6 C5- The Valkyries

Marcus looked at the drawings he did for the expansion of his Workshop. By this point, it no longer fits in the notebook.

Nope, instead, he had an entire wall of his workshop turned into a poster where he drew how he envisioned his Workshop to look.

To begin this he started with the left wall of his workshop. Just past the ritual room, he has enough space for his vehicles to exit. In other words, he needs another exit for the things which he created. 

Leaving through his lowerable ceiling is not always an option.

This is why he started to make another tunnel that will lead to an exit in the river valley more than a kilometre away. This way no one will know who is who and what is what.

Not that Marcus focused solely on this. He realised that work just continues to pile on him.

So after finishing the tunnel, he returned to work on his OS. His PROTO-Legio OS was a priority.

The work on this OS lasted for months, working on a basic OS that will help him in the development of the Assembly line and Matter Converter is very important.

By the time of Christmas and New Year, Marcus started to develop Assembly Lines as at that point the PROTO-Legio OS was at such a level.

He had a miniature version of the Assembly Line built in his workshop just to show Caster what is all about. The moment she grasped what this was and what this meant she could not control herself and wanted to help him to build it. 

After all, if they build it then they can build anything in record time with it! Originally in the shape of a cuboid, raw material will enter through one side and a finished product will exist from another, that's the gist of it.

The most difficult to build for this is the OS and the robotics behind it. The shape was done months ago, the pit was 'closed' back in November.

"...Just how many symbols do we need to carve into this!? It's like every inch of this thing has a circle! It's like…how can a square make a circle!?" The Fae asked with a confused look. She has been seeing circles day in and day out for weeks now!

"The secret is that the Assembly line is a world on its own. It's three-dimensional, when you ask for something it builds up a three-dimensional image of that item. As a specific portion of the line is dedicated to it. 

The one Assembly Line we are building is considered quite small. The best we could build with this one is a car in pieces. Or armour." Marcus explained to the Fae who was slowly nodding and learning under her Master.

"I see… it does make sense, Never thought I will be part of such a thing Master! My thanks!" The Fae fist-bumped herself as she was already thinking about what she can ask this thing to build for her!

She has a general idea of what this Assembly Line is capable of… Well, more like its capacities are decided by the schematic she can offer. Which is mind-boggling if she could think about it.

"How long does it take for you to come up and implement this, Master?" 

"It's not just a singular thing. The development started in the early years of life and continued to improve as I discovered new things." 

She nodded multiple times when the blonde heard it. This makes sense as well! 

"Great so… where does the Matter Converter come in the play?" 

"Matter Converter is the most important part in all of this because we can use ANYTHING to feed into the Assembly line.

Water, dirt, rubbish, all of it will be converted into a raw material which will be sent to the Assembly line to be made out into something useful."

"...Oh…I see… very dangerous, Master…" Artoria sagely said that. She can already see this getting abused by certain someone. Thankfully that person is dead.

"Tell me about it, I was chased around the whole planet when people knew that I had eternal youth, and could manipulate gravity. Imagine if they knew that I could control and alter matter, and produce an infinite amount of energy? People would flip." Marcus said that with a joking tone. This was one of the reasons that he was such a hikikomori. 

"I see, well this time it's better, isn't it? You have us!" The Fae said with a bright smile, the girl is recovering splendidly, her 'destiny' and all the stuff she had to endure in Fae Britain is more like a distant dream by this point. 

At this moment all she cares about is new magic stuff, eating Marcus or Marcus' mom's food, watching television, or exploring the city when no one is watching her. So, yes… she is living the dream at this moment.

"Yes, it's true on that." As he said that he patted the Fae's head. This made her once again blush for a bit.

"Good. Now let's return to work break is ending soon. I won't be able to spend this much time on this any time soon."

The Fae nodded and the pair returned to work on the Assembly Line.

~~~~~~Later~~~~~~ 

After the holidays were over Marcus had to return to the 'outside world'. While he doesn't like it very much, the refreshing feeling of doing something else is not that bad. 

Even the P.E. sessions allow him to feel like he IS in a teenager's body and the amount of energy he has is off the charts. Sometimes he feels that it's too much even.

But, sometimes such an amount of energy is good. As he was minding his business, his mana flared up as he sensed…danger. 

His head moved to the side and a ball passed through where his head was. At that moment he subconsciously used his gravity manipulation and made the ball lose its force.

Then his hand caught the ball. All of this happened so fast that people who saw this could not even grasp what the hell was this!

Though Marcus' eyes scanned the surroundings he found the one who did this. This kid still looked completely dumbfounded.

'Of course, it's him…' 

Every classroom has its arrogant kids, borderline bullies. Well actual bullies would not exist here for long, in such a small town bullying would be revealed immediately, and parents of such children would be shamed very quickly. 

This is why picking on someone is the closest one could get to actual bullying, it doesn't last for long and it's treated as a joke. Most of it is forgotten by the next day/week.

"Is this yours?" Marcus said that while casually throwing the basketball back at the one who threw it at him.

After catching the ball, the kid snapped out of the shock, he looked embarrassed, and this is where his shame started to boil as well. 

"Goldman you think you are better than everyone else do you!?"

"Hmm? I thought it was obvious by this point." 

To the Alchemist-turned-teen's words, his classmates laughed, embarrassing the kid even further who thought he could get some sort of rise up instead of such a counter.

"Huh? Do you think you are a big shot? Why don't we make this one-on-one? The loser has to buy food!" 

'Buy… food? Do I look like I have a wallet with me? What is this stupid mentality? Fine, I suppose. I haven't done anything like this in centuries.' 

"Fine. Let's play." 

"Master, are you sure? You could slip and reveal magic by accident!" Caster exclaimed with a nervous tone. The Fae already sensed that her Master used magic instinctually. He used Reinforcement and gravity manipulation!

"Don't worry, this little play should not force me to do anything." 

He might haven't played for a very long time, but his shooting is in top condition. Marcus spends most of his P.E. time getting back into his shooting grove.

"If you say so… I will be watching just in case." The Fae said to him as she took some distance and decided to observe it and if need be use her Fairy magic.

