Ronin scratched his head as he looked down at the gray warsuit. After mourning the loss of the first ship he'd ever built, he'd gotten a shuttle to bring him back from outside district 101. Now, with nothing else to do with regards to Specter but to wait, he'd brought out the massive power armor, but as it lay there before him... should he really modify it?

  Ronin hemmed and hawed as he thought about what to do.

  He'd already modified the Heromaker, and a quick paint job had removed the golden flame patterns on it. He'd first painted the suit navy-blue, then rimmed the edges of its larger metal plates in black. The Heromaker's shoulders, kneepads, faceguard and jetpack now had black lines running along them and the suit looked a lot more intimidating now than it had before.

  As for the warsuit though? No. The 3-meters tall monstrosity still remained the same as when he got it. Be it the illicit lasers or the missiles, Ronin hadn't removed any of them.

  When he’d brought the suit back from Exodon, he'd had big plans for it. He was going to make it look like a civilian suit, like it was just this big because it had a big person in it. But when his excitement died down, reality had come knocking.

  There was no way anyone would believe this thing was legal. No amount of paint could hide what this suit really was. He could maybe weld something over its weapon systems, but any casual inspection would still reveal it for the tool of war it was.

  Ronin only had one option…

  Do I really have to remove all of its weapons though?

  It would be such a waste. All of that potential, to just throw it away… After all, who knows what could happen? Why shouldn’t he deserve some real protection? There were thieves out there. Specter was still alive, and this was his suit after all. It belonged to him. It was his possession. It was all his own, his preciou—

  “What are you doing? Why aren’t you studying for the exams?” A deep voice rang out.

  “Simons?” Ronin asked, interrupted from his musings.

  “—And what's with that scary expression you were making?” Simons followed up.

  “Scary expression? No no no, I’ve just been thinking about design work,” Ronin lied.

  “So, you look like that when you’re thinking of design, huh?” Simons looked at Ronin suspiciously. “What is that gray suit over there then? We both know you're not as innocent as you claim… Mr. Defiler.”

  “Urgh, I hate that name,” Ronin said, his whole face twisting into one of disgust.

  It was his most embarrassing moment, codified with a name for the whole galaxy to see, something Simons wasn’t shy about mentioning at all.

  Noticing Ronin's expression, the big youth couldn't help but let out a giggle. “Anyways,” Simons began, “what design work in particular are you thinking of? Something golden, maybe?”

  Now Ronin really had to come up with something! He couldn't hide the big warsuit behind him, but he could at least bring the conversation over to something more pleasant. He rubbed his face to clear his thoughts.

  They’d already finished the racing ship. Well, Simons had finished it for the most part. The slim 5-meters long model was currently parked inside the warehouse, waiting to be sold. It was an old design, and at most, they’d only get a few thousand credits for it, but there was no way Ronin would keep it. Unlike his precious Hemsway, this ship had no sentimental value, and it was impractical to use. The only thing it did was move fast.

  But what ship should they build next?

  I’m not planning on making shuttles forever, Ronin thought as he gazed over at the machines occupying the hall. This factory can make ships up to the corvette class. The sooner I begin learning how to make bigger ships, the better—

  “Ronin?” Simons asked. “Why are you not answering?”

  Ronin, realizing he might have spent a little too much time in his own head, cleared his throat, then began talking: “I’ve been thinking lately... about how we’ve only been constructing smaller ships until now. At this point, we should both be fairly adept at the printer and assembler. I think it's time for us to move up. To make something bigger. Something closer to an interstellar ship.”

  Simons’s eyes lit up, “Really!? What size are we talking about?”

  “Well, let’s say something above… a hundred cubic meters, maybe?” Ronin half asked, half stated as he thought. “Hmm, yeah, why don’t we make something like a Heidenreich?”

  “What!? Do you mean the Heidenreich-B4!? That’s a 10-meters long cargo ship! That's too big Ronin! What about the upcoming exams? We’ll be busy for weeks!”

  Simons looked distraught. It was like he'd been caught between a rock and a hard place, and he didn't know what to do.

  “Business stops for nobody,” Ronin said with a smirk. It was his turn to gloat now. “I’m going to build that ship, but if you don’t want to join…sigh, now that's on you now, isn’t it? Seems I’ll be getting a head start after all. Just don’t come crying to me in the future when we’re building a corvette here, and you can’t keep up.”

  For him to still be worried about exams, Simons had clearly not adjusted to his new life. The entire point behind getting high grades was to get a good job at a design company, but they already had that job. It frankly didn't matter what grades they got as long as they passed the courses. They did have to pass them though. For the general public, the government had placed down a ban on any and all information relating to spaceship design. Unless you were a student or had already completed the education, it was almost impossible to find the information you'd need.

