Robotic hands moved, carrying a cone-shaped engine, and placed it into its slot prepared on the shoulder of a standing mobile suit.
Then Legion-powered robotic hands brought the other another cone-shaped engine and slid it into the other shoulder.
As these preparations were underway, Marcus watched the entire session with heightened interest, making sure everything was perfect.
"Finally. It's alive."
The Inventor Emperor softly said under his breath. There was a glint in his eyes as before him stood his newest machine, ATDGT-0000 Alpha Tiranis, which, he just finished putting together!
He walked over, and a bridge lowered, allowing him to approach the cockpit. The cockpit opened on its own as he jumped into a familiar seat.
At that moment, the machine began to power up. The Imperial Crest appeared on the screen as the booting up sequences followed.
Before long, several pop-ups appeared.
"Let's start with synchronisation."
[Beginning to synchronise the Twin Drives in a new platform.]
The two engine icons appeared on the screen, with their percentages next to them.
It took a while because the machine was filling up with particles.
Around five minutes later, the drives began to spin faster.
Moments later, the percentage breached 50% and continued to climb steadily.
"Good, it was worth the synchronisation before," Marcus commented, seeing it pass the dreaded 75%.
Eventually, it reached 100%, and the machine was ready for its first flight.
"Shall we go?" As he said, the holographic handles manifested around the seat as the Emperor grabbed them.
[Umm, you do know Imperial Protocol, Your Majesty, there are close to 35 thousand diagnostics we need to run. These are untested technologies and a platform.]
The Inventor and the Maker of this machine simply grinned.
"Indeed, you can do that when I fly!"
His hand went to the booster lever as he pushed to the maximum allowed in the atmosphere.
The twin drives slide into the wings as the twelve wings began to emit blue and green particles.
Alpha Tiranis began to walk towards the platform that opens up into the artificial cavern.
[Understood, starting background diagnostics]
Moments later, the drives began to spin faster as the Emperor pressed the pedal and the machine blasted outside at absurd speeds thanks to gravity resonance.
Marcus's reaction speed was just good enough for him to control the new monster he created, as he needed to turn and not smash into a wall.
The 'Gundam of Two Worlds' appeared above the Pacific Ocean.
[That was a close call, Your Majesty, a suggestion, at least turn on Phase Shift Armour]
"Good suggestion."
Marcus chuckled as he mentally selected the option that turned the armour on. At that moment, the grey machine turned black, purple and gold. Only the eyes and several sections remained green because of the Twin Drive System his machine had.
"Let's go to space. Is Alpha Tiranis AI functional, Legion?"
[Still developing him, you will have to deal with me, for now, Your Majesty.]
The Gundam Maker chuckled at the sassiness of his AI.
"Good enough."
As he said that, he switched his control to plane mode as the Gundam shifted into panzer plane mode, then pressed the medal, sending the machine blasting into orbit in a few moments.
Seconds later, he was already in a void of space.
[Switching into interstellar travel mode.]
"Do you know the position of Alpha Centauri?" The Emperor was hinting at a location he had in mind.
[I recommend not playing with that particular option until we are certain that the frame won't fall apart mid-flight.]
"Hmph, fine, let's do a planet parade."
Marcus rolled his eyes at being denied interstellar flight.
[That is acceptable.]
With that said, the Gundam's twin engines roared to life as blue and green particle dispersal increased, and it left the Earth's Sphere of influence. Moments later, it reached Mercury, did a fly by before slingshotting towards Venus, skipping Earth and flying over Mars.
'Let's check the South Pole.'
The Emperor grinned as he made his machine enter Mars atmosphere and land around the area where Prothean ruins should be.
"...Well, this is boring and a good thing at the same time." He commented that there was nothing there. This Universe doesn't have civilisations harvestic sentient machines from the looks of it.
After looking around and using Alpha Tiranis sensors for a short while, the Emperor left the planet and set course for Jupiter.
It didn't take him long to reach that world; in fact, he went to find where the expedition took place.
As the Gundam slowly floated over to the large space explorer, he activated his mech's sensors and began scanning.
[Your Majesty, I doubt I can locate anything of value without proper equipment. I suggest drones or exploration in person.]
Legion commented after scanning for a bit.
"A fair point," Marcus replied as he gazed at the human construct floating in Jupiter's atmosphere.
He pondered for a bit before pulling back and flying away towards the Gas Giant's moons. He continued with his planet parade, visiting all the planets and their moons.
About an hour later, the mech stood on Pluto, gazing at the very distant sun.
He was very far away from Earth, but not far enough in his opinion.
"Well, that settles it, we saw all the moons and planets, nothing of visible difference between our celestial objects and these." The Emperor commented as he leaned in his seat, his hands behind his back; he was lazing around while the legion processed the data.
[In-depth scans are recommended. So far, these worlds are identical to what I have in my databanks.]
"Then, are we ready for Alpha Centauri?" Marcus asked with a giddy look.
[The tests on the armour and engines are complete. You might try to jump space. Though I do have to warn you, if anything happens, it's not my fault.
I do not have the desire to explain myself to your wives, Your Majesty.]
Legion sounded resigned, even the artificial intelligence knows how women, females in general, can be.
"Don't worry, you are just following your protocols and programming." Marcus smiled, tried to convince his creation.
[It would work if I were not self-aware. But that is a different 'beast' as you call it.]
