It was sloppy work, but the clay was collected and put into large jars that then went into my [Inventory] for later. If we were going to be fighting more Automata in the future then having a weapon that could take them out quickly was going to be really useful. Getting the turtle apart was proving to be much more difficult though, even with the help of Mara and Kull. Both of them were skilled enough hunters in their previous village life, but neither had any experience with something this huge. I really wished I could call Najii, the Guild Dismantler, up on the phone and ask for tips or for her to swing by. Still, they knew the basics of dismantling which was better than me so I listened to any advice they had to offer. In the end, I had to build a huge sword with the fire crystal of a Flame Centipede embedded in it, and powered by me inside of Cyclone, just to get through the shell and start cutting it apart. I had no idea if or how this could be done by a non-Automata. The blade, alone, was cranking out a blistering amount of heat in order to melt through the iron shell and bones. Primus only knew what sort of fumes were being given off in the process.

Once we got the shell apart, things went much quicker. The blood had mostly congealed so it was easy to get into jars for storage. Mara said that turtle blood was often used in medicines so it should sell for a good price. I couldn’t think of any of my projects that would need turtle blood so I was happy to give it to the village to sell. I didn’t hold out much hope for the turtle’s meat being any good; a lot of it got charred from the sword. Maybe we could send some over to Willow Park with some BBQ sauce. We got everything broken down, and I was able to convert the shell and bone into iron slabs that I could use with my current project.

As I was getting the last of the turtle mess cleaned up, Shea and Elita returned from their hunting trip. They were able to get me two large lightning crystals, but I would still need four more. When I showed Elita what I’d found about the Iron Oxide Clay and how it had shorted Carnivac out, she backed away and didn’t want to be anywhere near the stuff. Not that I could blame her. Before I jumped back into the new shell project, I completed the repairs to the bodyguard Automata that I’d found here the last time. Maybe I should have given this one over to one of the new Automata villagers but I wanted to keep it for myself as a proxy.

I had to fashion a large metal patch to repair the damage to the bodyguard’s torso, so I designed it to look like a sheriff’s badge from the old west, and built a docking point for a drone into the back. To complete the look, I gave the bot a western style wide brimmed hat with a duster style trench coat.

I designated the new proxy Sentinel Prime and powered it up. Sentinel had some of my crafting abilities, but just enough for some basic things. Instead, I outfitted Sentinel with upgraded arm weapons. His arms looked pretty normal, albeit a bit thicker than normal but both had the ability to transform into either cannon mode or blade mode. Instead of connecting to my [Inventory], Sentinel’s ammo will be pulling from his own internal [Inventory]. With my upgrade, I learned that when I create a new server it gets attached to a physical object. I had no clue, physically, where the server was or how it was operating but I could attach it to something like a plate. Then if the plate broke, the server was also destroyed.

Creating these “servers” was still a pretty limited thing. On them, I was able to create a database and there was file storage to house magic code scripts as well as run things called Cron jobs, which were basically scripts that you could autorun at given time intervals. Like with the Automata creation, I found some new code frameworks and plugins available in my [Developer Environment] to make creating things like [Inventory] spaces a breeze. It might be because of my level, but I was pretty limited when it came to storage size though; so these servers were on the small size and nothing like whatever was running inside me.

I’d set up a small server inside of Sentinel that ran an [Inventory] with the capacity for roughly a square meter. This should be plenty of space for ammo as well as anything else he might need to carry around. I also equipped him with a modified version of the [Inventory] command called [Load] that would take what he touched and shape the material into cannon rounds that were optimized for flight and accuracy. Sentinel’s job was going to be to protect this village so that’s why he was also equipped with a drone that mounted in his back. When launched, it would act as another point of view proxy that Sentinel could use remotely. With the drone, I was really tempted to name him SoundWave, but Sentinel Prime was a better description of what his function would be, plus the new villagers were looking to me for guidance so if I wasn’t here physically then having this guy with “Prime” in his name should give them some comfort. Around the village, I’d also placed multiple stationary proxies that acted like security cameras that Sentinel could tap into. Each one still counted against my max proxy count so Sentinel could only tap one at a time. On his server, I added a Cron job that would cycle through each one on a timer that he could modify as needed or just focus on a single one.

I had some ideas for setting up proxy turrets and weapons but I didn’t have the time to focus on them. Maybe Sentinel and Jackie could work on those after I left. Once word got out that there was a village of free Automata, it was only a matter of time before the wrong kind of people showed up. The proxy limit was the main problem though. Until I could figure out how to get around that or up my limit, it wasn’t a practical solution.

With Carnivac, Cyclone, Sentinel, and Jackie helping me, I was able to finish up the new shell pretty quickly. Elita and Shea weren’t able to find the remaining lightning crystals for me so I had to change my design up a bit. Instead of using the electric motors that Cyclone had, this shell was going to get a steam engine. The new engine would be heated via the two large fire crystals I’d gotten from the Flame Centipedes. If my math was right, then this method would be more mana efficient than the electric motors too, but it wouldn’t be as fast.

I rolled the new shell out of the workshop, in my old world, it might have been considered an armored troop carrier. It was a large SUV type truck with six wheels and covered in armor plating. The thing was really heavy thanks to the materials from the Iron Turtle so I was glad that I ended up going with the engine instead. I still put electric motors into the front wheels though. The steam engine would need some help to get up to speed so the motors would provide some initial get up and go. When I connected to the truck proxy, I got an alert that warned that this proxy would require five proxy slots to connect to. I guessed that given its size, it put more of a mental load on me to control. Did this mean that I could control even larger proxies if I devoted enough proxy slots to it? Something to think about in a background process.

Like this, but with another set of wheels

Sentinel was introduced to the village along with his role and the confirmation that even though my main body was leaving, I would still be here for the village via Sentinel. Elita and Shea joined me as we said our good-byes along with promises of returning soon.

“So Prime, what’s this thing now?” Elita said, gesturing at the truck.

The front-engine area of the truck split open to reveal my compartment. “This, my dear, is how we’ll be heading home,” I said as I climbed in and closed the hatch back up. “I call him, IronHide,” I said in a low, gruff voice with a bit of Texan.

“You know, it’s kind of weird that you keep doing different voices for each of your proxies,” Elita mused.

“I think it helps give each one a more unique personality,” I said defensively.

“It’s like a carriage, right Prime?” Shea asked, opening the door to climb in and ignoring Elita and I. “It’s a lot more comfortable in here than it is on the back of Cyclone, no offense.”

“Can this thing even move? It’s huge” Elita said doubtfully.

“Yup, I’m topped off and good to go. Climb in.”

Elita got in opposite Shea. I still had four more seats that could lay down if needed for storage. I think I built that feature out of habit or expectation for this type of vehicle. It’s not like I had storage issues when I had my [Inventory] available.

With final waves of farewell, we were on the road and headed home, I was looking forward to getting back to my own shop.