I powered down as much as I could of the God Armor to try and stretch my mana a bit. My mana recovery systems had upgraded enough to keep up with powering the proxies that my subRoutines inhabited on the day to day, but there was no way to keep up with the demands of the God Armor.

In the 60 foot bot configuration, I couldn’t even access the shadow mirror to call Milliardo to let him know how it went, or attempt to check on how things were going at the castle. God Armor Convoy also sucked up every proxy slot I had so I couldn’t power anybody up to go check either.

I focused on just putting one titanic foot in front of the other as I dragged the corpse of the dragon and the fake Elita behind me. My subRoutines had gone quiet with the exception of Rom giving me occasional mana reserve reminders.

Off in the distance, I could see the castle shining against the night sky with the city around it and high walls around that. I could also see the gathering soldiers from Jamnasia, outside of the city, though it was hard to make out any details at this distance.

I still had 31 kilometers to go but I was starting to feel sluggish. Just another step, just another step, just another—

Prime.Ram:// Mana reserves at 2,522,473... After this step, we no longer have enough to keep God Armor Convoy moving.

Instead of putting another foot forward, we dropped the dragon’s tail and reached up, unlocked Magnum Convoy from our chest, and pulled it out. God Armor Convoy completely shut down, freezing in place with its hand outstretched, holding Magnum Convoy in “PowerMaster” mode.

Our consciousness shifted over to Magnum Convoy and we slowly tried to transform back into bot mode. The gashes left from the dragon’s claws had bit deep and mangled a fair amount of the inner mechanisms under the thick iron shell. I decided that would be a lesson to me, not to put the “inner bot” or “PowerMaster” stuck onto the front of the chest all exposed. The Transformers may have done it that way, but that didn’t mean that I should. It was asking for trouble, I now knew.

Eventually, we were able to transform enough that I could free Carnivac and myself from the combination with IronHide.

Sorry buddy.

Prime.IronHide:// Yeah, well... at least my body isn’t slag this time...

Once freed, I put IronHide into [Inventory] and stood in the palm of the God Armor’s extended hand. Carnivac and I looked over the edge, it was a long drop. Too far a drop to just risk jumping without taking some falling damage.

Now that I wasn’t powering the God Armor, my systems began to slowly recover mana and I was feeling less sluggish. My reserves had gotten all the way down to 2,361 by the time God Armor finally gave out. My mana recovery was only slightly more than the amount of power required to operate all of my proxies at once. I was starting to feel bad when I kept them offline and stuck in the HeadSpace, but the fewer I had running, the more mana I’d be able to add back to my reserves.

I returned Carnivac to [Inventory] along with the Convoy armor. I did opt to power up Cyclone and Alfred, though. Primarily so that they could inform Lena and Shiro, respectively. Shiro was overjoyed and jumped up and down swinging Alfred around and hugging him while Lena just sighed in relief. I could tell that both of them had been beside themselves with worry.

Milliardo had returned to the castle by wyvern along with a small detail of his guard while the rest of his army pushed forward to the eastern planes. He had sent out a fleet-footed company of soldiers to meet up with me and to secure the prisoners, though wouldn’t be coming himself. Nor would he allow Lena to come.

When Cyclone enquired about the Jamnasian forces, he found that they engaged with General Greevus’s army. The General had pushed hard through the night and went straight on the attack as soon as they arrived, catching the Jamnasians in the rear.

I hopped off of the God Armor’s hand and pulsed my jump jets, slowing my descent, until I reached the left hand. The arm was just barely connected to the shoulder, hanging on by threads and hope. When I landed onto the hand, holding the giant, fake Elita, everything groaned and swayed in a way that made me nervous.

I climbed down to about where I thought Jhaix might be inside and knocked on the hull.

“Hey, Jhaix. You in there?” I called.

No response.

“Well, just wanted to let you know that I’ve dragged you and your dragon all the way to Capital City. That’s where you wanted to go, right? Anyway, it ends up that some of your mates wanted to get into the city too in order to meet up with some buddies. Well, ends up that the Prince and some of his buddies showed up and weren’t keen on it and now they’re having a bit of a scuffle. Oh, don’t worry, I called a taxi service for you. They should be here in an hour or so. Feel like coming out? Or should I tear open this effigy you’ve made of my best friend and drag you out?”

The fake Elita thrashed around some more, nearly shaking me off, but it couldn’t break out of the God Armor’s grip. Of course, the God Armor’s hand was blocking his hatch so maybe he couldn’t get out on his own after all. He kept thrashing around though and the cables and torn joints of the shoulder moaned in protest.

“Uh... probably don’t want to do that...” I cautioned.

