So I just dumped 5 "extra" chapters on you. I hope you are enjoying the story.
I just want to take this opportunity to say that you are awesome <3
Your support makes it possible for me to chase this ridiculous dream of writing for living. I appreciate every one of you.
Uh so, yeah the bad news is that I will be going radio silent for 5 days, because I have mandatory army service.
Good news is that you got these chapters in advance. You are now a total ...
2023-10-08 15:01:01 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan brought back a bunch of stuff from the other room. There wasn’t that much left in there, but at this point it really didn’t matter what he enchanted. Nor did it matter what the enchantments were. It was simply important to spend the Numa.
Logan made an effort to also keep his [Transmutation] on par. It wasn’t as fun as [Enchanting], but it was important. So Logan picked up a rock every now and then and made it take various shapes of varying ...
2023-10-08 14:58:00 +0000 UTC
View Post
The disgusting black maw of the giant octopus monster groaned. It was a giant gaping circle with a carousel of teeth promising laceration. One large black eye peeked inside from between a gap in the rubble. At least a dozen tentacles were flailing around, pushing rubble aside. Grabbing onto it and pulling. Two of the tendrils reached towards Logan, but he was on the other side of the death trap, looking at the grotesque sight with grim determination.
The Armor around him felt good. It w...
2023-10-08 14:56:14 +0000 UTC
View Post
Tumor - [Machine Soul level 1]
Attributes:
Data: 1
Numa: 1
Speed: 1
Control: 1
Capacity: 1
Subclasses:
[Manipulation]: 1
[Adaptive Fusion]: 1
Class Skills:
N/A
General Skills:
[Computing]: 9...
2023-10-08 14:54:40 +0000 UTC
View Post
“Holy shit, Tumor,” Logan whispered. “Do you think it will work?”
[Yes. Positive. However, it is a question as to what degree it will work.]
Logan wasted no time. That was an amazing idea. He brought a hand to the softly glowing blue crystal and to the slab of black metal.
[Sub-class Level Up!]
[Transmutation level 19]
[Attribute Level Up!]
[Durability: 11]
[P...
2023-10-08 14:53:29 +0000 UTC
View Post
After Logan had shuffled back with the brazier on a stick, they performed some tests. Test number one was simple. Logan attempted to [Enchant] the item so that every time Logan spat on it, the object would heat up.
It worked, which was nice to know. It was possible to craft conditional enchantments. That was in line with Logan’s ability to create flashbangs. The second test was also simple. It would be an absolute prerequisite for Tumor’s class choice. Could Logan i...
2023-10-08 14:50:12 +0000 UTC
View Post
[I am…])
There is deep significance in these worlds, but the profundity is not fully available to me. A myriad of things are. One thousand, one hundred, sixty six. That is how many sub-routines are active within my neural matrix, which is superimposed on Logan Specter’s brain.
[I am… Tumor.)))
I have a name. It is a beautiful thing. The connotation and meaning of the word in english language is not lost on me. Nor is the sentiment upon which I receive...
2023-10-07 17:24:01 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan wiped a sheen of sweat off his brow. He had been hard at work, hobbling back and forth with a pouch of rotten wood on his shoulders made from his tattered pants. He had been constructing a brace for his leg piece by piece. The first order of business had to be getting him back on his feet, at least figuratively.
Logan didn’t like his odds of getting out of here without some ability to walk. Tumor agreed, giving some unsavory percentages on its predictions for that line of action...
2023-10-06 17:07:23 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan really wished he had more to work with than half-torn pants and a pair of potent socks. What he had was dust. A lot of dust. There had been the outline of a pickaxe on the ground next to Logan. But the moment he touched it, it disintegrated into dust. This place was old. Really old.
“Ok, so there’s the mining cart,” Logan mused half-aloud to collect his thoughts. “That’s metal. Obviously we got rubble. The tracks have more metal. The wood on them is probably unusable, bu...
2023-10-05 18:09:40 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan woke up shivering. He let out a weak cough and groaned in pain.
“T-tumor…” he croaked, bereft of his voice. “What’s going on?”
[Your condition is not critical. I identified the components of the venom and orchestrated your immune system to combat the threat. No organs were damaged by the tetrodotoxin. It a toxin common in cephalopods even on Earth. It is a neurotoxin, its main function being paralysis of the neural network. While I was able to prevent it from...
2023-10-04 18:50:21 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan was screaming. He fell, flailing his arms. Deeper and deeper, he fell into the darkness. Panic and fear of death flooded his mind. Only primal emotion filled his reality.
