The Mech Touch

While a few expert pilots got hit a bit harder than the others, their conditions had not deteriorated after the session had concluded.

Their moods and physical states were actually better than the norm!

Compared to the vast majority of test subjects that ingested the same general cultivation elixir, the unique circumstances of the Larkinsons and the Glory Seekers substantially increased their tolerance towards these treatments.

Although Jovy didn't mention it, Ves bet that the mechers had probably developed a much greater interest towards his innovations due to these results!

Kinship networks and companion spirits just gained greater value now that they had proven their utility in at least one additional case!

After the Tarrasque teleported Ves and the other pilots back to the expeditionary fleet, many of them just wanted to take a long break.

"I need to get back to my wife and kids."

"I should go to my living mech."

"I wonder how much my resonance strength has grown."

Ves did not let the expert pilots depart right away. He cleared his throat in order to capture their attention.

"I understand that you are all incredibly exhausted due to the strain that you have just been subjected to, but you're not free to go yet. As much as I want you to go off and take the rest of the week off, we can't assume that everything is fine just because the mechers have said so. While I trust their examinations to be accurate, it is never wise to blindly trust other people's input. I must insist that all of you go through one more examination before you are truly free."

The expert pilots did not like this at all, but Ves exerted enough pressure for them to go through this additional hurdle.

Fortunately, the examination did not last too long. Venerable Tusa, Venerable Joshua and all of the others merely had to spend a few minutes as various scanning devices examined their bodies from top to bottom.

A bot also extended a device that painlessly drew a sample of blood from each expert pilot.

None of the test subjects thought that this was anything more than a routine checkup. Once Ves finally let them go, he eagerly laid his eyes on the small vials of rich and delectable blood.

"Marvellous."

Ves did not actually sense that much power from these small blood samples.

This was not a surprise.

When it came down to it, expert pilots were willpower cultivators that solely invested their energies into strengthening their willpower.

While they occasionally managed to strengthen their flesh and blood, these were more incidental benefits than anything.

What truly mattered was that their minds and wills underwent explosive growth so that they could exert more power through their mechs!

In any case, Ves should not expect too much from these blood samples. He needed to temper his expectations. There was no way he could produce anything amazing from the blood of expert pilots.

His enthusiasm still remained high when he moved to his private design lab. The facility had gained a number of biotechnology-related instruments fairly recently, so Ves had everything he needed to perform a basic exploration of the harvested blood samples.

As the sophisticated machines started to spit out lots of data, few of the numbers mean anything to him. He lacked the expertise to interpret the most obscure data points. He only really paid attention to a small amount of parameters that essentially told him that the expert pilots were a little stronger than average humans.

What truly mattered to him was the extraordinary factors contained within the blood. Each blood cell was produced from a body that was constantly exposed to the force of will of an expert pilot.

Ves needed to ascertain whether this interaction contaminated the blood in an extraordinary fashion.

"None of these machines can tell me the answer." He frowned.

He decided to employ a more primitive method by putting a blood sample under a microscope.

Ves did not care about taking in the appearances of individual blood cells and other junk.

The purpose of doing this was to provide Ves with a visual reference on what he actually wanted to focus upon.

"Blinky, you're up again."

"Mrow."

The Star Cat deftly dove out of Ves' head and began to attune his senses towards the small sample of blood.

Blinky's senses towards energy were much more powerful than his own. His companion spirit managed to perceive faint traces of power infused in the blood.

This lined up with what he knew and what he expected.

"It's a bit too weak to be of use."

"Mrow."

"Let's take a look at the other samples."

Ves managed to observe slight differences in power.

In general, the earlier an expert pilot broke through, the more power he was able to infuse in his blood.

The greater the resonance strength, the more potent his blood had become.

This meant that there were strong differences between Venerable Zimbro Belson and Venerable Tusa Billingsley-Larkinson.

Their breakthroughs were many years apart. Not only that, but their resonance strengths were substantially different.

The differences between Tusa and Davia Stark were even more exaggerated.

A high-tier expert pilot exerted a noticeably greater amount of influence. Venerable Stark's blood was considerably more enriched with power than Ves expected.

This told him that resonance strength was the key variable here. The stronger the pilot, the stronger the blood.

"I wonder..."

Ves needed to gather more data. He decided to instruct his clan to harvest a blood sample from his grandfather.

At the same time, he took a brief visit to one of the Spirit of Bentheim's bays. He personally collected a sample of artificial blood circulating through the Blood Star's Carmine System.

Ves glanced towards the Bastion resting nearby. "Hm, since I'm here, I might as well expand my collection."

In the end, he managed to collect samples from both of the Carmine expert mechs in his possession.

He returned to his private lab where his clansmen had delivered additional samples of blood.

Ves not only got his hands on blood taken from Venerable Benjamin, but also obtained samples taken from Venerable Jannzi, Gloriana, Aurelia, Andraste, Marvaine and Clixie!

