"I see. It does make sense." Marcus rubbed his chin as he had just ended a call with Jeremiah.
The Knight apologised for being useless, but he was far from worthless.
'I might need to reveal my hand if they continue this. I need those metals more than these idiots and their short-term goals.'
Marcus was building an interstellar empire while these fools were trying to get their country back without hope of keeping it.
"What are you going to do?" Leila asked as she was snuggling in his lap.
"Go full frenzy… I will need to slaughter everyone if I leave with my Taranis." He said with a frown.
"If they are full-size ex-military, they should possess weapons strong enough to damage Sutherlands." The blonde reasoned.
"Of course, Glasgow and Sutherland have the same durability, made from the same metal."
'Even Lancelot is the same… they didn't improve on frame durability at all.'
Marcus said that part to himself.
"...as far as I know, it never was improved." The girl replied as she pondered for a while.
"Indeed."
"Then what does Andraste made out?" She asked, now that she realised, her machine can leave the atmosphere and then re-enter at will. The metal it's made of should be something else!
"A carbon alloy made from manipulated atoms. Ion thrusters are far too strong for any material found on Earth."
"..."
The girl looked at him, her eyes were full of disbelief. What he just said means that the material used in those machines is not even found on Earth!
But then it made sense! The power source is a miniature sun, which means that material needed to contain such heat should be out of this world!
"Then I assume none of the weapons produced by Knightmares could ever dream of damaging them." She realised that it was the case midway.
"Indeed. You should have figured that out by now."
"Hmph, one would never know in these simulations. Maybe Legion was going easy on me." She tried to complain.
"Hah. Don't be silly, my AI was using all of the latest data to simulate the fight."
He replied to her before standing up with her in his hands.
"Let's go to sleep, I need to figure out how to deal with these terrorists trying to leach on me." Marcus frowned; these pests were trying his patience.
"Okay~."
~~~~~~Later~~~~~~
"Well, do you trust them?" The Inventor Prince asked his knight over the phone call.
"You could show them your abilities first. That could serve as an example, before you show your status as Prince."
'Hmm. Infighting between Britannians is nothing new.' Marcus stroked his chin.
"True. Very well. Bring them to my Anaheim factory." The Prince decided to do it.
"It shall be done."
Sure enough, the next day, Marcus and Leila were in the Anaheim factory.
The blonde's eyes were wide as saucers as she watched the automation happening in the whole factory.
There were robots everywhere! She saw one guy watching the whole thing!
"The one who is working here is an Ashford Foundation person. Someone we could trust with the factory." He explained to her as they were walking through the factory.
They arrived at the loading bay where Sutherland's pieces were waiting.
These were custom-made arms, improving the machine's limb movement.
"I see." She nodded before looking at the parts.
"Isn't this one-time upgrade, if the limbs break…" The girl realised what this means.
"They would come back to me, yes."
"Devious…" She replied with an impressed and a bit cautious look.
"Just so, so." He did a dismissive motion with his hand as he looked at the loading bay doors.
Her gaze went to the doors as well, and soon enough they opened and three Sutherlands were waiting on the other side.
"Sir! We have arrived as you have requested." Jeremiah is trying to play it off as if he is not Marcus' Knight.
"Good, then park your Knightmares closer to the robotic hands." He motioned towards large metal hands, which were used to load materials, but that's just a designation. He can alter those since they are powered by his Legion AI.
"Understood."
As the machines got parked, three people popped out of them.
Marcus's eyes ended up on them. To his surprise, one of them was a woman he recalls from the show.
'Oh my, those pilot suits are something else.'
'One thing I can forgive, Father, is that you know how to design pilot suits, or in this case, approve them.' On one thing, he agreed with his old man was the uniforms for the females.
"Sir, there are my subordinates, Villeta Nu and Kewell Soresi, both of whom are talented pilots."
The pair saluted him, delighted to meet the genius behind most advanced prosthetics and exoskeleton armour tech in the world.
"Indeed. It's good to meet you two." He nodded before he looked at their machines.
"While I can't give you weapons, the mobility and efficiency enhancement will make your machines superior to any other Sutherland around."
As he said that, the robotic hands began to work.
The trio listened to him before they saw the robotic hands dismantle their machines in a matter of moments.
The pilots raised their hands towards their mechs, looking horrified! Their newest, state-of-the-art machines… reduced to parts like that!
"These upgrades will include the latest servomotor technology developed by Anaheim, including neural interface." He explained that previous parts were set aside and new ones were added. At the same time, their machines got an OS makeover. Not something as sophisticated as Legion OS, but an improved, power-efficient software.
"...I never imagined actual robots…" Villieta commented as she was baffled why such a tech is not used throughout the whole Empire.
"Anaheim creations, they are what is allowing us to keep up with Britannia's demand for military. Otherwise, I would need to recruit questionable people in Area 11."
His reply made the two nod, both of them are from a pureblood faction, so what Marcus is saying is what they want to hear.
