Luca DR

Edge 139

139 – Ice Octagon

The marble columns drew closer as they walked. It didn’t matter which direction the due walked towards, for all roads led to the center of this astral/mental space, and indeed as the pillars of white stone became taller and more imposing, sparse vegetation began to also appear. It was not green, but a sick and mutated brown with hints of red, lit by distant crimson lightning that rumbled in the distance. The sky, barely visible, was a sphere of dull red rust up a...

Edge 138

138 – Ruby manifestation

Jeff, talk to me. Did it work?

Affirmative. However, cohesion is lower than expected.

Albert looked around, having found himself along with Scrappy in an unknown place. He was surrounded by whiteness all around, but with hints of shadows and reds in the air. Humidity that was almost solid shrouded the ground and sky, and light from above shone in golden shafts among barely visible marble columns. In the distance above, a...

Edge 137

137 – Weak Mind

“Ah, Lina isn’t feeling well. I had to put her to sleep.”

Scrappy wasn’t stupid, of course. “Why was she attacking you? I saw her, that I did. Is she ill in the head?”

Albert nodded. The girl was quite smart, and she must have had balls of steel not to have succumbed to utter panic by now, with all that happened in a short amount of time.

“That’s what I’m trying to see.” Albert said. “Good job dodging earlier, by the way. Perfe...

Edge 136

136 – 2v1

Albert was aware that someone was watching: he had felt a presence hidden somewhere when he arrived in the cave, but he had been unable to do anything about it. Now he was struggling to protect the girl from the onslaught of flaming bullets coming her way, straining his Power to the extreme to simply tank the hits without any sophistication, simple kinetic shields and nothing more. Then finally the presence made itself known.

It was Lina. She appeared right behind th...

Edge 135

135 – Sidekick Gains

Scrappy weaved through the obstacles, straining her muscles and her limbs in ways she didn’t think possible. It wasn’t easy. In fact, it was the opposite of easy. It was painful, tiring and extremely taxing on her mind, but the more attempts at the course she took, the better she became at it.

It was at her third try that she finally understood why Sir Albert was making her do this. She had to grow accustomed to her new human body if she wanted to make...

Edge 134

134 – Obstacle course

Scrappy read the contents of the mysterious box in front of her with sparkles in her eyes. Tears too, if she wasn’t mistaken, but she barely noticed that she wiped them away with her hand. When she was done, she read the content of the quest again, for good measure.

Beside her, Albert was engrossed in whatever it was that he did when he stared off into nothingness, perhaps daydreaming. He was surely tired after having created a quest for her.

And ...

Edge 133

133 – Power theory

Albert sat cross legged on a small stone that was cold but, fortunately, not frozen over. He was thinking of ways to get the job done, giving Scrappy enough magic so that he wouldn’t have to worry about her survival. True, she still had the Defense Handbook and had done the procedure for the day, but he didn’t feel comfortable leading her deeper into danger until she had magic of her own.

Whether said magic was mana-based, Doom or something else entirely...

Edge 132

132 - Cat

Slowly the narrow dark tunnel of the catacombs morphed into a more natural-looking cave. Here and there, spent torches lined the walls, coming to life with bright orange flames before the duo passed thanks to a subtle flex of Albert’s Power. It took barely any effort to light the torches, he noticed, both because the action itself wasn’t all that hard to begin with, but also because he had gained a great deal of power in the span of a few days.

It was easy to lose ...

Edge 131

131 – Clever manipulation

The city quickly turned into a prison for Albert, at least in his mind. It was fascinating to see how quickly his mood could change given the different circumstances, and although he had the Power to leave if he wanted, it wasn’t worth the risk. As such, the walls he was walking towards were tall and ominous, the dark stone washed by the incessant frigid rain was slippery and covered in muck. What few torches still burned in the rain created thick, black ...

Edge 130

130 – Information

We need to go back to Bastion. We are being chased by five A-rankers, judging by their tokens, and no amount of creative use of Power will ever even the odds if we come to blows again. They know me and my strategy now.

Agreed. However, you might want to perform the experiment now before you return to the city.

Fine.

Albert prepared himself and breathed in. Beside him, Scrappy was quietly snoring, no doubt exhaust...

