The Mech Touch (Web Novel)

A mech designer did not suddenly improve all of a sudden. It was impossible.

Certainly, incidents of enlightenment frequently occured where mech designers passed a crucial turning point in their understanding of a specific field.

Yet those cases were not only rare, but also took place after a long period of precipitation.

The sudden boost in understanding and application on energy transmission systems was anything but normal! Ves was a mech designer who specialized in a more esoteric field. Achieving successive breakthroughs in the field of Electrical Engineering and other related fields was too ludicrous!

Even if Ves possessed an implant, it was not as simple as downloading a huge amount of textbooks and academic journal articles!

Rote memorization without taking the time to understand and internalize what they actually taught was pointless.

This happened to be the unique strength of the System. It was capable of making Ves absorb a huge amount of knowledge as if he truly spent months and years of diligently studying a lot of books.

Even if the Big Two somehow managed to develop this amazing technology, it would certainly be reserved for themselves. There was no way a tiny figure like Ves could have access to such an astounding means!

Therefore, Gloriana couldn't believe that Ves had improved. According to her, he must have consulted some other mech designer!

"Who is it, Ves?!" She imperiously placed her hands on her hips. "Is it Professor Ventag? No, it shouldn't. The improvements don't carry his style."

"It was all me! I can prove it to you! I still have some ideas left to implement, so let me demonstrate."

He disliked it whenever Gloriana questioned his competence! Even though he didn't specialize in technical mech design like her, that did not mean he was a drooling idiot when it came to this important aspect.

Every mech was a machine! Ves still understood this truth, so he often reminded himself not to neglect this aspect. Playing with Spirituality may be a crucial part of his main specialization, but that did not mean that he should neglect the fundamentals of his profession. He was not his mother! He followed his own path!

As Ves sat down behind a terminal and began to refine the energy siphoning mechanism of the extra appendages of their Hexer mech, Gloriana curiously observed his work.

It didn't take long before she started to feel less confident about her assertion. Before her eyes, Ves seemed like a different mech designer from yesterday.

All of a sudden, he solved numerous problems while mitigating other issues to a much better degree than before!

Though the overall gain in efficiency was only as little as 5 percent, this was already a huge accomplishment. When their project had reached their stage, most of their design choices had been setting, which meant that there was very little leeway to squeeze more performance gains.

To achieve small but solid performance gains with just a short amount of work was nothing but mind blowing to Gloriana!

"This is impossible!"

She had worked years alongside Ves! She knew exactly what he was capable of! They had collaborated on so many mech designs that she could probably draft a reasonably accurate list of all of his skills and competences!

Now, she suddenly discovered that she severely misjudged his capabilities. Or did she?

The wheels in her mind spinned at unheard speeds. However, the more she observed the solutions conjured up by Ves, the more she became enthralled by the elegant and sophisticated methods he employed.

A lot of problems were akin to trying to deliver a parcel from one city to another city.

Previously, they dabbled with relatively low tech solutions such as making someone bring the parcel to its intended destination by foot or by horse.

None of these solutions satisfied the pair. They were too slow and inefficient. Yet they couldn't come up with anything better.

Yesterday, Gloriana was pretty sure that they were both at this level.

Yet for some inexplicable reason, Ves had suddenly improved to the point where he was able to build a shuttle from scratch that could be used to deliver the parcel to its destination at a much greater speed than before!

Even if this analogy was a bit too exaggerated, it aptly described the shock she felt. This much difference in a span of a single day was simply too ludicrous!

Sadly, her imagination was only so big. She could never conceive of a notion that Ves made use of something as heaven-defying as the Mech Designer System.

That did not mean that Ves may have used other unorthodox means to gain enlightenment. It was just that Gloriana couldn't put much stock in all of those low-probability possibilities.

After a long time, she eventually came to a conclusion. This was not the first time that Ves pulled off something inexplicable behind her back. She quickly recalled how Ves abruptly showed off a Bright Warrior design that was considerably more refined and improved than before.

Though Gloriana studied her boyfriend's history extensively, there were still a considerable amount of holes in his background.

Just like Master Willix, she increasingly suspected that Ves enjoyed a secret relationship with a very competent mech designer!

If this 'Mr. S.' had struck again, then everything could be explained. Perhaps this presumed Master Mech Designer had given Ves a lot of relevant points yesterday! That would explain most of the improvements!

She looked increasingly more determined. This must be what had happened!

As Ves worked on the design, he had kept one eye on his girlfriend. He easily caught the changes in her expression.

He tried his best to hold back his grin.

From the start, he already knew it would be difficult to explain this sudden jump in competence. It wouldn't be long before he fully digested Senior-level Electrical Engineering.

Such a comprehensive jump was too difficult to hide from an observant mech designer like Gloriana!

