In the end, Ves gave a noncommittal answer to Venerable Brutus. He needed to think about it and consider whether it was worth it to go through all of that trouble.

As Ves returned to the LMC's headquarters, he began to weigh the costs and benefits of such a decision.

The value of an expert pilot was evident. Obtaining the service of an expert pilot would be a massive boon for his enterprise. Few private organizations secured the services of such august and powerful talents.

They were incomparable to expert candidates. They possessed a will and charisma that was greater than anything comparable to mortals, and their battle prowess was enough to elevate themselves to a higher class!

Their value on the battlefield was just as great as off the battlefield. Venerable Brutus already showed how much of a boost he provided to the Avatars and Sentinels. Many mech pilots benefited from his sage advice and personal instruction. As an excellent mech pilot in terms of skill, Brutus was able to pinpoint all of the flaws in another pilot's fighting style and suggest ways to remedy these shortcomings.

This was one of the greatest benefits of securing an expert pilot! This was also the main reason why the Larkinson Family kept pumping out mech pilots of a very high standard. Each young Larkinson mech pilot received periodic instruction from either current or former expert pilots.

Regrettably, the newly-founded Larkinson Clan lacked an expert pilot to perform this function. The Larkinsons who joined the clan would have been forced to receive instructions from ordinary Larkinson mech pilots.

While there wasn't anything wrong with that, only expert pilots were astute and skilled enough to provide the best advice!

This was why the presence and generosity of Venerable Brutus was so important to Ves. In this crucial early period of the clan, receiving the support of an expert pilot was extremely vital to keep up everyone's morale!

"He'll be gone, though." He murmured.

By all accounts, the Hexadric Hegemony would eventually recall Brutus in order to deploy him on the front lines against the Friday Coalition. The time for his departure was fairly fuzzy, but Ves suspected that it was getting close.

Once Venerable Brutus left, the Larkinson Clan lost the protection of an expert pilot.

Without the presence of an expert pilot, Ves and the Larkinson Clan would look a lot more vulnerable! It didn't matter if he was trying to build up his forces to the level of a mech regiment! Expert pilots were so feared and worshipped in the Age of Mechs that the presence or absence of one could sway entire battles!

Their deterrence value was already more than worth all of the effort to secure their allegiance! It was so rare for independent organizations to possess their own expert pilots that just having one was enough to double everyone's evaluation of the Larkinson Clan's strength!

Naturally, that was assuming Davia Stark would be able to recover her former will and regain the strength and mentality of an expert pilot!

"Will that really happen?"

Davia did not possess any personal loyalty to Ves. In fact, she should resent him a bit for his heavy-handed attempt to bring her along. Brutus probably owed more of her affection.

If Ves risked his forces to participate in the final battle against the sandmen, if Ves sent a fleet to the former Vindmar Republic so that she could find some closure, would she even recover?

Even if she did, would she be thankful?

Both of the questions were shrouded with uncertainty. Ves did not wish to go through all of that effort, only to give the Hegemony another expert pilot!

"I need some guarantees." He concluded as he rubbed his smooth-shaven skin.

Despite her broken state, Davia was still a brighter prospect than the other alternatives.

In the short term, Jannzi Larkinson and Tusa Billingsley-Larkinson weren't turning into expert pilots anytime soon. They were close, but not enough. They needed more precipitation as well as a catalyst to trigger apotheosis.

Perhaps their time might come in the next five to ten years, but now that the Larkinson Clan was at its weakest and most vulnerable state, Ves couldn't wait that long!

"I've been setting so many long-term plans that it will take decades or even centuries for them to come to fruition! I've been neglecting our short-term needs!"

He didn't rule out this option for this reason. As long as neither requests were unreasonably dangerous, Ves didn't mind meeting them in order to give Davia a chance to move on from her trauma.

When Ves returned to his office at the headquarters, he voiced his thoughts on the matter to Gavin.

"I've been studying the conditions of the Sand War for a while now." His assistant said. "From what I know so far, the sandmen are halfway into converging all of their fleets into a planet-sized deathball. The window of opportunity isn't big. If you want to take part in this so-called 'decisive battle', then you need to make a choice within a month, maybe two at most."

Ves grimaced. "I see. Where will the battle be fought, Benny?"

"It depends entirely on what the MTA war fleet will do. They haven't revealed any of their plans so far, but the most probable guess is that they'll let the sandmen come to them in the Bentheim System."

The Bright Republic probably didn't appreciate that choice. Too bad the MTA wasn't inclined to listen to a tiny state's complaints.

"What about the situation in the former Vindmar Republic? If I recall, this border state is a bit far away."

"Vindmar is situated in the Hexer half of the star sector, which means we'll have to cross a fair distance to reach its former territory. The good news is that there shouldn't be any sandman left. The stupid aliens completely abandoned their conquered territories and dismantled all of their colonies to form as many fleets as possible."

"Which means that the scavengers and bottom feeders have already swooped in, right?"