He would have insisted on collecting Lucky's blood if his gem cat possessed any trace of organic systems!

"Interesting. Interesting!"

Ves and Blinky already managed to collect interesting data from their examinations of the new blood samples.

Just as expected, the blood of more powerful individuals contained greater traces of energies.

However, there were substantial differences between mech pilots and other humans.

Gloriana's blood was actually the weakest out of all of the samples collected so far. This was no surprise at all. Mech designers weren't known for training and empowering their bodies.

His children's blood were remarkably more enriched with power. Their blood actually possessed far greater potency than any of his expert pilots, which was a remarkable result but not one that defied his expectations!

He just never connected the dots in the past.

"My kids are much closer to primordial humans than other folk. Their bodies are naturally stronger and more infused with power as a consequence."

When it came down to it, every primordial human engaged in a little bit of natural body cultivation. Even if they never did anything deliberate to train their bodies, their physiques still grew stronger simply by absorbing the power of heaven over their lifetimes!

However, deliberate cultivation was always better than remaining passive.

This was why Andraste's blood contained a significantly higher concentration of energy than either of her siblings!

"What!? She's actually stronger than Aurelia?!"

Aurelia was older than Andraste, so Ves initially expected that the older of his two daughters possessed an advantage in this area.

What was actually the case was that Andraste's blood was considerably more fortified.

There were other anomalies that caused his second daughter's blood circulation to be considerably stronger than normal.

Ves was able to ascribe at least a few of these deviations to her combat-oriented designer genes and energy-rich supplements.

However, the extraordinary factors in her blood were still too strong and abundant.

There was only one logical explanation why his little girl had actually grown much stronger than any other girl of her age.

"It's her swordsmanship training!"

Now that he thought about it, receiving personal swordsmanship instruction from a genuine swordmaster was extremely luxurious treatment.

Andraste essentially received proper lessons on how to practice traditional swordsmanship from a genuine willpower cultivator.

Even if Ketis did not mean anything else, her words, her willpower and her other actions all rubbed off on Andraste!

The thing about primordial humans was that they were much more attuned to external energies than modern humans.

They were like sponges that could easily get contaminated by any external influence.

This was not always a bad thing. All of his children grew up under the care and attention of Ves, his wife and the Golden Cat.

What was special here was that Andraste also absorbed a notable amount of energy from Ketis!

"No wonder she has become so addicted to Ketis' swordsmanship instruction. She has spiritually imprinted on her teacher."

Ves did not know what to make of these findings. He did not necessarily assume that this was a bad development.

Still, he did not actually want his daughter to become an extreme sword fanatic either. Every swordmaster became so obsessed with traditional swordsmanship that they eschewed all other modes of combat. Rifles practically did not exist in their eyes!

"Maybe she needs to start taking lessons from mech pilots instead."

If he and his immediate family wasn't already scheduled to depart from the expeditionary fleet, Ves would have requested Venerable Davia Stark to teach marksmanship to his little girl.

"Wait... maybe I should bring an expert pilot along."

One notable name popped up. The Hex Federation originally assigned Saintess Ulrika Vraken to the expeditionary fleet with the hope that Ves would upgrade her ace mech.

He could still fulfill this purpose if he brought her along.

While this would mean that his expeditionary fleet would grow even weaker, the Golden Skull Alliance still possessed enough combat power to handle most alien threats.

Ves wanted to bring Saintess Ulrika along for additional reasons aside from subjecting his daughter to the influence of a powerful ace pilot who specialized in ranged combat.

He also developed the urge to experiment on Saintess Ulrika and her ace mech!

The Hexers trusted him a lot. They essentially gave him free rein to do what he wished to the Macharia Excelsia.

Right now, Ves had a growing urge to upgrade the Macharia Excelsia with a Carmine System just so that he could collect a lot of data related to blood!

He had a hunch that the Carmine System and the Blood Pact associated with an ace pilot were much more powerful than he could imagine!

Not only that, but having an ace pilot close at hand meant that he could not only harvest as much of her blood as he wanted, he could even experiment on her directly!

"What would happen if I inject a portion of Saintess Ulrika's blood in Andraste's body?"

The outcome would likely prove disastrous to his little girl, but it didn't necessarily have to be this way.

The existence of the Red Association's general cultivation elixirs proved that there was a viable means to safely transfer the power contained in blood to an eligible recipient.

Ves just needed to develop his own solution to this problem!

No matter what, Ves believed that there were many possible methods for him to augment his daughter!

He even speculated whether strong exposure to an ace pilot like Ulrika might positively affect the development of Andraste's genetic aptitude.

While it was not likely for this theory to be true given that no one observed this relationship in the past, Ves believed it may be different for a child that exhibited most of the traits of a primordial human!

"If my daughter has become contaminated by Ketis to the point where she has almost become a sword initiate, then getting exposed to Saintess Ulrika should definitely raise her talent in mech piloting! I am willing to bet on this hypothesis!"