The creation of the Phobos was a major accomplishnt for the Larkinson Clan!
The new third order living ch was by far the most powerful masterwork expert ch in the clan's current ch roster.
Even though the Amaranto, the Everchanger and the Minerva had proven their worth in combat on many occasions, their illustrious battle records could not compensate for the harsh reality that their tech and material standards had fallen behind the tis.
While the Phobos was admittedly not as strong in direct combat as the aforentioned masterwork expert chs, he did not need to be. His powerful active stealth system along with all of his spiritual advancents enabled him to defeat powerful opponents before they had any chance to retaliate!
This was enough to acknowledge the Phobos as the masterwork that best reflected Ves' current strengths as a ch designer!
The Larkinson Clan would have praised the creation of the impressive expert stealth ch if not for the fact that the Phobos was supposed to be a clandestine asset!
The majority of clansn did not even receive any notification of this impressive addition. They still thought that the Mars was the latest masterwork ch that Ves and Gloriana jointly fabricated.
However, it was pretty much impossible to hide such a massive developnt in certain well-inford circles.
Davute, the Friday Coalition, the Hexadric Hegemony, the ch Trade Association and who knew what else already learned that the Larkinson Clan not only completed its long-awaited Ghost Project, but also attained a much better end result!
The implications of this were frightening.
There simply weren't a lot of expert stealth chs in human space. The ch community considered them to be a rarity because most of the pilots assigned to this ch type simply did not possess the qualities of a demigod.
Venerable Zimro Belson was a rare exception to this pattern, and thus granted the Larkinson Clan an extrely potent weapon that far too many other parties lacked!
No matter whether they were Davutans or Fridayn, many people who understood the ramifications of an expert stealth ch began to raise the threat level of the Larkinson Clan to a higher degree!
The most frightening aspect about the Larkinson Clan was not that it could muster up a lot of powerful chs and raid another planet like Pima Pri, but that it could quietly eliminate a lot of enemies without leaving behind any trace!
No traces ant no proof.
No proof ant that the Larkinson Clan could essentially get away with a lot of dirty deeds!
Even if the Larkinsons built up a well-deserved reputation for honor and uprightness, no one was naive enough that it employed stealth chs just to serve as sneaky scout units.
With so many rumors flying around, it was impossible for the Larkinson Clan to refute all of the stories.
In fact, it was more beneficial for the Larkinsons if other people knew that their chances of suffering retaliation beca much higher!
Still, Ves was not entirely comfortable with exposing the existence of the Phobos before he had even completed his first serious mission.
He would have preferred to keep his new expert stealth ch hidden and use the elent of surprise to utterly crush a powerful but complacent adversary!
"Oh well."
A day after the fabrication run had ended, Ves reluctantly applied to the MTA to inspect his latest masterwork ch and issue another batch of masterwork certificates.
He did not really care too much about collecting his eighth masterwork certificate, but he understood that it was a life-changing accomplishnt for Miles Tovar and Cormaunt Hempkamp to receive their first award of this kind!
"I'm not sure whether the MTA will recognize their contributions, though." Ves furrowed his brows. "Their involvent in the previous fabrication run was not that much to begin with, and my insistence on taking over a greater portion of their assigned work makes them look even worse."
Miles and Cormaunt still benefited enormously even if the chers did not award them with masterwork certificates in the end.
This was because the experience of contributing to the creation of a masterwork ch was already incomparably precious!
The subsequent masterwork transformation also granted the two Journeyn a lot of new insights and inspiration. They should make a lot of gains in their work after they digested all of the observations they made!
The sa applied to Ves. The spiritual foundation of the Phobos was strong and highly developed despite being born just a day ago! No other living ch could have matched the latest expert ch on this front just after their own creation!
The only exception was the Dullahan Project, but that was a special case. The expert space knight not only inherited a substantial amount of power from the Shield of Samar, but also ford a Blood Pact with Venerable Jannzi, enabling the both of them to facilitate each other's growth!
"The Phobos has a lot of secrets."
He felt deeply uncomfortable about displaying it to the chers. He knew from past instances that they would bring a small troop of ch designers and engineers so that they could ticulously examine and record a new masterwork ch from top to bottom.
Ves still did not exactly know why the MTA put such a high emphasis on masterwork chs, but he had already ford a lot of possible guesses.
"Well, the MTA will find a way to examine it one way or another, so I might as well invite them and get this over with as soon as possible."
The Phobos was currently in his weakest and most rudintary state, and Ves intended to keep him that way for the ti being.
This way, the chers would only be able to record the expert stealth ch's properties when he had only ford a single rune corresponding to the Path of the Hidden Stalker.
Ves had already studied the Phobos extensively enough to conclude that the new expert ch only needed to experience a small amount of growth to form his second 'rune'!
"If this was a roleplaying ga, then the second rune corresponds to reaching the second stage of an evolutionary process."
It was similar to how the ch community divided expert pilots into low-tier, mid-tier and high-tier buckets.
The difference here was that the differentiation between expert pilots was an artificial construct.
