The Mech Touch



The last time that Ves visited the System Space was when he was trapped inside the ancient alien prison.

Back then, he took advantage of the Mech Designer System's various rules to smuggle in an alien control crystal so that he could reengineer it with the help of the Workshop of Creation.

His exploitative behavior also caused the System to unlock a new feature of the Vault of Eternity that allowed him to rent a lot of convenient storage space in exchange for Ascension Points.

Ves winced at the thought of giving up 20 AP in order to rent 2 cubic meters of storage volume.

It took a lot of effort to earn so many Ascension Points under normal circumstances!

"It's still worth it, though."

The Vault of Creation still stashed a lot of diluted phasewater that he had stolen from the bottom floors of the ancient alien prison.

Once Ves took it all out and processed all of the liquids, he could obtain up to 182 kilograms of pure phasewater for his efforts!

The only complication was that he could not properly explain to anyone how he managed to obtain a huge bounty of phasewater all of a sudden.

This was enough phasewater to drive any research institution or development company crazy!

Not only that, entire states and other powerful groups would come and do everything they could to figure out whether Ves secretly obtained a source of lots of phasewater in the last few years!

"This is a bit of a headache."

Until Ves figured out a way to launder his irregular reserves of phasewater, he was not in a hurry to bring it out of the System Space.

As Ves ascended up the steps of the winding mountain top, he made sure to visit the various stations on the way in order to see whether they offered anything interesting.

The Divine Bazaar had refreshed and offered a lot of random products, many of which were expensive and not that relevant to his current interests. He had no need for an alien alarm clock or an organic metal that was made by compressing and processing the exoskeletons of voribugs.

The Tree of Possibilities beckoned to him a lot more.

As the evolution of the Skill Tree, Ves owed much of his improvement to the Skills and Sub-Skills that the System was able to grant.

Hundreds of ripe and plump enlightenment fruits dangled from the branches of the mystical tree.

Ves briefly wondered whether such a tree existed in reality. He normally would have thought that this was not the case, but then again who knew what people could do with the power of the Wood Scroll.

The fruits attracted him like a moth to flame. If not for the fact that those fruits cost dozens if not hundreds of Ascension Points, he would have plucked them out of the Tree of Possibilities right away!

Each of the enlightenment fruit offered insights and knowledge that was normally difficult to master or beyond his reach.

Just as before, half of the fruits related to mech design, science or engineering while the other half related to the more metaphysical side of reality.

Ves still recalled that he had been able to create his own divine artifact and make a big step in his journey towards Spiritual Ascension with the help of a simple enlightenment fruit that was worth 30 AP.

This told him that he shouldn't dismiss the cheapest and most modest-sounding fruits!

A lot of possibilities came to mind as he read through the descriptions of the fruits one by one. Though none of them directly had any relations to his current needs and priorities, he could still figure out a few indirect ways for him to improve his current projects.

He eventually shook his head.

"I already have more than enough on my plate. I can always revisit my expert mechs later once I have completed their starting forms."

The Dullahan Project and the Ghost Project were already fully loaded with features in their current configurations. There was no need for Ves to add a shiny new feature derived from alien technology to any of them. It was more important to get the fundamentals right and ensure they started off on the strongest possible footing once they were made.

"Maybe later."

Ves spotted a few enlightenment fruits that might not have much relations with his existing design projects, but may be able to help with his upcoming heavy artillery mech design project.

"Later."

After he finished his examination of the Tree of Possibilities, he continued to climb up until he reached the Mission Hall.

The Mission Board offered dozens of new ways for Ves to earn Ascension Points and sometimes other rewards.

"Nothing easy." Ves sighed.

The Missions offered by the System always forced Ves to work for his gains. The ones relating to mech design were already bad enough, but the missions that were relevant to Spiritual Ascension were even worse!

Though Ves spotted a Mission or two that he could complete by remaining within his System Space, he did not feel like doing any of them. He was not in the right state of mind and he already had plenty of other concerns on his mind.

Ves left the Mission Hall and continued to climb higher and higher.

The Sacred Temple rested at the top of the mountain, but this time he stopped short of reaching the peak.

He instead made a turn and stepped onto a structure that he had long neglected during his past visits to the System Space.

"The Time Gate."

It looked exactly as impressive as it sounded. It was an old round circular construction that was covered with runes. Plenty of marks of time made it seem as if it was an ancient relic that had been dug out of a forgotten cave.