~~~ 

Marcus and the kid, whose name is Chris, are about to play one vs one. The thing was about this kid that he knew Marcus from first grade. Yes, if the Alchemist would pay attention he would recall that his classmates stayed with him in the same class for the whole 12 years. 

Though not that he pays too much attention to this. For one in his previous life, he found out about magic when he was 14 and in this life, it's even less important for him to know as he is rebuilding all he lost and planning some seriously…evil stuff… depending on the perspective that is.

So, there is no point or need for him to invest time in any of this.

While Chris is annoyed with Marcus, very annoyed with this arrogant prick's behaviour. His annoyance is that all the girls are paying attention to him. They are attracted by his mysterious loner-like behaviour especially when they heard all about his work ethic. He knows what Marcus is going to do with his life. His life for him is all set up. He will graduate and take over his father's shop. Not only that but he is naturally talented in engineering, like fixing a completely broken down car since he was small, which has a certain attraction to them. They all love that confidence.

And that is annoying. This guy is not even trying and yet… he has half of the girl's attention from doing nothing!

A few moments later half of the court went to the pair of teens. The P.E. Teacher could only sigh and allow this to happen. There is no stopping it when the whole class is fired up to do this.

Though such 'duels' don't happen often, kids do such things more often after classes without anyone watching, they don't like embarrassing each other like this. So, this is quite…a fresh turn on things?

Soon enough the pair proceeded with their game. Chris was trying to look like a good guy and handed over the ball to Marcus who proceeded to advance.

While Marcus is not using Mana or any sort of Magic based things at this moment, there is a single thing that he has that normal people don't.

He went through a ritual.

His body got altered to his soul, this synchronisation made the Alchemist much more...potent, combined with the teenage energy he was leagues above any regular person.

So even when he missed his opening shot, his reaction and dash were faster than his classmates. 

The Alchemist got the ball back and then scored with a layup.

~~~ 

The class was watching with slightly opened mouths the one-sided beatdown. It looked like a 7-year-old was playing against a 14 year old.

It was weird and crazy! How could Marcus who barely does anything P.E. Related can be this good!? Not only that but he is wiping the floor in not just shooting, and rebounding but even in dribbling AND dunking!

This was no competition! 

Though the girls quickly concluded why he was this good.

"Working in that auto shop helped him develop all those muscles, just look how ripped he is!" The clueless girls talked among themselves after they saw Marcus in his t-shirt.

While the boys could only roll their eyes. They decided not to comment on that as these females would most likely attack them in groups.

But the most confused are the guys who spend time with Marcus from time to time. They never expected he would explode like this…against someone as natural at sports as Chris…

The guy has been playing sports since they could remember but this time… he is losing… extremely badly against Marcus who is not known to be this good at sports!

'What was that green glow on his neck… Am I seeing things or what!?'

Victor, one of Marcus' desk mates thought to himself as he remembered seeing green lines on his neck. It's strange…

Then… things got out of control… 

Not only the Alchemist didn't allow Chris to score but he started to dunk on him. Airwalk dunks which one could only see dunks like these being done by NBA Players…

This was mad! 

By the time Marcus was done, Chris was traumatised to the point that he didn't want to play anymore, hell… he even decided to go home instead of continuing with classes!

The kid had an identity crisis on his hands!

While the Alchemist-turned-teen simply decided to return to doing his things as he didn't see anything worth mentioning.

Hell, he didn't even register the fact that someone owns his food!

His mentality is far too warped to realise or even recall that. For him, 90% of teens making up promises is just that…making up promises in his mind. He never even believed that someone would buy food for him. 

This is why when he saw Chris just walking to the changing room he didn't stop him or even mentioned it. Unlike his classmates who wanted to stop the sport's kid.

"Marcus… he is dipping out!" Victor said to him as he walked over to his deskmate's side, he looked at his neck for a bit.

"That's fine. I didn't expect anything from him in the first place." Marcus said to Victor as he proceeded to continue his shootout. 

"...Dang… that's just cold. Did his throw at you piss you off to this point? He didn't even hit you?" 

"Not really. I am just saying how it is. I don't remember him buying anyone anything." The Alchemist said with a shrug. And he was right to a certain extent, he doesn't remember any of that. It was just that long ago. While he doesn't remember this time either. Since he is not paying attention.

"...Dang…again… you don't pay attention to anything do you?" 

"...I know that I am top 3 in the school standings. You are 5, which is impressive. Apart from that… is there anything that I should care about?" 

Victor just shook his head, he raised his hands in defeat. There is no point talking about any of that. 

Even teachers stopped trying to get him to open up more. The guy is a lost cause to all their current classmates.

