The Mech Touch

Though Ves held a disdainful attitude towards the cabal of elite educational institutions that took it upon themselves to dictate how students should be taught, he did not dismiss them completely.

No matter what, they were actually good at what they did. These centuries or millennia-old universities might charge a fortune for tuition and tried their best to devalue education programs provided by outside schools, but the graduates that left their halls were mostly set up for success.

Of course, it was not necessarily true that these young elites were that much smarter and more well adapted to the challenges of the future. A large part of why schools renowned throughout the galaxy were so successful was the extensive, age-old networks they formed.

Their most successful graduates went on to found huge companies with galaxy-wide reach. Once they made it in life, it was usually customary for them to give back to their alma mater by handing out sumptuous donations and providing special opportunities to future batches of students.

The universities applied strict standards when selecting their students. While they gave sufficient opportunities to poor but extremely gifted applications in order to make sure they scored high enough, the main business model of an elite university was concentrating the children of well-heeled elites and giving them plenty of opportunities to form connections that would serve them well when they transitioned to their professional careers.

All of these factors allowed the upper class to maintain their superiority over the masses over the long term. No matter how many generations went by, as long as the younger generations weren't completely useless, they were practically guaranteed to graduate with a prestigious degree and land a desirable job at a major company right out of the gate.

"Just because our own schools fall outside of this old boy's network doesn't mean it will stay that way forever." Ves muttered.

While he didn't expect the universities that the Larkinson Clan had set up to provide immediate value, he always held greater expectations for them in the long term.

As long as he became a Senior or Master and as long as the Larkinson Clan kept growing, it was not impossible to raise the universities in the Larkinson fleet into the higher ranks.

The reasons why he was confident about this was because of the lack of existing schools in the Red Ocean. Regardless of how many branches and off-shoots the old institutions established in the dwarf galaxy, it wasn't quite the same. There was plenty of room for new entrants to occupy the top spots.

If the Larkinson Clan's universities opened their doors to foreign students and gained a good reputation for preparing them for their future careers, then recognition would eventually follow. A Master alone was more than sufficient to bestow a lot of reputation to a school.

A strange thought entered his mind.

"Now that I think about it, Senior Mech Designers always turn into professors. It's practically an obligation for them to teach classes at a serious mech university."

He already speculated that Seniors needed to propagate their design philosophies in order to make further progress. If this was what Ves needed to do as well, then why not do it on his own terms?

"I can become the professor of one of my own universities!" His eyes shone. "In fact, forget about that. I can become the dean, no, the president or chancellor of the Larkinson University of Technology!"

Since he was pretty much the boss of the entire Larkinson Clan, who could stop him from shaping the educational program and more specifically the mech design program according to his ideals?

"It's a lot of work though." Ves belatedly realized.

He already had his hands full with leading the clan. How could he possibly squeeze enough time to manage an entire university?

Though he had not given up on controlling the way his schools taught their students, he probably wouldn't invest too much time on it. No matter what, designing mechs was still the best way for him to advance.

Since it took a lot of time for the academies and universities to get up and running, Ves left them be and returned his attention back to his main priorities.

Now that the fleet continued to make its way across the Bardo Star Sector, Ves only had to wait a few days before he could test his mech-sized luminar crystal rifle out in space.

The expeditionary fleet specifically diverted from the busy trade routes in order to enter a small and dim red dwarf star system.

Though the local space wasn't completely empty, it was easy enough for the Larkinson fleet to block the long-ranged surveillance conducted by automated satellites and listening posts.

"Who will have the honor of test-firing your new rifle?" Gloriana asked.

Ves smirked. "Who else but the first user herself? We haven't touched the Bright Beam Prime. It shouldn't be a problem to replace its current rifle with my prototype."

They hadn't gotten rid of all of the prime mechs right away. They only had to disassemble them in order to repurpose their Unending alloy armor plating, so the expert pilots still had plenty of time to practice with their current machines.

Even the Bright Beam Prime was on the chopping block. Despite the fact that the prime rifleman mech did not incorporate any Unending alloy, Ves still needed to retrieve the P-stones and put them in the production version of the luminar crystal rifle that was meant to be paired with the Sentry Project.

"At least, this is what I should do as long as I haven't found a way to create an artificial substitute for P-stones."

He was still disappointed at his failure to create a luminar crystal that could store spiritual energy. He was quite certain that it was possible to make a storage type luminar crystal, but his foundation in the alien tech was too shallow to create something so advanced.

For now, he had to make prudent use of the P-stones he had left. While there was a chance that he might be able to find more samples elsewhere, so far the search wasn't going too well.

It would be incredibly inconvenient if P-stones turned out to be an exclusive product of the region that he had just left!

