The Mech Touch

　　There were also cases where one or two voribugs remained undetected because they lingered around ship components that produced a lot of activity. The relatively weak lifesigns of an immature voribug would get drowned out by more powerful energy emissions of important systems.

　　Even if the Larkinsons shut down all of the systems, all of the residual heat and energy inside the alien vessels wouldn't dissipate immediately. The damn voribugs seemed to possess a vague instinct that encountered them to find the most annoying hiding spots on a starship.

　　"We can't go on like this." General Verle's projection reported to Ves. "The infestation levels on the captured alien starships are too high. The internal damage generated by the voribugs along with the external damage that our mechs have inflicted on the hulls has made it much easier for the voribugs to hide and move around."

　　Ves paused his examination of the pakklaton egg-shaped phasewater container. He frowned as he digested what he heard.

　　"I thought we stood a better chance of cleansing the starships. We're stronger and more advanced than the pakklatons. Our sensors are better and we aren't burdened by the necessity of keeping the ships operational. Have you tried taking advantage of our glows? I noticed from the recent battle that our Ferocious Piranhas are surprisingly effective in messing with the bugs."

　　That was indeed a welcome discovery. Before this point, Ves had always treated his glows as a means to affect humans.

　　Whether they were targeted towards friendlies or enemies, he never really thought about their effects on non-human entities.

　　In fact, the non-human opponents he fought against in the past were so big and powerful that he never really thought that his suppressive glows could make any difference.

　　The dark gods were so spiritually powerful that they possessed glows of their own.

　　The Uranus was so massive and powerful that glows could not have impacted his crazed bestial mentality in the slightest.

　　The Titania was so big and massive that mechs needed to breach its thick exterior at first in order to get to its control organs.

　　However, what if he employed his glows against smaller and weaker opponents?

　　While Ves figured that not every kind of glow worked against the voribugs, the recent battle had definitely concluded that the disorientation effect produced by the Ferocious Piranhas were highly effective!

　　Unlike human mech pilots, the voribugs were too young and mentally underdeveloped to resist this effect!

　　Even the so-called 'elder' voribugs were just insects that lived long enough to eat enough food to grow to their size and strength. They were a lot more powerful in a physical and biological sense but it appeared their mental development hadn't caught up to that of a highly-trained mech pilot!

　　Witnessing how his living mechs messed up the voribugs opened up a new door for Ves.

　　His mechs provided a lot more utility than he initially thought!

　　Suppressive glows might not always work well against human opponents, but there were lots of alien races whose minds and will were significantly worse. Their mentalities were 'weaker' which meant they became a lot more susceptible to the presence of strong spiritual entities.

　　This was a fundamental difference in life phases!

　　This was especially the case in the Red Ocean where lots of humans came in contact with different alien races.

　　Back in the Milky Way, humans did not need to think about fighting against alien forces.

　　Ves was the same. He had spent way too much time on visualizing his products in fights against the opponents he had fought against in the past.

　　That was fine if he stayed in the old galaxy, but he needed to revise his mental models now that he had moved to the new frontier.

　　Now that he had begun to think in this new direction, he understood that he could offer a lot more to his customers than he thought!

　　The natives of the Red Ocean probably never encountered anything like his glows. If they did, then someone would have pointed out the similarities between his solutions and an exotic application of alien technology.

　　This meant that the aliens probably lacked countermeasures against his solution.

　　Unless an alien race managed to dig up B-stone or develop a new innovation that blocked glow effects, they would remain vulnerable to his problems depending on their racial mental strength!

　　The only surefire way for voribugs and other susceptible alien races to prevent glows from screwing them over was to keep their distance from living mechs.

　　Ves calmed down a bit. A small and ridiculous-looking race like nunsers might be susceptible, but they were practically impossible to affect because many of them utilized warships that were much more powerful than the half-crippled vessels of the pakklaton refugee fleet!

　　His mechs would get blasted before they could even get close enough!

　　"Sir?" General Verle's projection asked. He was a busy man who did not have much time to spare.

　　"Ah." Ves returned his mind to the immediate situation. "What did you just say?"

　　"I replied to you that we have attempted to make use of our Ferocious Piranhas. While the mechs have been effective at driving away the voribugs from the exterior of the starships, their glows cannot reach the whole interior of the ships. The only result we have achieved is to compress the living space of the voribugs."

　　It was like flooding the outer circle of an island. The insects could still make do with half as much dry land!

　　"That does sound like a problem." Ves frowned. "It looks like you have an alternative in mind."

　　"We do. We just came up with the idea of employing the Penitent Sister battle formation to… exterminate all of the bugs at once. We have already seen how effective it can be against the elder voribugs. We will probably need Venerable Joshua's help to direct the energy attack and make sure it comprehensively sweeps through every corner of the infected alien starships."

