As the strongest element of the fleet, the Penitent Sisters would definitely play a crucial role in the upcoming battle.
As Hexers who possessed unusual ideas and uncertain loyalties, the former cultists could either save Task Force Predator or hasten its demise!
As Ves did not like to leave this question hanging, he wanted to secure their loyalty for real.
The problem was that the Penitent Sisters didn’t have much in common with the Larkinson Clan. They used to be some of the worst kind of Hexers imaginable. They fit every man-hating stereotype that foreigners held towards the citizens of the Hegemony.
He did not think it was impossible to integrate the Penitent Sisters into the clan. Ves had already noticed that the exiled Hexers had mellowed out during the time they traveled alongside Ves and his clansmen.
Months before, Ves fabricated and distributed a bunch of statues of the Superior Mother to the Penitent Sisters.
As expected, they became charmed by the glow of the supposed Supreme and worshipped it every day. To the Penitent Sisters, the Superior Mother was their greatest example! The authority of this mythical figure exceeded that of any matriarch of their home state!
Therefore, getting their buy-in turned out to be incredibly simple. Ves merely had to channel the Superior Mother a little bit and he easily managed to hoodwink these gullible Hexers.
His contempt towards fanatics had risen because of that. No wonder Prophet Ylvaine used to be able to seduce entire states with his drivel. The more someone was inclined towards fanaticism, the less they engaged in critical thinking!
Asking simple questions such as whether the Superior Mother was real or whether Ves was even channeling the genuine article never came up. Commander Chancy and Head Designer Stameros easily accepted the falsehoods that Ves had spouted.
After the two Penitent Sisters swore their devotion to Ves and the Superior Mother, they calmed down a bit and asked what he had in store for them in the future.
“It won’t be easy to earn your redemption from the Superior Mother.” Ves spoke in a normal mood. “You will need to go through the fires of damnation yet again and pass the tests that I will set for you. None of them are trivial. I have no doubt that many of you will fall and turn to dust. However, those who can survive these successive challenges shall be reborn anew under the Superior Mother’s blessing!”
He had already drawn back the ancestral spirit’s presence because he didn’t want his mother hanging over his shoulder all the time.
Regardless, his audience remained fixated by his earlier illusion. This was good, as Ves would easily tire if he had to do the whole song and dance over again whenever he met with the Penitent Sisters.
“What must we do, sir?”
Ves spread his arms. “I will pass on a number of plans in the coming weeks. You will have to make a lot of sacrifices, beginning with your ships and mechs. I hope you aren’t too attached to them, because we will probably have to use them up in the upcoming battle.”
The Penitent Sister Commander frowned. “You intend to use them as consumables? Do you know how valuable those ships are? You can’t just throw them away!”
“No material assets are more valuable than our lives! Wake up, commander. If we don’t give our all when we confront the pirate warships, then preserving our ships is pointless. We’ll be dead anyway and many of those fine Hexer combat carriers will probably end up in the hands of the Allidus Alliance. Does it please you to hand your precious ships over to the Nyxian pirates? They’ll be able to make bolder raids with the possessions that you have left behind!”
“None of us want to help the pirates.”
His argument hammered home the fact that nothing should be ruled out. Commander Chancy and the rest of her fellow Penitent Sisters never thought about making more use of their resilient ships because they were long used to valuing them. Even in the Hegemony, a fleet of combat carriers represented an enormous amount of wealth.
“As long as you pass the tests and earn the Superior Mother’s redemption, you will join our clan and be able to obtain new mechs and ships that we procure for you. Don’t get overly attached to your current war machines. Although it is regrettable to make use of them in a destructive fashion, they will have served their purpose in the most brilliant way possible. I think the Hexers who made your assets would have wanted them to go out with a bang while taking out as many degenerate pirates as possible. Don’t you agree?”
“We understand your point.” Commander Chancy responded. “Can you tell us what your plans entail?”
“In the short term, your engineers and ship crews will have to transform their ships as much as possible. Each of your combat carriers must be modified to excel at frontal collisions. I want to convert as many of them into ship-sized torpedoes as possible. At the very least, we should increase their bow armor, magnify their sub-light propulsion systems and pack them with as much enriched nuclear warheads and other explosives as we can stuff inside their hulls.”
This was an extravagant proposal! To utilize combat carriers as slow, jumbo-sized torpedoes was unimaginable to the Hex Army!
However, this was the only way that Ves could think of to inflict meaningful damage on the Gravada Knarlax. Any other missile or projectile would instantly get chewed up by the hundreds of secondary weapon batteries.
In a frontal battle, only pure resilience or devastating long-ranged firepower could put a dent on a heavy cruiser like the Gravada Knarlax.
Of the two options, the latter was not practical. Building, mounting or adapting a cruiser-grade laser cannon or a kinetic spinal cannon on a ship was not doable under the current circumstances. Ves and the Larkinson Clan lacked the proficiency in making these weapons and they didn’t have access to the drydock facilities or the lengthy amount of time required to mount a couple of ships with these devastating weapons.
