The Mech Touch

Ves quickly pushed the incident with Taon Melin to the back of his mind. After making some plans about searching for materials that reacted to spiritual energy, he turned his attention back to his work.

Some time passed until the second prototype completed its barrage of tests. This time, nobody came and stole the mech. The mech endured the last test as best as it could before it broke during the last and most arduous stress test.

The testing ground immediately disassembled the broken prototype and put it through some crushers in order to prevent anyone from reconstructing the mech. Only then did they send it out to a specialized recycling facility in order to extract its valuable materials.

Confidentiality was an important requirement for any testing ground. As the previous prototype went astray, this time the Curins made sure to handle the mech properly.

A courier brought back the data chip with all of the test data to the mech workshop. As Ves and Ketis took in the summaries, they both looked pleased.

"There are less deviations from the simulations." She said. "There aren't as many flaws either."

Ves smiled at the results. "While not all of the results are good, the second iteration is nonetheless a lot closer to completion than the first one. I don't think we have to implement too many changes to finalize the third iteration of our mech. It might even be the last one before we finish the design!"

Despite the inherent complexity of hero mechs, Ves knew his limits and hadn't incorporated any additional gimmicks in his design. The main challenge was to mitigate the severe imbalances in the mech and to make sure that both its ranged and melee combat capabilities remained in harmony.

It took a lot of effort to find the right balance. However, once he found it, he only had to make minor adjustments to keep the mech design in balance.

Everything went so well with the design process that Ves strongly considered whether he should finish his work when he completed the third iteration.

While there was always more optimization work he could do, the law of diminishing returns had already gone into effect. The more he iterated on the design, the less he was able to improve.

If Ves wanted to maintain his high quality standards, then he wanted to be a bit more assured and design a fourth iteration.

Yet that might take too much time. Adjusting the design didn't take a lot of time, but fabricating the mech and sending it over for testing ate up at least ten days.

Could he afford to delay this much? Maybe not. He reminded himself that he still needed to reserve at least two weeks to fabricate the six copies of his design.

He'd be cutting it awfully close if he delayed the completion of the design project because he wanted to develop a fourth iteration.

After weighing the costs and benefits, he decided to make his next iteration the last one. Even though it will still carry some imperfections that could have been addressed if he put more time into it, he already had another solution in store.

For the second time ever, he planned to make use of the System's Superpublish function. The comprehensive improvement it bestowed to the Transcendent Messenger should be enough to elevate it above what Ves could achieve with his optimization work.

Superpublishing came at a steep cost. In exchange for improving the overall performance of a mech by ten percent, it stopped him from earning any DP from the Transcendent Messenger.

"So what? It's not like I intend to mass produce it in the first place."

Only recently did he realize that the Superpublish function was tailor-made for custom mechs. A commission for a custom mech like the one he was currently working on would never earn him a lot of DP.

At most, he received a small lump sum of DP and a handful of DP for each copy he made.

For mech models intended for the mech market, the latter could accumulate to a frightening amount of DP. The Aurora Titan was already a good example of that as its virtual sales flooded him with Design Points before it reached a cap!

The Transcendent Messenger design would never proliferate that much. Ignoring the stolen prototype that didn't really count, only six physical copies would be made. There were no plans to publish a virtual version of the design. Any virtual versions of his design would only be made available during training simulations, which didn't earn him any DP at all.

In short, since Ves earned so little DP from the Transcendent Messenger design, he might as well Superpublish it and maximize its impact!

After he made this decision, he became a lot more relaxed. No matter how many flaws and inadequacies he missed, the Superpublish function would definitely sweep over them and smoothen out the wrinkles.

He still felt a little bad about it, though. It was as if he was running a marathon and reached the final stretch, only to step into a shuttle and blaze past the finish line without expending any further effort!

"It's a bad habit to cheat all the time."

He missed out on the problems he could have solved, thereby depriving him from the experience and lessons that he could have used to design an even better mech next time.

However, the Superpublish function was only available to him once a year. Such a frequency ensured that Ves would be forced to design plenty of mechs without the temptation that he could press a single button and level up his mech design all of a sudden.

"It's for a good cause as well."

A better mech meant he'd be able to make a greater impact with his work. The more he impressed the Ylvainans, the greater the chance he would be able to tip the momentum back to the reformers.

An entire week went by after Ves received the data chip. Together with Ketis, they processed and analyzed the data. They identified the remaining shortcomings of the mech that had become evident during the testing and addressed them as best as possible.

An invisible momentum built up in Ves. As he came closer and closer to completing the third iteration, he increasingly sensed his mech design possessed the capability to transform the Ylvaine Protectorate.

