The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1939

Chapter 1939 Undeserved

Days after Gion Greybeard's attempted betrayal, TR-3851 emerged in a quiet red dwarf system.

According to the transport ship's database, there was practically nothing of value in this worthless, lifeless star system.

Though it was a bit too close to the Desala System for his liking, Ves was running out of time. This Mastery experience lasted far too long already. He really didn't have the time to leave the territory of the Paramount Kingdom and bury his treasure in an even more obscure star system!

As a result, Ves had to make do with the Trion Enze System.

After making sure there wasn't any ships or signs of human life, Ves instructed the ship to travel to the inner asteroid belt.

While the ship made way, Ves continued to move his possessed around the ship in order to tweak the transport ship's systems.

While TR-3851 wasn't the most sophisticated ship he had ever seen, Ves wanted to make sure to erase every single log or record of her route.

No one was allowed to find out that TR-3851 visited the Trion Enze System!

It was easy to keep the dwarves in the dark. Most of them were confined in the cargo hold where they did nothing but sit on their thumbs while trying to adjust to the reduced gravity.

While Gion Greybeard and his most trusted men had died, Ves decided to withhold the news from the rest for the time being.

While the dwarves in the dark were already starting to ask questions, their trust in Vulcan was still strong! After Ves instructed the rest of the rebel cadre to keep their people in line, the dwarves no longer posed any trouble for the time being.

No one else had access to the ship's systems except Ves and his host. For the time being, Ves did not give Rion any chance of respite except for sleep.

Every waking moment, Ves continued to scour through every section of the ship. He tampered with the sensor system, the navigation system, the communication system and more in order to ensure the ship was as untrackable as possible.

In fact, one of the first steps he did was to manually dismantle the quantum entanglement node that connected the ship to the galactic net.

He didn't just isolate this crucial component or switched off its control system. He ripped the entire component out of its place and wrecked it until it was nothing but a pile of broken scrap!

This was just one of the many extreme measures that Ves resorted to in order to ensure the ship would not leave any clues behind. He just needed to retain enough functionality to reach a couple destinations while keeping his passengers alive. Everything else was completely redundant!

Once TR-3851 reached the asteroid belt, Ves observed the sensor input closely until he identified a large and distinctive-looking hook-shaped asteroid floating in the belt.

He memorized the mineral composition and other characteristics of this specific asteroid.

Though no asteroid remained completely the same after many years of floating alongside countless other rocks, Ves had no other choice but to draw the equivalent of a treasure map in his mind in this fashion.

There was no way Ves entrusted his Timpala Steel to anyone else.

He considered several alternatives.

For example, he thought about mailing the ore to the Komodo Star Sector, but how could a dwarf ever pay for it? How could he trust a courier company to faithfully keep his parcel secure for several decades?

He also ruled out stashing the ore in a bank. If Timpala Steel was just a regular chunk of high-grade exotic, then Ves didn't have much to fear that a bank would stoop to robbing its own customers.

It was a difficult case for a substance that was worthy enough to earn the System's notice!

Ves wouldn't put it past the MTA or the Paramount Kingdom to swoop in and serve an official document to the bank that allowed them to commandeer the Timpala Steel!

He was so paranoid that he even ruled out the Shadow Couriers, who even in this time period already fostered a reputation of reliability in the underground community!

"I won't be there to 'get my money back' if the Shadow Couriers fumble my parcel." Ves dryly noted.

Ves possessed no identity, money or reputation in this time period. It was seventy years in the past, so he wasn't even born yet. His grandfather Benjamin was likely still a young but prominent expert pilot in the Mech Corps.

For some time, Ves felt tempted to take advantage of his future knowledge to affect the course of history.

He could have sent a message to his grandfather that would warn him of the battle that led to his crippling.

Even if his grandfather didn't take the message from a random stranger seriously, he might still keep some of Ves' words in mind and avoid permanent damage to his brain!

Yet Ves resolutely refused to resort to this option in the end. He instinctively felt that interfering with the course of history might lead to very severe consequences, both to the timeline and to himself!

What if his grandfather died in battle? What if his grandfather never met the wife that would birth Ark and Ryncol?

What if his grandfather raised his children in a different way?

What if Ryncol was born as a girl rather than a boy?

What if Ves never had a chance to be born because his father never came into existence?

All of these what-ifs continued to frighten Ves so much that he resolutely swore off any attempts to affect the Larkinsons!

Even if he had good intentions, Ves truly did not want to return to a future where the Larkinsons no longer existed or where his mother had never met his father!

While he didn't exactly like his current life, Ves didn't want to exchange it for anything else. All of the good and bad he experienced throughout his lifetime turned him into a successful and exceptional mech designer.

Of course, even if Ves did not wish to affect the course of history, his actions during his Mastery experiences had already altered the original timeline.

Whether the present time he lived in was already affected by his actions in the past before he underwent his Mastery experience was a question that Ves did not bother entertaining.

He doubted the System would allow Ves to do anything that affected its own interests. Confining his actions to the Smiling Samuel Star Sector was the most Ves could get away with. Even if the changes in this star sector rippled out to the rest of the galaxy, it was doubtful that his actions resulted in a major upheaval elsewhere.

Once TR-3851 maneuvered close to the hook-shaped asteroid, a hatch opened up. A small floating mining vehicle emerged from the hatch. Ves piloted the vehicle to the surface of the asteroid and landed it into the deepest pit on the immense rock.

Soon enough, the mining vehicle began to drill into the rock at a steady pace. Ves continued to dig until he reached the center.

After that, the vehicle planted a heavily-reinforced crate in the asteroid before retreating back to the surface, collapsing the tunnel and fusing the drilled rock back together as it gradually emerged in the open.

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