~~~ 

As Marcus was walking back home from school his Caster manifested next to him, as they were some distance away and this road had…should not have people she did that out of instinct by this point. 

However, she popped up out of concern because of what she saw in the P.E.

"What is necessary to punish that human boy like this?" The Fae asked him as they continued to walk towards his home.

"Punish? Do you think I punished him?" He asked with some confusion. 

"What you did in that wide-open room was punish him with your superior ritual-enhanced body." The blonde said with a nod. Confirming to him that what he did was punishment.

"I see… so me not paying attention is punishment. I treated him more like an obstruction than a player. I guess your words had some sense. Next time I will try to see him as a living person instead of a non-living one." 

For a moment the Fae was dumbfounded, before shaking her head. 

It appears she underestimated how much her Master classified people into castes in his mind.

"I don't truly mind, but won't there be repercussions for what you did to that human kid?" 

"Maybe? But then again his pride would truly shatter, he won't be playing anything ever again. That's of course if he has some in the first place. Which I think he has some." Marcus tried and failed to recall anything about someone he knew over 300 years ago. He doesn't count his second life. Not yet, anyway.

"...So you don't know?"

He shrugged at her, she should stop bothering about people they won't be interacting or bothering anytime soon.

"...*Sigh*"

As the pair were walking home they didn't notice that someone was watching them from behind.

After all, the Boundary Field which should protect them only protects them from Magic kind. Marcus never saw regular people as anything more than a number in the population sheet.

That comes with his natural dislike towards them when he was alive last time and because without any sort of tech, they are quite useless. He might start paying attention to them in the late 21 century, not in the early.

So he didn't even notice how this person saw Caster just manifest next to him.

~~~ 

After walking home, Artoria went to discuss things with the Alter Maid. The Fae is a little bit concerned that their Master is far too cold towards regular people.

"I don't see this as a bad thing. Master is a lifetime genius, he can do whatever he wants." The maid said with a not-caring shrug. She only cares about her Master, not how he treats other lifeforms.

"But, Rider… Master is limiting himself! He needs more interactions! I know! Why don't you ask him for more cooking lessons!?" 

For a moment the Caster was extra jubilant while Artoria Alter for a second had a mystified look. Those lessons… It's more like cuddling sessions!

Her Master would guide her from behind, almost like hugging her. His hands would guide hers gently while showing how to neatly cut products and prepare things for cooking.

She would always end up forgetting what she is doing as the session would make her mind go haywire.

However, Caster's words were like sweet poison. She wants to continue this sort of training.

So, after everything was done inside the house Marcus retreated to his Garage. 

In winter time it's far harder for him to do that because it's winter and the garage doesn't have any sort of heating. It becomes harder for the alchemist to persuade his mother to allow him to work on his 'car'. 

But, it is still possible to leave the house, however, he needs to return home before sunset which doesn't give him much free time.

This, however, means that there is much more time to do other things…

Like cooking training!

"Master! Why don't we practise cooking today!? Your mother will be away after midday for her late shift so we can cook up a storm!" Alter maid quite enthusiastically said that to him!

"Hmm? Sure… I was thinking of coding today but we can cook too." He casually agreed with her. He truly likes his Artoria variants. Fate is a franchise that he got into when he was in the eleventh year of his school. A classmate by the name of Mark, not Marcus. Told him to watch an anime by the name Fate Stay Night. 

While not the best stuff he did get into it with Visual Novel experience. After that, it became a rabbit hole. However, what truly stuck up with him were the two Heroines… Rin and Saber.

Rin is the twin tails and her legs, while Saber…Saber is that cuddly pet-like girl…

This is why he can't stop but just wants to cuddle his maid and pat his Fae Servant when she shows enthusiasm for learning more of his Alchemy or Technomancy.

And so… the time passed and Marcus' mother went to work, a few hours passed before the Alchemist-turned-teen had to start to prepare ingredients for cooking.

This is where the maid is aiming at! 

"You can start with cutting the veggies." 

It didn't matter if her Master said that, her ingrained affinity for holding the knife like a weapon didn't diminish no matter what.

This is where her Master would sigh again and again after seeing it.

"I suppose…"

Once again he would walk behind her and take her hands and proceed to make her relax and start training her again on how to slice vegetables…

Once Artoria Alter would blush like a tomato, especially with her pale skin… it would be extremely visible.

After the vegetables, it was time for other ingredients, where the maid progressed quite a bit, tasting and cooking itself.

There is no need to hold her by her hand. Though it didn't stop the maid from trying.

~~~~~~Next Day, Morning~~~~~~

"Mate! You have to teach me your art!" 

The first thing the Alchemist hears in the morning is his deskmate asking him to teach him something!

"?"

"How do you do those things?"

"I don't take apprentices. You can fix your car by yourself." Marcus said with a deadpan tone.

