Just like how reckless experimentation with neural interface technology often led to fatal outcomes, messing with spirituality was also fraught with peril!
The crude form of spiritual surgery he performed on William Urbesh was already proof of how bad things it could get if he played with forces beyond his understanding!
"I'll have to limit my experimentation to test subjects rather than my customers."
Despite the risks, Ves seriously wanted to explore this avenue. Not only would he be able to add another application of his design philosophy to his arsenal, he also wanted to achieve something greater.
He already formed a tentative but ambitious plan to strengthen his fighting forces and grant them a unique edge!
While a spiritual network wasn't necessary, if he managed to pull it off, he could definitely achieve a lot of synergy by combining it with his next idea!
Just thinking about the mechs that incorporated these innovations practically sent him over the moon! As a mech designer, he loved nothing more than to turn the impossible into the possible!
"These will be my next research directions!"
He indulged himself for a few minutes longer before returning to reality. He could leave them for later once he passed the immediate crisis.
Now that his ship transitioned into FTL, he was safe for a couple.
"Before my Scarlet Rose emerges back to realspace, I have to make sure my assets are ready for battle."
Ves proceeded to inspect the battle bots and tally the damage they incurred. He also ran a diagnostic of the ship in order to find out if any of her systems sustained any damage.
Fortunately, the Scarlet Rose only suffered minor damage. Aside from some surface components such as sensor modules and other fragile devices, the mobile supply frigate managed to make it out of the battle unscathed.
Though she endured a lot of enemy firepower, her exterior armor was largely intact. Part of that was because the ship's constant rotations spread out the damage across her entire hull, thereby preventing any single exterior section from accumulating too much damage.
Even so, the minor cracks and chips represented a permanent reduction in armor integrity.
As long as the Scarlet Rose kept bumping into enemies, the damage would continue to accumulate until a breach finally occurred!
Given time, Ves might be able to patch up the holes. Yet Ves did not possess the expensive exotics required to fabricate replacement armor that was up to standard. He could only settle for the materials he had on hand to fabricate inferior replacements.
The same went for the mechs. Each of them only suffered light damage, but the dearth in materials made it difficult to repair any damage.
Lucky was partially to blame for his poor logistical circumstances!
The moment he stepped in the exotics storeroom, he found a near-insensate gem cat lying in a pile of half-eating minerals as if he was sleeping on a bed of money!
"Wake up, you thieving cat!"
Ves kicked the sleeping cat, causing Lucky to yelp and bounce against the bulkhead of the storeroom!
"MEOW!"
Lucky hissed indignantly at his owner!
"Oh don't be so dramatic! With all that you've managed to devour, a kick against your bottomless stomach is the least you deserve!"
When Ves gave permission for Lucky to eat the Scarlet Rose's exotics stash, he expected his cat to take a while to digest his food.
Yet as he approached some of the locked drawers and pulled them out, he encountered nothing but an empty cavity!
Every sample of a critical material was gone!
Ves inspected multiple drawers and found that some other valued materials had disappeared entirely!
As for the lower-grade exotics, Lucky only sampled occasionally.
"Lucky.." Ves gnashed his teeth. "While I didn't set any limits on what you could eat, I thought you'd be sensible enough to leave some to repair my stuff! If the Scarlet Rose goes down because you ate all of my repair materials, then you have only yourself to blame!"
"Meow meow meow!"
Lucky did not look contrite at all! As far as he was concerned, Ves would have never been able to capture the Scarlet Rose without his help! It was all him! Ves only contributed 5 percent to the capture of the ship at most!
Since Ves claimed the Scarlet Rose and her complement of mechs, then Lucky could only settle for the high and medium-grade exotics stored on the ship!
After a lot of arguing, Ves finally managed to convince Lucky to slow down his consumption!
"I don't care whether you've leveled up or grew stronger! A single cat won't get me back to friendly space! Only a ship can do that, so it is in both of our interests to keep the Scarlet Rose intact!"
"Meoow!" Lucky suggested while suggestively swishing his tail.
"That's ridiculous! I don't want to get stranded on a ship without an FTL drive!"