The Dark Apostle and Ketis grew more comfortable with each other as they continued to talk with each other by remote.
The Ascended Giant was no longer as impulsive and obsessed in his own superiority as before.
Unlike many of his underlings, he understood much better how scary red humanity remained.
Sure, the puny humans were not doing so well at the mont, but that may be a temporary setback due to their lack of preparation at the start of the Red War.
In any case, the Dark Apostle heavily depended on superdinsional matter to maintain his leadership of the Phase Lord Departnt.
The better his gear, the more dramatic his victories and the greater his deterrence. Not only would he be able to stave off leadership challenges, but he would also earn enough prestige to convince red humanity to recognize the right for the Ascended Giants to beco an independent race.
Nothing could be done while the Dark Apostle lacked the strength to pursue his ambitions.
"How much high-grade matter did the clan harvest this ti?"
"A little less than expected." The projection of Ketis replied to Ves' other personality. "With the completion of the Riot Mark III, we exhausted almost all of our reserves of armor-grade and weapon-grade superdinsional matter. Our latest haul is significant, but not as much as we have hoped to obtain during the 5 days the portal remained open. We have tried our best, but we have only managed to harvest enough armor-grade superdinsional matter to construct just over 6 full superdinsional chs, and 4 mid-sized lee weapons for those very sa machines."
That did not sound like much. The Dark Apostle's expression fell. He was hoping for a lot more.
"That is... disappointing to hear." He said. "I know that Ves and Gloriana have already reserved enough high-grade superdinsional matter to convert the Lionheart Mark II and the Prothea Mark II into full superdinsional archechs. What is left may be just enough to outfit with a stopgap raint."
"Stopgap raint?"
The Dark Apostle grinned. "Yes' ultimate protection for us is a Polytal ch. A full smart tal Carmine ch that is incredibly flexible and can easily be scaled up and down depending on our choices. It can fit into smaller indoor spaces, but it can also expand to a ratio of 5x, 10x or more depending on how much superdinsional smart tal can be produced. However, designing our personal Polytal ch is a big project that will take 1 to 2 years to complete in his estimation. That does not leave with anything, hence why I need a regular raint that I can use for the ti being."
The swordmaster furrowed her brows. "I know about the Polytal ch, but you are being a tad bit impatient here. You are asking for a superdinsional raint that will only be used for 2 years at most. I can imagine that you are eager to make a na for yourself, but there are many other good uses of armor-grade superdinsional matter. I need to calculate how much armor-grade superdinsional matter you need. Tell your demands for your stopgap equipnt."
The Dark Apostle waved his hand, transmitting a docunt that listed out his demands in bullet points. He also included a crude sketch that looked much worse than anything Ves could produce.
Ketis looked a little disgusted as she observed the sorry excuse of a draft.
"Well, this is definitely confirmation that you lack his touch. It is a good thing that you are familiar enough with his work to convey the most essential details."
"I don't want to fight like a brawler whose primary job is to take hits. I don't want to turn myself into a giant target dummy. I want to be a more nimble and maneuverable fighter. The more mobile I am, the more initiative I have. The greater my initiative, the greater my options. I never want to be left helpless on the battlefield. I can agree to sacrifice a bit of armor for this, but not too much. In short, I basically want to beco the giant equivalent of a spearman ch or a hybrid ch wielding a spear."
The raint that the Dark Apostle envisioned for himself was a dark suit of armor that completely enveloped him and conveyed a vague aura of nace and danger.
It was first and foremost designed to give good mobility and range of motion to an Ascended Giant. The ratio of 3.0x made him larger than the Ur-Titans, but not by an excessive degree. His mobility shouldn't be impacted too much, especially if the flight system was powerful enough.
Aside from being optimized for welding spears, the so-called Superdinsional Giant Regalia also had to carry a number of other armants.
The selection of weapon systems was not too ambitious, but imposed quite a burden on the design of this raint.
The Dark Apostle demanded a superior superdinsional spear of the sa scale.
"Nobody will justify a spear that is 3 tis the size of a normal ch spear that is made completely of weapon-grade superdinsional alloy." Ketis imdiately said. "At most, you can turn the tip out of the most valuable variant of superdinsional matter, but we will not agree to using any more of it on the shaft. You will have to make do with cheaper and more abundant armor-grade superdinsional matter."
That did not sit well with the Dark Apostle. "Why not? The shaft is just as important as the tip. If I ever face an enemy that is equipped with a high-grade superdinsional sword, I want to be able to block and parry that weapon without worrying about my spear shaft getting sliced into half."
"That is unlikely to occur in most scenarios, giant. The native aliens only make use of relatively inferior alien-grade superdinsional alloys. Armor-grade weapons will easily hold up against such weapons, especially if the spear shaft is thick and solid enough. There is no need to spend any weapon-grade alloy to reinforce the shaft any further. At most, your fancy spear will beco nicked and dented from all of the fighting, which Ves should easily be able to corrupt after the battle."
