The Mech Touch

A day went by without yielding any fruitful results.

Despite all of the uplifting glows, it was hard for the more impatient Larkinsons to maintain the belief they were engaging in a productive mission.

The digging pace was as slow as ever as the Worker Bees did not dare to extend the tunnel too quickly. They remained as careful as ever in order to give all of the different detection methods time to investigate what was up ahead.

Since Ves wasn't sure whether the angle they were digging in was completely correct, he regularly paid attention to the scanning results from the Minerva and the Everchanger.

Though Commander Casella wasn't able to translate her impressions into a precise map, it was enough for her to give him a summary of what she detected around her expert mech.

The Everchanger played a more useful role in this setting. The Odineye was a powerful active sensor module that happened to be decently effective at penetrating its sights through the soil.

Still, neither of the two expert mechs detected anything unusual even after the mining mechs advanced dozens of kilometers underneath the surface of the moon.

Ves had remained fairly close at hand. He had rebuffed every request to stay away and made sure the armored shuttle he was on kept pace with the main group.

Of course, he did not object to placing his shuttle well behind the mining mechs and the Sentinel mechs.

The Everchanger was close at hand most of the time. With the protection of an expert mech, Ves did not think that anything could stop his vehicle from evacuating if anything went wrong.

A part of him even wished an incident would happen just so that he could break the monotony. The lack of results was beginning to wear down his patience!

The mining director who had taken charge of this special mining operation also started to entertain a few doubts.

"What if an alien starship sunk into this moon but managed to lift off shortly afterwards? We may be following a trajectory to an object that has already made its way out. Even if it is still there, so many changes must have taken place underneath the surface that the moon may have pushed it far beyond our range."

Ves crossed his arms and continued to monitor the incoming observation data with just as much diligence as before.

His irritation notwithstanding, he still did not relax in any way. If he was able to fabricate a mech for one straight week, he could remain alert and continue to stare at boring sensor readings for hours on end.

"The cluster of resonating exotics is an incredibly odd and unnatural occurrence." Ves stated. "Humanity has only encountered a few cases like these, and many of them are created by obvious external factors. I don't believe this instance is any different. Whether the cause of all of those resonating exotics has left or not, I still don't want to give up our search too soon."

"What if we are heading in the wrong direction, sir? The line you drew yesterday might not match reality. Not only might we be heading down in the wrong angle, the passage of the source may not have been straight in the first place."

Ves slowly nodded. "All of those possibilities are valid, but that does not mean that I am ready to give up. I first want to know whether going any deeper at this angle will yield any results before I am ready to consider alternatives."

Unfortunately for the Larkinsons, the second day yielded no results either.

They began to pierce through several distinctly different layers that consisted of different matter, but none of them were particularly interesting to the Larkinsons.

It became increasingly more troublesome to dig deeper. The Worker Bee mechs had to transport the excavated soil all the way up to the surface in order to avoid clogging up the increasingly longer tunnel.

In addition to that, reinforcing the tunnel walls became more cumbersome as well. While collapses wouldn't doom everyone, they were highly inconvenient and could massively slow down their current progress.

"How much further do we need to dig?!"

Morale wore down as well. The clansmen became increasingly numb and no longer held any bold expectations about whatever treasures they might find.

Even Ves had to decide whether it was fruitful to continue digging so deep. Would it be better to go back to the resonating exotics cluster and branch out from there? Perhaps the source he was looking for may have veered to the side.

"I need more information."

He directed his attention to the Everchanger. The mech had remained active for many hours at a time. It only went offline to replenish its energy cells and give Joshua a break.

Ves thought about all of the prime abilities that Joshua had created with the design spirits that he was acquainted with. He possessed a strong talent in befriending other entities!

He opened a new communication channel.

"Venerable Joshua."

"Yes, patriarch?"

"What do you think about this operation so far?" Ves asked.

"You're the boss. It's not my place to say whether we should be doing this. I don't know how long this will take, though. Will we continue to tunnel through the soil until we emerge on the surface again?"

"I don't know, Joshua."

Since the trajectory sunk into the moon at an angle, the Larkinsons did not need to dig through the most difficult core of the satellite in order to reach the other side.

However, Ves did not want to waste too much time here. He did not think an object that had passed thousands of kilometers of increasingly more dense matter would have stayed put in the middle if it reached such a depth!

He needed to change the game.

"Joshua. Can you switch the Everchanger's glow to that of Ylvaine and request his guidance?"

"Will do, sir."

It took no effort at all for the Everchanger to adopt a completely different glow than before. The green mech took on a holy aura that only grew stronger as Joshua summoned up his full willpower in order to form the deepest connection to Ylvaine that he could manage!

Nearby Larkinsons grew hopeful again. They hoped that the so-called 'Great Prophet' might offer them a quick way out by pointing out the direction that they should actually be digging towards!

However, as two solid went by, neither Joshua nor the Everchanger showed any changes.