He didn't want his sudden improvement. He didn't spend an enormous amount of DP to let his newly-upgraded Skill collect dust! He wanted to make immediate use of it to elevate the quality of his subsequent mech designs.

In addition, this wasn't the first time he improved so suddenly. Ves wanted to set a pattern where Gloriana wouldn't take much notice of his changes, because he definitely intended to spend his DP in the same manner again in the future!

This was why he decided to openly show off his improvements to Gloriana. It didn't matter if he declined to say anything. People like Gloriana tended to make their own conclusions. This was something that Ves had already exploited on other people.

As expected, Gloriana looked much more at ease with herself now that she constructed a plausible explanation in her mind. She no longer looked interested in pursuing the matter further, but became fully engrossed at all of the alterations that Ves had made to their mech design!

This was another good way to distract her. She always became enthralled by anything that brought a mech design closer to perfection.

As long as Ves triggered her obsession, she instantly switched to a one-track mind! Nothing else mattered to her whenever she saw an opportunity to increase her ability to design a better mech!

At the end of the day, the Hexer mech design had gained a comprehensive improvement. Ves hadn't even finished yet but its performance had already become a lot smoother!

Due to the nature of his changes, the upper limit of the male Hexer mech hadn't improved all that much.

What Ves actually did was to increase the design's internal resilience. He improved the rigor of the internal components and how they interacted with each other. Their ability to endure a large burden had improved and they became much less prone to malfunctions or rapid degradation due to all of the dense energy transmissions running through the mech.

The heat capacity of the mech had also been improved, though Ves didn't have enough time to push through all of the changes. However, he had shown off enough solutions to make it clear that there was still considerable room for improvement in this aspect!

"How didn't I think of that!" Gloriana gasped.

She uttered those words many today. Though Ves only picked up two Sub-Skills and internalized just a portion of Senior-level Electrical Engineering, the new knowledge he had at his disposal was still something she hadn't studied herself!

One scary aspect about her was that she learned quickly.

The next day, as soon as Ves was about to resume his design session, Gloriana sat down at the terminal and began to demonstrate her own solution!

"What?!" Ves widened his eyes.

"I've been thinking a lot of what you have shown. I think I figured out the essence of your methods. As long as I understand the theory, I can apply the same solution to every other related problem!"

What Ves had shown off the day before was very complicated, but not that diverse. Many of the problems related to the mech design shared the same shortcomings.

As long as one of them developed a solution for one problem, they could easily apply the same formula to other related problems!

Though Ves was surprised at her learning efficiency, he soon accepted it. Now that she became capable of solving the same problems as him, they could both work on improving the mech design!

In fact, in many cases, it was Gloriana who came up with the formula and it was Ves that borrowed her work. It wasn't often that she was on the receiving side!

They proceeded to work on the mech design with gusto over the next week. The more time passed, the more Ves absorbed more knowledge on Electrical Engineering.

Much of the latter knowledge no longer held any relations to their current mech design, though, so Ves hadn't been able to come up with fantastic new solutions.

It was already enough. The sheer depth and breadth of Senior-level Electrical Engineering wasn't something that could fit inside a single textbook! Ves practically absorbed half a study room's worth of theories, formulas and other goodies!

Applying such a tiny fraction of it onto their current mech design already made a substantial difference. Ves believed that the result they achieved was not that different from bringing in a Senior Mech Designer as a consultant!

At the end of this design session, Ves and Gloriana both became a lot more at ease with their mech. While its overall level of refinement still couldn't match the excellence of a highly-optimized Hexer mech design, it was slightly better than the work of most other Journeymen!

"I think our first iteration is ready for prototype testing." Ves confidently declared.

While Gloriana still wanted to spend some time on optimizing it further, she reluctantly agreed.

There was only so much that simulation testing could reveal. It was not a good thing to rely too much on mathematical models and approximations of reality to assume the mech would perform well in any given scenarios.

Assumptions had to be tested! That was the custom in the mech industry!

"Who will fabricate the prototype?" She asked.

That was a good question, and one that momentarily stumped Ves. He initially wanted to leave this task to his design teams, but he immediately pulled back this suggestion.

Their Hexer mech design was too sophisticated! Not only that, it incorporated a lot of restricted Hexer-developed technology and components that couldn't be spread!

Though the pair could easily do it themselves, if they did so, that would make the creation of their first production model a lot less special.

That was something that neither of them wanted.

"Maybe we could ask another mech designer's help." Ves suggested. "Don't forget that we are currently in Cinach VI. There are loads of mech companies on this planet, and several of them are led by Seniors."

"I'm aware of that." Gloriana stated. "While I'm sure that they are capable enough to fabricate a mech of this caliber, I am pretty certain they won't be allowed to do so. Let me look into this matter."