The Mech Touch



The tacit cooperation between all of the mech designers had reached a high degree.

Ves and Gloriana had reached the highest degree of cooperation. No matter how many disagreements they might have over the course of their daily lives, they were still a married couple. They genuinely loved each other.

The two also happened to be more familiar with each other's work and theories than others. They may be completely different mech designers, but regular collaborations had caused them to effectively minor in their spouse's respective specializations.

Ketis was a long-time Larkinson mech designer and also cooperated well with the married couple. Her design philosophy along with the addition of Sharpie's extraordinary willpower allowed her to forge much better swords than anyone else in the Larkinson Clan and arguably beyond!

The only downside was that her narrow specialization did not make her good at other kinds of work. Once she finished her only major assignment, it was better if she took a step back and handled all of the miscellaneous duties.

Sara Voiken had joined the Larkinson Clan fairly late, but managed to convince everyone with her competence. She was a clever mech designer in her own right and had largely been responsible for designing the critical transphasic armor system of the Dullahan Project.

Although Ves played a defining role in setting the extraordinary characteristics of the Dullahan Project, Sara definitely designed the bulk of the mech frame!

The Dullahan Project was a space knight first and foremost, so its foundation was heavily tied to its defensive systems. Sara contributed much more to its design than any other mech designer. There was no way to do a good job of fabricating this expert mech without her personal intervention!

As for Master Benedict Cortez, he was the only non-Larkinson to take part in the process. Though he was likely able to do a better job in many areas than a bunch of Journeymen, he did not insist on depriving them of the crucial experience they needed to fuel their growth.

His responsibilities during the fabrication run were much more restrained and low-key than normal.

Normally, the opposite was the norm!

Just as during the time where he fabricated the original version of the Mars, Benedict firmly took the lead and assigned less important responsibilities to the Journeymen of the Larkinson Clan.

It was quite rare for a Master to acquiesce to a more assisting role during a design project, but this was the norm in the eccentric and abnormal Larkinson Clan where a Journeyman was in charge.

Everyone involved understood their respective responsibilities for the following week. No problems occurred at the start as they split up and handled their initial work assignments.

Even Venerable Jannzi knew her own place during this important period of time.

Different from the other Larkinson expert pilots, she had already participated in a similar process before.

She obediently sat down and relaxed as Alexandria appeared above everyone's heads and tied everyone together in a cohesive design network.

The exchange of thoughts, emotions and ideas started right away. The design network immediately became active as a bunch of excited mech designers as well as a highly impatient expert pilot leveraged the new possibilities in an efficient and familiar manner!

They needed all of the help they could get as they quickly got bogged down by the difficulty of realizing the Dullahan Project into a physical form.

Everything had become more advanced and high-end compared to just a few years ago. From using stronger and more exceptional raw materials to handling much more advanced production machines, none of the Larkinson Journeymen would have been able to complete their work assignments proficiently if they did not work hard to improve themselves in the past few years.

"Amazing." Venerable Jannzi uttered as she began to explore all of the complicated numbers and theories flowing across the design network.

She was a pure soldier and never dabbled in science and engineering. That did not stop her from appreciating how much Ves and the others excelled in their respective jobs.

The emotions and passion that the mech designers freely passed on to each other helped a laywoman like Jannzi follow what everyone else was doing to an extent.

For example, Sara Voiken took her time to ramp up by producing the easier mech components first. She wanted to do her best to warm up so that she could fabricate the large quantity of transphasic armor plating and other parts on the best possible footing!

Sara had worked hard to build up a decent understanding of phasewater theory and transphasic armor plating. Although she had managed to get started in these new and exciting fields, she was still too far away from calling herself a master in them. She simply didn't have enough time to complete the studies she deemed necessary to work on a transphasic armor system this good!

Sara did not refuse this challenge because she made special preparations to succeed during this fabrication run.

For one, Sara played a minor role in the development of the customized Bolton Armor.

Out of all of the high-tech developers that the Larkinson Clan turned to, Ves and Sara chose to get in bed with Melmen Advanced Systems once again.

The Larkinsons already cooperated successfully with Melmen numerous times in the past. The ExTrans Armor System of the Riot and the Godkiller Rifle of the Nullifier couldn't have been made without the cooperation of Professor Neihy Almar and her R&D teams!

While the Colonial Federation of Davute's deliberate attempts to court the Larkinson Clan gave its mech designers greater access to more exclusive development companies, Ves still preferred to work with the people and organizations he trusted so long as they were competent enough.

In fact, one of the deciding factors why Ves entrusted Melmen Advanced Systems with developing the Bolton Armor for the Dullahan Project was because his clan owned 7.75 percent of its stock!

