[1-200] THE MECH TOUCH

Chapter 23: Sell

When Ves logged into Iron Spirit, he visited the support section in order to register a free virtual license. The game charged a lot of credits for the virtual license of the The Marlin Solutions 1004-HRF 5th Generation armor plating. Considering that anyone could make a living if they designed and sold even a halfway decent mech, the prices weren't unreasonable.sz

The support staff processed his request promptly. Ves had made this request before so they still possessed all of his information. After confirming that he possessed an authentic production license for the armor, he received his approval half an hour later. With all the paperwork done, he loaded the Marc Antony's design file into the virtual workshop.

"Let's get to working."

Still motivated from his previous evaluation, Ves had no trouble getting into the right mood. The Marc Antony embodied aggressive passion, so in order to keep its X-Factor intact, Ves entered a state of mild frenzy.

With the help of his much more comprehensive Assembly skills, he operated his 3D printer with gusto. Parts rolled off the printer as if he printed paper. It was not as if his skill in operating the 3D printer had improved remarkably. The reason for his increased fluency was that his knowledge base had increased. He knew better how to tweak the printer in such a way that it resulted in less problems when fabricating a particular component.

Rigid armor needed to be treated much differently than delicate sensors. Heat affected one procedure much more, while another fabrication process couldn't be done properly unless vibrations stopped. All these kinds of trivial details that Ves neglected to learn had come to the front of his mind. The ease in which he applied the newly learned knowledge impressed him of the power the System wielded once again.

Naturally, not every component came out perfectly. Knowledge did not necessarily translate to better tool use. It was like learning how to play a piano by studying a book. At least the armor plates came off without any deficiencies. The HRF required a lot of processing to produce, but all it took was time and loads of resources. As mass production armor, it had been developed in a way to make it easier to produce in bulk. Fabricating one set of armor plates for his mech was easy.

Ves moved to the assembler and worked to put the parts together. From the internal frame, to the components, to the artificial musculature, to the cabling and pipes, until finally he molded the last pieces of armor in their places. His Assembly skill allowed him to optimize the order in which he put the components together, avoiding a couple of difficulties arising from inconvenient spacing. Working with parts that lacked any major defects also helped smooth the process along.

Frankly, the fabrication process could still be improved. With his prior experience in working with the Caesar Augustus, Ves felt confident he wouldn't screw up if he had to fabricate the Marc Antony in his real universe workshop.

His biggest difficulty was actually sustaining the proper intent while fabricating the mech. Despite his best efforts, it took over a day of work to finish the mech, and it was impossible to maintain the same mood throughout the fabrication process. He took brief pauses whenever possible, but his time constraints urged him to keep working.

He nearly collapsed when his virtual workshop finished testing the finished mech. Lucky left his perch at the couch and bumped his head against his body with worry.

"Haha, I'm fine buddy."

The specifications sheet showed his mech possessed no faults. Only minor errors marred the mech's performance, but they only impacted it in a minor fashion. In other areas, the specs performed as expected.

"Now I have to set the price."

The art of pricing was a subjective and delicate art. The Caesar Augustus CA-1 sold for a default price of 50,000 credits in the in-game market. As Ves had built the CA-1 himself once before, he knew the game set the base model's cost of 'raw materials' at 40,000 credits. Without taking into account the cost of labor and the time spent to produce the model, Ves could expect a profit of 10,000 credits a sale just for pumping out the base model.