The Mech Touch novel Chapter 82

Now that the previous round eliminated most designers, everyone gained sufficient space to work. The regulating system automatically paired mech designers against each other, forcing everyone to shuffle around. Ves walked to the left side of the field and met his opponent.

"Hi. I’m Ves Larkinson." He greeted politely. He looked at the man’s floating nameplate. "So you are Floyd Lee?"

"Tch. This will be easy." The Leemar graduate contemptuously said. Unlike the other students who wore purple, he wore an exclusive blue uniform decorated with many more symbols. He also wore a silver sash, which carried a special meaning that Ves couldn’t figure out, though only a few graduates shared the same colors.

Ves frowned a bit at his opponent’s lack of response. He wanted to spark up a conversation to learn more about his opponent, but his contempt revealed no further openings. He only figured out that this handsome floating man was an elite, and from his accent he likely originated from a core planet of the Carnegie Group.

"Give up, loser. I have no idea how you got through the first round, but I can assure you your progress ends here. Save me the trouble and make way for a future master."

"No thanks. I’d rather stay." Ves said in a clipped tone. He encountered plenty of entitled bastards in the past when he studied at Rittersberg, and he learned that the best way to cope with them was to keep your responses minimal.

Floyd intended to press the conversation. "Don’t think that the rules will stop a man of my caliber. I have ways of cleaning you up if I find you displeasing."

"Are you sure it’s a good idea to say that in the open with all kinds of monitoring systems active?"

"This little school doesn’t care."

Evidently, Ves placed too much faith on the Leemar Institute of Technology’s impartiality. Past competitions sometimes ended strangely when contestants of lesser means dropped out or spontaneously fell sick. Eventually it grew so bad that the LIT had to make a statement and put a stop to these unsavory actions.

His mood sank when Ves figured out that mere words could not elicit protective measures. He considered Floyd closer. Though he looked imposing, Ves did not find him to be particularly notable. He didn’t recognize his face or his name, so he shouldn’t be too famous.

As someone who recently stared death in the face, Ves was not easily cowed. Not anymore. Though he still acted discreet, he recently realized there were times when he had to forge ahead even if he ran into obstacles.

"You refer to yourself as a master, but all I hear is bluster. Come back before me with an official master seal from the MTA and then we’ll talk. Until then, prepare to go back to your villa, because I’m going to eliminate you in a couple of hours."

"You..!"

In effect, Ves burned his bridges with his opponent. Without any means of reconciliation, Ves backed himself into a corner. If he succeeded in attracting the attention of a master, then clueless blowhards like Floyd were inconsequential. If he failed, then not only did he fail the System’s mission, he’d also have to watch his back on the return trip.

The duel started soon enough. The noise disappeared when a new projection surrounded everyone. Everyone recognized the familiar interface of a virtual mech workshop. The only addition was that everyone could view their opponent’s workshop and even access their files on the terminal.

Professor Marshall explained how their designs were tested at the end of the design period. "As with all standard duels, your designs will be piloted by our proprietary AIs in a hundred different simulations. Whoever designed the mech that wins the most will qualify for the next round. There’s only one little change."

Everyone waited in anticipation.

"The piloting AI will remember the previous matches and can improve from its previous experiences."

This was a bombshell. Even after several hundred years of development, piloting AIs could never really match up against real pilots. The normal simulations only used the most basic, foolproof AIs for testing. Generally, only high-grade AIs were able to adapt intelligently to prior experience, and required a lot of processing power to do so.

The conventional strategy in designing a mech for a duel was to make it as simple as possible. The simpler the mech, the flatter the learning curve. This allowed the piloting AIs to grasp the mech as fast as possible and effectively use its strengths.

In a situation where the mech had time to learn from its mistakes and improve its performance over time, the story was different. Higher performing mechs were usually more complex, featuring a much steeper learning curve. The advantage of more complex mechs were that they usually performed much better in certain situations. If the AI was able to grasp the right technique for the right situation, it could leverage a complex mech’s strength to incredible heights.

"You have eight hours to complete your design. Now start!"

Everyone approached their terminals and opened the interface. At their current level, the LIT did not expect everyone to design a functional mech from scratch, so everyone had a choice of standard components. Ves took a look at what kind of parts he had to work with, and estimated that they matched up to 3-star mechs in Iron Spirit.

"That’s a little beyond what I’m used to, but with my recent improvements I should be able to handle them. First, I have to determine the shape and weight classes."

He took a look at Floyd, who confidently picked a frame without even bothering to wait for Ves. His empty workshop shimmered and the giant shape of a panther-shaped mech came into view.

The floating designer laughed down at Ves. "Hahaha, I gave you a chance to retreat, but now it’s too late! I’m at the top of my class when it comes to felinid mechs! Let the Beastmaster show you how it’s done!"

Then what if Floyd implemented ranged weapons on his mech. Ves studied his opponent’s early progress and noted that the mouth and flanks possessed the right infrastructure to mount a couple of rifles. He wanted to keep Ves guessing. _{fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓}