Chapter 7397: Rethinking the Relationship Every Star Designer was not right in the head. Just like god pilots, Star Designers always seemed to lose at least some of the restraints they still held when they lived as mortals. Yet compared to his peers, the Resonance Smith took this a lot further! Ves had never imagined that a Star Designer would not only question the mech designer’s creed, but consciously choose to set it aside! It sounded as ludicrous as a god pilot stating a lie. Such a fundamental contradiction in responsibility exceeded anything that Ves could have imagined from such a noble and selfless profession. Since the Age of Mechs, all mech designers had been taught to serve mech pilots in a devoted manner. Though their classes taught them that mech designers should never denigrate themselves or let them be ordered around as minions, the mech community definitely prioritized the needs of mech pilots over others. This pattern had been the established truth for over 4 centuries and counting. Nobody sought to question this hierarchy because it seemed as natural as anything. Mech pilots earned greater privileges because they were scarce and limited in number. Mech pilots bore the brunt of the danger whenever war erupted. Mech pilots had the potential to become the most powerful gods in human form. All of these reasons and more caused all of human society to put them up a pedestal. Mech designers, who possessed incredible capabilities of their own, could only take a backseat and adopt a more subservient position. This was why the Resonance Smith’s statement broke Ves’ cognition. The extreme contrast between the eccentric Star Designer’s stance and human society’s established norms was too great! It took a few moments for Ves to regain his composure and speak again. "How... how could you assume such a crazy stance? Why... would you express so much contempt towards the mech designer’s creed? Even if you have become a Star Designer, shouldn’t you continue to serve god pilots with the same devotion as before?" The Resonance Smith scowled at those words. It was as if the very notion offended his sensibilities! "That is why I despise the old regime so much. You have become so accustomed to rules such as the mech designer’s creed that you have never properly questioned whether they are still appropriate for the current conditions. Let me give you a lesson, Professor Larkinson. The relationships between god pilots and Star Designers are not even close to their mortal counterparts. We are all gods. One god cannot command another god. We negotiate with each other. We exert pressure on each other. We trade individual favors with each other. We never serve freely, because our services have grown too valuable to be obtained without cost." That sort of made sense. Star Designers existed in a different league compared to Master Mech Designers. Combined with the scarcity of the former, it was well within their rights to ask for more remuneration. However, that did not automatically mean that Star Designers had a right to screw over mech pilots! "What you say makes a certain amount of sense, but what gives you the right to toy around with the lives of mortal mech pilots?" "It is true that I do not dare to ’play games’ with god pilots, but that is because they are strong and sharp enough to detect impropriety." The Resonance Smith readily admitted. "Yet I feel no guilt by using mech pilots for my own ends. They feel honored to receive the attention of a Star Designer such as myself. I have never withheld any benefits from them. It is merely their biases and inattention that prevents them from acknowledging the greater price they must pay in order to use my works. I never forced Saint Conrad Morgenstern to make use of the ace mech that I have devised for him. I have explained its settings and features in exhausting detail." "Yet you deliberately misled him by downplaying its more manipulative traits, am I correct?" Ves looked up at the Star Designer in suspicion. "As long as you flood your audience’s ears with enough technobabble, you can get away with practically anything." The Resonance Smith’s smile became a lot more obvious. "Caveat emptor. Buyer beware. Not every seller has the customer’s best intentions at heart. It is unfortunate that mech pilots throughout the generations have lost their vigilance towards the mech designers that they have relied upon for centuries due to the existence of the mech designer’s creed. Its existence has distorted the relationships between mech pilots and mech designers and caused artificial stupidity to become ubiquitous. Mech pilots are becoming more stupid by the generation while mech designers have lost so much of their egos that they have become slaves in all but name!" It was very clear that the Unbounder felt very strongly about the negative consequences of institutionalizing the mech designer’s creed! While Ves could sort of understand the Star Designer’s perspective, he felt that the Resonance Smith mainly obsessed over the negative effects and hardly appreciated the positive effects. That was not a fair evaluation. Ves doubted it would do him any good if he pointed out this hypocrisy. There was no way a little Senior like himself could argue against a Star Designer on equal grounds. He sighed. "So what am I supposed to draw from your ’lesson’? Should mech designers gain the freedom to scam mech pilots." "Yes." The Resonance Smith directly responded. "Normal market dynamics must be restored. The Mech Trade Association and the Red Association have stunted the mech market for too long. They are treating everyone as children when they are actually full-grown adults. Let mech pilots be scammed! Let them be more vigilant of what they are buying and using! Force them to question whether a mech designer or mech company cares too much about profits to do their jobs properly. There will be wrongdoing. There will be victims. There will be dissatisfaction. However, once mech pilots develop the necessary degree of skepticism and vigilance, the mech market will automatically grow healthy and stable again. A more natural equilibrium will emerge that doesn’t rely on the iron fist of the mechers." His stance actually sounded quite reasonable. The mechers would never agree, though. They had guarded the reputation and integrity of mechs for centuries with success. Even if their many taboos and restrictions had led to huge distortions in the mech market, they ensured that people throughout human society possessed absolute trust in mechs. More