chs defined the Age of chs.
Human civilization had reached the right conditions to introduce chs and promote them on an enormous scale.
The technology, the demand and the surrounding infrastructure all happened to provide more than enough support to turn chs into a galaxy-wide phenonon.
Yet now that red humanity had entered the Age of Dawn, it was not quite certain whether chs would remain dominant.
There were plenty of armchair theorists who claid that warships would beco dominant again or that infantry beca the future due to the long-term effects of systematic cultivation.
Nobody could say for certain what could beco red humanity's next premier war platform.
The ch industry insisted that chs had too many advantages for people to abandon wholesale. They provided the right balance between power and practicality. The infrastructure centered around the developnt, production, repairs and recycling was not only extrely expansive, but had also reached an incredible degree of efficiency. That last reason alone ensured that chs would be able to stick around for a long ti. Even if other viable competitors existed, it was too hard to dislodge the advantages of an established player.
However, what if chs in their current state failed to remain competitive in the long run?
ch designers such as Ves could never afford to let that happen. Their entire careers were based around the mass proliferation of chs. If their products beca a lot less popular, then not many of them would be able to maintain their business presence!
This was why it was the solemn duty of all ch designers to constantly push ch developnt to a greater height.
Only through constant innovation and reimagination would the ch industry be able to keep its sole product category dominant in human society.
Low-ranking ch designers could forget about taking part in this collective mission. They still needed to learn the ropes of ch design and were far from ready to make contributions that could make a significant impact on the ch industry.
Ves was in a much better position to do this than many other Senior ch Designers. That was not to say that every other Senior was inconsequential. People like Gloriana and Jovy Armalon had already made significant attainnts in coming up with revolutionary design applications that could enrich chs once their inventors beca Masters.
These examples actually showed that Seniors faced an uphill battle when it ca to popularizing good inventions. The ch industry frequently looked down on their innovations because they were only valid on their own works.
Ves was no exception in this regard. Even to this day, his iconic living chs and his civilization-changing Carmine chs still remained exclusive to his own works!
This was why the chers and the fleeters assigned a permanent escort force to him, and it was also why hardly anyone else tried to imitate and further iterate on his solutions.
It was not because his competitors were unwilling to adopt living chs, but they were unable to do without the secret support of the Red Kingdom!
Even if most ch designers remained blissfully unaware of the existence of the Red Kingdom, they still understood the common sense that only the design philosophies of Master ch Designers beca universally available.
Ves therefore continued to encounter hindrances when it ca to popularizing his solutions, and thereby promote the evolution of chs in his own way.
Not even the boundary-breaking chs such as the Yellow Jacket line which received universal acclaim for its historic features could convince people that living chs represented the future evolution of chs.
Ves turned to Ketis, who knew more about living chs than almost any other ch designer.
"What do you think about living chs?" Ves suddenly asked.
The woman blinked. "I thought we were talking about what you intend to introduce with your seventh generation living chs."
"We are, but I first want to hear your thoughts about the current state of my products. You happen to be able to be able to design living chs by yourself, but you never embraced them as extensively as 1. Why are you okay with that? Is there stuff about living chs that you do not believe in or find redundant?"
"Not as such." Ketis shook her head. "I think your sixth generation living chs are definitely good. They wouldn't sell so well if they were inferior in performance. It is just... I want my works to be able to succeed in the ch market on their own rits. If I put more effort into adopting your design solutions, I may be able to sell more chs, but it will be to your credit as opposed to mine. I do not believe I can lose to you purely in terms of designing swordsman chs. This is my specialization and my passion. By constantly asuring up my work to your own, I can gain a clearer idea whether my products are good enough. So far, I am not too dissatisfied with the state of the Monster Slayer and the Stormblade Samurai Mark II."
In other words, Ketis did not dislike his living chs or thought that they were bad. She just sought to maintain a certain degree of distance from his works in order to build up her own brand.
That was completely fine. He would do the sa if he was in her place. She could never beco a market leader if he or she kept reproducing the solutions of a better ch designer.
The only exception to this rule were direct disciples. Ves considered Alexa Streon to be one of his direct successors, which ant that she would not have that many issues if she replicated all of the features of his latest generation of living chs.
Of course, Ves had to teach her all of the tricks of the trade in order for her to be able to
replicate his latest works.
Ves still thought that his influence over the ch industry and red humanity as a whole was still too limited in scope.
Many of his problems could easily be solved if he managed to realize his design philosophy and finally advance to the rank of Master ch Designer, but that was not realistic in the short term.
Ves therefore had to find an alternative ans to increase the value of his living chs and make them more valued and indispensable to society.
"One of the ideas that I ca up with as I was thinking on how to develop the D-Chamber is what exactly happens to living chs when they sustain too much damage and have to be scrapped for whatever reason. There are also old and outdated living chs that get sold to salvaging companies in order to get recycled.