"This shouldn't be the case." Ves shook his head. "It probably comes in a different package. After all, it doesn't matter if it is a yellow rock, a green rock, a heavy rock or a lighter rock. There is so much variety to P-stones that I can't find them by blindly finding rocks that match their physical parameters."

He had another theory why this might possibly be the case. The phenomenon of spirituality was intrinsically tied to life, so what did a bunch of lifeless stones have to do with that?

A possible answer was that the space rocks may have absorbed some spiritual energy over the course of their existence. A more drastic possibility was that the P-stone might partially or entirely consist of the fossilized remains of a powerful spiritual lifeform!

The latter theory fits the current circumstances particularly well. It not only explained why certain rocks had become spiritually active, but also explained why they came in such different shapes.

The explanation even offered a logical answer to the possibility that P-stones might come in different forms in other star sectors.

Perhaps one star sector used to be occupied by one ancient race of spiritually active aliens. These aliens lived on planets with specific environmental circumstances so the P-stones that their remains had empowered were mostly light and small.

In contrast, a neighboring star sector might have been dominated by a larger race of aliens. Perhaps this second race preferred to live on heavy gravity planets that featured a lot of dense and heavy materials.

As a result, the odds that the P-stones that originated from this star sector came in the form of heavier rocks was higher.

"Still, the only way to test whether this theory is true is to find more P-stones from different locations."

This was rather troublesome because Ves had to visit different marketplaces that offered a lot of exotics in person.

He could have done so in the Pelsa Ryndover System, but he was too busy with his existing priorities back then. He was also reluctant to make landfall on a surface settled like Talulah Silver and risk an accident again.

"Hmmm. Maybe I'll go next time. I can't hole myself up in my fleet on a permanent basis."

As the awful memories of Prosperous Hill VI began to fade, Ves felt a greater yearning to set foot on solid ground again.

However, it would take some time before the expeditionary fleet was ready to make another pitstop. The extensive break it enjoyed at Pelsa Ryndover allowed it to keep moving for several months. Even the fact that the four new capital ships were only tentatively operational wasn't a big deal.

So far, the vessels reported no major faults or warning signs. Their used FTL drives all enjoyed extensive servicing. Any potential problems that could have emerged as a result of wear and tear had already been preempted by preventative maintenance. The engineers assigned to the new capital ships were keeping the core systems under careful observation.

The chief engineers of the respective vessels received permission to halt the entire fleet if they detected anything wrong!

"The test is starting." Gloriana announced.

Both Ves and Gloriana stood behind their work stations as the test of the prototype luminar crystal rifle was about to commence.

The current version was far from reaching its final state. The most crucial elements it lacked were the prime material that made it alive and the resonating material which would allow Venerable Stark to empower it beyond its physical limitations.

Even so, Ves had very high hopes for the weapon. In order to test the firepower of its full-powered shot, a couple of mechs placed several solid pieces of ship-grade hull plating in space.

After the Larkinson mechs closed off a large area of space from outside observation, the Bright Beam Prime fired a bright laser beam!

The attack achieved drastic results. The laser beam almost managed to sear through the entire plate!

"What an amazing result!" Gloriana gasped. "The amplification in firepower from scaling up the weapon system is a bit higher than I expected!"

Ves possessed a greater understanding of luminar crystal technology, so the results weren't entirely outside of his expectations.

He shot her a grin. "I've refined my application of luminar crystal technology. I managed to squeeze more internal circuitry inside a crystal than before."

The fact that the luminar crystal rifle almost managed to punch straight through a hull plate that was rated for second-class combat carriers was quite amazing. Most mechs weren't as durable, which meant that the high-quality rifle could easily one-shot most mechs as long as it landed a solid hit!

Of course, the energy consumption of a single discharge was not light. Even if luminar crystal rifles were much more efficient than conventional ones, the Bright Beam Prime did not have enough shots to annihilate an entire mech regiment from a distance.

What was promising about this result was that the final version of the rifle could leverage both prime resonance and true resonance to achieve much more devastating results!

"Let's test out the other firing modes of the weapon."

The luminar crystal rifle could fire more than just a standard laser beam. In the next few minutes, the Bright Beam Prime calmly fired different types of beams. From slicer beams that cut straight through two solid places to positron beams that inflicted a lot more localized destruction, a lot of Larkinsons were able to witness the performance of a weapon system that might become the standard in the Larkinson Clan!

Seeing that the tests had gone well, Ves felt it was a pity to end the testing session. He spontaneously came up with an interesting idea.

"Gloriana."

"Yes, Ves?"

"What do you think about using the Dark Zephyr as a practice target?"