Just for today, I'm taking a break. Despite how much I'm gaining from it, talking to dozens of tinkers one after another is extremely tiring. Some of them are willing to listen to my advice, some are too self centered to care and some just want to buy things from me. On top of all that, my power is constantly active trying to observe everyone I talk to and after a few hours, all I can feel is a dull headache.
Yesterday, I spent another five hours after the meeting just talking with everyone that came to my stall. I spent a total of thirty virtual hours helping over one hundred fifty tinkers. Even with repair, I wouldn't have been able to endure the last two days of the event being like that so today, I'm taking a break to recharge my batteries for tomorrow.
Even if I call it a break, I'm still working. I can't really afford wasting time not doing anything, all I can do to relax is spend my time working on projects I like. Earlier today, I made the modifications on my printer and started the printing process for my next one so now I'm limited to work that only needs my two hands to complete.
Luckily for me, smithing is my second favourite thing to do and I just so happen to need a few test runs before I craft the blade that'll be used against Behemoth. Since I'll be working with adamantium-b when making that one, I can't afford to make a mistake in the forging process otherwise I'll waste fifteen thousand dollars of materials for nothing.
The knife I showed off to Chevalier was my first creation and the first time I realized my tinker power's thinker effect. When I'm forging, it's like I'm having a hazy dream. As my hammer hits the hot lump of iron, thousands of visions pass through me. In one, I am an old blacksmith. Blind from years of working with hot steel, I forge by sound alone. From time to time, young heroes come to my cave to obtain my works. They say I am peerless in the arts of the forge but I know better, I know this isn't my limit. Those weary hands of mine can achieve greater heights. They have to, I won't accept any less from them.
And just as that vision ends, another begins. In this one, I am a smith in a time where the arts of the forge are still young. Alone, I shape my steel. The others may call me a witch because they do not understand but they do not matter. I know that if I add certain leaves to my metal, that if I hit with my hammer in just the right way and if I forge at just the right heat, that I'll create metal stronger than any other. They call me Hephaestos and no one knows steel like I do.
The visions arrive and leave fast but each of them feels like a lifetime. The people in them come in all varieties but they all have the same thing in common, each and everyone one of them is a craftsman with no equals besides the others in my visions. When I am forging something, it's not really me that does it. The craftsman in my vision are the ones doing it and I experience their life as they work.
When my mind finally clears, the lumps of iron I started with have been transformed into five swords of unparalleled quality. With just one look, I can tell these swords are on a level of their own. Each able to cut steel with ease and to endure countless battlefields.
And no matter how much it pains me to admit, they're not enough. Theses swords able to survive centuries of heavy use by human hands would break within seconds against Behemoth. Despite my disappointment, the result is expected. These peerless swords in front of me are made with mundane materials, steel of the highest quality and layers upon layers of nanotubes. To fight the extraordinary, extraordinary materials are needed.
Even so, everything these swords lack, I can give them. Fifty break and repair cycles is all I need to push their durability high enough to survive. Their sharpness can be brought to higher levels by depositing a few atom thick layers of saturnite on their edge. Repair will bond the added edge to the sword. I can make them barely fit to participate in battle but the next one I make will have to be different. If these swords need upgrades to survive battle, then the next one will need to thrive in it from the get-go.
Three of the swords are European longswords, the fourth one is a machete and the last is a kriegsmesser. Each is perfectly balanced and the handles are made of memory gels that change shape to perfectly fit anyone's grip. I have no doubt a beginner swordsman could fatally injure a knight in full plate armor using any of these swords.
I'll upgrade them at a later date. For now, I have other things to do. Mostly designing my hospital and choosing a few initial products for the tinkers association to sell. I've already chosen what my first products will be, what I need to brainstorm are products that align with the current member's specialization. It's all suggestions of course, the members can decide what to sell on their own but it's always good to have extra ideas.
Two of them in particular have specializations with amazing marketability. Two twins with extremely similar powers, one directed at creating miniature copies of technology and the other directed at creating miniature copies of biological creatures. The first one can be used to create functional toy figures of capes and the second can both create small pets and give me an immense breakthrough in a whole lot of fields of biotinkering.
He can make miniature copies of people even if he never tried before, that means he can fit a human brain's worth of computing power in a space the size of a grape. If I figure out the genetic sequence, I can create a temporary brain booster. In simple terms, it's a modified version of brain upload that simply connects your brain to a compatible container temporarily. It doesn't work that well on machines since computers don't process data the same way brains do but it can be used to connect to an empty human brain for extra computing power.
On the other hand, the twin with the mechanical miniature specialization is a golden opportunity for another lucrative deal with the PRT. Imagine, people that already pay hundreds for unmoving hero figurines suddenly get access to miniature versions of their heroes that can move, speak and interact with them. If I'm the messiah of the tinker community then that boy's about to become a figure of worship for every PR department in America.