These new 'Ascension Runes' as Ves had taken to calling them possessed a lot of depth and mystery.
Ves could tell that they had nothing to do with the Kingdom of chs.
Instead, he theorized that his newly created Ascension Paths had accidentally contacted a deeper spiritual rule or phenonon that was related to these strange runes, either before or after the masterwork transformation!
Every rune had a aning. Ves could clearly sense that the Ascension Rune floating in the spiritual foundation of the Phobos possessed intrinsic power that remained active at all tis.
Ves looked thoughtful. "This falls in line with the first ability that I have outlined in the Path of the Hidden Stalker."
The main purpose of this Ascension Path was to make it harder to detect. The first ability was one of the most important evolutionary upgrades because it was ant to fool the sharp intuition of opposing expert pilots!
These powerful soldiers and warriors had honed their senses and instincts on the battlefield. Their advancent had caused them to beco a lot better at detecting anything that felt wrong or threatening.
If Ves wanted to turn the Phobos into an assassination unit that could take out an enemy expert ch in a single blow, then the Path of the Hidden Stalker had to put heavy emphasis on circumventing more unconventional ans of threat detection!
He did not know how much this new Ascension Rune affected the stealth capabilities of the Phobos. He would have to test his new expert ch in order to make this determination.
Hopefully, there would be a way to deactivate the Ascension Rune so that he could make accurate comparisons.
As Ves continued to study and go over the data on the latest fabrication run in his office, he began to develop the urge to give all of his other chs access to his latest innovation as well!
"These Ascension Paths should be useful to every living ch!"
While he already decided to apply them to all of the ch design projects that he had yet to complete, he was a lot more interested in applying them to his existing living chs for the ti being!
He was deeply curious to know whether granting them access to Ascension Paths would only affect their future growth or whether it would unleash the hidden potential that they accumulated over their lifetis!
Ves did not have enough theory or data to make accurate predictions. The only way to learn the truth was to conduct an actual experint on an older expert ch.
He already had one powerful candidate in mind. Aside from the Shield of Samar which existed no more, there was no better machine to test out the applicability of his Ascension Paths!
The implications of this latest innovation were enormous to his design philosophy as well as the lives of every living ch.
No longer would they have to grope in the dark and figure out how to evolve on their own!
While Ves was incapable of creating a 'Kingdom of Living chs', his design spirits could serve as adequate substitutes!
Not only were his design spirits more alive and responsive, but they could all co up with their own ideas, ensuring that the Ascension Paths would have plenty of variety!
Besides, Ves liked it a lot better when he did not put all of his eggs in a single basket.
The Kingdom of chs may serve as an incredibly powerful tool for humanity, but it was also an obvious target to any serious enemy!
Ves preferred it a lot more if the keepers of his Ascension Paths were spread out across several dozen different design spirits.
Just as he was about to rise to his feet so that he could pay a visit to one of his third order living chs, the door suddenly opened.
His wife marched inside as if she owned the place. The dismay she showed a day earlier had already disappeared.
"Ves! We need to talk!"
"Uh, what is it, dear?"
Gloriana placed her hands on her hips. "Do you rember that I told you that the Vraken Matriarchal Dynasty decided to send one of its ace pilots to the Glory Seekers? She is almost here. You should get ready to et her and take a look at her ace ch. The finest Hexer engineering went into its design. Prepare to be amazed."
"Uh, okay… I look forward to the ace pilot's arrival, I guess."
"I also wanted to discuss our latest theories on masterwork chs." Gloriana briskly continued. "I have examined a large amount of data and conducted a thorough analysis. I admit that my theory was not as close to the truth as yours. That is not to say that it is completely correct. I am rely acknowledging that it has made a small amount of progress. I still have a chance to make subsequent discoveries that can supplent our theories further. There has to be more criteria that determines whether a ch deserves to beco a masterwork. Matter and spirit are only two of the broad categories that we have identified. There should be other variables that can help us create masterwork chs with greater ease."
Although Ves vaguely sensed sothing wrong in his wife's argunts, he agreed with her overall idea.
He too felt that there was way more to masterworks than just perfecting their physical and spiritual forms.
Perhaps it was fa.
Perhaps it was technological advancent.
Perhaps it was the power of love.
Whatever the case, Ves and Gloriana had to fabricate a lot more masterwork chs if they wanted to have any chance of identifying additional key variables!
"We still have a heap of ongoing ch design projects that are close to completion, right?" Ves asked. "Those are good opportunities for us to put our latest theories and ideas to the test. Now that I have figured out how to make third order living chs on demand, our chances of turning those future works into masterwork chs should be a lot higher!"
Gloriana smirked. "That is exactly what I had in mind. Please prepare as best you can. The Bloodripper Project and the Greenaxe Project may not be as innovative as the Phobos, but they are still Larkinson expert chs in their own right. They deserve a chance to excel in the upcoming war between Davute and Karlach."
Ves dropped his smile. The reminder of the fact that neither of those two expert chs would beco a part of his expeditionary fleet soured his mood.
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