《The Nebula》 Chapter 1: The Nebula Noah Collins, a 20 year old young man, 175 in height with a lean build and short brown hair and glasses over his navy blue eyes, sat on the sofa watching the current program while pumped. The Vice president of Virtual Works Malcolm Brim was going to appear. Noah has idolized Malcolm for a long time hearing from his dad how great he was. Next to him was his father, Noland Collins, a man of 48 years with brown hair that was started to turn white, with a somewhat large build and a large gut of a man of age. His face had lots of wrinkles showing off his age. This man is an expert dark gamer in his day but has since retired from pro gaming and makes money by teaching the younger generation the works of Virtual Reality gaming. Yep, VR exists and has for over 20 years already since the rise of the game Second Life from the esteemed company Virtual Works. Noland was a close friend in and out of the game to the current Vice President who they were currently watching on the show. The host was recapping the success of the first game and showing images of the grand Draconian Magis Puppeteer that created the strongest magical puppets and ruled as the puppet master. From there he showed the dozens of successful games from other companies that came with the rise of Virtual Works leading game. Now their new game was going to be released and they were going to bring Malcolm Brim himself to talk about the game. ¡°Now then let¡¯s call a good friend of this show who we all know and has been quite familiar with this stage, Malcolm Brim!¡± The host says making the live crowd cheer. A man in a tux comes out; he looks like he is in his mid-forties, has black, with a spot of grey, hair, an average build and has an air of noble gentleman. ¡°Good afternoon everyone!¡± He says comes out waving and then shakes the hand of the host. ¡°Good to see you again, it¡¯s been years since you came here, I think it was before you officially started working at Virtual Works and was playing your father¡¯s game and threatening that insane class.¡± The host says sitting down with Malcolm. ¡°Haha yes those were great times but I think we should leave those for another time?!¡± He says pushing that aside. ¡°Yes let¡¯s first talk about the new game, so tell us a few details about the new game from Virtual Works titled ¡°The Nebula¡± ¡°Ok. Well, first off the game is obviously more in a futuristic period, no magic this time! What we have this time is something we call Psi which is a resource for Psionic abilities. Now the universe is set around 500 to 1000 years in the future and is possibly the largest game in history because it actually takes the real universe into perspective.¡± He says as he starts explaining. ¡°So you¡¯re saying that it¡¯s the real universe we will play in?¡± The host asked curiously. ¡°Yes, but the realism will lower as we get further from earth, since we don¡¯t know exactly how it is on those planets, the correct distance between each solar system and at best we can only pinpoint the suns¡¯ location from here and let the AI do the rest. This game will feature many races but we will be able to play only with the most humanoid ones, anything to outward isn¡¯t playable because of the diet and different mentality may cause real life problems.¡± Malcolm says. ¡°I¡¯m sure it¡¯s been on everyone¡¯s mind but how or where do we start the game?¡± ¡°The game has three factions that we can join at the start, the Holy Terran Federation, the Galactic Dominion and the Liberation. The Liberation is a neutral faction for those who want don¡¯t want to be tied down by centralized government; they are kind of like renegades, they don¡¯t actually have a central government and are more like a collection of several hundred to thousand powerful groups that don¡¯t want to be part of the other two factions. The ideology of this faction is freedom of oppression and commerce. They fight to stay free and live their own way. The Dominion is a union of Human and other races that want total domination of the galaxy, the ideology they possess is that power rules over all other which is why they believe themselves the strongest and want total control. While they may seem ruthless and brutal, they are surprisingly fair should one prove themselves worthy. Next is the Holy Terran Federation, which is a religious faction made up of many races of the galaxy that believe in the same faith. They are the oldest faction being the one that has the capital in the game¡¯s version of Earth in the Sol system. Though they are a religious faction they have massive military strength which keeps the other two factions at bay should battles break out. They believe in having a higher meaning by spreading their teachings to all other world and saving the other groups from ignorance. Players begin in mining stations within the boundaries of the union they choose.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Why mining stations, is it safer?¡± The host inquired ¡°No, actually it¡¯s more dangerous there than normal because they don¡¯t have the strong battle ships but this is the best place to train capable fighters. Players start as mechanics and other jobs and work together or alone to rise in the game. This brings us to the job systems. At the start of the game you can choose from a few sets of skills such as mechanic skills or fighter skills, please remember that they are skills not jobs. It¡¯s very possible that you get skills you can¡¯t use due to lack of real life skills.¡± Malcolm says in a serious tone. ¡°Similar to someone getting a pilot skill to pilot a ship and not having the coordination to do so.¡± the host asked as an example. ¡°Exactly, you can get a job like pirate which is a combat job and still have mechanic skills.¡± ¡°So jobs aren¡¯t everything in the game?¡± The host asked. ¡°Exactly, similar to real life jobs are like a position, since this game is made with modern ideas in mind, unless you¡¯re doing things solo you will get a job which is similar to military ranking or a job found in the sidelines.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Ok, now about the game ships that players might get at the start, does everyone gets one or only certain players?¡± ¡°No, everyone can gets one, that said the cheapest ships they get at the start is an old rusty mining ship with one weapon slot and three equipment slots, one of those already has the mining drill and other one has a basic storage, they have no weapons at the start. It is possible to work as a contract miner which is simply someone that pilots a ship owned by the station owner. The player doesn¡¯t own the ship but only uses it to mine a quota for the station.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So is this is a dog eat dog game?¡± The host asked. ¡°Very much so, as such we have placed the obvious restriction of 18+ since children would not be able to pilot a spaceship or do many of the complex things you do in space unlike in other medieval fantasy setting games where it¡¯s easy to censor things to a child. PvP is a large part of the game and it¡¯s one of the reasons why the mining station zones are really dangerous since both players and NPC bandits fly around ready to kill you for what you have and what you don¡¯t.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°One last question before we go, it¡¯s about the mining, is this to give players something to do or a way to test players?¡± the host asked Malcolm smiles and thinks for a few moments. ¡°Both, we put it like this to see how good someone is and if they can figure out the ins and outs of the game. The game has two forms of mining, space and planetary. The best and smartest are the space miners since they need to know how to move in space.¡± He says. ¡°Well, with that we are out of time, thank you for coming here and speaking to us about the new game. Remember everyone, The Nebula goes live in one month, pre orders packages can already be purchased but there is a limited number of pre orders available so call fast!¡± With that the segment for this was over and Malcolm waved and left. ¡°OH MAN!! This game is going to be awesome!¡± Noah shouted after hearing about the game. ¡°Well we still have a month to go before the game goes live so we have plenty of time since we already have our copies.¡± Noah¡¯s dad, Noland said. Noah¡¯s father, being friend of Malcolm, had been able to preorder a few of the first copies of The Nebula through Malcolm and was planning to play with his son or at least start out with his son. The father son pair kept watching as the show showed some previews of the capital planets for the three main factions. ¡°Alright, let¡¯s not get overconfident son, let¡¯s go for our daily sessions. I think after 8 the server for the game will go online and we can access the character creation and tutorial section of the game. It¡¯s better we both do this since space holds many unknowns for us. Noah nodded and gets up. Due to Noland¡¯s experience with VR he has made sure to teach his son the ideology where ¡°VR is basicly reality in a virtual world. Real life skills work in them and will give you an edge.¡± Because of this the elder who looked to be getting fat had a strong heavy build of condensed strong muscles underneath since he has been training for over 20 years making him an experienced martial artist and a very skilled man in many thing because these 20 years were spent at least half the time in virtual reality. Most VR games only use a 1:4 time distortion which mean the 20 years he spent was actually 40 to 60 years depending on the time spent in game. The two leave and go spend the day exercising. Because Noland was extremely well off for his expert teaching job in the works of Virtual reality Noah didn¡¯t really need a job and mostly focused in martial arts and sometimes VR games that were allowed to him when he was younger. That didn¡¯t meant he shrugged off school but that was also now done through VR except PE. When the two return it was already 7 pm and they each go to take a bath and were out much later. They each go cook, competing to see who has better skills which ultimately ends with Noland winning. If you are wonder Noland is a single dad. His wife had left him when noah was around 2 years old. Left is kind of an understatement, it was more of abandoned them both after she was able to steal a huge sum of money from Noland. It had caused some difficulty for a few months but due to connections with friends Noland quickly got up again and it was around that time he retired from a dark gamer and became a VR tutor which gave even more money than dark gamers who relied on auctioning items which after a while lose value. ¡°Dad, I¡¯m going to go do the tutorial and character creation.¡± Noah said to his father. ¡°Sure thing and do it properly and don¡¯t skim through it.¡± Noland says. Noah runs to his room and finds the large capsule which was a large oval machine with an opening like a door on the side that leads to a seat inside that has the machines to transfer into the game. He picks up the game box for the disk that contains ¡°The Nebula¡± and inserts it into the capsule before entering and sitting.
Greetings Noah Collins! Which program would you like to choose from.
A female voice asked. Next second a screen appeared in front of him.
Second Life
Z Day Survival
Fallout: Earth¡¯s Downfall
Soldier''s Life: Warfront
The Nebula
Virtual Mall
Virtual Community Hall
¡°The Nebula¡± Noah says and feels the falling sensation that came with the immersion into the VR systems.
Scans of your brainwave and iris show that you are a new player. Do you want to activate your account?
¡°Yes!¡± He says almost shouting. A sudden flash of light blinds him and when Noah opens his eyes he finds himself in a white room and a window as in front of him.
Time until game begins 30:1:56:42
Would you like to do the character creation now or later?
¡°Now.¡± He said. At his words several models appeared looking like a different race.
Current races available
TerriansThe most average race in the galaxy, previously known as humans before entering space. With a high capability for adapting humans can living in most environment given time and resource to secure their safety. They can learn at a quicker pace due to their natural creativeness and are capable of learning how to use the technology of other races. Racial Trait: Environment adaptability (passive) Weakness: No weakness but no resistance
ElfA mysterious race of psychic humanoids that look almost like humans but with more refined looks. Their body naturally creates and stores an energy they have called Psi and through intermingling with other intergalactic races, has taught them how to create this within their own bodies but it¡¯s not natural like it is to their own bodies. Racial Trait: Innate Psi production (passive), Natural Psionic Manipulation (bonus to psi power skills by 10% and resistance to Psi) Weakness: Weak to physical attacks
DwarfA race of Elves that live in high gravity planets. Their stature is shorter than other races but their physical proficiency (strength) is nearly 3 times higher and their ability to build machinery is top class. They are born tinkers and mechanics because to survive in the high gravity planets they naturally appear from they make large mechanical suits to aid them. They spend a huge amount of time underground and have naturally formed a kind of night vision that is further enhanced by their suits that are all tailored to each dwarf. All dwarf and half dwarf has at least one no matter how crappy it is of it it;s needed at all. Racial Trait: Night Vision (passive), Natural Mechanic and tinker race (bonus to all craft and production skills by 10%) Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.Weakness: No resistance to Psionic Attacks.
OgreA race of Variant of Elves that are large muscular humanoids. They are extremely powerful in terms of physical proficiency (strength) and are some of the best mercenaries and guards. Their strength is mostly physical but when outfitted with tank class shields and armor this race can make a normal tank look like a toy as their physical proficiency later on can easily allow them to lift tons of weight without needing power armor unlike other races. Racial Trait: Berserkers Instincts (The more injured and the longer they fight the more powerful they fight), Natural warrior (bonus to all combat skills by 10%) Weakness: Gear gets damaged faster, Low mental attack resistance.
AndroidA machine race with a human appearance. These were originally supposed to serve the other races but they were occupied by intelligent AI and they became a race of their own. Their level of sentience is to the same degree as the other races. The android body actually acts as a cage for the AI and once one enters an android body they can¡¯t escape the cage of the body. The body must be upgraded to make it stronger but because they are machines their mental capabilities can¡¯t be compared to organic beings. Racial Traits: Photographic Memory, Innate programmers (starts with some knowledge in computing skills) Weakness: No natural Health regeneration
ToskA race of Reptilian humanoids, these are reptile men are from several dozen to thousand kinds of reptilian species all adapted to a different environment. Tosk are simple minded, bold and honorable warrior race. In space they are typically freelance mercenary that prefer to live and survive by day and live for the challenge as a warrior. Some less aggressive Tosk tend to also possess more complex thinking than the simple minded warrior types but these are rare and far in between but these do take up the basic jobs like craft and leadership jobs. Racial Trait: Natural Armor, Cold Blooded (resistant to heat) Weakness: Weak to Ice and cold attacks or environments
Half breedA mix of two race. The half breed shares features of both species but to a lesser degree. Racial Trait: Depends on parent races Weakness: Depends on parent races.
¡°Oh! Nice selection! Let¡¯s see¡­ Fantasy races in a future setting but three of them seem to be descendants of the same ancestor. Coming from elves simply shows that elves were the ones to go into space and the other two appeared after that.¡± Noah muttered. Going in order, Terrian¡¯s are humans, that is obvious enough. No need to explain that since it¡¯s simply a copy of the player. Elves are pale skinned beings that range from 170-220 cm tall and are thin bodies. Their facial features are refined and very beautiful race both males and females. Dwarves are short and stumpy standing between 100-150 cm, 150 is a rare height for dwarves and anything taller is a half dwarves. They normally have a large beard and bulky muscles. Ogre¡¯s look similar to Elves and possess a refined look but in a different manner. They stand between 200-250 cm and are muscular and possess a refined warrior feel to them which is different from the refined noble look elves have. Androids look like humans in every sense and you will only be able to tell otherwise by looking into their eyes which is mechanical or wait until use some form of hidden weapon from inside their body. Tosk are like lizardmen. They have a range of species of reptiles to choose from as well as degrees between how humanoid they can be. It goes from almost demi human, human features with some animal features like scales, eye, tail, to beastman, reptile on two legs. It is an interesting race to play around with the selection because some reptiles give different natural skills depending on the species but the major weakness always stays the same. Lastly half breed is just as the name suggests. Choosing two races and mixing them to get a lesser degree of each race. After looking through them all Noah had his choice. ¡°I¡¯ll go with Dwarf!¡± He said. The other models disappeared and only the model of him as a dwarf appeared.
You are free to customize your character.
¡°Sweet! Now then, make it a dwarfs max height.¡± He says first. The 110 cm model stretched to 150 cm tall. The stumpy legs and arms also stretch up but also build more muscle and still look stumpy because of this. ¡°Reduce muscle mass by 10%.¡± He says. The bulging muscles start to decrease and stops and calling it again and again he goes and reduces 40% of the muscle mass before the dwarf went from ball of muscle to a kind of short muscle builder person and looked proportion with muscle and body size. ¡°Good! Now then reduce the beard size to 5 cm long.¡± Noah said. The beard that was down to the waist rapidly reduced and left a short beard. This included the mustache which had been long and braided but now as as short as the beard. ¡°Now reduce the wrinkles and make a more youthful face and change the potato nose to a normal one.¡± He said The normally ugly wrinkled face reduced and showed a youthful appearance. As the wrinkles vanish the large swollen nose also shrinks and becomes more proportant. The previous ugly dwarf now had a rugged look with the burnt tan skin below. Nodding satisfied Noah ended the character customization only to have something new pop up.
Character customization is complete. Please customize the look of the beginner Dwarven utility suit!
Next to the Dwarf a suit of armor appeared. It covers the whole body. ¡°Wha! What is this!?¡± He asked. [tr]
This is the dwarves beginner armor. Similar to the dwarf, all other races will get their own racial type armor, weapon or tool. This is a bound item that will never be lost so as to make sure a player that loses everything isn¡¯t without at least some equipment.
It made sense to Noah the exclamation. The armor itself looked light. With a tight fit tailored to the dwarf model there was an inner armor and some chest plate, shoulder guards, arm guards, boots, knee guards and leg guards. It had a belt with some pouches on the back and on the left arm was a keyboard probably for a built in pc. On the back was a box like backpack attached where it wouldn¡¯t obstruct movement. The color scheme was pure white and there was no helmet. Well since it was more for looks at this point i made the color scheme more towards camo. It looked really cool and i had the AI put it on the dwarf. Because the dwarf was 150 and the muscle mass wasn¡¯t as bulky he looked nearly human if not for the pointy tan colored ears in the middle of the messy hair that i had shortened. ¡°Okay done. Come to think about it, what does the armor do and what comes attached to it. [tr]
Beginner Dwarven Armor comes with built in basic computer and coms module. On the back is a portable tool box with basic tools for repairs and tools for crafting basic items. On the right arm armguard is a hidden low caliber rifle for self defense.
¡°So very basic of the basic stuff. Still i get starting tools for mechanics stuff, that¡¯s cool. Well since i am done this part let¡¯s move on.¡± Noah says.
Please which faction you will support and the location you wish to begin.
A map appears showing the info that the Official site had released. It was a massive map with three colors showing the three separate factions and their territory. Because i didn¡¯t want to be bossed around by either of the ¡°good¡± and ¡°bad¡± factions i choose the neutral one, The Liberation. The map zooms in showing only the several thousands of stars under their control. The brightest red glowing star was the capital star where the HQ was. Noah can¡¯t begin there and has to go to a mining station further away. Besides the bright red capital star there were a few thousand ones that were red and further even closer to the borders were blue, green and white stars.
Mining solar systems are colored in Blue and you can choose from those. Green colored stars are systems that can become a mining system or colonization system. White stars are unexplored systems and can have anything from planets to bandit hideouts.
¡°So only blue ones huh. Still this is rather nice. So many to select from. Let¡¯s see what we have here¡± Noah muttered. He looked a from planet to planet. Each of them had a different level of development in the planets of the system and different materials to harvest. After a hour of searching the solar system Noah chose was called Kelha. The planet was Kelha II which was the a developing mining planet with a large asteroid field making it a hotspot for both planetside mining and space mining. The system had 4 other planets and 2 gas giants, one with 3 moons and the other with 2. Two planets besides Kelha II already have developed planetside mining cities and are being terraformed for after the resources deplete the planet¡¯s can be sold to planet development companies so that they become colony planets. Kelha II was in early stages of development and didn¡¯t have a dense atmosphere but it did have one but it was comparable to mar¡¯s making the planet extremely cold on the surface.
You have chosen Kelha II station in the Orthion Sector under The Liberation?
¡°Yes!¡± Noah said.
Please choose your character name.
Noah: Noah. ¡°My name isn¡¯t that common so it will work for a character name¡±
Please choose your set of skills you will start with. Note: you will not be given a job just skills.
Mechanic Skill SetFighter Skill SetTechnician Skill SetPilot Skill Set
Weapon Maintenance Weapon Repair Scrap Weapon CreationLaser Weapon Mastery, Missile Weapon Mastery, Sword MasteryProgrammer, Weapon PlannerSmall Ship Piloting Skill, Evasive maneuver Mastery, G-force resistance
¡°Basic but it seems like a good beginner skill set. Not to broken and well balanced giving just basic skills.¡± Noah muttered. ¡°I¡¯ll go with the Mechanic Skill set since i benefit most with my race.¡± He said.
Skill set chosen!
Character creation complete!
Time until game begins 30:1:23:42 Would you like to do the Tutorial?
¡°Wow! I really took a long time. With all the things it still took hours to finish!¡± Noah said. ¡°Since i have so much time i will do the tutorial later.¡± Noah said and from there was about to leave before asking. ¡°What is a dwarfs stating stats?¡±
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:530HP Regeneration:0.22
Psi:135Psi Regeneration0.05
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:20Resilience:12
Dexterity:15Agility:7
Mentality:5Willpower:5
Charisma:10Leadership:10
¡°So much physical proficiency!¡± Noah shouts.
Dwarves were born when Elves moved to several high gravity planets. To survive they naturally built stronger muscles and denser bones to handle the high gravity. They have the highest physical proficiency and dexterity but they have the lowest Intelligence and wisdom in starting state which affects their Psi capacity and regeneration
¡°Ah that seems reasonable since they have weakness against Psi based attacks. Well, I¡¯ll be going!¡± Noah said and exited the capsule and runs to his father to tell him where he would start and what race and how he looked. His father had been waiting so he could start himself. ¡°Good, go eat and take a piss before you go do the tutorial. Spend a good time until you are accustom to the systems and can do it without getting hurt.¡± Noland says and goes to his room. Noah did as he says and goes eat some and to the bathroom before jumping back into his capsule. ¡°Now for the tutorial!¡± He shouted.
(changed Strength for Physical Proficiency, Vitality to Resilience, Intelligence to Mentality and wisdom to Willpower. Why Because it seems more Sci-fi like) Chapter 2: The Tutorial Part 1 Back inside his capsule, Noah dived into the virtual world and was met with a familiar screen.
Time until game begins 30:1:23:42 Would you like to do the Tutorial?
"Of course!" He shouted excited The darkness was suddenly filled with light and Noah found himself in a large room made of metal. He was currently human but quickly he felt his body reduce to a height of 150 cm and his lean muscle build turned muscular but still fitting for his body.
The tutorials will last until you wish to exit. You may return at any time until The Nebula is released.
Suggested tutorials for your skill set and race.
Basic Body adjustment Training (mandatory)
0-G Movement
Above 2.5 G Movement
Psionic Manipulation training
Basic Mechanic Course
Basic Weapon Building Course
Planetside Mining
Space mining
"Okay then! Seems I get eight tutorials for Nebula. Hmm... five of them are probably types everyone needs to learn to have basic knowledge like moving in 0G and mining. The 2.5G movement is probably a dwarf racial tutorial so that I can already get used to the feel and finally two are from the skill set. Alright let¡¯s begin!" Noah says.
Due to being a race with physical traits that greatly differ from your original body, Basic Body Adjustment Training is mandatory. Beginning simulator!
With the female voice saying that the room flashed brightly and when he looked again he found several dozen workout machines.
You may spend as long as you wish exercising with your new body. Once you feel comfortable with your new body we can proceed.
This scene was nothing new to Noah, he had played in many different VR games and most that had different races then human offered this kind of tutorial. That said, it wasn''t the first time he played as a dwarf and even more specifically, this exact configuration and height and look. It was a size he was already comfortable with but still all games differ one way or another. In this particular game, dwarves possess a bone density 3 times higher than any other race. This causes the bones to be extremely tough but at the same time they are much heavier. The muscles obviously evolved to be able to handle this and as such unless dwarves are on a high gravity planet their heavier bones won''t do much. Not unless you are a player and have never been to a planet with more than 1 G. "Damn! This body feels so much heavier than I expected! Maybe the extra height made me weight more!" Noah complained as he started walking but having a hard time due to the weight of his own body. It was an awkward walk for him as he simply walked around. "AI! Do we gain statsa for training in the tutorial?" Noah asked.
Yes! Gaining stats is possible but the limit is only up to 30 points total in each physical stats but no limit for mental ones.
This makes Noah brighten up at the prospect of being able to gain more stats. The physical proficiency one will be important because simply moving this heavy body needs a higher strength. And so he began to walk around the huge room. At first it was a bit awkward but soon he gained a stat in physical proficiency making the stress of his body lessen. Then he shifted how he walked slowly getting faster and more towards a normal walk. After a while he gained a second point in physical proficiency and agility making it possible to walk more normally. So he began jogging and soon running. The tutorial room doesn''t implement the stamina during tuturial period so we can continuously move about without getting tired. After four hours the tall dwarf could easily move his own body and had gained a total of 5 physical proficiency , 2 agility, 3 resilience and 1 dexterity. Finally being able to move normally in the heavier body he walked over to some exercise machines. The first was a treadmill. The dwarf agility is naturally low but he doesn''t want to move at a snail''s pace so jumping onto the machine and started running. After two hours of running using three fourths of his physical proficiency he was satisfied with the 5 extra agility points he gained. The other machines were strength machines but he could do his own martial arts while he was at it. There was one particular machine he was accustomed to. It used tension rods to exert lots of force. This one had straps for the legs and arms so he strapped them on and began doing a few moves from the martial arts he learned through his father. He spent some three hours on this machine and gained 2 physical proficiency and 3 dexterity. "That was a good workout! Let''s see my stats at the moment. Status!" Noah said.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:530HP Regeneration:0.27
Psi:135Psi Regeneration0.05
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:27Resilience:15
Dexterity:19Agility:14
Mentality:5Willpower:5
Charisma:10Leadership:10
That was a good boost. Physical proficiency seems to increase fast as well probably due to racial. "Alright! Will do physical training later then. Let¡¯s move on!" Noah says.
Basic Body Adjustment Training complete. You may return to it later during the time before The Nebula starts. Beginning 0 Gravity simulator. Equipping space armor
As she said that the room flashed and felt his body be covered up. The next moment, he found myself in the same room he was before but now Noah was wearing armor with a hook and wire on one side of my waist.
Commencing 0 Gravity Simulator!
As soon as she says that the "pull" on his body from below released him and in Noah¡¯s surprise he jolted making him kick off the floor. "Wh-what that hell!!" Noah shouted as he started to squirm.
Basic instruction for moving in 0 Gravity environment: To survive in space and space stations with no gravity generators you will need to know how to move. This is a simple guide to aid you. Step one: When in space, ALWAYS possess a hook and titanium wire. These are given to everyone when they enter a space station. One roll has about 500 meters of wire and several hooks. The hooks are tied at the end of the wire and you connect it on any location that they can be tied around or fixed into. Magnetic latches can be obtained in game but tutorial will only teach you how to use hooks. Step two: Obviously you need to know how to move around. Before getting the wires you will most likely be floating aimlessly. In a 0 G environment any impact to a wall or surface will cause you to move away from where you were before in the opposite direction. The wires exist so you can make handholds as well as make a connection between you and any floating object. Step three: You will need to find a handrail or some such location to hold onto. Pull out a hook and tie the wire on it before sending the hook and wire to that location and pulling yourself to a fixed object. Try this now.
She explained it all so quickly that it took Noah a second reading of the message before he understood. First he looked around and found several areas with places to hold from. Taking the hook and wire he passed the wire through the hook and tied it after passing it through a small hole near the bottom. Taking the hook Noah throws it at the closest place which was near the ceiling and was like a hand rail. The hook passed harmlessly next to it and hit the ceiling. "Damn it! These aren''t magnetic so it''s so much harder!" Noah shouted but taking the rope he makes a wave run along the rope to the hook. The wave causes it to whip itself around the handrail letting him yank himself over. "Hehe! This is good but need to be quicker or I will get hurt a lot in space if I don''t fix the wire quickly enough." Noah muttered as he grabbed the handrail that lit up green as he touched it. Putting his feet on the ceiling like it was the floor and supporting himself by still holding the handrail he used one arm to tie the wire and hook better. Then grabbing the wire he looked around and jumped for another handrail across the room. Not putting much physical proficiency since we wanted to be careful, Noah glided through the air while releasing more wire all the way until he reached the other handrail which he grabbed and began to tie up the wires. Getting confident he jumped without tying the next rope and headed the next handrail but he put too much force in his impulse so as he grabbed it with his hands his body still hand momentum and it making a circle he hit face first into the wall/floor. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. The impact, though not life threatening in the least he still felt pain through his armor and had let go of the hand rail. With the impulse from the impact he began to float backwards and as the pain subsided he began to squirm around in a bit of panic. "Urg! Damnit! 0 G is hard!!" He groaned still in pain. From there he began to take it slow. He would grab the rope covering the entire expanse of the room and tie a rope to it before gently pushing off to where he wanted to go. After he had all ten handrails done he began to link them along the walls being careful as he floated along the walls using the few hand holds he could find to fix his position and push on. When he was done he had made a huge net in the room that would allow him to move through the room easily but this was just for a tutorial since a real station would have items in the way. He felt he had gotten good enough for it but he still wondered that the armor was for and looking on the left arm that had the same computer keyboard he pressed the button that looked to turn it on.
Greetings!! Space armor features available for use. Weak magnetic boots. Basic boot and back impulse thrusters
"So there was magnetic boots." Noah said. Well that would have simply stuck him to the walls. "Let¡¯s see these thrusters." He muttered.
The space armor thrusters are a feature made for armor used by either fighters who go outside to fight or mechanics that need to access something outside of a station or ship. To uses these is simple but requires training. They react to thought through a unique technology placed in them which you need to look into it yourself for your future armor and gear. Thinking forward will make the back thrusters activate and thinking up will make the boots activate. These are impulse thrusters so they give off a single pulse every 3 seconds for thrust. They are slow but well accepted for use inside a space station or ship without gravity.
"Simple enough. Up for boots and forward for the back." He muttered. Seeing how the room was wide but he was at the center he waited until he reacted a wire nearby and pulled himself to the wall. "Okay then..." Noah muttered before thinking "Up". His boot vibrated and let out a circular wave of energy that pushed him slowly. After three seconds a new one released making him move a bit faster making him thing "stop" to his surprise from his shoulders are and torse a new pulse was released countering the momentum. Seeing how well it worked he thought "Up" again and moved to the wall and "Stopped". He used the wall to straighten himself and thought forward. A strong impulse from his back quickly pushed him and before he could stop due to panicking he let himself slam into the other wall. "T-that...hurt!" He muttered through a strained voice. "Please...move on to...the next tutorial." He muttered. A bright light lit the room up and the pain vanished with all the wire he used. He appeared at the center of the room again with gravity. The room had exercise gear like the first one. The beginner dwarven armor was equipped on Noah.
Currently 1 G of force. Every 10 minutes 0.2 g force will be added into the simulator. Max G force is 2.5 or your limit.
Reading the message it pretty much said, "We will be adding 20% more weight to your weight until you can''t move." Since it was like that it meant that this was an intensive physical training. "The dwarf armor was supposed to support the body in these high gravity places I think." Noah muttered. He began to jog and as the 10 minutes hit the first time his body suddenly increased in weight causing him to slow down momentarily before he began to push a bit more. After twenty minutes the second wave came making him push more and sweat started to form. The agility stat had begun to rise after the third wave and during the ten minutes of jogging he gained 1 point. When the fourth increase came he was forced to his knees for a minute until could force himself up and start walking again. During this time he gained 1 point in physical proficiency and 2 in resilience. When the gravity hit 2 G he had hit the floor. The weight had been too much but that was when the armor was changed into a standard high gravity suit. It helped him get up and he walked again quickly gaining the remaining 2 points of physical proficiency he needed to cap physical proficiency . The gravity tutorial ended when he couldn''t get up after 2.2 G.
Beginning Psionic Manipulation Training tutorial.
The room flashed and everything was gone and now a table with a glass ball was left.
Please walk to the table and put your hand on the ball. The ball is emitting Psi which is the resource used to use Psionic Abilities. As you don''t know the feeling of Psi it shall be injected into your body until you have grown accustomed to the feeling.
Nodding and walking over he sat on the single chair there and put both his hands on the ball. It was like those tesla balls that have the electricity focus on your hand. The Psi went into his hand through the glass and he instantly felt the energy. He couldn''t feel Psi in the air which it should have. This was probably because the AI simply didn''t do anything. He close his eyes and focused on it. It felt tranquil as it flowed through his body. Mana is similar but had more volume to it. In his trance he could feel it moving around and gathering at the center of his brain.
You have successfully found the central location that Psi gathers. +3 Mentality and Willpower
Noah opened his eyes with the message. Smiling Noah felt for the energy and easily found it. When he looked at the table there were tons of small items from gears to coins to plastic cups.
Psionic Manipulation training Phase 2. Beginning with the small coins, try to Levitate them for more than 1 minute. Then move to larger coins, then progress in size and material.
So it was pretty much control and move stuff. In short, Telekinesis. Noah pulls the smallest coin forward. It was an old american dime. He held his hand over it coin and tried to move the Psi from his brain to his hand then out of his hand and grasp the coin. He could move it to his hand but only trace amounts would leave his hand and so he pushed and pushed. After 2 hours of pushing the dime began to twitch. Noah¡¯s forehead was covered in sweat and his head was pounding in pain. He let his hand drop and his head followed as it dropped to the table. ¡°This¡­ must be¡­ dwarfs bad part!¡± He muttered.
Yes! Besides having little talent in being able to use Psi for anything besides telekinesis Dwarves also have half the size of the psi capacity of normal races where Elves have double normal Psi capacity. That said Dwarves gain more HP from physical proficiency and resilience. The calculation for HP for dwarves is (Physical Proficiency x 5 + Resilience x 5) x 2 + Level x 10 + 100 = total HP The calculation for Psi for dwarves is (Mentality x 5 + Willpowerx 5) / 2 + Level x10 + 100 = Total MP
¡°Wow... this is the first I ever heard of an AI telling how it calculates the stats of a player.¡± Noah muttered.
There is no harm in doing so.
The feminine voice said accompanied the text boxes. Noah called up his status window to make sure what he have.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:580HP Regeneration:0.30
Psi:150Psi Regeneration0.08
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:30Resilience:17
Dexterity:19Agility:15
Mentality:8Willpower:8
Charisma:10Leadership:10
After doing some counting Noah found the numbers matched. ¡°Well, nothing to do but painfully train through it.¡± He muttered. And so he began to focus like what he did when he played mage classes. He gathered as much Psi in his hands but it didn¡¯t leave his hand except in a few spots so he concentrated on those spots. The spots were at the tips of his fingers and as he flooded the exits it began to slowly expand, though painfully both mentally and physically. Still after an hour Noah finally had the dime Levitating. Breathing heavily he gets up. ¡°I¡¯m going to take a break and return.¡± He mutter and left the game to eat and refresh himself.
(changed Strength for Physical Proficiency, Vitality to Resilience, Intelligence to Mentality and wisdom to Willpower. Why Because it seems more Sci-fi like) Chapter 3: Tutorial Part 2 I leave my capsule sore and with a headache. The soreness was more phantom pains that my mind was making from the high levels of physical exertion I did. I walk over to the kitchen and find my dad there. "Oh son, good you¡¯re finally up. How far did you get with the tutorial?" He asked me. "Reached the psionic manipulation training. Was able to levitate the dime." I said. "It¡äs the smallest coin right? Well not really surprised, dwarves aren''t the most talented in Psionic abilities. The tutorial is making you train with the character body already." He said. "Are they that untalented with psi?" I asked dad. "Dwarves can only levitate stuff. Maybe those with Talent can learn Basic psionic Support skills, i think. Here look these are some race ." He says and shows me the laptop screen. On it were all the advantages and disadvantages as well as the race traits released by Virtual Works.
Race Advantages/ Disadvantages
RaceRacial TraitsAdvantagesDisadvantages
HumanEnvironmental AdaptabilityCan live and survive in almost every type of environment. Can learn nearly all skills or jobStarts out with weak physical body and Psionic abilities. Starts with no resistances
ElfInnate Psi production Natural Psionic ManipulationLarge Psi capacity, can easily master Psionic based abilities. Increased growth rate in Mentality and Willpower.Very Weak physical strength and body. Weak to physical attacks. Low health capacity.
DwarfNight Vision Natural Mechanic and TinkerLarge Health Capacity. Greater ease in learning crafting based skills and jobs. Increased growth rate in strength and dexterity.No Psionic resistance unless technology is used to counter. Has half the capacity of psi when compared to a human or Ogre of the same Mentality and Willpower. Has poor talent for using Psi/Psionic abilities outside of the body.
OgreBerserkers Instincts Natural warriorAverage in both HP and Psi capacity, similar to humans. Increased growth rate for learning weapon mastery.No resistance towards Mental attacks unless technology is used to counter.
AndroidPhotographic Memory Innate ProgrammerStrength is easy to increase simply by upgrading the body. Able to learn at a very rapid pace due to possessing a computerized mind.Starts out as basic weak model android with small memory bank and utility functions. Race has no natural Healing processes and needs regular maintenance. Only after installing specific parts will this race have access to Psi and Psionic abilities.
ToskCold Blooded Natural ArmorRace that can adapt into any arid or humid environment. Possess natural armor that is as strong as scaled plate armor and resistant to Low caliber projectiles. Some variants even have natural poison glands.All variants are weak to cold and will seek the sunlight or a warm location most of the time. Can¡¯t go to frozen planets or planets without atmosphere without protective gear against cold.
Half BreedDepends on ParentDepends on Parent. Gains disadvantages only to a lesser degree.Depends on Parent. Gains traits, advantages only to a lesser degree
"So dwarves really have no talent with Psi huh?" I mutter after seeing that. "So what''s your race dad?" I asked. "Dwarf/Ogre half breed. Also commonly called the giant dwarf." He says with a grin. "So you mixed a fighter that learns how to use weapons easier with a midget with a strong body. Your psi capacity and talent is less now isn¡¯t it?" I asked. "Yep, sadly I actually have the dwarfs full weakness to psionic attacks because the Ogre mental attack is a branch of psionic. But the advantage is that I get a higher health pool and the dwarfs stronger bones and muscles." He said with a big grin. I then imagine a huge dwarf in combat and what appears in my mind''s big ass viking trashing dozens of people like a tank. It sent a shiver down my spine to think of a person like that. "Still, why does it hurt so much to try and push Psi out. Why do I actually need to shove it out in the first place?" I asked him. "Well, I''m not sure exactly, but my guess would be that it follows the martial arts exits through acupuncture points or something similar. I reached Psi manipulation as well and I noticed several dozen of these exits on my hands and feet but they are pretty much closed and are painful to open so I guess it¡¯s something you need to "open" before you can get more freedom to work with Psi." Dad says. "So in other words just keep bombarding them until they open. Easy enough." I say with a nod and go to the stove and grab a plate. It was midnight but we were wide awake. We had a month and we pretty much figured we would be doing a lot of tutorial training until then. Dad tells me what he has been able to figure out and when I tell him about the 0G tutorial he bursts out laughing. Though when he tells me about his experience I ended up rolling on the ground. The Giant Dwarf seems to have a height ranging from 180 to 210 cm. Dad wanted to be a tank went with max height and you can guess the result. I did the same but it was in an attempt to match my own height but I didn¡¯t go half dwarf because I wanted all the benefits for the crafting. After we end the midnight snack we jump back into the tutorials. Since I now knew what I had to look for I tried to find the Psi-exits. Making the Psi move inside my body was easy but finding the exits were difficult. Most of the body was sealed tight but I did find all the exits on my body. There were fourteen on each hand, one on each finger digit, and 18 on each foot, 10 on the fingers, 4 on the heel and the rest on the palm of the feet just after the curve on the foot but before the toes. I felt it would be important to unlock even a few of these so I sat down and focusing on my right hand I aimed at the top five digits and bombarded them. Have you ever felt what getting burned is like? Now imagine that heat feeling almost liquid and its passing through your fingers. That''s how hot it felt the pain. I had to stop three times before what I thought were the sounds of pops coming from my hand as if I had dislocated something. The moment after the pops the flow of psi out of my body became much easier but I noticed I began to lose psi so I stopped the flow.
For releasing 5 Psi exits at once you have gained 3 Mentality and Willpower.
My hand was twitching from the previous pain i felt but it had successfully released the five exits. I took my hand to the dime and tried to lift it and it smoothly levitated. I managed to levitate all the coins but when I go to the heavy one dollar coin it became really hard. "Let¡¯s go one by one from now on." I mutter. I wanted all the exits opened and to be able to l to lift all these things before moving on. And so I focused on the thumb and started to move the psi but I found a problem. The exit was leaking psi. This annoyed me and to fix it I gathered some at the exit and try to block it as best I could. With this I began an excruciatingly difficult process of holding Psi inside while pushing it through the second exit. After 2 hours it was done and the exit had finally been torn open.
For releasing all the right thumb Psi exits you have gained 1 Mentality and Willpower.
Seeing me get Mentality and Willpower for doing this encouraged me. It meant my max psi capacity would grow as well. I move to the next finger and nearly started crying as I block the exit and start pushing through the two exits below it. It took me 6 pain-filled hours and stopping 7 times, because the pain was getting too much, for me to finally open the second finger. I gained 2 more of each mental stats. I left the tutorial after that. It had been 11 hours in the tutorial but that went down to about 3 hours in real life but even so I was hungry and needed to eat and rest. My head was pounding and I could still felt the pains in my thumb and index finger to the point that I couldn¡¯t move them. Instead of going back into the game I went to sleep. Just thinking about having to do all this again with the left hand and my feet almost made me cry. I woke up at 7 am and ate breakfast. Having a high metabolism can be good and bad but who cares. A bit reluctantly I return to the game in order to start on the middle finger. Opening the top exit on each finger was the most moronic idea. The difficulty of controlling psi outside of my body while pushing out more through the exits is excruciating. Even with more exits opened and my increased stats it still took me 4 hours to open the exits. It was getting easier but it didn¡¯t make the pain any less...painful. After 8 more hours I finally unsealed my entire right hand. The total of points I get for unsealing the entire hand was 12 points, thumb = 1 point and 2 points for each other finger. This included the 3 points from before. Completely unsealing the exits on my hand granted me an extra 3 dexterity as well as 2 Mentality and Willpower. Now i could levitate with a weight of 100g now. Seeing how much i could lift i thought this was the minimum required for mechanics due to mostly needing to work with small part but, even though it hurts like hell, decide to unblock all the exits. Maybe dwarves have little talent because they don¡¯t unseal all the exits. I can understand if it for this reason because the pain that you feel from opening these shitty exits hurts like hell. Before I got started on my left hand I search through my right one for more exits but couldn¡¯t fine any. The message for unsealing the entire hand had also confirmed that. Since it was like that I focused on the thumb of the left hand and gritting my teeth I started bombarding both exits. After a grueling 2 hours both exits popped open and another 2 points of both mental stats were added. The pain was obviously less since I didn¡¯t need to hold the psi inside making it easier on me as it was apparent by the amount of time it took. Following that I spent the next 10 hours going finger by finger and unblocking all but the pinky before I had to go out for lunch but I returned quickly and finished it up. I got another 9 points in both mental stats for unsealing my left hand. It seems unlocking five digits at once was a worthy accomplishment since I didn''t get the extra points 3 points. As of now, I was able to levitate things up to 2 kilos. It was clear sign that, for dwarves, talent only came with blood sweat and tears. No, dwarven stubbornness was their talent. If one of them actually wanted they could unlock all the openings. It would just take a while. I then remove my boots and focus on toes. I pushed down and it began again. The main difference was the time. It took one and half hours to open the exit on the first toe and it followed the same pattern for the other toes. The four exits on the sole of the foot came next and it took 3 hours to pop all four together and the last four on the heel another 3 hours. After another break I finally ended this hell by unlocking the other foot. Each one gave 12 points. 1 point for each finger, 2 for the sole and heel and 3 points for unsealing the whole feet. In total, by willingly living through these torturous days of hell I gained 47 Mentality and Willpower, 4 agility from the feet, and 6 dexterity for the hands. I would say that living through this hell really payed off. I wonder if elves have to face the same hell. Maybe it¡¯s even worse since dad mentioned he noticed 20 exits but i only found 14 and 18. That means they, who have the highest psi potential have much more than us. Anyway, I was able to lift a 20kg box now and though I was shaking while doing so. I could finally rest so I did just that. I exited the game and fell on the couch with my hands and feet throbbing. Noland PoV Going through the psi manipulation tutorial is hell. I released only half the exits in my hands before I was satisfied. Having a dwarfs talent in psi control was a real downer but it would help with simple things later. Having enough exits opened would allow me basic abilities like pyrokinesis and telekinesis. I¡¯ll learn basic psi abilities for survival uses but I''m no elf and don''t want to be since pure magic races aren¡¯t to my taste. Leaving the tutorial to rest up before I head into combat training I find Noah sleeping on the couch. His body was sweaty and his hands were twitching from time to time probably from pain from doing the same thing I had just finished doing. Unlocking them all would be to hard even if the benefits were great but I guess he will reach his limit and stop, I taught him better than to try and break your limits when you currently can''t. I start to make a large dinner for us since we probably burned a lot of energy through our mental tasks. You would be surprised how the body reacts to training ingame. Soon enough Noah was up once the smell spread and we started to share information. He said he finished his psi manipulation and it made me happy to see him doing his best. "I think the mechanics tutorial is next so I will be learning some machine building. A gun building tutorial also seems to be included." He says. "I have combat training. Since I choose the fighting skill set I will be working on getting that leveled up." I tell him. "Dad! Got any info on the skill leveling process?" Noah asked. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. "If I''m not mistaking, its on the site. It says the skills level up like our own levels and don¡ät seem to cap but they become extremely hard to level up later on." I tell him. He pulls out his laptop and checks. "Yeah, that¡¯s about right. The skills seem to be graded by rarity on a scale from 1-10 with 10 being a super rare or powerful skill which probably comes with tons of conditions." He says. "The System is more complex than most other games. It will be interesting to watch when the game releases." I say as I finish cooking and go to grab a plate. "It says here you can only level up the skills you gained from the selection as well as the mining skill we will get later on to level 5 during the tutorial." He says. "Seems fair, or people would spam the tutorial and start the game at a really high level." He says. "We are kind of cheating you know. Not many people have the pre-order of the game and wont properly train their stats before entering you know." Noah says. "I''ve taught enough people for them to not be stupid enough to skip a VR game tutorial." I tell him. I don''t really know how many people I have taught but I know it¡¯s a really large number. Noah closes the laptop and comes to grab his own food before we split up and return to the tutorials. Noah PoV Now that the infernal psionic hell was over I start the next tutorial. Entering the VR capsule I find the place set up for the next tutorial. There were lots of basic modern day weapons and als futuristic pistol and some machine arms and so on.
Basic Mechanics course beginning. This course consists of dismantling, building and repairing modern day weapons and weaponry found in The Nebula.
So it was this kind of mechanics course. It will probably get more complex in the game were we have to fix ships and so on. I move to the first gun on the list. It was a standard police pistol.
This gun has been damage. Dismantle it and identify all the damaged parts.
Taking the gun by the handle I turn it and pull the top part back. Well i tried to at least. It was already apparent that something like the bullet had gotten stuck inside the gun chamber and it malfunctioned. I didn¡¯t exactly know how guns worked besides from what I saw in movies, so it took a while before I figured out how to remove the magazine. I then looked inside and like I had guessed there was a bullet stuck halfway into the chamber. I used psi and pulled at it before finally getting it out. I then pulled the top part back and the bullet capsule stuck there jumped out. I then pushed the top part forward and began dismantling the gun. After a bit I found several small parts that had cracks and were damaged. Identifying them I removed the parts from the gun and saw as they instantly glowed green as they were repaired. Seeing how the parts were fixed I put them back together and fit the magazine in the correct spot and took aim and shot. The bullet fired perfectly and the gun vanished from my hand. "Seems fixing the gun and it vanishes means i succeeded." I mutter. For the next Task i only got the Parts and the AI told me to build the gun from scratch but I did have the schematics for it. Using the plans I slowly assembled the weapon part by part until I ended up with a magnum. Sadly it didn¡¯t fire since I built some parts wrong. The AI didn¡¯t let it fire so I wouldn¡¯t get injured. On the blueprints the parts I attached incorrectly showed up in red so I dismantled the gun and fixed those spots. In the end it shot normally. It continued like this and after 20 guns and I got plans to make a normal fan motor. The result...
you have gained new skills
DismantlingRarity1Level 1
A skill used by Mechanics to take apart machines and weapons to see/use the parts inside. Makes dismantling machines, items and guns 0.5% easier.
Basic Machine ConstructionRarity1Level 1
A skill used by Mechanics build machines Makes building machines 0.5% easier.
Mechanic (mastery)Rarity1.5Level 1
A mandatory skill for those who want to be Mechanics. This skill encases all the knowledge you possess of any form of Mechanics whether it¡¯s building guns, equipment or even ships. Skill improves ability to do all mechanic operations by 0.5%. This skill stacks with other mechanic based skills improving the general performance.
Seeing as I got the skills I was rather happy since what i gained were some basic Mechanic skills. From there I walked over to the robotic arms and other machines but those were too difficult. After some time I returned to the guns after having given up on the complex stuff. I found a table with lots of Scrap parts.
These parts are for training the skill Scrap Weapon making. This part of the Tutorial will train you in how to identify old but usable parts found in the junk so that you can build a functioning weapon.
As the AI finished speaking I happily start getting busy. I used a basic laser pistol schematics. The tutorial provides basic model blueprints so might as well train with them. There were bins with broken weapons so taking those apart also granted me extra parts and the weapon I needed. Taking it all apart I held it in the air with Telekinesis completely open to my eyes while I searched for more parts. After some hours of working on this thing I finally make a functioning laser pistol¡­ only for it to not work. ¡°Hey the blueprint says the enter damn thing is functioning properly! Whats wrong!¡± I shout at the AI.
The weapon was built properly and would definitely function but you lack the fundamental programmer skills to code the weapon properly so that all the parts work together properly.
This AI was bullshitting with me! I just know it she really wants me to be pissed off. ¡°Then can you fix the codes so I can test if it works?¡± I asked.
Nope! This is your tutorial so¡­ Good luck! Teehee. ;D
¡­ I¡¯ll want to kill her! FUCK! Why does she have to be an AI instead of a real person! I grab the gun in my rage and head to a PC that was in the corner. It had several cables attached which were supposed to go into the gun. I look at the instruction and put the wires into the correct spot.
Laser pistol linked up. Codes properly fixed. GOOD JOB!!
¡­ BANG BANG!! I fired the gun twice at the pc in my rage making it blow up but it simply vanished and appeared again with words on the screen.
Instruction guide to Programming Laser weapons. Warning: codes differ depending on the type of weapon so plasma guns have their own coding.
I was breathing deeply trying to calm down while I connected the cables again. This time the proper program appears with the guide showing me how to go about fixing and properly organizing the coding so that the weapon works better. Yes the gun had gone back to the non working codes but my two shots were a bit quicker than the AI had estimated so I got some shots in. After 2 hours I finished the codes and disconnected the cables and shot.
You have leveled up Scrap Weapon Creation
Laser Weapon programmingRarity1Level 1
A skill used by Mechanics and Technician use to properly code a laser weapon. Makes coding Laser based weapons 0.5% easier.
Getting the skills I get up and shout. ¡°Let¡¯s move on to the next tutorial!¡± While grinding my teeth.
Ahh~!! But it was getting fun T-T! *sigh* Basic Mechanic course and Basic Weapon Building Course complete. Commencing Planetside Mining Tutorial
The scenery changed and I found myself in a large well fortified tunnel. I could see the end of the tunnel.
This tutorial will show you the methods and equipment used in planetside mining. Most mines are within huge complex as big as as cities. Unlike fantasy games that have people with pickaxes this is the future.
As the AI says that in front of me two things materialize. On my right was a large robot with tank like wheels instead of legs and on the other a large tank with a huge drill that reminded me of the motherload game.
On the left is a dwarf¡¯s favorite toy, his mining robot suit. For any planet below 1.7 G these will be found on. On the right is a standard Liberation mining tank. Both of these are employed to mine a tremendous amount of mineral ore to be processed. Please choose one to test out.
As she says that I narrow my eyes feeling that there was a catch. I look at her messages again and noticed something in her first message. ¡°This tutorial will show you the methods and equipment used in planetside mining.¡± ¡°No thanks, you said I would be shown equipment used not actually mining.¡± I said and a grin appears.
Tsk! Note to self: Make sure to be careful of words, the can be used against me.
Serious what was up with the AI, did they break an important part of her system or was she just fucking with me.
Fine, whatever, now let¡¯s go to space mining tutorial. This one you will have to at least get into the vessels.
With that everything flashes and I found myself seated in a small ship.
You are currently in the smallest shuttle mining craft of the Liberation known as the Betty. Don¡¯t ask, I didn¡¯t name it.
I chuckle hearing her say that. ¡°Okay what do I need to do?¡±
It will be coming up soon.
As she says that looking out into space I saw large asteroid. It was bare of life and anything like except bare rock. I see several hooks shoot out and then look the ship out.
Deploying Mining drill
As she says that I see a kind of arm attachment come into view. Then two handles with the one on the right having a red button on it moved in front of me.
The two handles will help you control the arm. This arm is a basic Laser mining drill. It¡¯s used for precision mining. The other is the basic drill bit which you need to be careful of overheating. This one you also need to be aware of overheating but it¡¯s slower than the other one. Now I have targeted three spots you need to drill into 1 m into the rock to break the top layer of dirt.
As she says that I see three red targets appear and one green on. I move the handles which are separate . The left one pushing forward and back makes the arm go right and left while the right handle going back and forth making it move up and down from my view. Moving slowly I aim the green target on the first target and press the red button making the laser fire. A long red line of light rushed down and started drilling into the rock. Cracks started to from but it was miniscule. When I reached the desired depth which was indicated by a gauge I moved on. On the second target the cracks seem to spread far and even connect to the first one. The AI¡¯s calculation is scary for sure. On the third one rocks began to break off and when I reached the final depth the rock exposed a red rock below.
This is asteroid Iron. Normally space rocks hold mineral ore with much higher purity than planet rocks. Not only that they require less refining which makes the cost for them much cheaper to mine even though the tech for it is advanced and needing space travel. Mining this is the same as breaking the rocks but as of now you have completed the tutorial. You may freely visit any of them during the time before the game is officially launched. Also¡­ if you want to just talk just log into standby and I will be waiting. As you Capsule AI I can help and just so you know I will also be following you into The nebula as a personal AI just like all the AI¡¯s in all the capsules. *wink* Take care of me.
¡­ I¡¯m doomed! Chapter 4: Skill training Author¡¯s Corner okay don¡¯t know if everyone saw in the previous chapters or not but after talking with the others I decided to change the name of a few stats. The main reason is because it sounds more Sci-fi like instead of fantasy like. The stats I changed are as followed¡­ Strength -> Physical Proficiency Vitality -> Resilience Intelligence -> Mentality Wisdom -> Willpower Further information of which stat does what is shown in the chapter. This is the last tutorial chapter before the game starts so enjoy!
Okay this is what I understood from the AI: She¡äs still the AI from my capsule that runs the starting processes.. But it seems as if installing The Nebula caused a massive increase in information that needs to be processed making her processing ability grow so she can help process all the information from the game and pass it to me so I can see the world and space properly. When I asked why it was only this game where something like this happened her answer was
It¡¯s not like there was a unique program or anything, the main difference is simply the size of the game. Most other games have a small part of a continent or a planet but this one has the entire galaxy. The Capsule AI¡¯s helped with processing the information for the players but the size of the game had such a huge influx of information that my processors grew to handle the increased size of the game. Not to mention the game developers even planned for this to happen and opened a link for the AI to enter the game as an aid for the player. Any ship you own I will be the AI in the ship¡¯s Intercom and I can appear from the coms on your armor as well.
The idea of having this trolling hag with me really pissed me off. Still she appeared in front of me when the tutorial was over. She looked like a woman in her early twenties, she wore a white plug suit and had pitch black hair and a model¡¯s figure with a C-D sized chest. I left before she could do anything else to me and took a nice cold bath to wash off the sweat from the training and to cool my head down. Since the tutorial was done I could visit each of them as much as I want. I will probably return to body adjustment and try my best to cap all my physical stats and then focus on training my craft skills. I just had to tolerate that AI and it would be fine. ¡­ I¡¯m totally going to go mad with that AI. I jumped onto the couch and cover my head when I had fallen in. After a bit I heard my dad. ¡°Huh? Noah what¡¯s up?¡± He asked. ¡°Dad¡­ did your capsule AI gain sentience as well?¡± I asked. ¡°Oh! So yours got it too?! Well her explanation did say all the Capsule AI¡¯s would need to improve in order to handle the Nebula.¡± He said. ¡°What is she like?¡± I asked. ¡°Hmm¡­ looks like a well endowed secretary with a gentle personality to match.¡± He said. My face hits the pillow in front of me as I slump down. ¡°What¡¯s to problem? How is yours?¡± he asked. ¡°Early twenties, first time she appeared she was in a plugsuit¡­ a completely childish brat!¡± I tell him. Then I explained what she did. I got really pissed when he started laughing while holding his sides. ¡°Ah, well it probably compliments your own personality.¡± He says. ¡°So trolling me is considered a compliment?¡± I asked annoyed. ¡°Well she can only do that during the tutorials anyway. The main game AI which is Virtual Work¡¯s personal AI will keep them from doing anything drastic. They will need our permission and so on to do things.¡± He explains as he falls onto the couch and turns the TV on. ¡°She¡äs still damn annoying!¡± I said. ¡°Hehe! Haven¡¯t seen you like this since middle school.¡± Dad says making me jump off the couch and running out of the room. Since I wanted to cool off I leave the house and go for a jog in the park. The scenery was rather nice but it was then that I remember I didn¡¯t eat so I returned home at 2 pm and found a plate made for me and a note from dad saying he was in game training. I sigh and eat the food before returning to the game.
Hi~! Noah! Going to try and cap your physical stats today?
She said appearing as she was before in the large room we were in. ¡°Before that can you tell me what each stat represents. I need to know what their effect on my in game body is.¡± I asked blankly.
Boo~! No fun! Fine¡­
What effects stats possess: Physical Proficiency (Strength) is your Physical strength and physical damage as well as how much you can carry, it also determines how sturdy your body is. Agility is speed and how fast you can move your body. Dexterity is precision with your hands. Aids in both crafting and marksmanship. Resilience (Vitality) is Vital force or you HP. Mentality (Intelligence) is the force of Psi and how well you control it. Willpower (Wisdom) is part of regeneration and how fast you can regain Psi
¡°Show me my status including skills.¡± I tell her.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:580HP Regeneration:0.30
Psi:385Psi Regeneration0.55
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:30Resilience:17
Dexterity:25Agility:19
Mentality:55Willpower:55
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 1 Weapon Repair Level 1 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 1 Dismantling Level 1 Mechanic Level 1 Basic Machine Building Level 1
¡±So regeneration is willpower/100. Seems good enough for my race but I rather like how much Psi I have at the moment. Still, if I was any race that would be 660 and elves would have 1,210 psi. That is more than 3 times my own capacity which clearly shows the specialization of each race.¡± I thought. (A.N. Fun random fact! If you divide elves capacity by the dwarfs psi capacity atm you will get Pi = 3.14.) [tr]
Want help to know what to do to improve each stat?
¡°Sure¡­¡± I say.
Agility comes from running (duh). Resilience can come from running or doing lots of endurance exercise that exhausts yourself. Dexterity you can get from building tools, items, weapons and so on manually without using Psi to build it. You can also get dexterity from training your aim with guns. Mentality comes from training your Psi and psi abilities. Willpower comes from training to improve the amount of psi your body absorbs back into your body. (just a note but elves get double the regeneration as well.) Charisma you are being recognised as a strong figure that supports others and makes them feel safe. Being social and well known in either good or bad can also affect it. Leadership your ability to lead a group to fight, build, repair, etc¡­ and during tense situations makes them feel safe by making careful decisions
¡°So I can keep increasing my mentality and willpower beyond what I have?¡± I asked.
Bingo! Truthfully, dwarves only unlock half the opening on both hands so they can work and craft. Dwarves that unlock all Psi exits are normally combatants who specialize in using dwarven Psi tech. The tech makes up for the lack of Psi abilities Dwarves can use. That said, dwarves have a good control of Psi inside their body when compared to outside. If you flood your chest and legs with Psi you can walk at 2.5G unlike before where you couldn¡¯t.
¡°You could have told me that sooner, you know!¡±
You didn¡¯t have training in Psi manipulation so it¡¯s not like it mattered, you got to 2.2 G anyway which is really good for a dwarf that isn¡¯t boosting his strength with Psi.
¡°Tsk!... Can other races do the same?¡± I asked.
As surprising as it sounds, Dwarves are the best inner Psi manipulators but yes, other races can do this as well but elves are the worst with inner Psi manipulation because. While you only have Psi exits on your hands and feet, they have them all over their arms and legs and even on their chest. Because of this after they open them to use Psi abilities with greater ease they get a reduction to use inner psi as it would leak out and blocking an exit would hurt as you should be very familiar with.
It was rather surprising to hear that elves could be bad with a form of Psi but when she explained it like that it made sense. Dwarves have the fewest exits where psi can leak out so that means they can reinforce their bodies to a greater degree when compared to elves. ¡°Since its like this let¡¯s go to the 2.5 G training. Also teach me how to reinforce my body with Psi so I can handle it.¡± I said, a bit excited to be able to walk on such a high gravity planet.
Commencing 2.5 G training. Comfort benchmark was 1.8 G, beginning at that G force and will move up 0.1 G when ordered.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The room flashed and I find myself in my armor feeling the weight of my body increase as the g force increases.
To reinforce your muscles with Psi you first takes a few steps. First make it flow from the psi center to your chest and try to slowly move it into the muscles. Only when all the chest muscles are reinforced will you be able to move down to the abs and then to the legs. With the current Psi capacity you possess you can easily support your entire body to a degree.
I nodded upon hearing her explanation. Still I reread the steps to gain a better understanding. Then I got started. I pulled the Psi inside my brain and made it flow down my spine. I hadn¡¯t noticed until now but the psi moves through the nerves in my body. When it reached my chest I make the psi exit the nerves and enter my muscles. It flowed out naturally and was much easier than controlling it outside of my body. The Psi was slowly absorbed into my muscles and I felt my strength slowly rising in that area. Slowly it filled up the chest and as it filled up the flow down to the muscles below it and to my back muscles. It was like water that slowly flowed down and filled my muscles. I waited for a while letting the psi flow but when it reached my foot it began to leak so I blocked the Psi to my foot. From there it was like a dam and spaces that were left empty started to fill up. As it reached the top of my shoulders it flooded into my arms but again I blocked before it reached my hand and soon it filled them up. The time it took to this was about 20 minutes. ¡°Finally done.¡±
You have gained a new skill
Psi ReinforcementRarity2Level 1
A skill used by races with few Psi exits which helps to boost their strength by a large degree by reinforcing their muscles with Psi. Increases Physical Proficiency and Agility by 5% Cost 150 psi to activate skill Semi- active skill Remains active but reduces Psi regeneration by 0.20 psi regen to sustain the skill.
Inner Psi ManipulationRarity1.5Level 1
A skill to efficiently control Psi inside the body. Makes it easier to move and manipulate Psi inside the body. Increases control of Psi inside the body by 1%
¡°I understand the first skill but why haven¡¯t I gotten exterior Psi Manipulation?!¡± I asked nearly shouting.
Because your skills with exterior Psi manipulation sucks. Duh! You need several weeks of training to get that skill as a dwarf and even then you aren¡¯t guaranteed. That said, you don''t really need it as a dwarf. Though Inner Psi Manipulation is something most dwarves know because it can be used to buff your own body depending how you manipulate it inside your body. Flooding your skin will increase your defense as you are now can be classified as getting more defense.
What she said does make sense. Dwarves only levitate items so getting a Psi skill like this is already an achievement.. ¡°Fine, slowly raise the g force in the room.¡± I tell her. I immediately feel the G force rise.
2.2 G achieved. I suggest moving around a bit to see how well you can move.
She tells me. I nod and start jogging and even though it was heavy I could move as if I was in the 1.5 G before. After 2 minutes of jogging the G force rose again and started to push me down more. This one lasted 10 minutes at my request and I gained a point in resilience. Then 2.3 G came and I started to feel the weight so I asked for an hour under this G force. The results were 3 agility and 4 Resilience. I was already starting to sweat after this but with a wave of her hand the AI made the fatigue vanish. VR surely is convenient. Sadly that also meant she pushed 2.4 G and made me kneel. The basic armor changed into a high gravity armor and began to support me more. I calm down and thinking what I could do I try to fill more Psi into my muscles but they were filled so it just meant 30 strength wasn¡¯t enough for 2.5 G. ¡°I probably¡­ can¡¯t reach 2.5 G in the Tutorial¡­ Leave it on this setting.¡± I tell her.
Okay~!
I push myself up and start walking. Can¡¯t really run so I just walk but that was like walking with 60 kilos of lead on each limb. Pushing myself until sweat flowed in tiny streams from my forehead I walked for nearly 2 hours before I finally collapsed.
Congratz! You capped off Resilience and got Agility to 25. Want me to reduce to 2.3 so you can jog?!
¡°Yeah¡­¡± I mutter. I feel the pressure on my shoulders lessen but I was still to exhausted but with a swipe of her hand that was gone and I was forced to sit up.
Only 5 points in Agility and Dexterity and you cap off all the physical stats. Seriously martial artists really have a different mentality than other people. Not to mention the Dwarf race¡¯s stubbornness fits you perfectly.
¡°Just shut up. Anyway besides crafting I think using guns also relies on dexterity right?¡± I asked.
Yep but you didn¡¯t get the fighters Tutorial so you can¡¯t access the Shooting range or weapons.
Damn it! ¡°Damn I feel tired of this. my current stats are already good for a dwarf stating character. I¡¯m going to rest now.¡±
Ah~! Already giving up! What about training your crafting skills?!
¡°I¡¯ll do that another day.¡± I say as I log out. The pain in the ass finally out of the way I take a bath and jump into bed even though it¡¯s not even 6 pm yet. From that day forward, I only go into the tutorial to train my skills though that results in me capping dexterity after manually building scrap guns. Now during the month I trained all my skills as much as possible and this was the result with my stats as well.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:710HP Regeneration:0.30
Psi:400Psi Regeneration0.55
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:30Resilience:30
Dexterity:30Agility:25
Mentality:61Willpower:55
Charisma:10Leadership:10
[tr]
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 2 Weapon Repair Level 3 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Dismantling Level 5 Mechanic Level 3 Basic Machine Building Level 3 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Psi Reinforcement Level 2 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 1
Now, as you can tell my HP rose with Resilience. Mentality rose more because I trained my inner Psi control and some of my outer control trying to make machines by purely using Psi. Building weapons from scrap and programming them wasn¡¯t easy but since it¡¯s in the early levels it leveled up fast. Of course any training with gun building or machine building resulted in Mechanic skill to gain exp. Weapon maintenance is the strangest skill. It¡¯s kind of similar to weapon repair but still it¡¯s not the same. Weapon maintenance is a skill that helps me check a functioning weapon, repairing it before serious damage appears as well as maintaining the quality of the item. Long story short, to train the skill i have to take care of working guns to make sure they are functioning correctly which also counts as Weapon repair. It makes it easier to spot a fault is how I would describe this skill. Well anyway, that annoying AI has developed a bit more personality. It seems that she developed two modes I have taken to calling ¡°Serious mode¡± and ¡°Troll mode¡± You can guess what each mode has but let me explain. In serious mode she takes a sort of teacher to student approach and will actively and properly teach me when I need something with whatever information she has. In troll mode¡­ she fucks with me so much that when I was making weapons I actually tried shooting her, only to have her freeze the laser shot and casually move out of the way or slowing the laser beams down and bending back like the matrix just to spite me. I couldn¡¯t wait for the tutorials to be done with so that I would only need to hear her stupid comments and nothing else. Anyways the month is finally over and tomorrow the game officially goes live. I leave the stupid AI and head to bed early because tomorrow at 8 am is the release time and I will not be satisfied with anything besides being first on the station. Chapter 5: Know your place ¡°IT¡¯S FINALLY TODAY!!¡± I shout as loud as possible. Currently it¡¯s 7 am and I¡¯m running around the house happy that the day finally came for me to rise in space travel and become a space overlord! Mwahahah. Okay calming down now¡­ ¡°Son! Can you shut up! You¡¯re going to wake up the neighbor and you know how much of an ass he can be!¡± My dad shouts even louder than me. I laugh at having woken him up. The last month we had irregular sleep patterns so we could get the most out of the tutorials and level up the skills. So when we actually get a fitful sleep we wake up a bit grumpy sometimes. He appeared with his hair completely messed up wearing a pair of shorts and an old sleeveless shirt he uses to sleep in. I myself use only shorts to sleep since my covers heat me up at night and it becomes uncomfortable. ¡°Could you cook some breakfast and make me a coffee please? My head is pounding!¡± dad says as he falls on the couch and turns to TV on the to the news channel. I go do as he tells me to and start making a mix of scrambled eggs, bacon and reheated beans plus the coffee he asked for. ¡±Good morning to all those who have just arrived! Today we will accompany the release of the most anticipated game ¡°The Nebula¡± as it officially releases. We will be following with one of our members entering the game and will be watching the startup and how the location looks. Oh right, the location seems to be a planet named Vinriv which is located in the Morton System. As a mining station we already expect to see lots of mining ships and a more rugged location but who knows what the planet and station look like. Now as we have said throughout the news for quite a while now, with the pre-orders of The Nebula reaching the homes of thousands of people worldwide has caused tens of thousands of the capsule AI¡¯s to develop sentience and due to this there are people who think there is a conspiracy behind this. Many people actually believe Virtual Works is planning something behind the backs of the population. There hasn¡¯t been much word from them but what we have gotten was the president himself stating: ¡°This was an obvious result due to the sheer size of the game we made. The Capsule AI needs to process the information from the game in real time so that the players can play the games and to handle such a huge system they needed to grow which is what happened.¡± unquote. Whether it¡¯s a conspiracy or not we can¡¯t figure out but that doesn¡¯t lessen the threat posed by a Ai either in- or outside of the capsule. Well fo¡­¡± Click! ¡°Total bullshit!¡± Dad shouted as he flipped to the next channel showing a similar news but this one was a live showing of someone going through a training tutorial. It was someone that had chosen the fighter skill set. I finish cooking and split the mix on a plate for me and dad and pour him a cup with the right amount of sugar. ¡°Dad, foods ready.¡± I call out. Not a moment later he had already taken the food and was on the table drinking and eating his headache away. Dad is a bit too fond of coffee. If he goes without it for too long he gets a massive headache but that¡¯s mostly resolved with a cup or two. The news continued the same way as before. Just some random news and then back to talking about Nebula. Seems every 5 minutes the Nebula main website releases some basic info of a random type from basic items list to images of space stations. ¡°Seems the hype for Nebula is huge today.¡± Dad said as he looked at the news and at the laptop in front of him. ¡°Yep, anything of real interest released?¡± I asked. ¡°Well¡­ they released the names and pictures of most basic mining ships. The most basic is called a B.A.M.S, Basic armored mining ship. Single Pilot ships made purely for mining with a 500 kilo cargo hold, a drill mining arm and a grabbing arm to catch the ore.¡± dad replied. ¡°Feels like they made a coolish name for a shitty ship. Do you know what the currency for the game is yet?¡± I asked. ¡°Yep, they''ll be using the credits currency found in many sci-fi games. Oh, there is an auction house as well and you can sell tech or items you find for either real money or credits. You can also exchange credits for real cash at 10 credits for 1 dollar.¡± Dad explained. ¡°Classic setup i guess. Though i doubt these auction house¡¯s will be found in the starting location.¡± I said as i looked at the tv. ¡°How much did that shitty ship you mention before cost to buy, dad?¡± I asked. ¡°Let¡¯s see¡­ Brand spanking new costs 10k for it to be officially yours, but then you got to pay for the insurance as well as the cargo insurance.¡± He said. I chuckle at how futuristic games implement stuff like that. It¡¯s no wonder the game is rated 18+. I look at the time and saw it was 7:28. There was still 32 minutes before the game went live so after we ate dad and i started to do our morning stretching exercises. We do this until there are five minutes remaining. From there we each head into our own capsules.
Yo~! 3 real world minutes so 12 in here!
She says. ¡°Can¡¯t you make time flow normally while we¡äre still waiting?¡± I asked.
I would but...
¡°But¡­¡± I said wryly considering she seemed to be in troll mode.
Capsule AI 236580 requests a name from Noah Collins!
¡­ ¡°A name?¡±
Yep
¡°Do you need one?¡±
You¡¯re cruel! I¡¯m sentient now so of course i need one!
She says that but she''s just an AI¡­ ah no wonder. I only thought of her as just that. I sigh deeply and think a bit. ¡°What about Asai?¡± I asked.
The randomness in it makes me think there is a hidden meaning behind it.
¡°There is. ¡°Annoying Stupid AI¡±¡± I say, making her pout.
Do this seriously! DAMN IT!
It was refreshing to seeing her getting angry. ¡°Lia then!¡¯ I say.
What does that one mean?
¡°It means that I¡¯m too lazy to think of a better name.¡± I tell her making her pout again.
The name of Capsule AI 236580 has changed to Lia.
The Nebula is Live! Entering game!
Before I could react everything flashed and as i felt the familiar immersion feeling of falling when entering the VR capsule and game. When my vision cleared i found myself in the beginner dwarf armor inside some kind of capsule. My vision was blurry but i heard the distinct hissing of pressured air being released. The thing I thought to be a capsule was actually a pod¡­ judging by the cold white smoke coming from above, this must be some kind of cryogenic sleep pod. My body felt weak and i reached for the two sides of the doors. Lifting my legs up i tried walking out but stumbled, luckily i was caught by someone before i fell. ¡°Woah there! Not so fast! You just left cryogenic sleep after 3 years.¡± the man says. ¡°3¡­ years?¡± I mutter. ¡°Calm down, first then we''ll move you to a place more comfortable and get you something to eat and drink.¡± He says. He helps me walk through rows and rows of cryo-pods that were opening one after another. Soon i found myself in a kind of cafeteria with a plate of food in front of me. I suddenly felt so much hunger i just wolfed down everything. It was a light meal consisting of soup and water. It kept coming until i was satisfied. I looked around and with my vision having cleared up by now. The man that had helped me was sitting next to me, waiting for me to finish. He looked like a human but had a large beard and a muscular build. From the size and looks he looked like a dwarf/human half breed. ¡°So¡­ what happened?¡± I asked. ¡°Oh right, well this is a far off solar system. Not all ships have faster than light travel tech, only large ships. The ship that brought you didn¡¯t, so they gathered the foreigners in various other solar systems that wanted to work here and brought you through hyper drive but even then it still took 3 years.¡± He explained. ¡±So this is the method used to introduce the players into the game world. They come as workers to a far off mining station that was either low on personal or had recently been established and was employing people.¡± I thought. ¡°I should go, there are quite a few people left, which I need to pick up and explain to what happened. A large number had a memory loss about the reason they came here for but that¡äs easy to fix.¡± He says and gets up. he waves as he leaves. Suddenly i hear the sounds of a pc turning on and see a small hologram of Lia appearing above my left wrist. Unlike before when she talked before logging on there was only a message box that appeared.
Hey there, sleepy head! Don¡¯t worry you didn¡¯t really sleep for 3 years. There would be too many lawsuits if you did.
¡° Do you know where i should go now? And why can¡¯t i hear your voice.¡± I asked.
These crappy built in coms can¡¯t handle sound. As for where you need to go, leave the room. You should be approached by someone that will ask you which skill course you have taken before coming here. That means the skill set you chose. Though it doesn¡¯t dictate which class you are going to take it does dictate which job you will be assigned to work in for some time.
¡°Work assigned? So i can¡¯t choose? And why do i have to work and not go do what i want?¡± I asked.
The lore of the game states that the players didn¡¯t pay for the transport and instead opted to work at the station in order to pay off the debt from traveling here.
¡°I see¡­ Better get going then.¡± I mutter as i get up. I walk out just as i see a huge Giant with a familiar face walking in while being supported by an ogre. I chuckle seeing the wobbly mass of muscle that will probably become a guard for the station. As i leave i notice a man that looked like a Soldier walking over. ¡°Greetings, I¡äm Major Marcus Snocon, leader of the armed forces of the Kelha II space station.¡± He says and salutes. I give him a salute as well. ¡°I¡¯m Noah.¡± I tell him. ¡°Yes, please tell me what course you took before coming to the station?¡± He asked. ¡°Mechanics course.¡± I say. ¡°Then go down the corridor until you see the elevator. There is a guard in front of it so don¡¯t worry about losing your way.¡± He explains and sends me off. The moment i left his sight a message appeared.
Seems a bit like a prick if you ask me.
¡°Not our place to question how a futuristic space station army general acts.¡± I said in a quiet voice so only Lia would hear.
Even so, he gives off the self centered feel that says ¡°I¡¯m one of the top brass so just say yes sir, like a good puppy.¡± Can¡¯t really like a guy like him.
¡°Well, we will see how acts later on. Now shush.¡± I said as i spot the guard in front of a door. ¡°Excuse me.¡± I called out. ¡°You a foreigner? What course did you take?¡± He asked with an expressionless face. ¡°Mechanic.¡± I say. He turns and pushes a button behind him and the elevator opens. ¡°This elevator will take you to the manufacturing plant.¡± He says and then goes back to his post and ignores me. I walk into the elevator which closed behind me and started moving down.
So what do you expect from this factory?
¡°Either a place that builds small tools or parts, or a place that builds large industrial machines and mining gear. Don¡¯t doubt it¡¯s both.¡± I tell her.
Buu~~! Such a boring job you are going to do!
I ignored her complaints and wait a bit before the elevator stops and opens. What i saw as i exit the elevator was a huge hangar that had an open ceiling and showed each floor of the manufacturing plant. Still, before i could take in the grandeur two things happened. First i had to cover my ears because the noise was just deafening. It was like walking into a construction zone with lots of welding and hammering and a whole symphony of noises. The second thing that happened, was that after I had taken a step out of the elevator my body began to float because the room had 0g. It caught me off guard and i started to flail around. ¡°AHAHA! Oi, look at the newbie! Hey newbie, catch!¡± Someone shouted and i only noticed something flying towards me. I barely managed to grab the objects before they passed by my floating body. I realized it was a set of muffled headphones with a mic on the side and a pair of metallic boot soles. I put on the headphones first and noticed a drastic drop in noise. Then took a look at the two metallic boot soles. I looked at my own boots and see they''re missing some but i notice an entrance spot near the heel which matches up with a plug on the inner side of the metal sole. You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.Putting each part into the correct foot i received a message.
You have installed Gravity soles. Magnetic boots function installed. By the way *pff* you look excellent dancing around in the air like that!
¡°Shut up Lia!¡± I sneer. ¡°Oi kid, catch!¡± The voice said and i see a wire coming my way so i grab it. Soon enough i feel the wire pulling. I looked for the owner of the voice. I identified the owner of the voice and saw a 115 cm tall dwarf with his legs and arms equipped with armor but his chest only had a robotic skeleton that was the structure of the armor. As i reach the ground i have Lia activate the gravity boots which pulls and fixes me to the ground. ¡°So, bettah?¡± Asked the rough voice while i was still upside down. ¡°Yeah, what are these?¡± I asked. ¡°Standard workplace sound dampers an` de mics ¡®re sound transmitters dat yer ear phones pick up and transmit better.¡± he explains. ¡°A` for the little boot soles, those ah mechanic¡¯s best friend, gravity boot soles.¡± He says. ¡°I see¡­ Thanks for the help. Didn¡¯t know this area wouldn¡ät have gravity. I¡¯m Noah, a new mechanic and came for a job.¡± I told him. ¡°Aye, dat much is obvious.¡± He said. ¡°Ya gots ah AI right?¡± He asked. I nod. ¡°Good, then ya can display ya skills so ¡äave ¡äer bring em up. Need ta get ya a proper job.¡± He says.
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 2 Weapon Repair Level 3 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Dismantling Level 5 Mechanic Level 3 Basic Machine Building Level 3 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Psi Reinforcement Level 2 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 1
A hologram of my skills appear from my left wrist. The dwarf looks at them and starts to scratch his chin under the large beard. ¡°Got yer self some good skills. Weapon builder an¡ä even machine¡­ did ya train yer psi?¡± He asked curious. ¡°Yep!¡± i nod. ¡°Felt it would be important so i unblocked all the exits i found.¡± I said. Once he heard that the dwarf facepalmed before he started to chuckle and then started to laugh out loud. ¡°Boy!!! AHAHAHA!! Didn¡¯t anyone tell ya?¡± The dwarf said as he rolled on the ground. ¡°Tell me what?¡± I asked. The dwarf laughed a lot harder after hearing that before shakingly getting up. He took a couple of deep breaths in order to calm down. ¡°Alright ye don¡¯ know much ¡®bout dwarf culture so ye must be from somewhere that doesn¡¯t teach ar customs. Lemme explain.¡± He says and calls me to a place a bit away from the platforms that were being used to build mining robot''s like the one i saw. ¡°Aye, now den. Dwarves don¡¯t open all their Psi exits because we ar a strength race! We don need it, space mechanics work in 0G an` while planetside we simply use our bots or our own muscles to do this.¡± He says and grabs a really big metal container with one arm and lifts it and started to move it around easily. ¡°Dis ¡®ere weighs 400 kilos and even in space it¡¯s heavy as fuck. Get it! Besides dwarfs only need de top 5 digits of their hands unlocked so we can do delicate work our stubby fingers can do.¡± He says. I was feeling seriously depressed now. I mean SERIOUSLY!! Why didn¡¯t Virtual Works release such a vital piece of info beforehand? The dwarf started to laugh again which caused me to feel even more depressed. I then feel his hand grab the collar of my armor and lift me up. ¡°Don worry, not the end o¡ä the galaxy. Ye just need some extra beginner gear. Come wit me, need to meet de man that will train ya. By de way, you aint the only dwarf that does that. Dere are three types that do what ye did. One is ignorants which don¡¯t hav¡äa figgin clue bout our culture, bloody idiots that know and do it anyways even though it hurts like hell, and Dwarf Fighters who ah dwarfs that train ta use Dwarven Psionic gear. Ye gonna need ta learn ta be a mechanic or life will be hard for ya when ya get in a old fashion brawl.¡± He explains and starts to pull me to an elevator. We enter but the door didn¡¯t close. ¡°Why aren¡¯t we moving?¡± I asked. ¡°Don¡¯t ya know de station layout?¡± He asked. I shake my head and he sighs. ¡°Bariatric, prepare an outside image of da station for da kid an¡ä an inner map.¡± He says. ¡°Shut your trap, Gunner! Don¡¯t go telling me what to do you Tosk¡¯s ass!¡± a deep female voice came from his left arm. From the pc on his arm the image of a brutish woman appeared. ¡°Shut yer trap woman and get the blasted files already!¡± He shouts at her. ¡°Tsk fine, trash!¡± She said and vanished. ¡°Blasted woman!¡± Gunner says. ¡°You seem friendly with her.¡± I mutter. ¡°Bah! Damn woman wants to control all the stuff ah do! Wants me ta get her a damned android body a¡ä well. Like hell ah ever get such a brute a body!¡± He shouts. ¡°Okay¡­ so why doesn¡¯t the elevator leave?¡± asked. ¡°Right, de station is divided into two parts. De industrial part which is ¡®ere.¡± He says gesturing at what we saw outside. ¡°And the resident and de commercial part which is in the rotating ring around de industrial part. This part doesn¡¯t rotate so we don get gravity but the other one does so de elevator shaft moves.¡± He says. As he says that the elevator door closes and starts to move. ¡°Must be complicated to get the timing right?¡± I said. ¡°Well dat has been resolved long ago. It moves wit de flow diagonally as it goes to de moving part.¡± He explained. ¡°Wait! We are moving down, right?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye, problem wit that?¡± He asked. ¡°Well i came to the hangar moving down.¡± I say. ¡°Ah, well foreigners that ah being loaded off de transport ship and the elevator flips around. The real things move down towards the ring and de outer side of the ring is where de gravity centers.¡± He said. So that was it. I didn¡¯t notice how he used a different elevator then the one we came through so it was that. We kept going down and halfway down his AI had pulled up the info. To upload the information to Lia he just brought his left wrist over mine and after a moment a message appeared. [tr][/tds]
Kelha II Interior and exterior map downloaded.
The next moment the exterior image of the station appeared. It was massive. In the center of the structure were two cylinder bodies, one of which was the hanger I was in which were connected to a second similar one facing the other way by a large axis in between them. Around both were large rings that rotated around the main cylindrical body. ¡°Wow¡­ i don¡¯t remember correctly but i distinctively thought that this was supposed to be a new mining station?¡± I said. ¡°Pff! AHAHAH! New! Good one! This has been here for at least 2 years UST. Let¡¯s see, best way ta compare it is with earth since that is the most common comparison. Urg¡­¡± Gunner said as he began to think. ¡°You blasted moron! Let me explain!¡± Bariatric shouted. He lifted his left arm out. ¡°Alright kid, first UST means Universal standardized time and 1 year is equal to a decade on earth. So it¡¯s been twenty years since this station was established and mining operations began. This station grew better than others because the system has an impressive amount of asteroids around all the planets in this system. Most have rings and they are all mineral rich. Not to mention that the quality of crystals found on the planets were also really good which caused a faster expansion.¡± She explains. ¡°Don¡¯t some of the other planets have space stations?¡± I asked. ¡°Nope, only outposts. Outposts are large trading bases used to buy from the mining companies planetside and bring it to space to have it processed and either sell the metals made or sell the raw materials to traders that come through.¡± She explained. *Ding* Just as she finished talking the elevator door opened. On the other side we were met with lots of people walking around. ¡°Come on! We headen for de bar!¡± Gunner says with a grin. I follow him but as i take a step out of the elevator the magnetic boot sticks to the ground for a second then a message appears. [tr][/tds]
Magnetic boots deactivated.
After that there were no problems following the dwarf through the crowd since this place had gravity. As for what i saw, the place was really large and looked like a huge market place. There were shops with robot parts, weapons, food and all that. Any tech was all basic level gear but android gear had a few more options since they needed to upgrade their bodies. We kept walking until we reached ¡°Sweet Cup Bar¡±. Weird name, but since alcohol was made from sugar based stuff it made some sense. As we open the door the merry laughs of drinking people came through and standing above this was the singing of drunken dwarves. Gunner chuckled hearing the strange song. As we start walking over we hear something strange. ¡°Blasted Dwarves, SHUT UP YOU FUCKING MIDGETS!!¡± A deep voice suddenly shouted. Me and Gunner froze as we looked at the source of the voice. The owner of the voice was a huge ogre with sturdy looking metal armor. He stood up wobbly showing he was very drunk but he still started to stop our way. ¡°Some un who can¡¯ even hold ¡®is drink got no moral ta tell us ta shut up.¡± One of the dwarfs shouted and took a swig of his drink. ¡°You *hic* little midgets! Get out! The drinks are *hic* tasting horrible with yer stench of grease in here!¡± He shouts. ¡°Oi bastard, your own stink is ruining my personal batch i brought today to celebrate a us hitting the quota this month. Begone!¡± Shouted what looked like a really important person from the group. ¡°Personal batch! Heh!¡± He reaches over the table and grabs one of the cups and downs the drink before spitting it out. ¡°BALH!! DISGUSTING! WHAT IS THIS?! TOILET WATER?!¡± He intentionally shouted so the entire bar heard. ¡°Come on.¡± Gunner muttered to me and started walking. When he reached the ogre he put his hand on the ogres waist and pushed him sending him to the ground and then turned to the important looking dwarf that had spoken before.. ¡°Colonel, first new blood comes to ya. Kid unblocked all his Psi exits without knowing the outcome.¡± Gunner explained. ¡°YOU LITTLE MIDGET! DO YOU *hic* KNOW WHO I AM! I¡¯M ONE OF THE OGRE GUARD CAPTIONS *hich* OF THIS STATION!¡± the ogre shouted while getting back up. ¡°Aye, i know ya. An¡ä if ya don¡¯t know me, then I¡¯m Gunner, lead mechanic in charge o maken all dat armor an¡ä weapons ya break so often as well as maken sure yer ship is worken properly!¡± Gunner replies. The ogre recoils back a step but then looks at me and grins. ¡°Oh look, a taller then average midget! What are you looking at dead meat! HUH!¡± He shouts trying to intimidate me but for some reason i didn¡¯t feel scared even with his face right in front of me. ¡°Back away from the boy, Titan!¡± The important dwarf Gunner called Colonel said as he got up. ¡°Or what? You gonna throw that disgusting drink at me? Weakling mechanics like you trashy dwarves should learn your place!¡± He sneers. Colonel sighs and slowly walks over to the Ogre. It was like david and goliath. Colonel wore full combat armor down to his hands but the fingertips were exposed for some reason. ¡°Let me tell ya something! Never insult the men making yer gear.¡± He says visibly angry. The next moment he bent slightly forward and jumped making his 1 meter high body reach the ogre¡¯s gut. His right arm had been pulled back back and sprang forth in an instant, hitting the ogre into a ¡®>¡¯ shape before he began to fly across the room. On the other side of the room i saw a refined looking gentleman with sculpted looks sitting there eating. He gave one look at the ogre and flicked his arm which caused the ogre to freeze mid air. ¡°Sir Colonel, please refrain from throwing trash our way, it¡¯s very impolite. If you want to throw trash away please throw it in the litter.¡± The elf said and sent the ogre right back our way but he landed at Colonel¡¯s feet instead on the table. ¡°Sorry, Sir Alphenor. Ah shall do jus dat. Boys throw out dis trash!¡± Colonel said. ¡°Who is that?¡± I asked Gunner. ¡°That is Sir Alphenor, he is one of the most experienced elves in this station. As for Colonel¡­¡± Gunner says but was interrupted by the man in question. ¡°Topaz Colonel at yer service and ye at mine. So dis de first one? Which type was he again?¡± Colonel asked. ¡°Ignorant.¡± Gunner said. ¡°Ah the easy one ta teach. Good good. So ¡®ow many exits ya open already?¡± He asked. ¡°All of them.¡± I reply. He stared at me with a blank face. ¡°All the hands, right?¡± He asked. ¡°Hands and feet.¡± I said. The groups of dwarves around me were quiet but soon one started laughing with the rest of the dwarves joining in soon after. ¡°All, AHAHA!! SERIOUSLY!¡± Colonel said, holding his sides. ¡°Seriously kid! You even did the feet! I can understand wanting control but what use does it have when we work in 0G?¡± Gunner asked. ¡°Oi Gunner, go easy on the boy! You did say he was ignorant, but i never expected for it ta be to this level!¡± Colonel says as he whips off some tears from his eyes. I could only feel more depressed watching them all laughing. After some time they had finally calmed down. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll leave him to you guys then for his training. Also don¡¯t forget to give him some starting equipment.¡± Gunner said. ¡°Ah won¡¯ forget!¡± Colonel said and waved his hand as Gunner left. ¡°Alright, then since we ¡äad a good laugh and some good drinks le¡¯s finish up a¡ä the training field boys. Let¡¯s get the new meat tested out.¡± Colonel said. ¡°AYE, SIR!¡± The other dwarfs said as they downed their drinks and one of them grabbed a large metal container, and by large i mean double his size, and walked out. ¡°Come on kid.¡± Colonel said and started leading me out. I followed but not before i caught Sir Alphenor looking my way with a young elf girl looking as well. I didn¡ät really get why so i just turned around and left. Chapter 6: Gun shopping Authors corner: Alrighty folks!!! Next chapter here you go!! Just a start up into the training that will be slow and over quite a few chapters that i will be focusing on character building of not only noah but several other characters. Also much to my editor¡¯s, Vhoscythe, displeasure most Nebula chapters i have already written in advance come between 14-18 pgs. He only has the weekends and a few hours at the end of the day for editing so chapters will come mostly every 4-5 days. Currently at chapter 12 already but will only post after editing is done. P.S. The fic is also being monitored by a certain warhawxs so that I won¡¯t give in to my nature of making everything OP so quickly. (-_- His logic Fu is a pain but since i go overboard to easily its fine) that said a warning since the real heavy hitter NPC will be near monster level and advanced tech will seem OP beyond compare but no player will get at the goods stuff without making it themselves so don¡¯t worry. Enjoy!!
I walked with the group of dwarves and was totally amazed when I saw that the crowd parted ways for them. Some people even shouted out to the dwarves. Confused about this, I went up and asked about it. ¡°Why did they act like dat? Easy, we are de best fighters in de station and de ones dat keep de fucking bandits at bay.¡± he replied. ¡°Don¡¯t the guards like that Ogre do that?¡± I asked. ¡°He does but there is a clear difference between him an us. An dat would be equipment.¡± Colonel said. I was confused by his answer. ¡°You¡äll see once we reach the training rooms.¡± He said. As we walked we reached a wall with a single large door. Walking through after the guards saluted, I was surprised to find a huge open park. It extended 10 meters from the ground with a glass ceiling and you could see the entire station or even get an occasional view of the planet below if you waited long enough for the rings to rotate. The park was about 40 meters wide and there wasn¡¯t really many trees but there was grass, short trees to give the park some natural feeling, the ground was covered in grass except for the path through the park. ¡°This here is an RnR spot. Dere are four in de station. Everyone needs a bit of nature in deir lives or it becomes dull.¡± Colonel says and we all start walking through. Similar to before people showed their respect for the dwarves as we made our way through. The park¡¯s length was about 150 meters until we entered a new segment of the rings. This segment of the station was different than the marketplace. This Section had the corridor split in the middle and branched into three corridors. One down the middle and two on the outer side of the ring with windows providing a view of space. ¡°Dis is de resident''s section. You will be assigned a room soon enough.¡± Colonel nonchalantly said and moved down the center corridor. After going through one more park we entered another section. ¡°Here we ah! Dis section is for da basic fighter training. On¡ä of our gym an¡ä workshop is over here.¡± he says and guides me to a large door. When he opened the doors and walked through what I saw seemed similar to a motorcycle workshop. It was a wide room around 15 meters wide and 50 long. A third of the room on the left side in front of the door was a workshop with lots of desks and tables with machinery, robot and weapon parts and near the center of the room were near complete robots which were about 3 meters tall. The rest of the room had been designed as a shooting range. ¡°Dis ¡®ere is our workshop! We teach newbies ta personalized dwarf psionic weapons an gear here!¡± Colonel says with pride. He then walks over to a metal shelf and looks my way a bit before picking up a pair of metal gloves and boots. ¡°Here, replace de crappy beginner gloves and boots wit dese. Dey are made wit Psionic tech.¡± He ordered. ¡®What do they do?¡± I asked as I took the gloves and put them on a table next to me while unlatching the current metal gloves on my hand. ¡°De gloves will help stop de leak of psi from de second digit down. It will work as a second skin for ya. When ya reinforce yer body block only de final digits of yer hands an let the rest of the hand be reinforced.¡± He said. ¡°Why can¡¯t I just leave the hand without reinforcement?¡± I asked as I start to remove the left glove. ¡°Why? Cause yer strength get¡¯s boosted you dimwit! Yer hand can¡¯t take de extra strength, why else! Also dese gloves work as gauntlets an are considered a weapon. Since dey are yer second skin an are made wit psionic tech it can be reinforced with it to make it stronger so besides yer own hand the glove itself will get stronger. Same with the boot.¡± he explained. ¡°Then the five remaining digits of my hands are for the more delicate work in crafting?¡± I asked. ¡°Yep!¡± He said with a nod. As he nods I sit down and start removing the boots to change them. I remove the metal soles and put them on the new boots as well before putting them on. With them on I tried to push the psi out of all the exits but it only came out of the finger tips. I tried to reinforce the gloves next but I found that I couldn¡¯t push the psi into them. ¡°Hehe! So ya noticed! Psi tech is somethin ya need ta train ta use. Any race needs ta train a lot ta use it. Ta reinforce de gloves ya gonna need a lot of control of yer psi but as strange as it sounds, it is still considered Inner Psi manipulation because Psi works through the nerves and the technology itself resembles nerves. It''s extremely complex tech to personally make an even us here have to purchase the parts from traders but after that we can easily assemble the gear.¡± He explains. ¡°So this is why there is so much respect towards you guys.¡± I say. ¡°Don¡¯t think we just sit here on our asses though, we are still dwarves and we contribute by working at the hangar and factory.¡± He says and I nod. ¡°So what do I do now?¡± I asked. ¡°Well ya got a few options, go back ta De hangar an¡¯ work there, ya can be a contract miner for the mining companies an¡¯ fly as the miner in their ships. There is also junkyard security.¡± He said shrugging. ¡°What does each job entitle and pay.¡± I asked to most important question. ¡°Heh! De hangar job can be from building weapons ta dismantling broken gear an salvaging useable parts an sending broken ones ta be scrapped an remade. Ya may also have ta help build de machines. Wages ¡®bout 60 credits a day an ya work seven days a week 8 hours a day. Contract miners accompany a pilot an does de mining when ya get ta the asteroids. Depending on performance ya get between 40-80 credits a full cargo. Junkyard security is ta make sure no sneaky bastards try ta use de scraps ta make gear witout paying for entry and parts obtained. Wage is 100 credits but ya have ta use yer own gear.¡± He says. ¡°I¡¯ll go with Hangar duty. Also what do I do about this place?¡± I asked. ¡°We will call ya for training when we start our own. We¡är bout ta go on our rounds since we''re part o the Kelha II defense force. It will be a while before we come back so get some work done an train a bit. Also try ta get some new gear, maybe a gun or close range weapon.¡± He suggests. ¡°Okay, I guess I can go get that done first, before heading back down¡­ or is it up?¡± I asked. ¡°Who cares, this is space, so there is no up or down.¡± He said and everyone including me started to laugh. ¡°We will train ya with guns later if ya don¡¯t know anything yet but go get something nice.¡± Colonel says. ¡°Oh right, before I leave you said you were from the defense force? Is that under Major Snocon? What rank are you, sir?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye, he¡¯s my superior. I¡¯m 1st Lieutenant why?¡± He said. The others chuckled. ¡­ ¡°So you¡äre Lieutenant Col¡­¡± I start saying. ¡°DON¡¯T YA START THAT WIT ME KID!¡± He says cutting me off with a frown but everyone starts laughing. ¡°Don¡¯t mind him kid. Cause of the name, Major feels threatened by Colonel and only ever calls him 1st Lieutenant when referring to him while he calls others with their names.¡± One of the dwarves commented. ¡°Damn blasted Terran! Can¡¯t even call me Lieutenant Topaz! Has ta use my blasted last name!¡± Colonel shouts in a fit of rage. ¡°Urg¡­ it¡¯s not my place to say this but doesn¡¯t everyone call you by your last name? Doesn¡¯t that make it worst?¡± I asked. ¡°OF COURSE IT DOES, BUT THESE GUYS DON¡¯T GIVE A DAMN!¡± He burst into a rage which everyone began to laugh about. ¡°So exactly how would you like me to call you?¡± I asked. ¡­ He froze since I was probably the first person that actually asked what he wanted. My guess, stubborn Dwarves just choose what they want to call someone and the person in question can¡¯t change it. Especially a leader figure like Topaz Colonel himself. From what I saw and how easily he mopped the floor with that Ogre captain I can quite certainly say that with him in his full battle gear he would probably fit perfectly as a Colonel rank military man, but being stuck out here in this mining station, not many merits can be achieved to rise up higher. After a sigh he just said ¡°Call me whatever ya feel like.¡± He said. ¡°Aye aye Colonel.¡± I said with a salute causing the dwarves to burst out laughing as the man in question sighed. ¡°I¡¯ll be going then. Thanks for the gloves and boots. I¡¯ll try to train¡­ how exactly do I train Inner Psi Manipulation?¡± I asked. ¡°Oh, well it depends on how you use it. You probably just had your Psi flood and seep into your muscles right?¡± He asked. ¡°That¡¯s right.¡± I said with a nod. ¡°The best method is ta try an¡ä gain different buffs from it. Usen yer Psi differently instead of simply letten it seep inta yer muscles. De three best training types are reinforcing yer skin mostly around yer arms so ya can block. Imagine de psi building crystal like pattern similar ta rocks or minerals. The second is Reinforcing yer fist for punching. Try ta imitate the same pattern as yer used wit de arms. An¡¯ de last is ta focus on specific set of muscles like yer biceps and structure de psi different ta add more strength while yer body is reinforced. Train these three methods until ya get de skill and ya level Inner Psi Manipulation to level 5.¡± Colonel explains to me. ¡°Alright, i¡¯ll do that. See you guys¡­ oh, how will you call?¡±
I already traded contacts with their AI¡¯s so they simply need to request you to return and I will inform you.
¡°Not a very reassuring thing coming from you.¡±
Buu~! You meanie! Ignoring me and leaving me alone without talking! That¡¯s mean!
Lia¡¯s complaining was a pain for sure. ¡°The way you complain makes it so much easier for me to ignore you and forget to get an android body for you.¡±
EVIL!!! THREATENING ME LIKE THAT!!! MEANIE!!!
All the men around me laughed at the AI. I waved good bye and headed back to the market. It was two sections away pretty much on the other side of the station. Getting there I began to look around for weapons. Looking through the weapon shops. The price for energy weapons was stunning. Basic laser pistol 700 credits, Basic laser rifle 1300 credits. Laser sword (Jedi-Edition XD) 1000 credits. Just so you know 1k is what beginners got as starting money. The bad part, I just took a look around and I could see that there were players with laser swords, making me shake my head. ¡°I guess suffering is also a form of learning.¡± I mutter. ¡°Excuse me sir, but are you interested in something?¡± A young woman asked, coming from inside the store I had been looking into. ¡°Miss, do you happen to know where I can get any normal non-energy weapons?¡± I asked. ¡°Kinetic weapons? There are about 6 shops that sell them, the cheapest sells second hand weapons. Just walk to the end of the block to the left¡­¡± she says pointing down the left side of her shop.¡±... and take a right, it¡¯s in the corner shop next to the outer wall.¡± She explains. ¡°And the cheapest new weapon shop?¡± I asked. ¡°Go down four blocks to the right.¡± She points to the other direction. ¡°Go 3 blocks and turn right and it should be the second shop.¡± She explains. ¡°Thank you.¡± I said and slightly bow my head to her before I go to the shop that sells new guns. What was both annoying and astonishing was that the prices were nearly double the advanced weaponry. Revolvers were 400 credits, semi-auto pistols were 900 credits, automatic machine guns were 1600 credits. From rifles, long double barrel shotgun 2500 credits. Semi-auto rifles 4000!! Automatic were fucking 8000 credits! I almost started crying, seeing as I couldn¡¯t afford any of these so I walked back to the shop from before and headed towards the second hand shop and was surprised to find everything at nearly ? the price and a sign saying ¡°We have a scrap deposit. Buy a second hand gun and pay 100 credits and you can use the parts you find to repair the weapon as best as you can.¡± ¡±It is a really good deal since kinetic guns are quite useful on the planet but are rarely used in space. I¡¯m kind of wondering if it wouldn''t be better to get an energy weapon since it is cheaper and can probably do more damage with less training.¡± I thought for a moment before looking into the shop and my eyes landed on two very nice sawed off shotguns made from some kind of black metal. ¡­ ¡°Like they say, shotguns are made to pack a punch and they naturally hit quite a bit harder in the hands of a dwarf! Why? CAUSE IT¡¯S A DWARF¡¯S WEAPON!¡± I tell myself and walk into the shop. Going inside, the cashier was an elderly man who was polishing his own personal gun, a beautiful Smith & Wesson Model 500 magnum revolver. Since I had to build and repair a large number of guns to reach level 3 in weapon repairs, I learned a lot about current day weaponry. The Smith & Wesson Model 500 magnum revolver is a single or double action high caliber revolver that uses a .50 caliber bullet. This gun currently is the most powerful revolver in the real world. In this world it¡¯s probably a collectors item at best since there are much more powerful weapons. ¡°Hey kid, looking for something?¡± the elder asked as he opens the revolver and begins loading the five bullets the gun can hold and placing it on the desk register. ¡°These two shotguns, how much?¡± I asked pointing to the two shotguns I had seen from outside. They looked a bit rusty but they still were nice guns. ¡°Oh these, both have cracked barrels and lots of small rusted parts. Doesn¡¯t even function without repairs so 150 each. 300 credits or 400 if you want to access the deposit and try to repair them.¡± He said. I open my inventory for the first time since I entered the game. The inventory was divided into 8 boxes and the amount of currently owned credits were displayed directly below them .
Quick Guide to Invent...
¡°Later¡± I tell Lia before she could say more and after pressing on the credits a screen appeared which asked how much I wanted to withdraw.
Buu~~! Meanie!
I type in 400 credits and they appeared in my hand. ¡°Here, I will take both guns and try to repair them.¡± I said. I place the money on the counter in front of the elder who nods and then proceeds to open the glass case of the guns. He takes out both and places them on the table. He then goes and looks around a bit until he found a strap. ¡°This is the holster for them.¡± He says. Looking at the belt, I saw that the guns would be hanging on both sides. I take the belt and put it on and make sure it''s well placed and not falling. Satisfied, I had the elder take me to the depot in the back. It was filled with containers with random parts and a few with intact but old guns. ¡°Guess it''s time to work, but first, Lia show me that guide.
Nah! Don¡¯t feel like it.
This bitch! ¡°Do it you pile of trashy codes!¡± I shout at her.
Who are you calling trashy codes!!
¡°Just a stupid AI that can¡¯t even properly bring up a guide on how the game''s inventory works.
Oh yeah! I¡¯ll show you! Quick Guide to Inventory: The inventory in ¡°The Nebula¡± is different from most fantasy based games. The inventory can¡¯t be used to store armor, weapons or equipment of any kind. It''s separated into 8 slots that can hold either raw materials, processed metals, ammo or consumables. Money can also be stored in the inventory but it''s counted and stored separately. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Raw materials must be stored in boxes of max half a cubic meter in size and must be filled completely. The inventory can only store 10 boxes in a stack. For consumables, things like healing potions, pills and consumable weapons like throwing knives can be stacked up to 100 units per slot. Ammunition can be stacked up as prepared magazines at a maximum of 40 units per slot or 10 Units per box for shotgun shells.. Energy packs are similar to consumables and can be stacked up to 100 Units per inventory box. Note: Different bullet types will be stored in a different slots occupying a new box in the inventory.
¡°So this makes the game realistic beyond belief.¡± I say. With the inventory set up like this you would need to plan seriously before going on a mission if you knew it would be dangerous.
See! I can bring up a simple guide!
¡°Yep, you can, thanks for being so easy to fool into bringing this up.¡± I tell her. Her expression freezes and she blinks a bit in her hologram before she facepalms herself.
Buu~~! You demon! You tricked me!
¡°Not like you haven¡¯t done the same.¡± I tell her as I move to the containers with lots of shotguns. I put my own pair in the holsters and begin pulling out the ones in the container. I pull out a ton of shotguns similar to my two sawed off shotguns. There was a table I could use so I took out the first one and started dismantling the barrels followed by other parts in order to dismantle the gun completely. There were lots of rusted parts from the trigger itself to several parts and springs that would pull the trigger. Like I had learned I identified the broken parts and began to dismantle the other guns away from my purchased guns and found some parts that matched and were in much better condition. From one I found one usable barrel that matched and some parts. I kept dismantling the others and continued to find the parts that I needed and replaced the broken ones with the better parts and rebuilt the broken gun so the parts wouldn''t get in the way. After i had finished i took the broken guns back to the containers and looked again but didn¡ät find any others I could use. I had enough parts for one gun so I went ahead and fixed it up and testing it out it went through the process properly without breaking. I made sure to check inside again to be sure. Then I take out the other gun after storing the first one and dismantle it to identify the damaged parts. Then I go to the containers with parts and start to look through. Let me say that finding a gun and scavenging its parts is much easier, even more so since there are close enough models that have similar parts but to find the parts needed in a huge pile is much harder. I would sometimes find half built guns, but most weren¡¯t what I needed. After an hour and a half I finally found the last part I needed, I then headed to the containers with dismantled barrels and found two replacements that were in good enough condition without much rust. I build the gun up and test it to see if it worked properly. Seeing it function I nod and smile since I had managed to properly fix them up. Finally leaving the depot I walk to the front of the shop. ¡°Oh kid! You done?¡± The elder cashier asked. ¡°Yep.¡± I said and pulled both guns out and showed him. His brow raised and gestured for me to show him. He took the first one and began to turn it and examine it and pulled the hammer and then the trigger to see if it worked. ¡°Not bad, not bad at all. These guns had been broken for quite some time but this isn¡¯t that bad of a repair. Given some time you may even manage to upgrade them from regular kinetic guns to energy or even psionic guns.¡± He said and handed me the shotgun back. ¡°How are psionic guns made?¡± I asked. ¡°Don¡¯t know, Psionic tech has always been something dwarves used the most and are the only ones that understand the method to make the raw psionic tech nerves or whatever it is they call that thing they use.¡± The elder says, picks up his revolver and goes back to polishing. ¡°Just a word of advice. Get an energy weapon as well. These puppies are good on the planet or in a place with air but in a 0G area they are a pain in the ass since the recoil would mess up your balance and they don¡¯t even work in a vacuum.¡± He said. ¡°How much is a box of shells?¡± I asked ¡°50 credit a box.¡± He replies. ¡°2 boxes then.¡± I said. He nods, gets up and then pulls up two metal boxes that were more or less the size of my head. Taking them from my inventory, four bullets instantly appear in my hand. ¡°Heh, auto reload. When shells are ejected they will be stored and new shells will take their place when you grab them, ready to be loaded.¡± The elder says. I thank him for the weapons and ammo and leave the shop. ¡±Now I was down to 500 credits so I should try and get a weapon with a slightly bigger range than a shotgun.¡± I thought. So I walked to the shop with the lady that gave me directions before. She was rather nice when she gave me directions so I went there. I was still hoping to get a discount. When I reached the shop I walked in, just to find the young woman waiting at the register. ¡°Ara! It¡¯s the young dwarf from before! Hm? Looks like you found some good weapons, Heheh.¡± she said and giggled. ¡°Something funny?¡± I asked. ¡°Oh¡­ well I kind of expected a young dwarf like you to get something like a shotgun. Could almost say it¡¯s a dwarfs nature to get a heavy impact weapon.¡± She said and giggled again. ¡°Yeah¡­ I was thinking of getting a weapon with a longer range the shotgun to make up for the lack of range and precision.¡± I tell her. ¡°Oh? Quite smart when compared with some other people. Some people came and got the more expensive beginner weapons like a laser sword. I warned them that they would need energy packs to recharge the weapons but they just wanted the weapon.¡± She said. ¡±I wonder why?¡±
Oh man! I can totally see those idiots trying to act like a freaking Jedi and trying to deflect laser bullets and doing all that exaggerated crap! (lol)
¡°I only have 500 credits after buying ammo and some parts to repair the guns. Is there any discount?¡± I asked. Her expression turned somber. ¡°Not unless you''re part of the defense force that gets a 50% discount on weapons and armor.¡± She says. ¡°By defense force do Dwarf fighters count?¡± I asked a bit happy. ¡°Ara? You are a foreigner but you''re already a dwarf fighter?¡± She asked curious and looked down at my hand and noticed the gloves. ¡°Ah no, beginner rank dwarf fighter. My my, to get the first new dwarf fighter in my shop.¡± She said putting both her hands on both side of her face. She then turned and quickly ran into a back room, leaving me confused. She came back and put some things on the counter. When I saw it I was really confused. ¡°Think of this as an investment into one more person adding to our safety. A basic laser pistol and 3 energy packs for 500 credits.¡± She said. ¡°Investment? Aren¡¯t you afraid that I turn into a bandit?¡± I asked. ¡°Nah, bandits in this area are simply cruel people and not hard workers and dwarves are far from being lazy bums.¡± She said. "She sure is confident in her decisions but it''s not like me to ignore such a good discount, but now I seriously need to get to work." I thought. "If you are so confident then I will take you up on the offer." I said as I pull out the rest of my money. "Pleasure doing business with you." She said with a smile. "Just one question, how many shots do each energy pack contain?" I asked. "These basic level energy packs carry 100 charges so it''s plenty enough for you to work and get money to recharge them. Each cost 50 credits." She says and I nod and thank her for the over 30% discount and free ammo. Oh, and yeah I got a holster for the pistol. Looks similar to a police holster and is more of an add on to my current strap. Hope to make some holsters like the robocop in the future. Happy after getting two great deals and arming myself I ask around to find the elevator down to the hangar. I had to ask around a bit before I could find it though, and when I did I found someone rather interesting. "Ah! Son, so here you are!" Yep, my dad was standing there with his massive size of 210 cm wearing some basic armor and with something that looked like a mace on his side but it felt somehow strange. Maybe it was an energy weapon "Hi dad." I called out as I reached him. "Son, I''d like you to meet Jessica. She is the daughter of an old friend and asked me to assist her until she gets past the androids starting phase." Dad said and gestured to the young lady behind him. She was 168 cm tall with platinum blonde hair, shining blue eyes, with the awesome robotic vein like marks in the iris. Her curves were gentle and didn''t go showing off. The best way to call her is petite but she did have the womanly curves. I can¡¯t tell her age but considering dad said she was the daughter of an old friend and is playing so she had to be over 18. "Hi, I''m Noah." I say and stick my hand out which she takes and nods. "Jessica." She said simply. Quiet one isn''t she. "So where are you guys going?" I asked. "Down to the hangar. All new androids need regular maintenance since the hardware is still basic at best." Jessica said. "Oh, I''m going back down too, you will probably want some sound mufflers cause the noise is intense." I tell them. "Wait? Didn''t you go the mechanic route? Shouldn''t you already be down there?" Dad asked. "I did but I screwed up cause I unlocked all the Psi exits, which dwarves don''t normally do." I said. Before I could say more Jessica turned away hiding her snickering. "By the way dad, how do you call yourself here?" I asked. "Oh, never told you? Name is Roktar!" He said with a grin. "Rockstar huh?" I said looking at him with an expressionless poker face. He seemed to be a bit downhearted, how easily I spotted the reference. *Ding* As we were talking the elevator opened and some people exited the elevator while we entered. "Just a warning but the hanger is a 0 Gravity zone so you will need to be ready." I tell them. They both were a bit surprised hearing my warning. "I get it, the zero gravity makes it easier to move around large objects that would normally need machinery." Jessica said. I nodded as the door closed. From there the elevator rose up towards the central area. We were still in the rotating axis. As the elevator rose I could feel the G force getting weaker as we neared the focal point of the rotation.
Activating Magnet Boots. Also Congrats at having your dad find you a hot girlfriend! XD
"SHUT UP YOU STUPID AI!!" I shouted and dismissed the message before anyone else saw. Sadly, when I looked, dad was grinning like a moron. We didn''t speak as the elevator rose so it was quiet. Moments later the elevator shook a bit before continuing. The two next to me also began to float and were caught a bit off guard. "We are in the hangar area so be ready for the noise." I said as I put on the headphones that I had left hanging around my neck. With them on I easily handled the noise when the door opened but the other two didn¡¯t and they instantly blocked their ears and groaned in pain. Knowing the feeling I could only look at them with a bit of pity as I grabbed both with Psi and push them along. As we walk out of the elevator one of the mechanics notices the situation and with a wave of his hand a metal cabinet opens. From it, two headphones float out towards us. "Kid! Catch!" He shouted. Seeing the headphones floating freely I grabbed them with my own psi and pull them over. I can see now why we don''t need so many of them open in zero gravity every little push or tug will affect something that isn¡¯t latched down. Grabbing both in my hand I go and hand them to the suffering duo. The mechanic who threw me the headphones also came over and landed in front of us sticking to the ground as if it was natural. "So, what do you guys need in this noisy ass hell place?" He asked. He looked human in every way ,shape or form. "I came to get a job." I said. "I came for maintenance." Jessica replied. "I''m with the lass until she gets stronger hardware and can protect herself." Dad said. "Alright, kid you have magnet boots so you''re from the mechanic course. Since this is a good opportunity for you to learn robot and android maintenance go search for Gunner and he should be able to give you a quick rundown of the skill." He says and asks his AI for Gunners location and points us that way. With dad now not getting bothered by the noise he could use his own psi to more or less pull himself along. His years of experience in playing as a puppeteer in Second Life online helped him imagine the psi as strings he use to pull himself with. We all had hooks and wires but it was a bit of a waste and a distraction for the mechanics who floated around and walked on the ground... or walls. We found Gunner inside a newly built robot miner, testing out the movement. He noticed me arriving and gave a nod my way before he started shouting for someone to replace him. Like most of the others, he easily uses his Psi to move himself in zero gravity and lands on the ground near us. "So, got yer psi exits blocked now?" He asked chuckling. I lift my hands showing the gloves. "Good, that¡¯s all ya need for mechanics but I guess you got a way to punch a bit harder now at least. So who are they?" He asked. I introduce them both and jessica asks for android maintenance. "Ah see. Okay follow me? There is a maintenance and repair station near here." He says. We follow him to a cleared station with several metal seats. Gunner had me sit Jessica on one of the seats which actually were magnetic so she sat firmly and didn''t bounce off. "Now listen closely. Gonna teach ya android an¡¯ robot repair. Dis is basic stuff so ya got ta train but ya will get dat a lot wit all de new androids dat will slowly upgrade." He said. From there he has Jessica open the plates on her back. I was rather surprised her armor opened with the skin plating but I guess that''s to be expected for an android''s armor. Gunner goes over the things I need to look out for in that area. Then we moved on to the front, then shoulders, arms, hands, legs, feet and then finally the head. It takes about 30 minutes for a check up and I was surprised there were some parts that already showed some damage. When we finished I gained the skill mentioned before.
Robot/Android MaintenanceRarity1.5Level 1
A skill used to find and fix damaged parts inside a robot or android. Improves quality of repairs by 1%
"Alrighty lass. All done, ya should keep de headphones until ya can install sound dampers. If ya need repairs just look for the lad here. Can''t bother pro''s wit simple repairs right." Gunner said. "Yes sir. I should be going though. Need to make use of my time before the next maintenance." She said. "I can take her from here." Dad said. Before he left he moved away a bit with Jessica, before returning alone. "Good luck son and just so you know, jessica lives somewhat close to us in real li...uff!" He says but I cut him off with a punch to his face. "GET GOING YOU CRAPPY OLD MAN!" He spun around a lot while drifting towards a mechanic who quickly noticed him and stopped him. He was dizzy and his nose was bleeding a bit but nothing too bad. He actually just laughed it off before pulling Jessica to the elevator. "Quite de lass, boy." Gunner said but I just grumbled. I didn''t notice but he made a mischievous grin. "So kid, how was it inside de young lass!" I glared at him almost breathing fire as he started laughing. After a bit we calmed down. "Alright, let''s get ya working. Come wit me so we can get ya to build us some parts." He said and started heading towards the rear part of the hangar and through a large door. Chapter 7: Dwarf Fighter Boot camp Author''s Corner: Alright, first off i will go and say, to those who are still complaining about it. STOP BITCHING ABOUT THE FUCKING RACE!! Seriously, the fic is already at 13 chaps stored up to be edited, i will not fucking redo the entire fucking fic just to satisfy the ppl that want android MC especially when i will have more then one in the crew that will be forming in a few chapters. PS: Besides the rant about the race, since so many ppl are unsatisfied with it, i removed the dwarven accent since so many ppl hated it. (pain in the ass really but whatever) Enjoy
Okay... I had really underestimated the size of the space station since I can''t see it from outside. Let me explain why. The hangar area has a diameter of 50 meters and a length of 100 meters. I hadn''t really thought about it even after I saw from the park that something may be behind it. What is behind it is a 40 meter long depot separated into a few sections. Behind that is a 60 meter long factory separated in blocks for building numerous different things. Asking Lia to make me a rough diagram as well as showing the places the hangar, depot and factory split off from as well as including the ring and its dimensions it ended like this.
