The Mech Touch

5642 A Sacred Ritual

The Zeal was a unique mech.

Its name was not.

Over the course of rebuilding the old Transcendent Punisher mech into a powerful Mark III, Ves finally couldn't hold his curiosity back anymore.

He decided to ask the living mech a direct question while he was in the process of remaking its entire frame.

"Why did your battle partner name you the Zeal? As far as I know, I already designed a third-class hero mech called the Transcendent Punisher a long time ago. The one assigned to Taon Melin was supposed to embody one of the virtues of the Ylvaine Protectorate, so the old hero mech was the first Ylvainan living mech to bear this symbolic name. I'm not too sure what happened with it, but do you feel comfortable with retaining your current name knowing that it already belongs to another machine?"

It might be highly unusual for surgeons to ask questions to the patients in the process of performing life-changing operations of the latter, but mechs did not work like humans.

The Zeal remained fully cognizant and aware of what was taking place around him. Due to the excellent care shown by the two mech designers, his spiritual foundation remained strong and largely undamaged throughout the entire upgrade process.

Ves asked this significant question for more reasons than satisfying his curiosity. He wanted to know the Zeal on a deeper level and therefore increase his chances of turning him into a masterwork mech that he could be proud of. There should be no ambiguity about his current identity.

[I AM THE ZEAL. THE OLD HERO MECH YOU HAVE SPOKEN ABOUT IS ALSO CALLED THE ZEAL. THERE IS NO CONFLICT BETWEEN US AS FAR AS I AM CONCERNED. YOU HUMANS ALSO HAVE A HABIT OF USING THE SAME NAMES FOR YOURSELVES. SHOULD THERE ONLY BE ONE UNIQUE BEING CALLED 'ALICE' OR 'ROBERT' AMONG TRILLIONS OF YOUR KIND? THERE ARE EVEN CASES WHERE FATHERS NAME THEIR SONS AFTER THEMSELVES. THEY LIKE TO DO THIS ACROSS EVERY GENERATION SO THAT DESCENDANTS WILL END UP WITH NAMES SUCH AS SAMUEL III OR LEWIS CCXXII.]

Ves chuckled after he heard that. "You're right. We humans can be pretty sloppy with our names as well. Since you do not mind it if Taon has named you after one of his earlier mechs, then I guess it's fine. Shouldn't you be called the Zeal II, if only to distinguish you from your predecessor."

[IT IS NOT NECESSARY. BOTH TAON AND I KNOW WHICH LIVING MECH HE IS REFERRING TO WHEN HE USES THIS NAME. IT IS AN HONOR AND A SACRED DUTY TO BEAR MY CURRENT LABEL. TAON MELIN HOPES TO EMBODY THIS VIRTUE AND INSPIRE OTHER YLVAINANS TO SHOW THE SAME DEDICATION OF HIS FAITH AND BELIEFS IN BATTLE. I AM MORE THAN A LIVING MECH. I AM A SYMBOL OF MY FAITH.]

Even living mechs were capable of holding beliefs and superstitions. Since they had become just as sentient and intelligent as humans, there was no reason why these artificial beings could not be as stupid and ignorant as their organic partners either.

Ves already knew that this kind of development was inevitable. Every living mech interfaced so much with their mech pilots that they became strongly influenced by the principles, values as well as the beliefs of the latter.

In that sense, Ves understood a bit better why the Zeal proudly wore his current name. The heavy artillery mech had taken over a sacred mission, and felt it was his duty to carry the mantle of the old Transcendent Messenger that first held this duty.

"Do you know what happened to your predecessor?"

[THE EYE OF YLVAINE HAS ENTRUSTED THE ORIGINAL ZEAL TO THE ASCENSION GALLERY IN THE CAT NEST. THE HERO MECH CURRENTLY SERVES AS A MUSEUM EXHIBIT FOR VISITING LARKINSONS AND OTHER GUESTS.]

"That is interesting."

All of this talk about the old and new Zeal caused Ves to consider the idea of revisiting the old Transcendent Messenger design.

Perhaps he could update it into a much more powerful first-class iteration, turning it into a simple but profound combat machine that shared a lot of similarities with the original Ouroboros.

However, Ves quickly discarded this idea. The design considerations he made back then made sense back when he was limited to designing third-class mechs, but first-class mechs played in a completely different arena.

More than that, Ves was not able to come up with a good rationale on why he should design such a mech in the first place. Hero mechs held special meaning to him, and he did not want to design one casually for fear of disgracing the mech archetype.

He set this idea aside and put his full focus back on his work. His wife had already started to grow annoyed at his distracting thoughts.

When it was finally time for both mech designers to put their finishing touches on the powerful new mech after nearly three full days of non-stop work, the newly rebuilt form of the Zeal slightly began to deviate from the standard template of the Mark III.

The newly updated Zeal not only had to become a masterwork mech, but also become more attuned with Commander Taon Melin.

Gloriana had begun to apply a lot of software and hardware tweaks that should allow the machine to run smoother under the hands of the Zeal's designated pilot.