Ves had no choice but to resort to a more primitive solution. Flinging armored vessels forward was the only way that he believed would work against the pirate fleet, but not just any ship would do. Third-class ships were simply too fragile against large-caliber guns. Only the second-class combat carriers had a chance of making it through.
In fact, he was pretty sure that half or three-quarters of the suicide ships would never make it all of the way to their targets.
That was not a big issue. These ships were very large, very heavy and would probably accumulate a substantial amount of forward momentum once they reached their targets.
Since a heavy cruiser like the Gravada Knarlax was known to be sluggish, there shouldn’t be any way for this big fat target to dodge the incoming suicide ships!
Only a couple of collisions and subsequent explosions should be enough to cripple or at least heavily damage the flagship of the Allidus Alliance.
Perhaps the lighter destroyers and frigates might be able to dodge the suicide ships, but the Larkinson Clan could deal with them in other ways.
“There are limits to what we can do in a month.” Juliet Stameros warned. “Trying to modify a starship while she has to remain active and on the move is much slower than if we can park somewhere or put her in a drydock facility. Also, I doubt we have the materials required to make the best possible conversions.”
Ves casually waved his hand. “Don’t bother with trying to make everything perfect. Just do what you can within the deadline. We are not trying to make works of art.”
Both of the Hexers understood his point. While they were still fanatics, they were also soldiers. Not every Hexer was as obsessive as Gloriana when it came to pursuing perfection.
After discussing the modifications needed to turn their ships into deadly suicide vessels, they asked what else Ves had in mind.
“I’m not ready to unveil my other plans yet.” He admitted. “I’ll inform you as soon as possible when I am done with my preparations. Some of them are pretty radical and experimental. I will ask much from your mech pilots, but as long as they have faith in the Superior Mother, I am sure that they shall overcome the danger.”
“Can you be more precise? We would like to have an idea of what the Superior Mother requires of us humble servants.”
“Let’s just say that I am trying to implement a method to tie you to the Superior Mother during battle. I can’t say more than this, but if it works the way I think it will, the benefits to you and your mech pilots will probably be substantial!”
His claims suitably impressed his audience. They didn’t look reluctant at all. Instead, both Commander Chancy and Juliet actually looked like they wanted to experience what he said right away!
He intended to form a separate neural network for the Penitent Sisters. This one would be different from the network that Ves had planned for the Swordmaidens. He wanted to try out several ideas in order to see what worked and to avoid putting all of his eggs in one basket.
Since Ves was forced to resort to extreme measures in order to narrow the gap between his forces and the pirate fleet, he might as well take advantage of all of the opportunities for experimentation!
As long as he used the current crisis as an excuse, his test subjects became much less opposed to subjecting themselves to radical tests!
In fact, they happily volunteered to take part because their duty compelled them to. They would do anything to help!
Ves inwardly sneered at all of the displays of blind acceptance that he had witnessed so far. These Penitent Sisters eagerly listened to ‘boy’ just because he found a way to present himself as the envoy of the Superior Mother.
Their reactions only affirmed his belief that fanatics made for the perfect test subjects. They were willing to set aside any doubts to please an illusionary deity, even when it pertained to their lives!
The meeting ended shortly afterwards. Commander Chancy promised to convince the rest of the Penitent Sisters to go support his plans, but it likely wouldn’t be easy.
“It will help if you address all of my Sisters in person.” She said. “It’s easier to believe you if you show yourself to them as you did to us. Otherwise.. It will be difficult to ensure compliance.”
“I understand. Schedule a general assembly so I can address as many Penitent Sisters at once.”
This was not something that Ves was concerned about. If he could convert Commander Chancy in an instant, then her subordinates likely wouldn’t be able to resist his illusion either.
“I have one more question. If.. if we ever manage to make it out of the Nyxian Gap, how will you integrate us in the Larkinson Clan? Will we be able to retain our own identity?” Chancy asked.
Ugh. That was a problem that Ves hadn’t fully considered. He was much more focused on the present than the future.
“Don’t take our oaths lightly.” He warned. “When you join our clan, You are no longer allowed to regard yourselves as Hexer. You are Larkinsons first, and the interests of our clan triumph over every other loyalty. That said, you are allowed to develop your own beliefs or priorities as long as they don’t conflict with the core tenets of our clan. Just look at the Ylvainans in our midst. While they have changed remarkably, they still cling on to their faith, though they have made a lot of adaptations.”
“Understood. We shall do our best to fit in if we live that long.”
Ves didn’t need to mention that the Penitent Sisters would have to stop discriminating against boys. He wasn’t concerned about this problem at all. Just like Ranya, they were doomed to become more closely aligned to the clan once they joined the Larkinson Network!
