I closed up the access panel to the main engine compartment for my new upgrade set and stood back to look at it. On its own, it looked like an odd collection of random parts and machines of undeterminable purpose.

I had hopefully built my own set of Centurion Armor, so named for a show I watched as a kid. In the show, the heroes would have various armor sets appear and attach to them for different mission needs or weapons. With my [Inventory] and new [hotSwap(set)] spell, I should be able to do the same. Except, instead of teleporting my armors from some satellite headquarters I’d be pulling them out of my [Inventory]. It took me a while to get [hotSwap] working, but the new spell took a set parameter and would look through my [Inventory] database for the matching set ID and materialize the full set around me according to my relative spatial coordinates. I was able to do something similar manually with Cyclone and Carnivac when we were escaping from Urd so this streamlined the process. I just had to tag the target items appropriately in my database and add a new field that defined where the item should appear relative to me, without me having to think about it.

In 3D animation, there is something called an animation skeleton. Basically it’s something that your 3D model attaches to, and that’s the thing that actually gets moved around in the animation. I ended up having to create a sort of animation skeleton for myself that constantly tracked where my body was at any given moment and then materialized things relative to that. Figuring out that I need to do that, though, had given me a huge headache as I kept getting materialization errors that I couldn’t figure out.

What I had in front of me was an add-on armor set that I called CloudBurst. This set of parts would attach to me via the plug-in ports that I’d installed and should provide me with additional abilities. This set provides some enhanced armor protection, but all the extra “kibble” would allow me to transform into a small jet aircraft.

I had built something that I’m calling a Blink Engine that uses two medium sized crystals from the Blink Birds. The engine basically works by pushing the unit forward using the [Blink] ability for very short distances in rapid succession. I can adjust the "thrust" speed by increasing or decreasing the distance traveled per [Blink]. In theory, this method could be insanely fast without a build up of any momentum. It would eat up mana at a pretty good rate, but not as much as using the electric motors of Cyclone for long distances.

To help offset the mana consumption of [Blink] as well as for cruising speeds, I'd installed a wind crystal powered turbine under each wing. I’m lightweight enough that the two should be enough to provide lift and maneuvering at slower speeds. I don’t know if I can hover with them though, so some testing is clearly in order.

The King’s posse should be here in two days time. It will also take that long for Alfred and his group to get here. Now that I think about it, it’s possible that if the King’s Guard are coming from the Capital then they might be on the same road... Crap. Maybe I’ll get lucky and they will stop by Urd first to pick up that Oni that wants my head.

I would let Jackie know about the newcomers later, but for now I had a new toy that needed testing. Wait a minute, it just occurred to me that I am the toy... I’ve become my own action figure. I dismissed the thought before the whole thing became too meta for me to think straight.

I put the CloudBurst armor into my [Inventory] and stuck my head out the door to my shop. The sun was already starting to peek above the trees and everything looked to have weathered the storm just fine. The dirt road in front of my shop had turned into a small pond though, so I’d have to think about road construction at some point.

Elita had chosen not to have a quarters of her own, saying that she didn’t need it. Of course, that made it a little harder to track her down from time to time and I really had no clue where she could be but wanted to see if we could test out her wings along with my tests.

As I was thinking about her, I got a notification that new items had been put into my [Inventory]. This time, I got the upper half of a FireDrake, a single wing from a Draconic Fly, and some Basilisk eggs. Maybe now wasn’t the best time to bother her. I couldn’t even imagine where in the forest to find such creatures. Was she even still in the forest? It was time to pester Shiro instead.

I waded through the shallow pond to our town Inn and found Shiro folding sheets.

“Good morning Shiro. Um... Shouldn’t those sheets have been clean? I mean, we haven’t had any guests since Shea left.”

“Oh, good morning Master Prime. Not to worry, these sheets were clean, they were just folded wrong.”

“Ah. Our guests are still asleep, I take it?”

“Yes, so far. I want to prepare something tasty for them, but we don’t really have even the basics. It seems quite rude, to me, to expect to use our guests’ supplies to feed them.”

“You have a point there. I guess we’ll have to make a trade trip to Willow Park or see if we can start our own little livestock farm.”

“Oh! We could get some chickydoos!” he said with a little clap.

“Chickydoos?” I repeated. If I had eyebrows, I’d raise one of them.

“You know, those short little fluff-ball birds. You can squeeze them for milk? I swear Master Prime, for as clever as you are there seems to be a lot of basic things you’re lacking.”

“Well, you’re not wrong there. I didn’t grow up here, you know.”

“Like not in this country... or not...” he trailed off.

