The Mech Touch

Chapter 7611 Mother Crystal

Ves transmitted a message that contained his thoughts about trading a large share of their spoils to willing trading partners.

He planned to discuss this subject with her in greater detail after this meeting.

The Larkinson Clan needed to take advantage of this opportunity while the prices for these deathborn trinkets were still ridiculously high.

The more time passed by, the greater the probability that the Red Three and the other major players managed to get their hands on a sufficient number of alien specimens.

After all, the Hypeh-Tekas System was still in the hands of the Blackwater Summoner and his new allies.

The source of the dark miasma remained untouched and still served as a notable stronghold of the deathborn race. There was no way that either of the two were willing to give up now that they had committed so much to this endeavor.

The deathborn was bound to rebuild their temple complex and expand their colonial infrastructure even further.

They may even begin to expand their presence in other star systems in order to prevent a decapitation strike from wiping out all of their progress at once!

In short, the deathborn were bound to flourish so long as the native aliens did not regard them as enemies that had to be eliminated right away.

That would subsequently make it easier for future human expedition fleets to drop in and pick up lots of samples of deathborn technologies.

Ves seriously doubted that the human raiders would have much trouble gathering large quantities of seemingly mundane items such as acceleration boots and reinforcement bands!

Of course, it still took a considerable amount of time and effort to organize these raiding runs. Many of the major players also could not afford to redirect a substantial force of mechs and warships without weakening their existing military obligations.

That made trade with the Larkinsons so attractive, allowing the latter to demand higher prices.

Still, as much as Ves looked forward to securing valuable concessions such as high-end cultivation knowledge and additional RF Warship Tokens, he still felt a little disappointed that he had yet to encounter anything truly powerful or dangerous.

He knew that the RC search parties had managed to salvage far more goods than these modest goods.

"All of this stuff is good and all, but… my clansmen haven't fought and died just to obtain a bunch of research material." Ves said without bothering to hide his faint sense of disappointment. "I know you guys also managed to salvage more powerful specimens. Do you have anything that is both powerful and usable in the short term?"

The request caused the formation master to fall silent for a time. Several seconds passed before she slowly nodded her head.

"There may be one relic that meets your requirements, but… we still lack too much information to guarantee everyone's safety. If you insist on examining it, we will have to bring you to one of our larger and most secure labs."

"Then let's go."

The group exited the current chamber and moved down the corridors before passing through another secure checkpoint.

Ves noted that the bulkheads were thicker this time. The blast doors particularly looked as if they could withstand a number of hits from a mech-grade weapon. Once they passed through, he confirmed his suspicion that the entire secure lab had been designed as a self-containing block.

If the Moloch ever got threatened, she could eject the entire secure lab in the hopes that other vessels could successfully retrieve the block and its precious contents!

Of course, if a situation had already deteriorated to this point, the enemy would likely put a lot of effort into ruining this process.

"What you are about to approach is a known exotic radiation source. While not all of you are susceptible to it, please follow protocol and change into your hazard suits."

A set of lockers slid open. Everyone aside from Lucky donned their respective suits.

"These are new." Ves remarked as he donned his black-coated hazard suit. "I can see that you also incorporated some of the materials salvaged from the temple complex."

"They are. We designed a variant of one of the standard models. The most important difference is that we have reinforced the exterior with deathstone and hyper alloys that are much more effective at blocking death energy and other negative energies. We have also carved rudimentary spell arrays that further strengthens this purpose."

The suits certainly gave each of them a much greater sense of security.

"This feels stuffy." Andraste complained as her thick suit looked proportionally more clumsy on her smaller frame.

"Meow."

"Even Lucky agrees."

"Just bear with it, honey."

Once they completed this step, they entered an observation room where a handful of collies wearing similar hazard suits sat behind their workstations.

"Sir. Ma'am. Welcome to our lab."

"Report."

"The Mother Crystal still remains stable, but not completely inert. It is continuing to radiate a low degree of mixed negative energies as before."

"Mother Crystal?" Ves asked. "Is that what you call this big chunk of green crystal?"

"That is correct, sir. We originally referred to it as the Large Mother Deathcrystal Fragment. This is derived from the Mother Deathcrystal, which is our own term for the massive green crystal that used to power the temple complex at its center before its catastrophic destruction at the hands of the Riot. When our salvaging operations began, retrieving the remains of this priceless crystal was our highest priority. This fragment is one of the few that we have managed to obtain, and it is by far the largest of its kind. Other fragments are much smaller in comparison."

He could believe that. Compared to the size of the original 'Mother Deathcrystal', the fragment cradled in the center of a highly shielded lab chamber was only a fraction of the former's size.

It was roughly the size of a small shuttle, but still looked remarkably good. Its sides were mostly flat and angled neatly from each other.

Even the side that used to be attached to the rest of the Mother Deathcrystal showed off a clean break!

This made the large fragment special as it still contained a lot of death energy. More importantly than that, it also showed a hint of structured activity. Its glowing center still generated pulses of light at a consistent frequency.

"Who has a claim on this crystal?"

