The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1648

Chapter 1648 Boy Toy

Whenever Ves and Gloriana worked on the Adonis Colossus project, they no longer avoided discussing their views on men, boys and masculinity.

Neither of them expected to change each other's views.

Ves considered himself a man. Period.

Even if he knew that this assertion essentially fell on deaf ears to Gloriana, he tolerated her views anyway.

It helped that they both shifted the crosshairs away from him and placed it on Vincent instead.

Ves had much less qualms about disparaging Vincent's qualifications as a man than his own.

He cared little about betraying every other male as long as it wasn't him who suffered!

"Boys like Vincent are too self-absorbed to realize that they're no good." Gloriana self-righteously explained. "According to my personality analysis, his sense of self as a man is nothing more than a sop to prop up his fragile ego. His early life and his violent breakup with the Ricklin Family would have broken him if he hadn't turned to masculinity for support."

"You have a good point." Ves nodded in agreement. "From what I've witnessed, Vincent is much less of a man than he thinks. Compared to the male relatives in my family, Vincent is too inferior. He was lucky to become a potentate, but what did he do? He dickered in his training and when he finally grew a little serious about piloting mechs, he defected to the Bentheim Liberation movement!"

As a result of their disregard for Vincent's masculinity, the Adonis Colossus project suddenly went off the rails. Ves and Gloriana completely discarded their original intentions and the intentions of Vincent to pursue a crooked direction!

Instead of trying to make the custom mech personify the perfect masculine ideal, the Adonis Colossus now centered around appeasing someone they both considered to be a manchild!

Since the Adonis Colossus was just a custom mech meant to be paired with only a single person, Ves and Gloriana merely had to narrow the theme of the Adonis Colossus.

Instead of designing a mech that embodied the perfect masculine ideal, the mech now centered around Vincent's masculine ideal.

This crucial difference prevented Ves and Gloriana from pressing each other's views too much. They managed to hold onto their own views and tried to fit them together.

Strangely enough, it worked.

The project proceeded harmoniously as neither Ves nor Gloriana clashed any further. The common element that connected their diverging views together was their penchant for badmouthing Vincent!

Ves mainly concluded that Vincent was all about false bravado. Compared to the heroic Larkinson mech pilots who selflessly served in the Mech Corps in the name of duty, Vincent was much more pathetic.

His battle record was mixed and frankly disappointing. Whenever Vincent was in a battle where his side was ahead, he eagerly behaved domineering.

Whenever his side fell at a disadvantage, he was one of the first to retreat and save his own skin!

"Vincent has little courage to speak of." Ves remarked as he adjusted the shoulder launchers of the Adonis Colossus design. "The strong image he portrays in public is merely an insubstantial image. As long as you apply a sufficient amount of pressure, the image breaks."

As for Gloriana, she adopted the predominant Hexer mindset that men were all immature at heart.

This patronizing attitude towards the opposite gender colored the Hegemony's entire perspective on the male gender. Every Hexer routinely diminished every grown man by treating them as boys who would never grow up, unlike wise and clever women!

No matter how smart, strong or dignified a man became, Gloriana automatically converted each and every one of them into a boy!

Ves wondered if Calabast still looked at men in this light. For a woman as frighteningly competent as her, it was probably natural for her to dismiss most men!

At the very least, Ves felt that Calabast's attitude towards him had always been similar to a mother admonishing a naughty boy!

He gritted his teeth as he recalled his past interactions with the Hexer spy. Ves never had the impression that she treated him as an equal.

Even their supposed 'partnership' was just Calabast imposing herself in his orbit without his consent!

After all, a mother never needed to gain her son's permission to intervene in his life! As long as the boy was too premature to take care of himself, it was the duty of a mother to care in his stead!

That was the essence of Hexer views on the male gender!

If boys were left to fend for themselves, then all kinds of awful outcomes would ensue!

Boys becoming in charge of a state would doubtlessly become tyrants who exploited their subjects and pursued destructive conquests!

Never mind that the Komodo War broke out when the Hexadric Hegemony struck the first blow by commencing Operation K!

While Ves still felt offended in some ways, as long as Gloriana directed her views elsewhere, he could tolerate them. He felt no obligation to defend other men from Hexers as long as it didn't affect his interests!

Traitor of men? Hah! Whether he was Ves or Veronica Larkinson, his gender never played a major role in his self-esteem!

In other words, Ves regarded himself as a mech designer rather than a man!

Sticking to this principle made it a lot easier for him to brush aside Gloriana's views on his gender.

"How would you treat me if I was born as Veronica Larkinson instead of Ves Larkinson?" He curiously asked her one day.