Ketis tilted her head after hearing that. "What are you on about this ti?"
"Think about it. Don't you think that it is a waste of living chs, especially the more recent third order living chs, to die simply because people have better use for their materials?"
"That is pretty normal, Ves. I do not think that people are callous enough to ignore the existence of the living personalities inside the machines, but... what can they do with it? Upgrade them to a newer version? What if your LMC has yet to do so, as is the case with so of your older classics such as the Valkyrie Redeer? As for reconstructing the old and damaged machines, that is possible for the personalised machines of up-and-coming heroes, but it cannot be done on a large scale. The effort is too wasteful and too heavy on the logistics. We are at war. We are also suffering from extensive resource shortages. We cannot waste serviceable ch-grade alloys when they can still be used to produce more modern machines."
Ves nodded in agreent. "I do not object to your descriptions. As sad as it is, not many people at the top think it is worthwhile to reconstruct heavily damaged machines, even if they have evolved into third order living chs that have years of experience under their belt. Our industries are much more efficient at mass producing new chs than repairing damaged ones on a larger scale. This is why I have been thinking about how to improve how much can be salvaged from a living ch when it has reached the end of service life for whatever reason."
His forr student could already deduce what he had in mind based on the direction of
his talks.
"Let guess. You want to make it easier for people to 'recycle' the spiritual foundation of your living chs."
"Yes. Living chs and particularly third order living chs are treasures in my eyes.
Why would you throw it all away? One of the problems with taking them out of existing ch fras is that they are intangible and damn hard to work with on a material level. This is why I have decided to install hyper keystones underneath the cockpits of all of my living chs. These keystones are essentially hyper materials that can absorb and contain most of the spiritual foundation of a living ch."
"Is that even possible, Ves?"
"Not in the past, but this is the Age of Dawn. My understanding of hyper technology and E-technology has improved. Better hyper materials have also beco available. One that is suitable to serve as a keystone might not be able to maintain a 100 percent retention rate, but I am already happy if it can preserve 50 percent of the spiritual foundation of a third order living ch."
He projected the draft design of the Null Project and zood in on the cockpit. Just as Ves described, the underside of the cockpit seat contained a keystone that could potentially contain the spiritual foundation of a third order living ch if there was no other way for the ch fra to remain operational.
Ves designed it so that the ch pilot could easily slide open a chanical lock and take out the briefcase-sized keystone before evacuating from the cockpit.
While the keystone was rather heavy, Ves made sure to make it easy to grip by including
a handle. Ketis actually looked a bit impressed at this user-friendly implentation.
"If you can upgrade your living chs to make this work, then I can definitely see this work. Will you make it so that you can effectively 'revive' third order living chs by sliding them in the sa slot under the cockpit seat of a freshly produced machine?" "Yes, so long as they belong to the sa ch line!" Ves replied. "This is a great way to preserve older and much more developed third order living chs. They are too precious for people to discard just because it is costlier to scrap a heavily damaged ch than to restore it. There will be a degree of loss, but the most important bits will still be preserved. I will make sure to slightly change the dinsions of the hyper
keystones and the slots so that mismatching will not occur."
Ketis thought a bit more about this feature.
"Not everyone will bother to pay for a new living ch just to host these hyper
keystones. What if they do not want to acquire a new Valkyrie Redeer to replace the one that has just gotten blasted apart? What if the LMC has no longer decided to update
old ch lines such as the Aurora Titan and the Crystal Lord? Will the hyper keystones from those extinct lines beco worthless?"
Ves shook his head. "Nope. Think about it, Ketis. The developed spiritual foundations of
these living chs can still be repurposed. This is why I originally ca up with this
idea. I think that it would be great if they can be used as key ingredients in the process
of crafting powerful artifacts."
"Artifacts? That..." "Didn't you co up with the idea of Beastcasting a while ago? You can treat this as a
similar idea! High-level artifacts can be distinguished from low-level ones by possessing their own form of life and intelligence. It is normally very hard to create them because most thods involve imbuing them with an existing soul."
"That is not what I have read." Ketis said.
Ves smiled. "You are right. There are exceptions. One of the best ways to circumvent this
requirent is by creating a masterwork or higher. That seems to birth a rudintary soul or boost the power of an existing one. Other than that, most traditional craftsn can only make do with repurposing existing souls, especially if they want to ramp up production. Instead of supplying them with unethical human souls or downright hostile alien souls, we can instead supply the increasing number of traditional workshops with more powerful and more cooperative spiritual foundations of third order living chs!" If this could work, then Ves could increase the value of his seventh generation living
chs by making them useful even if they had reached the end of their service life! As long as their hyper keystones remained intact, they could be pulled out so that the valuable spiritual remnant contained within could be used to enable the production of high-level artifacts by adequately skilled traditional craftsn!
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