The Black Cats never informed Ves that any confidential information about the ExTrans Armor System and the Godkiller Rifle had been leaked over the past few years. Melmen hadn't let the Larkinson Clan down so far in this regard.

In any case, working closely with Melmen Advanced System to develop the Bolton Armor provided a lot of benefits to Sara Voiken.

Not only was she able to put a lot of new and complicated theories to use under the guidance of a much older and more knowledgeable phasewater pioneer, she also learned many subtle nuances that were specific to the Bolton Armor.

Perhaps Sara's ability to fabricate other transphasic armor systems was seriously deficient, but she should barely gain the qualifications to produce a satisfactory version of the Bolton Armor during the current run!

This was especially the case when she received the help of Professor Almar when mapping out her work assignments for this fabrication run.

Since the Larkinson Clan partially owned Melmen Advanced Systems, it was only natural for the latter to provide a lot more customer service and support than usual!

Of course, the rich amount of phasewater awarded to Melmen for its services also motivated Professor Almar into doing her best.

The Bolton Armor integrated 8.6 kilograms of phasewater!

It could have accommodated an even higher concentration of phasewater, but that would leave no room left for the internals and other crucial components.

A proper defensive mech needed more than a tough outer shell. If its other parts and systems did not receive a similar amount of strengthening, then its defensive layout would resemble that of an egg.

A space knight whose internals were far too soft and fragile to withstand much damage had no business participating in any serious battles!

That said, Sara did not have to concern herself about fabricating all of those other transphasic parts during this fabrication run. She only had to do the best possible job of producing the Bolton Armor.

It was all well-and-good to make a lot of preparations in advance, but once she started to use the advanced AP-VEX Superfab to use up precious phasewater, she started to grow nervous.

Ves noticed Sara's lack of confidence. If this went on for much longer, then who knew how this would affect the outcome of the run.

Fortunately, Ves had enough foresight to prepare for this possible scenario in advance. He could help her out in two different ways.

While Ves might not know as much about armor systems as Sara Voiken, his affinity and understanding of phasewater and its applications vastly exceeded that of the defensive specialist!

It was normally impossible for him to teach her and guide her during a fabrication run, but the design network removed enough barriers to make the transfer of information a lot more seamless.

What was impressive was that Ves could provide extensive guidance to Sara through the design network while still maintaining enough focus to handle his own work assignments!

Similar to Sara, Ves had taken up the duty of fabricating other difficult transphasic mech parts. His understanding of phasewater theory exceeded that of his wife, so it made sense for him to take over this burden.

Besides, his craftsmanship and appreciation for quality had improved so much that his wife reluctantly trusted him to do an acceptable job!

As time went by, Ves showed no signs of flagging. His mental capacity clearly exceeded that of almost everyone else in the design network, and the disparity was quite substantial!

The only mech designer who could outperform Ves in this regard was Master Benedict Cortez.

If he wanted to, the Master Mech Designer could largely take over the design network and completely flood it with a myriad of extremely profound theories.

The older and more powerful mech designer had to put a lot of effort into holding himself back. It would not do the Larkinson mech designers any good by exposing them to his much deeper and more developed design philosophy.

Gloriana became a little dissatisfied as several hours went by without any major changes.

Although she was pleased that no major accidents or mistakes had occurred, she hoped that she or the others would enter into an inspired state.

After all, they were not working to realize a normal design, but a Superpublished one! There was so much novelty in the improved design that she had many reasons to feel passionate about her current work!

In practice, she and everyone else became hindered by the vastly greater difficulties of their work. They had to invest so much time and energy into overcoming a lot of new and unfamiliar practical challenges that they had little spare capacity left to enter into an inspired state.

Gloriana briefly paused in her work and exchanged glances with her husband.

This prompted Ves to quickly complete his current production task before he moved over to Sara.

He held out a familiar-looking glowing hammer.

Since they all swapped their opinions through the design network, Ves needed no further delay to perform the solemn act.

Bonk.

Sara's eyes lit up as she spontaneously connected many different theories together and inadvertently solved a lot of different problems that plagued her in the past!

Her accumulation was so substantial that the false inspired state bestowed by the Hammer of Brilliance had an outsized impact on her mentality!

Her passion began to overflow the design network as she started to fabricate the next batch of transphasic mech parts with much more vigor than before!

Although the quality of her output did not improve by a substantial margin, it became a lot more stable and consistent!

"Now we're talking!"

Her current state would only last a few hours, so Sara and everyone else tried their best to take advantage of this temporary boost to fabricate the trickiest and most technically challenging mech components!

The mech designers worked at a faster pace. It seemed as if nothing would stop them from fabricating the expert mech that they had visualized for many months!