After that incident, which had still ended with Kid obliterating the blond oaf amusingly enough, our little group wasn't really messed with. I wonder why. Even the staff seemed to regard us differently, although that might have been caused by my grandfather, the Director of the entire academy raining hell down upon them for failing one of their own students so spectacularly.
Unfortunately, poor Addy seemed to be slightly afraid of me for a while afterwards. Guilt twinged in my chest seeing her cringe and twitch away from me at times. I admit that I did let myself go a bit, putting all those boys into emergency care in my rage. As for why I wasn't punished for such violence; the simple evidence of four boys alone in an abandoned section of the campus with a girl stunned and helpless on the floor, and well... The implications alone had made sure that nothing was held against me from the justice I had dealt.
Granted, I was given a serious talking to and subsequent lesson by my father about the most efficient, yet least damaging ways to incapacitate human opponents. Something about noble etiquette and how to properly settle grievances. Despite this, I distinctly noticed that he never mentioned anything negative against my actions.
Either way, life eventually returned to the usual grind. The only difference is that Ernie and I capitalized on the recognition of our abilities with the school staff to pursue a little project along with Batson, using the young Knightsmith's family's facilities in our spare times. As part of my acceleration of the plot, we started working on our first suits of power armor. Unfortunately, I didn't have the political weight yet to present the Commando to even the school staff. After all, it's a lot easier to get permission to build some power armors than it is to start construction on a full blown mech, let alone an experimental one.
That, and I needed to be as close as I could get to having total control over the entire project as possible, to prevent those clowns from Zaloudek from just stealing the damn thing or its equally as important blueprints. It was honestly rather stressful knowing for a fact that there were hostile spies watching for major events and achievements.
Due to it only being really worked on by just the three of us during our respective free time, along with being limited to the family smithy, it took a lot longer than it had in the original canon. Fortunately, with some help from Batson's father, we managed to get my first suit of Battle Armor ready for my first expedition into Kroke forest, exactly one year before the Behemoth disaster.
]I[
"So, this is the Kishi?" Kid asked as he peered at the empty armor, its back opening out like the power armor from Fallout. The trio of elementary students seeing me off as the middle and high school prepared to depart.
I chuckled "Technically, it's not the full Kishi yet, but it's at least the main armor components." Giving the armor one final check before climbing inside, I was wearing a simple outfit of thin workout clothes, interior ventilation still not being great inside the 2.5-meter-tall giant. Compared to the original Battle Armor, this one was notably lacking the giant right arm cannon and the inbuilt jump jets. Painted a strong shade of bronze with wonderful blue-green accents, but lacking any further ornamentation to speak of, it cut a rather bulky figure due to the raised collar that the helmet glared over, particularly in the back. Settling within, I reached out with my magic and triggered the armor to close, there was a moment of darkness as I connected myself with the armor itself before I felt my sense of self expand.
Suddenly, I wasn't stuck in the small, frail body of a child anymore. I was tall again, far taller than I had been in my previous life and hilariously stronger. Crystal tissue shifted and twitched as naturally as my body of flesh while the dedicated sensor spells within the helmet let me see far more than any eye of flesh could. The connection complete, I rolled my metal shoulders and slammed a fist into a palm with a resounding clang.
"Woah," Addy breathed
"Woah indeed," I chuckled, voice modulated by the speaker system to be lower.
"And you just had to make it taller than my armor, huh?" Ernie grumbled slightly, though a grin tugged at his lips all the same. After all, his armor was only 2 meters flat.
"Naturally," I easily replied, carefully reaching over to ruffle his hair with my now much bigger hand.
"Frededen! Are you ready to go?!" Stephania called out from gaggle of students that she was herding, she was the leader of the 7th graders, to which I had been assigned despite being a 6thgrader myself. Technically, as this was my first expedition, I should have been with the "kiddie" group that went into the first section of the forest. As it was, I was going to be traveling to a slightly deeper section of the forest with Stephania's group. Something to do with being able to kick a man through a wall while within this armor.
"Affirmative." I called back to her, effortlessly hoisting the large duffel bag resting next to me over a metal shoulder, its contents being spare parts for the armor and my personal items for the weeklong expedition. My other hand wrapped around the haft of what would be a two handed warhammer in the hands of a human but was closer to a one-handed mace in mine.
"I'll be back." I droned at the trio as I turned away, chuckling as I saw Ernie roll his eyes, much to the confusion of the twins. Due to the size and weight of both my armor plus bag, the ride that I had been assigned to was one of the cargo carts. I didn't mind; it allowed me to stretch out to an extent and relax in peace.
As the group made to leave, the escorting Knights stomped out of the gates, among them were the scarlet Guair and the stark white Earlcumber, their iconic forms easily recognizable. Amusingly enough, while all Knights within any given noble's forces were always uniform, the other Knights within the school were all painted in individual color schemes and had slightly tweaked armor designs. And yes, there was one that was a horrifying abomination of pink. Thankfully that one wasn't present for this expedition, much to my relief.
One of the Knights did a visible doubletake upon seeing me within the Kishi, this being its first major public appearance. The Knight in question was panted a pitch black with vibrant red accents and its armor adjusted to be as harshly edged and brutal looking as it could without coming off as barbaric or primitive.
"Well well, if it isn't the Bronze Dragon."The male voice of the Knight's pilot boomed out as he stomped his way over, planting his hands on his hips as I set my duffel bag onto my assigned cart. "I'd heard that you were going to be bringing something odd, but a mini–Silhouette Knight?" The Knight's head shook side to side as he chuckled, casually flaunting his own ride's 10-meter height as he literally towered over me. "Couldn't wait to get inside proper Knight so you built your own huh? Haha! I like your spirit kid!"
