Chapter 158: Old

While Marcella's comment about the crew aroused some worry, Ves decided to deal with it later. His newly hired crew used the trip to Cloudy Curtain as the Barracuda's shakedown cruise, so Ves expected them to arrive a bit later than usual.

First, he had to finalize his latest design. He mainly dedicated his time with testing his semi-finished mech's stealth systems. After optimizing its stealth armor as best Ves could manage in a few days, he turned his attention to the detachable particle generator.

Ves intended to employ the particle generator as a smoke generator. Once the rifleman mech fired its high-powered laser rifle, it exposed its position. Even the most ramshackle thermal sensors would be able to sense the incredible amount of heat projected by the laser beam and track it down to its origin point. His mech might as well be waving around a gigantic signal flare.