The Mech Touch (Web Novel)-Chapter 7152: The Future Treatment of Ascended Giants

Ves was happy to hear that Ketis was seriously trying to uplift the expeditionary fleet into a first-class mech force.

The expeditionary fleet had achieved amazing successes over the years. Its elite mech pilots had accrued a huge amount of experience and had become known as the top veterans operating in the middle zones.

They all deserved a shot at piloting first-class mechs. They could use their rich experience and combat skills to much better use by trying to stall the aliens as they attempted to dismantle the critical defensive lines in the Upper Zones. freēwēbnovel.com

The Larkinson Clan could still fill up the gap left by the expeditionary fleet by forming a new second-class fleet.

Although it wouldn’t be as good as its predecessor, this new second-class mech force could still do its job of helping to defend the middle zones so long as it was led by a strong cadre of veterans, which the Larkinsons had in abundance.

Ves would welcome the addition of Ketis and the expeditionary fleet to the upper zones.

The Larkinson Clan would gain greater importance in high society and also gained a lot of redundancy.

If the worst happened to the Premier Fleet, the Larkinsons could still rely on the other first-class fleet to protect all of their interests and deter opportunists from trying anything nefarious.

The only part that bothered Ves was that it would take an estimated 4 years to complete the uplift of the Larkinson contingent of the expeditionary fleet.

Given how many radical changes occurred in the previous 4 years, Ves fully expected the next 4 years to radically upend the Red Ocean, especially now that the mutated voribugs had exploded onto the scene.

Whether it was possible to complete the massive uplift project and whether there was still a use for the new first-class mechs remained to be seen.

There was not much Ves could do to improve the situation. Perhaps he could approach Ylvaine or the questionable prophets employed by the Red Collective to ask for glimpses of the future, but he knew that their visions could easily mislead him due their lack of reliability.

The Larkinson Clan had little choice but to take a plunge in the unknown and lock in a multi-year commitment.

Around 4 years later, Ves and the other Larkinsons would find out whether the massive investment paid off for their clan.

"I will definitely work on upgrading our staple mech models to first-class." Ves promised to Ketis. "However, I won’t be able to start on them right away. My design schedule is already packed for the remainder of the year. More specifically, the Premier Fleet needs to field first-class multipurpose mechs designed in-house. I want to complete these jobs first before I tackle your request."

Ketis nodded in understanding. "Take your time. We are not in a hurry considering that it will take more years for our second-class mech pilots to complete the necessary courses and train the required skills. Please take note that there is a limit to how much they can improve in a handful of years. Despite all of the support provided by our clan, not all of our second-class mech pilots possess the talent, the discipline or the motivation to persist. First-class mechs are faster, more powerful and more complex to operate regardless of how much you try to simplify them. The pilots who are least able to meet the elevated standards are the mech pilots who started off as third-raters. We are asking too much from this group."

Third-class mech pilots learned only a fraction of the skills and knowledge that second-class mech pilots needed to master.

Trying to make a second leap was far beyond them. They essentially had to go back to a mech academy and relearn everything but at a much higher tech level than before.

While Ves felt sympathetic towards third-raters who survived all of the previous battles and contributed so much to the rise of the Larkinson Clan, it was not viable to coddle them if they failed to keep up at this point.

The Larkinson Clan had already stepped onto a bigger stage. It urgently needed to build up more first-class forces in order to maintain a measure of security in an increasingly more dangerous dwarf galaxy.

The expeditionary fleet simply wasn’t important enough anymore. Its main role these days was to serve as a backup and a talent factory, but both responsibilities could easily be undertaken by other units.

Whatever the case, if there were Larkinsons who failed to grow any further for whatever reason, then the clan could always transfer them to one of the many second-class branches. The standards there would remain the same and they also served as good places to retire or take it easy depending on their proximity to the frontlines.

Ves did not meet with the two women in order to discuss the uplift of the expeditionary fleet.

Once they ended their discussion on Ketis’ big project, Ves briefly explained his thoughts and issues with the upcoming leadership challenge.

He already knew what Gloriana thought about it, but Ketis had yet to voice her personal feelings.

"These Ascended Giants do not actually value honor in the same way as us." Ves’ former student said with a frown. "Your descriptions and explanations lead me to believe that their fixation on honor is hollow. Perhaps they believe that they are being ’honorable’ on the surface, but their bottom lines are actually much lower than they realize. The fact that these Ascended Giants are willing to forsake their old oaths and betray everyone who has invested them with so much power and resources shows that their actual sense of honor is extremely poor by our standards."

"What does that mean for us, Ketis?"