In any case, the Time Gate remained dormant for the time being. It cost a lot of energy to activate it and propel his consciousness into the past.

Ves had often wondered how the mechanics of this System feature worked. He never got anywhere as he could not even begin to wrap his mind around the scientific principles of time travel!

"Maybe only the Polymath can make sense of all of this." He mused.

He stepped closer but did not touch it yet. He knew that he had to pay at least 5 Ascension Points in order to activate it once, and he needed to wait an entire standard year before he could make use of it again.

That meant he needed to be careful about specifying his demands to the Time Gate. The damn Mech Designer System had already screwed him over multiple times by throwing him inside the minds of mech pilots who were in a predicament.

Ves had no patience to go through an entire adventure again! He did not want to be put in a position where he had to take direct action and hijack the body of his host to get stuff done!

"What I did with Axelar Streon was already enough, but all of the stuff that I have done while guiding Rion Aaden is even worse!"

He had single-handedly raised a dwarven civilization through his careless actions in the past, only to bring it down in order to further his own goals!

He felt quite justified in exhibiting a lot of vigilance towards the Time Gate. There was far more depth behind its rules and operation than Ves was aware of. It was one of the most profound and effective ways for the System to mess with his life and push him into a specific direction.

This was also why he never fully made use of the System's Mastery experiences despite having the Design Points or the Ascension Points to do so. He just didn't want to get screwed over or have his entire life upended because he entered the mind of the wrong mech pilot at the wrong time.

"I can't run away from this forever, though."

His past Master experiences truly helped him in many ways. It offered him a true first-hand perspective of mech pilots as they fought in battle in real-time. There was hardly any way to replicate such an authentic experience in reality.

Ves always felt that his affinity with mechs improved by a small but measurable degree after concluding another Mastery experience.

It also helped him to do a better job at addressing the specific needs of mech pilots. His customers loved his products a lot more for that reason even if there were alternatives on the market that offered better performance!

With that in mind, he had many reasons to use the Time Gate to acquire a Mastery in heavy artillery mechs.

He hesitated before he touched the Time Gate.

"Should I use this opportunity to explore what it is like to pilot a stealth mech instead?"

That was his original choice for using the Time Gate prior to meeting Master Decimus Horst.

He wanted to do everything he could to elevate the Ghost Project. Ves did not possess much depth in stealth mechs. It was a lot harder to obtain information about them since they were used by all kinds of shady and secretive organizations.

Publicicing anything related to stealth mechs was counterproductive!

Not only would doing so expose the strength and limitations of these sensitive machines, the reports might also expose secret operations that must not be revealed to enemies!

As such, a part of Ves felt that exploring heavy artillery mechs could wait and that it was better to learn about stealth mechs instead.

He soon shook his head. "A large number of Davutan mech pilots will rely on my heavy artillery mech in a year or two. The Ghost Project on the other hand is just a singular work that is already being worked on by multiple competent mech designers."

Gloriana had learned a lot more about the specific requirements of different mech types over the years. She was not as shallow and inexperienced as before.

Aside from that, Master Benedict Cortez was also involved in the design process. Though he mostly acted as an outside consultant, he still brought a lot of interest points during their regular group meetings.

"The Ghost Project will be okay. It's not even a normal stealth mech anyway. It is a one-of-a-kind expert mech of great power. Better yet, its starting form is only temporary."

It was much less troublesome to upgrade the design of an existing expert mech than to implement a large-scale update to a widely used standard mech model!

"I can use the Time Gate to explore stealth mechs next year. Right now, it is much more interesting for me to explore heavy artillery mechs."

He did not intend to design a single heavy artillery mech in the near future.

Aside from working on his first mech design commission with Davute, he also wanted to reinvent the Transcendent Punisher!

Ves no longer felt proud of this mech model. Even though many Larkinsons included it in the top 3 mech models of the Larkinson Army, to him it was a flawed and misshapen work that needed to be fixed sooner or later!

Ves already had lots in store for this crucial heavy artillery mech. He believed that it was more than worthwhile to upgrade it to a transphasic mech!

"I can certainly spare the phasewater as long as I can bring out all of the phasewater stored in the Vault of Eternity." He smirked.

If that wasn't enough, he could always hunt down a couple of alien fleets and crush them under the weight of his mechs in order to squeeze out all of the phasewater they carried!

With that in mind, Ves took a deep breath and touched the Time Gate.

Dormant systems came to life as the impressive construct began to glow and radiate more energy.

A portal in time started to emerge!