Chapitre 60: 2-1-1
The new year greeted the city with, surprisingly enough, quiet and calm. At least in this particular portion of it. The snow laid thick on the wide, open streets, shining in the reflected light of the morning sun, intercepted with long shadows of the skyscrapers dominating the landscape. An astute eye could spot empty cans and bottles and burnt out fireworks lying around, which together with the broken windows some of the shorter buildings sported, somewhat detracted from the charm. That is to say, the idyllic visage of a winterswept, sleepy town meant no one noticed when a person showed up in the middle of the street in a ripple of air and a cloud of displaced snow. The stranger looked unassuming, a high collared grey jacket over white sweater and dark pants, pale skin, with short black hair and grey eyes, about average height. Everything about him was average and unremarkable, really.
A quick examination of the surroundings didn't yield much in the way of identifying landmarks for the man, unless one counted a rather on the nose gang tag brazenly displayed on the wall of one of the skyscrapers. A pair of eights, which also looked like a pair of different symbols, should one be so inclined to interpret them. Black on a red background too, just to drive the point home.
"Subtle." The man muttered under his breath. Concerning, too, given that it was big enough and placed so tall it'd have taken a whole crew with scaffolding to get it done. At least a glance at himself in one of the nearby windows told him they probably would leave well enough alone.
There was, of course, the rather poignant question of how he'd gone from a hispano-asiatic hairball to the human embodiment of white bread. Unfortunately, all his brain provided was a whole bunch of microwave noises and a vague impression of having agreed to something.
Well, that and a name. Outis Karas, because apparently he was engaging in the ancestral catalonian tradition of looting the Greeks now. Not that he had an alternative, either, with how his actual name was blotted out with static. Which–
Yeah, he was not going to dwell on any longer, thank you. Time to check his pockets and see how screwed he was in the immediate. A quick go revealed a pack of seven cards in his back pocket, going through all the colours of the rainbow in a gradient. And then, because magic was apparently real, the world seemed to freeze, everything but him and the cards sliding to grayscale.
[Account Name: 'Outis Karas' accepted.]
[Welcome to P/HO. To begin the game, you must equip a Class Card. You have been given seven Blank Cards.]
[Blank Cards provide basic parameter increases and access to class-specific Skills. Upgrading them will allow for greater parameter increases, levelling the Skills and acquisition of Personal Skills and Noble Phantasm.]
[To equip a Blank Card, simply state "(Colour + Class Name), Install!"]
[Due to that, another name for Blank Cards is Chromatic Class Cards.]
"Merda." He swore under his breath, then did it again when he saw the design on the top card. Missing memories, appearing somewhere with no explanation, vague recollection of an agreement, Servant Class Cards? The only question was what terrifying force of nature he was the world-saving errand boy of now.
Worse, it being so overt meant that things were bad. The Counter Forces were lazy fucks, they would much rather just give things a tiny nudge nobody would ever notice. He supposed it could be Zelretch, the pop up windows weren't that far off from giving someone a Kaleidostick, but the old man would've had the common decency of giving him an actual briefing.
…Right. He didn't know these beings. Just a mushroom's marketable takes on them. He'd have to play it by the ear, then. At least the decision of what to equip wasn't hard, just took figuring out what colour the Class was.
"Indigo Assassin, Install." The clash between cringe and childlike wonder at saying something out of a tonkatsu show and meaning it was fierce, but at least nobody could see Outis' twitching face in timestop.
Foreign muscle memory guided his motions as he gripped the card firmly yet carefully between his fingers, face forward as he thrust his arm in front of him. Immediately, a magic circle sprang to life around him with a shimmer of crimson light. He knelt, pressing the Card face down to the circle, where a mirrored image of the glyph flew upwards, almost as if the field of magic was scanning his body.
Then, bands of brilliant white light erupted from seven points of the circle, entangling themselves over his head before crashing down onto Outis' still kneeling form. Yet, he could feel no weight pressing him down. Instead, he was beckoned to rise up and stand straight and proud. As he did so, indigo flames engulfed his body, covering it almost completely, save for his eyes. They burned for but a heartbeat or two before they cooled, died down and solidified into his new apparel.
A dark hoodie and sweats, their smokey swirls of deep indigo almost imperceptible if not for how they broke up his silhouette. A pair of gloves and boots that felt like a second skin, and a bandana around his neck, melting into the shadows of his hood. He felt light as a feather for all that his clenching and unclenching fingers may as well be steel claws, like he could scale that eyesore of a gang-tagged building easy as taking a stroll down the street.
[Assassin selected. In Free Roam, the Class' Presence Concealment makes it for a good scout to find out Quests and Points of Interest (Instances/Dungeons) without getting into too much trouble.]
