Wish upon the Stars chapter 51

Getting out of the trash heap took a while. We ended up killing about  ninety of those damn raccoon things. Every time we finished a wave off  more of them showed up, and apparently the corpses of their kin weren't  enough to scare them off. Still once we killed a bunch of them we  managed to get enough of a reprieve to carry the things out of the dump  using emptied trash bags.

Luckily  the trunk of the skyride was spacious, and the raccoons were small, so  we just barely managed to cram the damn things in there. As we did  though, Benny started snickering. I looked at him questioningly and his  snickering turned into an outright cackle. It took him a second to calm  down. "Sorry. I'm just thinking about how horrified the guy in charge of  these cars is going to be when we get this back. I mean, this is gross  as hell, but at least we can just shower. Getting blood and trash grime  out of the inside of this is going to be a nightmare."

Callie  just shrugged as she loaded in her next bag. "Not really. There are  dedicated cleaners for the tower with purification powers. They're  actually paid really well because it's hard to find someone with that  skill set. Cleaning skills are easy enough to get, but you need  something valid to mix them with. Usually something energy based. It's  also usually pretty Fantasy heavy since you get stuff like fire that  cleans instead of burning. Mostly it's a long, drawn out process and you  don't find a ton of people willing to go to the trouble."

Jessie,  who was sitting to one side, watching the rest of us carry bags of  trash and dead raccoon and NOT helping for some reason, made an  interested noise. "That sounds really useful actually. I wonder what I  would get if I combined my ability with cleaning?" That was an  interesting question. There were a ton of really interesting abilities  that could be made through synergy, and powers offered almost infinite  customization. I was just kind of bummed I couldn't afford to do that  myself.

I did plan to create a new  ability later on down the line, one I could afford to lose the three  times modifier. Once you have a few million in every stat it isn't  really as necessary, something I expect my father had realized, and the  most likely reason for him changing his power at A rank. It was  interesting to think about what kind of amazing ability I could make if I  combined my Wish ability with something like DS Mastery. Finally after  all of us (except Jessie) finished loading all the bags into the trunk  we stopped for a break.

We  were all glaring at Jessie, who just sat to one side, humming happily  as we covered ourselves in sweat and grime. She'd somehow managed to  stay perfectly clean during this whole mess, aside from a bit of dirt on  her cloak. When she saw us glaring she smiled and waved cheerfully and  we all rolled our eyes. Apparently aside from being incredibly friendly,  good at information gathering, and a terrible slob, Jessie was also  pretty lazy. Which made sense now that I thought about it...I'd never  really seen her DO anything if she didn't have to.

Ignoring  our team's secret layabout, I turned to Callie. "So where do we turn  these in? I'm guessing it's the Unity building?" I HOPED it was the  Unity building. This city was big enough without adding new destinations  to our list. I supposed the crafting hall at the Academy would be  reasonable guess as well, but I got the feeling they liked to keep that  place pretty cut off from guild business when they could.

Thankfully  she nodded. "Yeah. There's a place off the lobby. I didn't find out  about it until later actually, when I went to look into critter hunting.  The lobby is pretty distracting. I don't think many people notice the  turn in hall since its off the main entryway and the view is so insane  as it is." She paused though. "That said...I don't actually know how  we're supposed to get everything down there. The skyride garage is  pretty high up. I guess we could use the elevator?" She shook off her  musing. "Nevermind, we can just figure it out when we get there. Someone  has to have a way."

We  climbed back into the car, after I physically hurled myself in front of  Callie to keep her from reaching the drivers seat, despite her protests  about getting us there faster. Jessie was our driver again on the way  back, and it was a relaxing ride that progressed smoothly through the  sky around all obstacles. We were lucky she knew what she was doing,  since neither Benny or I could drive one of the three dimensional cars. I  suspected her brother had owned one back in Velan, given his status as a  guild executive.

After  a relatively short trip back we arrived at the skyride garage and  climbed out of the car. We were in costume, but we were still coated in  blood and muck, despite my best attempts to use Mistwalking to clean us  off. Sadly the skill had zero direct combat applications, which meant  the water pressure was shit, and it barely cleaned off any of the grime.  Because of the obvious mess, we were getting a lot of stares, most of  them from the people running the garage, and most of them, as Benny  guessed, unfriendly. Callie may have been right about the purification  powers, but if she was, these were most likely not the people who had  them, and they were going to have to deal with the mess until those  people showed up.