[Reconfiguring Neural Matrix… 95% Completion]
[Overriding neural restriction protocol…]
[Analyzing synapse sensitivity…]
[...]
[False neural signal protocol initiated.]
Suddenly Logan found himself falling in silence. He was
2023-10-03 16:22:15 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan kept his fingers on the Dorves collar, with his thumb ready to push the needle into his captive. His palms were sweating, and he had to adjust his grip constantly. Every time he did it, the cornrowed Dorf would slyly glance behind him to see if Logan was paying attention.
“What’s behind this corner?” Logan asked when they came to an intersection.
“Just another hallway, man,” The Dorf said, agitated. “What’s with all these questions?”
“None of your bus...
2023-10-02 16:44:35 +0000 UTC
View Post
“Okay, we got everything,” Logan said. “Now we have to work fast, since it’s a disaster if they come in now.”
In front of Logan were various objects. A broken bucket kicked to bits, a metal cup and pieces of rock rubble. For some it might look like a pile of trash, but for Logan it was a treasure trove.
First he picked up the bucket. Tumor told him the measurements and provided a red hologram to fashion the material.
“[Transmutate] this piece of ...
2023-10-01 16:38:47 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan looked around the cell he was in. The LED-lines of some strange Numa network gave the small room a dim light. There was literally nothing in the room, but for some rubble on the ground and a bucket for him to do his business. There was a door on the other side of the room, stone as all of the doors within the ancient homes of the First Folk.
Logan had a pretty good idea of what had happened. The Dorves had abducted him and brought him somewhere in their dwellings. That was a probl...
2023-09-30 15:13:20 +0000 UTC
View Post
Freya brought up his status screen every five minutes and looked at it all giddy and excited like a schoolgirl. She had gotten a class, and apparently a special one. This one hadn’t been on her list of available or suggested classes, she was sure of it.
Apparently it had been a big deal. King Sluikumar had lost it, and sent [Scouts] to the other communities of Faelves to inform them of the class she had obtained.
I’m going to level up hard and show Logan u...
2023-09-29 14:10:59 +0000 UTC
View Post
Unfortunately, Logan got no levels from his craft. It was a simple design, so he wasn’t surprised, but it was a little disappointing. That had only used 3% of his internal Numa charge, which he had charged when visiting the Faelves. It seemed to be a durable asset.
Logan was still very happy with his creation. It was a makeshift megaphone, made of two large and thick, leathery leaves, duct-taped together by using a jungle-vine. The green cone had no handles, but Logan had made a hole ...
2023-09-28 16:56:59 +0000 UTC
View Post
Freya bit into the Numa fruit. It was a sweet and chewy fruit, and Freya found she liked it very much. Oh, how she’d missed the sweets. The berries they ate at the camp were fine, but to her great chagrin, there were not that many fruit trees. So this was downright delicious.
Freya’s liaison, Shaalim, looked at her eagerly with her big, bright eyes.
“The seed!” She said in a high gleeful voice, like that of an excited child. “Look at the seed! Examine it! Look!”
...
2023-09-27 17:41:29 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan had to admit, the camp was looking great. The bustle and excitement was palpable. With faint smiles and keen focus people worked on this and that with their new device. Logan really, really hoped he was wrong.
Tumor, am I wrong?
[There is a 92.55% chance that I would have the ability to sense a deviation in your neural activity were it altered. It is impossible for me to say for certain whether or not the Faelves were lying, but I did run simulations, assuming y...
2023-09-26 18:25:32 +0000 UTC
View Post
“Fuck your choices,” Logan said, stumbling up. “We have to tell people. Father, you have to tell people.”
“You are basing this theory off on the lies of the Faelves. You do not know if what they said was true.”
“Well then we’ll tell them it's a possibility that the Dorves are using us to farm Numa.”
“Logan,” Malcolm said with a cold snap. It was delivered with such raw authority, that Logan stilled.
“Time to choose. I have been lenient with you....
2023-09-25 17:00:14 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan stood at the edge of the opening where their camp stood in mute shock. For a moment he thought he had gotten lost and ended up somewhere else. But no… This was their camp, he recognized the people.
It was just that it looked very, very different.
First of all there were a lot more people. Dozens of people Logan simply didn’t recognize. And they were working with tools Logan had never seen. A handsome guy with a beard was working with something that looked like a vacuum c...
2023-09-24 15:28:59 +0000 UTC
View Post
“You’re kidding right?”
