Ketis decided to present the two configurations that she ca up with for the First Sword.
Both of them shared a lot of commonalities, which enabled her to make a certain degree of progress in the month since she comnced the First Sword Mark III Project. However, she would soon reach a point where she could not design the ace ch any further without finalizing the list of collaborators and making a definitive choice on the configuration.
"Let begin with the pure version first." The swordmaster bearing the Heavensword spoke. "The inspiration for this project cos from the duel where Dise successfully broke through. After speaking with the Master ch Designers of the ch Supremacist Faction, several of them have proposed to design an ace ch that can beco the ultimate sword fighter. It focuses on stripping away as many redundant elents as possible so that as many resources will be devoted to strengthening the armor system, the flight system, the artificial musculature and so on. By making them as strong as possible, Saint Dise will be able to execute her swordsmanship to the best of her ability, thereby allowing her to bring out her best when dueling against enemy phase lords, particularly the ones that wield the notorious Saint Piercer arms."
The ntion of the dreaded Saint Piercer weapons caused Ves to narrow his eyes. During the last battle he participated in, the Arena Lord of Ya'gwasa managed to stall Saint Tusa and the Dark Zephyr Mark III for a long ti due to the exceptional threat posed by this weapon.
Ves also couldn't forget that the experintal weapon that was rumored to be jointly developed by the Red Cabal and the Cosmopolitan Movent was ultimately responsible for killing Venerable Imon Ingvar.
Saint Piercer arms gradually beca more and more common after that. It appeared that the enemies of red humanity had managed to move past the experintal stage and begun to produce them in greater numbers.
While the Saint Piercers were presumably still expensive and difficult to produce, the native aliens steadily accumulated more and more of them over ti!
It was not an exaggeration to call them ga changers. Alien phase lords already possessed a considerable advantage in defense, but now that they gained a weapon that could directly negate the true resonance and willpower amplification of an expert ch or ace ch, the native gods turned into much more lethal threats!
"I see. Ves rubbed his hairless chin in thought. "If you want to create a powerful duelist. that can fight head-on against a phase lord equipped with a Saint Piercer, then it is not a bad idea to strip out the gimmicks, because far too many of them can be negated by the strange tech and materials that make these alien arms so ridiculously effective. The sword fey that I envisioned for the First Sword Mark III will probably get cut or pierced to ribbons by the Saint Piercer because it can completely invalidate most forms of true resonance empowernt."
The sword fey would still remain a good investnt when fighting against other opponents, most notably enemy small craft, but they would not fare well against the enemy that the Red Three was most concerned about.
Against this high-priority threat, Saint Dise had to bring out the most of the First Sword and put all of her skills in hunting exobeasts to use.
"This is why my first choice of collaborator is a Master ch Designer who is the first to develop an effective, if expensive, counterasure against Saint Piercer arms." Ketis said. A new projection appeared that displayed the public profile of Master Lilian Recins. "This is one of the foremost defensive specialists of the ch Supremacist Faction. Master Recins is known for her Class III design philosophy centering around Energized Vibrotal Armor Systems. Energized vibrotal is a special form of structured alloy that vibrates at a high frequency just before getting attacked. Due to many reasons I will not get into, this can partially negate the damage of incoming attacks. What truly makes Master Recins notable is when she managed to develop transphasic energized vibrotal. This has made her armor systems drastically more effective at resisting transphasic attacks. The highest end version of this design application has also proven to be partially effective at resisting Saint Piercer attacks. The Red Three have discovered by now that Saint Piercer is sohow able to concentrate phasewater far above the theoretical saturation limit. Therefore, only highly effective transphasic defenses have a chance of resisting this weapon."
"What?!" Ves reacted with surprise.
Discovering the principal reason why Saint Piercers were able to pierce through all manner of high-end alloys as well as the Saint Kingdoms of ace chs was a huge intelligence gain!
Of all of the reasons why Saint Piercers were so ridiculously powerful, Ves never expected for this to be the reason!
The theoretical saturation limit determined how much a physical object could be infused with phasewater before it beca so volatile that it started to tear itself apart.
Ves had always assud that this limit couldn't be broken, because why would he think otherwise?
Learning that it was possible to break the theoretical saturation limit was like learning that he could put 1 kilogram of sugar into a cup that held only 100 milliliters of tea!
It sounded absurd!
It sounded impossible!
Yet the native aliens and the cosmopolitans managed to turn this into a reality!
The successful developnt of Saint Piercer arms certainly proved that the enemy could never be underestimated. Even they were capable of coming up with amazing technological innovations.
"Do you know how the native aliens are able to break the saturation limit?" "Maybe." Ketis answered with a bit of ambivalence. "The ch Supremacists have shared their most likely theory with . They haven't gathered enough proof to back it up, but it makes sense to them. Their best guess is that the secret to breaking the saturation limit is... to create a superdinsional object and infuse the extradinsional parts with phasewater. That is how you can theoretically infuse far more phasewater into a weapon than it can bear in the material dinsions. The ch Supremacists assu that the only reason why the Red Cabal has been able to make these impossible products is because they rely on the extre spatial manipulation abilities of an ancient phase whale. It is likely impossible to produce Saint Piercers through other ans... at least for the foreseeable future."
