Chapter 6747 Dragon Scales

The fact that ST-688 Archon became redundant to ace pilots when they were getting closer to reaching the limits of their rank was a pretty big asterisk.

It was not too catastrophic as a mech designer could always swap out ST-688 for a different resonating material,

The problem with doing so was that all of the progress that the ace pilot had made to transform ST-688 into a more compatible resource through persistent willpower baptism became wasted!

Not only would Saint Commander Casella have to relearn how to fight with a different resonating material, she would also have to spend a lot of effort into becoming completely in tune with her ace mech.

This could add significant delays to her preparations to step on the road to no return! Of course, this was not a dealbreaker. Many peak ace pilots tended to make a lot of changes to their ace mechs in the hopes of turning them into prototype god mechs. What mattered was that the greater the changes, the more time the ace pilots had to spend on familiarizing himself with their new machines.

Swapping the key resonating materials of an ace mech was a pretty drastic change. Doing so removed and added powerful options to the ace pilot, thereby necessitating significant changes on how to approach combat.

"Before Saint Commander Casella reaches this point, she should benefit quite a lot from using ST-688."

The resonating alloy was like a cheat in that the Saint Commander was able to fight as if she had gained months or years of additional growth in resonance strength.

The importance of this boost could not be overstated. Resonance strength was a measure of how extensively a high-ranking mech pilot was able to distort reality with his willpower.

The higher the number, the more extreme the fabric of reality bent to the will of the pilot!

Resonance strength affected all factors of a machine. Their offensive, defensive, mobility and utility parameters all rose by different percentages depending on the height of numbers.

In addition to that, higher resonance strength affected the strength of resonating abilities, allowing high-ranking mechs to more easily outfight their enemies.

Resonance strength happened to be more important to Saint Commander Casella and the Minerva than usual because it directly affected the quality and quantity of the Enfeoffment effect.

As a non-traditional ace mech that lacked a Saint Kingdom, the Minerva possessed a diminished capacity to empower her own mech frame.

All of that missing power instead went on to boost the performance of many different mechs.

The problem with that scheme was that without Venerable Imon Ingvar, the Saint Commander was not able to concentrate all of her disposable power on a single subject.

Her current Enfeoffment limit was to elevate a mech into a Baron, which was equivalent to a low-tier expert mech.

Ves expected that once Saint Commander Casella received her Minerva Mark II, that limit should increase to the level of a Viscount, which should be equivalent to a mid-tier expert mech.

That was much better, but not enough to seriously threaten enemy phase lords, especially the more formidable ones!

The Minerva Mark II should be able to pose a serious enough threat against phase lords when she was able to Enfeoff mechs into Marquises, which corresponded to a high-tier expert mech.

That was about the same power as the First Sword or the Amaranto right before their pilots broke through!

In addition to that, if Casella was able to attain a higher effective resonance strength with the help of ST-688 Archon, then she might be able to convert 60 or 80 mechs into Marquises ahead of time!

That was an incredible amount of high-tier expert mechs on a single battlefield!

At that point, the sheer quantity of high-tier expert mechs should produce qualitative changes, especially if the original mechs already happened to be powerful first-class mechs.

The huge quantity of Marquises should be enough to strike fear in the hearts of phase lords!

Even if an individual Marquis was still not able to win a duel against a genuine high-tier expert mech due to multiple factors, the former at least matched the latter in terms of true resonance!

What did this mean in concrete terms?

Lesser phase lords would get shredded when they got targeted by so many Marquises!

Greater phase lords would endure serious pressure, perhaps to the point where they had no choice but to retreat.

The Minerva would no longer be as helpless as in the last battle where her Barons

ultimatekur nosed too little of a thrant to clou down the likes of the Herald of the Void and the Lower Herdmaster!

Ves actually felt tempted to pick ST-688 if not for the fact that it was heavily reliant on the quantity of people available.

ST-688 would also complicate Casella Ingvar's progression down the road.

Furthermore, he was not sure whether it was a good idea for the Saint Commander to gain superiority through numbers alone.

Her development might go astray as her boosted strength diminished the importance

of more qualitative factors such as her leadership skills.

Ves wanted to seek a viable alternative so that the option of ST-688 would not push Casella into a corner.

He eventually found one in the form of Dragon Scales.

Despite its name, it had nothing to do with the scales of a lizard exobeast.

It instead stood for a ace mech-grade resonating alloy that was aligned with the metal

attribute.

The effect of Dragon Scales was quite simple.

It was able to strengthen the physical toughness and other defensive parameters of all friendly metallic subjects within the domain of an ace mech!

Dragon Scales was originally developed for ace drone mechs that deployed a lot of

spurs.

These spurs tended to collapse and fall apart quickly when used in duels against other

ace mechs.

In order to make them tougher and last much longer on the battlefield, Dragon Scales came into existence.

