Ves was tired. Ves was tired of this battle. Ves was tired of fighting through multiple hordes of alien warships. Ves was tired of exposing his troops to the city-blasting, continent-razing primary plasma cannon batteries of the V'gahnt-Zezne. Ves was tired of trying to wrack his mind to stop a hidden unclean whale that had just woken up from hibernation from displacing them all to a completely new star region. Ves was tired of pulling himself into the System Space in an act of desperation, before spending a lot of days on trying to earn as many Ascension Points as possible in a single continuous run. Ves was tired of undergoing a strange and exhausting ascension ritual where he had been forced to confront the demons in his heart. Ves was tired of getting exposed to greater truths about 'gods', divine artifacts, Divine Cores, the nature of so-called True Gods and how entire galaxies were involved. Ves was tired of undergoing a surprise lightning baptism that went on so long that he even had to squeeze his design skills once again to take maximum advantage of the free opportunity to modify and upgrade his body even further. Ves was tired of putting all of his hope of solving the remaining threat once and for all by returning to reality and unleashing his powerful new cyborg cat against the target, only for his massive strike to fail to live up to his expectations. Ves was tired of seeing the six out of seven human ace mechs slip past the powerful spatial barrier of the unclean whale, only for them to get stumped as their opponent's thick phasewater-infused flesh blunted all of their formidable attack power. Ves was tired of worrying about the unclean whale recovering from his earlier blows and pulling off another technique that could screw over the entire human coalition that was trying and failing to put him down. "I AM SO GODDAMN TIRED!" He burst out as he gritted his teeth while remaining seated on the bridge of his flagship. "I am going to put you down once and for all so that I can finally enjoy a good night's sleep!" His crew and his children did not expect their leader to lose control over himself like this at all! Their leader had changed too much all of a sudden and there was no way to hide the fact that his presence had somehow become greater and more substantial than ever. No matter how much Ves relied on his camouflage measures and his diminished Unending Regalia to hide his presence, there was little he could do to prevent other people from detecting that he had become a lot more special. It was the nature of the weak to fear and respect the strong. The entire basis of glows was based around this fundamental spiritual interaction, and now that Ves had gained a lot of spiritual power that hadn't been squirreled away by his design seed, he had become an entity akin to some of his more powerful design spirits. Yet for all his newfound strength and capabilities, his mental state had suffered after all of this time. He had never enjoyed a decent rest after starting this battle. He hadn't even dared to sleep after he had taken an initial break because he was too stingy to waste too many Ascension Points on rest when he could have spent his time on more productive pursuits. Perhaps he had managed to save a few extra Ascension Points due to his frugality, but this did not leave him in the best of moods after seeing that the unclean whale was still going strong after getting struck by his new divine artifact! "I am ending you once and for all." Ves hissed towards the distant unclean whale. "If you just focused on escaping the Palace of Shame by yourself, then I would have let you go without a fuss. Trying to take us all with you was a grave mistake. I am not going to let you get away with threatening me. Our mechs may be weak against an opponent like you, but don't underestimate the power of synergy and teamwork!" His plan to deal with the unclean whale once and for all was radical and unorthodox, but Ves might just have the right mix of abilities to make it work! 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎 So far, his attempt to augment the Thunderer Mark II by applying his unique design solutions on the ace mech was working, if only tentatively. Venerable Joshua and the Everchanger played indispensable roles in this plan. The former strengthened the connection and generated the true resonance that was necessary to induce real changes in the Thunderer Mark II. The latter's malleability and versatility allowed Ves to turn the machine into his avatar for this operation. Ves had only theorized that this was possible. It astonished him to see that he could actually pull it off and turn the Everchanger into a substitute of himself of sorts! By taking advantage of the unique strengths and properties of his favorite expert pilot and his favorite expert mech, gained the potential to participate in battles more directly than before. There was nothing wrong with sitting back and letting the professionals he hired and trained at great cost do their jobs. It just frustrated him to be unable to use his power to destroy his enemies more directly like he had done in the past. A part of him still missed the 'good old days' where he wasn't surrounded by so many guards and mechs. He still had to fight and kill his way out of many crises and conflict zones by blazing a path through his enemies with the scorching laser beams of his Amastendira. It no longer made sense for him to fight in the trenches like before. He had become too successful as of late. He not only became an indispensable part of the economic engine of the Larkinson Clan, but also put a lot of effort into elevating his status as clan patriarch. All of this meant that he was too important to risk on the frontlines! While there were times where he fantasized about hopping into the cockpit of a mech so that he could ride alongside one of his expert pilots into battle, his honor guards would tackle him before he could pull off his crazy