The Mech Touch

Rion and his group amassed quite an impressive collection of first-class materials. Though none of them came in greater quantities, a crown was not that large to begin with. This was also the primary reason why the dwarves were able to amass a decent collection.

"This is practically a gourmet for Lucky!"

His cat rarely ate materials that were as extravagant as the samples in front of Ves. He bet that Lucky would probably grow incredibly upset at missing the opportunity to devour so many delicious snacks!

"Oh well…"

Ves reminded himself that he was still working on the clock. He couldn't waste too much time on getting fascinated by all of the wealth on display.

He soon grew serious as he began to study the most important properties and merits of each material. Though the selection of materials was not particularly impressive in the inventory of a first-class mech designer, the caliber was unquestionably higher than that of second-class materials!

"The primary criteria that determine the class of a material is how much value their properties bring. Their rarity doesn't play a role. As long as at least one aspect of them is powerful enough to be used in first-class products, they are classified as first-class materials."

What this essentially meant was that there were no useless first-class materials. The practice of dividing materials into three categories was a human construct to begin with, so there was no way that anyone could obtain less valuable first-class materials as a bargain.

"Let's begin with the ones that caught my eye."

As its name suggested, EFV-343 was an artificial alloy made out of a formula of several different exotic materials. It was a fairly old and well-known material that humanity had developed in the early days of the Age of Conquest.

It soon turned into a popular and widely-used first-class alloy due to its usefulness and the relative ease in sourcing the raw materials required to make it. This was also the reason why it was affordable enough for Rion to purchase a sample.

"If I have enough EFV-343 at my disposal, I could create a powerful energy weapon!"

EFV-343 had many different applications and was most widely used to make high-end electrical components. Although the physical durability of the material was average, it possessed an insanely high tolerance for heat, electricity and many other forms of energy.

The simplest way to describe it was that it was both a sponge and a pipe for energy. It was able to store energy naturally like a battery or heat sink. It could even hold multiple forms of energy at the same time. Depending on how it was manipulated or incorporated into an object, it could selectively channel a specific type of energy to another destination in an instant with remarkably high efficiency.

Although all of these functions sounded rather basic, a creative engineer or mech designer could employ EFV-343 in many brilliant ways!

Right now, Ves was thinking on how he could make use of EFV-343 to create a natural mechanism to power the luminar crystals of his crown. They could also be employed as a form of protection against excessive heat or other powerful energies.

This was a crucial material if Ves wanted to add a powerful extra function to his crown. Since Rion's prohibited him from incorporating any obvious technological components in his design, he could only take a step back and rely on the natural properties of materials to increase the utility of the device.

"I don't want to make a purely ornamental piece. A crown of this expense should always have a few surprises."

Ves already planned to turn the luminar crystals added to the crown into hidden energy beam projectors. Although their power might not be as powerful as dedicated first-class weapons, they would definitely give any attacker a surprise.

"Let's see what other uses I can add to the crown."

Whoever named Extreme Cold Titanium apparently lacked imagination. However, it was an apt description for this high-grade exotic. It was a lot harder than titanium but shared the same density and other properties of this mundane element.

What caused Extreme Cold Titanium to stand out was that it apparently broke the laws of thermodynamics just by existing!

According to the first law of thermodynamics, the sum of energy levels inside a closed system should be constant.

However, any system that incorporated Extreme Cold Titanium ultimately lost a lot of energy over time.

This was because the exotic just sucked in lots of energy, particularly heat, and caused it to disappear into nowhere!

"It's a fantastic material to use as a heat sink!"

Extreme Cold Titanium was universally popular in all first-class circles for this reason. Although it had its limitations such as limits to its rate of energy absorption, it was still a fantastic way to persistently cool parts that tended to generate a lot of heat over time.

As long as Ves employed a bit of Extreme Cold Titanium in his crown, he could employ heat or energy-generating materials without any concern for overheating.

"After all, my crown is not supposed to cook the head of its wearer as if it was an egg!"

The only downside to employing Extreme Cold Titanium was that it was active all the time. If left alone in a closed room, it could freeze the local temperature until it was close to absolute zero!

This was a known problem and humanity developed many different solutions to prevent Extreme Cold Titanium from creating disasters.

Ves looked intrigued when he regarded these two basic but incredibly useful exotics.

"I can already do a lot by combining EFV-343 and Extreme Cold Titanium. I just need to pick up both a source of energy and another material that does something useful."

He swept his eyes towards Histam alloy, which was named after its inventor. Just like EFV-343, it was an artificial material with highly useful properties.

However, compared to the other two materials, Histam alloy was a lot less flashy. It only stood out for its superior durability. If Ves was interpreting the specs on the projected information panel correctly, Histam alloy was actually a lot tougher and more resilient than Unending alloy!