It sounded complicated, but Ves was familiar enough with phasewater theory to understand what she ant.
Although the overly short explanation lacked a lot of important details, Ves could see
why it was plausible.
The production thod had to be extrely advanced and difficult to reproduce considering that it needed to manipulate matter in more than 4 dinsions!
Ves looked a lot more thoughtful as he processed this information. "I see. So this is what the pure configuration is designed to fight against. You want the First Sword to be able to effectively resist these superdinsional weapons."
Ketis nodded. "Now that the Red Three know more about Saint Piercer arms, they are hard at work in trying to develop effective counters against them. This will take precious ti which red humanity might not have. The special transphasic alloy developed by Master Lilian Recins is not completely effective at resisting Saint Piercer arms, but it is one of the best solutions that is currently available in this early stage. Even if there are better options available in the future, I will still bet on transphasic energized vibrotal
alloy."
It was not difficult to figure out why.
"Ketis, this special alloy... can not only be used to build a much stronger armor system, but can also be used to upgrade the Decapitator, am I correct?"
The swordmaster grinned. "That is a good deduction. You are exactly right! There is no point in fielding an offensive lee ace ch when the weapon subsequently gets cut and broken into pieces after getting struck by a Saint Piercer. The Dark Zephyr was able to get away with defeating the Arena Lord of Ya'gwasa because he relied entirely on evasion to render the Saint Piercer ineffective, but the First Sword is a dium ch. Even though I definitely plan to increase her mobility as well, she will never be able to evade as well as an ace light skirmisher. She will get struck, and her greatsword will get struck as well. It is absolutely necessary to prepare them against the lethality of superdinsional weapons ahead of ti."
No wonder why Ketis readily agreed to collaborate with the ch Supremacists. The design applications of Master Recins was simply too useful for the First Sword Mark
Ves shifted his attention towards his wife.
Gloriana looked anything but happy at the ntion of the RA Master ch Designer, and he could already deduce why she felt this way.
"I haven't heard any details about this transphasic energized vibrotal alloy yet, but I think I can guess why you want Gloriana out of the project. This special material can't be used in combination with archetech."
Gloriana refused to respond, but her silence was an answer in itself.
Ketis was much less reluctant. "Energized vibrotal alloy and its transphasic version both rely on high-frequency vibrations to take effect. That is why they must be applied on ch fras in special ways to prevent all of the shaking from destroying delicate internals. From what Master Recins has told , her design application simply cannot be integrated with archetal because there is no way to easily compensate against the transmission of vibrations, and because archetal parts cannot shake so wildly in order to function as a seamless whole."
That fit with what Ves knew about archetech. The archetal blocks that comprise archechs and archeships had to be solid and stable in order to function properly. If so or all of the blocks started to vibrate wildly enough, then they would constantly suffer from transmission problems. Signals might get distorted and end up sending the wrong commands, leading to lots of errors and malfunctions!
It was a nightmare to make archetech compatible with energized vibrotal alloy, so only one of the two solutions could be integrated into the design of the First Sword Mark
III.
Ketis had already made her choice on the matter.
"Gloriana."
"... What is it, Ves?"
"Can archetech be used to make the First Sword Mark III just as resistant if not more
against a superdinsional weapon like a Saint Piercer?"
"No." Gloriana reluctantly but truthfully replied,
"Can the application of archetal onto the blade of the Decapitator be used to make
the weapon a lot tougher, sharper and more resistant against superdinsional
weapons?"
"No..."
Ves pinned his wife with a pointed stare. "If that is the case, then I do not see any reason why you have any business with the First Sword Mark III Project." "THAT IS NOT TRUE! THERE IS MORE TO KILL THAN PHASE LORDS ARD WITH SAINT PIERCER ARMS! BESIDES, IT IS NOT AS IF AN ARCHETAL VERSION OF THE FIRST SWORD IS COMPLETELY HELPLESS AGAINST THIS TYPE OF ENEMY!"
Ves remained unmoved by his wife's latest tirade. "I do not think that Saint Piercer arms will disappear from the battlefield anyti soon. I think we should treat them as the Red Cabal's version of Destroyer weapons and adjust accordingly. Even if their numbers will remain limited, our clan should prepare at least one specialized counter against them. It is a good idea to dedicate the First Sword to this task as Saint Dise is our best duelist."
"It is stupid to rely on lee chs to counter a phase lord equipped with Saint Piercer!" Gloriana vehently retorted! "We should rely on our best ranged chs such as the upcoming Minerva Mark II and the Prothea Mark II to eliminate or drive away
this adversary!"
Ves shook his head. "That takes way too long! Do you know how much punishnt these
phase lords can endure?! If there is no lee ch that can block their advance, they will tear through our fleet and our ranged champions if they also happen to possess a mobility advantage! Like it or not, Gloriana, but we need a lee ch that can withstand Saint Piercer arms up close. If Ketis is right about the effectiveness of transphasic energized vibrotal alloy, then this ans you are off the project."
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