Chapter 7491 Second Configuration

"Whatever you did to the Riot Mark III killed the living mech and replaced it with an abominable being." Saint Isobel stated in a clear-minded fashion. "My Promethea Mark II does not deserve this treatment. I am not that hungry for power. If anyone must embrace evil in order to obtain power, then let that be myself. I am a saint. I can bear the consequences. If I am wrong, then let my battle partner be the one that can pull me back from the brink. I want my living mech to remain sober and in control over herself. She can play a far more useful role to me by serving as a friend and a second opinion. I never want to see you turn her into my enemy."

"Understood." Ves replied. "What about applying this treatment to a single weapon or functional module? This way, you can still obtain greater power and a higher intimidation factor, but also be able to retain your original living mech."

"My answer remains the same, sir. I do not want to be burdened with your dark experiments."

Saint Isobel conveyed her will and desire very clearly. She had put real thought behind this possibility.

This left Ves with no room to argue any further.

A part of him felt disappointed about that. Ever since he chose the latest System upgrade track, he still found himself with far too few opportunities to exercise his Demoncasting. He felt it was a bit of a waste to let this feature remain unused for multiple months.

Still, he could not bring himself to defy Isobel's decision. Ves had no choice but to shelve any notion of creating a new D-mech or D-arm.

"Very well. The Promethea Mark II shall remain an honest living ace mech." He said with a conciliatory voice. "What other requests do you have for your upgraded machine?"

Isobel shifted her gaze back to the projected sketch and thought about her wants and needs a little further.

"This rifleman mech configuration looks incredibly high-end, and I am sure that it will be much more powerful than the older one, but… it looks too small and thin for my needs. Since I want to gain the power to raze whole planets with my flames, my ace mech must be able to project much more firepower than what is possible with such a skinny mech frame."

"The Promethea Mark II is designed for active repositioning on the battlefield, just like the original." Ves explained. "Even with better tech and stronger materials, compromises must be made in order to retain enough mobility to outrun powerful enemies, outmaneuver tricky ones and reach distant destinations relatively quickly with the help of a minidrive. I do not think you want to pilot an ace mech that has become so big and clunky that she cannot escape pursuit from enemy phase lords."

Isobel grimaced. "You are right. I don't want to pilot a clunky ace mech against enemy champions that can pose a real threat. I also do not want to be lacking in firepower when I most need it. Why not… try and do both? Didn't you design several sets of mounted wargear years ago? If it is possible, I want you to design two versions of my Promethea Mark II. The base version can stay light and slender to improve our ability to survive on a dangerous battlefield. The expanded version should be the previous one, but wrapped up by mounted wargear that is so big and powerful that we can single-handedly destroy an entire continent's worth of cities by ourselves!"

That was a viable suggestion!

Mounted wargear would indeed solve several problems related to the Promethea Mark II.

At the very least, Isobel would not be forced to make a difficult choice between two configurations. She could retain access to both of them, though she could only ever make use of one at a time.

Even so, this would expand the Promethea Mark II's versatility and usefulness to a very large extent.

It was essentially opening up the choice to convert the ace rifleman mech into a temporary artillery platform!

Ves ran with this suggestion and began to sketch out a very crude interpretation of the mounted wargear.

The parts and components looked exaggeratingly large and thick in proportion to the structure of the ace mech.

He did not hold himself back too much and readily resorted to expanding the wargear in order to fit more components and energy reserves.

In the end, the mounted wargear had completely transformed the look of the Promethea Mark II!

She had become much bigger to the point where people would not be able to recognize her anymore if not for the sight of a familiar rifle and identical colorations.

The mounted wargear version of the Promethea Mark II exceeded the mass and volume of typical heavy artillery mechs.

In fact, if Ves had to classify this configuration if it was built as a single whole, then he would probably be able to call it an ultra-heavy artillery mech configuration!

This was not just because the mounted wargear multiplied the size of the Promethea Mark II by a considerable extent, but also because it also added multiple new weapon systems!

The secondary cannons did not pack too much of a punch, but that was not important. Ves had added them in order to increase the Promethea Mark II's quantity of attacks.

This would make it easier for Saint Isobel to spread her firepower across multiple 'softer' targets or regions.

As for more powerful and resilient enemies, the mounted wargear also possessed a very big gun that looked quite familiar.

Ves had hastily adapted the original concept of the Sun Caster and scaled it up to better fit the mounted wargear!

"Is this the super-special plasma cannon based on the work of the Plasma Shaper?" Isobel asked.

