The wildly optimistic projections for the Holy Soldier already came as a shock to Ves. This was the first time one of his mech models would surpass 10,000 sales in the second month!

As for the Desolate Soldier model, the circumstances were different and more complex.

His assistant dutifully explained the situation.

"Unlike the Holy Soldier, the demand of the Desolate Soldier is much more modest. The good news is that the LMC's reputation for quality and reliability along with the positive attitudes of our existing customers has generated a lot of initial interest. The shenanigans of the Ylvainans have been particularly helpful in publicizing our latest product and putting a positive spin on its effects."

"How has the warning issued by the MTA and the efforts of our critics affected the initial reception of my Desolate Soldier model?"

"Pretty bad, at least at the start. The Bright Republic's mech market is a lot more sober when it comes to our mechs. Most interested customers outside of our existing fans have adopted a wait-and-see approach."

"Has that changed?"

Gavin grinned. "Well, opinions are quickly beginning to turn around as soon as we adopted your plan to place the first batch of Desolate Soldiers across Bentheim. The duty they inspire from bystanders is so remarkable that the Bentheim Planetary Guard is actually the first major client to place a major order on our new product!"

"The Planetary Guard?!" Ves sat up straight. "Don't they normally operate on the surface of Bentheim?!"

"It's a nightmare to fight the sandmen on land. The Planetary Guard would much rather dispatch a bunch of mech pilots to space in order to help resist the sandmen that will be flooding the Bentheim System soon. As a port system, it's a certainty that it will become a magnet to these accursed aliens!"

It would be an absolute catastrophe if even a single sandman vessel reached the surface of Beintheim. Due to the planet's high population density, a sandman vessel could quickly spread out and harvest hundreds of thousands lives within minutes!

His cousin Melinda happened to be a mech captain in the Bentheim Planetary Guard. Perhaps he should get in touch with her in order to find out if she would be the ones deployed to space. Her Larkinson training meant she likely possessed a basic proficiency in spaceborn mech combat, so she might very well be assigned to pilot one of his mechs!

The thought of Melinda facing a flood of sandmen while piloting a mech that was only worth 20 million bright credits almost gave Ves a heart attack!

If possible, he wanted her to pilot a much better mech!

"How many Desolate Soldiers do you think we'll sell?"

"Our current estimate is 3,000 sales. We're actually partnering up with more third-party manufacturers to produce more mechs in anticipation of meeting future demand. We're betting that once the mech market recognizes that our Desolate Soldiers are good value, people will no longer hesitate and flood our company with orders."

"What's our projection for the second month."

"50,000 mechs."

"WHAT?!" Ves practically jumped out of his seat!

His shock was so drastic that even Lucky and Nitaa became alarmed.

"The first sandmen fleets will almost certainly hit the third line of defense by this time." Gavin spoke as if he hadn't dropped a bombshell. "Once the Desolate Soldiers perform as well as we think they will, demand will skyrocket. The widespread use of the Holy Soldiers in the Ylvaine Protectorate will also prove that our mechs can give defenders an edge."

Even so, Ves still thought that selling 50,000 Desolate Soldiers in the second month of the model's release was rather exaggerated!

"Don't forget that this accounts for sales in every state we maintain an active presence." Gavin added. "While much of our sales will still come from the Bright Republic, we expect to do very well in mech markets like the Reinald Republic that have most to gain from a mech that inspires duty."

"Ah. I see."

While Ves mainly designed the Desolate Soldier for the Bright Republic, a state with much less internal stability would likely value his new mech model much more than usual! If his Desolate Soldiers succeeded in affecting the moods of the citizens of the Reinald Republic and similarly unstable states, then selling 50,000 mechs was not out of the question!

"This is why we think it might be possible for us to reach 100,000 in the third month."

The shock of this immense sum had lessened after Ves digested the sales projections for the second month. After all, unlike the competition, his Desolate Soldier was the only mech that possessed the additional function of inspiring duty in everyone! The duel-purpose nature of his mech would probably come as a godsend to many faltering states!

Of course, with such an insane level of popularity, copycats and counterfeits would quickly begin to flood the market as well. While Ves knew that many of them would come with defective or absent auras, many consumers who weren't familiar with authentic LMC mechs probably didn't know the difference.

"This problem will mainly impact distant mech markets where we don't have a presence." Ves determined. "In the short term, it doesn't matter if unscrupulous mech manufacturers flood those distant markets with our products."

Gavin nodded. "The Bright Republic's mech market is well aware that only authentic mechs will deliver the best results. Foreign mech markets will quickly follow suit once we become more known there. Since our margins are already so low, there isn't much of a difference in the price of a counterfeit and an authentic copy. Mech buyers will definitely opt for the genuine products so long as they are available."

After the third month of release, the LMC could no longer make any confident predictions of the sales projections for the Desolate Soldier. It depended heavily on how the Desolate Soldier actually fared against the sandmen and how much their customers appreciated its aura.

Unless the Desolate Soldier performed disastrously in combat, the LMC did not expect its sales figures to subside! Selling more than 100,000 copies a month was a very realistic prospect so long as no other competing mech model was able to steal its thunder!

The insane numbers sounded rather surreal to Ves.