"I mean increasing your reaction speed and negating gravity and then summoning a spirit to your side? How… you do it?"

"..."

"Told you so… you should pay attention. Regular people or not." The Fae said with a victorious tone.

"He saw you manifest as well." Marcus pointed out the obvious.

"... well…that…I manifested when you were far away from school and he only noticed something weird when you showed your magic in that class!" The Fae explained herself with a slightly triumphant tone, in the end, it was all on her Master!

Internally the Grand Alchemist just sighed, he had no energy to argue with his Caster, especially when she started giving him that look.

Which she will show the moment she appears next to him.

"I practise alchemy, it's a family thing. I am the 13th-generation alchemist." The Alchemist-turned-teen said with a simple tone. He made sure no one heard what he said. Since they were in the class.

"Make sure no one hears us." 

"On it."

"Hold it! Your father practises Alchemy too!?"

"No, it ended before my grandfather's generation, if they practise it, it would be 15 generations. Not 13…" Marcus said with a sigh. 

"...And you just told me like that…"

"I did, if you tell anyone I will have to dispose of you." The alchemist said that plainly which made his desk mate stiff for a second. Only now he realised that this stuff is quite serious. He forgot all about that in his excitement!

"So-So does this mean you can teach me Alchemy!?" 

The Alchemist in question motioned for his deskmate to calm down.

"Listen, it's not just fun and games, this stuff is dangerous, it's a mix of physics, maths, and chemistry. A wrong turn and it can explode in your face or it could melt a piece of your body off." 

"B-But you are fine with it?" 

"I am fine because it's genetics, selective breeding. My family has been practising this for hundreds of years. It comes naturally for us to practise this art. Hell, even when my father and grandfather didn't practise alchemy their choice in females was, it was so ingrained in our body that it's a subconscious thing." Marcus explained with a sigh. However, now that Victor knows the secret, he could use that. There are perks when someone knows one's secret. Well, there are downsides as well. But at this moment this downside is not a thing. 

They don't have competition. The Town is theirs to be used.

"However, if you want to learn it I can help you. The thing about Alchemy is that you can practise with very little talent for magic." 

"...Wait! Magic is real!?"

"...What do you think Alchemy is? The ancient method of chemistry?" Marcus asked with a disgusted look. Sometimes ignorance can be very, very annoying.

"...Sorta? So it's circles and rituals? Combined with material use… does it mean we will be working towards philosopher stone?" Victor got excited there. This sounds kind of cool. While the Alchemist in question just facepalmed when he heard that.

"...No, Philosopher stone is not that impressive. It's more like a conduit to do certain things. It's like a car. You can use the car to reach your destination faster, but it doesn't mean you can't reach that point without it. It is just a rock with circles on it, you can make it into a bunch of variations. From doing maths for you to assisting in general alchemy. Hell, you can use it as the heart of a computer." 

"... wow, this is the first time I heard you talk this much." 

Marcus just rolled his eyes as he explained more.

"Because we are talking about interesting things." He said with an obvious tone. It was almost insulting to the Alchemist when he heard that!

~~~ 

Marcus did decide to help his classmate to practise Alchemy. For one he will have more time for himself in the workshop. 

He can always say that he is spending time with his FRIEND. This excuse is extra effective for his mother. 

Second, he can revisit the basics of Alchemy. It's never a bad thing to strengthen his foundations. 

"So you are practicing your Alchemy in…Garage?" 

"Don't be ridiculous. Mana is in the air, it easily escapes in open places like that. I do that underground.

Any sort of Mage has a workshop built underground, in the basement in similar places like that, mana doesn't escape so easily. Remember that." 

As he said that he took him to his attic instead. 

"...Then why are we going to the attic?" 

"To make a book. Do you think I will take you to my workshop?" Marcus asked with a joking tone. 

"...Maybe? But I bet it's in your garage…" The classmate joked but it was extra close…

"Close, but not close enough." 

"Under the garage? Wait! Did you build a secret underground base!? That's so freaking cool!" 

"Master, he is so similar to you… besides, he hit right on the mark…" Internally he grimaced when he realised that his workshop got discovered so quickly…

"True, but he won't be able to enter it even if he wants to!" The Alchemist quickly defended his choice of location!

"Yes, it's true I suppose… however, the intent-based enchantments I put will eventually make people realise something is there behind the garage." She reminded him about the things she placed around the garage.

"Well, you have some time, this means you can improve the security" 

"..." 

"I can think of something…" She said with a slightly panicky tone.

"Good fairy now proceed with your work." As Marcus said that his Caster rushed outside to think about doing something with the Garage enchantments. She shouldn't tease her Master like that. Sometimes he can just snap back at her and force some serious working hours…

Once in the attic, the Alchemist-turned-teen motioned to follow the place where he used to read the family grimoires. He pulled out several old books and proceeded to use some basic alchemy.

He turned the pages of an old book into blank ones and then proceeded to copy and paste basics about alchemy into this recently cleaned-up book.

Victor just looked at this with disbelief, he just witnessed magic being done!

Less than an hour later the book was finished.

"This has everything you need to begin practising Alchemy, I need you to learn everything which is written in this book. Don't come back to me if you don't." Marcus handed over the basics book.

"Sure thing! Leave this to me! Once I am done we gonna make a club or something where only Alchemist can be part of!" 

The Grand Alchemist raised his eyebrow when he heard that. This doesn't sound like a bad idea. However, a lot of things need to be done before anything can happen. 

"First get the basics down. Learn how to use it first before you do anything." 

Victor nodded at him. He was pumped up, while Marcus didn't want to fatally wound his hopes, yet.