He nodded. "That is right. I originally planned to design the Plasma Shaper as a back or shoulder-mounted weapon system to serve as the Ultimate Module for your ace mech. This is admittedly a clunky design solution even if you can choose to detach this offensive module. However, your latest proposal has caused me to change my mind. While I need to redo a lot of work that I have done before, I think it is ultimately better if I turn the entire mounted wargear into the Ultimate Module. This will not only enhance the performance of all of this hardware in a special fashion, but also scale up the destructive power of your strongest ranged attacks by at least an order of magnitude!"

In other other words, by dedicating much of the capacity of the mounted wargear to enabling and supporting the super-size version of the Sun Caster, the Promethea Mark II in this heavy configuration would be able to output so much firepower that she could probably spread devastation across an entire planet in a single day!

Isobel could not help but become enthralled by this new vision.

However, she was still sober enough to realize that it would not be easy to gain access to all of this firepower.

"What are the downsides?"

"They are relatively straightforward." He said. "The mounted wargear will be very large and massive. Your Promethea Mark II will not be able to dance across the battlefield, so you can only really make use of it under limited circumstances. For example, when our forces have already defeated the main enemy force, or when we have established orbital supremacy above a planet."

"Those conditions are acceptable. I do not mind these limitations."

"The second major disadvantage is that the costs are massive." Ves said. "Designing all of this stuff is not difficult, but it will take up precious time that could be better spent on designing other ace mechs. My wife and I will have to reserve at least 2 whole months just to flesh it out. Then there is the matter of fabricating the mounted wargear. It will have to be made out of superdimensional matter, which is a problem because the entire ensemble is huge enough to strain our limited reserves. We may even be forced to settle for using hull-grade superdimensional alloys as opposed to the armor-grade superdimensional alloys used to construct the base mech."

Isobel frowned a bit deeper. "I can… accept compromises in defenses as long as the firepower is great enough. Just as you have already said, the Promethea Mark II in this ultra-heavy configuration should never be employed in situations where she can be threatened by serious enemies. I can wait until we have killed or driven away enemy phase lords before bringing out the heavy guns."

"Mmhm. It is good that you can accept these conditions. Different problems require different solutions. For now, my wife and I will focus on completing the core project of upgrading the standalone version of the Promethea Mark II first. If we work quickly enough, we may be able to get it done quickly enough to deploy you against the native aliens who have grown fed up by our presence within their territories."

"What about the mounted wargear?"

"We won't be able to complete that quickly." Ves admitted to her. "It will be lower in priority. You can forget about making use of it during the Nemesis Campaign. It may even take a year or several years before you can finally gain access to this massive boost in firepower."

The ace pilot sighed. "That will be a long wait, but I can bear the delay. The Promethea Mark II by herself should be enough to keep me occupied for a long time. Is there anything else I need to take into account?"

"Shifting the Sun Caster from the mech frame to the mounted wargear is a highly consequential decision. I originally settled for designing a very basic implementation of this high technology in order to meet the tight deadline, but now that I am able to take my time to flesh it out in a much larger platform, I can definitely turn it into an extremely powerful and special addition to your future arsenal. The wait will be worth it. I can guarantee that to you. However, the price that you will need to pay is that your base machine will not have access to any version of the Sun Caster. The normal configuration of your Promethea Mark II will mostly have to do with her handheld energy rifle as her most form of damage output."

"That is nothing new as far as I am concerned. I am already used to that when I fought as a standard mech pilot and an expert pilot. I have not become spoiled just because I have become an ace pilot. If waiting for another year can make the Sun Caster twice as powerful, then I will gladly settle for less for a time. Just be aware that my patience is not unlimited."

"Don't worry. We will not torture you by dangling this upgrade before your nose for as long as a decade. I am sure that we can squeeze enough time in our schedule to complete this side project over the course of a year."

Ves actually felt incredibly relieved by this change. The Sun Caster was truly an extraordinary weapon system in multiple ways. It fundamentally changed the properties of every plasma bolt in ways that he did not fully understand to great effect.

The more time he dedicated to studying and tinkering with this high technology, the more competently he could adapt it to the Promethea Mark II!

The additional time also benefited him in other ways.

He could take advantage of the cutting-edge tech released in the upcoming months that were not available at this moment of time.

He could also monitor the performance of the base version of the Promethea Mark II and take note of all of her actual shortcomings.

This would enable him to design the mounted wargear in a way that more effectively compensated for some of those weaknesses!

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.