The Mech Touch

Who didn't want to become stronger?

Ever since the Age of Dawn commenced, Ves and many other knowledgeable people concluded that red humanity would change forever.

Heavenly qi. The power of heaven. Spiritual energy. Psionic power. E energy.

No matter what label it carried, this powerful energy with psychoactive and psychoreactive properties had the potential to turn a lot of trash into treasure!

The magnitude of E energy radiation bombarding the Red Ocean was massive. The vast majority of this supposedly 'free' energy harmlessly passed through the empty void of space and continued their way onwards without benefiting anyone or anything in the process.

Only a small proportion of this huge amount of exotic radiation slammed into planets.

Rocks, plants and exobeasts all became bathed in E energy radiation. They all became affected by this ubiquitous force in many different ways.

The effect on the vast majority of subjects was little to none. Only a few minerals or organisms proved to be much more susceptible to mutations induced by E energy radiation, but that was already enough to radically alter the ecosystem of a life-bearing planet!

These mutated elements did not remain isolated from each other. They were all part of an ecosystem one way or another.

Exoplants extracted hyper materials that had suddenly emerged within the reach of their roots.

All manner of herbivores devoured these mutated plants, thereby absorbing a fraction of the extraordinary power contained within.

Carnivores subsequently hunted down and devoured the flesh of these plant-eating exobeasts, thereby devouring a portion of the hyper materials and energy-rich flesh of their prey.

This was a process known as bioaccumulation.

Even if the rate of contamination and mutation was not that extensive in the lower end of the food chain, the apex predator that sat atop it easily extracted the essence of the global changes to the entire ecosystem.

This was the main reason why Ocanon VI and many other untamed planets gradually started to experience more and more outbreaks from the top predators in their respective lands.

The strongest and most threatening predators experienced the fastest growth in strength!

This not only made them a lot more dangerous to fight against, but also increased their predation ability even further!

As the brutally cunning beasts began to associate eating with rapid growth, they lost all restraint and began to hunt down as many prey as possible, regardless of whether they had already filled their stomachs!

At most, these rapidly mutating exobeasts learned to be picky and only devour the most energy-dense flesh and organs.

The exceedingly fast growth of these powerful predators quickly broke the ecosystems they were a part of. The Hunting Association branches of every planet where widespread hunting took place experienced greater pressure to contain these outbreaks.

This trend could not be stopped!

So long as there was E energy radiation and life, the organisms who lived and thrived on a planet would always find a way to mutate and explode in strength.

Letting these powerful exobeasts grow in an unrestrained fashion threatened to pose a greater threat to the humans who may or may not live on that very same planet.

Though it hadn't happened as of yet, there was a small chance that an exobeast would grow so powerful that it might even be able to escape its own planet and soar into space!

Not even the Red Two could remain complacent at the possibility of this happening. When exobeats turned into astral beasts, there was always a chance that a new terror among the stars would emerge.

If human-occupied space started to get plagued by marauding astral beasts, that would severely impact the supply lines that red humanity's industries relied upon.

The loss of trade and efficiencies would cripple red humanity's economy and warmaking potential, thereby dooming the chances of every human in the new frontier!

As such, the Hunting Association actually served an essential purpose in today's society.

Many people might not be aware of how vital it was to manage all of the hunting preserves and support the development of enough hunters to keep all of the mutating organisms in check.

The Hunter's Code played a key role in this new system.

Virtually every mutated beast was a natural body cultivator. They devoured the flesh and bones of weaker creatures that had absorbed significant quantities of E energy and hyper materials, thereby strengthening their own body tissue in turn.

Since exobeasts were able to grow stronger in such an extraordinary manner, then what about humans?

The extraordinary resources contained within the carcasses of their powerful prey held great value, and there was no reason for humans to let them rot.

There had to be a way to continue the process of bioaccumulation so that it effectively reached the human hunters that reigned at the top of every food chain!

This was the central premise of the Hunter's Code.

"It's not as easy as it sounds."

While the overall logic was sound, it was a lot harder to make it work in practice.

For one, humans were not known for their strong bodies. They were not only incredibly weak compared to a typical apex predator, they also happened to be fairly small!

It was impossible for humans to devour large quantities of flesh harvested from exobeasts that massed as much as two heavy mechs stacked together!

While not every mutated beast grew so large, they always tended to be far larger than any human could devour in a single meal.

This was problematic as exobeasts lost a portion of their potency at a rapid rate upon getting killed.

That was why the Hunter's Code put so much emphasis on devouring the flesh of the prey that the hunters had felled on the very same day!

The shorter the time delay, the more the energy-rich exobeast flesh retained much of the extraordinary qualities that made it strong.

Even then, hunters experienced many different problems in converting these precious organic resources into actual gains.

Their relatively small human bodies prevented them from eating a lot of rich flesh.

Their weak physiques meant that they lacked the ability to digest dangerous alien flesh that was filled with all kinds of poisonous metals and other toxic junk.