  As Simons grumbled over whether or not he should go back to the office so as to continue study sub-light propulsion, Ronin asked: “By the way, why are you here at the factory? I mean, I don’t mind the company but… you've been studying all day. You're not really working. You could’ve done this anywhere, so, why here?”

  Simons awkwardly scratched the back of his head.

  “I’ll leave if it's a problem, but... I don’t know, I kind of just like the freedom here. Back home, everything operates on a schedule. I’m rarely allowed out of the house. Every friend I have was chosen by my father and I’m only allowed to eat when my family does.”

  “Really!?” Ronin asked in shock. He and Simons apparently lived two completely different lives. Whereas he himself could basically do whatever he wanted, for good or for bad, Simons had no freedom at all.

  “What about when a friend asks you to stay over? What about just hanging out outside? Everyone does that.”

  “No, never. Not me,” Simons said. “My father says there's no point in spending time with friends. The only friend worth making, is the one that can help you elevate your social standing. Friends are there to benefit from and to help you rise, but if they can't do that... they're nothing, and there’s no value in wasting your time on nothing.”

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  Ronin's shock only grew. No wonder he mentions his father so much. He’s barely had any other relations. His father pretty much takes up his whole life.

  “What about you?” Simons asked.

  “Huh? What do you mean?”

  “What about your parents?”

  Ronin sighed, then looked up at the ceiling. “My parents? They're gone. A shuttle accident 3 years ago.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t—“

  “It’s fine,” Ronin cut him off, not wanting to get into it. “Anyways, I guess your father considers me a valuable connection then?”

  Simons made a slight nod.

  “Then stay as long as you want.”

  “Thank you. It just feels good to be out of the house, you know.”

  Ronin did not know, but Simons had been a good employee thus far. He’d also kept quiet about the Happy Pearl incident which meant Ronin owed him one. If Simons wanted to stay, heck, if he wanted to live here, there was no way Ronin was going to stop him.

  “I can arrange for another bed here if you’d like? Doesn’t matter to me. I mean, heh, void knows, if there’s one thing this place doesn’t lack, it’s space.”

  “Ahem, I think you can hold off on that extra bed,” Simons hastily said. “I doubt I’d be able to convince my father to actually let me live here.”

  Ronin flashed a grin. “Alright, but don’t be too sure about that. This is a top-of-the-line factory, and when we get commissions, we might have to pull some all-nighters to get the ships out on time.”

  The fact that Simons viewed a factory as a place of freedom, spoke a lot. Ronin almost felt a little bad for the guy. Either way, this was an issue between Simons and his father, and Ronin had no right getting involved.

  He did a theatrical stretch then began walking towards the design studio. “Ahh, now If you’ll excuse me, there’s a very big ship out there, just waiting to be built. Too bad there’s a poor soul here who’d rather bury his head in texts when he instead could've helped bring this beauty to life.”

  He then shook his head slowly, mimicking the voice of an old man: “A sad thing indeed, a sad thing indeed.”

  “Come on! Can’t we just wait for the exams first—“

  “Nope, time’s precious and I intend to squeeze it for every second it has.”

  “...”

  As Simons headed off to cram for the pointless exams, Ronin linked up his implant to the design studio:

  A holoscreen next appeared before his eyes, displaying a list of the blueprints he already owned. Unfortunately, this factory only had free blueprints for ships up to 5 meters in length, so, if Ronin wanted to move up in scale, he either had to design a ship himself, or pay for one. He glanced over to the right side of the holoscreen. There was a menu there for starting up a new design, a menu for design modification, and a menu for purchasing licenses.

  He clicked on the license purchase menu and was presented with two options:

  He could either buy the rights for individual ship parts or buy the license for a whole ship altogether. Ronin selected the search bar for ships, then looked up the Heidenreich.

  What?! A million credits for just a blueprint?

  Shocked, Ronin double checked the screen, making sure he hadn't clicked on the wrong ship. Yup, it was indeed the Heidenreich-B4. And aside from the initial upfront cost, he even had to fork out 5% of his earnings if he ever sold it. Ronin had visited this store before, but he clearly hadn't acclimatized yet. Some of these prices... were just atrocious.

  Note to self. When I design a ship in the future, I should rent out the license for it immediately.

  He narrowed his eyes, throwing this new revelation to the back of his mind as he studied the screen closer. Right now, he needed to find out if the ship was worth the cost.

