TWO. PROTODEMONS.
Researchers at the Nation’s Fourth Institute for Scientific Advancement had developed the first working nanomorph. It was given the classification of N4, for its creators, followed by N0, earning it the clever nickname of “Nano.”
I regret to say that I was not a part of this project, nanorobotics expert that I am. But I have never been officially affiliated with the institute, and at any rate, I was only just beginning my work at the time. Still, I watched the project progress with great interest, as did many others.
Nano was a pleasant if simple being. He was a pale orangeish color, and was generally kind and helpful to his creators. Nano had no ability to talk, but instead utilized a variety of alternative communication methods- holding up signs, forming letter-shapes in his goop, and typing on a keyboard.
His mechanical design was crude, but innovative for the time. The mind and central processing unit were contained in a somewhat bulky electronic device, about the size of a shoebox. (The nanomorph himself, for comparison, was the size of a small piece of furniture.) Despite the fact that he was soon archaic, he lived on quite happily with his creators for some time until Daraku took over and ordered him shut down.
But it is Daraku’s mentor, Albert Wily, that we must come to now. A few years after the creation of N4-N0, Albert surprised everyone by going slightly insane, ransacking a number of the robots his partner, Thomas Light, built and using them in campaigns for world domination.
Wily also used the publicly available data on N4-N0 to develop his own breed of nanorobotic monstrosities. Wily reworked the basic structure in a number of ways to make the beings faster, smarter, and more effective as destructive weapons.
Among the problems that he solved was the matter of the clunky processing unit. Wily simply reshaped this device into a smooth, elegant spheroid that a nanomorph could carry around with its goop. It was truly a beautiful system- Wily even went so far as to call his invention a “control jewel.” Note that due to the nanomorphs’ size (at least ten times larger than N4-N0) a proportionally larger control jewel was needed to process the required data.
Wily made several such creatures, in varying colors, and christened them Demons for their ferocity. He hoped that they would be a valuable asset in the fight against Megaman, his most frequent adversary. However, the Demons had one major weakness- a direct assault upon their control jewels would quickly incapacitate them. As such, Wily never had much success in his world-conquering attempts. He and Light remained at a passive neutrality for the longest time.
Yet one day, something happened to set an entire chain of events in motion.