The Mech Touch

Ves was deeply impressed by Master Dervidian's ambition!

Turning integrating phasewater in the human body was both an extreme and impressive goal!

He could not imagine what people were capable of once they replaced the normal blood in their bodies with an upgraded variety based on phasewater!

Of course, such changes should not be limited to blood alone. The rest of the human body had to undergo an extensive series of adaptation in order to survive with such dangerous material running through their bodies.

Perhaps at the end of it all, the transformed humans would have more in common with phase whales than baseline humans!

As Ves thought about all of the implications of this ambitious research project, he suddenly recalled that Master Dervidian had yet to supply him with a direct answer to his previous inquiry.

"Master, I am highly impressed with your research direction." He spoke up. "However, this still leaves me with the question of what this has to do with mechs. It sounds to me that you are more engaged in human augmentation than furthering the state of mechs."

This was a rather bold statement, but Ves really wanted to understand the greater context behind the MTA Master's work.

"My work is not as unrelated to mechs as you think it is, Mr. Larkinson. The work we do in miniaturizing many different technological functions to the scale of a human is a major challenge. Oftentimes, we can only scale down powerful tech so that they can be fitted onto mechs. This allows us to test our progress and study our products before we can shrink them down even further. Our work on minidrives is a good example of this. Even if our end goals are different from other mech designers, our contributions to the mech industry are just as great!"

Ves nodded. He accepted this argument.

It wasn't enough, though. He felt that there was more behind this story.

"You don't have to go through all of the trouble learning how to design mechs if you want to develop human-scaled implants. Why is it so important for people such as yourself to invest in mech design?"

The Master paused for a bit as he thought whether he should provide a more complete answer. Eventually, he decided to be more forthcoming.

"This relates to a profound philosophical stance. Let me summarize it as much as possible. As I have explained before, mechs mirror the human body for a reason. To Transhumanists like myself, the mech is not just an intermediate form between large and powerful technological platforms such as warships and the small and weak forms of humans such as you and I. The mech has a greater meaning, one that I think that may be far more relevant to your work than you think."

"Oh?" Ves grew curious. "In what way, Master?"

"I have learned that your design philosophy is working towards making mechs 'alive'. Up to this point, you have succeeded in creating mechs that fit certain definitions of this word. How much do they have in common with humans?"

Ves didn't expect that this deep topic would suddenly turn towards his own work, so he quickly had to gather his thoughts and offer a reply that would satisfy a Master Mech Designer.

"My living mechs… are far apart from humans. It was never my goal to make them more human. To me, the human race is unique and should stay that way. The living mechs that I have designed and nurtured have indeed taken after the humans that they interact with on a daily basis, but they ultimately make up their own separate species. If my living mechs aren't so intricately connected to humans, they would probably turn into completely different forms of life."

"Interesting." Master Dervidian said with obvious interest in Ves' answer. "Your answer is more sober than I anticipated. It is good for you to maintain a restrained and conservative perspective towards your own work. I am afraid that mech designers with more delusions and less self-control might gain a god complex due to their inflated thoughts about their achievements."

"I'm still a Journeyman. How can I have the capital to think that I have already succeeded at my stage?"

"Well said, Mr. Larkinson. Your living mechs are of considerable interest to certain groups within our Association. There are also other groups that feel threatened by them. The existence of living mechs raises questions that can evoke both fear and hope."

Ves grimaced. One of the reasons why he wanted to stay away from the MTA was because he didn't want to get caught up in this argument, but as he and his work became more prominent, it became harder to avoid this collision.

He wasn't too worried, though. If the MTA really had a problem with letting mechs gain self-awareness and even a bit of control over themselves, then the mechers would have stepped in a lot sooner.

Besides, Ves had met the Polymath in person and managed to win her over to an extent. With the backing of one of the top figures of the MTA, he doubted that the authorities would deliberately hinder his current research direction!

"How do Transhumanists such as yourself view living mechs?" Ves lightly asked.

"Your work is not yet widely known to our faction, but in my personal opinion I am pleasantly surprised by them." Master Dervidian smiled. "You see, their existence and their apparent traits already confirms a number of my hypotheses about transhumanism."

Ves wanted to scratch his head when he heard this answer. What did mechs have to do with transhumanism?

"I do not follow…"

"What are the differences between a mech and a human?"

"There are lots of differences between them. They are two completely separate existences." Ves replied.

"What are the differences between a living mech and a human?"

"Uhm… there is still a huge gap in between them, Master. It's just that living mechs are a bit closer to humans than before…"

Ves grew suspicious at this line of questioning. After a bit of thought, he suddenly came up with a radical suggestion!

"You… are you treating mechs as if they are human?!"​

Master Dervidian smiled and nodded. "Now you understand why we Transhumanists engage so much with mechs. To every other person, a mech is a tool and completely separate from a human. This is an understandable perspective, but to many of my ideological compatriots, we do not view mechs in such a shallow light. To us, mechs and humanoid mechs in particular can be more. They can be surrogates of the human body. They can be replacements of the human body. They can even become our alternate forms if we choose to abandon the small and weak bodies that we are born with! Just imagine it! Imagine a future where our society is made completely out of humans in the form of mechs!"

What?!