[Relatively, early on.]
"Loving the confidence." Outis (or Assassin right now, he supposed) grumbled as he scrunched into his new outfit. It may make him look like a mugger but damn if the indomitable spirit of humanity didn't know how to make some comfy sweats.
[You can designate two other Cards as your 'Hand'. Cards belonging to a Hand can be Quick Swapped to adjust as the situation demands. In Free Roam, it has little effect, but you cannot adjust your Hand once combat starts.]
…His heart cried out for Caster, but not only would it be a gamble if it gave him any combat ability before he put in some work, he was clearly in a first world city and that meant getting dogpiled by spooks if he did anything obviously magical. Rider was also out unless it came with a motorcycle instead of a living mount and even then he'd have to summon it out of sight, so if he had to make a quick getaway it'd have to be with Assassin.
So… "Set Archer and Berserker" Outis decided after a moment. Someone ending up full of arrows may raise some eyebrows (although it may just give him a gun, Assassin was looking pretty modern), but not enough to get him in the shit, so it was his best option in case he needed to fight at range. Berserker was the 'oh shit, oh fuck' button, plain and simple. He'd just have to hope Mad Enhancement was on a toggle and not too high rank, but if he got in a tough spot where the only way out was through, a big brick of stats was the best way.
[Archer and Berserker added to the Hand.] The system helpfully informed him.
[Current Objective: Gather information about immediate surroundings and situation.]
[Reward: 1x Saint Quartz.]
With that, the world slid out of grayscale and back into motion, leaving Outis back alone in 'Free Roam' of the city. With how unhelpfully open-ended the objective was, and how these kinds of things tended to go, it meant an encounter shouldn't be too far away.
"Character Sheet." He whispered, hoping that the system would cooperate. He'd been leery of prodding it when it was giving him the step by step, but now it should be fine.
Thankfully, it did cooperate. Although the screen was in his mind's eye instead of in front of his own. Which were apparently indigo now, same with his hair. Dark enough nobody would notice in the gloom of his hood, though, even if he didn't like the resemblance to Shinji one bit. Immediately relevant to him, apparently, were the first two fields in the top right, as well as the one immediately below his 'character sprite'.
[Name: Outis Karas]
[Current Mystic Code: None]
[Current Card Equipped: Indigo Assassin]
Then, under the equipped card field, there was an option to see the Card's current sheet, which listed Assassin's specs which were… well, they certainly were.
[STR: E AGL: D END: E MAG: E LCK: D]
[Class Skills]
[Presence Concealment [E] – At this rank, can only blend preternaturally well into a crowd or the darkness. Someone with the level of situational awareness of special forces would be able to notice Assassin's presence. If preparing for hostile action, even a normal person with good instincts would get a twinge.]
[Personal Skills]
[N/A]
[Armaments]
[Indigo Daggers – A solidly good quality pair of knives (bowie and fairbarn-sykes) with absolutely nothing unique to them. They can be dismissed and summoned as per Servant gear rules.]
[Noble Phantasms]
[N/A]
Once done beholding the absolute state of the sneaky one, Outis noticed three more fields in the bottom right: An option to just change his name, gender toggle and a (currently greyed-out) Mystic Code selector.
The former would've been useful if, y'know, his real one wasn't completely blotted out of his memory. Another scrabble there only told him that whatever it had been, it could be read as 'nothing', so it looked like Outis was as close as he'd be getting. The latter… well, his pragmatic side said that if someone noticed him in mugger chic, being a cute girl would hopefully defuse any suspicion because people were shallow like that.
The other side of him was just chanting the 4chan mantra as he experimentally focused down on the button with his mind. It wasn't like there was a hologram for him to poke.
Immediately, he (she?) could feel himself shrink down. His mental image, after a bit of a flicker with Indigo Assassin, settled down on the female version of him. The momentary lack of indigo filter landed her square in the 'cute girl next door' vibe.
[Gender change found and unlocked. From now on, the option to transition between the two will only require a mental command instead of digging through menus.]
[Please note that transitioning while having a Card installed may have unintended consequences, especially for Chromatic Cards. They are more malleable.]
[You would think it would be actual Servant Cards that wouldn't play nice with degenerate shenanigans, but no.]
"I mean, d'Eon exists." Outis muttered, taking note of both her voice (bright and sweet, although probably not enough for Yagoo to bust down her door) and the fact that the system definitely had some personality. That was a point towards Zelretch, man liked his assistant AIs, even if Ruby and Sapphire had turned out too obnoxious for him to bother with.
