The Mech Touch

Chapter 7113: The Significance of a Tenth Birthday

Many people began to converge upon the central continent.

This was the site where the highlights of the birthday party would take place.

Most people remained ignorant about the significance of the pyramid structure and the hefty amount of hyper materials used to construct it all. They just found it pretty and interesting without putting any deeper thought behind its purpose and meaning.

Yet not everyone could be fooled so easily. A high number of elites attended the birthday party. They could spot the clues and string them together easily enough.

To those with the right knowledge, it became abundantly clear that the crystal pyramid was akin to a gigantic formation anchor!

What was its purpose?

Was this secretly a trap?

If not for the security guards approaching them and discreetly conveying the message that the Red Collective under the supervision of the Red Association was responsible for creating the crystal pyramid, numerous concerned people would have tried to call in help in case of trouble by this time!

Fortunately, most guests received enough reassurances to continue to take their assigned seats.

This entailed quite a climb to those who possessed greater status than the norm. The higher their prestige, the more they needed to climb to reach their places at the upper sections of the pyramid.

Whatever weirdness the Larkinsons had in store, it shouldn’t be too dangerous.

Even if it was, the groups that attended this event had already made the appropriate backup measures.

As people continued to arrive from the different continents and took their seats, the pyramid grew increasingly livelier.

Many of the arrivals ordered drinks, which were delivered from bots that emerged hidden entrances.

Close to the top of the crystal pyramid, many of the people here consisted of high-level VIPs and important acquaintances of the Larkinsons.

Aurelia and her siblings even reunited with some of their classmates back at the Joan Devos Elementary School.

Of course, these guests were all aware that the crystal pyramid possessed a lot of hidden depth.

It was only because they trusted in the integrity of the Larkinson Clan, the Red Association and the Red Collective that they had set aside their misgivings and chose to take their seats.

Both Ves and Gloriana had gathered together to see everyone coming together to witness their daughter’s biggest moment.

Aurelia currently stood at the highest layer, offering her an excellent view of the people standing or seated below. Lucky and Clixie flanked her as if they were fulfilling the duties of an honor guard.

"Meow."

"Miaow."

"She has grown so much." Gloriana wistfully said. "She used to be so small that I could effortlessly hold her in my arms. Now, she is about to embark on puberty, more advanced study and forming her own circle of friends."

"About that, have you thought about where we should enroll her next?" Ves quietly asked.

"I have not. We should wait until we obtain the results of the genetic aptitude test before making further considerations. Whatever the case, it has to be her decision, not ours." Gloriana insisted. "That does not stop us from making recommendations, but she should be allowed to make the final choice without any pressure. I do not want to compromise her enthusiasm towards her studies by forcing her to attend a school that is not within her consideration."

Ves looked mildly surprised. "I thought for sure you would insist on making this choice on her behalf."

She responded with a grim smile. "Is that what you think of me, Ves? That I am such an overbearing and controlling parent that I have to micromanage my daughter’s entire educational trajectory?"

"..."

Her expression softened. "You are not entirely wrong. I push hard because I care about our children. I do not want them to go astray or see them suffer and hurt because of the consequences of making the wrong decisions."

"You can’t keep that up forever, you know. Our children must have room to grow up and learn how to deal with responsibility themselves."

"That is one of the reasons why I will let Aurelia decide where she should study in the following years." Gloriana admitted. "Another reason is that she has grown remarkably quickly in both intelligence and wisdom. If she was a more typical 10-year old girl, I would have insisted on choosing her next school myself. That is not the case. I have raised Aurelia so well that she is more than capable of performing her own evaluation and drawing her own conclusion."

Though Gloriana sounded a bit self-aggrandizing, Ves happened to agree with her assessment.

The whole point of parents was to take care of their children and make decisions that the latter was not mentally capable of understanding.

Aurelia clearly fell outside of this scope as she was definitely smart and perceptive enough to pass off as a child who was at least 5 years older!

Ves couldn’t help but nod in agreement. "Aurelia is a smart cookie, alright. She has plenty of schools to choose from. Any place would love to have her. The only issue is that if she decides to study outside of the Larkinson Clan, we need to stay on good terms with the owners of that school."

"That goes without saying. I would prefer it if Aurelia remains close at hand, but... our clan cannot offer her the quality of education that she deserves."

Gloriana felt disappointed at that. No matter how much the Larkinsons spent on recruiting better teachers and improving their teaching facilities, there were limits to what they could do. They simply could not match the long teaching heritages of heritage institutions with histories dating back thousands of years.

Even if the schools in the Red Ocean mostly comprised of branches that had been established in the last decade, they still inherited a lot of good stuff from the old galaxy.

