The Mech Touch

After a three-day reprieve, the main fleet of the Golden Skull Alliance finally resumed its journey again.

In order to avoid alarming the Gauge Dynasty, the Wodin Warriors did not accompany the expeditionary fleet.

The Hexers already planned out their own movements. Every mech regiment and mech division assigned to Operation Saturday Market were scheduled to go on ‘routine patrols' or fulfill other missions.

To be honest, the Fridaymen weren't stupid. When a lot of mech units from a lot of different parts of the Hex Federation departed in quick succession, the enemy would surely notice that something was wrong!

The mood in the fleet became more tense. In order to keep the offensive operation as secret as possible, the Golden Skull Alliance had to restrict people's access to the galactic net and curb many forms of communication.

While Ves and the other leaders did not doubt the loyalties of their own people, it was better to be safe than sorry. They were not traveling to Pima Prime in order to see the sights.

Many Larkinsons did not take the restrictions well at first. They had grown accustomed to living in an idyllic environment. The clan usually did not impose too many rules on its clansmen. As long as everyone applied a bit of common sense, then nothing would go wrong.

However, this time was different. No matter whether they were about to fight human or alien forces, information was a weapon that could easily save or doom thousands of lives!

The Black Cats took charge of this matter and implemented plenty of precautions in order to curb the outflow of information. It became increasingly more common to see clansmen in black uniforms throughout every ship.

While all of this was happening, the Larkinsons continued to prepare for the upcoming assault.

With the help of the MSTS, the mech pilots had all grown so familiar with Pima Prime and its defenses that they had grown sick of this place!

General Verle wanted to add more variation to the rotation of training scenarios.

"We can't allow our mech pilots to become so used to the current scenarios that they are unable to adapt to new scenarios that they have never practiced before. We need to shake everything up and increase their ability to react to unexpected surprises."

Ves therefore agreed to inject more chaos into the MSTS. He altered the parameters so that the Larkinsons bumped into situations that exercised their fault tolerance and crisis management.

For example, there were situations where 20 additional enemy expert mechs showed up out of the blue.

There were situations where reinforcements dispatched by the Konsu Clan or the other coalition partners arrived much earlier than expected.

There were situations where an overpowering nunser warfleet dropped out of warp travel and began to bombard both sides with crushing attacks.

Though the loss rate drastically shot up due to subjecting the mech pilots to so many difficult problems, they became more fired up as a result!

Many of them saw the added difficulties as challenges to be overcome!

As long as they adapted well to the changes and as long as they fought well enough, there was always a way to squeeze out a win or at least minimize the losses suffered by the Larkinson Clan.

Sometimes, the MSTS even threw the mech pilots into completely different battle scenarios.

Since there was a possibility that the Gauge Dynasty might learn about Operation Saturday Market in advance and increase the defenses of the Pima Prime System ahead of time, the Hex Federation might opt to change course to the Rotes Cewna System or the New Rammes System instead!

What was even more remarkable was that the Larkinsons even started to train with their counterparts in the Hex Army in the last few weeks before the start of the operation!

Usually, there were massive security concerns about holding joint simulation sessions across different star systems. The galactic net was one of the least secure communication networks in human space and nobody had any confidence that the confidential training sessions would escape the attention of the Fridaymen.

However, the MSTS was different. Since it was based on a completely different tech base, most hackers and virtual security specialists didn't even know how to gain access in the first place!

All of their fancy hacking tools and algorithms seemed to disappear into the void whenever they tried to access it from an LMC mech like the War Squire.

The Golden Skull Alliance and the Hex Army put so much faith in the security of the MSTS that Ves even received requests to expand its scope.

General Verle came with a clear demand. "We have found that the MSTS is not only a secure place to hold joint training sessions, but can also be used to conduct confidential meetings between us and the Hexers. It would be even better if we can upload information into a common database that can be accessed by both of our groups. If you can do this, we can plan out our actions to a considerably greater degree than before."

Ves thought this was a good suggestion. He never saw the need for all of these additional features before, but now that the Larkinsons had to coordinate a complex assault operation with the Hexers, it became a lot more important to communicate securely with external allies!

"I will see what I can do, general. It shouldn't be too difficult or time-consuming to program all of these additional amenities."

"Thank you, sir. It is up to you to decide how much access you want to give to the Hex Army, but so far the MSTS has most definitely proven to be a game changer for all of us. The training opportunities it provides are so effective that I would even choose it over any powerful living mech model that you can provide to our troops."

"Really?" Ves raised his eyebrow. "The mechs that I have designed for the Larkinson Army have grown increasingly more impactful over time. For example, there's the new Nullifier model that have given the Battle Criers a lot more teeth against powerful opponents."

