The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1042

A week went by as the peace talks made glacial progress. The cultural differences as well as the acrimonious dislike for each other prevented the Brighters and Vesians from getting along.

Both of them knew that they needed to forge some sort of bond at Kester Hills, but it was easier said than done to make friends with your worst enemies.

The tense, silence-prone meetings that Ves held with Venerable Foster went no better.

While Ves was rational enough to acknowledge his dislike for the Vesians but set it aside, Venerable Foster was remarkably stubborn in her animosity towards Brighters. It didn’t help that she disliked Ves in particular for his involvement in the Aeon Corona Mission.

She held grievances. A lot of grievances. From her scattered remarks, Ves inferred that just like the Flagrant Vandals, the Hostland Warriors and the Meandering Monkeys suffered huge losses in their landbound and spaceborn ranks.

The abrupt shutdown of the Starlight Megalodon’s FTL drives, Sigrund’s unshackling and the mobbing of all the errant sandman motherships stranded in the star system all caught the Vesians off-guard.

If the Vandals already lost a huge amount of mechs and ships, then how could the Vesians be any different?

While Ves conceded that he might be partially responsible for the losses incurred by the Vandals and Vesians, it was a hectic and confusing time back then. He couldn’t have achieved a better outcome unless he knew about Sigrund’s threat beforehand, which he didn’t. The hybrid sandman AI fooled everyone who took the bait, and now this rampant entity was loose in the galaxy.

Sigrund should have earned Venerable Foster’s ire, but her lack of awareness about him led her to turn her attention to Ves instead.

He couldn’t say he enjoyed the attention even if it let him remain within her company.

On her end, Venerable Foster likely couldn’t get used to how Ves easily ignored her force of will and presence. She wasn’t the first expert pilot he met and wouldn’t be the last. His time with the Larkinsons already disabused him of his hero worship for expert pilots, and her considerable spiritual pressure only splashed uselessly against his concentrated mind.

It became evident that Venerable Foster became increasingly puzzled by how inscrutable Ves behaved in her presence. She had never met a young mech designer who resisted her presence so nonchalantly.

Half of the time, Ves allocated his thoughts to something other than the current gridlock. He constantly refined the vision of his space knight in his mind. He considered several different possibilities, but he couldn’t get away from designing a super-medium mech if he wanted to fit in a bulky and heavy polarizing module.

When Ves managed to catch up with Professor Ventag, he finally described the radical idea that formented in his mind.

To his credit, Ventag didn’t laugh at him in his face. Even so, he did not look favorable on the idea.

"Mr. Larkinson, you are not the only person who toyed with designing a super-medium mech. Let’s take a step back and consider this unusual class. Do you know why mech designers avoid designing super-medium mechs?"

Ves nodded and gave the standard answer. "Mechs that exceed the mediumweight class but don’t match the heavyweight class are too weakly-armored to withstand an extended bombardment and don’t have enough mobility to dodge it either."

"So what makes your super-medium mech concept special that it can ignore these rules?"

"The custom against designing a super-medium mech is just a guideline. In the past, mech designers didn’t worry about categorizing their mechs in three weight classes. While there is a good reason to adhere to the three weight classes, there are limitations to this paradigm. They constrain our thinking and prevents us from accepting the most appropriate solutions even if they stare at us in the face."

Professor Ventag smiled and crossed his arms as he leaned back in his chair in the courtyard. "You have a critical mind. I like it. Questioning assumptions and established theory is the mark of a mech designer with an aptitude for research. Those are very necessary traits for higher-ranking mech designers, but it is rather unusual for me to see them in an Apprentice. You are ahead of your peers in that regard."

"Thank you, sir."

"That said, inquisitive Apprentices sometimes question assumptions too early in their career. Before you break the rules, make sure you understand their necessity. Now tell me what your super-medium space knight concept offers that regular medium space knights lack."

"Well, you see, sir, I made some calculations..."