[1-200] THE MECH TOUCH

Chapter 3: First Design

As a reputable mech simulator, Iron Spirit only featured real mechs. The base designs sold in its virtual store could be bought in real life with almost the same performance. With its vast and extensive database, the game worked hard to group them together in a simple manner.

The BSBH Corporation eventually decided to adopt a 1-star to 5-star rating. They later added even higher ratings with the introduction of even higher performing models.

The game's database included many older designs, but its library of current designs was incomplete. Many top-notch mech designs were highly guarded secrets. These so-called next generation models represented the cutting edge of mech design.

The Age of Mechs spanned four-hundred years, so the game offered plenty of models even without the latest designs.

Iron Spirit's lowest 1-star mech models used to plow the battlefield alongside legends such as Mack Liu, the mech pioneer. Compared to contemporary models, these ancient relics fell short in many ways. They were slow, clumsy, inefficient and sometimes looked ridiculous. When Ves took a peek at these clown-like models, he wondered if their designers had a few screws loose.

System's designer mode already loaded one such design. The Fantasia 2R incorporated a radical humanoid design scheme, and was the second iteration of a flawed first edition. The Fantasia massed very little due to its slim and narrow design, allowing it to run faster and longer than the stockier models available at the time. These gains were made at the cost of other parameters such as armor and firepower.

For whatever reason, the designers shaped the Fantasia 2R in the form of a woman. Its concave torso, sloping breastplate, thin limbs and narrow head evoked the appearance of a supermodel in dressed in skimpy armor.

The older 1R model already looked like a feminist's worst nightmare. The manufacturers doubled down by attaching hair-like sensor threads on top of the 2R's head. The sensors at least served a practical purpose, since they turned the model into a decent scouting mech.

Since the Fantasia was such a light and thin mech, Ves had very little leeway in modifying its parts without destroying its good points.

In contrast, Ves could easily tinker with heavier models, shaving ten percent of its mass without sacrificing too much of its defense. After applying modern techniques to the ancient design, he could easily raise the performance of his variant by two or three percent compared to its base model.

"This Fantasia the System provided me is really too skinny."

Since he couldn't go for the route of subtraction, he needed to find another way to add value. Ves could easily improve the design by adding additional components. Unfortunately, the System only provided the license of a single component, giving him very little options.

The virtual component license the System gifted him came with an overly lengthy name. The creators called it the Gemini twin rear ejection energy booster.

The complicated component did three things at once. First, it allowed a cockpit to eject from the rear in case of emergencies. It provided a fairly large amount of energy storage, allowing mechs to last longer without resupply. Lastly, it provided a large amount of straight-line acceleration with its boosters, though such boosts consumed a lot of energy.

Normally, such attributes matched perfectly with the Fantasia 2R's focus on speed. There was only one major snag. The Gemini's dimensions were drastically over sized.

The Gemini had been designed to accommodate the first heavy mech in existence, the Megacrab. This mech was a behemoth that required eight legs and twin cockpits for two pilots.