Ves could sense that Joshua, the Everchanger and Ylvaine were being quite active, but that was not enough to yield a good result.

Eventually, Joshua stopped resonating with his mech. The pure white corona around the Everchanger dimmed to a faint level.

"I'm sorry, sir. I tried my best, but Ylvaine can't help us this time." Joshua apologetically answered. "There are too many reasons why he can't find anything. We don't know what we're looking for. A lot of time must have passed as well. So many different things have happened on this moon that looking for our target is like finding a needle in a haystack!"

Ves grimaced. "I understand. I had those suspicions well, but it is still unfortunate to hear that Ylvaine hasn't been able to find any clues."

The Great Prophet was not a god. He was just a design spirit that had grown rather slowly compared to his more popular peers.

Though the population of Ylvainans had slowly grown in the Larkinson Clan, the amount of mech pilots able to provide spiritual feedback only amounted to a few hundred individuals!

This was not a healthy base to supply spiritual feedback to a design spirit. Although Commander Taon Melin was an expert candidate, the Ylvainan champion was too weak compared to an expert pilot.

Trisk, who emerged much later than Ylvaine, was already starting to catch up due to serving as the design spirit of the Dark Zephyr!

Venerable Tusa was able to provide spiritual feedback at quantities that surpassed millions of regular mech pilots!

Not only that, but the quality of his spiritual feedback was also higher, which allowed Trisk to begin evolving to a higher state.

"I really haven't done much justice to Ylvaine." Ves belatedly realized.

He couldn't help it. He was too busy. Not only did he have a lot of projects on his mind, he also had to cater to many different parties and interest groups.

His collection of design spirits was increasing every year and it became increasingly more cumbersome to give each of them his personal attention.

That didn't excuse his negligence towards Ylvaine.

Though Ves and Dulo Voiken had designed the Transcendent Charger in order to diversify and ready the Eye of Ylvaine for future expansion, nothing would change in the short term.

The lack of mech capacity in the fleet meant that it was impossible for Ylvaine to gain more sources of spiritual feedback!

"Maybe… I should figure out a way to incorporate Ylvaine in a commercial mech." Ves considered.

That was a substantial break from the past. Just like the Superior Mother, Ylvaine was a picky design spirit.

Only sincere adherents to the Ylvainan Faith gained his approval and support.

The mechs designed with Ylvaine in mind also had to be designed with Ylvaine in mind from the onset. The religious design spirit did not like it when he had to share space with others.

The only exception to these rules was Venerable Joshua and the Everchanger. Neither of the two possessed authentic ties to the Ylvainan Faith and only got away with becoming friends with Ylvaine because of their insanely high compatibility with every form of life!

"I can't use Joshua and the Everchanger as examples." Ves regretfully concluded.

Designing an Ylvainan mech that was both useful and commercially viable was impossible.

It wasn't like this in the past. Back when he was on good terms with the Ylvaine Protectorate, the state and its people had embraced his Ylvainan mechs.

Sadly, its government had turned away from the Hexers and embraced the Fridaymen as their new backers. Though the decision made sense, Ves had learned an unforgettable lesson from this betrayal.

Now that the Friday Coalition was about to win the Komodo War and take over the entire star sector, there was no chance in hell that the Ylvainan Protectorate would open up its mech market to the Living Mech Corporation!

Without this massive spiritual feedback channel, Ylvaine's growth had only grown slightly for several years. It should not have been a surprise that the Great Prophet didn't possess enough power and ability to provide Ves with the guidance that he needed to solve the current mystery.

He wasn't satisfied with the current situation any longer! Making Ylvaine stronger benefited Ves and his entire clan because they would gain access to a more effective early warning system if this happened!

Outside of looking for threats, a stronger Ylvaine could also provide a lot more hints if Ves ever wanted to find anything important.

"What can I do to strengthen Ylvaine?"

Ves knocked his fist against the side of his helmet a few times. He tried to come up with numerous solutions, but none of them were obviously good.

"I am not going to encourage my own men to convert to this faith!"

What else could he do, then?

"Should I try and spread the Ylvainan Faith among other people?"

Ves… deeply felt repelled by this idea. He disliked religion and never fully bought into Prophet Ylvaine's claptrap.

As far as he was concerned, the original prophet was just a charlatan who happened to be spiritually gifted. This endowment caused his persuasion to skyrocket and allowed him to convert much more people into his cult than normal.

The old charlatan died for a good reason and Ves did not want to play a part in spreading further superstition!

This left him in a difficult spot. He didn't want to spread the Ylvainan Faith among his own people and humanity in general. None of them deserved to dedicate their lives to false beliefs.

"That's pretty much all of humanity. Who else can I hoodwink, then?"

He suddenly came up with a strange idea.

"Wait a minute… there are more people than humans in my fleet. Aren't there a lot of alien captives aboard the Dragon's Den?"

A highly unorthodox idea emerged from his mind.