The Titan and the dragonriders

123. In the workshop

"So, what exactly are we starting with?" asked Chloe, eagerly and clapping her hands, which sounded a bit strange - not organic - due to her hard exoskeleton.

Benjamin and they were now in the relatively small workshop that Micheal had planned especially for his brother in the Venator. Or rather, Mark had insisted at the time on separating Ben's work from his, because the weapons expert, unlike Duncan, often worked with others and talked during that time. Warren had not protested because he knew his brother well enough to know that he preferred to work alone and fully concentrated. And the last thing Ben wanted was to drive Mark to the white glow, which could quickly catch the eye.

"First of all, I have to transfer the sketch into a technical drawing, with the complete data, so that the industrial anitus can do something with it. In the meantime, you could get the necessary materials from the warehouse if you wanted to," Warren explained after a brief thought, pointing to an elongated box the approximate size of a bed, the lower part of which was made of black lacquered metal and the upper part was coated armored glass. A reduced version of an industrial nanite factory that was specifically designed to work with metallic components under extreme pressure and temperature. Almost perfect for his upcoming project.

"Ah, yes, of course. Let me see again what exactly you need," the chemist replied, bowing her head deep over his left shoulder, pressing her cheek close to his neck. Involuntarily, Ben's cheeks then ran soft pink before giving her the graphic tablet. "Uh, of course, here. Mainly we only need the tungsten-titanium steel and the amorphous tungsten, you know, exactly what I used for Shixin's sword at the time. Otherwise, just some ordinary armored steel, a good piece of hickory wood and about 100 grams of pure tungsten. Rough leather for the handle I think I should have been driving around in one of the boxes here,"" explained the weapons expert as calmly as he could, so as not to notice anything, tempel held his head on his shoulder for a short time, probably to see the sketch itself, before it detached from him again and nod dodded. "That's what we get. I think I took the leftovers from the tungsten glass aside anyway and as your sketch looks, it should be enough for the sword. This stuff isn't necessarily that easy to make, especially not in the shape you need. But the remaining metals are all suitable for the INF?" she said, pointing to the manufacturer on the wall. Now it was up to Benjamin to nod in the affirmative. "Exactly." "Perfect, then I'll be back right away, with the materials we need," Chloe replied cheerfully, patting Ben on the shoulder and then rushing out to the door again.

Then the weapons expert took a deep and relaxing breath.

If only he had the guts to talk to them about it - no, he had to focus on his work now!

Ben put himself in a small pat against temples to arrange his thoughts, before stepping over to the small standing table next to the maker, which contained a simple laptop that was already wired to the machine. He folded it up and pressed the power button to power up the computer. In the meantime, he briefly let his gaze wander through his small workshop. On the left wall stood the bed-sized INF together with the computer table and a medium-sized shelf, which housed all sorts of basic materials for the manufacturer. To the right, directly opposite the door, a large, heavy steel workbench was fitted over the entire length of the wall, on which all kinds of tools, measuring instruments, pens, unused blanks and several different magnifiers were driving around. In front of it stood a wooden stool reinforced with steel struts, which Warren had only covered with a simple seat cushion, but as far as he was concerned, he had good seat edge anyway. Finally, other shelves were attached to the right wall, which housed, among other things, raw materials, but also semi-finished prototypes and heavier tools. His eyes fell briefly on an unfinished reverse draw crossbow, which he had once begun to build for Julia. However, since she had told him at the time that the weapon was not a priority, it had now been several months in which the crossbow on the shelf had been dusted.