equipment or he needed the help of a genuine expert like his mother.

"Since I can't figure out anything important, let me try and see if I can derive any other benefits from these bones."

He had the strongest urge to grab a knife, cut out his leg bones and replace them with the ancient relic bones.

Although this sounded absolutely crazy, he had the belief that his evolved body would be able to integrate the primordial human remains without any serious compatibility issues!

It took a few minutes for him to calm his restless and eager heart.

"I can't completely guarantee that this is safe or reversible. If these ownerless bones imprint on me and turn into permanent fixtures of my body, I won't be able to remove them without consequences."

Ves played around with the skull and other bones with the intention of studying what happened if he added multiple different varieties of spiritual energy in them. The way they separated from each other made it difficult for him to utilize multiple kinds of energy at the same time, but it was still possible if he concentrated his mind.

"I wonder…"

He had never really experimented with mixing different kinds of spiritual energies that conformed to different spiritual attributes.

To him, it was as pointless as mixing different incompatible drinks with each other.

For example, it was fine to drink coffee by itself, but if he mixed it with a fizzy soft drink, he would undoubtedly obtain a completely undrinkable abomination!

However, this did not mean that every combination of spiritual attributes was detrimental.

Coffee and milk went well together. He could mix a more universal substance such as alcohol with all kinds of drinks in order to produce viable new products.

While he wasn't sure whether this analogy applied to this specific situation, he might as well try and see what would happen.

"Having a bone like this makes it a lot more convenient to conduct these kinds of experiments." He smiled as he held a skull that glowed in all of the colors of a rainbow.

He tried to mix the spiritual energies donated by different design spirits, but quickly found out that they didn't get along well.

Their spiritual imprints got in the way. Just because they had been given away did not mean they became ownerless.

"Maybe I should take care of that first."

Once he conducted the tedious process of removing their spiritual imprints, he was able to mix the energies together a lot easier than before.

This was not necessarily a good development. Ves had the feeling he was creating different versions of mud pools by mixing together a lot of random junk.

"This is not useful. I should be able to do more with this, but what am I missing?"

He tried to recall any instances in the past where he was able to witness pools of spiritual energies with different attributes that somehow got along with each other.

He immediately thought of the spiritualities of many life forms!

Every sentient life form developed at least a sliver of spirituality that encapsulated their very beings.

As humans and intelligent aliens were usually complex by nature, their spiritualities also became mixed with different spiritual attributes as a result.

The problem was that aside from the two or three dominant attributes, the rest did not seem to do anything useful. They polluted the rest of the pool!

"This might not necessarily be a bad development." Ves suddenly thought.

He thought of extreme personalities such as Venerable Jannzi and felt that she might have been able to develop a milder persona if she wasn't so obsessed with her ideals.

Ves had long known that increasing the purity of one's spirit allowed it to grow a lot faster, it might also turn the individual in question into an extremist!

This theory happened to align with his observations of many different expert pilots.

The younger they were, the easier it was for them to develop extreme personalities after their advancement. This was because their life experiences weren't all that much yet. They still retained a touch of innocence and naivety that limited their spiritual pollution levels.

"Wait, this theory doesn't necessarily hold against the likes of Venerable Joshua."

Joshua belonged to the same generation as his former girlfriend, but he was more laid-back and approachable than her. Their lack of compatibility was partially the reason why they broke up their intimate relationship.

Thinking about all of these different cases caused him to unconsciously mix and separate different types of spiritual energies together.

While nothing produced any solid results, Ves continued to deliberate over his guesses and deductions until he abruptly stopped.

"Wait! Energy alone does nothing if it is left to its own devices. Energy can only be harnessed properly if it is directed or channeled in a specific manner!"

He thought back to all of those expert pilots and attempted to figure out what they all had in common.

"Willpower!"

The extraordinary willpower of expert pilots enabled them to bend the laws of reality and harness many possible forces that they ordinarily shouldn't be able to control.

His eyes shone as he started to feel as if he had stumbled upon a potentially useful design application.

When he thought about what sort of mech design project he could apply his latest discovery to, he immediately thought of a single mech design.

"I might be able to improve the Dullahan Project with this possible innovation!"

This was remarkable as he originally did not intend to mix the Dullahan Project with many different forms of spiritual energy. It was supposed to herald the rebirth of the Shield of Samar. While he had implemented many changes into the design, much of them were derived from the previous incarnation of Jannzi's expert mech.

What he had in mind this time was a brand-new addition to the expert knight mech that the original Shield of Samar lacked!

He set the glowing skull aside and activated a design suite. He immediately started to manipulate the interface and designed an entirely new physical tower shield.

The inner core of the shield consisted of Unending alloy while the exterior was made out of first-class transphasic alloys.

In order to make the shield a little more special, he colored it so that its exterior showed off a rainbow color gradient!

"The Rainbow Shield!"

This was not a tower shield that happened to look a little more colorful than before. If he could pull off his ideas, he might be able to turn it into a much more effective means of defense than before.

By borrowing the power of different attributes and combining them together into specific sequences, the reborn expert knight mech might be able to defend against all kinds of attacks to a much more effective degree than ordinary defensive measures!

"This is the power of prime resonance!"

It had been a while since he last worked on anything relating to the phenomena he had invented a few years ago. Prime resonance might have started off as the discount version of true resonance, but Ves did not want to believe it was limited to this level.

If he was able to refine the design of the Rainbow Shield, he may be able to create a new wonder. He just needed to flesh out its mechanisms and design characteristics in order to gain greater assurances that his latest idea was viable!