I chuckled back good naturedly. "Yeah, you could say something like that." the edgelord gave another laugh before he stomped off to his position in the convoy, giving a wave as he left.
"You're sure that you're going to be ok using a, 'prototype' in the wilds like this?" Addy softly asked, the three having approached the cart as I climbed my bulk inside.
I looked up at the three of them, the calls for the convoy to advance being heard in the distance. Adjusting the system to soften the blue lights of my eyes and edges of my voice, I gave them a thumbs up.
"Trust me."
]I[
"So, what's the point of making this guy?" One of highschooler Knightrunners asked as a few of them approached my little campsite that I'd set up for the night. Most of the space was taken up by the kneeling Kishi and the strewn-out maintenance tools and spare parts, further dissuading others from trying to bunk near me. I looked up with a bemused expression.
"A few reasons," I began as I continued tinkering with what would eventually become the right arm mounted Heavy Machine Gun. "One is that it's a major boost when trying to clear out infantry scale structures."
"When would that happen?" the first pilot asked, his brow furrowing slightly in thought.
"Unfortunately, retaking lost settlements or clearing out those under attack." I replied with a slight wince, the gathered students reciprocating the expression.
"Yeah," the guy muttered "that would get some use there..."
"What are the other reasons?" a female pilot spoke up, obviously trying to move the conversation along from the darker subject.
"Training," I say with a smirk "this guy here doesn't have a Magnus Engine and obviously has only me acting as the Ether Reactor. Just using him will increase my mana reserves and my spellcasting speed."
"Whuh- No Magnus Engine?!" another guy spluttered, looked back and forth between the Kishi's kneeling form and myself. "That means you'd be running all its movement and enhancement spells along with any attack spells you need yourself!"
All I could do is shrug. The Magnus Engine is analogous to an onboard computer, it's what runs all the passive internal systems so that the pilot only needs worry about telling the machine where to go and how to attack.
"It was certainly hard to get it to move around when it was first built, but it's just a skill like any other. Over time, it became easier and a lot of it is just muscle memory for me now." I explained calmly explained, the group of upperclassmen settling down amongst the clutter. "Anyone can do it if they want it enough."
"Says the guy who's permanently running boosting magic on himself." One of them huffed.
I smirked and nodded. "Yeah, that might have had something to do with it, to be honest."
"Any other reasons?" the girl asked again, elbows propped up the knees of her crossed legs and her chin in her hands. I supposed she was rather interested in the conversation.
"Well, the idea was that if this panned out, more of these Battle Armors could be made to help Knightrunners train as well. However, the other side to that idea is to use the basics of the armor to make something for the Knightsmiths; after stripping the armor plating down and putting in a Magnus Engine of course." I mused, "To go even further, you could give it to miners and construction workers. For any of those applications, it accelerates to work speed by a considerable margin."
The group at least seemed to be considering the idea, giving the Kishi contemplative looks.
"That, uh, that sounds expensive?" one of them hesitantly spoke up, not exactly sure in their statement, causing it to come out more as a question.
"Oh yeah, it's going to be expensive, but I'm confident that it's an investment worth pursuing and that it would more than pay for itself in record time." I easily replied.
"Do you think that it would take down a Duel-level Demon Beast?" the girl asked after another short moment of quiet.
"I'm certain of it." I replied with a challenging grin, much to the amusement of the gathered group.
"Yeah? What about a Silhouette Knight then? Do you think that your Battle Armor could handle my Brutalist?" a guy challenged back with his own grin, the punkish looking kid having the same voice as the edgelord mech that talked to me that morning.
"If I got the drop on you, definitely." I shot back, smirk widening as the group openly laughed.
"Oh?" he leaned in a bit "I suppose that you're willing to put your metal where your mouth is then? How about a spar in the arena when this is all over?"
I blinked, surprised by the offer. After a few seconds of thought, I gave a firm nod.
"Yeah, I think I would be willing to do that." I said, confidence building as I quickly ran through what needed to be done before I could. "Granted, it'd have to be after I've actually finished the Kishi. This is only most of him right now."
The guy waved away the concern with an easy hand. "I'd be disappointed if I couldn't face you at your best."
"That, and the arena would have to be set up for one of the hazardous terrain scenarios." I continued with a raised brow. "After all, I would lose quite soundly if we were simply dumped into an open field."
The pilot frowned a bit at that, only for one of his fellows to pipe up.
"Come on man, you can't really expect the little guy to just face you head on without anything to work with, right?" he gibed
"Alright, alright!" the pilot of the evidently named Brutalist huffed. "But I'll hold you to this promise." he said lowly, pointing a serious finger at me.
"What is a Knight, if not his word?" I quipped.
After that, the little group settled into a small discussion of scenarios where the Kishi would be useful, particularly which types of Demons Beasts would the Battle Armor have a greater advantage over a Silhouette Knight. Soon enough, curfew came about and forced everyone into their tents, all eagerly awaiting the next day.
]I[
That night, I dreamed of walking through an immense city I'd never seen, the sounds of strange thunder in the distance as I calmly made my way towards somewhere unknown, the shadowy silhouettes of soldiers walked with me, my height allowing me to easily watch over them with a fierce protectiveness. Despite the fog of confusion, I knew for a fact that we had a job to do, and it was going to get done.