The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1311

"We haven’t achieved anything so far." Gavin noted to Ves after the end of the day. They had returned to their hotel as the sun faded over the horizon. "There were plenty of mercenary corps who seemed decent, but you didn’t look enthused."

"Kelandra was wrong." Ves remarked. "At the very least, she hasn’t told me the complete story."

"How so?"

"Money talks. This is true. Yet sometimes the currency that matters more isn’t hard credits, but reputation. If I was a Senior or had a few more years to burnish my name, I would have been able to persuade the likes of Commander Mair to work for me. As it is, I’m far too obscure to recruit the truly valuable mercenaries."

"We always knew that to begin with, boss. In my eyes, you are setting your standards way too high. Don’t forget what we are here for. You wanted protection for your trip and loyal mech pilots to bolster the growth of the Avatars of Myth. While it’s great if you can get the best, you can still meet these goals with any other Kinner mercenary corps."

The reminder put Ves to thought as he stared at the bloody red sunset over Bloodstone’s crimson surface.

"I think you have a point." He admitted as he relaxingly drank a glass of wine. "I think a bit of Gloriana washed over me. I focused too much on getting the best that I lost sight of the bigger picture."

Lately, Gloriana’s insertion into his life made him feel a lot of pressure. He couldn’t afford to rest on his laurels. He needed to improve and build up his strength significantly faster than he previously thought.

Yet he got so caught up in trying to squeeze out advantages everywhere that he was starting to lose sight of his boundaries. Growing wealthier, powerful and more capable opened a lot of options that Ves could have never imagined.

With his overactive imagination and his creative mind, he became capable of designing great mechs.

However, his barely-constrained imagination also led him to develop dangerous ideas just because he was capable of putting them into fruition.

Ves noticed that this tendency became increasingly worse over time. When he reflected on his recent actions, he recognized that his common sense and grounded mindset had both been deteriorating for a while.

Was this what all mech designers had to deal with? Or was his artificially-augmented mental attributes to blame?

Maybe Ves was experiencing the same kind of degeneration as all of those infamous admirals and battleship captains back during the Age of Conquest.

The constant pursuit to improve one’s raw attributes often led to unintended side effects.

Ves thought that genetic modification had advanced and learned from the mistakes of the past.

Perhaps he was wrong.

The problems might be more intrinsic, making them an unavoidable part of improving oneself. The so-called ’side effects’ were so ingrained that they might as well be a core component of the total package.

How many leaders, military officers and dignitaries were running in the galaxy concocting wild schemes and plotting all manner of crimes in order to get an advantage in the current age?

The greater their capabilities, the greater their capacity towards destruction.

The worst part of this realization was that Ves suspected that he was on track to join their ranks.

Did he want to stop or reverse this development?

Not necessarily.

With all the experiences he had been through, he would rather suffer from too much paranoia than be too trusting and naive against a potential threat.

Yet even if he accepted this inevitable transformation, did that mean he had to resign himself to becoming a monster in human skin?

Right now, Ves realized that he always had a solution by his side.

It was the people he kept by his side.

For example, Ves kept Gavin by his side in order to keep him informed and to assist him in passing on instructions and making appointments on his behalf. Yet Ves did not call his assistant Benny for no reason.

Though Gavin harbored suspicions that Ves was suffering from brain damage when he stopped calling his assistant by his real name, the actual reason was much more profound.

At first, it was a conscious way to remind Ves of the danger of letting a gatekeeper gain too much control over his life.

Each time Ves spoke out the name ’Benny’, his mind kept harkening back on how Axelar’s bodyguard and assistant practically dictated much of the Terran wastrel’s life.

After Ves returned from that Master experience, he resolved to never make such a mistake himself. He should always be the one in charge of his own organization instead of the other way around.

However, in his drive to keep up his guard against a trusted subordinate, he overlooked the truth that sometimes a gatekeeper may be right.

Gavin accompanied Ves constantly ever since he returned from the war. Both of them grew up on the same planet, but whereas one became a wildly successful mech designer, the other one still retained much of his common Cloudy Curtain sensibilities.

Each time Ves made an extreme decision, he always did so alone. Yet each time he deliberated on his choices in the company of Gavin, his assistant often acted as a sounding board and a voice of reason.

From the perspective of a mech designer like Ves, it was a matter of specialization. Ves was very much in charge for a reason, but his judgement was only sound in some areas.

In other areas, the judgement of a common space peasant like Gavin was plainly better. The instance of trying to find a way to recruit Commander Mair clearly illustrated this point.

Perhaps the best way to restrain his more unreasonable urges was to have someone at his side who was ready to offer a second opinion.

This was the other function of a gatekeeper. To be a voice of reason whenever their bosses required one.