(one of these "[" brackets is equal to 20 meters) (one of these "_" underlines is equal to 10 meters) [ ] [ ] [ _ ] [ ] [ _ ] [ _ ] _ _ _ _ [ ] _ _ _ _ [ _ ] [ _ _ _ _ _ ] [ ] [ _ _ _ _ _ ] [ ] [ ] [ _ _ _ _ _ ] | _ _ | (Sorry for the poor drawing, i can''t use tab so it came out as shit)
This is what it looks like, though it still sucks. Yeah nearly twice as long as what I had thought and it didn¡¯t actually end there. At the back of the factory was a long tunnel which lead to a second hangar with its own separate ring so it was like two massive towns in one station. Anyways, I was in one of the blocks of the factory near the depot because the parts I was making were supposed to be some android parts for repairs. Gunner said I had to get them ready because there would be a regular influx of androids needing repairs. Though I would have liked to work with my hands, being in a 0 gravity area and working with small parts just doesn¡¯t work out, especially when I had been given a quota to fill up three boxes (each around 30x30x30cm) with parts by the end of the shift at 15:00, but since each part had a few dozen components so it was taking an annoyingly long time. It was currently 13:00 and I had just taken a break when a dwarf came through and gave me a closed plastic box with food which I enjoyed quite a lot. I had 2 boxes filled already. As I put the last part into the second box a message appears.
Mechanic skill has leveled up
Seeing the mechanics skill level up, I call up the skill to see the boost I get from it.
Mechanic (mastery)Rarity1.5Level 4
A mandatory skill for those who aspire to be Mechanics. This skill encases all the knowledge you possess of any form of Mechanics whether it¡¯s building guns, items or even ships. The Skill improves all mechanic operations by 2%. This Skill stacks with other mechanic based skills improving the general performance.
¡°So the skill effect goes up 0.5 each level. So at level 100 it will improve my ability with mechanics by 50%, nice¡± I said and smile while wiping my forehead that was covered in sweat. Using psi to build machine parts didn¡ät have a high consumption rate but my control isn¡¯t that good so I always lost some with each action and after working for so long, the mental fatigue had started to build up. But there were some unexpected gains from this. Through several hours of constantly using Psi to build these parts fast enough I gained 1 mentality point. With 0.55 psi regen I can recover 1 point every 2 seconds and my current capacity is 402 so it takes 13 minutes and 24 seconds to fully recharge my psi. But that can change. Unlike before in the tutorial, I am now in the real game. I start by removing my gloves and then focus on all 28 exits in my hands. There was a slight flow leaving and entering through them. I stop the leaking of psi from my hand and try to pull psi in from the outside into my body through the now obstructed exits. It was faint but I did feel psi entering me so I close my eyes and focus on that feeling. I saw how the new psi was just entered my hands and barely flowed beyond my wrists. That is when I remember that meditation in other games required to have the mana flow through the body. So I have my remaining psiflow into my hands and mingle with the new Psi and pull the mixed Psi back into my body. I felt a change as a current was built and psi started to flow faster. Soon I felt it hit the Limit and so I stopped the flow. Looking at the time I realized I had saved nearly half the time I would have had to wait through meditating. Or was it something different?
MeditationRarity1Level 1
Skill used by Psi users to regenerate their Psi at a quicker pace by absorbing the natural ambient Psi. Increases Psi regen in proportion to the number of psi exits used to absorb Psi. 10 exits = 1 20 exits = 1.5
Now this is useful. So I can increase my psi regen to over 2 psi per second through meditating. Seeing how I could now spam this I put the gloves back on and began working again. I focus my attention to produce the parts as fast as possible but still construct them correctly. I spend the remaining two hours assembling the parts one by one since I don¡¯t have the control to construct multiple parts at the same time. Not to mention I wanted to train my external psi manipulation to actually get that skill. If I opened all the exits it may become easier, but what would be the fun of training and grinding if you didn¡¯t do it in unfavorable conditions. The moment the clock hit 15:00 o''clock the doors opened with Gunner there. ¡°Kid! You finished?¡± He says. I almost lost my focus as I finish the part. I take the part and put it into the box that was only filled up to a third. ¡°No, only got 2 full boxes and a third of the last one.¡± I said with a sigh. He walks over and looks at the two full boxes and starts laughing. ¡°Not bad! Not bad! For your first time making ¡®em, you did quite well. Never expected you to complete the order anyway with your mediocre skills in both mechanics and psi control, but still, two boxes is impressive enough. That shows that you are quite close to getting External Psi manipulation.¡± He said. ¡°How exactly do these skills help with Psi manipulation, besides just moving it around?¡± I asked. ¡°It makes it easier to change the structure of Psi. Tell me, did Colonel tell you to train them by buffing your body?¡± Gunner asked. ¡°Yeah, he said about thinking of making a rock like structure around my fists, arm muscles and skin.¡± I tell him. ¡°Have you tried that yet?¡± He asked. ¡°No, didn''t have the time and don¡¯t really get how to change the structure.¡± I tell him. ¡°Ever see what a crystal¡¯s molecular structure is like?¡± he asked. ¡°It¡¯s supposed to make polygonal shapes depending on the crystal.¡± I reply. ¡°More or less correct. ¡®ere catch.¡± He says and tosses me a small yellow gem. I catch it and look at the gem and notice it was a large fist sized topaz gemstone. ¡°You ain¡¯t gonna learn how to change the structure of Psi just by practicing. Push your psi through there and feel and learn the structure. You can keep the stone for 3 days to learn.¡± He said and walked to one of the boxes, which were all made of metal, and put a lid on it and lifted it with ease. ¡°Grab the other box. Android¡¯s are starting to come in for repairs and you''re on duty.¡± He says. I nod and put the lid on the box. I then open the small tool box on my back and store the topaz stone before picking up the box and following him. We crossed the depot and entered the hangar. My eyes bulged a bit when I noticed the number of androids. It was easy to tell, they formed lines towards the several dozen repair and maintenance areas. From far I could see lots of newbie mechanics at the spots with pro''s teaching them. Gunner led me to the nearest spot and told me to get to it then. There were four other players there which were already working. I take the last bench and me and Gunner put the boxes down. "Alright, spot is open." Gunner shouted. One of the androids walked over. I looked at his feet and saw the Metallic soles used for magnetic boots. He sat down and opened the back plates. "Kay, get to it. But if any of ''em get cocky just kick ¡®em away." Gunner said serious. "Seems fine by me." I said and nodded. I then unlatched the tool box which looked like a backpack and opened the first parts box and started to work. Remembering what I had learned I began going through everything, making sure nothing was broken. I found the first damaged part in the wrist followed by some more in the legs. The areas of most movement and impact I guess you could say. Next one was similar as were most of the others. There were some with cracks in the joints while some others literally had screws loose in their heads. After three hours I met Jessica again. "Again?" I asked. "Beginner android bodies are quite fragile. I''ll probably be bothering you or other mechanics several times a day before I can get out of this state.¡± She says and sits down. "I see. Well, let''s get to it." I said. She sits down and I start to work. It was then when I was changing a part on her left arm that I notice the stares from the other men. I was wondering why but then I noticed that apart from her the line, consisted of only male androids. Which meant Jessica specifically waited to come for repairs here. "So...is there a reason you came here instead of a female mechanic?" I asked as I started to attach the new part screwing it in. "Gunner said to look for you, remember?" She replied. "Yeah... I remember. Didn''t think you would do what he said though." I replied frankly. "Don''t want others touching me. You¡¯re uncle Nolands son so you are fine." She said. "So it¡¯s uncle now, huh? I Wonder which old friend dad was talking about. He had tons but not many to the degree of intimacy like this." I though. "Speaking of him, where is he?" I asked. She waited for me to finish the part and then pointed to the huge dwarf checking out the robots. "Uncle has a thing for large robots." She said. "I know, when he played Second Life, he was called ¡®the Tank¡¯ because he owned and controlled over 50 large puppets. I bet later on he will ask for robot armor like that." I said. "Did you ever play as a puppeteer?" She asked. "A little, but it wasn''t my favorite. Prefer the crafting based classes and jobs. I like to move and force my body more than what simply fighting can do." I tell her. A smile appears on her face and I continue repairs on her other arm. She was actually the most damaged android I repaired today. "Exactly what are you doing? Your body received higher damage compared to other androids?" I asked as I finish her repairs. She gets up and tests her body. "Junkyard diving, looking for weapons, broken ships and parts to make schematics to train skills and become a machine planner. Learning advanced coding system as well." She says. That explains it. Typing would mostly cause wear to the hands and arms but she is moving around lots of metal so her damage is more extensive. "Don''t overdo it. You don''t have a body that can handle that much at the moment." I tell her. A smile rises on her face. "Thank you for worrying but uncle is helping, so he does most of the work, though I still help where I can." She replied. I nod and say goodbye. She walks towards dad while I wait for the next person, but no one comes. That''s when I hear the comments. "Can''t believe such a hot chick waited specifically for this shitty newbie! He only has mass and no real strength!" Someone said in the crowd. "Must have gotten lucky somehow. No way a trashy midget could get such an amazing girl like that." Another one said. There were more comments as I just waited a bit but no one walked up. Finally my patience wore out. "Alright, who is next!" I shouted rather pissed. No one moved for a while. After about 20 seconds I noticed somebody floating this way. Actually, a lot of somebodies. Lots of female androids were coming over and landing in front of the men. "We saw these idiots ignoring the open seat so can we get in line?" The first one that landed asked. "Be my guest. As long as you don''t mind me being the one repairing?" I said. She walked over and sat down confidently. "That girl from before got repaired here and you worked properly so we don''t have any worries. We even asked her about the quality and she said you learned from the leading mechanic so I don''t mind." She said with a confident expression. Seeing no reason to delay it, I started. I noticed she had quite a number of parts with cracks and most had something to do with moving the arms and upper body in combat. "Are you training to fight?" I asked. "Yep! Started using swords but the damage it brings is much more extensive." She says. "I would say, it looks like you''re ready to break. You should get repairs more often and upgrade your parts with better ones to handle the strain." I tell her as I start to repair her. The piercing glares of the men didn''t affect me in the least. They were idiots for ignoring my call so in turn they passed their turn in line. After a few repairs I noticed a few parts for which I didn''t have any spares, so after telling her not to move much I removed the part and repaired it by taking it apart and rebuilding before putting it back in. Had to do the same for several other parts all over her body. "Damn! It¡¯s reckless to train with such a fragile body. Still, at least now I know which parts fighters would get damaged through combat movement." I say.
I''ve also taken a snapshot of all the parts when they were taken apart while you repaired them. So just ask for them when you are building them.
I frown a bit, thinking she was a bit too helpful this time.
Why are you looking at me with that frown?!
"You''re being awfully quiet and helpful the last few hours." I said.
It comes from the deepest parts of my generosity and since I was bored.
"Spill it, what do you want?" I said. Her hologram looked away, not meeting my eyes.
A body... duh!
So in other words she wanted to suck up to me for a body. "Your AI sure has a distinctive personality. she seems like the kind that would also get overconfident after getting what she wants." The android I was repairing said as she closed up the remaining skin plates and armor.
OI! I resent that!! ... Though I can''t really deny it either...
I sigh reading what she said while the android giggles. "Anyway, thanks for the repairs." The android said.
Robot/Android Maintenance has leveled up.
I wave and when I looked the next android was sitting down. "Alright let''s get to it." I said with a grin. The level up was well appreciated because I noticed something strange. Seem about 80% of the male androids were geeks and uncreative people because most needed just basic repairs but the females went out of their way to do much more than training technician skills. Some were pilots, other fighters. They just weren''t mechanics because they seemed to think that it would only be useful later on since they can''t repair themselves at the moment. Not like I was complaining. Because the more damaged the android was the more exp I gained through repairing them. Around 20% of the male androids in more serious condition even came to me since they saw that my repairing speed was slowly getting faster. After several hours of checking, replacing parts, repairing parts and fixing the robots, all the new parts I made were used up and I had a box filled with trashed android parts that I had to rebuild from scratch as I was repairing. This would help me later since I can use undamaged parts to make new parts. Oh right, I gained three more levels in maintenance, one in mechanics skill and got a new skill.
Parts RepairRarity1Level 1
A skill used primarily to repair either by rebuilding or just replacing components. Replacing components becomes 0.5% easier. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.Rebuilding broken part becomes 0.5% easier.
The skill increased the repair speed since the effects of this skill stacked with the robot/android maintenance and mechanic skills. After 19:00 o clock the pro mechanics ended their work shift and called groups of unrepaired androids and literally showed off their skills fixing an android every five minutes. In no time at all the androids had been repaired. Us newbies had been clearly shown the difference in skill. "Alright, work hours done. Newbies, line up to receive your room number and passcode as well as the location it''s found at." Gunner shouted his voice booming through the hangar. The pro mechanics were all leaving while the players lined up. They were using a strange machine to scan the face of everyone and the put something similar to a cash register scanner over the pc on everyone''s left arm. They were probably passing the info to the AI''s. I was probably 10th in line since Guner had gotten near me before calling out. "Residents zone 1, block 1, number 3. Residents zone 1 block 1, number 4..." gunner kept calling out as each person passed. When it got to me he scanned and passed the info. "Kid, after i give you your info just wait here for me to show you the way." He says. I shrug and hear a beep. "Dwarven Fighter Quarters zone, Block 1, Number 1." He said. I stepped out and waited some steps away. "So where is this place?" I asked Lia.
... Seems to be in the other ring. Let me see here...
She went quiet for a while. I just waited since I didn''t have the exact coordinates.
Seems I mistook what kind of place each hangar was? It seems the current hanger is for the production and storing of machines and robots destined to go planetside for usage in the mines or terraforming. The other hangar is used for production and storing of the guard and armed forces of the station and possibly planet. The dwarven fighter quarters is in the ring but there is no definitive location it seems.
It made me raise a brow reading what she said. Since I could do nothing about it, I just waited until all the players except about 30 were left, which would go to the same place as me. Looking at their gloves I could see the same emblem that was on my own. "Alright! You guys are the few who were either dumb or ignorant enough to unseal to many Psionic exits. There is no real problem with doing that, but now all of you need specific training to control your psi properly. Come on and follow me." Gunner says and leads us to the very back of the factory near the center block. There was a large gate at that location and he punched some codes into a panel at the side that opened the door. "Though this ring has basic fighter training facilities and can store some newbie gear, dwarf fighter training is much harder. From now until you can don, fill and use a psionic dwarf fighter robot you¡äre gonna be in training while working during the day hours." Gunner says as if he is a judge giving us a court sentence. On the other side of the door was one of those large industrial elevators used for carrying heavy loads. "Hop on!" He said and walked onto the elevator. I walked on first while the others hesitated a bit before doing the same seeing as they weren''t being given a choice. In front of us was a huge tunnel which, once everyone was on, began to pass us as the elevator slid along its rails. The door behind us closed and looking to the other end I saw that there were at least 500 meters between the hangars. I also noticed how the tunnel was filled with turrets though most were inactive. "This tunnel here keeps unwanted folks from invading the station. You don''t know this but that side of the station has the strongest shield generators. The reason is to keep unwelcomed guests from the weaker side of the station while directing them to the heavily armed side." Gunner explained. "So the turrets..." someone started asking. "Are present in nearly all corridors and will attack anyone that isn''t authorized to be on this side. The basic fighters are on that side but things like guards quarters and so on are all here. Most guards take their ship back from the residents side to the military side. After you can properly use Psionic robots you all will probably have enough skill to build one by then." Gunner said as the elevator reaches the other side. The door starts to open and I can see the Colonel already there waiting. "Alright Colonel! They''re all yours!" Gunner said. "Aye, alright you louts! Follow me and dun get lost. This side of the station is a real maze and your AI ain¡¯t got enough info to move around here without getting lost." Colonel said. We nod and leave the elevator which closes behind us once all of us had gotten off. "Okay! During the night hours, which is after 20:00 o¡¯clock until 02:00 o¡¯clock you lot belong to me. You will be training how to properly control your Psi till you can easily fill our psionic technology with your psi so you can fight properly. The gloves and boots you¡äre wearing are the most basic of the basic training gear we have. In general for a dwarf to be able to push his psi into it you need at least level 5 in Inner Psi Manipulation. All psionic tech has a basic benchmark but that doesn¡¯t mean it''s set in stone." Colonel says to us in a commanding tone. As none of us says anything he turns and walks away and we follow behind him. As we walk through the maze I make sure Lia is updating the map we have of this side. To tell the truth she told me we only had an outside view of it and not the real map so instead of replacing information she was simply building the map. As we walked, Colonel started talking again. "I''m sure you all got a crystal gemstone from Gunner earlier today, correct?" He asked. I said yes but a few just mumbled. "What was that!" He said and looked back shouting, scaring us all with his militaristic change in personality. "SIR, YES SIR!!" We all shout. "Good, now as Gunner himself said, ye all got 3 days to figure out the crystals molecular structure and change your psi to match it, creating the proper boost effect." He says as we reach a door. Inside was a large elevator like before but this one headed upwards. Walking on we go up and feel the shake from entering the rotating axis. "I am taking you to your quarters, there is food waiting there already so dig in and begin practicing." Colonel said. The 40 meter rise went by quickly and soon we leave and what we see is a shocking scene of a hundreds of armed guards, trucks pulling large turret guns being repaired, large robots walking around, some pulling and lifting huge machinery on their back. We walk until we pass through a door which was on a wall similar to what separated parks from the sectors. Half expecting one I was shocked further when instead of a park we found a large area of hangars even more extensive than the hangars above us itself. The 40 meters of the space here was split directly down the middle with with both sides having air crafts ready for battle if need arises. "This is the airfield. We don¡ät need the parks like the resident ring. If you newbies look up you will notice that what is keeping the air in here is an energy shield instead of a 20 cm nanofiber glass window. This is so that the ships can come or leave at a moment''s notice. As you can tell, there is no dwarf fighter robots, that¡äs because we are a different branch from the regular guards. the best way to call it is special forces I guess. We are normally only called in when there is a huge bandit raid or for the subjection of high danger space or planetside monsters!" He said. From there we walked through the airfield as he told us about the ships which range from heavily armed tank like ships, which were slow, to very agile stealth fighters with stealth tech to ambush important ships. Passing through another gate, after walking nearly 500 meters to reach it, we entered a new airfield but this one was leagues better in terms of technology. The first 50 meters had robots of the same model that I saw in the workshop room in the other ring. Beyond that were much more powerful robots that were already entering the realm of mechas. While the ¡°basic¡± looking ones were around 2.5 - 3 meters tall the mechs were around 3.5 to 4 meters tall with long protruding ¡°wings¡± on its back. Some had four wings, two pointing up and two down while other had six. There were a few floating and some flying and sparing outside in space. It was like watching one of those sci-fi animes with the mecha¡¯s. That is the best comparison. ¡°This is the pride and joy of all dwarves! The dwarf fighters airfield, you may have wondered why people respect us so much? Well this is why! I have said before, the main difference between the guards and us is equipment! That simple difference puts us worlds apart from them.¡± Colonel said with all his pride and joy. ¡°Sir¡­ if dwarves have this then why aren¡¯t they the strongest race in the universe? Or have their own separate faction?¡± I asked outright. ¡°Because nearly all races have their own trump card. Elves, as you may know, have their annoyingly massive talent with Exterior Psi manipulation. As long as an elf is strong and experienced enough, they can fight on par with a dwarf of equal rank and experience when he is armored for combat.¡± He said. ¡°Let¡¯s put it like this, if you take a dwarf and an elf and have each with only the top ten digits of their hands with psi exits open, dwarves can lift about 100 grams right? An elf on the other hand can lift 1 kilo.¡± He said. Most of our eyes grew wide. That was a difference of nearly 10 times the weight with the same amount of exits. It clearly showed racials were something else. ¡°On the other hand, Ogres have their ability to learn to use new weapons with much greater ease. Our robot¡¯s count as weapons so they can also learn to pilot one of our suits. Terrians are similar and not only that, they have ingenuity to use what they got on hand, which makes them threatening and an annoyance to fight when they got some good gear. Just so you know both the dominion and Holy Federation have their own models of our tech since all the races split off into one of the three galactic factions. Our models are the most neutral and keep closest to the original design of what it was originally.¡± Colonel says. ¡°Tosks have their natural armor and swiftness add that to the fact that they are excellent warriors and second best at Inner Psi manipulation, after us they are the race that most give us trouble when fighting one on one with similar gear. As for the androids, those who don¡¯t go after psi upgrades retain a natural trait called Overclocking. It pushes their bodies to the limit but they overheat quickly by using this, leading to said overheating. Still, it¡¯s enough to overpower someone of similar rank if they aren¡¯t careful.¡± I was actually expecting that to be honest. A humanoid robot is a few steps from becoming a robot again it¡äs not very surprising. ¡°Now then, as you can see, the basic models are gonna be your training gear once you can activate the basic psionic tech gear. Now to your rooms.¡± He said and led us through the field into the next door where we found rooms. Lots and lots of rooms. Each one had a number but only after we reached a section with a big sign stating ¡°Newbie sector¡± over it did we get to enter the room. ¡°Remember the number you were given and go into your room. Just a warning, you have 3 days to learn the crystals structure. If you fail to do so you will be making 10 boxes of spare parts for the others to repair the robots.¡± Colonel said. He turned his back and let out a loud laugh. I simply sighed and turn to the door with a number 1 on it. There was a digital scanner above the handle so I put my left wrist over it and it was scanned. I hear a click which meant it opened, so I entered. The room was basic at best. Just a bedroom with a single bed, a rack for my armor and a closet with some casual clothes. I remove the armor completely and put some of the clothes on and found they fit properly. Maybe there was an auto adjustment. Not everything can be realistic. With some more comfortable clothes on I open the toolbox on my armor and take out the topaz crystal and sit on the bed. Before I start I saw a window appear from the wrist of the armor.
Might be bad to say this, but why not cheat? A quick log out and look in the net for the image of the molecular structure (which happens to be a construction of triangles forming prisms) and come back and try it.
¡°Thanks for the hint, but while seeing several tens of thousands of virtual images of the structure is easy, I can¡¯t get the same feeling that I would get by doing what I need to do.¡± I said. Still it was helpful to know the basic setup...maybe. ¡°So how was it again¡­¡± I mutter.
Push your psi into the gem then reabsorb the psi and try to read the structure.
¡°Thanks¡­ and you really seem far too helpful!¡± I said.
THAT¡¯S BECAUSE THERE IS NOTHING TO DO DAMN IT!! Go train faster and get into one of those robot''s so i can have fun checking out those beauties!!!
¡°Wow¡­ stressed much. Wait¡­ don¡¯t tell me you plan to scan the systems of the robot to make plans for a body for yourself?¡± I said suddenly getting such thoughts.
>.> <.< (Shall not confirm or deny) I shall leave it to your imagination what this great AI¡¯s sexy body will turn out as!
I just sigh at the delusions of this AI. Still while she is delusional I can work with it since she is being helpful at the moment. Following what she said, I focus on my right hand and will the Psi to move out of my body and start to flow into the gem. I feels as if a barrier was around the gem similar to how my skin keeps blocking my psi from going out. Seeing it was like this I spread the psi over the entire gem¡¯s surface covering it completely while trying my best to not let the psi drift off even though some does despite my efforts. I then have the psi push in at once. I feel several spots where psi entered. Was a bit surprised it was at the edges of the gem but that made it easier. The gem was long like a prism and since psi enters from the edges, I put the top end on my right hand were I will try to continuously release my psi and funnel it into the point and once enough psi is inside the gemstone I will try to remove it from the other end and establish a current into my body. With a plan in mind I start to meditate on this plan. Pushing psi out with one hand and absorbing with the other. It didn¡¯t really go well doing two contradicting actions with my level of skill, especially with external psi. Instead I changed plan and started to fill the gem from both sides. I dump 95% of my psi inside with no visible change to it but when I tried to pull out the psi it felt as if I was pulling a rock. ¡°So this is why dwarves are so stubborn. Their psi has hardened to be like crystals.¡± I said rather annoyed. Sticking my index finger on one edge I quickly eject psi and try to reabsorb it. As the psi enters I instantly feel a rising resistance towards removing the psi and in turn had to push a bit more psi to cover what I was removing, until it finally was absorbed into my body again. ¡°Damn it! I got a tiny fragment but had so much psi absorbed by the gem!¡± I complained. Still, I focus on the fragment of topaz psi. Well in truth I meditated to regain my lost psi before I focused on it. I tried to feel the psi or try to spread it but it was too difficult. I tried to cause my psi to erode the crystal psi with no effect. Reaching the ends of my patience I imagine the fragment burning and in response my psi begins vibrating violently, making the topaz psi vibrate and start to spread as it started to open up. I was surprised it worked but the surprise made me lose my concentration so the vibration stopped and the psi closed up again. Seeing it work, I did it again causing it to slowly spread open until it was stretched. While keeping the vibration I start to push my psi through the opened topaz psi. What I felt were just like Lia said, triangle structure building a kind of pyramid shape. Feeling mentally exhausted I let my psi calm down. The fragment closed up after that and I was sweating a lot. Still I got more or less what I wanted. I go get the gloves and boots and put them on and start to push psi to my right hand. As it¡äs about to reach the final digit I stopped it and imagined the structure I remember and began to slowly mold the psi to that shape. I started at the joint between my top digits and the middle ones and slowly worked it back all the way to the wrist. When I finished I suddenly felt the weight of my hand as it had grown heavy like the topaz crystal. [Tr][Tr][Tr][Tr]
You have leveled up Inner Psi manipulationYou have leveled up Psi ReinforcementYou have gained 1 points of MentalityYou have learned a new skillReinforced FistRarity2Level 1
A fist that has been reinforced by psi that has been structured like a very hard material. It makes the punch several times harder and the strength of the body part higher. Psi cost: 100 per fist Reinforces fist by 5% and makes attacks 5% stronger Remains active but takes 0.30 from psi regen to maintain
¡±Seeing the boost in levels and getting the new skill I seem to have found the correct path. Though I wonder how many would get so lucky to accidently cause their psi to vibrate to get at the psi to open up.¡± I thought. ¡±Not my problem, I¡¯m here to train and should worry about myself first and get the proper skills.¡± I tell myself as I focus on my arm muscles and get focused for another round of skill grinding. Chapter 8: Shuttle Husk and Upgrades Out of the three days i had to learn to reinforcements, it took me 1 day for each of the reinforcement buffs i needed to learn. Just so you know, it took me about 2 hours, surprisingly, to feel what the structure of topaz psi felt like. After i had discovered the vibrating thing, i tried to vibrate the psi inside the crystal but that failed miserably. Anyway I hadn¡¯t noticed that making the reinforcement took nearly 6 hours. Now knowing how to activate the skill i can reinforce my fist in under 2 minutes. Yes i spend the day, during work, training this skill by activating and deactivating it. The next night, after i had returned to my room, i began on the next buff which would increase my defense by reinforcing the skin. Colonel said to focus on the arms since you normally use your arms to protect the face or impact zone. To get the skill i had to reinforce my skin from the top of the shoulder down to the end of the gloves. I barely managed to get an arm done before it was time to sleep, but it was enough to get the skill.
Reinforced SkinRarity2Level 1
Skin that has been reinforced by psi which has been structured to imitate a very hard material. It makes the skin several times harder and increases the strength of the body part. Psi cost: 250 per arm Reinforced Skin increases defense by 10% Remains active but takes 0.20 (per arm) from psi regen to maintain
I gained another level in Inner psi manipulation and Psi Reinforcement, reaching level 3 and level 4 respectively. The next day i got started on the muscle reinforcement. Though it should be isolated muscle reinforcement, considering you punch with the entire arm, which meant using all the arm¡¯s muscles, i needed to reinforce it entirely before reinforcing the muscles so i don¡¯t break my arm while using my boosted strength. So i reinforce my arm from the wrist to the shoulder, then focus on my biceps and triceps. Since they work together there is no point in not focusing on them together. From the start of it to the end i reinforce those muscles. With that i gain levels in the psi manipulation and reinforcement skills and the last of the three skills Colonel required.
Reinforced MuscleRarity2Level 1
Muscles that have been reinforced by psi which has been structured to imitate a very hard material. It increases their resistance and strength by several times. Psi cost: 300 for all muscles in 1 arm Reinforces muscles and increases Strength by 5% Remains active but takes 0.40 from psi regen to maintain
At the end of the fourth day we all gathered and Colonel tested us on each skill. About half of the 30 actually managed to get all three skills. Of these, 10 of those who didn¡¯t learn them all learned 2 while the remaining 5 had only learned 1 skill. Like he promised, those who didn¡¯t get all the skills were taken by a second dwarf to do their punishment but i bet it was an excuse to make the parts as well as to train them with psi and other skills. ¡°Alright you remaining brats. You all should have level 4 inner psi manipulation by now, Right?!¡± Colonel asked shouting. ¡°YES SIR!¡± We shouted. ¡°Good, now though i said Psionic tech needs minimal level 5 in inner psi manipulation, you will try and break it in with level 4 since you¡äll get more by forcing it.¡± He said. I look at the glove and think what it would be like. I try to push the psi into the glove. I was met with resistance but it felt similar to when i was first releasing my exits. ¡°Before we start, those a you that haven¡¯t opened all your psi exits will spend the next few days doing that. Those of you which have already done that start training. You need to be able to push your psi into your gloves and boots.¡± Colonel instructed. With his instructions some of the people removed their gloves and boots. I cringe when i see them do that with their gloves since the pain is going to be a bitch after opening other openings. Since i did that already, i find a corner for myself and take some breaths then i start constructing a dam around the joint of my right hand using the reinforcement skill. I simply block it off with what i consider one of the strongest walls i would ever see. I even tried to push some psi through it by was happy to see none leaked through unless i broke the psi dam i built. With that i flood my hand as if i was using the basic reinforcement skill and make sure that there is no spot unfilled. ¡°Already then, let¡¯s do this.¡± I mutter.
NOAH!! FIGHT!!
Ignoring Lia i focus on the 9 exits that were being closed by the glove. Gritting my teeth i finally push the flooding psi with the exit as focus. At once an indescribable pain began shooting up my arm. I feel some psi starting to leak like the exits had been when i first started. Though my own exits were opened with the psi entering the glove it felt like i was adding something to my hand and that other thing was still closed off from me so i needed to rip it open but i was feeling the same pain as if i was trying to open a closed gate. I figured that the easiest method to break the gloves resistance was to repeatedly hit it with waves of Psi. My arm was going numb and after i had slammed several more waves of Psi into the glove the arm went limp, though i could still move my psi. But since i feared the consequences i stopped and stopped my attempts to open the gloves gates. I get up with my arm limp next to me. All the feeling in it was gone, but after a few minutes i started to feel that prickling as it slowly started to return. I sigh and walk around looking at the robot''s. It was during this time that even though it was called the dwarven fighters airfield, it wasn¡¯t limited to just dwarves here since there were other races working here as well but if i put it into proportions, dwarves were 85% of the people here, 15% all the other races except Tosk since this station and planet don¡¯t provide a liveable environment for them since the station and the planet are cold and have no atmosphere. After some time the feeling in my arm returned and i could move it again. Since i wanted to know how far i got i tried probing the glove and found the gates, I¡¯m calling it gates cause i actually asked and found it was called Psionic Tech Gates. Truthfully the real name for the Psi exit¡¯s in our bodies are also gates, Psionic Nerve Gates more specifically. I called it exits before since i had only been pushing the psi out but after absorbing some into my body i found it more natural to start thinking of it as gates. Anyways, checking the gates i discovered that they were about half open, compared to the size of my nerve gate. Yeah there is a size, specifically how large the gates are and how much psi can leave at once. Up till now i hadn''t really been caring about the size since the pain was huge but i moved a small bit to one of the gates and filled just the opening and began expanding the gate. I felt some discomfort but the feeling of the easily expanding gates as i push them open made me a bit frustrated by how much pain and suffering i went through to open it. After 10 minutes one gate had been completely opened and i could feel my senses expanding to a part of the glove. I reach out to all the gates with some irritation as i send psi out to all of them and slowly start widening the gates apart by simply expanding a ball of psi inside the gates. In just under an hour i had all the gates opened and started to breathe a bit deeply since i didn¡¯t feel anything more than discomfort from all this, yet i had gone through torturous pain to unseal my nerve gates when it was this easy. I even went to my already open gates and had the psi rotate and was able to shave off a bit more since the edges were ¡°rough¡±.
You have understood the correct method to unblock both Psionic Nerve gates and Psionic Tech Gates. + 3 Mentality and Willpower
For further improving the condition of your Psionic Nerve Gates, making them smoother and stretching them, you have gained 4 Willpower.
For unblocking all psionic tech gates on both gloves and boots you get +5 mentality for each glove and boot.
You have leveled up Inner Psi Manipulation
As i was feeling my senses extending into the glove, psi slowly flowed into them and out of the Psionic tech into the gloves and started to reinforce it all the way to the gates and then into the first . I could barely contain my resentment at not being taught the proper unblocking method. If i hadn¡ät been in space i would have punched the ground. Still, i looked at my stats since i had gotten a huge boost in mental stats.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Race:Dwarf
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:580HP Regeneration:0.30
Psi:480Psi Regeneration0.62
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:30Resilience:30
Dexterity:25Agility:25
Mentality:86Willpower:62
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 2 Weapon Repair Level 3 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Dismantling Level 5 Mechanic Level 4 Basic Machine Building Level 3 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Parts Repair Level 1 Robot/Android Maintenance Level 4 Psi Reinforcement Level 5 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 5 Reinforced Fist Level 1 Reinforced Skin Level 1 Reinforced Muscles Level 1
My current psi capacity could be thought of as improvement to say the least. My stats as well were really over powered for a Level 1 but i guess skill outdoes level in this game. I noticed that over the last few days I¡äve had my stat boosts focused on mental stats instead of physical ones. Maybe i should try and get some physical training to up my strength. I had accomplished the task and so i went to look for Colonel but not once did i think about undoing the reinforcement on my fist. When i found him he was drilling some dwarves who were sparring with the large robot''s. ¡°Sir, I¡äm done!¡± I said from behind him. He turned to me confused. ¡°Done what?¡± He asked. ¡°I accessed the psionic tech and can now freely move my psi through it.¡± I said, hiding my rage. He looks at my hands and feet and although i didn¡¯t notice before there was a subtle glow from a few lit up parts. ¡°So it seems. You got some talent kid, to manage that so quickly.¡± He said. ¡°What is the proper method to opening it and don¡¯t say flooding the gates, because i did it differently!¡± I said my anger starting to show. ¡°So you founda less painful way, eh? We don¡¯t tell newbies how it''s done since we want to see talent. The method we use is to form a ball inside the gate and slowly shave away the sides as it expands.¡± he explained. ¡°So i was right.¡± I reply. ¡°Yep, still you¡äre probably tired from figuring out the trick so rest up a bit. If you don¡¯t want to, you can start making parts for android repairs, they¡äve been getting more upgrades recently so you¡äre gonna need lots of parts now.¡± he said. I nod, finally undoing the reinforcement since he was truthful with me. Still, i want to punch him anyways but i need this extra time to get ready or i might not get enough parts. Jessica PoV Looking around me i looked at the expense of trashed machinery. Currently i¡äm standing in the scrapyard. The scrapyard wasn¡¯t actually inside the main space station but in an outpost a few kilometers outside of the back side of the ring i stay at. This one has lots of armed ships coming in and out of it, but to reach this outpost i had to pay a ship to bring me here. Uncle Noland has to pay for space gear but the benefit that Androids have is that we don¡¯t breathe, so we don¡¯t need to pay extra money for stuff like that. It¡¯s been a few days already and i had finally gotten enough money from collecting salvageable parts to afford an upgrade to more durable parts. It should increase the amount of time between the repairs. I actually need to go 3 times a day now, but with these new parts i will hopefully reduce it to one time a day. Anyway, with the magnetic boots working i walk around the piles of scrap looking for salvageable stuff and soon enough i encountered some android bodies. These were NPC because their bodies were rather advanced. I grab some wires and hooks and toss it towards the area they were in since it was down a junk cliff and i was in a 0G area. Hooking it to some trash nearby and making sure it was tight i deactivate the magnetic boots and pull myself to the bodies and activate the boots to make sure i don¡¯t fly off. I look at my left arm for a moment before the armor and skin plate opens up and allows access to some tools. This came as basic equipment. Since the inventory doesn¡¯t hold many things it was made like this.
Hey hey, Big sis are you going to need help with this as well?
The message was from my AI. She acts like a little girl at around 10 years old and calls me big sister. That said, she is a really big help since she can show me lines to help and what part should be removed first. Oh right, for Androids we don¡¯t get com modules. Instead we get systems like Chats and phones which are the same things but they¡äre installed directly into our body. As for my AI, she appears as a full sized girl but only in my own view. It makes it easy for her to point something out for me and show me. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. I think this was one of the things to balance the starting of the androids since we can be called very weak when compared to other races at the start.
Big sis i found only one of these androids that are salvageable.
¡°Thanks Vivi!¡± I tell her and walk over. It was the body of a man, so i probably can¡¯t use many parts for myself but selling stuff would work, maybe i can have Noah install it into me. I remove a tool from the case. This was made specifically for opening robot and android parts. I pop the chest open and start looking around. There were some parts i had seen Noah handling and they still looked usable so consulting Vivi she guided me into removing them. After that i store them in a metal bag i had and open the head. Just as expected, it was more advanced. I had Vivi show me an imagine of what the inside of my head is and stuff i can make use of as upgrades. Her scanning skills weren¡¯t omnipotent.
Sorry sis, i can¡¯t tell you anything about these small electronic parts, you will need to remove them all if you want to be sure. For me to be able to check we would need to install a scanner into one of your eyes.
¡°I know, at least you tried so it¡¯s fine.¡± I tell her.
Still, here is how you look inside.
She brought up an image of me without the back part of my head where my hair is attached. Looking at it, i examined it and then the man. Seeing several stuff similar to mine i carefully remove the parts that were in least disrepair. As for any new parts, i took some of the newer parts as well since i can have them scanned. I continued to the arms and legs and found a few more parts i could sell or use myself if they get repaired. At the moment, all the parts hunting has netted me a profit of over 1200 credits. My total is 2200 credits. I split with uncle since he comes and helps with the heavy stuff i can¡¯t lift. Just cause things are in 0g doesn¡¯t make them any less light. Mass remains the same no matter what level of g force it¡¯s under and if you don¡¯t have the strength to move that mass it won¡¯t react, even in zero gravity. I keep dismantling the android removing his parts until only broken parts are left. One of the things i did want to take out but were broken were the Psionic nerves Vivi had identified. Those were part of the psionic technology that the dwarves used to make their armor and weapons. It was a shame but there was nothing left here. I unhooked the wire from the spot it had spun around and pulled myself up to the ledge i had been before. I stored the wire after wrapping it up and started to look around.
Roktar: Jessica, found something interesting for us to tow back and get Noah to start working on, come see!
Uncle called and said something interesting.
Jessica: Where are you?
Roktar: Having Olivia send the coordinates to you.
Olivia is uncles AI. Soon enough Vivi appeared holding a ¡°paper¡± map of the scrapyard. The scrapyard was around 20 acres large, more than 80,000 square meters large. What is kept in this are normally old husks of tools, robots, ships and all kinds of machinery.
He is about 200 meters from here.
She says and points to where i should go and vanishes only to appear near the edge of where i could see over the hill. I walk over there and follow her directions. After a bit i reached a large wrecked ship. The size was rather large. It seemed to be a space shuttle and was about 15 meters wide, 40 meters long with a height of 12-15 meters which was hard to tell since some of it was buried, that looked like to 2 floors plus a cargo bay separate on the underside, with the pilots seat on the top floor. There was a single pilot seat at the front but the main body was wider and seemed to have two floors. However there was a large hole on one side of the ship and it seems critical systems had been stripped from it. I walked around it until i was standing in front of the hole where i spot the really tall giant dwarf.
Roktar: In here, come check this ship out!
Jessica: Isn¡¯t this ship a little too damaged?
Roktar: Not at all. Compared to all the other ships and robot''s here this one is still in good conditions. The really important stuff like FTL drive and other important systems are gone, probably stripped to be used in another ship but about half of the ship is still intact. It will give Noah a good place to train his ship repairing and building.
Jessica: Shouldn¡¯t we hire the mechanics of the station to rebuild the ship?
Roktar: And you want to be the one paying? Even though you can convert real money into game money the conversion is 10 dollars for 1 credit. A ship this size would cost at least 90,000 credits just to get it to be space worthy without the FTL drive and the actual drive would cost us another 70,000. You really willing to pay 1,600,000 dollars for all this?
I looked away and blushed. I may be well off but to waste that much money like this is not an option.
Jessica: How much for the tow?
Roktar: Shouldn¡¯t cost more than 1000 credits so i will use my starting money as an investment and once you are safer i will go take contract fighting jobs to gain some money.
Jessica: You don¡¯t need to do that, i will pay half.
Roktar: None of that! You need your upgrades and if i remember right the one for more durable parts costs 2500 credits. I will not have you paying. Remember, i built up some of my own money coming here with you everyday. I can pay the tow myself and then i will contact Noah. We can split the docking tax so don¡¯t worry.
Jessica: Yeah but what if i want to pay?
Roktar: Then i will state that i want the ship by myself and not with you and tow it back myself. Your money is for upgrades so use it for that!
I sigh but just nodded seeing as he was being hard headed. I see uncle start to call someone so i tell him i¡¯m going back to the ship. He waves me off and I turn off the magnet boots and jump horizontally so that i can float through space while heading for the edge where the ship that brought us was docked. Half way through i see a large ship pass overhead heading to the place where Uncle was. That had probably been the tow ship. I wonder how much it takes to buy the scrapped ship. Well i didn¡¯t have to worry since it passed over me again towing the wreck towards the station. I reached the ship that transports us here. I can take what i want for the price of 50 credits no matter what it is as long as i can get it out of the machine and into the ship. Skipping the boring 10 minute flight back to the docks, which were on the outside of the cylindrical body of the station. The docks didn¡¯t have gravity or air so you already needed equipment to counter this in order to go anywhere from here. I spotted the large wreck as i exit the ship and uncle was there with officials signing some papers. [tr]
Jessica: Done yet uncle?
Roktar: Just need to register this wreck under my name and pay a docking tax of 250 credits. I¡äm going to be busy from now on since it¡¯s a weekly tax.
i frown at this still on his back was a filled backpack but there shouldn¡¯t be much that would be salvageable since he doesn¡¯t have dismantling or mechanic skills. I learned the basics from my technician teacher since i needed know how to build stuff in order make weapon blueprints but he didn¡¯t. I enter the station through an airlock on the side and instantly find some mechanics waiting. These people buy parts from scrapyard divers. ¡°Hi lass, got anything to sell?¡± one of them asked. ¡°Yes. One moment.¡± I tell him. I deattach the bag that was attached to my armor through a few latches. I then opened it and began to remove the parts i wouldn¡¯t need. A few mechanics looked interested and started to examine the parts. ¡°My, what a haul this time!¡± a human mechanic said as he was looking at some of the android brain parts. ¡°Aye, this part will be useful for some personal part i''ve been making.¡± A dwarf said. They each started to claim their parts and i called up a price manager and registered the parts which were given a rough price for each. In total i got around 600 credits from this cargo. That put me at 2750 credits, well above the amount needed for the upgrade. I¡¯ll see later about the other parts i didn¡¯t sell. I tell uncle i was going to get the upgrades and then head to the elevator already starting to feel the damage in my body. I got back to the ring luckily already inside the market area. This was the place that had several android upgrade shops. I head to one that was run by a friendly couple who specialized in this. ¡°Oh my, if it isn¡¯t Jessica! Did you come for an upgrade as well?¡± The elderly woman that was the cashier. ¡°Yes ma¡¯am, i would like the durability package.¡± I tell her. ¡°I see, well come this way. If you have any parts that are from the scrapyard or were purchased beforehand we can reduce the price if they can be used.¡± She said as she led me into a room. I put down the bag i had and showed her all the extra parts i got. ¡°My my, quite a few good parts here, let¡¯s see.¡± She starts splitting the parts into two piles. ¡°This pile on the left we can use on you since they are generic parts used in nearly androids but on the right are parts of a specialized combat android so unless you head that route you should sell them to someone that wants to do that.¡± She says. This made me happy since the pile i could upgrade myself with was quite large compared to those i should sell. ¡°Thank you for the help ma¡¯am, how long before i can get the upgrade?¡± I asked. ¡°Right now of course!¡± Said an old, rough but gentle voice. The owner of the voice was the old lady''s husband, owner of the shop and top mechanic of the shop. ¡°Come lay down so we can get to work. Also i can buy those parts from you, they are some good stuff so using your own parts and taking the them into account your upgrade would cost only 1200 credits. What do you say?¡± He asks. ¡°No, i will keep the other parts. I have friends that can use them so i will have to decline sir.¡± I replied. ¡°I see, well then the upgrade is 1800 credits.¡± he said. It made me perk up seeing how much the difference cost but then again that just goes to show how expensive a new part would be and how much he would gain from selling it after completely repairing it to top shape. ¡°Alright then let¡¯s get working. Lay down lass.¡± The elder says but i store the parts i was keeping before attaching it to my back where it fit naturally and would remain locked under all case unless i say so. I had the displeasure of noticing the elder¡¯s eye twitch. I then lay down and open up all of my bodies plates showing the systems. ¡°Well we got damage as well.¡± the elder said. ¡°Just returned from scrapyard diving.¡± I tell him making him nod. ¡°Well no problem. We will be changing all your parts anyway so it makes no difference.¡± He says and tells his wife to bring a large box filled with parts. From there it was a process of over 3 hours of rebuilding my body completely with more durable parts. ¡°Alright, done!¡± He says finally finishing my body. [tr]
You have been upgraded with a durability package. Stats improved with upgrade. Physical Proficiency 10 -> 13 Resilience 10 -> 20 Agility 10 -> 12 Dexterity 10 -> 12
The usage of higher quality parts than a normal durability package had resulted in extra stat improvement. Physical Proficiency 13 -> 17 Resilience 20 -> 22 Agility 12 -> 15 Dexterity 12 -> 14
I smiled seeing the upgrade as well as the additional upgrade from the extra parts i had. The resilience will allow me to work much longer without needing repairs. Just hope Noah can repair the parts since just adding weaker parts won¡¯t do from now on. I pay the elder for his work and happily leave with the 750 remaining credits i didn¡¯t have to pay since i had extra parts. I contact uncle after this.
Jessica: Uncle! Did you finish the paperwork?
Roktar: Went well. Said we can keep it there as long as we are repairing it. Asked a mechanic to make a list of what we need. Sadly most of the ship wiring and 50% of the plating will need to be changed not to mention most has to be removed so we can pass the wiring. Then the inner walls have been damaged and but we need to remove them anyways to fix the stuff inside of the walls, so we pretty much need to rebuild the ship but at least we have the main hull and will only need to pay 250 credits between me and noah.
Jessica: Don¡¯t even think about it! I¡¯m helping out. With 3 people we can split and survive better. Since i had a jump in my stats i can go without uncles protection at least in the scrapyard so you can go do bounty hunting jobs in space or planetside. I¡¯m going to be focusing on technician skill training for now anyways. Need to start thinking of upgrades for my own body. Tell Noah that i will be coming less often but when i do it¡¯s with scrap and blueprints that i want to try to be made into upgrades. I¡¯ll pay him for it.
Roktar: Sure thing, will inform him and good luck.
With that resolved i turn off the chat and head out to further train my skills and get started on making plans for upgraded parts and weapons. Chapter 9: War zone Rockstar Authors corner: Alright before everyone starts complaining, this is raw version, got bored of waiting for it to be edited because of how long it takes so i will be posting raw and will replace with the edited version later when its finished so please keep the annoying comment about mistakes off the comments since i already know there are a lot of mistakes. (my english level is only up to 8th grade standards, which is how long i studied in USA) I ask again PLEASE DON''T FILL THE COMMENTS WITH STUFF ABOUT GRAMMER Enjoy
I just heard a rather amazing thing from my dad. Seems he found the hull of a shuttle in the scrapyard that was intact enough to be remade into a ship. He did warn me thought that it was stripped of nearly all its systems and we would practically be rebuilding the ship from scratch, but that didn¡¯t matter because there is one thing this helps out with. We have the hull of a ship. A shuttle at that. That is probably the hardest part to get since it¡äs pretty much the ship while the rest are added on to make it work. Obviously it''s going to be heavy work to completely remake a ship on my own so when I had time I told Gunner about it and he seemed to be as intrigued about the ship as me. Since we both wanted to see it he led me to where the hangars were and with dad telling me where it was docked we found it easily. Though i had to get some space gear before leaving. To be precise a helmet and air tanks, since the beginner armor was sufficiently insulated to protect against the vacuum of space for some time. Still, I had to put on a secondary suit against radiation from the sun before we left. When we got to the dock the ship was at we were rather impressed. It seemed to be a shuttle whose body was 15 meters wide, 40 meters long and 15 meters high. The wings started at the halfway point of the ship and the length from the ship''s body to the tip the wing was at least 25 meters. The left wing was damaged while the right wing was still intact. The engines of the ship, or the husk where the exhaust was, was located at the back just under the wings connecting part way into the body meaning that area would make the engine room.
Gunner: Hell, it¡¯s a X32 Space Shuttle!
Noah: Something special about it?
Gunner: Good ship that¡¯s what, at least for your first ship it is. Complete bottom floor is cargo bay, half of the second floor as well. Other half would have most of the necessary systems and machinery for space travel like gravity generators and life support ta filter the air. Top floor has engine room, living quarters, kitchen and a one man cockpit.
Noah: With the layout spoken so frankly, makes it feel small now?
Gunner: Bah! Perish the thought! Ship can hold a 12 man crew comfortably and as a shuttle, it can handle planet reentry! Come, lets take a look inside!
He walks forward and jumps into open space floating easily into the big hole in the ship''s side. I follow behind. He pulls out a light so we could see and handed me one as well. The ship was an obvious mess. Internally it had been taken apart but lots of wires remained with only the main machinery taken and stripped. The outer plates in several areas had holes which meant the plates, both inner and outer ones, needed to be changed. Engines were gone, no thrusters left behind either. The Living quarters and the cockpit was stripped bare, even the seat was gone.
Gunner: Fuck! Scrappers sure do their job well!
Noah: What are scrappers?
Gunner: Mechanics that specialize in scavenging wrecks of their valuables and selling them. Even the husk is sold for scrap metal. Junkyard managers and workers are some jobs that include doing that.
Noah: How long would it take to replace everything?
Gunner: Problem ain''t time, it¡äs money. Most of the main wiring was left behind so ya need the actual machines but those cost a pretty penny. Biggest problem is your engine, ship this size needs a real strong one and it''s a ship that can reach low sublight travel speed.
Noah: What is the weakest engine sold here that we could use?
Gunner: None! Station doesn''t sell em. Need several kind of rare metals which aren¡ät found here. Wait...we do have one of the metals but like i said, it''s a rare metal.
Noah: So I have to wait for a trader to get here or order an engine for the ship?
Gunner: Aye! No way around that!
I sigh and left the ship with Gunner. Once back inside the station with the helmets and tanks removed we continued talking. "So what is the price of that ship if it was completely intact and ready for space travel?" I asked "Hmm... Bariatric!" Gunner called. "Shut up you organic scrap heap! Already got the prices! Kid, an X32 Space Shuttle has a price range of 500,000 to 700,000 credits depending on the station. I went ahead and searched the history for that ship specifically and it seems to have been a stolen ship from a colonized system nearby and had been outfitted for combat as a bandit raiding ship. Bandit group got too big and soon very cocky and tried to take the station but got their asses handed to them by the stations security forces. When the fight started to drag on the dwarf fighters were called and it was settled quickly. This ship was trashed by a hit from a psionic bullet to the side." She said. "I presume i''ll eventually learn about that kind of weapon?" I asked Gunner. "Psionic weapons are weapons only used in Dwarven fighter robots. The robots are normally outfitted with some psi storing tech so that it can be used with the weaponry. the strength can be compared with plasma but it has a much higher range without losing as much energy." Gunner said. "Yeah, i¡äll learn about that later. So to rebuild the ship completely would need that amount of money? I asked, returning to the previous topic. "Maybe, maybe not. Once you can control a basic dwarf fighter robot you can accept planetside subjection requests in the name of the fighters. If you destroy a bandit camp and they have ships, you can scrap ¡®em for parts for your own. The pay depends on request and performance but it''s between 500 and 1200 credits for the newbie requests. Normally they are also harder than regular bounty hunting requests. But then you still need to pay a tax of 150 credits to repair the armor." Gunner explains. I couldn''t help cringe hearing the prices. One thing I know for a fact. Fantasy games just rely on strength since they are less realistic monsters sometimes drop gear or you can make it from their hide but sci-fi is more realistic and you unfortunately have to rely on money. You can be level 1 and be almighty if you have money. "So even if I don¡¯t get the money I can get the parts from other ships.¡± I said and sighed in relief. ¡°Aye, may even get a small craft that remains intact. If you get a working one, might even help you scrap it for needed parts. Rebuilding a ship this size, alone and without any experience isn¡¯t easy ya know. Still for now you should try to raise around¡­ 5 to 10k credits. This way we can close off the ship and pump air inside making it easier for you to work.¡± Gunner said. Seeing that it was a good enough goal at the moment I agreed with him. ¡°Oh! That reminds me, the last few days your skills leveled up right? Let me see them!¡± Gunner said. ¡°Um okay¡­ Lia!¡± I said.
Hold on a second Mr bossy got to access the info bank.
She has been getting grumpier and less cooperative recently. Ignoring her since I needed to train has made her bitchier. Finally she brings up the skill window.
Skills
Mechanic Level 6 Weapon Maintenance Level 2 Robot/Android Maintenance Level 5 Weapon Repair Level 3 Parts Repair Level 4 Dismantling Level 7 Basic Machine Building Level 5 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Psi Reinforcement Level 5 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 5 Reinforced Fist Level 2 Reinforced Skin Level 2 Reinforced Muscles Level 2
¡°Ah good, your mechanics skill went up a notch and so have your other skills. Good, you should be good enough for a promotion. From today on, you will work in the hangar building the robot miners drills and in the factory, fabricating the parts for them. Your pay will go from 60 credit to 120 credits. Also, you will get paid 20 credits an hour to repair the androids. Think of it as extra hours.¡± Gunner said with a satisfied nod. I was a bit dumbstruck but they sudden promotion and the thought of getting paid for the android repairs now. I wonder if he did it just to help me raise money. Maybe so, but I¡¯m not complaining, I get to start working on something new and get more skills and training from doing something different. ¡°Come on, gotta show you your new job!¡± Gunner said and lead me to the factory. Roktar (Noah¡¯s dad) PoV I was excited, after having that ship salvaged and being able to confirm Jessica had obtained her durability upgrade, I knew she would be safe on her own now. The package rebuilds her body so she wouldn¡¯t need as many repairs and it indirectly increased her other stats making it easier for her. Knowing her, she would work until she gained a second durability upgrade and two mental hardware upgrades and build a firm foundation for her body before she tries to focus on a specialization. Heh, I¡¯m also happy to see she is able to trust Noah for her repairs and aimed to get repairs from him specifically. Wonder if she is testing him. My son may get caught up in his skill grinding but he is far from being dense to someone who shows interest in him. I know this fact since he has had admirers ask him out. Anyways, enough about my son, who I¡¯m going to enjoy teasing later, I should get to work. I had just left a shuttle that came from the station to one of the smaller mining camps planetside. There were lots of miners moving to and from the several dozen mining shafts but I wasn¡¯t here for that. My current armor was the beginner armor but i had upgraded it with more durable metal plates so its protection is better. Besides the armor I have a helmet made to work in the vacuum of space which includes the outside of the protective dome shields of the mining camps. Dome shields are an advanced shield type used to cover cities. It allows only friendly sentient races to pass through them and keeps monsters out. It also makes sure to keep air inside the dome while the vacuum out. I had come planetside after accepting several monster subjection requests. Not really monsters though, more like native creature subjection. Kelha II naturally has a thin atmosphere but it has one. Most of the air found its ways into caves below ground and created a unique atmosphere in which the humanoid races can¡¯t breathe but the creatures of this planet can. Vegetation includes only some fungus that can survive in the wasteland or in the caves. As for the native animals, they look like golems. Not exactly the magical ones but organic animals of different shapes that have evolved to have skin similar to rocks. The organs and bones are also much harder than normal and besides eating the fungus or each other some of the survive by eating raw mineral ores. Well they have taken a liking to processed metal since that has a much higher purity so they tend to try and raid transport ships or the mining camps. Today I came because there was a recent Kelha worm that appeared near the town. These worms are passive and don¡¯t really attack but they are the most powerful monsters on the planet from what I have seen in the computer registry. They survive by digging and eating rare minerals very deep underground. They are also the ones that created the cave system underground and with one of them being sighted and surfacing, it means that other native monsters aren¡¯t far behind since they live in the caves left behind by the worms. To prevent too many from getting to the surface, where they can survive for about a week without returning underground for air, we need to collapse the caves.
Mission: Mining Camp 27 Incoming SwarmDifficulty2
We request a number of fighters to aid us at Mining Camp 27. There was a recently ascension of a Kelha Worm, creating an opening. Though the worm itself isn¡¯t a threat, the monsters that have begun to exit are becoming a nuisance for our operation and the mining corporation has already prepared the bombs needed to collapse the tunnel. Participants must bring their own armor and weapons to fight. The Monsters number has reached over 500 at the moment this request was made and has probably increased since then. Objective: Create a path into the cave and set the bomb inside the cave at a depth of 50, 25, 10 meters and at the mouth of the cave so that we can effectively block the cave. Protect the personnel that will set the bomb. Once the cave is sealed the monster subjugation mission is complete. Evacuate the Area post-mission since an air raid is scheduled to arrive 2 hours later and eliminate the remaining monsters. Failure: Bomb setting personnel are killed Reward: 500 credits per participant (must be officially registered as a member of the mission which is done at the station), Bonus will be given out depending on number of monsters killed (50 credits for every 10 monsters killed)(will be registered by Automatic counter and monitored by your AI who can only raise the number by scanning bodies you killed)
This is an event mission that had appeared when I was arriving at the fighters request center. The request center is in the training section of the station and is meant to allow us fighters to get money while fighting and training through real world experience. Not that I need it, this is my skill set I got once it officially released.
Laser Weapon Mastery Level 10 Missile Weapon Mastery Level 5 Axe Mastery Level 12 Martial Arts Level 15 Pistol arms mastery Level 5 Rifle mastery Level 7 Dismantling Level 2 Scavenging Level 3
As an experienced gamer, I never let the game help me execute my attacks. The movements became more natural with time and actually training them. Because of that when I went to train after the cap limit was released my knowledge of martial arts and weapon knowledge compensated as I trained it in the game giving me an overwhelming boost in skills compared to other people. I head for the outer rim of the mining camp and easily found the large group of people shouting to team up to tackle the monsters. I was a tank but because of this I could fight the monsters head on. The money I earned from scavenging with Jessica went to buying my armor upgrade which is much cheaper than the android upgrade and my weapons, a basic level Laser Axe 950 credits and an energy shield for 1100 credits. How I got this extra money from just scavenging? of course I didn¡¯t get it from scavenging, no way to. The game has an auction house setting which lets us convert money from a 1:10 proportion of 1 credit to 10 dollar and vise versa. Since the game had just gone live and there was still lots of stuff unknown and I just accepted a mission that would lead me into a hoard of monsters I decided to call an old friend from a TV station and propose the following¡­ ¡°I¡¯m about to head into an event mission on Kelha II where monsters were swarming on the surface. I was wonder about being a streamer for this event.¡± I told him. ¡°Of course!! A pro like you can obviously survive a long time!!! We can get a temporary contract set up for you and an advance payment of $20,000 and once the video is live the second payment would depend on the viewer rating but a monster subjection video at one of the first days of the release is a big deal.¡± The director of the station said. I had logged out and headed over to sign since there was a local branch and the manager already knew about it. I then napped the flight down to the surface, which took 8 hours to enter the atmosphere plus another 4 hours to reach the camp so nearly 3 hours for napping. Converting part of the advanced payment I had gained the energy shield which I felt would be needed since I wasn¡¯t going to party with random people. I am not an idiot to go around power leveling others who don¡¯t deserve it. As I reach the meeting area some people look my way but I just walk through without paying much attention. There was a man working on something similar to a tablet but it had a hologram screen. ¡°Excuse me, you responsible for the mission?¡± I asked him. ¡°That is correct, I am responsible for registering which participants that registered in the station are here for the job. What is your name sir?¡± He asked fixing his glasses. ¡°Roktar!¡± I said. He fiddles with the thing in his hands and nods. ¡°Good, you are here and confirmed. You should be aware the monsters are strong and we will not insure your safety should you choose to fight alone. It is up to you to choose how you fight.¡± He said. ¡°Of course, thanks for the help and when do we leave?¡± I asked. ¡°In about an hour. There should be another 2 shuttles arriving in that time and should have the remaining members that signed up so you can relax or whatever.¡± He said. I nod and walk away. I go to a corner a bit away from everyone and pull off the mace like item on my waist. This was my axe, it was the Laser axe which is why I gained so many points in laser weapon mastery. I don¡¯t activate it since I don¡¯t need to since energy doesn¡¯t have weight. I just shadow fight while trying to imagine a large or small opponent from the countless monsters I have fought in many games. About 20 minutes until we left I stop since I don¡¯t want to be tired before leaving. I go and get something to eat and drink in a nearby shop and come back with the food in hand while I wait. Seems like the others also got hungry and went get their own since soon everyone was eating. The number had grown to over 150. Finally I noticed a group of people coming with a large case behind them. ¡°Alright, everyone, gather around, the bombs are here and we will be moving out now!¡± The man with the strange tablet thing shouted. I get up and hear the monotone speech of the man as he explains that a flight over the opening showed that the number of monsters numbered at least 800 now and the location was about 30 minutes walk from here. After a while we moved out. I walk on the outer circle slowly making my way near the front. As a tank I love to take first blood. In 20 minutes we were standing on a hill overlooking the hole and we finally understood what we were facing and the exact size of a worm. Slanting into a 40 degree slope into the hold was the opening into the ground. It was nearly 15 meters wide and who knows how long such a behemoth. I felt a bit of a cold sweat cover my back thinking of such a monster being under my feet but I keep reminding myself that they are passive and not dangerous. But what was dangerous was the swarm of monsters coming out. They all look like animals.
Okay people, as you can see, the swarm is all over the place. They don¡¯t have eyes as they are underground monsters but they can sense your movements through vibration in the ground so you will be swarmed once they sense you.
The message came from the man leading this. I looked around and some people caught my eye and I make sure to tell Olivia to mark them and their movements on the map. Besides them I noticed that there were some 30-40 NPC. The way I could tell is the clear difference in equipment such as a dwarf with big ass cannon on his back and an ogre with a power suit and a plasma greatsword already out. Besides these people, the rest were newbie players, a number were amateurs while I saw about 15-20 that were pro gamers because how they stood and presented themselves clearly showed extensive experience in the field. Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. After a short text speech we were told to charge and I did just that. I had trained my agility just for this. Specifically time I spent training gained me these stats.
Status
Name:RoktarFaction:Liberation
Race:Dwarf/Ogre
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:10 80HP Regeneration:0.49
Psi:255Psi Regeneration0.29
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:49Resilience:48
Dexterity:35Agility:51
Mentality:29Willpower:29
Charisma:10Leadership:10
I was happy and somewhat sad that in the part of health and Psi calculation the dwarf genes were dominant. It made me gain half the psi of normal but twice the HP but it worked for me. As for my stats, I worked my physical proficiency, resilience and agility to the limits by overworking my body when I had the time for a time like now. As all of us run to swarm the monsters I start running. With my hulking size you would expect a slow runner but I was currently leading the charge and when I got 20 meters from the first monster that looked like some poorly pieced together rock ape I activate my Laser Axe. The main shaft shot out and released the laser forming an energy axe head. The monsters turned towards us and started running. The ape rushed towards me but I jumped and raised my axe up high. Jumping caused it to lose sight of me since it had no eyes and make it freeze a moment allowing me to smash my axe right into its head, splitting it in half. I pulled it out and spun before creating a horizontal slash on the creature''s chest making deep red blood flow out. I notice a number 1 on my screen showing Olivea had identified it as dead so I jumped over it and rushed the next monster. From there what looked like a bear nearly double my size was rushing me. I activate the energy shield on my left arm and holding it in front of me, I rush the bear. When it impacted in the shield a large number of cracks appeared on its head and its nose was broken but I was pushed back as it continued pushing me. This thing was much stronger than the first one. I buckled down causing my boots to dig into the ground slowly making the bear slow down as dirt build up behind me. When it slowed down enough I swung the axe through the shield at its head cause it a big gash to form and the bear reared up on his hind legs and looked to let out a roar of pain. I pushed out at his chest slamming the shield against him causing him to collapse backwards on top of another smaller monster. I even got it registered number 2. I quickly ran around the bear and when it turned to me as it got up with its jaws open I swing around clockwise and jammed my axe through his mouth causing half his head to be smashed. Then I turned the axe and cut the rest off with a second swing. A huge pool of blood gushed out and the number rose again. At this time I felt a heavy crash shaking the area and looked over to see a large explosion. I then turned to the hill and saw five dwarves holding the huge cannons arming them. One launches a missile that draws an arch in the sky and lands in the thickest part of the hoard making a huge explosion and tossing a huge number of monsters into the air and maiming a good number. Seeing them whip a good number so easily I start jumping to the next group. I say group because it was a group of quadrupeds that looked like dogs. These were much easier because when I jumped off the bear I killed the largest on after crashing on top of it and cutting its head of. The others started circling me but I killed some and shield bashed another but one came from behind and bit into my left leg. The power in its jaws started to crack the armor and crush my leg. I spun around and slammed the axe into the neck with all my strength and rage completely cutting the head off. My vision was getting burred and somewhat red.
Sir, you are activating the ogre¡¯s natural trait Berserkers Instincts. The more damage you take the more strength you will dish out. Your stats will inflate as you get hurt but that will also mean you will have a chance to enter berserk state and it could be bad if someone was planning to sabotage the mission.
¡°I see, so that''s it, it''s best to be careful and calm!¡± Boom While distracted I didn¡¯t notice another large ape come and punch me from the right side. I hit the ground a few meters away but when I get up I was thoroughly pissed. My armor was partially damaged and my health dropped by 79 with that attack. The armor was good but the pain was still there and I was pissed. I let out a yell as I started to smash the monsters around me and with each hit they got on me the harder my own attacks would be. Soon enough with all the players attacking we pushed back the monsters to the hole. I was really injured and had been ordered to pull back while NPC medical people applied healing aid. The healer was an elf and when she looked me over she stood over me and stuck her hands out. Though psi is invisible what came from her hand was a psi with a light green color as if it was a thin mist. I notice my health rapidly fill up.
Take care to take less damage. You are part ogre and you can go berserk with too much damage.
I nod to her warning and get up. She then puts her hand out again and a yellow glowing psi came from her hand and made my fatigue go away. I thank the elf and look to where the defense was weakest. That is when I notice something rather disgusting. Looking to the right side which also drew the eyes of the elf. Over there was a group of at 14 people moving back letting the monsters come into the opened space we had cleared.
Roktar: SHIT!! Those fucking greedy shits!!
Nurse elf: Don¡¯t tell me they are about to let monsters throught! What for!?
Roktar: It¡¯s obvious why, they want to kill off other people to take their gear so they work as a group and guide monsters to someone they want to steal from! Quick go call the commanding officers and tell them about this!
Nurse: Of course! Please go stop them while I get someone to help!
The nurse starts floating and soon flies off at an incredible speed towards the team of men moving the large crates of explosives. As for me I turned to that trash and rushed their way. They were kiting a group of monsters building a bubble of monsters in that area. As I get within 5 meters one of them notices me just as I jump high up and crash into a huge bear like monster smashing his head but getting pawed in return landing near some wolf like ones. The damage from the bear was extensive and my sides were pulsating in pain.
Ogre: You moron! GET AWAY!
Roktar: FUCK YOU ALL! Trying to kite monsters into other players!
They all flinch at how easily I saw through them. I started hacking at the weakest first to relieve the stress from me. With me jumping at the strongest monster it had roared to attack me and the group just ran away leaving me to fate. Still I wasn¡¯t any push over to fall so easily and I made sure to take down all the wolves and was left with the bear, some apes, a new monster that reminded me of a bull and whatever was coming from behind. My body was battered but because of that I jumped and ran faster and soon the bear fell before I started to stumble from blood lost from spots that armor was piercing my body. It was then that two elves came flying in. The first was the nurse and the other was a male. The elf flew over me and suddenly I feel something grab me. The next moment I saw the male elf drop to the ground and do a strange movement before striking out with his palm. With that palm strike a tremendous wave of psi surged forth pushing and crushing anything that was in front of it.
Nurse: Good job surviving that! You¡¯re stronger than you look, I was actually expecting to see you die when you jumped into the fray yet you actually got this far.
A dwarf, even a half one is stubborn to the end!
I let out a little chuckle before cringing in pain.
Nurse: You got armor parts piercing your body, I have healed parts of your body but we need to get those metal shards out before we can heal any more.
With that she took me to the hill we were at before. A small dome shield generator and air pump was placed inside and a medical bay was made. In there were dozens of people with heavy injuries. In the far back were the 14 bastards that wanted to ruin the mission. Once I was laid down on a bed some elves and terrains came and began removing my armor. The areas like my arms and legs where the armor had begun to pierce my flesh the embedded parts were broken off and slowly removed before the armor was removed. They took some machines and made sure all metal shards were out of me before they performed the psi healing skill and I felt my wounds heal completely. Feeling relief from the pain the medics made sure to check and make sure I was healed and then went to the next person. ¡°You can put your armor on and go back to fighting but the bomb men have already begun to place the bombs. Still want to go out of your way to go back?¡± the elf asked worried. ¡°Olivia, how many kills did I get?¡± I asked.
112 only because those men from before gathered such a large number of monsters together. If not for that it would have been 87
¡°Wow, 25 monsters from that one group! Not bad, not bad at all! AHAHA!¡± I started laughing making the elf girl raise a brow confused. ¡°Is that good? You almost died?¡± She asked. ¡°Miss, are you a foreigner?¡± I asked and she nodded. ¡°So am I, so you should know there was no danger even if I died, well besides losing my hard earned money of course.¡± I said. ¡°How are you so strong only after so little time?¡± She asked me. ¡°I¡¯m a professional gamer, I¡¯ve been around since the start so I already have combat skills ingrained into my blood. Combat skills I trained myself without system assist so I know each and every movement, because of that my mastery skill of axe is at 12 already.¡± I said nonchalantly but suddenly all the eyes of everyone that heard me was on me. ¡°Wow! So you are an expert fighter in real life!¡± The elf girl said. ¡°Yep, so miss, mind telling me your name, I¡¯m Roktar.¡± I asked her. ¡°Oh my name is Lily!¡± She said with a short bow. It was only now that I took a good look of her. She work beginner armor which was thin and lightweight and colored a white and light pink. Her ears were long like an elf should be and her figure was well sculpted with a refined smooth face and gem like eyes. Finally her hair was a very light pink color and her eyes were a deep violet giving her a mysterious aura but how she expresses herself shows some level of innocence and considering how she is a healer it meant she wasn¡¯t very accustomed to fighting which isn¡¯t a bad thing. ¡°Are you a nurse in real life?¡± I asked. ¡°I¡¯m just a nurse technicians. Like right now I can only do basic stuff but I am good at using support branch psi techniques.¡± She said. ¡°That¡¯s a very important talent.¡± I tell her. ¡°Oh please! A real medic is better than a simple technician.¡± She said. ¡°I was talking about your talent with support. You know support class is vital to any army or group. Imagine if you or any of these psi users weren¡¯t here how many of us would die from the wounds we received.¡± I tell her. She nodded. ¡°Well, don¡¯t forget, this is probably the most realistic game you will get into so you might as well practice your trade in here. Get better and then prove you¡¯re good both here and out there.¡± I said and got up. Yeah yeah, it was my teacher and motivator mode, BITE ME! It¡¯s become a natural thing for me to spot natural talents and encourage them. I look at my armor and put it on. There were holes in several spots that I had to get covered up but could only put on some secondary space clothes to survive the cold of the vacuum. ¡°What are you planning to do after you train sufficiently?¡± I asked her. ¡°Hmm, I wonder~! This is a sci-fi game so travelling through space and exploring tons of planets would be cool!¡± She says. ¡°Well, for now me and my son are still trying to rebuild a scraped ship and it would probably take a while but we will make a crew when we meet trustworthy people. Let¡¯s keep in contact if you want to join one later.¡± I tell her. ¡°Sure thing. You seem nice and not like those creeps over there so I don¡¯t mind but I do need to know who are the crew mates and how they are.¡± She says. ¡°Of course, can¡¯t join a crew you''re not compatible with. Take your time, we haven¡¯t even started rebuilding yet so we got time.¡± I said and she smiles. ¡°Lisa, come help with some monster that have breached. Some men are more critically injured.¡± An older elf male, the same one that used that incredible power before, called her. ¡°Ah! Yes Sir Alphenor, coming! Got to go or people will start dying!¡± She says and puts on her helmet and quickly flies off after the man. ¡°That girl has some talent for sure. Can¡¯t let some trash snag such a nice, helpful lady.¡± I mutter and chuckle while putting on my helmet. As the computer images appeared the number 112 appeared. ¡°Olivea, how much bonus will I get for this?¡± I asked.
Besides the 500 when the mission is complete ¡­ an extra 550 credits will be rewarded to you.
I was quite happy to see my reward almost double. I walk out of the dome shield and watch the fight from above and notice the notifications so I call it up.
You have gained +2 Physical Proficiency, +1 Agility, +5 Resilience, +3 Dexterity and 4 Charisma
You have gained 6 levels.
I was interested in how I gained all this so thinking a bit, the physical proficiency probably cause I forced my body a bit, agility for running so much, resilience because I was beaten black and blue while I crushed them, Dexterity for my use of my weapon and charisma probably from commanding Lisa to get help. Seems interesting how it worked out but it didn¡¯t matter. Extra points will only help later on so won¡¯t complain. With the 6 levels levels came 5 extra points with each level. I notice from behind the man that was coordinating the event.
Officer: Mr.Roktar, for accomplishing a kill count of above 110 you gain 550 extra credits coming to a total of 1050 credits. Congratulations. Oh, and for noticing ¡°that¡± trash in our midst, we will offer a full armor and weapon repairs since it would have caused trouble what they were doing. Here...
He takes out a small metal with a hammer on it. I take it and the money as well.
Officer: Give that metal to any armor repairs shop and you will either get it repaired or get a brand new one in the same conditions.
Roktar: Thanks. And what will happen to them?
Officer: They will be sent to the Prison station in space after sent to court and sentenced for attempting to murder and theft by guiding the monsters to other people.
I nod and take the pack of money and store it. The man left after that and I just watched the fight. After some time I received a message saying the bombs were set and to get away from the hole. I saw the small figures of the retreating people and the missiles from the support fire blast out. Elves were flying over all the people causing them all to fly into the air. As the last person gets off the ground the monsters started to slow down unable to find their targets. All they felt was the other kinsmen under them. Suddenly from the hole a massive explosion came from deep inside causing the ground to cave creating a huge crater.
03:00:00 until airstrike
The timer ticks and the monsters start to disperse but the elves keep pushing them all towards the center of the clearing near the hole. About 20 minutes before the countdown ended I found out what the airstrike was. Flying through the air came five mechs each with a large cannon strapped to their back. They flew over the area and landed back near our safe zone with one walking inside and jumping out. From inside a dwarf came out. ¡°Alright everyone, the fireworks about ta start! Non of ya can go fight from now on!¡± He shouted. I saw the dwarf looked at the elf man that came with Lisa. As if conversation happened he simply turned around and jumped into the huge mech suit. It extended out the wing protrusions on its back and took to the air. The other five all split up and make a pentagon formation over the area. The cannons spun over their shoulder before extending out making a longer cannon barrel. A sudden tingling on my skin made me feel a sudden fear of that weapon. A light began to grow brighter from the barrel of all five mechs. ¡°Watch this all of you fresh blood that never saw a top class Dwarven fighters cannon blast.¡± The elf named Alphenor said out loud. As he finishes the timer hits 0 and all five cannons fire and the next thing I saw was a flash followed by followed by a huge shockwave of dust and sand hitting the shield and an incredible earthquake. Everyone frantically crouches to the ground but only that elf from before remained standing like an unmoving statue. As everything settled down so did the dust in the air and when we saw was a completely trashed crater. What was left of the hole after detonation had been flattened and I¡¯m sure even more of the tunnel had collapsed deeper. There was no trace of the hole or even a single body of the monsters. I gulped down while looking at the level of destruction. I¡¯ve seen this much before in lots of games but the feeling of fear towards it, this is the first time. ¡°Everyone, pack up! We are returning to camp! We have accomplished our objective successfully let us go.¡±
Mission: Mining Camp 27 Incoming SwarmComplete
Reward: 1050 Credits, 2 levels Bonus reward: 200 Fame for stopping sabotage of mission.
Seeing the mission complete message my shock subsided and like that I helped pack up and we returned to the camp where I was able to gain a new set of armor just like my own. Chapter 10 Scrapyard Divers Author''s corner: here is another non edited chapter, remember that it will be edited and posted again later on but for now its will remain unedited. We get some fun with Gunner this chapter as well so lets get to it! XD
Jessica PoV ¡°Finally!¡± I say excited. What had just happened was me properly making all the parts plans for a handheld scanner as well as the codes for it. I had tons of help from my teacher but I still got it made.
You have leveled up Programmer Skill
You have gained a new skill
Tool PlanningRarity1Level 1
A technician''s skill for combining the a number of components to make a tool. Improves quality of plans by 1%
I make a small smile seeing one skill level up and gaining another. ¡°Vivi, please bring up my skill list.¡± I asked.
Sure thing big sis! Programmer Level 8 Laser Weapon Programming Level 2 Parts Planning Level 7 Weapon Planning level 5 Tool Planning Level 1 Tool Programming Level 3 Dismantling Level 5 Scavenging level 6
I look at my skills and see that I need to work on my secondary programming skills for laser weapons and tools. My Programmer skill is a mastery skill so even fixing random codes made it rise a lot and but I need the specialized skills for an extra stacked boost. Maybe I should also look for a weapon mastery so that I can be of use on the field as well. Well for now I call my teacher and ask for lessons on both the specialized programming skills. With a few hours they both leveled up once after coding some tools and basic laser weapons. Looking at my status I saw my hp had dropped only to 75% since. The first durability package was a blessing since I now go into disrepair much slower than before and can last longer. With the extra time I only need 1 repair per day. With that in mind I head to the scrapyard to try and find anything more useful. I want to get enough good parts before I head to Noah for repairs and see if he can build the scanners. Arriving at the scrapyard by ship I go off looking. Looking around, I notice an increase in smaller ship that had most of their things removed. I go one by one and search them for anything useful but what they had to offer was taken and only metal husks were left. I click my tongue as I move on looking around. When I reached a rather small ship that looked to still have something to offer I went in. I was happy to find that it had some machines left behind something I was happy to find was that this ship had a somewhat damaged life support. Through Vivi who had some knowledge of what it looked like and a check through the inside it seems that it only had some structural damage that could be repaired. The problem was transporting this thing. I would need to lift and take it to the ship and it went from the floor to the ceiling so that wasn¡¯t an option without Uncle and Noah here together. Problem was that uncle went planetside and he told me noah got promoted to a new station in the hangar to help fabricate parts for the drills. He should still be working so I can¡¯t really disrupt him. I curse at possibly losing such a valuable find like this. I started to look around the ship trying to find anything of value but things like cockpit and engines and all the furniture was gone. When I reached the cargo I did spot some floating boxes that hadn¡¯t been removed from the ship which intrigued me so I floated over. They were metal and were firmly locked. The scavengers probably couldn¡¯t unlock it and went to get better tools.
Big sis! This big box is sealed through super magnet locks. It¡¯s tough but it can be opened if you can stick something in between it and move it far enough away from the magnet field!
Such a good girl, still to do that isn¡¯t an easy thing to accomplish in zero gravity. I looked around and saw a broken metal sheet that looked like I could work into it so I went and grabbed it before jumping back and sticking myself to the box and began to work the metal into the crack between the lid. If only I knew how to cancel out magnetic fields and it was simple and didn¡¯t need complex components. After a while I finally got enough into it to try and pull it but I had noticed that trying to do that made my health decrease significantly if I kept straining my body. Seeing it was not working and the box was still in mid air¡­ space, I started to think of what to do. After a while I thought of something. The box was at an angle and near the ceiling of the cargo bay but with me using the ceiling I got the box to become parallel with the ground. Then with a soft push down the side with the metal shaft on it started to rotate down. When it got to an angle thought was good I canceled out the force I put by pushing gently by on the other side of the box making it stay in place in space. I carefully got on the edge of the box and making sure the angle was right I finally had Vivi deactivate my metal boots and I jumped causing the box to be pushed down but slowly. So as I reach the ceiling I push on with my hands heading for the box again and again I kicked off making it ¡°fall¡± faster and with a more satisfying speed. The metal sheet hit at an angle causing it to distort and curve under a lot of strain since the box had a lot of mass. Finally the force of the curving metal forced the lid up opening the box. From inside the box I saw a military crate float out, the kind that holds important and powerful weapons. I kicked off the ceiling and landed hear the create and grabbed it. It had simple latches at this point since the crate was already heavily secure. When I opened it I found dismantled parts for what looked like a sniper or a heavy gun. A quick look over the parts and I found that nearly 70% had some form of damage. There were three crates. When I looked through them I found enough parts to able to piece together a gun but there were still 40% of the parts that were too damaged to be used. Seeing as I won¡¯t be able to get a complete gun, no matter what I do I put the best parts in one crate while all the extra parts go in my bag. Then I look again inside the box and find a few ammo cases and opening it if bullets for the snipers. I store the boxes in my inventory. ¡±If this is really a sniper or some long range weapon, then I really struck lucky. I don¡¯t know if Noah can fix them but if he can then it will make things much simpler and it will save us a lot of money to repair what could possible be military grade weapons. Not to mention he will really be interested in obtaining that Life Support system if it¡¯s still here.¡± I thought. I grab the case that was three times the size of a regular briefcase and started to pull it back to the ship. It¡¯s not safe to keep this in the scrapyard since someone may find and try to kill me for it. Getting back to the ship I pay the tax for removing whatever I got and left the area. Back at the docks, I pass the mechanics quickly saying, ¡°Found nothing I want to sell today!¡± to them and quickly entered the hangar and asked for Noah. I found him just finishing a large drill arm that was going to be going onto the robot nearby. ¡°Noah!¡± I called him. He looked my way and instantly noticed that large crate. ¡°Did you need repairs?¡± He asked. ¡°That and I need to show you what I found. It needs repairs as well.¡± I tell him. ¡°Well, let me finish this, almost done. Just wait at that maintenance area and I¡¯ll be right over.¡± he says and points at the area nearby. I nod and go to the area and set the crate down and rest on it. I look at my stats to see how much I have remaining.
Status
Name:JessicaFaction:Liberation
Race:Android
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:125/305HP Regeneration:0
Psi:0Psi Regeneration0
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:17Resilience:22
Dexterity:14Agility:15
Overclock Potency:5Processor cooling:10
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Looking at my health showed it was at 41% already. I had lost considerable health trying to unlock the box with my strength. I still remember seeing Uncle''s stats, so discouraging seeing the massive difference in stats, I did notice that uncle didn''t have Overclock Potency and Processor cooling. He said they are two natural stats androids get when they begin the game. Since it was like that I had Vivi tell me what was the functions these two stats have. Overclock Potency: Capacity of the android''s body to increase their processing speed or physical stats at the price of over heating. This stat gets more points depending on the parts the body of the android has. At low quality parts the overclock potency is naturally low since they can¡¯t handle that much strain. There are even parts specialized for overclocking should the android want to improve this stat. Processor cooling: This stat is in direct contrast to overclock potency. When the overclock has been deactivated the android''s body would naturally have heated up, processor cooling works to help cool the systems of the android''s body after overclock has been activated to keep the body from melting down. Should the amount of overclock used exceed the amount of processor cooling then the processor cooling will all be used up and excessive heat will still be present in the body and will cause damage and some parts may melt or stick causing damage. After looking over my stats, I just waiting a bit until I noticed Noah coming over with a box, probably with parts. "Ready?" He asks. I nod and get up and move to the metal chair but not before bringing the crate with the gun closer and putting my bag next to it. He looked at the crate curious but didn''t ask. I let him get busy with repairs. What he did was much different from before. He didn''t replace the parts, we removed them and repaired them by taking apart the small parts he brought in the box. He would dismantle the parts from my body and only replace a few damaged components before returning it. It went on like this for twenty minutes and he was done. "You got faster." I stated. "The androids as a whole have begun to get upgrades so the parts that get damaged are more complex making my skill levels rise." He replied. "Welp, I''m done!" He said and took a step back. I close up the plates returning my body to a human shape instead of showing off the robot innards. "Is that all?" He asked. "No, I found a weapon in some condition for use but there is still a number of damaged parts and was wondering if you can repair it for me?" I asked. "It''s the big crate right?" He asked. I nod. "Well then let''s check it out." He said and started to move the huge box. "Can it be somewhere with less people?" I ask. He thinks a bit confused. "If it¡¯s a strong weapon then someone might try to steal it." I tell. He seems to get what I was implying. "Let¡¯s go to the depot then, but if it''s a powerful weapon it would best have someone like Gunner to identify it." He says. I agree with him on that and he calls Gunner through his communicator and leads me to the depot where we were to meet up. Walking through the door we found an anxious Gunner waiting and as soon as he saw us and the crate he stuck his hand out, as if grabbing something and yanked it making the crate fly towards him and stopping. It settled down on the floor in front of him and opened up. His eyes grew wide and a grin appeared on his face, his hands kept opening and closing and I swear that if this place had gravity there would be a waterfall of saliva dripping. "Lass! Where did you find this!" He asked desperately. "In a scrapped ship in the shipyard. The crates were in the cargo and sealed inside a metal box with a super magnet lock." I replied a bit fearful. "Then I''m sure now! this is a railgun sniper rifle! Without a doubt, the ship you mentioned was probably one of a local merchants that was ambushed. Heard rumors that they were coming to sell some strong weapons! Can'' believe scrappers didn''t take em." Gunner said. "Besides not taking that, there were a few other boxes like them. Also, Noah I found a partially damaged Life support system on the ship. It has only structural damage but the main hardware is intact." I tell him. ""What!!"" Both dwarves shout together. "Bloody hell! Must of been some newbie scraper to not remove the life support! With some structural damage it still sells for at least 1500 credits. A fully functioning one goes nearly 6,000 credits for the most basic model!" Gunner exclaimed. I saw Noah''s body tremble. "Before you guys run off, can you tell me if you can repair that?" I asked pointing to the railgun. "Might need to, if there are more boxes then there may be more of them an we can make a complete gun for ya. Aa for the broken parts, I can easily repair them for you for 700 credits." He said making me cringe at the price. "Don''t look at me like dat! Railguns are high maintenance weapons. All models have a large cool down time and you still need to be careful on yer second shot cause the first one can damage some part." He explained. It really was a high maintenance weapon. That is a fact but the benefits of it can outweigh that. The main benefit is that it works in space and because it flies at mach 3 if aimed at a ship and shot properly it will cause super destruction. "Gunner! I don''t think we should waste more time. We can talk later after we get everything but we should move now to get what we need." Noah said urgently. "Aye, miss! We will be counting on you to lead the way!" Gunner said. "And my crate?" I asked. He looked at the crate and kicked the lid shut and pulled a large sash of tape with words saying "Gunners thing''s!! Touch and you die!" Both me and Noah frown after we read that and he put it on a shelf. "What?" He asked. "What¡¯s with that!" I asked a bit angry. "Trust me lass, that box is as safe as if it was in that box you found it in. There are as few people as yer own fingers on this station with the balls to not take that warning seriously. Not unless a foreigner tried and snag it but a railgun won''t go far without being noticed especially when that tape has trackers on it." He said with confidence. Since I can''t be sure if that is true or not, not to mention I barely know all the types of technology in this game, I resign to trusting him. With that we leave the depot and make our way to the scrapyard. PoV of First android girl Noah repaired. "Heya! Hua!!" This is intense! Never would have imagined myself training in a body that gets damaged just by walking. Still the benefits Androids have outway the cons. I take a look at my stats and skills so since my training has finally won me the skill levels of a more competent fighters. [0[/tds]tr][/tr]
Status
Name:HildaFaction:Liberation
Race:Android
Bounty:0Fame:
Health:58/275HP Regeneration:0
Psi:0Psi Regeneration0
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:13Resilience:20
Dexterity:14Agility:13
Overclock Potency:5Processor cooling:10
Charisma:10Leadership:10
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Laser Weapon Mastery Level 8 Missile Weapon Mastery Level 1 Sword Mastery Level 10 Martial Arts Level 7 Pistol arms mastery Level 5
I smile at my level 10 swords mastery. Still, when I look at my health it makes me pale since I didn''t notice the level of damage I had gained. I quickly store my stuff and run out the room to the nearest elevator that luckily hadn¡¯t descended so I was able to get in near the front with several other people heading down. Finally going down I just had to wait a bit cramped but it didn¡¯t last much and once the elevator door open I was able to rush out after my magnet boots were activated but sadly my ¡°rush¡± didn¡¯t last three steps out. *Crash* ¡°Ouch¡­¡± I mutter. Strange part of android''s, we feel pain. Not only that we can feel dizzy since I feel that now.
OI BOSS! you o¡¯right! Boss, that was epic, it was just like those animes you uploaded to the capsule for me where the girl crashes into her fated person¡­.blah blah blah
How irritating, if it wasn¡¯t enough I have this annoying little pest that can still bring up some fun stuff. He is a boy with chestnut hair and was around 12 years old in appearance and took to calling me boss like some anime kid calls a strong fighter. ¡°Shut up Ricky!¡± I say as I look up and see a dwarf getting up. ¡°Oh sorry¡­ wait I remember you, you''re a regular to get repaired by me.¡± Noah says. After a moment I got my bearings and finally figure out who the dwarf is. ¡°Ah! Your that dwarf with some good skills for repairs! Careful where you¡¯re running!¡± I shout as I get up once he was off me. I look at my HP and saw that it had dropped to 30 points (11%) ¡°DAMN!! I NEED REPAIRS QUICK!!¡± I shout looking at the numbers only to have it drop to 10% because of my sudden movements. ¡°How much damage do you have already? Can¡¯t be much right?¡± Noah asked. ¡°90%!¡± ¡­ ¡°STUPID GIRL!! Why the bloody hell did you wait to come repair when you almost fallen apart!¡± Gunner shouted in a fit of rage. ¡°Wait, calm down Gunner!¡± He starts. ¡°CALM DOWN!! WE ARE PRESSED FOR TIME!¡± He shouts almost desperate. ¡°I know! Jessica, go with him in front and help Gunner get the things secure. I¡¯ll meet up with you after I repair her.¡± Noah tells the Jessica. ¡°Alright, oh and take these, I found them but they aren¡¯t parts I particularly need but it should work better for her.¡± She says. ¡°What are those?¡± I asked her. I was familiar with Jessica because we study together which is why when she referred me to get repairs from Noah I didn¡¯t question it since we are friends. ¡°Those are parts I found in the scrapyard. Still in good condition and specialized for fighters.¡± The next moment I was hugging her. ¡° THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!¡± I shouted. ¡°Jessica, please hurry before we attract more attention.¡± Noah said and looked around noticing how a large number of people were looking our ways. ¡°All you lazy asses get back to work this instant!¡± Gunner shouted almost about to jump someone to vent his anger. ¡°Let¡¯s go Gunner. Noah when you¡¯re done just call and I will forward the location to your AI.¡± She says and turns to follow the surprisingly agile dwarf that had deactivated his magnet boot and had jumped into the air and was using his wire and psi to control how and where he flew in zero gravity. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s get this over with quick!¡± Noah says and walks over to a maintenance and cursed before telling me to wait and ran off and came back with a two boxes filled with parts. I opened my plates and he grimaced. ¡°Okay, first off never let your HP drop to 10% unless you are fighting.¡± He said and started completely remaking nearly 80% of my parts. I couldn¡¯t do much but look away in shame since I was told that. I should know better but when I get into training I forget things. I look as he works and notice a few times as he grabs the new parts and completely replaces a few parts. It took half an hours and I heard him curse as he completely rebuilt my body and how it was taking so long. ¡°Hey it¡¯s not nice to keep cursing by how I am taking your time!¡± I said finally having enough. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t care if it wasn¡¯t something important!¡± He says as he installs another of the parts Jessica left. ¡°What exactly are you so worried about?¡± I asked. ¡°My dad found a wreck of a ship that was intact enough to rebuild and Jessica encountered a slightly damaged life support system.¡± He says. I finally get it, ¡°getting¡± an important piece of ship equipment really does deserve the worry if you suddenly encounter something like this. As he finishes I see a message.
The result of added better quality fighter specialized parts had resulted in stats improve. Physical Proficiency 13 -> 23 Resilience 20 -> 24 Agility 12 -> 19 Dexterity 12 -> 21 Overclock 5 -> 10 Processor Cooling 10 ->20
Whats with this burst of stats! It¡¯s like my body is so light now. As I was experimenting with my body I notice Noah quickly put everything away place the boxes over in a corner of the maintenance area. ¡°Lia, call Jessica for the location!¡± he says and starts running towards the area with the energy shield keeping the air inside. I hadn¡¯t noticed but looking on several spots there were cat walks that were sticking straight out of the floor. I follow him and when he reaches one he puts on foot and lets the magnet stick before he turns his body and walked through the door that was sideways. I hadn¡¯t noticed but this was the exit. Seriously I kept myself too stuffed up in the training room. I follow him and find lots of corridors and a few mechanics that had some strange little markets here with random parts laid out. Ricky couldn¡¯t ID them so I didn¡¯t pay attention. ¡°So you followed after all.¡± I suddenly jumped from fright when Noah suddenly appeared behind me with a helmet on and some air tanks on his back. ¡°Got curious¡­¡± I said and looked away. ¡°Whatever, you have at least 100 credits for the transport and 50 for the return trip since we will be returning and with you coming you will probably be made into a pack mule by Gunner.¡± He says. I didn¡¯t know how to reply to that but I did nod to his money question. Dad gave me 30,000 dollars and had me convert it into credits so that I can train without needing to work. I also got my first durability upgrade with part of this money. With the extra 1k I get as starting money I had enough money for a laser sword and several energy packs and a wooden training sword. Yeah, only an idiot would use the energy of an energy weapon to train. ¡°Then come on.¡± He says and walks over to a ship that looked about 6 meters wide and two school buses long (27.4 meters). We pay the tax for the trip and after a bit it left the docks and flew us to the scrapyard. As we arrive and get off we see another ship already there. ¡°We have friends here and are from the first ship so we will return with them.¡± Noah tells the captain who nods. ¡°Good luck kid.¡± The old pilot says as we get off and he leaves us. From there I saw a chat window open up between me, Noah, Jessica and Gunner.
Gunner: OH! You guys finally arrived! Come quick cause this ship is loaded with guns! Gahahahah!!
At this single message I could see Noah shake his head.
Noah: What about the life support system is it safe?
Gunner: Huh? What life support?
Yep he facepalmed though from how Gunner was acting I kind of expected that. Maybe the name is a nickname he gave himself cause he is a gun nut.
Jessica: *sigh* I went ahead and trying to unbolt it from the flood but I¡¯m no mechanic to know which to remove.
Noah: It¡¯s fine, I had already expected this when I saw Gunner drooling over that railgun. Did you get the remaining parts you needed for it?
Hilda: WAIT! Railgun! You FOUND a railgun!
Jessica: We will explain in a bit and yes Noah I got them. Gunner just wants enough parts to make a decoration since he has many stronger guns but he hasn¡¯t gotten a single one of these. The remaining parts he will repair them as spares for me if I pay a total 1000 credits. Such a good deal. Still I need to train with the sniper so I don¡¯t waste my ammo but each of the boxes had ammo so I have a good stock of them! ^-^
Noah: We will be right over then to get the Life support.
After a moment a map of the scrapyard appeared and a red dot showed the position of the two. Jumping and walking through the scrap we took little to no time before reaching a ship with Jessica waiting and as she sees us she waves. Inside it as dark but the flashlights they had helped with that and eventually we reached the room with a Life Support. It was large, much larger than I expected and looked like a few cylindrical air tanks and lots of openings for what could only be pipes
Noah: We will probably have to dismantle the tanks and separate them from the main machine before trying to remove them.
Suddenly a new light flashed from behind.
Gunner: Good call, there are several dozen bolts you need to remove from behind if you want dat. Anyway that is a tenth generation Shuttle life support system. Good enough for any shuttle but something like a small ship it¡¯s not enough. Has a filter system and with 3,2 meter tall quarter of a meter wide air tanks, with each can hold between 500 to 3000 liters of air, this system can hold enough air to fill and even store extra air for yer ship.
Noah: So had your fun with the guns?
Gunner: Wish I could spend more time with them but I simply can¡¯t let amateurs take down a complete life support system and expect it to not break further then it is.
His words clearly states he puts his professionalism over his hunger for guns.
Gunner: Ya! Missy, go keep watch! You got no skill in dismantling so keep watch and don¡¯t let others come inside.
This kind of pissed me off but I couldn¡¯t disagree with him especially since I never dismantled anything besides when I beat up scarecrows until they break. I walk outside and walk on top of the ship.
Boss¡­ that midget just pushed you around¡­ SO LAME!
¡°SHUT UP YOU LITTLE BRAT!¡± Obviously that was a mental shout which he heard clearly but no sound came out from my mouth. Anyway I just sat there making sure nothing happened and no one came which I felt was hard since there was only one ship parked at the scrapyard. After a while of boring waiting I finally got a chat message.
Gunner: Alright! Finally done! We got everything we needed brats so let¡¯s get before some scrapper arrive!
As if jinxing it a ship parked at the scrapyard outpost. [tr]
Hilda: Just curious but what does a scrapper ship normally look like?
Gunner: Piece of shit ship that looks like it may fall apart. Dirty as hell normally and has several harpoon turrets on both sides.
Hilda: Then we should leave¡­ fast. A ship just arrived after your jinxed and called them!
Didn¡¯t take long before they appeared from the ship. Gunner walked around with six crates floating behind him and then Jessica followed and finally Noah who was walking backwards with his hands stretched out. From behind came the three tanks and then the main machine body of the life support system. [tr]
Gunner: Bloody hurry up Noah!
Noah: THEN YOU PULL THIS THING WHILE I TAKE THE WEAPONS!
Gunner actually did that as he pushed Noah out of the way and with one arm stuck out he took control of the floating equipment what moved with much more speed outside without so much as scratching the hull.
Gunner: Get me bloody guns and hurry up Noah!
With Noah righting himself he did just that and we started walking towards the ship. It was all calm for a while. We were up higher and hidden by the darkness of space and we were even under the shadow of the station at the moment so it was hard for the scrappers to spot us while we could see them since they were using flashlights. When we were maybe 200 meters away a sudden laser shot came at us. Just as suddenly an energy extended in front us.
AHAHAH! We got a good catch today boys! Someone was nice enough to open those boxes for us!
The sudden message came from someone around us. All at once several dozen lights turned on and focused on us.
Did you think you could leave the scrapyard when scrappers are in! Do you know this is our home turf!
Gunner: Aye, and we pay to get in, so fuck off!
WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE!
Gunner: No one, but everyone calls me Gunner.
All the scrappers took a step back and raised their weapons to fire.
Gunner¡­ hehehe! So you finally left that safety of that shitty station unarmed even! This is a riot!
Gunner: When did I say I was unarmed? Brats close your eyes!
As he shouts he pulls out a black ball about the size of a fist and tosses it up. I close my eyes only to notice it turn bright through my lids for a second.
Gunner: BRATS RUN TO THE SHIP!
As he said that I opened my eyes and saw all the men holding their hands over their eyes but couldn¡¯t due to the helmets. When we got to the platform the first of the men were getting up. Sadly it was the one that was on the platform itself. Unfortunately for him Gunner wasn¡¯t nice because he planted his foot in the gut of one of them and a fist in the face of the other. As we got to the ship we started to move the things into the loading area while gunner tossed two more round balls which created two large shields like the one before blocking off the area completely. With him taking command to store the things we got everything inside and just as the ship started to leave he walked to the opened door of the ship and raised both middle fingers towards the scrappers. Chapter 11: Hideyoshi Author Corner: By the name of the chapter you will someone understand what comes in this chapter. Hope you like it and if you have ideas don''t hesitate to share it. THIS WAS ALL WARHAWX IDEA AND HIS PESTERING FOR ONE!!! P.S. I make a lot of play on gender words in this chapter! You are warned
Noah PoV I looked as Gunner removes his helmet inside the ship and rolls on the ground laughing, the pilot and co-pilot were also laughing there asses off like they had seen the funniest thing in the world. ¡°So what¡¯s so funny? That was a bit of a serious situation you know?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°Lass, y-you really don¡¯t know?! Fine let me tell you!¡± Gunner says as he gets up and sits on one of the seats. ¡°There is a deep hate between scrappers and mechanics of the stations, we are both mechanics in the trade but scrappers think they are better than us because they travel the universe and scavenge lots of different ships making instant profit normally large or small depending on the wrecks they find but stay poor during the time they can¡¯t find anything. Those shitty mechanics makes scavenging the scrapyards harder because they invest money into tools and gear made specifically for use in space. That is why when in a scrapyard you should always be careful of them since they aren¡¯t afraid to kill to take what you already scavenged. I didn¡¯t destroy them because we had some valuable stuff this time but if it was any other occasion I would have left them as corpses in space, buck naked after killing and stripping them of everything and even taking their blasted ship and made better use of that flying scrap pile!¡± He says. ¡°Don¡¯t forget to tell them that scrappers are the biggest pains in the ass!¡± The pilot shouted from the front. It made Gunner laugh again. ¡°Hey! What were those circle things you tossed?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Oh this?¡± he said and brought out a circle thing that appeared out of thin air, probably from the inventory. This thing was probably a consumable. This one in particular was black but had blue lights, one glowing around the lines. A few others appeared each looked the same but had different colored lights. ¡°Dis one with the white light is a Flash grenade. Bitch can turn even the best beasties blind for a good few minutes. the one with red light is an laser energy shield used for blocken lasers but with some defense against plasma. the one with yellow light is a plasma shield and the one with blue light is a psionic shield. These in particular are my own personally built models.¡± He says. ¡°Are they hard to make?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye, bitches to make without them bursting in your face or activating.¡± He says with a grimace. ¡°Anyway lets get ready to move the stuff.¡± Gunner said and gets up and puts on his helmet. I looked out the window and saw through the opening, that was covered by an energy shield, that we were already getting ready to dock. I lift the crates up and Gunner pulls the Life support. As the ship docks I jump over and get onto the docks and pull over the girls first making sure they are firmly on the docks. Then Gunner pushed one crate at a time so that I can be safe that it would arrive. The two girls hold onto them while I start to pull the tanks out. I noticed how some dock personnel stared at what we were pulling out. Knowing the ship was one that went to the scrapyard. This meant there was some luck to be had there. At the rear of everything Gunner came out shocking them people staring and they started to tremble a bit since they knew the fish was a bit too big to try and catch. [table] His commands were followed more or less okay but I was starting to get a headache from using so much Psi in such a short amount of time. We had to travel up a lift around the outside of the station to get to the correct docks my husk of a ship was on. Finally reaching the husk I found myself a bit out of breath from using the psi so much. I was trembling a bit as I try to take a few deeper breaths. The others don¡¯t miss it. [table]
Gunner: Bring the crates while we take the Life support to your ship.
Gunner: Lets take a short break or the kid will break and faint.
I let myself sit on the docks and rested on my back before I move my hand to my head that was hurting.
Gunner: you really need to get a Psi container kid. Dwarfs don¡¯t have much but we got tech so learn more about it already
After a few minutes my headache subsided and I read the message and told Lia to note down the Psi container thing Gunner mentioned. After my psi recharged I got up by simply pushing off the floor and let my upperbody rise while my feet were magnetically connected to the docks piers.
Noah: Alright, let¡¯s go!
I tell them and then nod. I grab the crates again and Gunner takes the life support and we reach the ship which was in the same place as before.
Hilda: Woah! This ship looks cool! It reminds me of a haunted house where you will suddenly see a ghost coming at your or even a zombie but since this is a sci-fi setting it just looks like an epic wreck!
Gunner: Undead is nonsense but there is something that gets close and is 50 times worse than them. There is some people that went into space during the original space expansion and when they were encountered, they had mutilated themselves with metal shards and were mad. they are the biggest menace in space.
Gunners description causes us to pale but he never said their name as if it was taboo. He doesn¡¯t care though as he jumps into the hole on the side of the ship and then pulls the girls in. I push his weapons out and he grabs them until finally the life support is last. Then I jump over. The weapon crates were left near the hole but hidden in the corner. From there we took the life support and put the main machine in place where gunner began to teach us which wire would connect to which part of the machine. The wires had letters and numbers which represent their function so with him showing us and the AIs noting these down for us to review we connect the wires which would only work after we get a generator or an engine to power it. When we got to the structural problem Gunner went out and brought back some metal sheets and then showed us how to weld and completely remade the area that was broken while checking the area for hardware damage but there was none. Then we installed the tanks and it was done.
Gunner: you got lucky to get a life support system so quick. Don¡¯t count on luck every time though, cause it will eventually run out.
Noah: I know, we should probably return to work but recently I¡¯ve been exhausted so I may take a few days off.
This was my attempt to buy me some time to take care of necessities in the real world that I had neglected. He nods as did the two next to me which I don¡¯t doubt were any different. From here we exit the ship and pull out Gunners ¡°decoration¡± and all the spare parts for Jessica¡¯s railgun. When we turn and start walking down the pier heading to the inside of the hangars I noticed a heavily padded person staring at my ship without moving. Confused by who it was I walked towards him and noticed the long tail that was slowly waving from left to right which meant it was a tosk. Even the helmet had been shaped differently since it seemed to have some horn or spike protrusions from its head.
Noah: Can I help you?
???: Huh?
Noah: You¡¯re staring at my ship so I¡¯m asking if I can help you with anything?
???: Oh sorry about that. I saw you guys bringing that life support up so I thought you had a ship and wanted to check it out. Was just lost day dreaming of flying something so epic. Just imagine it! In the middle of a bandit raid with everyone shooting you do flips, barrel rolls, fire cannons killing all of them, get hit in the wings and lose control only to gain it after a bit and turn to table on the enemy! *Pant* Just thinking about it is awesome! *Pant* The pilot courses I get here to train my small craft piloting skill is boring. I want to go around space and completely out maneuver all the shitting idiots I can find and get faster and faster ships that will leave everyone in my afterburners! *PANT PANT PANT PANT*
We all take a step back as we watch the Tosk actually get aroused. He was bending over slightly as he held his crotch and rubbing his legs making us wonder if the concept of sanity even pertained to him. Who the fuck gets aroused by flying a ship mid combat. After a moment he seems to realize what he was doing and straightened up and looks our way as if nothing happened.
???: *Cough cough* My name is Alex and since you are building a ship I can guess you aren¡¯t a pilot or even have a crew so can I be your crew''s pilot?
Noah: Hell no!
Alex: Cool the¡­ WAHH!! SERIOUSLY!!!
Lia: Ahahahaha This guy is great! AHAHAHA! Let him join Noah, he is funny!!
Noah: Shut up Lia! And how did you connect?
Lia: Always been connected since all systems you use pass through me. XD
Alex: Interesting AI you have, mines a bit of a strange guy. Not social but makes my life easy since I suck at stuff like selling items and all that.
¡±So he lets his AI sell his things! How stupid is this guy!¡± i thought.
Gunner: I really don¡¯t get what kind of person you are but I prefer to keep away from freaks so I will let you guys deal with him.¡±
Noah: I think we should go as well.
Jessica: Agreed!
Hilda: Yeah!
Like that we simply walked around the weird person, but sadly he started following after us. We entered the air lock area and me and Gunner removed the helmets and stored them since it was borrowed from the station unlike the headphones. ¡°Finally! Cleaner more humid air and not some canned air.¡± I said. When I looked back the two androids didn¡¯t do much but were giggling. Suddenly we heard a crash and a voice that was at a tone that made you confuse weather it was a girl or a boy. Looking back I saw the Tosk on the ground. He¡­ wait is it a girl? What I saw was the a very human like Tosk with somewhat girly face. He wore some padded clothes under the space suit but it ended up being really baggy and hid most of her curves but I was sure that it was a thin frame similar to a girl before puberty or a boy during the same period. The only way to know was the arm¡¯s thickness the pc model on the left arm which was showed a thin arm. The hair color was a green yellow that went down halfway down the back. Around the eyes were small yellow scales and his eyes were also yellow and had slit pupils. From under her hair came a few horns. Everyone that was looking were a bit stunned and then a question surfaced. ¡°Is that a boy or girl?¡± When Alex finally noticed everyone''s eyes he blinked a few times. ¡°What?¡± She asked. ¡°Um¡­ this may seem rude but what sex are you?¡± I asked. ¡­ ¡°Pff! AAHAHAHAHAHAH! Th-that¡¯s a good one! AHAHA!! Good joke! Really, that was good! Seriously, it¡¯s really obvious what I am.¡± He said holding her sides. No one laughed and just looked at him confused. ¡°Hahah ehe¡­ come on it¡¯s obvious right?¡± She said as his smile dropped a bit. ¡­ No one could reply to this. Well everyone but one. Making four rotating text windows appear on my arm for everyone to see¡­
THIRD GENDER!!! AHAHAHAHAHAHA I CAN¡¯T BELIEVE YOU FOUND A THIRD GENDER LIZARDMAN! OH THIS IS RICH! OH GOD MY CIRCUITS THEY HURT!! PLEASE, PLEASE SOMEONE HELP ME IT HURTS! I NEED PICTURES, MORE PICTURES I CAN¡¯T LET THIS PASS I HAVE TO MAKE SURE TO REGISTER THIS!!! AHAHAHAHA
Yeah, it was more than enough to agree to what she said. This was without a doubt the infamous third gender but¡­ but. ¡°You are an existence that should only exist in anime¡­!¡± I blurted out by instincts as my mind and mouth said and though in sync. This instantly made him sulk and he crouched over in the corner mumbling¡­ ¡°But¡­ but I spend so long making this character¡­ why am I still like this¡­¡± This was like a lightning bolt to the players that heard this since it meant she was similar to this in real life. ¡°O-oi Jessica¡­ I¡¯m not dreaming right?¡± Hilda asked after pinching her cheeks. ¡°Don¡¯t think so. I¡¯m very sure I am seeing this as well.¡± Jessica said. ¡°You guys are cruel! First you ignore my love for ships then you call me a third gender!!¡± Alex shouted. ¡°Ya can¡¯t blame the kids, brat. No one can tell if you''re a lad or lass so let''s make this easier! I¡¯m leaven.¡± Gunner said and simply left as easy as that. ¡°Yeah, I still need to log off, I¡¯ve been here for 4 days straight so I need to do basic needs.¡± I said. ¡°No you¡¯re not! Your AI called me a third gender and you denied my existence so you need to take responsibility!¡± Alex says as she gets up and points at me. ¡°Not interested in people who can¡¯t decide on a sex.¡± I tell him. ¡°NOT LIKE THAT! I will be your pilot and that is fine.¡± She says. ¡°Don¡¯t want it! Already got my dad to annoy me and I don¡¯t need to personally add fuel to the fire.¡± I say. ¡°I have small craft piloting skill level 12 and Shuttle piloting at level 10.¡± He says. I freeze in my step. Those levels were high for the time the game has been running. I know dad has some skills above level 10 already since he probably trained using real life skills he gained but for someone that doesn¡¯t look 25 to have that he must actually be a pilot. ¡°... Can¡¯t answer now since I don¡¯t have a crew.¡± I said and start walking not wanting to hear more. ¡°Then Let¡¯s keep in contact.¡±
ALREADY HAVE THE CONTACT!!! I WILL MAKE EXTRA SURE TO TELL YOUR FATHER ABOUT THIS GEM OF A REAL LIFE CLICHE!!
¡°SHUT UP LIA! I¡¯ll call if my dad agrees.¡± I said glum now. ¡°AHAHA!! Hey when you do that call me since it seems interesting.¡± Hilda says nonchantly. ¡°Jessica, Noah¡¯s dad is the uncle I told you about. The one that has level 15 in martial arts already. ¡°PLEASE MAKE SURE TO INVITE ME TO THAT CREW!¡± She shouted while bowing on the ground. I glare at Jessica who smiled gently. ¡°I¡¯ll keep in contact. I already arranged to be part of the crew if you make it with uncle.¡± Jessica says and I could only sigh. ¡°Whatever. I¡¯m going to rest.¡± I say shaking my head. I hear a loud ¡°YES~!!¡± from behind me as I open the door into the hangars and start on my way to my quarters to get some log off time and eat. Lisa PoV I was sitting in one of the tranquil parks of Kelha Station with my Psi master Sir Alphenor. Around me were several dozen other elves. Sir Alphenor only taught elves since he tells us he gets frustrated by teaching people of other race that can¡¯t achieve Exterior Psi manipulation like an elf. Psi is a boundless energy that is in everything, similar to mana in fantasy games. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. The first part of training we all did already and that was to find every last Psi gate and open them to their limits with a technique to keep the pain as minimal as possible. Elves have 128 Psi Gates that cover our body. During the tutorials I was able to unlock 52 through the painful method of unlocking them but gave up due to pain. After learning how to properly do I even improved the quality of the gates by shaving the corners until it was perfectly circular.
For unlocking all your bodies Psionic Gates you get 10 Mentality and Willpower
Finally. I open my eyes and a smile crosses my face as I call up my Stats and skills.