~~~ 

"...Did you tell him that there is a big chance he can't use any magic?" The maid said with a deadpan look.

"Or if he has magic circuits or not? While Alchemy to my knowledge requires minimal affinity to magic it still needs mana." She said with a sign.

"I know. He needs to find that out himself, it's the best way to get over it. If I said that to him he would have tried to prove me wrong. Now he can find this himself. Either way, I will benefit from this." Marcus said with a shrug. Anything Victor does will be beneficial to him.

He can even bait his classmate to do some work for him! It is possible, with some manipulation he could always say that it is training.

This way he would have more hands working for him.

"As expected from my Master!" The Maid nodded with a slight smirk on her lips.

"So what now?" 

"I return to my work." 

Since Victor went home, the Alchemist-turned-teen made sure his mother thinks that they went somewhere. This means he can work in peace until sunset.

And sure he did. His PROTO-Legio OS looks closer to what he remembers, and Assembly Line can already create around 40%.

There is still much to do but things are looking much more positive than before. 

One could say that Marcus' depression is slowly subsiding with each passing OS update.

~~~ 

Around a week later Victor finally opened up about his progress in Alchemy.

The copy of the book he handed over to his classmate has all the basics needed to proceed with work toward alchemy.

"I didn't expect it to be this difficult! Mark! Does this mean you know things at a molecular level!? Like how do you know what is what!?" 

"You eventually know the base composition of the metal, wood, organic or non-organic, this is why it's a generational thing. A man starts to learn and then passes it down to his son who does the same and passes it down to his son." Marcus explained how it was back in his previous world. He is pretty sure it's the same as the current one.

"Eventually all those hundreds of years of research bear fruit." As Marcus explained he lifted his hand and showed his palm. The wind started to gather around his palm. 

Thankfully they were outside, and away from people praying eyes. And in the background, the Alchemist's Caster is working to keep people away from hearing anything.

Once the wind settled down Marcus was holding a small diamond.

"Is that!?"

"It's a diamond, not the best quality but you could get around 5 to 9 thousand Euros from this." 

Victor gulped down upon hearing that. That was quite a bit of cash!

"Mark, do you know that you could get rich from this!?"

"For what? Do you realise that it's a regular people mentality? I am an Alchemist, if I want something I build something. I can make anything I want with a little bit of research, money was never on my radar. 

Money was created to govern trade between goods, but an Alchemist exists outside of such a system because we don't trade, we build." As Marcus explained that he handed over the Diamond.

"Sell it, give it away, it doesn't matter, or just keep it as a reminder of what you can achieve with Alchemy.".

His words made the alchemist wannabe gulp down as he inspected a nail size diamond, he never saw such a thing before! At least this size.

Diamonds are expensive and he is not into jewellery, but this is the first time he saw a diamond this big! 

"I see… I will keep this in mind." 

"Good, remember, think outside the box, you must understand the simple principle that instead of trying to be part of the system you are making YOUR system."

"What do you mean?" Victor asked curiously.

"Your first thing to do was to get money, even though you read through the manual? Why is that? You do know that with alchemy you can print money, make luxury items, or even luxurious bones like Ivory." 

The more said the more he grasped what he meant.

"See? Now you see. The issue is that we don't belong to a normal people system. We are natural inflators, our things would flood the market and inflate the value of money.

This is why I said that Alchemists should make their System.

Hell, a properly trained Alchemist could survive in space on his own. If you know the composition of air you can make air anywhere you go, any barren worlds, asteroids, space rocks you could find you could make into food." Marcus sounded as if he was talking 'what If' instead of something he did already in his previous life, he doubts he will tell this to anyone except his Servants.

Such information is far too sensitive.

"Hold on! Are you for real!?" 

"I am. Anyway, I gave you a pep talk, you can now return to your studies, tell me when you find your mental trigger." 

After saying that Marcus finished eating his dinner and decided to do some reading, he is re-learning certain things about his current society in his free time.

While Victor was dumbfounded to learn just how badass Alchemists are in truth! 

~~~~~~Later, After School~~~~~~ 

Marcus was quite giddy about today. His Assembly Line was semi-complete, and the OS of his systems needs one more update before it becomes usable alongside the Assembly lines.

This is where his work truly starts to pick up! 

So, after all the after-school rituals the Grand Alchemist-turned-teen swiftly went to his workshop.

Once in his favourite chair, he turned on his Computer and went to coding.

The way it works is like a cake with multiple layers. At this moment he was around the middle layer, at the point where his software can run automation functions.

He needs automation because he is at this moment just one man, one maid, and one Fairy show.

So after swiftly finishing the last paragraph. He pressed Execute button on the keyboard. At that moment the lights of the whole workshop turned off. And restarted a few seconds later.