  Hmm, this indeed looks very promising, Ronin thought as he read further into the ship specifications.

  In addition to being 10 meters long from stern to bow, the ship was 5 meters wide and 3 meters tall. The cockpit here was large enough to walk around in, and from the cockpit to the cargo hold, there was even a corridor. Further, along the corridor, there was a tiny sleeping quarters with two pairs of bunk beds, and in the cargo hold, there was a small engineering deck. All of these features were common on corvettes but not in shuttles.

  There was also the size of the materials he'd have to print out in order to build the ship. A lot of the Heidenreich's internal framework, couldn't be printed out as one continuous piece and he would have to print out these parts in sections. Later, he'd have to weld these sections together, but if the weld was just a little bit off, the entire ship would tear itself apart the moment it left the ground.

  This... this is the exact type of challenge I'd be facing with a corvette as well! Ronin thought.

  It was the perfect ship to practice on! He threw away all of his hesitation and forked over a huge lump of credits as the ship's full blueprint appeared on screen. He rubbed his hands together, a small grin tugging at the corners of his lips. It was time to build!

  Jogging over to the 3-D printer, he turned it on, then loaded up the blueprint as the metal ingots in storage began to heat up. A short while later, a ping from the machine signaled the ingots being ready, and he selected his first piece, choosing to print out the landing gear first.

  Ronin next watched with rapt attention as the machine started printing, its microscopic needles buzzing up and down as they deposited molten alloy. The hydraulic part only grew by a millimeter at a time, but it was happening so fast, the 50 kilograms heavy component was done in less than a minute. The conveyor belts then moved the cooling part along the factory, not stopping before the part arrived at the oil station.

  The first component was ready. The first of several hundreds to come.

  “...”

  During the next couple of hours, Ronin moved up and down the conveyor belt, printing then scanning components as he checked for defects. And finally, when the last piece of the landing gear was done, the printer let out a mechanical sigh of relief. He walked up to the oil station, spending about 30 minutes applying lubricants to the metal before sitting down to rest.

  Ronin grabbed an oily rag off to the side. Apparently, Simons had begun peeking at him from within the office. It shouldn't be long before the bulbous man broke.

  Ronin had a bot bring over some water as he wiped some of the cooling sweat off his face. He could have printed out every part of the ship before doing the assembly, but if he was going to bait Simons over, it was better to start now. Ronin took a gulp out of the water can, then headed for the assembler. Simons's intermittent peeking, had now turned into full blown glares.

  Ronin paid it no mind. He linked his implant up to the assembler's control panel and a holoscreen appeared before him. The screen showed the newly printed ship parts, the assembly arms, the lifts, as well as a number of available bots. To the side of the display, there were diagrams and lines of text. It was time to put the landing gear together. Ronin might not have worked out how to apply oil with the assembler yet, but this he could do. A good thing too, considering how many tons this stuff weighed. He might be strong, but he wasn't that strong.

  Ronin grabbed two of the levers sticking out of the assembly station, then began moving the mechanical arms. Before the arms could reach the landing gear though, a familiar figure rapidly made its way over.

  “Changed your mind?” Ronin asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “Stop fooling around, you know very well I’d never miss something like this!” Simons said, breathing heavily.

  “And what about the exams, huh?” Ronin chuckled.

  “Eherm, if we can’t wait for the exams, the exams will have to wait for us. Some things are simply too important. Now, can you transfer over the blueprint?”

  “You already have access, just link up to the assembler and you'll see.”

  Simons’s eyes lit up in excitement, then began to flicker back and forth as he read. “This—this thing is a monster!”

  “The perfect practice ship,” Ronin corrected. “Also, can you take point on this? I've got something I need to check.”

  “You're giving me the best job, just like that?” Simons asked, narrowing his eyes. “You're not trying to make me care less about school, are you?”

  “That's up to you buddy,” Ronin laughed. “But I'll take that as a, yes?” He really did have something he needed to check.

  As Simons made a short grunt in reply, Ronin inspected the factory's storage. After the landing gear was done, the plan was to next begin printing out the ship's internal frames, but with the size of the Heidenreich, there was a real risk of running out of raw materials before they could finish.

  Yeah… I’ll definitely be needing more metal, Ronin thought as the menu came up.

  He currently only had a few tons of iron left, and the factory's aluminium storage had sunken down to below 900 kilograms. Ronin nudged the implant and the holoscreen filled out as a long list of metal suppliers began to scroll across his eyes.

  Should I just fill up the entire storage?

  Ronin couldn’t see why not. He had the credits now anyways. He set up an order for over a thousand tons worth of ingots, then went to help Simons...