Selling a spiritual network to his allies was a major decision. It was not something to be decided on a whim.

After discussing this option with Calabast, Ves decided to put her in charge of laying the groundwork of a potential deal.

Properly speaking, a trusted diplomat should be doing this job, but  a spy usually acted as a decent substitute. Calabast was the sort of person who excelled at seeking advantages for herself. She should know how to maximize the Larkinson Clan's bargaining power and persuade their business partners into opening up their wallets.

As Ves reluctantly continued to stay on top of the ongoing developments while trying to resume his design work, he received a surprising request from Master Willix.

He looked at the notification on his comm with a mild surprise. He never spoke directly to her for quite some time.

Ves didn't take the initiative to talk to her because he didn't want to get confronted on what he had been doing back on Prosperous Hill VI. What kind of criminal was stupid enough to approach the authorities on his own initiative?

Another reason was that it simply wasn't necessary. Gloriana was in charge of the design projects this time, so it was natural for her to coordinate with the Master who supervised them. The nature of designing expert mechs was extremely technical, which fully conformed to Gloriana's specialty.

Ves even thought that he would be able to spend months without ever speaking with his reluctant patron within the MTA. The longer this went on, the lower the likelihood that Master Willix would confront him on stealing five precious vials of high-grade life-prolonging treatment serum!

This was why he became quite nervous after receiving Master Willix's summons. While the timing of this message suggested that the topic she had in mind was likely related to the ongoing terror campaign, Ves still worried whether she would mention some of his misdeeds on the last planet he visited.

"I need to control myself." He muttered.

He tried to suppress all of his nervous tension before leaving the design lab. Various thoughts swirled through his mind as he moved down to the hangar bay and boarded his shuttle.

While Gloriana probably didn't care about discussing expert mech design over the galactic net, Ves was different. The topics that he sometimes discussed with Willix demanded greater precautions.

This was why he had to travel all the way back to his former flagship, the Scarlet Rose.

He still left the Darkbreak module in the mobile supply carrier because Ves simply didn't trust it enough to install it on the Spirit of Bentheim. While it was rather inconvenient for Ves to travel all the way back to his old ship, it was a small price to pay in order to gain a lot of peace of mind.

"Wait in my shuttle, Lucky. I don't want you to get too close."

"Meow."

Lucky lazily flipped his tail while resting on top of a shuttle seat. Ves threw a viable exotic towards his cat in order to keep the pet happy.

"Meow~"

Though Ves hadn't stepped aboard the Scarlet Rose for many months, he was still familiar with her layout. He entered the dedicated communication chamber and approached the dark metal slab that rested in the center.

After inputting a few commands, he waited until the Darkbreak module established a highly secure connection to Master Willix.

The woman looked the same as ever. Ves had met her enough times by now to shake off his instinctual fawning and worship towards Master Mech Designer. Though he respected their formidable design ability, they were human in some respects.

That didn't mean he underestimated her. Ves only possessed a partial glimpse of her role within the Association. He didn't know how much power she wielded, but he could definitely make some guesses.

"Master Willix!" Ves pasted on a sincere-looking smile on his face. "I've missed you quite a lot. I was wondering if you forgot about me or something. You seem to have grown very chummy with Gloriana lately."

The great mech designer remained calm and collected. The projection of her lab-coated body barely showed any sign of tension despite the severe crisis the MTA faced.

A modest smile appeared on her face. "Miss Gloriana is quite devoted towards her work. It is a pleasure to feed her passion and guide her into developing her own solutions. She is a fantastic young women to work with. You are lucky to have her as your partner."

Ves briefly coughed. "Yes. I'm very lucky, yes. I couldn't ask for a better collaborator."

"Perhaps you might not be aware of her brilliance at the moment, but you will assuredly find out once you have moved past the preliminary phases and proceed with the main design work. She has developed some new methods that will surely play well with the expert mechs that we are developing."

He already heard his wife mention that a few times. Just like how Ves was constantly building up his spiritual toolbox, Gloriana was also building up her own array of exclusive tools.

Perhaps she never had the opportunity to use most of her tools when she worked on mass production mech design projects, but now that she was working on mech designs more suitable to her inclination, she would definitely be able to make use of her most potent methods!

Ves continued to discuss various issues about the expert mech design projects with Master Willix. She remained annoyingly reticent about various topics that Ves most wanted to know.

"You don't have to concern yourself too much with reserving space for resonating exotics." Willix dismissively answered one of his questions. "Just design your expert mech as if it is just a standard mech. I can easily modify the structure and components in a particular section so that they incorporate the right amount of resonating exotics. I will take care of all of the matters related to combining the resonating exotics in ways that will result in resonating abilities when 

activated by a compatible expert pilot. It is too soon for you to involve yourself in this process."

Naturally, she gave no exact reason why this was the case. Ves expected this already so he wasn't too upset about the lack of answers.

He could at least use this opportunity to ask other questions that were relevant to his work.

"I'm guessing Gloriana must have told you about the mounted wargear concept that I am attempting to apply to the Chimera Project, ma'am." He began. "What do you think about it? Am I going in the right direction and what aspects do I need to pay attention to in order to make it work?"