If Master Dervidian's previous ideal of injecting phasewater into human bodies was already crazy enough, this one was even more extreme!

Ves truly couldn't understand or accept the notion of him and everyone else shedding their familiar human bodies so they could assume the form of mechs!

He could see the advantages to doing this, though. No matter how much he agreed with this extreme notion, he understood that the transformed human race would probably enjoy a great leap of strength.

Many of the more powerful races in the cosmos tended to be large and formidable. Bigger bodies could exert greater strength by themselves, which was why larger life forms did not have to rely on technology that much.

Usually, the greatest flaws of bigger species are the greater consumption of resources, the longer growth rate and the lack of intelligence.

However, Ves did not think that many of these shortcomings would hinder the human race if it made this conversion.

Humanity not only conquered vast regions of territory, but also developed its technologies to incredible heights. With these advantages, Ves believed that it was viable to convert humans to a larger and more superior race!

His mind suddenly flashed a bit. All of this sounded familiar to him. When he thought back on what he experienced in the Life Research Association, didn't the Supreme Sage attempt to undergo just this sort of transformation?!

The man invested more research and resources into this goal than almost anyone else, but it was a pity that he became too greedy and ambitious.

The Uranus would have definitely turned into the most powerful 'human' body to have ever existed if the Supreme Sage succeeded in completing the consciousness transferral process.

Yet the mental and possibly spiritual strength acquired by this exaggeratingly strong biological monster was far too great for the former top researcher to handle!

Thinking about this calamity gave Ves a bad impression of the notion of trying to convert humans into mech-like life forms.

He rejected this idea! He was a strong believer in the classical relationship between mechs and mech pilots.

Mechs should not replace humans and humans should not replace mechs. It was only when they worked together and achieved symbiosis that they would be able to attain much greater strength due to synergy!

"Do all Transhumanists work towards turning humans into existences similar to mechs?" Ves carefully asked as he wondered how many people supported this insane notion.

Master Dervidian likely noticed that Ves did not think highly of this ambition. The man didn't mind.

"You do not have to be afraid that our faction seeks to coerce everyone to turn themselves into large mechs or biomechs. Only a fraction of us support this ideal, and I do not count myself among them. I am among the majority who is still attached to our current human forms. I would not want to give it up even if I am presented with the option to convert to a superior physical body. I am afraid that many of us will start to wonder how much humanity we have left."

Ves frowned. "Why would people want to pursue this goal at all? Do they look down on our humanity so much that they want to move away from what makes us human?"

"I do not wish to speak ill of my fellow Transhumanists." The Master replied. "They can present their goals and ideals much better than I. While I do not have that much in common with this specific subgroup, I do share a part of their approach. A mech can be viewed as a derivative of a human body. What we can do with mechs can also be done with humans. That is our hope. My work on minidrives is just one example of that. There are other projects that aim to transfer other aspects of mechs into humans. Think about expanding our sensory capabilities or allowing us to fly and move in space. In short, to us, mechs are test dummies that are scaled up to allow for more convenient experimentation."

This perspective made a lot of sense, but it caused Ves to view Transhumanists in a stranger light than before.

He still had a hard time understanding why Transhumanists were so obsessed with equating mechs to humans!

In fact, he felt more grateful than ever that the Survivalists managed to rope him in first. He had no idea what he would become if he started to buy into the abnormal ideology of the Transhumanist Faction!

"I see…" He slowly replied. "What is the goal of people like you, then? If you don't want to turn humans into mech-sized giants, then what are the other Transhumanists working towards?"

"It is not that difficult to understand, Mr. Larkinson. Imagine the mechs such as the first-class multipurpose mechs that I have shown you in my previous tour. They are large and powerful, are they not? Now imagine if they are thirty percent smaller. Are they still mechs in your eyes?"

"They most definitely are. They will just be a lot weaker because of their lower capacity, but I can imagine that most medium mechs will simply perform akin to light mechs in this instance."

Dervidian waved his hand. "Imagine if we downsize these mechs yet again. Are they still functionally the same?"

"They should be… I think. The ones that have previously become light mechs will now turn into even smaller machines, but they should still be able to perform in a familiar fashion for the most part. They will just be treated as ultralight mechs this time."

"What if we shrink these mechs a third time?"

"That… will make this hypothetical scenario a lot more difficult." Ves replied as he struggled to imagine this scenario. "I don't really know if the mechs can still be seen at mechs at this point."

"You are not the only mech designer to think in this manner. Let me spare you the trouble and complete this thought experiment for you. If we shrink mechs another time, they will start to lose the identity of mechs and begin to assume the identity of powered armor suits. People will no longer 'pilot' them as if they are mechs but begin to 'wear' them as if they are personal pieces of equipment."

Ves widened his eyes!

"I see! This is quite a radical progression!"

"This is not our ultimate goal, young man. We Transhumanists are not interested in making humans wear artificial suits of equipment all of the time. What we truly want to accomplish is to upgrade our human bodies. So imagine if we downsize these cumbersome suits of armor again so that their scales completely match our human dimensions. Instead of wearing them, we become them. Do you understand why we are mech designers, now?"

He did. He also thought the Transhumanists were even crazier than he previously thought! Only nutjobs would regard the act of designing mechs as preparations for designing their own future bodies!