'What sort of unintended consequences?' She added in her mind experimentally, flexing it in a similar way as she'd done with the button. It'd be best if she didn't have to speak to thin air like a loon, although if need be she'd just fake a phone call.
[Certain skills and effects do have gender requirements, to begin with. Both positive and negative. Additionally, Chromatic Cards are meant to develop with usage.]
'Right, even beyond Servant nonsense, there's things like how female magi have an easier time with flight magecraft and can use their hair as a high value item.' Lots of conceptual bullfuckery going on with what plumbing you had, if you cared to dig a bit. Ah, well, it sounded like she got to double dip without any glitches so long as she swapped while no Chromatic Card was Installed, so it was all good. 'Or does consistently using a certain card as a specific gender cause it to shift too?'
[Negative. Consistently and frequently switching between states while equipping a Chromatic Card may influence it.]
'Cool, cool. I'll leave sleeping dogs lie, I think.' Outis started strolling as she threw around her musings. Partly because a darkly clothed figure standing still in an empty street didn't exactly inspire warm and fuzzy feelings in people (even if it seemed to be early enough everyone should still be sleeping off their hangovers), partly just to revel in how fucking good her body felt. E rank may sound like shit, but ten times the average human performance was one hell of a drug. She felt like she could run a triathlon, deadlift a car and pinball across those skyscrapers like she was a Tenno on ten cups of coffee.
The surrounding buildings were somewhat well maintained, even if there was still some level of dilapidation here and there. Clearly a more struggling sort of city, then. And, of course, the gang tags strewn all over the place, if more reasonably obscured than the first one that greeted Outis. Possibly a consequence of celebrations getting out of hand?
As she walked, the usual sound of cars passing by started to be faintly audible in the distance. Eventually, she stumbled across a bench, with crumpled, snow covered newspaper spread out across it like the world's saddest pillow. The title read 'Brockton Bay Bulletin' and the date proclaimed 31st December 2010. The front page had a picture of an olive skinned woman in form fitting, stylised army fatigues with an american flag scarf pulled over her lower face. 'Miss Militia's public address. The ups and downs of Brockton Bay Protectorate for the past year.' The last page had a blurry picture of four shadowy figures riding… some sort of quadrupeds. 'Undersiders, the bold teen villains on the upswing?'.
…
...
'At least it isn't Marvel or DC?' Outis thought just a touch hysterically. The good news was that she could pretend to be a superhero and nobody would bat an eye at her nonsense… hopefully. It may very well play by MHA rules with one pretty narrow power per person, so she may still get dogpiled by spooks just for having whole powersets she could swap between. Nevermind whatever ferocious nonsense she'd be cooking up with Caster soon enough.
Ugh, secret identities would be such a fucking pain in the ass. Even if the Chromatic Cards all came with something that worked like a mask, she'd still need to cook something up with Caster for Servant Cards. Hopefully an identity dissociation effect ala meguca wouldn't be too bothersome to cook up. Wait, didn't Kaleidosticks have that baked in? 'Hey, System, are you at a discretion to tell me who made you and what our job here is? Also, what would you like me to call you?'
[To quote a certain Servant: "Le secret~☆."]
[No preferences.]
Outis couldn't help a soft chuckle, idly pulling her bandana up to her nose under the charade of the cold. It was actually quite nice and, if the circumstances were better, she'd be all too happy to play in the snow for a while. Didn't get much of that next to the mediterranean. 'I'll give it some thought. Maybe one of the Sephirah? Also, do you come with some identity protection or will I need to make a Mystic Code for it with Caster?'
[Presence Concealment. All Chromatic Cards come with some form of facial cover, save for Berserker which in exchange alters facial features, if not too heavily. At least for now, further rank-ups of Mad Enhancement or Personal Skills may or may not change that.]
Yeah, she could work with that. Now, time to figure out what the fuck she was doing about her living situation. Caster should let her take over an abandoned building easily enough, so that was shelter taken care of. Beyond that… 'I already know the answer, but just to check, I don't have anything to my name other than the Chromatic Cards and whatever gear they may summon, yeah?'
[You do have your own clothes.]
Right. Hooray for not being buck-ass naked as a normal (probably) human in the middle of the snow whenever she didn't have a Card Installed. Anyways, that meant no papers and no money. If she was lucky, superhuman Endurance meant she could go a while without food or drink, but at the end of the day she'd need to either swipe some money or sign up with a group.
…Yeah, probably better to play pickpocket on gangers for the time being. She'd rather not jump into the arms of any organisation until she had more data. Even if the world was wacky enough that having a superpowered stranger tumbling out of another dimension had government services for it… well, she may not be somewhere like Brazil or Venezuela, but the newspaper was written in american english. So depending on what state she was in, it could be anything from getting thrown in a cell to being given an apartment and a stipend.