"It means that you shouldn’t put your full trust in them. The Ascended Giants have lost the professional human soldier’s strong sense of duty and sacrifice. They would never talk about creating their own race or joining the Red Cabal otherwise. Too many of them see red humans as cattle or slaves as opposed to their brothers and sisters. If you ever manage to take them over, you need to fix this problem right away. You cannot have these Ascended Giants think they are superior to regular humans every second of the day."

Ves let out an exasperated sigh. "I know that, but this is easier said than done. All Ascended Giants are delusional, and while I definitely intend to deprogram their strange and weird ideas, I am afraid that much of it is already ingrained in their psyche. We can only make use of the forces we have, not the ones that appear in our dreams. The RC and I already have multiple ideas on how to make this work. They have become much more hierarchical and will try their best to follow the orders of their polemarchos... so long as he is strong enough to occupy this rank."

"That is one of the traits about the Ascended Giants that you can exploit." Ketis analyzed. "I can understand why they are so obsessed with strength and how it can make people desperate. All of those phase lords think that they have become the main characters of their own sagas. Everyone else is simply not as alive and valuable as them. This is why these Ascended Giants would feel little remorse if they end up joining the Red War on the side of the native aliens and begin killing lots of human troops."

"Their pride and perceived honor caused them to become prickly and way too prone to resorting to violent solutions after suffering minor slights." Ves said as if he excused them for their mental changes. "I will have to continue to maintain the strong act even if I win the leadership challenge. I can already foresee that it will be a nightmare to make sure that individual Ascended Giants do not individually defect to the native aliens under my watch."

"Is that not what your kinship networks are for?" Ketis asked.

"Yes, but not to this degree of severity. Kinship networks operate best in groups that are already highly loyal as a whole. It is like a clear lake. Any sign of pollution will not only become easily noticeable, but solving this problem can also be done quickly, easily and without any trouble. Yet what if we are not dealing with a clear like? What if we are dealing with a lake that is already polluted from top to bottom? I can’t clean out the majority of those 361 Ascended Giants. What I need to do is to nudge them back in the right direction, but counteracting so much pollution is a challenge."

Gloriana had her own opinion on this subject. "If a normal kinship network is inadequate for the purpose, can you implement a stronger one? I know it is possible. You need a kinship network that does more than encourage people to become loyal. It has to compel this quality in them. Strengthen its effect."

Ves looked shocked. "Do you know what you are talking about?! That crosses a line! You are suggesting a proposal that violates one of the most fundamental taboos of our civilization!"

"I know, but so what, Ves? Whatever force was responsible for turning them into pretender gods did it first. Do not look at it as a crime. Look at it as a correction. You are countering indoctrination with indoctrination. I see no reason why it would not work. You only need to ensure that the Ascended Giants do not get cold feet and desert before the network has time to reprogram them. Perhaps you should call them back first and make sure to surround them before issuing this demand."

While his wife’s proposal undoubtedly had promise, Ves felt very ambivalent about it. He did not want to betray the rust that the Ascended Giants put into him by brainwashing them against their will.

"It might not work." He said. "Phase lord cultivation is intricately connected to the Red Ocean. Who knows whether they will believe in their own godhood again whenever their phasewater concentration reaches another threshold."

"As long as they remain connected to the enhanced kinship network, it should be able to detect what is happening and give you time to restrict the movements of the phase lord in question." Gloriana retorted. "Then, you only need to wait for the network to do its job over time. As long as it is strong enough, it should be able to undo the damage."

The way she spoke about reprogramming the minds of the Ascended Giants sounded quite eerie to Ves. She no longer treated them as individuals. She treated them as bots that regularly got corrupted by outside influences.

Although Ves knew he could not afford to be soft-hearted towards the Ascended Giants, he truly did not want to mistreat them to this degree.

There was another problem. The Dark Apostle definitely wouldn’t like this proposal as he identified much more with the Ascended Giants than red humanity. It may turn into a huge topic of contention once he was able to voice his opinions.

"What do you think, Ketis?" He asked in the hopes of getting a second opinion.

The swordmaster responded with a quiet voice. "If the Ascended Giants aspire to form their own race that is seperate from red humanity, then technically you don’t have to extend human rights to them anymore. Let them form their own race if they want it so badly. Enslave them right afterwards. Make sure that they all become foot soldiers and cannon fodder in our war against the native aliens and the mutated voribugs. We need all of the bodies we can get, and we can’t always get them by being the nice guys."

What an extreme opinion!

There was a certain cold logic to Ketis’ argument, but Ves knew that it would lead to a huge amount of political repercussions.

There was no way the Red Collective would accept such a radical solution!

Perhaps the collies and the rest of red humanity might agree to implement this proposal if the Ascended Giants had already defected to the Red Cabal.

Even then, it was easier to execute them and start over with a new batch of human phase lords!

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