The Mech Touch

In order to implement his new 'mech as beast concept' in his Blood Knight Project, he needed to select an appropriate 'blood donor'.

This was an extremely important decision. Ves needed to take into account a lot of factors. Strength, safety, risk, compatibility, willingness and more all varied considerably based on his selection.

Based on these factors, Ves drafted up a list of names and steadily whittled it down until he ended up with three possible candidates.

These were the names that scored the highest in the aforementioned criteria. They were also so different from each other that they presented an interesting array of unique options.

"Venerable Joshua should be an excellent candidate."

This was by far the safest possible choice thal Ves could make.

Every other extraordinary being within reach developed unique domains that granted them a strong advantage in a specific area.

This always worked out well for someone like an expert pilot who depended on this strength to excel in battle.

However, when another mech pilot came along and tried to pilot a copy of the Blood Knight Project that was based on an existing expert pilot, compatibility became a serious issue!

If the Carmine biomech was based on Venerable Isobel Kotin, then a pilot who possessed a strong affinity towards water may have a miserable time!

This problem existed for so many different possible choices aside from one glaring exception.

Venerable Joshua's life domain was inherently gentle and inclusive. He was compatible with anything. He could even get along with Helena and her death domain because he was so inherently open to different attributes.

A Carmine biomech based on Venerable Joshua should therefore bo compatible with all kinds of mech pilots!

If any rejection reaction occurred between lhe biomech and lhe mech pilot, then lhe blood donor was nol lo blame. The true fault would rest on another variable related lo lhe Biocarmine System.

Ves also saw other advantages to choosing Venerable Joshua as the first blood donor of the Blood Knight Project.

He believed that Joshua's life domain might promote the health of the mech pilot. Anything related to the life domain was beneficial to all kinds of life.

"Perhaps it is possible to heal different ailments, extend people's lifespan and possibly restore aging pilots to their peak condition again!"

This turned Joshua into the ideal blood donor for the Blood Star Mark II Project!

His grandfather had already reached a relatively advanced age as an expert pilot. Combined with bls other conditions, his health could certainly use a powerful boost.

As far as Ves was concerned, the Blood Star Mark 11 did not exist to add another powerful combat asset to the Larkinson Clan.

It mainly existed to preserve his grandfather's life and allow him to enjoy his life as long as possible!

Therefore, Ves did not feel any urgent desire to add a lot of combat power to Benjamin's upcoming expert mech.

That was also the downside to using Joshua as a blood donor. His strength came from his versatility. It was difficult to express this advantage In a Carmine biomech.

This was why Ves did not immediately settle on Joshua despite how many benefits he brought.

If Ves aimed to bestow his Blood Knight Project with the strongest possible boost in power, then he needed to select a much stronger blood donor!

Saintess Ulrika Vraken was the best possible candidate within his reach!

Though Ves had yet to request a blood sample from the powerful Hexer ace pilot, he could already predict that he could use it to design and fabricate the most powerful version of the Blood Knight Project!

Of course, the safety factor of this decision was also the lowest. The probability of accidents was too great!

Compatibility was also a severe issue. Vos predicted that only Hexer mech pilots could properly bond with a Carmine biomech based on Saintcss Ulrika.

It would be even better if they shared other commonalities such as bloodline.

"I don't think that any Larkinson can pilot such a Blood Knight Project."

That was not a big deal when it came to an experimental mech design. Ves treated this project as an attempt to realize a proof of concept more than anything. It was not a work that was meant to be used in the field, though it would be nice if it could participate in battles without much fuss.

Besides, even if the Ulrika Blood Knight was limited to the Hexers, Ves could easily use the Glory Seekers as his test subjects for this risky implementation.

The fact that he did not care as much for their lives as he did with his Larkinsons was a selling point as far as he was concerned!

However, Ves also came up with a third possible candidate.

"What If 1 use my own blood as the basis for a second generation Carmine System?"

That... sounded extremely interesting... and dangerous.

Unlike the previous two options, Ves did not know what to expect at all with his third possible choice.

Using his own blood as a source of power for the Blood Knight Project sounded crazy and nonsensical!

What could his blood add to the mix that his design philosophy hadn't already accomplished?

It sounded rather redundant to put more of himself into his work than necessary.

It also seemed incredibly dangerous as his physique was anything but normal!

From getting operated on by a crazy Compact cultist to accidentally becoming a phase lord, Ves had veered so far away from the baseline human norm that he could justifiably claim he compromised his own separate species!

Still... Ves couldn't get rid of this idea.

Out of curiosity, he drew his own blood sample and carefully examined it like all of the other ones.

Many of his findings matched his expectations. He was quite familiar with his abnormal physical state, so he did not find it surprising at all that his blood contained a lot of additional junk thal originated from lhe inhuman attributes of his Jutland organ.

Although Ves had done little with it, he never forgot that the Jutland organ functioned similarly to a power reactor. It had assimilated his human heart in its entirety, which meant that it exerted an enormous influence on his blood!

