The Devil's Evolution Catalog

With Misseger gone, I immediately got down to business. “Ansom Krayt, I’ve heard that you were here yesterday. Do you know where the magitek armors are kept?”

Ansom looked me in the eyes for a second, then replied in a respectful tone. “Yes, Lady Mo Na, it was by my grandfather’s arrangement.”

“And who is your grandfather?” I decided to ask out of curiosity because his name struck me as familiar.

“The one and only Meister Amori!” his face beamed when he mentioned the name.

So that’s why Misseger appointed him as my adjutant. He’s a tiny royal himself. I just hope he listens to my orders. Although, I wouldn’t mind getting a little rough with him if he doesn’t.

“Right, we’re pressed for time so let’s return to my prior question.” I could see he was about to continue on, but I cut him off with a wave of my hands. “The magitek armors should have been sent over yesterday, am I right?”

“You are, they are in the warehouse.” Realizing that I wasn’t in the mood for idle talk, the boy smartly put on a formal tone fitting of my adjutant. “Follow me, Lady Mo Na.”contemporary romance

“You will address me as “Instructor” here, understand?!”

Hah. As if I’m going to let someone call me “lady” all day when I’ve got a better option.

“Yes, Instructor!”

“You lot, follow us as well.”

“Yes, Instructor!”

Befitting their elite upbringing, the students of the Royal Andassean Academy answered in unison and began marching off in an orderly manner.

A little later, we arrived in the base’s warehouse, stocked row after row with magitek armors, transported over via teleportation. These were the first generation of the Messianic series of magitek knights. Each of them were forged with the core of a seven-star fire magical beast. In terms of firepower alone, they could output an attack at the level of a seven-star.

However, all that was just theoretical. Being a man-made machine, there were bound to be some discrepancies between a natural seven-star. Piloting skills played a great deal as well, making the theoretical limit of a seven-star highly unlikely.

Even so, these machines were strong.

Being a machine, an energy source was necessary. In order to alleviate this issue somewhat, we had another magical array carved into its frame as a backup source. Should their beast cores run out of energy, these arrays would be able to recharge the core within a day. Naturally, if these armors were deployed to an area rich in Fire elements, the rate at which the cores recharged would be much faster.

On top of being able to recharge themselves, I had the cores be replaceable. This ended up delaying the development time further, but everyone agreed with this plan. The feature was a necessary one, seeing as having downtimes could be fatal in a battle. At the very least, we could swap out the cores like batteries while they were charging, ensuring that the armors remained in service throughout.

Technically, the pilot of these machines could just inject their own mana into the core and recharge it, but the core of a magical beast had the mana capacity ten times that of a human’s… They would run dry just filling up a measly ten percent. But it was an option.

As the massive doors of the warehouse slid open with a groan, the morning rays seeped into the dusty interior, revealing an array of jet-black machines to the astonished children.

“Wow!”

“Amazing…”

“Are those supposed to be armors? They’re too big!”

“Humanoid golems?”

“They almost seem alive…”

“They are, in fact, able to move.”

I cast a cold glare over every student, immediately pouring cold water over their excitement.

“Now listen up, these have all been provided for by His Majesty, Andassis the Seventh. Developed through the hard work of me, Meister Amor and Meister Belud – the newest advancement in warfare: the magitek armor! The Messianic series of magitek knights!”

I immediately followed up, “Due to some extenuating reasons, we have to be extra stringent with our pilots. You lot are the ones we chose after sifting through all the candidates. The elite of the elites! I’m sure every one of you will soon learn the greatness of these machines. Right now, start by choosing your knight. Grab the black plate on their hands and hang it on your necks…”

Hearing me praise them so unreservedly, a number of the children, both boys and girls, blushed with pride. I could see their bodies shake with sheer anticipation.

A little too lively, perhaps. But I’m sure they will serve just fine with some supervision.

As instructed, the students retrieved the black dog tag from their chosen knight.

“Very good, now head to the back of your knights, you will see an indentation there. Place the plate into that slot…”

“Ahh…”

A gasp immediately interrupted my instructions. It was a girl who was the first to do as I told her to, resulting in the back of the magitek armor opening, much to her surprise.

“There’s no need to be shocked. Enter. That plate you had will be the key to your knight. Even if it kills you, do not lose it!”

One after another, the students entered their knights, excitement written all over their faces. But I did not have time for them to be fooling around.

“All right, everyone, we’re starting our first day of training. Move out.”

The empty forest clearing was immediately besieged by the heavy sounds of machinery. On top of that, a cacophony of conspicuous crashes and clangs could be heard woven in between.

Even without looking, I could tell that the warehouse most likely would not survive this maiden test drive of the magitek armors. After all, these magitek armors weren’t toys that anyone could just hop on and ride. Willpower and constitution were both necessary in being a pilot.

Thanks to the Meditation Stones, any movement of their hands would be reflected by the machine itself. But that did not stop a portion of the weight from being transferred to their young bodies. Even so, this wasn’t a problem that couldn’t be fixed with some strength training.

Finally, after twenty minutes of fiddling around, all 100 candidates managed to make it out of the warehouse.

Man, imagine if they had to actually pilot those suits like Gundamns… Even an ordinary pilot would take years of training -all to end up as fodder on the battlefield… No wonder they needed enhanced humans all the time!

done.co