Hopefully the libraries here didn't require an ID to use the computers.
Whatever plan she had would have to be put on hold as the footsteps crunching in the snow reached her ears. Footsteps, alongside sounds of… dogs, if she had to guess. The subtle clinking of chains certainly pointed to that. From behind the corner, a person stepped out, wearing heavy boots and fur collared jacket, face obscured by a cheap dog mask framed by locks of red hair. Accompanying them were three large dogs. The dogs stopped first, spotting Outis, causing the person to freeze as well, their gaze initially sliding over her before one of the dogs nudged a chain-wrapped arm and they managed to focus. [Master: Bitch] the title box above their head seemed to glitch out momentarily before settling on [Rider: Bitch].
[Congratulations, you've found a local to interrogate! Objective complete!]
[1 x Saint Quartz gained.]
[New Objective: Successfully obtain information from Bitch.]
[Rewards: 1 x Saint Quartz, depends on approach.]
Now, she'd never claimed to be the most socially apt person, her cocktail of neuroses made sure she was dogshit (hah) at reading cues. However, between the stage name and how the woman presented herself, figuring out a good approach wasn't exactly hard. Hands out where the superhuman could see them, Presence Concealment off, and words blunt as a brick. "Sup. New in town and not about to start shit."
Pickpocketing some gangoons to buy food wasn't exactly starting shit, as far as she was concerned.
The, going by the unflattering nickname, presumed woman grunted in acceptance of the words. She stayed silent for another long moment, hand absentmindedly petting one of her dogs as she contemplated something.
"Thoughts on dog fighting rings?" She asked eventually.
"Worse than even goddamn bullfighting." Outis replied immediately, not doing anything to keep the very real heat out of her voice, "The people who do that to dogs should get their ears clipped, see how they like it."
The woman's posture relaxed a bit more. "Wanna help bust one? I keep the dogs, you keep the cash?"
"Deal. Kinda broke right now, so cash and a public service is a win-win." Outis said with a nod after a moment's thought, rubbing her hands happily at the prospect of all the loot. It would make her some enemies with a gang, for sure, but honestly fuck 'em. Plus, it got her a tentative ally.
…Speaking of, she'd need a superhero name to be called by. 'Ah, there we go, thanks brain.'
"It's nearby. Scouted it a few times to make sure." Bitch grunted, pointing back the way Outis came. "See they announced themselves too." She added, making it obvious she spoke about the building with the massive tag on it. "You're a Stranger, can you make sure there's no capes inside?"
"Yeah, my stuff works better in a crowd, so it should be easy enough." The Assassin said with a bob of her head even as she made a mental note of the terminology. Intuitive enough.
[New Objective: Bust a dog fighting ring.]
[Rewards: Money, ???.]
With no more conversation forthcoming, she slunk off, letting the Class Card guide her. The skyscraper with the massive, doubled eight over its front entrance stood as it was when she left it behind not too long ago, the main entrance littered with discarded fireworks and beer bottles. Said entrance was, surprisingly enough, both automated and open, the door sliding to the sides when she approached. The foyer just beyond sported some more signs of festivities, discarded food and the likes, alongside first unmasked people around, still sleeping New Years off.
The temptation to swipe their wallets was strong, but she had a job to do here. Once they were ignored, the rest of the ground floor was fairly typical. Nothing critical there, just a reception area, a few corridors leading to unimportant looking offices, waiting rooms and, of course, toilets. Most of which were empty of people. The stairs up were behind actually locked doors and the lifts didn't seem to actually work. Finally, tucked beside a (closed and locked) back entrance was a security office where a pair of guards dozed off by a small table, completely ignoring the camera feeds, an abandoned game of cards on the table.
Well, that was promising. A peek at the feeds should tell her everything she needed to know, plus she could snatch their keys for free run of the building. A bit of work revealed that the higher floors were perfectly normal office space, with perfectly normal celebrations, with the worst things happening being cases of dubiously allowed and alcohol enabled office romance, alongside some unfortunate janitors working their way down the building.
The basement floors, on the other hand… Well, there was nothing directly incriminating, but the amount of traffic seen from the lobby down or from the underground parking towards the stairs implied things. Swiping the keys and access card off the security guard afterwards was a little bit tricky, the men keeping them in their pockets for some semblance of challenge.
But, well, Assassin. It may not be a capital-S Skill, but having superhumanly light fingers was part and parcel. The only real stumbling block was adjusting to the new instincts, but soon enough she was slipping down to the underground levels. The first underground level, a parking lot, didn't stand out. A whole lot of cars, but otherwise completely empty. The staircase was tucked a fair bit away from the lifts, with additional doors barring the way further down. Well, for someone without the card.