"True. Well, anyway…" The Emperor's hands moved, and the controls reappeared. He moved his Gundam once more. The mech left the planet, transformed into Panzer Plane mode, and then began to position itself for interstellar flight.
He needed to use the Star chart to look for the Trinari sun system of Alpha Centauri. Well, Alpha Centauri has two suns, and then there is Proxima Centauri, a red dwarf, the same type of sun as most of its fusion reactors are.
In a sense, humans simply call these three stars Alpha Centauri, the closest Stars to our Solar System and the first destination for humans outside the Sol System.
After reorienting and finding his destination, Marcus got comfortable in his seat before he said the 'magic words'.
"Trans... Am."
The machine erupted in red light as the cone engines roared to life. The wings began to disperse a massive amount of GN and Gravity particles with forward motion, the mech rippled through space and disappeared from Pluto. It looked like it kicked off by using reality itself.
The Gundam Maker looked with wide eyes as he watched three stars getting closer and closer to him by the second.
A small smirk slowly began to creep on his face. It was working! He just did an interstellar jump to another solar system!
Alpha Centauri, more specifically Proxima Centauri, is 4.25 light-years away from Sol! That sounds a little, but with conventional methods, it would take them a lot of time to travel!
Thus making an interstellar Empire extremely hard!
But now…
[Exiting the Jump sequance in… 3…2…1…]
With a burst, the 'bubble' of trans-am shattered, and the mech tumbled from interstellar travel and began to spin out of control.
"Oh crap!"
Marcus grabbed the control and got the machine back under control.
*Phew*
The Inventor Emperor sighed in relief; his heart was pounding loudly, and he was in 'Alien' space, very far away from any civilisation to speak of.
If anything happens, he is toast, but thankfully, the machine he built with his new Innovator upgrades is on a different level.
But then, all of a sudden, he got extremely giddy; there were two suns in front of him. One is larger than Sol, and the other one is around the same size, and of course, there is a red dwarf a bit of distance away.
"Hell yeah! We are here, Legion!" The Gundam Maker giddily exclaimed that he is the first human to do this with a Gundam, no less!
[Congratulations, Your Majesty, but I recommend we wait for a bit until the Machine's particle storage tanks fill up.]
With no particles in storage, the Gundam behaves like old-school mobile suits, sluggish, with no gravity-defying feats.
"We should keep the GN Drives connected to the wings and power them up directly, while a decent portion of the energy will fill up the tanks." As he said that, he flew towards Alpha Centauri A, also known as Toliman, the brightest of the three, which should have several rocky planets and Gas or Ice Giants.
Now, if it's true or not, he will find out for himself!
[Understood, the tanks will fill up in 14 minutes]
With that said, he began to cruise towards the middle star. It was bright yellow, while the one on the right, the Sun-sized one, was yellowish-orange, same as Sol, and, lastly, on the far left, it was Proxima Centauri.
One of the first things Marcus noticed in this Toliman's system was that the outermost world was a whitish-dark grey gas giant, and he could see strong storms raging on it.
But after it, there were rocky worlds, a toxic-looking world for the fourth world…
"W-What the!" His eyes widened as he saw a greenish world for the third one!
He immediately set course for the third world as his Gundam entered the atmosphere. The Inventor Emperor did a fly-through.
"It looks like a world in the early stages of habitability." He commented as he switched the 360-degree cockpit into immersion mode, meaning that the HUD is completely gone.
Instead, he focused on looking around as his Gundam cruised around this world at a decent speed.
What he found were signs of liquids and some greenery.
"Pity that this machine has no damn tech to figure out the composition of the air." The Emperor complained.
Well, Marcus did not design this Gundam for exploration or anything like that. Hell, it was a new prototype machine made from two machines and an idea.
[I do have some readings. But they are not as helpful.]
All Legion had were pressure readings from outside, which were not bad. It can tell him that this planet had an atmosphere, but he already knew that upon entry and had seen it from space.
After flying around for a bit more, he left and checked the other two remaining worlds.
The second planet of Toliman was a large volcanic world, a decent size for a rocky world, and it had a volcanic moon as well.
The one closest to the star was another volcanic world, with yet another volcanic moon.
"So four volcanic worlds, a good colonisable world in green belt, a toxic world like Venus, and a blackish white gas Giant for the last one."
The Emperor commented as if he was taking notes before leaving the middle solar system and flew to the right one.
This star system was named Rigel Kentaurus. Will he keep that name? Well, who knows, he has not decided on such things yet.
Regardless, what immediately caught his attention was an enormous Jupiter-sized Gas Giant.
While he could not get proper radiation levels, there were a couple of ways to figure that out. One of them is size; the larger the mass, the stronger the core, and that part is covered.
"Ping this one for future GN Drive creation. No wasted resources, Legion." Marcus commented, as he did a fly-through before flying deeper into the solar system.
But this is where he discovered the Gas Giant's cruel power. The remaining worlds of Rigel Kentaurus were barren wastelands.
The magnetic fields of those two barren worlds were most likely shredded apart by the Gas Giant that was quite close to them.
"Pity, well, Centauri Proxima is the last one."
[Indeed, Your Majesty, you have been away for quite a long time. Princess Euphemia and Wang Liu Wei should be getting worried.]
"Crap…yeah, you are right."
With that said, he increased the flying speed.
~~~
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1000 Power Stones = 2 Extra Chapters
And so on, You know what to do.
~~~
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