scheme! The fact that his own guards were right to stop him from engaging in high-risk behavior didn't make it any better. "It will be different from now on." He whispered. "Now that I know that this is possible, I will definitely exploit the hell out of this ability in the future." It was too much of a waste to possess the Everchanger. The powerful expert hero mech was made for combat. Its job should be to fight powerful champions and to support other friendly mechs. Ves would be depriving Joshua and his battle partner of valuable growth opportunities if he kept commandeering them to act as a field mechanic. This time, it was okay. There were no more meaningful alien enemies left on the battlefield. The expert mechs along with the regular mech forces had already swept most alien forces aside. Aside from remnant starfighter squadrons that had opted to flee and blend into the denser asteroid clusters, there weren't any threats worth guarding against. This allowed Ves to 'possess' the Everchanger without any concerns. "It's strange." Ves had never done this before, but he already know how to do it on an instinctual level. It helped that he was working with a familiar expert pilot and a mech that he had passionately designed. It also helped that he had been working with design spirits for years. He observed them at work and he even made a fair amount of them himself. Together with all of his new senses and abilities, he quickly acclimatized to this new mode of working. Already, the part of himself that was possessing the Everchanger had affected a lot of changes to the Thunderer Mark II. Though it wasn't possible for his expert mech to apply physical changes to the ace heavy artillery mech of the Santana Group, Ves focused on the one area that he excelled at, which was improving the spiritual design of the powerful machine. Suffice to say, he encountered a lot of resistance. The ace mech hadn't exactly been alive before Ves had touched it, but it had received a huge amount of baptism from Saint Jelmer Osenring's Saint Kingdom. The ace pilot's strong willpower not only strengthened the spiritual foundation of the Thunderer Mark II, but also shaped and altered it in a way that reminded Ves of earthquakes. From a spiritual perspective, Saint Osenring unconsciously molded the Thunderer Mark II to channel and embody his characteristic shockwaves. The powerful machine became more attuned to his domain and was able to propagate any true resonance abilities centered around his specialty to a much greater degree than before. Many mech designers mistakenly attributed the relatively quick boost of strength after an ace pilot interfaced with a new ace mech to the former's accelerated growth. The reality was that the latter also deserved a lot of credit for allowing itself to get molded into a more suitable vessel for its principal user. All of these insights were extremely fascinating to Ves. Ace mechs became increasingly less magical and obscure to him. Understanding how they worked and why they were so much more powerful not only gave him the confidence of designing a suitable ace mech for the Larkinson Clan in the future, but also encouraged him to make his mark on the Thunderer Mark II! What he was doing to the Thunderer Mark II was not proper mech design. The professional side of him felt as if he was intruding on another design team's masterpiece. It was rude for him to vandalize the work of other colleagues without asking for their opinions, but the situation was too dire to wait that long. Ves could only make do with obtaining the emergency approval of the leading Santanas who commanded the local fleet. "Saint Osenring." He conveyed over the communication channel and through his current mech avatar. "You are clinging too tightly onto your ace mech. I know it is uncomfortable for you to stand by and feel how your precious machine is changing into something different and alien, but please bear with me. We can reserve all of this after we have concluded this battle. You can either do it yourself by 'washing' your ace mech with your willpower or I can do it for you by pulling back what I have bestowed. Until then, please follow the instructions of your superior and let me do my work." The Everchanger could clearly sense an increasing sense of discomfort and alienation. "I… am trying my best… patriarch." Saint Osenring spoke while exerting as much of his willpower as possible to keep a lid on his own power. "You are asking for the impossible. I have trained all my life to defend against intrusions that hit too close to home. I am not entirely certain what you are tinkering on at the moment, but I can feel that you are enabling a new and distinctly alien creature to contaminate my pride and joy. I am this close to unleashing my power to drive it away. The more you corrupt my mech, the less I am able to hold myself in. Please do not push me any further." Ves scowled. He was far from done with his work. Though he had probably managed to make an initial transformation to the Thunderer Mark II's spiritual foundation, it was only capable of channeling and supporting the descent of the Phase King. "I thought you ace pilots had more control over yourself." The Santana ace pilot tried his best to remain polite. "I can understand why you have developed that impression, but you cannot expect us to reverse our entire beliefs and fighting systems in a single day." "I'm making your ace mech stronger!" "It doesn't look that way to me, Patriarch Larkinson!" "Ugh! Why can't you take me at my word? Try out my changes if you don't believe me. Just make sure to keep an open mind and accept the new influences that I have introduced. They won't do anything if you keep them in a corner." "I will try, but I can make no promises." Seeing was believing. Ves was more than tired of dealing with Saint Osenring skepticism and disbelief. He looked forward to hearing the ace mech's reaction once his Thunderer Mark II started to open fire again.