I decided to change the subject, “So I have some new armor I’d like to test out that should have some really interesting results. If nothing else, it should be good for a laugh if it doesn’t work. Want to come along? We can work on testing out the flight abilities of your winged lion form.”

“I don’t know, Master Prime. I’m not so sure about flying.”

“You know, “ I teased, “Elita gave me a handful of basilisk eggs. I don’t know if they are fertilized or not, but either way I’m sure a [Cooking Lvl 8] should be able to do something with them, right?”

“Oh Master Prime, that’s not fair,” he said, setting aside his folding. “Let’s get this over with.”

“Perfect!” I said rubbing my hands together.

Behind my shop we had set aside an open area that backed up to the village border. I think that originally it was supposed to be a small field for crops, or maybe it was for horses, I wasn’t sure. Now I used it as an area away from buildings to test things that could go wrong in a spectacular fashion, or target practice. I called it The Range, but I don’t think that anyone understood the meaning given this world’s level of tech.

When we got to the Range, I found our town’s Automata twins; Beju and Yani. I had no idea if they were actually twins, but they were siblings and the youngest of the victims from Willow Park. I think at least one of them was ten years old while the other was either the same age and a twin, or a year younger. Their father, Teddy, had moved to AutomaTown to stay with his children, but I didn’t see him with them.

They both had small and thin bodies, similar in size to my own. Beju, the sister, had been learning to do brass inlays with Jackie and used her own armor plating as a canvas for interesting scrollwork designs. Yani, the brother, had also become a canvas for Beju’s artwork attempts but the designs were much more crude. I assumed that this meant that he had been the test subject and she did the work to herself after she perfected the technique.

Yani had embedded brass wire into his head plating to look like thick and fluffy hair that was then shaped and tied in a bushy ponytail. Incidentally, this was pretty much what Teddy’s hair looked like but in black instead of brass colored. The two had [RockLauncher()] guns installed, similar to my own but at a third of the power.

When I saw them, they were taking turns shooting clay pots off of each other’s heads.

“Morning, kids. Getting some target practice in, I see.”

“Morning Prime!” they both called out.

“Where did you get the pots?” I asked, gesturing to the stack of small, misshapen lumps of clay.

Yani looked down at the pile of broken pottery, as if for the first time, while his sister answered for the both. “Jinko.”

“Does Jinko know that this is where his pots are?” I tried to ask in a casual manner.

Both kids just shrugged. I’m sure I’d hear about it sooner or later but I’d deal with that as Sentinel.

“So, this is my friend Shiro. He’s new to town. I think he’ll be running our Inn from now on.”

Beju loped up to Shiro with her hands behind her back and started inspecting him from within his personal boundaries.

“Very pretty,” Beju said as she stared into the eyes of the lion on Shiro’s chest. I think the lion blinked and looked away but it might be my imagination.

Yani also approached Shiro while perfectly balancing a pot on his head. He pulled on one of the hip plates on Shiro’s jacket, exposing the red inside. “Do you have a girlfriend?” he asked, looking up at Shiro. “I think my sister would make a good girlfriend.”

“Oh shut up!” Beju yelled, punching her brother in the chest and knocking the pot from on top of his head. “You’re just trying to get rid of me!”

I caught the small pot with my prehensile foot and gently set it aside.

“Hmm.. true,” Yani replied, “would that be so bad? Sounds pretty great to me, right Prime?”

“Oh, no. You two aren’t pulling me into this. Or Shiro. We have testing to do.” I dragged Shiro away from them and into the middle of the Range. The kids followed along but watched with interest. “Shiro, we’re going to start out on the ground here and take it slow and work our way up to higher elevations. Oh wait, Beju, can you and Yani go grab that rain barrel on the porch of my shop and bring it here?”

The two saluted in a way that looked remarkably like the way I tend to salute when leaving people, and ran off.

“Are they going to be able to carry it, that looked like a pretty big and heavy barrel as I recall,” Shiro worried.

“It’s fine,” I waved away the concern, “even Automata children are quite strong, and with those two, the chances are high that we won’t see them any time soon. Now, have you read the Beast Mode README file yet?”

“No. No I haven’t,” he said hanging his head. I was starting to feel like I was bullying the guy into something.

I couldn’t put a hand to his shoulder without being super awkward about it thanks to my height so I held one of his hands in both of mine.

“You know what, don’t worry about it Shiro. If you don’t want to use the Beast Mode, then you don’t have to. If you want, I can even remove it.”

Shiro looked at me and slowly turned his head sideways with a completely blank expression on his face. I really didn’t know what the expression was supposed to mean, but then he looked out towards the forest and said “[Transform].”