After Ves concluded his confidential talk with Saint Commander Casella Ingvar, he did not hesitate to give her full support to enact her master plan. He granted her broad access to the Larkinson Clan’s funds. He also gave her authority to act on his behalf, enabling her to override the orders of any other Larkinson official. In a time of blood and war, bureaucracy would only get in the way. There were periods where stuff needed to be done properly, and there were other periods where people had to achieve results quickly. The current circumstances clearly called for the latter. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚 Of course, Ves was not completely stupid. Even if he was pretty sure that the Saint Commander had become a committed confidante, he still assigned Gavin to make sure that people monitored her activities. The Saint Commander went to work right away. Casella hosted an emergency virtual meeting with all of the officers and senior staff that currently made up the Premier Fleet. She did this in order to establish her absolute leadership position and impose her own direction into the nascent organization. She also kicked off her charm offensive by scheduling meetings with Admiral Gori Tensen, Major Simon Jankowski and Commodore Zonrad Reze. No one would dare to refuse a personal meeting with a powerful ace commander. Even the mechers and the fleeters had to bow their heads to such a potent force on the battlefield. This was already the case for ordinary ace pilots. As for the Saint Commander, her proven ability to augment both mechs and other craft had direct implications to the forces of the Bluejay Fleet. After being elevated to Knights or Barons, the already potent RA first-class multipurpose mechs may become powerful enough to pose a credible threat against lesser phase lords! As for the RA and RF warships, each of them should easily be able to withstand considerably more damage and destroy twice as many adversaries if their overall performance received a modest 20 percent enhancement. The spacers did not dare to ask for more. It was impossible for the Saint Commander to empower large warships to the same extent as small and compact mechs. Casella did not spend all of her time on winning over the members of the Bluejay Fleet. She also visited the recruiting office and told them to cast a much wider net than before. The Premier Fleet had been rather strict when it came to recruitment. Its recruiters had become accustomed to Ves’ demands and expectations. The Saint Commander had different ideas. "Much of the reason why the Premier Fleet has been slow to take off is because we are not recruiting fast enough." She explained to Ves. "Our recruitment criteria is also unnecessarily strict. Do you know how many applicants our recruiters have rejected? 99.997 percent. This is not necessarily wrong, but when the structure of our Premier Fleet has remained so understaffed, this figure is too high." "Are you saying that we must lower our standards?" Ves frowned. "Yes." Casella plainly admitted. "Look, Ves, I can understand the logic of limiting recruitment to young professionals who have earned top marks in their studies. You want to start up a fresh organization that is not tainted by other groups and is flexible enough to make rapid changes. However, there are good reasons to recruit at least some older and more experienced personnel. They provide enough stability and know-how to avoid a lot of common mistakes." Ves crossed his arms and thought about her words. "You are right, but they also think our organization should be run like that of others. That is not what I want. Our clan has developed its own culture and institutions that suit our clansmen the best." "We can preserve much of that even if we recruit a modest proportion of senior and more experienced personnel so long as our leadership reflects our vision." Casella argued back. "In this case, I am unquestionably in charge of the Premier Fleet. We do not make decisions by committee, and I have no obligation to satisfy the demands of interest groups that do not align with our objectives. There is no need for concern." Well, she at least sounded reliable enough. She had plenty of experience with leading the Living Sentinels and the expeditionary fleet, so Ves had a good amount of confidence in her management skills. "You also plan to recruit personnel that do not measure up to the standards of elites, is that correct?" "Yes, sir." Casella said. "It is not necessarily good for your entire organization to be filled with overly ambitious soldiers and workers. Every elite needs the support of multiple ordinary workers who are reliable and are committed to doing their jobs for multiple decades. Once you earn their loyalty, they will always be on our side. They shall become our backbone that will see us through the current crisis. Aside from that, we can fill up our vacancies a hundred times faster if we lower our recruitment standards. Speed is of the essence." "Alright. You’ve convinced me. You can do what you want in terms of recruitment. Just be aware that once our Premier Fleet is up and running, I expect our forces to participate in the fighting in the Upper Zones. No one can escape the flames of war at this stage of the Red War. I cannot afford to give you the time to train and indoctrinate our personnel. They will have to go through a baptism of fire as soon as our main fighting units have arrived." The Saint Commander grimaced in response. This would definitely result in a lot of stumbles on and off the battlefield. While her Command Field could make up for the lack of familiarity and coordination in many cases, this was ultimately a crutch. She could not puppet every asset on the battlefield all of the time. That would deprive the soldiers of their agency and prevent them from accruing valuable experience. For