All that led to the spacious underground hall, lights dimmed, with the air heavy with the smell of smoke and alcohol, people slumped over the tables or on the benches in a variety of outfits, but with predominantly red-white-black accessorising or outright colours for the outfits. And, at the centre of it all was a caged off arena, red floor with the distinct, black double eight on it, with cages containing resting dogs just outside the gates to it. The big change was that quite a few people here were awake, either those who managed to rise early or those who never went to sleep in the first place, shuffling groggily around in search of drink or food. One of these, a middle aged, balding guy looking a serious part of 'salaryman after a night on the town' stopped shakily close to Outis, his gaze glazing over as much from effects of Presence Concealment as it did because of tiredness and alcohol his breath stink with.
"Huh? Whad d'you wann?" The man slurred, propping himself against the wall for some balance. He must have some serious chops to notice her while this hammered, but it seemed like Presence Concealment was keeping her from registering as someone too out of place. Not a cape, though, he lacked a title over his head. Nobody had any such marker, really, so mission accomplished.
"Just making the rounds." She murmured before slipping back out. She already had the floor plan committed to memory and there were no doors other than the one she had come in through.
"F'ir enouff." The man nodded before pushing himself away. "'S pretty borrrin' 'nyway. Piss and quiet."
"Cops don't like when you kill." Was all Bitch told Outis once she got in through the underground garage. Her dogs had mutated into massive, lizard-like, four legged beasts of teeth, claws and bone-y plates over their bodies. Even their tongues looked more serpentine. In short, they looked magnificent.
Bitch could've probably used her own advice, the woman was being pretty brutal with that chain of hers. Her dog-beasts, commanded by Bitch's whistling, weren't exactly gentle in their mauling either. It was fairly impressive how the four of them were going through the entire ring of suddenly very much awake, if chaotic and disorganised, white supremacists. At least it didn't look like anyone had a gun on themselves.
"Fuckin' bitch! C'mon boys, Hook is gonna kill us if we let her break another one!" The man who previously spotted Outis, now much more coherent, tried to bring some semblance of order to the gangers, jacket wrapped around one arm, muscular frame flexing as he tried to keep one of the dogs at bay with a baton.
Which was why the Assassin happily introduced his achilles' tendons to her bowie knife. Right when he was playing tug of war with the dog, of course. Noticing a threat was worthless when you couldn't do anything about it. He went down with a cry, even if, to the man's credit, he kept his jacketed arm between himself and the monster-dog.
"Fukcin' Strangers!" Was all he could grunt before he was too preoccupied.
Assassin happily faded back into the chaos, the dogs keeping everyone entirely too busy to notice her even as she gleefully revoked kneecap privileges. They knew there was someone going around popping off those shoddy joints with satisfying cracks, but damned if they could get a bead on her. Idly, she noticed that Bitch had taken advantage of the bedlam to slip down into the arena and get started on freeing the dogs, going one by one and spending a moment with each before going for the next.
Outis made sure she wouldn't be disturbed, redoubling her efforts to snuff any rallying or potential problem in the cradle by way of generous stabbings. This was fun!
Soon enough, the gangers, actual and suspected, were all moaning pitifully on the floor, some back in the sweet embrace of unconsciousness. Bitch, for her own part, stood by the stairs with a handful of leashes and a new pack of dogs.
"Go grab their wallets, I'll make sure you have peace." She grunted as she directed one of her transformed dogs partially upstairs.
"Much appreciated." Outis said with a jaunty two-finger salute, going to work swiping their cash and snapping all their cards. Just for that extra bit of spite.
"Un barco una vez quiso navegar, y su nombre era La Tetera del Mar~𝆕."
[Objective complete!]
[Rewards: $800, Bond with Bitch increased from 0 to 1.]
At least the notifications from the system were unobtrusive enough. There was a feeling like the system wanted to continue exposition but held back while Bitch offered her assistance in getaway by way of riding one of her spare monster-dogs. She herself rode one with the kind of ease which implied experienced familiarity with the peculiarities of dog riding. The last of her pets served as a way to transport newly liberated dogs, secured to the beast's back with some knotwork utilising their leashes.
Lady (even if she'd probably object to the term) clearly knew what she was doing and ran a tight operation. Outis wouldn't go quite so far as to call her a professional, but she could damn well appreciate a competent woman. Also the fact she'd let her ride one of the big guys, the bone plates felt lovely to the touch, nevermind the sheer sense of power from those huge muscles flexing underneath. They'd probably be all sorts of uncomfortable to straddle for a normal human, but hey, E Rank Endurance, "Say, mind giving me a quick and dirty rundown of the players and turfs around town?"
