Gem Research
Ves made the decision.
In the desire to increase his collection of referral letters, he chose to make contact with Master Carmin Olson.
He did not activate his comm and make direct contact with the cheap Master who barely taught him anything before kicking him away due to getting entangled by a single Hexer.
Though he held a lot of resentment towards her in the past, enough time had passed for Ves to mature and get over this incident.
In fact, Ves likely wouldn't have been able to decouple himself from his family and his state in order to pursue his own future without this crucial turning point.
All of the experiences he went through and the lessons he learned from them had molded him into one of the leading independent mech designers of his generation!
Of course, Ves also went through a lot of dangerous and death-defying incidents, but he conveniently downplayed their severity considering that he managed to come out on top in the end.