At that moment the Computer systems were linked with the entire workshop, including the semi-working Assembly line.

This was the next step to make his workshop in working order, truthfully he did this already so many times that he could do it blindfolded.

Each time he visited a new Solar System he would create a workshop. There were only a few times when he did not build one. 

However, the point stands that he did build workshops for a considerable amount of time.

"Master? Is everything alright?" The blonde Fae asked him with a slightly worried tone. 

"Everything is fine. The workshop is now linked directly to my computer."

"Oh, so it's finally done! So what now!?" The Caster asked with an enthusiastic tone. Finally! The step which they were in for months is finally done!

"We will proceed with the creation of Homunculi."

The maid, which was quiet most of the time, and the Fairy Caster had widened their eyes for a bit.

Homunculi! Their Master is starting to get serious!

Up to this point, their Master only created resources from the dirt, he was quite small-scale, but Homunculi that's manpower.

If he starts making those he will become quite a serious threat…for the rest of the world that is…

"What are you going to be using them for?" The maid asked with a small frown, she doesn't want to be replaced or even to be compared to those! She might not be King of Knights anymore, but she is STILL Artoria Pendragon. She still remembers the Battle of Camlann where she pierced Mordred with Rhondomyniad and that curse on Mordred which fatally wounded her.

Mordred was a Homunculi… There is a certain feeling….A bitter feeling for her when it comes to those magical creations. 

"Everything, I might not have used them much in my previous life, however in this one… I will master this craft." 

When he said that his Rider's eyebrow slightly twitched. 

"Don't worry Rider, you will always be my Head Maid, such a job is not replaceable. The only thing you should worry about is that you will have maids to worry about."

The pale blonde Servant relaxed quite a bit when she heard that. This was much more acceptable for her.

However, she still has her insecurities. Yes, her Master is very capable, so who knows what he will come up with in a year or two…

This is why she decided to be the very best she can be! The Ultimate Maid for her Master!

~~~ 

After installing the update for the operating system Marcus showed the pair the power of a factory! The capacities of the Assembly line. He started to feed it with resources.

He already sent the plans for Homunculi chambers, so the Assembly line started to create the necessary resources needed to make the parts for these chambers.

The speed of it… It was like a printer which printed paper. It only takes moments! Which has severely impressed the pair. 

With such a thing, their Master can rapidly expand! Hell! In just a few years he could potentially have a proper faction of his own! 

This is what the pair were thinking for some time now, all the clues of this have been leading to him building things of his own, unrelated to the society outside.

Regardless of their thoughts, the Grand Alchemist proceeded to create the Homunculi chambers. It's going to be just east of the Assembly lines and North of the Mana pools. North Eastern from the Triple Core Reactor.

Carving the room he did it in a single night. By this point Marcus was not holding back, he needs to finish this as soon as possible. He was going slowly far too long. Not that he could improve the speed of his construction much. It was all about efficiency.

After carving out the room he sends the materials to the Assembly Line, after transmuting them into alchemist clay. He still needs to finish the Matter Convertor but that's after he is done with the Homunculi Chambers.

With the speed of the Assembly Line, Marcus finished the main part of Homunculi in just a week, much faster than any other facilities so far in this life.

This was quite nostalgic for him, he loves this increased efficiency! Reminds him of his previous life when he was at the apex of his existence.

Though after dealing with the infrastructure, he needed to write the code for his Homunculi.

This is where he spends the whole day thinking about how to proceed. He still wants to make them into the third level which he came up with in this life. However, he doesn't have the basic foundations of that.

He wants to make their consciousness into data that can be downloaded into bodies. Something akin to a software and platform kind of relationship.

However, such a thing is not easy, to change neural patterns into runic patterns is not that easy. 

'Though, not impossible, the body creation ritual is a runic formula, to begin with. So it just needs to take it a step further.'

After thinking for a bit Marcus decided to start with the basics.

A level one Homunculi with slightly altered brain patterns. Patterns that react to a wave. A wave that he can research further.

A level one Homunculi is pure flesh automata, they might look human-ish but they are not human at all. It's purely efficiency and conservation of resources in mind when Alchemist creates these.

Their performance time is short-lived and they are quite dumb. Though with a short lifespan, Marcus is thinking to allow self-aware evolution.

This is to allow the development of his stage 3 homunculus.

After the operational time is at the end he would record these runic patterns, the magic version of neural patterns, and then store them in the data banks. 

Such a thing would allow him to build up the base he wants. 

'Something quite similar to Throne of Heroes, now that I think about it.'

There was a certain thoughtful look on his face before the Alchemist returned to his work.

It took him a few hours before he was done with the code. 

~~~ 

The pair of Servants looked at the person inside a glass container, it was a homunculus with white hair, and there were 14 of these beings growing rapidly in these tubes.

Their 'Programming' is as their Master said quite specific, he had to copy and liquidate his memories of specific things. Extremely unique processes, these memories include basic language understanding, breathing, and base instinctual things.

All of these Homunculi have this, it only took their Master a total of two weeks to build this whole facility and make it functional. It's quite honestly absurd. 

How quickly it all happened. What is funny about this is that the Master's friend still hasn't found out his trigger image!