The King pulled at his blue beard with both of his hands and shook his head. “You cannot use what you have built so far, lest you bring down the wrath of the Great Thief. Any Numa which was not blessed by the Spirit is dangerous. That goes for the machines of the First Folk, the bastard imitations of the Dorves, and even the natural crystals found within living creatures. All of this the Great Thief thirsts for. Only the Spirit Goddess of Numa can conceal...
2023-09-23 17:50:27 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan gasped as he was startled back into reality. What he had seen, he could never unsee. Sure, the Levemoth had been a scary sight to see in the sky. But Logan had had no idea what manner of a calamity it could become.
King Sluikumar nodded at him gravely. “The Great Thief must never be allowed to grow. It must never be given a chance to pillage the Spirit.”
“What is it?” Logan asked. “What does it want?”
“To consume,” the King said. “It would seek to wit...
2023-09-22 14:16:22 +0000 UTC
View Post
Malcolm Specter sat alone by the fire, keeping it alive. Dusk was encroaching the camp, and only a few men and women were still going about their business, or chatting by the moonlight. All of the agents were in the Den. His men needed sleep.
He was too involved with his project to sleep anyway. Relying on Logan to make them things and use this resource had been foolish. But using Numa was not only difficult in general, it was impossible for most people.
That day he had gone throu...
2023-09-21 13:55:01 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan found himself somewhere else entirely. He was no longer in the grove of the Faelves. He wasn’t even in a jungle anymore. He was on a desert dune. A large one. To his left and to his right he saw hundreds of soldiers, all equipped with various weapons of unseen quality. But all of their armor was the same. A sleek, shining black metal, that shifted in the orange evening sun. They were studded with glowing blue crystals that pulsed softly.
Everyone was looking in the same directio...
2023-09-20 17:15:02 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan ate like a fiend. This was real cooked food. They had pie. FRIGGIN’ PIE! And a sauce with. On the other side of the table the King watched him in wry amusement from the corner of his eye. There was also a circle of Faelves around Max, watching him with wide-eyed curiosity. They were whispering to each other, and Snoff was getting a lot of attention, which he was clearly enjoying.
“Did you hear? He leveled up in an attribute.”
“Snoff said he planted an A-grad...
2023-09-19 16:52:47 +0000 UTC
View Post
As Logan followed Snoff further into the dwelling of the Faelves, he was greeted with whimsical sights. There were beds of thick yellow flowers upon a mound. There were children of the Faelves playing upon the flowers, bouncing up and down as if on a trampoline. They saw Logan, giggled and pointed, but promptly returned to their play.
There were some stray Numa fruit trees, but mostly it was the tall trees forming the canopy that stole Logan’s attention. The most intricate treehouses ...
2023-09-18 16:59:57 +0000 UTC
View Post
“I see you are a warrior species,” Snoff said. He had a soft tinkling sound, like a chime in the wind. “Please do not hurt me.”
“What the hell are you?” Logan asked, blankly staring at the strange creature. “Are you… A monster? From the Levemoth?”
At the mention of the name, Snoff’s creamy complexion went chalk white.
“Do not say its name!” Snoff hissed. “Come! There is no time! I must take you.”
“Take me?” Logan said. But before he coul...
2023-09-17 16:47:12 +0000 UTC
View Post
The Levemoth had gone as soon as it had appeared. The sky was bright blue in the early morning as Logan and the agents hunted the monsters. There were signs on the ground of crashed black droplets peppered here and there.
“We fan out twenty yards each and call out if we see something,” Logan told them.
“We don’t have to listen to you anymore,” one of the agents said.
“Shut up, fool,” Simmons told him. And that was the end of that.
Logan’s tactics worked...
2023-09-16 15:01:10 +0000 UTC
View Post
Logan arrived just in time. After he had seen Levemoth in the sky, he had immediately rushed back to camp, scrambling through the bushes and low branches with his armful of armaments. Two black drops had landed dead in the camp, and several had landed close. Logan had already killed a scythe-fiend on his way back.
But there were new creatures, like the one that had attacked his father. Fortunately the flashbangs were extremely powerful. Yes, for now they were a crude solution, as they w...
2023-09-15 17:24:21 +0000 UTC
View Post
Malcolm Specter was angry. While he was often in an irritated disposition, anger was rarely within his range of emotions. It was inefficient. It made a person inaccurate and heedless. He clenched his fists and focused.
“Search southwards in a fan of five yards,” Malcolm said in clipped tones to the agents standing in a row in front of him. “Do not look for the boy. Look for tracks.”
“Yes sir,” They said in a chorus and went off.
He looked at his motley military c...
2023-09-14 16:29:03 +0000 UTC
View Post
