Chapter 6982 The Cost of Bestowing the Potential for Greatness
Chapter 6982 The Cost of Bestowing the Potential for Greatness
After Ves gave an explanation about his latest creation, he proceeded to put it through its paces.
He used his special connection with his masterwork to possess the partial superdimensional alloy body and proceeded to control it with great familiarity and fluency.
How could Ves not understand how cats moved?
His companion spirit Blinky was a cat.
He also already had Veronica for a few years.
If he was a mech pilot, then he would have done everything in his power to tiger mech!
The tests he set up were relatively rudimentary, but they served as barely acceptable props to showcase Ferrum's powerful capabilities.
When the new cat activated his stealth systems, he became virtually undetectable at longer distances and was still damn hard to pick up at closer distances.
Unfortunately, the active stealth system supplemented with Solus plating was not completely infallible, but nothing was ever perfect.
Ferrum was incredibly scary when engaged in combat. Numerous armed dummies fell after getting struck by transphasic fire laser beams.
The thin but fiery hot beams penetrated the relatively ordinary armor of the bots and quickly burned and vaporized the internals.
"The accuracy leaves much to be desired." Casella commented as she witnessed Ferrum haphazardly winding his tail from one direction to another. "It is not advisable for this feline machine to employ this weapon system when he is deployed alongside friendly units. This tail weapon can easily rake them by accident."
"You try controlling a precision laser weapon with your tail, then! This is completely different from holding a pistol in your hand!"
Gloriana frowned at the unreliable display. "Why did you not integrate the laser weapon in a more convenient location such as the head, the paws or the side of the body?"
"There's no room!" Ves answered. "I had to stuff a lot of tech in a tiny cat-sized body. Sure, I could have made Ferrum larger, but that not only uses up more superdimensional matter, but also makes him more conspicuous and harder to hide. I chose to maintain a compact size and stuff as much tech as I can get away with. The tail happens to be a limb that facilitates balance for quadruped lifeforms, but it can be more than a simple chain of interlinking parts."
In fact, if Ves really needed to, he could still mount a miniaturized luminar crystal weapon on another part of Ferrum's body, but he simply didn't feel like it. He wanted to integrate it into the tail and that was the end of the story as far as he was concerned.
Gloriana obviously understood this truth, but she only gave him a measured look. She did not bother to argue the point.
She understood the eternal truth that boys would always be boys.
At least Ves had not made the most outrageous and juvenile choice of turning a certain other limb into a miniature luminar crystal weapon.
The weapon tests involving the claws turned into a spectacle as well. Ves was much more skilled in controlling Ferrum's limbs. The mechanical cat avatar swiped the enemy dummies and static targets with enough grace to look natural.
Even Lucky looked impressed by how easily the new cat was able to cut through energy shields and armor plating with ease.
The bite attacks were also lethal. None of the dummies had any chance of saving themselves once Ferrum latched on and bit them into pieces!
However, there was one major problem related to his arsenal.
"His claws and teeth are so short." Gloriana noted. "They are deadly alright, but they extend so little from their base that it takes time to cut through thick walls."
Ves shrugged. "It can't be helped. I can make the claws longer, but that will make it much more troublesome to store them safely inside his own body. It also takes significantly more weapon-grade superdimensional matter. That goes against my intentions. One of the reasons why I kept Ferrum small is to make him disposable. If the native aliens ever kills him or has prevented us from retrieving him, then I can readily abandon him without feeling too much pain."
Any quantity of superdimensional matter was precious at this stage, but so little of it was used to make Ferrum that the Larkinson Clan could still bear this loss.
"Will it be difficult to create a replacement for Ferrum?" Saint Dise asked.
"Not really. I won't be able to create an identical copy of him, as he was always meant to be a unique existence. However, I will be able to create a similar mechanical avatar that possesses his own unique quirks and features. Masterworks are never meant to be commodities, but there is no rule that states that I have to start from scratch every time. As long as my intention and sincerity are good enough, then it is not too difficult to create a series of masterworks based on a common template."
Gloriana and Alexa nodded their heads in understanding. They both knew about this subject to understand his argument.
The ace pilots did not quite get it, but that was okay.
"So this is how you intend to contribute to our operations from now on, Ves?"
"Yes, Casella. I am not the kind of person who can sit still when there is so much going on. It is obviously a monumentally bad idea for me to unfold my true body and let Sev come out and play, so this is the only other good alternative. Since I have the capacity to do this, I may as well do it. I think the people of the Bluejay Fleet are also happy to see me stay back and spend my time on controlling a 'cat drone' by remote. I don't even have to be in the same star system or zone in order to transfer Blinky to Ferrum, though I have to bear much greater strain and expend much more energy to perform remote avatar channeling at longer distances. This is why it is usually better if Vulcan does this on my behalf."
