Chapter 3849 Varied Living chs
After he concluded his 'delightful' talk with the Shield of Samar, Ves visited the final third order living ch on his list.
Fortunately, his conversation with the Minerva didn't go nearly as deep as with the last living ch he visited.
While the Shield of Samar was the oldest and most experienced of the bunch, the Minerva was practically a newborn baby at the mont!
It was so new that it had only fought a single proper battle, and that was against a horde of fish-whales that hardly challenged its command capabilities.
In addition to that, the Minerva's experiences were much different from that of other chs. As an expert command ch, it was not only bound to a powerful legion commander who was fully preoccupied with leading the Living Sentinels, but also got into contact with many different chs and ch pilots through the Command Field.
All of this led to the shaping of a third order living ch that was much more closely bound to the Larkinson Army than its peers!
CHS ARE EXPECTED TO SERVE, JUST LIKE CH PILOTS. I HAVE FEW COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE TREATNT THAT WE HAVE RECEIVED. THAT SAID, I SUPPORT THE CHANGES THAT YOU HAVE NTIONED. IT WOULD BE GOOD FOR LIVING CHS SUCH AS OURSELVES TO BE SEEN ON A MORE EQUAL LEVEL TO EVERY CH PILOT IN THE CLAN. WHILE WE ARE WILLING TO SACRIFICE OURSELVES FOR THE GOOD OF THE CLAN, WE WILL BECO MORE MOTIVATED TO SERVE OUR DUTY IF WE RECEIVE BETTER TREATNT.
"Those are my thoughts as well." Ves nodded. "I have been thinking about what kind of changes I will make in the near future. There is no ti to implent the reforms that I have in mind right away, but I will promise I will see this through once our stay in the Garil System has co to an end."
YOU DO NOT HAVE TO GIVE US RANKS, BUT IT WOULD BE A LOT MORE CONVENIENT FOR US CHS TO COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER AND WITH FELLOW HUMANS IF WE CAN GAIN ACCESS TO THE INTERNAL NETWORK. THIS IS A SAFER OPTION THAN GIVING US ACCESS TO THE GALACTIC NET RIGHT AWAY. NOT EVERY LIVING CH WILL BE AS PRUDENT AS WE WISH.
The Minerva made a good point. It appeared that it was developing into quite a responsible ch. The strong influence had already shaped its personality in a direction that allowed it to be entrusted with greater responsibility.
Of course, it was still too young and inexperienced to take up any leadership positions. It was too difficult for the Minerva to convince the other powerful living chs with its lack of developnt.
Even so, the Minerva was already proving to be a useful, helpful and insightful expert ch in the short ti it had co into service.
Once it reached the age of the current Shield of Samar, its sophistication would definitely surpass any other living ch!
Ves had a good chat with the Minerva. He even discussed other topic with the friendly expert ch.
"How is Commander Casella faring these days, in your opinion?" He asked.
MY HUMAN PARTNER IS CONTENT AND BUSY. SHE ENJOYS PILOTING AND IS EAGER TO MASTER MY CAPABILITIES. TOGETHER, WE ARE WORKING TOWARDS OPTIMIZING AND REFINING OUR VARIOUS TECHNIQUES. MY ONLY REGRET IS THAT SHE MUST SPEND TI ON OTHER LEADERSHIP DUTIES IN ORDER TO LEAD THE LIVING SENTINELS.
That was much as he expected.
"Has she encountered any troubles that is slowing her down?"
THERE IS ONE. HER BROTHER IS TRYING TO IMPOSE TOO MUCH ON HER. THOUGH THEY ARE SIBLINGS WHO CARE FOR EACH OTHER, THEY ARE BOTH ADULTS WITH DIFFERENT RESPONSIBILITIES. WE UNDERSTAND THAT IMON HAS THROWN HIS LOT WITH HER, BUT IT IS ALREADY ENOUGH FOR CASELLA TO BE ABLE TO COUNT ON HIM ON THE BATTLEFIELD. THERE IS NO NEED FOR HIM TO BOTHER HER OUTSIDE OF COMBAT.
He had heard about Venerable Imon's persistence in trying to get close to his sister. This was a worriso pattern of behavior.
If Imon was an ordinary ch pilot who wasn't related to Casella, then a ch officer would have already disciplined him by now. This kind of obsessive conduct was not appropriate and completely set the wrong example.
However, Imon's status was more sensitive than that. He was Casella's blood relative so his motives weren't impure. His conviction was also related to protecting his sister, so it wasn't odd for him to act so weird even during his off-hours.
This was why the clan had not taken any strong asures against Venerable Imon thus far. Expert pilots were known weirdos and eccentrics, and the behavior of the newest Larkinson expert pilot was sowhat tolerable.
The clan still needed to do sothing about him, though. Ves was well aware of how difficult it was to change the minds of expert pilots, but he did not think it was impossible for him to persuade Imon to find a better way to occupy his ti.
"I will have a good talk with him once we are done with Purgatory." He promised to the living ch. "For now, the mission cos first. We are almost ready to depart for the Evolution Kingdom. Be ready to deploy."
I AM ALWAYS PREPARED TO BE OF SERVICE. THIS IS WHAT I WAS MADE FOR. CASELLA WILL NEVER HAVE A REASON TO DOUBT MY READINESS.