So how could hunters successfully devour the deadly flesh of their powerful prey?

The Hunter's Code did not prohibit hunters from processing the toxic flesh to render it safer for human consumption.

This was why a lot of hunting teams had started to bring along biological processing machines that were previously only found in food processing plants.

As long as these ambitious hunting teams successfully felled a mutated beast, they planted down their fancy machines and stuffed as much valuable flesh into it as possible!

After a lot of work, the processing machines successfully filtered and extracted a portion of meat that lost all of the elements that made it so deadly.

The yield was usually low, but at least it was better than nothing!

This was what the hunters sought to attain. While eating all of this processed meat usually did little for most humans, the story was different if they cultivated the Hunter's Code.

This expansive tome contained numerous mantras and techniques that were specifically designed to actively allow hunters to extract the most potent energies and nutrients from all of the rich flesh in their stomachs!

The hunters could subsequently channel all of these extracted resources into promoting the strength of their bodies and spiritualities.

Though the conversion rate was still fairly low, as long as their defeated prey was powerful enough, these hunters could rapidly strengthen their bodies through continuous hunting!

This was the body cultivation component of the Hunter's Code.

What was also important to note was that hunting teams usually received more flesh from this process than they could fit into their stomachs.

What should they do with the remainder of the processed and unprocessed flesh?

It was not that useful to ship it back to other people. Those who did not participate in the hunt would not be able to employ the methods of the Hunter's Code, thereby finding themselves unable to take advantage of the same powerful methods.

The Code offered an alternative way to convert the remainder of the excess flesh and bones into useful gains.

Ves widened his eyes as he caught sight of numerous rituals. He grew more and more astonished when he saw how boldly this cultivation method leaned on sacrificial offerings!

"Is this for real?"

The rituals in question encouraged the hunters to perform special actions in order to sacrifice the excess resources from their prey.

This mostly amounted to burning whatever remained from the carcasses in fancy processes that burdened on making religious offerings!

By sacrificing the remains of powerful prey to the Huntsman, the god pilot promised reward the successful hunters by granting them a trace of his own energy!

"This... this is wild!"

It was no wonder that so many hunters embraced the Hunter's Code!

This was probably the closest they could ever get to a god pilot.

The Hunter's Code did not obfuscate the benefits of receiving a trace of the Huntsman's energy.

Devouring a lot of messy energies from living creatures often led to contamination.

This problem became especially serious when it came to powerful mutated beasts that bore a huge amount of resentment towards their slayers!

The psychoactive and psychoreactive elements of their remnant flesh still contained traces of this burning resentment, and would do anything to take revenge!

Hunters that continued to devour flesh contaminated by resentment would ultimately become distorted by all of their kills.

The Huntsman's god-like will was able to cleanse all of the impurities formed by devouring contaminated flesh, thereby allowing hunters to retain their humanity and rationality.

This was not all.

As long as hunters earnestly cultivated the mantras of the Hunter's Code, they would eventually develop the artistic conceptions that were associated with their profession.

Getting into contact with the energy of the Huntsman would allow these earnest hunters to rapidly boost the development of their artistic conceptions, thereby advancing their qi cultivation by leaps and bounds!

Ves recognized that this was the qi cultivation component of the Hunter's Code.

"No. It is not as simple as that."

The strong involvement of the Huntsman effectively added a contract cultivation component to the Hunter's Code.

Every hunter who sacrificed their kills essentially completed a transaction to the Huntsman!

"What a clever scheme!"

Ves could spot the ambition of that powerful spear-throwing god pilot through these sacrificial rituals.

Whenever hunters made their sacrificial offerings, they not only transmitted a portion of the extraordinary resources to the Huntsman, but also offered up their faith in the process!

How could they not? From the perspective of these hunters, the Huntsman was their literal god.

The continuous exchanges from all of these sacrificial rituals benefited the Huntsman enormously.

By engaging in this form of deity cultivation, the god pilot obtained an army of hardcore devotees who constantly grew stronger by continuously hunting powerful prey.

The quantity of all of these hunters might not be great, but their quality as well as the frequency of their sacrificial offerings would absolutely be high!

This would undoubtedly further the subsequent advancement of the Huntsman.

It became clear that he had definite ambitions to become the God of the Hunt!

Ves did not know why a god pilot wanted to lean so heavily into deity cultivation all of a sudden.

He was still far from reaching this level. Perhaps his mother knew more, but she was not willing to divulge information that he was not yet qualified to know.

All that mattered was that the Huntsman was playing a big game with the Hunter's Code.

Ves grew inspired by the god pilot's ambitious and expansive layout.

"Is this a portend of the future?"

Ves did not entirely feel comfortable about the Hunter's Code. It contained several elements that possessed strong religious undertones.

This was an overt challenge to the Big Two's historical policy of avoiding and suppressing religion.