Of course, the mech markets became saturated, sales would quickly fall to saner levels. Even if that didn't happen, once humanity repelled the sandman invasion, the Desolate Soldier no longer had a purpose.

"Let's see how it goes." He spoke, forcing himself to calm down. "Keep track of the market reception of our Desolate Soldiers and inform me as soon as sales begin to spike. Also, make sure to allocate some funds on resuming construction of our second manufacturing complex on Bentheim. We're going to need it if we want to produce more silver label mechs."

After a long and extensive discussion with Gavin, Ves finally ended the call. He took a couple of deep breaths to calm down his wildly-beating heart.

"All of this hinges on whether the market values my Desolate Soldier highly. If the LMC overestimated its market reception, then we can forget about reaching 100,000 sales per month!"

Ves had already compared his Desolate Soldier to the works of other mech designers. Its performance was good enough to surpass most rifleman mechs designed by Journeymen. However, its performance in some aspects was noticeably worse when compared to mechs designed by Seniors.

Seniors whose design philosophies excelled in raising the performance of specific aspects of their mechs possessed the greatest advantage in this area. Their products always captured significant chunks of market share and Ves expected no different this time.

"At least we don't have to worry about competition from mainstream mechs this time."

It was impossible for the huge, trans-galactic enterprises to take notice of a tiny incident taking place in the Komodo Star Sector. All of their Master and Senior Mech Designers had better things to do than spend all of their valuable time and effort into designing a ludicrously-optimized mech that fit the current circumstances of a single region!

This was also one of the major reasons why the LMC and every other mech company revised their sales projections upwards. Mainstream mech models ordinarily took up a lot of space in open mech markets. Now that they had become irrelevant, local mech companies eagerly filled in the void!

"That reminds me, I still need to check something."

He went to the bathroom and activated his usual security precautions before activating the System.

[Design Evaluation: Desolate Soldier DS-A-01]

Model name: Desolate Soldier DS-A-01

Original Manufacturer: Ves Larkinson

Weight Classification: Medium-Light

Recommended Role: Ballistic Rifleman Mech

Armor: E-

Carrying Capacity: C

Aesthetics: B+

Endurance: C

Energy Efficiency: C

Flexibility: D

Firepower: C

Integrity: A

Mobility: B-

Spotting: C

X-Factor: A-

Cost efficiency: A

Project involvement: 80%

Original component composition: 17%

Overall evaluation: The Desolate Soldier is a simple spaceborn rifleman mech designed for cost efficiency and ease of use. It does not possess any other strengths aside from its mobility and duty-oriented X-Factor. This mech is primarily meant to be employed against the sandman race, 

[You have received 1,000 Design Points for completing an original design that has no other equivalent.] 

[You have received 50,000 Design Points for designing a mech with a high presence of X-Factor.]

Most of the scores didn't look very flattering to Ves. As a cheap mech, there was no way it would score well on armor and firepower.

That was not a big deal to Ves. The Desolate Soldier scored well in the areas that mattered. Its cost efficiency, integrity and mobility were the two main selling points of his product, and in that regard it could hold its own against the competition.

Of course, Ves knew his mech design well enough to be able to come up with these scores on his own. What he truly cared about was how the System evaluated the X-Factor of his mech.

This was the second instance in which he made use of a spiritual product as his design spirit. Though Ves believed that the Solemn Guardian had reached a respectable amount of strength, he still needed confirmation.

"A- is better than I expected."

The Solemn Guardian did not match the strength of Qilanxo. In fact, it was only a litle bit stronger than Ylvaine's spiritual fragment at the beginning.

Ves knew that this was just the start. Ylvaine's spiritual fragment experienced a considerable amount of growth for some reason, and Ves expected the Solemn Guardian to grow even faster if the Holy Soldier and Desolate Soldier actually realized their ludicrously high sales projections!

The only regret he had was that the urgency of the situation didn't allow him to shape the upbringing of the Solemn Guardian as he wished.

Ves only hoped that his initial customers served as good role models for the maturing design spirit.

"Uh oh."

The Solemn Guardian occupied both the Desolate Soldier and Holy Soldier design. Since the initial market demand for the Holy Soldier was much more drastic, the Ylvainans would likely become the dominant influence!

"Well, it's too late to do anything." Ves shrugged. "I can hardly withhold sales for my product when demand is so high."

He resolved to check up on the Solemn Guardian frequently and step in if it developed a desire to convert mech pilots to the Ylvainan Faith.

In fact, Ves did not even wait. He dismissed the System and concentrated his mind on the Desolate Soldier design. As soon as he made contact with the Solemn Guardian, he already noticed that it had grown much more turbulent since last time.

This signified that his infantile spiritual product was rapidly learning and maturing under the influence of the first people who piloted his new mechs!

Though the Solemn Guardian appeared very active and chaotic right now, Ves believed there should be a way for him to influence its growth.

"I'll need to prune out some unwelcome developments."

The drastic shifts taking place in the Solemn Guardian reflected its nature as an artificially-created entity. It lacked the maturity of naturally-grown spiritual entities.

If Ves hadn't gotten the idea of checking up on the Solemn Guardian so early, who knew how it would turn out in the end! It would have been too late to steer its growth once it matured and internalized its lessons!

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