The sheer difference in efficiency is staggering and quite amusing to watch for the maid, while the Fae in question only looked at this human with some pity. She can't help him, not when her Master forbids her to do so.

The guy needs to find out about Alchemy himself and work his way to achieve it. Not to make him drop his work Marcus was constantly telling him how great Alchemists are. 

Such a thing keeps him trying; however, for now, the pair were not thinking about their Master's friend. No, at this moment they were thinking about the growing Homunculus in the water tank.

"It is still hard for me to grasp how simple paragraphs of letters allowed this to happen." The Maid said with a frown as she recalled how her Master just wrote down a formula and sent it to the Homunculus chambers.

A few moments later the tanks filled up with water and now it started to grow up these humanoid automata.

"Well… Is it magic? I am not good at explaining, I am more of an instinctual person so I can't just explain it. However, this is new magecraft for me as well." The Fae hoped that her words would help the maid.

*Snort* 

"It's fine, there is no need for you to try to consult me. You forgot that I am much older than you are." 

This time the Blonde Fae remembered that this maid is an Alter and she can be quite annoying. Though her attitude has settled a little bit after the whole cooking training exercises.

Artoria is not an expert but she thinks this maid likes her Master quite a bit.

"Suit yourself, these Homunculi will soon be fully grown, after that we will be instructing them on what they must do." 

The maid nodded before her frown returned.

"Why do you think our Master needs this much land? From my understanding, the whole workshop will be around 3 Square Kilometres of land." The Alter Maid remembered seeing the plans hanging on the wall. It's an enormous complex, there are two large places called 'Drydocks' . If her understanding is right about their purpose then he will be building ships of some sort…

"I don't know… I guess that he is building up forces… and we might go to space." Artoria Caster said with a slightly dreamy tone, she has been stargazing with her Master for some time now, in winter the stars are most beautiful. And it helps that her Master knows his stars. It gives a certain feeling to it.

"Stars huh… over all the years as Servant I have never been in space. This is something new for me as well." The maid is slightly looking forward to it. From all the stories she has heard there are all sorts of worlds, dead or teaming with life, or life which is just starting, with enormous stars which could kill a person In just seconds, to frozen wastelands to Moons circling massive Gas Giants. 

Her Master told many such tales. After all, he has been in space for over a hundred years.