Ves on the other hand began to show a bit of artistic flair as he took a big paint brush and began to paint sacred images and symbols onto the fresh white coating of the heavy artillery mech.

Before the start of this upgrade run, he had a small argument with his wife about this action.

"Why do you possibly want to mar the relatively clean and tidy design of your Transcendent Punisher Mark III by hand painting messy illustrations across the exterior? There is no functional purpose behind this action!"

"I don't agree with that, Gloriana. I've learned a lot about stuff during my recent trip. Back when I was vacationing on Ocanon VI, I learned that there is real significance behind rituals,, especially now that we are living in a medium-energy environment. Actions that previously appear to be purely symbolic in nature have now gained the power to bend reality, if only slightly. Just let me give this a try. If the results do not end up meeting my expectations, then we can always wipe off the paint."

Though Gloriana still objected to this proposal, Ves was in charge this time, so he managed to get his way on this issue.

When the time came for him to start his unusual art process, he had already psyched himself up for this experimental attempt.

Despite working for three days straight, Ves had already accrued a measure of mental fatigue. The workload was extremely high and the E-computers of his Blinkyverse had been running at full capacity this entire time.

Even though Ves' mental condition was not as sharp as before, he did not mind his current state.

He actually felt it was an advantage to start his improvised art project when he was already starting to get tired.

This was because he wanted to paint the surface of the Zeal with his heart, rather than his mind!

Ves hadn't even come up with a single coherent plan or vision on the artwork that he wanted to apply on the living mech.

He was certainly creative enough to come up with a concept and a draft, but he refused to do so because it would go against the spirit of his goal.

Naturally, there was no way he wanted to stick to his tiny human form for this step. That was way too inefficient. Since he possessed the capacity to make himself larger, he might as well make use of it so that he could proficiently hold a much larger paint brush!

"I need to make sure I don't rip apart any of my clothes."

He took a few deep breaths as he shed his lab coat, his uniform and most of his clothes.

He had dressed himself down until he wore an expensive first-class vacsuit that his wife had bought during her recent visit to Vulit.

Though Ves complained about her extravagant purchases many times in his mind, he had to admit that this vacsuit came in very handy at this time.

This was because it was actually stretchable to a ridiculous degree!

There was virtually no way the original developers of this product ever imagined that the vacsuit would be used for this particular purpose. It was only made this way in order to justify the enormous price premium on this fashion article.

Whatever the case, it should be fully capable of accommodating Ves' true body!

The only caveat was that its endurance was much lower than ordinary first-

class garments. It was never designed to function as a battle outfit and would easily fall apart if Ves tried to wear this in a serious battle.

Both Gloriana and the Zeal watched on with varying degrees of awe as Ves literally grew in size.

His glow and his presence became a lot more pronounced as his true form started to become visible again.

Ves stopped just before he had reached the height of a typical light mech!

If he went too far, then he would lose a lot of fine control, which was detrimental to his purpose.

Ves moved a bit to make sure that his stretched vacsuit remained intact. Once he became satisfied with his new condition, he picked up the giant-sized painting tools and began to perform his meticulous craft.

What was special about his approach was that he did not paint by himself.

Instead, he opened up his mind to Ylvaine and enabled the design spirit to descend onto his mind.

An air of sacredness started to get mixed into Ves' glow. His eyes grew deeper as they seemed to see the future as well as the present.

Ves purposefully put himself into a less cognizant mindset. He deliberately lowered his awareness so that his conscious thinking process did not dominate his mind anymore.

Instead, he gave plenty of room for Ylvaine to take root and exert his own purpose!

The two had entered into a magical state of cooperation. The design network started to convey a lot of confusing and illogical thoughts to Gloriana.

The stuff that was taking place in Ves' mind in his current state was so disorienting that it was already driving her mad!

"Maow!"

Alexandria forcibly shut down the design network in order to save Gloriana from her husband's latest bout of insanity.

Ves did not really care about the cessation of the design network. It wasn't necessary anymore as he was much more intent on joining hands with Ylvaine at the moment.

In his self-imposed fugue, Ves deliberately tried to turn himself into a vessel of Ylvaine's intent and vision.

As his giant limbs started to move the paint brush with slow and delicate motions, the surface of the nearly completed heavy artillery mech started to gain a bit of color.

It soon became clear that his plan was working.

Ves retained just enough cognizance to retain his excellent skills and personal art style.

Ylvaine meanwhile gained the capability to direct Ves to paint certain symbols and images based on his current foresight.

The design spirit had opened himself up to the currents of time, allowing him to gain random images of different events that may or may not take place in the future!

Ylvaine subsequently tried to induce Ves into transforming these ephemeral visions into a concrete illustration that would 'solidify' these future glimpses.

Ves and Ylvaine literally turned the Zeal into a canvas that immortalized these random visions in the form of art!

The significance of their cooperative actions was deep and profound. Even Gloriana managed to feel that the two were conducting a sacred and unknowable ritual due to the resonance they evoked from the environment.

The longer they worked, the more E energy radiation began to pump into the freshly painted symbols and vistas.

It was as if the universe itself had chosen to bless these prophetic visions!

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