The Mech Touch

Ves had the illusion that he was lecturing another class of university students.

The few times he taught at the Eden Institute of Business & Technology turned out to be extremely helpful.

He gained a valuable amount of experience on how to speak to a crowd of really smart first-raters.

Compared to holding a lecture in front of a crowd of attentive mechers, Ves found it a little more challenging to capture the attention of all of these distinguished people.

His current audience represented a small portion of the very best Survivalists. Their visions were much broader and higher. Their comprehension was greater and they demanded more proof to back up all of his assertions.

Ves was able to oblige them a bit better based on the fact that everyone in this hall had a red or purple dot on their badges.

It actually felt liberating for him to talk about spirituality and cultivation on a more open basis. They were all a part of the 'in group' so to speak.

The listeners did not even mind if he employed his own terminology and theoretical frameworks to describe his perspective on companion spirits.

In any case, he managed to produce results that were valuable enough to be invited to hold a closed session, so Ves was definitely doing something right!

Ves spent a considerable amount of speaking time on explaining the basic properties of companion spirits. He wanted to get all of the truly necessary explanations out of the way before he could get to all of the fun stuff.

"...Now that you have received a basic idea of what companion spirits are, let me show you what they can do to make your lives better."

"Mrow."

Blinky dove down and passed through the deck without incident. He then emerged again and passed through numerous other obstacles in the hall to show that he was not hindered in the slightest!

"As you can see, companion spirits can be useful for spying purposes as they can be used to peek at what is happening in another room or whatever. Everything they see, you can see as well, as they are essentially another part of yourself. There are range limitations to most spirits, but there are cases when they can be overcome. You can make them invisible to most forms of detection as well."

Blinky turned invisible, though not perfectly. The cat could not be detected with visual sensors, heat sensors, gravitic sensors and the like, but that did not mean his spiritual presence had disappeared.

Although Blinky tried his best to dampen his own presence, he did not excel in stealth, so those with unusual means of detection were able to sense his location easily enough.

Even so, the potential applications of a companion spirit in the intelligence community were still great!

Ves could already see the attendees with pink dots looking a lot more attentive than before. So long as companion spirits could solve the flaw of getting easily detected through metaphysical means, they could be utilized to strengthen their spying efforts even further!

"This is only the most basic usage of companion spirits." Ves spoke as Blinky's manifestation became visible again. "A more profound usage is to treat them as incarnations that can engage in separate forms of cultivation. For example, I am a mech designer, so it stands to reason that I cannot engage in other forms of cultivation, correct?"

The people who only possessed red dots on their badges might not be experts in cultivation, but they at least received a crash course on it, so they could still follow the explanation more or less.

"Well, that rule no longer applies anymore from the moment you have a companion spirit. I don't profess to understand everything that is going on, but I can show you real examples of cases where engaging in multiple forms of cultivation at the same time can individually strengthen our own capabilities."

A small number of people looked as if they already understood what Ves was about to present, but much of this was completely new to the rest of the crowd.

"Mroooow..."

Blinky cautiously began to cultivate the Imaginary Universe Method. Even though this act interrupted the cat's ongoing recovery, he only had to maintain this state long enough to make a statement to the audience!

"I am a mech designer, but I have also become a qi cultivator." Ves boldly stated. "My companion spirit is not bound to my limitations as a mech designer. By engaging in a cultivation method that is suited to a pure energy-based life form like himself, Blinky is able to absorb a lot of E energy radiation and use that to fuel all kinds of applications."

The Star Cat demonstrated one such application by converting a moderate amount of his enormous reserves to life-attributed spiritual energy.

The newly produced energies began to spread across the entire compartment and even spilled into the surrounding spaces as well!

The audience showed a much greater reaction at this time. What was happening was supposed to be impossible for ordinary mech designers. Even if they somehow gained control over their own internal energy, they couldn't afford to spill it out so unscrupulously!

The fact that Ves or rather Blinky was able to do so without suffering any serious consequences made this session a lot more important than before!

More than a few experts among the attendees were hidden cultivators or possessed an extensive understanding of cultivation. They fully understood the advantage of having a companion spirit that can supply a specific variation of E energy in larger quantities!

Ves actually held back the fact that Blinky was actually able to disgorge large amounts of unconverted energies of different attributes as well.

While he was not sure whether it was possible to keep the Red Association in the dark about Blinky's internal universe, there was no need to volunteer sensitive information for free.

"Would you like to demonstrate your own companion spirit, Jovy?"

"Sure."

The other Senior Mech Designer stepped forward and showed off his Eye of Providence.

"Zsssss."

Many of the attendees were already familiar with it, but now that they received more context, they understood how valuable it was to a mech designer.