The Larkinsons were unable to match these old institutions in this regard.

Whether Aurelia would choose to stay close to her parents and siblings on the Tarrasque or attend a prestigious institution located on a planet, her choice would change her life forever. It was only fair that she would get to decide on her own future.

Ves and Gloriana kept talking about their daughter as the crystal pyramid continued to host more people on its terraced sides.

Once most of the guests that traveled to the central continent had found their places, silence automatically fell onto the site.

A light shone at the very top of the structure. Ves and Gloriana had stepped up and stood by their daughter at this time.

Many projections soon came to life. Each of them gave the guests a very clear view of the people standing at the top of the pyramid.

"Welcome, ladies and gentlemen." Ves greeted everyone with a smile. "Thank you for attending my daughter’s birthday party. Ten years have passed since she was born. This is an important turning point for her life, as is the case for countless other people. The genetic aptitude test that we will soon be conducting on our daughter will determine once and for all whether she has the correct aptitude for piloting mechs."

A brief pause.

"Standard mechs, that is." He said with a grin. "As you are all aware, children like Aurelia no longer have to rule out the possibility of piloting mechs entirely. My Carmine mechs grants every human a new option. Although I have only released the Yellow Jacket line so far, rest assured that I am working together with multiple different partners to develop high-end Carmine mech models that will cater to a more discerning audience."

This was not a surprising revelation to well-connected people, but it still provided a lot of relief for many norms.

The Yellow Jackets were simply not good enough in their opinion!

While they were more than adequate for common folk who could never afford to purchase a real mech, the Yellow Jackets were completely incapable of fighting at a higher level. They simply weren’t designed and optimized to be used in such an intensive way.

Many mech designers had since developed variants of the Yellow Jacket models, but the more they deviated from the original designs, the more difficult it became to keep the Carmine Systems of the modified machines in working condition.

Ves promised to deliver them a better alternative!

The only problem was that he did not give them a solid timeline. Hopefully, he would not keep them waiting for too long.

"As such, the availability of Carmine mechs has reduced the significance of a tenth birthday." He continued to address the audience. "Far too many times, these occasions may seem cheerful, but were actually games of chance where the results were far too often skewed in the favor of the house. Which one of you had not experienced a moment where your whole universe collapsed after you learned that your genetic aptitude was not up to par? This is practically a shared trauma of 96.5 percent of you. So long as our genetic aptitude did not fall within a very narrow range, we learned that we were not the protagonists of the Age of Mechs."

Ves crossed his arms. "It is a good thing that we have transitioned to the Age of Dawn. With the successful widespread adoption of my Yellow Jackets, more and more norms have signed up for military service or joined one of the many private outfits. The days where we have to treat norms as second-class citizens or the like have been completely removed! Since the release of my historic works, genetic aptitude is no longer the sole variable that can end or create one’s aspiration to pilot a mech. A birthday like this no longer needs to be held at such an enormous scale."

That was right. They could have celebrated Aurelia’s birthday like they did in the previous years. It was already good enough to hold a family-friendly event.

"Yet still we insisted on holding our daughter’s birthday party on the Microplanet. Why? It is because we wanted to remind you all what you had lost during the fighting. Our rapidly changing circumstances have enabled us to develop wonderful new technologies, many of which have wide implications to us all. The fact that one of those inventions has single-handedly turned a child’s tenth birthday into just a regular celebration, then that is perfectly fine in my opinion."

Ves smiled wistfully as he thought back on his own tenth birthday. "The tenth birthday is not a proper celebration to most people who lived in the previous age. It was a virtual execution. Many children’s dreams abruptly ended on their tenth birthdays. It was not until I caused the fall of the genetic aptitude tyranny that we have become liberated from its oppression. Birthdays like these will continue to be organized by the groups that can afford it, but no longer will the growing boy or girl find their path to becoming a mech pilot closed. They will have to take a cumbersome detour in order to reach their destination, but that is already enough."

Many people genuinely felt grateful to Ves for changing the future of many people, particularly children!

Enough time had passed for his works to definitely prove their ability to break the genetic aptitude tyranny.

Carmine mechs were the real deal.

So long as Ves hurried up and completed his next Carmine mech design projects, his influence on red humanity would reach a height that very few mech designers could match!

That would be the day when Ves ascended to the rank of Master Mech Designer with a huge amount of momentum propelling him upwards!

This would be his true repayment for all of the time and effort he put into realizing this bold dream of his! Nothing would validate his works better than to become a Master Mech Designer at a fairly young age!

There was nothing wrong with being a Senior Mech Designer, but events in the Red Ocean escalated so much that Ves urgently needed the power of a Master Mech Designer in order to realize his goals!

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