The Mech Touch

Chapter 7477  Greatest Son, Terrible Race

"I don't care about that cultural stuff, Gloriana. My only question is this: can it work?"

His wife fell silent for a time.

She had difficulty processing the proposal made by Ves.

His remark revealed his general ignorance of arche culture and physiology. She had to put more thought into her explanation.

"Archeshells and the bodies they are attached to form a close biological relationship with each other." She eventually said. "They partially support each other. An arche officer not only possesses a powerful and beautiful archeshell, but also invested in a body that can bear the additional mass and power. High-quality archeshells are usually comprised of many volatile exotic materials that can poison or even outright disintegrate the body of a lesser arche. I have not even talked about the invisible bonds between arche and their archeshells. Even if they have not formed an explicit Blood Pact or similar, they are still inseparable from each other by more than biological compatibility."

In other words, Gloriana saw no chance for the proposal to succeed. Even if there was a small chance that it could work, she would never allow Hekkel to be subjected to such a dangerous procedure.

Ves couldn't help but feel disappointed. It would have been a lot more convenient to take full control of the archecruiser if archeshells were a lot more interchangeable.

They exercised their brains a bit more, but failed to come up with a feasible suggestion.

"Let us inform the other parties and have them come up with solutions." Ves finally suggested. "They all have a vested interest in preserving as much of this archecruiser as possible. A ship like this is a very rare find. I am actually wondering why she was stationed here at this time and why the alien commander chose to launch a risky stealth attack, but I won't look a gift horse in the mouth."

His wife nodded in agreement. "It is a huge loss for us to allow this ship to degrade any further. I do not even care that much about who will be able to claim final ownership of this vessel. I just want the hull and all of her priceless archetech to remain as intact as possible so that I can study all of the advanced applications."

While the Larkinsons had dispatched lots of teams of technicians and engineers to conduct detailed scans of every advanced component, studying data was not as good as examining the real thing up close.

After spending a few more minutes poking around in the bridge of the archecruiser, the married couple finally concluded that there was not much more they could do without obtaining proper access permissions.

"I will leave Hekkel behind to monitor the active consoles and relay any information that may be cause for concern." She said as she stroked the top of the friendly arche engineer's shell. "I think it is best if he does not meet the captain of this vessel in person."

Gloriana had put a lot of time and effort into training her pet arche. She did not want him to harbor any conflicting loyalties when he came across a genuine high-ranking arche leader.

Besides, who knew whether the two arche might secretly communicate with each other.

After settling this matter, the pair moved over to the ceremonial hall that had incurred a substantial amount of collateral damage.

The bout between the Apocalypse Wardens and the archeshell mech had crushed bulkheads, created dents into the deck and destroyed a host of alien decorations.

The obvious marks of damage partially ruined the solemn and exotic atmosphere inside the large chamber. It seemed as if the humans had rudely invaded this holy space and desecrated the arche articles of faith.

That may very well be the case as the First Sword Mark III along with a large number of technical personnel surrounded the crippled archeshell mech.

All four severed crystalline limbs had lost much of their shine and inner light. They looked dull and powerless even as the salvaging teams carefully lifted them into shielded containers.

The thick torso and alien head that remained attached to each other still retained a bit of luminescence, but that was all. The crippled 'body' exuded a despondent air that emphasized its total defeat at the hands of a human ace mech.

"It's a pity." Ves couldn't help but comment.

"How so?"

"This fellow tried so hard to attain the alien version of godhood, only to fall short in both body and spirit. What he has been able to create is quite remarkable, but… no matter how fascinating this fusion may be, it falls short of the standards of a lesser phase lord."

"All the better for us." Gloriana replied with a selfish expression. "This form is better for us. The more radical the transformation, the more difficult it is to decipher and replicate the individual components. This half-completed state is much more convenient for my purposes. There are enough evolutions to derive dozens of advancements in archetech without having to deal with so many impassable hurdles."

"You will need for him to be alive if you want to gain the most benefits out of his unique form." Ves noted. "I am afraid that may not be easy. His spirituality is too weak relative to his new body. Suffering so much trauma and loss in a brief amount of time has made everything worse. His will to live has sunk to the bottom. I am not sure how his body works, but… if he chooses to commit suicide, I do not know how to prevent him from doing so. Perhaps the only reason why he is still clinging to life is because he wants to have a final chat."