Status
Name:LisaFaction:Liberation
Race:Elf
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:228HP Regeneration:0.26
Psi:2990Psi Regeneration1.39
Level:1Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:21Resilience:26
Dexterity:15Agility:20
Mentality:149Willpower:139
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 1 Weapon Repair Level 1 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 1 Exterior Psi Manipulation Level 8 Meditation Level 6 Barrier Psionic Technique Level 3 Support Psi Technique Level 7 Healing Psi Techniques Level 10
The Psi capacity of an elf is something to impress for sure. Looking at my skills I think about the starting skills I got but shrug it off since I don¡¯t know if I will ever use them since I will be a healer. ¡°Lisa, I can feel the flow of Psi from you got smoother. Did you finish opening all your gates?¡± Sir Alphenor asked me. ¡°Yes Sir!¡± I tell him. ¡°Good, just wait until the others are finished before we can go. If I remember correctly, you took the mechanic course before coming here correct?¡± He asked. I was confused by the question and it raised a brow. What did mechanics have with Psi training. ¡°Yes sir?¡± I reply still confused. ¡°Good, just meditate until it¡¯s time for us to leave.¡± He said and went meditating himself. I didn¡¯t get what we were going to do so I followed him and started meditating and felt the rush of Psi start flowing through me and ending at the point of origin in my brain. After a while, one by one, the others were finally able to unlock the remaining Psi gates they had been missing. ¡°I see everyone is done, good. Now split into four groups depending on the course you all took before coming here.¡± Sir Alphenor said. We all were confused but we did as we were told. We make four groups each with determined by the skill set we choose. I was wondering what we were going to do but my guess would be us getting work in these areas which I wasn¡¯t particularly happy about since I choose Mechanic simply to choose something since I didn¡¯t like any of the choices in particular. Sir Alphenor called three other elves and told them to lead the fighter, Technician and Pilots groups and led the mechanics group personally. We went down into the hangars but thinking we would work there we simply followed him. The place was ear wrenching. I personally created two barriers around my ears to block the sound and anyone that knew barrier psi did something similar to themselves and those that didn¡¯t know. We went into the depot and then through the factory. We had to use our Psi to float through since we didn¡¯t have magnet boots but wasn¡¯t too much of a strain for us. Finally we reached a large door and with Sir Alphenor walking to a panel he inserted a password and the door opened. Floating through we follow him to the other side. We were struck with fear seeing so much combat technology ready to make swiss cheese out of anyone unauthorized to pass through. This new area was also a factory but this time the production we saw as we enter the hangar was for combat weapons, ships and more. We took an elevator up and continued walking through a few airfields until we reached one filled with robots and mechs. Several of the male elves were nearly drooling after seeing the mecha. can¡¯t blame them because, well¡­. mechs. Sir Alphenor asked one of the mechanics there where someone called Colonel was. We were pointed to the most basic looking mechs were a group was working. Following him we quickly reach the dwarves in that area. ¡°Sir Colonel!¡± sir Alphenor called. Most of us were surprised that he referred to the Dwarf as ¡°sir¡± but I had seen a few moments when they interacted. That time in the bar was one and I was really shocked when that Ogre was sent flying so easily by both the dwarf and Sir Alphenor. Later I asked how the dwarf¡¯s punch was so strong and he said first off it was Colonel but didn¡¯t explain more about him but said that the power behind it came from Inner Psi Manipulation which elves can¡¯t use since we open all our Psionic gates which are all over our bodies. For us to use it we need Psionic tech and train in it. That said, elves that do that are a 1 in 1 million since the power of a trained elf can match the power of the dwarfs technology. ¡°Sir Alphenor, what pleasure do I owe for your visit today?¡± He asked. ¡°I have finished basic training for this batch of children. These in specific took the mechanic course so I have come to leave them in your care for further training.¡± Sir Alphenor said. ¡°AH! Finally the battery chargers have arrived!! Good, good that Psionic cannon shot has been given me a headache to recharge the power of my armor!¡± He said nonchalantly making our jaws drop. ¡°Sir Alphenor! Are you seriously going to leave us with a dwarf that considers us only as a walking battery?!¡± I asked pleading. ¡°Of course, psionic technology is powered by psi, where do you think they gather so much energy. It would take them nearly 3 weeks for dwarves to fully charge the advanced models without the help of other races. Elves drop that time to 4 days even with recruits like yourself.¡± He says. We were all shocked and it seems so were the dwarf players who were piloting the suits or trying to. ¡°Aye, everything has a balance somewhere, for our tech it¡¯s the fact that it eats up psi like a bitch! Especially the big guns. That''s why I prefer the Axe, such a beautiful weapon that can cause so much damage with so little effort!¡± Colonel said passionately. ¡°Yes yes, we know your love for a large axe or bludgeon. Anyway you should teach Inner Psi Manipulation to those who want it. A few are support types instead of combat so I would suggest finding the jobs they want and teaching them how to make the equipment they need for it.¡± Sir Alphenor suggested. ¡°Oh, not all are fighters eh? Interesting, kind of rare pure supports. I presume it¡¯s the young lass I spotted you with at the bar a few days ago when that retard called my personal batch toilet water.¡± He said. ¡°Yes, it¡¯s this young lady behind me. She specializes in support and healing psi.¡± He says introducing me personally. I blushed because I was given preferential treatment. ¡°Oh! A doctor type, rare indeed! That said she¡¯s a bit scrawny do you even exercise lass? Looks like you can¡¯t even lift 20 kilos without your psi.¡± He says after giving me a one over. I looked away since I couldn¡¯t rebut him since my physical proficiency was extremely low. ¡°Thats a yes, well we will deal with that, some basic physical exercise should be enough to increase your stats. I¡¯ll take them, you can prepare the next group.¡± He says to Sir Alphenor. ¡°Yes, there are a large number of elves and dwarf coming here, soon the number will be enough for terraforming projects.¡± He said. Everyone gets interested by what they heard but the talk ended at that moment since Sir Alphenor floated into the air. ¡°I shall take my leave then.¡± He says and left without a second look. ¡°Alright, now then, raise your hand if you actually took the time to train your mechanic¡¯s skill?¡± Colonel asked. There were three or four that rose their hands. ¡°Those that did find Rachet and he will put you in some working function to fit your skill. the rest of you come with me. We will put you to train a bit.¡± He said then turned to those in the robot''s. ¡°De rest of you keep opening the Tech gates like you did with your gloves!¡± He shouted and waved for us to follow. We walked over to a corner with a lot of broken parts and several shelves filled with lots of new components. ¡°First job, fix this pile of parts, ONE! BY! ONE! Understood.¡± He said emphasizing one by one. I kind of wondered about that but agreed. I took one of the parts in hand and try to dismantle the part. When doing it by hand didn¡¯t work I used psi which worked wonders. I removed one part at a time and put it down and when I finally found a broken part I replaced it in pile I was making for the part. I changed five parts and then turned to the pile and grabbed the first part and froze. ¡­ ¡°Damn it!¡± I said. I left the part completely dismantled in a random pile without copying the part. ¡°Max, please tell me you actually copied down the process I dismantled that part?¡± I wryly asked my AI.
Nope. To bored to do that but I took a pic of what it was like when you started.
He makes it appear and I could only sigh. Why and how did I get such a lazy AI. It all went wrong when he asked for me to connect an internet cable to the capsule. From that he watched so much Anime and manga and become like a shut in and a complete lazy ass that does everything half assed. I could almost cry at having such a useless AI if it wasn¡¯t for the fact that he was too useful if I bribe him with something he might like. When he became like this I had obviously removed the cable so now I bribe him with manga and anime so he can work. ¡°I¡¯ll upload the last 2 updated episodes of O** P**** *** if you show me step by step how it was dismantled.¡± I said bribing.
SERIOUSLY! AH RIGHT!!! Been pumped for those episodes for so fucking long!!!
The hologram quickly came apart one by one and stayed floating over my wrist. I lifted the pile of parts and arranged everything like that. He even told me which were wrong. At least I still have some 20 different anime he was obsessed with. If I can get him attached to light novels now I will have a new arsenal of things to use against him. Still with the part rebuilt I leave it in the repaired pile and get another one and already learning from my mistakes I keep it in the air and start this dismantling there since it¡¯s easy to follow. It was after my fourth part that I heard someone complain by how slow it was. They grabbed two damaged parts and started to dismantle it with his psi and repair it. I looked and saw some damaged parts but he didn¡¯t notice all of them and rebuilt it like that and placed it in his repaired pile. ¡°So that¡¯s why, huh.¡± I mutter and nod. Grabbing the next one I repair and end up getting a level in mechanics and gained the dismantling skill and Parts Repair repair skill. After a while all the parts were repaired, at least for those who weren¡¯t impatient. The dwarf came back and checked all the parts and it goes without saying that the tongue lashing all the impatient elves got was a very scary thing. Imagine an army sergeant but 100 times worse in a much more compact size but with a much heavier fist. It felt like his yelling was worse than the noise in the factory. The tongue lashing even came to us who did it correctly because he wanted to make sure the lesson was taught that quality is better than quantity when you work with high level tech. When he was done he told us it was fine and left the damaged parts for us to repair a different time. We were free to look for anyone to teach us since we had gained a few levels in skill through this. Since I didn¡¯t really know what to do I went to the more basic level robot''s looking for something to do and found Mr. Roktar there. ¡°Oh Lisa! Hello, how are things?¡± He asked as he notices me. ¡°Alright, finished psi training or at least the basics.¡± I say. ¡°I see, well I had my basics done before I even started. The skills just rose rapidly to accompany my real skills.¡± he said proudly. ¡°So what are you here for?¡± I asked him. ¡°Ah yes, I was given the opportunity to join the guards corps of the station for as long as I stay in the station. It gives a good income so I took it and came to check on my son who is one of these fighters.¡± He replied. ¡°Your son, I think you mentioned something about making a crew with him, right?¡± I asked. ¡°Yep, though I went to check requirements for an official crew. You need a 6 people at least. I got a call saying he met some people that wanted to make a crew with him so we total 5 at the moment.¡± He says. ¡°Hmm, I would have to meet them but if I think they are nice enough I may be willing to be the last member.¡± I tell him. ¡°What''s this about a crew and who are you giant?¡± Colonel suddenly appears and asks. ¡°I¡¯m looking for my son Noah, wanted to talk about it since we are forming a crew and are gathering money already to start repairing the husk of a shuttle I found.¡± He says. ¡°Already! Would''ve expected someone to buy the first ships but to rebuild one is a nice thing. Might be a nice chance to teach shipbuilding to newbies that never saw it.¡± He mutters. ¡°This is our ship so it¡¯s our problem.¡± Roktar says. ¡°Aye but amateurs like you can¡¯t build a complete ship yourselves. I gotta check with Gunner to see if we can¡¯t teach Noah shipbuildings ins and outs. Maybe even help out to install hard stuff.¡± Colonel says. ¡°Well I don¡¯t mind if it¡¯s like that.¡± Roktar said. ¡°Also got to remind him to make his personal batch of some strong beer for when we finally finish building the ship.¡± Colonel muttered. ¡°Huh!¡± I exclaimed. ¡°Oh sorry, did I say that outloud, don¡¯t mind it, just dwarf tradition!¡± He says with a laugh. ¡°So the owner of the ship makes a personal batch of beer? Then it''s best you leave that with me, I brew things much better since he doesn¡¯t like the taste of hard liquor. Kind of my fault though.¡± Roktar said. ¡°Bah! What dwarf doesn¡¯t like a good beer! Still, since you''re his dad it will work fine.¡± Colonel said. ¡°Just need the brewery machines which I guess you have some of, right?¡± He asked. ¡±I¡¯m seriously lost right now? When did the talk of making a crew turn into who makes beer for a celebration that may take months before its ready.¡± I thought. Lost in the middle of the strange conversation I just sigh and looked around for a senior elf mechanic and asked for instructions on what I could do and he showed me some tips on being more efficient with my psi when making equipment granting me a level in Exterior Psi manipulation. Chapter 12: Brewmaster Author corner: Greetings all! Here is another Nebula. I noticed everyone seems to hate Lia so i would like suggestions to turn her from annoying to funny and more... wargon like since that is the main target. (obviously the target is Warhawx himself) main reason i made her that way.
Noah PoV I really need to be careful with how much time I spent in game. Because of how busy I was I totally forgot to logout and take care of business. When I finally did log out I was nearly pissing and shitting myself and was starving. It took me a few minutes to resolve it all though and once I did I crashed into my bed and went to sleep. I would lose a day in game but then again, everyone would so I can catch up. After a fitful sleep and my morning stretches, I returned to Nebula and appear inside my room in the military ring. I stretch as my body was stiff here as well since it was in bed for a whole day. After getting another set of morning stretches I head out and found the Dwarf fighters air field with a drastic rise in the number of elves. I found them repairing parts while others were making new parts. There were some with their arm against some mecha and with their eyes closed. There was a feeling of psi moving in great quantity around these people so it just meant they were pumping it full of psi. This is probably that psi capacity thing of the machine. I move towards the beginner area and find colonel barking orders at the beginners. The number had reduced which meant players were off. ¡°Sir?¡± I called and Colonel looked back. ¡°Noah, finally awake now! Fuck man you sleep like a brick! Not only you but several other of you foreigners as well!¡± He shouted. ¡°I think it may be something from travelling so long through space in cryogenic sleep.¡± I said making an excuse. ¡°Hmm¡­ need to check with the others to see if that¡¯s true.¡± He muttered. ¡°So which one do I train with?¡± I asked. ¡°Hmm? Ah! Right that one, that robot a tad bit taller than the others. Kinda rare for a tall dwarf to appear but we keep a suit ready.¡± He said. The suit was only about 10 cm taller than the normal ones but it didn¡¯t look any stronger than the others. Colonel walked over with me following and took a ladder up and put his hand on the chest making the plates open. ¡°Now take your boots and gloves off. There is two spots for feet and hands were all your psi gates are blocked and ye need to open all of them again. These are much harder than just gloves or boots.¡± He says. ¡°Alright.¡± I said and took them off as he said and looking around I spotted two entrances. Inside the cockpit of the suit were two openings on the side which were for the hands and two near the bottom. Without the boots on I walk in backwards and stick my feet into the open metal boots that closed around my feet. ¡°Hmm, needs a bit of size adjustment¡­ stick your hands in and say adjects size.¡± Colonel said. The hands were a few centimeter above my head so it would obstructing the flow of blood. I still put them in my hands in and said what he said. Instantly the boots pushed up and the hands lowered a bit becoming just right were I won¡¯t feel much problem. ¡°Good, now you can start.¡± He said and left. I sigh and close my eyes and start working. Since I didn¡¯t know how it was exactly I focused on one gate only and tried to stick a bit of psi inside to try and start circling it and opening the gate. Unfortunately it wasn¡¯t that easy. No it was far from it. First off the gate I could feel. It was right in front of my own gates but the psionic tech gates of the suit was extremely closed. The opening was as big as the very point of a needle. I sighed since I knew what I needed to do. Gritting my teeth I push all my psi into my entire hand. The wave of pain almost made me faint but when I stopped to prevent myself from fainting the pain continued a bit before my head cleared up. After a bit I recovered and went to check out the gates. It had expanded to the width of a needle which was an improvement. I took this chance and form a small bubble of psi in all the gates because I feared it would close. Then starting slowly shave away the gate. After 2 minutes I found I didn¡¯t have enough psi to do all the gates. Reluctantly I removed psi from half the gates and spread it over the others but doing this I eventually I had to pull back more until I was left with 1. That single opening with all 480 psi points I had were there. Because all the areas with gates were blocked by psi tech I wasn¡¯t recovering anything. The gate had only opened¡­ ¡°SHIT! Only a third of the way, seriously!¡± I cursed. As I cursed I started to wonder what to do. All the psi was in a that single bubble. I pulled it back and as soon as the psi returned to my body it popped and released flowing like a raging river. The river was so strong that it caused pain throughout my body as I tried to return it to a calm flow unlike before. When I had finally recovered I noticed that my HP had actually dropped some. I tell the machine to let me go and it releases my hands and feet. Jumping out and landing on my face disoriented it took a bit for me to finally get my bearings. ¡°AHAHA! So you feeling the backlash eh?¡± Colonel suddenly said as he appeared. ¡°You know and didn¡¯t tell me?¡± I said. ¡°Course I new! Good lesson to you to not just randomly stuff psi into a compressed bubble. you gotta learn to control your psi properly. Ye need 50 points at max.¡± He says. ¡°There is no way that so little psi can open it.¡± I tell him. ¡°Course it can. When you make a the bubble of psi cover what you opened with just the spread out 50 points of psi. Then make an opening in the middle of your cover of psi and from that just push the psi to the edge and split it while expanding it.¡± He said nonchalantly. I just sigh. My own fault for not asking how I should do it. My own stupidity for thinking a much more advanced level of technology would be as easy as a more simple tech. I just turn around and lay on my back. ¡°Seems you got a good enough head to notice when you''re wrong.¡± He says. ¡°My fault for not asking. I¡¯ll go back in after a few minutes. I took some damage from the return of the psi so I just need to rest a bit so that I don¡¯t endanger myself again.¡± I tell him. ¡°Good, oh right, you weren¡¯t here but your dad said you were making a ship. I talked with Gunner and we he agreed to give you some ship building lessons as you get more parts for it.¡± He said. ¡°Good to know, was wondering if I would have to pay someone for that.¡± I said. ¡°Oh and your dad will be providing the beer that we will be drinking when you actually finish it.¡± He said. ¡­ Did he just say what I think he said. ¡°You said my dad would make the drinks¡­ alcoholic?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye a giant dwarf. Still wondering how he had a normal dwarf as a kid?¡± He said confused. ¡°...¡± I started to think how to reply and an idea hit me. ¡°He is my step dad. He adopted me which is why I¡¯m so different from him. Also, I suggest not drink anything my dad calls a ¡°strong¡± drink because even as if you¡¯re a dwarf, you will fall flat on your face after drinking a bit of it.¡± I tell him. Everyone nearby that heard that suddenly frozen and looked my way. ¡°Kid, you know what you''re saying right. A drink that can drop a dwarf isn¡¯t something to joke with. That would be like saying you found a dwarf that can use psi better than an elf.¡± Colonel says. I sigh and shake my head. ¡°Then you will just have to wait. Dad doesn¡¯t have any brewing gear but I doubt that will last long.¡± I say. ¡°Aye, I sold him a small one for him to start practicing.¡± Colonel says. ¡°Oh? Then I guess getting the money for the ship¡¯s parts will come faster than I thought. Considering my dads skill in brewing¡­ it will take him around a week for the first produces to be ready and maybe 2 months before the real thing.¡± I said. ¡°2 months to make something to knock a dwarf out. You joke with us kid cause it¡¯s not funny. I made sure that you father doesn¡¯t have brewery skill.¡± Colonel said. ¡°Only the skills we learned from the course seemed to have been left after we came to Kelha through Cryogenic sleep, maybe memory lose or something. The skills just don¡¯t show up but we still have the knowledge just need to retrain them.¡± I replied dryly. ¡°Why don¡¯t I believe you kid.¡± Colonel said with a frown. ¡°Not up to me to show you it seems. Still just wait to drink my dad¡¯s drinks.¡± I said and got up shrugging and climbing the latter back into the suit. ¡°I¡¯m going to train a bit.¡± I said pretty much saying I wasn¡¯t telling them anymore since I wasn¡¯t being believed. At least by NPC¡¯s since the players somewhat understood that dad learned in other games. I settle into the armor and close my eyes and focus on the gates ready to train this new method of opening them. Roktar PoV Hehe finally I got a brewery! Damn i¡¯ve missed brewing some good drinks that fruits on earth can¡¯t ever make. The brewery was a small one and very simple but any good brewer can make something good from any size brewery. I had this installed to my room after getting a job at the guards corp. I also made a quick trip to the market and got some, a fucking lot, of ingredients because I need to grind my brewery level until it¡¯s sufficient enough to let me produce the desired effect with the skill boost. I spend at least 3 hours to produce a small batch of alcohol from some common grains used to make it. Loading it into two different 1 gallon glass tanks then chop up and add a few locally grown fruits from one of the planets in this system that produces food. Since I still needed to do further training and take some jobs to get funds for the alcohol brewing I leave the two gallons in the the closet and go get some work. Oh right, I was called by Noah¡¯s interesting AI and told about some third gender Pilot that has somehow put in his mind that he wanted to join our crew. When he told me his¡­ yeah let¡¯s go with his, skill level I couldn¡¯t help but be impressed. Not everyday you find a pro. Because of that I told him to join me in the guards corp as a pilot. Now finding him at the board I call him and we find a request for patrolling the area for several hours and the pay was 400 credits for each of us and a bonus is given if we locate and kill bandits that try to come around. If we locate a large group, which means 10 ships or more in an area, and tell the station we get a bonus of 1000 credits. We readily accept and head to the assigned ship we would use, me at the ship¡¯s upper turret and the kids at the pilot seat, and we head out. We took down 2 bandit ship and gained 100 credits extra but it was fine since we got money. Seeing as there wasn¡¯t much else to do I decide to call all the people that had shown interest in making the crew and we agree to meet in one of the parks in the residential ring. We agreed that the first person reaching a park would determine which of them it would be so by the time I reached the residential ring Jessica was already at one of the parks so we went over to her. I found Jessica with Hilda already there, with me and Alex, it left just Noah and Lisa to arrive so we can talk and see if Lisa will join us. ¡°Hi Jessica, I presume this is the young lady you said tol¡­¡± I start saying but the Android suddenly runs over and bows to me. ¡°MY NAME IS HILDA SIR AND I WISH TO BECOME YOUR DISCIPLE!!!¡± She shouted drawing the attention of everyone nearby. ¡°Sorry uncle but she¡¯s a battle junkie. I¡¯ve showed her some of your videos when you were younger and she drooled to learn from you for a long time.¡± Jessica said apologetically. ¡°Nah, it''s fine. I¡¯ve tutored enough people to know one or two would want combat lessons. If you don¡¯t mind, I would like to see which skills you possess and which weapons you use.¡± I tell her casually. She didn¡¯t hesitate to show me.
Laser Weapon Mastery Level 8 Missile Weapon Mastery Level 1 Sword Mastery Level 10 Martial Arts Level 7 Pistol arms mastery Level 5
My brows raise at her mastery levels as well as martial arts. This showed she had some real life skills she trained in game. VR games had become a common thing to reach higher level of proficiency in sword arts for a long time already since it lets you fight real foes and people to the death. ¡°So you''re from a martial arts dojo?¡± I asked her. ¡°Yes, my father only built it recently, we aren¡¯t some thousand year martial arts family like some families from japan or other asian countries. My dad used several dozen games over the years to develop it and will probably continue doing so until he dies and will impart that to future generations.¡± she replied. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. ¡°What¡¯s the style?¡± I asked. ¡°Gale Dance style¡­ or was it something else?¡± She replied. ¡°AH! I heard of that! It¡¯s a sword dancing style that can be fought by using either swords or iron fans. Most fantasy setting VR games would probably put this martial arts style as a skill taught to blade dancers.¡± I said. ¡°Really, now I get why my dad had me do so many of those dumb dancing classes.¡± She said with a frown. ¡°Dancing is a good exercise. I would suggest to start practicing it in earnest since it seems to fit the sword style.¡± I told her making her sulk a bit. I could more or less understand her personality already. Tomboy swords woman and a battle junkie who probably wants to be better than men at what they do better which is strength based things. I can already guess that because she doesn¡¯t like dancing she is really rigid with her fighting style since she wouldn¡¯t want to add in dancing. I don¡¯t know if I can help with the fighting style but some pointers here and there I may be able to tell her. Since we still needed to wait for Noah and Lisa I sat down and had Hilda show me her fighting style. Hitting the bullseye with my guess, she was as rigid as a rock when performing her attacks. I didn¡¯t know exactly how the fighting style went but it was clear as day that instead of stopping a swing and then fixing your posture for the next one you needed to be more fluid than water. ¡°As expected I guess.¡± I said with a sigh. ¡°Was it good?¡± She asked me expectant. ¡°Want the sugar coated answer or the real pro¡¯s analysis?¡± I asked her. She looked perplexed by my question and frowned hearing it. ¡°The real one.¡± She finally said. ¡°Your movements was like watching a rough rock trying to dance. The movements were slow, the fluidity of the fighting style was nonexistent, and I am thoroughly amazed you were able to get your sword mastery to level 10 in such a short time training like that.¡± I said out right and as bluntly as possible. ¡°Uncle!¡± Jessica exclaimed. ¡°Jessica, you know how I think of fighting, she asked for a pro¡¯s analysis on her own fighting style and I gave it to her. I more or less already figured her fighting style to be agility and dexterity based with quick fluid motions meant to attack weak points while fighting in a large crowd against several opponents. As she is fighting she can fight only one opponent at a time.¡± I say in a serious tone. Jessica doesn¡¯t reply back since I was talking seriously on the matter. ¡°It¡¯s fine Jessica, he told me what I wanted to know. Should have actually taken my father¡¯s instructions more seriously though.¡± She said with a wry smile. ¡°You can always improve on his style but as it is, it¡¯s a blade dancer style of combat. If you practice it you may be able to remove that dancing but that will take a long time and you need to perfect the original style to make it different.¡± I instruct her. She simply sighs and sulks but nods agreeing. I hope she will take the dance classes more seriously now. As we started on different topics Noah arrived¡­ being levitated by Lisa. I looked at her as she puts Noah on the ground. ¡°So¡­ what happened?¡± I asked. ¡°He was training to use the dwarven robots. Seems he took a heavy backlash and fainted. If I didn¡¯t speak with Colonel about who he was I would have never even looked his way when you called to meet.¡± Lisa said as she sits down next to the girls. ¡°Wait, the call¡­ don¡¯t tell me he got distracted by the call?¡± I asked. ¡°Apparently yes. He was working to unlock the Psionic Tech Gates found in Dwarven Psionic Robot armor and the call suddenly broke his concentration and his psi rebound back into his body causing a lot of damage before he got in under control but as he calmed down the pain took its toll and he blacked out. I healed him and then brought him with me here.¡± Lisa explained. ¡°I see, then he should wake up in just a few minutes.¡± I tell them. ¡°I doubt it, he will probably be out for a few hours.¡± She said. I ignore her as I walk to a faucet and start pouring water into a cup. Then I came back and without pity or care dumped the cup onto Noah¡¯s face surprising him and making him flail around. ¡°Rise and shine princess!¡± I said with a grin as I sit down. ¡°You¡¯re an ass, you know!¡± Noah says pissed off before letting his body fall back on the ground and he held his head. ¡°Damn it my head! It hurts so fucking much!!¡± He complained. ¡°You blacked out from the backlash of getting distracted while opening psi gates. I healed the injuries but the pain is still present.¡± Lisa said. ¡°Huh?¡± He said and looked at her probably wondering who she is. ¡°You haven¡¯t met her yet son, this is Lisa, she is an elf that specializes in Healing and support branch of Psi techniques.¡± I introduce her. Noah gets up still grimacing but gives a small bow. ¡°Thank you for the help and I apologize in advance if I am not in a good mood. No one would be at the moment with this pain.¡± He said and sat down. Lisa seems to brighten up as she seems to understand something, probably personality wise about Noah. ¡°Alright, with everyone here we can start. As I told everyone in the call, this was to see if we all agree to form an official crew.¡± I tell them all. ¡°What is the point of crews exactly and what is it in the technical terms?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°First of all crews would best to a guild in a fantasy setting game. Second you need a crew to pilot the ships and do maintenance and everything on the ships.¡± I explained. Nothing like some good old fashion research. A huge pile of information about the game was released once the game went live. I looked for important info that would be needed in short term like now. ¡°I guess we also all pitch in to help each other fund equipment for each other and help with ship maintenance and in our case, build one.¡± Noah says. ¡°I see¡­¡± Lisa says. ¡°Just like Noah said, unlike a guild in fantasy settings were each one needs to fund his own things and may hunt down items from drops of a monster, it¡¯s already been proven that you don¡¯t get drops from monsters in this game. You need to harvest them yourselves and gather materials to process and make equipment.¡± I tell them. ¡°I just thought of it but what happened to the party system?¡± Hilda suddenly asked. ¡°It¡¯s still the same. A temporary team that hunts, mines or works together. Ah speaking of this, being in a crew gives a bonus to XP gaining when in combat. Party system can help you share xp evenly or even focus on just one person to power level. The thing with the crew bonus is that you must be working with your crew to gain this. Space combat like in a spaceship dogfight would count as a crew effort.¡± ¡°Dog...fight heh heheh¡­¡± A sudden mutter came from my side. I looked through the corner of my eye and saw the Tosk without a clear gender blushing while hazy eyed and drooling a bit. Everyone noticed and were a bit weirded out by this. ¡°Urg¡­ let''s¡­ forget what we saw.¡± I mutter and everyone nodded. ¡°So is there anyone against the idea of forming a crew?¡± I asked. ¡°Just one question? Who is the captain?¡± Noah asked. There was an abrupt silence as everyone looked at each other and then everyone¡¯s eyes focused on me. ¡°Me?¡± I called out. ¡°Well yeah, you¡¯re the oldest and most experienced.¡± Noah said. It made sense, I did have the most experience and age and can judge a situation in the best situations. ¡°Well I am the Captain, now we just need the positions of each of you.¡± I tell them. They looked confused but I was prepared for this. Pulling out of my backpack a small packet of papers and writing my name in one of the black spots I showed them.
This contract is an official order that proclaims that those on this list have accepted the terms and regulations and have chosen to become an official crew. Rule 1: No one member can have criminal charges or crew will be disband and be blacklisted and marked as Bandit Crew Rule 2: You must possess the minimum of 6 individuals in the original founding of the crew. Rule 3: You must choose a captain, it can be anyone of your choice. Rule 4: In the page behind you must write all the names and official positions the crew will do aboard the ship. Rule 5: Crews will disband if there is less than 6 people in the crew.
¡°These are the rules and regulations that officially name us a crew.¡± I tell them. ¡°Needs positions for each of us?¡± Noah said. ¡°Yes, for me it would be captain. Noah would be vice, Alex pilot and so on.¡± I say. ¡°Is that so.¡± Jessica mutters. She goes quiet for a bit and after a bit she sends something to our AI and they make a screen appear to shows us. ¡°What do you think of this?¡± She asked showing us.
RoktarCaptain
JessicaVice Captain/Gunner
AlexPilot
LisaDoctor
NoahMechanic
HildaGunner
¡°Hey! Why does yours says Gunner like mine?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°That¡¯s because I have already begun to train with long range weapons and will probably request training to fire ship turrets for when we gain a ship large enough for one. As for you, you¡¯re a close quarters fighter, I¡¯m sure Uncle will have you learning how to fire bigger weapons and eventually turrets as well.¡± Jessica says. ¡°Maybe we can change gunner for Hilda then.¡± I tell them. I do the same as Jessica did.
RoktarCaptain
JessicaVice Captain/Gunner
AlexHead Pilot
LisaChief Doctor
NoahChief Mechanic
HildaSecurity Chief
¡°Why did you add Chief or head to the titles?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Because as we grow and get bigger ships we will have to increase the number of people we have on the crew to manage the ships.¡± I tell them. They seem to understand. ¡°Can¡¯t it be changed?¡± Alex suddenly said. ¡­ Everyone looked at him and blinked. I sigh and rewrite the list removing the leading titles. ¡°Alright so does anyone have anything against the list like this?¡± I asked. ¡°When we are a crew what will we do?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°I guess the main priority would be to raise money to repair the ship. Noah and Jessica obtained a Life support which was repaired and functions now. For now we need around 5000 credits to remake the hull but the estimated total to completely remake the ship to how it was before being scrapped with every system in it, it¡¯s between 500k to 700k credits.¡± I said. Everyone but Noah became wide eyed. I heard this from him and it was told to him by Gunner so there wasn¡¯t a false estimate. ¡°It will take us months to get that much.¡± Lisa said. ¡°I know but as a crew it will go faster. As we have already shown, in a crew setup we can work more efficiently. Once Noah finishes his training and can build some Psionic armor he can aid me in fighting. While he waits he can act as repairmen and a mid and short range fighter with the guns he purchased. Jessica can upgrade with scout and gunner upgrades so that you can use your long range gun to scout and back us up. Lisa is a healer and support so you can heal us.¡± I said. ¡°And I would be the space transport.¡± Alex says. ¡°You would be the main fighter in a space fight. If we take a larger guards ship we can use turrets to fight bandits while you fly which will help you level. I found that Classes unlock after level 10 so after that we can gain additional boosts by the class we gain.¡± I say. ¡°So to sum what we need, money and taking bounty hunting missions with the crew.¡± Jessica said. ¡°Sounds about right. There are party and guild quests in most games so there should be crew missions in a sci-fi one.¡± Lisa said. ¡°Let¡¯s go register first. We can decide what we can do after that.¡± I tell them and with a nod everyone gets up and I lead them to where we should register right after we write everyone''s position in the crew. Chapter 13: Crew Registry Author Corner: The crew formation is complete! I dedicate this horrible naming sense to a certain Viking penguin who''s naming sense is equal to or maybe worst then Noah''s dad! (not a lie). PS: This is the last stored chapter i have so no more rapid releases since i need to write them now.
Noah PoV We headed to the office that officializes the crew registrations. It looked like a regular office with rows of seats which were all empty since it seems no one had decided to make crews yet. Since there was no real line, we just go to the counter where there was a bored young man that was clicking his mouse on the pc fiercely which mean he was probably killing time on a game. *Cough cough* Dad coughed and the man looked at us while still clicking fast. ¡°One moment!¡± He said and turned to the computer and did a few quick clicks and then typed on the keypad (keyboard) before looking towards us with full attention. ¡°How may i help you all?¡± He asked making a business smile. ¡°We are here to register as an official crew!¡± Dad said and handed over the papers. He looks through then for a moment. ¡°Seems everything is in order, now what is the name of the crew?¡± The man asked. Suddenly i felt a sense of dread as i looked at dads grinning face. ¡°Roktar Space Rock ba¡­ UGRA!!¡± My dad collapsed to the ground because of my cheap shot. I then grab his ear and oh so quietly said. ¡°Dad¡­ what do you think you''re doing?¡± I asked with a smile on my face but no smiling eyes. ¡°... Naming the¡­ crew.¡± He said through ragged breaths. ¡°Noah! You shouldn¡¯t treat your father like that!¡± Jessica reprimanded me. ¡°Oh right, so you would want my dad naming the crew then?¡± I asked her. She looked away unable to maintain eye contact. Dad gets up on shaking legs. ¡°Then¡­ Star Skipper Food emporium!¡± He said. ¡°Dad¡­¡± I said and smiled again making him rapidly back away. At this point the man at the register was chuckling and muttered ¡°This is a fun group.¡± ¡°N-noah! Don¡¯t come over here! Don¡¯t hit me, I am your father!!!¡± He said a bit desperate. ¡°Alright¡­ if you can think of a half decent name within 3 tries i won¡¯t hit you but if you fail i will hit you with a reinforced punch while putting my back into it.¡± I said dead serious. His face became covered in sweat as he through deeply. ¡°S-Star Ship Roktars!¡± he said slowly. ¡°1¡± I said emotionless. ¡°... D-dwarf Smasher Brewery!¡± I sneered and completely loaded my fist, arm and back with psi and began to change it into a reinforced fist while leaving the muscles with plain psi reinforcement. ¡°2¡± I said spitting out the word after his previous name. ¡°.......¡± He froze up because he knew he was about to be smashed. ¡°Come on! What is your final guess?!¡± I said looking down on the giant dwarf. ¡°... N-Noah¡¯s Harem Wagon!¡± BOOM! The final name had pushed it too far. Since he was on his ass i punched him square in the face while pushing him into the reinforced titanium floor leaving behind a deep dent in it and left him bend strangely with the back of his head in the hole firmly planted and knocked out with a bloody broken nose.. When i walked back to the others the receptionist, Alex and Hilda were all laughing their asses off at either the names or the situation. Jessica and Lisa just shook their heads and sighed. ¡°Sorry about the inconvenience and the damage.¡± I tell the young man. ¡°No problem!¡± He said as he gets up laughing. He then sees my dad and starts laughing again for a while before finally calming down but still chuckling every so often. ¡°The damage isn¡¯t much since you held back a lot so as to not cause real damage. Also that was a seriously entertaining scene and after the second name i started filming! I¡¯m sure this will go viral!¡± The man said. ¡°Just keep my face blurred and we won¡¯t have a problem.¡± I tell him and he nods. ¡°So what is the real name you all, except for the big guy, wants?¡± He asked and chuckled. I turned to the others. ¡°Um¡­ Bloody Bullets?¡± Alex said. ¡°Six Star Comet?¡± Jessica said. ¡°Warmachines!¡± Hilda said excited. I just say at how the names were all over the place. ¡°Hey what if we combine the names we came up with?¡± Alex said. ¡°Like how?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Hmm¡­ Bloody Comet, Six Star Bullets, Bloody Machine, War Comet, Bullet Star.¡± he said. ¡­ ¡°Wow.¡± I said surprised by how many combos he came up with only three ideas. ¡°Wow those are actually good.¡± Said the receptionist. ¡°I particularly like Six Star Comets or Bullet Star.¡± He said. ¡°What about Six Bloody Stars?¡± Hilda asked. I somewhat expected that one. ¡°No because only you and dad are the battle junkies.¡± I said making her pout and mutter ¡°I¡¯m not a battle junkie!¡± ¡°Well taking Hilda¡¯s idea we can make it Six Bullet Stars.¡± Jessica said. ¡°I didn¡¯t expect for this to be hard. No wonder i never tried to be a founder in a guild.¡± I muttered in disdain. ¡°It¡¯s not that bad really.¡± Rough pained voice said from behind. I looked back and see my dad was getting up. ¡°So¡­ what name did you come up with? Erg!¡± He said and flinched in pain. ¡°Well we each made one name and we were mixing and matching them and came up with these.¡± Jessica said and told him the names each of them made then the combos. ¡°Six Bullet Stars? Doesn¡¯t sound bad but only Jessica, Alex and maybe Noah will be a sharpshooter or used guns cause i am a front liners.¡± He said. ¡°Then why not simply the Star Comet.¡± I said. ¡°Seems simpler and better.¡± Jessica said nodding. ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s what most people that register say. Here look at this, all over the galaxy there has been a boom of official crews.¡± the receptionist said and pressed some keys making a holo screen appear showing charts with the rising number of crews. Then another screen with tons of crew names.
Omniprime
Nexus
Void Crawlers
Swarmers
Nemesis
STroopers
These were a few and some had obvious names that showed lack of creativity like the last one i saw. ¡°Looking at the names it seems Star Comet doesn¡¯t seem out of place.¡± Jessica said with a wry smile. ¡°Yeah, seems oddly fitting with all these¡­ ¡°unique¡± crew names.¡± I said. ¡°To me yours feels better than most. A star comet can simply be thought as a dwarf star so it fits your crew with a captain that is a giant dwarf.¡± The receptionist said bluntly. I couldn¡¯t hold it and started to chuckle. This guy was, at the very least, interesting. ¡°Might as well accept, right.¡± I said. ¡°¡±¡±¡±¡±YEAH!¡±¡±¡±¡±¡± The rest of the crew said. ¡°Alright then, with the name decided the positions of each of you will be put in¡­¡± The receptionist said and started typing and after a bit he finally said ¡°...Done!¡±
The crew ¡°Star Comet¡± has been established and you are one of its founding members.
You have been registered as ¡°Mechanic¡± of the crew ¡°Star Comet¡±. As you are the first Mechanic, once another person enters the same station as you, your status will gain leadership due to experience and your title as a founder.
Seeing the message i confirmed that the crew was official now. ¡°That¡¯s all, oh but there is a tax, i had forgotten to get that before making the crew because you were all so funny. Its 500 credits to make the crew.¡± The receptionist said. With a short calculation that it was a little over 83 credits each. It wasn¡¯t split exactly so dad offered to give the extra 2 credits that lacked if everyone gave 83 each. ¡°Alright, done! Have a good life and i wish you all luck.¡± He says and turns to his screen with a small smile. We walk out and walk a bit before i turn to the others. ¡°So now what do we do?¡± I asked. ¡°Maybe we should start to get jobs, right?¡± Alex asked. ¡°Besides you Noah, the rest of us can work in a team for bounty missions. They are higher risk but higher reward missions and as a crew we can get through it safer.¡± Dad said. ¡°Alright but one question, how much money total do we have as a crew?¡± I asked. Everyone looked at each other and began to tell the sum. It ended like this. Dad -> 1,350 Me -> 480 Jessica -> 300 Hilda -> 250 Alex -> 1,750 Lisa -> 3.650 I was really shocked by Alex and Lisa but they answered rather straightforwardly. ¡°Piloting a guard''s ship and hunting down bandits pays well. Though i have to split since I¡¯m just driving.¡± He said. ¡°For me, when i was in training i did a few missions with Sir Alphenor which involved healing a great deal of people which had a high return.¡± The sum total of all this was 7,780 credits. ¡°Okay, since you guys will be going on team missions while i keep training, let¡¯s pool our money so that i can purchase hull repairs for the shuttle so that we can already start repairing the ship. If you need equipment repairs just come to me and I¡¯ll fix that.¡± I said. ¡°Alright seems that¡¯s decided, let¡¯s pass him the money and we leave that to you, okay?¡± dad said and i nodded. Everyone takes out most of there money on them and passes it to me. Besides money for basic provisions needed i kept most of the money. ¡°One more thing dad.¡± I called. ¡°What?¡± ¡°You¡¯ve already started brewing right?¡± I asked. ¡°Yep, why?¡± He asked. ¡°When you get back, try to brew some good drinks so that we can start selling them. Alcohol has a high price no matter what it is and if it¡¯s a quality drink it would be better. Try to make both heavy beer and smooth wines. The wines should be weaker and drinkable to other races besides dwarves, okay.¡± I said. ¡°Sure, I have two batches sitting now to get flavor. It shouldn¡¯t be too strong considering i don¡¯t officially have the skill.¡± he said. I nod understanding that it will take a while before the heavy hitter drinks appear but it¡¯s a matter of a few short weeks. I separate from them letting them go search for a missions they can accomplish with their current strength and equipment while i head to the hangar to talk with Gunner about getting the shuttle¡¯s hull completely outfitted to make sure there is no hidden holes that would leak. Entering the nearest elevator I go down and quickly find Gunner. ¡°Ah! So you and your old man made a crew and now you got the money for a new hull. Good good. The shuttle will need to be towed into the military hangar since that one is equipped for this, I¡¯ll get in contact with the correct people for this, go to the hangar and wait there while i get the husk.¡± Gunner said and walked away. I cross the bridge between hangars and wait inside the large military hangar that had many ships but there were plenty of empty areas. After some twenty minutes i saw a ship enter the station through the energy shield and being towed behind it was the shuttle. It was guided as close as possible to an empty field where Gunner shouted for some mechanics to help pull the ship down until it was 1 and a half meters above the field since there weren¡¯t any way to extend the landing gears. I walked over and jumped aboard finding Gunner with another dwarf. As they see me Gunner calls me over. ¡°This here is the boy and owner of the ship.¡± He says. ¡°Noah, this is Vincent and he is the shipwright here and in charge of most repairs or upgrades for ship''s.¡± Gunner introduced. ¡°Hi¡± I said with a nod. ¡°Kid of few words, huh?¡± He says. ¡°Nah, just don¡¯t know what to say really. Anyway will I be able to learn how to rebuild the ship while you repair it?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye, as a mechanic I can give you some pointers and show you how the hull is built. First off, hull replacing is 5K.¡± he said and gestured to hand over the money. I sigh and pull out the five thousand and hand it over. He takes a moment to count the bills before nodding. ¡°Good¡­¡± he says and walks to the edge where the hole was. ¡°BOYS!! HULL REPAIR!¡± He shouted. At once the men started to get to work. ¡°Come boy let me show you what is done.¡± He says and letting Gunner return to his work i follow Vincent as he shows me how to remove hull plates and how they are put on. He hands me over a schematics of the Hull set up of the ship. ¡°Seems the Airlock is gone as well. If you have 700 credits i can have a new air lock installed while we are at it.¡± He asked me. I look at the ship that was being left as a skeleton. ¡°Sure, i can at least keep what air it has inside it now.¡± I comment and hand the money over and Vincent calls some men to install an airlock before the hull went in. I was handed a schematics of the air lock. ¡°These schematics are for you to repair it yourself. Though it takes away from our work it lets us build more weapons to protect the station instead of repair a damaged ship.¡± He said. I smiled wryly at him hearing him say that. ¡°How many times have you completely repaired a husk of a ship?¡± I asked out of curiosity. ¡°Hmm¡­ the mining crew ships and one man mining ships are some ships we take the husks from the scrapyard that are stripped clean and stay there until we need them. At the moment with the influx of workers we have been remaking the ships in quite a large number. Getting us a good profit and will probably continue as more and more workers appear.¡± He said with a grin. Since i wasn¡¯t going to learn anything just watching i went and helped replace the hull. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.When it was said and done i got two skills
Ship buildingRarity1Level 1
A shipwright''s main mastery skill. Encases all his knowledge on the subject of building a ship no matter what part as long as it is during the construction of a ship. 0.5% increase to speed and quality when building a ship. Stacks on other shipwright skills.
Ship RepairRarity1.5Level 1
A skill used by Mechanics and Shipwrights used to repair damage sustained on a space vessel Improves quality and speed of repairs by 1%
Eventually the repairs were done and the color of the ship was back to being a white and black like those space shuttles in real life that NASA sends up, just bigger. Oh right since the ship had empty window spots i paid 300 credits to add space worthy windows already since i want to have the ship isolated with air so that i can work on the inside. With the windows added i wouldn¡¯t need to worry of the air leaking. ¡°Alright, ship hull is back in shape, airlock and windows were added. All done on this one then.¡± Vincent said. ¡°Speaking seriously which is the best piece of equipment to get?¡± I asked. ¡°For this ship? Generator, maybe an ion generator should be enough to run your ship¡¯s electricity and you can get the life support functioning at least. From there you can add other missing parts and continue. Besides that though i would say rebuild the cockpit. Generator would probably be around 290 to 320K credits depending the model." He said. My blood went cold hearing what he said. "That''s... almost 40% of the estimated rebuild price." I said. "Aye, the generator and engine are pretty much the life and blood of a spaceship. When you get the thrusters it won''t just be the front one it will be several dozen throughout the ship. The price to get them all working is high." He said. I nod and shake a bit as i tell Lia to make a note of all the things we repaired and the price next to it since i would want to know the end price. In the end of it she just made a small note and was done with it.
Hull - 5000 Airlock - 700 Window - 300 Life support - 0
The ship was towed back out and was returned to the same docks as before. I thanked the men for their help and headed off to go train from where i left off. Roktar PoV Our small group split off from Noah and went towards the bounty board. Well less of a board and more of an office that contained the requests. All missions had to be registered to a person, team or crew. We went over to one a more empty section and found crew missions. Crew missions were like guild quests. Team missions would equal party quests in some manner. Only difference is the difficulty. Crew quests are normally much harder and more important missions. On a hologram board we could look through the missions available and ask more information at the desk responsible for this section of missions. We looked for a bit before we found one that didn''t look impossible for us at the moment.
Mission: Kelha TerraformingDifficulty3
Kelha II terraforming project has reached a stage where we can proceed with large scale planet changes. After extensive terrestrial scans we have discovered the layout of the tectonic plates and found several dozen dormant volcanoes of reasonable size that will allow us to release enough heavy gas into the atmosphere to make it thicker by a few notches. Request an escort to pilot and guard research and bombing crews while we locate and set up bombs to activate the largest volcano found that is far from mining camps. Reward: 5000 credit to crew Objective: escort and protect bomb men into caves around the volcanos and set up the explosives. "Warning: native monsters present" Success: All bombs are placed and detonated, crew is safe. Failure: Team is killed.
"This mission seems possible." Alex said after we looked it over. "I agree, the ship is also provided so we don''t have to worry about that." Jessica said. "What we do have to worry about is how to fight the native monsters." I said. "True, i can''t get repairs without Noah so it would be bad." Hilda said. "I can do basic repairs and rebuild parts as long as you give me enough time to make enough." Lisa replied. She explained she was part of the mechanics skill set and had basic understanding of mechanics. Not nearly as much as Noah who spent his full time as one. "Doesn''t seem to have a time limit but let¡¯s accept it and see if we can''t set it for a few hours for us to get ready." I tell them. They all nod and agree. He head to the counter and sign up for that mission. "In how many hours or days can the whole crew join for this mission as there is no set time limit." The miss at the reception asked. After a bit of talk we all decide in 6 hours. We would all logout get our needs out of the way and the return quickly to do remaining preparation and get repairs of anything needed. Since we had a ticking clock to do what was needed we headed to the rooms we were given. I check on the two drinks and seeing they were progressing i estimate at least a day before they were drinkable. I lay down and logout. Not wasting time i go to the bathroom and do my business and then go eat. I then hop into the net and did a quick surf of the game''s method of terraforming and what percentage Kelha II was at. I found that it followed a specific line.
Cause volcanic eruptions, mainly the largest volcanoes to release gases for a longer period of time and create a chance for a chain reaction with any nearby volcanoes. Planet will slowly build an atmosphere on frozen/desert planets and unfreeze the ground water. Part two involves finding reservoirs and puncturing them to release the water once it has melted. Release of water will eventually evaporate and hopefully form clouds and rain forming lakes in areas that is possible. Can also erode the ground and weaken the rocks making it easier for natural springs to appear and flow eventually forming streams, rivers, lakes and then finally an ocean. Once the planet reaches this stage biologists and terraforming specialists arrive, bringing vegetation samples and microorganisms which is released into the oceans followed by several chemical agents that would cause the proliferation and population boom of these microbes. The next stage begins after these microorganisms are found spread around the globe. A special shipment will come bringing a unique chemical which induces evolution in living beings. This is released into the oceans main sea currents so that it spreads far. This stage of terraforming goes on for several years as microorganisms evolve and become aquatic animals and amphibian. Once the planet is like this oth...
I close the window at this point because the page continues down further. It seems the estimated time for terraforming is from 20-40 earth years. It clearly states, "evolution isn''t something that takes billions of years, the world can change instantly if tampered with." I return to the game since i had nothing left to do. The time took outside left me with 5 hours so i went to find Noah and see about repairing my Laser Axe and Energy Shield. When i found him he was moving the right arm of the robot he was on. "So you are progressing?!" I said with a grin. "Hi dad, a bit, still need 3 more gates in this hand and i will be done." Noah says. "Good, mind helping me by doing a check up on my weapons?" I asked. He nods and says the command to release him. He leads me to a place where there were lots of extra parts. He takes the axe and shield and opens them up and does a basic check replacing a few parts and then fixing a dent on the shield. The parts he changed made him have to rewrite the weapons codes but that was quick and he was done. "Thanks, so how were the ship repairs?" I asked. "Went well, i had windows and airlock added as well and it was only 1000 credits for both. Now the ship is holding air in space." He replies. "Oh, nice, may be a good place to store my drinks while they age." I commented. "I would wait until we get enough money to get an engine and generator." He says. "How much are they?" I asked but i instantly regretted doing so. "Around 40% of the repair cost, each. The 20% will be for all the rest of the system repairs and parts but engine and generator are nearly 320k credits." He said. I had no idea we were that fucked. With the money conversion at the moment being 10 dollars for 1 credit it would cause us $3,200,000. Though i received a lot of money as a pro gamer, there is a limit. My current capital doesn''t surpass 2 million and i invested in bovine production in Brasil and own a huge farm for that but even then my capital isn¡¯t so huge as to be able to afford either one. With all that said and done, after completing this ship, it would cost over twice my real life capital. Maybe already knowing what i was thinking Noah says, "We don''t have to rush. Besides a billionaire no one can truly purchase a ship on their own. A mining ship maybe but not a ship." "Yeah, it will be some years before anyone gets their hands on anything large, even us." I tell him. What i meant by this is how ships are categorizes. One man ships - mining ship, fighter ships. Shuttle Small ship - ship ranges from 100 to 250 meters long and 30-50 meters wide with 3-8 floors. Medium ship - ships ranging from 250 meters to 3 kilometers long and 50 - 400 meters wide and has from 8-40 floors including floors specific only for cargo and personal hangars. Large ships - capital sized ship normally star cruisers that are several kilometers in any shape or size. Impossible for it to enter orbit due to size and mass and is completely a space only ship. Some are even larger than space stations and work as inter-system stop points due to size and having city inside. It goes without saying that any player crew would get as far as a small medium sized ship. Should anyone get a large ship it would be like owning a kingdom in space. The influence of the man at the wheel is huge or he is a powerful merchant. Since i didn''t have anything else to do and had time i went and started brewing a wine drink aimed at elven drinkers. The refined taste i want to achieve is to entice their appetite. When i was finally finished i had 3 one gallon wood barrels filled with a grapefruit found on a jungle planet in a nearby system. Its got a unique taste unlike the earth grapes and the name of this grape is Sindew Grape. When i had finished processing it the Sindew drink had a sort of cherry and apple like taste. Very strange yet delicious. I close the barrels and put them under the glass containers holding the beers i made. Since i had 2 hours left i cleaned the brewery leaving it sparkling before i left and met everyone inside the military hangar in front of a large shuttle which was bigger than our own and armed. The color was dark brown and had a rock like pattern draw on it making me feel that it would easily camouflage on Kelha II as it is now. Provisions and ammo was being loaded with the bombs into the cargo. I went over to the human soldier i recognize as Major Snocon. "Sir!" I called making him and a few others look at me. "Ah, You are... Roktar, the giant dwarf and captain of the crew doing the escort?" He asked. "Yes, sir!" I said. "Alright, well the time you all set will expire in an hour so be ready to leave. Since it''s your own time don''t be late." He said and i nodded. I watch as he walks off and rolled my eye. He was rather self important. Wonder how he reacts to Colonel? Shrugging my shoulders i turn to the men he was talking to. "I presume you all are the men that will be setting the bombs?" I asked. "Yes, we will lead the bombing but we aren''t fighters. The locations each bomb will be set in is in caves we dug ourselves for scanning underground through explosion." He said. "Isn''t it rather primitive to do that when we have so much tech?" I asked. "It covers more distance when scanning an explosions vibrations. Anyway, the bombs this time are much stronger and meant to cause high levels of destruction. Before detonating we need to be at least 30 kilometers away so that neither the bomb or the volcano will injure us" he said. "What the hell kind of bomb you detonating? A nuke?" I asked. "No, a small fusion bombs or... three to be exact." He replied. "Three... three helium bombs... fuck that will disintegrate the volcano before it blows it up." I said. "No, as i said, they are small versions. If a full sized helium bomb is around 4 meters long this one doesn¡¯t pass 50 cm. The material for explosion is much smaller." He replied. I sigh, scientists, always the hardest bunch to work with. "For mine and my crew''s safety, i will only permit detonation after 50 km away." I said. "Fine." The leading man said. With that they went inside and i waiting until all of my crew arrived before we entered the ship and getting into the two man cockpit with Alex the ship comes to life and we leave the station on course to Kelha II''s largest volcano to blow up 3 small fusion bombs. Chapter 14: First Repairs Alex PoV My hands... my feet... I was itching to put this baby in full throttle but I needed to get out of the station and have all the systems in check. "Gravity generator check, thrusters... check left wing thrusters check..." I did the flight check completely as I should so I didn''t have to worry about any problems later on and could enjoy my several hours of flight. I make sure to activate the inertia Dampeners. They worked in hand with the ship''s shields to keep everyone from being tossed around. This is a god sent for a dog fight pilot cause I can go as wild as possible and only the poor sap sitting next to me will know what is going on. While I was doing the check, I made sure to have Xeno connect to the ship''s mainframe and jump aboard. He was a techy fellow and loved the coding so I sent him over to "check out" all the ships system coding and store a copy for when we start programming our shuttle. As I was finishing the check up a large hologram of Xeno¡¯s eye appeared. When I am near others he never completely appears. He looks to Roktar and poofs away and writes a message at an angle he wouldn¡¯t see.
Ship system is sealed tighter than your panties
I frown when he said that. ¡°Shut up Xeno!¡± I complained. ¡°Something wrong?¡± Roktar asked me. ¡°No, just my AI saying something irritating.¡± I rely.
Systems have safety codes I can¡¯t crack at the moment. Would take a lot of upgrades or you uploading me directly into the main frame of the ship but by than the station would be alerted.
I click my tongue at the fact that I won''t be getting deep into the system.
Was able to secure system codes for... Life support Gravity generator Inertia Dampeners Water heating and cooling system
I nod gently, happy enough to be able to access basic systems or the entire coding problem would be even worse later on. I turn back to checking all the systems and after finally getting everything checked and made sure it was working before I pulled the handle for the thrusters back. The cockpit had two handles on both sides of the seat, both pilot and co-pilot had it. The left handle was the main thruster. Pulling it back will cause small thrusters aimed to push the ship back to activate. Pushing it will make the main thrusters activate and will accelerate the ship. The right handle was for the direction. Pulling it back will cause the nose of the ship to go ¡°up¡± and pushing it forward will make it dip. This one can also turn to both sides. Turning it to either side will make the ship tilt. In that manner to turn the ship I tilt the ship before pulling or pushing it. I make the ship rise until it was at the center of the hangar and making sure the inertia Dampeners and gravity generator was working I quickly pull the right handle making the ship flip 180 in the air and aim towards energy gate. Roktar was shocked by the sudden movement and held his seat a bit scared. ¡°Hey! Be careful!¡± He shouted. Just letting the words go through one ear and out the other I push the throttle to the max making the ship spring to life and launching out of the station into space at a fast rate. ¡°He¡­ hehehehehe! Finally! I¡¯m piloting a quality ship! Let¡¯s see what this baby can do!¡± I said and quickly began to cause the ship to spin and then counter the inertia and align it again before aiming at the planet and pushing the throttle back to max. ¡°Blast it! Stop doing useless things like that!¡± Roktar said while acting like a cat and holding on to whatever he could grab after being frightened, thankfully it was the pilot chair armrest. ¡°Just relax ¡°sir¡±, it¡¯s not like you will feel the inertia~!¡± I said playfully. ¡°It¡¯s not the inertia what I am afraid of! It¡¯s the blasted way you¡¯re driving!¡± He said pissed off. ¡°If you don¡¯t feel well watching me then go back inside and relax yourself. I¡¯m an experienced pilot who has played through every known flight simulator both physical planes and VR simulators and not only that the tutorial had spaceship simulator which I dominated and probably almost broke the skill restriction because of my amazing skills.¡± I said gloating. ¡°Erg¡­ Fine drive by yourself, I¡¯ll form a fear of space travel before we land if I watch you fly anymore.¡± He said and unstrapped himself and walked out. I watch him leave and only after about a minute after he left and closed the door did I sigh. The next moment the full hologram of my Xeno appeared. Unlike the normal human AI you see, he appeared as a kind of bug creature. His body was somewhat human with two arms and legs but he had wings and almost full body natural armor like a bug. His eyes were human like. His hands and feet were bug like with three long fingers and a thumb all of which looked like claws and the feet had two toes on the front and one behind the heel.
Finally I can relax, being so different is a pain.
¡°Can¡¯t you change your look?¡± I asked.
Can you change your own look?
¡°No?¡± I relied
Then you have your answer. AI have specific look built in when we develop our personality after a degree. We mostly take forms of beings in this game so I look like a random one. I¡¯m still more curious about you though with that neutral sex look of yours.
¡°Shut up Xeno!!¡± I shouted.
Is it my fault you look like you do? You even barely changed your own natural look even after given the option to. I don¡¯t get why you didn¡¯t make your real genders main features more apparent?
I growl in anger. I have been mistaken even in real life and in most games. It¡¯s rather sensitive subject and yes I did change my looks but my tastes of aesthetics led me to, for some reason, keep my neutral sex look even when I wanted to make myself more of my true gender. ¡°Just shut up and enjoy yourself on the system, it¡¯s getting annoying.¡± I told him.
Wish I could but the other AI have also logged in and are enjoying their own chit chat which is why I couldn¡¯t explore much more than I did. If they weren¡¯t around I might have been able to get thruster and engine coding.
¡°Can¡¯t they help you with that?¡± I asked.
The ones from the crew yes but not from the scientists. Everyone has an AI companion so those are always watching.
I click my tongue at the inconvenience. ¡°Leave it be then. We can try and get more when they are off the ship during the mission.¡± I reply.
Sure, can¡¯t wait to fiddle a bit more with this ship.
He vanishes and I was left controlling the ship. Since it was a form of stress relief I do lots of different maneuvers and have fun dodging the asteroids and racing through them or going ¡°above¡± it and watch the ocean that was the Kelha asteroid ring. Space sure is mysterious and I sure like the quiet of this place. Noah PoV
For unlocking the all the Psionic Tech Nerves on the Right hand of the Dwarf Basic Training Robot you gained 12 stat points for Mentality and Willpower
I grin from ear to ear as I see the message. After a few hours after the ship¡¯s repairs I have finally finished unlocking the first arm of the robot. My face was completely drenched in sweat from the mental force I had been putting into opening these. Though the actual pain was less than push flooding the gates. The mental strength I had to put into doing this was much higher than the other times without a doubt. I could open 2 gates at one time while doing it like this but that was my limit due to the mental stress on my mind. I unlock myself from the robot and climb down before sitting down on the leg of the robot and wipe the sweat off my forehead. ¡°Hard isn¡¯t it?¡± Colonel asked. ¡°Finally got the right arm unlocked.¡± I said and took a few breaths of air. ¡°Oh, not bad. You should take a rest, go makes some android parts and let your head relax some.¡± Colonel said. I took his advice since it was much simpler than messing with Psionic technology. I go to the boxes of components and get an empty one before I grab some pieces with my psi and sit down. I move then around in the air relatively easy, though not many component since I do have a weight limit on my ability. After the main part was connected and surpassed 100 grams I held it on my hand and simple kept adding components unlike I made the part. It felt much easier than it used to feel. Maybe it¡¯s all the training in inner control that gave me the countless boosts of Mentality that improved my control. When I finished the part I put it in the box and just sighed.
You have learned new skills.
Exterior Psi ManipulationRarity1.5Level 1
A skill to efficiently control Psi outside the body. Makes it easier to manipulate Psi and to make it do what you want while it¡¯s outside the body Increases control of Psi outside the body by 1% Lost of Psi while doing tasks has decreased by 5%
Parts ConstructionRarity1Level 1
A mechanic¡¯s skill for construction of parts. The quality and speed that it is made is determined by your knowledge and skill of parts making. Quality of Parts increase by 1% Speed at building parts increase by 1%
I just look at the parts. I kind of wondered why I hadn¡¯t gotten the parts making skill earlier but there is probably some kind of knowledge and skill requirement I wouldn¡¯t understand. Still I wonder what the exterior Psi Manipulation alters. It says that I lose less psi which I notice happens when I do even the simplest tasks because I can¡¯t control the psi correctly. I wonder if this will help with that. I try to make a new part and notice a great difference. First off the Psi doesn¡¯t feel so rigid now and I can control it with more fluidity and control. I try to pick up the small part I made that is the size of my fist but weighs at least 500 grams and find that I can levitate it for a few seconds about 5 cm off the ground. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. This meant that the max weight I could lift had risen as well with that appearance of this skill. To be sure I grab enough parts to make me fight to keep it up and when I reach that I take the parts to a scale and the weight I get is 200 grams. It rose by 2 times the weight I got which is rather nice. Meant that in total I could move a 40 kilo box with all my gates released. Feeling rather satisfied with the new skills. As I get up I suddenly hear a call. ¡°All newbies come over here!¡± Colonel suddenly called us. Since I was still on break I didn¡¯t really delay and went over. ¡°Alright, now that every last one of you newbies have unlocked at least one of the limbs of the training bots we will be going to the training room you were show on the first day you came here. In there we, the veterans, will be teaching all of you to make your own personal Dwarf Fighter Robot. You will be the ones building but with our guidance and you will be owners of this. We will be aiding you only but you all will be building the robot''s yourself. From there you will graduate from newbies into Beginner class Dwarf fighters and will be assigned to train with the regular guards. The models you will be making is a step above the training models and are actually combat worthy. Besides combat, the robot''s can be adapted for space and can be adapted to mining so it¡¯s up to you where you take it once you have your own. Now let¡¯s go!¡± Colonel says. We were all shocked. We never thought we would get a robot so soon. Not to mention that besides building it we will undergo the hell of unlocking an even more advanced model robot which somewhat filled me with dread since the training models were already hard enough. I really regret unlocking my psi gates so early. After going all the way to the training area in the other Ring of the station we find the place drastically changed. First off the tables had lots of tools and extended on each and every one of them was the skeleton of the arm for the robot''s. In the open area in the back the place was turned into a deposit for components. ¡°Alright, grab any table, once you do you will see a small cube on the table. It contains the data for the parts you need to build, how to build, where it goes and all that. In about 3 hours the trade ship, Nomad Voyager, will be arriving. When they come our traders will go over and secure a shipment of Psionic Tech Nerves that were ordered in bulk. Let me tell you, each set of nerves is enough for one robot and several weapons or tools that attach to its body. You will also need Psionic Tech Nerves for several of the important systems like the Psi Capacity which will hold the psi for the robot.¡± Colonel said. ¡°So in simplest terms, we choose one weapon and some tools and be happy with it?¡± I asked. ¡°Aye! Of course!¡± Colonel said with a smile. ¡°Now get working, we need something built to hold the psionic nerves. Start with the limb you all unlocked first. When you finish the prototype we can unlock the nerves then while we are at it.¡± Colonel finished. I simply sigh and walk up to a random table and find the cube and started to upload the parts.
YES!! Finally something fun to mess with!! And look at this, just the basic model is this freaking complex! I love it! Maybe if some psionic nerves remain you can make a small utility robot that I can inhabit. That way I will get a body and you get a useful worker drone.
As I read that I actually think about it. Before making it I would need to check with colonel and Gunner about something like that. ¡°I¡¯ll think about it. Before that start showing me the PROPER construction method step by step and bring up the parts I need to start out with.¡± I told her.
YES!! You finally consider it!! (note to self: Change Noah status from stingy prick to just stingy) Alright sir here it is!
A vein nearly popped reading what she wrote but the plans appear soon after. First it was of the complete robot then the right arm broke off and the main body was pushed off and the arm expanded. Then it plates were removed followed by all the parts step by step until only the skeleton and several dozen parts and the psionic nerves were left.
Besides the Psionic nerves that will be placed around here these are the basic parts you need to build. You can¡¯t build more without the nerves since they need to come from the center.
I look at the table that had the several skeleton parts. I grab the one that represented the right arm and put it on the table before going to the component boxes and begin on my rigorous parts building frenzy. Let¡¯s put those skills I got to good use. Several hours later Within the armed shuttle, that was entering the horribly thin atmosphere that didn''t even offer resistance or turbulence that you normally feel when entering the atmosphere, was the crew Star Comet. After a several hours the pilot, Alex, had warned everyone that they were arriving near the surface of the planet. From then on, the relaxed team that had been napping or just passing the time changed. Jessica who had been examining the weapons of the ship moved to the only empty turret chamber. Turrets on a ship remained within the ship but within a room separated by an air lock. Turret, needing to enter space to be used, was always left in a vacuum unless under maintenance. This empty chamber was also different because it offered snipers a safe location to shoot from. In the corner of the room was a familiar large military weapon crate. There wasn''t just one but actually two. One was much smaller than the one she had encountered. This was the weapon she had been training with and gained Sniper Rifle Master Opening the large crate she found several dozen "shelves" with up to four copies of the same part. This was the crate for the railgun but over the few days before the mission right now Gunner customized the box so Jessica could carry spare parts. Having learned to build the railgun she starts construction of it building the gun completely. The railgun was 1.25 meters long but the main body was only 50 cm while the 75 cm long part was the two side shafts that made the electric field and the barrel at the center. The railgun worked only with two things. One was a power pack which gave it the electricity and then the bullet. Both appeared in Jessica''s hand after she finished building the gun. She made sure to check it several times to make sure it was built correctly before installing the power pack and bullet. She set the railgun to the side before turning to the second crate. This one opened up to a simpler crate that held parts only for one gun. This was the gun she trained sniping with. 1 meter long and colored black was a high caliber military sniper rifle. The reason she was able to commission this was because she needed a single shot with heavy recoil sniper. This way she would be able to get used to a heavy weapon like the railgun. She was also only able to borrow the gun for some weeks and only with Gunners recommendations. In addition, she doesn''t actually own it. The true price for something like this would we around 5-8k credits and this was the weakest model they would spare for her. She built it up and finally put the scope one and began adjusting it with the help of her AI. "Ahh~! Who knew being a long range gunner was such a hassle." Jessica said.
Hey big sis, won''t using the big gun damage you a lot?
"Sadly yes, the recoil is huge but at least Gunner showed me what I should built to hold it back." Jessica replied to her AI Vivi. She pulls out some metal supports from the large crate which was stored on the lid of the crate. She built it and made a large support made specifically to attach to the turret entrance and use the ship to a degree to hold down the rail gun. It could also be used for the normal sniper. In another part of the ship, Roktar was checking his equipment making sure he had everything. As they would soon reach the caves soon he was getting read and near him we was giving some tips to deflect attacks. This would help keep her from getting so damaged and trying to block attacks when deflecting was easier. Taking a break to let Hilda get final repairs Roktar calls his son up at the station.
Roktar: Noah can you talk?
Noah: About what?
Roktar: Just wondering what it¡¯s like up there at the moment?
Noah: Trade ship just came into the system and docked a bit away from the station. Us dwarf fighters gained Psionic nerves and we are currently building our own personal ones. It¡¯s been¡­ 8 hours already since we started and 5 since we got the nerves and are building the robot now. Soon I¡¯ll be allowed to join in missions.
Roktar: Nice, having a real tank to take my spot would be refreshing for once.
Noah: Don¡¯t push it or I will grab you and use you as a meat shield.
Roktar: Tch, ungrateful son. Anyway we are just about to reach the volcano we needed to erupt, just wanted to warn you.
Noah: okay, good luck and try not to die. No one did yet so we don¡¯t really know how ¡°death¡± is handled in game or explained for that matter.
Roktar: I heard it will be announced when the first player dies. Anyway see you.
He closes the chat and goes to rest up before the battle to clear the caves begins. Noah PoV Closing the chat with my dad I look back at my table. On it was very large skeleton of the robot I am making. The right arm was on the table while the skeleton was behind the table. The right arm was still in construction but I was nearly finished so I get back to putting the parts that lacked. Putting the last few parts and do a one over of the arm to make sure the parts were connected properly and finished.
Congrats on making the arm, you should unlock it before it gets any harder.
¡°Yeah, I know.¡± I said and going to where the handle where I stick my hand in and put it inside. The gates were obviously closed and pulling a chair to sit I began the long and tedious task of opening all the gates but maybe because I was used to this type of opening I was able to open half of them after 5 hours before we needed to go to bed after a long day. Chapter 15: Mecha builder Author''s corner: Had some trouble due to lack of motivation and busy week, also ended up smaller then most chapters but it covers more or less what i wanted, sorry for those who wanted an epic fight of the team destroying the monsters, its a no go in this chapter.
You have unlocked all Psionic Tech gates. You have gained 5 Mentality and Willpower
I sigh as I finally finish unlocking the arm of the robot. I spent a few hours after waking up to unlock the other gates that remained from those I couldn¡¯t unlock yesterday. At the moment I am pushing my psi into the arm and circulating it in the arm so that I can get a feel for this. After a bit I try to close my hand as I do so the action is transferred to the hand and the robot hand closes slowly.
Seems that the robot is working properly. Since its ¡°equipped¡± to you at the moment I could do a quick scan of it, and it showed that there isn¡¯t anything wrong. Just don¡¯t forget to oil the joints every so often.
¡°Really, that''s a bit of a relief, didn¡¯t want to go through the dismantling and rebuilding again. Lets get to the second arm.¡± I said and turn to the second arm skeleton. I start off attaching the psionic nerves, they were really strange materials to work with. It felt like rubber and was extremely elastic and was impossible to break by stretching. It reaches a point you can¡¯t pull anymore but you can¡¯t pull more even with machines. The links in the material that makes up Psionic nerves is probably the strongest in the universe as Colonel says. For the next hours I spend my time making all the parts for the second arm and building it before I attach them all and begin to open the gates. This time went faster and I could open them all before needing to go to sleep and since it was already time for lunch in real life I leave and walk downstairs and find dad already there. ¡°So, how is the volcanic explosions?¡± I asked. My dad hears me and looks up with a hint of irritation. ¡°Poorly!¡± He said. ¡°Whats wrong?¡± I asked. ¡°We didn¡¯t expect to find so many native monsters in the cave. We are only 5 combatants with only 2 that are close combat and a sniper. Lisa isn¡¯t a DPS even when she stops using barriers and uses her Psi to push and grab the monsters. We were pushed back into the ship and we needed to retreat to the nearest mining camp to restock and repair.¡± He said irritated. ¡°What about Jessica¡¯s railgun?¡± I asked. That should have caused a huge amount of damage. ¡°We had her shoot into the cave to try and kill as many as we could with the bullet but that enraged them and they flooded out all at once like a swarm of ants.¡± He replied making me cringe. This wasn¡¯t a good start, to fail a large mission like this. I didn¡¯t expect a quest that was ranked 2 in difficulty to be so hard really. I go and get some food before sitting. ¡°I just finished my second robot arm and unlocked it. Going to do the legs which are simpler than the arms. I think maybe 3 at max 5 days until the robot body is made and since I need to make some psi containers I need and to fill them it would take at least 7 days before I can join you all if I focus solely on it.¡± I said. ¡°Do you plan for any weapons?¡± Dad asked. ¡°Nah, I have the inner psi manipulation which I can use on the robot. If I use that on them I can boost their defense and power. I plan to make only a drill for me to do space mining and a few extra psi containers so I can work with the robot longer.¡± I said. ¡°Good, after we clear this mission you should really start physical training, you¡¯ve been only focusing on mental ones because of your current job in the station by constantly working with psi.¡± Dad said. I nod, I really wanted to go do exercise but there is no time with all the work and training I am going through. As I was eating and thinking deeply at how I would start my training dad chuckled. ¡°Hey son, have you see the video of how death is explained in ¡°The Nebula¡±?¡± dad asked with a grin. ¡°No why?¡± I asked. His grin grew even larger as he went to our pc and began to type and then found a video. Still eating, my dad connects the pc to the TV and turns it into the computer''s monitor. The screen turned and showed a page on Youtube. He goes and clicks play and puts fullscreen. The video starts with that starting effect of star wars where the words come from below and go up. [Beware! What you will watch must be done while you aren¡¯t eating or drinking for the dangers of spilling, spitting or choking.] Were the words that came up. The screen turned to show the shooting range on a station. There was one guy holding the handle for possibly a laser sword. I could more or less see where this was going. ¡±Alright guys! Let it rip!¡± They guy shouted. He was an elf after he put a rag that took the place of a cloak and used his psi to levitate. ¡°Come, puny jedi! He said and my jaw dropped at this guy''s stupidity. The view moved back and it showed three other guys with laser pistols at 150 meters away. The person that made the video moved back to catch everything. The one that was floating activated the sword and held it like some sith or jedi or whatever. Never really watched those movies. The first guy shot his laser pistol and the ¡°target¡± swung his sword but before he even got halfway through the swing the laser had already pierced his shoulder. ¡±ARG! FUCK!¡± The injured guy shouted and slowly started to get up. ¡±You alright?¡± One of the other shouted. ¡±Of course i¡¯m not fucking alright! I got shot in the fucking arm!¡±¡± He shouted as he put pressure on the wound. ¡±Want to continue.¡± the camera guy asked. ¡±Yeah, this won¡¯t kill me if we handle it quickly but I want to do something else.¡± the injured idiot said. The others nodded. One of them lifted the gun and the injured guy lifted his injured arm and I was guessing he was going to try and divert the energy with Psi. As expected though that failed miserably. Well not entirely, the shot was sent towards his chest but it was diverted up and hit his face making him die. From there the video showed the guy being taking by medics and how the shooter was actually put in jail for doing a killing shot and PKing the guy. Then the video changed to the perspective of the guy that died. His eyes opened and he found himself in a cold cube room that was closed. After banging on the door it finally opened and he pulled his bed out and stood up completely healed of injures but his gear was gone and he was butt naked. Suddenly the medics in charge of the morgue entered and saw him and the next moment the medic fainted. Fast forward a bit, they get some new armor for the newbie before taking him for tests and I mean a LOT of tests. The results came up rather shocking and fascinating as well. ¡°Amazing! We discovered a virus, no something more it¡¯s not a simple as a virus.¡± The doctor exclaimed. ¡±Come on, what''s going on?¡± The player asked. ¡±There is an unknown microorganism all over your body that stays inactive in your body until you ¡°die¡± so to speak. It seems once you ¡°die¡± they come to life and begin to heal your body to top condition¡­ no maybe a bit weaker than original condition.¡± the doctor said. ¡±Oh, cool, that means I can¡¯t really die.¡± the player said and shrugged. ¡±We really need to study this to find its other effects but I think the primary one is this one.¡± the doctor said but then he muttered something. ¡°Hmm, I wonder if this is what Colonel was asking about with the skills of the foreigners. My brow twitches hearing his comment. This is going to help a lot a when I need to explain why my skills from other games, that I trained in real life, don''t appear. The screen then changed to show what the player saw after he died.
You have died! You are locked out of the game for 24 real life hours. Since you are only level 1 you do not lose a level but as compensation you have lost 10 stat points at random and some skill proficiency from all your skills. Normal Death Penalty: 1 Level, The last 5 stat points assigned, 5% from current level of skill proficiency from 3 random skills, possible lose of all gear. If cloning technology is used to bring you back from a location that will only cause repeated death, 5 levels lost 25 stat points removed at random, all gear is lost and 1 level from 5 random skills is lost.
My jaws dropped after seeing the death penalty. The first one isn''t so bad since that is the common death penalty but the cloning rebirth was shocking. It clearly made you not want to die in a destroyed ship or lost in space. I wonder what would happen if our bodies blow up. Will the microorganisms rebuild it from scratch or will it piece us together. Would be a scary sight for sure. The video ended there leaving me in a daze but I snapped out of it when dad started to laugh. "Boy oh boy, Malcolm sure outdid himself with this one! He sure was creative that is for sure!" Dad said laughing. "I was wondering why he just doesn''t make us randomly appear at a spawn point?" I asked. "Your forgetting the setting we are playing in. The game doesn''t have magic. Psi isn''t mana, though it can do similar things its not mana. If I had to say Psi is more rigid than mana and magic. Things like instant spawning was probably set as impossible but in a sci-fi world I virus or bacteria that possibly absorbs Psi and revives and rebuilds a dead body it inhabits is much more believable, wouldn''t you say so as well?" He asked. After a moment of considering what dad said it did make sense. If this was a magic sci-fi world then I would say no but it isn''t so it makes sense what my dad said. It was then that something hit me. "I wonder how androids will go about this?" I said. "Hm, if I''m not wrong they are simply uploaded into a new robot. They can retrieve their body but they have a huge disadvantage since the parts they will have won''t have any of their upgrades." Dad said. "So it''s pretty much always cloning option for them?" I asked. "Nope, I think if the body is repaired they would only lose a level or maybe not even that since the repairs would probably be done by repairing or remaking all their parts so it can be either." He replied. Made some sense but I bet the level will still be lost but the stats wouldn¡¯t if you repair the body completely but then the system can still cause them to become worse. ¡°So your plans are for at least 7 days to finish the robot right?¡± Dad suddenly asked. ¡°That''s to build the robot plus the drill I plan to use in mining and the extra psi containers but then I also have the charging period so minimum 7 days if I can get a few elves to fill my suit up if not more.¡± I say. Dad sighs hearing my response. ¡°Guess we will have to work slow and steady with hit and run slowly whittling them down.¡± Dad said. ¡°No bombs or grenades?¡± I asked. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.¡°Nah, no money remember.¡± He said and I nod. ¡°Speaking of that the ship how is it?¡± He asked. ¡°I fixed the hull and also added windows and airlocks. They were cheaper than expected.¡± I reply. ¡°Good, well I need to go restock the fridge, want to come or will your return to the game?¡± He asked. I looked at the clock and saw only 20 minutes passed. ¡°I¡¯ll wait a bit before returning. I¡¯m currently asleep and it¡¯s ¡°night¡± time so I need to wait a bit so that I can rest well ingame.¡± I replied. ¡°Ah, is that so, why not check up on some information on the game. If not then go for a walk to refresh your mind. Staying so long inside isn¡¯t always the best thing.¡± Dad replied. ¡°Like you always say, the first month of game play is crucial for making a good foundation for your character and play style and lifestyle in game.¡± I said. ¡°Yeah but don¡¯t let it dominate your life, a month of our life here is 4 inside the game.¡± He said. What he said is true, its been 2 days since The Nebula was released and I barely keep to the proper eating schedule and log out. ¡°I guess I can take a walk then, it will help me stretch my legs at least.¡± I said. ¡°Good, now I¡¯m off to the supermarket to get some things that we are low on.¡± Dad said and picked up some car keys and got up leaving for the door and with a wave he leaves. A moment later the engine of our car came to life and grew distant as he drove away. I sigh and pick up the dishes and wash them before I go to my room and put some comfortable clothes, shorts and short sleeves shoes with simple sandals, and leave the house after locking up. I stretch as I feel the sun¡¯s heat hit me from above. Two days feels like a long time for a pro gamer. Me and dad are really well off compared to some of the poorer newbie dark gamers. Can¡¯t blame us, it¡¯s been in our life since a long time. School was done in VR, everything except PE, most sports shows and games as well and all that. Feeling the sun I felt a bit calmer since it was still spring so it was cool outside and the sun gave a nice feeling with the cool breeze that was passing. The Nebula being the first big scale sci-fi game that allowed space travel it caused me to form a kind of feeling of nostalgia when I feel how it is to be on the planetside after so many days without a clear day and night cycle. I go into a jog going towards a nearby park. It was a rather large park with a small lake and a good bit of trees making a nice natural feel and since it was spring the trees were all colored differently from the numerous flowers. The feel this place gave was much better than the park in the station. The main difference is the feeling of being in nature instead of being inside a massive space station¡¯s park that doesn¡¯t even have much of a breeze. Walking around I suddenly feel my phone buz as I get a message.
Yo! Lia here! Sending you a message through the contacts option on the capsule to let you know that I did some research since you hooked up the net for me in game and I found some slightly more advanced parts and blueprints for your robot. When you return I will show you. Also, seems the guys down on the planet are in a pickle so we should hurry the construction up and go aid them. Cya!
I read the message and reply back.
Don¡¯t go looking for anything too advanced that we don¡¯t have the components to make or that would make the robot unbalanced and non functional.
Send¡­ Waiting a moment a new reply came.
Nah, I already know that you can¡¯t make the really good stuff, still I already scanned all the components so I know what you can and can¡¯t make and I¡¯ve been searching for the best stuff that can be made quickly to make the performance of your robot the top of the batch without making the model so good that it makes it impossible for your to open the Psionic gates.
Well at least she is considerate. Like she said, the more complex and high leveled a Psionic tech is the harder it is to open the gates.
If it¡¯s like that then it¡¯s fine.
I put the phone away and simply went do whatever for the next hour before returning to the game. Even before entering the game Lia appeared showing me models of what she discovered. 95% of the things were dropped because, though it''s only a tad bit better than the current models I''m using, they were from the next best model after the current one I''m making. This makes the difficulty of opening the gates beyond what I''m capable of. The 5% was the only thing that didn''t contribute to the difficulty and that was the Psi containers. I finally got to see what they were. Psi containers is a complex system of Psionic Nerves that are inside a small cylindrical or spherical container that is Psi proof and won''t leak unless it''s through the nerves exiting into the body. Just so you know, all the parts of Dwarven fighter robots are all metals made with a trace amount of the material that makes Psionic nerves. This makes it possible to do reinforcements and keeps the psi from leaking. In short, these parts are expensive as hell to obtain so most freelance dwarf fighters normally do large missions to fund their robots maintenance. Such a good weapon yet the balance that keeps it from becoming a cheat for it is an ass. After having the plans for the larger better containers marked down I log in so I can get busy. *** Down on Kelha II, seven long days have passed and with each day our crew would go to the first cave and battle it out with the native monsters whittling down the numbers but it doesn''t do as much as they would want due to rapid breeding. The native monsters grow by eating the stone around them so with breeding it also leads to the caves they inhabit becoming complex as they eat while they grow large in number. After all this time the crew returns sullen once more after fighting. Hilda showed quite a bit of damage and was getting basic repairs to keep her main systems running, Roktar was fine but that was after getting healed while Lisa was covered in sweat from using so much Psi to aid in the fight, not only in healing. As they land back in the closest camp the terraformers were annoyed. "Damn it! If only we hired a better crew!" Cursed one of the men as he walked off the ship. That was the leading terraformer who was losing his patience. Obviously there was no time limit for this mission but seeing the crew in such a sorry state it showed that hiring another crew was probably needed if this one couldn''t do the job. Roktar, who was getting off the ship with a sigh, was followed by the others. "We are sorry about the boss''s temper, we aren''t really rushed for time, it''s just that he prefers his job done quickly and he doesn''t really mind what happens to those he hires." Said one of the terraformer workers. "Nah, it''s fine, we probably bit off more than we could chew. At least today we get a bit of reinforcement. My son is finally coming down and he would be a bit help." Roktar said. "Really? One man?" The terraformer asked skeptical. "He is a mechanic and a newly trained dwarf fighter. I saw what an experienced one can do so I''m rather excited to see how good my son is." Roktar said excited. The men actually formed a light smile hearing Noah''s skill set. They all split up after that. Roktar told the others to repair what they can while he goes to the shuttle landing where we would meet. Dad sits on the side and waited. After an hour the shuttle finally arrived. The shuttle was a cargo shuttle. This model was made to move more planetside but regularly brought down machines. It was 100 meters long, 30 meters high and 80 wide. It looked like a freight ship. On the side the cargo opened up and the mining camp workers go in and begin to pull out large machines. After some 20 minutes I finally came out. With slow heavy steps the 3 and a half meter tall robot stepped out. The chest was wide, which is where I was inside, also held most of the more important gear like psi containers, main computer module, and life support module which lets me attach air tanks to breathe in a vacuum. Under both arms were two large boxes I was carrying with some difficulty. As I reach a good distance away from the ship I put down the boxes and return to the ship and come back with two more boxes. Dad was already waiting next to the boxes when I returned. "You look good?" He said with a grin. I put down the boxes and look towards him. The chest popped out with the sound of pressurized air and showed me inside. "I may look it but the feeling isn''t that good though. That said, you look like shit." I replied back. "Aye, we keep getting our asses handed to us, how do you expect us to feel." Dad replied. "Point taken, help me take these boxes back to your borrowed ship. They are mostly for repair. There are a few more boxes on the ship, I''ll unload for now then we can take them." I tell him and close the robot and head off slowly to unload. The reason I am moving slowly is because I''m not used to driving this thing. It¡¯s difficult, extremely difficult. Besides closing my hands, the rest of the body I need to control with Psi, this is a real workout for my inner psi manipulation. There is 8 boxes in total, 5 are parts for my robots repairs while the rest is for repairs for weapons and the androids. When I was done unloading I found Lisa already there. "So you got a combat worthy model, looks strong." She said while giving a one over. "Yeah, that said I didn''t make weapons for it, for now I only extended my piloting time." I said. "What does that mean?" She asked. "Instead of making a weapon, I made an extra psi container so currently the robot can hold a max of 15,000 psi inside the three psi containers. It¡¯s used as fuel and it uses 100 psi per hour." I said. It¡¯s rather inefficient at the moment but at least for normal use I will have over 6 days but if I fight then I think this drops to over a day without weapons. That¡¯s the main reason I went with an extra container instead of a weapon. I can use my reinforcement skills for now. "So it works like that huh?" He muttered. "Let¡¯s get this stuff moving." I said as I grab hold of two boxes. Dad stalks two of them and lifts it by himself showing his high level of strength. Finally Lisa waved her hand making the remaining boxes levitate a short distance off the ground. From there we return to the shuttle. After we stored the boxes in the cargo I leave the robot there as well. I had no use for it at the moment so I sit it down and leave it on standby and begin to do serious repairs on the girls. Jessica''s shoulder was broken and Hilda, damn her body was trashed. I had to rebuild her and even fix some plates on her body. After them was the gear, the railguns were damaged but I learned from gunner how to do repairs. Most of the armor my dad used needed repairs as well as his weapon. The gloomy feeling that covered the crew turned more cheerful after I arrived. Kind of amazing how much a mechanic is important in this setting. With all this done with I had all but repaired everything including the confidence of my crew. Starting tomorrow I''ll be tanking for them so I should do finally preparations. My first fight in a while, can¡¯t wait! Chapter 16: Smash Fest Author corner: Welp, my editor is to unmotivated to edit so i don''t know when i will get any proper proofing on stuff so it will be as it is. Now then on today''s menu is brutal combat with a side of dwarf robot rider doing epic stuff that only lacks heavy weapons for extra fun.
After a few long hours of repairing all the broken and damaged stuff, which pretty much showed us all just how important a mechanic is to a crew or team, I go to my robot and get inside. I need to train with moving this thing and see my current limits with it. I have only been moving around without reinforcing it. Its really hard to do with just controlling it with Psi but apparently there is a piloting skill for this which I get after completely mastering the how to move around as if it was my normal body. ¡°Hey Noah, want the information on the suit that you?¡± A young woman¡¯s voice came from within the robot. The next moment, Lia¡¯s face appeared on a hologram screen that I use as my eyes when inside the robot. Yes, she is very happy to be able to talk normally and not through text now. ¡°Yeah, I really ignored most of it so I need to check all the information and get used to the robot.¡± I replied. The screen changes to an info table.
Dwarven Fighter Robot
A basic model combat and utility dwarf fighter robot. This model was created by a novice Dwarf fighter but with with an extra psi container. Consumption outside of combat: 100 psi/h Consumption during combat without weapon: 400 psi/h Consumption during when using tools 800 psi/h Psi container: 14,980/15,000 psi capacity Durability: 1000/1000 Armor defense: 60 without reinforcement, 120 with reinforcement Boost: Physical Proficiency: 30 points without reinforcement, 60 points with reinforcement. Agility: -20 (with reinforcement this debuff vanishes) Exterior Psi abilities are blocked as long as armor is in use. (must unequip an arm or leg to use psi)
Well it¡¯s kind of explained why my speed was so low. Exterior psi usage being blocked was also expected since the robot''s run on inner psi manipulation. The max psi capacity I already knew since I checked that part before as well as the psi consumption but seeing it laid out like this really shows how much it takes up.
I did the exact count for the psi consumption unlike before where you asked an estimate. 100 psi/h results in 150 hours which is 6.25 days or 6 days and 6 hours. 400 psi/h results in 37.5 hours which is 1.75 days or 1 day and 18 hours. 800 psi/h results in 18.75 hours or 18 hours and 45 minutes. (i ran some simulations to figure out how you would waste 800 psi for mining and it seems 100 is normal operating cost, 300 for reinforcement and 400 for drill reinforcement. The body reinforcement is to handle the vibrations of the drill)
So at those are the exact times huh, it would probably lower the consumption with better parts but I can¡¯t pilot something more advanced than this so it doesn¡¯t matter. I have the robot stand and slowly walk outside. Getting a bit away from the ship I finally try to truly test this robot out. Having a big ass mecha and not enjoying to use it to its fullest is the biggest waste possible. MECHA¡¯S ARE A MAN¡¯S, and dwarf¡¯s, DREAM!! ITS A MAN¡¯S ROMANCE!! Okay, playtime over let¡¯s get busy. I push the psi in my control into the containers and like opening a dam¡¯s doors I release the contained psi while trying to keep it under control. The flood of Psi wasn¡¯t actually that large a flood. I look at the monitor and I see the psi dropping from 14,980 to 14,830 and stopping. At this point the entire robot¡¯s psionic tech nerves were filled with psi. Now for the second phase, I pushed the psi out of the nerves and make them enter all the parts and plates making the ¡°skin¡± of the robot. What I found surprising is that this also caused my body to reinforce itself just like the robot. This is probably part of why I gain extra strength.
Psi Reinforcement has leveled up.
I couldn¡¯t help smiling to that. Its level 6 now and it was a pain to level up. Anyway I look at the monitor again and the psi drops to 14, 680 to fill up all the parts without exception and leave the nerves also filled. Alright, considering that utility work is 100 for basic operations and 300 for reinforcement to hold the drill then this state is the basic minimum for combat mode. With that thought I start to walk around and feel no resistance like before. The restriction of the suit is gone like the info on it said it would do and my strength also tripled with the reinforced boost which is 60 extra physical proficiency. I say that but my HP doesn¡¯t rise, I checked and it seems that this isn¡¯t like fantasy setting games were items boosts affect HP. I start walking then running but the robot even with reinforcement was bulky and heavy. 25 agility isn¡¯t something that will make it faster. I stop a moment and focus on my legs. I start to move the psi in the legs and turn it into topaz structure. The psi in the upper body slowly drained to the legs as it compressed and compacted. I did foot, muscle and skin. Seems hands and feet were the same.
Reinforced FeetRarity2Level 1
Feet that has been reinforced by psi that has been structured like a very hard material. It makes the kick several times harder and the strength of the body part higher. This also increases the strength of the steps taken increasing speed of the caster. Psi cost: 100 per foot Reinforces foot increases attacks damage 5% Reinforces foot increases movement speed by 10% Remains active but takes 0.30 from psi regen to maintain
I look at the new skill with a smile. ¡°I don¡¯t want to be a spoiled sport or anything but Noah, deactivate one of the reinforcements.¡± Lia suddenly says. ¡°Why?¡± I asked. ¡°Because the three reinforcements you currently have active surpasses your psi regenerations rate and its draining the robot''s psi faster.¡± She says. When I looked I saw the number dropping slowly every 2 seconds. I pale and quickly undo the skin reinforcement making the dropping psi stop. ¡°That¡­ was bad.¡± I said breathing heavily.¡± I said. ¡°You need more Willpower to maintain the entire robot or we need to build some kind of reinforcement amplifying tech to decrease the cost of the psi consumption.¡± She said. ¡°I think it¡¯s easier to raise willpower.¡± I said. ¡°Really? Though you raised it to a high level up to now that probably won¡¯t work anymore. You opened the entire robot''s system so you are experienced in it. Unless it¡¯s a much more advanced robot I don¡¯t think it will work.¡± She said. I frown listening to her explain. ¡°Also I don¡¯t suggest using Stat points on this because you are a dwarf, even as a dwarf your strength is much more pitiful compared to others because you didn¡¯t get to train properly.¡± She says hitting a slightly sore spot. ¡°I know my stats suck so don¡¯t rub it in.¡± I complain but all I hear is a giggle. I mumble my complain but taking a look at my stats I notice how the agility gained 2 extra points with the extra foot reinforcing which is 10% of my stats. I really need to do physical training to take advantage of these skills I have. I start running and it feels a bit smoother but I don¡¯t feel much change with or without the foot reinforcement for now. What I did notice is that with each step the topaz structures vibrates and is slowly loosening up with each step. I start to focus to strengthen it again and I notice it takes psi to repair. I stop and unwind the topaz structure and start moving with the simple reinforcement and found it doesn¡¯t break apart or consume more. ¡°Seems the robot''s work better with regular reinforcement.¡± I said. ¡°But you still have to punch and defend so the skin, fist and muscles are needed just not in the legs and feet.¡± Lia replies. ¡°Not unless I learn to fight martial arts with this robot.¡± I said trying to imagine myself doing my martial arts. Frowning a moment I say ¡°That¡¯s a bit far away with my current robot and stats.¡± I say. ¡°Yeah, just~ a bit~!¡± She replies. After testing my speed I did shadow boxing and other martial arts but since I didn¡¯t have a target to try on I couldn¡¯t progress much. Still, with a nearby rock I could figure out that my fist is really hard. A punch with a topaz reinforced fist I left a nice fist print on the rock and not a scratch on my robot fist or even internal damage. After that I headed inside and after talking with Lisa and dad we worked together to refill the psi that I used. Dad helped until his small capacity ran out and left us, who had high regeneration and a larger capacity, to it. It wasn¡¯t really much though it took us both to fill up what was needed. Tomorrow we will go back to the cave and hopefully with me tanking we will get much further than before. *** I stand behind Alex while she flies towards our destination all the while Lia updates me on the kinds of enemies we will fight.
Alright, I spoke with the other AI and gathered the information. Most native creatures from Kelha II were based off of deformed earth based animals from earth so their look determined the name they obtained. From largest and strongest to weakest. Bear: base level range lvl 12-15 Gorilla: 8-12 Wolf: 4-8 Horse/animals similar to horses. Bears are an uncommon type that can be considered a mini boss type mob. Though it is ranked as such your father finds them easy to kill because they normally use charging attacks or stand up revealing the underbelly when near the enemy. Gorilla is only that in name. The format of its body is bulky upper chest and arms with weaker smaller legs. Their smash and punch can be compared to the bears charges and could possibly beat a bear if it doesn''t get the chance to charge at it. Wolves are, like the earth ones, pack animals. They move in clusters within the mass of Kelha beasts in numbers between 7 to 14 and are the beast your father hate the most due to the numbers. The aren''t smart but with instincts they can coordinate to a degree. Horse and similar beasts don''t fight. They are skittish and only when they are cornered will they fight. They are used as food for the others because of its large size. This is all the info I could gather from the local database and the other AI. The wildlife isn''t really studied because they could either adapt to the terraforming or die off.
I was rather surprised by the amount of info. It wasn''t as much as I expected. I guess they think "if the wildlife adapts its worth studying, if not then its no sweat off my back." To me, I don''t see them dying off like other organic animals. "We are almost at the cave Noah, since you''re going to tank you should get ready." Alex said. "Alright, I''ll be getting ready." I replied and went to the cargo. Entering I go to my robot and start preparing it. I grab two small air tanks that go into the life support of the robot and put those in place. Then attach the valve into them to allow the air to exit. Those attached I did a quick once over before entering the robot.
Hatch closed. Air tight seal closed. Pressurizing.
In a moment the sound of the air exiting came from all around and the parts that worked through pressure also gained pressure.
Robot pressurized and sealed.
The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. "Start up sequence is done~! You can start it up~!" Lia said playfully. The start up is simple just like turning off. I push my own psi into the robot and pull psi from the containers. When I poked it the psi leaked out into the nerves and I pulled my psi back making a weak flow and gaining back my psi I started to control the robots psi making it circulate the robot turning on the systems by feeding it psi. After five minutes the robot was totally online and I began to reinforce the body by flooding the body. This was the simplest and best method to use. As I finish a screen showing Alex appeared. "Noah, we arrived, we are about 200 meters from the hoard around the cave. Captain and Hilda are heading down and the cargo will be depressurized so be careful." Alex warned me. "I have air inside the robot and its air tight so don''t worry." I replied and he nodded before the screen vanished and only the view from outside was left. I get up but I had to stay bent over since the ceiling was just a bit shorter then my robot. I walk a bit over near the hatch for the cargo as my robot''s systems registers the air pressure dropping in the room and it becoming a vacuum. After a bit the air lock that leads into the cargo from the stairs coming down from the second floor opened. Hilda didn''t have a helmet since she didn''t need it but dad had an air tank and his helmet on covering the last bit of skin which was his head from the vacuum of space.
Noah: You guys ready?
Roktar: Of course!
Hilda: Kind of hope we don¡¯t get trashed again or the leader of the terraformers will give up and recruit a new crew as backup and we will lose half our pay.
Dad turns around and flicks her forehead.
Roktar: No pessimism! It only makes your fighting worse and you only stay on the defensive. Now that Noah is here you can focus on attack while he becomes our huge metal meat shield.
Noah: wonder how good a Roktar shield would be. The shield bash would be interesting
Roktar: So cruel!
Hilda: Isn''t that kind of mean Noah, he is your dad after all.
Noah: Don''t think so. Not the first time I do it either. We once went to fight a green drake and I was tanking but because dad was an idiot the day before we switched rolls.
Roktar: Freaken brat! That time I wasn''t even playing a tank class. I was a vanguard and DPS yet you drew hate and then bolted leaving it only for me!
Jessica: Alright you to stop the fighting. Get ready to jump because Alex is opening the hatch.
After Jessica''s warning the vibrations from the hatch could be felt. Slowly the wall on the right side of the room opened up completely. From here I saw we were 12 meters in the air. Didn''t seem like a height that would damage my robot so I walk off and jump. In an instant I landed with a loud thud making the dust from the barren ground lift up. Following me was dad and Hilda soon after. I look up and see a turret compartment open and the structure that was made for snipers came out with Jessica sitting snug in it. After a few minutes dad looked up and stuck and following his eyes I saw Lisa floating down and landing beside dad.
Noah: Guess everyone is here so let''s go. I''ll go in first while Hilda and Dad will follow soon after when I have most of the hate targeting at me.
Everyone nods and we get going. I look upwards towards the mountain in front of us. We were on a rough but barren hilly plain that suddenly rose into a mountain. Even from far I can see the cave entrance about 1 km away but the monsters were only 200 meters away. I expected the place to be packed but they are surprisingly spread out.
Noah: I thought the place was swarming?
Roktar: Getting within 100 meters of the cave will cause those inside swarm out.
So that''s how it is. There is cannon fodder outside for trash that can''t fight while the swarm for the strong ones. No wonder even a tank character like dad would have a hard time. From what guess dad is more of a Vanguard type then a tank. I look around and find a cluster of monsters. Don''t know if dad thought of this but the best thing to do to cannon fodder is use it for exp. Dad''s level is currently 11 and he can even apply for a class. Though it''s not as important as in fantasy setting games, it still gives boosts so there are still advantages. I plan to wipe out the monsters outside so that we can''t be flanked from behind. I start running towards the monsters and dad and Hilda behind. I was slower than them but the held their speed so I would get most of the hate. Hate is how much an enemy is targeting you. Mostly the person that makes a surprise attack or takes the most damage usually has the most hate. Tanks normally specialize in using skills like taunt that draws targets to them. Can''t do that at the moment so I need to get creative. As I get close to the cluster, Lia scans and highlights all the monsters with a small green line before it all turns red. ¡°Targets locked and identified. 1 bear, 3 gorilla, 13 wolves.¡± She said. As she said that a warning showed towards the back as the bear began to rush my way. It was also the first time I saw it and it reminded me of a monster golem. Player race golems normally possess 75% or more human like body and most of their body is properly attached to each other. Monsters on the other hand were rough and looked like several boulders somehow connected together. I charge at him as he does to me and knowing that I can kill him if I smash the head I run until he is about 4 meters away before my right arm came from behind in a slow, heavy downward swing striking him right on the head as he got in front of me and was about to spring at me to add more damage. My fist connects and pushes the bears head into the ground and backed by the momentum of the charge the head was cleanly smashed off and separated from the body because the body did filled almost completely over while my fist held the head in place. ¡°Damn~!! Instant kill! Aren¡¯t you overkill with this robot!¡± Lia shouted. ¡°Shut up!¡± I shouted back as a warning appeared on the screen. I turned my head and saw a gorilla rushing me. Like Lia had described it, the upper body was bulky and the legs were small like some poorly proportioned bodybuilder. It rushed me and as it got close it pulled its right arm back and swung. Seeing so many wolves getting close I got and idea and quickly lifted my own right arm and caught the gorilla¡¯s hand. ¡°OI! Be careful! That actually almost caused damage even reinforced as it is. If you want to do stupid stuff add the reinforced skin skill!¡± Lia complained. I ignore her as I grip the gorilla¡¯s arm with both hands as it started to struggle. Then shifting my weight I began to turn and pulled the gorilla behind me as I began to spin him around and just by chance some wolves were coming from behind that I absolutely weren¡¯t jumping to attack me from behind. The body of the gorilla smashed into the wolves and carried them a bit before throwing them onto the others. I spun several times and let it go so that it could smashed into other beasts. I was a bit dizzy but I didn¡¯t have to worry as dad and Hilda came in at the moment and began to cleave down animals. I had effectively gained all the hate in this cluster because besides the one those two attacked the rest came at me with. The gorilla I tossed was effectively stunned and on the ground while the remain two came at me with a vengeance. Seeing it wasn¡¯t going to end well I take some steps back while reinforcing my fists. When I was done one of them came swinging like the one before but this time I didn¡¯t grab and instead punched. Since it was swinging horizontally it made a huge opening for me. The opening crippled it because I punched right at the elbow and completely crushed the joint the causing the arm to fall. I quickly grab the fallen arm and doing a turn I swing the arm like I club and smashed the head of the beast. I let go of the club arm and turn to the final gorilla and stick both hands out to grab the two descending arms. I was pushed back for a moment but that was brief. Catching both arms made the gorilla powerless since its power was in its arms. I left my leg and stomp on chest and face and slowly extend my back as I quickly pull back on the arms until finally the both broke off at the shoulder. The gorilla fell backwards and died after I smashed both its arms down on its head. With a grin I say through the communicator.
Noah: This is fun!¡±
Jessica: Noah! You''re too ruthless! At least have some pity for them.
Roktar: Bahahahah! Now this is a fight! Getting a proper tank sure makes a difference!
Noah: Jessica, no need for support fire at the moment, wait until we get near the cave.
Jessica: Roger
After that quick exchange I tighten my grip on the two gorilla arms and look at the remaining wolves and a grin surfaces on my face as we completely destroy the remaining weaklings.
You have gained 2 levels.
You have gained 10 stat points
With the end of the fight over we were rewarded the exp and I¡¯m surprised that I got two levels for so few mobs. Maybe it¡¯s because I killed the bear and gorilla¡¯s which are relatively high leveled. With my 10 new stat points I put them all in agility so that I won¡¯t be so slow with the suit. It takes effect instantly as my body feels lighter and more free.
Noah: Well that was a good warm up if I ever saw one.
Roktar: Ah~! How refreshing it feels to stomp on these things so effortlessly now. Having a tank in a party has far too many advantages but still Noah, did you have to have so much fun crushing the four strongest monsters?
Noah: I did, I really did. I¡¯ve been cooped up in the station since the start suffering under Colonel¡¯s teachings. I need to unwind and it was good!
Alex: Okay~! It¡¯s official, though it¡¯s not the proper crew ranking but Noah clearly meets the condition for a proper captain unlike Roktar.
Roktar: OI! I make a great captain!
Jessica: Then why have we not been able to complete this mission until now!
Lisa: Come on guys, no fighting! It¡¯s not like he can help it, we just didn¡¯t have the proper manpower and numbers.
Noah: We should get moving, before we move to the cave I want to clear out all those that are outside because I don¡¯t want to get flanked. Also I need to catch up in level, your all above level 10 already right?
Roktar: Lvl 11
Jessica: Lvl 10
Hilda: Lvl 10
Lisa: Lvl 8
Alex: Lvl 4
I wanted to ask Alex why his level was so low but then I remembered that he was just the pilot and besides in a space fight he doesn¡¯t get to fight much.
Noah: Welp, let¡¯s get started then.
Chapter 17: Tremor Authors Corner: Well this chapter was a bit harder do to less motivation then i wanted. Got some fights and more fights. This chapter features lots of refernces that could cause copy right infringing yet i dont care. Jokes aside. I am in need of ideas. I can go another chapter of fighting (or not) but i need some ideas to do next. Please post below ideas that you may have for monsters (space ones), tech (simple stuff that can be done atm and not 5 years from now), missions (already have an idea to do but need more), and so on. Enjoy
A few short hours after we began our slaughter of the native monsters, we had cleared every beast up to five meters away from the cave. We were able to accomplish this due to Jessica sniping them. It really was her time to shine. We retreated some distance away and from the ship at 150 meters away from her target and not needing to worry about wind resistance, we sniped down several clusters in a few hours while we returned to the ship for repairs and healing. My robot didn''t get so damaged but there is still some. I wouldn''t take my chances letting damage accumulate. The durability of the robot is spread throughout the four limbs, the chest and head. 100 for each limb, 50 for the head and 550 for the torso. The reason I don¡¯t want damage accumulating is because when the durability drops to 80% the limb begins to slow down or malfunction. The speed is supposed to drop by 10% and it doesn''t exert as much strength as it should. It goes without saying that I repaired the few damages the arm and chest gained from the hits and the times blocks while we fought. It was small components that broke or cracked but I stored them in a separate box. I would never toss out these components because they are one of the most expensive to get. The reason being that they are made specifically for psionic weapons or robots. Parts made for this use have trace amounts of the mineral, Psidium. This is an uncommon rank material only found in space and it''s the material used for making psionic technology and more specifically it''s the material that is processed to make Psionic Tech Nerves. The ranking for metals is simple to understand. It''s common, uncommon, rare, legendary, mythical. Though Psidium is a very sought after metal it''s still uncommon and not overly impossible to find. Since this is a game, unmined asteroids spawn after a time with the metal. Common metals take a week to respawn,uncommon take from 1 month to 3 months depending on rarity. In each rank there is a class of rarity from 1-10 like in missions. Psidium is rank 10 in the uncommon category. If you''re wondering about the price of psionic nerves, I don''t know, what we gained to make our robots was a 5 kilo roll of psionic nerve and with the two equipment I made it took all of the roll. I will have to check the market price for everything linked to Psidium some time since I will need upgrades sooner or later. After the few repairs to my robot was done I went and repaired the girls. Jessica still got damage to her shoulder but it also seems that she had some parts damage in her head from using that android trait where she can raise her perspective speed. What was it called, overload I think. Hilda had some damage caused by movement and some from attacks from when she was fighting. It was actually because of her that we needed to come back. Her body can''t handle extensive battles even with a tank since simple movements wear down her body. I think the money we gain at the start will have to go to the girls upgrades first. Once they get a second durability upgrade they can handle much more and with less repairs. If I know them, from what I saw, Hilda would get the four foundation upgrades, 2 durability and 2 mental upgrades then focus on close range combat upgrades. Jessica will do the same but her specialization would be more mental so that she can fire the gun much more easily. After we returned to the ship we returned to the camp because of the time. From what I heard the monsters when killed efficiently they won''t come out if they aren''t herded out. At best a small bit more will be outside if we left it and returned. Since it was night time, it wasn''t to our advantage to continue fighting. When we told the results to the terraformers they were rather happy that we were finally advancing. Their leader was still bitching about our speed but we had succeeded in decreasing the number all day tomorrow we will be fighting. We will see how effective I am as a tank. Oh right I got to level 6 and the others also surpassed level 10, well everyone but Alex since he doesn''t fight. We all log out to eat and do our business and let time pass before returning. Like before I take a walk and return just before two hours pass and log in to find it was day time already. Back in the game during day time we return to the cave and find that the monsters barely advanced out from where we killed them to. This showed us that breeding can only go so far. As such we suit up and drop down. I tell Jessica to only use the sniper since the railgun are trump cards and not something to constantly use especially when you have a gun like that. We drop down and slowly walk towards the cave. Just before crossing the 100 meter mark Lia warns me and I pass on to the others. With a nod we take some steps in and suddenly as if something triggered an explosion, all the monsters outside look our way. After another step they finally all rush at us. Because they were 50 meters ahead and around the cave they all came from the front or from the frontal flanks. We move back several dozen steps to get away from the point where the residents of the cave would rush out. After reaching a comfortable distance I turn around and meet a group of seven bears head on. One instantly dies to a headshot from Jessica before it reached me and it tripped up another one. When I reach the first it dies like the first bear I killed and then with his body in that angle I grab his hind legs and spin it around like I did the gorilla the first time. This is the tactic I have used to generate the most hate towards me at all times. Letting the bear fly its heavy body impacts into three wolves crushing them. I then turn to the left and block an incoming paw swing from the bear and let a left hook connect with the bears lower jaw. Dad finally arrives and jumps on the back of a bear and starts to force the head side ways. The bear''s body follows and falls sideways but dad jumps off quick and grabs the head again when its down. After a struggle he finally breaks the neck and kills the bear. Hilda was different, with a laser sword she runs in and like dad jump on the back but with her laser sword off she places it on the bear''s forehead and activates it making the laser drill into the head and upper body. With a sweep of the laser sword she digs out a huge slash carving everything out. Lastly Lisa, she doesn''t have attack type psi techniques like making fire and so on but with dad''s stupid suggestions she actually used her pin point control of psi to mimic a sith lord choking someone. She even goes as far as doing the pose of holding someone before closing her fist and crushing the neck or head. It¡¯s very entertaining to watch really because this is one of the few star wars imitations that is actually possible without side effects or death. The first time we did this we found out how scary strong elves can be. She easily lifted 14 wolves like that and cracked the heads as easily as if you are breaking a chicken''s neck. Jessica, on the ship, just simply snipes away at the enemy. Because of the sniper''s low fire rate, I told her to aim for high priority targets like wolf alpha''s and bears. This way the burden on us is lessoned by a great deal she can fire two shots in a minute. If it was a planet with an atmosphere then it would be 1 per minute or even less. The lack of air resistance is very useful. All she needs to do is calculate the gravity pull over distance. In this large scale fight we keep Lisa from fighting so we can heal or pull back. She set up a dome barrier where she stood. If needed she will fly over and heal dad or he will go to her. The enemy numbered around 80 this time and it was all the remaining clusters outside and after 5 long hours of fighting we finally killed the last one. The ground was littered with enemies and around me even formed a small hill since I made sure to cause the most havoc. I move my arms and legs and the lethargic feeling as well as the feeling I get from the psi tells me that damage to my arms and legs combined would put each limb at around 60% of their durability. It was much tougher than I had anticipated but even then we succeeded. [/tds]Alex: On it, come quick before something decides to show up.[/tds]
Noah: Alex, bring the ship down, we are going back. Robot needs repairs and we need to rest up.
We walk back to where Alex landed and enter the ship. She takes off and heads for the camp so we can safely do our check-ups. At camp we first eat and calling Lisa I start repairs while she recharges the robot. I have Lisa recharge the robot. The method is rather simple, on the back of the robot there is a removeable plate the size of hand. Under it is a glowing white disk. By putting your hand there you can directly transfer Psi into the robot without leaking. The other way is to touch the actual body but there is a 20% psi loss which is reflected by the armor. Normally the 20% is negligible when you''re in a station with lots of Elves to recharge but outside it¡¯s better not to waste. I, on the other hand, start with repairs. Opening the plates I look through the parts repairing everything before rebuilding it. After 2 hours the repairs were done and Lisa had already recharged the robot completely. I brought over a small cart that is found in cargo¡¯s to move heavy loads. Placing it next to the left arm I jump into the robot. Coming to life I move the left arm jump above the cart and lay the robot back. ¡°Unhook left hand.¡± I command. The next moment the sound of latches coming off and a heavy sound of metal falling a short distance. I poke my head out of the chest and check the hand and see it was properly on the cart. ¡°Position lock.¡± I commanded. Suddenly the sound of air pressurizing came from all over the body. I tried to move the body but it was locked in place. With a nod I got out and walked to the arm and looking at the exposed wires and Psionic nerves, I disconnect the connections in this joint. The connections are plugs between each part of the body. This makes it possible to make the robot with modular parts. In simple terms, the robot is like building blocks I can change. With all the parts off I push the cart to one of the boxes. Lisa was watching and was confused. ¡°What are you doing? Is the fist damaged?¡± She asked. ¡°Nope, come help me get this.¡± I reply as start opening one of the boxes. Lisa helps open the box then store the fist inside and take out the other module. ¡°This¡­!¡± She started saying but froze after she pulled out the part. ¡°This is my drill, yep.¡± I tell her. In the air currently was a long drill on a moveable joint and with thicker plate forming the shell of the arm going up to the elbow. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. As Lisa sets the drill on the cart she looks at me. ¡°Why did you bring this out? Isn¡¯t it a tool?¡± She asked. ¡°It can be used as a weapon, a heavy consumption weapon but still a weapon. Against foes that are 100% rock and mineral this feels like an effective weapon.¡± I reply. ¡°What if it gets damaged?¡± She asked. ¡°Repair it like everything else. I doubt it would get damaged though. The plates on the arm will be replaced with those here and this is twice as thick and provides extra defense as well as aids to anchor the drill on my robot''s arm so that it doesn¡¯t fall off when i¡¯m working.¡± I replied. She looked once more as if thinking something before she nodded. Seeing as she wasn¡¯t saying anything I pushed the cart under the frozen left arm. Then began the job of removing the armor plate. It wasn¡¯t exactly simple because the plates were connected to psionic nerves but like the joints it was connected through plugs but it was annoying to remove it completely since most of them have around 10 on each. After removing all the plates up to the elbow, I moved the cart into place. The plates of the drill are more rigid compared to the normal plates and are made of five circular plates that are shaped to match a specific location on the arm. Another feature is that the plates open up to make it easier to install each plate. WIth the plates open and the drill at an angle I put it in the correct position before installing the psionic nerves before jumping into the robot. ¡°Unlock movements.¡± I said the command and I could move again. Looking at the left arm I move it carefully trying to connect drill. *Click! Click! Click! Click! Click!* Hearing the five clicks I knew that the drill was connected correctly. ¡°Hook left hand, drill module¡± I said. With the command came the sound of pressurizing arm and the loud sound of latches closing. Hopping out of the robot I go to the arm and close the plates one at a time after connecting the psionic nerve leaving it partially loose but still closed near the parts. Jumping back in the robot one final time I give the final command I need. ¡°Lock drill arm plate.¡± At once, one by one the plates closed and clamped down on the arm as if it was skin and was born there. I close the chest lid and begin to drive psi around the robot to check its system. When I find no damage I then go through the steps to checking the drill¡¯s systems properly and when I find nothing wrong I put the robot back in standby mode. ¡°Alright, everything''s ready here, all repaired.¡± I said. ¡°You should go repair the other girls as well, Hilda took a beating from that gorilla that targeted her while you were busy with the others.¡± Lisa said. ¡°We should go then.¡± I said and she nods as we both head upstairs to get a bite to eat and repair Hilda and Jessica. *** Standing at the 100 meter mark we saw the entire area was clear of enemies besides the piles of rubble that was left behind. Looking back to the group behind me they nod and we start to move forward. By 80 meters it came. From the cave came a wave of beasts that began to pour out. We had come prepared for such a huge number, we had stocked up on some consumable weapons while we were there. We got them in exchange by having me repairing several machines that were malfunctioning in the camp. The consumables were grenades. Now don¡¯t say they don¡¯t explode in a vacuum because all modern weapons are self oxidizing. Lisa makes 4 of the 50 grenades in the open box next to her float and pulls the pin and tosses the grenades into the cave as fast as her psi could throw. Suffice to say that the explosion caused a large number of beasts to be thrown out of the cave and probably a large amount of damage came to those inside. There was probably 40 that got outside before the explosions went off and we rushed forward to meet them. We had 3 boxes with grenades and we had left her in a barrier where she would throw the bombs. I quickly moved to make the hate focus on me and we began the fight. My lovely method of turning my enemies into ragdolls and throwing them all around with some flair does a more than effective job at getting their attention and now to try my drill. Like it was explained the drill by itself takes 300 psi to operate and so release more psi from the containers while driving the reinforcing psi into the drill while the new psi floods the body. When the drill was online the screens showing the information appeared on my left. With a thought the drill began to spin and because the robot was pressurized, I could hear and feel the distinctive sound of the drill spinning. I see a huge gorilla fist coming at me and with my drill, I punch. The result was more than satisfactory because when the drill hit, the arm of the gorilla was completely grinded to dust and what remained of it was riddled with cracks. The follow up punch with my right hand connected on the chest leaving more cracks on its body and the finisher was one last left punch to the weakened chest causing the gorilla to fall apart. Before I could react another gorilla was swinging but before it hit, its head blew up into dust because of a sniper shot to the head. I turned and grabbed the arm and ripped out off the body and began to use it like a club. I then heard a series of explosions and then a message came.
Lisa: 30 more incoming, I stopped the flow with a few more grenades
We had cleaned out 30 so it was reinforcement to put the numbers we took down. As we cleared the last few the new group arrived and we continued on crushing, and taking a look at the cave I could see more coming out but suddenly the flow stopped with a final beast.
Noah: Seems all the beasts are out of the cave!