Edge 129

129 – Food for thought

Albert groaned. The world was, once again, spinning. But he had escaped the A-rankers, if barely. There had been five of them, armed to the teeth. Two cultivators, one mage, and two others he could barely classify. It did seem like magic was different for everyone. He even thought he saw the flash of a card, an actual game card from a sort of deck before he was pelted with magic and could no longer afford to waste time on his musings.

As his Focus droppe...

Edge 128

128 - Trust

Scrappy suddenly stopped walking, perking up and sniffing the air like a cat. Her ears seemed to twitch ever so slightly, but they were covered by her hair and it was hard to tell. It was clear, however, that she was straining her senses to the extreme. Albert studied her for a moment, seeing that the magic within her, the strange structure he had already started to slowly study with the help of his AI, was moving ever so slightly.

“Someone is following us.” She ...

Edge of apocalypse 127

just a heads up: i broke my collarbone yesterday and... writing is not easy with the injury. we still have a healthy dose of backlog for the patreon, even more so for RR, but I wanted to let you know just in case

127 – Old names

Albert learned that when he set himself up to do a task, important like escaping Bastion without complications, he could be strikingly effective. He was so dead set and laser focused that he momentarily overrode his brain’s quirks and used all his ar...

Edge of apocalypse 126

126 – Rushed and cramped

As soon as Albert name-dropped the Kirkesis Core, the guild master’s whole demeanor seemed to change abruptly. Albert was not so clueless as not to realize when he made a potential mistake, and with a budding headache already lessening his focus, he very well considered bolting out of the guild as fast as possible.

Which was, clearly, not doable. Surrounded as he was by adventurers, such action might land him squarely from the frying pan into the fir...

Edge of apocalypse 125

125 – Dangerous fellow

The man crumpled to the ground even as a faint hint of a headache made itself known to Albert’s sensibilities. The man’s power was clearly below Albert’s own 33, and it was easy to tell even without a scan by the way magic acted around him. Everyone in this world was either magic or Doom – or a mix of both like Scrappy was – therefore by looking at how magic behaved it was possible to have an idea of someone’s Power without risking a scan.

Th...

Edge of apocalypse 124

124 – Backlash

Albert woke up with a groan. The edges of his vision sported the familiar blackness to them that he had, unfortunately, gotten used to as of late. Feeling the pain in every inch of his body, he tried to pull himself up, hearing the sound of scuttering feet closing in.

Panic threatened to take over his mind as he struggled to remember how he ended up in this situation. He was in a bed, covered by an ungodly amount of heavy sheets, but he didn’t seem to be bound...

Edge of apocalypse 123

123 – Inn

“A room for two.” Albert said. “No, wait.” He looked at the boy standing next to him like a puppy. “That came out wrong. Two rooms.”

The innkeeper nodded without speaking, and produced two keys. Albert took them, and offered one to Scrap. The boy took a moment to understand the meaning behind the small pieces of metal being dangled in front of his face, but when he did his eyes went huge.

“Sir! Lord! I-I can’t accept this!”

Albert cocked...

Edge of apocalypse 122

122 – Scrappy boy

The large stone gates of Bastion hung wide open, and the paved road – which did not extend more than a hundred meters away from Bastion before reverting to a bland dirt road – was devoid of people so that the large convoy could pass through without issue. To the side, standing in the fields and in the ditches, the travelers waited for the caravan to pass.

It was a procession of many carts pulled by beasts and monsters, covered in drapes of fabric of many ...

Edge of apocalypse 121

121 – Regroup and focus

You overdid it again.

Show me logs. What happened?

Power +1

Critical failure: Focus dropped below 8%

Power +5

Bending successful.

New stat: physical power 1 -> 2

I did it.

Albert pushed himself up to his feet. He needed to stop fainting so much. It wasn’t healthy, nor was it safe. A quick ...

Edge of apocalypse 120

120 – Stop fainting

Reality Bending Power: 14 -> 19

You might be happy to hear that I have enough data to correlate Power growth with Focus drops.

Ugh. Albert groaned in pain. His head felt like it had been pried open with a crowbar, filled with explosives and set aflame. He pulled himself up, slipping on the blood. At the edge of his vision, the number 22% told him he had regained some Focus.

How long was I out? 2023-09-09 18:55:05 +0000 UTC View Post