The Mech Touch novel Chapter 967

Overall, Ves was in line to receive six significant awards. Aside from the three he received from General Clesse in person today, he also received three more, either immediately or later.

The War Saint was an award to every active participant of the Bright-Vesia Wars. Even though a huge number of Brighters received them every generation, receiving them at all was a great mark on their record.

The Mech Corps additionally bestowed Ves the Frontier Service Medal just like the rest of the Verle Task Force. This signified that he served on behalf of the Mech Corps while deployed to the perilous frontier.

The third significant award he received was the Mech Corps Commendation awarded to every member of the 6th Flagrant Vandals. This was a unit award that gave supreme honor to the mech regiment as a whole, but every Vandal that served during the time of the commendation’s given reason for bestowal received the right to wear this ribbon.

All of these awards and honors bestowed to Ves and the surviving Vandals seemed impressive at first glance. Yet some couldn’t help but feel they served as an inadequate band-aid to the dangers and predilections they all suffered during their arduous mission.

Many Vandals never lived to make it home. Only two ships out of dozens made it back. The most galling fact was that many of those who died at the hands of the pirates, Vesians or sandmen never found out what they fought for all the way out in the frontier. Why did the Bright Republic send them all the way out to an isolated star system deep in the frontier?

What was so important enough that the sacrifice of hundreds of mech pilots and thousands of support personnel made the people awarding the medals to the handful of survivors so pleased?

Oh, Major General Clesse had the decency to recognize their sacrifices and appear solemn. Yet some of those bureaucratic official types standing at the side seemed inordinately pleased for what should have been a serious occasion.

This was because after General Clesse finished going over the Vandal survivors, he began to posthumously award the confirmed dead and missing-but-very-presumably-dead.

This put Ves and the Vandals into a somber mood. _{free𝑤ebnovel.com}

People like Chief Dakkon and Dr. Tillman all contributed enormously to the ground expedition, but aside from the honors bestowed to them, their existence no longer mattered to the Republic.

The classified nature of this award ceremony basically meant their family members would never find out where and why they died. They would forever hear that their deceased relatives died as heroes, but that would be the extent of what they were allowed to know!

Perhaps Ves should follow up on the family members of those he’d been close with at the Vandals. Not now, of course, but after the war.

As Ves looked at his fellow comrades, he saw that he wasn’t the only one who thought that way.

After the end of the award ceremony, one of the civilian officials gathered Ves, Major Verle and Captain Orfan to the side. "Our patron, the primary benefactor of your mission, cordially invites you to attend a private banquet with him on this planet in three days time. We have already arranged your schedule to accommodate this appointment."

Major Verle’s lips twitched. Though the official’s invitation was worded as a request, it really left no option for refusal. "Mr. Cordwraith, we would be delighted to accept your patron’s invitation."

"Good." The slick-haired middle-aged man replied perfunctory. "The Bureau of Sector Affairs will prepare all matters on your end."

After that, Cordwraith rejoined his fellow officials and left through the side door.

As everyone returned to the guest area of BuSecA’s headquarters, Ves asked a question. "Who is Mr. Cordwraith? Who is he working for? And is that person..."

"Mr. Cordwraith is the executive assistant of Senator for Life Camden Tovar of the Bright Senate. As for Mr. Tovar, I doubt you require a history lesson on the Tovars."

The mention of Camden Tovar came with such a shock to Ves that he temporary stuttered in his steps.

Tovar!

In the chaotic founding of the Bright Republic at the opening of the Komodo Star Sector shortly after the start of the Age of Mechs, a few leaders came to prominence.

During this time where all sorts of exiles, misfits and hopeful colonists flocked to the Komodo Star Sector to carve out a place of their own, one colonization fleet from the New Rubarth Empire set forth with hope.

They hoped to live a life away from the stifled, stratified and war-obsessed Rubarthans. Several somewhat well-to-do Rubarthan families pooled their resources together to fund the colonization fleet and set forth to the edge of the galaxy as fast as possible.

In total, seventeen families funded the colonization fleet and owned shares in it with the hope of founding a prosperous new state. If not for the clash between their idealism and the rampant fighting in the Komodo Star Sector, they would have occupied a much better territory than the stars the Bright Republic occupied today!

In truth, their colonization fleet suffered a humiliating defeat at the center of the sector where the fighting was most heated. After being kicked out of the area where the Friday Coalition now made its home, the much-diminished colonists dejectedly founded their homes elsewhere, immediately butting heads with the founders of the Vesia Kingdom who carved out those stars for themselves!

"Seventeen families funded the colonization fleet, but only five exist today." Ves recalled. "As one of the five remaining surviving founder families, the Tovar Family is one of the most influential family lines in the government!"

The Larkinson Ancestor may have fought on behalf of the newly-founded Republic as well, but he was merely an extremely talented mercenary. The founder families consisted of the true behemoths of the Bright Republic and still shaped much of its policies to this day.

Much of the public cynically considered the founder families to be noble houses in all but name. Ves tended to agree with their sentiment, but at least they pretended to be the first among equals rather than outright superior as with the case of the nobility in the Vesia Kingdom.