After he concluded his talks with the Minerva, Ves retired to an office in the headquarters building and summarized his findings and observations.
"The sample size is too small."
Although he collected a variety of opinions from different third order living chs, he did not feel he gained a complete understanding of their population group. All of their opinions were colored by both their individual ch pilots and the Larkinson Clan as a whole.
Any future third order living chs that Ves sold to other parties would probably grow up into substantially different entities!
Would they be as patient and willing to serve humanity as the Larkinson living chs? Ves could not give a straightforward answer to this question.
"This is the potential of life. All sentient and intelligent life forms are able to choose their own destinies. They can develop into humanity's greatest protectors and partners, but they can also degenerate into scourges that can pose a real threat to people."
This was the inherent duality and chaotic nature of life. No one was perfect and there were always malignants in every group.
Ves was actually quite fascinated with the concept of living chs gone bad. The Devil Tiger was originally ant to serve as an early experint in this regard.
Unfortunately, his plan to observe how a ch with a less-than-proper attitude towards humans interacted with those very sa people were dashed. Ever since his mother hijacked his first prized masterwork ch and handed it over to his father, the Devil Tiger had been transford into a completely different machine.
He suddenly ca up with an interesting idea.
What if he restarted this experint in a different form?
The rougher and more remote parts of the new frontier were nearly just as dangerous and chaotic as the Nyxian Gap!
No one who road those parts could say no to free chs that also happened to be powerful in their own ways.
Ves briefly imagined this scenario. He could secretly design and build a batch of 'bad boy' chs that contained a few controversial design elents that were sure to generate a lot of uncomfortable questions if exposed!
The hardest part about this operation was to prevent the MTA or other snooping organizations from finding out about his involvent. This was rather hard to accomplish as his living chs were so unique and iconic that there was only one ch designer in the Red Ocean who could possibly design such machines!
He frowned. "If I want to go through with this, I need to solve this problem first and foremost."
It was a lot harder to camouflage his design philosophy now that he had developed it further. He was pretty much 100 percent certain that soone like the Polymorph would imdiately be able to deduce his traces if she got her hands on one of his experintal machines!
Still, the chances that a figure as high-ranked as hers would deign to study a trivial ch designed by so forgettable figure was miniscule!
Ves would just have to put a lot of extra effort into making his ch less obviously valuable than normal.
Designing his chs for third-class ch pilots should do the trick. Having been a third-class ch designer himself once upon a ti, he already figured out that the chers paid much less attention towards the weakest and most poor-performing chs in use. They were too limited and rarely offered innovations and design solutions worth recording.
This ant that the chances that he could get away with designing a series of third-class 'dark chs' was much higher!
Coming up with a workable design was only the first step, though.
He couldn't fabricate the chs within the Spirit of Bentheim or any other ship in the fleet because the risk of exposure was too great.
He needed to fabricate the bad boy chs in a completely different ch workshop. Davute or any other major port system was out of the question because they were too public and densely populated. He would have to veer to a more remote and shady settlent that hired out its workshops, but that brought its own risks.
After that, he needed to make sure they were being shipped to the right places without suffering a mishap of so kind.
This was not too difficult of a job, but the troubleso part was removing every trace of their origin.
"I'll think about this later."
Although the risks were great, the opportunity to gather a lot of interesting data on the growth and performance of deviant chs was too attractive!
His design philosophy centered around growth and evolution, so it was best if he could observe the progression of different styles of living chs.
Although his ch designs were all unique in their own way, they all possessed a lot of common elents that kind of got stale after a while.
Working on a completely different interpretation of living chs would definitely light up his passion again!
He recalled that the process of designing and making the Devil Tiger was his first successful attempt at making a masterwork ch. Even if he did not aim for it, his abundant passion and enthusiasm were so great that he was able to transform it into a qualitatively better ch with a little bit of help!
Even if he didn't need to rely on designing extrely off-beat chs to make masterwork chs anymore, Ves was too passionate about ch design to overlook this additional opportunity to diversify his work and learn new facets about his design philosophy.
"This isn't the ti to think about new ch design projects."
He recalled his current priorities and quickly suppressed his desire to experint with new ch design concepts.
He returned to handling various arrangents and making sure that the chs that were about to accompany him to the Evolution Kingdom were in order.
Once the ti had co, over a thousand chs had assembled.
chs hailing from the Avatars of Myth, the Flagrant Vandals, the Penitent Sisters and the Swordmaidens made up the main body of the task force.
Additional chs hailing from the Glory Seekers and the Cross Clan also joined the task force.
Though the ch models were all different, none of them were too slow and sluggish. The ability to run away was one of the most important criteria for this mission. There was no way to fight against an entire fish-whale kingdom, so if hostilities ever broke out, mobility was a critically important factor!
This was also why the Shield of Samar did not take part in this mission. It was just too slow and heavy!
Aside from all of these chs, a bunch of cargo shuttles carrying additional energy cells and other supplies joined the task force as well.
Although the supply train was a bit ager and inadequate to sustain the chs over a long campaign, they at least ensured that the chs wouldn't run dry after fighting one or two battles.
"Everything is in order, sir!"
"What are you waiting for, then? Let's set off and et so fish-whales!"
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