Reporting for Work
So here’s my report about what went down when I visited the Junkyard. Junkyard HQ was exactly as you’d expect something called Junkyard HQ would look. The trash mountain isn’t a fraction as tall as the one in Shulgi Park, but yeah, it’s pretty well-sized, maybe about the height of a five-storey building. If it was back in our world you’d have modded up junkers having carved out a small town inside it. Some like that life but give me a good cardboard box anyday.
I met with some dude named Georgios for my interview. Rough old man, scarred, with long, tangled, unwashed hair any hobo would be proud to have, tied into a ponytail. I liked him immediately. Here’s how our interview went:
G: So you want to join the Junkyard as a… mechanic? You don’t look the sort.
Me: I’m really good with my hands, if you’ll just let me show you.
G: Huh. Well, there’s a bunch of parts in that box. Can you put together a working mana converter from those?
Me: What does that look like?
G: Right…
As you can see, it didn’t go very well, but I impressed them enough by using one of the primary tactics in a hobo’s arsenal. Which is to say I camped outside one of their workshops until Georgios gave me a menial job carting around stuff.
And that gave me the opportunity to actually learn enough of how these machines worked. Turns out that magic armors are far simpler than I expected once I actually managed to examine one up close. Any self-respecting tech hobo who can put together a mobile worker frame can put together one of these given the proper parts.
Three times as tall as the average human, the structure of these armors are similar to a worker frame, with the pilot located In the center.
The head unit is packed with orbs which contain sensory spells that project what they can image of the surroundings for the pilot – like shady crystal balls, I suppose. I’ve heard that these spells apply not only for regular vision, but also detection of magically cloaked enemies or mirror image clones.
The limbs are controlled by magic gloves and boots set firmly halfway down the arms and legs of the armor. The fingers of the armor can be controlled to a fine degree using these gloves. Of course, that’s dependent on the quality of the enchantment on these gloves – cheap parts get you poor results. I’ve heard that the highest class of enchantment would allow a magic armor to pick up a cooked pea without mushing it. Besides fine control, the gloves and boots also assist in moving the large and heavy limbs by being a conduit for mana.
The back of the armor is usually lined with vents and fins that are designed to shape mana flow – these are utilized for quicker movement much like thrusters would for the mechs I’m more familiar with. By altering the flow and utilizing the ambient mana in the environment, they generate a physical force at a lower energy cost than it would take to convert mana into thrust using spells. Uh, that’s what I heard.
Anyway, as expected of magic armors, mana is the source of its energy. It seems that you need decent mana levels to operate these machines. Most armors have an inbuilt mana capacitator of sorts to assist in energy supply for basic movement, but the energy expenditure during combat is highly draining and the average commoner would likely run out of stamina quite quickly.
Now, knowing this, you’d think that mages or wizards or whatnot would be far better at using these armors. And you’d be right, to a certain extent. A magic user’s larger mana capacity would make the armor they wear faster and stronger. However, their material science doesn’t seem to have progressed far enough to develop armor that can operate under high levels of mana. It seems that putting a mage in a magic armor just makes it almost guaranteed to break apart and blow up the capacitator the moment he tries to exert his full mana in combat. The Junkyard crew tell me that the mages they know don’t have the reflexes to handle high speed combat anyway. It seems that in an actual fight, attack magic is used like artillery. And in mage duels they just seem to stand there and shoot spells at each other, taking turns.
Now, back to the armors. Where was I? Right, I was about to start talking about the weapons. Those are pretty standard. You have your basic giant sword, or spear, or axe, or whatever melee weapon the pilot wants to use. For ranged combat, they use enchanted bolts that are loaded onto canisters that can be attached to the shoulders and the forearms.
I think that about wraps it up for an info-dump on what these things are. Pretty sure I got everything right. Uh, mostly right. Probably. Magic mumbo-jumbo isn’t really my forte.
Anyway, it looks like they aren’t planning on promoting me to full-fledged mechanic any time soon, so I’m still stuck carting junk around for now. Should I continue working hard, learning on the job and being patient?
Maybe I can secretly sneak out scrap and put together an armor of my own, try to improve on it, and then impress them with the finished product. That might work.
Or perhaps I can do that and start trying to hawk my armor under the table to impressionable young gladiators for a reasonable fee that undercuts everyone, even the Junkyard, because I can afford to do this since I’m… uh… acquiring the parts at no cost from the Junkyard itself.