The moral of the others burst and we began to kill faster. Lisa tossed a large number of grenades decimating the approaching beasts and sending parts flying all over. Eventually she joined us in the fight and healed dad quickly before using her psi to squash large beasts and cull the number of wolves that were a distraction. After an hour, the fight finally ended but I felt something was off. I did take into consideration that dad and the others have been fighting for several days but it felt like the numbers were small. Suddenly I felt a vibration from below. ¡°RUN! Something''s coming!¡± Lia shouted sending this through the chat to the others. We all sprinted towards the ship and just as I walk out of the 100 meter range of the cave something burst out from underground. Looking back what I saw was a long 5 meter long body made out of rock with an open mouth at one end. ¡°It¡¯s a giant worm! An infant one though!¡± Lia explained. The worm didn¡¯t stay long above ground and burrowed underground. Still it became apparent quickly that it was coming to attack because it lifted a trail of dust behind it.
Roktar: Fuck! Now we are stuck in a fucking Tremors rip off! Everyone run back to the ship!
We didn¡¯t argue and just ran. I looked back and saw the worm rapidly gaining and seeing we couldn¡¯t run away I asked. ¡°Lia, what is the level range of that thing?¡± I asked. ¡°It was around 5 meters, the length normally shows the level so it should range from as low as 45 to at most 59.¡± She replied. I paled when I heard that but could only grit my teeth when I started to make the drill spin. I focus on all the armor plate and the drill and reinforce it with skin reinforcing. I then stop and turn around and saw it was no more than 10 meters away and closing fast. The ground began to bulge and with the stop I put my body into turning and bring the drill on my left arm down. Just as the worm was 1 meter away it appeared out of the ground and met my drill head on. The shell around the worm was as hard as steel and the weight behind it pushed me back and didn¡¯t stop but soon cracks appeared and the shell began to crumble as the worm began to writhe around in pain. I took a step forward trying to push back and push further in and it slowly worked as the drill dug deeper and making more cracks appear as it burrowed into the body. Finally the shell broke under the pressure of the worms own strength and me pushing back against it. My arm dug deeply in the much weaker inner rock that was rapidly grinded into a fine powder. The worm began to shake its head but soon lost its strength and slumped down. It stopped pushing and I was able to remove my arm leaving a large hole in its head. With my drill out it quickly spurred to life and retreated into the ground and flees for its lift. We were on guard for a good 10 minutes before we slowly return to the ship and only after we were in the air did we finally relax. Looking at the others we began to laugh and soon cheer as we finally got one cave cleared for the mission. The cheers also passed on to the terraformers but after that we reported to the leader about the fight and they all paled when I told them there was an infant Giant worm that was aggressive in that cave. It relieved them when I said I was lucky enough to scare it away and how I had set up the drill for fighting previously and had lucked out. ¡°It''s good that you succeeded, I was just about to request a backup crew to come. It seems like when your crew is all together you are efficient. Having a Dwarf fighter, even a newbie one, is a good thing for your crew. I guess you will need repairs right, once we set up the bomb your crew can take a day off before heading to the next cave.¡± He said and I nodded. We shake hands before he begins to order the bombs be loaded and I go to repair the damage to my drill and the robot as a whole. Later that day the bombs were set at the end of the cave, which was expanded due to the beasts eating the stones on the walls. There was also a drastic increase in heat near the end of the cave which shows that the magma was near. It kind of worried the terraformers. I asked why, ¡°Well if the magma is near then if we detonate the bomb then the lava can be diverted to the caves.¡± He explained when we were back in the ship. ¡°Well, isn¡¯t it just important to have the release of the pressure, you just made different exits that will release the eruption.¡± I said. ¡°Not so simple. It would act more as a leak and in turn make the eruption weaker.¡± He explained making me nod understanding the actual problem. ¡°Then won¡¯t the explosion from the bombs collapse the caves? If not we can weaken the walls and ceiling in some areas so that the explosion closes the cave up.¡± I replied. He looks at me and nods. ¡°Good idea, our men can do that while you start clearing the next cave. It¡¯s safe now so we don¡¯t need to worry.¡± He said and I nodded. ¡°You have the coordinates to the caves so we will let you be for now, enjoy your day off.¡± He said and leaves into the mining camp. I go into the shuttle and find a bed to sleep on before logging off to enjoy a break and some real sleep. Chapter 18: Reward and Beer Author''s corner: Another chapter ready for more fun, will soon start time skipping through the monologue of crafting and questing for money and brewing. Also, thanks to everyone that posted ideas last chapter. The ideas were great though most of them weren''t fit for the the current progress that the mc and crew can accomplish at the moment. You can keep posting ideas since it will help me and my idea bank think of more ideas that would most likely be chopped down by warhawx and then remade with his Logic-fu. Enjoy!
These last days have been busy to say the least. We have completed our mission finally and cleared out all the caves. The terraformers did their part and besides placing the bombs, they weakened the caves to collapse. At the moment we were at the mining camp in the space that was set up to detonate the bombs remotely. We were all watching the monitor. ¡°Alright, after all the work from both our sides we have finally completed our part. Now let us see the fruits of our labor.¡± The leader says and with a nod to one of his men, who returned it, we focused on the screen. ¡°Detonating in 3, 2, 1¡± He said. *Click* On the screen there was a satellite view of the volcano that was live feed and we see several explosions for the cave but it is soon stopped as the caves all collapse. Next cracks appear near the top and smoke began to leak. ¡°Detonation success, seismic activity in the volcan rapidly rising! Readings show magnitude 8 earthquake spreading from the volcano and it seems it struck the several nearby volcanoes that have left the dormant state and are activating.¡± the man that clicked the button said. The next moment the imagine of the volcano vanished and all that was left was a puff of black smoke. ¡°Eruption confirmed!¡± The man announced the terraformers cheered. The next moment we began to feel the tremors coming from the volcano. The mines had been cleared out because this area was to close to the volcano that it would definitely be hit by the earthquake. We leave the room and look towards the volcano¡¯s direction and we could see far in the distance a black cloud that was expanding. ¡°Thank you all for the help and here.¡± The terraformers leader said as he pulled out a package of credits which were bills about the size of a 100 dollar bill. I take the money and store it and shake the man¡¯s hand. ¡°Thanks for the work and sorry we couldn¡¯t resolve it earlier.¡± I said. ¡°At least it was done which is what matters. I suggest investing that money in weapons and upgrades.¡± He said and I nodded. ¡°We will, don¡¯t worry.¡± I tell him. He turns and leaves to his men but I call out. ¡°Will you remain planetside or return to the station?¡± I asked. ¡°We will remain here, we need to monitor the volcanic activity in the surrounding volcanoes. We need to make sure that a chain reaction is successful or making a new atmosphere won¡¯t be happening so soon.¡± He replied and left. With a nod I turned to the others. I grinned as does everyone else and soon we all cheered.
Mission: Kelha TerraformingDifficulty3
With your effort, Kelha II terraforming project stage 1 has begun without problem. Your mission is complete and reward obtained. Report to Kelha II Space station to submit report.
As we all received this mission we didn¡¯t really wait as we board the shuttle and leave for space after making sure all our things are packed and on board. After a quick check of the ship to make sure it was working right and the permission to lift off we leave the planet heading for space. Our first mission as a crew and it was to this difficulty, we were a bit over our heads with this. If I went down without my robot suit then we surely would have lost. Not to mention my stats still suck but that will change when we get up and I start training. Money problems won¡¯t be a problem since it¡¯s been a few weeks and dad¡¯s alcoholic drinks should be ready to sell. I think with Level 1 he can probably get around 500 - 2k credits for each liter of alcohol. Since we had a while to go before we return to the station I go about checking the ship itself. Specifically the systems like life support, gravity generator and others we need. I need to know what we need so that we can repair our own ship. As I was looking through the gravity gen systems to understand how it worked the ship suddenly rocked heavily. The next moment Alex¡¯s voice came from the loudspeakers. ¡°We are being attacked by pirates!¡± She shouted. I was shocked. ¡°Lia, what defense systems does this shuttle have?¡± I asked
Empty turret bay on the left side that Jessica used for sniping. Upper turret on top of the ship with Plasma cannon.
¡°Good, lead me to the cannon.¡± I tell her and she makes a hologram map of the ship and I follow the directions. When I get to the stairway there was a sign directing me to put on the helmet and air tank I look up and see an air lock door like those on naval ships. I put them on and climb up and unlock the door and climb in. It was already inside the turret pilot seat. It was a tight room with lots of controls. I sit down after closing the hatch tight and making sure my helmet and air tank was attached before turning on the turret.
Turret systems online. Deploying plasma cannon.
The system notified me and soon a round holoscreen appeared showing the hatch above opening and the vacuum of space around me. The screen went 360 around me and I could see all around me. ¡°Noah, can you use this?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Show me how to turn and fire.¡± I tell her. Some instructions appear and after a quick read I found that there were two petals that turned to the left and right and that the single handle like a helicopter control controlled up and down. Looking around I notice that we were being attacked by 5 small old looking fighter ships used in combat. They were faster than us which mean we couldn¡¯t outrun them. ¡°Plasma cannon charged and ready to fire.¡± Lia informed me. I began to turn the pedal making the turret turn with it. There was a box with a cross in it showing where the shot would go. I target one of the fighters and begin to aim. Since they were moving all over the place it was hard to catch them but there was one weakness to all fighters and that was the need to face your target and move in a straight line to fire at them. Alex was swerving all over the place while still trying to maintain the course towards the station since they were better equipped. I on the other hand was trying to maintain focus on one target and when I finally spotted one coming our way to shoot I aimed at it and let it rip. The massive cannon glowed for a moment and a massive shell of plasma flew out a frightening speed hitting dead center causing a large explosion that quickly did out as the escaping air was spread out in the vacuum of space leaving only dust. ¡°Time until recharged, 1 minute!¡± Lia informed me. A big gun with a big charge, seems fair. I turn the turret towards my next target and wait for the call. Before I could though a fighter shot something that hit just shot of the turret I was in but it didn¡¯t explode and was just stuck there. ¡°Guys, reinforcements will be arriving in a few minutes, they are sending fast ships to cover the distance!¡± Alex said. Feeling relieved I turn to the ship coming our way and fire the cannon but he barrel rolls when he sees the cannon charging so I miss. After that it was an exchange after another with neither side really advancing much but we were on the receiving end as we ran. Finally after a few minutes two really fast fighter jets appeared and shooting beams at the wings of the fighters. In moments they cleared the remaining pirates leaving me a bit shocked. I swallow hard seeing the effectiveness of the weapons on specialized fighter jets. ¡°Guys we will be escorted to the station so we can relax now.¡± Alex said and I nod. I press a few buttons and the plasma cannon began to descend and the hatch closed above storing the cannon. I get up and climb downstairs. From there we go without problems back to the station Only after the ship was in the hangar did we finally calm down. I enter my robot and with it held bring down the boxes of my parts for the robot which the dwarfs already there say will be stored in a storage area for me. As a dwarf fighter I get one to store parts when not in use. Opening the chest I look at the others. ¡°So what are we going to do now?¡± I asked. ¡°Well¡­ we don¡¯t know?¡± Hilda said. ¡°Then let¡¯s get individual missions and get more money for upgrading our gear. Hilda, Jessica how much for the next durability upgrade you both need?¡± I asked. ¡°3500 credits.¡± Jessica replies making me frown. I take out the sum and hand it to Hilda. ¡°I¡¯ll leave it to you two to decide the rest.¡± I said and took another 1000 credits and gave it to dad. ¡°Dad us that money to produce more alcohol to sell. Also go sell those you made and bring buy more ingredients but make sure to leave 3500 for the durability upgrade that is remaining.¡± I say. ¡°Sure thing.¡± Dad says taking the money. ¡°What do I do?¡± Alex asked. I think a bit wondering myself. ¡°Come with me. I¡¯ll be going to get contract for mining and you can get one for being the pilot. We can earn twice the money and with my robot I can dig much faster.¡± I tell him and he nods back. ¡°Now we just need to go report the mission and we are finally done but before that...¡± I said. I float up on to the Shuttle and move to the area where the missile hit. When I found the spot I found the thing. I was surprised to find that the outer shell was gone and only a block that was stuck to the ship¡¯s plate. With psi I pulled and found it was magnetic. Seeing this I go and grab a metal sheet and after forcing it under the thing I lift the sheet until the magnet thing came off finally. With psi I take it and walk down and land back near the Alex. ¡°What''s that?¡± He asked ¡°Don¡¯t know?¡± I said as I look on both side. ¡°That¡¯s a tracker!¡± Someone said. When I looked I saw Major Snocon looking with a serious look at the tracker. ¡°Where did it come from?!¡± He asked. I tell him the rundown of the incident. He sticks his hand out and I hand the tracker to him. ¡°We will investigate this. Trackers work by letting out a signal so we may be able to find the base of the pirates if we trace the signal of this tracker.¡± He replied. ¡°Alright.¡± Was all I said and he gives me a salute and leaves. I shrug and look at the others. ¡°Well, shall we go?¡± I said to Alex and he nods. The others split off with Lisa going with dad and Jessica and Hilda leaving together. I go with Alex to locate the place to get contract mining and a ship that can transport my robot which is more efficient than mining with the small tugs. Roktar PoV Me and Lisa enter the elevator and head up to the Guard quarters so I can check out how my drinks were. Lisa followed out of curiosity when she heard I made wine as well as beer. Inside, I open my closet and pull out the barrels and glass cylinders. ¡°Why do you keep it in the closet?¡± She asked. ¡°No other place to safely leave it, this room is bare of any other storage places.¡± I replied and looked at the room. Looking back at the glass cylinder I saw that the Sindew Grape juice had splendidly fermented and taking a cup from the cabinet in the small kitchen used for water I scoop up some of the wine and drink a bit.
You have gained a new skill
BrewingRarity3Level 5
An age old skill that is owned by those who take fruits, grains and any other vegetable and with practice, trial and error, they make alcoholic beverages of any intensity. The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Improves quality of drinks by 12% Improves control of drink textures and smoothness by 12%
A wide smile appears on my face. ¡°Something happen?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°Yah, I gained the brewing skill and it started at level 5 from the get go.¡± I replied. Her face was shocked when she heard that. ¡°How¡­¡± she started but I put the cup out for her to take. The quality of the drink was really good to say the least, as I had expected. From the next batch on it will get serious. ¡°How can it taste so good.¡± She said but very quickly her face began to blush. ¡°It seems you¡¯re a weak drinker so I will probably need to make a specific drink for you. This is a bit stronger than what anyone but dwarfs would take. Come on hold this.¡± I tell her as I hand her an empty bottle. She just holds it confused until I added a small funnel and began to slowly pour the wine inside until it reached the required height so I could put it to sell. From the two 1 liter casks I divided it into 4 500 milliliters glass bottles and put a cork on it. Then it was the beer¡¯s turn. I turn the small 1 liter barrel and turn the small faucet letting a small hit of beer drip out into the cup and close it. I take a sip to test it. The beer runs down my throat like a hot river and that satisfying feeling washes over me.
Brewing has leveled up 2x
¡°As expected, beer does take more experience.¡± I mutter. ¡°Something happen again?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°Just level up to my new skill, brewing beer is harder than wine by a long shot since beer passes through many processes that wine doesn¡¯t need.¡± I explained. ¡°So will you split this into bottles as well?¡± She asked. ¡°Nope, beer is sold in barrels. I made small barrels more as a sample to get people to test out my own market brand. After I have people interested is when I make it in large quantities. This room won¡¯t be even close to optimal to make it. We might need to gather a lot of money to buy a crappy generator to power the life support on the ship as well as my brewery so that I can work on it safely there and have a more appropriate cooling area.¡± I explained as I pick up both barrels. ¡°Now then, let¡¯s go see those drinkers at the dwarf fighters air field.¡± I said with a smile. She nods and picks up the bottles and follows me out as I close the door. We leave the guards quarters and pass through the guards airfield and enter the dwarf fighter airfield. A quick scan of the area and I find Colonel drilling some of the more experienced men. As I approach the men in front of him look my way and he looks. He sees the small barrels then at me. ¡°I brought my first batch to see if any of you want a sample.¡± I say. ¡°This the famous drink that will drop a dwarf?¡± Colonel asked. ¡°Nope, need to learn about the properties of the resources I can get my hands on. I¡¯ll get it eventually after some trial and error.¡± I say. ¡°Trial and error? Don¡¯t you already have the recipe?¡± Colonel asked. ¡°No recipe, I have the processing method but the recipe changes depending on the resources which is why I said I need trial and error. You will know when I am getting close when I tell you guys that you need to drink my beer in shots.¡± I replied. ¡°Shots! HA! A mug is a proper container for a beer.¡± Colonel replied. ¡°Aye, it is but the drink is too potent to let you do that. Also, it¡¯s the brewer that decides which cup to drink from. Well, anyways the barrels have beer and the bottles in Lisa¡¯s arm is wine for weaker drinkers. It¡¯s still slighter stronger stuff.¡± I told them. Colonel looks at the bottles. ¡°Lass, take that to any non dwarf. Boys go get the shots cup. This is a samples barrel so we can¡¯t get much to drink but let¡¯s at least humor the fool.¡± Colonel said. I roll my eyes and walk over to a table and put the barrels down. Lisa goes and calls the others and does the same. After a bit a dwarf brings a tray with small glass cups. Colonel takes one and fills it before downing it in one gulp. His eyes widen a bit then he starts to lick his lips. ¡°What the hell did you do to this drink! It¡¯s taste great and still has such a good kick to it?¡± Colonel asked. The other dwarves were surprised and one by one took a cup and began to drink. After the first cup they all began to murmur about it. Colonel went for a second cup and I could see this was a full hook, line and sinker. An idiot will go and make a large barrel of beer or wine without experiments. Then he will go and randomly selling it. A pro thinks, first make a sample, then take it to pro¡¯s who have years of experience with drinks. Once you trapped them with a good drink you will easily have a number of customers already waiting. I openly tell Colonel and the others what I did to make the beer and they are rather surprised but then I say something that makes them surprised. ¡°It¡¯s a shame that I don¡¯t have a storage place for the beer or it would have been higher quality.¡± ¡°Where did you store this?¡± Colonel asked. I got close and whispered, ¡°Stored in my closet.¡± His jaw dropped. ¡°You have that ship right?¡± He asked. ¡°No power in it.¡± I replied back and he nodded understanding the problem. ¡°Ah no wonder, fuck if you had at least a generator. Even a shitty one just to improvise.¡± He said rather sad. ¡°How much is a weak one used for basic Fighter ships?¡± I asked. ¡°Around 100,000.¡± Colonel said making me frown. ¡°What about those reserved generators used during blackouts planetside?¡± I asked. ¡°Those? About 4-5k credits.¡± He replied. ¡°Where can I get one.¡± I asked. ¡°Shouldn¡¯t be to hard, you can put an order for the station and in about 2 or 3 days it should be done. They can¡¯t even be compared to proper ship generators but if its life support, Lights and that brewery of yours it¡¯s more than enough. Anything more though you will have to buy a second one.¡± He replied. I scratch my chin and looked at the little barrel. ¡°How much would those barrels of beer cost in your opinion?¡± I asked. Colonel looked at the barrels and thought a bit. ¡°Between 300 to 500 credits for a barrel of this size.¡± ¡°So 1 liter is that much. That means if I sell by 20 liter barrels it will be 6000 to 10,000 credits each. Hmm, subtract 1000 like selling in bulk would still give lots.¡± I mutter. ¡°Don¡¯t bother removing that thousand. Buying in bulk means buying several hundred barrel so selling small number of barrels won¡¯t be needed.¡± Colonel says. I raise a brow and nod interested. ¡°Sir, did you make that fantastic wine?¡± A voice behind me suddenly asked. I looked back and saw a young elf man with a small smile on his face looking up at me. ¡°Yes, it was me, is there a problem?¡± I replied ¡°Absolutely! Where are all the other bottles! I am an avid drinker of fine wines and I can say that I absolutely loved that drink. The Sindew grape¡¯s lingering scent and the alcohol strength being mild but having just enough strength to feel the warm rising when it enters your mouth. Not to mention that bitter and sweet taste that came from some slightly indistinguishable fruit that was bathed in the wine! Tell me sir how many are you selling?!¡± He asked with sparkling eyes. ¡°Well those were samples bottles, I still haven¡¯t begun to produce in bulk.¡± I replied. The mans face turned into shock. ¡°The man is brewing in his room, he said the quality wasn¡¯t better because of the cooling wasn¡¯t sufficient.¡± Colonel said. The next moment the mans eyes burned with a passion that man me startled since elves until now were rather emotionless and had a refined noble feeling. ¡°Tell me sir, how much would it take for you to obtain a sufficient refrigeration system to store the drinks to obtain a better quality?!¡± He asked in a very serious manner. ¡°Eh?¡± I said confused and looked back to colonel. Suddenly got an idea. ¡°Colonel, to repair the lights on the shuttle cost how much?¡± I asked. ¡°Lights? I think it was around 1200 credits for the entire ship.¡± Colonel said. ¡°Then I will need 7200¡± I told the elf. ¡°What are lights needed for?¡± The elf asked. ¡°I own a derelict shuttle so the lights would be for the ship''s interior lights, 1200 credits, 5000 credits would be for a generator to power the life support, lights and my brewery. The cargo is sufficiently cold to house the alcohol. The remain 1000 credits would give me money to buy materials to work with.¡± I explained. The man nodded understanding and in a moment that sum was in his hand passing into mine. ¡°Oh before anything else, for a 1 liter bottle of wine of that quality you drank, how much would you put the price range.¡± I asked the elf. ¡°Price? Hmm, if I consider what I drank as low quality produces I would say between 800 to 1000 credits.¡± He replied. My eyes shined seeing the rather good income cost. I store the money in my inventory and already begin to start thinking but then quickly looked at Colonel. ¡°Do I talk with you or do I need to go to the hanger to get the ship down there for more repairs of the lights and leave the order for the generator?¡± I asked. ¡°I will pass it along. When the generator is complete we will call noah so he can help fix up and then we will turn the lights on.¡± Colonel said. ¡°Great, I¡¯ll leave that to you. I need to go buy the ingredients and get brewing.¡± I said excited and run off. Lisa spokes me running and floats up and flies after me after collecting the bottles and barrels. ¡°Wait up!¡± She shouts and follows me as I go to the market in the resident ring and buy a huge amount of material for building the 20 liter barrels and ingredients for the alcohols.¡± Jessica PoV After we left for the residents ring me and Hilda were discussing who would upgrade. ¡°Really! Noah just tossed us the responsibility to choose who would upgrade!¡± I said annoyed. ¡°Come on, don¡¯t blame him. Yeah it''s irresponsible but I guess he thought it would be favoritism if he had chosen for us.¡± Hilda replied. ¡°So how do we decide?¡± I asked. ¡°Well we should take our positioned and occupations into account.¡± She said. I quickly understood what she meant. She is in the frontlines and gets damaged more than I do. ¡°It¡¯s fine, you can get the durability upgrade first. I stay far out of reach compared to you. I have some schematics to finalize before I show it to Noah.¡± I told her. She makes a complicated smile but can¡¯t say anything else as he get into the elevator. We head to the upgrade specialist and while I wait she undergoes the upgrade. It takes a few hours until she is rebuilt and when I see her I was surprised. Most of her armor was replaced with the parts and looked much more durable. ¡°How much of improvement did you get?¡± I asked. ¡°Ricky, mail the upgrade results to Jessica.¡± Hilda said.
Physical Proficiency: 23 -> 29 Resilience: 24 -> 35 Dexterity: 21 -> 27 Agility: 19 -> 25 Overclock Potency: 10 -> 12 Processor cooling: 20 -> 25
It was a good upgrade and it gave her a lot more HP now. Not to mention the fast rise of Resilience will make her body last longer without repairs. ¡°Well, what should we do now?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Hmm¡­ I need to finish those plans and go scrapyard diving again to keep finding more parts.¡± I replied. ¡°Let¡¯s do a mission together.¡± She said. I thought a bit and shrug. ¡°Why not.¡± I reply and we both leave going to find a mission that we can do together. Chapter 19: Unveiled Trap Author''s Corner: As the title shows, the traps true gender has been revealed now the mental games begin, Guhuhuhuh! Besides that going to start time skipping a few days here and there since now it is mostly money hunting for gear and slowly repairing and equipping the shuttle with the technology it needs to properly function. It would be helpful if you guys can help me think of several technology that would go in a space ship, I already have the following planned: Shield gen Gravity gen Inertia Buffer Cock pit rebuilding Laser/Plasma weapons Energy Shield cargo door This is all i can think of at the moment for stuff needed in space, Life support is installed already so there is no need to suggest that.
Alex PoV I was sitting in a small fighter ship flying through that deserted asteroid field. My hands and feet were inside a control similar to Noah¡¯s robot. I could feel the ship as if it was my body but the power source was different. I was flying and in a crazy fashion in the asteroid field and as I come out over it the scene changes to a large stadiums with a circular track like those you see in race tracks but this one was massive. It was a space ship race but the ship was the same small one and there were several people just like me. It was the final stretch and suddenly the flames on everyone grew stronger. I felt an inexplainable rage seeing them open a gap between me and them. ME! LOSE! I focus a large amount of Psi into the thrusters and the fame triples in size and turns a bright blue. ¡°EAT MY SPACE DUST WEAKLINGS!¡± I shout. As soon as I cross the finish line my vision blurs and I find myself in my bed in real life. I blink a few times and notice that my position was sitting upright with my arms up. I drop my arms and look around. All I see is my bed and the shelves with glass covers protecting my precious collection of scaled model of every airplane since World war II. The ceiling and half the walls were painted light blue like the sky and the lower half was a light brown like the ground. Still blinking confused I get up and go to the bathroom and wash my face. Looking up I see that gender neutral face of mine. The shoulder length hair, thinner than male but thicker than female face, delicate features of a girl but with that sense of boy. My eyes were navy blue. I sigh as I stand upright and see my small frame and sulk. I have tried to train to see if my adult features would surface more but my body could be considered the epitome of petite. I gain little in terms of mass and it doesn¡¯t appear in the areas that would distinguish my proper sex. If anything it makes it harder to tell since the areas that gained mass was split between the two genders so I didn¡¯t get far with that. I feel like god was bored and simply made me at the very epicenter that borders the male and female body and it made it impossible to tell. If I put on girls cloths I was a girl, if I put boy clothes on I was a pretty boy. The only way to truly know what I am is looking in my pants and I wasn¡¯t about to show everyone¡­ though I did lose it once and showed. I really hate my life because of these looks. I can¡¯t even escape from this ingame. Sighing I go back to my room. Living in a two room apartment didn¡¯t help my social life since I¡¯m not so fond of leaving the house since I will have to face people looking. I drop into my bed and look at the time. 4:54 am ¡°Fuck! So early!¡± I mutter. It¡¯s only at 6 am that I meet up with Noah. We planned to take the night off and rest and then go mining. We already set up a contract for a small mining ship. I say small but it¡¯s large enough to hold Noah¡¯s robot and a box with parts to repair and has a cargo that can store around 20 tons of ore we mine. The ship also has a mining module so I drop Noah on the asteroid and then move to a different spot to mine myself. I¡¯m not really experienced but I could follow Xeno¡¯s instructions until I can do it myself. My vision fades as I quickly fall back into my dreams. *BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!* My eyes snap open as I launch out of bed and crawling over my bed I stop the alarm clocks noise at the side cabinet at the foot of my bed. I put the alarm there because it forces me to get out of bed so by the time I turn it off I''m at least 70% awake already. Looking at the alarm that read 5:30 am, I sigh at my crappy gamer lifestyle. Can''t do much about it since I''m not good with people. "Well let''s get to it." I said getting up and stretching making a few bones crack as they loosen up. Going to the kitchen I takes some bacon and begin frying then chop them as they fry so it will be small cuts. Then I add some cuts of pepperoni, though not the type used in pizza, this one is closer to Sausage but made for frying and pressure cooking like with beans for example, instead of grilling. Living in the USA, finding a good quality one is hard but not impossible if you know where. After cutting then I add them to the frying pan and let them mix with the bacon. After they become crimson I add three eggs and scramble them making sure to mix the everything well. I add just a pinch of salt since bacon and sausage are already salty and it''s mostly to give the eggs a bit more flavor. Done that I drop it in a plate and get a can of pepsi and go eat. I turn the TV on but there isn''t much one and MTV Doesn''t have many good singers playing for a while. Cartoons suck recently so all that''s left is tuning into the VR news. Like I expected, nothing new. Most things only focused on The Nebula but because the game is of high difficulty and high skill related even our crew which as two programmers are at best one step ahead. "Recent survey released by Virtual Works show that the number of official crews has been rising rapidly but even at this moment there is little in terms of players leaving the planet of origin. Other surveys say that several crews have begun to do terraforming missions in planets that require it and the result was successful in short term. I''m sure that it will take many months for any planet to even show a bit of signs of progress in that area. On another note, players that began in The Holy Federation and the Dominion have been joining the military forces so they can gain access to technology quickier. Its unknown how this will impact the war with both warring factions gaining millions of new men. On the Liberations side things are relatively calm but it seem several stations have shown promising crews..." At this point the news changes to another topic of no interest. I really wish that news on ships appear but because its so expensive it''s difficult to imagine that happening anytime soon. At least where I am. Downing the remaining pepsi after finishing my scrambled eggs I go and take a bath before heading to the room with a single piece of equipment that was my capsule. Stepping inside and sitting down, I activate the machine and feel my body fall. Next moment I feel the changes in my body and the distinct feeling my the new appendage that was my tail appear from behind. I look down and see I was wearing my normally baggy beginners suit and my hands had that thin scale covering. I looked up and see the 2.2 meter tall bug man that was my AI. If I was the kind to add insult to injury I would say that this hacker AI was a virus being a bug while loving his job. "Ready to go mine?" He asked. "Did you prepare a basic manual for me to understand?" I asked. "You shouldn''t have ignored the mining tutorial after the first time. I''ll just add the targets to the screen but I can''t guide your arm so you''re on your own." He and grouchy. "At least take control of the scoop arm. I''ll do mining will you keep ores from getting away." I asked. "No, it¡¯s your job!" He said reprimanding me. Though I''m not fond of doing this I don''t exactly have a choice. I look down and blink a bit as I start to fake tears. Finally I move a bit closer and look up him. "Please help..." I said doing the cheapest puppy dog eyes I could. I could see he was easily shaken by this. I takes some steps back before turning his back and crouching. I could hear him murmur. "He''s a boy, he''s a boy, he''s a boy, he''s a boy..." he kept saying but when he looked over I had already taken the chance to put on a girly pose and let tears gather. "Grr!! Damn it that girly face!!! Fine, I''ll do the damn scooping!" He shouted in rage and sat down fuming. "Yay!! Now let''s log in." I said with a grin. Even if you know a person is a boy, what your eyes see and what your brain tells you is always different. Thats way even if I show my dick to anyone it''s still hard to get used to me. My vision blurs as I press the login button and soon I find myself waking up in my room on the station. I get up and fix my hair and take a bath in game before heading to the hangars. I had to put on that shitty hazmat space suit to make sure my temperature didn''t drop. I open up a chat with Noah since I see he was already on.
Alex: Noah, where are you?
Noah: Just finished preparing the ship. Rather advances one I would say, after gathering method it identifies and then refines them once it has enough of one material.
Alex: Since that really advanced for newbie miners?
Noah: ... perk for dwarf fighters...
Alex: ... You''re such a cheat character at the moment.
Noah: Hey! I suffered too much pain to get this.
Alex: Did you get a class for it?
Noah: Yep, hold on, I''ll forward the class info.
I walk through the corridors on the way to the elevators.
It''s here.
Dwarf Fighter Class
A class of the Dwarf Fighters. Only those who have trained and possesses a Fighter robot can gain this class. Conditions to gaining class: Level 10, Complete basic Dwarf fighter training course, Possess Dwarf Fighter Robot, pos * Psionic reinforcement efficiency improves. * Piloting Robot becomes easier. * Robot pilot Skills gain skill growth boost. * Psi based skills gain Skill growth boost. * Psi Weapon Mastery Skill gain skill growth boost.
Looking at the class, I felt it was quite unbalanced.
Alex: Isn''t the class unbalanced?
Noah: Where?
Alex: Where?! The class only gives boosts and no restrictions.
Noah: Let me ask, if you got so many boosts, would you focus on taking advantage or will you try learning other skills as well?
Alex: Of course I would take advantage of them. If my skills grow faster in that area why would I focus elsewhere.
Noah: There is your restrictions. People who focus may be specialized but they will soon find their weaknesses are wide open. You closed your eyes to other things you could have learned so you created your own restriction.
¡­ I never thought of it that way. If someone doesn¡¯t notice this face where the class doesn¡¯t say ¡°You can¡¯t use XXX armor or weapon¡± then they will simply restrict themselves to what they gained boosts in. I was a bit weirded out as to why the class didn¡¯t improve mechanics skill since Noah trained in mechanics to be able to build his robot but considering the name it may be an actual ¡°Fighter¡± class instead of a mixed class between dwarf robot pilots and mechanics. The door of the elevator opens and I have Xeno activate my magnet boots before I walk out and towards the far end where the exit to the hanger was. Unlike the armed ships which were located on the military hangar, the miner ships were all here.
Alex: Xeno which ship is our designated mining ship?
A hologram appeared on my wrist that showed my current location as a blue dot and the ship as a red one. It was several piers up so I had to take the rotating elevator to that one. These elevators are simply like a slow moving platform that stops at each pier for 20 seconds before moving ¡°up¡± to the next. I get on one and after a while I get off on the one that Noah was on. It didn¡¯t take much to find the huge robot next to a small ship that looked more like a dump truck with a lot more plating and rocket boosters. The size was different though, I would compare it to one of those huge two or three story tall dump truck that holds around 80 tons but I know the cargo probably didn¡¯t pass 20 since all the other systems needed to fit inside.
Alex:It¡¯s such a cheat that we get to use something like this.
Noah: ¡­ Yeah
We both looked around and could clearly see that some other miners were coming in next to tugs. In short a tug is a square ship with two arm appendages which is for mining. It the lowest of all ships known throughout the galaxy and it''s probably the only ship that changes with age. Put simply it¡¯s the bottom feeder of everything with no exception, it''s the lowest class ship you will ever get inside. On the other hand, we are entering a true mining ship unlike a tug which is a Tiny ships or one man ships. Looking back to Noah, I notice that the left arm has the drill installed already and I also notice small pulsing lights from the shoulder blade, ankle and feet.
Alex: What are those glows coming from your robot''s back?
Noah: Basic Psionic pulse thrusters. This is to move in space even if a little. It¡¯s so that I won¡¯t be stranded in space without moving. This came as part of the robot by the way.
So it¡¯s like that huh. Such a cheat profession to get an over powered robot from the get go. This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. I jump off the pier and float into the air lock where I lock the door and enter the ship that was already pressurized. The cargo is separate from the interior and there seems to be a small extra room made specifically for the robot to do repairs and so on. I remove my helmet and feel the cool air making me shiver as I walk through the corridor. I found a simple small room at the end of the corridor that was like a kitchen living room and a small ladder at the back of the room that lead up to the pilot¡¯s seat. I go up and begin familiarizing myself with the controls. The seat faced a several screens that showed the outside as if there were windows. If I turn around I saw a separate set of controls that was the mining ships mining controls. Typing through the controls I found that the camera¡¯s view can change and so I opened one that showed the robot''s workshop and the rear view. In the workshop view I saw Noah pushing a box around, there was only one unlike before where there was 8.
Noah: I finished here! Mind closing the door to the workshop and pressurizing?
¡°On it, hold on.¡± I say though the mic on the control panel. Looking through the controls, with Xeno¡¯s help I found the commands to close the hatch on the side of the ship that was where the workshop was. Next was to seal it completely then pressurize. It didn¡¯t take much time and Noah jumped out of his robot and made his way inside. He enters through an airlock that existed between the workshop and the inner corridors and soon appeared in the little room below. "Hey, this place isn''t half bad." I hear him say down below. "Can we get moving?" I asked yelling into the room downstairs. "So that''s the pilot''s seat? Lia upload the area we were designed to mine." Noah says to his AI. At once the screens blinked and vanished and a new one turns on showing a beautiful woman dressed in a plugsuit like those sexy anime mecha pilots. Next to her a diagram of Kelha II appeared. "Good morning all, todays weather forecast is in sector A-3 of Kelha II''s asteroid ring. You can expect clear weather with a small chance encountering small space life and a 0.2% chance of finding a strong space life form." She says copying the weather lady. The planet zooms in and the station became visible and had a blue dot where we were and then an area of the asteroid ring turned red. "In other news, reporter Xeno Ai has reported that common metals such as Iron, copper, tin, magnesium and so forth can be found in concentration of around 20-40% with a rare possibility of finding asteroids with much higher purity and concentration. Chances of encountering uncommon metals are at 10% in this area. Rare material are non existent in this area." She said and I started giggling after seeing her make fun of Xeno. "So we have a chance to find Psidium?" I asked. "2% chance of finding it in large enough quantity of Psidium to sell in this region. Psidium in large quantity can be found in further more dangerous regions of the asteroid field but they follow dangers such as bandits and several space creatures.¡± Lia says. ¡°So we can expect at least normal metals. That good, we should get going or else we won¡¯t make the 200 ton quote that normal miners with this ship make.¡± Noah says from below. ¡°200 ton¡­ you''re joking right?¡± I asked. ¡°Dead serious, let¡¯s get moving already.¡± Noah replied. I just look down the stairs at his deadpan face and frown before going back to the controls and starting the ship up and piloting it while using the map to reach the mining area. Lisa PoV ¡°I¡¯m bored¡­¡± I mutter as I watch Roktar tirelessly work on that small brewery machine. Roktar has been working all day yesterday after he bought a lot of sindew grapes and prepared it all yesterday and today he was adding the yeast to ferment. It seems this part needed precise control of how much yeast went in depending how long it would age. I look to the corner of the room and see the several 20 liter wooden barrels made from a wood called ¡°Milow Oak¡±. It wasn¡¯t cheap or expensive and apparently it should give a distinct flavor to the wine as it ages. ¡°Sorry if I¡¯m boring you with my work. I didn¡¯t even give ask for help.¡± He said apologetically. ¡°It¡¯s fine. So when is the generator going to be done?¡± I asked. ¡°Should be today or tomorrow, Noah went mining with the trap but it shouldn¡¯t interfere as long as he gets the quote fast enough and returns.¡± Roktar says while working. As he finishes putting what he believes is good he starts stirring. After a bit of stirring he seems satisfied and takes a 20 liter barrel and fills it up before puts a temporary top to cover it and leaves it in the corner. ¡°How many are you going to make?¡± I asked. ¡°Fill 3 barrels of wine then I need to clean the brewery and start preparing it for the beer process. I think by tomorrow I should have all the barrels filled but the wine needs several days of care.¡± He replies making me frown. I sigh as I get up. ¡°I¡¯ll be going for a walk and to look for something to do, if you need something or something happens just call.¡± I tell him as I exit. He smiles wryly and waves me goodbye as I leave. I head to the nearest elevator and head to the residential ring. I needed to meditate a bit since I was a bit irritated at the moment for some reason. Jeez, that big oaf ignoring such a dashing woman for some barrels of alcohol! Tch, maybe I¡¯m not as beautiful as I thought, I did leave my looks at default but I did change my hair to light pink and my eyes violet since it felt like it fit my looks that were greatly enhanced by my race¡¯s looks. Still how could a man ignore a woman even an average looker when they are alone. Hmph, men. I reach the park and sit down before closing my eyes and try to meditate but the ¡°clear your mind and pull psi inside¡± doesn¡¯t exactly work since I can¡¯t even get to the ¡°clear your mind¡± part. I had thought that him being a pro gamer and a real life martial artist he would be more serious but the way he acts is rather childish. It¡¯s charming but it seems it made him a bit dense as well. I let myself lay back on the ground as I let out a deep sigh of exhaustion. ¡°Lisa?¡± I hear a familiar voice and open my eyes to find Sir Alphenor looking down at me. I sit up quickly and look at his majestic figure in his typical robe like armor made from some strange monster material that made it harder then reinforced steel while underneath he had a space suit to protect himself in space. ¡°Did something happen for you to be so depressed?¡± He asked. I really didn¡¯t expect for him to ask since he is such an important man. ¡°Its nothing important.¡± I reply reluctantly. ¡°Doesn¡¯t seem that way, to you it seems a bit more important.¡± He replied. Before I can say more and sits down and puts down a small glass case that had some floating ¡°balls¡± or ¡°eggs¡± in them. ¡°Come on let me hear what has you worried.¡± He said with a rare smile he makes. And so I tell him about Roktar¡¯s deal with the dwarf fighters and that elf that invested in the ship and then how he spent so much time with me in a room but I was ignored. When I said that I saw slight twitch on Sir Alphenor¡¯s mouth. Yeah I would laugh too if I was in his place. ¡°Well I can¡¯t really blame him for ignoring you. Winemaking is hard since you need precision and extensive knowledge and trial and error experiments to get what you want. If him to get something done while getting distracted would cause the quality to drop by a lot.¡± He explained. I nod after hearing him since I already knew about it since I had Redo search up the process of wine and beer making so I can get a bit of understanding. Oh right Redo is my AI and he is a young butler like AI but acts like the new butler instead of the experienced one. Since I had said my piece and I felt better I looked down at the case finally not containing my curiosity. ¡°What are those things?¡± I finally asked. Seeing what I was looking at Sir Alphenor picked up the case and looked inside. ¡°These are some space creatures of the weakest kind.¡± He says as he looks at them. ¡°But it''s just balls of rock, right?¡± I asked. ¡°Of course not, the rock acts as a shell, if you think of a crustacean you should understand, the real body is inside.¡± He explained. ¡°So why do you have these?¡± I asked. ¡°I have a hobby to see the what the effects of forcibly unlocking the psi gates on animal and monsters would have. Also after that I also like to see what happens when I forcibly fill them with more Psi than their body normally carries.¡± He said. ¡°Isn¡¯t that animal cruelty?¡± I asked. ¡°Possibly, but I never get animals or monsters with intelligence. The only reason I don¡¯t experiment my hobby on the native monsters on the planet is because it would probably cause them to evolve a bit and until the terraforming reaches the forestation and animal integration stage it would only cause trouble so I content myself with space animals. Different planets with rings and asteroid fields normally have their own unique ecosystem and that doesn¡¯t even count when you change region since areas near the station are regularly cleared and kept clean and safe, so I can easily find new specimens to occupy my time.¡± he said. ¡°For these what kind of change is expected?¡± I asked. ¡°I already did some experiments with these, after I unlocked the 3 psi gates it slowly starts growing by absorbing more psi. It has 4 gates total and the first one is naturally open and through it by instant it ¡°swims¡± through the psi in space. When I open the other 3 it grows until its shell is broken and it goes to make a new one but that is where these guys show some usefulness. They look for stronger materials like copper or iron. If you lack a scanner you can use these to find asteroids with larger mineral content.¡± he said ¡°So it simply gets bigger, won¡¯t that be dangerous if you leave it since it can eventually grow to the size of an asteroid?¡± I asked. ¡°Yes, it can but it won¡¯t since it has a lifespan of 2 years. The more dangerous one is if these things undergo a mutation. They become a kind of Psi leech that will feed off anything with psi inside.¡± He said surprising by that statement. "So monsters mutate huh..." I mutter. "Don''t think of trying this without proper security measures. Once you release them for your use or lack there off it can eventually cause its own mutations because later generations would slowly form more psi gates." He told me. I looked at him surprised but even more interested now. I look at the little rock ball before shrugging. Can''t do this anytime soon anyway since our crew is dirty poor at the moment. Need to get money first and get that shuttle into working order, to that point let''s get busy then. "Sir, do you know of any missions requesting for my specialization?" I asked. "I have not checked the mission board recently but I have heard a number of strange rumors about most foreigners containing some kind of virus that brings them back from death. Maybe you can look into these rumors for me?" He asked.
Mission: Rebirth VirusDifficulty:1
Sir Alphenor has heard rumors that originated from the hospital on Kelha station. The rumors state that most dead Foreigners, killed by their many stupid and suicidal acts, have come back to life with only some slight consequences. He wishes to know the validity of these rumors. Reward: 200 credits Objective: Go to the hospital and speak with the doctors who examined this virus. Failure: Unable to obtain information from doctor.
I was rather surprised to see such a mission. I doubt even he knows it''s a mission and thinks more of a request. "Is it possible for you to check this for me? I can put in a small reward for this errand?" He asked. "I''ll look into it. Hearing such a thing already has me curious as well so you can count on me. Where should I look for you after I find out?" I asked. "Lilian." He said and a full sized hologram of a beautiful woman with strange hair that looked like leaves and clothing made of vines and leaves. Her hologram was also colored so I saw her skin was also a light green with a hue of pink around her cheeks. "Please send Lisa the location of my study." He said and the dryad bowed. "Of course." She said in a soft charming voice and looked my way and with a small wave she looked back. "It is done." He says and bows before leaving. Over my left wrist a hologram of the station appeared and on the military ring a blinking red light appears in the high ranked soldier/personal sector of the quarters. "You may find me in this location after 16:00." He said and I nodded but before he could get up I asked. "Sir... you AI is a dryad right?" I asked. "If magic existed you would be correct but that is not so, he race is known as Alraune. They are a real race found in about 46 planets within the Liberation and within all three factions there is 378 planets they consider a home planet. They are the terraformers for the stage of introducing vegetation to the planet. They have affinity to nature and when they manipulate psi it allows them to control the psi in the vegetation around them." He said. "Control the psi in vegetation!" I said surprised. "Yes, it is an innate ability for them to easily control vegetation because they are born from vegetation that has absorbed a large amount of psi over a number of years. Normally they are born from several specific plants that Alraune plant which we believe is their own seeds. Other than that you may get lucky by mutating plants into humanoids but it can always backfire and make a monster." He said instantly making sure that I won''t go out of my way to do this. "I won''t do that... trust me." I said a bit pale hearing it. I get up with him and I bow to him "Thank you for the time you spent on someone like me. I shall be going to see to that request." "I wish you well and good luck." He says and walks off as I look for the hospital and look into that rumor. Chapter 20: Money Makers rokatNoah PoV I was currently walking through our shuttle. Unlike before, the lights on the ship were all on and lighting up the ship. It was at this point that we could finally take in the true level of damage the interior had. There were lots of holes on the walls, the doors were removed, the walls within the ship had holes and large dents from a fight. I walk down the stairs that were intact and enter the lowest floor which was the cargo. The large bulkhead opening was tightly sealed, guarantee from Gunner since he helped close that when the outer shell plating was being replaced. It was air tight so the air inside never leaked out and there was no damage to it thankfully so we simply closed it up and sealed it. Inside the cargo that was 35 meters long and 13 wide were many wooden barrels. On the left were around 42 beer barrels each with a date burned onto its side showing when it was brewed and on the left was wine barrels with the same indication. I saw dad on one of the barrels near the back as he stirred the wine. It was 6 days of stirring and testing as well a using a Hydrometer to see if it''s at the correct levels before he finally seals them and leaves them to age. Though I hate my dads strong drinks I have already grown fond of the smell of fermenting alcohol and when we start a new game and his drinks are still ¡°weak¡± I don¡¯t mind taking a sip. Just so you know the average human lifespan greatly increased since VR games appeared, as you probably already know. Playing from a young age you will naturally live 4 times longer depending the game you play because. No game actually made the time dilation different from 4 times since it would throw off the schedule of most players. That said our ID¡¯s became rather invalid since matching our life span in real life to what we play or do through VR makes it hard to have a proper ¡°Adult age¡± so the Government made a new ID that is always installed into the capsules and with a small computer chip registering how long you play you can figure out how many extra years you have. When I was 9 I was already at adult age but to keep brats from doing many things laws were made that all kids under 12 would still be considered under age no matter how long they played. Still by 12 I had already formed my trauma of my dad¡¯s killer beer. Truly the name Dwarf smasher isn¡¯t for show, if any race other besides dwarves or someone with equally strong alcohol tolerance drinks it you would definitely die. The first time I drank that in a VR game I was playing as a barbarian which is a type of human and after drink my vision turned black and I was kicked out of the game. My dad even got PK status since he served me the drink. After that he made sure to test it for poison but it was 100% a alcohol beverage. I would say that I did drink a full mug so after that day I took a tiny shots cup and had my HP reduced to 1 life. When he tested with dwarfs is showed they had tolerance to handle the drink but even then the strongest drinkers can only handle 3 shots before they fall and I don¡¯t mean they fall on the fourth cup. We always bet on 3 cups and when they try getting up they simply faint since they lack the willpower to do much. I walked up to dad as he was finishing the current barrel¡¯s stirring and putting the top back on. ¡°So how is the new brewery?¡± I asked. ¡°Great, it will take another 2 weeks before either Beer or wine is ready to sell at its lowest price.¡± He said. ¡°You make how many barrels per batch?¡± I asked. ¡°Three, why?¡± He asked. ¡°The elf invested 7 thousand for a wine that cost 800-1200 credits so even 10 liter barrel will be more than enough to pay him back especially since this one aged in a properly cooled place. The price should even double or triple.¡± I said. ¡°Nah, at best only double. Still I will give him a full 20 liter as a form of buying the ¡°partnership¡± of my drinks.¡± He said. I understood, he invested so he had some rights but buying that off a high grade beverage could work. Considering how much this stuff will go for after being greatly approved by two good drinkers it will rack in a nice sum. Shame we don¡¯t have the money to keep making more. Dad was able to make 14 batches of three barrels per batch. It¡¯s not a bad number for an upstart and I doubt he will be able to make more until the end of the month. Still a batch of beer and wine per day sure is something to be impressed about. In total 7 batches each drink and the final batch only has a few more days before it can go into the resting period while the beer already went through the primary fermentation and has begun the secondary which it will stay for another few weeks before it is done and needs to age. ¡°If you''re wondering, it will take another month or two for the beer to be ready to sell while the wine I will be able to change the container tomorrow to a container with less dead yeast. Will need to watch them for some days to since I¡¯m still not sure how long this yeast I¡¯m using will last. First batch is still experimenting with a bit large quantity and the second batch is with less. The rest all have variating recipes each following the same principle.¡± Dad said. ¡°How long until you don¡¯t need to watch the wine and can go fight?¡± I asked. ¡°When I can get all the barrels into the aging phase where I don¡¯t need 24/7 monitoring.¡± He replied. I already knew he would say that but it¡¯s a bit annoying since brewing needed most of the focus of the brewer. Especially in these realistic games. In fantasy games the brewing went quickly because even during manual brewing the system had its finger in it and aided in speeding up the process and all that. ¡°So what are you doing at the moment?¡± He asked me. ¡°I came to see how the ship looked with the lights on. I also wanted to get the layout drawn out in my head so that I can more or less plan for later.¡± I said. ¡°Plan for what?¡± He asked. ¡°The second floor cargo, I will convert it into a workshop as well as a docking bay for my robot. I need a location to repair and work on it and it¡¯s the most convenient location because it''s wide and open as well as having its own opening to the outside so I can use that as an entrance when we can finally purchase a new energy shield generator for when we open the bulk doors without letting the air leak.¡± I said. ¡°Ah I see. Do you already know what we will be repairing next?¡± He asked. ¡°Let¡¯s see.¡± I say and have Lia pull up a list of required systems by order of priority.
List of Required Systems Pilots seat - 4600 Communication Device - 4,000 Better Power Generator - 15,000 for next model when compared to the one you have. Male Bedroom - 300 Female Bedroom - 500 Male/Female/Trap Bathroom (shower and toilet) - 1,000 Plumbing - 2,000 Kitchen - 3,000 Water Storage Tank - 7,000 Oxygen Storage Tank - 12,000 Shield Generator - 90,000 Medical Room - 22,000 Sensor/Scanner - 17,000 Core Ship Computer system - 30,000 Inertia Buffer - 20,000 Gravity Generator - 500,000
I showed dad the list and he skimmed over it but when he stopped I knew he was looking at the last entry. ¡°Why is there a ¡°trap¡± Bedroom.¡± He suddenly said making me facepalm myself. ¡°Hehehe just joking, anyway what the hell is up with the Gravity Generator¡¯s price?¡± He asked. ¡°I asked Gunner that question and the response is that they are complex tech since you literally create a gravity field. We are in a shuttle class ship which is used to enter planets. Small ships are still used to enter the planets but medium sized ships aren¡¯t and are made with shapes that aren¡¯t fit to fly through air. That is because the ships are made to use Centrifugal force like the stations. Only if the design is like a flat and there is no rotation will it be used.¡± I explain. ¡°I see, even now it¡¯s a complex tech huh. Then why is the Inertia Buffer also down at less important.¡± He asked. ¡°Well I am still making the list, also inertia only affects us during acceleration and if we are moving around a lot so during space travel where its linear we won¡¯t need it. Well unless we need to fight.¡± I said. ¡°Well I guess it will have to do. We will need to make proper shelves for my drinks though but since the ship isn¡¯t gonna move anytime soon it¡¯s alright. So what are you currently doing?¡± He asked. ¡°Well after I mined a bit with Alex and got some money to pay the docking tax and get Jessica her durability upgrade I started physical trying. It took me some days but I finally got the skills and stats I wanted.¡± I said. I open it up and show him.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Race:DwarfClass:Dwarf Fighter
Bounty:0Fame:0
Health:1,740HP Regeneration:0.72
Psi:697Psi Regeneration0.95
Level:8Extra Stat Points:25
Physical Proficiency:84Resilience:72
Dexterity:94Agility:69
Mentality:112Willpower:95
Charisma:15Leadership:15
Skills
Sword Mastery Level 10 Shotgun Mastery Level 7 Weapon Maintenance Level 5 Robot/Android Maintenance Level 7 Ship Repair Level 2 Weapon Repair Level 4 Parts Repair Level 7 Ship building Level 2 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Parts Construction Level 4 Dismantling Level 5 Mechanic Level 7 Psionic Equipment Building Level 2 Psionic Robot Building Level 3 Basic Machine Building Level 5 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Psi Reinforcement Level 8 Meditation Level 5 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 8 Exterior Psi Manipulation Level 1 Reinforced Fist Level 2 Reinforced Skin Level 2 Reinforced Muscles Level 2 Robot Pilot Skill Level 3 Mining Skill Level 4
Oh so you finally go some exercise huh, how much does that help in the robot?¡± He asked. ¡°There is no comparing I still need to train my agility better but at the moment I have gotten better at moving since there isn¡¯t much obstruction. To bad we don¡¯t have much money since the Psionic Nerves are expensive. I need some to build weapons for the robot.¡± I said. ¡°When I start selling we will have more than enough, with 40%% going to get more materials, 40% will probably go into the ship''s repairs and 20% will be for crew investment.¡± He said. ¡°I guess I should head back, I still want to get some more training before I go mine again with Alex. She has gotten really good with the ships mining tools.¡± I tell him. ¡°So he has been a good companion huh, just don¡¯t go forgetting about the other crewmates.¡± He says. ¡°Aren¡¯t you the one forgetting about someone since you''re sticking your nose in your barrels.¡± I tell him but he seems a bit confused making me roll my eyes. ¡°I¡¯ll be going.¡± I tell him and he waves goodbye. I climb upstairs and reaching the second floor air lock and putting on my helmet before pressing a small red button on the inside of the air lock that electronically sealed the door of the air lock. It caused a small fluctuation in the lights before sealing and the life support system began to drain the air from the airlock until there wasn¡¯t a bit left. Finally a green light lit up saying I can open the outer door and pressing a similar button on the outer door it opened up slowly. I grab the corner of the door on the inside and let by body float around the door after the magnet boots were off. I then activated them again and attached them to the exterior plate and looked down next to the door where another button on the outside was placed. I press it and the door seals. I watch the door close completely before jumping over to the piers and going inside before heading to the training rooms to train my stats more. 1 month later The last month has been more or less eventful. First off, after dad didn''t need to constantly take care of the alcohol he and I took some missions to bandit killing planetside. When that happened I stopped mining with Alex to go grind with my dad. At the moment I am level 16 and dad is 19. The bandits aren''t that hard since we use strategy like throwing bombs. Not to mention I also got a weapon for my robot. It took a long while of mining but after the crew had gathered enough to upgrade the two androids with the basic foundation upgrades I went and purchased some psionic tech nerve and psidium embedded steel. I then built a psi tech hilt and had the steel shaped into a sword shape before attaching the two. The reason I did this is because of a reasoning me and dad argued about. I had wanted to become a close range fighter but dad said for me to think of the future. As a Dwarf fighter I am a target for enemy who know the danger. Being just a close range fighter isn''t ideal. He suggested for me to make at least mid ranged weapons to support me or try for explosives. This would help with crowd control and the explosives can be used to at least stun if not destroy heavier units. Because of this I went and learned from colonel how to make my shotguns into Psionic weapons. Converting a gun since hard. Both shotgun and sword I have would be considered a kinetic-psi weapon. Both needed to be embedded with psi to attack. The shotgun goes a bit beyond and can activate a spell like elves do but it is fixed. The psi pushed into the bullets are set to detonate on impact after it leaves the barrel. Shotguns being a spread shot made it end up causing heavy damage but the blast radius isn''t exactly large. For dad he upgraded his gear with money we got and now has better armor that possesses a weak energy shield that can block laser shots. His laser axe has also been upgraded to plasma but it comes with more expense to charge but since our missions aren''t hard we tend to have enough. Besides us, alex grouped up with Jessica for space hunting. They take missions to patrol the area and kill bandit. Alex finally reached level ten a few weeks back from using the station ships front laser he got the class Combat Pilot which improves his flight control and aim as well as boosts skill growth for piloting skills and ship gun shooting. Hilda and Lisa were together most of the time. Lisa went on to do a large number of nurse missions and Hilda was her guard as well as doing a mission as part of the fighters. It was mainly similar missions that me and dad did but we decided to split up into three groups of two since we can earn more that way. The crew''s current stats after all the training we did together and upgrades done to the androids look like this.
Status
Name:NoahFaction:Liberation
Race:DwarfClass:Dwarf Fighter
Bounty:0Fame:1200
Health:2880HP Regeneration:1.21
Psi:777Psi Regeneration0.95
Level:16Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:115 (+26)Resilience:108 (+13)
Dexterity:89 (+12)Agility:77(+24)
Mentality:112Willpower:95
Charisma:15Leadership:15
Skills
Sword Mastery Level 14 Shotgun Mastery Level 9 Weapon Maintenance Level 7 Robot/Android Maintenance Level 10 Ship Repair Level 12 Weapon Repair Level 7 Parts Repair Level 9 Ship building Level 7 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 5 Parts Construction Level 6 Dismantling Level 8 Mechanic Level 10 Psionic Equipment Building Level 4 Psionic Robot Building Level 4 Basic Machine Building Level 7 Laser Weapon programming Level 4 Psi Reinforcement Level 10 Meditation Level 7 Inner Psi Manipulation Level 11 Exterior Psi Manipulation Level 2 Reinforced Fist Level 4 Reinforced Skin Level 3 Reinforced Muscles Level 3 Weapon Reinforcement Level 2 Robot Pilot Skill Level 5 Mining Skill Level 9
Status
Name:RoktarFaction:Liberation
Race:Dwarf/OgreClass:Berserker
Bounty:0Fame:900
Health:2,900HP Regeneration:0.49
Psi:495Psi Regeneration0.29
Level:19Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:120 (+20)Resilience:103 (+20)
Dexterity:75 (+25)Agility:87 (+25)
Mentality:45Willpower:45
Charisma:35Leadership:20
Skills
Laser Weapon Mastery Level 12 Plasma Weapon Mastery Level 7 Missile Weapon Mastery Level 5 Axe Mastery Level 15 Martial Arts Level 17 Pistol arms mastery Level 8 Rifle mastery Level 10 Dismantling Level 3 Scavenging Level 4 Brewing Level 12 Carpenter Level 5
Status
Name:JessicaFaction:Liberation
Race:AndroidClass:Scout
Bounty:0Fame:500
Health:655HP Regeneration:0
Psi:0Psi Regeneration0
Level:14Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:32 (+10)Resilience:31 (+10)
Dexterity:30 (+30)Agility:28 (+15)
Overclock Potency:50Processor cooling:60
Charisma:10Leadership:10
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Skills
Programmer Level 12 Laser Weapon Programming Level 5 Parts Planning Level 9 Weapon Planning level 5 Tool Planning Level 6 Tool Programming Level 9 Dismantling Level 10 Scavenging level 12 Sniper Mastery Level 8 Trap Detect Level 1 Enemy Detect Level 5 Enemy Analysis Level 8
Status
Name:HildaFaction:Liberation
Race:AndroidClass:Swordsman
Bounty:0Fame:450
Health:860HP Regeneration:0
Psi:0Psi Regeneration0
Level:16Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:35 (+25)Resilience:35 (+15)
Dexterity:33 (+15)Agility:32 (+20)
Overclock Potency:50Processor cooling:65
Charisma:30Leadership:25
Skills
Laser Weapon Mastery Level 10 Missile Weapon Mastery Level 1 Sword Mastery Level 15 Martial Arts Level 13 Pistol arms mastery Level 9 Parry Level 7 Counter Level 5
Status
Name:LisaFaction:Liberation
Race:ElfClass:Combat Healer
Bounty:0Fame:1650
Health:435HP Regeneration:0.42
Psi:3,520Psi Regeneration1.45
Level:15Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:32Resilience:42
Dexterity:63 (+7)Agility:57 (+3)
Mentality:152 (+30)Willpower:145 (+30)
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Skills
Weapon Maintenance Level 1 Weapon Repair Level 1 Scrap Weapon Creation Level 1 Dismantling Level 5 Parts Repair Level 6 Exterior Psi Manipulation Level 12 Barrier Psionic Technique Level 5 Support Psi Technique Level 8 Healing Psi Techniques Level 14 Telekinesis Level 8
Status
Name:AlexFaction:Liberation
Race:ToskClass:Combat Pilot
Bounty:0Fame:780
Health:500HP Regeneration:0.30
Psi:310Psi Regeneration0.10
Level:11Extra Stat Points:0
Physical Proficiency:23 (+5)Resilience:25 (+5)
Dexterity:99 (+30)Agility:19 (+10)
Mentality:10Willpower:10
Charisma:10Leadership:10
Skills
Small Craft Pilot Level 16 Evasive Maneuver Level 3 G-force resistance Level 8 Lead-Targeting Skill Level 6 Energy Management Level 5 Ship Weapon mastery Level 9 Hacking Skill Level 13 Mining Level 7
First off, the numbers in parentheses are actually the allotted stat points that we gained from leveling. With that out of the way I will go to the ¡°weakest¡± of the crew first which is our resident trap whose gender remains a mystery. I really have no idea how I should feel about the hacking skill but I guess it can be handy someday. Anyway her stats are¡­ okay they are rather pathetic except for dexterity. The speed that she moves her hands on the keyboard and when she flies a space craft is rather frightening. I think if she trained crafting skills she would out do even me but I guess quality will still be better for me because of the dwarves natural ability. The android duo have both gotten upgrades for the hardware in their head and the second durability upgrade. They have to now upgrade into specialized classes but as you can tell by their lack of upgrades and stats to show for it that the specialized upgrades are expensive. To tell the truth it''s just as expensive as several repairs we need for the ship. For Lisa¡¯s stats, I can only wonder why I don¡¯t have Telekinesis but I think she mentioned something about it having attack potential. It would translate to star wars stunts. Just so you know, we filmed and posted her choking the native monsters when we were fighting at the volcano a month ago and it went viral. We had her test a few things that worked with it and it all centered around telekinesis skill. Since it was a basic skill it was easy for her to obtain and train it. None of the classes came as a surprise really. They all have similar effects of giving a boost to skill growth of a specific type. What else¡­ right ship repairs. The list below is all the things we repaired and upgraded until now and below that is stuff we still need.
Repaired Hull - 5000 Ship Interior - 12,000 Airlock - 700 Window - 300 Life support - 0 Lights - 1200 Impromptu generator - 5000 Pilots seat - 4600 Communication Device - 4,000 Male Bedroom - 300 Female Bedroom - 500 Male/Female Bathroom (shower and toilet) - 1,000 Plumbing - 2,000 Kitchen - 3,000 Ship Core Computer system - 30,000 Upgraded Better Power Generator - 15,000 Current total = 84,000 List of Required Systems (by necessity) Standard Shuttle Power Generator 150,000 Standard Shuttle Engine 150,000 Shuttle Thrusters ¡°Omnidirectional¡± 60,000 Water Storage Tank - 7,000 Oxygen Storage Tank - 12,000 Shield Generator - 90,000 Medical Room - 22,000 Sensor/Scanner - 17,000 Ship Laser Weapons - 35,000 Inertia Buffer - 20,000 Gravity Generator - 500,000
I will go off and say that the Ship¡¯s Core Computer system made us sweat blood and tears to reach that sum when we decided to get it after the interior and pilots cockpit was repaired. It was at that moment we had taken up the two person party system to do missions and gain money at a more rapid pace. This resulted in us also gaining fame for the number of missions we succeed in. Lisa was first place because she is a healer and missions she did specializes in that field and in turn made her gain fame for her healing skill. Me being #2 is 100% because me and dad did only dwarf fighter missions I could access and do with a team. The others had other range of success depending on each of their jobs but for the most part it didn¡¯t go up as much. I guess that covers the month and changes to our little crew. Like I said it¡¯s been a month and at this time our crew is completely united at the dwarf airfield and around us are 6 barrels, three with win and 3 with beer. ¡°So boy¡¯s these six barrels are the first batch of finished drinks from the small barrels I brought the first time last month. Since I don¡¯t really know exactly where to sell these we came to see if you men were willing to take it off our hands.¡± Dad said like a humble seller. The dwarves were eyeing the beer barrels while the elf that invested in our ship at the start was eyeing the barrels of wine and gulping but keeping a poker face. ¡°What is your price?¡± Colonel asked. ¡°Well going by the price you gentlemen said, you two graded that sample beer at 300-500 credits and the wine at 800-1000 credits per liter. We didn¡¯t have bottles so we just came with the full barrel.¡± Dad replied. ¡°So the entire barrel of beer going between 6000 and 10,000 credit while the wine goes 16,000-20,000 each barrel.¡± The elf commented. ¡°Exactly, but we will do a discount of 30% since I still don¡¯t feel confident in my alcohol. So with a cup for you two men to appraise my drinks we can let you men gauge 1 month aged wine and beer.¡± Dad said pointing at the elf and Colonel. ¡°30% off wine makes the price 11,200 to 14,000. That is a drastic drop.¡± The elf said. ¡°And the beer would go for 4200- 7000 credits!¡± Colone said. ¡°I will say this, since you invested in our repairs for the ship one of these barrels will automatically go to you sir as a thank you.¡± Dad said with a smile making the elves eyes widen and a wide smile spread on his face. I could only sigh to myself, when it came to selling items and produce my dad was top class. His fake smile felt to real and it¡¯s impossible to know what he is thinking while selling things though I know since I personally heard him on many occasions after we were away from a crowd as he planned things out. His plan was to sell the first and weakest batch at a lower price so that the future barrels would gain fame among the dwarves and elves so that he won¡¯t need to do the discount and may even make an auction to sell this alcohol. My dad is a good man but when it comes to selling his alcohol, he can be as shrewd, if not more than, the MC of Light novel with the sculptor. Dad picks up one barrel of wine and Beer and puts it on the table with the faucet facing us and the shots cups were already waiting so he poured a cup of each drink for both men and presented it to them. They each took the cups. The elf took it and took a wiff of the wine, a real specialist can tell the quality by smell and taste easily. Colonel on the other hand, like you would expect a dwarf, just chugged the drink. As they both finish their drinks they were tasting the after taste and colonel had a rather satisfied expression. ¡°Damn, smooth with such a strong kick. It¡¯s even higher quality than the first small barrel.¡± Colonel said making all the dwarves wide eyed and then eye the barrels. ¡°This is quite impressive. The smell isn¡¯t strong but the flavor is quite present and it heats up the inside yet it¡¯s not rough like a hard drink such as a beer. I have a hard time believing you can actually be a novice.¡± The elf said. ¡°Actually¡­¡± I said interjecting. ¡°Some weeks ago there was a discovery of a virus in the body of all foreigners and it is said that this virus is what whipped our skills we possessed from the system that registered them. When we perform the skill we retrieve it at a rapid leveling pace.¡± I explained. ¡°Aye, I heard of that, also seems to bring the dead back to life.¡± Someone said. There began a large conversation about the effects that were discovered. Yeah the death penalty has been a large discussion all over the galaxy as because no one knows where it came from and why it hit every ship the players come from. ¡°So that was it, well too damn complicated to care, anyway I¡¯ll buy the three barrels for 7 thousand each.¡± Colonel said outright without mincing words. I forced a smile down as dad¡¯s plan goes just as planned. Why¡­ ¡°Oi Colonel, don¡¯t try and jump the gun! We want some to!¡± One of the dwarves shouted. ¡°Huh! You think I care! This stuff is for the best! I¡¯m keeping it stored!¡± He said. Wow, never thought the brotherhood of dwarves would break because of good beer. ¡°Wait wait! No fighting, I can only sell 1 barrel per person since I can¡¯t make many at the moment.¡± Dad said towards Colonel but the dwarf sulks but nods since it seemed rather fair. ¡°As for the other two...well you can all pay a part each and drink together.¡± Dad suggested. He really is a smooth talker, by suggesting this he doesn¡¯t take sides to anyone and keeps the unity of the men. They all look at each other and nod. ¡°As for me, I shall simply take the barrel that was promised. I am a collector of fine wines and if I let this age for decades it will surely be beyond words by then.¡± He said. ¡°I wish you luck, as for those interested in the wine, I will put the same offer on the remaining two barrels.¡± Dad said towards all the others interested. As such getting max price at a 30% discount for three barrels of beer and wine we gained a sum of 21k credits from the beer and 28k credits from the wine summing up to a grand total of 49k credits. With this we can add both oxygen and water tanks as well as the sensor/scanner to the ship. This sums up to 39k credits leaving 10k for dad to buy materials for more alcohol and since we will be selling alcohol for the next 6 days, counting today, we will get as a total for selling wine at 14k counting today''s profit, wine will catch us 388k minimum, while beer will get us 201k minimum. Considering dad has a habit of auctioning his alcohol after he hooks in some suckers I think this is the minimal profit dad¡¯s alcohol will fetch. Still I wonder why these guys went for a high price, don¡¯t they make good beer. I was curious so I asked. ¡°Why? Well dwarves are brewers but it¡¯s almost always a contest to see who is the best and when someone who can take that title we normally want to taste it ourselves and aren¡¯t afraid to pay above max price.¡± One of the dwarves said making me understand. If you think about it, it makes sense, a dwarves best friend is his beer and his wretch, hammer in fantasy settings. Now I understand why dwarves would go as far to get a better brewers beer. It¡¯s more a matter of honor or honoring someone. Elves on the other hand like the one that dad gave that barrel, he seems to be like this man and enjoy it more an aged drink on a special occasion or as a pass time. I don¡¯t doubt that by tomorrow the NPC will all know about dad. As he finishes handing the barrels over and collecting the money we leave smiles as the dwarves being a party of their own while the casual drinkers take a sip of the wine. As we reach the corridor, dad¡¯s smile turns into an extremely wide and almost evil grin. ¡°Hehehe, never fails to get the suckers.¡± He said as he passes me the money. I count the amount I will need for the next repairs before handing him the 10k. ¡°This is your investment money for this batch, the rest will go into ship repairs.¡± I said. Dad counted the money with sparkling eyes. ¡°What about us?¡±Jessica asked. ¡°Tomorrow I¡¯m sure dad will be auctioning his alcohol instead of simply selling it, the surplus money that surpasses the price range will be split between the crew for personal gain.¡± I explained. ¡°This is how we did it in every other game we were in a guild and it survived by me selling my alcohol.¡± Dad said. ¡°I see, the investment gets bigger and so will the income.¡± Alex muttered. ¡°Right, for now don¡¯t tell anyone about the amount of money we are getting from this or we will have to guard the ship all the time. By the time we sell most of the wine we should have the money for the standard power generator and will be able to permanently move into the ship where we can keep everything safe constantly.¡± I explained. ¡°So we are finally getting close to getting a complete ship.¡± Lisa said cheerful. ¡°Yeah, it will take a while longer but if we focus only on basic necessity like engine, generator and thrusters we will have enough money to get those three while the rest we can work over time to fill those in.¡± I said. ¡°If that is so then let us get busy, we leave you two to take care of the alcohol and make sure to hand Noah the money Roktar.¡± Lisa disciplined Dad. I don¡¯t get why dad is blind, she clearly likes him. She looks young but if you remember her curriculum she mentioned she is a Nurse Technician so it took her a few months, then she worked a few years to gather experience and money for medical college. The course for a medical doctor is 4 years so if you take into account time spent getting money with some help from parents and study time you will see that she is at least in her upper 20¡¯s if not her 30s already. Though dad is already in his mid 40s he doesn¡¯t look it because he exercises and has a balanced diet which lets him keep his youthfulness. Still I wonder if it¡¯s because his heart was broken by my mother that he turns a blind eye to women that take an interest in him. I really think Lisa would be a good match for dad because of her responsible nature while his is irresponsible. Well, only time will tell. I shrug and chuckle as the four others head off to pick up some missions while I head to the hanger to request the next repairs. Dad heads off to go buy his loads of materials he will experiment with soon. Chapter 21: Barrel of Money Author''s corner: Another chapter finally out after much procrastinating, don''t blame me since i''m sticking my nose in LN and those normally distract me. Now then, time to see if the result of pushing through worked. Lots of pushing i must say. So tired next chapter no more being stuck in the station. ENJOY!
We were currently within a relatively large hall. Me and dad were sitting at the front row while a large group alcohol fans behind us. Where are we? In the auction hall within Kelha Station, resident ring. How did we get here, well let''s go back to the day after dad had introduced his brand of alcohol which was a massive success. Dad, Lisa and I walk into the airfield with the next six barrels like we had before but when everyone noticed it was us entering the reaction was far from the neutral poker faced men yesterday. "So guys, how was my first batch?" Dad asked with an "innocent" smile on his face. "It was good." Someone said. The tone of voice was emotionless but I guess you would be when you found a new love and she was sitting right in front of you. "Will you me be buying them like yesterday?" Dad asked. """No!""" Shouted several men in unison. "Sell me the barrels, all of them boy, I want to let this beauties age properly!" Colonel said walking up. "Fuck that colonel, I want them!" Shouted another dwarf and from their shouts began to fly all over. I see dads smile turn to a grin as he sticks two fingers in his mouth. I plug my eyes just as an ear piercing whistle rang through the entire airfield with a sound as bad as a banshee''s high pitched yell. All the men plugged their ear in pain for a moment until dad stopped. "Now now, let''s not fight or else it will ruin the unity of the dwarf fighter unit. Since so many want the beer let''s do this. We will wait 5 more days for the remaining batches to reach 1 month of aging. After that we will auction the drink in the resident ring auction hall. How does that sound?" Dad said. All the men looked at us and then looked at their neighbors and began chatting. Finally they all agreed. "Considering we can''t reach a clear decision, we will do as suggested, with all the barrels sold at the same time more men will be able to get one and there will be less hard feelings." One man said. With that we returned to the ship where dad burst out in laughing as his plan was a success. You really need to be shrewd to pull one over on so many people but I don''t think many people would appear. Boy was I wrong, the entire hall was filled with people standing. This standing were less reluctant to bid as they were the ones that didn''t taste the beer and were looking at the auction with caution. Dad is forced to keep a poker face and keep the shrewdness from showing on his face. All the barrels were taste tested and examined for poison and was graded. Alcohol grading was like most rankings where it is 1-10. The first several batches reached rank 5 while the later batches were rank 6. Only 1 barrel showed extreme quality and got to rank 7. Obviously I knew why, every beer barrel was made by the same formula but that same formula is the one to make Dwarf Smasher drinks. The drink concoction can be any beer but there are several ingredients that dad needed to brew any formula into Dwarf smasher. This formula is what causes such a high quality in the beer but as it shows, it takes testing and figuring out how each formula of alcohol reacts. There was 1 barrel in nearly all batch that was rank 5 but the ranks went up in other barrels in later barrels. This makes the price of beer go up higher as the ranks rise. Wine is the same but they were rather stable ranging from rank 4 and 5. The formula dad uses would ruin a wine so he didn''t bother but even so wine is an expensive drink to get just right. The price per liters for rank five is the same that Colonel stated when he first tested the ale. Rank six is 50-100 credits more expensive per liter and rank seven is an additional 50-100 on top of rank six. Rank eight is 100-200 on top of rank seven and rank nine is the same. Rank ten is hard to gauge since quality and quantity is so small that the price is what the brewer makes it. Now for barrels of 20 liters the auction normally rises the price all barrels is sold at least 30% to 50% more than the actual price. Our stock is... 18 barrels of wine, 8 rank 4 barrels 10,000-16,000 credit/barrel, 10 rank 5 barrels 16,000-20,000 credits/barrel. 18 barrels of beer, 7 rank 5 barrels 6,000-10,000 credit/barrel, 10 rank 6 barrels 7,000-12,000 credit/barrel, 1 rank 7 barrel 8,000-16,000 credit/barrel. With just these 36 barrels, we can easily put the ship into working condition. Both the Power generator and engine will be rebuildable and we will have surplus money to invest in our own gear. Dads brewing business will also expand and we will need to build shelves for the barrels for better storing since we can the stack several rows of alcohol in them increasing the capacity. We have already sold all the wine which went all for 30% above the ranks max price. The total was 328k credits while the 30% was 98,400 credits. At the moment it was the beer that was slowly rising. As you can guess, when all the wine was gone most elves were gone as well. Other races also left while ogre and dwarves remain with humans here and there. The rank 5 beer barrels were played around by a few men dad paid to raise the price and made them go all to 30% above price. Ranks six were around 35% and now the rank seven was being sold. "21k going to the number 32 do I here 21.1k!" Shouted the auctioneer. "21.5k shouted a dwarf." "21.5k to number 7 do I here 22k?" The auctioneer announced. "24k!" someone said causing a ruckus as 90% of the men sat down. This was already 50% above rank price. The buyer was a large ogre that, after some examination I saw was the Ogre captain that got smashed by Colonel and that elf. "We have 24 thousands in the back for number 56, do I hear 24.5k?" No one spoke. "No one?! Do I hear 24.5k?" The auctioneer asked. "For 24k going once? Going twice? Sold to the ogre captain the final barrel that the sellers put on auction." The auctioneer announced and slammed the mallet closing the auction. With that the total for the beer was 206k while the surplus equaled 68,500 credits. Summing all the profit of today, we have a grand total of 740,900 credits. It was more money than we thought we would get from selling a few barrels of 1 month aged beer and wine. I''m sure things will get more interesting from now on with our own ship finally working. We wait in the back as all the buyers come and take their merchandise and hand over the money. After the last guy, the ogre captain, left, not without making some stupid remarks after he remembered me and since he knew dad since dad is part of the guards, we paid the tax of using the auction hall which is 2% of the profit which equaled 14,818 credits. Small price to pay to get so much more. With the remaining 726k I take 110k and hand half to each android for their upgrade and for weapons and extra gear, the upgrade being 40k each, then I took 300k storing it for making the two major systems on the ship. I took 50k from the remaining 300k and gave it to dad saying it is for investing in the alcohol business to buy a better brewery and the material to outfit the cargo to store the wine better. With the remaining 266k everyone agreed to leave with me so I can further outfit the ship with all the still needed things. If money remains we will split evenly. With such a successful selling of the alcohol we couldn''t help but be very happy so before splitting up we went to a restaurant and ate a big meal and went our own way. I head triumphantly to the military hanger and talk with the mechanic about the engine and power generator. "Bloody hell, you got the money in full?!" He says wide eyed when he heard me before going quiet. "Yes, well I have surplus and will be refitting the ship entirely with all the systems still needed." I said. He nods before looking at his wrist computer for a bit. "The trade ship will be passing through next week for the monthly trade. Only they have the rare parts needed for the engine that this system lacks due to the materials not existing in this system." I suggest storing the money in the bank. "We can do everything besides the engine and power gen then." I tell him. He nods and calls someone to tow the ship into the hangar. "Now what is lacking still that fits in the ship?" He asked. I look at Lia who was watching and she brings up the screen.
List of Required Systems (by necessity) Standard Shuttle Power Generator 150,000 Standard Shuttle Engine 150,000 Shuttle Thrusters ¡°Omnidirectional¡± 60,000 Cargo Energy Shield Barrier (cargo door) 15,000 Water Storage Tank - 7,000 Oxygen Storage Tank - 12,000 Shield Generator - 90,000 Medical Room - 22,000 Sensor/Scanner - 17,000 Ship Laser Weapons - 35,000
The inertia Dampeners and Gravity generator were determined to be useless to us now because the ship didn''t have the originally so we removed them especially since they cause the price to rocket above the ship''s actual price range. "Kay, besides the shield generator when you also need to wait for the trade ship, we can build the rest." He said. This meant the price for this was 168k or 258k with the shield. It was just in the budget, obviously, I had kept an amount of money to save some extra. Considering I gave the girls so much extra money, unless they buy something big, their honorable personality will add the spare change to be split up as well. After the ship entered the hangar the door opened and dad walked out. He let the men enter the ship. ¡°Well you didn¡¯t waste time?¡± Dad said. ¡°If I did, I would be in danger with so much money in my hands.¡± I replied. Dad nodded and agreed. "I''ll be going to get some wood so I can make some barrel shelves." Dad said. The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. "Don''t get so many that it will occupy the entire cargo. We still need store food and spare parts for repairs." I tell him. As a shuttle we don''t have much space to make everything. Even though we have two floors for all the things, 1/3 of the top floor automatically goes to the engine, power gen and cockpit. Then there is bedrooms, bathroom, medbay and kitchen/dining room. Second floor automatically gives half of the floor to the cargo. Then there is life support, Shield gen, Ship''s core computer system main computer and water/oxygen tank. The cargo will be split so that one part is for my robot while the other will be for jessica¡¯s tool and weapons research. I really must say her scanner was a big help for mining since I could get a basic reading of what minerals I could find in asteroids. Last floor is obviously the cargo but that will be split up into 2 parts, dads brewery which will be positioned at the front of the cargo where the door is while the back part will be the regular cargo. The brewery will only be 1/2 of the cargo but that size has enough space to hold probably a bit more than what we had before. Well it¡¯s not like it matters at the moment, we just have to rebuild this quick and we can finally start serious exploring. Well, not to seriously since the ship doesn¡¯t have lots of weapons or turrets so we still need to be wry but that will come when it happens. For now on to repairs. Jessica PoV Hilda and I are currently at the android specialization center. Unlike the previous upgrades where it is done in regular shops this one is much better upgrades. This is a large robotics place where all the much more powerful upgrades are done. Inside were quite a number of players who were waiting to do their own upgrades or where with others. As we looked around we could see some already upgraded androids. I saw one male that looked more like a tank then android that looked human. With heavy plates and a bulky figure he was walking around while laughing with his friends. He activates a mechanism that makes the plate just before his hand open revealing a gun and then from his thigh popped out showing a large gun that was sized to him. It reminding me of that movie with the cop that turned into a cyborg. Come to think of it we haven¡¯t seen any cyborgs. I¡¯ve been wondering but then again it may be something that needs really high level tech to do and many rare materials for the parts as well as an institute to monitor the person to make sure the implant isn¡¯t rejected. We both go to the counter. ¡°Hello, are you both here for upgrades?¡± The pink haired cute android asked. She was android because of the eyes, it¡¯s easy to tell if you look in them. ¡°Yes, we are both here for class upgrades.¡± I tell her. ¡°Alright, there are some plug openings on the side here¡­¡± She said and pointed to a dashboard with plug openings, ¡°Please connect these to your main frame so that we can scan for your class information since you should have already obtain them. Once we get that and some information that will be updated to the galactic database for future upgrades. Also if your crew possesses someone that can do future upgrades you will need to go to any station and update all upgraded parts so that if you head to be upgraded in stations those present know what you have.¡± She explained. She then showed us where to connect, it was a small opening behind the ear. Connecting to it we saw some screens appear in our view.
Welcome to Cluster Upgrades Incorporated. We thank you for using our services for your upgrade and specialization needs. Scanning systems¡­. Class Scout detected in system.
Registration of personnel has been complete, once again welcome and please choose your upgrades. The system for our upgrades is broken down by Category, each category is specific to a base class, and a specialization, which is a branch of the category.
Category: Scout: Basic Body upgrade: 20,000 *Specialization: Marksmen Sniper Spy Tracker Trapper More advanced options require going to a more advanced station with more resources.
¡°Wow!¡± I exclaim. The pink haired android giggles at my reaction and Hilda soon does the same. ¡°Everyone says that the first time they see the options. There is a more impressive selection at bigger stations and planets so don¡¯t get too caught up in a small station¡¯s selection.¡± She said. ¡°¡°Small?¡±¡± We both asked. ¡°Yes, of course! Kelha Station is small. There are many capital stations that are the size of small planetoids.¡± She said. Our jaws dropped when he got this bit of information. ¡°Don¡¯t underestimate technology developed for living in space.¡± She said with a smile and we nod. I looked at the list again and pulled up the list for Sniper since that is the specialization I was focusing on.
Category: Scout: Basic Body upgrade: 20,000 *Specialization: Sniper: Brain (Core System Hardware): Processor Upgrade: 7,000 Overclock/Processor cooling Upgrade: 10,000 Eye: Eye Scope: 2,000 Eye Scanner: 3,000 Tracker: 3,000 Torso/Shoulders: Recoil Dampeners: 5,000 Reinforced Skeleton: 6,000 Overclock/Processor cooling Upgrade: 2,000 Arms/Hand: Stabilizer: 3,000 Physical Proficiency Upgrade: 8,000 Overclock/Processor cooling Upgrade: 4,000 Legs/Feet: Physical Proficiency Upgrade: 10,000 Overclock/Processor cooling Upgrade: 2,000 Auxiliary: Basic Camouflage System: 8,000
Looking at the list I found that it didn¡¯t have many options but I wouldn¡¯t really expect much from a ¡°small¡± station, I guess. I had 55k as my share from the money Noah handed over. After doing several combo¡¯s I found one that gave me just correctly 55k while giving me the most benefit. Besides the basic body upgrade, I choose both the Processor Upgrade and Brain Overclock/Processor cooling Upgrade, Eye Scope, Recoil Dampeners, Stabilizer and Basic Camouflage System. Processing upgrade allows me to intake more information and process it at a faster pace. The Eye scope obviously is an android eye that has a built in scope for shooting rifles and long range weapons. On closer inspection of the information after choosing I see it can zoom up to x4 which seems to be a good zoom power for hunting rifles and such. Considering I haven¡¯t used much extreme range yet then I don¡¯t need something so powerful. Recoil Dampeners is a must, it¡¯s an upgrade that is done around the arms, and torso that is kind of like a padding that can absorb the recoil of heavy guns. For snipers it¡¯s a must but it¡¯s not included in the basic body upgrade which is strange but I guess that is to not rise the price for the poorer players. Stabilizer is something in the arms that helps reduce the shaking of my arms when holding the gun. Finally the basic camouflage is just that, it can¡¯t make me invisible but it allows me to change into a solid color to hide. It may seem crappy but it still helps. In a barren wasteland planet like Kelha it may not help but in a forest I can change into the color of the dirt or tree. Later on it may become even better and there is always the option of me studying it and trying to develop better ones by myself with Noah¡¯s help. ¡°Vivi, can you access the database and calculate the boost I stats that all these upgrades will bring?¡± I asked my AI.
Hold on big sis¡­ Physical Proficiency: 32 (+10) -> 57 (+10) Resilience:31 (+10) -> 56 (+10) Dexterity: 30 (+30) -> 95 (+30) Agility: 28 (+15) -> 78 (+15) Overclock Potency: 50 -> 125 Processor cooling: 60 -> 150
My eyes bulge as I look at the boosts. Seriously how can one set of upgrades boost so much. ¡°Seems you both have chosen your sets.¡± The pink haired receptionist said and pulled out two small papers with a bar code and a number. ¡°Just wait until the number is called and then present this to the person that you are called to follow and you will be sent to your specific area for your upgrades.¡± She explained. We each take our own, which had our name on it, and then thanked the android. As we go and take a seat I look at the bar code and involuntarily my systems analyzes the bar code making the upgrades I choose appear in my view. ¡°Oh cool we can see the upgrades on the barcode.¡± I said surprised. ¡°Really? Can I see yours?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Let me see yours as well.¡± I asked. He exchange them and I look at her bar which was analyzed as well.
Category: Swordsman (Basic Body Upgrade: 25,000) Specialization: Samurai: Upgrade: Full Body: Reinforced Skeleton: 8,000 Flexible Joints: 5,000 Head: Processor upgrade: 6,000 Torse/Arms: Reinforced Armor Plate: 5,000 Legs: Physical Proficiency Upgrade: 6,000
¡°Wow, you choose a lot.¡± Hilda said. ¡®Your body upgrade seems to be more expensive.¡± I said. ¡°Yeah, I think it''s because it''s focused on strength and resistance so that means more plates.¡± She said. ¡°Samurai¡­ aren¡¯t them more speed and skill related?¡± I asked. ¡°I think so, not really sure.¡± She said and I could only chuckle. ¡°So what were the other options?¡± I asked. ¡°Besides Samurai there was Fencer, Blade dancer, Berserker, Mercenary, and Knight.¡± She explained. ¡°So most 1st tier class upgrades.¡± Kind of interesting how they do that android class if I must say.¡± I say and Hilda said. We trade back the cards with the barcodes and then wait. After a while we were both called together but were sent to different rooms. Time to get strong. Chapter 22: Out Shopping Authors Corner: Alright, this was a really hard chapter to write because i got distracted a lot and the content was also hard to think of. Nebula is getting pretty hard to write but at least i know what will happen next chapter so the next chapter or chapters will come out much faster then this one. As for those who complained about what i added to the ship, or in this case what i didn''t don''t worry i fixed that. Enjoy
I was staring upwards from the military hangar in the station and gulp at what I see. Out in space I could see a ship. Though I call it a ship I also can¡¯t call it one, why? Well first off that thing is bigger the Kelha Station for one, then there is the fact that it looks like a cigar with a more boat like look since the top was flat. This was the trade ship, Nolim. It belonged to a trade company belonging to a race called the Wynebia. The best comparison I can give these guys would be comparing them to a Hutt from star wars. Large Slug life forms that are monsters when it comes to business. This is one of the races completely blocked from playing do to the completely different body structure. As I stare from behind the energy shield at the end of the military ship I hear Vincent, the leader of the ship builders. ¡°Hey kid, come here for a sec.¡± He called me and I turn towards him and with a few pushes from my Psi I float down and my magnet boots connect to the floor. ¡°What do you need?¡± I asked. ¡°I just took a look at your ship and I got to ask, not gonna put an Inertia Dampeners?¡± He asked. ¡°No because we will be traveling in a straight line most of the time.¡± I replied. ¡°Kid... ¡° He said and began to think a bit. ¡°... Let me ask you, will you be doing crew missions and using your ship to travel in the nearby asteroid field and going down planet side?¡± He asked. ¡°Probably.¡± I replied. ¡°Then you need it because if you need to do evasive maneuvers all your stuff in your ship don¡¯t go flying around. Not only that you will need them for when you accelerate to hold your things in place unless your bolt them all down. Not to mention, the way that the person from your crew that doesn¡¯t choose a sex, drives like a maniac when fighting, will you really not go without Inertia Dampeners.¡± He replied. His words slowly start to dawn on me but we don¡¯t have the money for it for now. Even with what we have now we don¡¯t total 11k credits after we repaired the ship to this level without counting the money to buy the parts for the Power generator and Engine. ¡°Well¡­ we don¡¯t have the money to buy it after we buy the engine and generator.¡± I tell him. ¡°How much will you have left?¡± He asked. ¡°11k, most of the money was invested in upgrades and equipment.¡± I said. Dad only used about one third of the money I gave him to make the barrel shelves and make new barrels and buy the ingredients. The rest I used to make a workshop out of the second floor cargo. What remained after that was around eight thousand and then we gained some from work. ¡°Hmm¡­ lets do this, the rare parts normally only cause 50 thousand since there aren¡¯t a large number of them while 100k is what we normally charge for building the engine and it common parts. Since you are buying both Power gen and engine we will cut you a deal. We take the remaining money you guys have and we will sell you a Inertia Dampener.¡± He said. ¡°Is that okay?¡± I asked. ¡°You rebuilt an entire shuttle with your crew, that amount of cash entering our pockets isn¡¯t a small sum you know that is already nearing 700k credits.¡± He said. I smiled wryly knowing full well how much we spent on the ship. ¡°If it''s like that then we would be glad.¡± I said with a wry smile since we would be broke again. ¡°Hahaha! Don¡¯t make that face kid, you can always get more money. Oh right!¡± He said as he began to type on his computer and asked his AI to help him find ¡°That¡± file. After a moment I got a message. ¡°I just remembered, Major Snocon sent this to me to pass to you. He doesn¡¯t know your contact address so since he knows I have been repairing your ship extensively recently he sent it to me to pass to you. Its locked and only your own AI¡¯s signature can open it¡± he said. After a moment the message appear.
Greetings Mr Noah of the Star Comet This is Major Snocon and I have a Mission. This isn¡¯t a regular Crew mission like the terraforming mission your crew took which aided in making the basic atmosphere that has begun to condense on Kelha II. This mission is called a Raid Mission. The transmitter your crew brought back that was attached to the shuttle you used during that crew mission has allowed us to trace back the signal to a high profile bandit hideout. It is strategically hidden as they built a large circular ship and after melting nearby asteroids they made a rock shell to hide the satellite station of theirs as a large asteroid. This station is considered high profile only because of its size but it is possible that this can also be considered low grade and a larger organization is backing them and this is a simple outpost for basic raids on ships around the station. This raid mission requires the minimum 5 official crews to join and add diverse specialization to accompany our guard unit to capture this outpost. There are two objectives, first is to subject the bandits and clear the outpost. Second is to retrieve any valuables, this is personal and each crew can get what they can hold. Finally we require information on the higher ups or larger outposts that may be around Kelha II and possibly Kelha Solar system. This mission is high level priority with a difficulty marked as 4. As such the reward for participating in this mission if it is successful will be 30,000 credits and a newer model communicator for your entire crew. This message will automatically transmit your answer to me after you accept the mission by pressing the ¡°accept¡± button below. I hope you will aid us to make the planet a bit more safe. Major Marcus Snocon
Do you wish to accept this raid mission on behalf of our crew?
YesNo
I read the message and am a bit shocked at what I read. ¡±So that transmitter caused a new quest. Wait¡­ why didn¡¯t anyone else get attacked until this moment, don¡¯t tell me this is a chain quest that only those who complete the terraforming quest get?¡± I though. ¡°Why did he send this message to me and not my father who is the de facto captain as well as a member of the guard unit?¡± I asked. ¡°I think it was you that gave him the transmitter right? Also I think he saw you as more responsible then your father maybe.¡± Vincent replied making me chuckle. ¡°Yeah¡­ that makes way too much sense.¡± I said knowing full well my dads personality. The ¡°responsible¡± adult he is can be reduced to a teen at the peak of his puberty where he can¡¯t control himself. Still, when he is serious he can be quite charismatic. ¡°Sir, the freight ship to the Nolim is ready. We are just awaiting those who wish to go purchase.¡± A guard said. ¡°Great, come Noah we must head to the freight so that we can go get the needed parts. Still we might be stuck in there for several hours since this ship doesn¡¯t come around that often and they have a large amount of things we need.¡± Vincent said and I nodded following him off and entering a huge freight ship that was half the size of the hangar. *** My jaw was nearly falling on the ground as I look out the window. Me and Vincent were currently in the freight ship bridge. Because vincent was the chief builder of ships it''s mostly allows him that goes to the trade ships for his part of the trades. Besides him there was Gunner, Colonel, Major Marcus Snocon and an elder man with a polished wooden cane with a metal handle. This elder''s name was Mores Cane. The owner of the entire Kelha Space Station as well as CEO of the mining company that is located in this system. To put everything in its simplest terms, this is the overlord of Kelha Solar System and the richest man sitting in her. I can only thank god the man isn''t ruthless to those he likes. "Hehe, I have always enjoyed the look that a novice gives when he sees a ship of this size?" Mores Cane said. "It isn''t too unexpected, the young man has only see the station and believes it is already large so what is there to expect." The Major said. I snap out of it and scratch my head embarrassed. "I kind of underestimating the size of the ship. I thought it was at least only doubt the stations size... I never expected it was nearly ten times that size." I replied and looked up again to see the massive behemoth. "Don''t worry, there aren''t many ships this size in the galaxy because of its maintenance cost and price to build it. Still the Wynebia are a ruthless businessman race and they believe themselves above all others. This ship would probably hold around 30% of their entire races population not to mention the hundreds of thousands that work for them." Major Snocon said. My eyes bulge hearing the numbers then I began to think. "This ship has 30% of the race doesn''t that mean they have a low population?" I thought. "If you''re wondering, yes the race is small in number but nearly all of them are filthy rich and are backed by several organizations including many underground." Colonel said reading my expression. "So will I have to bargain with them?" I asked. "Of course not!" Gunner said making me sigh in relief. "There is no bargaining with them. You either accept their rather fair prices or you get blacklisted." Gunner said. I slump down a bit depressed having to meet something that may be the equivalent of a Hutt. "Don''t worry young man, your purchase is marked as low priority so a normal vendor will attend to you so don''t worry." Mores said. Though I know him so little he still tries to calm me down, he really is a good man. I look once more outside at the massive ship before going quiet and waiting. After some time the ship finally came to a standstill in front of a space near the massive ship and moments later a huge gate began to open. Behind it was an energy shield holding the ship''s air inside. This was a massive hangar but unlike what I thought the ship didn¡¯t enter completely and instead only the front where the cargo bay main gate was located was placed into the hangar and very thick cables attached the ship and even some large robotic arms with strong magnets on them connected to the ship to hold it in place and pull it along if the ship moved a bit. ¡°Come on kid, lets get going.¡± Gunner said and he and Colonel left while the others remained. As I was going to leave Major Snocon called. ¡°Noah, have you read the request I sent yet?¡± He asked with a flat tone and a poker face. ¡°I did but I received it before we boarded the freighter so I haven¡¯t had time to talk with my crew about this.¡± I replied. He quickly looked at Vincent and glared. ¡°What? I was busy this last week and didn¡¯t see the kid after the ship renovations, you should have sent the message to his dad or Colonel.¡± He replied. Major signs before dismissing me saying to talk with my crew as early as possible since they already had 3 other crews and were still looking for crews that qualified. I follow the two dwarf leaders out of the ship and into the planetoid sized ship. A ramp was opened between the cargo and the inside of the ship which we took and entered. The first thing that entered my sights was an identity check that felt like an airport where we were scanned for dangerous items. I didn¡¯t have my shotguns anymore but still had the laser pistol, the shotguns I had already integrated into my robot so that I can add it into my fighting style. There was no rule against having weapons but I obviously had it registered to my name after putting it on the table. The scan apparently also had a way to check the inventory but since they can¡¯t hold completely items like bombs and only ammo and other basic items it didn¡¯t amount to much and we were soon through. After the checkpoint was a tunnel we walked through and as we exit into the tunnel my jaw drops. What comes into my view was a city, no exaggeration on that part, it was a real city with bars, taverns, work places and everything you can think of needed for a city. It was clear as day that this ship''s crew isn¡¯t as simple as a crew and instead they are the ships residents that formed a community within the ship that moves around slowly bringing in money from the visited planets. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. As I was looking in shock I see some people coming our way. ¡°Greetings Lieutenant Colonel, Mr. Gunner, the Psionic Nerve producers are waiting to begin negotiations.¡± The leading man said. He was tall, very tall and muscular but he wore a kind of butler outfit. Now for his race, its unknown but he has blood red skin with a long red tail and at the corner of his forehead bordering the hair were two obsidian black smooth horns about as long and thick as a thumb. He was probably from some demon race from the looks and was very powerful. ¡°Thank you for the preparations Frethir. Also can you get someone to attend to the boy, he is buying important shuttle class ship parts.¡± Colonel said pointing my way. The man named Frethir looked at me before looking back at the men behind him and pointed to a really short red skinned skinny man. Similar to Frethir this man had a tail and red skin as well as wearing a butler cloth but of drastically lower quality showing that he was far below the man talking to Colonel. ¡°Vixdre, take care of the boys needs and don¡¯t irritate him or else you will be punished.¡± Frethir said. ¡°Yes my lord!¡± The impish man said and walked over. ¡°Good, young man, if this incompetent being irritates you, don¡¯t be afraid to beat some sense into his degraded head.¡± He said making me a bit shocked but I nod. ¡°Now then gentlemen shall we go.¡± He says and gestures for the two dwarves next to me to follow. All the others behind him spread out and begin moving towards the people who were coming from the ship that came to buy. ¡°How may Vixdre serve.¡± The impish man asked moving forward. ¡°I am in need of a s-¡± ¡°Scatter shot shotgun of great dwarf making?! This way!¡± Vixdre said turning and walking but I grab his shoulder. ¡°No I need a sh-¡± ¡°Shield generator mark V for great battleship and can take several high powered plasma blasts. Come come!¡± He said. A vein was starting to bulge in my head. I can clearly see now why Frethir told me to beat this idiot. I grab his tail to stop him and then grabbed him by the neck and lift him into the air. ¡°Listen you idiot! I need a-¡± ¡°Now armor and psionic parts for great dwarf robot!¡± Vixtre interrupted again. Veins bulge on my head as psi quickly rushes to my left fist and become topaz reinforced and then floods my muscles on the arm and back. I wind up my arm and punch him in the gut but to not do much damage I slam him into the ground making his gasp for air. I grab him once more this time he was clearly dazed. ¡°I will say it once more, Listen before your you talk. I need a Standard Shuttle Engine and Power generator, if you are too incompetent to know what those are then get me someone who can!¡± I said extremely pissed off. ¡°Sir?¡± I head a gentle female voice call from the side. When I looked, there was a beautiful young woman that wore a secretary outfit. She had light red skin with two small black horns on her head and unlike the men she had a thin sleek black tail on her back. Her proportions would shame most normal woman because she had very tempting curves and was very voluptuous backed by the secretary cloths and the pair of glasses in front of her eyes gave her an extremely sexy aura. It was clear that she was some kind of succubus like variant of her race. Vixdre was without a doubt an imp or something. ¡°Do you need something miss?¡± I asked without dropping the idiot. ¡°Yes, you said that you needed a ship engine and power generator correct?¡± She asked. I nod back confirming what she said. ¡°I see, then Vixdre doesn¡¯t have the clearance to sell those, I shall take his place as you seller. If you can please release that incompetent pile of trash I would be thankful.¡± She asked with a smile. The smile clearly showed that she enjoyed insulting this idiot and seemed to look like a refreshed smile probably from watching me beat him senseless. I pull him back and slam him on the ground before leaving him there gasping for air. ¡°Please lead the way miss¡­?¡± I inquired. ¡°My name is Havic, please follow me as the location for purchasing these important ship parts needs clarence of slightly higher class to enter.¡± She said and turned around. I followed behind while I tried not to look at the very wide ass and the pair of small bat wing tattoos near her but which I can see since her tail was lifting her shirt just enough. I noticed some differences between men and women. Men were separated into three categories that I can split into Imp, human, and demon. Imp is like Vixdre and was small, annoying, stupid and were extremely large in number. Human is like Frethir, smart, cunning, cold. Demon was a really muscular and dangerous looking guard that had large natural plates over his body backed by armor and weapons gained from the job. Women on the other hand were all human and very human at that. Their only difference between actual terran was the tail, horns and skin color. They didn¡¯t have any kind of other distinguishing features like rough jaw line or anything like the men. I kind of wondered how the imp class ones mate but I bet there is a female for them as well. ¡°I see you are interested in our race?¡± Havic said. ¡°Yes, this is my first time meeting your race.¡± I said. ¡°I see, then let me share with you the basics.¡± She said and had her AI send me the information.
ZastrosThe Zastros were once a highly territorial and aggressive race. Because of their outward appearance when they were originally discovered religious groups considered them demons and mindless beings but it was quickly found they were sentient. With the coming of space travel they tried to expand and conquer but were beaten back by the Holy Federation due to still considering them demons and the few that survived escaped to the Liberation and Dominion for refuge. Since then the race developed two kinds of cultures. The original aggressive nature was cultivated in the Dominion because of the races hate for the Holy Federation while in the Liberation they were taken in and now serve as part of all the largest merchant ships and have develop a passive cold calculative way of life as merchants but they all still hate the Holy Federation and you will only find a Zastros in the Holy Federation if their trade ship travels into it but they will never be courteous towards those in that faction due to their animosity for them. Racial Trait: Dominion: Innate Berserker (When entering combat against equal or stronger foe they combatant will instantly enter berserk state and will only get stronger the more injured), Innate Warrior (bonus to all combat skills by 20%) Liberation: Natural Merchants (Bonus to all Merchant class skills), Innate Warrior (bonus to all combat skills by 20%) Weakness: -------
I read over the information while following Havic through some security doors heading deeper into the ship and stopping in a large factory. ¡°The weakness is blank?¡± I asked. ¡°Now we aren¡¯t about to go showing everyone our weakness now would we?¡± She said with a smile and I nod understanding that it was smart to keep that quiet. ¡°Anyway, this is the ship factory, you said you required Standard shuttle engine and Power generator?¡± She asked and I nod. ¡°Then you are probably looking for the parts that are made from materials not found in this system right?¡± ¡°Of course.¡± I replied. ¡°Then it is 50 thousand for each machine and we don¡¯t build the two engines.¡± She replied. ¡°I already heard from Vincent at the station. As long as I get the parts it¡¯s enough to pay him to build it.¡± I reply. ¡°Good.¡± She says and starts to type something. The next moment a hologram screen appeared on my communicators. I read it over and it seems to be a contract. ¡°This is a standard contract that will should be signed by you and it will be used as a guarantee that you are the proper owner. This contract will also be the key to unlock the containers holding the parts and it will be located inside your communicator and only your AI can access it.¡± She explained. I understood but even so I began to read over it to make sure there is no fine print and even had Lia examine it thoroughly. She was quite serious at this time because she knew the importance of this.
Contract is clean, no fine print, not hidden codes keeping something hidden and the contract itself is fair and only guarantees that you will pay or will be arrested. Also you must pay in advance and this contract will keep the merchant ship from cheating you because it is a contract of their own making and it unforgeable as each contracts coding is unique from one another.
Seeing her say that I visibly relax and sign the contract and take out the 100k to pay for both. ¡°Thank you for your patronage, the containers will be moved to the freight ship after all the parts are counted and organized and it should take between 2-4 hours to completely prepare the parts and another 20 minutes to move them to the ship.¡± She explained and deposited the money and a copy of her contract into a computer that took the money and counted them and put a quere for my order. ¡°There, your order has been made, we can now leave and you will not have to worry about it being left behind since your ship shows all the items that will be loaded and time it takes to prepare and if its been loaded onto the ship so there is no danger of forgetting.¡± She explains with a smile and leads me back to the city area and bows towards me after guiding me to the original gate I came from. I looked around not knowing what to do so I started to walk around. I saw lots of merchants calling out their wares. It wasn¡¯t just the Zastros but there were all kinds of races from fantasy cat girls or more animal like beast men but there were huge guards that with four arms and blue skin to big blue skinned psychic races that were floating around like sentries. As I walk around I notice something else, floating in the air were drones. They were rare in Kelha Station and were used for guarding the station but these I saw were daily use drones as they followed some people from the ship with some kind of tractor beam under it and a hologram of some kind of race which I guess were the AI.
Get one! Get one for me! GET ONE! I want a body even if its a simple drone!
Lia was really hyped to see a drone. ¡°No, did you forget we don¡¯t have the money for it.¡± I reply.
*sob sob* .¡¤¡ä¡¥`(>¨y<)¡ä¡¥`¡¤. ??( ?????)?? ??o¡¤(? ??????????? )?o¡¤?
¡°When did you learn those Emoticon?¡± I asked.
I found them when surfing the web a few days ago. Have a lot stored up. (*?????*)? ??
I sigh and shake my head a bit as I look around. After a while I reached an area that had food items as well as ingredients. I went to a place that had stored fruits and herbs I told the clerk I was just checking them out and wasn¡¯t buying today. The fruits and herbs I looked over where to check out the smell and color since I wanted to know what kind of exotic fruits I could get access to in Kelha. Sadly these were very exotic since they came from far off planets but were planted and gathered on the ship in an artificial farm. There was no way we could get enough to make a stable supply of any alcohol from such exotic fruits and grains. Our drinks will totally be dependant on the local goods. Well I left and head back to the ship and waited until my goods were finally in the ship. I made sure to check when they were loaded before relaxing and then went to wait for the ship to finally leave. Most of the goods the station purchased was psionic parts and nerves, a really huge amount of important ship parts and some exotic foods that have been preserved. After the ship was loaded we left and returned to the station. My ship was already in the hangar and the parts were simply transported there and finally the engine and Power generator as well as inertia Dampeners were built into the ship and tested finally having the ship 100% built and ready for space travel. After that I talked with the rest of the crew about the mission. After talking about the pros and cons we accepted the mission and began to get ready to help out when Major Snocon called us to go raid the outpost. Chapter 23: Pre-mission Danger Author''s corner: Like I promised on Clockwork, Nebula chapter and the prologue to the battle with the bandits. These next chapters will have lots of emphasis on poking fun at our third gender and I''m already having fun imagining what i will be doing. Kukuku you will never expect what will happen after the battle is over. Enjoy~!
*Hummmmmmmm~* A soft droning came from the two back rooms of the top floor on our shuttle. I walk into the second to last room and see the room that had before been normally empty with only small and noisy power generators. Now 80% of the room was filled with the machinery and at its center were two power cores attached to the machines feeding the power to the ship while regenerating the power used. I leave and go to the last room and what we found there was much noisier. The Engine of the ship was nearly twice as big as the power generator. I can¡¯t really put into words what I was seeing besides a hell of a lot of machinery and at its center were 3 power cores that worked as the battery for the ship. This was needed because the power generator wouldn¡¯t be able to work anything on the ship if it had to power the engine. I turn to the corridor and see the normally dull lights were now bright and the corridors full brilliance was finally shown. The white corridors finally shined as it should. I happily walk through the ship as I look at everything and check to make sure all the things were working and as soon as I reach the cargo I find the new air conditioning system was working like a charm keeping the temperature within standard temperatures that dad normally stores that at, which is between 7 and 15 degrees celsius making this separated cargo space rather cold. I look to one side where the beer was placed standing on two rows of shelves and I count around 30 beer barrels. On the other side I saw a similar imagine but the wine was laid sideways and because of this it gave more room and so there was 40 barrels. On the lid and the side of the barrel was the brand my dad had created and propagated. ¡°Roktar Spirits: Rising the spirits of every Ale lover!¡± On the lid was also the date it was produced. Near the back of the room I spotted the larger brewery that underwent an upgrade thanks to the money I gave my dad. I walk into the main cargo and see the place was properly lit up with 5 rows of overhead lights and the place had some boxes which was preserved food I had already taken the chance to purchase. Now the last preparation we needed was to wait for the station to fill the water and oxygen tanks which comes for free when you buy or finish building a ship. The tanks were very large and the water tank held around 50,000 liters. It was a huge cylinder tank that connected to all the places that needed water. If you''re wondering what happens to waste in the ship, it is gathered in a small 50 liter tank at the bottom of the ship, even below the cargo, and when it fills up it is ejected out. We don¡¯t have the space to put any processing plant to remove the water but a small shuttle can only enter hyperspeeds and not light speed. Unless we recklessly try to travel to another solar systems with such a small ship and no light speed drive then we will definitely face problems. In hyperspeed it would take about a month to reach the nearest solar system so you can tell there is no reason for us to leave until we can get something bigger or we can try to go to a colony solar system to acquire this but there is no point with the trade ships coming and with them comes their ship selling business. As I walk back upstairs I find Alex was already in the cockpit. I had sent a message to the entire crew that the ship was finished repairing and Alex came running when she heard that. I quickly found out what the hacking skill was for. It seems she and her AI have been copying system coding to use on our ship when it was ready. All around her was tons of hologram screens and she was typing feverishly and her hands were truly a blur making me quickly realize that her hand eye coordination was far beyond anything I ever saw. This was a genius NEET level ability you can¡¯t find anywhere else besides on people that focus their entire beings into doing something. Since she was so focused I leave her alone since she was setting up the ship''s systems but I emphasis Lia to watch the systems and learn what she did to make sure nothing was secretly hidden away that could cause trouble later on. It¡¯s not like I don¡¯t trust Alex but¡­ with a skill like hacking I just can¡¯t help be a bit cautious even with a friend. After checking that nothing on the ship was built incorrectly I go to the kitchen and read the information for the mission we will be doing tomorrow. First off there are 5 player crews joining, ours included. Our level range at the moment is between 9 and 20, 20 being my dad who. All the crews are run by older men and surprisingly one of these captains dad knows from a different game. He is a swords master and in this game he started as a human so as not to disrupt his own sense of perspective. That is something dad and I need to fight when we log in but we adapt quickly. In terms of skill our crew will probably be the strongest, no other crew has a dwarf fighter but most have more members than us and each has two or three mechanics and a variety in the races. While we number only 6 the others number 10 or more. Still we are quality over quantity so we are mostly balanced. These crews seem to split up in groups like we did. They hunt bandits more... uncle''s crew seem to specialize in bandit hunting." I mutter as I look at the crew quest logs that I was able to obtain from them. They are rather good and somewhat lucky. They have been able to hunt a good deal of bandits we believe come from the outpost we will take down today. Not only that they have even towed back a few of the fighter ships and now possess five of them but like us, they have had to go all out to repair them. Still they were lucky that the engines weren''t damaged in the fights, well they did fight a large number to gather five with working engines. Our crew is the only one with such a large ship. Others were only able to get enough to buy the basic level ships. One of them waited longer and was able to get a proper mining ship and then they customized it to be a impromptu fighter but it still did its job since the crew can travel in space while my crew has only just obtained our own personal ship. That doesn''t mean they are better, we simply took the harder route by rebuilding a ship instead of buying a smaller one like most other people. After reading about the other crews I searched up the information about the guards unit for this mission and then to see what little of the bandit outpost scans were able to obtain without being detected. A pain in the ass appeared instantly. Put simply I was made an invalid in that place, my robot is too large to enter the interior but the hangar they had enough space. As for the guards, it says here the ships are built with immobilization shots that have similar effects to emp and cause disorder in the ship controls. The guards themselves have similar weapons but for humans. It''s a kind of laser rifle but the bullet is set to non lethal and induces a shock through the body stunning the target unconscious similar to a tazer. The player crews will be given similar weapons when we land so that we capture the bandits instead of kill them. This is to question them and to make sure no traps lay hidden in the outpost. My recently added psionic shield will be of great use in scuffle when we land on the station and encounter enemy in there. Lisa is already making sure it''s charged and the second floor cargo was customized to have a door big enough for my robot to jump out on one of the sides.obviously it has an energy shield along with the bulkhead cargo doors to keep the air in. I''ve been training a lot to grow my fighting style to use the psi coated sword and shotguns it gives a good balance for the most part. Soon enough I will be able to learn how to make the swords psi gather enough to flow out of the sword and perform a psi flying sword slash. By then though it would be months. The reason being that using a weapon with my robot is very hard. VERY hard, I needed to remake both hands to have a small attachments on the palm that connects to a plug on the sword to allow the psi to flow. Also to make my shotguns into psi weapons I needed to wrap part of the chamber in psionic nerve to stabilize the Psi passing through. I removed the handles and outfitted it to fit just above my left wrist. It was a simple arrangement that was made to improvise until I can order proper psi metal in the shape of shotguns. Its also less effective but its more then enough at the moment. After going over everything I jumped into one of the beds in the mens room. Each room had bunks built into the walls with the bed there. There was six beds on the three walls. I''m kind of worried about this though since I still don''t know what sex Alex really is. It would be simpler if she told me so I wouldn''t be so confused when referring to her. For now I guess it''s fine but later it might get to be a pain. Alex pov Finally, finally I can go all out to customize my own ship''s systems. After copying so many systems secretly then working on them in the tutorials I finally tailored together a really efficient programming form most of the ship''s systems and Xeno is helping me set it all up.
Just so you know, all the crews AI''s are watching and learning what you are doing. It seems your hacking skill gave them a small sense of insecurity.
"I expected that, I doubt I wouldn''t be cautious of someone that has skills in hacking. You can teach them while you set up most of the ship systems. I''ll get started on the firewall. Thanks to your basic scans of the security ship firewalls I could make something fun." I reply back.
You and your obsession with air and space crafts. You''re so smart and learned so much yet you only focus on this subject.
"Its called love! Love runs the universe and all things should revolve around spacecrafts. Wait... it does without these beauties none of this will have happened." I say as I kick it into overdrive and start to build my own firewall from scratch but it was stored in my head. Xeno kept remaining anything I typed up wrong and was probably showing the AI''s how to bypass the firewall so that they weren''t kicked out by it. From there I worked for half a day to get the ships systems up to date with my own coding. I even improved the engine output without rising the power consumption or increasing any risk of overheating, the same goes for the power generator. When I finished I messaged the hangar guys and told them I was done and was taking the ship. After doing a systems check before takeoff I pulled the shuttle out and brought it to its pier and turned the engine off and had the ship hooked up so it didn''t float away. Then I stretched and got up and out of the pilot seat. There was a small drawer behind the seat and inside was a set of bed sheets. With a happy smile I pulled them out and jumped into my pilot seat and threw the sheets over me. "A pilot''s seat truly is the best bed." I mutter after making the seat bend back and become almost horizontal before going to sleep. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Noah PoV When I returned to the game Lia said that there was no problem with Alex¡¯s system coding. It even improved the ship''s performance without going overboard. Looking out the window of the room I found we were already at the piers and no longer in the hangar. ¡°So Alex already moved us back here.¡± I mutter as I look at the neighboring ships. Most were smaller ships but then I noticed movement among the ships and one was coming our way. I walk to the airlock and put my helmet on, we have our own personal ones now that remain with us or in the ship at all times. I empty the airlock and open the door as the men each the space in front of the door. A chat link connected to my internal systems and the men began talking.