"A mech made out of Histam alloy would be a tough nut to crack." Ves imagined.

Histam alloy also enjoyed another advantage compared to Unending alloy. Ves had no idea how to make the latter, but the former was already a well-known material.

If Ves didn't have any better choices, then it was completely acceptable to make use of Histam alloy as the base material for his crown. It would add a lot of durability to the end product, ensuring that no matter what crises or perils it endured, the crown of the dwarves would always remain intact!

Still, Ves was reluctant to settle on Histam alloy because it brought nothing else to the table.

"It's also a dense and heavy material. I don't know if Rion's head can hold that much heavy metal under heavy gravity conditions."

Ves mentally put Histam alloy on the pending list and moved on to studying another material.

Ireon B was a natural exotic that was often found alongside its more precious and rarer A variant.

Ireon A was highly desirable because it was a lot more potent due to its purity. The problem was that deposits of this rather rare exotic were largely tainted and mixed with other materials. It was too hard to find significant amounts of pure substances.

The larger quantities of Ireon B found in these deposits were weaker and not as potent. Many first-raters even regarded it as substandard materials and would never think of using it in their mech designs or other products!

"There's nothing wrong with Ireon B, though." Ves shrugged. "It just isn't as impressive as its big brother."

The main use of Ireon B was to form a natural energy shield!

Yes, an energy shield!

A single piece of processed Ireon B could project a protective energy shield that possessed much of the same functionality as a shield generator!

In fact, many people theorized that the tech behind shield generators was originally derived from studying the working principles of Ireon B.

There were several differences between a conventional shield generator and this exotic.

First, the former was operated by a powerful AI or clever programming. It was able to be selective about what was permitted to pass through the energy shield. A typical example was light and air.

While the simplest application of Ireon B was also capable of projecting an energy shield, the problem was that it blocked everything! Anyone who wore a device that was centering around this exotic wouldn't be able to perceive what was happening outside due to a lack of light!

The exotic also cut off air circulation which might or might not pose a hindrance.

All of this meant that a shield based on Ireon B worked well as an energy barrier, but it could not be relied upon to fight an extended battle.

"It's still a good tool to guard against assassination strikes."

Someone as arrogant and ambitious as Rion Aaden would make enemies sooner or later. He wanted to unite as many dwarves as possible, and some of them might not take kindly to a rival who wanted to usurp their men.

It would be a shame for the Iron Emperor to perish early because of insufficient defense.

"Rion is an emperor, not a soldier." Ves muttered. "The various downsides related to Ireon B aren't as relevant to a non-combatant."

Still, it was quite tricky to incorporate Ireon B into the crown. Ves had to make sure it created an energy shield on command. It shouldn't be projecting any energy shields when there was no need to put up a defense.

"Maybe I can mitigate the other problems if I make use of a clever combination."

The rather silly-sounding Copenhagen Copper quickly aroused Ves' interest for a couple of reasons.

It was a natural nemesis towards signals. It generated a natural interference field that was able to scramble nearly all forms of communication. Fortunately, there was a way to neutralize this property, or else Rion would have to put down his crown each time he wanted to receive remote transmissions!

However, this was not enough to arouse his greed. What truly attracted him towards Copenhagen Copper was that it was also able to disturb many if not all forms of teleportation, displacement and materialization phenomena within a decent range!

This would prevent Rion from being teleported against his will. Copenhagen Copper was also able to prevent nearby materializations. This was a good way to prevent an assassination attempt by materializing a bomb close to the high-value target!

"The only annoying part is that Rion has to manually switch off these settings every time he wants to teleport or materialize something in his presence."

These were decent tradeoffs even if the dwarven emperor was able to rely on other tools to block teleportation.

"Damn, all of these first-class materials are so useful. They're so tempting to incorporate in my crown!"

Aside from maybe Histom alloy, Ves already hungered to make use of the other exotics or alloys he surveyed so far! With plenty of more materials to study, Ves knew that he would find it much harder to limit his section!

"I need to pare back my choices. The crown shouldn't do everything. There are other specialized gadgets out there that can block teleportation or project an energy shield."

Ves realized that most of his ideas surrounding his crown tended to focus on self-defense.

He was projecting himself too much in Rion's shoes. Due to his paranoia, Ves was always eager to increase his ability to defend against threats.

"Someone who can afford to purchase all of these first-class materials isn't lacking in solutions!"

Ves realized that it was a better idea to focus on more esoteric and unique abilities that others couldn't easily replicate.

An interesting question emerged in his mind.

"Are any of these materials spiritually reactive?"