Gavin smiled ruefully. "Reports have already come in of pirates, scavengers and mercenaries swooping into the abandoned star systems in order to scavenge as much valuables as they can! The sandmen may have consumed a lot of valuable exotics and minerals, but they have ignored plenty of valuables!"

"The Sand War isn't even over yet! Damn these greedy bastards!"

From high-grade exotic deposits to neglected holdings, there was plenty of treasure to pick off the ground if the scavengers moved in fast enough!

"They shouldn't pose a threat, though. There are so many ruined planets to loot that the opportunities will mostly be focused on picking up as many scraps as they can. The last thing the scavengers want to do is to confront a neutral party, especially a strong one!"

"You're right. Another factor is that most of the scavengers will move to the planets. There is nothing for them to gain if they remain at the edge of a star system."

If Ves wished to meet Davia's request, he likely wouldn't dispatch his entire fleet to Vindwar. As long as the danger level did not exceed a certain standard, it was enough for Ves to hand over this responsibility to the Battle Criers! This was exactly the kind of mission they were supposed to fulfill!

The only issue was that his Battle Criers still hadn't been reinforced with Kinners from their tribe. Commander Cinnabar already told Ves that this would take a while due to the Komodo War getting in the way.

As Ves continued to discuss this matter with Gavin, he gained some confidence that he'd be able to meet the two requests. He didn't want to make a choice immediately, though. None of his forces were in a state to move right now. Ves still wanted to grant them enough time to reinforce their numbers and procure more carriers. The latter was especially important!

"How are we on the starship end? Do we have enough ships to transport all of our mechs on short notice?"

Gavin looked at his data pad and browsed a status report.

"Right now, the Avatars and the Battle Criers are doing okay, but the Sentinels received the short end of the stick. They can only field a third of their mechs from a carrier, though they have enough transport capacity to bring along more mechs. They'll just have to empty the cargo bays of every ship in their possession and squeeze in as many mechs as possible in their packed and partially-disassembled state."

That meant that any mech put into the cargo bay would not be ready to deploy if a battle broke out.

It took far too much time and effort to unpack a mech and restore it to a functional state! Most battles would be over by then!

This was the reason why everyone valued carriers. They were specifically designed to accommodate mechs and facilitate their deployment no matter the circumstances!

Right now, the only reason Ves managed to gain a lot of carriers was due to his friendly relations with the Ylvaine Protectorate. If not for his identity as the Bright Martyr, the Curin Dynasty would have never allowed Ves to place so many orders for light carriers!

As it was, the Avatars and Sentinels still had to slow down or curtail their recruitment entirely in order to allow their starship departments to catch up with the growth of their mech contingents!

"How is the manpower situation, Benny?"

"I can't say much about your mech forces as my access to their systems are limited. The LMC has changed a lot, though.

"Oh? How so?"

"For one, we are slowly drawing down our Manufacturing Department. We have way too many mech technicians and other production personnel on our payroll. Though we own some manufacturing complexes, we are mostly relying on external manufacturers to produce and supply our mechs throughout the Komodo Star Sector. Since we are increasingly becoming more dependent on outsourcing production to foreign partners, it doesn't make much sense to have all of these mech technicians hanging around."

Ves furrowed his brows. "Only fire the useless ones. Try to retain the more talented and loyal individuals. Don't fire any people with crucial skillsets, and don't get rid off too many workers. Remember, we still need a lot of technical personnel on hand to man a factory ship as well as all of the smaller production facilities in our future expeditionary fleet!"

Skilled manpower was hard to come by. Though the population base of the Komodo Star Sector was enormous, a lot of organizations competed over their employment!

"How is the staffing of our new ships proceeding along?"

This was one of his most persistent worries. Spacers were extremely hard to come by these days as the Sand War practically skyrocketed their value! States could produce as many starships as their shipyards could handle, but training qualified spacers to man all of these vessels was not as straightforward!

"Surprisingly, it's going well. In fact, staffing is one of the few issues that aren't of concern to us anymore!"

"Oh?" Ves sat up straighter in his office seat. "What's going on?"

"The Curin Dynasty passed some preferential policies that made it easier for us to recruit Ylvainans. The desire and enthusiasm to work for you has always been strong. It's just that the most valuable professionals such as starship captains and chief engineers are already committed to their current employers. Poaching them is very difficult for most people."

"Then how did you solve this problem?"

"We didn't." Gavin shrugged. "Lately, a lot of Ylvainan professionals have decided to escape their current employment contracts to work for us. They come from all around the Protectorate."

"How have they been able to get away with ending their contracts early?"

"That's the strange part. Their employers all agreed to release the professionals without much fuss. We think the Curin Dynasty might have pressured the bosses to acquiesce, but we don't know for sure. In any case, ever since change, we've been recruiting starship personnel left and right! As long as you don't mind Ylvainans manning most of your ships, we won't have any problems on this end!"

Ves grimaced with distaste. If this went on, the Ylvainans would probably outnumber the Brighters in his employ!