better or worse, the Larkinsons may have no better choice than to subject the new recruits to a baptism of fire. Throwing them onto the battlefield with inadequate preparations was the fastest way to temper the inexperienced recruits! However, so long as there were enough older and experienced personnel available, they could not only serve as a source of stability, but could also mentor the young guns to prevent them from suffering too much trauma. Ves understood now why Casella was so insistent on hiring older personnel. "Since you want us to enter the fray sooner rather than later, what are your objectives?" Casella asked. "As a tier 3 galactic citizen, you do not have an obligation to deploy your forces to the frontlines. The Bluejay Fleet solely exists to protect you, and our new Premier Fleet can be regarded as another bodyguard fleet. If you think it is necessary to deploy us to the front and expose yourself to greater danger, then the gains must at least be commensurate with the risks." While Ves was technically a tier 3 galactic citizen, his actual status and importance had definitely reached the standard of a tier 2 galactic citizen. Casella was correct to state that Ves had no obligation to send his bodyguards as well as himself to the frontlines. He could avoid unnecessary risks and travel to the rear of human-occupied space instead. However, Ves never conformed to the standards of ordinary mech designers. He always liked to grasp military power for himself, and he did not shy away from the battlefield. He only agreed to relocate to New Constantinople VIII and settle down for a time in order to ease the concerns of the Red Association. He and his wife also wanted to give his children a normal environment so that they could have friends and enjoy a better childhood. While Ves felt regretful for pulling his children out of school and forcing them to say goodbye to their Terran friends, he had greater concerns on his mind. Battle could not be avoided anymore. Now that the Red Tide Offensive had reached this point, those who fought and amassed more combat power should be able to amass more reputation and rewards than cowards who huddled in the rear. Human society could not afford to transfer excessive resources and benefits to those that did not provide as much help to the war effort. Ves admired the farsightedness of the New Elites Program. So long as it remained valid, the Premier Fleet should be able to amass a large amount of power and resources! As long as the Larkinson Clan survived, it would definitely come a few steps closer to realizing its belief of forming a true sovereign star nation! Of course, human civilization in the Red Ocean needed to be preserved in order for that to happen. All of the sacrifices that the Larkinsons would make over the following months may end up going to waste if there were too few humans left to care about these matters. As the Saint Commander continued her efforts to expand the Premier Fleet, the atmosphere in Diandi Base was gradually changing. Ves noticed that many people, no matter whether they were Larkinsons or mechers, gained more confidence and optimism. This was rare as bad news continued to spread across the galactic net. No matter how much the Red Three tried to manipulate public opinion, there was a limit to how much they could massage the continuous loss of territory in the Middle and Lower Zones. Even the Upper Zones started to buckle under all of the pressure. Reinforcements continued to arrive in the border systems, but their fortifications could not be repaired as fast as the native aliens tore them down. What was worse was that the aliens began to take advantage of conquering the adjacent Middle and Lower Zones to go around and attack the Upper Zones from the flanks. These incursions were fairly minor for the time being, but they were bound to escalate over time. After all, if the aliens had a choice between attacking well-defended fortified star systems at the front, or the much less defended industrial star systems at the sides, many of them would definitely prefer the latter! This was the downside of effectively abandoning every pretense of defending the Middle and Lower Zones. There weren’t enough first-class mech forces to defend so many different territories that suddenly became vulnerable to alien raids and invasions. This was why Ves was in a hurry to get the Premier Fleet up and running. He anticipated that this scenario would unfold. Compared to fighting against the most powerful alien invaders head-on at the frontlines, he would much rather hunt down the smaller and relatively weaker alien raiding fleets that were tasked with razing less-defended first-class star systems. If the Larkinsons were lucky enough, the first set of opponents shouldn’t be too big and strong. The enemy raiders could serve as adequate practice targets and enable the new hires to integrate into their new organization and build up their camaraderie on the battlefield. Only after beating several easy targets would Ves think about challenging more formidable opponents. No matter what, if Ves and Casella wanted to forge the Premier Fleet into a truly strong elite force, it had to challenge itself against more formidable enemies, just like the expeditionary fleet had done in the past! As long as the Premier Fleet survived all of these ordeals, Ves and his clansmen would gain the confidence to survive many of the storms that raged across the Red Ocean. This was his strategic outlook. Compared to holding territories that were always vulnerable to getting invaded, Ves much preferred to form a strong fleet that was highly mobile but also concentrated a lot of combat power! No matter whether red humanity successfully beat back the invasion or lost almost all of its territory, Ves remained confident that he would never be at the mercy of others!