"Professor Larkinson here has customized a companion spirit for me based on my individual traits and requests." Jovy said as his Eye of Providence stared at all of the attendees with an unnerving gaze. "My Eye cannot absorb and release E energy as unscrupulous as Blinky, but as its shape suggests, it is good at detection. It can not only help me observe E energy radiation and various related phenomena directly, but it also has special abilities related to probability manipulation."

Ves had already explained before that the traits of a companion spirit was largely based on the strengths and inclinations of their principals.

It did not take much for a lot of smart mechers to make a reasonably accurate guess of what the Eye of Providence could actually do! The very name of the companion spirit made a lot more sense to them all of a sudden!

These were brand-new metaphysical capabilities that were either impossible or incredibly difficult to obtain through traditional cultivation!

It was also unheard of for mech designers to gain access to all of these extra abilities without giving up their ability to work with mechs!

Ves grinned. "There is more. I can only show you Blinky and the Eye of Providence to you in person because that is all 1 have on hand. 1 am more than happy to give you a closer look at the companion spirits that I have created for other people, but this conference of yours is strict about the people who can come along. I can only show you clips of archival footage. Everything you see is real. You can ask my friend here if you want confirmation."

A projection came to life that began to show different companion spirits as well as their abilities in action.

A lot of mech pilots suddenly grew a lot more interested and excited as they witnessed numerous expert mechs in action.

Even though they were just second-class mechs, that could not take the shine away from them! When they saw that the Promethea single-handedly burned down entire alien starships by using Kiroshi, it became clear that companion spirits were useful in combat as well!

"Mech pilots are not supposed to wield this form of power... but if they are somehow able to do so, then this should be the expected result."

"I have heard that double cultivation is too impractical to make any serious attainments, but these companion spirits make it easy!"

"This is the perfect solution to my dilemma. I can keep piloting mechs while simultaneously abiding by my family's ancient traditions."

"This is like having a cake and eating it too! I cannot say anything about how this will affect mech designers, but these companion spirits can increase the combat effectiveness of expert pilots by at least 30 percent!"

"That burning cat Kiroshi looks rather familiar, don't you think? Isn't there another powerful pilot that has taken to using a cat to shape her own resonance-empowered attacks? I wonder if Professor Larkinson has based his work on the power of a god pilot."

Ves smiled as he saw and heard the reactions from his audience.

Of course, it was only the younger and less important figures that exhibited their reactions in the open. The more important and powerful figures at the rear kept their cools and held their cards close to their chests.

There was no way they remained impassive, though!

Ves had saved the best for last.

"Up until this point, I have shown you two different examples of how companion spirits can complement a mech pilot or a mech designer in his existing work. Their existence can strengthen existing abilities or enable new possibilities. However, what if I tell you that they can also be used to make another impossibility happen? While I cannot give you a direct example of one, I can show you a related case of what I am suggesting."

A new projection came to life that showed Ketis in various capacities.

Some of the clips showed her designing her mechs in the design lab or the workshop. Though she looked unusually fit and muscular for a mech designer, she showed all of the competences of a Journeyman Mech Designer.

In the other clips, she had donned her combat armor and began to chop at various alien enemies as she and her fellow Swordmaidens boarded crippled alien warships!

Enemy shots bounced off her sharp domain as Ketis charged forth!

She did not even wait to get in range before she swung her sword and unleashed a resonance-empowered energy wave that cut through solid metal cover and bisected the yurzen marines that tried to defend their doomed ship!

A lot of mech pilots as well as a fair amount of mech designers shot up straighter in their seats!

As the clips showed Sharpie exerting strong willpower and diving into Ketis' greatsword, much of the crowd became fascinated by the fact that this amazing woman was both a warrior and a mech designer!

Even if not everyone in the crowd was aware of the existence of traditional swordsmanship, the whispers soon made it clear that this was an ancient discipline that also relied on willpower to overcome all odds!

The mechers did not miss the implication that if a mech designer could become a swordmaster, he or she could theoretically become a mech pilot as well!

A true mech pilot was one that could attain godhood by constantly strengthening their willpower.

The most essential requirement was to have the possibility to undergo apotheosis!

It was not a secret to this gathering that apotheosis only graced mech pilots who did not engage in any other form of cultivation.

Even though this demonstration did not prove that high-ranking mech designers could simultaneously become high-ranking mech pilots as well, the promise of this dream alone was enough to make people excited!

Ves felt it was a good decision to showcase these examples. It might not be as good as presenting them in person, but there was enough credibility in the footage to convince these gathered mechers and associates that companion spirits had the potential to transform their lives as well as the rest of red humanity!

Although he was uncomfortable with acting so high profile this time, he knew it was necessary for him to move up in society.

The Age of Dawn imperiled all of red humanity. Ves did not want to remain stuck at the cannon fodder level when the war progressed to a more serious stage!