“You’ll never take me, you Cybertronian wannabe! I hope you rust and all your joints freeze up! When I get outta here, I’m going to tear you apart and use you for a toaster!”

He kept violently shaking the fake Elita as he ranted. Above, I heard and felt one of the cables break with a loud twang sound and the whole arm shaking and bobbing.

“Knock it off you idiot!” I yelled at him, but he wasn’t listening.

“I know what those demons do to humans! They’re vile, evil creatures! Why do you think the kingdom has to keep summoning us heroes?! To stop the demon lord, of course! Every moron knows that! As soon as they get their hands on me, I’ll be dragged down to some dungeon and become roommates with a tentacle beast!”

Another cable went and the groaning got louder.

“Are you stupid?! The whole arm is about to bust off!” I warned.

“Almost got it! And you can’t do a thing about it you crappy little tin man!” he taunted back.

The Elita mech was thrusting her legs up and down, back and forth, flapping, and flailing, trying to break free. Finally, the last connection holding the shoulder together broke and the entirety of the arm dropped into freefall. What didn’t break free was the God Armor’s grip.

I leapt clear of the falling arm, pulsing my jump jets until I reached the ground some 40 feet below me. The fake Elita smashed into the ground with the full weight of the God Armor’s arm pile driving into it. Several tons of weight crushed the mech like it was made of foil before the arm teetered over like a falling tree.

I rushed over to the mangled train-wreck and put the fallen arm into [Inventory] to get it out of the way. The torso of the fake Elita had been crushed flat like an egg. Lots of mana fluid drained from the wreck into the dirt along with traces of blood. I reached my hand out and thought about claiming what was left but decided against it. The empire would want the corpse and having a big, fake Elita was just too weird.

I sighed and collected my thoughts for a while as the cavalry company arrived. I didn’t see anyone I recognised, though the company lieutenant reminded me of a female version of Captain Antilles. They had brought an engineering team with them to cut open the dragon in order to get the mages and crew out along with a number of prisoner carts.

The captain, a well muscled, male centaur that reminded me of a palomino in coloring, asked me about the Automata army that we had encountered. I told him that what was left of any humans with that group would be found in what was left of Redwall Hall. He started to press me about where the Automata were but I told them that they had been neutralized and that I would be handling the rest.

He stared at me for a long while but eventually gave up and headed off to check on the anti-mage unit. As much as a robot could be tired, I was tired. I was spent and ready to just go home. Where was home though? Was home back in AutomaTown with Shiro? Or was home in the AutoForge now, with Lena? Was home in Urd somewhere?

I actually wanted to just power down, voluntarily, for the first time since I arrived in this world. If things could just... stop... for a while, that’d be great. I looked up at the God Armor and stared at it while people moved around me. None of the subRoutines were making any noise, maybe I was too tired to keep them going.

I walked over to the God Armor’s foot and placed a hand on it, returning the whole thing to my [Inventory]. It took a solid five minutes for the full mass to dissolve into storage. Wasn’t it faster pulling it out and putting it away before when it was GodBomber?

I shrugged and walked away, heading for the capital city. The tigress lieutenant caught up with me and respectfully walked alongside me and slightly behind me. I glanced over at her, while keeping my stride.

“Sup?” I asked in a tired voice.

“A bit late for dinner, I’d say,” she said carefully.

I dimmed an optic in an analogue of a squint then shook my head.

“Gonna walk the whole way with me?” I asked, looking away.

“Well, we can’t have an auto out running around on its own, now can we? Especially not the Crown Prince’s personal auto.”

I stopped walking and looked at her.

“Did he say that?”

“Say what?” she asked, confused.

“That I’m his property? That he owns me? That I’m his slave? Is that what that brat of a prince said?”

“Not in so many words...” she said softly, her eyes growing large. “His highness was very concerned and ordered us to make sure you were kept safe.”

“Uh huh,” I said, rolling my eyes and resuming my walk.

I must have caught her off guard and she stood there trying to process everything before giving herself a shake and catching up.

“So... if you’re not owned by his highness... are you unclaimed—” she began.

“Don’t. Finish. It.” I said, cutting her off and jabbing a finger in her direction. “I am my own person. End of discussion. I just happen to have a body made of metal and mana while you have a body made of meat and juice.”

“Touchy little guy...” she said, half under her breath.

I chose to ignore her and kept walking.

“Hey, um... are you planning on walking the whole way back to the castle?”

I looked over but didn’t say anything and kept walking.

“It’s just... you’re kinda slow. Want a ride?”

“I’m heavier than I look,” I grumbled.

“I’m stronger than I look,” she said, puffing her chest out and thumping it.

