The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1474

The workshop erected by the Circle of Mota to accommodate visiting mech designers offered decent facilities. Though all of the machinery and equipment looked fairly old and heavily-used, Ves did not intend to make use of them anyway.

The commission only called for him to design a variant of the Spyre Helix. Though Ves could go the extra mile and apply his modifications to the physical copy of the mech that had been moved to the workshop, he did not stand to gain anything extra.

Frankly, Ves wasn’t very eager to turn the Spyre Helix into the deadliest platform for weapons of mass destruction. Though he did not object to the commission to the point of refusing it outright, he clearly lacked passion for the project.

Fortunately, developing a variant was far easier than designing a completely new mech. Since Ves had to work along existing design choices, his work demanded far more out of his technical capabilities than his creative vision.

It was fine for him to treat the commission as a regular job and try to finish it in a decent fashion. It wasn’t as if he would ever commercialize his variant and put it on the market.

If that was the case, Ves had to put far more effort into optimizing and strengthening his variant!

Ten minutes after inspecting the workshop, Ves returned to Finlay. "The workshop is in order. I can begin my design work immediately."

"Good." Finlay jerked his robed and suited body. "I’ll be taking off, then. A number of our men will remain in place to guard this facility and supervise your work. Please do not leave the workshop before the job is done or if the Circle of Mota instructs you otherwise."

"I know. That’s what I’ve signed up for. You can expect to receive your revised design very soon. Just make sure you have my rewards ready for transfer."

After a brief chat, Finlay finally left with his bodyguards. Ves turned to Nitaa and made a silent gesture.

"I will keep an eye on your watchers." She spoke and remained close but unobtrusive.

Ves had already gotten used to being stared at by Nitaa all the time. At least he was reasonably sure that she was completely on his side.

The same could not be said for the faceless goons garbed in full-body armor. Half-a-dozen of them silently patrolled the interior and exterior of the loaned mech workshop.

It was a given that Ves disliked their presence. He never really enjoyed performing his work with an audience. He only really got into his groove when he was by himself or in the presence of like-minded mech designers such as Ketis.

As for Finlay’s guards? Ves regarded each of them with a healthy amount of wariness. Considering the highly controversial nature of his commission, he could never discount the possibility that Finlay would want to silence him afterwards.

Ostensibly, the Circle of Mota ought to prevent such instances, but who knew if they were as impeccably neutral as they claimed? Ves was a complete nobody to the Circle while Finlay happened to be a VIP!

Still, the chance that the Circle of Mota would run afoul of its own rules and traditions was small. It wasn’t worth it for them to risk tarnishing their reputation in order to please a single faction.

Ves put his paranoid worries out of his mind and began to focus on the task at hand. Finlay’s organization had been very efficient in moving a physical copy of the Spyre Helix into the workshop.

"Before I begin, let me study the mech up close."

Ves approached the impressive doom crawler. Though dormant and locked in place by restraints, the Spyre Helix nonetheless evoked a primordial sense of doom and terror in his heart.

The mech looked formidable.

"What a formidable machine. I can feel the intention of its designer from its very contours."

Sharp. Intimidating. Unstoppable.

Whoever designed the Spyre Helix understood the basic essence of the doom crawler mech type. The design emphasized those characteristics as much as possible without compromising too much in other areas.

Due to his heightened mech affinity, Ves was capable of inferring a lot more clues out of the physical copy than before.

He captured many nuances about the doom crawler, enough to paint a vague picture of the original mech designer’s distinctive design style.

The mech designer probably started off as an orthodox Journeyman Mech Designer, but went pirate some time ago. Despite going pirate, the Journeyman did not lose much of the thoroughness and meticulousness demanded of their profession.

In fact, the Journeyman successfully incorporated a lot of fundamental design traits tailored to a different clientele.

As Ves climbed up to the doom crawler and entered the cockpit to boot up its operating system, he discovered the extent the original mech designer had gone to simplify the Spyre Helix’s piloting requirements.

The extent of automation employed by the Spyre Helix frankly alarmed Ves! A disturbing amount of control had been taken out of the hands of the mech pilots!

If the AIs of the Spyre Helixes were ever tampered with, then most of its nuclear arsenal could easily be unleashed in the wrong direction!

He sighed. "This isn’t my problem."

A lot of things could go wrong by placing so much control over the doom crawler’s destructive weapon systems in the hands of exploitable AIs. Yet Ves did not have the leverage to impose any changes in its specifications.

For a moment, Ves considered sneaking some tampered code into the programming of the mechs themselves. However, he reconsidered shortly afterwards.

Any decent Apprentice Mech Designer proficient in mech programming would easily be able to identify any detrimental elements in the updated software packages.

Ves did not wish to risk his own safety or endanger his deal with Finlay over a misguided attempt at appeasing his morality.

As long as the modified Spyre Helixes didn’t blow anything up that belonged to him, its owners were free to use them as they wished!