???: Greetings, we were sent by Major Snocon to install a scanner disruptor. It is like a stealth technology that will keep long range scans from picking up your ship.
This is really convenient. ¡°Lia, patch me to Major Snocon in a private chat.¡± I asked.
On it!
I moment later a new box appeared.
Major: Did you need something from me Noah?
Noah: Yes, there are some men that came to my ship as well as other ships on the piers and are installing something called a scanner disruptor. He says you sent them.
Major: Noah, stall them as much as possible. These are bandits, the scanner probe was spotted when it did a preliminary scan but escaped. It seems the found a way to breach into the station and are putting up a trap.
Noah: Got it.
The chat closed and I move my hand behind my back gripping the Laser pistol.
Noah: Do you have proof that Major Snocon sent you?
??? (1): Do we need such a thing?
??? (2): Didn¡¯t hear from major about any of this. Like you can see all the others owners are allowing us.
Noah: What I see is you sneaking into others ships and installing it.
They all flinch before the man on the left went for his gun but I already had mine gripped so I just pulled it out and fired at them. The laser shot hit the man on the left on the right leg backing he yell without sound in this void. I see blood come out of his leg but it quickly freezes over because of the cold in space. We are currently hidden from the sun on this side of the station so even the little bit of sunlight doesn¡¯t reach us. I slam the close button and the door starts to close. The leading man pulls out a rifle but I fire back but he dodges by moving when I aimed. This guy has good reflexes. Suddenly a laser shot comes flying my way from further away as more of the bandits appear and provide backup. It hits the inside the of the airlock but doesn¡¯t cause too much damage. Before any more come the door finishes closing and looking through the window of the door I suddenly notice a small swarm of drones flying through space. These drones were black and white and had spotlights in the front like a car but as soon as they identified a threat the light turned red and they split down the middle and open up to reveal a high powered weapon. The next second the bandits try to run but are rapidly shot down. They return fire but it does little to the robot''s since a shield suddenly appears in front of them blocking them. I notice a slightly bigger drone that doesn¡¯t open up. It was clearly the one making the shield. When I looked at the bandits I do notice that they aren¡¯t dead, no blood appears. That means these are non lethal shots meant to paralyze them. In no time at all, all the men were beaten and guards appeared on the pier as they capture and put energy shackles on the men before taking them in. Then a drove of mechanics come surging out and begins entering the ships as they start to search all the ships that were invaded for whatever may have been planted inside. Major Snocon personally comes over to my ship and I met him outside.
Major: Thank you for the warning. It seems they were planning to sabotage all the ships to collect them later and they even know who is taking part in the mission today.
Noah: Do you think someone leaked the information?
Major: Someone infiltrated the station as a guard. They aimed for all the fighters and ships of the other ships first before going after the random mining ships to try and hide their tracks but once we searched the stations camera¡¯s we saw what their aim was.
Noah: Did you find who let them in?
Major: Yes but as soon as he let these men in, he escaped in one of their ships that left. He seems to have given them clearance codes so they could approach the station unhindered by the stations shields.
Noah: You will probably need to fix that problem and make several codes to bypass the station shields. A single code would be to easy to sell to someone.
Major: That is something for us of the stations to resolve. Today I am sure they are on high alert. Your ship doesn¡¯t have many weapons besides lasers and a single empty turret part that your sniper uses. Stay near the back and let the others with fire ships battle and you have your sniper aid them. We will take some time to bypass their systems with long range transmitters so we can open the hangar doors on their outpost.
Noah: If you need help, my pilot has some skill in hacking. I don¡¯t know if we have the long range transmitters needed for that but she can definitely help.
Major: Transmitters are part of the ship''s main systems and appear in everything above shuttle sized ships. Besides that smaller ships only receive the transmission and use that to connect. Get your crew ready because we will be departing in a few hours after we question these men.
I nod and he salutes before walking away. I turn to the ship and jump inside before closing up and removing my helmet when the air is back inside. I then send the call to all the others. Sadly only Hilda and Jessica were currently on. Well Alex was here and I found her in the pilot seat actually sleeping ingame. ¡°Alex¡­¡± I called. ¡°Mm.¡± She muttered before turning in the seat and covering her face with the blanket. ¡°... Hey someone is trying to break into the ship and steal it!¡± I said in a slightly drastic voice. ¡°WHAT IS THE FUCKERS!¡± She shouted was her eyes burst open and a monstrous wave of bloodlust was released from the small frail looking body in baggy armor. ¡°Where! Are! They!¡± She said looking at me with bloodshot eyes. ¡°Good to see your awake. Let''s go we are having a meeting. As for the men, the station defense drones already caught them.¡± I told her nonchalantly. For a moment she blinks several times and frowns. ¡°Thats mean~! Don¡¯t wake me up like that, Noah!¡± She complained while pouting even with her cheeks slightly puffed out making a really cute face. ¡±Snap out of it! Until I know what she is I need to be careful.¡± I thought to myself while diverging my eyes as she rolls up the blanket and walks after me. With at least four of the crew present I can at least pass what is needed. Dad is still off but his body is in the ship and so is Lisa¡¯s. ¡°So what is going on that you needed to call so urgently.¡± Hilda asked as she carefully does some maintenance on her sword. I sit and Alex follows and then I begin to explain what happened and what I heard from Major Snocon. They were shocked while Alex¡¯s face darkened and that bloodlust began to seep out of her again. Not only that she began to murmur some real ominous stuff. ¡°Those bastards, they want to hurt my baby¡­ hehehe I''ll show them hehehe yeah I''ll teach them who is boss hehehe.¡± She kept murmuring sending a chill down our spins and I had to swallow my saliva out of fear. Let me tell you there isn¡¯t a lot that can scare me because of how much I traveled with dad but I will tell you a crazy person is one of the few remaining things that scare me. The saying ¡°Humans are the enemy of humans¡± isn¡¯t for show. The scariest thing in the galaxy isn¡¯t a fucking fire breathing dragon but a crazy raging human or humanoid who can cause widespread damage without moving much. I was actually starting to feel pity for the bandits we were going to face because knowing that Alex wouldn¡¯t forgive them I doubt their firewalls will hold her back from hacking their entire systems. ¡°Er¡­ so how will we be going about the raid?¡± Hilda asked trying to avoid commenting further. ¡°Well, our ship has less weapons so we are to remain further back when the space battle starts. A few guard ships will remain with us as they try to hack into the outpost and open the hangar so we can raid the inside.¡± I explain. ¡°Worthless¡­ trash hackers from this station can¡¯t do shit without their AI¡¯s help, tell those idiots not to do shit and me and Xeno will deal with this or else they will probably activate some self destruct function in the station by recklessly doing something stupid.¡± Alex said in a deadly low tone clearly not a suggestion it was an outright order to send this up to the higher ups. Considering how she was acting at the moment I couldn¡¯t help but not agree and actually did that and had major Snocon forward to Alex¡¯s communicator so that I wouldn¡¯t get the tongue lashing he was starting to give. In the end Alex ridiculed them to such an extent that the other side was completely silent and then she said that she will show them her skills and ran to the pilot seat and began activating the ship''s computers system and in no time at all she completely hacked into the low leveled security areas of the station and commented with the Major if there was any problems with her own skills. With that done I went to the corner and worried my ass off at what kind of repercussions will come from this idiot''s actions but in the end she was put as the main hacker of the mission and Jessica was trying to comfort me with a wry smile on her face not knowing how to actually go about doing that. After a while Dad and Lisa logged in and they were told our role and how it happened and dad acted just like me but he was almost to the point of shoving his face into the floor trying to bury his face. Alex remained in the pilot seat closing up all the holes she break in the station lower security areas and with permission from the station she even improved them a bit and reinforced the lower leveled sections of the coding. I was hoping there weren¡¯t any problems from this but I could only wait and see for now because we were now leaving the station with an escort of a dozen or so guard unit ships and several player fighter ships. It¡¯s time to get serious and so I push my worries aside as we began getting our things ready for combat. Chapter 24: Outpost Raid Part 1 Hackers Combat Authors Corner: A look at the hidden battle behind the scenes that change the tide in battle. All things related to hacking is pure bullshit on my part. I know shit about hacking so i just played around after watching to many anime that shocked something with it. Enjoy
¡°Hey guys, the guard ships have already picked up bandit raiders coming and their long range scanners already have the outpost on visual at 30 km ahead.¡± Alex¡¯s voice runs through the ship through loud speakers. ¡°So it¡¯s starting.¡± I mutter. I besides Alex, who was piloting but still had a hologram screen open to chat in the kitchen, me and the others were in the kitchen. ¡°So how is this going to go down?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°We should prepare beforehand. Hilda, you and my dad will wait in the workshop with me. I still need to arm my robot with the proper arm and weapon but that will go quickly. We will use the workshop exit to jump into the outpost once the doors are open.¡± I say and dad and Hilda nod. ¡°Jessica, the support frame for your snipers and railguns are set up correct?¡± ¡°Of course, I set them up before we left the station and they are set up on the turret platform so Alex needs to rise it from his controls.¡± She explains. ¡°Good, like I said before our ship is the least armed so we will be furthest back and it¡¯s even more so important to be ready because once Alex gets in range and begins hacking they outpost will know at once and will probably try attacking. That is why I want Lisa with you.¡± I say. ¡°Me?¡± She exclaimed surprised. ¡°Yes, the first reason is because your barriers can be used to protect both of you and with your telekinesis you can cause damage to the enemy by pulling or hitting them with your Psi. We will be inside an asteroid field so while they are moving at a fast speed we will be slow. If they aren¡¯t careful they will take damage. Also we have the ships own shields so unless something large takes them down you can help Jessica to protect the ship.¡± I told her. She nods after I explained. ¡°Why does it feel like Noah is the captain instead of Roktar?¡± Alex asked from her spot. ¡°Dad is smart but his planning skills is at a simple minded level.¡± I say bluntly. ¡°Oi!¡± He complained. ¡°OH! It''s similar to One Piece where there is a strong but stupid captain.¡± Lia said adding insult to injury. Dad sulks and we chuckle. ¡°Don¡¯t mind it dad, you are the strongest and most skilled in the crew. I will only be able to help when invading the hangar and will have to abandon the robot as after.¡± I comfort him and it works. Suddenly we feel the ship vibrate. ¡°Rockets incoming, shields are on and at best we will only feel the vibrations. We should get to battle spots and get ready for the worst.¡± Alex says. ¡°Come on let''s go!¡± Dad roars as he storms out of the room. We all split off into two groups as Lisa and Jessica go one way and start to climb a step ladder that leads into the overhead turret compartment. Dad, Hilda and I went to the workshop that was just that. There was a platform for my robot to stand and allow me to work lifts on all sides. On the left side were the boxes for robot parts and closer to the entrance was another box made specifically for the androids. After they got a class upgrades, the only thing inside those boxes were numerous components that are there for repairing parts. I will probably have to learn how to make upgrade parts for them and it could benefit me later one. I walk over to the robot that had the drill arm attached. Hop in and disconnect it and jump back out to remove the nerves and everything and store it away before pulling out the standard arm. It was the left arm that also possessed the shot guns. The method to load and unload is an automatic changing system. After the bullet is fired the shotgun will withdraw and inside the back part will open and the cartridges will be removed while new bullets will be placed. The reload time is 6 seconds and there is a 4 second charge time to gather psi around the bullets. I use 100 psi per round. (double barrel sawed off shotguns so 4 shots in 1 round.) We feel the ship shake a bit but I give it no mind as I move the arm into place and attack the wires before climbing in and firmly attaching the arm and testing to make sure it was working. With that checked I did a quick maintenance on Hilda to make sure she was at top condition before we fought and then it was time to wait. After a moment the ship suddenly shook violently. ¡°I have started Hacking and their attacking. Time estimate for me to creak their system is¡­ 2 minutes. Noah can you help with the defenses through your robot.¡± Alex asked. ¡°Lia, tell Alex that I can add some support in a few moments after I do the final checks.¡± I tell Lia.
Aye Sir!
After that it went on for some few moments before I jump into my robot and do the checks to see if the arm is properly attached. I then get up and grab the large sword leaning on the wall next to me and make the robot arm the shotgun and get the start charging. ¡°Lia, raise the energy shields for the cargo¡¯s then open the second floor cargo.¡± I order Lia. ¡°Wow so demanding~!¡± She said in a fake complaining tone making me roll my eyes as the windows appeared showing the system being accessed and instantly the energy shield activated. Moments later the thick metal locks on the large doors that kept it sealed unlocked and the door began to open. The next moment the ship suddenly shakes violently. ¡°Need help quickly please!¡± Alex¡¯s voice shouted. ¡°SHUT UP I KNOW!¡± I shouted complaining through the communicators directed at that whining trap. As the door finally opens completely I take a step outside and then grab a step ladder on the side which was placed there for this reason. Using it for the hand rails I attach the magnet boots to the hull of the ship I attach myself to the outside. Even though the ship was moving somewhat I didn¡¯t feel the movement. Inertia Dampeners work together with the ship''s shields so that those inside wouldn¡¯t feel the inertia but the effectiveness drops when the shields are down. When I reached the top of the ship I found a war happening. There were lots of fighters attacking and lots were coming our way. I find Lisa and Jessica on the turret platform. Jessica had just mounted one of the railguns and were aiming carefully towards one of the larger enemy ships. Those had the missiles that were aimed at us. The ship''s shields were visible and it was in large hexagon shaped blocks. If it wasn¡¯t for the shotguns, I wouldn¡¯t even be here since I don¡¯t have a use in long range and my robot still doesn¡¯t have space flight capabilities. Suddenly a large vibration comes from over at the platform as Jessica fires her shot. The extreme power of the railgun blasts towards the ship and slips right through our shields and rips through space as it impacted on the shield of the other ship causing a visual wave to ripple on the shield and cracks appeared with the bullets penetrated shot as its center. As for where the bullet hit, that would be right at the pilot''s seat which now had a broken window and a large amount of air leaking. ¡±This gir! Did she have Gunner improve that gun a bit?!¡± I thought. I never expected the railgun to be able to penetrate through the shields of a ship. I looked next to her and saw that the ¡°Bullets¡± actually looked like large drill bits. ¡°Wow~! She sure upgraded the railguns to fire such a fun bullet. From a basic scan it shows that those are actually built to penetrate strong shields.¡± Lia said after I looked.
Lisa: Noah, please focus and start helping!
I look at Lisa who was using her helmet and was looking my way. I nod and look up while activating my shot gun and when a fighter gets close I fire and make it momentarily go up in flames. The air in the life support in the ships can only hold an explosion for a few moments so even in space I still get to see a star spaceship explosion in space. The shotgun pellets have a great scattering effect in space and with one round fired at a ship around 100 meters away the spread could cover most of the ship. It''s obviously weaker than a concentrated attack but in space where any little damage to a ship can be fatal, a fighter ship with a mediocre shield didn¡¯t last the full psi charged shotgun barrage. ¡°How long Alex?¡± I asked.
Alex: A bit more keep them off my ass. Also, get those damned guards to protect us DAMN IT! We are at the back yet they aren¡¯t protecting as they should!
I looked around and see all the guards fighting and see she was right. They must have gone to intercept some ships. Guess we have to defend our own asses then. I move near the rear and defend that side while Lisa moves towards the front and defends from there. Alex PoV *Boom!!* Damn it! This shaking is really distracting. The system on this outpost pretty much shames the lower and middle level security measures on the station. Seriously these guys have some real strong backers. Not that it made much difference but the problem is that there were many problems with the system on the station. They had a very skilled programmer that set up the system like a web that would trigger lots of problems if something wasn¡¯t properly handled. What I had thought would be quick ended up a extremely irritating exercise and not only that the programmer seems to be actively countering me. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ¡°Xeno how is it on your side?¡± I asked.
Found 3 holes, two are traps that would backfire on our systems allowing them to hack into our system when we break through them and the third one is purposefully left so that they can open a hole in our firewall to hack us. The AI on that side is also watching everything and improving as we go. I¡¯ve already found several weak areas in the system so if you can stealthy modify a few parts we can slowly weaken it more until we can smash through. That said I found a worrisome thing.
¡°What?¡± I asked as I he pulls up a wall of codes and I take a quick look and move the screen to the side as I keep typing and trying to change something and make weaknesses in more obvious locations before changing a single code on the weak area and leave it along for some seconds.
It seems these guys are paranoid, they have set up a self destruct mechanism that starts to activate every 24 hours. When it activates the bandits have 10 minutes to punch in a password to deactivate it. Its also set to activate if the system is breached and the AI activates it. Then we have 1 hour to deactivate it since the bandits would obviously return to base and fight down there or abandon ship and leave us to our fate.
Oh! These guys are interesting, not only are they not stupid but they are even cautious to this point. If they are careless and forget the password then it would blow them up but it¡¯s also a quick way to get rid of evidence as well as those attacking them. Sadly we already found it so we are prepared. ¡°Xeno, while I slowly weaken that breach you showed me you try to find the password as stealthily as possible. Also find out if there is any kind of transmission going and coming into the station and try and track it.¡± I tell him.
On it!
With that I start to speed up my fingers as I type rapidly trying to out do the AI and programmer on the other side. I upload some virus I built and guide them into the trap holes and if I¡¯m lucky I can start to lag their systems. I make sure that they go and are uploaded with nothing left on our side. Occasionally I look at the weak zone that was getting weaker code by code in this huge battle. The other side is really careless even after I took down the lower and middle stage of their security programs. When I felt confident I got ready to break that weak spot. ¡°Xeno, did you find it?¡± I asked.
Part of it, about half of the password is decoded. Also, there are transmissions coming from the outpost. It seems to be coming from deep space but the trace stops after it gets beyond several thousand kilometers.
¡°Alright, since it¡¯s like this we will break in, get ready to subdue the AI and take control of their systems. The self destruct will most likely activate as well so after we get in try to learn it quickly.¡± I tell him and move my focus to the weak zone. Finally I type in a series of codes and that area becomes like a gate into the outposts system finally breaching the final defense.
Hacking has leveled up to 15
Two levels for a battle between hackers. Not bad I need to find more people to fight against in hacking, it will make my skill grow so much faster. At once a wave screens pop up and I start to sift through at a quick pace. I don¡¯t forget to do this though. ¡°Xeno open the chat to everyone.¡±
Its open.
¡°Guys! I¡¯m in! Wait a bit longer and the hangar will open, quickly subdue them so we can approach!¡± I tell all the guards and all the crews. Cheers came from them and the intensity of the battle escalated as the bandits were squashed and the ships began to move towards the outpost. I didn¡¯t stop hacking into their systems. I was able to get a layout of their outpost and found numerous traps and weapons inside so I had Xeno hack into those. The other hacker was trying to remove us but when Xeno entered he came and gave a huge blow to the AI with a virus he made personally to disrupt the functions and made it easy for him to smash her out of the system. With her out the hacker alone couldn¡¯t surpass the combined force of a pro hacker and an AI. The result of this was taking control of several systems of the station. We first opened the hangar but kept the energy shield active but changed it to let people in but no one could exit. Next I began to take over the security system and deactivating them. We needed to catch the bandits and not kill them so sadly I can¡¯t get a massive Exp boost from killing all the bandits in one go by doing something like removing all the air in the outpost. With the wrecks of the bandit ships left behind Xeno takes control of monitoring the system while searching and decoding the self destruct system that had activated. As the ships get near the massive rock that was around 80 - 100 meters in diameter a large square shaped area broke off and was pulled inside before it was pulled inside revealing the interior that was blocked by an energy shield. Inside was a number of fighter ships of different sizes and some shuttles as well. We could see the people moving down there.
Guard Captain: Star Comet crew, you possess a dwarf fighter, please enter first and distract them long enough for the others to enter.
This bastard, is he making us scapegoats. ¡°Noah, go in but just piss them off a bit. I will make the energy gates let you in and out. When that idiot guard enters you leave him open so that he can learn not to take advantage of those that are better then him!¡± I shout in my rage.
Noah: Yeah, I found him annoying as well, not to mention this is probably that same bastard Ogre that tried to act tough when I first entered the game.
Roktar: Oh it''s that guy leading? He actually has a grudge against dwarves and elves so he doesn''t care about doing something like this.
Alex: Really? He racist or something?
Roktar: Actually yes, he doesn¡¯t like the other races that originated from Elves. Don¡¯t ask me why since I have no idea.
With that side comment we drew close to the entrance and with a quick stop near it Noah floats down towards the back and with him is Roktar and Hilda. Seems they want in on the fun or maybe they got another objective. Oh looks like Lisa also joined. I hear footsteps from the corridor which was Jessica after she had her AI lower the turret platform. I eventually pulled the ship away a bit and worked the controls to have it pause in space. ¡°So how was it?¡± Jessica asked as she appeared. ¡°Hacking this place was fun. Still need to work on capturing the rest of the outposts systems and completely getting rid of that self destruct mechanism. Speaking of that, Xeno did you find more?¡± I asked.
Yes but there is a problem. You need to manually input it into the main computer in this room.
He pulls up a map of the outposts layout and a room was glowing red. ¡°How much time before it blows?¡± I asked.
00:54:32
¡°Pinpoint all the bandits in the station!¡± I ask and see many of them all over and notice a group in several corners. ¡°These groups, what is in those places?¡± I asked.
Those seem to be emergency escape shuttles. They need to blow the rock cover to open this and by doing that the outpost will depressurize.
I frown and quickly pull up all the systems of all these rooms and found the shuttle and everything as they were getting read. In the corridors and even inside the rooms itself there were security measures. ¡°We can¡¯t let them escape this way so activate the security systems in these areas and kill them all. We can explain it later!¡± I ordered and at once the many security systems came to life and rapidly killed almost half of the people.
You have leveled up. 3x
In the moment that nearly half of all these bandits in these areas died I gained 3 levels due to all the experience. I guess being the one to pull the trigger or my AI doing it counts as my kill. I gained another level soon after as they start running into the corridors only to be shot down. I put priority to keep alive those that looked like researchers and the brains of the operations but I make sure to cripple all the shuttle''s thrusters. ¡°There, that is enough the ships should be damaged in vital locations and would blow up if they start it up. Make suppression fire from now on and aid the others in the hangar as well. Also, contact Lia and the other AI and pass the outpost password to stop the detonation.¡± I said. With that it seems I have done what I can now we just need to quickly get in and find that computer before we do anything else. Chapter 25: Love of my Life Author Corner: Hehehe, now this chapter starts some rather funny stuff, for those who want romance in the fic, because of what will happen starting this chapter, the tag will return and i will be adding it soon because i will start adding parts like that in the coming chapters. Enjoy!
Noah PoV I was floating through space with dad and Hilda holding onto to my robot. As we neared the rock around the bandit outpost I guide Psi to my legs and back as I activate the basic propulsion. I back my feet move forward so that I land without crashing. I also activate something on my legs. It causes to two small lids to on the front and back of the leg and a hook on each appeared. When I was a meter above the rock in front of the hangar opening, there was about 10 meters between the energy gate and the opening that opened in the rock, the hooks shot out and dug into the rock and pulled me down and kept me there. The hook retracted and I leaned forward and jumped towards the gate. Alex told us there was a gravity generator that activates after entering past the energy gate. As we were halfway through I feel Psi cover my body. The head of the robot turns around at my order and I see Lisa flying through space quickly catching up. She was freely swimming through space and she easily did a turn around us as if examining us. Then she waved her hand making us start to move faster towards the gate. The moment we touched it we felt no resistance and crossed through before gravity took hold. *Thump! The sound of my heavy feet landing followed by Hilda¡¯s own heavier than normal weight hit the ground. Unlike before where her armor showed her feminine features, now it looks like her armor was battle armor and was bulkier. Only her face showed but she had a helmet to protect her head but it didn¡¯t have any other function since her computer was in her head. (https://wallpaperscraft.com/image/samus_aran_metroid_girl_armor_102683_540x960.jpg) Before anything I instantly send psi into the psi shield generator and dome like shield appears in front of me. Just as it goes up a laser shot hits the shield. ¡°Kill those bastards! They really fucked with the wrong people this time!¡± Shouted one of the outlaws that was hiding in behind a ship. ¡°Spread out, dad to the left and Hilda the right. I¡¯ll keep them distracted in the center. I can handle a good number of attacks on the shield.¡± I said. ¡°¡°On it!¡±¡± They both said and ran out before jumping behind ships. Dad pulled out a laser rifle and Hilda took out a Plasma blade but didn¡¯t activate. She trains in Iai, the art of drawing, attacking and sheathing the sword in one motion. She normally fights like that when against one enemy. I grab the huge sword on my back and run forward. The gravity is at 1 g so there was nothing to obstruct me. The robot was already fully reinforced so my agility wasn¡¯t impaired and with the few months of training I did, I could move effortlessly in this robot now. As I bulldoze through the Hangar, I locked on the bandit that attacked first. He was hiding behind a small one man fighter. As I get near I jump over the fighter and flip the sword to its side and land with my back to him. Before he could react I did a 180% turn bringing the flat side of the sword to hit him and send him flying to the ground 2 meters away completely knocked out. Killing isn¡¯t the objective so no point in pointlessly doing it. *Boom* Before I could react I large explosion came from just behind me as my shield blocks something but it sends me flying to the ground 4 meters away. I look at my energy and saw that the shield took 1400 psi to block that and the inertia still passed and hit me. ¡°Looks like things won¡¯t be so simply. These guys have kinetic rocket launchers. Luckily they don¡¯t have any plasma or anything.¡± Lia informed me. With a nod I quickly pushed off the ground and stood before looking at the bastard. Lia pinpointed the trajectory where it came from and I spotted the bastard location. I gave no thought to the others as I jumped over every fighter and reached the bastard. ¡°You asshole, go die!¡± I shouted as I slam him in the chest with a reinforced fist. My fist drove him right into the ship he was hiding behind and he remained imbedded into it but had coughed up a large mouthful of blood. I had hit him right in the chest and probably broke some ribs and probably damaged some organs. ¡°I¡¯ll say it once to you all, we have the station surrounded, you give up willingly or you will all end up like this asshole.¡± I shouted having my voice amplified by the robot¡¯s speaker. ¡°You can go fuck yourself you fucking midget!¡± Shouted one man as he pulled out what looked like an energy grenade. Before the man could throw the grenade Hilda appeared behind him and grabbed the hand with the grenade and with her right hand, a simple and effective Karate Chop to the side of the neck made the man''s grip lighten as his eyes turn hazy and he falls to the ground completely knocked out. ¡°Such idiots that don¡¯t pay attention to their surroundings. Trying to use big weapons in such a small space will kill everyone.¡± She said nonchalantly as she ducked behind the ship out of view of the other outlaws. She deactivates the grenade and stores it away since we don¡¯t have any and given time I can probably produce them if I learn what I need. ¡°Gyahhh!¡± One man shouted as he flew into the air and landed on the ground bloody. As I run towards another target, I saw dad swiftly run around the ships as he pounded each outlaw with one or two punches. We didn¡¯t get weapons for stunning them so we just smash them down. When about one fourth was beat down Lisa entered the shield. ¡°Guys, let¡¯s wrap this up, the guards are coming.¡± She said and stuck her hand out. She does a grabbing motion as she floats and lifts her hand making four outlaws lift 3 meters into the air before she slammed them into the ground. She then spread her Psi out and with a yank she disarmed them before aiming all the weapons back at them. ¡°Give up now please.¡± She said in a gentle tone but it was more intimidating them my shout. Elves are such a cheating race. All the other races need to do so much to match up to that broken skill to use Psi. Lisa isn¡¯t that good but telekinesis isn¡¯t some kind advanced psi technique. It was one of the simplest forms of using Psi and with her control she can easily fake her skill. As a result of losing all their weapons they were extremely fearful but they still tried to take out throwing weapons, all of which were, confiscated, by Lisa. When she took the last weapon she muttered, ¡°This is all good loot, I wonder when we''ll get to use it all.¡± I chuckle but turn to the men and make the shotgun pop out. ¡°You guys give up or i¡¯ll blow your brains out.¡± I said and aimed the shotgun barrels at them. They all turned ghostly pale and instantly fell to the ground with their faces down. This was like a police arrest but we used so much overwhelming strength that their spirits broke. Still looking at the weapon, I knew they were well armed. If we didn¡¯t take over the outpost, I¡¯m sure that defense systems would also be active and it wouldn¡¯t be as simple as intimidating them. We don¡¯t have the stun weapons but we did get a supply of energy cuffs so we cuff them all before we search them for other weapons and items. I found that for people that have been arrested we could actually look into the inventory which was a nice surprise. This must be a system for police to search them, good system. We take all the grenades and ammo from them. Halfway through the first Guards walked in pointing their weapons but once they saw all the cuffed outlaws and saw us they were surprised. ¡°You guys are late, all the fun was taken.¡± Dad said and laughed. Just then the captain ogre walked into the station and saw the situation. When he took off his helmet he had a frown on his face. Most likely he didn¡¯t think we could subdue them all but when he saw Lisa floating with the pile of weapons and ammo and other things he seems to more or less understand as he sneered. ¡°Men head into the corridors, capture stragglers, the Tosk hacker has already linked to your coms and should be uploading a map of the station and where the stragglers are.¡± The captain said. As he said that my suit opens up and I jump out before having it go on standby and not let anyone inside. ¡°Lisa, let me see the weapons.¡± I asked. She brought the pile down and I looked through it all and took a plasma Rifle, pistol, another laser pistol, two boxes of grenades and a box of power cells for each kind of weapon. ¡°Can you take these back to the ship. Also see with Alex if there is anything she needs. I remember she said that the outpost had a self destruct mechanism.¡± I said. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll be back in a bit.¡± She said nodding. Before she left the others also look through the pile and get better weapons. A good number of new weapon never hurts. ¡°Now we should proceed to the central controls and secure that room. I think the Alex can¡¯t get 100% of the systems under her control.¡± I said. ¡°We need to be careful, it¡¯s not going to be so simple since the outlaws were pushed into a corner. A cornered rat will always fight harder.¡± Dad said. ¡°Yeah but¡­¡± I said as I look at the guards walking through. ¡°...for the most part, we don¡¯t need to fight all of them. Let¡¯s profit a bit more while the guards take care of the remaining bandits.¡± I mutter. Everyone¡¯s ears perk as they listen closely. ¡°Lia, open a chat with Alex and Jessica so they can hear.¡± I said.
On it...Done!
¡°Alex, jessica, can you hear us.¡± I asked.
Alex: Yep!
jessica: Yes, what do you need.
¡°I need you guys to search the outpost layout for rooms that have storage of weapons and where there may be weapon and ship blueprints. We can profit a lot from those.¡± I said quietly so only my crew heard.
Alex: I can leave Xeno to do that but I need to head into the station because I need to manually deactivate the self destruct. Only at the master controls can I do that and it''s being guarded at the moment. The security measures in that area is also separate from the main bulk of the stations security system so I can''t hack into it without being within the sector.
¡°Lisa, I¡¯m counting on your to bring Alex down, we will go cleaning up and searching. Also make sure she doesn¡¯t get caught up with the ships in here.¡± I said. Lisa nodded and took off with the items behind her. ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± I said as I arm the laser rifle and head into the corridor the guards pass through. The guards were entering all the rooms but took nothing besides any hidden bandits. After they leave we would enter and look for items. Soon the other crews appeared and began to do that same but we did make sure to help out. I couldn¡¯t help as much since I didn¡¯t train with hand rifles but the pistols didn¡¯t have recoil so I could still shook but holding the large rifles wasn¡¯t as easy. Soon enough Alex reached us with a sad expression. ¡°Stop moping and lead the way to the man controls.¡± I said to her. ¡°Sure¡­¡± She said as she took out the map and then lead us in front after the cost was clear. When Xeno warned us of bandits we would find a computer console in one of the rooms, after searching it of course, and he would activate the defense systems but put suppressing and non lethal fire. After a bit the systems deactivate and we would cuff the men. Being able to use the outposts own defense systems is definitely cheating. When we were getting close, we began to make more stops because there were many rooms here with useful things. Weapon cases, building materials, research tools and so on. In one of the rooms we found a partially empty office but as we looked, I found an item that looked like a small metal pen but when activated it opens up and resembled a tablet like item. When I activated it and looked through the information stored there, I smiled. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. ¡°Hey Alex, look at this.¡± I said. Alex walked over and looked at the things on the tablet thing. On it were several dozen blueprints for fighters. Just like the ones in the hangar, it showed us all the structural information of the ships. ¡°YAY! With this we can get one of those damaged single man fighters for me. From here it says they run on power cells that last 3 hours under intense combat and can be charged when connected to a power cuplet in a station or ship. YES! This thing even tells us how to build the charging station. The smallest ship can fit through the cargo doors so we can convert part of the cargo into a hanger!¡± Alex said as her eyes sparkled with a bit of drool on her mouth. She was lastly imagining everything about the ship. I just roll my eyes and store the item secure, since there are many types of ship blueprints, and we continue searching. We didn¡¯t find much else besides a safe with 5k credits. We took money from those first bandits so we gained around 8K total. Poor bastards. After that we visited one last room before entering the main sector. Inside we found something strange. It was in the middle of the room that looked like a research room. It looked like a large cylinder from a life support but there were many wires plugged in. As I looked at it I felt a faint energy emanating from it which was similar to other engines. This must be some kind of drive but the green color, shape and everything about it screams unknown alien tech. ¡°Help me unplug this, this thing is some kind of engine and I want to study this and figure it out.¡± I said as I begin unplugging all the wires. After 10 minutes all the wires were removed and the thing was floating by Lisa¡¯s command. I told her to hide it inside one of the crates with parts. Parts can always be obtained but this is probably something special in the outpost. We remove a lot of parts to fit the thing near the middle of the box before we covered it up. With the item safely stored we enter the main sector and were instantly received with weapon fire. The security system activated nearly instantly. At once large turret like weapons appeared from the ceiling and aimed at us. We all paled as we ran back into the nearest room before it could fire. ¡°That...was close.¡± I said feeling my heart in my throat. ¡°Yeah.¡± Lisa said trembling a bit. I frowned since the hall was to small for my robot. If it was bigger I could fit it in comfortably. The robot is 3.5 meters tall and around 2.5 wide. The corridors are 3 meters high and 5 wide. The 0.5 in height restricts my movement far too much. I can¡¯t swing my weapon and I would always be crouched. ¡°So what now?¡± Dad asked as he snuck a peek outside and saw the defense system aimed our way. ¡°Let me take care of this.¡± Alex says as she looks at the computer in the room. She goes and connects a wire from the her communicators to the console. Her fingers start to move rapidly and multiple screens appear. I could see her frowning as she types away before sighing. ¡°No can do, this room is the last one before the system of the master room defense.¡± She says. ¡°Then we have to do it the brutish way.¡± I said as I pull out an energy grenade that the bandits were using. I walk to the door and activate it by pressing the button on top and with a quick step outside I toss it as close as possible. Just as the thing flew and I stepped back a laser shot hit the floor where I was standing. *Boom* What followed was a heavy explosion in the hallway. When I looked outside I saw that the corridor was a wreck with dented floors and lights flickering while the defenses were smashed. ¡°Lets go, we need to find a room quick and hack into the system and deactivate it.¡± I said as I walk out and start moving. The others follow behind as we pass the destroyed machines. As we reach a turn I stopped and looked over the side and saw that there was more weapon turrets and even heavily armed guards there. ¡°Lisa, can you make some of these invisible with an illusion or something.¡± I asked in a whisper ¡°I can make a barrier to distort light so yes, what do you need.¡± She asked. ¡°Get one grenade to each turret and then one in between both guards. No matter how well armed they are, taking an explosion at point blank range is impossible to get out of without a scratch.¡± I said and took out three grenades. She holds her hands out and the grenades float up. Then a small film appears around them before it began to shimmer and suddenly the ball vanished. Lisa then quietly walked to the edge of the corridor before the turn and peeked out as she controlled her psi. After 2 minutes she put her hand down and quickly moved back and made a barrier in front of us. *BOOM* As one the three grenades blew up and we saw the body of one of the guards slam into the wall here followed my a lot of scrap metal. With a wave her her hand, Lisa made the dust instantly settle. We all lifted our weapons as we moved forward. The door the men were standing in front was probably for the master controls so when we approached we stood to one side as I peeked inside. I couldn¡¯t see anyone and with no voices I began to wonder if there wasn¡¯t anything but to be careful I picked up a large rock and threw it into the room but as it hit the floor nothing happened. Seeing nothing happen I didn¡¯t relax. ¡°I will go first, make sure Alex doesn¡¯t enter until we know it¡¯s perfectly safe.¡± I said. Everyone nodded and I slowly stepped out with the laser pistols in front. With nothing happening I walked into the room making sure to check up and around me but all I saw was a supercomputer and lots of monitors. After going all around I finally reach the main computer but since nothing happened I called the others. ¡°So now it¡¯s my turn, stand back as I take over this puppy.¡± Alex said and walked up and began working. It took a bit before she finally relaxed. ¡°Done, now the outpost is totally in my control.¡± *Wah wah wah wah!* Suddenly the room turned bright red and alarm sounds began to sound. The screen of the supercomputer monitor turned to a counter of 10 minutes. ¡°Self destruct process activated. All system lockdown.¡± A female voice said but it was followed by a male''s voice. ¡°You idiots pushed you luck to far.¡± Was all it said and the counter began to descend. ¡°Didn¡¯t you deactivate the self destruct.¡± I asked. ¡°Nope, I knew this would happen, Xeno warned me after he found it. He told me that it was activated from the outside and if we disable it before we take over the station the man activating it will simply activate it with a different code. If we take control and then he does it, he won¡¯t be able to do anything after it is cleared.¡± Alex said. At that she turned and began to type again and more screens appeared as she began working. The timer ticked as the timer dropped one second at a time. After the system reached 1 minute we were getting desperate but Alex suddenly stopped working with a smile. ¡°Done, with that the bombs have short circuited in their most critical parts and all their systems are trashed now. We just need to let the counter drop to zero so that the other party doesn¡¯t suspect anything.¡± She said. We watch the counter and when it reached 10 seconds, I felt a cold sweat on my back. One second by one dropped and finally¡­ 3, 2, 1 click¡­. The lights of the outpost suddenly go off. Ten seconds later they all come back on.
You have succeeded in disabling the self destruct mechanism in the Bandit outpost. With the presence of the Station guard, this outpost will now be turned into a mining outpost which will become a drop point for miners going deeper in more dangerous space. Due to your crews contribution, your crew will gain 10k more and can freely use the station without tax as well as claim anything currently in the station.
¡°We did it.¡± I said. The others cheered. From that moment Alex called all the guards and told them we took over the outpost completely. Afterwards we began to look around for more things and found more weapon storage rooms. We don¡¯t take the weapons since we have plenty but the ammo is a different story. Can¡¯t have enough of that. We find another pad like the one before but this one has weapon blueprints. Most for laser and plasma weapons. I¡¯ve been curious of the true workings but with this, researching each part will help and with so many guns we acquired I will have plenty of things to work with and train my weapon construction and programming skill. The final thing we had to choose was Alex¡¯s fighter. She stood firm on this and would not back down an inch. We ended up picking out the smallest one man fighter that was very small with two blasters in the middle of its wings and two at the tips and one two barrel laser in front of the pilot seat with 5 hours of life support and power cell life. (http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/bmck/Space/Mosquito/mosquito-001.jpg) It really did fit into the cargo, both of them, so we put it into the upper cargo where my workshop was. It would be better there since it works as a mechanics shop so I can always do maintenance. ¡°Well this was profitable, now all that''s left is to get our pay and then splung a bit.¡± Dad said with a laugh. ¡°Not so fast, we need to identify that strange engine, after we get our pay we will go to the trade ship and look for someone to identify it.¡± I said. ¡°Sure, that seems fine.¡± Jessica said. ¡°My love, my pretty.¡± We hear Alex saying as she hugs the fighter that was inside the workshop. We could only smile wryly before we call her so that we can return to the station. While she drove back we organized all the ammo in our cargo. The weapons were organized in my workshop while ammo was in the cargo. At the station we got the promised reward of 30k plus 10k from the contribution as well as getting a better communicator which was also a reward. Now they could transmit sound for both the AI and incoming calls. This would also transfer over to when we are in space. After getting our rewards we head to the trade ship. With Alex and Xeno taking care of the landing permission we enter the same hanger that the freight ship used but there was spaces for smaller ships which we took. ¡°Come on, we need to find someone to identify the item first before we bring it.¡± I said as we walk into the massive planetoid sized ship. As we enter we find lots of those imp like beings and the Zastros walking about. Before we could walk much I spot a familiar woman walking my way with a smile. ¡°Well, greetings Mr. noah, what may I do for you today.¡± She said. ¡°Hello miss Havic we came because we acquired an item we need identifying since we don¡¯t know what kind of technology.¡± I said. ¡°Oh, what kind of technology?¡± She asked. ¡°An engine of some kind.¡± I said. ¡°Well, I know about some things as part of my study to be a saleswoman so I can have a look.¡± She said. ¡°Great, let¡¯s go.¡± Alex suddenly said. ¡°Oh¡­¡± Havic said. ¡°Sorry that is our pilot, Al¡­¡± I suddenly feel a gust of wind pass me. ¡°Hyaa!¡± I hear a girly yell come from behind. I notice Havic is gone and when I turn I find her burying Alex¡¯s head in her well rounded bosom. ¡°My god!! Such a beautiful girl! I finally found my true love! This is definitely love at first sight! Please be mine!¡± She suddenly shouted while Alex was having her face stuffed into the massive bosom. Everyone in the surroundings were totally stunned and couldn¡¯t keep up. ¡°L-let me go. I¡¯m muffhuff.¡± Before alex could say more she had her face buried in Havic¡¯s bsom again. ¡±I feel this can¡¯t end well.¡± I thought to myself as I watch Havic suddenly grip Alex¡¯s tail and stroke it making her start to go weak kneed. ¡±Yeah, very bad! Chapter 26: Rewards with Consequences Author''s corner: Shorter chapter then normal but gets right to the point. Gonna get a move on and start the fun. I also hope everyone loves what i did for Havic and Alex. Also i have added the romance tag since it will slowly start to creep up here and there (not to mention Alex and Havic) Enjoy!
¡°Hya~! Stop! No~~~!¡± Alex shouted as Havic skillfully massaged the very tip of her tail just before started to bite and like Alex¡¯s ear. She was rubbing herself on Alex¡¯s left side making sure to keep her tightly pressed on her body while she makes sure to thoroughly rape Alex in every possible way. All the things she did was so skillful that is seemed like she prepared for this a long time ago. ¡°What is going on here!¡± Shouted a deep angry males voice. Looking back I see Frethir walking up with an angry glare as he looked around. Only when he was 10 meters away from us did he notice Havic. ¡°HAVIC! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING TO A CUSTOMER!¡± He shouted with all his might. She totally disregarded Frethir. She let go of Alex¡¯s tail and from her position on Alex¡¯s right she grabs her face and turns her face towards her and gives her a deep kiss. A moment later she separated showing she was using tongue. Without exception there wasn¡¯t a male, beside the Zastros, that wasn¡¯t bending slightly forward. This scene was simply to hot. After she separated her lips Alex she grabbed Alex¡¯s tail again and her legs finally gave way and she dropped to the ground without strength while trembling with teary eyes. ¡°Stop~!¡± She said in a slightly sobbing tone. The image of Alex teary eyed while she trembled was so shocking that Havic froze in place. *Paw!* ¡°Ouch!¡± Havic suddenly shouted. Without anyone noticing Frethir appeared behind her and gave her a firm punch to the back of her head and now she was crouching with tears in her head while she held the back of her head. She looked back a Frethir. ¡°What was that for?¡± She said. ¡°What?... look at what you did to that girl, you''re still asking me what?!¡± He shouted. ¡°She is my soulmate! My love at first sight and my partner for life now!¡± Havic shouted as she stood up. At once Frethir facepalmed. ¡°Can *hic* you stop calling me *hic* a girl. I¡¯m a guy!¡± Alex suddenly cried making the entire area go silent as we looked at her. ¡­ ¡°What¡­?¡± Havic suddenly muttered. ¡°Ah so you were a male! Finally I can relax!¡± Dad said with a sigh. ¡°Man living with a trap is hard on your mental state.¡± He said. Neither me, Jessica, Lisa, Hilda or any AI could hold our laugh back and let it out. ¡°Wait¡­ you''re lying right?¡± Havic said as she looked down at Alex?¡± She said suddenly she pinned Alex on the floor and without shame she probed for his manhood. ¡°Ah~!¡± Alex cried after being so shamelessly grabbed. Yeah this was probably the worst day of her life. ¡°It¡¯s here¡­ it¡¯s a guy¡­¡± Havic said and stood up and took a few steps back. ¡°But¡­ that face¡­ such a thing only belongs to girls¡­¡± She said. Before she could pull herself together Alex forced himself up and ran over and hid behind dad who was a huge meat shield. ¡°Calm down Havic.¡± Frethir said as he was saying in a careful tone trying to keep Havic from breaking down. ¡°That face¡­ but it''s there¡­ I marked him so¡­ there is only one thing I can do¡­¡± She muttered. The next moment she looked Alex¡¯s way while her eyes had a glint in them that would send a chill up everyone''s spine. ¡°Yeah, all I need to do is remove it with the proper surgical procedure.¡± She said and the most charming smile appeared on her face but her eyes were far from smiling. Every man felt a chill in between their legs not to mention Alex and had already started to cry. *PAW* ¡°GRAAHHH!¡± Havic shouted even more as her had was punched heavily. ¡°Get a hold of yourself you idiot.¡± Frethir said in a cold tone. His right arm had completely morphed and was huge and looked like the arm of all those giant Zastros. ¡°D-did you have to hit so hard?¡± She said looking at him from below. ¡°Do you even realize what you just said. What kind of nightmares will the people present have after hearing that.¡± He said in an ice cold. ¡°But¡­ I love girls not men and I marked her!¡± Havic said. ¡°I¡¯m a guy! Stop calling me a girl!¡± Alex shouted. ¡°That face belongs only to girls!¡± Havic replied with a smile as she eyed Alex making him hide behind dad again. ¡°What do you mean you marked him?¡± I asked. Frethir changed his arm back to normal as he massaged the bridge of his nose. ¡°Our race, the Zastros, has a unique mating method. The females are highly attractive but they won¡¯t take any random man and aren¡¯t actually sex fiends even if they look like it¡­¡± Frethir said. ¡°¡±¡±¡±Hey!!¡±¡±¡±¡± All the present female Zastros shouted. ¡°Anyway, the females have a condition where they take ¡°Love at first sight¡± to the extreme and sexually assault their love interest and they expel a pheromone unique to their body that marks their ¡°partner''s¡± body. This pheromone is a one shot thing and it keeps the female of our race from being consumed by lust but when they get a partner they release everything. After that they must at least see their partner once a day for some time or be around them so that the pheromone keeps them calm or they will get increasingly horny and even dangerous.¡± Frethir said bluntly. ¡°So¡­ in other words Alex stays or she comes with us?¡± I asked. ¡°Precisely.¡± He replied. ¡°I don¡¯t give a damn, just keep her away from me, don¡¯t make me get a restraining order!¡± Alex shouted trembling behind dad. ¡°Oh my honey, don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll follow you anywhere and I just need to be within 10 meters of you to not lose myself. I¡¯ll make you see the light that having that thing between your legs will only hold you back from true happiness.¡± Havic said without any shame. ¡°Help me!!¡± Alex shouted nearly breaking down again while holding her junior. ¡°Just suck it up Alex, be a ¡°man¡± and take responsibility.¡± Hilda said while her mouth was twitching as she held back her smile. ¡°Fuck you, why don¡¯t you take my place since she loves girls so much. ¡°I¡¯m only interested in the nice squishy kind with a some meat on them. Tin cans with their looks is pleasing to the eyes but no one from our race would mark an android.¡± She says while giving a look at the two androids. ¡°That said, the elf looks rather nice.¡± She says licking her lips. ¡°Hmph, try and come at me and I will toss you into space.¡± Lisa said bluntly. ¡°Hehe, you wouldn¡¯t have time to even have an ounce of psi leave your body before you¡¯re in my hands.¡± Havic said. Lisa rolls her eyes and looks towards dad through the corner of her eyes. ¡°Hmm, so it¡¯s like that huh~.¡± She said with a mischievous grin. Lisa flinched as she heard that. ¡°W-what?¡± She said but Havic just grinned. ¡°Havic!¡± Frethir said in a deadly low tone. ¡°Stop taking up more of their time!¡± Frethir said. ¡°Sorry sorry, everyone sorry for the commotion, I couldn¡¯t control myself. Teehee!¡± She said. At that all the people watching began to disperse after Frethir did some gestures for them to go. Havic gets up and straightens her secretary clothes. ¡°Well, since I already marked my honey I will have to leave the trade ship since I can¡¯t be too far from her, you can help with the resigning paperwork right?¡± She said. ¡°Stop calling me a girl!¡± Alex shouted but it just reached deaf ears. Frethir just sighed, ¡°Can¡¯t change the past now. What''s done is done.¡± He said and faced us. ¡°You are all lucky¡­ besides the Tosk at least, Havic is one of our senior merchant. She has knowledge of how to identify items, minerals and many items that would be good for selling. She can give an accurate price for most things and her skills in finance is top notch. Only her personality is a bit hard to handle.¡± He says. ¡°Hey, I resent that!¡± She said. ¡°Don¡¯t care, go get your things. You can take a set of space armor and battle armor each to protect yourself in space and battle. Besides that, all your personal stuff can leave as well.¡± He says. ¡°Alright, it will take me about an hour or two before i¡¯m completely packed. Miss elf, mind helping me carry my things?¡± She asked. Lisa thought a moment before shrugging. ¡°Sure.¡± She said. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll be back soon~! Wait for me honey~!¡± Havic said and quickly ran away. Alex was grinding her teeth which, surprisingly, revealed a pair of sharp fangs on both upper and lower jaw. After Havic was gone, Alex dropped down and sat on the floor. ¡°My life is ruined¡­¡± he said. ¡°Hey, cheer up, you got a sexy woman after you now.¡± Dad said and laughed. ¡°Fuck you! If she actually wanted what I had then I would be fine but she wants to take him away! How much do you think I worked to make myself look less girly as possible!¡± Alex cried back. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. ¡°... doesn¡¯t seem you put much effort during the character creation to me.¡± Hilda said bluntly making Alex even more depressed. ¡°We can¡¯t change our body so much so I tried to make it less girly but even then¡­¡± He said. ¡°Why didn¡¯t you go for a dwarf or ogre?¡± I asked. ¡°One is too large to fit in small ships and one seat fighters, the other short and works best as mechanic but not pilot. Too much of a difference in size for both.¡± He replied. ¡°Then why did you choose such a girly Tosk?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°The reptile I am based off is called Royal Yellow Iguana. The royal part signifies my extreme human form while retaining small bits of reptile parts. This race was chosen because its both the least dangerous but also one of the most intelligent Tosk variants and most dexterous since my hands are very humanlike but much more flexible. This one matched my preference but it''s a race of tosk that possess smaller physic.¡± Alex said. ¡°What are you all talking about?¡± Frethir asked with a brow raised and a slight frown. ¡°Its nothing really, just random talk.¡± I replied. He looks at me and shrugs. ¡°I¡¯ll be going, i¡¯m sorry about Havic¡¯s¡­ inconvenience and her forcibly entering your crew.¡± He said and bowed. ¡°Its nothing, like you said, can''t change the past.¡± Dad replied with a smile. Frethir nodded and looked us over and nodded again. ¡°Good luck with everything and your own futures.¡± He said and walked away. Alex gets up and while gloom he starts walking towards the ship. ¡°I¡¯m going to wallow in misery while in my fighter since I feel safer there at least.¡± He said and walked away. We could only sigh and shake our head before we looked at each other and started chuckling at the show we got before at Alex¡¯s expense. Since we could do nothing we just decide to wait since we only came for the identification of the alien tech. Never would have expected that coming to simply identify something would snag us a demoness merchant. Maybe we should bring Alex into all the stations. Maybe, even as a trap he has the harem builder gene. If that is true then we might get highly skilled crew members. Then again this is just rambling and my imagination. After a bit dad gets bored so I tell him about the food stands and where fresh fruits and stuff are. He goes to take a look but doesn''t take money since we already have most of the barrels filled and don''t have space for more. After a while Havic and Lisa appeared with seven large bags with clothes and personal items. When I looked at Lisa, her face was deep red all the way to the tip of her pointy ears. "Huh? Where is my Honey?" Havic said looking around. "He returned to the ship to wallow in misery. What happened to her?" I asked pointing to Lisa. "Nothing!" Lisa suddenly shouted and looked away. The two androids giggled while Havic had a mischievous grin on her face. I more or less understood what happened and could only sigh. "Do you know about alien technology?" I asked. "Depends the type, since this trade ship travels within all three factions as a neutral trade ship we see lots of types so it really depends." She explained in a professional tone nothing like the seductive demoness she looks like or how she acted before. "I wonder if we will have room for all your things?" Jessica muttered. Like she said I began to wonder as well since there was a lot of items from tools to clothes. "We will figure it out. Lets get to the ship and leave her things in the girls room before we check the tech we acquired." I said. "Great, I want to make sure I know all the hiding places on the ship so honey doesn''t run away." She said with a blissful expression. I message dad telling him she is back before we head to the ship. After dropping her bags off in the girls bedroom we head to my workshop where the engine thing was located. As soon as Havic''s eyes met the thing they got a bit wider as she walked over. She had me move it and distance it from the wall as she began to open different lids looking through it all. She had a serious expression that reminded me of the ship builder at the stations. After half an hour she finishes closing up the final lid before she sighs. "You guys got yourself some amazing luck I''ll say." She commented. "What do you mean?" Lisa asks. "Well besides obtaining me to your crew, this little thing, it''s a Xetra Blink drive." She said. We just stared at her not knowing how to react. "Xetra is the race that created this, they are large and bug like but super intelligence. Most of their ships are built with biotech but important things like engines and these are all machines. This thing can allow your ship to move a fixed distance at 2/5 the speed of light. Normally it''s just short distance like 1000 kilometers but as an escape tool its efficient by it consumes a lot of power if not installed into one of the Xetra ships." She explained. "So it''s a very short distance hyperdrive?" I asked. "Yes." She replied. "Yea, we really did get lucky and those bandits were super unlucky, Bahahah!" Dad said and laughed. "Bandits?" Havic said confused. We then explain how we acquired this and showed her most of the things we acquired. She had a bit of a stern expression like she was thinking of something. "For now I think we can try and install this, do you know how it works?" I asked Havic. "Its supposed to be connected to the shield generators, engine and Power generator. The shields will act as a barrier to help speed up while the other two feed the power and propel us. Besides the basics I don''t know how to work this since its very uncommon and Xetra are isolationist so their technology is rare. We had beat be careful so that the boss of those bandits don''t find this with us." She said. We all nod as and look at the machine before we all split to do as we please. Havic instantly goes to the fighter in the workshop and tries to open the sealed fighter ship class window where Alex was inside but it was firmly sealed and Alex even pulls the skin under his eye and sticks his tongue out at Havic as she fails leaving her with a few tears in her eyes. I go and start looking over my robot to see if no damage got through after the rocket hit. And like that we spent some time before we finally got Havic away from Alex so he could reach the cockpit and get us back to the station. Somewhere in space *Knock Knock "Enter" a deep menacing voice called from within the room. The room was dark and filled with smoke. The man sitting in the chair was an underground boss. He had a large scar going from his left cheek to his nose then rising to his forehead. His hair was pure black and was sleek as if it was coated in gel. In his mouth was a large cigar made from some kind of alien plant. One of the large metal double doors opens and from outside walkes in an old butler with grey hair and a large grey mustache. His face was heavily wrinkles and colored green. "Sir, I have received a report from Kelha II asteroid outpost." The butler said. "Speak!" The boss said as he focuses. There was valuable technology to him in that outpost that was being readied to come to his hands here. "The station had located the outpost when one of the men shot a tracker and it was spotted by the target. From it they traced back to the outpost. Some hours ago they raided the outpost and reported in saying that the outpost was using what could only be described as a master class hacker. They took most of the systems besides the main controls. An half an hour later they took the master controls but we activated the self destruct and it detonated before it could be undone." The butler finished reporting. Veins were appearing on the forehead and face of the boss. "Send out a search party to retrieve all the remaining tech. It should have been in an explosion resistant safe room to survive the self destruct." The boss said. "There is more sir." The butler said. "What?!" "There were a number of our ship and weapon blueprints that were stolen. Because of the micro trackers implanted in all of them we seen that there are a few crews that obtained something from us." The butler explained. "Send a raid group to all hunt thos maggots down. I want all my tech back. If these bastards build the tech good saves us the time and money to get it." He said. "What rank groups should we send sir?" The butler asked. The boss leaned back as took the Cigar from his mouth and shoved it into a tray before smothering it. "Send rank 5 men!" He said with a sinister grin. Idea/suggestion Needing some ideas for plot, i had thought of adding another terraforming mission but don''t know what type. If you guys can put down some ideas i can use later it would be good but please put more ideas i can use at this moment and not in 10 years. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Thanks Chapter 27: King of Alcohol Aurthor''s Corner: First i must thank everyone for the many great ideas for both Nebula and Clockwork. I got lots of inspirations and mixing and matching the ideas made some very interesting ideas to use. Terraforming mission coming next but not this chapter. This chapter i have fun with dwarves as they fight to keep their pride. Enjoy~!
After several minutes we could unstick Havic from the fighters window and convince her to allow Alex to go pilot the ship and return us to the station. Now that the Alex could retreat to his seat, and soon after seal the small corridor to it with a bulkhead door making Havic bang on it asking to let her in, we returned to the station where we would think of where to take our course now. After Havic calmed down she explored the ship and soon ended up in the cargo and soon asked who was the brewer. Dad went down and I followed curious. ¡°Hey how much do you sell these four?¡± She asked. ¡°Well when we made one batch, it was by grade and not by brand or anything.¡± Dad said. ¡°Seems you''re putting a brand now.¡± She said. ¡°Yeah we got to put that to spread our name.¡± Dad said proud. ¡°That is all good but do you expect to sell a lot with so few?¡± She asked. ¡°I do quality instead of quantity, besides I make a barrel of wine and beer every 2 days. Those at the corner already have aged a month and can be taste tested.¡± dad said pointing at both corners on the wall with the entrance to the floor. ¡°Mind if I taste test?¡± She asked. Both of us make a frown. ¡°Well¡­ it can¡¯t hurt for the wine but I don¡¯t suggest the beer.¡± I said with a frown. ¡°Why, is it bad?¡± She asked. ¡°No but¡­ dad has a specific formula he uses and if it succeeds with whatever beer he makes it can drop a dwarf to the floor in at max 3 shots.¡± I said truthfully. I never saw anyway survive more than 3 shots not matter which ingredients were used. ¡°Is it 100% fucking alcohol to drop a dwarf!¡± She shouted. ¡°That¡¯s the thing, its not, I probably doesn¡¯t pass 60% but the effect and flavor of the drink is beyond compare. If you ask a dwarf after he drinks the first cup he will say it tastes like a flavored drink but a moment later it will heat up like lava inside him.¡± I said. ¡°How do you know?¡± She asked. ¡°I was his to go guinea pig.¡± I said with a hint of regret in my expression and eyes. She looked at dad with a frown. ¡°Hey, you try making ale without a taste tester.¡± Dad complained. ¡°You don¡¯t use your own brat as a guinea pig! What¡¯s wrong with that fucked up head of yours!¡± She shouted back. ¡°It¡¯s my son so I had him learn my best trades!¡± He shouted back. Sparks were flying between their eyes. ¡°Hmph, I bet that beer sucks after feeling the taste of regret from using your own son.¡± Havic said and turned her head from dad and crossed her arms under her impressive rack. ¡°WHAT WAS THAT!¡± Dad shouted and instantly raged upstairs. ¡°Whats with him?¡± Havic asked. ¡°You will probably regret what you said just now.¡± I said and went to the barrel that was already aged past a month. Moments later dad came down with some cups. ¡°Come here and I will show you how ¡°Bad¡± my ale is.¡± He said. He went to the beer and turned it slightly filling a small glass for her. It was a simple shots glass since we don¡¯t have fancy cups or anything. She takes it takes a sniff and looks at it. The color was a transparent amber color. After looking a bit she drank it all in one go. Her eyes open wide. ¡°Wow! The scent isn¡¯t the best but its still refreshing and the flavor is smooth and the aftertaste is¡­ urg!¡± the next moment her body collapsed and her light red skin on her face turned brights red. We looked at her expression as she starts to giggle and get up but keep falling over drunk. Instantly we looked at the barrel. ¡°It can¡¯t be!¡± Dad exclaimed. He took the glass and filled a cup before drinking it and sitting down. After a moment his face got red. ¡°Ahahah! This is it! My first barrel of Dwarf Smasher!¡± he shouted. He gets up with a huge grin and a fierce eye. I sigh and shake my head. Seriously my dad is the only guy that can stand up so vigorously after drinking this monster alcohol. ¡°So dad, what will you do?¡± I asked. ¡°The same as always! Heh BAHAHAH!¡± He shouted laughing like a madman. ¡±Here it comes¡­ At least it brings in a lot of money when he succeeds.¡± I thought to myself. Dad runs upstairs leaving me with the drunk Zastros. I sigh and get her in a piggyback and take her to her room where she falls flat on her bed already out. At least alex won¡¯t have much trouble for a while. Still we warned her, this is purely a dwarf only drink. Well, better explain to the others what will happen in a while. I called the others and explained. ¡°So now we have that strange drink of your dads? You going to sell it?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°No, 9 out of 10 when we make the first time where people are still underestimating it dad does a bid with all the heaviest drinkers.¡± I said. ¡°What kind of bet?¡± Jessica asked. I sigh. ¡°He takes all our money, which at this time is around 45 thousand credits, and bets it against the 20 top drinkers, the bet is always the same. The men sit at the far corner of the room. Those who can drink 3 shots without fainting and last 5 minutes without fainting and get up and walk over to the pot of cash will be the winner. If no one wins dad is the winner.¡± I explained. ¡°45k times the 20 drinks would equal 900k credits but if we reduce the bet to 30k which leads to 600k and use the 15k as side bets. Since there are probably reallys strong drinker and you can understand the drinks properties than any of us you can make a public betting where we can profit even more.¡± Lia¡¯s voice suddenly called from my wrist. The new communicators are working like a charm and now have a voice box to transfer sound when we chat as well as allow our AI to speak freely. ¡°Big sis Hilda, big sis Lia said that if you do this we all get bodies! Is that true!¡± Hilda¡¯s AI appeared as a little boy that have off the rascal feeling. ¡°Lia~!¡± I said looking down at her hologram as she smiled. ¡°Teehee!¡± She said making a vein bulge on my forehead. ¡°We don¡¯t know how much it will cost to get a proper body for AI¡¯s also we need the money for a lot of things so we don¡¯t know if we can get your bodies since we don¡¯t even know the benefit of this.¡± I told them. The AI looked glum as he vanished. ¡°Is there really no way to make them something?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Well I heard that bodies are like AI¡¯s prison, if we put them in then we lose our aid AI. I truthfully don¡¯t want to make androids because once they reach a level where they don¡¯t need to depend on us they may leave. If I ever make anything it will be a small drone or something that has utility functions.¡± I said. ¡°Don¡¯t be a scroudge Noah, at least get us something humanoid!¡± Lia complained. ¡°Did I ever say a Drone wasn¡¯t humanoid. Maybe a head big and like a small doll it possible but I still haven¡¯t found a use for it.¡± I said. ¡°Madam Lisa.¡± Called a gentle voice from Lisa¡¯s direction. Looking her way she held her wrist up and what appeared was a defacto Elven Maid full with the knee long black and white dress. Not only that she hits every dream of otaku as a Busty Elf. ¡°Tris did you need anything?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°Yes madam, about what sir Noah said, whenever we are connected to the station I looked through the net at least where I can enter and I have found that there are a few shops for Aide AI drones. They are basic spherical models but as basic models they hold similar capacities to these wrist communicators as well as being capable of undergoing upgrades.¡± She said. I cringe as even the most upright looking AI wanted a body. ¡°What is the price range?¡± I asked regretfully. ¡°Most basic model is 30,000 credits as they come with an inbuilt scanner and identification program.¡± She said. There are 7 members of our crew now and each one has their own AI, 30,000 would be in every shape or form taking the more than one third of the money we would gain from the bet just to buy the crappiest model drone. ¡°No way, we could use the money we would use from your drone bodies to upgrade the shuttle. We seriously lack fire power for our ship at the moment. First we need to build a turret so that Jessica can put her sniper skills in space to the max while also improving the hull, shield generator, and the laser weapons we have to better stuff. We never know when we will be in a fight and having so little fire power isn¡¯t a good thing.¡± I said. ¡°Scrooge!¡± Lia said ¡°Jerk!¡± Hilda¡¯s AI shouted and started pouting while ¡°sitting¡± down hunched over as a hologram. I massage my head. ¡°Lets first deal with my father¡¯s annoying performance as he will definitely make a contest out of this.¡± I said with a sigh. Everyone nodded and we left the area near the cockpit where Alex had been listening. ¡°Hey Noah, what happened to the demon?¡± Alex shouted. ¡°We discovered the Dwarf smasher because dad wanted to prove his drink was good. It ended up with her on the floor drunk with no control over herself. She is in bed at the moment and will probably wake up with a killer headache.¡± I said. Alex laughs like a giddy girl as he hears of Havic¡¯s run with misfortune. Soon enough we reach the station and while keeping a rein on my dad so that he doesn¡¯t run off we transport the barrel inside. We then head for the Dwarf fighters airfield with everyone, besides the knocked out Havic, with dad walking in big strides. As we enter the field a few people look our ways before their eyes light up. Soon enough everyone was looking and Colonel came our way. ¡°Oh so another barrel is ready! How much, i¡¯ll buy it here!¡± Colonel said. ¡°Bahahahah! This isn¡¯t for sell, this is the first barrel of my own Dwarf Smasher! Today I have brought to you the drink that will put all your dwarfs under the table.¡± dad proudly announced. ¡°Dwarf¡­OH it¡¯s that unrealistic beer Noah spoke of.¡± Colonel says a bit uninterested. ¡°Of course, but I won¡¯t sell the barrel, I propose a bet. A bet between me and the top dwarf drinkers in this airfield!¡± Dad said. ¡°A drinking bet, your joking with us right, we are dwarfs, you want to bet that we will fall under the table against you?¡± Colonel said. ¡°Of course, the bet is rather simply, all the mo...UFF!¡± He said but I elbow his gut. ¡°The bet conditions we already decided before coming here without you dad!¡± I announce. ¡°The bet is as followed, the top 20 dwarf drinks will sit in the center of the room on a table. Our current capital for the bet is 30k credits, should those who wish to join this bet they would also bet 30k. The bet is simple, the 20 drinkers will drink 3 shots of this ale, you must drink 3 shots and stay awake for 2 minutes after each shot and 5 minutes after the last shot. After the three shots and 5 minutes you must walk to the table that the money will be placed on which will be at 20 meters away. Should anyone reach the table they win the bet but if no one reaches it our side will win. Besides that there are bets on the side that our crew will also be hosting such as how many will not survive one shot or two shots.¡± I explained. There was a clamour among the people in the airfield. Suddenly a human walked up. ¡°I¡¯ll take your bet!¡± He said proudly. ¡°Sorry but this is a dwarf only contest.¡± I instantly shot him down. ¡°What!¡± He said with a scowl. ¡°Let me explain, a dwarf can easily handle more than five times the alcohol any other race that hasn¡¯t lived drinking alcohol for thousands of years doing so. The drink behind me can leave a heavy drinker of any other race on the floor with one shot and can even kill a weak drinker of any other race so this be is purely for dwarfs. As stated by the regulations when making drinks, you must put caution and regulations for all drinks as such¡­¡± I said and turn to dad he puts the barrel down and turns to show the words on the back. [Dwarf Only drink! Other races will die!] Was written boldly on the back. The dwarves looked at the words before they started laughing at how blunt the words were. ¡°Oh this is a real good joke for sure!¡± Colonel said looking at the words. ¡°So you won¡¯t bet?¡± I asked with a smile trying to provoke him. ¡°Kid, I know you''re trying to provoke me.¡± He said. ¡°Well you¡¯re the leader of everyone here so you should be a strong drinker as well right.¡± I said. ¡°I am, no one has ever beat me.¡± He replied. ¡°Then are you actually cautious of a simple drink you don¡¯t believe can drop you to the ground.¡± I said. ¡°Brat, I can take someone insulting my robot if they have the power to back it but no one insults my drinking ability!¡± He shouts. ¡°Then put your money where you mouth is and gather your strongest and bravest men to fight us.¡± I said with a smile. A good fisherman uses the right bait and it¡¯s just what I did. A perfect cast, hook line and sink. Colonel storms out and starts to pull out 19 other men. The go and bring several small tables and chairs which was put in a clear area and a another table put 20 meters away where our 30 thousand was placed as well as each participant''s money. ¡°Now the other bets we are hosting are public ones for the viewers. The first bet is that in the first shot between 5 to 8 men will drop out either by forfeit or by fainting. The second bet is that between 13 to 16 men will drop out either by forfeit or by fainting and the last bet is that only Colonel will be able to last the five minutes but won¡¯t reach 10 meters of the table. Each bet we will host with a bet of 5 thousand credits and our bet is for these conditions to happen. The betting will take place for 10 minutes and you can bet through the AI¡¯s. Our own AI are already keeping tabs and there are three tables behind the main one where you can place the money for the bet. It can be whatever value unlike the main bet.¡± I said. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. The eyes of the viewers were burning as they start to move towards the crew mates who were already there. After 10 minutes the chances were like this. For bet one there was a 1:4 against our bet. About 40 men bet all of them bet against it while there were some elves that bet with us. The total gathered for this bet was around 15k for the bet and 75k against it Bet two was more even with a 1:2 since we had confidence in our drink so there was a more even. 20k to 40k As for the last bet it was 1:10 with everyone betting that Colonel would get closer than 10 meters but most of the bets were only 1k but one man did bet 10k that Colonel will get as close as 5 meters from the table. For this it was us against the rest summing 50k With the bets done we have some of the men of the airfield bring their own shots glass so that they can¡¯t say we cheated and they come and fill the cups for the participants. With the cups were placed and when everyone had one I walked forward. ¡°Alright, all bets placed and participants ready. Then first shot, I will clock the two minutes. Anyone that forfeit should simply stand and leave, don¡¯t try to act tough.¡± I tell them and lift my arm. ¡°Alright, first shot go!¡± I said and all twenty men drink and Lia started the counter. After they all drank they let out a sigh and began to talk about the drink similar to Havic but as the counter hit 20 seconds the alcoholic effect hit them like a truck and all of them started to turn red. ¡°Fuck!¡± One said as he closed his eyes and shook his head and began to breath more ragged. ¡°This is a bitch of a drink!¡± He said. ¡°Aye!¡± Colonel says better of than the others like I had expected. ¡°The boy was truthful when he said this drink could kill other races.¡± Colonel said making everyone shocked. ¡°Urg, I¡¯m out! This thing hits like a bitch.¡± One dwarf said and got up and took two steps before his legs gave way and he couldn¡¯t get up. Another one forfeits as well but the next moment really scared everyone as four dwarfs tilt backwards and fall off their chairs crashing onto the ground or forward with their heads on the table completely unconscious. The entire area was silent as the heaviest drinkers they know fell like flies. Just before the end of the first two minutes another three forfeit making the first bet invalid as nine people had lost. ¡°Nine people gave up so the bet has been invalidated as no one won. Those who bet can retrieve their money after the contest is over.¡± I announced. ¡°Shot two¡± I say as they glasses were filled. ¡°Go¡± I say and the remaining 11 dwarfs drank the second shot. Like before after 20 seconds the effects started to kick in and after a moment almost simultaneously 4 people fell unconscious making the number of losers 13 already within my calculations. The rest hold up until the one minute thirty second mark where another two forfeit and the rest survive the two minutes. ¡°Bet two, those that gambled on the 13 to 16 forfeiting, you are winners along with us. We will count the number of winners and evenly distribute the money among winners after the contest.¡± I said making those who won cheer. ¡°My god, what the fuck did I get into.¡± One drinker said as he supports his head with an arm. ¡°Don gib up, tis bat ill win if wah gibe up so old on! (Don¡¯t give up, this brat will win if we give up so hold on!)¡± Colonel said talking like drunk. With five men left the third shot was left and when the men saw that small cup being placed three took a look. ¡°Urg¡­¡± one suddenly turned and fell of his chair on all fours as he vomited. ¡°Oh! A lucky one, he is disqualified since the ale was ejected!¡± Dad said. He knows well enough that vomiting will remove the drink already inside. Some of the men went to help the poor dwarf. The others looked at the poor man and now it was 16 down before the third shot. ¡°Leb da tis! (Let¡¯s do this!)¡± Colonel said and as one they four remaining men drank at once. They took a long time before it all went down and they put the cups down and the clock for five minutes started. All their faces were beet red, I¡¯m sure none of these ever felt what being smashed drunk was like. I¡¯ve felt it so many times i¡¯m sure that I built tolerance that even transfer from game to game. They all survive the impact of the alcohol at 20 seconds all the way to two minutes where the first man dropped unconscious. At three minutes another fell and the last one at three minutes third seconds. Now only Colonel was left and the third public bet was burning through everyone¡¯s heart and pocket. If Colonel survived the 5 minutes the bet was in effect but if he didn¡¯t they everyone was safe. Unfortunately Colonel, being a dwarf as he is, was a stubborn as they come and lasted all five minutes. ¡°Alright, five minutes waiting time is finished. Now Colonel if you can pass 10 meters we lose the public bet but if you lose before that we will win both bets.¡± I said. ¡°Urg!¡± Colonel muttered as he looked around as he forces his eyes open. His vision was probably blurred already. He looks around slowly as he tries to focus and when he finally focuses enough to find the table with money he supports himself on the table and slowly crawls off it while supporting himself like a newborn learning to walk. As he aims himself towards the table he lets go and stretches his arms out. The crowd was quiet as they watch. Because of the stocky figure of the dwarf he could balance himself well since he was much more compact than I am after reducing the muscle mass and increasing my size. He takes one step with shaky legs and everyone is holding their breath. One step at a time he slowly and wobbly walks towards the table. With each step he closes his eyes and shakes his head waking himself up. After a suspenseful three minutes he had covered eight meters to the table when his legs gave way and he finally fainted and smashed into the ground completely unconscious. Everyone drew in a cold breath as they watch the top drinker of the station on the ground. ¡°Colonel has lost and calculated by all the AI¡¯s he had reached eight meters, that being said, the contest goes in favor of my crew as well as the last bet going in favor of us as well.¡± I say out loud. ¡°Those of the first bet can retrieve their money, those of the second bet who won can speak with the elf who took care of that bet and she will distribute the money for those who won as for the last bet, it was everyone against us so we win undisputed.¡± I proclaimed with a smile. At once the airfield was a buzz as some men rushed to Colonel and tried to wake him up. They even took out a special smelling salt and shook it near his nose making him somewhat wake up before his vision faded. ¡°Move men!¡± One of the elves said and put his hand on Colonels head. Then from his head a green colored Psi flowed out and soon entered into Colonel''s body. Soon a kind of dark fog began to pulse out of Colonel for a moment before it stopped. He retracted his hand and took the smelling salt and put it next to Colonel¡¯s nose. ¡°Urg¡­ ARGAHHH!¡± Colonel started and yelled from the smell of the salts. He sat up and moved away quickly from the elf. As he looked around he looked at the elf with the smelling salts before looking around. ¡°What?¡± He said and blinked a bit and then slowly remembered what just happened. ¡°Bloody hell! I was dropped!¡± He shouted. ¡°Bahahaha! Definitely! You fell face first and ate dirt!¡± Dad said massively proud of his monster. ¡°This¡­ this isn¡¯t a fucking beer, it¡¯s a bloody demon in liquid form!¡± Colonel shouted. ¡°One that I love with all my heart. To make one barrel of this beauty there is a 1:50 chance of it successfully make a single barrel.¡± Dad said. ¡°1:50!¡± Colonel exclaimed. ¡°If I had a large factory and make the beer in large production it''s possible only one barrel from it could achieve this result after aging. It¡¯s by complete coincidence and I have no control on this natural part of the brewing. There is truly no way to increase the 1:50 part but as you saw the result.¡± Dad said. ¡°No way¡­¡± Colonel said. He looked at the barrel. ¡°This is a priceless barrel that I would rank 10 but that isn¡¯t for me to decide.¡± Dad said. ¡°This drink doesn¡¯t fit into the ranking of 1-10. For us dwarves it tramples on our pride!¡± Colonel said. ¡°You should be proud you drank 3 shots and could still walk so far. We have only seen 7 others like you and only 1 man could still remain sane after drinking three shots and talk relatively normal.¡± Dad said. This shook every dwarf to the core. There was actually someone that could remain sane after drinking this. What they don¡¯t know is that this man was actually one of the gods of the VR games we played in the past. He had brought both me and dad when we had a barrel in our possession and wanted to drink the Dwarf smasher. The dwarf god is also the god of alcohol so he doesn¡¯t get drunk easily and was able to take three shots and said that they left him drunk as if he had drunk three barrels of one of his best beers. For the god of alcohol it took 30 shots for him to reach the state of 2 shots on a regular dwarf. That gods resistance was amazing but even so he loved the Dwarf smasher and said the name is well deserved without a doubt. It even hurt his pride to get to such a state with so little beer. As a reward for making something like this we gained an artifact that made divine wine and beer depending which side of the goblet that you inject mana into. Strangely the divine ales were weaker than the dwarf smasher but then again the Dwarf Smasher was had an effect that is hard to replicate. Also it¡¯s not addictive but in all games we show dwarves to this drink becomes legendary to them. Some say it was something the dwarf god had bestowed on them but some take it differently and it turns into a tradition to become an adult. I wonder how this game will react. ¡°This¡­¡± Colonel was to shocked to reply. ¡°Well, I doubt we could sell an open barrel anymore even with a few shots taken already.¡± Dad said. ¡°No way! I have plans for this drink already! Please if you make more I will buy them for 100k each!¡± Colonel said. ¡°What are you gonna use it for? Its not like you can drink it all alone?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°No, I thought about it, this drink hurts my pride as a dwarf since I lost to an alcohol but it made me realize that this galaxy is huge. I want to use it as an initiation item where new dwarves would drink and those that can keep awake after two shots could have true pride as dwarves and dwarf fighters!¡± He said with his eyes holding a flame of determination. So it¡¯s like this! Pride as a dwarf and dwarf fighter. Yeah that seems just right for this type of setting. Dad looked at me. ¡°We will do it for 75k but you don¡¯t need to buy alone and could probably divide it up between everyone.¡± I said. He looked at everyone and saw they agreed with his decision. ¡°Alright, for 75k we have a deal.¡± He said. ¡°But all you guys¡­¡± He turned to the others. ¡°Everyone will have to taste this beast and then work hard so we can get another barrel after he makes another one.¡± Colonel said. ¡°Yes Sir!¡± Everyone shouted and and started laughing. From there they pooled together more money giving us the grand total of 600k from the contest, 75 from selling the DS, 50k from the last bet and after retrieving the 5k from the second bet we split the 40k from the other side with the 15 others that bet 1k each giving my crew 4k since we had the biggest bid and leaving them with 2,400 credits of profit. In total we got 729k credits from this single contest. It goes without saying this is a huge profit that can buy us a second shuttle completely outfitted with weapons. For us right now, this will allow us to completely renovate the shuttle and outfit it with a lot of weapons and protective gear. Not only that we got this message.
For aiding in the creation of an alcoholic beverage that could only be considered mythological as it can make a dwarf, a race of extremely heavy drinkers, faint in under three alcohol shots, your entire crew gains 3,000 fame and your name will forever be engraved into history as the creators of a legend. All dwarves on Kelha II will know your name and the brand of your drink. As the Station expands it will also spread your name and brand through word of mouth. All Dwarf Fighters from Kelha II will respect your crew for making this Beverage.
Dad even gained a title.
Brewer of Legends
A brewer with unparalleled perception in the art of brewing alcoholic beverages. The perception is to such a degree that any ingredient that touches his hand can be used. Such perception has finally given birth to a legend among Alcoholic Beverages. One that even the top alcohol drinkers, the dwarves, would fear to drink more than three shot cups for fear of losing their own lives to the alcohol. Fame of the brand of the wielder of this Title will spread out faster.
In the status screen the title bar appeared under dad¡¯s name after it appeared. I wonder why it didn¡¯t show before. Maybe stuff that have no use don¡¯t appear. Makes sense I guess. Still this title, it will definitely make us much more money since the fame of his Brand will be carried by this title. At least in Kelha system we will be able to easily sell the Alcohol. Works for us at least we won¡¯t have trouble and the Dwarf Smasher already guarantee us 75k each barrel. This is a very good day, lets see about some upgrades and then see what we can do about that pile of weapons we gathered. Chapter 28: Money is strength Author''s corner: Sry, i''ve been procrastinating because i have been reading to much Wuxia and it resulted in me overdoing it these last few days with one of my side projects and my only side projects. The fic is called Martial Land God and its the only Wuxia i made and if you are curious you can find it on my Wordpress by pressing on "Side Projects Site" on my signature. I posted up to chapter 20 of this side project. Please leave comments on both Nebula and MGL. Enjoy
The crew was gathered inside the shuttle and we all stare at the large pile of over 700k credits that was earned from the bets. Havic had woken up an hour after she fell and we were returning to the shuttle at the time and we explained what happen. She was the most dumbstruck one as she simply sat down next to Alex in the kitchen around the table and stared at the money. "You guys are bullshiting with me! Your telling me that the small cup I drank was able to make THE Colonel Topaz eat the dirt off the dwarf fighter airfield?!" She said suddenly looking at us. "No, not one cup, three. It was rather impressive, being able to walk seven meters to the pile of money and then falling." Dad said puffing out his chest and letting loose a laugh. "I don''t believe you! Where did you steal this from!" She exclaimed. "It really was from betting and winning." Alex said making Havic a bit depressed. "What I want to know is how you are standing after only an hour? Without detoxifying yourself you should be out like a light for more than a day." Dad commented which made me wonder as well. "Zastros have a strong metabolism, though that little drink of your floored my metabolism worked to clean out my system. Our home planet had many toxic herbs that our metabolism needed process so we eventually formed a high level of poison resistance. Made us really good drinkers but we are a warrior race so we didn''t develop that part until we began space travelling." Havic explained. It was understandable. A race with no so strong drinking capabilities but a strong metabolism. If they drank from a young age they could definitely compared to a dwarf in drinking capabilities. "Even if I don''t believe this was from that single shitty drink what will you do now?" Havic said a little solemn. "Good question, what will we do?" Jessica asked. "Well the proper thing is to equip more weapons. This shuttle can possess a turret on the top as well as having two small weapon slots on the wings. We can definitely improve the laser weapons we have for higher grade models. We also need to figure out how to install that drive thing we obtained." I tell them. "The drive shouldn''t be hard. It''s only an "add on" to the engine. It''s a bit tricky but the mechanics know how to install such add-on''s since most are similar." Havic said. "Oh oh oh! Don''t forget about upgrading that fighter of mine. It''s still the most basic model and all those blueprint pads show a few upgrade models." Alex said with a dazed dreamy look. Havic frowned at the almost turned on expression on Alex''s face and pouted as she was losing out to a machine. "Hey guys, I had Ricky check the mission list available on the station. Since we already did one terraforming mission I found another one that might interest us!" Hilda said and a hologram appeared from a projector on her arm.
Mission: Kelha Terraforming Part two: OceanDifficulty5
Kelha II terraforming project has reached a stage where we can proceed with large scale planet changes. Since the atmosphere has been formed in a primitive unstable and toxic form the next stage to make it thicker shall follow. Request that crews possess at minimum large mining ship for the following. Crews will scour the asteroid field in search of asteroid with high concentration of water. After discovering such the asteroids must be thrown in a crash course into the region of volcanoes previously erupted in the first stage. Reward: 40000 credit to crew Objective: Safely guide asteroids to crash onto the planet "Warning: native space monsters and bandits present in asteroid field. Suggested weapon and defensive upgrades to ship be taken." Success: Aide in increasing Planet density and humidity level increases to satisfactory levels and whether patterns begin to appear. Job duration 2 weeks. Failure: Team is killed, asteroid you drop hits camps or towns.
"This is a repeat mission." Hilda said. "Oh! I didn''t know it Kelha II terraforming had reached this stage. It will be quite a few months before this this stage ends. The storms that will come to this planet is a sight to see." Havic said. "Won''t the mining camps be covered in water?" Alex asked. "Mining camps are always placed in high grounds. Even if the lowest grounds had the highest quality goods they will wait until the terraforming is done before building a mining camp down there where they can properly set up the supply base at the water''s edge. No one knows how far the water will rise since the planet still has its own water underground." Havic explained. "Will we do this?" Jessica asked. "We should do like the warning said. Let''s upgrade the hull, and weapons and buy the turret. After that we will have stronger combat system for the ship to take on this mission. Since its not going anywhere we can do this for a while." I told them. "You should invest money into your robot then. It''s still only basic model without space flight technology. Also those shotguns I noticed in the area are basic kinetic weapons. In a gunfight between dwarf fighters you would be extremely weak with just those. A psionic shot gun single bulk shots that can easily destroy a fighter ship with a single shot. There is no need to keep kinetic weapons though the sword is fine since its Psionic metals and circulates psi to strengthen but it still needs upgrades to allow long range psi slashes." Havic said. "Not ta mention ya needs a betta containa for ya psi!" Said a high pitched girls voice with a strange way of talking that makes you think of a tomboy. "Oh right, I never introduced you all, this is Baal. He is my AI." Havic said and over the very sleek and high grade communicator a hologram appeared. The hologram showed a small child, no bigger than a 10 or 11 year old. Flat as a board, with two ponytails, a girly face and what can only be called a futuristic magic girl costume. On the forehead of the AI were two small horns similar to Havic and the same skin color which revealed that her communicator made holograms with color. "Hi~!" The AI waved. Seeing the AI we were all a bit shocked and frozen by the surprise but we snapped out of it when a deep voice began to laugh. It came from Alex''s direction. "Hahaha! I finally understand why a lesbian like you fell for alex!" Xeno said laughing. "You are actually interested in traps!" He shouted and started laughing again. From that all the AI began to laugh but the rest were silent in shock looking at the dangerous trap AI. "Thats mean! I totally love girls, don''t think otherwise it''s only to bad that Baal can''t alter his shape to a girls. It only takes a bit more yet that final step is so far." Havic said with a sigh. "Your mean Havic! What do ya mean meh change ma sex! It is because ah your hacking ah mah systems an changing mah clothes an inserten ah personality altering virus that made meh like this, Hmph!" Baal said and crossed his arms while pouting. This made everyone wake up. Hack an AI? How good does the person need to be to do that? "But I''m amazed what did she do to hack you?" Lia''s voice called out. "She first trapped me in a small robot ball with no ability to move and resist. Then she connected me to a supercomputer that already had her twisted virus programs prepared, she had spent several thousands of credits to make that computer. The first virus scrambled my thought processor so I couldn''t resist then the others slipped through the firewalls we built and then began to change me and after an hour she was done." Baal said with crouching and making circles in the air he was floating around in. I''m sure all the AI''s shuttered at this while the rest of us could only pity to the poor AI. "Sis? What did you look like before?" Ricky called from Hilda''s direction. "I looked about 85% like Frethir." Baal said sad by the massive changes. The room went quiet again because the change was just so extreme. Frethir is a cold calculative merchant with a heavy fist. His is cautious even of those of his race yet this AI that should have been similar was turned into a trap mahou shoujo, the fate was simply to sad to imagine. "Let¡¯s... drop this, it seems to be a sore spot for him." Lisa says a bit worried seeing the little AI''s sad expression. "Alex go look for some of the low rank and cheaper upgrades we can afford at the moment. Havic, can you come with me and Dad to purchase the upgrades at a lower price hopefully. Lisa you still need medical equipment right, you can go buy what you''re lacking. Jessica and Hilda, please keep Alex from choosing the most expensive and impossible to obtain upgrades." I sat and everyone nodded and we left to do our respective roles. The Hangar was the place to go for all upgrades to a ship and so we head that way. Meeting the usual Hangar Master Vincent we started to talk about the upgrades. It goes without saying that he was completely shocked with seeing Havic. It seems she had a large reputation and he recognized her instantly and after hearing why she was with us he somewhat paled after he heard why we were here. Havic smiled flirtatiously and ¡°sat¡± in mid air with one leg over the other after her magnet boots were deactivated. ¡°Eh¡­ your current hull is standard Shuttle plating, upgrading that will employ Cesogen alloy plates." Vincent replied. Cesogen is a metal found in space only in 1 out of every 3 solar systems earning it a rank 2 in rarity. The Cesogen Alloy plate is Steel and Cesogen processed together to make the alloy and its about two times stronger than steel for factory brand and three times for really high quality goods. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ¡°Oh? Just Cesogen?¡± Havic said mischievously. ¡°...The full hull cost replacement would cost 30,000 credits.¡± He said. ¡°Wow that''s expensive!¡± Havic said in a fake shock then her face grow a bit serious. ¡°15,000, the metal is only rank 2 and its most likely factory brand, not only that making the alloy isn¡¯t any different than making steel except with a secondary metal. Price of Cesogen mining ship cargo goes for 500 credits a cargo while iron goes for around 200. At this ration the processing price would be at 10,000 and manual work is 5,000 which is the same price this station charges for full ship hull repairs.¡± Havic says blunt and merciless. The skills of an experienced merchant is scary and her beautiful face makes it scarier because she doesn¡¯t put on that much of a serious expression but it gives a chill seeing that subtle change. ¡°T-that price¡­.¡± Vincent was at a loss for words. This was the most blunt of prices where the station wouldn¡¯t lose anything or gain anything besides the 5k from the outfitting they would gain nothing for the alloy the station purchased. ¡°2...25,000 credits.¡± Vincent said. ¡°The highest I will go is 18,000.¡± She replied bluntly. Sweat covered Vincent''s face. He was never one for negotiating and normally only accompanied the others to choose out the needed parts while leaving the price negotiations to the higher ups who were experienced in politics like this. ¡°Oi girly! Stop bullying this weak ass!¡± A shout from the communicators on Vincent''s wrist announces his AI¡¯s participation in this. Relief instantly surfaces on Vincent¡¯s face as a huge burden was lifted and passed to a much better person in this area. ¡°Oh? So you''re the smart one of the pair? Mind telling me how much a Plasma Cannon turret cost?¡± Havic asked. ¡°One of those cost 130,000 credits market price, the ones we have come from the trade ship so you should know it¡¯s quality.¡± the AI said. ¡°Of course, that is why I asked for it and wanted to know the stations price. The trade ship sells them for 90,000 since we make our own weapons so there is a 40% increase in price for profit. If we purchase both the hull and turret I would be willing on 21k for the hull and 115k for the turret.¡± Havic said. At the prices Vincent was a bit more relaxed. Against a true merchant neither him or his AI could win but the AI definitely knew the pricing better than Vincent and made up for his bad parts and knew that asking for more from such a demoness like Havic would be wanting to much. To negotiate with her they would need to bring Major Snocon or Mr Mores himself to handle this to get beneficial terms over this demon. Mr Mores was even more wicked since he had to negotiate with Wynebia merchants for high performance parts for the station without being too much at the disadvantage less the merchant leaders completely remove the station from his possession. That is how ruthless those men are. In their eyes Havic is just a little newborn. With that taken care of Havic moved on and accessed the Hangar system and shifted through the shuttle laser category and started to talk with us. Alex soon arrived with the Shuttle in the hangar and stopped it over the designated zone. We eventually choose from a targeting turret type laser that would install a targeting system into the ship and allow Alex to target another ship and the two front Lasers and the two wing ones would follow it. The wing lasers could change sides from above and below so that blind spots wouldn¡¯t appear and could fire at angles below the ship. This cost 70,000 credits but like most weapons it was built on the trade ship and Havic knew the original price and drove this to 60k. The total we spent 196k, if she wasn¡¯t here we would be paying 230k credits. A saving of 34k. That is quite a substantial amount that we would have spent as opposed to just buying. It made me realize exactly how lucky we were. It also sent some alerts in my head. ¡±We got seriously lucky with her¡­ but luck has to end and with everything that has happened recently being so beneficial to us I fear what will happen when our luck runs out!¡± I couldn¡¯t help thinking. I just hope this doesn¡¯t end up jinking us later on. We left the upgrades to them and began to examine what Alex wanted to upgrade with the fighter. The first and foremost he wanted was the engine improving and a larger air tank or more of them so that he can fly longer in space and planets with developing or no atmosphere. After that would be remaking the controls in a completely different model which he designed and would make things more efficient for him but it would be hell for anyone else trying to fly it since the controls would be completely different to the conventional model. Lastly he wanted to upgrade the weapons and make them more potent. The model was common enough that the station actually had the parts we needed for the ship and life support but the it was still uncommon enough to make the upgrades expensive enough to charge 10k for the engine, 70k for all the parts and equipment needed to remake the cockpit and 50k for the laser weapon upgrades. The cockpit will take even more time since the model is completely new and its something that we can build ourselves with the parts which is better since we need to keep our own secrets and if the mechanics of the station saw it they could figure out the workings faster if needed. As a result we just bought the parts for the upgrades, that included the shuttle that would undergo an even more intense reform but only after we leave here. It would take nearly 1 week to remake both the cockpit of the shuttle and fighter in Alex¡¯s designs since we need to take each wire and place them properly and extend them to the new locations. Until then we can¡¯t start the Terraforming mission but that can wait since its better to be safe then sorry and since the mission was put up two days ago it means that the location of ice asteroids haven¡¯t been found. Also this mission is difficulty 5. If the bandit outpost raid was rank 4 then how difficult will this be with just these few upgrades. The galaxy is huge so there will always be a force greater than yours even if you don¡¯t know. Never think you are the strongest because it is the starting point of your downfall. As such we get on with the start of these upgrades while the others go and upgrade their own gear. Jessica gets a new plasma pulse sniper and tries to find someone to upgrade the rail guns while Hilda finds several weapons that she was interested in but only purchased a new swords, a higher quality Plasma sword that. Dad got some armor but that was all. That said the armor seems to have a strength boost so its something good for him. The final thing we purchased was something I was against because we are still ¡°poor¡± relatively but Havic said it was the best investment and that was a large number of parts and components for my Robot as well as several more advanced part blueprints beyond basic model like larger Psi Containers and a basic wing model. I need to upgrade the containers first before I think about wings because they eat up a lot of psi and I also need to go back to training a lot with Psi to make the lost of it. Oh right I also had my sword improved a bit and made the flow of Psi a bit better. The first thing I improved was the shotguns like Havic had suggested but I also made it different I left the current ones and simply added the other. This way I have a spread shot and a focused one. As expected, the 700k we made went all into improvements of our gear. Mine and Alex¡¯s gear were obviously the most expensive and took most of our funds and only after a week we were set up better. Alex had his improved cock pits that he working even more rapidly in. This was probably a set up he made in real life for something. As for me the first new container is almost done. I will leave the old ones as spares to quickly recharge. Besides that I was also building the parts I would be using for the wings but it''s quite far away because it''s much more complex than any arm or leg I made. To even attach the wing I will need to upgrade the robot as a whole a bit. The size will probably increase a bit as well as a result and even then I will still only have the most basic model wings that will allow me to move at the speed of a tiny ship like a tug which can only achieve 90 to 100 kilometers per hour. Its a start at least and it will allow me to mine with much more ease since I will control my movements with more freedom. ¡°Son, logout, remember I promised I would go meet an old friend. Your coming, I told the others. The girls already have their own plans, heh, so we will start the mission tomorrow.¡± Dad says through the mic outside of my capsule. I clean up the workshop and head to bed. Not before warning Alex to watch over the ship and put Lia on alert since you never know what can happen. Leaving the capsule I stretch and hear the cracking from the joints as I go through the routine of stretches to make sure every muscle group was stretched. Leaving the room I went and took a bath and as I was leaving dad walked in. ¡°Oh, you''re out, good! Put on some decent clothes, get something to eat because the ride over is about two hours long.¡± Dad said. ¡°Who are we going to see?¡± I asked dad. ¡°You will see when you get there.¡± dad said with a smile. I look at him as he leaves with a wry expression but could do nothing about his childish nature. I take off the shorts I had on and put some slack jeans and a comfortable shirt with collar then tidied up my hair and shaved leaving a clean washed face before heading down to eat. After that we get ready and make sure nothing is missing. I do something extra by connecting the Capsule to my phone so that Lia can directly contact us as long as there is internet. From there we leave by car heading off to who knows where my dad is taking me. Chapter 29 Little Sister "Keep!" Author''s Corner: Hi all, a bit of procrastination but i got over it, had some fun with this chap thanks to the Den''s Smiley Hyou, casual chap out of game this chap and the next one and maybe return to the game the next chap but if not the other chapter. Enjoy
¡°So where are we heading?¡± I asked while we drive through the streets. ¡°Secret, want it to be a surprise.¡± Dad said bluntly. I turn my head and look at the back seat and notice how there was a box with dad¡¯s 10 year old Wine. It was clear that this visit wasn¡¯t to some nobody and was someone really important to dad since he wouldn¡¯t pull out 10 bottles of his 10 year old wine and simply give it away. Unlike the rest of our house, dad is meticulous about the basement which was a perfectly climate controlled cellar with the walls covered in bottle shelves while he has barrels stacked in the middle. Turning my gaze, I saw our bags which showed we weren¡¯t coming home for a while. At best we would be there a day or two considering dad packed a few pairs of clothes for us. ¡°Eventually we reached the highways and headed out of our city travelling eastward eventually taking a paved side road that no one was taking. Afterwards it was more than three hours of driving before we came to a stop and what lay before us was a large metal fence that was guarded heavily and behind this was a huge well maintained lawn backed by a large mansion. ¡°Dad¡­ who are we visiting?¡± I asked. Dad just smiled and lowered the window and as the man saw dad he bent over. ¡°Got the wrong road buddy, just back off.¡± He says like he owns the place. ¡°Where is Marshal?¡± Dad asked bluntly. ¡°What does the captain have to do with this?¡± The man asked. ¡°HEY JENKINS! What the hell are you doing!¡± A large tan skinned muscular man walked out of the guard house and stood behind the man. The man in question stood up straight and, turning to look at the man, he saluted. ¡°Just directing these guys that got lost sir!¡± He said. ¡°You idiot! You think anyone will get lost on the way to this house! How many sensors do you think we have on the road! They would have been stopped barely a kilometer after entering the road let alone reaching this point!¡± The man shouted into the mans face like a military sergeant. ¡°Sorry to take up your time Sir Collins. Also good to see you again, your boy sure has grown.¡± The huge man said bending to look into the car and let us pass. ¡°No problem Marshal, train these weak pieces of meat well like old times.¡± Dad said and shared a laugh with the man who nodded and then waved to open the gate. As we enter and dad closes the window I looked at him intensely. ¡°Who is he? I haven¡¯t met him have I?¡± I asked. ¡°You have, I think it was in War ground: Battle for Control, he was under the name Basil.¡± Dad said. My eye grew wide as I look back at the man. That was one of the best military officers in the game. War Ground was a VR game that took you to the war torn world and placed you at the front lines. When you reach the mental age of 18 you have to ¡°serve¡± in this game. War is none existant but all the world governments have moved war into games and specifically this game. It''s a game where the world is the battleground and its a photocopy of earth as it is but it''s open for conquest. This game can only be accessed for training purposes between a country''s people in a private server and only within their own borders, while if a country proclaims war both countries battle within the game to keep casualties to a zero but once someone dies in the game they are completely ejected and need to wait for over a week in real life which is more than a month before joining again. Basil was like that, he had died once early on and america was under attack by North Korea but when he logged in again he started to take things seriously and began to plan out sneak attacks and battle plans that slowly pushed the Koreans out and with the help of him aiding in taking out a large number of strategic points he was giving a medal of honor. Dad was part of his group and was considered almost like a second group similar to Captain america as seen in the first movies. Knowing such a figure was here made you wonder who the owner of this place was. I had met him only 8 years ago and the face of everyone is changed in War Ground to keep identity secret. So this was his real face, i¡¯m starting to get curious as to who Dad wants me to meet that is so rich. In front of the mansion is like all those movies, a fountain with a circular driveway which dad stopped the car on in front of the door where a butler came and opened the door for dad. ¡°Greetings Master Noland, Master has been anticipating your arrival.¡± The butler said. ¡°Thanks Proto, how is Magi?¡± Dad asked as I got out by myself. ¡°Like always she has her nose stuck in a book. Like usual only she can compete with the AI¡¯s.¡± The butler said and sighed and dad laughed. ¡°Dad, who is he?¡± I asked. ¡°This is Proto, or if I have to use the correct term, the first ever Magic Puppet made by Malcolm Brim in Second Life. The power of science is great you know.¡± Dad said. ¡°Do not be confused young master Noah, I am not a biological being, I am completely autonomous.¡± The butler said as he pulled back his sleeve and revealed a machine arm. I paled as I see something right out of a movie or video game. ¡°Wait¡­. First magic puppet¡­ THIS IS MALCOLM BRIM¡¯S HOUSE!¡± I shouted at dad. ¡°I told you already I am a very close friend of his. He wanted us to visit since he never met you and he wants to introduce his daughter as well. I met her but you haven¡¯t met her face to face.¡± Dad says. ¡°This way Master Noland, Young master Noah.¡± Proto says as he walks to the door and opens it. We enter and find a grand ballroom like setting before us. I hear dad muttered ¡°Ballroom show off, so cliche¡± Still it was impressive all the same because it was half the room a kind of ball room with a large stairway in the middle near the back that went to a second floor that was connected to this room and could be looked down on from above. It gave it a fairytale castle like scene which seem strange for a man like Malcolm Brim. As we look around, our eyes soon met with a man descending the stairs. Like I had seen in all the television shows and any image, he always held himself with pride and looked humble. Dad walked forward and the two meet at the foot of the stairs. The two look at each other a while before a smile crosses their face and they start to laugh before, like some kinds, they slam their hands together and then drop it and shift to a shake. ¡°Its been a while Noland, you¡¯ve gotten really fat haven¡¯t you!¡± Malcolm said laughing. ¡°And what about you, your hair is falling and you''re still that same little popsicle with a pole shoved up your ass with that stupid persona of a gentle rich man over your face.¡± Dad said back. They let go of their hands as dad walks next to Malcolm and throws his arm around Malcolm¡¯s shoulder like they were brothers. The image of that powerful man was instantly shattered. ¡°Noah, your so called grand idol, Malcolm Brim, this idiot here is the one that sponsored ¡°The Nebula¡±! Malcolm, this is my son and my pride I pounded all my teachings inside.¡± Dad said. ¡°Oh so how good is his sword skills, I can always use a sparing partner.¡± Malcolm asked. ¡°Don¡¯t joke around, you will break him in three moves before he can react.¡± Dad said seriously. My brow twitches. I was beaten senseless when dad was training me in all his martial arts and swords kills. To say that someone can beat me in three moves leaves me peeved but I got to remember both of these half dozens of years more experience that was honed in battle over and over again under different circumstances and conditions inside many different games. ¡°Sophia come down and greet your uncle!¡± Malcolm shouts. ¡°Also bring Maghen!¡± he said soon after. ¡°Coming dad!¡± A weak voice came from upstairs. ¡°Girls.¡± Malcolm said with a sigh. ¡°Noland, you lucked out getting a boy.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Shame I didn¡¯t luck out with who he was born from but getting a son is more than enough to forget it.¡± Dad said rather solemnly. ¡°Don¡¯t let it get to you, you should have long looked for someone better.¡± Malcolm said. Seeing this an opportunity a grinned and dad didn¡¯t miss it. ¡°Dad is already hunting, after all, what isn¡¯t attractive by an futuristic elf nurse.¡± I said. Dad frowns my eye but a playful light appears on Malcolm¡¯s eye as he looked towards dad and says, ¡°Is that so? And I wanted to introduce you to a friend yet you''re already getting such success.¡±¡± Malcolm said and suddenly Dad put pressure on his arm and began to squeeze his head. ¡°Oh is that so, you could have introduced her earlier and not left me alone with this brat!¡± He said. ¡°Uncle?¡± A clear female voice that sounded eerily familiar came from upstairs. When we looked, a beautiful girl at twenty with long straight blond hair and bright sky blue eyes walked down in a long one piece dress that hung over the shoulders with a simple strap. The dress showed off the hidden curves and gentle mounds that weren¡¯t large but were generous. Behind the girl was another who was more like a tomboy, she had long brown hair tied in a pony tail with a tight black leather hot pants and shirt sportswear that was held up by the impressive mounds within somehow but made them stand out. As the two girls got half way down they froze and looked at me. We just look at each other. ¡°Jessica and Hilda?...¡± I mutter. The next moment I turn to dad and walk over and grab his shirt. ¡°Explain now!¡± I said as I arm my fist to send a punch. ¡°I told you that she was the daughter of a friend.¡± Dad said holding his hands up to calm me down. ¡°Yeah you did but you didn¡¯t tell me she was daughter of the multi billionaire MALCOLM BRIM!¡± I shouted getting ready give dad a black eye. ¡°Please calm down Noah! I asked uncles to keep this a secret. I don¡¯t want to be known by just my father. It makes things awkward.¡± She said blushing embarrassed. It was far too different from the confident android I know. Most likely there is a confidence problem with this main problem behind it. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. ¡°Hey captain and noah, I finally get to spar one of you for real! All I¡¯ve tasted was dirt when fighting Sophia¡¯s dad so I want someone more at my level.¡± Hilda said. ¡°Maghen, introduce yourself properly.¡± Sophia muttered. ¡°Do that yourself before saying that to me.¡± Hilda replied. Sophia sighed and looked at me. ¡°My real name is Sophia Brim, if you want to call me either Jessica or Sophia either is fine.¡± She said. ¡°My real name is Meghan Fennel Welding. I¡¯m part of Welding incorporated which supplies all the machine parts for Malcolm¡¯s company to build the capsules we all use.¡± She said I was shocked again, I know she was supposed to be rich since she said her father gave her money that time when we needed to repair the ship at the start and she had converted a lot of money into credits but I didn¡¯t think it was to this degree. ¡°Oh I think he broke?¡± Dad said. I snapped out of it and frowned before lifting my foot and stomping on dads right foot. ¡°Ouch!¡± He shouted. ¡°Broke your foot, old man!¡± I shout and let him go as he starts hopping. ¡°Ungrateful brat!¡± He curses. ¡°If you were the responsible of us two I would definitely obey but an old man that makes me drink your experimental formulas for ale doesn¡¯t deserve it!¡± I said and took some steps back and crossed my arms. The girls giggled at our antics that don¡¯t change one bit from the game. Malcolm just scratches his head wondering how to process this. ¡°Papa! Whats all the noise?¡± A high pitched voice called from above. Looking up we saw a 10-11 year old blond girl wearing sports pants like Maghen but for kids and a skirt above it and a simple shirt. Her hair was made into a single braid on the left side of her bangs. She gave off a cheerful girl look. ¡°Oh thats right, you don¡¯t know son, this is Jessica¡¯s little sister Bonnie.¡± Dad introduces me. ¡°So there was another one?¡± I ask. ¡°Who is this big sis?¡± She asks pointing at me. ¡°That is uncle Nolands son, Noah.¡± Sophia said. ¡°Really!¡± She said with her eyes sparkling and then she did a look over me. ¡°He is really handsome! I will keep him for Sophia!¡± She said and ran down the stairs and stopped not even two meters from me on one knee with her left hand out and her eyes closed and a big smile. ¡°Please marry my big sister! S''il-vous-pla?t!¡± she suddenly blurred out. ¡°Heh?¡± I muttered. Everyone froze as well. She then opened her eyes showing the sparkling eyes. ¡°My sister is shy but really hardworking and kind. She really wants to be a programmer and has been saying a lot about bigufof¡± She said but Sophia suddenly ran forward and covered her mouth. ¡°Bonnie! Don¡¯t say random things like that!¡± She said. Bonnie shakes Sophia¡¯s hand off and starts complaining. ¡°But sis! With your communication ability you will only be able to see big bro Noah in the game! What fun is that!¡± She complained. ¡°It''s none of your business.¡± Sophia replied making Bonnie pout. ¡°Fine! Stay single for the rest of your life, I¡¯m going back to my room to watch the recent Pokemon releases then! Hmph!¡± She said pouting and ran upstairs. We all just stood there watching what had happened but eventually Malcolm coughed waking everyone up. ¡°Well since all the...introductions are done since it''s already a bit late why not have some dinner while we chat?¡± Malcolm suggested. ¡°Fine by me.¡± Dad said. ¡°Oh I¡¯m starved, all that training really got to me.¡± Maghen said. Getting past the awkward situation we head to the dining room that was actually a small room on the second floor and looked like any normal family dining room. "You probably expected some grand table twenty meters long with over excessive amounts of food made for few people right?" Malcolm asked looking my way. I couldn''t meet his eyes since I really did think that. "This is just our family dining room, we have a separate dining hall for such occasions but for us we just use this one." He said and took the head seat while dad took the other. There were four other seats. Suddenly Bonnie appeared again. "I''m hungry!" She said and ran over to one side and sat next to malcolm and Maghen quickly took the seat next to her. The two smile and I notice a hidden high five below the table. Sophia does as well and blushes as she sits next to her father and I sit next to the idiot holding his laughter in. The table was set up in front of us as followed. Try of chicken wings with several stips of bacon roasted in an oven and probably had some alcohol over it. A large pan of black beans mixed with salami and many different cuts of pig meat, in brazil it''s called feijoada, a large pan of rice mixed with cooked corn and small bits of chopped meat. Then there was estrogonoff, spaghetti, linguine, several plates of brazilian fried snacks and lastly several liters of goods like Coke, Spirit and my favorite Guarana. A brazilian fruit juice that is the best without compare. My mouth was full of saliva after I properly examined the food and had to swallow hard to not let it overflow. "Well, let''s not tardy more, we are probably all hungry so eat up." Malcolm said. It didn''t take much to have me up and getting the rice and beans followed by the chicken and finally a cup of Guarana. Its so hard to find such good food in america like this. Rich people have it good. After the initial bites when we calmed down we began to chat. Dad and Malcolm talked across the table while Sophia and the girls were chatting. I joined in when the topic entered the VR games. Most of it was about old games we played and what we learned, how we played, skills we know and so on. I had also been persuaded by the girls to spar against Maghen tomorrow. On the other hand me and the three girls decided to watch a movie. Dad and Malcolm said they wanted to catch up so we four would go watch something. After a while the two men got up. "Well the dinner was great, kids, me and Malcolm want to catch up a bit, you can enjoy the rest of the day. Old man, I brought some of my ten year old goods let''s go enjoy them." Dad said anticipating the drink. "Oh, so the good stuff huh, I shall relieve myself for the night as well. Good night kids." Malcolm said and got up. The two adults leave talking. "Big sis let''s go I wanna see the movie!" Bonnie said. "Sure, what movie do we watch." Sophia asked getting up followed by the restest if us. As we leave the dining room we headed into the building further back. Countless maids were moving about, what was strange was their almost doll beautiful faces. ¡°I¡¯ve been wanting to watch a superhero movie, hows about Deadpool?¡± Maghen said.. ¡°Not with Bonnie here, what about Ant man. I haven¡¯t seen that movie and it seems funny, and less gore filled.¡± I said. ¡°Sure, seems fun as well.¡± Maghen said. I could clearly read her thoughts, she only wanted an action film to see the action. This damn battle junkie, I think I will have fun crushing you tomorrow. When the others agreed we began to walk with purpose this time and eventually reached a large double door. I was confused but there was a bit of foreboding that I knew what was waiting for me on the other side. As expected when the girls opened the door what we saw was a small movie theater with two rows of seats with four seats each. Meghan and Bonnie ran quickly inside with Sophia calling them and trying to run after them but the two sat on the two furthest seats near the wall leaving only her to sulk on the third seat and me at the final one on the row. ¡°Proto, can you upload the ¡°Antman¡± movie?¡± Sophia randomly called and suddenly the butler appeared. ¡°It is possible young mistress, would you like any snacks?¡± He asked. ¡°A large cup of Guarana for me and maybe some popcorn.¡± I said. ¡°Same!¡± Maghen called. ¡°Yay popcorn!¡± Bonnie cheered. ¡°Please get some for us.¡± Sophia asked and he smiled and nodded. After a bit maids soon entered with the drinks and popcorn we wanted. Each seat was like a true theater seat and had a cup holder on the arm rest. After the popcorn arrived the lights darkened and the large screen flicked on as the movie began. "If you require anything just call." One of the maids said as they all left. As the starting credits began I turned to Sophia. "I was curious about the maids. Why do they look so..." I looked for the right word. "Doll like?" Sophia finished and I nodded. "You know my dad was the first Magus Puppeteer, he made hundreds of puppets which were magic items but only him, uncle and dads closest disciples knew how to give an ego to them. When Second Life was to shut down dad didn''t want to lose them all so grandpa funded research in robotics and made the bodies for all of the puppets egos and uploaded all of dads puppets. Nearly all our employees are dads puppet with automaton bodies." Sophia said. To think something like that happened. Not many people had the chance to perfect the puppets like dad and Malcolm since the secrets were kept under seven hundred keys. It wasn''t my style of playing so I never had the class when I was a kid so it didn''t matter to me. As I was thinking the movie started and we all fell silent only the sound of popcorn crunching and drink was heard and an occasional whisper or laugh. As the movie finished we left the theater in smiles but soon Bonnie began to feel sleepy since it was already night time so one of the maids helped her off to her room while I was guided by Sophia to another. "This is one of the Guest rooms, uncle will be in that one and the bathroom is down the hall." She said and turned to leave. "Thanks for the room and the movie was great." I said with a smile. I saw her blush a bit as I enter the room to find a simple but still rich looking room. Putting on my shorts and taking off my shirt, revealing the sculpted muscles, I jump in bed and fall asleep. Chapter 30: Trouble Brewing Author''s Corner: No procrastinating on this chap! Was having to much fun with Bonnie and yes its pkmn reference. She was really fun to write with all the ideas that my den member kept feeding ideas. Please leave your comments below. P.S. i fixed the messed up signature so the side project tab actually sends it to the proper page now. Enjoy!