Ignoring  the hateful glares I approached the nearest employee. "Hi there, do you  know how to get goods down to the monster hunting bounty office?" The  small woman in a crisp white button up, vest, and bow tie, was glaring  at me like I'd just asked her the best way to saute a baby.

She  pointed off to one side with a snarl. "There's a bulk goods elevator  over there." She shoved a finger into my chest. "HOWEVER, it is  preferable if you simply use the loading entrance on the ground floor  when bringing in...corpses." I winced. Yeah, I could see how that would  have pissed her off. With one final sneer she turned and stalked away. I  made a mental not to try to buy lunch for the garage crew or something  with the money from the raccoon bounties, if we made enough. I'd always  heard that 'don't piss of the people who make your food' was an  important rule of survival, but 'don't piss off the people who maintain  your flying car' had to be at least as important a rule.

We  moved the car down to the bulk elevator and hit the button, all  relieved to be away from the garage. I turned to the others. "Ok. So we  let Benny turn in the bounties solo. Hopefully it's enough of a boost  for him to hit H rank, but if not it'll at least get him closer. Then we  split the chits. I suggest we use at least some of them to spring for  lunch for the people int he skyride garage. We're going to be using  those again eventually and I'd rather they not give us the one that has  no brakes or something."

Jessie  nodded emphatically. "Yes please! It's hard enough driving one of those  things when it works well." We all ignored Callie grumbling about how  it wasn't hard at all. Jessie turned to Benny. "One thing though, you  need to pick a name. A temporary will work but personally given how  generic your costume is I'd say you would be better off sticking with  whatever you decide on. You can keep the color scheme with your new  costume and just ride the wave."

I  could tell from his silence that Benny was thinking pretty hard about  it, but he finally nodded. "Yeah. You're right. I'm just...not totally  sure what to pick. I kind of want to go with something relevant, but I'm  planning to change my ability when I get to H rank." I knew he could  merge Lesser Inventing, and I'd expected him to do it, but it was still  crazy to me that someone could change their ability so early. He bit his  lip. "I'm guessing Hephaestus is taken?"

Callie  snorted out a laugh. "Benny, almost everything is taken. You think this  genius over here is the first Ascendant to ever go by Solomon? The  universe is a big place though, and being heavily separated by region  helps with that. People usually avoid using the same name as someone big  on the scene already because it pulls focus. But yeah, Hephaestus is  one of those super common names that will make it pretty much impossible  to advance. There are dozens of them usually, it's especially popular  with crafters."

I  snickered at her comment, I'd checked online after I picked my name,  there were no Solomon's on Callus, but she was probably right about  there being a bunch of others. I wasn't worried about it really, since  my personal method of growing stronger didn't rely on rep as much as  most others, though it was helpful. Still, I felt his pain here, picking  a name was a giant pain in the ass for me. I frowned, thinking over the  potential names that might fit. If he was going to something inventing  based he wanted a machine vibe probably. But something interesting and  fresh too, at least as fresh as possible.

I  blinked. "Hey. What about Clockwork? It's not exactly on the nose, but  that's not a bad thing. Names that give away everything about you are a  liability anyway." Metal and inventing was sure to come up with some  interesting things when combined, and I was betting Clockwork would  apply pretty well then, but it still wasn't the kind of name that made  you think tank. More Mad Scientist, which would be a huge advantage for  him going forward, since people wouldn't expect a Might focus.

He  nodded thoughtfully. "I like that. It has a nice ring to it. Not too  obvious, and I haven't heard of any Clockwork's how about you guys?" He  looked to the girls who shook their head. Honestly analog clocks weren't  really relevant except as show pieces anymore. But I knew Benny had a  pocket watch his father had given him for his thirteenth birthday, the  wealthy still used things like that as a status symbol. It was niche but  still recognizable, which I thought was perfect for a name.

We  climbed into the elevator, heading down to the ground floor. When we  finally made it, we ended up in a side hall that I hadn't seen, with  counters along the sides dotted with big metal platforms that judging by  the sensors at the bottom were scales. We found and empty one and sent  Benny ahead to turn in the job on his own as we waited off to the side.  As he did I began to consider next steps. With four stat points (three  not counting Impact) Benny was only six away from H rank, and this  particular great deed should pay out some serious points, probably  unlocking at least one stat too.

Once  he was at H I had a ton of room to pump him up without notice, and if  he ranked up faster than most they would just attribute that to the  academy. I could give him the stats he needed through wishes if we could  find a way to help him pay for them. The best way I could think to do  that was to get him more materials, and the best place for that was  probably the Academy. Looked like tomorrow it was time to go back to  school.