Cyberdragon

The latest and greatest in modern mythology! Yours for only 4,999,999.99 Credits.

Designed, developed, and constructed by Valhalla Dynamics, the Cyberdragon is a wholly artificial creature. Originally envisioned as a pet project of Valhalla Dynamics' CEO James Greene, the project has lead to many technological leaps in the field of autonomous AI, and is considered an enormous success.
Initial research and development took nearly three decades of painstaking research, trial, and error. Creating the robotics was the easy part, the vast majority of the time and research went into the relatively young field of Virtual Intelligence. Valhalla Dynamics hoards its advancements as fiercely as the mythological beasts the corporation creates synthetic copies of, locking their secrets behind heavily redacted patents and highly encrypted documents.
Two lines of Cyberdragons have been released commercially, a domestic version which are the "pets" of the rich and wealthy, and a heavily armed and armoured militarized version for Corporate Law enforcement. A third line of space travel capable Cyberdragons were prototyped, but the project has since been canceled by Valhalla Dynamics' investors and shareholders over cost concerns.

Domestic Dragons

Valhalla Dynamics are not responsible for house fires caused by poorly trained Cyberdragons. Keep out of reach of small children. Suitable for ages 5+.

House pets of the rich and wealthy, Domestic Cyberdragons were the very first line that were researched and developed. Each Cyberdragon is unique, a bespoke commission, with a body and VI that are tailored to the commissioner's specifications.
Developing and training a suitable VI personality is an incredibly expensive and time consuming process. The process usually takes anywhere between two months and a year of iterative work, and is the component with by far the longest lead time and monetary cost.
Domestic Cyberdragons are "infinitely customisable" according to the marketing, which Valhalla Dynamics' legal team insists is hyperbolic and superlative. As they are custom made, many different things can be done to make them unique. Body size and shape, synthetic scales, fur or feathers, tails, wings, ability to fly, and manes are just examples of customizable features.
Cyberdragons can be fitted with a device that allows tgem to spit small flames. This comes at a significant premium and an extra clause in the sales contract to absolve Valhalla Dynamics of any responsibility for pet Cyberdragons setting fire to something, such as clothes, curtains, rugs, and small children.

Militarized Dragons

"Oh [BLEEP]! The fuzz sent in a [BLEEP]ing dragon! Run!"

The militarized version of the Cyberdragon is heavily standardized to specifications defined by Corporate Law Enforcement. Unlike the domestic "house pet" version, militarized Cyberdragons lack a VI personality and use a more traditional standardized AI instead. This drastically reduces the costs of server upkeep and prevents the inconsistent logic inherent to VI personalities.
Initial production of a new make and model of militarized Cyberdragons begins with a series of prototype units that are rigorously and ruthlessly put through their paces.
The first production run of new models are built to strict quality control standards at great expense to Valhalla Dynamics. However, after the first production run is approved by Corporate Law Enforcement and contracts for further production runs are signed, quality control becomes... somewhat relaxed.
The current Mark 37 Law Enforcement Cyberdragon (MK XXXVII LEC) is a fearsome beast, used for its intimidating presence as much as for its lethal armament. Its primary armament is specialized for crowd control and riot suppression. its head is equipped with a flamethrower that spreads hot burning liquid hydrocarbons in a cone of variable width and length. A pair of twin barreled 40mm grenade launchers are affixed to its back just aft of its shoulders. These are rapid firing and belt fed, able to rapidly saturate an area in 40mm tear gas canisters, smoke canisters, or fragmentation grenades, depending on what has been loaded into the ammunition belts.
Militarized Cyberdragons fly on an array of small jets mounted in their wings. These Jet thrusters are outsourced to Auriga Jet Systems on an ongoing production and maintenance contract.

Spaceflight Project

"Vee? Vee is a myth. A hoax, used to troll gullible fools like you."

Most domestic Cyberdragons are flightless, and those that are capable of flight are restricted to in-atmosphere operations. A side project looking into a Cyberdragon capable of spaceflight yielded six prototype designs, all of which were of incredible size due to the complexities and distances involved with navigating through space.
Two of them, Prototype IV and Prototype V, became the target of a grand heist by the pirates of House Pallas, and escaped into the vast expanses of Sol. Valhalla Dynamics continues to deny that this ever happened, and security at their facilities on Odin have become truly draconian even by the standards of that world.
The project was cancelled after investors and shareholders threatened to withdraw investments. The officially stated reasons were concerns over rapidly spiraling costs, but unofficially it is believed that the theft of two of the prototypes were major contributing factors.

Geographic Distribution

• Saturn