Chapter 6495 Diligent Mayra As the family continued to partake in their dinner, Ketis eventually proceeded to shift. her attention to Mayra. Unlike her son who possessed black hair but already started to shape up into a small swordsman, her daughter lacked the sharp edge that came with training weapons and learning how to kill in the most brutally efficient way possible. Both Ketis and Joshua were already more than satisfied with raising their son into a mighty soldier or warrior. Fighting could never be avoided in this day and age, and they wanted at least one of their children to be able to protect their loved ones by themselves. Mayra therefore had the luxury of pursuing other career options. The mother and father therefore made deliberate choices to steer Mayra away from more violent professions and develop a liking for more peaceful and productive pursuits. Fortunately, Mayra developed an early love for designing mechs. She deeply looked up to her mother and built up a keen interest in learning how to play around with emchs. Just like little Marvaine, Mayra had already begun to play with Mekano sets. Although her progress was not particularly fast, the fact that she was enjoying the process of putting different parts together and trying to invent better configurations was already enough to make her parents satisfied. "How is your progress at school, Mayra?" "My teachers say that I am doing well. My companion spirit helps me learn and remember the study material faster. I am also getting better at calculating sums. My math teacher even allows me to study ahead and try to solve equations from the textbooks meant for older students, but it is harder for me to do so. I get stuck more often and have to skip to other problems. Can you look at my work and help me solve the most difficult problems?" Ketis smiled indulgently at her daughter. "Math is easy and fun at first, but it can quickly get more and more complicated. If you ever get stuck, don't try to look up the answer on the galactic net or ask me how to solve it. Just go over the latest chapters of your textbooks and try to find a connection between theory and problem. As long as you think hard enough, you will figure out the answer eventually. Only by doing this over and over will you train your problem-solving skills. Mech designers have to solve hundreds of problems like this every day, and their difficulty is much harder the more sophisticated your mech becomes. If you cannot solve the low-level problems of these textbooks, you can forget about designing mechs in reality" It was not quite fair to expect her daughter to solve problems in textbooks meant for students who were several years older than herself, but Ketis believed her precious girl was up to the task. "Can I cultivate as well?" Mayra pleaded. "I have heard that there are many methods that can directly make you smarter. I can solve these problems much easier after I have begun my practice!" "No. Kirian may be old enough to dip his toes into cultivation, but you are still too young. The risks are too great, companion spirit or not. Wait until you are as old as Kirian before you ask me this question again. You'll be old enough to improve your control over yourself. We will also know much more how qi cultivation methods work with cases like yours. Right now, we still do not fully understand the positive and negative effects of cultivation in relation to children with companion spirits." Unlike a certain infamous Larkinson Mech Designer, Ketis was not so eager to use her own children as test subjects. The reason why she reluctantly allowed her son Kirian to practice an auxiliary qi cultivation method was because of his slightly greater age and the mental tempering that came with repeated swordsmanship practice. Having taught Kirian herself, Ketis had already sought to mold her boy into an indomitable swordsman. This made his mentality harder and better able to resist external shocks. Mayra lacked this quality, so she wouldn't be able to endure as much stress. It was better for the girl to take it easy for a few years. Ketis continued to chat with her daughter. Her lips curled in pride when she saw the shadow of herself in her daughter. In fact, the mother felt proud of both of her son and daughter. Kirian had taken after the swordmaster side of Ketis. The mother felt that Kirian would definitely be able to inherit her swordsmanship legacy. The one regret that Ketis had when training Kirian into a swordsman was that he would not be able to join the Swordmaidens. Unless he made the radical and somewhat risky decision to undergo a medical procedure that could turn him into a woman, Kirian would not be able to join the Swordmaidens. Ketis did not really feel upset about this. She would have insisted on bearing another daughter if she deeply wanted to dedicate an offspring to the Swordmaiden Mech legion. The truth was that she never felt a strong urge to do so. To Ketis, the Swordmaidens was a sisterhood. Every member of this elite and highly offense-oriented mech legion was a sister in thought if not in blood. All true Swordmaidens had long shed their attention towards bloodlines and fully embraced each other as their new family. It felt wrong for Ketis to specifically raise one of her daughters so that she would become eligible to become a Swordmaiden. The swordmaster did not see the point in this as she already had many 'sisters' in the Swordmaidens already. The addition of her daughter only added one more relative to the lineup, which did not sound impressive in the slightest. In any case, Ketis felt no regret if none of her female descendants ever chose to join the Swordmaidens. Her love and affection towards the Swordmaidens compelled her to do whatever it took