Truthfully the pair have no idea what their Master has in store…for Earth.

~~~ 

Marcus looked at his working Homunculi, there are 48 at this moment. They all are working with the gauntlets prepared by his Fae Servant.

The humanoid automata have been working on properly preparing the tunnel to the outside of the River Valley, the tunnel needs lighting and cables needs to be installed.

If it was Marcus and Artoria then the pair would be working for a few weeks just doing that.

However, with this much manpower, it only will be a few days.

But, this is where the Grand Alchemist realised something. He doesn't have a Servant on standby when he is going to school.

And that just feels wrong for him, his Caster is busy with the Homunculi, supervising them, while his Maid is making sure everything is spotless, and she generally doesn't like being outside going to a boring place like his school.

This leads him to one solution. He needs another Servant.

So after another day in school, after all the post-school rituals he went to his workshop, directly to the lower floor, to check the mana pools.

'The excess income amount has dropped quite a bit, and the energy used by the Assembly line is quite considerable, not to mention all the energy used by the lights and just general use of liquid mana for transmutation.' 

Marcus understood that the excess amount of energy is dropping each time he is adding a new facility to his Workshop.

However, he still generates energy and stores it in the water. At this moment he still has three pools of energy.

So he will use one of these pools to summon another Servant to help him with management.

After seeing that he had enough resources he rerouted one of the pools to flow into the ritual room. Once that was done he went upstairs to prepare for the ritual.

This time he wants management or a guide for his homunculus workers. Another Caster perhaps? To help with the management of such magical creations.

Thankfully he knows Anti-Hero or just purely evil Servants won't answer his call. So he is not that worried that he will waste a whole pool of mana.

Nope, will surely get some sort of heroic one. Well, he doesn't want purely heroic, those can be a pain in the butt.

This is why he made sure that gets someone to manage and guide his Homunculi workers.

""Master?""

The pair of Artorias manifested in the ritual room as they saw Marcus was there, preparing for summoning. They felt a massive amount of mana flowing here.

"I will be summoning my third Servant to help with the management of my workers." 

The pair slowly nodded at him.

'Is Master not happy that I was not with him?' The Fae said to herself with some realisation.

She slightly blushed as she realises that her Master likes having her around!

Sure enough, the ritual started and Grand Alchemist proceeded with his version of the summoning chant. The way he attracts his Servants is how competent is the summoning.

From the massive amount of Mana being used to summon, such a thing tells that this Master is powerful, to the chant which specifically tells the reason for the summoning.

The reason why summoning a Servant has been considered a true miracle is that the decision to accept such summoning ends up for the Servant itself.

This is why Marcus chants, words that he uses to summon one intrigues a Servant, for the Fae that he wanted an assistant in magic and that he was able to contact her which is a miracle on its own. And for Rider, he wanted a helper which was strange and even amusing for her that he considered summoning a maid. Those were the reasons or more like whim-like choices by the Servants who accepted the summoning.

Now, however, when the dust created by mana settled down, Marcus' eyes widened to a large degree when he saw what he had summoned. It was not a single individual. Nope, it was three girls dressed in white-like robes. They all had spears and shields.

Their spears are creations of pure energy of some sort, while their shields radiate energy that he has never sensed before. It was almost divine!

'Maybe it is Divine if these three are what I think they are.' 

As the Alchemist thought about this his eye went to the blonde standing in front of these three warrior-like girls, more specifically his eyes went to the pair of wings this girl had on her head.

It had a certain effect on Marcus which he thought he never would have, he finds these wings cute and…interesting! He wants to stroke them!

"...Valkyrie. Individual designation…Thud." The blonde introduced, after she did, the one with pink hair on Thud's right spoke next.

"Individual designation, Hildr." 

Then the one on the blonde's left with black hair hidden under a white hood finished the introduction by telling her name.

"Individual designation, Ortlinde." 

Then the trio understood who was standing in front of them!

"...Eh!? Human!?" Ortlinde exclaimed with shock.

"...Ehhhh!? No way!? He is human!" Hildr exclaimed even more. 

While the blonde was the most controlled about this, she did however have disbelief on her face!

"How curious, you are human indeed, but your mana output rivals that of a Minor God," Thud said with a fascinated look.

"Though don't worry your summon isn't wasted, we indeed accepted the call and accepted the contract you offered. Though at first, we wondered if some sort of God wanted our assistance, it turns out it was a human… How fascinating… Tell me how you got this much mana?" Hildr by this point was in front of Marcus, her red eyes gleaming with curiosity. 

"Hildr…" Thud's commanding voice made the pink-haired Valkyrie slightly reel back.

"Sorry! Just extremely curious about our Master!" 

"...Valkyries…wow… Honestly… I am shocked." Marcus for the first time looked like someone pulled the carpet under him. He was honestly baffled that he summoned THE daughters of Allfather Odin himself! 

This was intense… These three are Divine Spirits! 

"Hmm… We are shocked just like you are! By the way…how in Allfather's name did you generate this much mana?" Hildr asked him, she is still trying to think how this human made them confuse him with a God. 

"I am an Alchemist, and mana was generated by one of my creations."

"I see…so we will be serving a creator," Thud said with a professional voice as she followed Ortlinde exiting the summoning circle.

"In your chant, you asked us to guide, at first I thought that we will be messengers of a God, but it appears it will be something else. Am I correct?" Thud asked for confirmation, she wants her duty to be clarified before anything else.

"Indeed. I am an Alchemist, so I am looking for a supervisor for my Homunculi." 

"...Supervising…Homunculi…You do realise that we are Valkyries…" Thud for a second tried to process what she just heard, her red eyes are once again in disbelief.

"...Yes… And you will be supervising hundreds of Homunculi." 

Now that disbelief disappeared instead he made the trio follow him.

While all this was happening the duo of Artoria was In the background watching their Master interacting with three new summons.

The Caster was wondering who these Servants were, she never sensed anything like this… The only one she could think of is a certain God she faced at the end of her life.

The aura these three emit have similar composition but the quantity is much lower. 

'Divine Spirits?'

"What do you think, Rider?" 

"Unbelievable, he summoned Three Divine Spirits at once! The only time I saw something like this was when a Master built a bond with such beings and was able to summon them by dumb luck!" The maid exclaimed with a shocked tone… Well, not as shocked as one would expect by this is Alter, having her show this much emotion shows that what their Master did was quite impressive.

"This…sounds impressive, are they some sort of Gods?" 

"They are Daughters of the God Odin, he is the Chief God of his Pantheon, and each of them holds some form of Divinity," Rider explained to the Fae who was slowly nodding her head and absorbing the information.

"I see… This indeed sounds impressive." 

"It is, you could say our group's fighting power increased exponentially."

After talking for a bit the pair went after their Master and the Valkyries.

~~~ 

"Those are runes! Master, are you perhaps a Runemancer as well!?" Hildr asked as she spotted Runes on the lights on the walls and the sides of the walls.

"Indeed, I started studying them over three hundred years ago." The moment he said his age the black-haired Valkyrie Ortlinde inspected him from top to bottom, her red eyes curiously scanning him.

"I see… Alchemists are a strange people, as far as my knowledge goes they can expand their life with all sorts of transmutation." Thud said as well as she was inspecting the walls.

By this point, all the Valkyries have recalled their weapons and entered a tourist mode of some sort. They were very curious about their current situation; they had been summoned by a human!

'Very curious, these runes… He is utilising them to bond with materials, instead of using them like magecraft or spells, it appears he has completely added them into his Alchemy, by this point, it's a completely different art from the classic Runemancy taught by Allfather.' Thud thought to herself as she inspected the light projects on the walls.

'Curious… The source of energy is quite far away, the whole place is an intricate web of some sort of metal lines through which the energy flows…'

"Are you sure you are not a God?" Thud once again asked him, while she can't sense any sort of Divinity from him, though her sense could be simply lying to her…

"...No, I am just a very dedicated Alchemist," Marcus said with a sweat drop. 

~~~

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