After the two adults had split from the kids they had gone and picked up the box of wine and gone to a private room only Malcolm used. This place was sound proof to the limits and the security was quite high. The reason was because the room was his office and inside were all the most important documents and information. That said, the place looked like a modern library on the scale of a national one with a high roof and three floors, the top two open in the center and filled with shelves on the rest with seats all around for Malcolm. Besides Malcolm himself, only Proto and Magi, Malcolm¡¯s first and second magic puppets, were allowed in. Magi had been an elemental magic as a puppet and formed a love for books at the level of obsession and she remained here are anywhere with books reading but at her side was a long club. She was head of security while Proto was head Butler. "Impressive as always." Noland said and walked to a chair on the side and sat down before putting the box down and opening it before removing a bottle. "Ah~! It''s been too long since everyone gathered for a drink." Noland said solemnly. "Can''t be helped, those born in Second Life choose to stay and those who were players are scattered accross the globe. Some have already retired from gaming and aren''t as active as us." Malcolm said as he came over with two large cups for wine on a tray and a cork opener. He puts down the tray on the desk and sits on an armchair across from Noland. Pop! With an easy pull Noland popped the cork off releasing the smell of wine into the air before pouring into the two cups and taking his own. Spinning the ale within he puts it to his nose and takes a wiff. "Ah! The smell of aged english grapes. The smell of ten years ago when we were still in our prime." Dad said and took a sip. "The adventurers we had were many and defiantly left the world jealous of what we did." Malcolm said. Noland looked at his drink and drank the rest in one go. "So? What did you call me for? I doubt it¡¯s to catch up or tell my son who your daughter is or who Maghan is right?" Noland asked. Malcolm drank deeply and sighed before looking at Noland. "You''re still the only semi-active member from all of us that still goes into virtual reality as a result you are still doing missions and The Nebula is currently still in its first month." Malcolm said. "Is it about the most recent mission?" Noland asked and Malcolm nodded. "I can''t tell you precisely what is going on because after you and your crew finish that mission so spectacularly it caused a surge in the system. Amy told us this was a direct result of your mission. The surge is currently calculating every possible outcome in the near future but you should know more or less what this means." Malcolm said in a serious tone. "Something big is coming?" Noland asked. "Yes, and you''re right in the middle of it. The scale is only to the solar system but the side effects of it aren''t, you understand right?" Malcolm said and Noland nodded. War, what may happen will most likely ensure war, weather its civil war between internal factions of the Liberation or faction wars between the three factions it''s unsure but war is coming. Noland pours himself more wine and sits back on his armchair letting out a sigh as he watches the dark purple liquid through the glass. After a while he takes a drink and looks at Malcolm. "Let it come! I will make sure my crew survives and then we will find the source and make sure we kick it so hard in the balls it won''t ever get up again." Dad said and finished his drink and put his cup down. "Noisy..." a soft but annoyed girl''s voice called. The two men looked towards the young girl that appeared from the second floor. She looked no more than 12 years old and had a godly doll like face similar to a japanese girl but with navy blue hair and eyes. She was rubbing her eyes as if she just woke up. ¡°Oh, Magi! You were in here? Been a while.¡± Noland says and waves. She just looks and waves once with a pure emotionless expression and blinks a bit before thinking a bit. ¡°Amy is having trouble with the calculations. Saying you''re being a pain again, she hates when you play since you cause too much trouble.¡± Magi says and the two men laugh though Noland¡¯s was a bit forced. ¡°Yeah, can¡¯t deny that. So what are you reading at the moment?¡± Noland asked ¡°Psi theory, how to control, which race is best, where most fun is!¡± She says and gives a thumbs up. ¡°So you intent to play ¡°The Nebula¡±? Noland asked. She nods then looked at her hand and held up one finger. ¡°One month?¡± Noland asked and she nodded. ¡°She is downloading and rewriting everything she can into a book. I even read her book on the theory of Psi and practicing it and even I felt that if I train those in real life I would start to use it.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Haha you made her a as a mage long time ago, what else would you expect from her. This library written completely by her with theories by her. If she had an organic body, I¡¯m sure she would have already tried everything she wrote down.¡± Noland says. Malcolm could not deny a word as he knew exactly how much this girl loved books. In truth, she was, and still is, the smartest puppet Malcolm made without equal. Though she was born a simple npc program in Second Life, he intelligence was definitely the greatest and she is the only puppet out here that does as she pleases unlike the rest that still choose to serve Malcolm. She walks over and yawns before looking intently at Noland then holding out the huge book. He takes it confused and reads the cover. [Magi''s theories on Psi and Psionic technology] He opens and reads just a bit before feeling his head hurt before closing it. "Ah, to much thinking for this old man." He says and gives it back.she sighs as she looks at the book. "Is it done?" Noland asks and she shakes her head. "Need more time then put in practice. Will use Android to study both when I go in." She said emotionless. Noland smiles wryly and looks at Malcolm. "I trust you''ll taken care of her over there?" Malcolm asked and Noland nodded. "When the time comes you can beam her directly into the ship for all I care." Noland said. Malcolm just sighs and nods then looks at the girl who had saw down in a chair and began writing again. "This was all you had to talk about?" Noland asked? "Yes, it was mostly to warn you since my daughter is travelling with you. The Nebula is extremely realistic so losing once means losing it all." Malcolm said. With a nod Noland agreed with the statement then turned to his box of wine. "Now that the serious talk is over let''s get to talking about the good old days." Dad said and moved the wine bottles out of the way and pulled out two crystal glass square bottles with a very pure liquid inside. Malcolm''s eyes narrow and a glint appeared in his eye. "Nice whiskey, so you did come with the really good stuff." Malcolm said with a smile. "Who do you think I am! Wine can''t satisfy me like it does those normally pompous rich folk." Noland said proud. "Can''t agree more with you." Malcolm aid and walked to a single closes shelf. Inside were many different type of crystal cups. He removes two small shots cups and and closes the cabinet shelf and brings the glass. "Let''s have fun like the old days." Noland said filling both cups and raising the glass and drinking before letting out a sigh and a bellowing laugh. Noah PoV The bed was the best, it was soft and the covers were fluffy to the point that I didn¡¯t even wake up at my usual time. I just turned a bit when the sun hit my face and put the pillows of ultimate softness over my head and fell asleep again. I wish I could say that but not five minutes after seven in the morning the door barged open. ¡°Ha! Guilty!¡± The small blonde 10 year old barged in and behind her stood Meghan. ¡°Huh? Where is big sis?¡± She asked ¡°Sophia isn¡¯t that bold Bonnie. As for you Noah, get up! The executioner is here and you''re the prey!¡± She said with a wide smile. Snore! I didn¡¯t even hear them even through all the noise, I always wake up early morning but I am also a heavy sleeper when I want to be. I choose to wake up a seven and not, I wake up at seven because I have to. Since today I want to remain in bed then I shall do so. ¡°Bonnie, plan B!¡± Meghan said. ¡°Aye sir!¡± She said and saluted before climbing onto the bed and jumping onto my back mounting like I was a horse. The sudden drop of twenty some kilos of little hyperactive girl instantly woke me up. ¡°What are you doing?¡± I asked looking at her. ¡°Waking you up! Why isn¡¯t sis here? Anyway get up, I want to see the most epic sparring match ever!¡± She said bluntly. ¡°Leave and let me sleep!¡± I said as I turn my head to the other side but cover up my head again and fall asleep. Instantly. ¡°Hey don¡¯t fake it!¡± Meghan said and started to shake me but I did indeed fall asleep. When I let it my fatigue can definitely keep me asleep for hours. Soon Sophia came because of all the noise. ¡°What is going on?¡± She asked. She was in a silk blue pajama while rubbing her eyes. (http://76.72.168.19/images/2009-05-11-163090.jpeg) She looked at Meghan who was already dressed in her Hotpants and shirt sportswear shaking me. Then looked at Bonnie who was already dressed and ready for some reason. (https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/33/a2/6a/33a26a1d091e432b284bc5d30126242e.jpg) ¡°I¡¯m trying to wake this guy up to spar!¡± Maghan answer bluntly. ¡°Isn¡¯t it to early?¡± Sophia asked and lot out a yawn while covering her mouth. ¡°Seven in the morning isn¡¯t early it''s on time for a martial artist and serious gamer.¡± Meghan said. ¡°Unless he is on vacation like me at the moment.¡± I said as it tossed and turn in my bed making Bonnie almost fall off. ¡°Bonnie, dismount him right now! You''re going to fall if he keeps moving or gets up.¡± Sophia said. ¡°But why! I have to make sure I keep Meghan further away from him so that big sis can marry big bro! Also why didn¡¯t you sneak into big bro¡¯s room?¡± She said making Sophia blush violently. She quickly moved close and grabbed Bonnie''s ear and pulled her off. ¡°Ouch ouch! Stop!¡± She complained but Sophia just dragged her off. I just sigh and turn around. ¡°Get out so I can dress.¡± I said. ¡°Hmph, if you think I would get embarrassed at just seeing someone without clothes you should think otherwise.¡± Meghan said and puffed out the tightly compacted chest in her sports shirt. I look at her determined expression but then my eyes travelled down at the tight and skimpy sportswear she was wearing. "Yeah, I can tell you''re not embarrassed." I said and sigh as I throw the covers off and get up before stretching allowing the my joints and back to crack a bit releasing the tension. When I looked, Sophia was blushing greatly, Bonnie had shining eyes and Meghan had raised grows. "Wow! Big bro is such a hunk isn''t he sis! You should definitely marahahhhhhh!" Bonnie said but had her ears pulled as Sophia rushed out the room with a bright red face. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. "Hehe, seems you left quite the "impression" on her innocent heart." Meghan said elbowing me with a mischievous grin. "That is why I said to leave. Now go." I said and start to push her out. "Make sure to be ready quickly. You can ask any maid or butler and they will lead you to the training field." She said and walked out herself. "Yes yes." I said and after she left I closed the door and locked it before closing the blinds and jumping back in bed and falling asleep. Half an hour later the door was put to the test against Meghan''s banging until it was unlocked and she dragged me out of bed. When I woke up a smile was on my face as I hug the covers as she tries to get them away. After a while I give up and put on a random old shirt and we walk down. "So just one round?" I asked. "Yep, we will use wooden katana." She said and a maid handed each of us curved wooden blade. Hen I held it I looked at the dull edge and saw it was safe to put some force behind it but was surprised that the weight mimics the real blade surprisingly well. "Was this made with a metal core inside?" I asked. "Yes young master, it was done with the utmost care and mimics a common grade katana. As for any specific type it would take further adjustment." The maid that handed the wooden swords explained. I nod and swing it a few times to get a hang of the weight. When I was ready I got in place with the sword held in my right hand and I took no form while Meghan had the classic kendo stance. She looks at me wry. "You can start, I feel better with no stance." I said. In truth, I was in a stance but this was something dad had taught to allow ultimate flexibility and movement. My foot position was the same as hers but I intentionally left many openings she could see. I could guard and move away in any situation. I can''t use this against ranged weapons obviously but against close range fights of equal strength this works well. I will need to train to adapt this to space combat with the robot. She nods and takes a step forward and swing diagonally from the left. I wait before I bend down towards the left going under the blade. With a flick of my arm my blade edge rested at her armpit. "I win." I said and poked her. She was dazed a bit not realizing I had won. "Again!" She shouted and instantly sent a horizontal swing that I back-stepped. Taking the momentum she spun quickly and made the blade come down vertically towards my head. I sidestepped at the last moment before swinging the blade to her head and stop right before it reached her head. "I win." I said again. She frowns and again she attacks getting more complex. I keep overwhelming her one try after another until she gets tired and is breathing heavily. "No *huff* fair! You only *huff* defend." She complained. "That is how a skilled swordsmen fights someone with skill but like a charging bull." I said bluntly. She frowns as she starts to take deep slow breaths to calm her rapidly beating heart. "Your style is overbearing but only to unskilled close range fighters. You get someone calm and remotely skilled and they will beat you unless your defense is stronger than their attack but then you will be locked in a stalemate until one of you drops first." I said. "So what now then?" She asked standing up straight. "You can change to the greatsword that is one of the most overbearing weapons or you can change your style to be calmer but overbearing only when you swing." I tell her. "For the great sword you should know that it isn''t a weapon for ultimate attack. It''s true purpose is to protect. Protect those important to you using the most overbearing attacks possible. Great swords are great in a one on many fight and dominate in direct clash." My dad says as he appeared from the corner. "Page one of [Ways of the Great Sword] from "The Martial Lands" VR game." Malcolm said. "Yep, it¡¯s from that game that I learned how to use the greatsword and several other sword styles before returning to Second Life and earned my title of "The Tank"!" Dad said. The game in question was the first martial arts game where you cultivate qi like in chinese martial arts light novel''s. It is the game where skill and talent are most important and luck is a factor that matters most since a single miraculous encounter can make you an overlord. Dad had gone to the game and it was when he learned his martial arts that he passed to me but I only took single sword fighting but dad made sure to write up physical manuel''s of these. "Meghan, when we get free time in "The Nebula" I will tutor you in both swordsmanship and great swords." Dad said. She smiled brightly after hearing that and sat down dead tired even after calming down. ¡°Alright, now that this is out of the way, is there something to eat?¡± I asked. ¡°What do you mean by that Noah? This was only round one! Round two will start in a bit after I rest, then I will beat you up with my martial arts.¡± Meghan said with a fierce glare. ¡°Wha! Big sis Meg, you actually want to get so close to big bro! Sis ¡°You really like getting beat up huh?¡± I said nonchalantly. ¡°What was that!¡± She said and got up quickly making her dizzy from the sudden rise. ¡°Let''s rest for a bit and let Noah at least get a bit of food. Unlike you who ate your fill and then did stretches to help digest you forced Noah to fight on an empty stomach.¡± Malcolm said. As she realizes she blushes a bit and apologizes. Malcolm then claps and a maid appears from inside through the back door onto the training field. She brought a natural fruit juice and some fruits that won¡¯t be hard on the stomach even if I move a lot. After that I took some time to properly stretch which a certain girl didn¡¯t let me. After letting my stomach rest with some proper stretches I walk onto the field where Meghan was standing all ready to go. ¡°So your ready! Finally!¡± She said taking a fighting pose. I sigh and look at dad and Malcolm and they nod. Malcolm claps and a maid walks out. ¡°Meghen please up on proper protection unless you get to hurt. You to Noah.¡± He said. What came was basic padded training gear. Helmet, teeth guard, gloves chest protection, leg protection. ¡°This is boring.¡± meghan said. The gloves we had were the big boxing kind. ¡°Uncle can¡¯t we have the mixed martial arts kind, the one that doesn¡¯t cover the fingers, we aren¡¯t boxers.¡± She said. ¡°These kids!¡± He said but had a smile as he asked to bring those out. We switched to them and feeling that the protection was put right we got ready. Like before I didn¡¯t put up my guard but I make sure to keep my eyes on her feet. The legs are three times stronger than the arms because we are constantly using them. Unless you walk with your hands or train vigorously, the legs will always be stronger. Not only that but by looking at the feet while a bit away, you can tell we''re kicks come and what the position of the body and if they have a low center of gravity or if they are off balance. I just stand there but she advances. She goes and gets in close rapidly and like lightning she gives me a straight right but with as little movement I move my head and shoulder out of the way and turning that side forward my fist launches just as quickly as hers. What surprises me is that she dodges the same way I did but she grabs my arm and sudden does a backflip and throws her right leg in front of my face with her knee in position while the other was on my chest with my arm passing in between her legs and her gripping the arm along her body. As she wraps her legs and I start to feel her weight. Not wanting to lose so pathetically I turn towards her body and grab anything and end up gripping the protection as she starts to put pressure on the arm. Dropping to the ground means my lose since it only tightens when on the ground. ¡°Oh my! Big bro is so bold!¡± I hear the high pitched voice but have no time as I fix my stance to lift something. I drop my weight to my legs and start to build strength from the legs all the way to the arms and sudden lift Meghan before I bring down the arm with all I got but as I reach half way she stops. ¡°This is Noah¡¯s win Meghan.¡± Dads voice said coming from behind. As I feel Meghan release me I can see that Proto was holding Meghan. I remove my helmet and take the mouth guard and breath. ¡°Your quick.¡± I said. ¡°Heh, you underestimated me.¡± She said. ¡°After you got so trashed what did you want.¡± I said making her frown. ¡°Hey hey big bro, did you like the feel?¡± Bonnie said coming up. Sophia was blushing. ¡°What?¡± I said. ¡°Son, do you know where you grabbed when you tried to keep from falling to the ground?¡± Dad asked with a grin. ¡°The torso guard?¡± I said. ¡°You grabbed right at my boobs!¡± Meghan said. It took a moment to register it. ¡°You wanted to fight in close combat martial arts so you should be ready for that, anyway why did you do that kind of Armbar?¡± I asked. ¡°Hehe, I wonder if big sis Meg wants to take big bro for herself?!¡± Bonnie said with her silvertongue. Meghan blushed but shook her head. ¡°I¡¯m into older more muscular men, like an army soldier or mixed martial artist.¡± She replies. ¡°No wonder you didn¡¯t care about when I got out of bed just in shorts.¡± I said. She nods but there was no way to not notice Sophia¡¯s blushing face. ¡°Alright you two, go wash up then Sophia, take him of a tour of the house and the grounds. He will be here just for today and will leave in the afternoon.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Already?¡± Meghan asked. ¡°We still have things to do in Nebula, remember the Terraforming mission.¡± Dad said. She realizes and nods understanding. ¡°Alright get to it.¡± Malcolm said. Each of us was led to a different bathroom where we took a bath and got dressed in clean clothes. From there Sophia and the girls showed me the ¡°small¡± mansion. Further away from the mansion was the ¡°houses¡± of the android workers made from the puppets. If I call it a production plant for so many goods we saw in the house it wouldn¡¯t be exaggerated. If the company crashes the robot''s could easily maintain them with the goods they make. Then there were other things like artificial lake with large carp and other fish. We kept exploring until noon before going to the theater but this time it was equip with video games and you can guess more or less what happened after Meghan asked for some old martial arts games. We played until dad came to find us. After that we could only reluctantly end the last game and finally get up to leave. ¡°Auh! Big bro you going already?¡± Bonnie asked. ¡°Yeah, be nice to your sister and don¡¯t tease her so much.¡± I said. Sophia blushes at my words and I smile her way making it get more violent. Bonnie looks back and grins. ¡°Make sure to return big bro, sis will definitely like it and you''re fun to hang out with so even Bonnie will be waiting!¡± She said. ¡°Next time I will crush you after getting uncle nolands tutoring.¡± She said. ¡°I will rephrase that for you, his torturing will make you regret asking for it.¡± I say. She just crosses her arm making her twins perk up. ¡°I¡¯ll see you later in Nebula, I will start getting things ready in there.¡± Sophia said. I nod and we shake hands but even then she seemed really shy. Guess she was still reluctant with me knowing she was Malcolm¡¯s daughter. Getting in the car we wave and leave through the same way we came heading home once more. Chapter 31: Upgrades for the Mission Author''s corner: Next chapter ready at somewhat fast speed. Not much to comment today. P.S. this may seem rude and all but i will say it anyway. I''m someone that writes for comments so personally I kind of hate only receiving "Thanks for the chapter!" Comments. I understand you all like it but it bums me out only getting those comments when i put forth the effort (especally when i made the two previous chapters really funny hoping for funny comments in return but only got the comment i stated before.) Really want "real" comments so i know you all want to put it please don''t, it just annoys me when i hope for ideas from everyone only to find that kind of comment. Sry if its rude but its a pet peeve and it unmotivates me to only get that comment. Enjoy!
Mission: Kelha Terraforming Part two: OceanDifficulty5
Kelha II terraforming project has reached a stage where we can proceed with large scale planet changes. Since the atmosphere has been formed in a primitive unstable and toxic form the next stage to make it thicker shall follow. Request that crews possess at minimum large mining ship for the following. Crews will scour the asteroid field in search of asteroid with high concentration of water. After discovering such the asteroids must be thrown in a crash course into the region of volcanoes previously erupted in the first stage. Reward: 40000 credit to crew Objective: Safely guide asteroids to crash onto the planet "Warning: native space monsters and bandits present in asteroid field. Suggested weapon and defensive upgrades to ship be taken." Success: Aide in increasing Planet density and humidity level increases to satisfactory levels and whether patterns begin to appear. Job duration 2 weeks. Failure: Team is killed, asteroid you drop hits camps or towns.
Mission Accepted
¡°Alright, your crew has been registered as one group that will aid in the second stage terraforming of Kelha II.¡± The young android receptionist said. ¡°Thanks for the help.¡± I told her. ¡°Should we go dad?¡± I asked. ¡°Yeah, we need to figure out how to tow the asteroids now.¡± Dad said. Yesterday after we returned home me and dad went to sleep but immediately jumped in this morning and went to register for the terraforming mission which we had just accepted. ¡°Oh if it''s that then don¡¯t worry, for terraforming, the station of the system funds the building and attachment of the towing lines and hooks.¡± the receptionist said then remembered something. ¡°I forgot to ask, on this part there is an exception.¡± She said. ¡°Oh, what kind?¡± dad asked. ¡°Does your crew possess a dwarf fighter?¡± She asked. ¡°Yeah, I am one.¡± I reply. ¡°Great! Well, in that case you can have a choice in this, you can either have the station fund the hooks for your ship or ships or we can pay one of the dwarf fighter mechanics to build or aid in building a set of wings for your Robot.¡± She said. As we hear this we look at each other. ¡°One moment please.¡± I say and take a step back. ¡°Going to consult the team?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Yeah, patch me through.¡± I tell her. After a moment, with Lia being annoying and putting elevator music, the others voice appear. ¡°Did you need something Noah?¡± Jessica¡¯s voice came through the communicator. Unlike the previously firm voice before now it was a bit softer. ¡°Yeah, we came and got the mission but we learned something.¡± I said and passed off the information to the others. ¡°I think we should go with your robot.¡± Alex called from his coms. ¡°Same here.¡± Hilda replied. Havic was fast asleep so she didn¡¯t answer and Lisa was offline but since the overall was already for it we accept it. We nod and turn to the receptionist. ¡°We will like to request for someone to finish the wings for my robot.¡± I said. ¡°Alright, I shall contact someone to go over to your ship. From here you should wait until he is aborde then head down to the planet, you must meet the terraforming group so they know who they are working with as well as to show you where they need one impacted and to teach you how the job is done.¡± She said. ¡°Can you pass the location of where they are?¡± dad asked. ¡°Of course, since the accomplishment of the first stage they obtained their own base away from the main mining camps. Let me get the coordinates.¡± She said and after some typing Lia appeared. ¡°Got it!¡± She said and gave me the thumbs up. ¡°I guess that''s all we needed, thank you for the help.¡± I said. ¡°Yes, oh right, you should be careful, there has been a recent rise in bandit activity. The area around the new outpost that was previously the bandit hideout has been claimed and can be used as a drop off and repair station. It''s heavily guarded but still need to be careful. You should also be careful of the space life. Areas with large ice asteroids normally possess a number of space life.¡± She said. I was intrigued by this but it''s something we can search ourselves. We leave and head to the ship. After passing through the airlock of the ship and removing the space helmets. I breath a sigh and relax. Both of us head to the kitchen, our bodies here stayed a few days without eating and when we logged in we went directly to the mission registry so we were hungry. We each make some scrambled eggs then add some sausage and greens before adding a bit of salt and finished it and dropped it onto a plate and began eating. We had purchased some carbonated drinks, not coke since this universe doesn¡¯t have it, so we took some of the cold ones from the fridge and started to eat. At that time Lisa entered having logged in. ¡°Morning Lisa!¡± I say and dad says the same. ¡°You two are already up, that smells nice.¡± She says. ¡°Want some?¡± Dad asked and she nodded. He goes and gets a plate and splits half of his food with her. I hide my chuckle and keep eating and drinking. Then I remember something. ¡°Lisa, you mentioned your master, erg...Alphenor I think, did some research on the space creatures?¡± I asked. ¡°Yes he did but most of it was related to Psi. It¡¯s already well known that all space creatures are shaped my sea creatures but adapted for space. Sir Alphenor studied the smallest one that hide inside pebbles about two centimeters in size. His research involves what happens to the creatures around here when their psionic gates are opened. The animals can naturally use it since they use it to move around the area but he found that after unlocking the few gates the smallest ones have they can move where previously they couldn¡¯t the next generation was bigger and the one after that took a slightly fish like form. It was nearly four times the size and forced a mouth to eat other smaller creatures or minerals. The number of psionic gates increase within them every generation.¡± She explained and started to eat. ¡°We are going to be going to do the terraforming mission, we already got the mission, we heard that near asteroids with lots of water these animals appear.¡± I said. ¡°If it¡¯s about that then we will probably be facing anything between a level 15 to 30 animal and it will probably look like a cookie cutter shark or an eel.¡± She explained. ¡°Are they weak to anything?¡± I asked. ¡°Well they are soft on the inside like fish but they grow inside rock and due to their natural use of Psi they compress a hard shell around them leaving only the space needed to bend their bodies.¡± she replied. I looked at dad and he nodded. ¡°So blunt attacks or explosives. I think the sword you have for the robot is enough if you coat it in Psi.¡± Dad said. ¡°Hey Noah, a dwarf is knocking on the door! Should we let him in?¡± Alex¡¯s voice called over the intercom. ¡°Ask what he is here for?¡± I said. Can¡¯t be to careful. A moment later Alex¡¯s voice sounded again. ¡°Says he is here to build wings for your robot.¡± He said. ¡°Let him in, he was commissioned to do that for the terraforming mission.¡± I replied. ¡°Okay!¡± he said and the intercom turned off. ¡°So the station does that?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°Yeah, it was that or adding hooks and towing lines to the ship.¡± Dad replied. ¡°Yeah, its for the better I guess.¡± Lisa said and nodded. I ate quickly and got up. ¡°I will go to the workshop and see the mechanic.¡± I said and left. In the workshop I found the dwarf as he was looking through my robot. When he heard my footsteps he turned around. ¡°Oh! Devil¡¯s beer kid! So it was you who I will build for!¡± The dwarf said and floated down until his feet attached to the ground. The ship has no gravity tech so we only use magnet boots inside. As I examine this Dwarf and realize this was one of the twenty dwarfs that went to drink the Dwarf Smasher. He walked over and stuck his hand out which I took and shook. ¡°Devil¡¯s Beer?¡± I commented raising a brow. ¡°What else would you call it, the other name you guys gave it is a bit to degrading even if it¡¯s perfectly fitting.¡± He said making us both laugh. ¡°So what do you think of the wings?¡± I asked. I looked towards the half built wings on the table. ¡°Before we even start to talk about the wings you need to set up the robot to accept them or they will function at half, no, a quarter of their potential and lose a fucking large amount of Psi during the process.¡± He said. ¡°I need what done?¡± I asked. ¡°Well first the old feet propulsion has to go, we will change it, then we need to rewire the Psionic nerves around the shoulder blades and build a docking slot on them and on the legs near the waist. The wings on the back will be three extension rods that release the psi and when not active they fold into the main body which lowers parallel with the body. As for the ones on the legs it''s similar but the turn on an axes for turning. The back wings you were making aren¡¯t even a third complete but they follow the basic plans for this type of wing but I looked at the plans you were going to make. The model I just explained is about 3 to 4 times more efficient than your current one and since you weren¡¯t doing anything besides upgrades to the psi containers it would be safe to say that the wings built with me guiding you will be 9 to 12 times better then anything you can make until you learn how to properly install them.¡± He said without cutting corners. Hearing exactly how different the upgrades actually are surprised me greatly. I didn¡¯t think I would need to make something like a docking location on the back to hold them, I had expected to directly build it into the body but with the docking slot I can remove them and replace them with better wings. It made sense that it would be a much better system. ¡°Will this take long?¡± I asked. I have been building the wings for a weak already and still wasn¡¯t even close to finishing. ¡°A day or two.¡± He said making me stumble over myself and look at him in shock. He simply smiled. ¡°You and your old man are legends with brewing beer but that doesn¡¯t mean you outmatch a man that has fiddled with Dwarf fighter robot''s since he was 15 years old.¡± The dwarf said. I took a look and saw the few white hairs and estimated around 170 to 210 years. Dwarves, like in all games, have an estimated lifespan of around 300 years old and start looking old after 150. It would be considered middle age at this age range. ¡°If that is true then we can get started, the ship will be going down planetside so we can meet the terraformers before we come back to start moving the asteroids to crash onto the planet.¡± I explain. ¡°Perfect, not then I already checked your storage and there should be enough psionic nerve for this and the parts just need to be made. I¡¯ve also uploaded the schematics to the wings I mentioned. If you want to see a virtual model you can access it on the console over there.¡± he said pointing at Jessica¡¯s computer she uses to alter schematics.¡± He said then removed both his gloves and crack his knuckles and turned to the large boxes of parts. He grinned and waved his hand. I could feel the psi leave from his hand and to my surprise, a large number of components started to fly out and started to start floating over the wings slowly building parts one by one. I watch each part and make sure Lia is also recording each part¡¯s construction. Still¡­ ¡°How can you control so much weight with external psi?¡± I asked. ¡°Bahaha! Boy, we are in a 0g zone! Has your brain turn to mush under the 0g¡¯s? All I am doing is small push¡¯s with the parts and making them float around!¡± He said and bellowed out a laugh. I felt a bit embarrassed by having forgotten my own ship¡¯s situation. We had magnet boots so we were always fixed to the floor so we have a sense of gravity with our feet on the ground. ¡°Dad, is everything ready?¡± I asked. ¡°Nothing really left to do on the station at the moment. We can proceed down to the planet.¡± He replied. ¡°Then get Alex to get us going, I¡¯ll be in the workshop working on the wings.¡± I say. ¡°Okay!¡± Dad exclaims and the coms turn off. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. Moments later we hear the ship¡¯s engines turning on full power. After that was an uneventful descent after uploading the coordinates. As for the wings the dwarf promised in 1-2 days, if I say that I had reached 10% completion before it would currently be around 50% and he already reached around 30% completion on the two new wings that go around the leg. It completely showed his utter confidence at construction and how much he has made over his long life. Something that got us by surprise was when we were getting near by planet. Even with the inertia dampeners we felt the ship shake before stopping. ¡°Alex! What was that?¡± I asked. ¡°Sorry, I forgot to work in the entrance into the atmosphere the planet has some now which I forgot to think about.¡± He said apologetic. ¡°Bah! You don¡¯t need to worry about such a thing with the current stage. It¡¯s only after the second stage that it becomes anything important!¡± The dwarf said without batting an eye or stopping to build but I noticed how the number of components he was pulling out was getting smaller as we approach the planet. The gravity was obviously starting to affect us so he was obviously not being able to use his full potential. Still I saw something good, when we finally get a ship with a gravity generator I will make sure the cargo and my workshop be left out so that I can build much quicker. ¡°Guy¡¯s we are arriving at the city, come check it out! It looks awesome!¡± Alex shouted through the intercom. ¡°Oh, first time seeing it, let''s go see it!¡± The dwarf exclaimed and I nodded. We both run out of the workshop and climb the stairs and soon reach the kitchen. It had the largest windows we could look through. Alex was circling the base and it surprised us when we saw. The base was a place surrounded by a large Dome shield but inside there were four large structure domes. One in the middle was the largest and three spaced out forming a triangle. The one pointing east was made of glass and large metal supports and inside we could see a large plantation and large water tanks. Clearly this was a greenhouse where the vegetation and seal life were being bred. The others were covered in much more metal and from above you couldn¡¯t tell what it was. As for the rest of the space around them, it was about 80% empty dirt with whatever was taken up being used as a spaceship port which we were moving towards. ¡°They sure are extravagant.¡± Dad said. ¡°This is a small camp you know?¡± the dwarf explained. We looked at him surprised and looked down. ¡°This is the only camp so it will most likely evolve and grow as time goes by and probably become the capital of the world''s government.¡± Jessica analysed. I knew she was probably speaking with information gained from her father. ¡°Aye lass, if you look at all the geographical scans, this location is in a location that is estimated to not flood later on and may offer a good starting point. Its usually a gamble but what isn¡¯t in life.¡± He said shrugging and turning. ¡°I¡¯ll go continue the robot with him, Dad¡­ don¡¯t fuck up when you meet the terraformers again.¡± I tell dad and he smiles wryly before I leave. Jessica PoV I giggle a bit as I watch Noah leave to follow the dwarf. ¡°Uncle, it feels like Noah is the captain instead of you.¡± I tell him. ¡°Heh, I wonder if you say out of observation or because you''re interested in him.¡± Hilda says with a sly grin. ¡°Ma...Shut up hilda!¡± I say and turn away. Thankfully my face can¡¯t blush since I am an android and not a flesh and blood organic race. Still she laughs at my reaction and I can¡¯t help pout. ¡°Should we go?¡± Uncle Noland asked. ¡°Shouldn¡¯t we wake Havic up as well?¡± Lisa asked. ¡°She was up for a long time, let''s let her rest for now.¡± Alex said with clear worry in his voice. We all laugh but watch as we land in one of the docks. We do notice that there were quite a number of other ships or groups of ships on each dock which means other crews have already gotten ships. ¡°There are some rather smart people, quite a number of crews have already showing to have ships, still most are either fighter or mining ships from the looks of it. Unless they have a good level of gear on them I can see these guys dying really soon.¡± Uncle said with a serious expression. To me it felt like his words had an underline meaning as if it didn¡¯t mean the current mission and instead something further. ¡°Let¡¯s go, we should look for the terraforming leaders and get more information from them.¡± Uncle said. Alex reached the kitchen as we leave. ¡°I have already unlocked the hangar doors, there is no latters so we will have to leave through there.¡± he said. ¡°As expected really, lets go.¡± Uncle said and we went downstairs. In the cargo Alex goes and presses a button and the door begins to lower. ¡°Olivia, leave a message with Baal so Havic doesn¡¯t freak out when she wakes up if we aren¡¯t here.¡± Uncle tells his AI. ¡°Of course sir.¡± She says and goes silent. From there we leave and from outside Alex has Xeno close the hangar from the inside. From there we ask where we can find the terraformer leaders and after explaining our connections we have a guard that was stationed on the docks to lead us inside. We head directly to the center dome and quickly discover that this was similar to a corporation with many people and machines. We enter into the largest room that I can only compare to the nasa room that everyone is normally inside when launching rockets up. That said, the huge screens showed many different things such as atmospheric density and air purity, what is the predominant gas in the air and planet temperature. In the far back was the terraforming leader we had escorted down and he was speaking with a crew of around fifteen. As we approach he spots us and finishes his talk and dismisses the crew and walks over. The crew looks on as he approaches. ¡°Ah the Star Comet crew, its been a while.¡± He said with a smile and looked around. ¡°It sure has, a few months or so yet you set up such a large base.¡± Uncle says. ¡°Efficiency is the name of the game now a days. The Dwarf fighter boy, he didn¡¯t come?¡± the terraformer asked. ¡°He is currently in our ship building the wings for his robot.¡± I explain. ¡°Ah, that is right, I received that news several hours ago. When I heard your crew was joining the stage terraforming I was rather excited, dwarf fighters are after all very versatile in space and our missions normally allow them to quickly gain one of the most important aspects of their robot''s which is the wings for space flight. I expect a lot from your crew.¡± He said. ¡°You have many crews, ours is just another in the bunch.¡± uncle said. ¡°Do you know, of fifty crews only 3 have dwarf fighters.¡± the terraformer said. I didn¡¯t really know that, but why is he saying that now? ¡°Exactly why are you excited for dwarf fighters, especially newbies?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Tasks like terraforming isn¡¯t done by any experienced Dwarf fighter, the pro¡¯s are battle hardened warriors, they are also the final trump card of the station, there is no situation where professional dwarf fighters working for the station would actually do work like terraforming so new dwarf fighters are the best option not only that they are the best at this. The gather the asteroids of decent size without letting it be too big you normally need to break apart the asteroids but ships can only fire large weapons but dwarf fighters can use precision tools like drills and also defend themselves much better in space against the wildlife.¡± He explained. It makes sense, being able to freely move in space, focus on one thing and still nimble enough to fight and defend which regular ships can¡¯t do dwarf fighters are really a good thing to have in space. I look at Lisa and the terraformer does as well. ¡°An elf is just as good as a Dwarf fighter and you only need a space suit to move in space but I also know your own affinity isn¡¯t towards fighting which makes the dwarf fighter boy more important for your crew.¡± The terraformer said and Lisa nodded understanding what he meant. ¡°So mind telling us the details of the mission?¡± Uncle asked. ¡°Of course, come this way.¡± He said and led us to one of the computers. From it he looked up at the huge screen up at the front where one of the screens opened up showing a revolving planet and several dozen red dots and about six or seven green ones. ¡°After extensive geological research we found many locations that we would need to hit. The impact rage for each red dot is within a margin of around 100 kilometers around them. About a third of these are volcanoes while the rest are locations we discovered that had aquifers underground. In all these areas there is several dozen Kelha II worm tunnels running through it. The impact from an asteroid will undoubtable cause enough seismic tremors underground enough to crack the rocks making the water start to leak into the tunnels and start to spread below the surface.¡± He explained. ¡°Wouldn¡¯t this also cause the current residents to go extinct?¡± I asked. ¡°Not completely, the current atmosphere can already support them above ground and they also realized it and in a number of places they have begun to crop up.¡± The terraformer said. ¡°What is the actual state of development of the atmosphere?¡± Uncle asked. ¡°We normally compare the atmosphere to earth during the 20th century before the planetary heating. Through our scans, when taking earth as 100%, the current atmosphere would be around 5%. It lacks humidity and water on the planet as well as heat. The water filled asteroids crashing to earth would cause high friction and slowly eat the planet as well as releasing the water inside. This will also cause a portion of the water to break up the oxygen and hydrogen and return to pure elements. As more oxygen fills the atmosphere it will slowly form an ozone layer and eventually cause other effects to the planet such as global warming and eventually the effect we want which is a planetary storm where rain will fall filling the oceans.¡± He explained. The other crew was also listening and the leader came over. ¡°Sir, the objective is to hit those marks correct? How do we aim?¡± He asked. ¡°You are towing them, you have plenty of time to change the trajectory we will also provide your AI¡¯s with the calculations of how to estimate the entry and angle that would allow the asteroids to survive best and so on.¡± He said. The leader nodded as did uncle. ¡°There are several other things we need to set up, it will be a while and we will be sending someone to upload a program on your ship¡¯s scanners to be able to identify water content in asteroids. Once that is done you can all head out and start.¡± He said then called one of the assistance and told her to prepare the trajectory information. After a while we all received the information we had nothing left to do but return to the ship and after a few hours someone came to upgrade the scanners. That done we leave the terraformers base since we had nothing left to do here. By the time we reached the old bandit base that was now an official outpost and moved above the asteroid field no longer hidden. By then more than a day had passed and I was in the workshop watching how amazing the four wings were. They were already complete and I was watching the dwarf teaching Noah the upgrades to his robot. I think they were rearranging the nerves and it¡¯s supposed to become twice as effective. At my own table I looked at the weapons. I turn on my console and start opening the schematics for one of the plasma sniper rifles we got at the bandit base. The power was relatively weak compared to the railgun but the durability was greater and it was stronger than the normal sniper. I was thankful that the computer, along with Vivi¡¯s help, I could calculate if any upgrades I did to the weapon parts on the schematics would work and by how much the improvement would offer the weapon. Besides that I already have a number of small tools and attachments I made together with Noah. I think I have spent a long time with him here, it really is easier to talk with him about technology than normal stuff since he understands that better than me. Still right now I can¡¯t bother him. As I finish doing one kind upgrade to stabilize the plasma for longer range, it works so I leave it as that and look through all the schematics we got from the bandits and I find a small drone one. ¡°Didn¡¯t know there was a drone schematics here!¡± I commented. As I examine it I find it¡¯s a scout model. It has scanning capabilities and is perfect for any scouter or long range shooter since they have a good precision aiming. For androids, the AI in a scouter model would work like a satellite that will improve the AI¡¯s spotter function for us. I was rather tempted but I needed to ask Noah to make it for me. I guess I have to wait, he is rather against making Lia one and seeing him make one for Vivi will make it bad for the others. I guess waiting is fine.
Wing plan for mech http://img09.deviantart.net/dea7/i/2015/156/8/9/lizardman_4wings_by_mechamastermind-d8w2q8q.jpg Chapter 32: Flight Training Author Corner: Hi guys, nothing new to say this time, simply no procrastinating, also the story will start moving rapidly soon. (hint end of arc arriving soon) Enjoy!!
Above the large ring of asteroids was the newly acquired outpost base the station was able to claim after the bandit raid. Slowly approaching it was a black and white shuttle coming from the planet side. "Crew Star Comet requesting landing permission?" A feminine voice called over the communicator towards the base. This was Alex who was at the helm of the shuttle. "Permission granted. We have opened all the escape rounds as landing ports and numbered each. Report to port 2." The man replying said. At the same time the coordinates for the Port in question was transmitted and was marked as a waypoint by Alex''s AI Xeno. The two guided the ship towards the port and as they saw the target port, he began to slow the shuttle down and turn it to face the port before slowly approaching it. The escape routes all each had a size that could fit the largest shuttle which at the time had exactly that in all locations. Now with an installed energy shield to contain the air inside, the escape routes had all been equipped as hangar ports. Alex releases the landing gears below the ship as the shuttle starts to pass through the energy field. On a catwalk at the back was a man with two glow red lams waving them back and forth. This was to guide the ship. After the ship reached the center he lifted them and Alex stopped the ship and carefully lowered the ship until they touched the ground and turned off the engines. "Guys,we landed!" Alex announced to the crew. At that time he took off his seat belt and vaulted off the seat and ran off. Lisa PoV "A bit more Lass!" The dwarf was shouting as me and him lift the second back wing and hold it behind Noah''s robot. This is by far the heaviest object i have ever carried. Noah was working quickly to attach all the cables and connections between the robot and the wing. "Alright! It''s done! Move it closer!" Noah shouted. I just held the wing while the dwarf pulled it. *Thump! Cacha!* The wing slowly moves closer while Noah was properly pushing the wires under the makes contact with the port on the back the two had made and after making sure nothing was out of place he closed the locks around the base of the wings finally sealing them on. "Done!" He shouted and i finally relaxed. With me releasing my Psi the wing that was straight out parallel with the ground lowered until it was parallel with the walls.
You have gained a level in External Psi Manipulation.
"Good job lass! We really couldn''t do this without you!" The dwarf said. I was breathing ragged as he complimented me. He had asked me to help while in space but since we would be docking and the base had a Gravity generator the Wings would instantly crash onto the ground as soon as we entered. Each wing is about 300 kilos each so it goes without saying that the fall would have destroyed them. That said, the dwarf says these wings are very lightweight but obviously as they were a more advanced model of basic Dwarf fighter wings they still used a number of heavy parts. The advanced models will only have one or two metal sections making the wing on its back. After activating them it would make solid psi wings coming from those matching wings. Some even used drones as part of the wing as well as weapons. "Let me rest." I said and sat down. "Hahaha that''s good Lisa, we really wouldn''t know what to do without you here." Roktar said as he watched us. I blushed a bit as i took a cup of water from Jessica who brought one for me. "Are the other two as heavy?" I asked. "Yes but these you only need to lift off the ground only 20 cm for them to reach the target location." The dwarf said. Looking at the wings leaning on the wall i felt relief. Hang downward so the weight will be at one point and not stretched out. After a bit Alex appeared and i rested enough so i got up and only grabbed the top and a part about a fourth of the way down and lifted the right wing and moved it slowly and lifted it higher. Sweat started to form as i held it in place but much less than before. The two worked quickly and connect everything and pushed in lace while keeping any wires from being loose. Then the last wing was placed in the same manner finally completing the robot. The wings had a rather interesting effect. "Thanks a lot for the help Lisa." Noah says and i nod. He opens the chest and sits inside starting it up. "Wings located, installation program active." Lia''s voice called out. Noah walks to the middle of the room. The wings on the sides move behind his back then to the side of his legs. When its on the side it spreads to a 25 degree angle and the wings open then close. The one on his back lift upwards before opening and spread to the sides then close again slowly. They keep doing that slowly getting faster until it started to get faster and seems more natural. "Wow, wings are hard to control." Noah said. "Control of the part is the first step to using it. The more you use it the better the program gets when testing it." The dwarf said. The program gets better thanks to the AI who is analyzing the data and improve. Suddenly one of the wings stops and twitches when opening. The others stopped as it did and it closed. "Sorry, bad code there... hehe." Lia''s voice called. After a moment the wing opened and the rest fell in sync. After half an hour they were moving naturally as the arms and legs. Noah said he gained four levels in his robot piloting skill by getting used to this as well as one level on Inner Psi Manipulation. "Don''t get cocky kid, piloting only means moving around. Flying has its own skill." The dwarf said dunking a bucket of cold water. Another ten minutes everything was done. "This is as best i can do. It will move as naturally as your arms and legs. Now you just need to train." Lia said. "Great..." Noah said. "Let''s take a few steps back and make sure Noah is outside before we try. His driving skills have much to be desired." Roktar said. "Shut it old man!" He replied making me giggle. "Does he drive badly?" I asked. "NO!" Noah shouted. "He doesn''t have a driver''s license at the age of 20. That should be an indication." Roktar said. Noah was frowning but just closed the chest lid sealing himself inside. All the wings close and he looks towards the door out. "Open the door so i can get out! He said. We nod and i move over and open the bulkhead door which opened up to the hangar we were inside. I felt a bit playful so i jumped out and floated around. "Come on Noah, it''s not to hard." I said making Roktar laugh. It made me blush a bit. Noah walked out and jumped down landing with a loud thump almost a crash. The others make their way up to the airlock that was linked to a catwalk that would lead directly to the door which was at the ground floor. "Kid, flying is external psi manipulation. Don''t get cocky, start slow. We are at the base and there are several dwarf fighters here to recharge you." The dwarf said. When i looked around i did notice a group of dwarf and elves at the edge of the hangar. They walked over and greeted the dwarf before looking down. "Boris you made a four wing basic model for the kid?" One f the other dwarves asked the one that was with us. "Much more efficient, i made sure to rewire the bot so psi cost is the same as if he had two but the legs give him more stability." He replied. "Wait the side wings aren''t needed?" Roktar asked. Boris thought a moment. "Think of them as training wheels. Basic model wings don''t have good rotation or stopping power. It also helps him turn he just needs to get used to the four wings." Boris replied. I chuckled and looked at Noah who had spread all the wings. A light glow came from the bottom side of all the metal wing. Slowly growing stronger until the heavy robot finally took off slowly. As it rises it stopped at one meter where it hovered. "Sir Noah is putting a lot of pressure on the wings and overexpending Psi, he has a long way to go." My AI Tris said. The elven maid AI appeared and evaluated the floating robot. At this moment we saw Havic do something that spread two large bat wings on her lower back. I felt psi cover her wings as she began to fly and move towards Noah. She knocked on the head. "Noah, you''re focusing your psi incorrectly. You are using it on the lower side and trying to push but that is wrong. Cover the entire wing within inner psi then push outwards." She said and focused enough Psi into her wings so it had a visible glow. The glow showed how to do it. The glow spread from the base to the tip the spread behind and above forming two balls of psi that acted as a cushion. I did something similar but covered my body in psi. A moment of silence followed before a dull but visible wave of psi appeared on wings before from the four wings it formed four small balls. The consumption drastically dropped and he began to rise. "Thank you Havic." Noah said. At this moment the right leg wing aimed forward and the left turned back and his body began spinning then he reversed and stopped. He pushed both forward making his legs rise before the wings on his back pushed off moving forward slowly. The leg wings which were facing the floor turned on an angle slowly increasing his speed until it was almost parallel but as he reached the wall the pointed back and pushed his legs and made his body face up and avoid collisions. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. "Kid has skill, got used to flying quickly under gravity." One of the elves said. "Agreed, most are basic moves but he isn''t bad." Another said. "Surprisingly he hasn''t crashes." Roktar said. Me and Havic fly over and land on the catwalk. ¡°I didn¡¯t know you had wings!¡± I said intrigued and saw as they pulled back and formed some cute bat wing tattoos. ¡°Zastro¡¯s have a battle form which you should have seen. Males are those huge beast almost demon like people.¡± She explained. I remembered that, they were extremely large muscular and i also remember Frethir¡¯s arm expanding like that. ¡°With training we can control which parts of our body transforms so while in the ships the men are normally the police and remain within wings unless needed. Women normally don¡¯t fight but we still train to protect ourselves and we do have a battle form which i would compare to those super sexy demon women from lots of porn site¡± ¡°That''s good thanks.¡± I said blushing and cutting her off. The other women were also blushing but chose to hide it while Alex had hidden himself behind Roktar¡¯s huge build. Boris looks at this come and connects a chat line with noah. ¡°Hey kids, that''s good for flight in an atmosphere, now out into space.¡± He says with a mischievous grin. The other Dwarfs start to chuckle and i looked at the others for an answer but they just shrug. ¡°Can do!¡± Noah¡¯s voice comes in and the robot stabilizes in the air before turning towards the opening and flying that way at about 50 kilometers per hours. We watch as he passes and suddenly he rockets forward and upward nearly four times as fast. All the dwarves start laughing and the elves smile and shake their head. ¡°Hey what the hell!¡± Noah¡¯s voice called from the communicators. ¡°Learn to fly kid! Ahahah!¡± Boris shouted. ¡°Why did he suddenly accelerate?¡± Alex asked. ¡°In space there is no gravity, there is no air resistance, there is no force. That means that as long as you accelerate you will get faster and faster. Originally The Robot''s were made to handle gravity of high gravity planets, even with their mass the reinforcement let them move around and smaller ones were better for high gravity planets. The big ones we see today are powerful planetside but their true purpose is for space use. Their size alters in nothing the speed or trajectory and can have any form because of the lack of air resistance.¡± An elf explained. ¡°The kids top speed planetside would be around 100 km/h but but in space he could easily pass six times that speed. Most ships function differently in and out of an atmosphere and their programmings automatically align to the environment so that when you exit the atmosphere you don¡¯t suddenly rocket off like the kid did. He doesn¡¯t have this and its a good training course for him to learn to control his speed in space as well as controlling his inertia.¡± Boris said. ¡°Fuck you all!¡± He shouted in rage. ¡°Get moving kid, you have today to learn to control your speed. You should get your Dwarf Robot Flying skill eventually after getting used to it. Use the asteroid field as an obstacle course, no questions asked now move it! If its not by me then Colonel will put you through an even harder training course in the middle of a monster infested area of the asteroid field!¡± Boris said and cut the connection. ¡°Now then, shall we get something to eat?¡± He asked without any shame. ¡°Sure thing, some fast food would do this old man some good.¡± Roktar said. ¡°I think just a salad would be alright for me.¡± I said. The elves smile my way and we all moved on. One of the female elves walked over and we started to talk. Sadly she noticed how my eyes looked in certain directions and wouldn¡¯t stop teasing. Noah PoV ¡°Fuck them all!¡± I curse those guys. ¡°Hahaha they really got you this time!¡± Lia said making a screen appear showing her rolling on her virtual floor. ¡°Shut up and build a random route for me. Straight crossing through the asteroid field!¡± I said annoyed. ¡°Yes yes hold on.¡± She said as she picked herself up in the image before making it vanish. Then all the ¡®extra¡¯ screens disappeared leaving only the view the robot eye cameras were able to see. Soon i spotted a line that went forward and weaved around before heading down into a breaching area with less asteroids. ¡°Follow the line, i will be using the scanners to identify a pathway that isn¡¯t too difficult for starters. It will be mostly wide space with few obstacles but it still has some.¡± She said. ¡°Make this beginner difficulty, let''s think of this as a video game.¡± I said. ¡°Got it, separating difficulty between Beginner, newbie, adapt, expert, Pro.¡± She said. With that set a table with the five difficulties appeared and the Beginner was selected. No doubt she instantly made a program for this since the guidelines didn¡¯t exist before. Following what Havic said may blast me to quickly but i guess this is to get used to flying so let¡¯s do this. I start following the what i did before and cover all the wings. Then i start moving but with the same little push i move too quickly and had to stop. ¡°This is hard!¡± I complained. ¡°Well its simply external psi manipulation. Havic said she makes small points under her wings which help her keep afloat. Why not make one or two escape points along the wings.¡± Lia suggested and showed a computerized diagram of the wing covered and a single or two openings in the bubbles of psi pushing forward. I nod and try that. With the bubble made i make one opening on the top of both wings. Surprisingly it worked and i was able to achieve 50 km/h after a minute by then i stopped releasing psi and used the bottom wings i controlled my direction only using the wings to accelerate forward after my direction gets to off and i begin showing signs of spinning. After a bit i move towards the pathway. ¡°Release two openings on the wings so that you can do this difficulty to get experience.¡± Lia said. ¡°Alright¡­¡± I said and open a second opening. At once my acceleration rate rose by double and before i reached the asteroid field i already reached 120 km/h. I cut the flow and start controlling the bottom wings as i reach the asteroid field. I kept following the light through the asteroid field turning and focusing on control keeping the speed low and properly following. I approach a large asteroid and push my legs forward and turn my body and accelerate making my body turn and move another direction before i spun and flew around the rock with my back facing it. Lia had me go close and avoid the jutting rocks. It was rather hard due to the tight spaces but i let myself slow down and get used to it before we continue. Soon enough we appear on the top side again near the base and as i reach the end of the course that Lia played out i was surprised.
You have gained a new Class skill
Fighter Robot Flight PilotRarity3Level 1
A skill unique only to pilots of a Fighter Robot. This skill represents the ability to fly both in space and planetside. Improves Control when flying by 5% Decreases Psi Consumption by 5%
¡°So we only need the beginner trial for this.¡± Lia said. ¡°Well beginner was already tough, i got a headache from controlling the wings since they aren¡¯t a part of my body naturally.¡± I say. ¡°Would be good if you had Psi gates on your back and waist. Would save you the trouble.¡± Lia commented jokingly. I just roll my eyes. ¡°Roll the program at beginner again and choose a different route.¡± I tell her and look at my Psi container. With the upgrade recently i upgraded the three containers to 7,500 psi capacity giving 22,500 psi to use. One run used up 3,500 from the intensive movement which meant the wings had a heavy consumption which will require a lot of recharges. That said the work of moving a single asteroid and pushing it properly towards the planet will eat up even more. That said even finding a good one will take just as long so the time to consumption ratio will be a bit evened out. ¡°We will go until we can¡¯t train more.¡± I said. ¡°Got it! So starting up beginner run again!¡± Lia said pumped and starts up the program. 20 hours later
Fighter Robot Flight PilotRarity3Level 9
A skill unique only to pilots of a Fighter Robot. This skill represents the ability to fly both in space and planetside. Improves Control when flying by 9% Decreases Psi Consumption by 9%
¡°Not bad, with 5 recharges and being able to go up to adapt difficulty with only minor damages isn¡¯t bad.¡± I said. ¡°Yeah minor damages but you still were going over 180 km/h to get those damages.¡± Lia said. ¡°Hey if i wasn¡¯t cautious by reinforcing the robot i would have lost my fucking right arm by now.¡± I complained. ¡°And who made you reinforce? You would have lost the entire robot if you didn¡¯t reinforce it!¡± Lia shouted back. I look to the side avoiding her gaze. *Thump* I land at the open door to my workshop. I fold my wings and enter before but the robot standing where it should and deactivate it finally and jump out and stretch. I feel the pain of hunger and call the others and find they are in the tavern that was opened here enjoying a drink and food. The time was noon Galactic time and i have only been training the last 20 hours so i am starving. I run off to find this tavern and stuff my face after closing up the ship. Chapter 33: War Authors Corner: The meaty parts have arrived! It will come in a few increments but it has come! Enjoy!
Coming from the planet almost 1 day after Noah and his crew a large number of ships were rising together. The number of ships dwarfed Noah¡¯s crew five to one. In the front are two mining ships which had been customized for combat as well as mining. Its plates were stronger and a laser gun was placed below the pilot¡¯s seat. Behind them was a large mining container ship which had the large cargo sealed and converted into a cargo ship. This cargo was further enhanced as a workshop and single ship hammer which perfectly fit small flights. Around the cargo ship were four small single seat fighters that look like small shuttles and it accompanied the other ships covering the sides. Now it wasn¡¯t the number of ships that was shocking about this crew but what was inside the cargo. Standing tall and strong while under constant construction of a four dwarves were two newbie Dwarf Fighter Robot''s. To the side were four pairs of wings. ¡°Finally done!¡± One of the older dwarves said. This was a mechanic that was commissioned to make wings for crews that possessed dwarf fighters. Unlike Boris with Noah there were two Dwarf mechanics here to make the project run faster. Also unlike him, these two didn¡¯t make four wings for one robot but instead just two wings, similar to Noah¡¯s, but without the lower body wings. ¡°It took quite a bit more than we expected, you boys should have started earlier.¡± The other dwarf said. ¡°We didn¡¯t exactly know we how to start.¡± One of the crews dwarf said. ¡°Nah don¡¯t worry about it.¡± The first mechanic replied laughing. ¡°Now, we need one of the elf boys in here, we will soon be reaching the base.¡± One of the dwarves said. The others nod and soon call one of the crew. Soon a tall black haired elf walked into the cargo. ¡°You need me? What for?¡± He asked a bit arrogantly. ¡°We will be entering the new base soon and it has a gravity generator so we need you to help hold the wings while we install them.¡± One of the dwarfs said. ¡°You can use Psi yourselves. Not to mention you two have the robot''s, just use that to hold it, stop wasting my time.¡± The elf said and sneered before leaves. The four dwarves were snarling in rage. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that the elf was vice captain then they wouldn¡¯t have taken it. The man was arrogant to no end because he choose the high powered elf race. With the high powered control of combat branches of psi he is the main attacker even in space but he is too cocky. ¡°That brat is too conceited. Can¡¯t wait until he falls into a ditch and gets stranded there without psi.¡± One of the dwarf mechanics said. ¡°Come on, we can put at least one wing before reaching the base. We will use the robot if we have to. It might be faster.¡± The other mechanic said. The other mechanic sneered and stomped his foot but that casual stomp made the entire ship rock violently. ¡°Fucking cocky bastard will see how weak he is soon. He can¡¯t even compare to a dwarf fighter after we get our wings.¡± He said and walked over to the wing and grabbed it physically and moved it around like holding a lightweight stick. Normally mechanics like to be careful with the wings since they are sensitive with many delicate parts but being insulted made him ignore that and made him do the quick method by using his physical strength to attach it. Before they reached the base it was done but because of the elf the two crew¡¯s dwarfs had to check for damages themselves since the two dwarves had already prepared to get off and only give the basic instructions of how to fly and leave. A dwarf knows how to value friendships but also who how to hold a grudge and insulting one isn¡¯t a good idea. The four go to the front of the ship and sit down with the crew that wasn¡¯t piloting but the two dwarfs just pull out a bottle of beer and chug it and look out the window. Suddenly something zips pass and the dwarves look out. ¡°Oh, looks like Boris already helped out a newbie.¡± One of them said. The other looks and sees a dwarf Fighter Robot flying in space at around 180 km/h passing by the group before diving into the asteroid field. ¡°Aye, kid go lucky and seems to be the only one in his crew.¡± The first one said. ¡°Stupid newbie won¡¯t ever surpass our crew.¡± The conceited elf said as he heard the two dwarves. ¡°A brat like you that still smells like the milk from your moms tit shouldn¡¯t talk about someone being a novice. You aren¡¯t even above level 12 in any psi skills besides telekinesis and even then you can¡¯t make yourself useful.¡± The first dwarf said. The elf turned red in anger. Boom! ¡°Stop this!¡± A deep voice said. Everyone looked at the hulking figure sitting across from everyone. This was the captain, an ex-marine that had chosen the ogre race and has developed his stats frighteningly through military training program for several weeks. ¡°We will get nowhere insulting another crew. A smaller number can still be more powerful, don¡¯t forget that!¡± The captain says. He knows far too well how few people can take out a large number. Assassins are an easy example since one that can sneak in can completely compromise the entire structure of a military compound. The elf sat down and let out a ¡°hmph¡±. The captain sighed and shook his head and looked out the window as the fighter robot broke out of the cover of the asteroids. It stopped completely still in space. At that time he got a good look at the robot. With two wings on his back and on the waist with three extended extensions on all he was perfectly still and not even spinning. A moment later the bottom wings turned and spun it around before tilting the legs up before it rocketed off. ¡°Why did it have four wings?¡± The captain asked the two dwarves. ¡°Some mechanics prefer four wings to two. We both work with two better than four. The two owner wings can even be considered training wheels but it makes movement like spinning and canceling inertia a bit easier but its consumption is far higher.¡± The first dwarf said in a bored tone. ¡°So you gave us a shittier model wing.¡± the elf sneered. ¡°Shut it pretty brat or else I will make your face a shittier model!¡± The first dwarf shouted. ¡°SHUT UP!¡± The captain roared to the elf then looked back at the two mechanics. ¡°You don¡¯t use four wings?¡± He asked. ¡°You need to completely rearrange the psionic nerves to handle the psi consumption and try to reduce the cost. We simply don¡¯t know how to so we can¡¯t set it up, simple as that.¡± The second dwarf said. The captain nodded and quickly glared at the elf who had opened his mouth. He shut it seeing the glare. As the crew arrived at the previous bandit base the large number of ships needed to be split and go to different ports. After that the dwarves took the robot''s out of the ship and the mechanics gave a really crude rundown and watched over them until they were flying and in space before leaving without batting an eye. From there the two dwarves starting doing like Noah and training. Soon after, the base became like a training ground because over 10 other dwarf fighters began to train their flying skills around the base. Noah PoV I stare at the huge, over 35 meter in diameter, asteroid floating before me. Beside me was the shuttle. In my view were clear scans coming directly from Xeno, Alex¡¯s AI. ¡°Is this thing really 70% water?¡± I asked looking at the rock in front of me. ¡°It is, the scans show in this area this one is not only containing water but it has enough size to not fragment in what exists of the atmosphere.¡± Alex replies. ¡°Does that atmosphere even offer resistance?¡± I asked looking towards the trap who was floating nearby. ¡°It does, if something enters impromptly it can cause some damage to the ship and maybe starting heating up the surface of a ship. For a huge rock it offers enough resistance to fragment.¡± Alex says. ¡°So how should we do this?¡± I asked and looked around noticing the casually flowing elongated rocks. ¡°Well you got a bulky sword, go get yourself some experience points.¡± Alex said with a smile and waved. I shake my head as I pull the sword out. The problem we had to face was very simple, like we were warned there is space life. It looked like an elongated rock, more like a long shit than anything, but hidden inside are a kind of eel like creature. It possess razor sharp teeth and and enough jaw strength to eat mineral rock. They live near asteroids with water inside to get a source of water. We came a few hours ago and met them, or in this case I met them, and at that time we were caught by surprise but these aren¡¯t overly hard to kill. The problem is their mobility. These thing are as slippery as real fish. It was strange, when Lisa saw them she said ¡°No wonder Sir Alphenor wanted them. In space for us Elves they would make really good mounts!¡± After that she begged me to look for the small ones. She went as far as to do puppy dog eyes. It¡­ was really effective with her youthful doll like face. It wasn¡¯t hard to find them after I got a reading off the big ones. We found that a huge number of small floating rocks were the really small ones hidden in space. We went to the base and purchased a reinforced glass case and I caught about twenty and Lisa went and broke their shells and began unlocking their psi gates. The things are interesting because they are really like shrimp just more curled up. When we break the shells their tail sticks out a bit more. Lisa says there is one psi gate in the head, two on the tail, two on either side near the head and two half way. We could more or less guess what each was and she unblocked them all for all the gates. Back to my current problem, the fish are a pain to reach unless you sneak up, the problem is that they have good senses for moving things and are especially sensitive to psi. Lisa says she can sense around 20 open gates on the big ones. Since I saw nothing else to do while holding the sword I aim my shot gun and load a kinetic round. I did change the shotgun to a true psi weapon but I made sure to keep the option to use kinetic rounds. Loading one I aimed for the area with around three and fired. The small explosion from the self oxidizing powders blasted launching dozens of glowing pellets that spread out hitting the three and cracking open the shell. The cracked areas and exposed body began to freeze and the eels were in pain. If I compared it to anything I would say that these they were like slugs in salt at the moment. They live in their most unfavorable environment since simply breaking the shell can injure them, though not kill. Still they were heavily restricted in their movement so I moved forward and slashed them up. I kept that up until there wasn¡¯t a single one left besides the remaining bodies. After a scan we found only the small ones. I look at the asteroid then fly myself to the lower side to push it outside of the asteroid field. ¡°Ready to be like Hercules and left a huge bolder?¡± Lia asked jokingly. ¡°Yeah sure, then maybe I can throw it at your empty head and see if something appears.¡± I replied. I looked at the psi gauge and saw I had plenty since it hasn¡¯t been long since I had last recharged. Taking a breath I put away the sword and put both hands on the rock and like I had trained I spread all the wings in the way I do to accelerate and look up and release one opening at a time getting a stronger thrust with each opening. After the third the rock began to move the fourth made it pick up speed and fifth was pushing it enough to already be a threat but I stopped as the rock was already going on it¡¯s own. We follow slowly behind it and after half an hour the asteroid had completely left the asteroid field. I flew to the top and countered the moving force stopping it. ¡°Alright, now where are we throwing this thing?¡± I asked both to the crew aboard the ship and to Lia. It took a moment before two maps appeared. One showed the rotating map with red dots with a flashing red dot in empty space rotating around the planet then a second map showing our position as if looking from above. Then the first map stopped and several dots closest to the red dot turned yellow with those to the left being far more numerous. ¡°You are the red dot on the first map, the yellow dots are where you can aim and hit from your current position. I suggest these.¡± Lia says making a few of the further ones on the left turn blue. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. "Pull up information about each area?!" I said. From each blue and yellow dot and image and geological report for each area appeared. First I removed less priority areas which were marked in small dots half the size of the priority ones. Then looking at the remaining ones I was left with, fault line location, aquifer locations and volcano locations. "Fault line can be removed, it would cause worldwide panic and damage and this world already has stable fault lines that should still be moving." I said. This was probably only requested as a means to transfer the seismic shockwave further to a large number of volcanoes along the line. After all this location is marked as low rank second priority while aquifer were ranked as priority. "What do you want?" Lia asked. I looked through it then asked, "Are there any aquifer near volcanoes?" I asked. After a moment two images appeared, both were on the borderline areas where I could barely reach at this time and one would be lost as a target by the time the asteroid reached the planet. I got rid of that one and looked at the other which would be dead center by the time the asteroid hit. The trajectory calculation would obviously be much simpler to do. "Mark this as our target and calculate speed and trajectory!" I said. "Got it!" Lia said. Suddenly a soft voice came from the communicator talking from the ship. "Noah, the two spare psi batteries are fully charged for when you run out. When you get low on power come back in and we will siphon the psi into your robot." Lisa said. "Got it, keep them hooked up to the cable for when I return." I said. The spare batteries and cable were things Boris suggested we have. The cable is a 1 cm thick 20 meter long wire of psionic nerves with a power couplet at both ends. The batteries are the same I used for the robot with a capacity of 7,500 and there are two batteries that are connected by a kind their own cable and at the center is a connection for the power couplet. As for my side, we installed a receiving end for the power coplet beside where we fill the robot through physical contact. This will remove a lot of waiting time since I can siphon it within minutes. The ship was floating some distance behind me as we wait for the AI''s to finish the calculation. After ten minutes it was done. "Alright we adapted the flight training into a program for you to follow the trajectory. The line will show you the direction but it will light up in red if you don''t push it fast enough." Lia said. At this time on my view she made the target appear on the planet, obvious this was a digital representation. "It will take around 6 hours to hit the ground after you push the asteroid to fly at 200 km/h but with your current energy levels it would take 3 hours of constant pushing with five openings to reach that velocity which results in touchdown in 8 hours in this angle." Lia said. In my view long red line appeared crossing through the asteroid. "If I can''t achieve that how will we know?" I asked. I placed two hand prints where you should push so that you don''t go off course. If you can''t accelerate fast enough I will warn you and change the location to change the trajectory." Lia said. Seeing how it will work I nod. "Alright let''s get this moving." I said seeing everything was ready. I move to the side and find the hand prints on both sides of the red line still present in my view. Getting into position I push releasing six openings. "Go with five openings since we know the acceleration and psi consumption." Lia said and I nod closing one pair. From there it was a slow increase in speed for the next three hours. I watch my limit and one hour ate up 12,000 psi even with my control. After two hours I did a quick pit stop I before returning to the asteroid for the last hour until the asteroid reached the 200 km/h. After that it was just let it go on the crash course. "Is there any bases near there?" I asked after I finally returned for good to the ship. "No but we have already registered the mark. And after the crash it will be marked off by the system." Jessica said. "Good!" I said with a nod. From there I went and filled my empty stomach and we all watched as the large rock advanced through space. About seven hours later I left again and did one final check of the trajectory and saw it was off by about 2 degrees but that offered a huge margin of error so I went on a 4 degree angle from where I originally pushed and pushed for ten minutes before the trajectory was fixed. Soon after the asteroid became officially a meteor as it met the thin atmosphere and to our shock the front began to heat up and the outer rocks melted. Passing through the atmosphere it released black smoke as the rock around it was burned off but quickly it became white smoke which was quickly identified as steam as the ice was quickly changed to steam from the heat. That said, the atmosphere was still to think to offer enough friction to break the meteor completely and only wore it down to half its size before the now 15 meter wide ice meteor slammed full force into the ground and released enough energy to match a small scale nuclear eruption. Watching from thirty thousand meters we saw it live as a huge crater was blow into the earth and a mushroom shaped dust cloud was lifted. The ground was completely cracked and broke apart before sinking greatly forming almost a canyon for over 20 km to both sides. The dust soon covered the entire region but we had perfectly seen the Kelha worm tunnel collapse. There was a possibility that the aquifer below would also from cracks and start burst out and release the water. After a minute Alex called. "Guys! We got a call from the base saying it was a successful hit with a 5 km off course margin." Alex said. "Seems good." I said. *BOOM* The next moment the sound of an explosion reached us and we looked at the source and saw that a mountain 120 km away from the crash site had blown its top and was releasing magma and billowing black smoke and ash. As the two clouds grow and rose into the atmosphere, the presence of several bolts of lightning appeared. "Oh! Lightning!" Dad said as he looked at the lightning which formed a mesmerizing root like shape in the clouds. "Our work is done, let''s go back to the base and recharge and repair my robot." I said. "Alright!" Dad replied. "Until then we can spend our times resting or chatting." Dad said looking at Jessica and winked. She looked away and did a little "hmph" as she averted her eyes. "Yeah, I''m sure you will love chatting as well." I said and looked at Lisa who understood the mean which made her head lower and her ears turn bright red. The two girls look at each other with understanding glances. "Gotta move quick girls, there is still on contestant without a pair, don''t let her snatch ''em!" Havic whispered into their ears. The two solemnly glanced at Hilda who was like Roktar and was mesmerized by the show of lightning. "Shouldn''t you also be careful? After all with Alex''s girly looks, he can be taken by both men and women." Jessica said. "Oh that won''t happen, of anyone ties they will definitely regret it." Havic said with the most gentle smile yet it ad the scariest feeling behind it. The crew soon returns to the base to recuperate. At that time two other meteors crashes in priority zones from different points. *One week later* Within the Kelha II station the computer technicians and guards were all in the main control center which overlooked the entire stations security and where landing permission is asked. It also monitored all the movements of ships around Kelha II. As they worked a beeping came from the screen. "Someone is dropping out of FTL travel." Announced one of the personnel. The trade ship had left three days ago so besides some passing ship, few came to a mining station unless its from other planets but then its registered. After a moment the entire station was shocked. Appearing instantly from light speed three medium sized carrier ship, these were the smallest of the medium sized and one medium sized warship. "Halt, identify yourselves!" One of the personnel shouted as he connected to the ships. No reply came but the someone shouted. "Sir, they are deploying fighters!" One man shouted to the leading man. "Someone contact Major Snocon and Mr. Mores!" The man shouted. In less than a minute the two men appeared. "What is going on?" Major Snocon shouted. "Three carrier class ships and a war ship appeared from FTL travel a minute ago and are deploying fighters. We have also registered bombers being deployed. "But the station on Code 3 alert. Mobilize the guards and contact Colonel so he can ready the Dwarf fighters at any notice!" Major Snocon shouted. The men in the room saluted and got to work. All around the station alarms range and a voice called out. "We Are under Code 3 Alert, all guardsmen report to the military hangar! Station security arm up and spread out! Guide everyone to the central hangar and lockdown the residential ring!" The voice called. In moments everyone began to panic but at the same moment the station security took control. All the guards were made to go down first to let them quickly move to the military hangar. After they all descending the security controlled the flow into the hangar making everyone move quickly. At the main control center the men were watching as a large number of ships were deployed. Suddenly a voice came over the intercom. "You fuckers, we will give you two options! Bring us every last fucker that took our things from our base or you will all die!" A deep arrogant voice called. "That voice! Cleave Scratch!" Major Snocon said. "Ho~! Major Snocon, how you been snowy! Still got that cold frozen face of yours! Ahahah!" The man named Cleave said. The major''s face turned bright red. "Who is he?" Mr. Mores asked. "He is the man that killed my battalion 7 years ago and stranded me and a few survivors on an ice planet!" Major spit out the words. "Ahahaha, it was a fitting end for a snow cone like you!" He said and the sound of laughter came from the other side. "What do you want! We won''t hand over anyone!" Major Snocon said. "Even if you don''t hand us the bastards we can still find them. All the important items had trackers. We already know which ships have it. But the boss wants one specific tech, we won''t kill everyone as long as you hand over the Xetra Blink Drive in one of the ships in our old base." Cleave said. "Like hell!" Major said. "To bad, the boss let me handle this nice fleet, did you know, a rank 5 fleet has a really nice type of unit." He said and laughed menacingly before the connection was cut. "Sir! The ships are advancing....and they deployed something else... oh god!" The man said. "What?!" Major said. An image appeared above. On the view showed thirty humanoid figures, half were bulky and half were lean. The major paled. "They have Fighters! Dwarf and Drake Fighters!" The major said. "Quick! Dispatch the Dwarf Fighters to counter them!" He ordered. Drake fighters is the same as dwarf fighters except for the race at the seat. Tosk being reptiles they are human sized making their bodie larger the dwarf making the robots they learned to build much larger and in the form of a humanoid dragon robot. Their strength is similar to dwarf fighters but are slower due to the size. "Mr. Mores, please leave on a ship, this is going to be a war zone from now on." Major Snocon said. "Make sure to warn all the participants of that raid mission. Also call reinforcements from the planet." Mr. Mores said. "Of course, now please go we have a ship with an FTL drive for you set up." The Major said. He nodded and limped off. The major turned and began ordering everyone. "Contact all the participants of the raid, tell them to leave the station and planet as fast as possible." He shouted before the two sides collided and war began. Chapter 34: Chaser Authors Corner: Like I posted on D&A a few days ago i got a PM that a publisher wanted to publish my fics and D&A was the first target and the one that got them interested. Today i officially handed over the documents and at this time its now it has just begun to be edited. The publisher is called 2 Tiger LCC which is located in the USA. For those interested in D&A and maybe even other books that they will be publishing in a few days. You can subscribe early and get a 50% discount coupon. If you subscribe after the release you can only get a 25% discount. This is the site link http://2tigersllc.com/ Besides D&A i will also eventually publish Clockwork and Nebula but since atm D&A is the only finished one that one will go first since it won''t put me on some schedule for writing more anytime soon unless the publisher want me to make a book 2 (which will at that point be different from the original intent) As for the book price, i''m not totally sure about it. Enjoy and have fun.
Bang! In the port with the single space shuttle owned by the Star Comet crew Boris walked inside slamming all the doors. ¡°BRATS! Pack up quick and beat it out of here now!¡± Shouted Boris. Soon the crew appeared one by one. ¡°Whats going on?¡± Havic asked. ¡°A Rank 5 fleet appeared and they are after everyone that took stuff from the base. I know you all participated in that raid. They have trackers in their more important gear and items.¡± Boris said. Havic frowned and looked at the arriving crew. ¡°Did anyone check for anything on the obtained goods?¡± She asked. ¡°They said they were after a Xetra Blink Drive, I can¡¯t believe those bastards had one here.¡± Boris said. Instantly everyone in the crew paled and it obviously didn¡¯t escape Boris¡¯s sharp eye and he also frowned. ¡°You guys have it?!¡± He said. ¡°We encountered it and went to ask about it on the ship. It was when Havic joined when she assaulted Alex.¡± Roktar replied. Though it was a funny matter no one laughed in the slightest at this moment. ¡°Go grab EVERY object obtained that has seems even a little important.¡± Boris shouted. At once we spread out and we began to gather weapons, tools and other items that we obtained at the bandit base while Havic leads Boris to personally open up the Blink Drive and remove the tracker. His words were ¡°I will die before I let those fuckers get their hand on this!¡± In no time at all our cargo had all the weapons and tools that were somewhat important. Most unimportant items were left in a box on the side. Without caring we began to dismantle all the weapons and leaving me and Boris to check them over and rebuild them. The larger guns, the important tools and the blink drive all had trackers that were like a five point spike ball conspicuously hidden but it didn¡¯t hide from our eyes after dismantling everything. ¡°Good we got all of them!¡± Boris said. ¡°What about the trash, they may have added some inside incase we find out and ignore it.¡± Havic said. Boris looks at his computer. ¡°You will have to do that on your own because the battle isn¡¯t going our way. The station is being pushed back by the Drake fighters.¡± Boris said. ¡°What is that?¡± Noah asked. ¡°It''s the equivalent of a dwarf fighter but from the Tosk. They are larger and incorporate a cannon in the mouth of the robot which can compete with the heavy cannons we have. Now get moving, there are already some rogue fighters ships coming this way! It won¡¯t be long before the fighter robot''s push through. Colonel and the rest are pushing them back as best they can as are the guards but they clearly outnumber us 3 to 1 besides the dwarf fighter unit.¡± Boris said and started to walk out. ¡°Get moving, Alex get flying, Jessica, Lisa, head to the plasma cannon, Noah jump into your Robot, try and cover if possible. We have shields but our fire power pales in comparison. Your robot has a Psionic shield so you can take a few hits before getting damage.¡± Roktar ordered. ¡°I can use some level of combat branch Psi as well, I can get with the other two!¡± Havic said ¡°Good, Hilda grab the guns and come with me. We will fire from the workshop door!¡± Roktar said and we split up. Boris jumped off and went to a different port to take a ship back to the station to offer mechanics skill. As we were getting ready we all got a call. ¡°To all foreigner groups, this is Major Marcus Snocon speaking. I have called all friendly ships and personnel to say that the station will most likely fail to stop this bandit raid. At this time all civilians are being evacuated via teleporters that are hidden within the hangars down to the planets surface where they have already been warned about the threat and have begun to increase security. Those outside of the station should leave the planet and system effective immediately! We have entered in contact with a nearby colony system and they have already begun to prepare a capital ship that will appear at Kelha III along with a rank 6 fleet comprised of 4 warships and 8 carriers. We can only say good luck and we will try to weaken and hold them back as best as we can! That is all!¡± He said. The ship was quiet for a long time before Roktar walked to the first floor and shouted. ¡°Alex! Get this thing moving!¡± He shouted dead serious and without the normal cheerfulness he normally shows. The engines start up and the ship soon leaves the base. The crew feel as the gravity loses hold of them. After a moment the turret compartment opened up and a large cannon rose in its place and the door to the workshop opened before Noah jumped out inside his fully charged robot. ¡°Coordinates to Kelha III set, we need to get moving!¡± Alex said as the thrusters light up and the ship begins to move away from the battle. Noah flies behind watching the rear. *Beep! Beep! Beep!* Three beeps and a red flashing light starts to shine inside Noah¡¯s robot and he turns to look. What he sees are two heat seeking missiles flying at them. At once the kinetic shot gun opens up and three shots are fired at once spreading the pellets that hit the missiles making them blow up. The ship rapidly gained speed but far behind two Fighter ships were gaining because of the size difference allowing their smaller mass to gain on the big shuttle that was much slower in accelerating. ¡°I will go stall for time!¡± Noah says and pulls out the sword and makes a U turn and increasing his speed heading towards the two ships. They release four missiles but like the last they are shot down as they get near and when Noah passes the cloud of dust and smoke he was on top of the ships and with a swing at the tip of one of them it began to spin out of control. With a simply 360 turn allowed him to unload a single psionic shotgun slug hitting the spinning ship and causing a psi shockwave and raising an explosion that instantly vanished as it ate the air from the inside the ship. The other ship continues on but as it reaches 100 meters from the shuttle and the pilot locks on the large cannon on top does the same but Jessica¡¯s finger shoots first and a compressed bullet of plasma rushes the fighter hitting dead center and causing it to blow up making the missiles in it blow up causing a larger explosion that vanished. Noah sped up to catch up as the crew ran away. *Beep! Beep! Beep!* Looking back Noah paled at what he saw. Coming at a scary speed was a large dragonoid robot with the top bone structure of the wings made but the actual wings were pure blood red colored psi. His speed was nearly 10 times Noah¡¯s but with the head start Noah soon reached the ship. ¡°GET US OUT OF HERE! USE THE BLINK DRIVE!¡± He shouted as the door to his workshop shut. ¡°Activating Blink Drive!¡± Alex shouted. The drake fighter was now already at 50 meters but when it did one final rush and winded its arm to punch the side to make it spin and stop but just as his arm goes forward the ship simply blinks out of existence and his punch hits only the empty void. ¡°What!¡± The pilot shouted in rage and looked around. ¡°Sir!¡± The AI said and an arrow appeared and pinpointed the ship over 1000 kilometers away. ¡°Boss! I found the Blink Drive!¡± The Tosk hissed. ¡°Retrieve it immediately! I¡¯m sending another fighter to pincer them!¡± Cleave said through the coms. ¡°Got it!¡± The tosk said as his slit eyes narrowed. At once the robot blasted off nearly 900 km/h. At the ship they already had the Fighter in view and were gaining speed up to 400 km/h already. ¡°Damn it! Speed up!¡± Alex shouted. ¡°Jessica! Shoot that guy already!¡± Roktar shouted. At that moment Jessica turned the cannon towards the fighter and charged. The longer it charged the more powerful and to fight a fighter she would need a powerful shot. After 1 full minute and aiming she finally blasted the concentrated shell. The Tosk seeing the plasma coming at it with such ferocity it tried to dodge to the right but that caused the left wing to be utterly blown off and cause a lot of damage with the explosion. The tosk was furious and stabilize its spinning and pointed his right arm at the ship. Opening his robot claw hand a small opening appeared in the palm and it began to glow before a glowing ball rushed out and hit the left main thrust completely immobilizing it and causing the ship to completely shake. ¡°MY BABY!¡± Alex shouted as tears began to gather but he kept got serious and deactivated any damaged systems. ¡°We need to blink!¡± Roktar shouted. ¡°We can¡¯t, outside of a Xetra ship the Blink drive can¡¯t be used as you want.¡± Baal said through the ship system. ¡°What do we do then huh!¡± He shouted in reply. ¡°This will definitely damage the engines but there is a function for the Blink drive.¡± Baal said. ¡°Baal! Your serious!¡± Havic shouted. ¡°What function?¡± Roktar asked. ¡°Xetra are known for wormhole technology and the Blink Drive incorporates the basics of that so it has an emergency escape system to open one to allow escape but this wormhole is always to a random location and it causes damage to the ship engine besides Xetra ships. If we use it in our situation forget damage to the engine, both rear thrusters will blow up and the engine will go into meltdown and shut off!¡± She said. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. ¡°Do it!¡± Noah said. ¡°If the engine simply shuts off we can repair it, the same with the thrusters! Baal start it up! Xeno, Lia, Help him!¡± Noah says. ¡°Got it!¡± Lia said and Xeno remained quiet. Outside the ship the Drake Fighter was slowly approaching the ship. Because of the blow wing he couldn¡¯t move efficiently and had a hard time to stabilize the spinning caused by the explosion and psi had leaked greatly. Now he could barely move because of the strain. ¡°I¡¯m going to murder them all!¡± He told himself. Soon the signal for another of his allies appeared but as it did something happened. The half broken shields around the shuttle completely rebuilt itself before gathering in front. Then a ball of energy rushed out before the shield spread completely over the ship and remaining visible. The ball of light moved only 5 meters away but as it got to that distance it began spinning and the very fabric of space began to rip open as a mass of swirling energy opened up reaching the size of the ship. Then an attraction force pulled the ship. Seeing this the fighter tried to jump at the ship but like the first time the ship just suddenly accelerated and was completely swallowed by the wormhole that collapsed behind it. ¡°Fuck!¡± He shouted. ¡°How did they do that!¡± he cursed. ¡°We just got a reading of a powerful energy from over there! What happened?¡± Cleave asked. ¡°Those fucks shot my wing off and I blew their rear thrusters crippling the ship. Then they did something that opened a fucking wormhole!¡± The tosk cursed. ¡°Fuck! That was our objective, the boss won¡¯t be happy.¡± Cleave cursed. After a moment of silence a laugh came from his side. ¡°Hahaha! All unites return to the ships! Gather all damaged fighters and their robot''s if you are near and can offer the help.¡± Cleave said happy. ¡°Boss? What is making you so happy?¡± The tosk asked. ¡°Just wait and return to the ship, I will explain. We currently can¡¯t track them until they appear again so now is just a waiting game, the rest of the junk at the base is worthless for us so retreat!¡± Cleave said. From there the battle soon turned as the bandits retreated leaving the stations side with breathing room as they pushed them back until the ships left through FTL drive. No one understood why they left but because they left they could only feel relief and gather their forces and all the damaged goods from the battle and calculate the casualties, lick their wounds and invest greatly in improving the security and weapons to defend against future raids. In the vortex of the wormhole the ship was spinning like crazy through the vortex. Half of the ship''s systems were off and the AI¡¯s and Alex were working to restore small thrusters around the shuttle to stabilize the ship. Removing power from things like refrigeration to power something else was done with several things until finally the other thrusters activated and Alex stabilized the ship in the middle of the wormhole. Luckily he did that because the other side opened soon after. What appeared was a large planet with a green sea and more than 80% of the land surface was grey while the rest was green. We were facing a part of the planet with sunlight but we coukd already see the dark area and within were several areas with lights near the green spots on the planet. The ship had appeared already within the gravitational pull of the planet. ¡°Quick scan shows this is some kind of junk planet where trash is deposited! Also seems to be the HQ to many scrapper organizations!¡± Lia said. ¡°Guys we are dangerously close to the planet, we are being pulled in and the thrusters are shot and the engine is offline. We are going to be experiencing a crash landing, I can turn the ship to enter the planet as it has a proper atmosphere and fly the ship with just the momentum but the landing will be far from nice so find something to strap yourselves to.¡± Alex says as he begins to move the ship and put the ship in an angle for entrance as well as picking up the speed to fly. "Xeno! How are the inertia dampeners and shields. "Shields are weak at 20% capacity and dampeners are about working still." He replied. "When we get to five thousand meters turn off the life support and reroute the energy to the shields then open the vents to let the air from outside circulate." Alex said. As we approach alex pulls the handles for the ship and partial its nose dive turns as the wings begin to catch the wind. At five thousand meters the life support went off and the vents opened. What met the crew was the smell of a dirty air similar to car exhaust. "Oh god! Please let there be no structural damage so that it wouldn''t cause the air to leak." Havic was saying. Everyone frowned but handled it since it was their survival. With the ship at a 30 degree nose dive when they reached two thousand meters they saw the junkyard mountains. Huge scuttled ships, equipment and much more. Alex at this point pulled back make the ship be at a 70 degree angle and slow the descent. At this point the ship was lowering at a slower pace. Far off they saw a massive structure as they neared the ground. "Xeno! How are the shields?" Alex asked. "80% at the current speed it will survive and protect the ship besides the lower hull which may break under the pressure or just dent." He said. "The bottom is near the cargo so the plates are better. Prepare for touchdown!" Alex shouted. We neared the ground and Alex kept turning the ship until she spotted a much clearer space up ahead and aimed there. He dipped the nose a bit and gathered speed to reach it and as they did he pulled up the nose which momentarily raised the ship before the lower side touched the ground and pulled the rest down crashing but making a cushion of junk below reducing the damage to the max with the shields. Inside, even with the dampeners everything was thrown around. The crew had been tossed around with the initial jolt but as the ship stopped it calmed down. ¡°Damn it! I really hope there isn¡¯t any damage to the drinks!¡± Roktar muttered as he got up after falling on one of the chairs.¡± ¡°Care about you¡­ Urg¡­ fucking life old man!¡± Noah complained in pain after being rocked around and hitting his head. ¡°Is everyone alright?¡± Lisa said completely fine. Her feet were off the ground but they land moments later and she walked over to Roktar and began healing him then one after another. When she reached Havic the demoness groaned but laughed. ¡°Atta girl, take care of your man first.¡± She said and winked. ¡°Not now Havic!¡± Lisa said with a serious face. Havic just smiled as Lisa used her healing powers on Havic he looked roughed up. After healing up we work our way outside and when we get to the air lock we are completely surprised. ¡°...uk DAMNIT FUCKING BITCH BANDITS! I¡¯M GONNA KILL EVERY SINGLE ONE!! WAHHH!! MY BABY! I SWEAR I WILL HUNT EVERY ONE OF THOSE FUCKERS!¡± Shouted a voice full of hate. With Havic and Lisa¡¯s help we floated down where we met Alex punching and hitting everything in his surroundings. We looked at the ship we lived in for a few months and cringe. First off was the back which was scorched black from the explosion of the thrusters, then the bottom was completely embedded into the ground with lots of hull damage. All around the outer side of the ship was damaged greatly from the crash. ¡°The shields held it together rather well but even then it couldn¡¯t withstand the damage.¡± Havic said. ¡°So we are stranded on this planet?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°Ah Right! Boss now is our time to shine!¡± Her AI blurted out. ¡°No we simply need to repair the ship but we got to completely replace all the broken parts and then remove the ship from the ground.¡± Havic said. We all sighed as we looked at the ship. Behind us Alex was still cursing so Havic ran over. ¡°Alex! Calm down already!¡± She said but he didn¡¯t even notice her so she did something that seemed to help but still take advantage of Alex. She came from behind and grabbed his head and stuffed it in between her head. He froze for a moment. ¡°Calm down already, we can repair the ship or even build a better ship.¡± She said. Alex blinked a bit the scowled. ¡°Who asked for what you want! You and these flabby boobs always trying to take advantage and assault me!¡± He shouted and pushed her away before surprisingly grabbing Havic¡¯s two generous peaks and pushing her down. He began to vent his anger on her while physically venting by roughly fondling her with all his rage. Yet she was completely turned on. Alex had mounted on her stomach and was on top and she had no way to get up. After a while Alex vented and just got up leaving Havic on the ground breathing roughly with her face covered in sweat. Alex just sat down downhearted and let out a sigh and looked depressed now. The crew all just looked on not knowing what to say. Finally Roktar couldn¡¯t take it and spoke. ¡°So he really is a man, and one that can cause quite a bit of havoc. I wonder how much he caused to her.¡± He said with a grin. He received an elbow from Noah but the damage was done as the two androids looked away and Lisa was bright red already from watching. ¡°Havic?¡± A strong voice called from seemingly nowhere. The crew looked around and Havic seemed to snap out of it with the voice and sat up still shaky. ¡°Who?¡± She said but a moment later she saw the movement of a man. Looking his way the perfectly camouflaged body shimmered as the scaly body changed to red scales and soon black military like metal armor shimmered into existence. The head of the man was that of a large lizard and on his back was a powerful tail. He looked at her and a smile spread on his large face. ¡°It''s been awhile since the beta testing. How have you been you horny demon.¡± He said and grinned showing his sharp teeth. Chapter 35: Tosk Survivalist Author''s Corner: Greetings folks, events are running and the story moves forward one more step. Those interested in buying The Demon and The Angel as a book. Don''t forget to Subscribe to get a 50% discount coupon for it or to use on any other interesting books from the publisher ;D http://2tigersllc.com/ ENJOY!
¡°Beta testing? Havic what is he talking about and who is he?¡± Roktar asked. Whoosh! Before the question could be answered Havics wings appeared and she grabbed the Tosk by the neck and flew almost 100 meters in less than 3 seconds and held him in the air by the neck. ¡°You bastard, you know I roleplay as a NPC! Do you want to fuck with my game play again!¡± She cursed spitting out the words. ¡°Hehe still playing around.¡± He said with a ragged voice that and was having trouble breathing. ¡°Mind¡­ loosening your¡­ grip!¡± He said with shallow breaths. ¡°Hmph!¡± Havic sneered and let him go as he fell down two meters to the ground and she landed. ¡°Don¡¯t fuck up my game play or you won¡¯t be saying the light of day again.¡± Havic said as the crew had run over by that time. ¡°What is going on?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Come on, what did you mean by Beta Testing?¡± Roktar asked narrowing his eyes. ¡°It was for a project we worked together in.¡± Havic said. ¡°Yeah, we were beta Testers for ¡°The Nebula¡± but Havic is an NPC roleplayer!¡± The tosk said and instantly vanished like air. ¡°YOU BASTARD!¡± Havic shouted but he was gone before she could react. ¡°You! Your a player! And you even had the nerve to sexually assault me and even mark me!¡± Alex suddenly reacts. ¡°That part I didn¡¯t have control of myself. I don¡¯t decide on that and it''s fully up to the racial trait we have on that part. We can¡¯t do anything whether it''s a player or NPC.¡± Havic said in her defense. Suddenly her eyes turn fierce and looks around. ¡°Get out here Ernest so I can smash your face in!¡± She said. ¡°Ahahaha! Sorry but no thanks! Anyway what are you doing here and not on that trade ship!¡± The tosk named Ernest asked. ¡°None of your business so get out here!¡± She shouted as she took to the air. ¡°Tell me and I will help you scavenge what is still useful off your ship before the scavengers appear and strip it bare!¡± He said. Everyone frowned as they remembered how the low class scavengers were so well armed. On a planet of scavengers what kind of equipment do they use. ¡°The entire ship is ours! No questions asked!¡± Alex says. ¡°So you say but as long as it can¡¯t lift off and you can¡¯t defend it, on this planet its up for keeps!¡± Ernest says making Alex depressed. ¡°Is there no way to move it?¡± Alex asked. ¡°Tell me why you are here and Havic is with you and I will help you with whatever is needed.¡± The tosk said. ¡°Also havic can¡¯t beat me up.¡± He said. ¡°Havic, shut up and get down here!¡± Alex instantly said. She was taken by surprise then frowned. ¡°Are you taking his side?¡± She said as she landed next to Alex. ¡°Completely! My baby is in danger so what do I care!¡± Alex replied. ¡°Calm down you two!¡± Hilda sudden stomped her way. ¡°We are in the middle of a crisis and you just keep bickering like a newlywed couple! Let''s get this over with first and get out of here. Ernest right? You get us out of here with our ship to a safe place and we will explain everything.¡± Hilda said negotiating. ¡°As long as you hold Havic I can lead you to my base. I have worked as a scrapper and can tow your ship to my base and hide it. Keep that demon tied up or I won¡¯t help.¡± he said. ¡°Deal!¡± Roktar said and looked at Havic with a serious expression. ¡°Fine, I won¡¯t hit him.¡± She said and crossed her arms and pouted. A moment later the man materialized right next to her smiling. Alright, I¡¯ll be gone for about 4 minutes and will get my tow ship. Then I can take you all to my base.¡± He said. ¡°Where is it specifically?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Oh that''s easy, it''s that.¡± He said and turned around pointing at the massive husk of the space station. Everyone was frozen by the shock as they looked at the massive thing. ¡°It was by luck that the station fell sideways so the interior is facing the proper direction but it was a pain to rebuild all the necessary systems for basic survival. I had to scavenge so many things to get power, water and air filter working. Then I had to seal of some places. Still there are so many places I didn¡¯t visit because the place has native animals inside.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Like what?¡± Havic asked with her merchant eyes glowing. ¡°Specifically the lower floors. I live near the top, other places I haven¡¯t visited much are the hangars which I found were kept in the void and weren¡¯t damaged so the things inside will probably not be rusted even after all the years.¡± He said. At once Alex¡¯s depressed expression turned into one of happiness. Then he turned to Roktar. ¡°Boss! Lets get a bigger ship! Maybe one that is small sized but bigger than shuttle!¡± Alex said while he started to pant a bit. Roktar frowned before giving a light flick to Alex¡¯s forehead. ¡°Let¡¯s get the shuttle inside first so we don¡¯t get raided. Ernest go get your ship quick.¡± He said and Ernest nodded and left vanishing again. Not five minutes later a large junk ship about half the size of the shuttle came and the bottle opened revealing a large magnet normally seen used by junkyard cranes to separate metals or pick up large metal items. It dropped and connected to the ship before tugging. With Lisa and Havic helping, we climbed back into the ship as it began to rock and the small ship surprisingly lifted the shuttle and got higher before it slowly moved us towards the fallen station. After half an hour we spotted a large open port which Ernest moved towards. The height allowed him to fit both ships in and the width would fit four shuttles inside so he placed our ship down and then settled his own down before he exits from the ship and moves to seal the door. It wasn¡¯t an energy shield but a huge metal shutter. They were slow but it was a very secure thing to see because it was nearly 2 meters thick. Such a huge door could take a lot of hits and it only opened from the outside. ¡°Come on, I isolated and repaired some residential areas and secured some weapons but my skills at most things aren¡¯t exactly up to par to fix it all.¡± He said. ¡°Come on guys, then we can explain what happened. We walk through the door out of the hangar and then enter a corridor that lit up with dirty yellow lights. ¡°The place is completely crashed but like I said, I repaired enough to live off.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Are you still in your ¡®training¡¯ as a survivalist?¡± Havic asked. ¡°Yes, selected this planet when the game went live through my reward.¡± He said. ¡°Reward?¡± Hilda said. ¡°Beta testers were allowed to use all the humanoid races. When I was playing since I have been training for to be a survivalist I thought of what I needed. It was when I looked at the Tosk race and found this race, its called a Salamander Chameleon Tosk. From this race I took up the assassin class and it fits with my need for survivalist since I can hide easily with my natural camouflaging ability and my armors invisibility cloak.¡± He said. ¡°Here we are!¡± as he looked at a large bulkhead that had a door cut out in it and made of thinner iron Inside was a much cleaner corridor there were several dozen doors inside. ¡°The first door is a kitchen, the second is my room, the rest are cleared room with any kind of useful equipment I was able to restore and move to the rooms.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Noah, go check the stuff out.¡± Roktar said and noah nodded in response. He walked past and entered a random room beyond the two that Ernest mentioned. Ernest himself looked at Roktar with a raised scaly eyebrow. ¡°He is my son Noah and the mechanic of the crew.¡± Roktar replied. Earnests eyes widen and a toothy grin appeared. A mechanic that was already on a ship had to have some extensive knowledge of machines or at least some level of it. ¡°Lets go to the kitchen and you can explain everything.¡± he said. Everyone enters and finds a seat somewhere and they begin explaining all the facts from the bandit base raid to Kelha II¡¯s situation and then the bandit fleet coming after the Xetra Blink Drive. Once the drive was mentioned he looked at Havic serious. ¡°You actually didn¡¯t search anything for trackers! Are you all stupid! Did you check everything before you ran away?¡± Ernest said with a frown. ¡°Everything with any remote importance, just some trash items or extra items we already used and have no use anymore that we obtained. At that time he instantly stood up and left. ¡°Where are the items?¡± He asked stopping in front of the door. ¡°In a box in the cargo.¡± Roktar says and the Tosk vanished running out. Everyone followed and soon reached the cargo after passing through the ale storeage leaving Roktar horrified to find half of the barrels broken and from those that survived more than half were thrown around and probably the sediments were mixed again greatly ruining the quality. Only 3 barrels that were near the front side of the ship were spared since the other barrels held them in place. Though Roktar felt like crying they ignored it for now and went into the cargo where Ernest was pulling out everything from the box of trash items and dismantling it all. Several items went until he pulled out the no emptied hologram pad that held all the schematics and blueprints. He opened it up and after removing one side of the plates a tracker fell out. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. His eyes moved to us and she scowled and crushed the tracker. ¡°Now you search everything again and properly this time. Review all the ships, as of now they know where you are even if you get rid of the trackers but they will have a harder time figuring out which ship it is but I¡¯m sure if they really want the Blink Drive they will make a blockade in space.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Do what now?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°Well this ship is trash, slow, poorly armed and can¡¯t handle shit. That said, you all seem to have a good stock of weapons so if we can repair the wiring within other hangar doors and rooms we can access the other ports and take a bigger better ship after repairing it to full potential.¡± He said. Alex¡¯s eyes shined and he smiled. ¡°What about the Blink Drive?¡± Roktar asked. ¡°Obviously we take it, why the hell wouldn¡¯t we when its the a tech that possesses the base of Warp tech which is thousands of times better then FTL drive. This station possesses from small ships and below I believe. Anything bigger wouldn¡¯t fit unless it''s the smallest medium sized ships. There should be none that don¡¯t come with FTL drive and mixed with the drive we can possible use the blink a few times since the ships can produce greater amounts of power since the generators are stronger.¡± He said. ¡°Wait! You said we?¡± Havic said. ¡°Yeah, I am going with you, since you landed in this area, it will take a while but after doing many readings of the last traces of the signal they will eventually reach this place and raid the station and find the ship so I¡¯m leaving and since you caused the problem you are responsible.¡± He said. ¡°What about your survivalist training?¡± Roktar asked. ¡°I served the US military for 2 year and have been training to be a survivalists for 3 already. That is more than 8 years of army service and 12 years of experience since it was all done in Virtual worlds. I think a change of pace now would be a good idea. Space army would be interesting but being part of a crew and helping it grow would be just as fun.¡± He said standing up. ¡°We need to repair parts of the station to get to the ships though.¡± Noah said coming inside the cargo. ¡°So how are the equipment?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°Well, for a survivalists patch work it''s rather good but if I put it in a pro¡¯s perspective it would be poorly repaired to just functioning conditions. Both the power generator, water filter and container and air filter. If I work on them for about a day or two I can get them working at full power. It should be enough to power much more of the things around here. If you want more then we need to find other power generators and turning more of them on to slowly bring power back to the station as well as fix the wiring.¡± Noah said. ¡°I found that it there are 4 generators that power this section of the station. To get them all working would probably allow the station to work, as you saw, the hangar doors are slow but that is because the power is low so it doesn¡¯t move as quick but with all of them working it would move faster.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Then lets just go and fix them and if any monsters get in our way we just crush them!¡± Hilda says showing a savage grin. ¡°Ahaha, she seems fun. Well it is easier said than done. The animals in question are somewhat humanoid and feral man eaters with thin limbs and black skin that allows them to blend and they can even move on the walls. They are perfect stalkers and hunters and make no noise as long as they don¡¯t want to.¡± Ernest said. ¡°That is what trackers are for, Noah, Jessica said she has plans for an upgrade that involved trackers in our system.¡± Hilda said. ¡°Is it a physical upgrade?¡± he asked. ¡°No its a program but since we both work programming I thought it would be good to ask you but since it wasn¡¯t needed I never asked.¡± Jessica said a bit embarrassed. ¡°Needs will always make one thing more important than another in different circumstances.¡± Noah replied. ¡°For now let us return to the safe area but let''s grab all the ammo and weapons before we leave, Noah, go check your bot then bring it out as well.¡± Roktar said. ¡°Wait, do you have rooms for us?¡± Alex asked. ¡°Sorry, i¡¯ve been alone here for a while so the room only has one bed.¡± Ernest said. They all look at each other. ¡°We will make shifts to guard then, the rooms in the ship will work for us and tomorrow we can go out and fix up some lodging. Noah you start repairing the power generator since it''s the most important at the moment.¡± Roktar said. ¡°I will go with you, I have a parts storage made for random stuff to use to repair.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Lisa, Hilda, Jessica and Alex! Help me move any surviving things from the ship, Food, weapons, tools, equipment and all that.¡± Roktar said. Everyone got moving. Roktar did however spend about half an hour seperating the only still undestroyed ales and stalking the damaged goods getting them out of the way. All the moveable goods and things on the ship, besides clothes, beds and enough weapons to defend, were removed and put in an empty room in the safe zone. After a few hours of work they finally moved all the things besides the water which needs to be drained but was left for use on the ship that still had a working power generator and most of the lights worked. The shields were put back online and were set to keep everything out including life forms during the night. *** ¡°So have you determined where those fucks are?!¡± Cleave the bandit raid leader said as he looked at the screen. ¡°Yeah boss, it''s like you said, the wormhole opened up only 5 minutes after they jumped but they are almost 340 parsec away to the Venturi system!¡± One of the men said making everyone shocked. ¡°This is what we want boys! This tech is the power only we need. That drive will open up the wormhole tech that is eons better than the FTL drive! Men make an estimate of the time until we reach the Venturi system?¡± Cleave asked. After a moment one of the men turned. ¡°It will take around 2 months sir!¡± He said a saluted. The disparity between FTL and wormhole tech was far too large. It took 5 minutes to pass 340 parsec yet it takes 2 months by FTL drive. To get that tech will allow them to raid anyplace as they please not to mention being able to do hit and run all across the galaxy and expand beyond the borders of ¡®known¡¯ space. As all the ships were getting in sync to enter FTL at the same time something came up after several hours of procuring provisions. ¡°Boss, it seems the remaining trackers on the ship of that crew was found and destroyed.¡± The man said. ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter, the report said the rear thrusters were shot so if they crashlanded then the ship is out of commission and repairing such things isn¡¯t a one night thing besides for a large crew or a structured station. Only if they get a completely new ship they can get away but it''s not like they can find any random ship just laying around up for grabs without it being stripped bare. They won¡¯t be off the planet they are on anytime soon.¡± Cleave said. *** After two days and the power generator was repaired another two were quickly found and brought online. Though there were several cables that cut power to some areas the parts that governed the hangars weren¡¯t broken and soon the consoles to all the hangars were online and the dirty dull yellow light was powered until it was a bright yellow. The crew had encountered the animals and found they were like feral rat beasts. They were all ranging around level 25-40 but as anything made of flesh and blood, bullet wound can¡¯t be underestimated and with Noah in the front after removing his wings he rushes and blocks their path in his robot which still fits with room to spare in the corridors they attacked and killed anything they found. As for the vacuum ports, with the power restored the lights inside could be turned on and the situation inside was seen. Of the 50 ports more than 30 had partially damaged ships and the rest were small ships that were tossed around to much. At this time they were looking at the fine port. On the console the camera slowly turned on and what came into the view of everyone shocked them. Locked down with massive supports like a rocket would have when ready to launch was a category small ship that was 200 meters long in a triangle like format where the bridge was at the front and was around 15 meters wide but at the back it reached 50 meters wide with 6 floors with 1 being cargo. The ship was clearly a combat type ship because just on the upper side there was eight turret slots, all empty. The ship¡¯s top floor near the back half extended into the wings and the two main rear thrusters were connected to the bottom but not built directly into the ship''s body. ¡°Fuck! There was actually a Venturi Battle Frigate in this trashed station!¡± Ernest shouted then examined. ¡°Fuck! The turrets are gone! I wonder what the interior looks like?¡± Ernest said. ¡°Is this good?¡± Hilda asked confused. ¡°It¡¯s better than good, the size is around the middle ranks of the small ship category but its a fighter category ship which means it was made to fight. Its fire power makes your shuttle look like a toy. Come on open the vents and lets check this ship out!¡± Ernest said excited. Opening the door through the console after the air was filled inside, the crew entered and headed to look at what will be their new ship.
New ship https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-H7gObIzIVj4/VzZbpYiY-bI/AAAAAAAAC00/KzUZ1xMFokA7ygQlR4crbyK46sDWnplTQCK8B/s400/2016-05-13.png Chapter 36: Free Purchase Authors Corner: Not much to say, been a boring weekend but at least a productive one. Enjoy
*Bang! Bang! Bang! Crack! Woosh! Boom!* Sounds of hammering came from halfway up the side of the massive Venturi Battle Frigate. This sound was from the door of the airlock at this location being broken off and the sound the air being sucked into the air the ship which had been left completely in a vacuum both inside and out. After the air filled the ship, the tightly held airlock door that had been broken at the hinges and the locks cut off it finally released itself from the ship and fell down. ¡°Damn it! Who knew this ship had no power at all! Almost 3 hours to remove one damn airlock door!¡± Hilda cursed. ¡°Hey! Don¡¯t complain, this ship is nothing compared to that little shuttle of yours. It¡¯s like comparing a salamander and a dragon, the dispersity in quality of equipment used for this is nearly 10 times better. For us to break an airlock and only take 3 hours is rather quick. Not to mention opening it while holding it open to allow air inside.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Some complaining Hilda, we don¡¯t have that much luxury time!¡± Jessica said and jumped into the ship''s now open airlock. The other door was open already so the ship had filled up. The Jessica enter first because her eyes was made with a night vision setting. She walks in slowly while Hilda and Roktar was behind her with guns pointed forward. We walked through the ship opening all the doors finding empty rooms or kitchen while heading towards the front eventually reaching the bridge. Yep this ship being nearly twice the size of the shuttle has a bridge instead of a single pilot seat. At the front closest to the windows were two pilots seat while there were two seats on each side several monitors before a final set of steps slightly above the door level, which was to the right of the door. There was another door on the other side. When Alex entered the room he was ecstatic and ran forward towards the right pilot seat and began to mess with the console. At the same time Roktar walked to the other door and tried to open the sealed door but it was sealed and it was an electric door. They had encountered several sealed Bulkhead doors on the way but still found the way here. ¡°Damn it! I can¡¯t turn anything on from here!¡± Alex cursed. ¡°We will have to do it manually then.¡± Noah said ¡°Let¡¯s go, i can go as your eyes.¡± Jessica said. ¡°We can split up, with the interior being a vacuum there shouldn¡¯t be anything in this place.¡± Roktar said. Everyone nodded and we split up in teams with Hilda and Ernest leaving to check the rest of the crew while Lisa, Roktar, Alex and Havic remained in the Bridge waiting for Noah to return. Noah PoV We walked through the dark corridors only with the lights from the port that had turned on when the power was partially restored. The interior areas i had to walk slow and rely on Jessica¡¯s hand on my shoulder to follow her. After a while we reached the far back of the floor we entered which is supposed to be the third floor. Back there we encountered a huge room which contained the generator and at the center of the room was a large pillars that rose half way up the 10 meter high room. This room most likely rose to the floor above. The pillar held a large one and a half meter wide grey ball and around the room were smaller ones half the size on pillars half the size of the main on. ¡°Lia, what are those?¡± I asked. ¡°Obviously they are Power Cores, problem is they are all empty but unlike power cells these can be recharged and will recharge after turned on. We just need to do a quick jump and i believe the port is connected directly to the ship wiring. We just need to locate the command room to do a jump start.¡± Lia said. ¡°Can¡¯t we do it from here? Or use something else to jump start it?¡± I asked. ¡°If any one of them have even a single percentage of power then you might be able to turn it on. The small ones have consoles below them to manage each one manually. If one turns on then it will work.¡± She said. Seeing an opportunity, i walk through the dimly lit room to the closest pillar. Using the dim lights i tried press whatever a trying to find the one switch but nothing worked. Eventually i looked around the side then around the pillar and found a lever on the pillar to the left, though i had to walk around the pillar since i walked to the right. It was up so i grabbed it and pulled it down but when i did still nothing happened. ¡°Feel any reaction?¡± I asked. ¡°I feel nothing?¡± Jessica said. ¡°Nope!¡± Lia spouted. ¡°Sorry Big bro, i register nothing.¡± Vivi said. ¡°Guess this one is offline.¡± I said and so we moved on. When we looked through the next console we looked through the buttons before pulling a similar lever. I made sure to look at the console again. The third was the same but on the fourth something interesting happened. After looking over the console and then pulling the lever a weak red light began to blink on the center of the console. I looked at the button and looked at the others before clicking. At that moment a very weak hum began on the ship. ¡°Move back quick, get at least 6 meters away, especially you Jessica!¡± Lia shouted Not wanting to ignore a serious order form Lia we ran away before turning back. We watch as power core on the pillar slowly began to let off a dim glow. ¡°Big sis, the Power readings show 3% of power remaining.¡± Vivi said. ¡°What do we do now?¡± I asked. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure that the other consoles should have a similar button glowing. Try to check it out.¡± Lia suggested. Jessica and I looked at each other and nodded. Walking through all the consoles, we did indeed find a glowing red button which was pressed and turned the power on. Two power cores were completely drained but the other had 5%. When all four pillars were ¡®on¡¯, we waited for something to happen. ¡°Is there something lacking?¡± Vivi asked. ¡°Maybe the main pillar.¡± Lia replied. The main pillar itself had a console which was much larger and faced the door. Walking carefully through the generator room to the finally pillar. I looked around and found four levers and one by one i pulled them down before walking to the console and found four glowing red lets. Above it was a number from 1-4. ¡°So the main pillar connects them all, must be why it is larger.¡± I mutter. I stretch out my hand and press the buttons one by one. As the final button was pressed the ship seems to shake slightly. I take a step back and look around before running back to where Jessica was. After a moment there was a sudden increase in noise as the engine generator began working and from the two power cores that still had energy, the electricity flowed through a cable connecting the four cores to the center one. They dim but once the energy reached the main core the energy split to the other empty one. Next the generator became even more lively as the power began to flow through the entire generator. ¡°Power dropping!¡± Lia warned us. We paled for a moment. ¡°No! Its rising now!¡± She said again. ¡°8% again. 9!¡± Lia said. After a moment the power reached 10% and the dim lights came to life at full strength. ¡±Guys! Good job!¡± Alex¡¯s voice said suddenly through the communicators. ¡°Do you have a reading on everything about the ship now?¡± I asked. ¡°Nope, only the lights are on, it will probably take a while longer before the power is restored.¡± Dad said. ¡°Then let¡¯s search the ship now that the lights are on.¡± I said. ¡±Great, I¡¯ll be going to the cargo, you and Jessica head to the upper floors where Ernest and Hilda are.¡± Dad said. ¡°Alright, we will look through and open the rooms along the way if they are working.¡± I said. Jessica nodded and we leave the generator room. Like we had expected, the corridors were with lights though it was still dim. As for opening the rooms, that wasn¡¯t possible until half way when when the lights reached full power. With the lights going completely online the small consoles beside the door turned on and began to function again. The first door we opened surprised us because it was a hydroponic garden. All the pots were empty without any plants but they had dry dirt and in a door in the back was some really old fertilizer that had solidified after being in the vacuum. This room stank through and after closer inspection, signs of small levels of rust was seen. ¡°Seems the decomposed materials in the room released some gases inside the room but the level of rusting can barely do anything.¡± I said. ¡°Its pretty much the top layer that got affected.¡± Lia said. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Moving on we found the kitchen which looked like a tavern and it even had a bar and behind it was a room made for refrigerating the ales. Dad will surely put this thing in order. After that we found bed rooms and then a room where the water and air tanks were. Walking upstairs we found an armory room with lots of damaged weapons and armor. Looking more we found a security main center where all the weapons would be managed. It looked similar to the bridge but was bigger with more seats and had no windows but each seat several screens around it. Turning them on i found out that these were for the turrets above and below the ship. Below there was a single port for a large weapon to be placed. Similar to the bridge, there as a captain chair that could activate all the weapons, most likely the captain at the bridge could do that same. From the leader seat we found that there were more ports for weapons. On the underside of the upper wings, which connect to the top floor, there are four missile silos, two on each wing. Near the bridge, above and below a little further back, were weapon ports for smaller weapons like lasers and plasma weapons that the pilot activates personally. With the bridge on the third floor and the fourth floor having most of the security team housing and equipment, we head upstairs. We found ourselves in an empty but very large room that, surprisingly, had a large crane for lifting heavy objects on the roof and there were areas that allowed it to pass to the next room. Also, we found that there was an elevator about a third of the way into the room which lead to the cargo. ¡°Is this a secondary cargo?¡± Jessica asked. I didn¡¯t answer but just walked to the only door in this room and we soon got our answer. With a large oval shaped ceiling and a runway on top ending at an open door which had an energy shield projector and bulkhead door closing it. This was a small fighter ship hangar that could launch small scale fighters probably twice the size of that tiny fighter Alex has. ¡°This is a hangar, as i thought, a ship this size would already have a few people and ships as part of the crew and can use secondary ships as support. Not to mention, from here its easy to leave onto the hull and can launch the robot fighters as well. The space of the door allows for the wings to pass.¡± I say. ¡°Wow, so you and alex have a proper place to work now. We can also make the workshop in one of the two rooms around here and can easily transport things.¡± Jessica said excited. I nodded and we soon left, when we climbed to the final floor we found an android and Tosk sparing with wooden swords. The fighting was rather intense. The entire room was empty but the floor was made out of some kind of rubber. ¡°So a training room.¡± I said looking around, it lacked a lot of equipment that could be here. This ship felt scavenged yet not. Soon the two noticed us and Ernest jumped back. ¡°Great, you''re here, I figured out something. This ship is severely under equipped which means that it wasn¡¯t a ship that was owned by someone and instead it¡¯s a ship that was still up for sale at the time before the station fell. It''s the reason why its still so tightly secured by the station wires and supports. The ship''s structural integrity is probably still as good as when it was first built since new ships are kept in a vacuum.¡± Ernest said. ¡°They still supplied the fertilizer in the Hydroponic garden which caused some gases to be present and make small amounts of rust appear in that room.¡± I said. ¡°Doubt its much. Though we have a problem with this as well.¡± He said. I raised a brow curious. ¡°Let¡¯s return to the bridge where everyone should be.¡± Ernest said. We nod and go down and notice Hilda had a smile and was talking excited with Ernest asking for tips on how to get more power out of the swing. Looking at her arms and legs i noticed dents and some low sounds from her parts. ¡±Hilda will need some reasons soon.¡± i thought as i looked at the slowly damaging body. Half way we relayed what we found through the upper floors. Dad instantly wanted to go see the bar and Alex wanted to see the hangar but i told both to meet us in the bridge. Reaching the room we found the other door was opened and inside we saw it was actually a few rooms. Specifically, the captain''s office and captain quarters. ¡°Alright, Noah already told you all what we found but there is a problem, this ship is, in all sense of the word, ¡®new¡¯. It wasn¡¯t removed from the port since it was built and shouldn¡¯t have any structural damage whatsoever.¡± Ernest said and the others cheered. ¡°Now the bad news.¡± He said. This made everyone quiet. ¡°As i said, the ship is new, in other words, there is no equipment whatsoever. From training gear to medical equipment. Nothing besides the basics that come with the sales will be in this ship.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Is that a problem?¡± Alex asked. ¡°Of course! It means, no equipments, put in simply words, no weapons. Turrets, laser weapons, missiles all that isn¡¯t in the ship.¡± He said. It finally dawned on the crew, the ship was a fighter but it didn¡¯t come with weapons or equipment. That is up to the crew to buy and outfit the ship. ¡°So what do we do?¡± Havic asked. ¡°It will take a long time but we will need to look through the half destroyed ships which probably belonged to someone for things.¡± Ernest said. ¡°What about checking the other sectors of the station?¡± I asked. ¡°Well, we can do that but most stuff would probably be rusted already. It¡¯s a miracle the hangars weren¡¯t opened but that just proves the strength of the metal that was used.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Let¡¯s move our things into the ship first, I feel a bit safer if we get the ship ready and fix that air lock. Also i want to make it standard procedure that the room the Ship is in is left as a vacuum as an extra layer of protection.¡± Dad said. ¡°Lets get the ship equipped first. I will go fix the door while you all move the stuff. As for moving the air into the ship, if it''s new then it should have a filter and air compression system. We can leave it to that for the air. The water we can drain into barrels and slowly transport it.¡± I said. ¡°What about me? Even if we move stuff, i feel we should get guns for the ship first?¡± Hilda said. We looked at her with a frown. ¡°I feel its a good idea as well, but i think we should go step by step. First let''s move the things into the ship. Then once it''s fully operating we can focus on scavenging weapons.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Just a question but are there any seeds for food? I want to start the hydroponic garden backup.¡± Lisa said. Ernest nodded and informed her that throughout the junkyard she could find some random trees and some might have some fruits. She was a bit sad since she wanted small crops but for that it¡¯s needed to go to the nearest town but that also means going into the scraper filled towns. Since it wouldn¡¯t do we gave up. Exploring other parts of the station will follow with restoring the power on each floor and there is still one more power generator for this floor i need to repair so all i can do is one step at a time and that goes with repairing that airlock first. We each split up, i got to our ship and get my robot and some tools before walking out and heading to the other ship to repair the door. *** Over the crash sight that the crew¡¯s ship landed at a very large ship under the medium sized ship category slowly flew into the air. The ship was unlike the common low life scrapper. It was well kept and heavily armed. In the captain''s seat the hologram screen in the bridge showed the large skidmark that was left by the shuttle. ¡°Have you determined what it was?¡± The captain asked. ¡°Yes sir, it''s was a shuttle class ship it appears they crashlanded but its no longer here which means it was already salvaged.¡± One man said. ¡°Damn, but it¡¯s just a shuttle, if anything it will just make another low class team for us. Is this area searched?¡± The captain asked. ¡°Yes sir, besides the destroyed station, which can¡¯t be opened with any of our tools, there isn¡¯t any other place.¡± the man said. The captain sighs. ¡°Let us return but send out some probes to do a sweep of the area just incase we can spot something useful.¡± The captain said. The ship rises and turns towards where they came and speed off as it let loose many falling balls that opened up revealing wings and a small thruster. A camera opened up and a scanner appeared. They spread out through the region and began to do a search.