"What if the Red Cabal improved their tech and equipped their phase lords with high-grade superdinsional weapons?"
"Then you adapt." Ketis answered back. "I am not a ch designer who knows nothing about actual combat. A good fighter does not bla his gear if he ends up at a disadvantage. Any enemy can be solved if you are skilled and wise enough to make the appropriate adaptations. You can adopt a more cautious fighting style that encourages you to keep your distance and avoid clashing your spear against the enemy's weapon. A spear has good reach. Make use of it. That is all I can say."
Though the Dark Apostle wanted the best, inwardly he already expected this outco.
There was a good likelihood that the Saint Commander would not object to the creation of a superior superdinsional spear where only the tip is made out of the most exclusive weapon-grade alloy.
They moved on to discussing so of the other armants.
"These javelins are quite modest compared to your spear. You have not imposed heavy demands on them. Are you truly sure you are fine with making them out of hull-grade superdinsional alloy?"
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"Alien-grade is acceptable as well if it is abundant enough." The Dark Apostle replied. "The reason why I am fine with mid-grade superdinsional javelins is because they are inherently designed to be disposable. If you look closer, I want to design them with the capacity to explode, just like the spears that I used during the leadership challenge. I am not necessarily going to blow them up in every instance, but I want the option to do so without feeling like I have thrown away a fortune's worth of superdinsional matter. I want to produce them in a large batch so that I have plenty of spares in reserve. I only intend to carry up to 5 of them in battle, though."
"To many people, it will seem that way." Ketis grimaced at the thought of all of that wasted superdinsional matter. "Those previous explosions seem violent enough to leave minimal salvage behind. These javelins all appear to conform to the 3.0x ratio that you have chosen. That ans that you will have to use up enough hull-grade superdinsional matter to construct a small spaceship at the very least. Depending on how often you get into fights and how many tis you toss those javelins, you can run out within 2 years or less."
"That will have to do. That hull-grade stuff is much easier to get than the higher-grade stuff. I do not think that Casella will object to using it up like this. Not every enemy is worth getting hurt by my exploding javelins. I will only reserve them for the truly serious enemies. Oh, I also want to reserve a bit of hull-grade superdinsional matter to construct better harpoons for one of my strategy:"
"I will take it up with the matriarch, but rember that the Red Collective has brought back their own haul of superdinsional matter. Maybe you should ask the collies to outfit your giants with superior gear."
"Perhaps."
Ketis continued to study the remainder of the design. The shoulder-mounted ranged cannons and the chest-mounted integrated armants did not interest her too much. Whether the Dark Apostle wanted to mount missile launchers or transphasic hyper weapons did not interest her that much.
The nature of a raint ant that there was not much room for internals that could strengthen and support the performance of these ranged weapons.
This made it difficult for them to pack a truly powerful punch. Since the Dark Apostle was not a high-ranking ch pilot, he could not amplify the performance of these armants beyond what reality permitted.
The only reason why most enemies still needed to take these weapon systems a little more seriously was due to their greater scale.
They would probably be powerful enough to zap down alien phasefighters and soften up enemy warships for follow-up attacks, but their effectiveness against enemy champions was highly questionable.
Maybe that was one of the reasons why the Giant Regalia had not turned into the equivalent of a first-class multipurpose ch. It could have fitted way more weapon systems, but Ves and the Dark Apostle had made the sensible decision to keep it fairly minimal.
What drew her attention a lot more was the backup lee weapon.
"Murder Knife Mark II?"
"Yes. I used the original Murder Knife Mark I to harvest the lives of two Ascended Giants. The D-arm has fed from their energies and grown stronger and more mysterious as a consequence. While Ves designed and built it in haste, I think that there is much potential in this weapon. It would be a sha to recycle it like Ves had done with the rest of his improvised gear. I want to commission you to take the original Murder Knife and properly reforge it into a full weapon-grade superdinsional D-arm with a ratio increase from 1.0x to 3.0x. I know that I am asking much from you, but would you be interested in this project?"
He was right. He was indeed making a big demand. Ketis felt irritated that she was not allowed to develop a customized knife for the Dark Apostle from ground zero.
Instead, she had to take this piece of demonized junk and work hard to figure out how to reforge it into a proper superdinsional blade while still preserving Ves' original vision as well as its D-arm properties.
Despite all of these problems, Ketis did not take much ti to nod her head. "Fine. Send it to the expeditionary fleet. I will do my best to figure out how to work around its... eccentric properties. I admit that a part of is curious whether it is even possible to reforge a D-arm. Just be aware that there may be a chance that it will break during my attempts to upgrade it. If that happens, I would be more than happy to compensate you with a proper superdinsional knife."
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