That possible realization dampened their enthusiasm. They already had trouble with trying to preserve the archecruiser. If they had to deal with the same problem when it comes to the archeshell mech, then that would truly spoil their victory!

When the pair stopped a healthy distance from the crippled archeshell mech, they began to examine its prone form with greater interest.

The proximity helped them pick up a lot more details than viewing the same subject from a remote feed.

For example, Ves could make much better use of his spatial senses to gain a better grasp of the mechanics of the archeshell mech.

It turned out that he was not wrong when he considered it to be a forbidden merger between an archemech, a Carmine mech and a phase lord.

The archecruiser captain did not pilot this arcane construct. He had fused with it to the point where the two had become inseparable.

This condition reminded him a lot of Saint Rosa Orfan's condition. She too had become fused with her own machine to the point where it was impossible to sever her vestigial biological body from the cockpit.

There were still differences, of course.

Saint Orfan fused with a powerful but adversarial D-mech, creating lots of tensions that still caused problems to this day. The main reason why she was still able to preserve her sense of self was her Saint-level willpower.

This situation differed because the physical vessel lacked a strong spirit prior to its transformation.

Perhaps it may have gained a rudimentary form of life after its macabre assembly, but its stability was questionable. It probably consisted of a messy concentration of remnant spiritualities of all of the arche who had been forced to sacrifice their blood and archeshells to manufacture this alien construct.

Whatever sacrificial ritual the arche had improvised, it had to be sloppy and dangerous beyond all reason!

Given these flawed conditions, Ves did not feel any surprise that the archecruiser captain failed to achieve his objective.

A part of him couldn't help but feel empathy towards this alien leader. Every race pursued ascension. It was a universal desire. The arche may be an enemy of red humanity, but they still possessed many of the same dreams and aspirations.

"Can we talk to this fellow?" He asked a nearby exobiologist who looked confused more than anything.

"It… he… still shows indication of life." The expert who found himself way out of his depth eventually responded. "Some of our scanners still detect activity that suggests that he is conscious, but we are unclear whether he is still lucid enough to hold a proper conversation."

That sounded good enough to Ves. He turned towards the giant figure and began to convey his words with his voice as well as his Spirituality.

"Greetings. I am Ves Larkinson, the leader of this fleet. You may have heard of me. Know that I am ultimately responsible for your defeat. You did not lose because you were weak. You lost because I am stronger and better prepared."

A moment of silence passed before the injured and exhausted life form deigned to give a response.

"#$&@$@&."

"WE KNOW OF YOU. LARKINSON. THE GREATEST SON OF YOUR TERRIBLE RACE. YOUR COURAGE IS ADMIRABLE, BUT YOUR INVENTIONS THREATEN TO DOOM US ALL. IT IS REGRETTABLE THAT WE HAVE TO BE YOUR ENEMIES, BUT NOTHING CAN CHANGE THIS. OUR WAR WILL NEVER END UNTIL ONE RACE IS LEFT IN THE OCEAN OF RED."

Neither Ves nor Gloriana needed to resort to translation programs to interpret the alien leader's words.

Ves was able to interpret the defeated alien's words from a spiritual level.

Gloriana had mastered enough of the arche language to understand the alien speech.

This also happened to make communication a lot more convenient.

"Why do we need to be enemies?" Ves suddenly asked. "From what I know, you arche don't fit in with the rest of the major races of this dwarf galaxy. You are pariahs who have lost their homewords. Even now, you are still being denied the right to claim your own territories. Don't you hate it that your people are still forced to wander the stars like poor vagrants? Why not work together with us? We may be at war with each other at the moment, but that does not have to stay this way."

Gloriana and several other people looked shocked at Ves.

Seeking peace through diplomacy with the native aliens was still taboo!

Besides, wasn't Ves supposed to be a human supremacist? It was no secret that he opposed the Xenotechnician's ideology.

Ves couldn't help but make a rueful smile behind his helmet.

While all of those assumptions may be true, Ves felt that there may be an opportunity to make life harder for the native aliens.

At the very least, it didn't hurt to try.

If it worked, then that would give red humanity a massive boon to the war effort!

If his attempt at swaying the arche to switch sides came to nothing, then he wouldn't suffer any losses.