"I won't argue with you on that, sir. The Nullifier is strong without a doubt and adds a lot more capabilities to our Larkinson Army. However, mech models like these only directly strengthens one of our mech legions and only a part of our mech pilots at a time. The MSTS is a lot more universal than that. No matter the living mechs we use, our boys and girls can always look forward to mastering their use and actively develop better relationships with them in simulations with unsurpassed realism. I think our clan could easily become one of the richest and most successful organizations in one fell swoop if you released it to the public without any restrictions."

"That is out of the question." Ves shook his head. "A former military officer and intelligence operative such as you should know better. While it is true that we can indeed get rich quickly, the problem is that we will make way too many enemies when our foundations are still too weak to fend them all off. Relying on the MTA and other benefactors to protect us against our opposition is no real solution at all. The mechers might value me and my work, but they have no qualms about abandoning assets once there is no profit to them anymore."

He was under no illusions about his increasingly more cozy relationship with the friendly factions of the MTA.

Both sides were merely making use of each other. Transactional relationships tended to be more honest than normal, but they could also be cut at any point if they became inconvenient.

His cooperation with the MTA hadn't progressed to the point where he felt confident enough to unscrupulously spread his MSTS to the general public. It was already a considerable risk for him to grant access to the Hex Army.

At least he managed to gain extra concessions out of the Hex Federation in exchange for gaining access to his exclusive simulation training system. In addition to securing an additional channel of raw resources for the LMC, Ves managed to extract an even more important concession from the Hexers.

According to the confidential agreement that Ves had signed with the colonial state, the Hex Army obtained unrestricted use of the MSTS as long as the Hex Federation supplied the Larkinson Clan with 5 kilograms of phasewater a year!

In other words, the Hexers accepted an expensive subscription from the Larkinson Clan!

This was definitely one of the most significant business deals that Ves and the Larkinsons had made in years!

While a colonial state as large as the Hex Federation definitely had access to a lot more phasewater than this relatively modest amount, the Hexers had way too many uses for it. There were a lot of Hexer dynasties that sought to equip their most important mechs and starships with superdrives, minidrives and other transphasic systems.

Even if Ves was the son of the Superior Mother and even if the Larkinson Clan was about to help the Hexers defeat the Friday Coalition, the Hexer matriarchs still had to prioritize their own interest.

In the end, both parties agreed to set an annual fee of 5 kilograms of phasewater. It was low enough for the Hexers to be able to retain most of their phasewater projects while still being high enough to ease the concerns of the Larkinsons.

"Giving away 5 kilograms of phasewater on an annual basis is a significant burden to a colonial state such as Hex Federation." Minister Shederin Purnesse explained to Ves at the time. "There are not that much phasewater deposits in the Magair Middle Zone or any middle zone for that matter. If prospectors have managed to track one down, the chances are great that they are nonrenewable. Once they are depleted, there will be no way to obtain more phasewater from those places."

Ves frowned. "Does that mean that Magair will run completely dry in a century?"

"That is unlikely. There are still many undiscovered deposits of phasewater in many star systems. The difficulty lies in finding them as there are not too many hard rules that determine where they can form. In addition to that, there are also rare phasewater deposits that are actually renewable, though the output is dreadfully low."

Ves nodded in understanding. As someone who invested a decent amount of hours into studying phasewater and phasewater technology, it was important for him to know where it showed up and how it could be produced.

Up until now, humanity did not master any technology related to producing phasewater.

That didn't mean that aliens were just as incapable. Certain past and present indigenous alien races had cracked the secret of phasewater and learned how to produce it in many different ways.

Species such as the phase whales occasionally used their vast understanding to generate artificial phasewater wellsprings in various star systems.

Most of the methods behind these wellsprings were modeled after natural phenomena.

One of the main distinctions between upper zones and middle zones was that the former was much more rich in resources!

To be more precise, natural phasewater wellsprings were much more abundant in the upper zones!

The bulk of phasewater harvesting took place in the parts of the new frontier that fell under the control of pioneers hailing from many different first-rate states.

The Terrans, Rubarthans and other first-raters fiercely competed against each other in order to secure these seemingly endless wells of phasewater!

Regardless, the long-term importance of controlling territory became a lot clearer after Ves learned about the existence of phasewater wellsprings.

The larger the colonial state, the greater the income of phasewater!

Since the Larkinsons did not colonize any planets, there was no way for them to gain possession of phasewater wellsprings.

This was one of the greatest shortcomings of the Larkinson Clan.

However, as a businessman, Ves wasn't bothered by this fact.

"If I can't own a phasewater wellspring, I can still obtain a portion of its output by trading away a benefit of equal value."

The most recent trade deal that the Larkinson Clan had made with the Hex Federation opened his eyes to the possibilities that he had never thought about before.

What if he forged similar deals with other colonial states?

"Maybe I should look into this possibility in the future."