"Machines are far better than elevens who don't want to obey their betters. These robots will do what their master tells them." Kewell snared with crossed arms.
"Indeed, now let me show you what Neural Interface does. It's based on the same technology that allows people to move prosthetic limbs."
The trio followed Marcus while Leila stayed at the back; she watched the other two Sutherlands getting assembled.
Here she was close to the Britannian military. A small sigh escaped from her lips. It still takes time to get used to that racism…
Thankfully, she is away from all of that in the academy.
Otherwise, she will get snappy if she needs to listen to that all the time.
'Though I am surprised how well Marcus makes them eat from his hand.'
Since she knows the purpose of these upgrades, all these interactions make her understand how well Marcus can act.
'Acting is coming naturally to him… No wonder, Emperor's genes.'
After a while, the trio got back into their Sutherlands and began to test the upgrades.
"A-Amazing the reaction speed."
Kewell and Villieta tried to move around, making a couple of complicated moves before stopping.
"Good. Now, on the other objective that you three need to do."
Marcus walked over, and the Sutherlands stopped close to him.
"Last night, another of my refinery plants got attacked." The Inventor Prince spoke with a serious tone.
"I want you to teach these thieves a lesson."
"Leave this to us, Sir!" Kewell said in an excited tone.
"Good, if you can do that, I will leave some spare parts for your improved Sutherlands." Marcus enticed them more, making them excited to work with him.
"We won't disappoint you, sir!" The pair were excited to help, not to mention Jeremiah, whose 'loyalty' was on fire! The knight has finally found his true Master!
~~~
The next day, Marcus was listening to Jeremiah giving him another report about the next raid the trio had on the terrorists.
'As expected, it's a major group, flexing its resources.'
The Inventor Prince compared the documents which were retrieved from both terrorist bases.
They were similar. Sadly, none of these papers had any clue who was behind all of this.
'I need more clues.'
He frowned before sending a message to his scrapyard managers.
Instead of funnelling money to buy more rare minerals, he shall invest in the security of his scrapyards.
Cameras are one thing, but listening devices are another. Criminals love bragging; they could drop a hint about who is behind this.
With that in mind, Marcus sent a message to Jeremiah, saying that next time, they need to capture the leader. The head terrorist should have an idea of what is going on.
'I guess, I should create some support tech.'
His eyes went from the pictures of documents to his design window. He began to draw concept art for listening drones.
'At the same time, I need a radio tower of some sort…' He immediately thought of the Viceroy's Government Building.
With that in mind, he checked his new backdoor entrance to the main computer of the Government building.
'Oh my… Code R research data is right here, for Viceroy's eyes only.'
Marcus hummed for a second before easily breaking the encryption and checking the files.
'My oh my, so cruel, Clovis.'
The Inventor Prince checked some of the videos of a green-haired girl getting tortured and experimented on by a bunch of different methods.
'So primitive.' The more he watched, the more he was disgusted by his half-brother.
Eventually, he stopped checking as the Viceroy got nothing of value from these stupid experiments.
Instead, he tagged the location of the research base. He can rescue the witch later; for now, he needs to secure his resources. His base and greater access to space are far more important to him.
The first was to create a secondary profile user on this computer. It's something quite easy to do, given the software's limitations on these computers.
It's what happens when society is not capital-driven. The software is decent, but it's not good enough for someone who has AI-driven operational software and far complex code.
Once he had a secondary user, he began to lay down the foundations for his network.
Before long, he had a basic network for his drones to operate on by piggybacking on the Britannian network.
Next was to iron out the concept art and begin the testing and assembling phase.
"You should rest." A soothing voice said from the side as blonde hair dropped into his vision. The accent he won't mix it up with anyone.
"I will, once I know who has the balls to steal from me." Marcus' patience is running low. His hands were already twitching to rain plasma on these wannable freedom fighters!
Oh, he has inherited Lelouch's rage, and it's slowly starting to pick up steam.
"It shouldn't be that surprising, you have such high-profile sites in ghettos. People want your riches."
"Riches? Don't be silly, all of my money is re-route to acquiring more materials. I am even stingy with our dates."
"...I see…"
Something shifted in the blonde.
"I want to join you then." She sat down on his lap. "I want to join this mission, in Andraste, I need a test run."
"..." Marcus didn't expect that she would take this that personally.
"Since I have a boyfriend now. I think I should get a proper date, but if these fools are stealing from us. I am feeling a bit… annoyed."
Her 'annoyed' came out with a thick accent. There was some venom there.
He didn't expect that she would be that triggered…
Normally, she won't, but her frustration has been piling up, and simulations are not that great to release the stress she was feeling from blowing up machines.
It doesn't help that she is feeling extremely involved in Marcus' business.
"In that case, I can arrange a launch."
The Inventor Prince realised that he could utilise a camera blackout throughout the entire Area 11 now.
He has access to all of the systems.
'My oh my…'
A small grin began to surface on his face.