The name conveyed the ideal to make spurs so tough and resistant towards damage that it could turn an ace mech invincible when stacked together!

Although the performance of Dragon Scales in reality fell short of this ideal, it was still

a fairly successful product.

It also happened to be compatible with ace command mechs, though it behaved a bit. differently in these cases.

The effect of Dragon Scales was proportionate to the strength of an ace mech's

domain field.

The Saint Kingdom of an ace drone mech was typically strong, so its spurs received a massive boost in defensive power.

The Command Field of a more classic ace command mech like the Minerva was much weaker but more dispersed.

This meant that Dragon Scales could only provide a more moderate boost in defensive

power.

However, since Casella was able to Commandeer 10,000 mechs or more, this meant. that she was able to make a lot of assets a lot more survivable than before!

"This is perfect for throwing lots of melee mechs onto the native aliens!"

Melee mechs bore the greatest risks in battle. This had never changed, but the differences in casualties became especially lopsided in the Red War.

Most of the weapons used by the native aliens were so strong that melee mech pilots had significantly lower survival rates than ranged mech pilots!

It was costly to deploy melee mech units against serious enemies. No matter whether their side had won or lost the battle, the melee mechs always paid a price.

If Casella was able to bolster the defenses of every Commandeered mechs by just two

or three times, then that could make a massive difference in losses over a longer span

of time!

"Her Command Field can also affect subjects other than mechs."

She had already demonstrated the capability to Commandeer human starfighters to a slightly lesser degree back when the RF still fielded them in considerable numbers.

This gave Ves hope that she would also be able to Commandeer starships one day if she had a reason to expand her capabilities in this direction!

The Saint Commander would partially resemble the Demon of the Sand or more famously the Technomancer, who also relied on empowering warships to saturate their opponents with overwhelming firepower!

So long as Casella was able to bestow her true resonance on increasingly larger warships, she may even be able to transform a warship as immense as the Tortouous

Scream into a much more impenetrable bulwark!

Naturally, Ves had a very high interest in making vessels such as his own flagship tougher and more defensible.

"Our clan lacks champions that can bolster the defenses of our fleet. Ves sighed.

The problem would become a lot less severe if Venerable Jannzi was able to trigger her

second apotheosis.

However, the Bastion was just one living mech. She could only defend one large hull or

a handful of smaller hulls at most.

This was not enough for a fleet that consisted of at least a dozen different starships!

The only way to bolster their defenses and increase their chances of surviving a lengthy campaign was to empower their defenses on a more universal level.

Dragon Scales had the potential to make that happen. but only if Commander Casella actively expanded the scope of her Command Field to encompass warships. Ves was a bit reluctant to encourage Casella to develop her power in this direction.

By focusing on expanding her versatility, she would have less time to spend on improving her hard power.

Dragon Scales also benefited Commandeered subjects more than Enfeoffed subjects. The latter enjoyed a better defensive boost, but not that much due to diminishing returns. Since this was the case, it was much better to spread the benefits to as many

friendly assets as possible.

"This resonating alloy is also rather passive in its usage. It doesn't provide a direct

offensive boost to different subjects."

Stronger defenses often proved to be insufficient in the battles of the present day. It took strong attack power to quickly penetrate the defenses of the native aliens. Even so, stronger defenses could give the mechs and warships that already possessed adequate weapons a much greater chance to survive, allowing them to get off more attacks than otherwise!

Besides, Casella's Command Field already bestowed a qualitative boost in offensive

power.

As Ves continued to weigh the pros and cons of ST-688 Archon and Dragon Scales, he could not make up his mind.

Although they both steered the Minerva Mark II in different development directions,

one was not inherently better than the other.

He decided to present his dilemma to his wife. Gloriana's answer was simple.

"I can see why you are struggling to make up your mind. Frankly speaking, we do not

have the right to make this design choice. We should brief the Saint Commander of

her options and let her decide."

"Hm, you are right."

They did just that. When the Saint Commander patiently listened to what key

resonating materials she could choose from, she remained silent for half a minute before she voiced her opinion.

"Both key resonating exotics have their merits." She said. "I am more interested in immediate benefits than long-term payoffs. ST-688 fits my criteria quite well. It matters little to me that it becomes worthless once I become a strong enough senior

ace mech. I am more willing to exchange long-term pains for an immediate boost in combat power." "That is quite magnanimous of you, Casella." Ves remarked.

"Dragon Scales can also serve an immediate purpose in the short term while also remaining highly useful in the long-term." The Saint Commander continued. "Its benefits to the mechs under my influence are massive, as helping them survive when

struck by the primary or secondary gun batteries will make it much less costly to employ melee mechs against enemy warships. This resonating alloy will make our mech army much more effective at culling a large number of mundane assets. No matter how heavily the enemy outnumbers us, they cannot defeat our forces so long as we do not go down fast enough."

She was completely right!

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