There's also some advancements to be made from observing his progress. When I showed him my current design, he was able to draw me a blueprint for a miniature of my HAF generator the size of my VR chip but as powerful as mine despite its pitiful range. Paired with armsmaster and that simplified technology tinker I met a few days ago, I'm sure the trio could make something absolutely amazing. Adding me to the mix would propel us to new heights.
I create a design for a full sized piece of tinkertech, armsmaster makes the design more efficient and fits more functionality in it, the other guy makes the design simpler and then we pass it around between him and armsmaster a few times before we give the blueprint to the boy and he changes the design for a machine the size of a microwave into a smartphone sized piece of tinkertech with ungodly amounts of functionality for it's size. I just need to find a way to recruit the simplified technology tinker, without him the combination is much less powerful and he'd be extremely helpful in general for the tinkers association.
Despite their lack of confidence, every tinker that accepted to join me has potential in my eyes. They just need a push to make it big.
As for my own product, I decided to go with full scale VR and custom supercars for my principal sources of revenue. The full scale VR is simple enough to understand, I'll make a server and a design program for game developers to make VR games. Once that's established, I can sell cheap VR chips to customers and have the game developers pay me a percentage of the earnings they make with VR games sold on my servers. Since it's a new concept, I'll set the price at two hundred for a VR chip that essentially acts like a game console and three dollars on every purchase of a game on my servers.
That should make me a large amount of money once it becomes popular, I'll just have to design a few games myself since a game studio will take months to years to develop a game on a platform with no guarantee on return. The custom supercars on the other hand will net me large amounts of money in relatively little time. I just need to contact a large brand for a contract and I can make millions within two months.
Rich people already pay millions for regular supercars, finding one willing to pay ten million for a tinkertech supercar is only a question of time. I'll just need to sign a contract with a brand, make the car and send it for testing before the brand sells it at an auction. Even if I only request fifty percent of the sales revenue, that'll still boost my budget by an order of magnitude. I'll be a millionaire.
My last product was something Chevalier recommended me, mastercraft swords. From what he told me, rich collectors would be willing to pay millions for just one blade of the quality I can make. I just need to establish a reputation before attempting to contact a buyer otherwise they won't even bother to call me back.
I've also started transmuting a stockpile of materials that I'll need for my next round of upgrades. I'll need a shit ton of carbon if I want to build the association headquarters out of graphene reinforced ferroconcrete. It's also a good thing I can transmute dirt since most of the facilities need to be underground, I get the materials from the ground and I excavate the area at the same time. The biological printer has begun the creation process for the multicellular organisms I'll need for chlorophyte metal and I've already accumulated a few kilos of the specific mix of dirt and minerals needed for the material.
All in all, I'm about halfway done with the preparations for the next phase. The seeds needed for the resin used to create adamantium-b will arrive next week and the new members of the association will be arriving throughout next month since I can't send portals to their place of residence without admitting I know more than I should. After tomorrow, I'll be able to make some true progress and to go back on patrols.
The new 3D printer will be finished in about eight days so the time before then will be used to design everything and to catch up on events around the bay. With armsmaster and me absent, the department is extremely stretched. I haven't had the time to watch the news but I wouldn't be surprised if the gangs saw an opportunity to cause trouble.
Last thing I need to do today is start the printing process on the twenty temporary homes I'll need to accommodate the association members until the facility is constructed. I'm sure some of them won't have homes ready fast enough so I'll offer them temporary ones and stealthy portal access to the city to protect their identities. Everybody knows where I live after all so unknown civilians leaving my property would be suspicious to anyone spying on me.
I just hope I won't have to spend too much time at Sphere's facility tomorrow. I'll be there to answer questions for a few hours but a soon as lunch time arrives, I'm out of there. I'll go back home through portals and my drones will come back on their own. Maybe I'll leave a few business cards at my stall but that's it. If they want to contact me, they have my number and the specific hours they can call me is on my card.
A.N: My opinion is that tinkers are the single greatest chance humanity has of killing scion without bullying him into suicide. Together, the God driver needed under one hundred tinkers to create and did more against scion that ninety eight percent of parahumans, and it was a rush job. Together, one hundred tinkers can destroy a big moon, a thousand of them can erase earth from existence. In fact, most parahumans in worm can do exponentially more damage by working together. Imagine two hundred high rated blasters shooting together with vista compressing the space so every beam is squished into a space the size of a quarter. Anyway, hope you enjoyed, till next time.
Universe of origin for tech:
Insight program: Zola's algorithm in marvel cinematic universe.
Chlorophyte metal: inspired by the multicross fanfiction 'easy mode' on spacebattles.
Portal bullet: original idea(as in I didn't use another source for inspiration, the idea might have been used by other people before but I didn't use any of them for inspiration).
Graphene reinforced ferroconcrete: original idea.
Ascendant matter: my own technobabble explanation for tony stark's new element.