"Why did you not resort to him again as you have done with your other mechanical avatars?"
"That would mean that Vulcan gets to have all of the fun, Gloriana. More seriously, Vulcan has many talents, but discretion and skullduggery is not one of them. Blinky is also much more suited for dangerous missions, and is also very helpful in controlling cat bodies. If necessary, he can release E energy from the Blinkyverse and perform a variety of different spells to assist Ferrum in battle."
"How long can you sustain the connection?" Casella asked another serious question.
"I am not sure, but I think it will not be a problem to sustain it for at least a couple of hours at my current strength. The premise is that the distance is not too far, or otherwise I'll be lucky if I can maintain the connection for an hour."
Ves answered a few other questions. The Larkinsons were intrigued by Ferrum and what he represented. This was an amazing new weapon that also happened to be exceptionally lethal at close range. He could easily be used to assassinate key military commanders or even ace pilots outside of the cockpits of their mechs!
"Can other mech designers replicate what you can do?" Gloriana asked. "Can I make and deploy my own masterwork cat avatar?"
That was a question that Ves never considered. He only thought about himself when he devised this stuff.
"I am not sure to be honest." Ves responded. "You and I are masterwork mech designers at the Senior rank, which is extremely rare in our industry. I haven't talked to any Masters whether they are able to descend on their own masterworks, but I think it isn't likely. I am only able to do it because of several conditions. First, my masterworks are alive, or at least have the capacity to host my consciousness. Perhaps another artisan can do something similar by creating a high-level artifact, but this is not the only requirement. You also need the capacity to extend your awareness at a distance."
"What do you mean?"
"Incorporeal design spirits such as Vulcan are able to extend parts of themselves to many different locations." He said. "This is an inherent quality to them. Humans like you and I are much different because our spirits are anchored to our bodies. We can only rely on special techniques or tricks to break the cage of our bodies. Fortunately, both of us happen to possess companion spirits."
Gloriana frowned. "There is a problem with that. Our companion spirits cannot move too far away from our bodies."
Ves grinned back. "That is true, but have you forgotten what masterworks represent? They have become so good that we unconsciously separate a piece of ourselves and insert it into the masterwork in order to bestow it with our potential for greatness. Don't think my explanation is nonsense. It is real. I can transfer my companion spirit over to the Amaranto, the Everchanger, the Minerva and all of our masterwork mechs because they all carry tiny pieces of myself. In fact, I have imparted so much of myself to so many different works over the years that I am afraid that I may be overdoing it, especially when I have yet to gain the strength of a Master Mech Designer. Nothing comes for free."
His wife looked disturbed by his theory. "That… actually sounds plausible. I have not noticed any signs of weakening myself. I believe that it is safe enough for us if we only limit ourselves to creating a handful of masterworks a year. If our output of masterworks is higher than once a month, then we must monitor our conditions extra carefully."
"I am not too concerned." Ves dismissively waved his hand. "My Spirituality is notably stronger than yours or any other Senior Mech Designer. Besides, I am not too obsessed with maintaining a high output of masterworks. That only makes me commoditize them, which is ultimately detrimental to my craftsmanship."
The magic of masterworks had to be preserved. Quality had to come before quantity.
Alexa decided to ask her own question. "Do you think that works that reach a level of quality above masterwork may demand the creator sacrifice a greater amount of power to fuel its transcendence?"
Both Ves and Gloriana exchanged glances.
"We don't have to worry about that for a long, long time." Ves eventually replied. "For what it is worth, I think you have raised a very great point. I think your theory is plausible enough to be true. It may be the reason why we have never heard anyone below the rank of Master Mech Designer having created anything that can be classified as a grand work. It may also be one of the hidden challenges that they must overcome in order to ascend to the rank of Star Designer!"
Ves had no idea whether this was true, but it made too much sense.
He knew the approximate spiritual strength of Master Mech Designers.
He also met a few Star Designers in person and became overwhelmed by how much stronger and more encompassing they had become.
Comparing a Master Mech Designer and a Star Designer was like comparing a campfire to a forest blaze!
The latter probably possessed plenty of power to fuel the creation of a grand work.
What about the former? It would definitely exhaust itself half to death just to create a single grand work!
If this was the case, then a lot of Master Mech Designers must be working hard to grow the size and strength of their 'campfires' as much as possible.
Not only did they have to make it strong enough to feed the voracious appetites of their possible grand works, but they also had to build up enough of a safety margin to preserve their lives if they failed to break through!
All of that took a lot of time and effort. If all of this happened to be correct, then that would explain why so many Master Mech Designers languished for hundreds of years without making the ultimate jump of their careers!