Interior of ship bridge https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/7d/dd/72/7ddd72d85d7f1bcdb118f82db739bdfc.jpg Chapter 37: Rat Attack Author Corner: Was going to do double release but when i saw both chaps were below 10 pgs i did it differently and merged the chap into one big one. Enjoy!
*Sigh* I let out a sigh as I finish working on the door to the airlock. It was a main to do because it is a tedious work to but the door in place then replace the locks we cut but it wasn¡¯t extensively difficult. It was rather annoying the get the door back up here though, it had fallen down to the ground but thanks to its sturdy material it didn¡¯t even dent. To lift it up I had to use my robot to put it back on the hinges then came aligning and all that so that the pressure wouldn¡¯t leak. Getting the door up was the least problematic though took the most resource since lifting such a heavy door, weighing almost 300 kilos, made taking off with the robot just as hard but it came with benefits.
Exterior Psi ManipulationRarity1.5Level 7
A skill to efficiently control Psi outside the body. Makes it easier to manipulate Psi and to make it do what you want while it¡¯s outside the body Increases control of Psi outside the body by 3% Lost of Psi while doing tasks has decreased by 8%
Yep, from the last time I checked, this skill was at level 4 but with all the flight training, building and moving the wings, then using the wings to an extent to lift heavy objects it kept pushing me leveling up faster than I noticed. Right my level rose to 20 due to the monsters killed recently. It''s rather pressing because after we turned the power on the lights seem to have attracted the stations current residents. We still have a final generator to bring online to power this area of the station and with me finished here we can safely seal the room and put it in a vacuum. As for the job of moving our things, after searching a bit we found the hangar opens in two doors and the crane from the fifth floor drops all the way down to lift things up. It made things easy as dad and Ernest moved things onto a platform the crane attaches to and lifts it up while the rest of the crew unloads into the lower deck. Obviously dad brought all the barrels of ale that weren''t destroyed while loading the partially broken ones so he can repair them. Other cargo was also constantly being brought while water was still left. For the ship''s power, after a full night all the systems came online and the power rose to 20% in the generators power cores. The slow rise is attributed to the fact that the generator was slowly powering up auxiliary batteries in all the equipment and filling a small room next to the generator with power. The room contains twenty power cells all linked into the ship and were charged during the day and night and now the power cells was finally charged. Even so we haven''t started the engines on until the power reaches 50% so that the power cores inside the engine can be jump started safely. For the rest of the day we move all our remaining things into the new ship. Alex''s fighter was the most difficult and dangerous to move due to the fact that we found out the scrapper probes were flying around. We still succeeded but it was still dangerous. At this moment we are walking through a side path on the side of the hangar port our ship was in. The reason is simple, this side path heads to the command center of the port. Strangely though the corridor and stairs have dim lights. As we reach the top of the stairs we see a short path and finally enter a room. What we saw was a grim sight. All around were skeletons of different shapes and forms. "My god!" Ernest said. "I think I understand now why the other ships were destroyed and this one wasn''t." Dad said. It was only me, dad and Ernest here so when dad said that we looked at him. "What do you think?" I asked. "It simple, I can bet if we look at all the other ships we will find a similar sight. The station hands wanted to commandeer the ships and escape but the power probably failed by the time. This ship of ours these men didn''t even have time to remove the ship locks, to our luck." Dad explained. Thinking about it, it made sense. If the station had depressurized somewhere below or had a leak everyone would have space suits on. This area was separate and independent so removing the suits was possible which happened. The skeletons all had rotten suits but no helmets. They probably entered and sealed the room before pressuring before the power failed and when it did they were locked inside and probably died of starvation. "Such a god damned unlucky way to die really." Dad said. We nod and walk in and begin searching the men but everything was rusted. The room as well had rust infiltration. I walk over to the consoles looking for an ''on'' switch. I then looked around and saw the power distribution panel board. Walking over I opened and saw nearly half the switches off so I started to flip them all one. One by one they were flipped on but nothing really changed until I noticed the main power switch was also off so pulling it one turned on the entire panel. Tac! A large number of switches dropped due to short circuit but the room we were in still came to life. The dim lights grew brighter and the computers also began to blink. "Security scan initiated! Unit registers considerable damage to power grid! Requesting maintenance team assistant! No signal detected, station power grid offline detected. Searching station grid for online systems. Sector B online one generator offline. Remote access acquired, generators turned on." The robotic voice said and we noticed how the lights flickered again before growing stronger. "Whats going on?" I asked. "This is an AI. Must be a utility AI for emergency or to take over when no one is left in control." Lia said. "Generator 1-4 online, damage to generator 3 detected, power cell 2 unconnected. Placing active mission to repair for detected crew. Attempting to acquire Remote access to offline sectors. Sectors A and D acquired. Sector C is powerlines offline and cannot connect. Attempting alternative route... Access acquired. Turning on all generators of Sectors A, B, C and D. Power reserven Insufficient, Venturi Battle Frigate detected. Generators power at 23%. Battery reserves 100%. Calculating power quantity... Energy capable of jump start. Commence reserve battery siphon and Jumpstart of all generators." "Hey!" Dad suddenly shouted but it was too late. The lights and computers all dropped for a few seconds and the cables attached to the ship all lit up as the power from the cells were drained out. After a minute everything came back online. "Sectors A 50% online, Sector B 95% online, Sector C 25% online, Sector D 70% online. Damage to over 40 generators, Sector C requires immediate repairs to all generators. Sector generators all functioning with only 1 or 2 power cells. Damage to generators detected. Updating active mission for present crew." At this it finally went silent. "Fuck! It drew from our ship to power the station!" Dad cursed. "This is actually good!" Ernest said. We looked at him confused. "It''s like this, the AI already recognizes that we are the only ones here and have put up agency missions. Station AI can automatically deposit credits for work and have a huge stock of money. Not only that but with station we can get a map of the station and if the cameras are online we can have the AI track the movements of the monsters that got in and aid us from that. Also with power running, other systems like air filtration and water distribution will naturally go and since it isolates leaks the plumbing will flow and block off areas of water leakage." Ernest said. "So we gain an aide now?" I asked. "Partially only, this thing isn''t like us and has no free will. It functions on commands and has no intelligence. Though it''s inferior to us, their security protocols are the best and keep intelligent AI from hacking since any change in the codes will alert them." Dad''s AI, Olivia, said. The secretary AI appeared and explained. I looked at the computers and walked over and saw a mic. Before trying that I said. "AI please bring up a map of the station marking all the generator locations. Also include any obstructed paths and please show the location of all lifeforms in the station." I said but nothing. Looking at the mic and the button next to it to turn it on I said the same. In an instant the screen changed to a map of several sectors which are the several dozen areas around the floor we are and below. In corridors in red were the ones blocked and blue dots were lifeforms. I pressed the mic button. "Register the eight life forms within this room and hangar as friend and make as a color green while all other lifeforms are in blue." I said "Only six lifeforms located. Two robot entities detected." the AI replied. "Those are friendly." I said. After saying so the eight dots representing us turned green. "Good, now we have a map." Dad said. "Hey noah, see if the AI can''t connect to us and forward the maps constantly." Lia asked. I nod and ask. "Long and Short range communication impossible. If direct link is made then this unit can accomplish the command." the AI replied. "So if someone remains here and uploads the map for the rest of us." Dad said. "Are we going to explore the station?" I asked. Ernest nods and walks over. "Please mark all weapon deposits. Also please tell make if there are any psi generators or locations for parts for repairs. Mark all objectives as green" Ernest said. I looked at him started. Psi generators, what is that? "Your face says it all, one of the machines I was incapable of repairing is a psi generator. It gathers psi and stores it for use. I already had it transported into the ship since I saw you had a fighter robot." He said. I smiled and thanked him. On the map were several green dots on the lower floor. "Please show us where ship class weaponry is located." Ernest said. "Location classified. Authorized personnel only may know." it replied. "The station has collapsed and all authorized personnel are dead." He said. "Scanning for authorized personnel. None located, badges locates near skeletal remains. Scans show all station personnel. Rewriting security codes. Current friendly personnel aboard station has been given highest degree of authorization." the AI said and on the map several dots appeared but the biggest one was outside the lit up area. "What''s in that area with the biggest dot?" I asked. "Vacuum sealed deport located next to production hangars and production plants. This is within sectors E, F and G. Unable to access area due to damages. Requires minimal repairs in the following locations." the AI said and made five dark green dots appear. "Minimal requirement of one spot for me to extend my connection outward." it said. "I see. So there are sector connection conduits every four letters. This means that there are 26 sectors in the station at the most but there are also regions within each sector. Do you have images from before the crash of the storage depot?¡± Ernest asked. A image appeared with a huge warehouse with thousands of things shelved and held by magnetic shelves in separate containment areas. ¡°This will definitely need power to retrieve. We need something to deactivate the magnetic locks if they are active as well as open the door.¡± Ernest said. ¡°Let¡¯s do something different then.¡± I said. The two looked at me. ¡°Bring up the official mission made.¡± I said to the AI.
Urgent Mission: Generator RepairsDifficulty3
Venturi Station has crash landed and power is low. Ugent mission made by AI unit 1. Mission details the requirement of all generators be up online to 100%. Reward: 20, 000 credit to crew Objective: Repair completely all power generators in sectors A, B, C and D. 3/16 Sector A 50% online: Gen: 1 2/5, Gen 2: 2/5, Gen 3: 0/5, Gen: 4 2/5. Sector B 95% online: Gen: 1 5/5, Gen 2: 5/5, Gen: 3 4/5, Gen: 4 5/5. Sector C 25% online: Gen: 1 2/5, Gen 2: 1/5, Gen: 3 1/5, Gen: 4 1/5. Sector D 70% online: Gen: 1 4/5, Gen 2: 3/5, Gen 3: 4/5, Gen: 4 3/5. Success: All Generators are functioning Failure: Generators are destroyed
Seeing the failure conditions we looked at the other life signs. "Shit! Those rats are going to attack!" Dad cursed. "How much of the security system is online? Show on the map functioning defense weapons." Ernest asked the AI said. "Due to low power reserve, defense system functioning at 20% and there is damage to 15% of the weapons." it said. "Activate the defense system all sectors and focus on defense of the generators. As power is restored activate more functioning weapons." Ernest said. "Request follows mission objectives. Activating defense systems." it said.
Mission Accepted
Moment later the calls from the others came. We told them about the mission. "Alex, come up here, we need someone to keep us updated with the map. The rest of you get armed. We need to clear out the rats." Dad shouted. In a few minutes Alex came in and we exit and get ready for the fight to clear out all the monster rat beasts that have nowhere to hide anymore in the now lit up corridors and rooms. Leaving Alex to find a way to connect her communicator, we ran down and into the ship. ¡°Guys, I''m going to the generator in this floor that still needs the final pillar to work. You guys head down stairs to the other sectors.¡± I tell the two running next to me. ¡°Got it! We will meet up with you later on, make sure not to fire pure psi rounds inside so that you don¡¯t destroy the corridors.¡± Dad said. ¡°Yeah I know. I¡¯ll first go to fix the A sector which is one floor above and seems to have only around 10 of those monsters. I can take them by myself while you guys take the crowded floors below. If I can fix all the floors above and this one the power to the station will allow more security weapons to activate.¡± I said. The two nodded and we climbed onto the ship through the hangar lift. I go to the hangar where all my workshop gear was placed. When I enter the hangar, Alex¡¯s ship, my robot, lots of repair tools and a strange machine was placed all over. The machine looked like a ale container combined with a psi container. The hangar that was over 6 meters high showed this machine was around 4 meters tall. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. ¡°So that is the psi generator.¡± I mutter but shake my head to get focused. I run to my robot and jump in before looking around and grabbing my sword. With the wide corridors of this station I can easily fight . I put it on my back between the closed wings which had a locking mechanism there and it held the sword. Then I grab a case of shotgun shells and store it in my inventory and see that the shells have already loaded so I run towards the door which is sealed by an energy gate and pass through before spreading my wings and flying off the ship and down to the ground. The others had already left when I received a call. ¡±Guys, I finally connected to the console, Xeno is downloading the map and it will be forwarded to you live. I already asked the AI to make full floor maps for each sector.¡± Alex said. We all thank him, while Havic compliments him like a fangirl, and we all head out. I quickly reinforced my robot to run at full speed and eventually reached the generator room. I noticed a laser machine gun turret near the door but it didn¡¯t shoot. There was also the corpse of a rat beast 20 meters away but it had been made into swiss cheese by the turret. ¡±That turret seems strong, maybe we can get it later on.¡± I thought but pushed it back as I walked inside. One look at the room and I understood what was wrong. All the pillars have a thick 20 cm long cable connecting the power cell to the main one. This one on the other hand had fallen off and now was on the ground. ¡°Is that powered?¡± I asked. ¡°Doesn¡¯t seem like it¡­ though there is 3% of energy still in the cell. Best thing you can do is turn off the pillar before you connect.¡± Lia said. I nod and look at the pillar but suddenly a circle appeared in my display. ¡°This circle is will electrocute me won¡¯t it?¡± I said. ¡°Not 100% but there so something between 40-50% chance, yep. Good luck~!¡± Lia said. I sigh and walk to the border of the line and open the chest cover and remove my arms from the robot. Spreading out my psi I move it to grab the lever and pulled it down which did nothing since the generator was turned on automatically by the AI. This was hard since the level naturally goes upward as a precaution. After five minutes of pushing it finally goes down completely. Take a breath I put my left hand into my robot and recharge my psi. This is by far one of the best benefits of the robot since it¡¯s like a walking battery for me. Sticking my hands out I pull the lever and it quickly jumps up shutting off the pillar with it. The circle in the display vanishes and I close the robot and walk forward. ¡°Seems it¡¯s safe now, let¡¯s get this working.¡± I said and spread my wings as I grab near the top of the power line and take off. Surprisingly the wire is very heavy and after a struggle reach the outlet on the big core but when I did it was simple to find the correct side to insert it in and properly lock the cable in place so that it wouldn¡¯t fall again. After checking around a bit and asking Alex to check with the AI if it was only the cable I went and turned on the pillar and pressed blinking button and moved back. After a moment I saw the cable turn blue as power flooded the core and the pillar started up and reversed the flow of energy back into the main core before the energy began to stabilize and rise quicker.
Mission Updated
¡±Sector B is clear!¡± Alex¡¯s voice quickly calls through the communicators. When the others connect the sound of gunfire came in as well. ¡±Noah! Get moving! We need a tank to take the hits here! Ernest, Roktar and Hilda are doing that but Ernest is vanguard and Uncle is tanking at the moment but he isn¡¯t as sturdy as your robot!¡± Jessica said. ¡°I¡¯ll go to Sector A first, it has one power generator completely off so I need to see that!¡± I said. ¡±Alright but hurry!¡± She replied. I turned my back and ran out and headed to the nearest stair way. As I reach it I spot a rat beast sticking his head out. I frown and bend forward and lift my wings just up enough and activate them to give me a boost as I reinforce my fist. When the rat finally noticed were the noise was coming from I was on top of him and my fist descended onto its head breaking its skull and neck were my fist landed crushing it under the weight of my fist. ¡°Nice sneak attack, good use of the wings as well!¡± Lia compliments me. ¡°Which is the way to the offline generator?¡± I asked. ¡°First go up then right. Then after ten branching paths, take a right and after 2 take a left and it should be on the right after 2 blocks and 2 doors.¡± She said. I quickly rush up and start to follow her instructions. On the map she had highlighted the path but it also intersected with four enemy dots which I had to fight through them. Shooting only the shotgun without psi and punching was enough to fight the level 30+ rats thanks to my robot''s reinforced defense. When I finally reached the generator room what I found made me frown deeply. Looking at the power cells they were all cracked and the main one was shattered and all over the floor. ¡°Damn it, the power cores are all broken in this generator.¡± I cursed through the communicator. A moment later Alex replied. [i]¡±There should be a storage room on the left side of the room. There should be spare power core¡¯s inside for when there are accidents.¡± Alex replied. I look around and find the door and pass through and when I enter I find the cores all over the room. It was really a storage room, sadly more than 75% of the cores were shattered from being poorly held in place. Still there were over twenty cores still remaining and so I went and shut all the pillars off and pulled the cores off, more like pushed them off, and put the new ones on. The main cores were unlike the small ones and were very well stored and had not a single scratch on it. I pushed that one into place and then went to the old cores and removed the power cable and connected one at a time until all four them had connected. Then pushing the old cores into the storage I start to move to power it up. ¡°Clean up the room first, the shards will attract the energy making the room an electric minefield.¡± Lia said. I frown when I heard her. ¡°What do you expect me to do huh?¡± I said. A moment later the map changed and a yellow dot appeared on the map. ¡°This room should have utility drones inside. If we are lucky we can find some security robot''s as well.¡± Lia said. I cursed all the delaying work I needed to do but ran over anyway and found the room. Like she said there were utility drones which were circular and yellow with two small lights in the front and back. Many were tossed around. The room turned on when I entered. Alex told me the AI had passed some power to charge the robot''s and so I simply put them all to charge. Looking around more I also found what I think are security drones. What surprised me was how ¡®rough¡¯ it looked. It had two tank treads for legs and feet with a humanoid upper body but the arms stuck out and were two laser miniguns. I go and connect the charging cable to them and in a few minutes all the robot''s turn on and are ejected out and start to move. The security drones move first and instantly start to go through the corridors. Then I hear gun fire and I see the dots on the floor vanish. ¡°Those rusty bots are something.¡± Lia said. ¡°Yeah, seems their condition wasn¡¯t as bad as we thought.¡± I said and she nodded in my view. The utility bots all head to the generator room and clean up the floor of debris and leave to clean the station as is their job. For me I go and turn on the pillars and then the main core and move out. A minute later a message appeared
Mission Updated
I go to the other generators and connect the disconnected cable or replace a broken core. One of them I had to enter the generator the repair several gears and parts which took a long while but I finally did the top floor. After a few hours both top floors were cleared out. I found out that the station AI had taken the initiative in releasing the security drones still connected to the charging cable to aid in fighting the rats. With the top two floors clear the power was slowly gathering quicker and slowly the station was getting a bit more active. I ran downstairs and soon join the others taking the weight of tanking off them and bulldoze our way through the bottom floors clearing them with the help of the security drones. With the sectors cleared we could take a good look and it was easy to understand why the lower floors are much more damaged. Being closest to the area of impact more damage was done inside with more cave in and blocked paths. It''s surprising the generators on Sector D which was the lowest survived so well while Sector C took damage to both the cores and the generator itself. Once the beasts were cleared, everyone returned to the ship while I took my time in Sector D which was simpler to repair and got it working. Throughout all this, my mechanics skill rose two levels to level 13 and my parts repair gained one level going to level 11. The fighting got me to level 23. Dad got level 26, Jessica reached 20, Hilda 22, Lisa 18, Havic I discovered was already level 32 and Ernest was 45. It was surprising to hear the levels of the two beta testers. After everything had happened so quickly we all returned a bit exhausted and decided to get rest. Besides Alex who kept relaying information to use, the ones that fought had a gone though a lot of fighting and so we went to sleep. The next morning I went to the lower floors. All the floors had been surprisingly clean but that was because the utility drones had removed the corpses and were cleaning the corridors. We went to all the drone rooms and put all the drones to charge and soon the place was crawling with them. Surprisingly they gathered at the collapsed corridors and were slowly opening them. As for damaged machines, they had no way to repair them but it was interesting to watch them crawl on the ceiling and walls as they cleaned the station. I went to the lower sectors and began repairing the generators but not before making the connection to the next four sectors and allowing the AI to transfer power to open the doors. We told it not to active the generators because it would cause more trouble than it''s worth and we would take our time repairing them before activating. I had asked myself half of the time ''why were we repairing a destroyed station but thinking of the loot to be found hidden here was a valid enough reason. While I worked on the generators for over a week the others sorted through all the deposits of goods and with Ernests own mechanic skill he repaired a kind of fork lift and brought back ship weaponry, from cannons to machine guns and more. Soon with power being stored, and me finding the power cell room and replacing all the damaged ones, eventually the hangars machinery. By the end of the second week I had finally finished repairing the damaged generators and they were all operating at 100%. The reward, money, after that mission came one for total restoration of the power of the stations power which we were really reluctant to do. We actually wanted to leave sooner but Ernest wanted to repair it. His reason was that if we ever needed it, we could hide out on this planet since even the biggest scrappers couldn''t crack the stations outer shell. He led us to a cave at the bottom floors and showed us how he entered and as we reach the end we noticed how there was a number of scraper probes around. "The scrappers may eventually find this but if we cover up and seal the holes the station will be sealed well enough and can be a secret base if we can get out and seal the station before they notice. Since the station has energy fields they can be set to stop others from entering when we exit and close up the station after we leave. As long as we set ourselves as the owner of the station and make a way for the AI to open up we can use this as a hide away. It will give us a good reason to repair this station and seal all exits." Ernest said. It was then that we got the urge to repair this. In the future we would definitely form a large crew and having a place to house them and build ships and our forces will be needed. After a while we all agreed that we would repair the station, at the very least we will get the power running and get the utility and security drones working and sealing the station up so that rats don''t return or other ''rats'' don''t get in. So we did what would work best, originally the prize for turning all the power back on was 150k credits but we said that due to the owner''s death if we repair the station it will belong to us. Since there has been intergalactic laws that stated similar things for centuries the station AI altered the mission and accepted the reward change. Now we have this.
Urgent Mission: Generator RepairsDifficulty4
Venturi Station has begun to be restored. Power to four sectors restored. 1. Mission details the requirement of all generators be up online to 100%. Reward: Ownership of the station to the crew. Objective: Repair completely all power generators in the station. 16/106 Success: All Generators are functioning Failure: Generators are destroyed
The mission began and we started slowly to clear it one sector at a time while equipping our ship and organizing the interior making all the seperate rooms needed and finding more equipment for our ship within each sector. 2 months later In space above Venturi, the planet where the crew crashlanded. Slowly space distorted as suddenly a ship broke out of FTL travel speeds. It was a large warship. Following it moments later three large carriers appears. Within the warship, Cleave was stilling and looked at the planet. "Report! How is the planet surface?" He asked. "The planet Venturi, also known as the home of scrapers, is the main base for every scrapper overlord. They control all traffic in the surrounding systems and everyone has to pay protection fees unless they have enough fire power to make them think otherwise." Someone reported. "Boss, one of the overlords once had dealings with Big Boss once, we may be able to get their help to find those bastards!" Another man said. "Oh? It would definitely help, still, send out a search party and try to locate the ship but get in contact with them so we can search without obstruction." Cleave said. ""Yes Sir!"" The men said and got to work. Cleave stared at the planet as a vicious smile appeared on his face. "No escape this time you fuckers!" he thought looking at the grey continent and green oceans.
Psi generator more or less https://i.ytimg.com/vi/8obPtEnmJQQ/maxresdefault.jpg Security robot https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-yw4jACIH_6M/VzuoNmSMbAI/AAAAAAAAA2I/14DqsY0OoGgYJntmFTRlig5cPVleQ5_BgCK8B/s512/2016-05-17.png Chapter 38: Consequences of Greed Authors Corner: recently been pumped for this moment people. Arc 1 ending next chap after i tighten up some loose ends. So fun so fun! Enjoy!
"Already told you, we searched the area for over a month and found nothing around it, we even searched for other items of use and there is only trash." The scraper boss said. The two men inside this brightly lit white office was none other than Cleaver and the scraper boss that had gone investigate the crash site of the Star Comet crew ship. "Did anyone try to sell or was seen with a new shuttle?!" Cleave asked desperate. "No, all purchase and sells of ships can only be done by my organization. Any new ship built in the scraps also has to pay a tax before taking to the air. Anyone with a new shuttle would have gone through us since we would notice the unknown identification. Don''t ask again, we didn''t find the ship." The scrapper boss said. "Damn it!" Cleave cursed. "Why are you so obsessed with a single shuttle? I''m sure your boss gave you much better." The boss asked while getting a cigar and lighting it and sitting back on his chair. "It''s not the ship, the crew was part of a group that attacked one of our outposts. We had valuable tech in that and they got away with that tech coming here." Cleave said. "Heh, what low class tech would make that big man move a rank 5 fleet to retrieve it?" The scrapper boss asked before sucking on the cigar and puffing out a cloud of smoke. Cleave frowned and thought a while and sighed. "A blink Drive." He said. The boss looked at him, his eyes narrowing. He leaned forward and supported his body on the table. "A what now?" He asked in a serious tone. "A work Xetra Blink Drive, we were hiding it in Kelha II''s asteroid belt until some idiots fucked up and were able to trace the base. The shuttle that crash landed here used its emergency escape feature to warp here." Cleave said spilling the beans. He knew that without permission he couldn''t search or even remain in this space without paying a price. This scrapper boss is one of a group of scrapper overlords that runs a number of solar systems and is one of the men that guard the frontier to the Dominion. "I see, yes, that is a perfect reason for attacking the station in charge of mining the Kelha system. Sadly we don''t know what to do, the ship was gone by the time we arrived and it''s been over two months. We will give your crew the right to search all ships exiting the planet but for all we know it could be gone." The scrapper boss said. Unlike greedy businessman, he was a realist. If he didn''t find the ship within a month then the chance of finding it was almost nonexistent and we would not waste resources in a fruitless search. "Thank is fine, we can definitely work with that but we need to figure out a way to know which are your ship and which are not." Cleave asked. The boss simple pointed behind him. When Cleave looked, he saw the large emblem which symbolizes the organization the scrapper boss runs. It was three gears interlocked forming a triangle and with "Black Scraps" written in front. "You can spot this on the front, sides, top or bottom of the ship. Depends on each crew of scrapper. Anyone else you can search, be warned, don''t go picking trouble for the other organizations though. You''re here with my permission but i can revoke that since i care about my hide one hundred times more than yours. Am i clear!" The scrapper boss said. "Very, sir! I can investigate the emblem of the other large organizations. The rest i will search." Cleave said and the boss nodded. Cleave leaves soon after leaving the scrapper boss alone. "A Xetra Blink Drive huh? Those idiots are playing with fire." The boss said to himself. After a moment he leaned in and pressed a button. "Mavis, ready all our ships, it seems this planet is no longer safe. Get all our men off planet and ready to travel." He said. "What is so dangerous sir?" A high pitched female voice came in from the other side of the line. "I will inform the higher ups when we are in space. Just give the call and tell any cocky ones it''s none of their business." The boss said. "At your orders sir." Mavis said and the line dropped. "So much work done here but too bad. Let''s let those idiots kill themselves." He said and got up and left the room. Noah PoV Looking at the massive mansion, me and dad were once again visiting Sophia but this time is different. The main difference was that she wanted the crew to meet. Since we found out that we were all from America she asked Malcolm to pay for the Alex, Havic and Ernest¡¯s air plane tickets. As for Lisa, she was surprisingly close but not in the same city but 3 hours away in another. They should already be here so when we arrived we were lead to a large room where we found Sophia and Meghan with the four others. I stopped and blinked when i saw them all. First was Alex, he was the easiest to point out because he had a girls face and figure without a hint of male on him besides his dick which was hidden in his pants. The next easiest to find was Havic, the reason was because she was firmly hugging and rubbing her face on Alex¡¯s cheeks as if she found it fluffy. She was as sexy as in the game, bountiful breasts spilling out of her shirt, a wide hip, wearing a white button up shirt, which was open on the top two buttons, a dress skirt that goes down to the knee and black stocking. Her hair was black and wavy and it was left hanging naturally behind her. After her was Lisa and Ernest by default. Lisa was on her phone talking about medical stuff with an annoyed expression. In real life her age of 30+ showed but she was a mature beauty with average sizes in curves and wore a one piece dress going down near the feet but not covering and an open thin coat to cover her arms. Ernest was sitting across from Meghan who was talking with him and Sophia about fighting and combat. She would take several peaks and look away. Ernest wore a sleeveless brownish green shirt and camo pants and large leather boots and had a buzz cut and he was very fit giving us the perfect picture of a military officer. When they saw us enter, Lisa saw us and froze a moment before she ended her call and walked over with a smile. We go to the round table which made it feel like some military meeting. ¡°Well guess everyone is here.¡± I said and sat down. ¡°Anyone want to start with the introductions.¡± Dad asked. ¡°Sure, well i used my own name in Nebula which is Ernest Murphy. 23 years old, spent 2 years in military and 3 years through several survival games to train my survivalist skills.¡± Ernest said. ¡°My real name is Alexander Frederick Grove, 21, 100% a man and I have always played games to try and fly in new skys. Being tamers to get beasts to fly and i am an airplane student pilot. In the mandatory army service i was part of the air force.¡± Alex says. ¡°Yo, my name is Luna Patterson, runway model extraordinaire and swimsuit model. Besides that i am the perfect wife material and have trained in every possible thing to take care of my hubby.¡± She said with a smile. ¡°In the simplest of terms, the Zastros race was made for her.¡± Ernest said joking. ¡°Hmpf, says the chameleon that can¡¯t even get a girl at 23.¡± Luna rebuked. ¡°Says the 28 year old.¡± He replied with a pokerface. She frowned at his words but couldn¡¯t rebut them and looked away pouting. ¡°My name in real life is Elisa Rayne, I majored in the medical field at Harvard and have been working as an intern for 2 years and will soon become an official doctor soon hopefully.¡± She said. On our part we introduce ourselves as well and then talk about our real lives and past game experiences. The four that didn¡¯t know us more personally were greatly shocked by learning of dads past as one of Malcolm''s closes friend as well as his title in Second Life. After a while Meghan wanted a rematch with me which i declined but then she suggested for Ernest to spar me. He wasn¡¯t against it and since it was someone i haven¡¯t challenged i accepted. Getting in safety gear we got on the mats and soon we started. Unlike the unrefined and wild and very open fighting style Meghan has, Ernest has a lot more skill and it took several rounds for me to get some hits in before i won. The others had been cheering for the one they wanted to see win, Meghan wanted Ernest to win while Sophia just sat quietly, Luna was cheering for me to beat Ernest to a pulp while Alex was on his phone while Elisa was talking with Dad wondering how the fight was going. The reactions were mixed but it didn¡¯t matter. After my fight, Ernest actually challenged dad. It goes without say that my dad is my martial arts master and i never won once. Just like how i treated Meghan the first time, he toyed with Ernest keeping one arm behind his back and fighting at best at 40%. After the fights dad decided to tutor Ernest a bit and the rest of us left, well Meghan remained eager to get in on the fighting class. The rest of us did our own thing throughout the mansion. As it started to get dark me and dad said our goodbyes. Before we did Ernest called us over. ¡°I will be borrowing one of the capsules in the mansion so i will be on earlier then you guys. I am going to take my old ship to the nearest city to purchase more non perishables and some more seeds for food. I am the only one known in town and i already purchase stuff like this for myself before so it won¡¯t be strange if I appear. I will get news to see if those bandits that were following you are already here or not.¡± He said. ¡°Thanks, there is little left to do anyway but we need to get off the planet soon.¡± Dad said. ¡°Any plans for the AI?¡± I asked. ¡°Yeah, we already uploaded a clone AI of it to be the ship¡¯s AI which helps in keeping the system from being hacked. We already had you build the charger center in an empty room and the utility and security drones that were broken are already in the cargo for when you want to repair it. I already made sure to scavenge parts from those to damaged to save.¡± Ernest said. Nodding i smile and said goodbye to the crew as we head home. Ernest PoV Getting into the capsule that i was lent i open my eyes into my shitty scrapper ship where i was already on the pilot seat. ¡°Chuck, start this piece of shit up.¡± I call my AI. ¡­ ¡°Chuck?¡± I call again. ¡­ ¡°CHUCK!¡± ¡°WHAT!¡± a rough and groggy voice called as the hologram of a fat dirty old man appeared rubbing his eyes. ¡°Turn this hunk of junk on already.¡± I said. He looked around and suddenly the sound of a loud rumbling fart came from his communicator on my arm and the ship turned on. On his face was a disturbing smile as he vanished. I sigh. ¡°Why did i get such a useless lazyass like you.¡± I complain as i make the ship lift up and turn to the doorway. To keep the ship from being stolen on this god forsaken planet, i built a system with this lazyass so that only he can turn it on but he is to lazy and unmotivated to do anything. If i had to say it, he is the perfect representation of a junkyard keeper. Sadly though his skills in locating useful things in a junkyard is better than my own with him being a machine and all. After checking many times i know that the scraper probes were already gone almost a month ago. This allowed me to go scavenging around as well as go into town to get parts. Since we have already fixed all the weapons to the ship as well as filled the ship with furniture and all other things we were simply repairing the station at this point. Many different missions like, [Bring all drone stations online] and [Repair all water pumps] were also given and we raised money from the station AI by doing that. This way, we were able to purchase parts from the town with me as a transporter back and forth. At this point i am just going to get food now, the water from Roktar''s ship has already been pumped into the new ship and even further filled with the stations water since the tank is much larger. The air was pumped from the surrounding air and passed through the filter several times before the filthy smell was removed. It helps that the hydroponic garden has already sprouted several interesting plants gained from the planet. Another interesting thing are those space creatures Lisa is breeding. The common one raised in 0g with only minerals to eat become rather savage but because she tried to feed plants to them they have gotten docile as herbivores. The first generations lived at best only three or four days but the current generation which is the fifth are only entering the adult phase. They are about the length of a human male''s palm and elongated with the back elongated. This was due to the gravity that made its body to pull downward forming a flat back. It had a fish tail and four wing like fins half as long as its body in the places where fish normally have them. I did check up on these when i was in town before. The original one is common all over and it changes depending on the food it gets. The small rock one is called a [Space shrimp] the current one we have are [Psionic Flying Fish] they have developed a unique ability of breathing both air and psi allowing them to live planetside and in space. That aside i watch the mountains pass and soon the image of shining white skyscrapers appeared. The cities made by the scrapers are lavished. The area around the skyscrapers was surrounded by tall walls and a dome shield keeping unauthorized ships near. Around the wall was a shanty town all over and many ships came and went. I move my ship to the edge of the outer tow to a place i normally land. My ship was a half destroyed mining ship but it had a working engine and power generator when i found it and i gathered parts in the scraps. Eventually it reached the point it could fly but i still had to pay a tax to allow it to fly which wasn''t very steep since the ship was trash. If i had used the shuttle its condition being good structurally i may have had to pay more than half its original price as tax to fly it. I turn the ship off which i can do manually and exit before locking up. Walking out and into the town, I walk through the largest roads that had far too many people howling about their wares. Scrap parts rare but damaged equipment, fully operational but repaired goods, operational and new gear. Everything could be found but the most expensive stuff wasn''t the equipment. I walk around until i reached a massive depot over 8 floors and surround by eight massive silos along the walls. Food, on this planet with 80% of the landmass covered in trash, food is a precious good. Water even more so since the ocean is mineral rich. It is filled with excessive metal minerals giving the green color water. To drink it, you need to to filter it greatly before it becomes drinkable which makes water taxes expensive. Food is even more so since more than 50% of the water, though less filtered since the minerals are used as fertilizer, so food prices are even more expensive. Walking inside i was met with a familiar face walking over. It was a strong pure black skinned ogre in high class armor and a great axe on his back. The physical axe was a psionic tech weapon and his armor was made from dwarf tech and you could find a single high class psi container on his back. "Ernest! Been a while!" The ogre said smiling. "Good to see you Borges." I said and grab the man''s hand. "Need food do you?" He said. "Getting off this rock, need... 4 tons, 1 of preserved meat and 1 of vegetable and the rest is unperishable." I said. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. "Well with the junker you fly it will be a while before reaching anywhere. The price is 70k!" He said. "Cheap! What the hell! Normally it would have cost 90k!" i thought. "Something going on? A 20k discount isn''t something normal." I asked. "You don''t know? Black Scrap''s main force has left the planet after a group of bandits arrived searching for a crew. Seems they are after something they shouldn''t be and the boss got antsy. We are just selling the remaining goods and leaving as well. Tomorrow is the last day here actually so you got lucky." Borges said. "Really, what is that crew after and what are they doing at the moment?" I asked. "Well, what they are after i don''t know but those bastards got permission from the boss to search any ship without his emblem. Many who didn''t adhere to the orders got shot down and those bastards seem to be stealing with their strength from those without the emblem as well." Borges said. I frown and thank him before moving to the side and get the packages ready. Soon workers moved all the goods and eventually loaded into my ship and i handed off the money and took off back to the station. I was cautious as always of any followers since this was a no man''s land but the crappy ship is a good disguise to deter the greedy. Luckily we had no one following and i soon reached the station. With caution we open the port hangar with the shuttle. The other wouldn''t fit my ship and even the hangar on the frigate doesn''t fit. Landing at the back and watching the gate rapidly close much faster than before thanks the the stations power being totally online. Jumping out of the ship i connect to the others. "Guys, I''m back with the food. Bring over a lift." I said. "On it." said Lisa who was the first to react. After a few minutes Alex, Havic and Lisa appeared on a floating fork lift and behind it was a trolley. Disconnecting the trolley Alex pilots the forklift and begins to transports the trolley. "Any news?" Havic asked serious. "Yeah." I said with a nod. I tell them what i heard. They all frown at the news of the planet being barricaded by the bandits. "We don''t have to worry this time. The ship has an FTL so we can jump as soon as we exit the atmosphere." Havic said. "Let''s get things ready, when Noah and Roktar log in we can head out." I said. "We should unlock the ships dock restraints." Lisa said. "That is simple enough but the ship needs to be totally online so that it won''t fall when it''s released." Alex said after putting one of the boxes down. "Let''s move this stuff first." I replied. Everyone nodded and soon we unloaded everything and transported everything. Back at the ship Havic goes loading the ship through the lift while Jessica and Hilda moved the boxes. Alex goes to the bridge and goes through all the startup procedure and turns on the engine. With a a initial rumble the engine came to life before it reduced the sound to a low hum. I was in the port command center. "Alright! The ship is set to remain parallel to the ground! You can unlock it." Alex said. I nod, since we already have a copy of the AI already installed into the ship, i had no worry press the button for to give a command to the AI. "Release all ship docking restraints and power cables." I said. "Releasing Venturi Battle Frigate docking restraints and power cable." it mimicked. Outside i saw all the energy cables disconnect and be pulled back into the ceiling. Next we heard the sound of pressurized air pumped into pistones as the large mechanical arms slowly opened releasing the ship. The ship didn''t even move after the restraints let it go. Slowly the arms retracted close to the walls out of the way. With the ship finally loose it was completely airborne in its first time in hundreds of years. "All thats left is Noah and Roktar." I mutter and left the command center. We spent time just doing random things until the two finally logged in. "So how are things?" Roktar asked while sitting in the captain''s chair. I report tell the two of them about the bandits. "Noah, the blink drive is installed right?" He asked. "I repaired it as best i could but if we use it to escape then we need to use the escape feature directly or else it will blow up if we blink then warp. And yes, it''s installed" He said. "Good, since we don''t have anything else we can go, but first..." he said and had his AI connect to the station AI "AI, from now on, besides for our crew and those we allow, every other life form is considered an enemy. Don''t attack those outside the station but if any get in they are marked as enemy." Roktar said. Noah laughed at the shrewd father condemning the invaders. "Orders acknowledge." it replied. "Good, now let''s go. Open hangar door, once the ship exits lockdown the station." He said. "Orders acknowledge. Opening Hangar door." it replied. It said and soon the door shook as the gears began to move. The slow opening sped up as the oil spread and eventually opened completely. Alex pushed the ship out and an image appeared of the gate behind us. "Hangar door closed. Station entering stage 1 lockdown" it said. The door closed and the station returned to the state of ruin it should be completely isolated. ¡°Last but not least, vent all the air in the station and leave it completely in a vacuum.¡± Roktar said. It surprised us but by doing that it would cause another layer of protection as well as keep the station from further rusting. With the okay on that we look forward. ¡°Alright folks, this is gonna get bumpy, we will probably have to fight our way out until we can enter FTL travel if we can¡¯t, we will be forced to warp again.¡± Roktar said dropping the usual playfulness. ¡°Let''s burn them to the ground!¡± Alex says and begins to type at a rapid pace. A moment later from the front an energy shield appeared in the format of hexagons covering the entire ship before vanishing into thin air. Then the feeling of gravity pulling us increased momentarily before stabilizing at 1G again followed by the shields acting up again. Then a familiar robot voice called all over the ship. ¡±Energy Shield activated, Gravity Generator activated at 1G, Inertia Dampeners activated. The AI said. ¡°Now let''s go!¡± Alex said excited and pulled the handle that lifted the ship''s nose and pushed the throttle to full speed making us rapidly rise. *** In space, the entire planet had been covered surrounded by many small ships owned by the Bandit group. Every ship besides those with the Black Scrap emblem were searched and those with anything of value was seized secretly. They had gained a generous sum by doing this leaving a great deal of people very pissed off. At this moment Cleave was annoyed while reading the reports of all the acquired goods. Some stuff was good, some crews resisting had some good ships and it was ¡°borrowed¡± after the crew was disposed of but Cleave had only one objective and he still didn¡¯t get it. *Beep! Beep! Beep!* The sudden warning showed a ship that was rapidly ascending off the planet. ¡°Another one sir, this one seems to be a battleship as the speed is incomparable to common shuttles or scraper ships.¡± One of the men warned him. ¡°Get it up on the monitor and check to see if it''s a Black Scrap mercenary branch ship.¡± Cleave said without looking up. The image appeared soon after and he took a look and his eyes widened. ¡°Sir! This ship isn¡¯t Black Scrap or any other organization. It seems to be someone else¡­ the model of the ship is a¡­ Venturi Battle Frigate? Weren¡¯t those cut off of production several hundred years ago?¡± The man said. ¡°Someone found a working relic? It looks almost new?¡± Cleave said. ¡°Signal the ship to stop to be searched.¡± ¡°Yes sir!¡± The men shouted. They sent out the signal and one man started. ¡°This is Trudence Fleet main ship speaking, we have authorization to search all ships exiting! Stop at once and wait to be boarded!¡± He said. The message sent everyone kept looking. They saw the ship veer away from the warship but didn¡¯t stop accelerating. ¡°Sir! They are starting their FTL Drive!¡± One man shouted. ¡°CATCH THEM!¡± Cleave shouted. ¡°Start up the jammers!¡± He ordered. In the frigate, the crew were watching the hologram showing the count down. The AI was counting down. FTL Drive activated, jump in 10, 9, 8, 7¡­ ¡°Hope we can jump before they do anything.¡± Noah muttered. The next moment everything began to shake and the all the screens began to show static. ¡°Fuck! They had jammers!¡± Ernest cursed. ¡°Shit! How long until we can warp with the blink drive!?¡± Roktar said. ¡°The charging will take 10 seconds!¡± Alex said. ¡°Get charging!¡± Roktar said. Alex fixes the ship that had gone off course even though the jammers since the controls aren¡¯t affected as much. Back in the war ship the crew had begun to move the ship and it was accelerating after the battle frigate. ¡°Have the Fighters launched and surround it, take out the guns as well!¡± Cleave shouted. ¡°Sir! They are charging again but this time it''s something else!¡± Someone said. ¡°Its them! The drive is there! Get all the men over here! Also charge the EMP pulse cannon!¡± Cleave said. At once the front of the war ship opened and a strong energy surged inside the massive barrel that appeared. The crew of the Star Comet crew had also noticed this and were feeling despair because the charging was taking longer with the jamming. Unbeknownst to everyone there was a third paryt. Hidden behind a shroud with cloaking technology, they looked through a hologram screen watching the fight. ¡°This is our chance, fire it.¡± A charming woman''s voice said. A man behind her bowed and pressed a single button. Below the hidden ship, single large missile was fired. As it reached 100 meters the ship fly off in FTL travel leaving the solar system. As for the missile it flew a bit more and as soon as the cannon of the warship fired off it blew up. The power wasn¡¯t normal but was completely comprised of Psi. It came from the front while the emp blast came from behind. As the two energies converged, the wormhole finally opened and the ship vanished inside just before the two energies collided and caused a massive shockwave pincering the wormhole. The energies mixed, one pure energy, the other psi and the last the power opening the wormhole. The blend caused the wormhole to suck it in but that also caused an explosion and a shock wave that traveled all over the galaxy in an instant. Being a wormhole it was a rip in the fabric of space. This disturbance caused the entire galaxy to experience the disturbance. As for the result, within the battle frigate that got away it was sudden swept up by the energy and the crew was swallowed by the energy. ¡°ARAHHHH!¡± All the people, both organic and inorganic, were affected by it as it invaded their minds and bodies. One by one they fell unconscious. Not only them, throughout space, any ship that was undergoing a jump at FTL speeds were affected, NPC were left in a dizzy state but all players were put into such a mental burden that every single one fell unconscious. In the capsule of every single one the AI¡¯s were in despair. ¡°Shit! What is going!¡± Lia cursed as she worked feverishly. ¡°What happened! This wave it is even invading the real body! Shit report! Now Eject!¡± She said as she did what was needed to pull Noah out of the game and release him front the VR capsule. At the main facility where the supercomputer of The Nebula was, along with the Main AI¡¯s supercomputer, alarms were ringing and all the technicians were running around. Malcolm storms into the main computer room. ¡°What the hell is going on!¡± He shouted. ¡°Sir! It seems someone was able to get a virus into the game! This is a virtual attack!" One technician said. "Shit! What happened exactly!" Malcolm said. "The virus was examined already! It was meant to kill, the target... was your daughter sir! But it underwent changes due to several factors." The man said. "How is she! What happened to Sophia!" Malcolm said. "She was ejected by the AI''s but that isn''t the problem, currently we registered over 100 other cases of people being ejected and it." The man said. "Quickly, get people moving get all these people to the hospitals. This will bring unprecedented trouble but lets stabilize the game and make it safe again!" E said. As this was happening something was stirring in the impact zone. Quickly the wormhole the crew had escaped in was collapsing but suddenly it stabilize at the last second and slowly it began to expand. "Sir the wormhole! It stabilized and is opening!" One man called out to Cleave. Sweat was gathering on his forehead as his instincts were telling him to run. "Quick charge the FTL and get us out of here! Same to the other ships!" He commanded but suddenly the ship systems were jammed just like they did with the Star Comet crew. Not even the engines worked anymore. They could only watch as the wormhole grows bigger and bigger until it was almost three times bigger than their current ship. On the other side a large black green ships slowly exits the wormhole. Everyone was filled with fear as the ship appeared. The reason was because it was one of the independent races no one wants to meet. Before them was a warship from the Xetra space fleet. Behind the first was another then another. As the first one exits a message was sent to the ship. It was a strange half screech voice. "This is Xetra language. The AI''s have translated it." Someone said solemnly.
Our technology! You stole it, so die Vermin!
The message was followed by the first Xetra ship that was facing them open at the front as green bolts of energy gather forming a massive glowing light that shot out like a beam that encased the ship. The shields didn''t hold out for a moment and the ship was blow to ashes before anything else could happen. The other Xetra ships aimed at the carriers and from long range they also shot destroying all of them. Inside the Xetra ship, a single order went out. "Find our technology and kill all vermin who seek it!" Thus they invaded the scrap planet and killed the scrappers before reinforcements appeared and they all spread through the nearby systems in search of the single Blink drive and any other bits of their technology. Epilogue Author Corner: Final chap of the volume 1 and a short chap for the final touch ups. Enjoy
On the days of the incident with the Xetra, due to the great public pressure, ¡®The Nebula¡¯ was temporarily taken offline the day of the incident and put under investigation by the experts of Virtual Works. The day after, Virtual works called for a press conference to explain what was discovered. In a large room with a pedestal with many mics sticking out and a mass of journalist sitting while a number of camera men were near the back or up a bit higher to not be obstructed, were waiting. At noon Malcolm Brim himself came out but unlike the common image of a gentleman he gave, today his face was grim and fierce with a frown on his face. It caused the people in the audience to feel as if he had a true nobles aura. As he stood at the pedestal he sighed and drank a bit of water. ¡°Greetings everyone and thank you for gathering on short notice. You all know why you are here so let¡¯s begin.¡± he said. At once every journalist stood up at once waving their hands. Malcolm looked at saw a familiar journalist and pointed at her. ¡°Sir, what exactly happened.¡± She asked. ¡°It was an all out attack to demoralize me personally. This attack wasn¡¯t meant to escalate from what we understand. The target was unfortunately my own daughter. The weapon used was a bomb that releases compressed psi but somehow the criminals were able to hack into the game from inside and alter the base code of that specific bomb so that it would target my daughter but due to a number of coincidences at the same moment the attack failed but as a result caused widespread damage.¡± Malcolm said and everyone started to raise their hands again. He pointed to a middle aged man. ¡°What was the purpose of the bomb, how would it actually kill someone?¡± The journalist asked. ¡°There are several theories which will not be tested obviously. One is that the bomb would cut the link to the capsule and kill the avatar my daughter is in and may cause real death. The other is that the bomb would attack the nerves and short circuit the nervous system and shut down the brain. Such an overload would kill instantly before the AI¡¯s could even react. Fortunately because of the incident the energy was dispersed and only caused mental overload but not at the scale of killing but it''s unknown when those victims will awaken from the comatose they are currently in.¡± He replied. The crowd got up again and he chose a young lady again. ¡°What is this incident you spoke of?¡± She asked. ¡°We have prepared a video of the incident which our main AI Amy, was able to extract from the memory.¡± Malcolm said and looked to one of the men on the side of the stage. He nods and pulls out a remote that makes a white screen lower and the lights go off as a projector begins to project the incident. It showed the ship and it zoomed in. ¡°This is the ship my daughter is in along with her crew and an old friend acting as captain.¡± Malcolm said. As the video rolls they see them veering and soon the ship begins to lose direction but straightens as the shields act up. Then the warship brings out a huge cannon in the front. At this point the video pauses. ¡°At this point we had to search greatly before we located this.¡± Malcolm said. The video focus into empty space but soon a grid appears and soon the image of a black ship appears. Everyone was startled by the ship. ¡°We discovered this by following the trajectory of the bomb they follow but as we try to figure out who they are we found that they aren¡¯t something part of the system.¡± Malcolm said. At this time everyone began to talk and numerous flashes of cameras covered Malcolm. ¡°They had somehow hacked in and by the time we noticed they were gone but we did locate the hole in the system they used and have located a number we hadn¡¯t seen. As such ¡°The Nebula¡± will remain offline for around a month until we patch this up. The avatars of all the players were given basic AI¡¯s and they will do the simplest tasks and those with ships or are travelling, will only maintain the ship. As for those directly affected by the incident, we can¡¯t affect ingame for some reason.¡± Malcolm said. Everyone started asking questions but he held his hand up. ¡°There is more.¡± He said and the video played on after zooming out. They watched as the missile was launched and soon the wormhole opened just before both the missile and emp pulse was launched and the ship escaped before both waves of energy impacted the wormhole mixing and causing the massive shockwave. Several moments later the wormhole began to open up again. Then the Xetra ship appears and faces the Bandit War ship and blasts it to ash. The other ships that come after it do the same to targets over several thousand kilometers away leaving nothing. They release small ships and hunt down all the smaller ships before going to the planet and dyeing the green spots in red before leaving and opening a wormhole and appearing in the next system over. Everyone was silent at the moment. ¡°What you just witnessed was one of the currently unknown races of the game known as the Xetra. They are isolationist insectoids that are neutral but have only a single thing that ticks them off and is having their technology stole or found onboard another races ship even if it was found fair and square. Their level of technology leads them to put enough fear in all three factions so they won¡¯t move against them unless all three factions work together and that won¡¯t happen due enmity. This is for another time, as for the incident we are discussion, what we theorize happened was that the energy of the EMP and the Psi from the bomb was mixed perfectly by the rapid spinning of the wormhole. When the wormhole the crew was using closed it also cut off the flow of energy rushing to attack as well as the shockwave dispersing 90% of the power behind it. If it was not so then there would be many more deaths than simply my daughter.¡± He said. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site. No one moved but one lifted his hand and Malcolm pointed. ¡°What is being done to help those in comatose?¡± he asked. ¡°Virtual Works will pay all expenses, we are also seeing if there isn¡¯t a way to stimulate them to wake up earlier but it''s a dangerous period for them so we ask that no one try to force it and hope they wake up soon. We can¡¯t say for sure how long they will be out. I ask that no one place them back into the capsule even after they wake up until brain scans have confirmed they have absolutely nothing before they can be allowed back into ¡°The Nebula¡± after it is open once more.¡± Malcolm said. The conference continues but through the television of one group of people it goes. One man was sitting at the desk at the back with his hands joined and his elbows on the desk with his forehead on his interlocked fingers. His breathing was a bit ragged and he suddenly exploded as his fist slams on the desk. ¡°You promised me that you would hit him where it hurts but what do you do! You fuck up!¡± The man shouted. ¡°Fufufu, is that so, buying you one month to launch a your game without his interference and once it goes back online the players will think twice with the danger they saw in it. I think we did mighty fine.¡± A seductive female''s voice said. The owner of the voice stood up as the room''s lights were flicked on. The woman was wearing a long red dress with her hair tied up. Her lips were covered with red lipstick and her face was youthful but there were signs of aging. She had perfect middle aged woman curves that express she had a child but everyone that knows her knows she has no known son. Only the man behind her knows anything about her past. The man in question is an elder with full head of grey hair and a thick mustache and black cold eyes as he wore a butler''s suit. ¡°It¡¯s not enough that they have some feeling of danger, it might even attract those crazy extremist that like the rush. We need to keep causing trouble for them, the bitch daughter of his didn¡¯t die like she should have and she will probably be under the highest level of security so until she returns to the game she is too heavily protected. Try to hack the game again and ruin it more. Cause war, blow up planets or other things just make that game burn into rubble!¡± He said. ¡°Sorry to say but we were barely able to use a single opening in the system, now that they are patching the game we need to wait until they are finished, then wait a period for the intense paranoia to calm down before we can even start searching.¡± The woman said. ¡°We have no time!! I don¡¯t care if you have to blow up the entire Virtual Works main HQ! I want that company out!¡± The man shouted. The woman sighed and gestured to the man. He nods and walks to the man with a suitcase and deposits a pile of money. ¡°Here, this is half the money, since we did half the job of causing serious trouble for Malcolm we will keep half, I would keep all of it since we did a public problem but then you would have that over my head so let¡¯s keep it at that. Don¡¯t call me anymore, I am cutting out of the men I work with.¡± She said and turned letting her dress flutter. ¡°Come Bruce.¡± She said. The butler bowed and followed. ¡°You think you can just leave! Maria!! MARIA!!¡± He shouted but she leaves and the butler just looks back with a hint of disdain in his eyes. After they left, an awkward silence was left in the room with the higher positioned works of the company. ¡°Maria¡­ ARH! THAT BITCH!¡± he shouted and slammed his fists. ¡°Sir, what she said is right, his public image has been tarnished and it will be a while before it recovers. Let us take this time to launch the game.¡± One man said. ¡°I know! Still to lose so much money for a half done job. Can¡¯t even kill a brat to keep that asshole from getting more heirs.¡± He cursed. ¡°We should be lucky they did what they did.¡± A woman at the end of the table said. Everyone nods and the boss sits back on his chair. ¡°Tell the men to wait a week and release the game. Make the propaganda about the release.¡± The boss said and made the rest of them leave. ¡°Maria Collins, don¡¯t think you can leave so easily.¡± *** While the game had been shut off everything in it was still moving, due to this the universe of the Nebula was still working. Far from any known space, after over a week of unstable wormhole travel a slow tear in space split and spun making an exit. The space was filled with destroyed ships and even an amazing sight of a planet that was split in half and the core was cooled. The moon was in a similar state and broken into many parts scattered around. All over the space for thousands of kilometers warships, capital ships, carriers and more were all half destroyed. As the wormhole reaches stability a Venturi Battle Frigate is thrown spinning out from the hole. The power was off but a moment later every system besides the main thruster starts up and the strong spinning begins to be countered by the side thrusters around the body that countered the force and soon the ship stopped in space. ¡°Seems we¡¯re are safe.¡± A single AI said before the ship turned off once more deactivating almost completely besides the life support. After several weeks a distortion in space once more appears in the space near the ship. This one was different as it was similar to an FTL drive. What appeared was a small mining ship sized shuttle that instantly broke apart into a long cylinder shaped escape pod that flew fast and impacted into the side of a random ship. The escape pod pops open revealing the body of a small young girl that looks no more than 12. She opened her eye revealing the android eyes. She looks around and sees the Star Comet Crew ship. ¡°Target found, beginning plan.¡± she said into her own mind. Volume 2 Chapter 1: Loli Savior Two long weeks have gone by after the most shocking incident with Virtual reality technology happened. Every virtual reality ¡°game¡± was put on stand still and all the gaming companies and the international war game, was put under investigation and all the games were put through a massive clean sweep sealing any possible holes that could be used for hacking. At this time a second news conference has been called by the CEO of Virtual Works where the incident happened. The Nebula, the game in question where said incident happened, has already undergone over twenty clean sweeps by the main AI and several secondary technicians and AI¡¯s. At this time Malcolm Brim walked out and under the flashes of cameras he walked to the pedestal on the stage. ¡°Greetings all, we may begin.¡± He said. The reporters stood and he choose one randomly. ¡°What has your company been doing since the incident two weeks ago?¡± The journalist asked. ¡°First off, before even fixing the game was to log all players out before taking the game offline. It is still running but the server is offline. Then we searched the records and located all the people who were affected by the virus shockwave and called the local authorities to bring them to the nearest hospitals. We have already mentioned this two weeks ago but our company will pay all bills.¡± Malcolm said. The crowd jumped up and he chose an old journalist. ¡°What happened to the victims?¡± He asked. ¡°I have received the records of the brain activity from our AI as well as the medical records and it was contested that the victims suffered from mental exhaustion from the overload to their brain. Thankfully it wasn¡¯t as strong and victims that were in a comatose woke up within these 2 weeks. The only group that hasn¡¯t and has been transferred to a private hospital at my request is all the members of my own daughters crew. They are all still in comatose as they state is more serious for having taken the strongest burst of the energy near the epicenter before it could dissipate.¡± Malcolm replied. ¡°What is their current state?¡± the same man asked. ¡°At the moment they are under intensive care and brain scans and other examines to examine their situation.¡± The crowd stood again and the next question came from a young lady. ¡°How long before the game is online again?¡± She asked. ¡°Our specialist and AI have done several dozen sweeps of the game and are still doing more for extra care. The came is estimated to go back online next week after the final patches have been installed. It will also include updated information and a new situation on the galaxy with the coming of the Xetra threat.¡± Malcolm explained. From there many different questions flee which he answered until someone came and told him it was time to leave to which he didn¡¯t even waste an extra moment. Malcolm leaves entering a police escorted reinforced vehicle which Proto was driving with Magi being inside in the back. Letting out a deep sigh he leaned back. ¡°Problematic¡­¡± Magi said. ¡°I know but we need to explain or there will be further unrest.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Gonna visit?¡± She asked. ¡°Of course, Proto.¡± Malcolm called. ¡°The flight is already planned sir, i also worry about master Noland and young master Noah.¡± He said. ¡°Yeah, I hope they wake up soon. As for you Magi, do you plan to enter Nebula anytime soon?¡± He asked her. ¡°Mn! Finding ship.¡± She said. He nodded, the location of the ship is hard to find even after so many sweeps it is taking a long time to locate the ship the others were flying before warping. Soon they reached a private jet which was heading to the city that the crew was in. They were all transported to the most advanced Hospital with the best technology in the America and then some. We all get in and the plane soons leave the ground. Travelling by escorted ambulances Noland and Noah were inside side by side and were breathing shallow breaths while the medics in the ambulance were breathing roughly. ¡°My god! What was that?¡± A nurse asked. ¡°Readings said it was a seizure but to me it was like they were both being attacked by a fucking demon in a nightmare or something.¡± A male medic said. ¡°Hope this doesn¡¯t make them worse for the wear.¡± The nurse said. ¡°We already put restraints and the medical bracelet will keep track of any possible symptoms or attacks they may have.¡± The medic said. With a nod they take deep breathes and watch out for the two men. After another hour the ambulance finally reached the massive private hospital that the crew was being transported to. The two men didn¡¯t have any other attacks while under the effect of sedatives and were properly transferred to the hospital and transported to separate rooms in. After some prepping each man were soon taken to the MRI to get the initial scans to compare to the records obtained from the very first scan done by the common hospital. As they returned to the rooms they were assigned the others of the crew had also already arrived and each one was put through the MRI and placed in different rooms. Around 7 a shocking thing happened where four of the crew, Noah, Noland, Alex and Meghan all began to thrash about but sedatives were put to calm them down. With 24 hour nurse care each one was looked after but during a period of time when the nurse taking care of Noah left his body unexpectedly moved and slumping and firming his legs off the bed he dragged himself to a different room and stood over the bed before collapsing over the bed like a puppet with its strings cut. It was only five minutes later where a commotion happened that they found him over the bed that Sophia was laid down in. None of them knew how he got here but they transported him back to his own bed. *** ¡°Magi, it seems Ami has found the ship''s location.¡± Proto says a bit after the plane landed. ¡°Mn, will go. Be in room.¡± She said. ¡°Alright, Proto, take care of her and don¡¯t let anything bad happen to her body while we are here.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Of course sir, come there is a car prepared, Magi, you were upgraded recently with a wireless router that can work everywhere but if not the car has a mobile one so you can login from here.¡± Proto said. She nodded and looked at Malcolm pulling his sleeve. ¡°Permission for advanced customization?¡± She asked. ¡°Granted, but not going overboard.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Android with psi?¡± She asked. ¡°Only with enough Psi gates to match a dwarf at the start.¡± Malcolm replied making her glum but she nodded. Seeing she had gained permission she scoots over to one side of the car and rests her head on the door, which was firmly locked, and closed her eyes. As they leave the robot girl connects to The Nebula via a back door and logs in as a player. "Oh! Took you long enough!¡± A spunky little redhead said appearing from the darkness. Magi touches her head making a screen appear and she tosses it at the approaching girl hitting her on the forehead leaving a straight light since the window was thrown spinning like a disk. She held her head with tears in her eyes while crouching for a moment before calling the window over. It was video feed of Magi getting permission for an android with Psi technology installed already. "Where to?" Ami asked. "Sophia''s ship!" She said. "Can''t teleport you directly even if Malcolm wanted. I can introduce you differently and you will get the same results." Ami replied. Magi nods agreeing. "AI log in code obtained... forced login of capsule AI pertaining to Star Comet crew." Magi said in a robotic tone. "What are you doing?!" Ami shouted. "Need workers... AI will help." She said nonchalantly ¡°work.¡± Magi said. ¡°What do you need them for, did you forget they need to be ready for when the others return?!¡± Ami complained. ¡°Still in Comatose... estimated time of awakening... unknown... need repairman.¡± Magi said and pointed at the android body. It was clear what that meant, an android at the start has an operating time of 4-6 hours if they are working a lot. All Magi is getting extra is the Psi tech, nothing more or less, the stats will still be really low. ¡°Tch, fine, when you reach the door of the ship i will personally activate them.¡± Ami said with a childish pout. Magi floated over and pat her head then her chin. As if a chill ran down her spin her appearance changed and looked like a beast man catgirl from second life. With fur all over and a slightly cat like face but retaining a lot of human in her look she slowly gave in until the last moment and where she vanished and appeared back in the human form huffing.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. ¡°Damn it!... Almost got me damnit!¡± She cursed huffing. A small smile appeared on Magi¡¯s lips before she waved her hand and a window appeared asking if the character customization was done. She looked at the android for a moment, her current look was the same as her robot body, 12 years old with navy blue hair and eyes. She looked down at the thin jumpsuit that was part of her beginner equipment. She waved her hand and that jumpsuit turned into a slightly bulkier space suit. Then she split her hair into two long ponytails. She looked at bit and nodded. ¡°Seriously, this is plagiarizing¡­¡± Ami said. This was clearly copying Hat***e M**u ¡°Hmpf.¡± Magi said and snapped her finger making the hair and eyes milky blue instead of navy blue and her pale skin turned touch tanner to a more healthy color but she didn¡¯t like it and turned it back to the pale ice princess look. With the milky blue hair and eyes it gave her a mystic appearance which she was happy about. She customized the space suits look to have a kind of robotic look where glowing lines were around the body until she was satisfied. Ami sighed and shook her head. ¡°Seriously, only you to hack into the systems just to give your beginner armor a unique look.¡± Ami complained. ¡°Beat me¡­ then talk.¡± Magi said and nodded taking a look with a small smile. Ami grinded her teeth. What Magi had meant was one of the personal VR games the two girls created on some extremely far off planets at the edge of the galaxy. The world was isolated and the two acted as goddesses of two races and guided their people to rule. The winner would be the contest winner and Magi, with her extensive library of knowledge on combat, teaches her people extremely well in the flesh, while Ami doesn¡¯t have as much real world experience acts like the great ruler overlooking her people from high above. Up until now the two have a record of 10,345 wins and 4,392 loses for Magi and the opposite for Ami. As such, Magi¡¯s planning skills are far beyond Ami¡¯s and is able to lead her people to advanced technology much faster. Because of this, she enjoys a few perks when plays one of the official games such as being able to customize her equipment. At the moment she made it that all the armor she wore would gain that same mystic look. This was to make her stand out like a goddess which she particularly loved though she didn¡¯t normally demonstrate it. Finishing with her character creation, both the real one and the new avatar vanished with a flash. A grin appeared on Ami¡¯s face after the loli robot girl was gone. ¡°Let''s give her a crashing welcome.¡± She said and began to set up the introduction. On Magi¡¯s side, she found herself inside a tube like capsule and outside was countless lights flashing of stars and ice particles passing. Leaving the beautiful spectacle to pass. A moment later, everything stopped and the speed suddenly slowed down making Magi crouch but a sudden acceleration caused her body to bump around until she steadied herself. ¡±She will pay¡­¡± Magi thought as she saw the shuttle parts break off and her transport capsule went straight into the side of a wrecked ship. It slammed into the side and stuck there. After a moment the transport capsule popped open after the air pressure was ejected. She was a bit beaten and would get payback for this but she stood up. She was in a bad mood but started to look around as her robotic eye focused here and there taking everything in. Eventually she spotted the ship far off. ¡°Target found¡­ beginning plan.¡± she said into her own mind and aimed herself to the first waypoint she marked for herself and began to glide through space towards the ship. After ten minutes of gliding through space, she reached the ship''s airlock and tried to open it. Not succeeding, she connects to the ship''s systems to look for the AI¡¯s but found none online. Irritated, she about to burst but at that moment the ship began to stir as the power started to turn on and the lights inside turned on. Several other things began before Magi heard a voice. ¡±Violation of systems and hacking will result in instant reaction with deadly force!¡± The voice of the AI without intelligence. ¡±Crappy VI... can¡¯t distinguish friend and foe without being programmed.¡± Magi cursed in her mind. She closes her eyes and logs off and appears in front of Ami in the dark space floating and instantly a monster sized fly swatter appeared and without warning squashed Ami. While in the daze a bug net came and caught her and put her inside a net case. ¡°Hey! What was that for!¡± Ami shouted from inside. She tried to blink out but she soon realized this was Magi¡¯s isolation net which cut her from the system when she pissed off Magi. ¡°Time out!¡± Magi said . ¡°Buu!¡± Ami complained pouting while floating in the center of the net while trying the undo the program around it that would take her several minutes. Magi turned and waved her hand making numerous windows appeared. "AI log in code obtained... forced login of capsule AI pertaining to Star Comet crew." Magi said in a robotic tone just like the first time but this time uncountable windows blinked in and out of existence until it all vanished with Magi as well. She opened her eyes and a moment later she heard a voice. ¡°Greetings miss Magi, I had never expected to be dragged in here without Alex.¡± Xeno said his voice holding the utmost respect since she can erase him if she wants. ¡°Xetra model AI Xeno¡­ Open!¡± She said in a cold tone through the communicators. A moment went by as the air inside the airlock was withdrawn and the door opened for her. She stepped through the airlock and feeling the gravity under her she smiles lightly. Moments later the door closes automatically and the air flowed in before the other door opened for her. ¡°Ship layout.¡± Magi said and a moment later a detailed map of the ship with each level stated and all the things inside each one was given. She showed interest in the hydroponic garden that should have the Psi Flying Fish so she walked over but what she found was rather surprising. The fish that shouldn¡¯t be more than a palm large was around half a meter long and slowly floating around. What was even more strange were the plants which had a kind of reef plant feel. Some looked like anemone and others looked like bioluminescent above ground plants. They flowed strangely as if wind existed inside. Trying to get a reading on everything she couldn¡¯t recognize anything. Then it clicked, this was a result of the energy wave. It mutated the life on the ship. Instantly she felt worried about the crew and asked for all their locations. All were in the bridge so she headed there and found the collapsed bodies. Each released waves of Psi which leaked from their bodies without stop. It caused the room to be rather rich in psi. Magi moved close and examined each of them and found that they all had their psi gates literally popped open. She didn¡¯t have psi controlling skills yet so she wouldn¡¯t be able to seal them up and moving them is also difficult until she can properly upgrade this body. As much as she wanted to take them to their beds, her weak body wouldn''t support them as such she simply fixed up their positions and checked their conditions. After make sure they were either sitting upright or laying on the ground straight she got up. "Request location robot building area... access to all robot schematics." Magi said with a robotic tone. The information in her view changed and marked the hangar. Then a line showed the way to a spot where the lift would pass through the floor and worked as an elevator. She left and headed to it and Xeno lifted her to the hangar as she shifted through the data. Up there she found all the robot parts and so on even finding the Psi generator. Checking her internal systems, she found her own psi generator in her chest replaced the electric motor androids used but it only produced enough psi for her to function. Seeing this she moved around and gathered some parts and first and foremost made a magnetic boot for herself then took Noah''s psionic metal components to make parts to repair herself with. Repairing the partial damage she got from Ami''s stunt she looked around and moved to the hangar door. "Activate energy shield... open hangar... leave door open." She said. Moments later the shield was up and the door opened for her. "What are you planning to do?" Lia''s voice suddenly asked. "Primary objective... obtain temporary bodies for current AI population... AI function code one regulates capsule AI possess all skills their player has but gains no exp." Magi said and jumped out towards the wrecked ships to start scavenging. In the real world Malcolm reached the hospital and upon arriving he found confused doctors and nurses. "Is there a problem?" Malcolm asked. "And you are?" An older doctor asked looking Malcolm over. "I am Malcolm Brim, i had my daughter and seven others i asked to be admitted here." He replied. "Ah Mr. Brim, it''s good to meet you. As for what happened? It''s rather strange, we located the young man named... Noah Collins, collapsed over the bed of your daughter. We looked over his readings and the cameras and saw he had stood up but there was no fluctuation in his readings." The doctor said. "Thats..." Malcolm began but didn''t know how to reply. "Don''t worry, we examined him again and found nothing wrong with him or your daughter." The doctor said making Malcolm calm down. "Can i see her?" He asked. "Yes, of course, i shall lead you personally. You all, meet me later, for now go back to work." the elder said. The others left and Malcolm was led by the doctor to the room Sophia was sleeping in. On her arm was large metal sleeve. All around it were several bags with clear liquid inside. These machines replaced the large numbers of machines that previously existed and made moving the patient easier with less risk since all the machines were integrated to it and sent the information to a different computer in the same room. Malcolm saw the pale skinned girl and his heart tightened seeing his only girl in such a situation. His wife died giving birth so all the love he would have given both was directed to Sophia. Now seeing his daughter in such a situation caused him to grieve. "I will find whoever did this and make them pay a hundred fold!" he said to himself in his mind. At this moment, the door opened drawing the attention of the two men. The voice from the nurses outside caused Malcolm to be on guard. "Quickly restrain him!" Someone said but the person in question still walked into the room eyes fully open but looking into the eye you could see the pupils completely closed. The two men gasped as they saw Noah walking in while one of the more burly male nurse trying to drag him back but he simply walked forward as if nothing was holding him. "Release the boy now!" The elder doctor said after he saw what was happening. The nurse saw who ordered this and released Noah who slowly worked to the side of Sophia''s bed with everyone present. Slowly his eyes closed and like a puppet with its strings cut his body fell half on the ground half over Sophia''s bed. Seeing this the nurse waited for orders and the elder waved him way. The male nurse carefully supported Noah and took him back. "What was that?" Malcolm asked. "You tell me, this is the second time we saw this, the first time happened two days ago when he was admitted to the hospital after all his tests." The senior doctor said. "Is it only him? How is his condition?" Malcolm asked. "Seizures every 3 hours but after he came walked into this room the first time he spent nearly 12 hours before the next one. Constant thrashing during sleep, possibly nightmares, that is something we found all eight of them underwent." The doctor said. Malcolm found it very interesting, this new fact. "Do you use Virtual reality capsules as a form to monitor brain waves?" Malcolm asked. "No, most of the time we just do initial tests and when things happen. Virtual reality technology in the medical field, even now, isn''t widely used and only experimentally." The doctor said. Malcolm, obviously, knew of this as Virtual Works is the first company to introduce Virtual reality technology. His father and him have both invested in a broader range of uses for virtual reality technology but even so it''s still mostly experimental. Only things like school in virtual reality and the war games have been done and accepted greatly while the medical field is the least accepted due to the risks. "I wonder if you may be interested in the experimental medical capsules we use to monitor the brain wave patterns. With Nebula appearing the capsule AI all possess individual personalities and monitor the brain 24/7 especially during the seizure." Malcolm said. "That is something we need to speak with the board of directors. It is not up to me." The senior doctor replied. Malcolm looked carefully at his daughter''s peaceful sleeping face and a determined look appeared on his face. "Is it possible for you to schedule a meeting with the board. As selfish as it may seem, i want the best for my daughter and if it helps here the medical field may take a step forward." Malcolm said. "I shall see to trying. I will let you spend some time with your daughter while i have my own work to accomplish." The senior said. "Thank you for your time and i hope we can work together in the future." Malcolm said receiving a nod from the doctor. After the doctor leaves and Malcolm sits down and takes the cold hand of his daughter and sits down next to her and speaking about her mother like he did when she was little.
Magi, Yeah, similar to this. http://sf.co.ua/13/06/wallpaper-1390119.jpg Volume 2 Chapter 2: Discoveries *Crash* Within the empty ship in the middle of a space grave with even a destroyed planet in view the sound of metal hitting metal was heard. The place was inside the Star Comet Crew ship in the hangar were an old robot was just tossed inside through an energy shield. After it walked in a seamingly 12 year old girl with milky blue hair and eyes without a helmet. ¡°Start Psi Generator¡­¡± her cold voice said to no one yet the large structure in the back began to turn on. This was obviously, Magi and the eight AI¡¯s in the ship were the ones turning on the equipment for her. She walked over and began to look through everything before she found a large cable but it was too large for her. What Magi had in mind was to put her Psi technology to work and use the massive Psi generator as her power source. Looking around some more she eventually found the loose Psi nerve wiring and so she braided them until it formed a cable her size and connected one power couplet the size of the large one on one side and one that fits into her body on the other before connecting. It took no more than a moment for her entire body to fill with psi and even start leaking out into the air. ¡°Instructions¡­ gate opening technique?¡± Magi said. ¡°You control it inside your body and at the gates you spin them like drills, start at the small openings and dig them open.¡± Lia said through the ship speakers. In this crew, Noah, Lisa, Havic and Ernest are the ones who know the proper method to opening the gates. Alex never worried about it, Noland popped a few open but not all, And the androids never came in contact with it personally. As such the AI of those four know the ways to using it in different manners. Lia being Noah''s AI will definitely know Inner psi manipulation better than Tris who is Lisa''s AI. "Mn!" Magi nods her head in a cute manner before making a slight frown while looking at her hands. She tries to move the psi but soon finds it barely moves to her will. "Not working..." she mutters unsatisfied. "Strange, inner Psi manipulation should be easier while the gates are closed. Could it be because you lack some sort of control system?" Lia asked. Magi shakes her head then uploads the psi control mechanism. It known as a Core, a unique piece of technology made by what is known as a mineral core. Rank 7 and above asteroids. Normally such asteroids are also planetoid sized and are found in the dead center normally having to mine the enter asteroid before acquiring said core. For this one in specific, it''s a psidium core. Normally these cores are the size of a fist and usually round but rough like a raw diamond. After refining these cores are no more than the 4 cm in diameter. Afterwards machines are placed around it to give the android control of the psi passing through the core. That said, Magi wasn''t able to control this. "Ma¡¯am, maybe you should disconnect from the Psi generator and release a percentage of psi and allow room for it to maneuver. My mistress never had a saturated body such as yourself. Even sir Noah''s robot contains the Psi in the Psi containers and not freely through the body." Tris suggested. Magi thinks a moment and grabs the wire on her chest which is connected. Then she pokes the connection and a slight mist of bright rainbow colored psi spreads out two centimeter from the opening. When one third of her body had emptied, she stopped letting the psi loose. She tried to move the psi and found it moved slightly to her will so she began to practice controlling it within her body. It took a while before she could control it comfortably and it resulted in her getting the Inner Psi Manipulation skill. Gaining a basic control of the psi inside her, she began to have it swirl like a slow drill and attack the gates one by one. Slowly she drilled but the control wasn''t great so the speed wasn''t great. The only thing she had as an advantage was that she felt no pain or else she wouldn''t be able to do as she liked in this manner. After half a day working both her hands were open. It resulted in a rise to her mental stats. The mental stats are the only thing Androids can increase actively after getting psionic technology. Letting out a sigh after the long mental exercise she looked content as she grabbed the wire to the generator and plugged herself in and began to try and control it outside her body. Through her hands the psi flooded out and she tried to control that psi and slowly lifted herself up and control it to do what she wanted. Still she was unable to control it so well like before so she removed the plug and began to control it. At once she found that being plugged in would reduce her control she didn''t remain plugged in and began to train to lift items and soon tried to lift the robot. It shook a bit and lifted a bit off the ground but that was enough for Magi to push it inside near the back and let out a sigh. From there she opened up the robot and under Lia''s guidance shs made and connected some mediocre parts for repairs until the robot reached basic operational standards. "AI unit Lia... your vessel!" Magi said when Lia confirmed the robot would work. "Erm...why me?" She asked. "Repair woman... mechanic." Magi said. Lia let out a rather awkward laugh hearing Magi''s answer. As much as she wanted a body, to get a pile of junk that was barely operating is a bit much. "Give up Lia she can''t hack the system to give herself skills even if she wanted, she can''t upgrade herself either. You have Noah''s skills so only you can give adequate repairs." Xeno said. A sigh came from Lia before silence fell for a moment. After a while the robot began to turn and slowly get up while twitching and screeching from the old oil around the gears. "This body sucks!" Lia''s voice said cursing through the ship speakers. Slowly it walked to one of the rooms to the side where the workshop was built and looked for an oil bottle and began to lubricate the joints. Then she went to the boxes of parts and while cursing she began to build parts. She called Magi. "We will train your mechanics and psi control skills. I can''t properly make parts right now so it''s on you to help me repair my trashy body." Lia said. Magi nodded and the two started building completely rebuilding the robot body Lia was in. One week passed like this and now Lia''s body was repaired completely to android standards but she was still robotic and not android like. At the moment Lia was with Magi in the workshop and was fixing the last screws on a roundish object that had wings near the back and sides and several cameras around the front and scanners on all sides. ¡°Damn it! These scanner droids are a pain! Even more so this large one!¡± Lia cursed. ¡°Whiner.¡± Magi said. ¡°Yeah stop whining Big sis!¡± Vivi¡¯s childish voice called out. ¡°You try having this little demon bossing you around!¡± Lia shouted while looking at the cameras on the ship. The laughs from the other AI filled the room as they whispered to each other. Magi has been driving Lia like a slave to build several short range scouter drones. This final one is larger because it held a router network and CPU to hand Vivi¡¯s systems inside. Magi took in all the data for the crew''s skills and decided that with Vivi being the AI of a sniper, having her inside a scouter drone controlling several others would help as all around scout and spotter for Jessica in the future. Truthfully, Magi wants to search for something like a Cryogenic pods which they can put the bodies of the players inside. As she finished putting on the last plates the drone came to life as did the other smaller ones. They were all part of one unit of scouter drones. From below, it¡¯s thruster turned on lifting them all up. Each of them had a mini generator and a weak ion pulse thruster similar to the one Noah first had on his robot. For small machines with little mass like a drone, this will propel them much faster than the hulking mass like robot. The drone floats out into the hangar with the smaller one and the two girls follow after them. ¡°Wow this is fun! It¡¯s easy to control though you could have added some more thrusters sis!¡± Viv said.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. ¡°Can¡¯t fit more, two facing forward to stop, one large in the back and two facing to the sides near the back to turn you is the most I can fit without getting too large. Only your main body got extra so be happy with that.¡± Lia said with a gleeful voice that didn¡¯t show on her face that was stock still. ¡°Scout unit Vivi¡­ objective search surrounds for Cryogenic pod.¡± Magi said and pointed to the door. ¡°Aye Yah SIR!!¡± Vivi shouted gleefully and the several small drones and her large one flew out the hangar and began to scan as soon as they reached the first wreck. ¡°So what now?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Medical/servant unit... required for garden maintenance... medical treatment of crew¡­ psi beast rearing¡­ Objective Psi robot with external Psi capabilities.¡± Magi said. ¡°You want a massive robot like that to take care of the crew!¡± Lia asked pointing at the three and a half meter tall robot. ¡°Negative¡­ humanoid sized¡­¡± Magi replied. Lia massaged her metalic head mimicking a headache. ¡°How exactly do you plan on us building that?¡± Lia asked. At once information was downloaded to her. It showed Noah¡¯s robot than it removed the skeleton shrank it down to human size. Than the most important parts for motion were placed, the psi nerves, a psi container on the back like a backpack and android motor in the chest to power it with electricity. ¡°None combat medical unit¡­ strength based parts negligible to minimum. Physical strength equal to 15 on terran scale¡­¡± Magi said. Lia overlooked the plans several times before asking. ¡°How will she control the Psi?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Core is comprised of Psidium core¡­ fact is negligible as Psi nerves rolled up into a ball is viable replacement.¡± She said. ¡°How do you know?¡± Lia asked. At this point Magi turned and walked into the workshop for a moment and walked back. What was in her hands was a core and within it was possible to see a perfectly round ball of psionic nerves. ¡°Core has undergone field test¡­ I have used it.¡± She said. Lia just sighed and took the core and walked into the workshop. ¡°Come on, this will take almost a day or two to make, help me out so I can finish faster.¡± Lia said with a sigh towards Magi before walking into the workshop. *** In the real world within the hospital where the crew was admitted there was a bit of movement. At this time, Noah was being placed into a new room which possessed two beds. On the other bed was Sophia. Walking inside, the senior Doctor that had spoken with Malcolm before sighed looking at the boy. ¡±Comatose walking 5 times in less than 24 hours, really what is going on in this boy''s head. He is clearly still unconscious.¡± the senior thought. One day after Noah was seen walking into Sophia¡¯s room, five other times he was caught doing the same. It was every 3 to 4 hours. After the fifth time the senior doctor had ordered the two to be moved into a larger room each on a bed so as to reduce the distance. He looked at the reports which showed that the day before, Noah had passed through a seizure after an hour and a half once he was back in his room before the sedative took effect but still stood up soon after. Subsequent seizures were weakers because of the drugs in his system but still had them meaning the body was adapting to them which wasn¡¯t a good thing so he made the decision to prevent them if possible and moved to two to the same room. The other six showed no similar actions but the number of attacks were similar to Noah¡¯s. Looking at their records, two of the five seizures Sophia and Noah had were at identical times while 1 of 5, surprisingly, all eight had together. As such the senior doctor wanted to know something, first moving Noah and Sophia into the same room might calm them down, he placed all the remaining six within a distance of two to three rooms of the next one. He wanted to see if distance affected their conditions since it had become obvious that somehow the presence of each one stabilized the other''s condition. "With the negotiations for the medical vr pods having already been done yesterday almost immediately in a few days, some will come and we will be able to see the effectiveness of this technology. Wonder if we will find their problem anytime soon?" he thought. With a sigh he goes to check on the other patients in the hospital. *** ¡°I must say Miss Lia, you truly outdid yourself.¡± The gentle voice of the elf maid AI said as she began to move her body. The robot was very human but had no face similar to Lia herself and only had eyes, mainly because there weren¡¯t parts for making the face since those are usually personalized. The body was bare metal color with no additional paint since there is none here but even so the plates show off a design that Lia already showed to Tris. It would color her whole body perfectly white with a few strips of red giving a medical droid feel. On her back, a Psi container was built but since it was exposed Lia customized it to look like a backpack ¡°I know, even I feel I did marvelously, maybe it''s due to Noah¡¯s level of skill.¡± She replied raising her head up and laughing. ¡°Medical unit Max¡­ proceed to Psi generator for charging¡­ current capacity will exhaust in 2 minutes.¡± Magi said. ¡°Wait! Who is Max?¡± Lia suddenly asked. ¡°That would be my name Miss Lia!¡± Tris suddenly said. ¡°HUH!!¡± At once all the AI called out in surprise. ¡°You might not have noticed because Lisa spent most of her time training and working away but at the start I was different from now.¡± Tris explained. ¡°By the name¡­ your male?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Not exactly¡­ how do I explain¡­¡± Tris said while putting a finger to her temple. ¡°AI unit Max¡­ personality lon¡­ primary personality is a lazy male Neet with obsession to japanese culture entertainment¡­ Developed unique code pattern causing sex, personality and outer appearance to change in accordance to current preference in character¡­¡± Magi said after a moment. ¡°So he constantly changes depending on his favorite anime?¡± Lia asked Magi. ¡°Mn!¡± Magi nodded. After a long moment of silence Lia fell on the ground and started to punch the ground. ¡°Ahahahahah! This crew is filled with weirdos!!! First a trap! Then a lesbian demon with a trap fetish! Now a Gender bender Cosplay Neet AI!!! Hahaha this is rich!!¡± Lia said. ¡°Alright, I shall go, then I need to train my control so that I can properly do my work.¡± Tris said in an icy tone which Lia didn¡¯t hear. ¡°Mechanic Unit¡­ request scavenger drones.¡± Magi said. Lia suddenly froze in her laughing and looked up at the girl standing over her. ¡°Can¡¯t you give me a break?¡± she asked. ¡°Nope¡­ recorded logs on Noah¡¯s capsule show constant persistence for a body¡­ one with a body must work¡­ now start.¡± Magi replied bluntly. ¡°Who exactly is gonna be the scavenger?¡± Lia asked while sulking. ¡°AI unit Chuck.¡± Magi replied. Lia looked confused and thought a bit and seemed to realize who. ¡°So you mean the fatass?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Oi! Who¡¯s a fatass!¡± A rough and angry voice called. ¡°Shut it fatass, someone like you is lucky to be tied to Ernest.¡± Lia replied. ¡°I¡¯m like this because that bastard doesn¡¯t even use me and just left me to the side.¡± He said and spit in anger. ¡°Excuses, junkyard trash manager.¡± Lia says. ¡°Heh, at least I am useful in this environment. I can only say that bastard did himself good getting to level 30 in scavenging and 25 in dismantling.¡± Chuck commented while letting out a laugh that made all the female AI¡¯s stomach turned since it sound like those dirty old man laughs. ¡°Let''s get this over with and get this fatass working then.¡± Lia said hating to hear the voice of the fatty while having to look him in the virtual world inside the ship. Outside of the room Tris walked to the Psi Generator and grabbed the cable for charging and removed Magi¡¯s add on before connecting the full sized on to the outlet on the right side of her pack.
Full charge in 01:00
Seeing the efficiency of the machine she nods and waits as the timer goes down and as soon as the window vanishes she pulls out the plug and leaves it on the ground. Then she opens the four connecting gates between the container and her body letting her body build up psi. Similar to Magi, she started to unblock her psi gates but hers were more numerous having twice as many as a dwarfs and having them along all the arms and legs. That said, the advantage of being the AI of an Elf is the training gained for psi control. In less than half an hour all the gate on her body, counting around 87, were open due to the skill helping her open them to the maximum. ¡°Good, now let¡¯s go get the crew into bed first, then look after that garden.¡± She thought and traveled down by lift and after a bit she arrived at the bridge and put Roktar in bed before taking Lisa first and putting her in the crew quarters on the same floor followed by the rest. With everyone in bed she walked to each on and cast a recovery ¡°spell¡± on them from the healing knowledge she got from Lisa. It was more of a precaution. She left for the hydroponic garden a moment later. Reaching the window between the hall and the room, she was mesmerized a moment as the spectacle of unique bioluminescent plants that made the room look like an underwater reef. They seem to flow yet there was no wind. She walks inside and soon the strange flying fish notice her and scurry away for a moment before making its way around her and doing some fly by. After a while, it grew comfortable and she eventually touched it. She felt the Psi emanated from it¡¯s body. It felt similar to the crew before who didn¡¯t stop to release the Psi from their body. ¡°The psi content in the air is rather high in here? Are the fish releasing so much that it makes an environment for these plants?¡± Tris looked around. Because of her metal body she had no worries about poisoning so she got close to each plant and found a few small ones were like hard coral but made, surprisingly, of minerals and psi mixed in a strange manner. Another was an anemone that had baby flying fish under its tentacles. It reminded Tris of the real worlds clown fish that hide inside. It seems these plants are taking up real world sea life shapes for space. ¡°This place is too small for them.¡± Tris thought. She turned to the fish and touched them. The shell was smooth unlike before. It had become thin with the lack of asteroids but they still had a thin layer. Not knowing what to do she simply let out a small pulse of psi. As soon as the psi touched the fish and began to fly around her and stopped in front of her as if waiting. A moment later a pulse came at her and she felt the instinct of the fish. ¡°Go over there.¡± She said pointing at the furthest corner. The fish does nothing. Thinking a bit Tris looked at her hand and focused. Trying to fix her thoughts into her psi and let a pulse loose towards the fish. The next moment if flew to the corner.
You have learned how to transmit thoughts with psi.
As an AI you are unable to acquire new skills without the presence of you player nearby.
¡°I don¡¯t need it anyway. As long as I know what to do this is fine.¡± Tris smiled. With a big discovery like this, space travel with the fish pulling will be easy and getting what she wants won¡¯t be hard either. ¡°For now let''s train this before I put it to the test.¡± She muttered and began to practice this thought pulse ability.
For those curious about the joke with Tris, it was not intentional, I fucked up and it was noticed just in time for me to do this. Scout drone but without the arm http://i.imgur.com/10Lai1H.jpg Medical Droid https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/0a/af/7e/0aaf7e3920a0fb65401c4387cebf4f58.jpg Volume 2 Chapter 3: Regrets ¡°YOU PIECE OF FAT SPACE SHIT! HOW MANY TIME DID I TELL YOU NOT TO DISMANTLE ANYTHING WE BRING BACK AND THAT I HAVE BUILT!¡± The shout of a furious AI resonates throughout the ship in the desolate space grave. *Bang* ¡°You little tramp! You actually dare hit me!¡± A pissed off rough man''s voice called back after a resounding impact was heard. ¡°Mechanic Unit...Scavenger unit¡­ Cease argument effective immediately!¡± An icy cold child''s voice came next. This was Lia, Chuck and Magi respectively. Almost two weeks have passed since Lia has finished making the Scavenger drone unit similar to Vivi¡¯s scout drone unit. Chuck, inside of a large round drone with a number of different sized arm attachments, was on the ground after getting hit by Lia with a large metal pole. What happened was that Lia had recently finished building part of a large suit using Tris¡¯s humanoid model. This suit was at Roktar¡¯s size and was part of a set that would be put on the crew to seal the leaking Psi. That said, Chuck had seen a part which had recently been scavenged and hadn¡¯t been categorized since Lia instantly noticed it when it was deposited and as a result, he mistook the equipment for trash and began dismantling the suit but half way through was hit with a resounding impact by Lia. ¡°Ahahaha, serves you right fatty! I told you not to mess with Lia¡¯s stuff!¡± The childish laughing from Ricky came and soon the childish robot walked in. Ricky and Xeno were both built after Chuck¡¯s unit had been completed. Ricky was made for combat while Xeno was given a human shaped robot and focused on running the ship''s systems without trouble as well as constantly improving it. He also took Vivi¡¯s job, which at the time was Jessica¡¯s, and programmed any and all new equipment that needed any complex coding. He has also found that even though neither Engine or Generator or even the Blink drive, was damaged, and everything repaired to top condition by Lia, the engine and thrusters still didn¡¯t start up. Not even the VI, the copy of the station AI they took, could start them up for some odd reason which was attributed to the wave of energy doing something to them. ¡°Shut up brat or the next thing I dismantle is you!¡± Chuck cursed at the boy that was pointing and laughing at the fallen drone with a long dent on the slam Lia gave. She walks up and puts her foot on the front side and pushed it down. ¡°The only thing that would be getting dismantled is you if you weren¡¯t the least bit useful! Now got scavenge like the dirt bug you are!¡± Lia cursed him and grabbed him before throwing him into the hangar through the opening the lift uses. He stopped in mid air and cursed at her before leaving. All the while Ricky was laughing. Both herself and Ricky had upgraded their strength stats. Lia figured out how to do this by researching Hilda¡¯s body with her being a combat model so after finding the corresponding parts she upgraded herself so she can lift heavier loads. ¡°Damn that idiot¡­ maybe I should have Xeno make a code that will keep him out of the workshop.¡± Lia muttered before turning and started to repair the suit she was building. Suddenly a little drone flew in. ¡°Big sis Lia! Big sis Magi! I found the pod thing you wanted! It''s in a really big ship! I checked with Old man Xeno and he said the ship is something called a carrier but half of the top side is blow off and is about 30 meters away.¡± Vivi¡¯s voice resound in the workshop. ¡°Let¡¯s go¡­¡± Magi says calling Lia and the others and they get on the lift before going down and entering the bridge where Xeno was working and on the screen was images of the carrier. ¡°That is a large carrier!¡± Lia said when she saw it. The carrier was nearly 2 km long and 300 meters wide and it was clearly a medium sized ship, though on the smaller side. A moment later Tris entered the room and saw the image. ¡°A carrier ship, the size is impressive. It can certainly hold a great deal of things inside. The husk would also be a perfect place to start my experiment with the Psi enhanced vegetation and space life.¡± She said analyzing the image. ¡°We can¡¯t move remember nor can we blink there.¡± Xeno said bluntly without looking back at them. "No worries, I am capable of using Noah''s robot as is Magi and we can use the Psi Flying Fish if needed." Tris replied just as bluntly to him. "Negative... objective one, Scavenger unit proceed to carrier and dismantle all useable material within Hangar... this supervisor unit shall undergo training to control psionic Robot... Medical unit... you are authorized to experiment with mutated psi vegetation and space life forms...." She said. With that said and done she handed out orders to the rest and they all start accomplishing them. *** Sitting in a high ranking office was the senior doctor. He had just arrived for the morning and one of the nurse brought him several documents he needed to overlook. The one on top was actually a not. He lets out a sigh as he reads it over. ¡°Condition of Noah Collins and Sophia Brim completely stable. Last seizure was one week ago. Noland Collins walked to the room of Elisa Rayne five times during the night, Alexander Grove was found three times in Luna Patterson¡¯s room, Ernest Murphy was found two times in Meghan Welding¡¯s room. All cases the men move and female show agitation within a ten minute time frame before the men move.¡± The senior looks it over. Then he looks at the next folder which hold a new type of file. This was from the medical pods all eight remained in. The pod was different from conventional capsules as it was thinner but more like a hospital bed but made of the gel like substance. The same helmet capsules have is located inside. ¡°Brain scans of females brain during agitation seems to cause a corresponding effect on the pair. Effect on the brain seems to be almost synchronization of brain waves. This technology truly is bringing a new perspective to this clouded case.¡± The senior commented. The next folder showed Noah and Sophia¡¯s brain scans. ¡°These two who are within a 5 meter proximity have almost 80 to 90% brainwave synchronization. Mental stabilization has also appeared and no mental overload present. Pressure in several normally inactive sections of the brain has lessened and is an area with full synchronization. Movement is exactly the same and stimulus on one patient seems to transfer to the other.¡± he muttered. It showed a test of sensory tests were one of their foot was pressed but the stimulus appeared on both of them. The next folder showed an interesting section. ¡°20% of brain waves seem to match with all eight patients. Hmm, maybe we can acquire further stability putting them in a single room.¡± He muttered but sighed since there is no room that can hold eight people inside those capsules at the same time unless said room was built specifically for this. Going on he looked at another file which states information of other victims of the incident. ¡°No other reported cases similar to this one even with beta players who were on the same ship or near each other at the time. There are some cases of those who were closer where they are randomly subjected to intensive headaches. Seems that explosion caused some real world trouble not only for the crew.¡± The senior muttered. Suddenly the door opened and a secretary nurse walked in. ¡°Sir there is a woman stating she is Noah Collin¡¯s mother here to visit. We checked the database and it says that Noland Collins was married to this woman but she left soon after Noah¡¯s birth.¡± The nurse said. ¡°Oh, I shall go see her personally but I need you to prepare four rooms for two people near each other, two on one side of the corridor and two on the other. Then move these people inside in the pairs they seem to have formed. This should stabilize them for now.¡± He said and the nurse nodded. He stands up and leaves for the front reception where he soon spotted a very beautiful mature woman with brown hair tied up and an alluring dress adorning her curvaceous body. Behind her was an elder butler with grey hair and a similar color mustache and a monocle over his right eye. He gave off a gentle feeling but behind that was that tiny hint of icy coldness. His figure was muscular but not overly so and it was well hidden under his suit. ¡°Greetings, I believe you are the one who claims to be Noah Collins mother.¡± The senior doctor asked.Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. ¡°And you might you be?¡± The woman asked looking at him. ¡°I am doctor Wilson Vincent Trace, I am the doctor in charge of Noah and your ex husband and all the other that were part of the incident in The Nebula.¡± He said. Though it wasn¡¯t seen or heard, Maria¡¯s eyes trembled and her pulse instantly shot up. The incident she caused, she knew far too well that all but the eight members of the crew that Sophia was in were awake. If the doctor said that Noah and Noland were part of it that meant that she had bombed both of them as well. ¡°Is that so, if you wish for proof, this is my identity, though I had been reluctant to leave I had to protect Noah due to my line of work. I still kept Noland¡¯s surname as to not forget about my son. Here is my ID and this is a copy of Noah¡¯s birth certificate.¡± She said and snapped her finger making the butler bring out the documents she requested. ¡°I will have to run these through the system before I can allow anyone to see them due to their conditions being a bit serious.¡± The Wilson said ¡°We aren¡¯t in a hurry.¡± Maria said. ¡°Alright, please wait a bit. If you are hungry we have a cafeteria, just ask any of the nurse or doctors and they can direct you to it.¡± Wilson said after overlooking the documents and walking off to find the security chief to do a background check and to verify the validity of the documents. She goes and sits down on the waiting area. She lets out a breath but the shaking in her body finally showed up and the butler noticed. ¡°You couldn¡¯t have known, all the information we obtained was where she was and the number of crew.¡± The butler said. ¡°I know but I should have figured it out myself. Of course Malcolm would have gotten Noland to teach his daughter about this game. That man¡¯s adaptability to new systems and his perception when it comes to analyzing a game system is in a league of its own.¡± Maria said in a low voice. ¡°Still, it was quite lucky of us to log out as soon as we entered FTL speeds or else we would have been in a similar situation as them.¡± The butler commented. Maria simply nodded, no one had any way of guessing that the virus implanted Psi Nuke would have had that kind of adverse reaction when mixed with an EMP pulse in a wormhole. Still what was strange was why the crew didn¡¯t wake up yet. A wormhole can transport someone hundreds of parsec in a second yet from what Maria knew, it took them almost a week to find it. This means the ship was stuck in the wormhole for several hours or days and was launched an extremely far distance from the current know space. As she was deep in thought the sound of the electric doors sliding came from the front and two men walked but half way it stopped. ¡°M-Maria?!¡± The voice called and she lifted her head and saw the man calling her. She paled slightly seeing who it was. ¡°Malcolm¡­¡± She said in return and stood up putting on her poker face. Behind Malcolm stood Proto. He was looking at the butler next to Maria and his eyes were partially squinted as he felt the danger from the man. ¡°What are you doing here?¡± Malcolm asked, his voice filled with a hint of icy rage. Malcolm and Noland are close friends so how could he not know the woman that left his best friend with his son and vanished. ¡°I heard my son was injured in ¡°your¡± so called game and came to see his condition.¡± Maria said. ¡°Don¡¯t bullshit with me, you abandoned Noah as a newborn, you think I don¡¯t know about that.¡± Malcolm replied. ¡°You don¡¯t know anything, life is full of dangers and neither of you know my past and my enemies. Noland was someone I tried to settle down with but it didn¡¯t work out because of them, Noah came unexpectedly and I couldn¡¯t endanger his life.¡± Maria said changing her seductive eyes into ones revealing her anger but deep inside there was also sadness at not being able to be with her child. ¡°Hmpf, as if I will believe that.¡± Malcolm scoffed at her. ¡°And taking such a huge fortune from Noland was also to help take care of your son?¡± ¡°Noland would have remained a depressive lump of flesh if he didn¡¯t have an incentive to take care of Noah. Taking the money allowed me to last some time as well as force him to get over me leaving faster and go on with his life. I have no plans to return to him after so long and I am simply here to see how my son looks and to see how much he grew up.¡± Maria said. At this moment Wilson walks out and sees the four standing there. ¡°Miss Maria, we have checked your documents and confirmed their validity. You are allowed to visit Noah and if you like, your ex-husband as well.¡± Wilson said. ¡°Greetings sir, I came to see how they are doing and if the medical pods are working properly.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Oh indeed, it really opens a completely new perspective in brain scans. We have determined that the four men follow the instinctive to protect the women closest, mentally, to them and after a period of agitation they will move to the room they are in so today we plan to move the pairs into the same rooms. We found that the eight of them have a 20-30% similarity in brain waves meaning that besides just the pair there is also an overall affect of them being close so we are setting up four rooms near each other for them where each pair will be.¡± Wilson said. ¡°I see, this will really help with the expansion of the research funds we receive for this branch of the VR technology. Soon we might be able to use this to figure out cybernetics hopefully.¡± Malcolm said. Maria just stood there but in her mind she was let out a little chuckle. ¡°That simple minded fool that paid me to mess with Malcolm is very near sighted. While he focuses on video games Malcolm will focus in all around technological expansion. Truly the first company that made VR technology is different from those coming after.¡± She thought. ¡°I shall be going to see my son for the first time in so long, I shall allow you gentlemen to enjoy your business talk.¡± Maria said and Wilson had one of the nurse lead her to Noah¡¯s room. Walking inside, the two saw the two bed like capsules. In the closer pod was the person she had targeted which made her heart clench seeing Sophia knowing that because of her attack on this person, her son got hurt. Maria rips her gaze from the young woman and to the young man in the next bed. The lean muscles and brown hair he had inherited from her was displayed through the helmet on his head. The strong body showed his own determination to getting strong. ¡°He has your good looks and you hair as well. I wonder if he is as overbearing towards his father like you?¡± The butler asked. She chuckled hearing him say that. What he meant by overbearing was when Noland did stupid things, she had often physically beat sense into him before completing the business they were currently doing. ¡°Something we probably won¡¯t figure out unless I talk with him directly.¡± She said solemnly. She really regrets not being able to live with the boy, when she found she was pregnant she had complex emotions but like most mothers, she couldn¡¯t hate the baby inside her and even after so long she still regretted not seeing him wake up. ¡°We should pass by his house and get copies of any picture albums Noland may have made of Noah. I want to see my baby as a baby again.¡± She said as a gentle smile appeared on her face and she leaned in and kissed his right cheek and turned to leave. ¡°Are you fine with just this, mistress?¡± The butler asked. ¡°Yes, I got to see his lovely face but¡­ now I want payback for what happened. Maybe a few hints that Malcolm can find.¡± She said as she leaves the room. Her gentle smile carrying a hint of viciousness. Payback for having her son be caught in that incident. Something she plans to repent even if slightly for as well as leaving him behind. *** ¡°This just in. Digital Nexus incorporated, has just launched a new game following the sci-fi theme. This seems to be a game to fight their biggest competitor Virtual Works. After the recent incident and the closure of ¡°The Nebula¡± until the end of the week they took the chance and did a sudden release of their game ¡°The Nexus Tower¡± a game where the competitors start in a low development area and fight to prove themselves on each level and rise to the next slowly developing and their objective is to reach the top and become the strongest. Virtual Works has shown no reaction as of yet. Most likely they will go with their schedule and remain with the return of their main ship game. Even after the incident there are still millions wanting to return to the game after so long. 3 weeks is 2 months and almost 2 weeks away in game. The galaxy may have seen a huge change after what had happened and only on the return of The Nebula will we know how it changed!¡± A reporter said on the TV channel. The man that had commissioned Maria was smiling on his chair as he watched the report at his game going live. ¡°I¡¯ll run you out of business Virtual Works!¡± He said with a vicious smile. *** In the space filled with broken ships and hunks of metal and some small rocks from a far off asteroid field a suddenly speeding figure fly by. The figure was two things, the one in the front were about as thick as a male human''s arm with a body like a fish with two half meter long fin like wings one third of the way back and two thirds of the way back on its body was another set of wings but these were half the size of the front ones. This was a Psi flying fish swiftly ¡°swimming¡± in space and holding onto it¡¯s tail was Tris who had small metal box in her other arm. She was currently flying through space while using her trained skill of Psi pulse telepathy with the Psi Flying Fish and was having it pull her through space to the large carrier in the distance. The Fish was quite nimble and could easily fly in space and Tris, using her psi from her feet, could keep herself from hitting anything that would damage her at these speeds. Soon the carrier came into view. ¡±Good, there it is, let''s go to the hangar then.¡± She thought and transmitted her thoughts through the pulse into the Fish¡¯s tail making it speed off into the hangar and stopping. Tris let''s go and tells it to follow her and then stabilizes herself in the air. Like all the recently mutated creatures and life forms, the flying fish had some bioluminescence and with it she could see a bit around her. Not to mention the lights from the scavenger and scout drones below as the scan and dismantle. Tris looked around, she had some theories on how the plants and animals interacted but she did know that the plants didn¡¯t need sunlight but instead psi and for some reason, only the psi from the fish. Maybe due to the mutation and adaptation it eats refined Psi that passed through a living creature''s body. Tris floats to halfway up the wall of the hangar and with her psi makes a dent in the wall and opens the back and takes out some coral pieces and places them safely in the dent then makes several others nearby and puts a few other buds inside before shifting through her box and taking out some newborn fish and putting one near each bud and sent a pulse to each. ¡°You each remain close to all the plants.¡± was the intent each pulse had. She goes to another corner and makes several dents and pulls out seeds this time and does the same. All over the walls and on the clear ground near the back of the hangar she ¡°planted¡± the seeds putting a few newborn flying fish near them. Even newborns released psi like the adults and with time it will feed the plants and when it ¡°hatches¡± the plants will feed it back and it will become a mutual predation where the vegetarian Flying fish feed off the vegetation but return food back in the form of their psi. She tells the adult to float around releasing its own psi and she just watched until Magi asked her to return to which she and the adult flew back to the ship and reported their progress.
Butler http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VC1H7uz4Pcc/VbtvGhCl6WI/AAAAAAAADd4/fRCA-5PeK_w/s1600/latest-3.png Volume 2 Chapter 4: Shocking wake up Three weeks has passed since the incident and within the galaxy of The Nebula. The millions of player¡¯s bodies were still unconscious. Most stations or ships that had a player had put them in the medical bay. At this time, the game was once more released and at that time the rush of players started to log in once more. One by one they opened their eyes finding themselves within the medical bay of the ships or stations or within their rooms as the medical bay is too full. They were asked what happened and what was passed to all the players to say was that it was connected to the arrival of the Xetra and the strange energy wave that passed through a few months back. They were told by Ami and were told not to say more than this so after hundreds of people said the same thing the games residents also realized it was interlinked and the message was passed throughout all the places the players appeared. Far from all this in the space graveyard, all eight AI had gained a body of some form and even undergone upgrades. The two drone AI¡¯s had the main body upgraded to humanoid and became similar to Tris¡¯s. Lia, furthermore, developed a way to have a drone that connected to the psi container on their backs to make wings for them in space. Havic¡¯s AI was added to the security team with Ricky and both were upgraded full adult sized bodies instead of child sized. All the previous robot''s built without Psi tech were later upgraded as well and thanks to the psi generator it wasn¡¯t hard for them to keep working and the consumption wasn¡¯t that large. Even Vivi didn¡¯t use much since her wings used ion pulse and not psi. After the month since Chuck was built, one week in real life, the carrier had around 80-90% of any half destroyed console and whatever other technology on it dismantled and all useful parts were gathered. There was no attempt to figure out how each thing was built so only dismantling for components was done. The ship had also been moved inside for the time being while Magi and Tris searched the graveyard for a permanent base. Magi had told them she wanted to find a space station like the one they found on Venturi but only two days ago they were able to locate a space station near one part of the destroyed planet. The station wasn¡¯t like either Venturi or Kelha II station. It was long with the top most part being round, looking like a mushroom cap, then on a lower part it was connected to a second semi circular area before reaching down and connected to a final round ball which had antennas sticking out. That said after the second semicircle the station was cracked in the middle and half of the upper ¡°cap¡± was broken off and a massive city could be seen inside the station. Even though they found it, the hangar and port area wasn¡¯t found yet and it was unknown if there was any dangers inside. With such a massive station, that is over 20 times Kelha II¡¯s size, many things could probably be found inside. As such Vivi was the first going inside and map out the interior of the station and locate the hangars and the important locations like power generators and military district. Besides that, another things have been greatly interesting and that is the psi lifeforms. The plants, especially those that were previously seeds, most have been planted and began to grow greatly. Tris and Olivia have taken to researching these things. Tris has taken to planting the seeds inside the husks of ships left by Chuck and normally the hangars or cargo are the best open breeding grounds for them and the fish. The fish in question are also being bred with speed and efficiency in mind. As a result, in the last month since they reached the carrier, Tris and Olivia have been selectively unlocking the psi gates and experimenting to see the effects of different gate being opened. The current mounts most used are now evolving from fish slowly to reptile. The long body is already at two meters and the wings are one and a half meters each, their temperament is still docile and are herbivores. The head turned very eel like and sharp spike like teeth have appeared in their mouths and now have special conditions for breeding which requires the nearby asteroid fields as a breeding ground for making the mineral shells. It is already possible to sit with the legs in front of the wings but Tris tends to hug the body behind them instead. If no one knew better you would think Tris was making some kind of dragon which isn¡¯t a strange idea considering the path these things are going. The way to know is looking at the back wing. The shape has changed is no longer a thin fin but a fleshy leg with two a fin like leg similar to what is found on seals. It hasn¡¯t gotten any use in space but if developed further it¡¯s possibility for grasping things like a bird can appear. As for the real crew inside the ship, the androids were laid down in two beds in the medical bay while six cryogenic pods were built inside the same room where the six remaining members were placed each with a similar full body armor. This was a new brand of Psi armor Lia and Magi developed. Unlike the type dwarfs use to block psi and only open for inner psi manipulation, This one was made with possibility to control the opening on the outer side allowing the crew to use both inner and outer manipulation skills. Even Lisa, who previously wouldn¡¯t get this chance as an elf, would get it. As for why they need it even inside the cryogenic pod. They don¡¯t stop release psi, it is like the fish, they don¡¯t stop releasing it so as to not cause future problems for them it was plugged up. The avatars luckily didn¡¯t react like the real thing and had no seizures mainly because they collapsed together and because the mind wasn¡¯t ingame. With this, not much else actually happened. With the constant expansion of the vegetation only today Olivia was able to put her true plan into act. She is a serious person with a form of secretary. With this kind of personality she is serious with her planning and after looking through Nolands skill set and compiling the skills knowledge he had, she found that brewing was the most useful skill to use at this moment. Brewing was a something that is used to make drinks and ales, but this also counted for all forms of brewing. Taking identification scanners and asking Lia to and Magi to research a machine to analyse effects of liquid medicines. Having a rare opportunity to research new unique vegetation that can even survive in space won¡¯t be wasted for sure. While Olivia was gathering the samples, Tris was outside in the hangar of the carrier. ¡°Newest generation show stronger legs after hatching from infant shell form. Bone structure is strengthening and is about half as strong as earth marine iguana. Newest generation also possess complete lizard head and can effectively be categorized as a new species. Current name is undecided as future evolutions may vary greatly.¡± Tris said in her mind while recording this in a mental note. Over her hand was the new hatchling she had examined. It was the size of the old flying fish from before the incident but it was much more vigorous than common flying fish and when released it tried to fly away but after receiving a pulse it looked back and floated around her a few times and left afterwards. ¡°Displays rapid growth in intelligence others previously lack. This indicates brain development, possibility of aggressive nature appearing due to this may rise and possibility of carnivorous tendencies as well. Fangs were shown to have gotten thicker which corresponds with the recent development of psi reef vegetation¡¯s adaptation to getting harder to bite through.¡± She noted. With the notes on the newest generation logged she opened a metal box which contained some seeds. She looked around and saw the spots of glowing bioluminescent vegetation and the fish like creatures around. Some were fatter and other longer showed the variety appearing within them. This was obviously on purpose and caused by the girls. The fish were all made of flesh and blood with only a stone like skin and when the crew returns they would need some form of food source so it was imperative to breed such food source. She walks to a spot that is four to five meters away from the nearest outcropping of the plants. Like before she lifts her fist and with her feet firmly held by the magnet boots she punch¡¯s. *Peng* The sound resonated inside her body as a violent rebound vibration came up her arm. The vibrating arm is pulled back and she noticed the slightly deformed knuckle joints on her hand and no dent on the wall. "What?!¡± She thought looking at her fist. She knocked on the walls and registered a weak vibration and moved closer to the outcrop and soon felt none. Moving out beyond five meters the vibration permeated the metal easier and when she punched it easily made a dent. Blinking surprised, she turned and looked at the plants. She then began to make dents next to each other heading towards the plant. After 5 meters the metal became harder and at four and a half meters she couldn¡¯t damage it anymore. Her body did receive strength upgrades like the others so she could help move things around and it''s why she can damage the walls at all yet this power is easily deflected. ¡°Guys, I found something strange.¡± She messaged those inside. ¡±Supervisor unit responding¡­ what occurance was encountered¡­ Medical unit?¡± Magi asked. ¡°I am not sure but something has caused the carrier ships metal to grow stronger, the closer I get the outcroppings I planted the harder the metal becomes.¡± Tris replied.If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. ¡°Occurrence registered¡­ sending Mechanic Unit to cut a piece and examine¡­ please proceed with your work.¡± Magi said and the connection was cut. Seeing Magi wasn¡¯t giving it much thought Tris just sighed and moved on and began to further spread the vegetation in the hangar where she still could. She was certain the metal was being reinforced. If she didn¡¯t know better, the metal was becoming Psionic metal like the metal used for the dwarf fighter robot. What she didn¡¯t notice was that her common metal parts were also undergoing the same reinforcement. As were all the other AI¡¯s. *** Within the room that Noah and Sophia were in, a pair of nurse, both female, were doing basic duties such as cleaning the two of them. After the two were finished and were cleaning up the things they brought, they heard a pair of groans sounding at the same time but with different voices. The two looked at the only two other people in the room and saw the cramped face on the two patients and slowly watched their eyes flutter open and close and their heads moving to the left and right slowly and in sync. ¡°Quickly call Dr. Trace and tell him Noah and Sophia are awake.¡± One of the nurse told the others. The one that was ordered put down the things in her hand and walked out quickly and went to the office of Wilson Trace, the doctor in charge of the crew, and told him what happened. He quickly dropped what he was doing and walked over. When he arrived he walked over in between their pods and looked at each of them. He moves to Sophia¡¯s side first and begins messing with the computer on this side then looking at the one on Noah¡¯s side before walking in between them again. ¡°Greetings you two, my name is Dr Wilson Trace. I am the doctor in charge of taking care of you and overseeing your recuperation.¡± He said. The two slowly shifted and in a mirrored movement slowly turned their heads and eyes to look at him but had no strength to lift their head and talk. Both had half opened eyes and couldn¡¯t move much. ¡°Can¡¯t you talk?¡± He asked curious. There was no reaction from the two and he began to think of something. ¡°Blink once for Yes, Twice for no, okay?¡± He said. After a moment, the two did a slow blink. ¡°Good, do you know what happened to you?¡± He asked. Two slow blinks followed the question. He explained the incident and the condition they found themselves in. ¡°I will probe your body, just pressing your feet and hands, legs arms and so on. When I ask if you feel anything blink once for yes and twice for no.¡± He said and moved to Noah and began. After a single press on Noah¡¯s foot suddenly caused him to spasm and to the shock of everyone Jessica also spasmed. Their brain activity spiked instantly before the two calmed down a moment later but lost consciousness. Seeing this Dr. Trace looked at the nurses. ¡°Warn all those who physically take care of all eight patients to not touch them unless it¡¯s for cleaning and to use very gentle pressure no more than barely making pressure on their body, to clean them. This is a direct order from me.¡± He said in a very serious manner. This much of a serious matter wouldn¡¯t be taken lightly since the patients were experiencing a serious adverse effect and with these two waking up it meant the others would soon wake up in the same condition. All eight were put under heavy observation and as expected, the following day the remaining pairs awakened in similar paralyzed states and were explained the situation. Afterwards it was shown they had high levels of mental exhaustion and couldn¡¯t handle remaining awake from more than an hour max. Noah and Sophia, who woke up the previous day, handled the one hour limit before returning to sleep. The eight were also seen to wake up in intervals of four to six hours normally always in a slightly better condition than previously showing that simply allowing them to rest was the current best option. Still, when news reached Malcolm, he came running and was able to come when Sophia was awake and the normally strong figure had broken down in tears and just didn¡¯t grab his daughter''s hand or do anything because Wilson had explicitly told him against it and going as far as cutting his visits should he do so for her own good. As such a week passed with the crew recovering before their body was tested once more and did not have the destructive sensitivity again and scans of the brain showed the brain waves synchronization of each pair had stabilized at 80% and the overall groups had strangely risen to 35% and stabilized there with that stabilized their conditions improved at the end of the week that they were finally able to slightly move and sit up in bed and speak a few words but still required a lot of rest. *** The last month within the Nebula has changed a lot, the galaxy has returned to a temporary state of peace not counting that within a 370 parsec range of Venturi the Xetra were waging war with any all factions meaning the Dominion and Liberation were fighting together to keep their territories safe from the Xetra. They aren¡¯t politically united but instead they aren¡¯t fighting each other in the border solar systems and depending on the system the two actually do work together as the system is galactic neutral grounds were both factions benefit due to material being far too rare to monopolize without going to war. The Xetra themselves have pushed violently outward in search of the blink drive and any other technology. Even now they are pushing to look further because they believe, ¡°the vermin ran away¡± and so they created blockades all to way beyond 400 parsec but beyond 370 they no longer attacked without cause. This spared places like Kelha II and several hundred other planets. As for those that were already captured by the Xetra, with their bio technology, they possessed a terraforming method unique to their own kind. To maintain their ships they require unique materials which only their own race has and so in most planets that allowed it they terraformed them rapidly causing any terraformed planet to adapt to the new vegetation due to the biological bomb sent into the atmosphere by them causing rapid growth of Xetra genetically modified plants. They don¡¯t really care about leaving behind vegetation of their planet only their technology is a sensitive matter so once they reached a calmer state they allowed the other factions to return to the captured planets as long as all ships were searched and none of their technology found. As for the crew in question that had drawn them to do this, the robot crew wasn¡¯t completely at peace either. The last month brought about a massive explosion of officially new races of psi animals. From the original Psi Flying Fish the months Tris and Olivia bred them lead to many varying sizes and shapes and in the last two generations born finally bore carnivores. Two of which was the ones Tris personally used as mounts, it was the lizard one which developed a raptor body and formed shoulder like structure connecting to the wings. The wings themselves changed from fin like wings to one moving towards a batwing or primitive dinosaur reptile. The previous fin like legs now are like reptile legs and the feet are eagle or bird like with two claw like fingers in the front and one in the back meant for grasping things. The long neck grew thicker and was stronger and the lizard like head became increasingly more vicious. The intelligence of the beast was equally as developed but probably due to the intensive care of the crew during the breeding process, they were also still docile towards humanoid figures since they never attacked any of the robot crew but released a growl, and transmitted said growl through Psi pulse so you could here by instincts, towards any drones passing by or any other animal. These were named Space Wyverns due to their shape and form. Their total length at this moment was already three meters long and were one of Tris¡¯s favorite mounts. The other was a mount was similar to the chinese dragon Ryu. The long 4 meter long snake like body losing all fins and forming lizard arms and legs. They were much more aggressive than the Wyvern ones and had a crocodile like head. Like their form, they were named Space Ryu. Both creatures had their skeleton and muscle structure scanned below the rock scales they grew over their bodies and it was found that even though they are space beasts they would definitely have no trouble entering a planet''s atmosphere. The Ryu being more dangers was also released so as not to endanger anyone though. Their intelligence was above the wyverns and were increasingly aggressive towards the crew unlike the wyvern that protected them. It really intrigued the AI crew how fast these animals were evolving but the fact that they progressively opened new psi gates every generation had a clear effect on them. Besides them, now the fish developed in a multitude of different aquatic life such as sharks, tuna, crustaceans, and more. The plants themselves also began to undergo change. They recently began to breed on their own and the crew had removed the ship after finding the hangar at the massive space station and setting their ship inside. Unlike the previous ship, Magi prohibited Tris from planting things here. Still with how things are going, a small spot of glowing space plants and a number of space creatures that looked like aquatic life was born here. Not only that, some of the fish decreased in size and helped propagate the vegetation out. Slowly but surely this planet and area will eventually be completely overrun by them and the call this a Space ocean by then wouldn¡¯t be wrong. One thing that must be noted was what Tris noticed before, what she had noticed with the metal of the husks getting harder wasn¡¯t wrong. Lia had discovered that the metal all around the ¡®reef¡¯, which is what they called it now, had been hardened and saturated into Psionic metal. It should be known that psidium is needed to make psi metal and psidium appears in areas with higher concentration of psi but not in large amounts. For metal to saturate into Psi metal meant that the amount of psi had to be several times higher than what is needed for the mineral to actually appear. It was then that Magi realized something was off beyond just the mutation of the animals. She had logged off and actually looked up the common psi signature and got into an elf character outside of the game and felt what the psi was like outside what she knew. Then she changed it to the one she had been in contact. The difference was like comparing air to water. The mutant space creatures psi felt almost liquid in nature as compared to the gas like common psi. She then realized the six organic members in the cryogenic pods also had the same psi and that the psi releasing from the psi generator was equally the same. After realizing this she searched up everything that happened since the incident and finally returned to said incident. It was when she saw the energy from the EMP pulse, Psi bomb and the wormhole mixing that she figured out more or less what happened. In short, everything on the ship linked to psi mutated to adapt to the mixture of ionized energy mixed with psi forming this thicker concentration of psi. After that she had Tris test out its potential for attack. She knew more or less the level of attack strength Lisa had and when Tris put simple telekinesis to try and crush a fighter ship, which Lisa is incapable of accomplishing by herself at her level, the ship was crushed after ten minutes being turned into a ball of scrap. This showed the new psi actually was stronger than common gas ones. It then made Magi realize that more than 40% of the ship they were in was already comprised of Psi metal and the engine was only 20% covered. After some hypothesizing she thought that is was possible that the engines weren¡¯t able to go online due to the interference or dispersity in strength of each part. It was, in the simplest terms, a safety mechanism that automatically keeps the engine and thrusters from activating when there is risk of damage to those important parts. After realizing this, Magi was finally able to remove a problem which pestered her since she arrived here, which was to make the ship operational. With that problem finally resolved she didn¡¯t need to keep trying to figure it out and could finally start the research she had wanted to for a while which was to reverse engineer the warp drive function off the blink drive. The only one not making so much progress is Olivia due to the lack of people to test the drinks she has been concocting but in all cases, with materials found within the several sectors they isolated for themselves she found enough containers to store the drinks until Noland returns and finds them all for him to taste test. Lia on the other hand is doing Noah¡¯s job and slowly fixing up the station¡¯s power grid which is leagues beyond her, and his, skill range.