Bitch kept silent for a moment as they rode through still empty streets up north, before tugging at the 'reins' of her dog so as to come level with Outis. "Met the Empire." She grunted. "Keep to 'good' part of the town, means mostly Downtown. They're nazis and dog-fighters." From her tone of voice, it was clear she thought the latter part was as bad, if not worse, as the former. "The most capes out of everyone, including the gov. North's the Docks. Belongs to Azn Bad Boys. All-Asian gang, red and green. They do all sorts of stuff but will leave you alone if you aren't starting shit. There's my boss, if he actually exists and Tattletale isn't pulling my leg. Protectorate and Wards, government and government junior division."
"Hopefully the eastern boys are drinking enough yakuza juice to be happy to have someone going to their businesses." Outis grumbled. She could go for some yakiudon right now, get some carbs going before her body hit the alarm bells. For now, time to double check rules of engagement. "Alright, so. Softball with Empire to not get dogpiled, play it by the ear with the ABB, kiddie gloves for the Wards else I get hunted down, touch and go with Protectorate but try not to get too much heat. Whitehats willing to get their hands dirty around here, or keeping to the pretty parts of town to keep the rich schmucks sweet?"
She may be theoretically on the side of the angels here, but humans always found a way to squabble over the pettiest shit. So, yeah, she was probably going to rumble with the heroes at some point. Kinda concerning that Bitch hadn't mentioned any non-government hero teams, but they may just be small time enough that she didn't feel like wasting breath. Or a bunch of independents rather than actual teams.
Well, technically Bitch just implied that she had a teammate and a maybe-boss, but that sort of shady man behind the scenes bullshit smacked of villain. Honestly, he could play Gendo all he damn well pleased so long as he didn't make himself a huge nuisance or do something beyond the pale. She had a job to do here, she'd certainly do good on the side because it felt good and sometimes paid, but saving the world came first.
Bitch grunted in her approximation of agreement. "Tattletale likes to say it's like game Cops and Robbers. 'S why no killing each other if you can help it. Even Empire manages that on capes, most of the time." The woman snorted. "Guess some good comes from Endbringers."
…
Well, all-fucking-right then.
At least the threat she was here for wasn't subtle? Hopefully they wouldn't be Beast bad. She didn't exactly have the luxury of being in a Singularity or Lostbelt that'd all poof away anyways once all was said and done, so collateral was an actual concern. But it sounded like they were being kept at least somewhat in check by all superhumans banding together whenever they showed up, given they were both a known factor and civilization was still kicking.
"Silver linings and all that." Outis huffed, shaking her head clear of those cheery thoughts, "And more reason to be careful with the Empire, they know they're the biggest swinging dick in town and can get away with some rule breaking because nobody wants to call them out and find out. I'll just pace things out and try not to cripple any of their capes, that and me being pasty white should keep the kid gloves on."
"Mhm. The shelter I'm taking those to is a bit into ABB territory. You can tag along and ask about a decent food place." Bitch offered after another moment of silence, giving a glance towards her 'cargo'.
"Sounds like a plan. They the kind to get pissy about whitebread being fluent in chinese?" The Assassin asked with a tilt of her head. In her experience, it was a bunch of brownie points, but she was a white girl in goddamn America now.
Unfortunately, it seemed Bitch's usefulness in that regard ended there, as the woman just gave her a shrug in response. Ah, well, she'd just fuck around and find out.
[Objective Complete: Obtained the bare biomes of the situation in Brockton Bay (and possibly greater beyond).]
[Rewards: 1 x Saint Quartz. Basic understanding of power balance of Brockton Bay. Basic understanding of Unwritten Rules. Bitch doesn't seem to mind your presence terribly much.]
Truly, a privileged status.
[Bonds with parahumans offer the following benefits: Access to relevant Class' EXP instances. Access to relevant Class' Skill Gem and Monument instances at higher levels. Raising the bond sufficiently allows the formation of a Party with parahumans which allows them to receive Command Seal (currently unavailable) benefits. Reaching Bond 5 allows for engraving of Parahuman Power upon Blank Cards.]
[Just like any other kind of humans, parahumans increase their bond levels at different rates. Congratulations on forming a positive first bond.]
'Huh, so rivals and nemeses are also tracked? Neat.' Outis projected, all too happy to settle into a comfortable silence with Bitch. Hah, they hadn't even exchanged names. Well, if the woman didn't feel the need she wasn't going to push.
Special thanks to my Patrons: Xanah, Unknown B, Penguino, JoJoDio, Shirou0Emiya and Bowchikabowbow who decided my writing is actually worth paying for.
