The Mech Touch

Much had changed over the past years. The Living Mech Corporation had gone from an obscure mech company that was indistinguishable from other ones to a rising market player that intimidated many market competitors!

Leveraging Patriarch Ves Larkinson's unorthodox design philosophy and unique glows that provided tons of utility, the living mech models that the LMC published with increasing frequency quickly became famous — or infamous in various circles — for their ability to affect the minds of people!

Whether it was their supportive glows that lifted the morale of soldiers or suppressive morale that ruined the concentration of enemy mech pilots, the glows associated with LMC products quickly became one of the more famous features of the products of the Red Ocean!

Though paranoid critics and disgruntled competitors often brought up accusations that the Larkinsons exploited illegal brainwashing technology, such news only gained a moderate amount of traction.

One of the key reasons why these legitimate-sounding concerns did not completely tarnish the LMC's brand and reputation was because the Mech Trade Association never issued any statement regarding the controversy!

The MTA merely reminded every inquirer that it had already issued proclamations regarding glows in the past. The mechers saw no need to provide any additional guidance to the mech community.

In the end, regulatory action or inaction did not become a factor in people's purchase decisions.

While there were plenty of mech buyers who turned away from the LMC's product catalog, there were also others who swore by them and made great use of the unique range of mech models.

The owners of living mechs often possessed a competitive advantage over their rivals and enemies, causing them to win more battles than they should, especially when their opposition had not made any preparations to fight against this new phenomenon!

In addition, more and more customers had begun to discover the more profound benefits of living mechs.

Their glows may have caught their attention from the beginning, but many mech pilots who had piloted their living mechs for months or years refused to part with their battle partners due to all of the growth they experienced together!

Due to all of these reasons, the Living Mech Corporation became the only mech company led by a Journeyman to break into the consciousness of the mech market and become a known brand!

p-n0vel、com The start of the LMC's major success in the Red Ocean began with the design of the Pacifier Project.

As a collaborative project between the Living Mech Corporation and Voiken Industries, its development trajectory was different from ordinary projects.

Ves and his fellow Larkinson mech designers were already accustomed to collaborating among themselves. They also accrued a decent amount of experience working together with external consultants such as Master Moira Willix and Professor Benedict Cortez on powerful expert mech design projects.

This was a different form of collaboration, though.

During the very first virtual meeting between the two principal mech designers, Professor Taigen Herman Voiken made it clear who was in charge of the Pacifier Project.

"I believe that you and I already possess a clear understanding of each other's competences." He spoke. "Your strengths lie in designing living mechs and adding useful glows to them. My strengths are based on my extensive exploration and mastery of different types of non-lethal mechs."

Professor Taigen Voiken was over a century older than Ves. If not for the fact that he and his family held high expectations for the unique design solutions of the Larkinson Patriarch, he would not have bothered to address him as an equal!

The large generation, rank and experience gap made their initial moments of cooperation rather awkward. Ves was quite aware of how much a powerful and experienced Senior had to alter his behavior in order to maintain a harmonious atmosphere during their collaboration period.

Ves casually waved his hand and made his stance clear. "I have no objections to allowing you to take the lead. You are the authority on law enforcement mechs here and I agreed to cooperate with you exactly because I do not need to provide any input on how to put such a machine together. I will not pretend to possess any expertise on law enforcement mechs, so I do not intend to get in your way."

The Voiken Senior responded with a genuine smile. He had been afraid that someone who shot up as rapidly as Ves might have developed an arrogant or conceited personality, but it appeared those fears were unfounded.

In truth, Ves didn't want to fight with Professor Taigen on this issue because he was short on time!

How could he possibly have the hours to spare on trying to push his own vision onto a Senior who started designing law enforcement mechs long before he was born?

Ves might be confident, but he wasn't a fool!

"That is reassuring for me to hear." Professor Taigen smiled as the tension between the two had dropped. "As long as we develop clear rules and make our division of responsibilities clear from the beginning, we will be able to avoid many problems. What aspects of the Pacifier Project do you wish to provide your input?"

"Hmm." Ves paused for a moment in order to think about exactly how he wanted to contribute. "I can leave the basic configuration and most of the technical design to you, but I would like to make my mark on the piloting experience, the external design of our mech as well as the marketing, branding and presentation of the product. The Pacifier Project may primarily be your work, but it is my contribution that makes all of the difference. It is important to me that our collaborative work possesses the flair and imagery that is expected from my mech company."

The Senior frowned. "I can agree with a number of these points, but I will not surrender all of my rights regarding these areas. The products that I have developed fit a more sober and functional style that does not match your visual language. We will need to hold individual discussions for each aesthetic and other contentious style choices."