　　"…You're asking me if you can use a battle formation, a trump card designed to change the outcome of major battles, to delouse our prizes?"

　　General Verle apologetically shrugged. "It is the most convenient and effective solution that we can think of. The sooner we can pull this off, the less we have to worry about the ships falling apart. We have been informed that it will take a couple of weeks for a professional salvage fleet to arrive in Orange Tulip. The voribugs will remain idle during this time."

　　Though his words made sense, Ves did not like the idea in the slightest.

　　"I don't like to lose money either, but this is going way overboard. It's like using a nuclear warhead to bake a cake! It sounds wrong to employ the Superior Mother for something as banal as pest control."

　　"The voribugs are more than simple pests, sir. They are a scourge that can destroy entire ships and planets if they grow out of control. Killing them by any means is a worthy cause."

　　Ves sighed. "You're right, but that doesn't necessarily mean we should grab the biggest hammer in our toolbox. The solution that you've mentioned is way too crude. There's trees, wildlife, bioponics, organic products and other stuff inside. All of them will be affected in unknown ways if they get swept by the same indiscriminate attack."

　　"Then what do you have in mind, sir?"

　　"Hmmm." Ves thought for a moment. "Start by making use of the Everchanger. It can imitate the glow of all of my other living mechs. It can also amplify the range of its glow across a large distance. Try taking advantage of these properties and see how that works out. If you position all of the alien ships around the expert mech, Joshua will only need to do this once to affect all of the voribugs."

　　"Glows won't kill them, though." Verle retorted. "The insects will only go crazy for as long as Venerable Joshua can maintain this effect. Once he stops, the voribugs will probably go back to eating up our prize ships."

　　"Try and experiment with different glows. This is a good opportunity to see how voribugs and more generally non-humans can be affected by them. Maybe I can develop a specialized anti-voribug solution from what we are able to learn from these experiments."

　　Ves and General Verle continued to discuss the potential applications of glows towards aliens.

　　Once General Verle ended the call so that he could arrange the 'experiments,' Ves finally turned his attention back to the phasewater egg container.

　　For safety's sake, Ves did not dare to get close to it. Even though the container was highly effective in isolating the dimensional disturbances produced by gathering so much pure phasewater together, he had no idea how solid it was and whether it was up to the task.

　　A quantity of over 2 kilograms of phasewater was no joke!

　　In fact, the expeditionary fleet managed to capture even more phasewater. The pakklatons had stuffed a lot of extra phasewater inside the evacuation ship's warp drive.

　　Retrieving all of that phasewater was a delicate operation so Ves wouldn't know until a few days later how much of the substance could be recovered.

　　Even if the phasewater would have to be split between every alliance partner, the Larkinsons would still come away with a generous bounty!

　　As Ves resumed his examination on the egg container, his cat acted a bit oddly ever since Ketis handed it over.

　　"Meow…"

　　Lucky did not dare to get close to the object. The contents of the container exerted a huge amount of threat towards him! He did not even dare to employ his phasing abilities at this distance!

　　"Meow meow."

　　"You're right. I need to do something about this bomb. This container is designed to do more than isolate all of that phasewater."

　　Ves had studied it for a while now. He not only gained more confidence in the storage properties of the container, but also confirmed that it could do more than store this dangerous substance.

　　The alien circuitry and components apparently helped with regulating temperature, pressure, radiation and other factors that could affect the stability of the phasewater.

　　Just like regular water, phasewater could come in different states of matter.

　　It could be frozen like an icicle and it could be warmed up until it turned into steam.

　　The only difference was that its freezing point was way lower and its boiling point was way higher. This was also why most natural deposits of phasewater were all liquid.

　　In any case, the egg container did not have to work that hard in order to keep the phasewater inside in a stable form of liquid.

　　What Ves was actually concerned about was how this alien tech could also be used to make phasewater less stable!

　　When the phasewater inside the container boiled into a gas, it would expand in an explosive manner, thereby turning the egg container into a bomb that could deal great damage to its surroundings!

　　If that wasn't bad enough, phasewater in gaseous form was a lot more active, producing stronger dimensional disturbances that could destroy entire ships if the quantities of phasewater were great enough!

　　"I need to get this phasewater out of this alien container."

　　He had to figure out a way to extract the phasewater from this device without triggering anything dangerous. He also had to find an alternative way to store this volatile substance.

　　Ves turned to Lucky. "Hey, would you like to take a sip of phasewater?"

　　"MEOW!"

　　The cat jumped back as if he was scalded by hot water!