Although Ves sounded casual about it, what he attempted to create was absolutely astonishing!

He did not know whether the RC had made any progress in this area, but he was pretty sure that attaching a spell into an artifact was pretty rare if nonexistent in the modern age.

If he succeeded, then he could take advantage of this new design solution to diversify the capabilities of his mechs as well as his personal wargear.

Ves already looked forward to wielding the spear that he desired. Compared to letting Blinky cast the withering curse by himself, it was much more efficient to outsource most of the work to a dedicated artifact, particularly one that already integrated the Corrupting Orb!

Though he was currently busy in his own research, he did not mind sharing his thought process and speculation to his wife.

Gloriana might not specialize in hyper technology and E-technology as much as her husband, but she was no slouch in these areas, or else she wouldn’t have been able to become a good collaboration partner.

She nodded several times as Ves espoused his theories.

“So if I am understanding you correctly, you are trying to automate the process of performing a cultivation technique as much as possible. You also want to increase its reliance on external sources of E energy in order to minimize the consumption of the wielder.”

“That’s right, Gloriana.”

His wife was sharp enough to deduce the possible implications of this attainment.

“Are you trying to create an artifact that can perform a powerful cultivation technique that is completely independent from the cultivation attainments of the wielder? I can think of many useful applications. Ascended Giants armed with your artifacts can launch withering curses without knowing anything about qi cultivation. Mechs can cast spells by relying solely on exotic radiation as input. Even the newly developed artifact warships can mount massive upscaled modular weapon artifacts that can produce all kinds of effects, allowing them to come closer to matching the performance of dreadnoughts!”

If Ves was able to make any of these ideas come true, then red humanity would have a lot more capital to defeat its enemies!

The two mech designers sincerely cooperated with each other as they tried to upgrade the original Sting. They did not work on a set blueprint, but instead chose to experiment with different ideas.

Unfortunately for the both of them, their confidence did not match their results. Several precious hours went by as they repeatedly tried and failed to produce significant results.

Although they gathered precious data and learned what did not work, all of this would only benefit subsequent research and development.

Ves was much more interested in immediate gains. The experiment only yielded partial success in this regard.

As the Withering Sting eventually took shape, he grew disappointed.

While the upgrade did manage to bring about numerous improvements, the end product fell short of his high expectations.

His wife patted him on the back. “This is already a good experimental result in my opinion. You cannot expect to develop a fully independent weapon artifact that can poison massive alien organisms without requiring any meaningful input or technique from the user. You would have to create a work on par with the Heavensword if you want to meet your ridiculously high criteria. It is already good enough that we managed to build a weapon that can assist your efforts to afflict your enemies with the so-called withering curse.”

The Withering Sting ultimately earned its new name, if only barely.

Along its dark superdimensional metallic shaft, Ves had painstakingly carved dozens of runes.

Ves and Gloriana had carefully chosen each and every rune. They roughly understood their meaning, but did not know what would happen if they attempted to string them together into larger sequences.

They had too little time on their hands.

The proper way to go about it was to start sub-projects centered around experimenting with different rune sequences.

However, due to the urgency of the ongoing battle, the Miracle Couple had little choice but to set aside all of that trouble and rely on a combination of existing academic literature and extrapolations of their own theoretical frameworks to complete this attempt.

The success rate of such haphazard and directionless experimentation was never high in the first place.

Ves still hoped to attain greater results, but reality rudely smacked him in the face.

As he examined the newly upgraded weapon artifact scaled at 3x, he tried to imagine how well the Dark Apostle would be able to wield this armament.

“Blinky, or rather me, will have to expend a significant amount of focus and energy to cast the withering curse.” He sighed. “My goal was to make it foolproof to the point of allowing my other self to wield it without needing any conscious input or technique, but… this is a lot harder than I thought. I feel like we have missed a few crucial steps in our process.”

He once again lamented that he had yet to redeem the Divine Blacksmith Records from the System.

The knowledge gap was enormous.

He knew what was possible, but he did not know the steps required to produce the desired results.

This frustrated him beyond belief, especially when he learned first-hand the difficulty of closing the gap.

His wife was right, though. It was far too unrealistic to expect instant results. Not every goal could be met at the first attempt. This was clearly a research subject that he would have to investigate over a longer period of time. It may take at least several years before he could produce a truly qualified end product.

“I suppose this will be enough for the time being.” Ves said with a sigh. “The Withering Sting will help, but only to an extent.”

The Dark Apostle still had many shortcomings when it came to equipment. Every human phase lord possessed inadequate equipment.

Ves yearned to complete his Polymetal mechs. Once he completed this elemental Carmine mech design project, he would finally have a Carmine mech of his own that was infinitely adaptable and could easily serve as a superior alternative to a phase lord raiment.