AN: As AssmasterOfCalais (one of our mutual Discord friends) put it and then dared us to put in the first chapter's note, "We don't know what to write so instead we'll be recreationally injecting ourselves with subcutaneous doses of rotten semen".
As a word of warning/being honest: neither me nor Nihilo has read Worm. We read some fanfics every now and then and have some amount of osmosis knowledge of the setting. We are also aware of Wildbow's... opinions on some of his characters and how their arcs are supposed to happen. Opinions we don't precisely agree with. As such, the Worm side is heavy on fanon, headcanon and 'bullshit I reasoned after a quick wiki dive'.
January 1st
The shelter Bitch rode into was one of the more open area ones, on the smaller side, with a fenced off area for animals, mostly dogs, to run around in some fresh air, and separated into a few sections. The dogs they grabbed off the Empire being put into an emptier one, further separated into smaller patches for each dog to have for themselves.
"At this point we're pretty much used to handling them." One of the volunteers, a blue eyed, black haired teen who only didn't scream average because it would be actually a notable feature, commented wryly as he accepted one from Bitch. "Good to see she is making friends though." He added with a grin, which in turn earned him a turned head. Glare, probably, if Bitch wasn't wearing a mask. "And I mean, friend-friends, not the rest of that little group she started riding with a bit back." The teen continued amicably as if he wasn't being disapproved of by a woman who could turn dogs into bigger murderbeasts than meese. "Grue is an alright guy and Tattletale is really smart but she just… likes talking."
"So do you." Bitch grunted from where she kept tending to another dog.
"Someone has to!" Good lord, but the guy was upbeat. "Gotta make sure you remember how to make human noises too~. Anyway, you a new 'sider, or is it just Bitch managing to genuinely reach out?"
"Hah, nah. Just an indie she found wandering around and decided to offer a deal for busting a ring." Outis chuckled with a shake of her head, hands in her pockets as she rocked on her heels, "Got a tidy pile of cash, the warm fuzzies and maybe a friend within a couple hours of rolling into town. Things're looking up."
"Ah, not a Brocktonite, gotcha. Not that I'm one myself." The guy admitted with a chuckle of his own. "But at least got a couple years to get used to the place. So if you need a list of great food places, I can offer, as long as it's in the Docks. Gotta support the community, eh?"
"Now you're talking my language!" The Assassin laughed, smile wide enough to crinkle her eyes. "And yea, I get you. Chinese side of the family run a bunch of restaurants back home in Spain."
"Well, you're in luck, Docks have a lot of Chinese restaurants. Them'n Japanese. Others too, ABB takes its 'all-Asian' creed fairly seriously, but Lóng is half'n'half for both so there's always folks thinking they can get extra favour with him or discount for protection fees by catering to heritage." The guy chuckled, even as his hands slowly worked on cleaning the dog which weathered his ministrations patiently. "Least most of'em are decent-to-good quality 'cause of that."
"Hah, I'd imagine. Nobody wants to be the guy who gave the dragon or any of his lieutenants indigestion with some dubious shia chiao." Outis snorted, idly wondering what sort of gang leader someone calling himself after the wise dragons would be. Certainly sounded like he was at least sipping the yakuza juice, so that was promising. "Hmm, probably going for Chinese. A bit of familiarity sounds nice right about now, even if I wouldn't say no to some unagi or yakiudon."
"Golden Tail isn't too far away, if you wanna Chinese. A bit hard on tofu, if you ask me, but 's to be expected with a patron like [Xianglu]." The boy threw a recommendation immediately, with the system instantly managing to recognise a superhuman when talked about. "Unagi and yakiudon…" He tapped his cheek for a moment before nodding. "There's this one stall close to Boardwalk, has a nice red-and-green firework explosion for a sign to identify, really shilling that one time [Firefly] complimented him, if you want grilled fish. Homerun is on the Boardwalk proper, if you want stir fry. [Kanabo] officially isn't ABB but she is… passionate about cultivating our culture abroad. Even in a maid dress." He added with a sage nod and a bit of a blush. Then, he sighed, a quiet mutter escaping his lips. About the first time he looked less than persistently optimistic. "No wonder, after Kyushu."
"A bit hard as in they specialise in it? It's been a while since I had some good thin-fried." The purplette asked, idly tucking away the mention of Kyushu as something to research later. Sounded like it got hit by a natural disaster. Or an unnatural one. "Also, any reliable way to get in touch with Bitch? She doesn't seem like the sort to keep a phone on hand, unless her boss forced her to."
She'd ask the woman directly, but the cape was busy with the dogs and had probably burned through all her human-social energy already.