I looked her over again, she was well muscled, just like Antilles, and had a larger, thicker frame than a human. I stopped walking and shrugged. She grinned, showing off two rows of dagger-like teeth. She pranced a bit on her tiger paws in a way that was, honestly, a bit cute and sat down on her haunches to let me climb up.

“Ooof!” she exhaled, “you weren’t kidding! Heavier than expected but nothing I can’t handle.”

She pushed up into a standing position and resumed walking, picking up speed. She seemed to be moving at what might be a light jog for her, which felt around as fast as my full sprint on my short legs. I wrapped my arms around her and leaned my head against her back, dimming my optics.

“I’m just going to rest my eyes a bit, Miss Tiger,” I said sleepily.

“It’s Wendy. Lieutenant Wendy Antilles of the third cav,” she said with a smile.

“I know another Antilles...” I mumbled. “He likes to knock the stuff off my desk and push buttons that he has no business pushing...”

“Captain Willian Antilles? In the Royal Guard for the prince? That’d be my little brother.”

“I thought you looked... similar...”

“I didn’t know that Automata can get tired. What was that giant thing anyway? We could see it all the way from the castle before the lights on it went out. Was it some kinda statue? Where did it go anyway? Do you have [Storage] or something? It must be a really huge storage space to fit something like that.”

“State secrets,” I mumbled.

“Yeah that makes sense. Still pretty crazy. Did you really fight that dragon? Well I don’t know how a little guy like you could fight something that big. I mean that was really huge. We would have been in some serious trouble if that monster made it to the castle. I guess it broke down or something and you found it and reported it, huh? Good job little guy.”

“Wendy honey... I’m going to pretend to sleep now.”

“Ah. Right, sorry. Sometimes I talk a lot when I get nervous. Or when I’m happy. Or just sometimes, you know? I have to say though, you’re a pretty good listener. Not like my brother. THAT GUY can talk, let me tell you. You can’t get a word in with that guy and he doesn’t hear a thing you say.”

I offered no responses but that didn’t stop Wendy from telling me all about how growing up, her parents were worried because she barely spoke. Both the Antilles were super annoying in their own ways.

While Wendy may have been a chatterbox, she was a quick one. We made it back to the city in about 45 minutes. I was expecting to see a battle ground, but the Jamnasian forces had been chased off. Wendy took us straight through the main gate and up to the castle where Milliardo was waiting along with Lena and Cyclone.

I climbed down off of Wendy and she stretched her back, bouncing on her toes a bit. I suspected that carrying me was more than she’d anticipated when she made the offer. Still I got back faster than if I’d walked on my own so I thanked her.

Lena slammed into me, picking me up and hugging me close to her. Wendy’s eyes got big again.

“Your highness,” I whispered, “the lieutenant here knows just how heavy I am... and you’re picking me up like I’m a child.”

“I don’t care,” she whined. “I was so worried. Expect to be punished later.”

“Lena, put me down. Now,” I ordered.

She looked surprised, almost like she’d been slapped, but gently set me down. I wobbled a bit until Cyclone caught me and picked me up, holding me like a little kid in the crook of his arm. I rested my head against his chest. I just felt so tired. Lena looked even more worried.

“I’m okay,” I said, gently touching her cheek. “I’m just spent. No damage at all to my main body this time. Go me.”

She nodded curtly with pursed lips and backed up.

“Don’t go passing out on me Pops,” Cyclone said softly. “You pass out, I pass out. And that’d just be embarrassing.”

“Heh,” I half chuckled at the joke, but still tried not to actually pass out.

I was brought to a suite within the castle that almost felt like a maintenance shop. I was told that this would be my suite when I was in the castle and that it was, in fact, a maintenance shop for the castle’s Automata staff that had been upgraded with some lounge furniture and better lighting.

Cyclone set me down on a couch and waited by the door. Milliardo had gone off to do Milliardo things while Lena stood apprehensively nearby.

“It would seem that his majesty wants to meet with you in the morning,” she said, cautiously. “I don’t know how he would even know about you. I’ve never mentioned you to him, nor has Milli, to my knowledge, and your involvement in anti-dragon activities has been kept under seal.”

“I’m sure that any regent worth their salt has a vast network of information gatherers,” I offered.

“I suppose. Father hasn’t granted any audiences or attended any of the war meetings. It just strikes me as odd, is all.”

“Well, it’s not every day that he comes across a dragon slaying knight, right? It would be more strange if he didn’t acknowledge it.”

“I’m sure that’s it,” she said, still looking worried. “Get some rest, I’ll come find you when it’s time.”

She then bent over and kissed me on top of the head before looking embarrassed and speed walking out of the room. Cyclone gave me a smirk before following after her. I tilted my head back and analyzed the pattern on the ceiling. It was hexes, which struck me as odd for ceiling tiles.