It was a ridiculous notion! How can a single mech design change the course of history of an entire state?

Yet no matter how much he tempered his expectations, each time he studied his mech design, his hopes couldn't help but inflate!

He might have been able to manage his emotions if that was all that happened, but Ylvaine's spiritual fragment made it worse!

Each time Ves envisioned how his mech design might spark a huge culture shift among the Ylvainans, the spiritual fragment radiated strong waves of faith, certainty and anticipation!

The spiritual fragment probably thought that this vision would definitely come to pass!

Although Ves had high hopes for his mech design, he didn't dare rest on his laurels at this point. A lot could still go wrong!

Yet the momentum that built up within his spirit became more and more formidable. His entire mind and spirit seemed to resonate with his design. Although that was just a figure of speech and not an actual metaphysical phenomenon, Ves couldn't help but get caught up in his growing euphoria!

A frenzy of passion and inspiration overtook his mood, and even Ketis fell to the wayside as she watched with widened eyes as Ves made a lot of small adjustments to the design.

"Is Ves always like this, Lucky?"

"Meow."

She shook her head. "You know, why am I even asking? Unlike Ves, I can't tell what you're trying to say."

"Meow."

The two of them quietly enjoyed the show as Ves frenetically perfected the design. At some point, his passion blended with his design seed and Ylvaine spiritual fragment. Three different sources mingled together and connected into one, causing Ves to enter a miraculous mood that motivated him into working even harder!

While this hyperactive inspired state didn't help him solve the problems any better, it imbued the design with a lot more spirituality! The passion he felt passed on to his mech design, elevating its meaning to a greater height!

In his state of total concentration, only a small part of his mind was aware that he had created a work of fervent passion!

It was his most passionate mech design to date!

Did this mean that his other mech designs lacked in passion? Perhaps. The circumstances of their development were different.

Ves never thought he was lacking in passion. He cared about almost all of his mech designs, especially the ones he designed for the market or for a client. As a mech designer who constantly improved, it wasn't difficult for him to maintain his love for the craft.

Yet only now did he feel as if he surpassed a new threshold in passion!

He could feel that the Transcendent Messenger transform under his ministrations despite the limited scope of his adjustments. It constantly gained more meaning as he adjusted its shape.

The weight behind the Transcendent Messenger even seemed to be on track to surpass that of the Aurora Titan!

The most remarkable trait about his famed super-medium space knight design was its exceptionally powerful design spirit. Its X-Factor was by far the strongest he had ever imparted in a mech design!

Yet if Ves stripped this asset away from the Aurora Titan, what was he left with? An overweight mech that moved extremely slowly in space and fought like a tub of lard. Its only merit was that it could absorb a lot of energy damage in the right conditions.

He realized now that the Aurora Titan would never be able to enjoy its current degree of success without its remarkably strong X-Factor. Strip that away, and the mech model would have been destined for failure!

The difference right now was that Ves didn't regard the Transcendent Messenger the same way. While hero mechs were notoriously difficult to design, his abundant knowledge, his design seed, his prior exposure to hero mechs, his latest Mastery experience and the inspiration he received from Ylvaine spiritual fragment all helped him design a great Ylvainan-style hero mech!

None of this would have been possible if he hadn't advanced to Journeyman! His design seed provided him with an enormous amount of help, bridging many gaps and accelerating the design process.

His strengthened Spirituality also helped him refine the spiritual fragment he needed to design a mech that not only conformed to the Ylvainan Faith, but embodied it to the highest degree!

Ves judged that it would be fine if he completed the design without imparting it with a design spirit! Its technical, visual and spiritual design aspects were already strong enough to make the Ylvainans speechless!

Of course, he still intended to proceed with his original plan anyway. Designing a good mech already sounded nice, but he would never miss the chance to make it even better.

"It's close. Just a few more finishing touches before I'm done." He whispered to the spiritual fragment.

At this stage, the spiritual fragment's aura had broken past the boundaries of his mind and radiated outwards.

Ketis frowned as she sensed something unusual in the air. "What's going on? Is gas leaking from somewhere?"

"Meow!"

The cat in her embrace sensed what was going on and grew excited as well! As long as Ves grew more successful, Lucky could look forward to eating better exotics!

The awareness that something unusual was happening extended to the guards and Protectors stationed at the mech workshop. They looked at Ves with amazement as they had the illusion that the great prophet had descended into the mech designer's head!

To the Protectors of the Faith, it seemed as if Ves had been overtaken by divine inspiration! He was doing the great prophet's work!