"Very well, but let me remind you that the purpose of this collaboration is to develop and release a product that can shock our customer base and break open the inertia that has already taken hold in the mech market. I can understand why you do not want to make a law enforcement mech too loud, but the Pacifier Project will already be high-profile enough due to its obvious glow. We might as well go all the way and turn it into a truly visually striking machine!"

Unfortunately for Ves, Professor Taigen wisely did not allow a young and excitable Journeyman to have free reign on the exterior design language of the Pacifier Project.

The two would have to work it out ad-hoc when they actually started to work on the mech design.

After they hashed out their responsibilities, their collaborative project soon took off at a rapid pace.

Professor Taigen had developed many first responder mechs beforehand, so this was nothing new to him. He already thought about and drafted several different configurations that all possessed their own individual strengths and weaknesses.

The older man presented his draft designs to Ves during their next virtual meeting.

"Hmm." Ves rubbed his chin as he studied the different variations of the same overall mech concept. "Each of these drafts have their strong points. It's hard for me to make a clear choice."

"We can implement most of them without needing to cut them away as they are variations of a common template." Taigen told him. "The important point here is to choose a baseline that will determine the range of variations. A base model that is inherently fast will always produce variants that possess at least decent mobility. The actual choice we need to make at this junction is to determine the defining physical strong points of the base model. What aspect do you wish to prioritize the most?"

Ves studied the different variations and dismissed the ones with more extreme or radical performance characteristics.

Since the initial Pacifier Project served as a base for hundreds of possible variants, there was no need to go to extremes straight away.

What they truly needed to settle upon was a basic starting point that was nonetheless defining enough to convey a clear design direction and focus.

He eventually pointed his finger at three of the projected draft designs.

"This, this and this. Each of them resonate more with me than the others."

The three versions of the Pacifier Project were largely identical to each other. They only differed by their emphasis.

Professor Taigen did not look too surprised at the selection. "You have a good eye. These are certainly on my short list as well."

One draft design possessed a larger and more energy-intensive flight system, allowing it to close distances faster.

Another draft design featured beefier and sturdier armor, turning the Pacifier Project into a more median law enforcement mech that could hold its own in battle.

The last one was a bit skinnier and did not look as dependable as the other two. However, it was significantly more economical and featured the lowest overall design budget.

_{New novel chapters are published on Freeᴡebn(ᴏ)vel.cᴏm.}

The two discussed the merits of every potential choice and compared them to the list of expectations and requirements that they made for this project.

"We don't need to start with a machine that tries to outperform the competition through superior performance." Ves stated to his collaboration partner. "We need to introduce a mech model that captures the attention of our clients and lure them into trying them out. It is much easier to persuade different Planetary Guard organizations to invest in our solutions if they don't come with higher price tags. I am confident that as long as a customer only buys a single unit or batch of our first responder mech, they will instantly fall in love with its actual benefits."

Professor Taigen Voiken looked intrigued at his argument. "Your argument makes sense, but if your glows are not strong enough to make a difference, then our Pacifier Project will turn into a low-quality, low performance product that will not impress any law enforcement agency. Many peacekeeping operations have standards, and they can be quite high in the Red Ocean. A race to the bottom is a losing proposition to us. We do not have access to infrastructure or cheaper raw materials to win a price war with our immediate competitors."

"Don't worry, professor. The glow that I intend to impart on the Pacifier Project will be anything but weak! We just need to make sure that my input on the mech design is sufficient enough for me to qualify as a contributor."

Though Professor Taigen was not completely convinced that they had made the right choice, they settled for designing a base model that was more affordable than most of the prevailing alternatives on the market.

They settled for a design budget of around 1 MTA credit. The low design budget made it difficult to design an adequate aerial mech for peacekeeping purposes while still earning a decent chunk of profits.

"The real cash cow is the rest of the mech ecosystem that I intend to design around our Pacifier Project." Professor Taigen told Ves. "If we commit to designing the cheapest and most affordable base model for our starter product, then we need to adopt the opposite approach for other main products. My colleagues and I can take care of that ourselves. Our greatest priority is to make the Pacifier Project as attractive as possible so that it can drive the sales of our more expensive offerings."

"It's a good thing that we signed an agreement that allows my mech company to earn a share of the earnings of your entire mech ecosystem." Ves smirked.

Ves would have objected to this business model if he was only entitled to a share of the profits of the Pacifier Project, but fortunately this was not the case.

Now that they agreed on the design budget and pricing strategy of their entire collaborative venture, they soon proceeded to design the Pacifier Project in earnest!