The Mech Touch

Chapter 2378: Foulness

”Meooowwww….”

Luckyʼs face looked queasy ever since Ves forcefully fed a tiny sample of B-stone to him. The cat behaved as if he had lost energy and laid completely limp on the work table.

Ves wasnʼt sure whether Lucky was putting on an act or not. He knew very well that his cat did not agree to be experimented upon, but Ves was used to dealing with uncooperative test subjects.

”Cʼmon, Lucky. Do something. Has there been any change?”

”Meooow…”

”Maybe the dose isnʼt high enough. At least I found out that a small amount of B-stone isnʼt lethal to you. Well, for now. Who knows what might happen in a few hours. Your stomach might suddenly rupture and dump all of the contents in your dimensional pocket into your current body. Since the volume of stuff inside this pocket definitely exceeds your stomach cavity by at least a factor of a hundred, that means there is too much stuff and too little space. Do you know what that means? Your precious little body will assuredly explode into a rain of metallic parts!”

Luckyʼs weak head looked at Ves with horror!

Ves rubbed his smooth-shaven chin. ”I could be wrong, though. B-stone shouldnʼt cause your stomach to fail because itʼs not very energetic or reactive to physical materials. Instead, it is likely capable of inducing all manner of spiritual reactions, some of which may be benign and others that may be harmful in nature. The B-stone may very well gnaw at your spirit, acting like poison thrown into a lake. It would be quiet. One moment, youʼre alive and spirited. The next moment, everything in your mind is snuffed out as you have become no different from other soulless mechanical pets.”

”Meooow…”

”Donʼt be such a worrywart, Lucky. Iʼm here, remember? If anything happens to you, Iʼll do my best to intervene. I may not be able to do much about your hyper advanced body, but when it comes to your spirit I can still do plenty. After all, I have built up a considerable amount of experience in experimenting—, ahem, treating peopleʼs spirits. As far as Iʼm concerned, I am on my way to become a spiritual surgeon, so you are doubtlessly in good hands.”

Lucky didnʼt even deign to reply to that remark. He merely looked increasingly troubled as he feared his stomach might explode at any time!

Several minutes passed as Ves continued observing. Nothing meaningful changed aside from making Lucky more uncomfortable.

While it was best to keep observing for a couple of hours, Ves was way too impatient to bother with that. He was much more inclined to believe in his initial guess, which was that he fed way too little B-stone to Lucky to make any difference.

”Well, I think you need some more.”

Ves prepared a thumb-sized sample of B-stone this time and proceeded to force Lucky to swallow it. This time, his cat had grown weaker, so Ves hardly encountered any resistance.

”Meoooowwww…” Lucky meowed as if he was about to lose his soul.

”Hmm, I hope there is a bigger effect this time.”

The effect was greater than before. Ves sensed various strange activity boiling inside Lucky. At the very least, a larger amount of stray dark energy was leaking from his stomach area.

”I think itʼs working! Isnʼt that great news?”

The activity didnʼt last long. After a couple of minutes, Luckyʼs insides subsided. In the meantime, a small amount of foreign energy spread throughout Luckyʼs body.

”Oh, that wonʼt do.”

Ves had no idea if the Unending One was still able to control this trace of energy, but Ves did not wish to push his luck. He concentrated and tried to remove the dark energy before it could contaminate Luckyʼs spirit or something.

Once he shoveled the dark energy away, it automatically dissipated into the imaginary realm. Through this method, Luckyʼs body became clean again.

”Well, this treatment is definitely effective if it is able to purge the dark energy from your stomach. Iʼm afraid the dose still isnʼt enough.”

This time Ves did not bother to hold back anymore. He cut the remainder of the egg into smaller bite-sized portions and stuffed them into Lucky one by one. Once he did that, Ves took a step back and studied his catʼs current state.

Lucky looked like he had died. He lay flat on the table with his electronic eyes glazing over. Even his tail had stopped moving!

What was even more concerning was the fact that Luckyʼs spirit was convulsing quite a bit! All of the B-stone he ingested probably had an adverse effect, but Ves was not yet concerned.

He did not recklessly feed B-stone to Lucky without any thought. In fact, he was confident that Lucky would thank him afterwards.

This was because Lucky was one of the few entities capable of assimilating all manner of exotics and extraordinary materials without rejection. This was quite a remarkable ability and one that was key to this experiment!

Ves basically bet that despite Luckyʼs spiritual nature, he was capable of assimilating or at least processing the B-stone without getting poisoned to death. His voracious gem cat had eaten all manner of dangerous and even radioactive materials, so why should B-stone be any more dangerous?

As Luckyʼs stomach attempted to cope with a relatively significant influx of B-stone, his stomach abruptly began to leak more dark energy. The quantity being expelled constantly grew until the entire mech workshop threatened to descend into darkness!

”Damn, why is there so much?!”

Ves hastily broke up and threw the dangerous energy into the imaginary realm. He had to exert more and more of his strength to do so because the energy was alive. The higher its concentration, the harder it was for Ves to manipulate it. He had to work faster and faster in order to prevent the dark energy from pooling too much.