What was funny was that the alien-derived substances added to his blood were nol even the most toxic part about his own blood composition.

The true danger lay In the trace amounts of phasewater Integrated in his blood!

Although the concentration was so low that it was barely noticeable on lhe surface, its presence still presented a lethal threat to any other human body!

Torn blood vessels. Ruptured brain cells. Unending pain throughout the body. Exploding hearts. All of these ailments and more were bound to happen so long as a Carmine biomech attempted to channel the blood of a phase lord in a body that was not qualified to handle such power!

There was one compelling reason why he considered himself to be a valid choice as a blood donor to the Blood Knight Project.

"The only person who can pilot a Blood Knight attuned to my own blood is... me." Ves whispered.

He could already imagine it. The Blood Knight made after his own biological image could serve as a substitute to his weak and tiny physical form.

Although it was difficult to make solid predictions about such a hypothetical Carmine biomech, Ves believed that it would function much like the body of a more powerful phase lord.

For example, even if he was a relatively weak phase lord, if he combined this body cultivation with that of a biomech with all of lhe advantages that came with it, he had a hunch that he could effectively compete against the likes of the Trampier of Stars or the Eminence of Torment!

"This is like cheating!"

Ordinary phase lords patiently worked to increase the phasewater concentration in their blood.

Even then, their cultivation would always be constrained by their lack of a genuine phasewater production system.

Unless they managed to obtain a PPS from the phase whale race, lesser phase lords would likely remain stuck at this stage for the remainder of their admittedly long lives.

"As for me..."

Why should he allow himself to follow the outdated and highly suboptimal cultivation method of the indigenous alien community?

The essence of human ingenuity rested in humanity's ability to develop much more effective solutions to existing problems!

Ves began to get immersed in a grand illusion that charted a completely different means to gain power as a phase lord!

The heart of this radical idea rested on his recently developed 'mech as beast concept'.

By designing a strong Carmine biomech with phasewater concentration that was slightly higher than his own concentration, Ves bet that he could use it as a cultivation tool to improve his own strength with ease!

As long as his own body did not blow up right away due to introducing an excess amount of phasewater in his own cardiovascular system, the physical and metaphysical strength of his Carmine biomech would gradually feed back to him through both the Biocarmine System as well as the hypothetical Deep Blood Pact!

"This... this can actually work!"

Even though this radical idea was based on way too many assumptions, Ves actually felt confident enough to turn it into a reality!

Not only would this unique biomech enable him to fight with the effective combat strength of a much more mature phase lord, but it could also allow him to finally make progress on his body cultivation and gradually make him stronger without exerting any additional effort!

That was not the limit.

If Ves and his clan were able to hunt down a genuine phase whale and harvest the massive alien's PPS, he could trim it down and install the essence into his phasewater-erapowered biomachine, thereby creating the first artificial greater phase lord in existence!

"Even if it can't turn me into a phase lord that can fight head-on against an ancient phase whale like the Tide Caller, I can just continue to upgrade my personal biomech with other powerful high technologies until its comprehensive strength can reach this ultimate level! it has the potential to become the first god mech that isn't paired with a god pilot!"

Such an exceptionally powerful biomech could qualify as a grand design, a living god machine that transcended all existing boundaries, becoming a pinnacle work that could never be replicated before or after its creation.

In other words, this was a mech design project that could potentially allow him to break past the limits of a Master Mech Designer and advance to Star Designer!

Yes, Star Designer!

Even though Ves still knew too little about what a Star Designer was supposed to be and what he needed to do in order to become one, what few clues he gathered so far did not contradict his current notion.

He knew in his heart that if he was actually able to pull off this incredibly ambitious grand design to the fullest extent, he would have birthed such an amazing creation that he would have satisfied all of the requirements to becoming a True God!

However... was this truly how he wanted to break past the ultimate bottleneck?

His enthusiasm faded as he reminded himself of the core tenet of his profession.

"Mech designers exist to serve mech pilots, not themselves. This design project... is powerful alright, but if it is solely centered around me, then it is not appropriate to treat it as my main goal. At most, 1 can work on it as a side project if I have enough time."

Ves didn't care too much about his status as a phase lord. He never asked for it, and that hadn't really changed.

While it would be handy to gain additional power in order to defend himself against the distant threats that the Survivalists were spooked about, Ves ultimately did not think he was suited to fight in person.

He was a mech designer. Rather than do all of the fighting himself, he should entrust the mech pilots around him to do the fighting in his stead!

Ves quietly shelved this crazy idea. As interesting as it may be, he had better things to do with his time.

"Let's settle for the safest option for the time being. It is better to maximize the success rate by selecting Venerable Joshua as the blood donor for the Blood Knight Project."

Aller all, with mechers paying so much allenllon 10 him, il wouldn't do lor his test subjects lo explode in a violent fashion as soon as they interlaced with a Blood Knighl for lhe first time!