The parts required to build an assembler appeared in a list before his eyes, the list was surprisingly small "The scale of the assembler isn't that large, it seems that small-scale Mechs and Robots all have small parts that join together to form one larger part. Kind of like joining three bits of leg bone together to make 1 whole leg"He noticed that the assembler came up to about just above his belly button and just as wide. Which meant that he would have to collect the parts at his humble shack "There should barely be enough room to fit this thing inside, lucky that it's quite small for an assembler" Ferrous decided it had to do with ease of production in mind, as small scale Mechs and robots rarely saw combat, and performed more laborious tasks such as mining or what he was doing now, scavenging " The good part about the assembler being small, meant that so were the parts, which also meant that the trouble of finding larger, more rare parts wouldn't be an issue "At least for now, anyways"
Ferrous decided to start with what was familiar, mentally marking parts in the list that he felt he knew about the most, and were also on the ship he was scavenging "Batteries and metal plates wont be a problem at least" Batteries were used for nearly everything, at least that's what Ferrous thought, as he had never been able to learn about what happens outside of his unappealing rock of a planet.
Metal plates were also easy because firstly, he was in a ship made out of them, and secondly, he could custom cut the size he needed for the assembler. Ferrous chuckled to himself lightly, for some reason he imagined the washing machine he used at home, completely naked without any cover on. He felt it would be especially unsafe if the covers were left off on the assembler "Assemblers heat metals up to molten temperature, it wouldn't be good to leave that exposed in my tiny shack" He then thought again "Wouldn't using it be like a over-sized heater, filling my home up with sweltering amounts of heat?" He made a mental note not to keep it inside, Ferrous hated the heat.
30 minutes passed and Ferrous almost had the last plate cut to shape, he probably didn't need this much but decided to leave it. Assemblers were mainly giant 3D printers that worked with metal instead of other materials like plastic. Of course there were Assemblers that were made for that purpose, giant toy companies used these to make special kiddie Mech suits that were more of a shoddy plastic exo-skeleton (Author: Imagine Iron-man, except not as intricate and... Dangerous)
"Kids in the inner ring probably buy these" Ferrous had enough to buy such items years ago, yet he found it wasteful of money. As he was finishing his thought, Kellan came down the hallway looking visibly worn out but happy nonetheless "Looks like we went the wrong way, I went where you wanted to go and I... Why do you have metal plates for?" Kellan was confused to why his friend had spent his time scavenging plates instead of actual components that could sell for way more "Did all the heat outside melt your brain, buddy" Kellan asked, grinning all the while. Ferrous smiled, looking at his friend "I found some weird program in the terminal, it seems to be some builders application. It says by gathering these parts I can make my own assembler! Cool, huh" Kellan's eyes visibly widened the more Ferrous spoke "Really? What are you gonna use an assembler for? Do you even know how to use it?" Kellan asked "That's the special part, it lets me learn how to build Mechs, Robots and even Spaceships! Though I do need to learn quite a bit before I can do that" Ferrous noticed a lot more tabs designed for teaching various engineering skills to him. He was nervous, as the system told him that all learning was up to him, so the system wouldn't build for him, he had to do everything himself "That sounds cool! But kinda boring as well.... I'd much prefer controlling Mechs rather than building them" Ferrous continued on "Even so, with this program I could build high quality robots to sell, so we can finally get out of this planet" Ferrous abandoned the thought of making Mechs for now. If people found out that a kid from the outer ring, with no education managed to build a Mech, they would definitely think something was wrong. "Robots are fairly simple and I have quite a bit of experience with them, as my old mining job required me to repair and maintain the mining robots there. Ferrous decided the first robot he would produce and sell would be a mining variant. He didn't have any knowledge on designing his own robots, but he knew what all the parts were and what they did at least. Kellan broke his thoughts "Enough money to leave the planet?! That's tens of thousands of credits alone! You'd need to build hundred robots to be able to have the amount needed to leave the planet, not to mention the money needed to move all your gear to a different planet" Ferrous already knew the amount he needed to save up to leave the planet, all in all he had 3400 saved up over a year, most of it was from his dads bank account from when he passed away...I get off track, the amount needed was 35,000 credits to catch a ship to another planet and moving services costed another 15,000 credits, more depending on the amount of items you need moving, and let's not forget the housing at the planet he moves too. His house costed 1000 at most, average price would go for nearly half that though. The lowest tier housing at other planets is all the same, or so it says on the website, they cost the least at a sum of 10,000 credits a pop. All in all Ferrous needed 60,000 credits, not to mention spare money for food and water when he arrives there. Ferrous also needed to consider Kellan, as he would be damned if he were to leave here without his one and only friend.
Ferrous looked at his friend "Alone, I need 60,000 credits to leave and find housing on another planet" Kellan looked downcast "That's more than a lifetimes amount of money needed" Kellan sighed in exasperation "Of course, if you do manage to get that amount of money, I wont hold it against you if you leave ahead of me" Kellan feigned a smile "Nonsense" Ferrous uttered "Why would I leave without you? Robots sell for 1000 credits a piece! Minus production costs, I would still be in the green with an excess of 400 credits" Kellan mouth drops open "That still means you would need to build and sell at least...2...3...300 robots to earn enough for both of us to leave, it could even end up being more, depending on what we move with us!" Ferrous thought for a moment before looking confidently towards his friend "Only 300? That would mean I need to sell at least a robot a day for a year at least to allow us to comfortably move to another planet? Sounds easy enough" Kellan looked at his friend, mouth opening to speak but failing to utter any words until it would close again, eventually "O..Okay fine, go ahead and do it then, i'll help you anyway I can, seeming as your doing this for both of our sakes. I don't know how I can help you though" Ferrous thought a bit "Your a good fighter aren't you?" Truth was they both were, Kellan just seemed to have a natural talent at beating people senseless compared to Ferrous "How about.. I try and make an exo-skeleton for you, and you bodyguard the workplace... Which reminds me, we'll need a shop"
Kellan agreed wholeheartedly! Contrary to his kind and seemingly normal frame, Kellans muscles were as firm as steel and compacted after years of living the rough life. That was also one of the reasons why everyone in the outer ring consumed nutrient packs instead of the same meals people in the inner rings eat, firstly it cost to much for denizens of the outer ring to afford such tasty food and secondly, even if they did eat the same food the people of the inner ring ate, their bodies would waste away quite quickly, as other sources of food weren't enough for their bodies to maintain such extreme muscles. So you could imagine the power output of an extremely powerful human, with an exo-skeleton delivering even more power.
Ferrous and Kellan agreed on that course of action. They didn't know exactly what they were doing, but that wouldn't hold them back. For now, they need to collect the parts for the assembler and save up enough credits to purchase a workplace. They'd have to work at home for now though.