importantly, people also trusted the individuals who designed the very same mechs. Ves benefited a lot from the institutional trust in the mech designer profession. It would have been a lot more difficult for him to run a successful business and expand his sales if he constantly had to prove the reliability of his own products! That was why Ves felt very mixed about the Resonance Smith’s stance. His belief that most of the rules had to be torn down might led to a great wave of liberalization, but it would also ignite a lot of chaos! There was already a lot of chaos in society at the moment. Ves hardly believed that red humanity could endure more disruptions during this dangerous period of time. "I am sorry, Your Excellency, but I cannot bring myself to agree with your viewpoint." Ves calmly responded as he placed his confidence in the rules that he relied upon for much of his life. "Rules give structure. They are necessary to maintain stability. Perhaps a decade ago would have been the right time to enact reforms, but now... it will only make things worse. Much worse." Ves only had to shift his perspective to Veronica and witness the absolute breakdown of order to witness what would happen if a great authority like the Mech Trade Association lost power! Fortunately, the Resonance Smith did not press further. "That is your prerogative. Keep my words in mind. Once you have become my peer, you shall see for yourself that I am correct. This is because some truths always remain in force. Mech pilots are destroyers. Even if they possess the power to create, their ability to spread death and ruination far surpasses anything else. They are a disrupting existence to society. Sometimes a little destruction is necessary to create room for more useful alternatives, but too much destruction will only lead to our end." The Star Designer consistently expressed a contemptuous opinion towards the mech piloting profession. This was very arrogant behavior on his part. Ves seriously doubted the wisdom of treating mech pilots with contempt! Sure, Ves had met plenty of mech pilots with questionable judgment and intelligence, but that did not mean they should be treated as idiots! For the most part, mech pilots were honorable soldiers who freely stepped up and fought the good fight. Many of them resigned themselves to fighting and dying to protect masses of people that they never personally met in their lives. That alone deserved respect. "If you think that way about mech pilots, what about mech designers like myself?" Ves curiously asked. The Resonance Smith smiled a little brighter in response. "We are the brains that truly keep our society together. If mech pilots are sources of disruption, then mech designers are sources of mending. We are problem solvers. We are service providers. We are engines of innovation. You of all mech designers should understand who we are. We study mundane phenomena and extrapolate them into the extraordinary. That is true power. Do you think the might to destroy a planet is impressive? Nonsense! You have redefined the definition of life and broke the rules that have kept the mech piloting profession atrophied since they first utilized the neural interface! You have engineered the collapse of an entire pillar of the mech community! This is true destruction!" Ves did not feel honored by this accomplishment, especially when put in this way. It was never his intention to damage the prestige of mech pilots! "Please do not twist my work into the Carmine System. I did not set out to damage the interests of mech pilots. I simply wanted to serve our society, and what better way to do so than to allow any norm to pilot a machine that was previously closed to them? While I may have damaged the exclusivity enjoyed by mech pilots in the process, none of it was deliberate. Besides, they still enjoy an inherent advantage because they can use two different control systems at the same time. I think that my invention has made everyone happy in the end." "How naive." The Star Designer smiled and shook his head. "You put too much faith in the cooperative relationship between mech pilots and mech designers. The former are not worth so much of your respect. You only need to study my plan for Conrad Morgenstern to understand why this is the case. Only a short amount of time has passed since his planned sacrifice, and already the numbers have changed for the better. Compared to previous time intervals, the short period after his demise has led to significantly increased breakthrough rates." "Really?" Ves looked surprised. "The statistics do not lie. 105 percent more expert candidates have emerged. 62 percent more expert pilots have come into power. 23 percent more saints have announced themselves. These are all excess quantities that measurably exceed the previous pattern. This has already vindicated the death of a single senior ace pilot. If even one new god pilot comes into being due to this catalyst, then the yield of my plan is near infinite!" Ves almost felt sick after hearing that. The Resonance Smith was essentially justifying his deliberate decision to drive a senior ace pilot to his death by emphasizing all of the ’profit’ that ensued! This attitude of treating lives as numbers on a balance sheet seemed very anti-humanist. It was no wonder that the Pilot Humanist Society felt it was necessary to advocate for the rights of mech pilots! It was because of leaders like the Resonance Smith that the PHS had become a necessary existence! "By the way, less than 30 minutes ago, a familiar friend and relative of yours is also included among those statistics." "What?!" The Resonance Smith activated a projection that showed a busy and fairly destructive battlefield. Amidst all of the damaged ships and destroyed strike craft, a single heavy mech holding a radiant shield glowed with the power of a singularity! "THE VOICE OF LIBERTY IS RIGHT! SINCE HIS FALL, THE WEAK AND THE UNDERSERVED LACK PROTECTION. SINCE THAT IS THE CASE, I SHALL PICK UP HIS MANTLE AND ASSUME HIS MISSION. I SHALL BECOME THEIR SHIELD AGAINST THE ENEMIES FROM WITHOUT! I SHALL ALSO BECOME THEIR SWORD AGAINST THE ENEMIES FROM WITHIN! LET MY VOICE RING TRUE AND LET THE UNIVERSE BEAR WITNESS TO MY PROMISE!" Much of the surrounding debris circled around the machine as if it had turned into a new star! Ves immediately recognized his old work! "The Bastion! That’s Jannzi!" Venerable Jannzi actually managed to break past her stubborn bottleneck and broke through, thereby becoming the latest ace pilot to grace the Larkinson Clan!