Although his Superdimensional Giant Regalia possessed astounding defensive properties, it lacked the tech and flexibility that a mech designer could exploit to the fullest.

“The problem that is vexing me most is the size changing aspect of artifacts.” Ves said while nursing his forehead. “I just can’t figure out how it is done.”

He summoned the Oceancaller and sent out a mental command that caused the artifact flute to spontaneously grow larger.

“Is this artifact able to grow larger because of its runes? That sounds unlikely. Ever since we discovered the existence of superdimensional matter, I developed a hypothesis that artifacts are able to change their size by incorporating materials with phasewater or superdimensional matter. However, I am not sure whether this is true. The Withering Sting certainly does not possess any trace that suggests that it can change size.”

Gloriana frowned in thought. “You have raised a number of interesting theories and possibilities. I have not put a great degree of thought on these matters. In my opinion, the most likely answer involves a combination of two. Runes are essential because they serve as the programming code of this esoteric ability. Superdimensional matter is also needed to form the root of the size-changing aspect, but I do not necessarily think we should limit it to a narrow range.”

“What do you mean by that, honey?”

“Do you think that all of those ancient blacksmiths and artisans all had access to phasewater or superdimensional matter during their lifetimes?”

That was a difficult question to answer.

“I am not sure. Ancient records mention lots of wondrous materials, but it is rather curious that none of them have spoken about phasewater or superdimensional matter in-depth. Of course, this may be the cause because those sources were too low-level to gain access to the good stuff.”

“I think that it is too extravagant that every crafter at the time had access to phasewater or superdimensional matter.” Gloriana plainly said. “As far as we know, phasewater is a unique resource of the Red Ocean, and it may not have been produced in large volumes at the time. Superdimensional matter has not appeared naturally outside of the 365th dimension. Under these circumstances, it is not realistic to think that ancient blacksmiths relied on these materials to create size-changing artifacts. I believe that they have relied on other tricks to accomplish the result.”

Ves took a closer look at the Oceancaller. While the replica artifact possessed a lot of depth that he was not able to analyze in depth, his intuition told him that it didn’t incorporate any phasewater or superdimensional matter that he could recognize.

This meant that Gloriana’s theory may very well be true!

In order to produce a size-changing artifact, it was not necessary to rely on the miraculous properties of phasewater or superdimensional matter!

“Interesting.” He said while idly waving the Oceancaller around. “Since you don’t think phasewater or superdimensional matter is strictly necessary, then what else can explain this ability?”

“I think… that we are looking at artifacts from the wrong perspective, Ves. We are too used to treating our works as fixed material objects. There was nothing wrong with that idea in the previous ages, but times have changed. Now that we have entered the Age of Dawn, we need to rethink this assumption. We know now that every artifact has a material and a spiritual component. As you are the pioneer of living mechs, you should understand this truth better than others, correct?”

“Correct.” Ves responded. “What are you getting at, Gloriana?”

“Think about the end point of mechs and artifacts. Whether it is god mechs or the Heavensword, both of them blur the line between energy and matter. God pilots and god mechs are perfectly fused together, which ordinarily shouldn’t be possible. The reason why it works is because god pilots are predominantly energy-based life forms while god mechs are predominantly material objects. The overlap between the two is not too strong, which means that they can slot together. So long as the fusion is good enough, one can easily borrow the strength of another.”

Ves narrowed his eyes in suspicion. His wife had a specific destination in mind, but he was not yet able to figure out what she was trying to convey.

“Go on.”

Gloriana smirked at him. She clearly believed she had drawn a conclusion that her husband had yet to form on his own. That gave her a particularly strong sense of superiority.

“Think about it, Ves. While it may be presumptuous on my part, I believe that the perfect fusion between god pilots and god mechs can serve as a model for high-level artifact creation. It is not the material side of artifacts that is responsible for changing their size. It is the spiritual side that is responsible. So long as it possesses the right properties and programming, I believe that it can affect the material nature of objects. We already have proof that such a relation exists in the form of demonic mutations.”

She was right!

The physical mutations of D-arms and D-mechs directly proved that the spirit could affect the material.

What if Ves substituted the demon for a spiritual product that knew how to change its size?

The spiritual entity’s ability might get passed onto the object, thereby allowing the latter to grow huge!

Ves suddenly sobered up. As much as Ves wanted to believe in this theory, it was not rigorous enough to win his approval.

“You don’t have proof, right?”

Gloriana’s smile cracked. “That is currently the cause…”

“We can test your theories out at a later date. I think this research subject is too high-end for us to delve into right away. For what is worth, I think your guess is one of the more likely ones to be true.”

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