"Your clan." Andrea Vos answered. "You and your clan are entitled to the largest share of the spoils. According to the current distribution plan, this particular crystal fragment is yours, though all of the other crystal fragments that are smaller but still formidable in size have already been claimed by your allies. This can still change if you decide that you would like to exchange it for other valuable prizes and rewards."

There was no way Ves would be willing to trade it for anything else!

Even if the Larkinson Clan lacked the research capacity to make heads or tails of this large green crystal, he could clearly tell that it was still rare and powerful.

It would be nearly impossible for the Larkinsons to obtain anything similar to it unless they raided another deathborn stronghold in the future!

It did not matter too much to him if none of the researchers of the Larkinsons managed to get anything useful out of this big boy. Ves already came up with a few crazy plans to harness its power for his own use.

Sure, his methods would probably waste much of the potential of this large crystal fragment, but as long as he succeeded, the results should still go on expanding his understanding of mechs!

"I take it that this crystal did not come out of nowhere."

"As you can surmise, this deathcrystal fragment is extraordinary because it still maintains a clean shape despite the calamity that has befallen the original Mother Deathcrystal." The Farseer explained to Ves. "Our studies in other deathcrystals and deathcrystal fragments has taught us that shape is a key variable to these alien constructs. Irregular surfaces somehow cause these green crystals to lose their cohesion. They stop functioning properly and leak out death energy as if a balloon has popped. We theorize that the deathcrystals are designed to function as closed or at least semi-closed systems. This is logical if you equate them to circuit boards or any other electrical system for that matter."

If that was true, then deathcrystals sort of functioned as machines in their own right. The biggest difference was that they ran on death energy rather than plain old electrical energy as their power source.

"Okay." He said. "This is clearly cool, but… have you figured out what it can actually do? I mean, anyone can guess that this fragment can still pull off a few tricks, but I imagine that it is very risky to experiment with it. I can't get an exact read on how much death energy is left inside, but it looks like it is very considerable. Nothing good will happen if this fragment discharges it all at once."

"That is correct, sir. We dare not take risks with such a powerful and potentially volatile object. Proper testing can only proceed once you have brought it to a purpose-built lab that is preferably situated in an isolated location that is several light-hours away from any human population centers. However, we have not remained completely passive. My men and I have not been able to hold back from conducting a host of minor tests."

"What sort of minor tests?"

"We have learned several rudimentary methods that allow us to manipulate deathcrystals in a superficial manner." She responded. "Before you ask, we made these discoveries when experimenting with much smaller deathcrystals."

"I see. That sounds… a little more sensible, not entirely free from risk. What works fine with a tiny crystal might produce a very different outcome when you handle something as large as this. I hope it has been worth it, Andrea."

The woman smiled at him. "Then you will be happy with what you are about to witness next."

She passed on a few precise instructions to the other scientists.

Shortly afterwards, a free mechanical arm descended from the ceiling. It unfolded and cautiously started to reach towards the large fragment.

The arm extended a metallic finger and began to tap the surface of the glowing green crystal at several different angles.

It looked completely random to Ves, but he guessed that the pattern was definitely deliberate in nature. They just hadn't figured out its underlying rules and formulas.

Whatever the case, as soon as the mechanical arm finished tapping, the Large Mother Crystal Fragment suddenly started to pulse its glow at a higher frequency than before!

Ves almost took a step back when he sensed that the crystal became more active.

"What is happening?!" Andraste cried out as she could also feel the large object begin to mobilize its formidable energy reserves.

He extended his arm and held her shoulder in a reassuring fashion.

Meanwhile, the crystal began to pulse faster and faster before it projected a large green sphere!

At first, the projected green globe did not seem special.

It was only when Ves tried to look deeper that he began to detect hundreds of bright spots of light. Most of them were clustered around the center, though there were also other clusters located a bit further away.

"This looks… like the output of a detection array." He commented. "What is it picking up? Not starships. Not organisms."

The Farseer supplied the answer. "As far as we can surmise, it is detecting deathcrystals or elevated concentrations of death energy. We haven't been able to rule out either possibility as of yet. Regardless, this function alone makes this large fragment valuable to any combat force, as it can be used to detect the presence of deathborn or their tech at considerable distances."

"Are you sure about that? The range of this detection function does not look impressive if these clusters belong to other ships that are carrying deathborn spoils."

"This is just the default setting. We have already found a way to 'zoom out' so that the projected display can cover larger distances."

The same mechanical arm as before pressed a metallic finger across the surface of the large fragment and began to drag it in a circular fashion.

This drastically shrunk the clusters of light until they pretty much merged into a single point of light at the very center.

What was remarkable was that a handful of other points of light started to show up at the edges of the projected sphere!

"Is that…!?"

The Farseer smirked. "We have already compared this display to our star charts and confirmed that they correspond to other star systems in the region. What you are likely seeing is a map that displays the coordinates of other deathborn or deathborn technology. Whether it is truly real-time has not been completely verified, but we strongly believe this to be the case. In other words, there is no delay. This alien sensor is able to precisely pinpoint the presence and locations of possible enemy units across at least a dozen light-years!"

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