to keep the mech legion 'pure'. The sisterhood developed by its members remained untainted by selfish and corrupting thoughts, and she would never wish to break such a treasure. "Mayra, since you have been playing with Mekano for a while now, have you developed a preference for a specific mech archetype? Have you taken a liking for swordsman mechs like your mom, or do you prefer to work with other mech types?" Mayra scrunched her face in a cute manner. "I can't make up my mind. I love all of the mech types, mommy. I tried to put together multiple swordsman Mekanos with the Basic Melee Mekano Set, but... it's too boring. I don't want to play with mechs armed with only swords all of the time. I tried to put together a Mekano armed with swords, spears and halberds. I really like that last one. It has so many different ways to cut that you can do a lot with this weapon. I don't know why it is more popular. I have also been trying out the Basic Ranged Mekano Set, but the toy weapons only fire weak light rays or tiny foam bullets. It is fun to see the tiny weapons fire a dozen times, but then it gets boring. I am thinking about designing a doom crawler next! I haven't made that before!" "You shouldn't try to explore radically new configurations too soon. I think you have plenty more Mekanos that you can design with the existing sets. I won't buy additional sets for you as it will only do more harm than good." "Aww..." Hearing about Mayra's latest explorations with Mekano caused Ketis to frown. The mother felt slightly disappointed that Mayra had not yet developed her love and passion for swordsman mechs. Another part of Ketis felt concerned that Mayra may have become too flighty or indecisive. All of that bouncing around reminded the Journeyman Mech Designer of Ves. The patriarch of the Larkinson Clan also possessed a restless spirit. He never seemed content to design many variations of the same mech or mech type. He always chased after novelty, which was one of the reasons why he worked so hard to innovate. Was Mayra beginning to develop in the same sort of mech designer? It would be scary if that was the case! As her mother, Ketis felt an undeniable responsibility to educate her little girl and firmly teach her that the best approach towards mech design was to pick a narrow range and stick to it for the rest of her career! "My girl, the future mech designer of the Larkinson Clan." Joshua spoke as he already began to imagine the splendid sight. "Be patient, Mayra. It will still take many years before you can graduate as a mech designer. That gives you plenty of time to decide what sort of mechs you want to design." There was not much more to talk about with Mayra as she was still too young. It would take years before she participated in a genetic aptitude test and found out what sort of talent she possessed. "Wait. Her eyes suddenly lit up as she recalled a previous but related discussion. Joshua was sharp enough to notice his wife's distraction, "What is it, Ketis?" "I suddenly had a good idea. One of the problems associated with systematic cultivation is that people are unclear of their talents and affinities to different E energy attributes. I was thinking... can we develop a way to measure the relevant data and calculate the talents and affinities of a human? I think we can prevent many people from making decisions that they would regret due to incompatibility" That sounded like a helpful suggestion. Information about systematic cultivation was still too sparse and inconsistent. Modern society thrived on information. Bad or unknown data could ruin anyone's calculations. Even Joshua recognized the immense value of being able to precisely determine one's cultivation qualifications. "That sounds like a great idea, my dear. How will you be able to implement such a device?" "I have my ideas," Ketis tested as her thoughts spun for a moment. "The test has to be conducted on a spiritual level. The MSTS is perfect for this. It already exists and it has accrued a monstrous amount of data that allowed it to reach a more perfect state. It should be able to conduct discrete measurements on the mech pilot's spirit to quickly ascertain that person's qualifications. "That only works for mech pilots and maybe Carmine mech pilots." Joshua retorted. "Maybe the Golden Cat can gather this information on her own initiative. She is already connected to every clansman." Ketis still shook her head. "You may very well be right, but it is not a universal solution. The MSTS has the advantage that it can be accessed by people outside of our clan, though only after paying us in phasewater. We may as well introduce a new service while we are at it. These are also the soldiers whose qualifications we need to know the most." The swordmaster became more and more optimistic about expanding the functionality of the MSTS, but she needed to have a good talk with Ves in order to implement this demand. In fact, Ketis also wanted to talk to him about expanding the MSTS. She understood a part of the reason why he had restricted its proliferation. It cost energy to operate a new instance every time a mech pilot connected to it. The MSTS became a growing burden to maintain upon active use. Earning a profit within 24 hours was not always guaranteed." Previously, the MSTS had to be run sparingly in order to avoid draining its reserves. Now, abundant access to E energy radiation caused everything to enjoy a glut of energy. The main problem that hindered the proliferation of the MSTS had crumbled after the start of the Age of Dawn! Not only was the MSTS able to maintain a positive energy balance a lot easier than before, it also began to acquire more complex and mysterious characteristics due to constant E energy exposure!