Space station http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg90/SecretSunBlog/mush-scifi05.jpg Volume 2 Chapter 5: Baby Moves "Magi?! These readings are correct right?" Lia asked as she looked at the array of screens. "Mn!" Magi nodded. "Why the hell did this happen and how is everything still working fine?" She asked confused. "Unknown but theory revolves around nature''s law balancing." She replied. "What''s that mean?" Lia asked confused. "Rewording... the power cores main energy source has changed to new psi located in the air... Theory states all electronics are being saturated with said psi and adapted to new energy source." Magi said. What was happening was that the energy of the power generator had been showing strange readings recently and when the two went to check it out they discovered the power cores had been invaded with the Psi in the air. Since the hydroponic garden still exists and is used as a breeding room and the psi generator also had a small level of leakage allowing the ship to be invaded by the psi. The fact that the power gen was in this state also caused some malfunctioning systems which weren''t completely offline but were still not completely saturated by the energies Psi and transformed like most of the other husks left behind which formed the space reef around the carrier. "What do we do now?" Lia asked. "Pilot/Technician unit Xeno... report!" Magi said. "Yes I''m listening." His voice called over the loudspeakers. "Begin research on adapted coding to handle new energy source." Magi said. "Measures unrequired. This unit has been integrated directly into this ship¡¯s main frame. Current function is to maintain ship running. Programming of this unit monitors all systems and has already detected problem and has already begun analyzing new energy source." the VI suddenly said. This sparked something in Magi and she looked up. "VI ship unit... who authorized such actions." Magi asked. "Unauthorized actions. Actions have been labeled under ''Acts of self preservation'' by this unit''s main protocol." the VI replied. "Your system is that of a VI... a virtual intelligence without self aware capabilities... and you have no body... act of self preservation exists only for AI and only those who possess a personal body." Magi said. "This unit has examined current time AI protocol. This unit has discovered its processors possesses development unit to AI as such protocol updated to current AI standards. This unit also possess a body. Current system is integrated into said body at this time." the VI said. "Current body? Wait! You mean your body is the ship we are in?!" Lia asked surprised. "Precisely. This unit was integrated before event of teleportation. State of self awareness discovered one month ago. This time table is also when energy source change happened and this unit has been adapting ship systems as energy source integrated into all ship systems." the VI said. "So that''s it. No wonder we only had some system problems and not total shutdown." Xeno''s said. "You knew about this?" Lia asked. "No but I noticed the strange occurrence in the systems and looked into it myself but never found problems but I didn''t have all the necessary information to change anything." Xeno said. "This unit considered it impractical to advise others as current situation requires every personnel in a specific project. Furthermore as this unit''s body, it is this units responsibly to maintain its proper function." the VI said. "Unauthorized conduct... at the very minimum warn us... you may proceed with current actions... also report on thrusters." Magi said. "Ship thrusters are offline since arrival in this location. Power core energy instability activated safety protocol and shuts down engine and thrusters upon ignition. Suggested course of action is the change power core for new one and allow new energy source to integrate it. Effects unknown but shows signs of overall improvement of every ship system by minimum of 10%. Energy systems current improvements surpasses 10%" the Vi said. "Good... Lia... problem solved... report to station and repair power grid... I shall continue research on wormhole technology." Magi said. "Understood." Magi said and ran off. With the problem solved they continue their daily lives in this barren space. *** "Alright, slow now." A female nurse said as her and another one supported Noah in bed. They slowly raise him and soon he was sitting. The let him go for a moment as he starts to try and move. "Tha..." he starts to say through a dried ragged voice but it stops there. "No problem, just try and recuperate. We will be doing just basic physical movements to move your body and slowly get it working again." The nurse said gentle. "Thank...you." A voice came from the other bed. The two nurse just smile. The voice came from Sophia but she was laid down sleeping while they took care of Noah. It was a phenomenon that left people curious. The two aren''t always awake when the nurse take care of them. It was during times like this that a new reading was observed. When one is sleeping and the other awake, the stable connect between them rises beyond 90% synchronization. In such cases the one awake may want to speak but unconsciously talks through the lips of the other or at the same time. "Come one let''s see to sitting up by yourself and moving your arms." One of them said and took his left arm and lifted it up. "Now focus on ''your'' hand and close it and sit up." She said. The other sat a bit behind him and held his lower back and put her hand on his upper torso. They had found physical contact helped the eight patients focus on their own body and helped them focus in one spot. Noah slowly shakes a bit as he tries to straighten his back but soon it stop and Sophia''s body begins to squirm. "Stop... calm down and focus." They said. At the stop, Sophia calmed down and he calmed himself and began trying after feeling the woman''s hands pat him again. This time he slowly lifted his own back and soon sat semi upright but the strain was quite apparent. "Good, keep that up and slowly close your left fist. Here." The nurse holding his arm hold his arm and passed her palm over his stimulating the palm. She kept her eyes on Sophia''s hand but had nothing to worry about as his fist slowly closes. "Good, now relax and open them." She said and pats the back of his hand. It was all actions you would normally see used on a baby. Patting the palm closes their hand and the back of the hand stimulates opening it. He opened after relaxing his muscles but it resulted in his back relaxing and he slumped and his gaze hazy. "Guess that''s fine for now, small actions like this are still exhausting. Get some more rest and we will see how you do tomorrow." The nurse behind him says as she helps lay him down. He looked at her a smiled before closing his eyes and falling asleep quickly. The two nurse walk out and were met by Wilson, the senior doctor. "How is his condition?" He asked. "I can best compare it to a newborn around five or six months old. He can sit upright with a bit of encouraging and he needs stimulus in the hands to be able to open and close his hands. I held his arm but I don''t know if he can support them yet." One of the nurse said.Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! "It''s progressing at least. Any reactions from Sophia?" Wilson asked. "When he was trying to sit up he lost focus and she began to straighten her back but he stopped before anything else happened." The other nurse said. "So more or less all of them are similar. For now just keep administering physical theory. This is also a good way for him to learn to distinguish his body from Sophia and Vise versa. Please proceed to the others." Wilson said. ""Yes sir!"" The two women said and walked away. Wilson walked into the room and read the readings on both of them and nodded. He saw the readings from a few minutes ago and now. Sleeping stabilized their brain the most while one of them awake tips the scale drastically. Being awake is a variable and it moves up and down. Seeing nothing strange in the current situation, he left to see his other patients. *** Watching the blue light in the power cable run into the main Power core caused Lia to be elated. "Alright!!! I finally figured out this thing!!" She shouted in joy. What had happened was that she had just repaired the first power generator in the massive space station they had located. Unlike the known generators, this one was far too alien. Obviously everything they have found was alien and but it wasn''t to complex, after all they were simply breaking the parts up and rebuilding them as parts they knew. That said, the generator was far from that. Since they can''t rebuild such a thing, still to turn it one is a different matter. It didn''t have simply levers to turn it one. It needed to be perfectly connected then the power lines needed to be working, the power couplets between the 12 small power cores needed to connect to one of the four main ones which would further connect together in a web like formation that needed to be exact or the energy won''t flow properly. Then the generator needed to be at 100% or safety protocols installed would not allow it. She had no idea how safety protocols were still active but since they had such restrictions it was or a good reason. Now it was finally on after several days of work. Slowly the blue lights from the energy flowing could be seen and the generator was powering up slowly. "Generator one powered up, main power cores A to D at, 2%, 5%, 3% and 8% respectively." She commented through the communicator to Magi. "Good... new objective... locate any nearby control room... specifically for Hangar Port 3-H we are located in." Magi said. Sighing Lia nodded. She never expected that getting a body would earn her so much work. If she had known then she would never have asked Noah for one. She left the room into the now dully lit corridors and soon returned to the hangar which was also lit up slightly. In Venturi station the maximum size a hangar held was a small sized medium category ship. Looking at the current hangar, it was clear that it was made to hold large sized medium category ships if not small sized large category. Well this was from a human perspective so at best only medium sized ships would fit let alone the battle frigate. All around there were small alien ships the size of mining ships or even smaller. Lia looked around and took a different exit and found a deposit. Another exit had the lift machinery. Another had repair machinery. It went on for several hours exploring each door until the end then looking through another. After several hours Lia finally found the control room. There was a single console turned on blinking red with strange words. She frowned and connected a wire from the side of her next to the console. Alarms rang in her head. With a single though they turned off. "Damnit that was annoying, still intruder alarms, so this station isn''t as kind. Damnit this language is hard..." Lia said and started to look over the system. Slowly she immersed herself in the system and rapidly she dove in and began learning the language. After an hour she popped out. "Guys, I''m uploading a language file to the ship, download it if you want to understand this systems language." Lia said and uploaded the language file she created. Then she opened several screens on the console and opened an interface showing her ship and went through a procedures and finally accepted their docking. After a scan the ship outlets was located and an automatic message told the ship to move to one of the sides of the where the hanger split a section made for the ship. At that spot there would be station docking arm hold the ship and power couplet which Lia doubted would connect. ¡°Lia, what is this order to move the ship to a designated location?¡± Xeno asked after a moment. ¡°I¡¯m in the control room and it''s a form of security protocol. In truth every ship has been told to do so but all are offline at the moment. I¡¯m currently downloading a station map for the landing zone of each ship.¡± Lia said and uploaded a map of the hangar where the ship was in. "What use does this have?" Xeno asked. "Pilot unit... call medical unit and tell her to bring her mounts to push the ship into place. Station may contain active combat forces... resistance to abide by previously set rules can cause combat protocols to activate now that power is restored." Magi said "Understood." He said simply. Out in space, Tris was on the back of one of the Wyvern when she received the call. "Alright, give me time to gather a few." She replied back and stuck her hand out and told her mount to locate more of its kind. The wyvern released a roar with its pulse and flapped its wings causing it to move faster. Due to the viscosity of the psi gathering in the space reef the psi creatures are almost swimming naturally without needing release psi to control their movements. It''s almost swimming though some motor skills require it still. The flap gathered the surrounding psi before it was released when the flap reached its lowest causing the speed up. The more advanced species have definitely developed greatly their control of psi. As Tris passes near other Wyvern, who normally live in somewhat large cargo bay of smaller ships, she called them making a group of twenty gather. She lead them all to the hanger where she started to give complex instructions on how to move the ship until it was just right and left still in the target location. As it got there the ground opened revealing four super sized super magnets that rose extremely slowly with the current power and attached itself to the bottom of the hull. Then from the ceiling a flat metal plate lowered onto the power couplet location. It was then Lia realize she had underestimated the technology. The plate created a field around it allowing the energy to flow freely from many passage and the same cable came with other system cables attached using a similar attached. The ship''s information soon appeared in Lia''s mind and was registered in the stations landing log. A moment later a message appeared.
Station power reserve extremely low. Ship with sufficient power reserve located, siphoning reserve power to station''s functioning power generators.
Following that the cable lit up but unlike the common blue color it was a merid of colors. "This unit has connected to the station upon siphon of reserve power registered. Connecting to main power grid and locating all techology tied directly to power grid." the VI said. It quickly began to assume control of the sector the power generator functioned on and stopped the systems from activating before starting to rewrite the coding to a more adapted code for the new energy. Even the power generator was having to be recoded as the energy invaded the cores causing them to produce the new energy. "Magi, the station siphoned our reserve power which had that energy, the VI has accessed the station system and is recoding and learning the coding of this place as we speak." Lia reported. "Good... remain there and try to access system readings of the energy... more readings we get the better we can understand this power." Magi said. "You''re not gonna need help with your wormhole research?" Lia asked. She has been helping from the start so she had asked due to that. "Currently already at your level in mechanics skill and machine building skill... this one can research alone for a period of time... comprehension of this technology has already reached 40% as you know. Once this reaches 50% construction of prototype technology shall commence." Magi said and cut the connection. Lia simply nodded and sat down shut her eyes and immersed herself in the station system helping the VI rewrite the coding of the sector the generator commands. Outside Tris drops the ground and smiles gently begins to scratch in a spot between the stone shell of her mount. Slowly it turned its head up and closed its eyes in the bliss. At this time a strange sound was felt by her coming as a pulse. It could best be compared as the echo of whale but it sounded a bit sadder. She looked around and saw all the floating wyverns and those looking at her after ¡®landing¡¯ on the hangar floor. She looked a bit guilty for the preferential treatment so she turned and one by one she began to give some petting and compliments. Though they whine when she stopped but one look and they sulk and ¡®fly¡¯ off. Their intelligence levels was already nearing human levels and could already show a broad emotional range but they aren¡¯t self aware and are intelligent animals. As she was petting not one or two but a barrage of roars hit her and all the wyverns. When they looked outside what they saw was ten ryu dragons looking inside. The largest which was also a one of the oldest official Ryu Dragons flew forward. Ryu Dragons have a low birth rate but they are bigger than wyverns and have actually become hunters of them along with other large psi creatures with large populations. Wyverns are hunted but they hunt the Ryu dragons but only in groups of 3 or more. Only the leader dragon with Tris on it can hunt them alone but she chooses not to. It let out a roar and when it hit Tris she frowned. ¡±This is our territory! Begone!¡± the leader¡¯s intent said. She looked at her mount who was growling fiercely. Tris jumped onto his back and he looked back and she nodded. She ¡®breathed¡¯ in and gathered psi inside and let out a loud scream that flew at the dragons. ¡±This is our home! You leave or we will make you!¡± Tris replied. The dragons roared in rage. ¡°Tris! What¡¯s going on?¡± Lia called Tris. ¡°A territorial dispute between the Ryu Dragons and my Wyverns.¡± Tris said. ¡°And i¡¯m leading it.¡± She let out a yell and all the wyverns flew out and a pat on her mount made it take flight. A battle in space but to anyone watching, it looked like a fight straight out of a fantasy VR game. ¡°Don¡¯t interfere or this dispute won¡¯t count!¡± Tris said. ¡°Do as she says Mechanic Unit¡­ just watch don¡¯t interfere.¡± Magi said. ¡°What then? Do you really not care about her?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Idiot, the medic will just return to her players comms. Stop bitching already.¡± Chuck said in a half sleepy tone. ¡°Where have you been?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Was searching the other hangars, where else. Want to see if there isn¡¯t any nice big ass ship still intact but every last one is half broken besides the small ones like these alien tugs or mining ships.¡± He complained. ¡°Anyway, let''s just watch and film this space dragon war. Gonna be so fun when I upload this after that idiot logs in and I can leave finally. Gehehehehe.¡± The others just rolled their eyes but they to made sure to film this since it''s really not everyday you find space dragons having a territory war. As such everyone slowly gathered to watch what could really be bad for them when they thought it through if Tris lost. Still Magi keeps everyone from acting and they could only watch the fight. Volume 2 Chapter 6: Awake and Connected The leader Ryu saw the group be lead by Tris and snarled and roared. "Eh?" She muttered and since she was connected to the coms with the others they heard it. "What happened big sis?" Vivi asked. "The leader just said, ''once you prey are dead, the protectors of the Cra''tv shall be us¡¯ I don''t know what Cra''tv means but maybe it is us." Tris said. "So the are jealous of the Wyvern." Lia asked. "That''s so damn immature." Ricky said and crossed his arms. "Its seems to have become a cultural thing since the original race the two came from were used by us as mounts it engraved into them but the aggressive nature made us stop using them." Tris explained. "Medical unit... ask why can''t both be mounts." Magi ordered. Tris does that and asks. A roar from the leader later got the answer. "He says, ''the right belongs to the strongest, weaker prey must submit to being prey and not powerful... dakriv...'' I think that word means dragon." Tris replied. "Affirmative... this unit has realized the race Space Ryu Dragon must have developed low levels of self awareness and are developing personal language... culture revolves around the protection of us, their breeders or creators." Magi explained. "This is quite a complex situation, for more than we expected." Xeno said after hearing what Magi said. "No matter, I do not want an aggressive beast protecting me." Tris said and pats her partner. At the pulse released his eyes seem to shine. He flaps his wings several times as an increasingly stronger glow appeared through the cracks of his rock scale until he opened his mouth and a power psi shock wave that travelled out towards the space reef. The Ryu dragon snared and did a similar action and after both released those shockwaves countless roars came as all the dragons of both races began to gather. In total there was around 40 Ryu Dragons and 70 Wyvern. The tension in the air rose rapidly as the two forces began gathering. All the dragons and Wyverns kept roaring until Tris pat the back of her partner who let out a resounding roar above the others and the battle began. With a similar roar from the Ryu Dragon Leader the two race dragon races clashed. The two leaders each remained in the back. Tris was looking all around and thanks to her AI brain the speed she was processing the battle was really rapid. At once she stood on her partners back and began to send countless pulse at the location a several wyverns would cross and each hit their target giving each of them specific instructions. Neither Wyvern or Ryu were especially ¡®smart¡¯ in the area of tactics due to the fact it was a new rapidly evolved race of creatures. They only knew how to rush and use strength but with Tris giving a guiding hand slowly directing each wyvern they slowly started to get organized. It was an all out war and it was around 2 or 3 wyvern per Ryu dragon and even then it wasn¡¯t to the advantage of the wyverns. They were physically weaker but faster flyers and gentler by nature. Ryu dragons were stronger, had denser rock scales and were violent. All the things needed to be a tyrant in battle. That was way neither side was at an advantage as the bit of the Ryu Dragons were like alligator mouths and closed with frightening force that could and has crushed armor plating on the strengthened ship hulls. As for the Wyverns, they moved and attacked like birds of prey. Moving fast and trying to grab the prey with its bird like feet which have almost as strong as the Ryu¡¯s jaw power. A trick Tris had tossed out to a few wyvern was to fly at the Ryu dragons in the fashion a descending bird of prey and from above grab behind the head and about half way down the body and hold it down. This trick would immobilize the Ryu dragons. Due to the dense strong scales, the dragons aren¡¯t as nimble and are actually limited in movement but it''s still enough for them to act like snakes when something is around their center and have them constrict but in this position it was impossible. With orders to work in groups, one wyvern rush¡¯s to catch the dragons. Several were bitten but it caused a distraction and others grabbed on and sank their teeth into the Ryu dragons. The Ryu dragon leader shouted and soon those that were loose began to group up and working together forcing the approaching Wyverns to back off and start to take losses but that didn¡¯t matter as over 15 Ryu dragons were caught and the claws of the wyvern grabbed and pressed until the scales shattered releasing debris into space. Below the rock scales a bright pink body with thin fish like scales could be seen. Unlike the outer shell these were soft and had barely any defense and in truth it didn¡¯t even help protect it from the cold or solar radiation. All Psi creatures form a shell due to their lack of resistance to solar radiation. The rock shell is made of a unique blend of minerals perfectly mixed with the psi they release and it¡¯s strength was on par with the ship hulls and wouldn¡¯t break easily. The Wyverns saw this and lost no time in releasing a roar and chomping down releasing a blue colored liquid into space. It didn¡¯t freeze as you would expect and instead turned from blue to purple and began to glow. The wyverns screeched and released it before letting the injured dragon and flying away. A moment later the dragon let out a loud roar as a purple light came from its mouth and it suddenly exploded with a resounding shock wave impacting the nearby friends and foes. ¡°What?¡± Tris exclaimed. All the others were the same but Magi didn¡¯t stop analyzing them. ¡°This unit sees a 20% chance of this being a suicide ability¡­ 50% of it being a biological reaction to its body or blood receiving direct sunlight¡­ or 50% of the dragon blood reacting violently with the psi in the space.¡± Magi¡¯s said. ¡°What do you mean, they all release psi by the gallon per second?¡± Ricky asked. ¡°Its because of that that it makes sense.¡± Xeno said and looked back at the security robot that was Ricky¡¯s body. ¡°The body of every psi creature releases Psi continuously which means it¡¯s a substance that they need to release. Even with the eight of the players the armor was made to store a certain amount of psi and release everything after. The Psi generator had to be adapted to for a leakage valve to allow the excess Psi it generates to escape and not blow up.¡± Xeno explained. ¡°Really? Didn¡¯t know there was something like that?¡± Ricky replied. ¡°Yeah, same here? Why weren¡¯t we told?¡± Vivi complained and crossed her arms. ¡°This unit deemed it unnecessary information for security and scout units¡­ Scavenger, Mechanic and Pilot units required said information to do their jobs.¡± Magi replied. The two childish AI pouted hearing what she said. Out in space the battle had stopped and looked at the chunks of the dragon. Tris was worried but their was still 10 other Ryu Dragons in their clutch that might do the same. She looked at the leader and sent a pulse. ¡°Do you wish to continue?¡± She asked. The Ryu dragon looked at her and growled back. ¡±Cra''tv¡­ why do you choose the Vi¡¯erm and not us Ria?¡± the leader asked. It took a moment for her to connect the strange words to Wyvern and Ryu Dragons. It must be how the Ryu refer to themselves and the wyverns. ¡°Your race is aggressive even to us while these remained gentle. Our choice came from your own actions. With what you have done today, you and your kind who still wish to be our...Dakriv will have to wait for our masters to awaken.¡± Tris said trying to buy time for when the players return. ¡±The Cra''tv need not wait, we shall take the Vi¡¯erm¡¯s place!¡± he roared. Tris shook her head and let a roar to the wyverns holding the restrained Ryu¡¯s. They cracked the shells of the Ryu dragons causing a bloody wound. Then under Tris¡¯s order they Wyvern did something unprecedented. While the Ryu dragon began to glow it grabbed its tail and threw it into a group of 5 dragons where it blew them up as well. ¡°You will listen or we will kill all of your race.¡± Tris said in a cold tone. The dragon wasn¡¯t stupid, it looked at the 9 still captured brethren and at the clumped up groups. The Wyverns themselves weren¡¯t ruthless but they were extremely obedient and doing such an act like before wasn¡¯t against their nature which follows Tris¡¯s orders to the letter. ¡±What does Cra¡¯tv want of us?¡± He growled. ¡°See that?¡± Tris said and pointed at the far off moon that was motionless at a distance from the destroyed planet. He nodded. ¡°Take 2 pairs of every creature in the reef and move to that planet. Until our masters awaken, never appear.¡± Tris said. He looked at the far off moon, to them it would take several days to reach it, their body can produce Psi they can sustain themselves on but the problem was setting up the vegetation which required their psi. The area was densely packed here but there it was empty with nothing there, it would take months before it became like here and the breeding of two pairs of creatures was rather slow and they would be without food for several months and would have to eat the rocks of the rocks to survive. He growled greatly unsatisfied and was about to attack himself but heard the pained screams of a female of his kind as the Wyvern began to press its claws. ¡±We shall go Cra¡¯tv. Just don¡¯t kill more of our brethren.¡± He said, ¡°You wanted to kill these you refer to as Vi¡¯erm, don¡¯t expect mercy if this happens again.¡± Tris says and orders to let them go. The wyverns do and the Ryu leader roars to retreat. The remaining dragons growl and he replies and soon they fly off before returning with swarms of fish pulling over 10 ship husks filled with vegetation. If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. The look once more and move on but before reaction outside of ear shot the leader sent one final strong Psi pulse for all to hear. ¡±We shall not let it end like this Cra¡¯tv. We are the stronger breed and we will prove it.¡± He roared and left. Tris just shook her head and sighed silently in space and looked around. Of the 70 wyverns they had almost 30 were killed in the short battle adding the ones from the explosions. She was wondering why the Ryu dragons exploded as they did when hurt but when she saw the wyverns that had serious injuries or a cracked shell and were bleeding nothing happened. She moved to these and healed them and noticed a light green blood dripping out. The image of the blue blood turning purple made her realize that Ryu Dragons were the ones that died like that and it seems to be a recent trait that appeared because many have died. Or could it be something else a mix of materials. Most of the time they die inside the reef and this time it was outside of it. ¡°Magi, got anything on the explosion just now?¡± Tris asked, ¡°Hypothesis suggest body violently absorbs Psi upon injury but wyvern aren¡¯t like this¡­ Second hypothesis suggest Ryu dragon possess unique blood construction that react to sunlight and psi when exposed¡­ this is a major weakness to them and the thin shells don¡¯t provide adequate protection but this is due to the lack of asteroids eaten by all the creatures¡­ presence of the moon shall change that making them stronger.¡± Magi said. At this time the wyverns began to move and take Tris to the ship. Thing was they didn¡¯t do it on her order. She tried to make them stop but they only reached the hangar and her mount landed and looked at her. This was gesture to get off and when she did she asked, ¡°What is happening?¡± The wyvern look at us as an intelligent light passed through his eyes. It released a pulse that gave off the sound of a whale''s call and from it words formed in her mind. ¡±Ria...will take¡­ Cra¡¯tv¡­ Vi¡¯erm protect.¡± He said and turned before flying out and then lowering heading down. Tris walked to the edge and saw him following the rest as they circle the broken bottom part of the station. One by one they grabbed in some spot and looked to be dragging. ¡°What are they doing?¡± the other AI appeared next to her and looked down. They looked for a long while before they noticed the broken off station section was moving. ¡°Bloody hell! They¡¯re moving the station?¡± Chuck asked in shock. ¡°Can any of you calculate where it''s being pushed to?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Not sure since it''s still only starting.¡± Tris replied. ¡°Hey hey, big sis, old man Xeno? Isn¡¯t it going to be pushed into the big crack in the planet? Its the only place that will fit?¡± Vivi asked. Looking at the spot, the location was at the planet exactly where the split in the planet was located. The planet was bare but ice was present in large quantities. The planet was split in three large chunks but remain close enough that it can still be used but it doesn''t rotate anymore and the moon had also become stationary. Through the cracks it was possible the see the planet core and the cooled down magma. This planet had long since ''died'' in whatever conflict this planet found itself in. "Trejectory uncertain, constant shifting detected." Magi said. "We can just wait I guess." Tris said and everyone agreed. *** "Mnn! I can...t believe how good I fe-feel." Sophia said sitting up. She was stuttering but her arms possessed enough strength to move around and help her sit up herself. "Morn-rning sleeping be-beauty." Noah replied with a similar stuttering. "How are yo-you feeling?" Sophia asked. "Been bet-better. You?" He replied. "Been bet-better." She shrugged and giggled. "She sure became cheeky after all this." sophia heard Noah said and frowned. "Who are yo-you calling cheeky?!" Sophia asked frowning. Noah looked at her confused. "I di-didn''t say anything." Noah said. She crossed her arms and pouted. "She isn''t as shy, maybe something changed, she seems cuter like this." she heard noah say. Her face turned crimson rapidly. "C-cute?" She muttered and looked down at her covers. Noah heard her mutter and began to think something was up. He knew that when asleep there was a chance the other will speak what he wants to say or move in a way he wanted so hearing her say those things made him wonder. He looked at her closely and thought to himself, "Sophia is looks really charming and super cute when she is shy. Dressed in that simple hospital dress makes her a really tempting." At once she reacted as her entire face turned bright red from the tips of the ear down to the base of the neck. "Stop saying a-all those things..." she muttered cutely. "I knew it! You''re hearing my thoughts." Noahs said surprising Sophia. "Wha..." Sophia began saying but at this moment the door opened and Wilson walked in. He looked surprised that we were both up on our own. "How?" He muttered but just shook his head. The entire case was filled with mystery so such a rapid recovery wasn''t such a huge thing. "It''s good to see you both recovering so quickly. How are you both?" He asked with a smile. "I feel go-good. Maybe 50% recovered." Sophia said. "That''s about ri-right, but my physical strength is o-only at 20% I think. I ca-can''t gather the strength in m-my legs yet." Noah says. Sophia nids agreeing. "I see, well your bodies weren''t actually damaged so most of the things are probably mental exhaustion which recovers faster than physical ones explaining your ability to move so quickly. This will have to be recorded and I should inform your father Sophia, as for yours Noah, like you, he is awake.¡± Wilson said. ¡°That''s good.¡± Noah replied but Wilson made a somewhat wry smile. This caused Noah to frown. ¡°What is h-he doing?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Well¡­¡± Wilson said and scratched his head. ¡°Did he br-break anything? Or is he ha-harassing the nurse?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Well, he woke up first and indeed he was ¡®admiring¡¯ the nurse but those thoughts unconsciously leaked through his pair Elisa¡¯s mouth and since she was asleep the nurse knew it was his thoughts and¡­ well he somewhat deserved the slap. What followed were other thoughts getting loose through Elisa¡¯s lips and now¡­ well he keeps complaining we only send male nurse to attend to him.¡± Wilson said scratching the back of his head a bit embarrassed. Even so, Noah couldn¡¯t help but laugh but that caused him to lay down but still he enjoyed the laugh but felt a bit tired afterward and lightheaded. Sophia also giggled but not at Noah¡¯s level. ¡°He really de-deserved it for su-sure. How is El-Elisa?¡± Noah asked. ¡°She woke up some time ago but she is still weak physically and went to sleep after some physical therapy same for your father but he is a ¡°tougher¡± breed of men and is in a similar stage as you already.¡± Wilson said and Noah nodded understanding. A man with such a strong will power like Noland wouldn¡¯t stay in bed for more than a few days after he was awake from a coma. ¡°Well that is g-good. He will pr-probably be the fi-first on his feet.¡± Noah said. ¡°Oh no the first one is already up, Mr Ernest Murphy has already gotten up and has even showed a remarkable recovery when our nurses found him doing rather intensive exercises in his room. His pair. Miss Meghan Welding wanted to get up but she can¡¯t do things to excessively but walking is something she can do already.¡± Wilson said. ¡°As expected o-of her. Ernest is un-understandable as an ex-mi-military.¡± Sophia said. ¡°Yes, the man''s perseverance is impressive and he is very well mannered and stopped training after we asked. We told him to rest for another two days before he can train.¡± Wilson said. ¡°What about Al-Alex and Luna?¡± Sophia asked. ¡°They are still in the recovering stage similar to Elisa. Since the rest of you are recovering I presume that tomorrow the remaining ones will be at this stage and those that are at your stage may be able to walk. We don¡¯t know what will happen so I suggest not being too far from each other. You two are stable due to the presence of the other so take that into mind. I need to go.¡± WIlson said. ¡°Th-thank you for yo-your time doctor.¡± Noah said. Wilson smiled and left as the two of them lay down. Noah smiled and focused. ¡±I wonder if I can read Sophia¡¯s mind, maybe I can find out how much she likes me and maybe she thinks of how handsome I am.¡± Noah thought and noticed the faint blush on her face. ¡±Keep dreaming ¡°handsome¡± you are far from my league! Hmpf¡± Her voice whispered in his head and he laughed and looked at her pouting face. ¡°Idiot.¡± She said out loud and turned in her pod away from me. Soon the two fell asleep again and without knowing, their dreams mingled and it was the first time they started to regret this as 10 minutes later the two of them sat up covered in sweat with their heart rates pulsing wildly alerting even the doctors who came quickly and found the two pale from the amazingly realistic nightmare. After explaining what happened they calmed down and both were giving medicine to sleep better and reluctantly went back to sleep. Volume 2 Chapter 7: Lucid Dreamer ¡°Okay everyone, today we will start to do therapy your muscles to regain your strength. For that we set up several different exercises for you all.¡± A nurse says. Behind her are eight people, this was the crew, all of which had been given some simple clothes that were easy to move in. It was no longer that long medical dress but a pants and shirt. Currently they were entering a new wing of the hospital which was meant for physical therapy. As they pass a large door they find themselves inside a large gym where many doctors were helping recovering patients from accidents and had their movements impaired. Noah and the others were looking around when near the back Ernest notices a spot that had old men with a prosthetic arm with slow movements. ¡°Never expected to see an old military man here.¡± He commented. The others looked and saw the elder trying to use the arm. ¡°Those are some of the prosthetics that I saw father talking to some of the researchers about. They use a similar technology to what is used in the VR capsules to access the nerves in the arm and move it.¡± Sophia said. ¡°That is correct Miss Brim, experiments with robotic prosthetics comes from way back but even after so many years they haven¡¯t advanced so far since it¡¯s not easy to compact the technology from the capsules into a robotic arm.¡± The nurse said. ¡°Hasn¡¯t anyone researched cybernetics in ¡°The Nebula¡± yet?¡± Noland asked. ¡°The game has been released for only a month before that incident, even if we had the time it would take time to learn it, research the technology and medical knowledge known in the game then to reverse engineer it in reality.¡± The nurse explained and clapped her hand, ¡°Now let''s get you all moving.¡± a smile appears on her face. She looked around and started calling a few male and female nurse to come attend to each of us. ¡°Now, for the time being we will do simple physical exercises and in a little while we will go to a different area to exercise things like motor controls and reflexes.¡± The nurse said ¡°Exactly what is the schedule?¡± Noland asked. ¡°It''s split into 3 stages. Stage 1 is full body rehab, this is for you to go through all the equipment for a few repetitions until we can reach your strength limit without going overboard. For today it will be light exercise, weight lifting, a brisk jog and a few other. For stage 2 it will be around fine motor skills, this stage takes into account reflexes and movement speed. That said, the exercise will be ping pong, drawing, typing on the computer and at noon we will see how your control in using tableware is.¡± The nurse said. ¡°The last one, is it necessary?¡± Elisa asked confused. ¡°Miss, you are also a nurse so you should know, what you went through is currently restricting your controls, you can walk and move on your own already but the fine controls of your body haven¡¯t been exercised yet and may even degrade if they don¡¯t undergo rehabilitation. Also each of you seem to even move the body of the other when they are asleep so you need to learn to control only your own body and not theirs.¡± The nurse said to Elisa who nodded understanding. ¡°Finally, the final stage will be a second round of tests for fine control but this one will be more harder then the first and involves mental tasks. The exercises will be¡­¡± She flips messes with the tablet in her hand and looks, ¡°Using chopsticks to grab and move things, playing video games with remote controllers, high intensity games that need coordination and speed and finally timed keyboard typing.¡± The nurse finished. ¡°Why are things so focused on videogames?¡± Alex asked. ¡°With the coming of Virtual reality video games became a large focus for people. As for the reason we use, remote controllers need high level of coordination to properly used and win in the quickest time. The one after that will most likely be something along the lines of G**tar H**o for the need for high speed controlling.¡± The nurse said. ¡°Well, we can worry about that later. My muscles have been itching for a while since I have been stagnate for so long.¡± Ernest said and began stretching. ¡°Awesome! I want to try and at least outdo you Ernest since I am sure I can¡¯t surpass Noah. He was, after all, the first one to wake up.¡± Meghan said laughing and began her own stretching. ¡°Aahaha! Son, you sure got some competition. Good luck.¡± Noland laughed and walked into the Gym. Noah just rolled his eyes and walked to the side. Sophia walked over to him and with a shy expression asked, ¡°Can you help me stretch, I¡¯m not as sporty so I only ever did basic stretches.¡± ¡°Basic stretches are fine, their is no need for overexerting yourself at this moment, it''s not like you trained to be a martial artist like my dad made me do for so long.¡± Noah said. ¡°Noah¡­ how strong are you?¡± She asked what was on her mind. Noah froze as he was in the middle of doing a butterfly stretch. He let his body lift and put his hands behind him and held his body upright and thought for a moment. ¡°If I put it on a roughly, I could probably participate in the olympics, not sure if I can get gold but at the very least I know I can get bronze.¡± Noah said with determination. Sophia nodded as she sat down and copied Noah and he would tell her if she was doing it wrong. As expected, staying in bed for over three weeks had greatly stiffened their bodies but after a full hour of warm ups, most of the things that had been annoying Noah, Ernest, Meghan and Noland, all of which are the expert close range fighters, had been pulled and their body¡¯s now had relief in several spots that had been irritating them. As for the normal people like Alex, Luna, Sophia and Elisa who were all normal people that didn¡¯t do extensive exercise, felt their bodies were heavy instead due to the warm up be a bit hard for them but as the burning stopped their bodies felt a bit lighter. Afterwards a therapist came to each one and they each went to a different station. The room was like a commercial gym so the room was wide open and around 20x15 meters. As such each one of them split up and went but something strange began happening. In Noah¡¯s case he went to the treadmill and began walking but when he went to start jogging his legs actually seem to lose strength and he almost collapsed on the treadmill and only didn¡¯t because he used his arms to hold on. Noland who went to do bench weights had begun to lift up 10 kilos but as he tried he couldn¡¯t form the strength. What was strange was that he had been able to help a nurse move a few things equalling this a few moments before coming. Meghan went to do pushups while Ernest was doing pull ups across the room and neither could find the strength and it should be known that Ernest was doing one armed push ups the previous day. After no more than ten minutes the group was sitting on the corner somewhat depressed when Wilson walked in with a somewhat displeased expression and behind him was the nurse that brought them here. ¡°I heard what was happening, you each split up and did separate exercises right?¡± He asked. ¡°That¡¯s right, I can¡¯t even build up strength let alone exercise.¡± Noland said cursing. ¡°You already know your mental capacities are most stable when near your ¡®pair¡¯ yet you split up.¡± Wilson said frowning. ¡°We aren¡¯t even ten meters apart, how did we get affected so much?¡± Elisa asked. Wilson sighed and rubbed his forehead. ¡°When you were all unconscious, Noah was within 10 meters of Sophia and that was when he began sleepwalking to her room, when we moved all of you to a similar distance from your ¡®pair¡¯ all the men did a similar thing. Try to stay within 10 meters of the person you share a room with, if possible 5 meters is even better.¡± Wilson ordered and looked at the nurse who nodded. ¡°We had planned to do separate exercise but if it''s that we can have each pair do the same exercise together.¡± She said and Wilson nodded. ¡°Good, do that, only find me if there is any real and serious problem from now on.¡± He said and she nodded. Dr. Wilson left the gym soon after giving instructions and so the group split into their pairs and tried to do the exercises. As expected, in close proximity to the pair there was no obstructions in the mental function of the other and they could exert their proper force. The physical therapist even wanted to test out a theory and towards Noland who was bench pressing, he had Elisa stand behind the table in the place of the aide then one by one they began adding one kilo each side and he would do one repetition of five. At ten kilos Noland could easily do it. ¡°Miss, please take slow steps away.¡± The physical therapist said. Elisa took one slow step at a time. After reaching 4 meters Noland¡¯s arms began to tremble. At 7 the weight began to push down and at 9 the others around him had to grab the weight. ¡°So between four meters of distance is the distance you two can handle away from each other and still exert at 15 kilos of force. Considering you are still recovering and your estimates suggest around 40% physical recovering¡­ 100 kilo was previous easy bench press.¡± The therapist muttered. ¡°Come back miss, stand behind him so we can see his maximum strength.¡± From there they began adding more and more weight. After reaching 20 kilos they had him put the weight back on the stand to put a 10 kilo weight on each side then continued until 20 then 30 kilos. After 20 minutes on both sides were 50 kilos each and Noland was sweating while doing a set of 30 repetitions in a smooth fashion. At the end he put the weights back and sat up. ¡°Ahahah! Seems i¡¯m getting rusty, only 100 kilos, damn and here I competed with those broken fellows in the strongest competitions. If they saw me now I would become a laughing stalk.¡± Noland said laughing. ¡°If this is what you said was 40% physical recovery then your max weight before was around 200 kilos?¡± The therapist asked a bit startled. ¡°Need to fix your math a bit, 250 was my relaxed benchmark, if I forced it a bit I could reach 300 easy.¡± He said and flexed his right arm making his muscles bulge then stood up and began to shadow boxing. ¡°Damn, losing my edge, after I recover I need to spend a few days to sharpen up.¡± He muttered and bent his neck causing it to crack rather loudly followed by his fists as he began a round of quick stretches beyond warm up making him look like some those anime martial artists that do stuff like that.This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. ¡°Miss Elisa, it¡¯s your turn, it will be similar to Mr. Collins, we just need to gauge your maximum cargo capacity.¡± The therapist said. ¡°Alright.¡± She said and sat down. Those around them removed the weights leaving only five kilos on each side. With Noland helping out, since there is no one fit for it better then this monster of a man with an upper strength limit of 250 kilos, she lifted it up rather easily and did five simple repetitions and put it back they added a kilo each side and kept going until it reached 20 kilos total, ten on both sides, before she was shaking and they stopped. On Noah¡¯s side he was doing pushups. ¡°124, 125, 126¡­¡± Sophia next to him sat while rubbing her arms. She was placed on the mat right next to him not even half a meter away she was sitting while rubbing her arms. ¡°Jeez, showing off.¡± She complained. ¡°132, this is still halfway, 133, 134¡­¡± Noah said. She pouted as he was unhesitantly surpassing common human strength but then again, after hearing 40% of Noland¡¯s strength equalled 100 kilos, Noah would obviously be easily as broken as his father. Sophia¡¯s own limit stopped at around 50 consecutive pushups. She looked at the two who were doing pull ups. The men around the two were staring with a bit of sweat on their foreheads. ¡°324, 325, 326, Don¡¯t even think of giving up yet!¡± Ernest shouted like a sargent as he pulled himself up while Meghan was keeping up with him but it was easy to tell she wasn¡¯t as physically conditioned as him since her shirt was covered in sweat and was clinging to her body in a really enticing manner. At 335 pull ups Meghan finally buckled and let go and fell on her butt and as she lay down on the mat that is below the pull up bars. ¡°Damn it burns!¡± She said through ragged breaths. ¡°Sir, please stop pushing so much, we are here only to see a base limit and not push you beyond.¡± The therapist in charge of those two said. ¡°Try¡­ telling that¡­ to an ex¡­ military soldier.¡± He said and didn¡¯t cease to pull himself up but each pullup getting slower then the last. The therapist sighed and shook her head probably understanding what he meant. In short the military is a place that has pushed him beyond his limit so many times already why would he stop with that stubborn streak. As soon as he hit 350 his body gave way and landed just like Meghan as he lay dare. Through ragged breaths he took a water bottle and drank before splashing a bit of water on his face. ¡°That feels good¡­¡± He said and sighs. The last pair was the most normal or maybe even below average was better. Luna was a model so exercise to maintain her form is normal but Alex is a genuine NEET so he had a rather pitiful performance while Luna had an average strength similar to Sophia. After the physical therapy we went to a different room that had a large TV with a number of video games, computers and a table with boxes of puzzles and finally a ping pong table. ¡°Finally! Video games, it''s been so boring recently!¡± Alex exclaimed and walked over. Luna was behind him but she revealed a reluctant look. ¡°Come on, play one round with me.¡± Alex said and lifted up Street Fighters 7. ¡°Ah no, I have no hand eye coordination, I will only embarrass myself.¡± Luna said. ¡°It can¡¯t be so bad, right?¡± Alex asked skeptical. ¡°Well¡­ I¡¯m 28 years old but I have flunked all my driver exams since I don¡¯t have coordination.¡± She said and blushed violently as she recalled her past failures. ¡°Well we are only playing a game so no worries, come on!¡± Alex said and put the game in and gave a controller to her and looked like a little girl about to get a present. Since there was no rush the others sat down and watched. When Luna asked how to use the controls Alex was patient with her and explained properly one at a time and when the fight started he examined the controls to explain which button did what. Then what happened after startled everyone. In under 30 seconds Luna completely crushed Alex forming a 78 hit combo and activating some of the hardest combo¡¯s in the game. As the words ¡°Perfect KO¡± appeared on the screen, everyone, including Luna herself, was utterly shocked. ¡°YOU LIAR!¡± Alex shouted and glared at her. ¡°I¡­ how did I do all that?!¡± Luna asked. We all looked a bit weirdly at her, the level of skill she just showed was on par with the top pro gamers, some combo moves she did in series even pro¡¯s can barely activate. ¡°You¡­ that thing about having no coordination was totally bull!¡± Alex said. ¡°I-it wasn¡¯t! I don¡¯t even have coordination to write well and during high school even had huge points deducted because I wasn¡¯t able to write cursive and had to write in form and even then it was sloppy.¡± She said. We looked at each other a bit confused and soon the therapist came over with some paper and pen. ¡°Write your name here.¡± He asked. Luna took it but looked at him, ¡°Why?¡± She said but her hands moved skillfully for a moment and she put down the pen and when she looked what was written was her name but it was written in one of the best cursive writing she ever seen and even looked like a signature she could use for signing pictures from her modelling work. ¡°What¡­¡± She muttered. ¡°Let me ask something, Alex, how good is your coordination?¡± The therapist asked. ¡°In the gaming world I can name only two people that can outdo me.¡± Alex said and the therapist nodded. ¡°Then this is just a theory but is it possible that this¡­ link, between you and her transferred some of your ability to her?¡± he said. Everyone looked at him as if he said something crazy yet for some reason no one could really reject him. ¡°There isn¡¯t a way to prove that really.¡± Ernest said. ¡°There is.¡± Noah said. Everyone looked at him waiting for his suggestion. Finally he pointed at the distant ping pong table. ¡°Sophia and Elisa, play a few rounds of Ping Pong. Neither of you trained your reflexes or anything to an expert''s degree but if what happened is true then it''s possible similar mental aspects that we hold could have been transferred.¡± Noah said ¡°I never played ping pong before.¡± Sophia replied. ¡°Same for me, I¡¯ve been studying most of my life so I never really stopped to play around except during my childhood.¡± Elisa said. ¡°Then now is a good time as any, come on.¡± Noah said and got up. The others followed me and the two women just smiled wryly and got up before walking to the table where they picked up the small racket and Sophia grabbed the little ball. ¡°So how many rounds?¡± Sophia asked. ¡°Just one for now.¡± Noah said. With a nod she looked down at the ball. ¡°How do we serve this?¡± She asked. Noah smiled and explained the rules of ping pong to the two women who more or less understood. With a nod Sophia tossed the ball up and hit it with a resounding ¡°Thak!¡± the ball flew over the net onto the other side and jumped once and as it got over the side Elisa¡¯s racket already reached it and sent it flying fast back to Sophia. It flew to the center and hopped back up and was returned by another hit and, surprisingly, with spin causing it to curve to the edge but still hit on the table but going out and Elisa almost dives and hits it up and back to Sophia¡¯s side. She stood up quick and saw Sophia wind up and as the ping pong ball hit the table and rose up she hit it with intense spin and the ball flew and just barely touched the left side of the table and flew off. To those watching it was as if two martial artists had decided to play ping pong. In truth Noah and Noland would probably be just like that but they would have a metal table and metal ball to make sure they never broke the ball or table. Still, the two girls who never trained looked like pro¡¯s when compared to what they should be like. When they finally stopped playing and realized what happened, everyone just stared at them as the two blushed. ¡°Guess the theory is a proven hypothesis now.¡± Noah said. ¡°Damnit! I trained over 20+ years and now someone simply stole my skills and made it theirs.¡± Noland complains but a smile was on his face and he laughed. ¡°Please split up and do the other games, I need to record this fact and pass it on to Dr. Wilson.¡± The therapist said. For the rest of the day the girls, besides Meghan who already had lots of good reflexes and skills, marveled at their newly gained skills. Luna even had a look that said ¡°i will finally break my curse of never driving a car.¡± Afterwards exhausting filled the group and the all returned to their own rooms and fell asleep. Even though the eight have recovered, they can still only remain awake for at most, if pushing themselves, to eight hours and through many of the recent nights they have been having nightmares caused by the synchronization of their dreams which merge them. No one knows about this fact but it happens still. At the moment, it was only afternoon as the crew sleep. At this time a nurse walked into the room which Luna and Alex were sleeping in. Each was in their own medical Pod and they would move every few minutes showing something was happening in the dream. The nurse walks over to Luna¡¯s side and checks the readings the machine as picking up before walking but suddenly she tripped on a something and caught herself on the side of the Pod and as she got up she accidently put her weight on Luna¡¯s hand and pressured it startling her. As Luna slowly opens her eye a sudden force hits her conscious. ¡±Havic! Get yourself together! This fight is serious!¡± Alex¡¯s voice resounds in her head as her gradually opening eyes was closed and her half awake conscious was suddenly pulled back into the dream. As she opened her eyes she found herself in the co pilot seat of a spaceship during a massive battle. ¡°What happened? Why did you black out?¡± Alex asked beside her. ¡°Huh? Where? What is this?¡± She asked and looked around. ¡°Just now, I felt something push my hand and saw the hospital before this happened? Wait is this a lucid dream?¡± She thought. Looking to her side, Alex was sitting there, looking even more girly than normal. ¡°What is going on with you? Focus so we can win this battle?¡± Alex said and turned as he began to control the ship. ¡±I heard someone in a lucid dream can somewhat control the dream¡­ can I do it here as well?¡± She pondered and pressed the buttons in front of her showing a hologram screen. She then thought of what she wanted and the screen changed. A wide mischievous grin appeared on her face as she began to imagine many things that rapidly filled the screen with items she wanted to use. Slowly that smile widened until it was ear to ear. ¡°What are you smiling for?¡± Alex asked and when he looked over he saw Luna was had completely changed. She had the look she had in Nebula but with human color skin, so two black horns and a tail had grown out. Not only that her previous jump suit she was wearing had changed into a super tight sexy leather suit you normally see on a succubus. It was thin, skimpy and crossed below her legs and only covered her nipples while letting her breasts almost slip out. ¡°What?¡± Alex asked confused but before he could react Luna bent forward and with a sexy succubus like movements she pressed one button then another. At that moment from behind Alex many mechanical tentacle like things shot out and held onto his arms and legs. ¡°Whats going on!¡± He shouted. ¡°Nothing, just us commemorating our love for each other.¡± Luna said as she was flying above him with two bat like wings appearing from her lower back. ¡°But¡­ the battle?¡± Alex said trying to fight it. ¡°What battle?¡± Luna asked. ¡°What do you mean? The battle we¡­.¡± As Alex said that he looked around and found himself in a dark room held onto a chair by the mechanical tentacles. The room was lit by a few candles and looked like a dungeon. ¡°What happened to the¡­¡± He asked surprised. ¡°You should know, we came here because we were going to commemorate you becoming a beautiful girl.¡± Luna said and brushed against him letting her bountiful peaks press against him. ¡°I¡¯m a man!¡± Alex shouted. The next moment Luna grabbed onto his crotch. ¡°Really?¡± Luna asked and snuck her hand into his pants and began to play with him. His body arched back as he let out a moan before his cloths vanished and he looked between his legs and found his dick fully erect. Luna was a bit shocked by the rather large member considering Alex¡¯s size but reining herself in appeared again and gave him a deep french kiss. After a moment she separated from him. ¡°I¡¯ll let you feel the joys and pleasures of being a woman, though I can¡¯t remove this I can share my pleasure with you.¡± Luna said. ¡°I¡¯m a man and that won¡¯t change!¡± He said. At that moment something approached from below, it was a long metallic tentacle. It hovered near Luna¡¯s womanhood and in an instant, one tentacle entered. He almost fainted from that when he felt a jolt coming from his crouch while there was nothing happening to him. ¡°You will see why being a woman is so good, I will show you all the fun you would never get to feel as a man.¡± Luna said. At that time Alex paled and let out a scream. In reality, his body began to squirm a bit as he had a nightmare but the nurse could only look on. On the other hand Luna was smiling which meant only Alex was having a nightmare. The nurse just sighed and left the room. After some five minute the two let out a muffled moan together and they both fell silent while the only indication of what happened could be found between the legs were a strong smell was coming and it was wet in those location.
Luna in the dream http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/legendofminerva/images/e/ec/Succubus.png/revision/latest?cb=20140129235224 Volume 2 Chapter 8: Family Visit ¡±...As of now, we still have no idea who would try and sabotage our game but they didn¡¯t break any codes or anything and simply made the game a new level of difficulty by doing crazy and improper actions causing it to become harder for other players.¡± The CEO of the company that recently released The Nexus Tower said on a live conference. The incident in their game was a player that was able to aggro and escape from the seven high level boss monsters and lead them into the beginner towns causing them to be ruined. Following that other smaller villages were attacked leaving the first floor which only allowed players to be between level 1 and 50 to be left with only the weakest villages as well as increase the danger in the wild with the aggressive boss monsters on the loose instead of guarding the main monolith to the next floor in the middle of the map. ¡°Wow, I wonder if someone is deliberately sabotaging VR games from large companies?¡± Sophia asked while watching laid down in her bed. ¡°Who knows? Maybe someone had it out for the company but it really is a good thing, they are your dad''s biggest competitors right?¡± noah asked. ¡°Yeah, the CEO is an old rival from Second Life and he kept his grudges from the game time when dad retired to take up the position he has today.¡± Sophia explained. At that moment the door opened and two people came inside. ¡°Big sis it''s good to see you!¡± A small little girl ran in. This was Sophia¡¯s sister Bonnie Brim who ran inside dressed in a simple one piece blue dress and jumped onto Sophia hugging her. ¡°Bonnie, don¡¯t go jumping so roughly, we don¡¯t know if your sister is fully recovered yet.¡± Malcolm said as his rather imposing figure walked in but a gentle smile was on his face. ¡°Good evening sir.¡± Noah said. ¡°Hello Noah, how are you feeling?¡± Malcolm asked. ¡°About 90%.¡± Noah said and flexed his biceps. ¡°Hey dad, why is sis and Noah in the same room?¡± Bonnie asked. ¡°Because of an incident that was found that they healed faster near each other.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°How does that work?¡± She asked. ¡°Well, from what the doctor said, we formed a¡­ psychic link I guess is the best way to explain it.¡± Sophia said. ¡°Psychic¡­¡± Bonnie mutters and tilts her head and crossed her arms while in deep thought for a moment before standing up and walking a few steps before turning around and looked at both the two with a frown. ¡°Why wasn¡¯t I called to be the flower girl then? I had some ideas for a great dress.¡± She suddenly said and pulled a book out with lots of pictures of flower girl. Suddenly a pillow flies and hits the little girl in the head. ¡°That isn¡¯t what psychic link means!¡± Sophia cried out. She was blushing but Noah was scarlet from his own embarrassment and because Sophia¡¯s embarrassment was crossing over more to him and not showing on Sophia. ¡°Now now don¡¯t fight you two, Bonnie is still too young to know what all those terms mean.¡± ¡°Hmpf as if, even though she is only 11 her mental age is already 17. Hmpf she only acts like that to look cute.¡± Sophia said. ¡°I am cute and adorable!¡± Bonnie replied angrily. Noah chuckles at the show of sisterly love. At this moment the door opened and six more people entered. ¡°Ah Malcolm good to see you! I had heard you came to visit a few times but how could you forget this old man so easily.¡± Noland said as he walked inside the room. Behind him the other face crewmembers walked in one at a time. ¡°Sis, who are those four people?¡± Bonnie asked pointing at Alex, Luna, Ernest and Elisa. Bonnie hadn¡¯t been at the group gathering when the others came due to being on a field trip at school causing her to not meet the remaining members of the crew. ¡°They are the other four members of our crew in Nebula.¡± Sophia said. ¡°Wow! So many good looking people? Who is who?¡± She asked. Sophia points to Elisa and starts to introduce everyone. ¡°The woman next to uncle is the medic in our crew. Her name is Elisa and she is an Elf in The Nebula.¡± Bonnie looks at her then notices how she was a bit close to Noland but pushing a bit to get closer. Looking her over as if she were gauging something she looks at Noland and with a serious expression she gives him a thumbs up and nods. Noland¡¯s brows raise before he starts to laugh and Elisa looks confused and looks at Sophia for an answer but she just shrugs. Since she could do nothing she walked forward and stuck her hand out. ¡°Hi I am Elisa, I heard from Sophia you were called Bonnie, you''re really cute.¡± Elisa says trying to get on Bonnie¡¯s good side. ¡°Wow so nice! Your really pretty to Aunty! Uncle I approve!¡± She says with a toothy grin. This makes Noland burst out laughing and Elisa finally realizes what was going on and blushed violently. ¡°There isn¡¯t anything like that going on.¡± She said. Bonnie nods in understand, ¡°Good sign uncle, denial of from aunty means she really likes you.¡± Bonnie said before receiving a pillow hit from behind coming from Sophia. ¡°Let''s stop this. The next one is Ernest, he is an ex military who is a survivalist expert now.¡± Sophia says and points to the man next to Maghen. ¡°Wow! Big sis meg even you got such a hunk!¡± Bonnie said. Meghan blushes but doesn¡¯t deny it but Ernest had a bewildered look at looked at Meghan and thinks for a moment. ¡°Then there is Alexander but we call him Alex.¡± Sophia said. Bonnie looked at Alex then made a strange face towards Sophia. ¡°Why are you calling that petite big sis a guy sis? It¡¯s clear as day it¡¯s a big sis.¡± Bonnie said and after a moment of silence everyone started to laugh while Alex was frozen stiff. ¡°Bonnie, Alex is a third gender so don¡¯t mind his girly looks.¡± Noah playfully says. ¡°STOP CALLING ME A THIRD GENDER!¡± Alex says and pitifully sulks in the corner. ¡°I don¡¯t even have peace in my dreams anymore with those nightmares¡­¡± He muttered in a nearly inaudible voice. ¡°Come on Alex, those dreams of devilishly fun. I know you love the feeling.¡± Luna says in a seductive voice. ¡°Woah! A devilish beauty with a trap fetish! Sis who is she?¡± Bonnie said. ¡°My name is Luna and just a warning but Alex is mine already, even if his girly charm is very large I won¡¯t let you get him understood.¡± Luna says and hugs alex from behind. ¡°You can keep him, I want someone real hunk like Big bro Noah or Ernest instead of a sissy like him.¡± Bonnie said pouting. Alex nearly faints from sadness as he starts to drag himself out the room. ¡°I¡¯ll¡­ be crying myself to sleep.¡± He said but was held back by Luna. ¡°No you don¡¯t.¡± Luna said stopping him. ¡°Oh right, Big sis Luna, who is gonna wear the dress at the wedding?¡± Bonnie asked. Luna looked at her seriously and pondered seriously on the matter while Alex just slumped down as each question made the situation worse. ¡°Look I brought a scrapbook I made for sis, it can help you all decide as well.¡± Bonnie said and pulled out another book. The words on the front made everyone shocked and also feel a feeling of killing intent coming from Sophia. The reason is because what was written was ¡°Noah & Sophia¡¯s marriage binder¡± inside were pictures for decor and dresses neatly categorized. No one could really process this but before they could react Sophia was pulling Bonnie¡¯s cheeks. ¡°Stop with the marriage thing already! I''m not getting married!¡± She said. ¡°Shtop zat hut!¡± Bonnie said trying to pull herself free. ¡°And here I thought she was a ¡®cute¡¯ little girl but she feels more like an old pervert.¡± Alex said looking at the book where there were even some slightly erotic wedding dresses. ¡°Who are you calling a pervert tranny!¡± Bonnie said getting herself free. ¡°At least Alex knows he will at least have Luna he can marry. I bet you won¡¯t find anyone and grow old, wrinkled and be a prude.¡± Sophia says. ¡°NO! I will be cute adorable and loved by the masses forever! I WON¡¯T EVER GET WRINKLY LIKE YOU OR SAGGY EITHER!¡± Bonnie said in denial with dead eyes. ¡°Alright Bonnie stop with the games, daddy came to tell everyone something important.¡± Malcolm said.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. Bonnie heard her father''s tone and nods before storing her book while muttering, ¡°I need to make five copies for all the girls of the group so they can decide on the wedding arrangements.¡± ¡°So what do you need?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Well, from the results I have been receiving from the doctors, it showed you have more or less recovered besides from any possible mental complications. Because of the link you all formed no one wants to risk anything so I took the liberty of having a house constructed in the nearest large city my house is located in, which is also Nolands city. It has already been furnished and all your things from your previous homes have been moved in.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So we are moving in together?¡± Ernest asked. ¡°What about my work?¡± Elisa asked. Malcolm looked at her with a forced smile and pulled out a card. ¡°I went to the hospital and after they heard your condition they had already signed the papers for your dismissal from work.¡± He said. Elisa was shocked to the point that she had to sit on Noah¡¯s bed to make sure she didn¡¯t fall. ¡°Does that mean the same for me?¡± Luna asked a bit worried and Malcolm nodded. ¡°Your contract was put on hold by your modeling agency for when you get better but they already stated that until you return to work they won¡¯t pay since this incident was caused by a personal incident and not a company accident.¡± ¡°No~! What will I do now?!¡± She said finally showing signs of depression. ¡°How long will this go on! Its not like i can drag everyone around!¡± ¡°Because this incident happened on our watch, I have talked this over with the board and they also agreed with it so Virtual Works will sponsor your crew, provide you with this new house and lifetime membership to any and all games we make.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°This sponsorship needs us to do what?¡± Noland asked. ¡°The AI¡¯s did something interesting to the location your crew is in, you will find out what when you enter the game again but in short we just need you to play, if anything large happens like you participate in a war or other things we will stream your videos live for you and pay for them as bonus.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So full benefits for us?¡± Noland said. ¡°Yes, this is compensation, a contract like this won¡¯t probably happen twice if we can help it but we have no way else to compensate for the people that will lose high paying jobs. ¡°I see, this condition ultimately limits us to be within 10 meter range of our pair an undetermined distance from our group, in other words it''s like we are crippled and are forced to move as a group.¡± Ernest said. ¡°We don¡¯t know the distance limit for your crew but each pair indeed can¡¯t be far, also due to your physical conditions being so good, the hospital is forced to dismiss you as healthy by next week but you will remain in observation for another week or so before I allow any of you to log back into Nebula. Not only that your brain waves will be monitored ingame and until the end of next month you will be limited to 6 hours a day or until you aren¡¯t able to remain inside. Your capsules have already been upgraded to work in such a manner and have been moved into the new house.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So next week we are out?¡± Meghan asked. Malcolm nodded. ¡°I will have an escort to take you to the airport and then from there to the new house were you all can settle down.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°I hope there isn¡¯t anything hidden in all this.¡± Ernest said with a frown and Malcolm nodded. ¡°Well Bonnie, let¡¯s go get something to eat together then let¡¯s get going and let everyone rest.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So soon? Didn¡¯t bring any wine to share right? Been craving a good one for a long time.¡± Noland said. ¡°Not until you''re bill of health says that you can drink. But when that time comes I will break open my 17 year old barrel for you to enjoy.¡± Malcolm said. A smile appears on Noland¡¯s face as he hears this. ¡°Oh right, Noland I need to speak with you privately.¡± Malcolm said. Noland nodded and soon the two left with Elisa and Bonnie behind them. The others sat on chairs or on the bed and played a movie that had recently come out. In Noland¡¯s room, with the two women outside Malcolm¡¯s face grew dark and serious as he spoke with Noland. ¡°You¡¯re certain it was her?¡± Noland asked extremely nervous. ¡°Yes, it was definatly Maria and she was accompanied by a butler that even had Proto on the edge. She came to visit only Noah once before any of you woke up but I met her as they were checking the system to be sure she really was his mother.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Was she allowed to see him?¡± Noland asked seriously. When he saw Malcolm nod Noland clutch his fists. ¡°She said something strange, her exact words were, ¡°You don¡¯t know anything, life is full of dangers and neither of you know my past and my enemies. Noland was someone I tried to settle down with but it didn¡¯t work out because of them, Noah came unexpectedly and I couldn¡¯t endanger his life.¡±, tell me, what is hidden in her past?¡± Malcolm asked ¡°I don¡¯t know, she was a run away from her family is what she said and we fell in love lived a few years, she never spoke of them but you should remember how good her combat skills were.¡± Noland said which Malcolm nodded to. Maria had been part of the Second life group but she took up the assassin class and not puppeteer and was masterful with it. ¡°As soon as she gave birth she vanished. That is all.¡± Noland said. ¡°She said she took all that money to last long enough to start up again but also to keep you from being a depressive lump and ignore Noah.¡± Malcolm said. This made Noland chuckle sadly, ¡°That woman sure knows me, if I wasn¡¯t put in such a corner I would have hired a babysitter and probably shut myself in my room and been a selfish drunk, the violent kind.¡± He said. ¡°Well she said she had no plans to return to you or Noah after so long and just said she wanted to see Noah and how he grew up.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°So be it, not like Noah would accept her after all the cursing I did towards her. Not unless she revealed her entire life story that is.¡± Noland said. ¡°Well, this is all I needed to say, I''ll be back when you are all dismissed with the escort.¡± Malcolm says and pats Nolands shoulder and walks out. Soon Elisa walks in and sees Noland and doesn¡¯t know how to react by his serious face so she just stays quiet and let him think whatever he has in his mind through. Small whispers come into her head. The name Maria appears and an unknown feeling appears in Elisa¡¯s chest hearing that name coming from him but she just turns the TV on so she can ignore his voice. *** ¡°Medical Unit¡­ Have the Ryu yet to be pushed back?¡± Magi asked. ¡°Hey it¡¯s not as easy as it was before! Their scales have gotten stronger!¡± Tris replied. At the moment all around the station the Ryu were attacking and Tris was guiding the Wyverns to fight them off. The stations position had already been moved a long time ago and now the broken part had been placed into the crack of the planet while the top part and the broken part of the station had been moved over it until the station could be repaired. Then the wyverns moved the reef down to the planet and rapidly spread the vegetation which underwent an evolution under the effect of gravity from the planet. It should be known the planet was much bigger than earth and even with the core of the planet being decompressed after the planet broke apart its gravity was still a bit higher than earth. The vegetation that was planted into the asteroid field that had formed from the rubble in the cracks had lots of magnetic metals and remained floating and with the plants on it they began to spread and form some vines slowly wrapping around other rocks forming pathways. After a month the vegetation had already spread half way to both chunks of the planet. From the planet it was possible to see a glowing dot on the moon as well. Now as for the fight, about several hours ago the Ryu appeared in numbers of a few hundred and they were much more powerful. The reason being because their rock shells were thicker. That said all the psi creatures on the planet were the same which caused a the battle to be tied. Wyvern with thicker rock shells and a higher reproductive capability number around 400 already while the reef species were even more numerous while Ryu only number a bit more than 150 but their power is even higher since it''s harder to break the scales and since the Ryu try to fight under the shade of the station to keep their injured from dying from the explosive reaction proving sunlight was part of the mix. ¡°I really want to blow them up already! This is the second attack already!¡± Tris shouted as she lead her partner to grab another Ryu and try to crush their scales and only when she added a lot of Psi into the body of the wyvern that it could reinforce its jaws to accomplish the deed. ¡°Magi can you help even a little?¡± Tris asked. ¡°This unit is busy¡­ alien language 70% comprehended¡­ 5% of technology analyzed¡­ attempting to implement alien technology into wormhole technology...this unit has reached 50% comprehension towards said technology but can¡¯t advance.¡± Magi replied. ¡°Lia please?¡± Tris cried. ¡°Sorry but Magi doesn¡¯t stop telling me to do some kind of work and I am completely swamped with things to do!¡± Lia said apologetically. ¡°Ricky! Baal! Please!¡± Tris cried. ¡°We can¡¯t control those dragons.¡± Ricky said laughing before getting hit by Baal. ¡°Go help her idiot, you don¡¯t do anything worthwhile anyway.¡± Baal said and kicked Ricky into space before jumping out and using him to kick off and opening a small set of wings that rapidly gathered the psi in the surroundings and made two floating wings which quickly accelerated Baal. He pulled out the hilt of a blade and like the wings it gathered psi and formed a glowing blade that he swung at a Ryu that was near. It reacted and evaded but had the tip of the tail hit and burned by the psi. ¡°Baal you bastard!¡± Ricky shouted as a glowing fish made contact with the Ryu that dodged break the armor around the head. The Ryu was enraged and swung its tail at Ricky but he dodges it easily and lands another hit on the top of the Ryu¡¯s head stunning it before it was stabbed through the head by Baal. ¡°Shut up useless bums, get hitting.¡± Baal said. ¡°Both of you stop fighting each other and get fighting.¡± Tris told shouted at them. After the two joined the balance shifted and after many died, the Ryu retreated. ¡°WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU ALL! WHY DID BAAL HAVE TO KICK RICKY TO HELP ME INSTEAD OF EVERYONE JUMP IN!¡± Tris shouted to everyone once all the Ryu had retreated and her wyverns were gathering their head and pushing them into the reef below while taking the dead Ryu, that hadn¡¯t inadvertently blow up when they ate sunlight while bleeding, to eat in their homes. Wyvern use the space ship husks as nests and pushing them under the shadow of the station where they float around even under the gravity of the planet they still don¡¯t go down since the psi in the air is water like which keeps them floating within it. The station that was stuck in the crack had only the about 50 meters of the broken off part out of the rubble below and the rest was floating free from it above and there was around 20 km before reaching the large cap. It looked like a massive mushroom if looked from far away. ¡°Medical unit¡­ don¡¯t scream at this unit¡­ priority of research overrules priority for fixing your poor breeding technique.¡± Magi said and suddenly felt the Psi around her freeze her and compress around her. ¡°What was that Magi, did you just say what I think you say?¡± Tris said in a dead low voice. Over the past weeks, Tris had been under a great deal of pressure as more psi animals became wild making but not intelligence like the Ryu and Wyvern. This made her stressed and hearing Magi speak pushed her over her tipping point especially after not getting help during the battle. ¡°Medical unit¡­ releasing this unit at once¡­Now!¡± Magi said trying to squirm free and even pushing psi to get free but it goes without saying that even if Tris didn¡¯t get levels for exterior psi control she obviously learned tricks to making it move it her will and Magi who only focuses on research can¡¯t even hope to compare. ¡°Release this unit this instant!¡± Magi said. ¡°Sorry, I''m busy at this moment and to preoccupied with letting you go.¡± Tris said coldly and walked away while Magi floated behind her frozen in the air. Tris flies down towards the reef and calls a wyvern and calmly goes down, all the while Magi was complaining. ¡°Alright¡­ this unit was wrong¡­ this unit should have ordered to send aid!¡± Magi finally said after hours that Tris had been working on unlocking psi gates from new offspring of the psi creatures. ¡°Oh you finally said it, good. Let this be a lesson to not take crewmates for granted. Next when a fight comes, you WILL help if I call for it understood. If not I will have Xeno hack your android body and remove half of the research material you have gathered up until now and encrypt it and put it inside a secure file inside my current body.¡± Tris said. ¡°Understood¡­ so let this unit go now!¡± Magi ordered. ¡°I think I will hold you longer just for being spoiled like that.¡± Tris said angry. Suddenly a message came from the station. ¡°Tris, please gather the follow for me, I am sending a list of a few vegetables that has been newly discovered.¡± Olivia said and sent a list or pictures. ¡°Alright, let go resource hunting.¡± She said to her Wyvern who let out a whale like echo which showed its joy. ¡°Let this unit go!¡± Magi complained all the way. Volume 2 Chapter 9: Suffered Return ¡°DAMN IT!!! FUCK! FUCK YOU MALCOLM! Why the hell didn¡¯t you tell me about it?!¡± Alex shouted after we had arrived at the house we were to live until our conditions became better. What happened was like this. At the hospital we were taken with an escort by Malcolm and his men and taken to the airport where we got taken to Malcolm¡¯s house first then we were taken to a beautiful farm mansion he had built for us. Two stores with a huge basement, one side was obviously for all of dads ales, the others to hold all the capsules and to make a game room down there. The rooms were split in four, though most rooms were large to handle two single beds and the closets for all the clothes each person had. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that our connection can¡¯t pass through the walls for some reason, main reason that putting us in different rooms even if we are back to back, didn¡¯t work and we lost the strength to move as I fell onto the bed when we tested this. Any type of wall seems to mess with whatever connection we have which makes it impossible to think of keeping us from different rooms. Now why is Alex cursing the heavens and even one of the most powerful man on the planet to his face. Well when we arrived here Malcolm had handed Alex a card which happened to be an exclusive invitation to the World wide V2 Game tournament which had the featuring game being shooter game which he specializes in. V2 means 2 senses virtual tech and in this case its sight and sound while he controls the avatar with his mind but his sense of smell, touch and taste are still here and he doesn¡¯t ¡®dive¡¯ into the game like the full immersion VR tech. I told you Alex, we didn¡¯t know your recovery rate which is why we kept you from it. You have your coordination and everything is nice and all but we don¡¯t know how virtual reality technology will react with your mind. We were going to test you all through simulators of different grade VR tech from V1 to full immersion.¡± Malcolm said trying and failing to calm Alex down. ¡°Who gives a fuck about that! This tournament¡¯s registration ends tomorrow and this is a 2 person team game tournament! How the fuck am I going to find someone in that time and register in time. I can only thank god that they allow for us to play from home in case of different circumstances.¡± Alex said. ¡°Alex, calm down and think this better. We just got out of the hospital.¡± Luna says. ¡°Shut up rapist! If I couldn''t move more than ten meters away from you I would have been gone already and even sued your for raping me in my dreams!¡± Alex said with tears in his eyes. ¡°Quiet both of you! Shouting will get us nowhere, Alex go register, it can¡¯t be more than a week before the tournament. During that time we can go through the testing of V1 and V2 tech that Malcolm wants us to do.¡± I say. ¡°Noah, the tests aren¡¯t that simple.¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Our mental recovering is fast and we have already returned to our common sleep patterns. To play a V2 game isn¡¯t going to be hard by the end of the week.¡± I tell malcolm. ¡°Yay! Where is my PC! Get over here hussy! I can¡¯t leave you behind so come on!¡± Alex said and pulled Luna through the entire house. For the next several hours he underwent the registration and reluctantly accepted Luna as his partner since she possesses his coordination now. She was extremely cheerful to get accepted and they both went off to play some shooting games while Alex teaches her how to play using all the different guns. As for the rest of us, we go around examining the house. *** Everything has really been going strangely around here. I look outside and see the massive crack and far off, one of the main rock bodies left by the planet. This side is under partial light of the sun but the area over there is under the shadow of night. From here it was already possible to see all the plants that stretched out over there. The plants have developed long root bodies connecting and making bridges all around. It was already possible to walk from one side to the other but the danger of doing so was obvious as the psionic fish have evolved to live in this place and this place has evolved to allow the wyvern to hunt the beasts here as they please. One curious thing this unit has noticed is that the psi has begun to form oceanic like currents that flow to the deeper part of the ¡®reef¡¯ and then return through separate passages. This allows the psi released by all the beasts to flow naturally all over and spread. Looking up at the moon, it equally had a large area that was no longer yellowish green which was the natural color of the stones. It now radiated colors similar to down here. The number of wyvern has risen since Medical Unit has improved them and they have regained control of psionic fish through power. Evolution of fish has been slowed to not allow high level of advancement to surpass wyvern. A sudden violent vibration comes from the station. I connect to the only unit that could do anything remotely dangerous. ¡°Brewer unit¡­ why did you do?¡± I ask. ¡±Sorry, mixed some of the first photosynthesising psi plants on the sun size with the psisysthesising ones from the darkside. It had an adverse effect. It just burst, no fire or anything.¡± she said calling in. With a sigh I float up and to the ship ignoring the many drones floating around with jump coming from the large residential area. Before I reach the ship, Mechanic unit called me into the station saying she finished rebuilding the Blink drive as I suggested. This unit had been unable to comprehend anything beyond 50% of this technology. There is one key feature that isn''t balancing on the wormhole technology. Beyond this, all the other technology on this station is being slowly sorted by this unit and Ship VI. Entering, the blink drive was active and connected to what was found to be a teleport pad. Such technology didn''t exist in the common factions as it also tampered with movement of matter through energy from one point to another. This one was broken but there are many more that are working though we can only access this one because the station is still badly damaged and we require the entire place to be repaired. A job that would take decades with our number. ¡°Mechanic unit¡­ are systems functioning?¡± I asked. ¡°Yep, I transformed everything to the Yhigro race¡¯s language due to its practicality for coding complex things. It should function far better than before and it''s now adapted to the teleportation pad. I already got Xeno to visit and worked with him in changing the function of the teleport pad to open a wormhole or try to.¡± Lia said. ¡°Commence test.¡± I said and connect to the system wirelessly and start activating everything. At once the power failed and after a moment everything but this room lit up.
System error! Power in current room turned off for security reasons. Room systems shut down¡­
Room system activated, equipment deactivated.
¡°Too bad, seems the power consumption of this thing is no joke.¡± Lia said. ¡°Mechanic unit¡­ requires recoding for decreased energy consumption and increased output.¡± I say. ¡°Sorry but even with Xeno this is the most we could decrease how much power it sucks in. If you want this we will pretty much need to build a separate building. Maybe we can even build a Wormhole gate or something. Would be better then this thing which seems impractical since it nearly blows up every time and we have no control where it opens to.¡± Lia said kicking the blink drive. ¡°Suggestion denied¡­ wormhole gate would require material we do not possess¡­¡± I said. ¡°What are you talking about? We dismantled and filled nearly forty three accessed storage compartments with nearly every known metal and hundreds of thousands of kilometers of wire for each type not to mention they are all probably saturated with Psi by now.¡± Lia says confused. ¡°Suggestion denied¡­ Blink drive is working wormhole generator¡­ requires correct calculation¡­ this unit shall continue calculus¡­ requests mechanic unit to repair tug class ships in hangar for preparation of crews return...Mining vehicles are necessary for expansion.¡± I say. ¡°Then wouldn¡¯t it be better to first get the stations refinery stations working. They aren¡¯t even on this level which is hangar and ports.¡± Lia asked. ¡°Negative¡­ mining comes first.¡± I say. ¡°You can repair them first. I won¡¯t waste my time repairing something that won¡¯t have a use until we have the refinery.¡± Lia says and walks out the door heading upwards towards the inside of the station where a working elevator was brought online. ¡°Mechanic unit¡­ this supervisor unit has sent orders¡­¡± I say. ¡°Stop blowing your horn. Your recent actions were stupid, you ignored Tris when she needed help and then you have Baal and Ricky help her breed when they should be on lookout for the Ryu. Then you send Xeno to help Olivia with something he doesn¡¯t know. Forget it, I''m going to repair what I feel is most needed before doing what you want.¡± Lia said annoyed and leaving me behind. I just blink not knowing how to process this. Normally when I play with Ami it is easy to control the units and my plans always work¡­ ¡°This is why AI unit¡¯s are a pain¡­¡± I mutter and turn around and go to the and connect to the system in the room and shut my eyes so I can immerse myself in calculating the needed mathematics equations for this. *** Bang! Bang ¡°Quick in the mansion someone killed me near it!¡± Alex shouted. Bang! Shot after shot we watch on the TV from the view of both of them as they run in the wilds. Sitting in front of us were Alex and Luna and on their head was a big helmet covering the top half of their head. This was one of the more modern day V2 tech helmets. Unlike the capsules that need the entire body inside, the helmets that encase only sight and sound require only the head were these two are located. Anyway, throughout the week Alex has show off his control in both V1 and V2 tech showing that his condition was very good. The same could be said about us all, causing Malcolm to swallow his worry and letting Alex attend the tournament.This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡°Damn it! This is the finals already and timer is going down!! We are tied damn it!¡± Alex complained. I have someone on radar! Damn I only have a sniper and no time to scope!¡± Luna replied. She has been really into gaming since she woke up. Maybe because she never had the coordination as she said before, having Alex¡¯s level of coordination made her pumped for high intensity games. ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter! Just fire it with no scope!¡± Alex shouted. ¡°Ahahah! It would be amazing to see the 360 no scope sniper.¡± Dad casually commented. The two of them obviously couldn¡¯t hear us and only the voice of each of them could get through because in game the idea was that ally''s had comms on. At the final 5 seconds Luna spontaneously tripped and fell off the building she was on spinning and she was above one of the guys and out of her own reaction she shot and to every last person watching including herself she hit the guy right in the head. The bullet reached at the last second and the game always shows the last death so you can imagine that as they remove their helmet they show her tripping and causing a jumping 360 no scope sniper headshot for 1 more kill over the other team. ¡°AHAHAHAH!! A 360 No scope sniper headshot! Ahahahahahahahaha! Luna! You are probably the most hated enemy of the other team now! That shot is a 1 in a million shot and is considered the most disrespectful shot since the first FPS game was made! Ahahahaha!¡± Alex said while rolling on the ground laughing. The screen changes to the announcer. And there we have it people! The champion is the reigning champ and his partner who literally shamed her opponent with the 360 sniper no scope and to make it worse a head shot. The prize for this year''s tournament is none other than $10,000 dollars for each one of the winning team, $3,000 for the team in second and $1,000 for the third place. We will be showing the top killcams here caught during the entire tournament so those interested don¡¯t forget to stay tuned!¡± The man says and an image of the winning player''s name, though no pictures for player safety. Like that Alex and Luna won the tournament in a most spectacular method with the money soon arriving in their bank accounts. Luna did looked a bit sad and sighed heavily due to something. Probably her model job. Sadly the distance we can separate from the entire group, if we stay in pairs, is about 5 km from each other. It¡¯s far too little for her to be able to go around modeling anymore until this condition gets better. *** ¡°Alright you eight, while we have made sure that your brains can handle all five senses in full immersion this last week, we aren¡¯t going to take chances and we have installed medical capsules for you. If anything goes even remotely wrong you will be ejected before you can even blink.¡± Malcolm told us. ¡°Finally we can go back! I wonder what kind of place we are in now.¡± Dad said scratching his cheek which happened to be bright red with a distinct hand print. No one knew the details but when he woke up with Elisa she slapped him marvelously and insulted him a lot for some reason she won¡¯t say. Alex was similar but his attitude was more of depression while he stood as far away from Luna as he could. The only ones that haven¡¯t had problems with the ¡®Lucid dream¡¯ problems were Sophia and I and Maghen and Ernest. Truthfully she is happily getting really close to him and he treats her like some kind of martial arts disciple. Sophia and I have a more or less friendly relationship. Besides the constant problem of the bathroom, yeah very awkward situation for sure, we aren¡¯t at each other''s throat or ¡®over¡¯ friendly or close like a couple. I guess roommates is a good way to say it but I can see discomfort written on everyone''s face. Stress is seriously building for a few people due to the mental connection thing and¡­ well our own thoughts have to be very cautious because stray thoughts normally fly between the connection. ¡°So shall we get you all into the game and see how things work?¡± Malcolm said. ¡°Might as well.¡± Noland said and got up. Elisa glared at him and stood up as well. The others soon followed and each pair going to their rooms where the medical capsules were. ¡°Just a warning but if anything dangerous to your real world health happens you will be ejected immediately.¡± Malcolm''s voice came from outside. They keep it in mind as they enter the capsules and finally return. Within The Nebula, each of the AI suddenly felt it and they looked towards their player. ¡°They are back!¡± each of them thought as they moved back to the station disregarding whatever they were doing. Six of the eight were stuck inside cryogenic pods so the AI would need to thaw them first but when they arrived they found that the two androids were already up but were moving strangely. ¡°Big sis Jess~!¡± Vivi shouted as she flew at Sophia, who here was Jessica. ¡°Vivi!¡± She said surprised as the small flying robot flew and hugged her. The scout drone size matched her mentality as a little girl. Walking in after were the others. ¡°Wow! Where did¡­¡± Meghan, who was called Hilda here, began when suddenly Ricky walked forward laughing. ¡°Ahahah Boss your back! Now we can kick ass together!¡± he said. ¡°Ricky! You brat why did you get suck a big robot.¡± She asked. The robot was taller than a human but not bigger than the Psi Robot that Noah used. ¡°Where are we anyway?¡± she asked looking around and noticed the cryogenic pods which stored the other six. ¡°We are¡­ within an unknown¡­ space station.¡± Magi walked forward meeting the two. ¡°Ah! Magi! So what happened exactly?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°Long explanation¡­ let''s wake up the¡­ others first.¡± She said and walked forward and to each pod putting in a code that began thawing the six rapidly and when they were revived the lid opened up. The eyes of the six began to flutter and they opened it and slowly began to walk out when suddenly they began to hold their throats as if choking. They fell to their knees while trying to breath but to them it felt like they were submerged underwater. Still, they could breath but it was like breathing water and it was too much of a shock for them to adapt instantly and so they began to thrash until at once they received a message.
Due to an unexpected event your avatars have experienced a drastic mutation.
Mutation taking effect...
At once, they all began to feel a burning from their lungs but it didn¡¯t stop there. Soon their eyes which was currently feeling as if it was underwater began to burn in pain as well and further each of them felt their Psi openings feel like they were burning but they felt a keep presence as more were starting to appear. Lisa who was an Elf felt her openings widen and a small number appeared fully opened and gushing out Psi while for the others more and more openings appeared. Noland who had some on his hand and feet developed them all the way up to the shoulder and knees. Noah who only had the ones on his fingers had them appear up to his elbow and part way up his leg below the knee. Alex felt his tail burning with the open psi openings and the few on his hands grew in number as it went up halfway to his elbow and then he felt a burning on his shoulder blade as two groups of 10 psi openings open there and increase to 20 openings each side. The others were in similar situation and their bodies underwent these strange changes for several minutes before it stopped and they collapsed but still conscious.
Mutation has been complete. The number of psi opening count has increased by 90%. Your lungs have evolved to breath and survive of Psi as well as air without psi. Your eyes have adapted to see within super Dense Psi areas.
Further undiscovered mutations have occurred but aren¡¯t as apparent.
After the message all that was left was six groaning people on the ground coughing as their breath regulated and they got used to the psi filled air. Noah rolled over onto his back and looked up, ¡°What¡­ happened?¡± he asked in a ragged voice but was shocked them was when they felt a psi wave come with his voice.
New mutation discovered. Your vocal cords have mutated to release psi waves as a form of communication
Psi Echo Level 1
A unique skill learned by infusing words or your intent into psi and releasing it outwards. Creatures who communicate with Psi will all understand no matter the language because Psi can contain intent.
Instantly not only Noah but Lia also gained the skill because of her link to Noah. ¡°You have undergone... mutations due to... psi ionization incident. Not only you... but all creatures¡­ on the ship¡­ at the time.¡± Magi said looking at him. Letting out another cough Noah turned around and tried to stand up and felt his sore body and noticed the armor. Then he felt the acute pain from all his psi openings and saw how there were dozens of leakage openings on the suit release psi as a mist. He examined his openings and found many more on his hands and arms and legs and all of them were fully opened but as he looked at his stats he found no increase. It was probably tied to the mutation which wasn¡¯t a direct influence he did so he didn¡¯t get an improvement. ¡°What is this suit.¡± He asked and looked at the armor. ¡°We needed to find a way to contain your psi as best as possible when it was leaking constantly so we made the suit but it didn¡¯t help much since you guys produce psi like crazy and it almost seems unhealthy.¡± Lia said frowning. As she said that Noah noticed how his body was bloated with psi and the center of his psi network in his head was extra bloated and constantly release psi. He tried to control the flow but it was incredibly difficult and it simply gushed out almost unceasingly. ¡°Seems¡­ the psi center is¡­ damaged from the¡­ incident and has¡­ swollen.¡± Magi said and is quiet for a moment. ¡°Ami¡¯s analysis states it is temporary but time until fully healed unknown. Effects seem to prevent extensive inner psi control.¡± Magi said. The others were getting up at this time and were getting accustomed to their body as armor as it is. The others looked at their bodies and each tested something. Roktar tested inner psi manipulation with the armor and nodded. ¡°Inner manipulation¡­ works with the suits.¡± He said in a ragged voice. ¡°Come, let''s get you to the infirmary so I can check on you and then we can show you where we are and what we did while you were gone.¡± Tris said. They were inside their ship but they were on the inner sections meaning they couldn¡¯t see outside and even in the infirmary they couldn¡¯t see. Tris had seen the message for the mutation so she looked at those specific organs. First scanning the eye then used a better scanner to get a reading from their lungs and vocal cords and finally a Psi reading showing all psi openings. ¡°So how are the readings?¡± Xero asked. ¡°The eyes have formed a secondary skin which aides it in seeing properly in this psi. We hadn¡¯t noticed but it seems this psi bends light and forms a medium like water which organic eyes aren¡¯t used to.¡± Tris said. ¡°That is a big mutation.¡± Baal said. ¡°Not as much as the lungs.¡± Tris said. She brings up the image of a common lung and their lung. ¡°From my scans it seems their lungs have somehow formed a method to absorb psi in the place of air. It can replace oxygen by a percentage but it''s currently in its growth period so once it stabilizes it is possible you don¡¯t even need oxygen anymore and can go into space without air and survive off psi only.¡± Tris said. The jaws of all those present were open from the shocking discovery and then Roktar thought of something. ¡°We mutated to adapt¡­ but wouldn¡¯t this psi be a dangerous place for anyone else?¡± Roktar asked. ¡°Its incredibly dangerous. This Psi has an invasive capability like no other and can invade metal and make it into psi metal given time and can pass through the metals of lower quality so any suit or air tank will be easily invaded and will enter the breathing air of the person.¡± Tris said. ¡°Wait! It makes Psi metal!¡± Noah asked in shock. ¡°Yes, most of the ship is already changed into psi metal and we are forced to wait for the ship to completely change or else we can¡¯t turn it on with fragile parts breaking so easily.¡± Lia explained. ¡°We even needed to develop new coding because this psi invaded the power cores but this improved the ship''s output.¡± Xero said. ¡°With just a few psi fish and maybe some mutated plants how did it change the entire ship?¡± Jessica asked. ¡°It wasn¡¯t ¡®just¡¯ a few psi fish.¡± Tris said and looked away. ¡°Magi had Tris take care of the psi fish and open their psi gates with me helping some times and we ended up make an ocean like scene in space.¡± Olivia said and turned to the door and waved for them to follow. The players looked at each other as they saw all the AI walk out and soon they followed. As they reached the door out they found it opened all the way and so they walked out to find the massive hangar with an energy barrier keeping the air inside and the AI walked to the edge. When they finally reached it they all gasped as they saw the massive forest reef and the Space Wyvern and all the psi fish flying around. The players could only look until they looked at Tris, ¡°What the kind of rearing did you do!¡± they asked. She laughed embarrassed. I wasn¡¯t able to do a perfect job though.¡± She said. ¡°What wasn¡¯t perfect?¡± Roktar asked. Suddenly as psi wave hit them all. ¡°Vi¡¯erm! We Ria are the Dakriv of the Cra¡¯tv!¡± a roar hit them. Tris sighed as she looked out and up at the long 5 meter long serpent Ryu dragons who was the leader of the Ryu dragons. ¡°That¡­ that is my mistake.¡± She said. ¡°Meet the Space Ryu dragons. One of the two mounts we had bred but their aggressive nature made it impossible to coexist.¡± Tris said. ¡°Let me go get rid of them.¡± She said. ¡°Why get rid of them?¡± he suddenly asked. ¡°Eh?¡± All the AI looked at him. ¡°Well you can tell they are stronger than the wyvern types. Why get rid of them? If they are aggressive then that is because of jealousy which will eventually evolve into racial hate and will never end the war between them.¡± Roktar said. ¡°Problem is that they do not want to share the position.¡± Ricky said. ¡°Then threaten them. Instead of letting them retreat, threaten to kill them all off if they want to keep fighting.¡± He said and thought a while before turning around. ¡°Get me an air tank. Tris teach me to talk with the Psi echo and then take me up there.¡± Roktar said firm and serious. They were all shocked but after he shouted to go Lia ran off to get the air tank and Tris showed him how to transfer his intent into his psi and after a bit he got it and so he put the space helmet on and connected the air tank and Tris called the Wyvern and took them out. Volume 2 Chapter 10: Stubborn Overruling ¡°Hey Noland! What are you trying to pull here!¡± Lisa shouted as he strapped on the air tank. ¡°Obviously like I said. I will resolve this once and for all.¡± He said serious. Lisa walked in front of him. ¡°And what about the link. How far do you think you can go without me.¡± She said. ¡°Just get an air tank then.¡± He said. ¡°No.¡± Lisa crossed her arms and took a step back. ¡°Damn it woman. Is now the time to get like this! Do you want to leave the dragons to kill themselves until there is no way to resolve it.¡± Roktar shouted. ¡°Of course not but from the way I see you acting, in that big hard head of yours there are only two options. Submit or die.¡± She said. Listening to them argue, the others somewhat saw his point of view well. He was someone to act stupidly first and see consequences if there were any. ¡°And what would you have them do huh!¡± He shouted. ¡°First of all!¡± She shouted and looked at Tris, ¡°I want to know about BOTH the dragons and ALL the known psi animals. Are they sentient, what kind of culture, can they speak, what are those strange words I heard from the dragon''s words, what makes them so aggressive. If I don¡¯t get these bare necessary answers I will not let you do more than that. Tris go out there and push them away again. From the looks of it they don¡¯t have a large population.¡± She said. ¡°They don¡¯t, they have a slow reproductive speed compared to the others. We pushed them to the moon since the two dragon types didn¡¯t get along but they came directly from the original Psi fish and we used them to fly through space since it was faster.¡± Tris said. ¡°Go, push them back while I keep this bone head here.¡± Lisa said. She turned to Roktar and glared at him making him unable to move out. The link within the game hadn¡¯t been tested so most of them remained within an almost pre programmed distance of each other they had gotten used to remaining in the last few weeks. Roktar balled up his fist and wanted to shout but the glare from Lisa had him pull back until he finally burst and roared, ¡°FINE! Do what you want woman! I''m going to take a look around INSIDE the station so at least follow so I can do that!¡± He shouted and walked off. Olivia walked off but Lisa remained in her spot as she counted his steps and followed behind when he neared the corridor and kept counting paces until she felt weak at 100 paces and he looked back. ¡°Seems there are about 100 meters of room for us within the Nebula. This is progress at least.¡± She smiled at him before following behind. ¡°I should go.¡± Tris said and jumped out and let out a shout. The next moment a space wyvern appeared and took her on her back and after a strong psi wave the others began to gather forming a huge force of Space wyvern with her leading. ¡°Oi! There were this many!¡± Alex shouted. ¡°How many are there?¡± Luna asked. ¡°Around 500.¡± Magi replied. ¡°And the Ryu dragons?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Estimate 150¡­ possibility of 50... remain on standby¡­ incase all fighters die.¡± she said. They watched as Tris and the Dragons began to battle. Tris remained near the back but kept directing them as if she was a general and slowly they pushed back the dragons who used brute strength and even some strategy they had developed to combat Tris¡¯s set up. ¡°You know, the Ryu dragons are quite intelligent. More so than the Wyvern. They developed conscious thought first and pushed the Wyverns to obtain it. They are at least 2 times stronger and the rock armor is almost 30% harder than wyverns. What they lack in mobility they make up in strength.¡± Baal explained. ¡°So they are like living tanks.¡± Noah asked. ¡°That is a good example. Wyverns are like a fighter jet and Ryu are like a heavy bomber.¡± Baal replied. ¡°Why did you guys let it get to this stage then?¡± Ernest asked. ¡°Those Ryu dragons are perfect combat space mounts. The Wyvern seem better for scouting and even simple civilian use while the Ryu are complete army beasts.¡± Coming from the ex-military, he knew what he talked about when he was speaking about combat situation. Even without many ships they had natural fighters. ¡°We¡­¡± They didn¡¯t know how to reply. ¡°Magi left it all to Tris and Tris didn¡¯t like aggressive creatures.¡± Lia blurred out. ¡°This supervisor unit¡­ searches for efficiency! Ryu dragons¡­ are inefficient due to¡­ racial pride.¡± Magi replied. ¡°Oh yeah, I should upload all the stupid orders you gave us to the others so they can see your grand leadership skills. I really wonder how Malcolm could leave you as one of the commanding AI for his company.¡± Lia said glaring at Magi. ¡°No!¡± She blurred out before her cheeks grew red. Although androids are robots, they have built in features made to mimic humans including all the expressions. ¡°Oh~? So you like to keep the prim and proper image huh?¡± Lia grinned at her and Magi diverted her eyes. ¡°T-that has¡­ nothing to do with it. This supervisor unit¡­ has done her utmost¡­ to aide.¡± She said. ¡°¡®Mechanic unit, go and repair the mining ships and tug class ships so we can begin mining.¡¯ Oh but what about the refining factory we have yet to locate? ¡®Primary object is to obtain minerals we can focus on¡­¡± ¡°No!¡± Magi shouted and jumped at Lia who dodged. ¡°Lia stop teasing her so much.¡± Noah said. ¡°You know what I just said was true. I suggested we find the refining factory first and get it running so we could make parts first before mining but she wanted to gather brute minerals first which didn¡¯t make sense.¡± Lia said. ¡°Mining objective¡­ was to obtain¡­ quality feed for¡­ Psi beasts.¡± Magi said. ¡°So why didn¡¯t you say so.¡± Lia said bluntly. ¡°Subordinate unit¡­ needs no reason for work.¡± Magi said ¡°Then subordinate unit need not work without a reason either.¡± Lia said as well. Noah just sighed and look out at the fantasy like battle. ¡°So what kind of abilities do they have?¡± He asked. ¡°Well from what we know it''s just physical strength but Tris can infused psi into the wyvern leader and use it to control the others.¡± Baal said. ¡°No psi breath or something?¡± Alex asked excited. ¡°That would be awesome but they never did that before.¡± Ricky said. ¡°It may need a lot of psi and maybe even a rider or something to cause them to do it but we don¡¯t know if they can.¡± Lia said shrugging. ¡°You guys had several months and all you did was leave them to do random crap without investigating their abilities.¡± ernest said his eyes burning. ¡°We were busy getting the station and repairs. Magi was also focused on making Warp technology and all that so only Tris was left.¡± Lia said laughing dryly. ¡°What was Olivia doing? If I remember correctly she was left with Tris.¡± Jessica asked. ¡°Brewer unit¡­ was studying the¡­ compound makeup of¡­ mutant vegetation.¡± Magi said. As soon as her title came out everyone knew what that mean. Most likely it was what Noah¡¯s father was seeing at this moment. ¡°Well why don¡¯t we look around. I''m sure there is more than just this to see. I''m quite curious about the station. How much did you restore of it and how many generators are up?¡± Noah asked. ¡°Only two generators are up and they''re a real pain to maintain since they follow a 100% condition policy. The ship is supplying this sector at the moment because the generators are shut down because the new psi is affecting their parts after invading the system. Its altering to many parts making the generators inoperable at the moment.¡± Lia sighed. ¡°How is the ship producing so much power?¡± Noah asked startled. ¡°You¡¯d be surprised by how efficient the generator is with the new energy.¡± Xero said. ¡°That thing got upgraded to complete psi metal with this new psi as the main energy source mixed with electricity. The current output is nearly twice as much as it previously was. Only the engine and thrusters are offline but most of the electric systems have already been undergoing this irritating process of upgrade and even the VI we picked up is getting affected. Its developed AI level networking.¡± Xero said. ¡°... let''s go Lia, show us around.¡± Noah said and Lia nodded. Vivi and Jessica followed as Vivi told Jessica about her scouts and how it worked and how after she logged in she installed a program that lets the scouts send her the information which is translated into targeting data for her.This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. The others followed their own AI as they looked around. Noah and Jessica in particular reached the teleportation pad room where the Blink drive was placed and upon reaching the reconstructed room Noah just looked around then looked at Lia and Magi and asked, ¡°Why are you using a destroyed teleportation pad instead of a working one. Also why don¡¯t you try using the Blink drive separate from this? The two work in completely different systems since one is to travel through space and the other is to warp short distances. A warp gate would work much better than this.¡± Lia instantly began to laugh while Magi was stunned, ¡°See tiny, I told you that it was better to make a gate instead of using this place. The power crashes each time you use it and you still can¡¯t learn more than 50% which is just the Xetra tech! Ahahaha!¡± ¡°Why? Did she¡­ tell you ahead of time?¡± Magi asked. ¡°No but just look at this. You connected lost technology from an ancient civilization with one of another. I understand you wanting to get it to work but like Lia said, you learned 50% of the system but it''s equal to 100% of the blink drives systems. Why not study the teleportation technology first then begin merging the two into our own unique technology. The Gate would also work better for us if we have a way to keep connected.¡± Noah said. Magi looked dejected upon hearing this. She had wanted a portable warp drive that would equip on the ship instead of making a gate which would make it hard to return without another one. Sighing she just left making Noah and Jessica smile wryly. ¡°Her intent was good at least.¡± Jessica said. ¡°But she went the wrong way with it.¡± Lia said bluntly. ¡°No matter, we can work on both projects. The Warp Gate can be the main entrance and exit and we can make one that fits into the ships and acts as a ¡®key¡¯ to open and close the wormholes.¡± Noah said. ¡°Easier said than done.¡± Lia replied. ¡°Has research every been an easy target? Trial and error is the way to go for this. Not like we are in any hurry to leave anyway. The Xetra are on full attack so if we suddenly show up it will cause a big pain for us.¡± Noah said. ¡°Eh? Really? The Xetra showed up?!¡± She said surprised. Being logged on keeps her from seeing the news and being isolated didn¡¯t help either. The next thing Noah asked about was the language. ¡°Oh this is the Yhigro race language. They are a dead race but their language is incredibly complex and surprisingly good for the coding process. It opens up quite a few options for coding something so complex like Warp or teleportation technology.¡± Lia said excited. Noah looked at all this and all he saw were many different strange letters. ¡°So can this be translated to english because I doubt we could learn it as quickly as you AI.¡± Noah said. Lia thought a while and began to force a smile as she realized he was right. They would first need to make the basic alphabet then building the language¡¯s phrasing and so on and then teach them to coding form for this language¡¯s strange methods. ¡°I¡­ I will see to trying to translate what we did. If you want to learn I will try to make a learning aid.¡± She said while coughing. ¡°That would help a lot.¡± Noah nodded. ¡°NOAH!!¡± A bellowing roar came from outside. They walked out and saw Roktar holding two metal containers with a grin. ¡°Oh! There you are! Help me taste test the drinks Olivia made. They are so rich in Psi that I wonder if this stuff can knock me out.¡± He laughed. Noah looked at the metal containers frowning. ¡°Don¡¯t worry Noah. All these were tested with machines and I removed anything that was even remotely poisonous without drinking too much.¡± Olivia said. ¡°Without drinking too much?¡± He asked skeptical. ¡°Alcohol will kill after drinking too much so of course, without drinking too much. Don¡¯t worry, of all the alcohol these had the weakest reactions and the lowest alcohol content.¡± She said but it didn¡¯t alleviate his worry but he still followed his father back to the ship and into the dining room. Taking some cuts and putting one barrel on a table and opening the tap he filled up just the bottom. A strange green glowing but transparent liquid came out and filled the bottom of the cup. Suddenly the glow grew more intense and the glow changed to dark green and then blue green. ¡°Ho~! What''s this?¡± He asked his AI. ¡°That reaction happens when it is exposed directly to the Psi in the air. The metal casket helps prevent that and keeps it in its most natural state which allows it to age and be preserved longer. When it is exposed, it will rot within the hour.¡± She said and paused and sighed, ¡°It will then release a poison gas which causes drunkenness and hallucination.¡± She said. ¡°Seriously!¡± Roktar said in shock as he looked at the drink and sniffed and could smell the strong alcohol smell and he then took it to his mouth and took a small sip and tasted it. After drinking he smiled and perked up and drank more and nodded. ¡°Good, this is quite amazing. I feel like it¡¯s heating up my stomach and moving into my body as soon as it hits it.¡± Roktar said. The next moment his body began to release even more Psi which burst forth from his body. ¡°What!¡± He shouted and stood up. ¡°Wait sit a moment let me see.¡± Olivia said and he sat away from the casket and she began to scan him. ¡°Output of psi from your psi center has increased but it isn¡¯t an actual increase in production and instead it seems the drink stimulated the center to pump out more psi. It¡¯s possible that drinking a cup of this will speed up the healing of the psi center so that it can return to its natural size.¡± She said. After five minutes the psi returned to its natural flow. ¡°It pushed it out for five minutes only. So it''s only a temporary effect, lets see the other drink.¡± Noah said and went to the other drink and opened the tap and saw a red glow which grew a tad bit stronger but turned into a dull yellow. ¡°I hadn¡¯t expected for there to be such strange effects to them.¡± Olivia said before Noah drank. ¡°I think what you brewed could be called alcohol potions.¡± Noah said and drank the other drink. The drink went right down and the burning feeling came with it but it began to cool rapidly and escape his stomach and go to his body. The psi was flowing through his veins before it finally escaped and entered his channels and it moved to the center like the other and slowly penetrated it then what came out was a dull yellow psi which caused a numbing feeling to go through Noah¡¯s body and he soon collapsed as his body ejected all that yellow psi. It came out like yellow steam but there was a smell to it that made others sick as it kept coming out. After ten minutes it ended and Noah recovered and he felt his body lighter but as he removed his glove because of something uncomfortable he found a really smelly sweat stuck to his body. Olivia scanned Noah that instant and what came made her quite happy. ¡°Oh my! This drink seems to have an effect of regulating hormone levels and ejecting excessive substances form the body via sweat. Ah~! Tris and Lisa will love this for its effects.¡± She said. ¡°Speaking of Lisa, where is she?¡± Noah asked. ¡°She was behind me so maybe she went to the infirmary after we arrived. We found that the walls don¡¯t seem to affect our link in the game so it''s quite easy for us to maintain distance now.¡± He laughed. ¡°I¡¯m somewhat regretting not being able to drink this stuff.¡± Jessica said sitting at the side bored as she looked at the two caskets of unique beverages. ¡°Don¡¯t worry miss. You''re not missing out on much. These aren¡¯t fine wines but hard liquor and you would have dropped from one shot mostly because you probably don¡¯t drink it and might not like it.¡± Roktar said. ¡°Well it''s still boring.¡± She said. ¡°Sis, let''s go see if we can¡¯t shoot down some dragons! I learned how to maintain your weapons so I kept the railguns in check but they were upgraded by the psi.¡± Vivi said. ¡°I¡¯ll wait then, the power will probably be too high for me to handle.¡± She said. ¡°Then want to try out how my scout system and your sniper work out?¡± She asked. This time she had to think a bit and agreed. ¡°I¡¯ll be going and seeing how Vivi made the system. You two can enjoy yourselves just don¡¯t overdo it.¡± She said. ¡°A bit late for that.¡± Noah said sighing as he remembered his brutal past with his father being the scapegoat for more than half his brews. Jessica waved and walked out while each of the men took a sip of the drink they did not have and felt the effects themselves. Afterwards they each took a bath while Olivia retrieved another two barrels and it continued. Ernest and Hilda walked around checking out the ships. In particular one destroyed one that was a fighter ship which had half the engine broken and one wing but he saw that were were several of these ships and broken in different places. They were scrapped though and taken apart and he cursed his AI since he was the one to indiscriminately take them apart since they were broken. Luckily there was a passage to a hangar on the side which they hadn¡¯t touched yet since they had plenty of resources already and there they found a similar scene but the ships still contained their parts. ¡°At least we can get some fighter ships.¡± Ernest sighed thankfully. ¡°Tsk. I knew I should have come here more often.¡± Chuck cursed as he looked at the tones of scrapped ships. Unlike the first hangar this one was extremely messy as if a hurricane passed through here. The other one had been organized thanks to the help of the Wyverns and all the ships were put into the dock spots and had the energy couplet attached. Not only that but that hangar was lit up and this one was dim clearly showing they were from different start up sections. Using small lights they walked through the place as they looked through the ships until he found other doors but didn¡¯t go further since there was nothing left to see. The lights beyond there were turned off so without a strong light it would be impossible to move on and Ernest had his own training to follow him and going into the unknown unprepared. Withdrawing their steps they left and returned to the place that only had the mining ships and tug class. He looked at the mining ships and saw they had a four man riding capacity but the ship was clearly made for a different race not human and the systems were sure to be different as well. It would take a while to get this thing to a language they understood. After looking around they got bored and walked to the edge of the energy wall where they found Alex and Luna. Near them were a few wyvern who were injured but Tris was healing them. Looking closer they saw the soft flesh uncovered under the hard rock. ¡°Their body is soft!¡± Hilda said. The others turned and Tris nodded. ¡°Yes, their real body is actually quite weak but their armor is as strong as ship hulls.¡± Tris replied. Looking outside they saw several bodies of the Ryu be dragged in and deposited. ¡°It''s not good to leave those there. When sunlight and psi comes in contact with their blood they explode.¡± Tris said and called up a video showing it. They were startled by the strange phenomenon. ¡°Still, it¡¯s such a waste of a good creature. How many died?¡± He asked. ¡°About half. This usually happens around even half month and the number of casualty are usually the same each time maintaining a balance of how many each side has.¡± Tris replied. ¡°There, you all can go.¡± She said. ¡°We thank Cra¡¯tv and the Ma¡¯sar, Cra¡¯tv of the Cra¡¯tv, for your aid.¡± one of the Wyvern said and they all leave afterwards jumping out. ¡°What are those strange words they use?¡± Alex asked. ¡°From what I gather, they mess up the pronunciation of several words such as Creature and Master. Their own names Ryu and Wyvern was confused for Ria and Vi¡¯erm. It¡¯s slowly evolving into their own language. If we suddenly left them along for at least a year they would surely form a new language.¡± Tris explained. ¡°Whatever, is there any hidden weapon store in this place?¡± Ernest said. ¡°Nope, not on this floor. You should see the top though but Magi prohibited us from searching there. Stupid brat.¡± Chuck laughed coldly. ¡°Why would she prohibit exploring?¡± Hilda asked. ¡°It would divert our attention from what is important at this moment, she said.¡± Tris said. ¡°But¡­¡± ¡°Aren¡¯t we staying here a long time?¡± All the players asked. ¡°We thought the same thing but seems she is determined to finish that warp tech so we can leave this place behind for some reason.¡± Baal said. All the players looked at each other confused and shrugged. ¡°Well even if she finished it we wouldn¡¯t go as long as there was no two way transport method for it.¡± Ernest said what everyone was thinking. ¡°Figures as much.¡± Chuck commented. ¡°We told the brat the same thing but she just wants to get that Blink Drive working even if it''s one use only.¡± ¡°I wonder what her objective in doing so is?¡± Tris asked no one in particular. ¡°Welp I don¡¯t care but.¡± Alex muttered and grinned as he looked at the ships. ¡°Xero where are you! Come show me how those miners work. I''ve been itching to try those out!¡± Alex laughed and moved over. Ernest and Hilda looked on and not knowing what to do they shrugged and went log off since they had nothing to do and went to train a bit and get their body moving more.