The Master directed a twinkling gaze towards him. "The idea of equipping mechs with swappable, external equipment is not a new one. The logic of it is similar to the reason why individual soldiers equip combat armor and other gear when they are in service. The assumption is that human bodies are weak and unable to exert enough strength in combat. It is for this reason that they need to rely on highly-sophisticated equipment to leverage power that is far beyond their ability to exert through natural means."

"Humanity is a technology-based race. We are not endowed with superior strength like some other alien races. We don't fight with our own bodies. We can't grow or evolve our bodies into superior combat forms, though that hasn't stopped people from trying."

Willix twitched her mouth into a disdainful sneer. "You are quite correct about that. The so-called 'Uranus' that you have experienced in person is but one of a long line of doomed attempts to redefine humanity. I am sure your little ordeal has taught you the folly of abandoning your humanity. We are strongest when we rely on our intellect and our tool-making ability to develop our society. Ordinary mechs are more than adequate for our race to satisfy our need to fight."

Ves tactfully didn't mention that warships were even better tools to wage war with. No matter what kind of mech the MTA was capable of designing, he seriously doubted that it could overpower the best of what the CFA had to offer. The incident with Uranus fully reinforced his impression that size mattered!

"Let us get back to the previous topic." She said. "I have just explained to you the rationale for humans to rely on external equipment to fight. Do you believe it applies to mechs as well?"

"Not… exactly, ma'am." Ves reluctantly answered as he thought about the issue from this angle. "Mechs are different. Human bodies are all inherently weak. Even if you can augment them, it is prohibitively expensive to make them ready for modern combat. Mechs can be weak as well, but more often than not they are quite effective in battle by themselves. Depending on their design, budget, material composition and so on, they can be fabricated in huge batches and allow many mech pilots to exert considerable strength. Yet mechs don't necessarily need to borrow all of that power."

"Why is that, Mr. Larkinson?"

"Because they are machines. They are works that can be specified and designed with great precision. We can put anything in them as long as we have the resources, know-how and technology to implement our ideas. A mech is already a war platform by itself. Mounting external equipment on it doesn't necessarily make sense from that perspective."

"I see you have made the most important realization." Master Willix nodded in approval. "Mechs, at least the most popular humanoid variety, are designed to imitate the human form, but that does not mean they have to inherit all of the weaknesses associated with our physique. In fact, the goal is quite the opposite. Mechs exist to compensate for our inherent weaknesses. Since they have to be strong in order to be useful, they are already adequate by themselves. Aside from arming them with necessary weapons, the need to mount additional modules and equipment on them grows weaker. Do you know why most of humanity doesn't bother with this versatile option?"

Ves knew that Master Willix was guiding him towards a deeper answer. He took a couple of dozen seconds to think over this issue.

"It's not efficient." He finally answered. "Sure, mounting extra modules and other gear onto mechs can strengthen their performance, but on a wider scale it is probably better to just design a higher quality mech that incorporates the added strength in a much more effective and cost-efficient manner. Due to the limitations of mounting external equipment onto mechs, a lot of potential is lost and a lot of capabilities are being wasted. In most cases, it is already sufficient to field naked mechs that are designed to handle a job without needing additional assistance."

"That is a good answer, Mr. Larkinson. Mechs are not as weak as humans, so it is a mistake to blindly apply a model that works for the latter but is never meant to be used on the former."

Ves frowned. He could hear the implicit disapproval in the Master's guidance. Fortunately, he also recognized a window which he could use to stick to his vision.

"Even if that is the case, there are exceptions for everything. I can already think of one scenario. Expert mechs and expert pilots are scarce in our clan. While I can just design a vastly superior mech for one of my expert pilots, there are limitations to this approach. Their mass and volume can only be so much before they lose the ability to duel against other expert pilots. Since I don't have that much access to excellent but extremely expensive exotics, the only other method to strengthen an expert mech is to mount wargear on its frame to make it bigger. As long as size and mass limitations are no longer a big consideration in certain battle scenarios, I can make full use of the advantage of scale to design a loadout that can give an expert mech an enormous boost of power without paying too much!"

The Master raised her eyebrow. "Your logic is not wrong, but what you save in cost and other resources, you take on significantly more burdens. You already recognize the impact that excessive gear can do to the mobility of your design. I'm told that Miss Gloriana has already told you about the resonance compatibility problem. There are numerous other issues that affect the performance of your work."

"I can manage the downsides. What we need is to improve our top-end power, and there is no easy way to do so unless you are generous enough to donate first-class exotic materials to our clan. If not, I can only resort to a more stupid method and rely on size to make one of our expert mechs stronger. Unless you can give me a better solution, I will stick to my chosen course."

Master Willix let out a soft sigh. "Your determination is stronger than I expected. Have it your way, then. I will do my best to help you integrate the resonance characteristics of your mounted wargear with the rest of your expert mech, but only once. You will have to find another consultant in order to integrate additional wargear loadouts to your special expert mechs."

Ves smiled. "This is all I want."