In the worst case scenarios, the dark energy might become potent enough to summon an artificial anomaly or give the Unending One an opening to launch a remote attack!

”Begone, darkness!”

Lucky still laid flat on the table as his stomach finally seemed to expel all of the foulness that had occupied it for almost a month.

Despite the purification, Ves was fighting poison with poison, so from a physical perspective Lucky was actually doing worse!

”Just bear with it! Youʼre doing great! Hopefully, your stomach gets back into gear and begins to assimilate what youʼve previously ingested.”

Lucky kept leaking dark energy like a deflated balloon. Though Ves wasnʼt sure he had given him a sufficient dose, with the amount of foulness leaking out, there shouldnʼt be much left inside.

Once the flow had entirely cut off, Ves tentatively judged that there shouldnʼt be any need to feed his pet with another chunk of B-stone. Even if there was something less, his cat should be able to cope with the remainder.

Lucky a little bit more relieved at the end. He seemed to have gained a bit of energy, but not too much.

”This is a good sign.” Ves self-assuredly nodded his head. ”I think youʼll do fine!”

”Meooowww…”

”I think this is enough for one day. You better heal up quickly. If there is no progress in a day, then Iʼll come back with another B-stone.”

”Meow!”

Lucky looked incredibly distressed after he heard this statement!

”If you donʼt want to become my patient anymore, then donʼt be sick anymore. Youʼll get better. I know you will.”

Ves had great confidence in Luckyʼs digestive capabilities. Now that the B-stone he ingested got rid of the indigestible dark energy, his stomach should be back to normal now. This meant that Lucky should be able to process both Unending alloy and B-stone regardless of their difficult and conflicting properties.

He picked up his limp cat and brought him out of the mech workshop. Once he returned to his stateroom, he dropped Lucky onto his couch like a sack of nutrient packs.

”Meooow… meooowwww….”

”Thatʼs good. If your tummy hurts, then itʼs obviously doing something. Youʼll be back to normal in no time. In fact, youʼll definitely become even stronger! I canʼt imagine how powerful you will be after you have assimilated the properties of both B-stone and Unending alloy!

Though Lucky looked tortured, Ves did not worry too much about his cat anymore. In his limited judgement, his catʼs life shouldnʼt be under threat. Even if some kind of accident happened, as long as Lucky remained alive in spirit, Ves was confident he could patch him up somehow.

Since Lucky apparently needed more time to settle his stomach, Ves began to call up his designs for the gear he intended to build with the Unending alloy that Lucky would hopefully be able to process with his teeth.

He frowned a bit at the rough designs. The various swords, spears and shields for the custom mechs reserved for the expert candidates of his clan did not look very refined.

A helpless expression appeared on his face. ”I canʼt expect too much from a cat.”

Using Lucky to process an extremely hard metallic substance was as crude and primitive as using his bare hands to assemble a data chip!

Ves had already studied the bite marks on the statue of the Unending One extensively. While it showed that Lucky should have little problem chewing through the hard material, his bites werenʼt exactly as straight and precise as a machine cutter.

This imposed a lot of limitations to Ves. He had to assume that any portions that Lucky would be able to chew off would be rough, irregular and jagged.

Perhaps he might be able to get Lucky to chew some of the roughest parts, but his carnivore-like teeth werenʼt suited for fine work. This meant that Ves would have to accept the fact that he would be working with lots of irregular chunks.

Considering these limitations, Ves had to make a lot of compromises in his designs to cope with this outcome.

For example, the tower shield reserved for the Aurora Titan would likely consist of the biggest slab possible. Ideally, Ves wanted Lucky to separate the middle of the statue of the tentacled whale so that Ves would be able to gain the most height and surface, but he couldnʼt guarantee it would come out that way.

”If a single slab isnʼt big enough, then Iʼll have to get more and fit them together like a puzzle.”

Such a shield wouldnʼt be as structurally strong as a single solid slab of Unending alloy. Against heavy firepower, the shield was liable to break into pieces.

The same went for the other mech-sized gear that he reserved for the other mechs. Captain Orfan needed a solid spear and Joshua needed an even longer lance.

”Thankfully, the Blueshift doesnʼt demand that much.”

It was possible for light skirmishers to arm themselves with bigger weapons, but they usually did not do so for various reasons. Creating a pair of daggers and perhaps some extras should be one of the easiest jobs.

Too small was not necessarily a good thing, however. In order to separate the plates required to build an Unending alloy combat suit, he needed Lucky to bite out very thin plates. This sounded like a difficult task and Ves would probably have to plan and supervise the process closely.

”Meow! Meow! Meow!”

Lucky started huffing and meowing, causing Ves to turn his attention away from his rough but ambitious designs.

”Is it time?!” Vesʼ eyes lit up. ”Are you finally about to solve your constipation problems?”

”Meoooowww…”

”This is good! Keep pushing! You can do it, Lucky!”

It was very doubtful that his words actually helped, but Lucky was far too troubled to pay attention to Ves anymore.

His tail flopped frantically as his body began to feel more and more pressure from his stomach. Lucky looked at his lower body with concern. He had never regretted eating something so much!