"Revamped the menu completely to make it all-tofu substitutes, yeah." The teen chortled. "There's folks who like that, but a bit of variety in fillings would be nice. As for Bitch…alas, it's all gacha. If she isn't hanging out with her crew, at which point good luck, your best bet is to ring every animal shelter in the Bay till you get to the one she is currently at." Then, he leaned forward and gave Outis a conspiratorial wink. "You can totally skip the ones in Downtown, naturally."
"Hmm… I'll save the tofu for another day, I think. I'm still in ayunas so a one-two of the stall and Homerun sounds like a plan." The Assassin decided after a moment, nodding to herself. "And good to know, even if it'll be a bit of a pain in the ass. Thanks a lot. I'd introduce myself, but I think it's funnier if Tattletale and Mr Illusive Bossman have to deal with nobody having an idea what I go by just yet."
"Haha, I was wondering when we'd get to introductions!" The boy laughed, slapping his knee. Then, he stood up and waved Outis over. "It will definitely set Tattletale off. Funny though. C'mon, we've got some maps of the city, I can part with one so the directions aren't just funny sounds for you."
"Much appreciated." She said as she followed, quietly wondering if google maps and smartphones weren't commonplace here or if this was just the guy being used to dealing with people like Bitch. Ah, well, she'd find out soon enough with a bit of window shopping.
[New Objective: Sustain yourself.]
[Rewards: Don't starve. Supposedly good food. 1x Saint Quartz. Meeting another parahuman.]
Oh nice, more contacts to make. Alright, probably best to stick to her current form and Card, then. It would keep her safe enough if things got ugly without showing too much of her (hah) hand. Besides, seeing how people reacted to a 'cape' just vibing would give her some useful data.
Hm.
'Hey, partner, how do you feel about Da'at as a name?'
[Designation acknowledged.]
The Docks had a lot of brutalist concrete buildings in them, at least in the part the shelter was located in. That's not to say it was bare, there were plenty of gang signs and more innocuous street art dotting the walls, the predominance of red and green making it fairly obvious, but even then, there was still variation, almost definitely delineating internal divisions of Azn Bad Boyz' territory. By now, only the most hardcore party goers were still resting after New Years', so the streets had an actual bustle to them, and in the Docks that meant plenty of Asian people. Almost as if that portion of the city was a full on foreigners' district, which in turn made Outis' white bread complexion stand out, at least what little could be seen in Indigo Assassin's getup. Add that the entire thing concealed her features and people seemed to spare only the briefest of glances before moving along, and that was without Presence Concealment on.
The stall she was recommended stood at an intersection leading directly for the Boardwalk from the heart of the Docks, parked in the mouth of an alley between two post-industrial apartment blocks, almost serving to delineate the border between the two, left one having signs and graffiti in… some kind of non-weeb, non-Chinese Asian language, while the right sported some Japanese decor. The stall, bereft of any cultural identifiers, in turn, compensated by going extra hard on the fireworks theme and was tended by a pair of androgynous looking twin teens, short, amber eyed, with brown hair with red and blue highlights, with red jackets thrown on. When one of them turned around to grab something from behind, she could see a golden eastern dragon emblazoned on the back. Unfortunately for whatever set-up the twins might have had, Da'at helpfully identified the left one as [Archer: Firefly].
"Ah, a very special customer approaches." Firefly greeted Outis with a jaunty wave, hand almost hitting the menu hanging from the ceiling and held by a pair of dragonfly-themed pins. "What can the Phùng siblings do to you, newbie?"
"Excuse my sibling," Firefly's hypothetical sibling sighed with a roll of their eyes, their words carrying a slight accent, as they handed another person their order. "Linh so do loves teasing capes, very dangerous hobby."
"That's 'cause you're risk averse, Makoto." Firefly snorted as they leaned on the counter. "Don't see lot of Strangers 'round, which I guess is kinda the point, but still."
"Hah, no Stranger danger for tā today, rest assured." Outis chuckled, electing to use Chinese's utterly ambiguous pronouns as she took a seat.
"Very brave of you to use Chinese to address Japanese and Vietnamese named people." Makoto deadpanned while their sibling snorted.
"Most folks around here know at least some. And besides, our friend is doing a clever way of avoiding tripping over our little game." Linh shot right back, nodding in approval as they rested their head on the palm of their hand.
"And hey, you took a gamble and so did I, Phung is also a Chinese surname." The Assassin replied with a crooked grin just barely hinted at by the crinkling of her eyes. There was also how Linh sounded 100% like a Chinese name, but Asian languages loved looting from one another and she was no expert, so whatever, "One unagidon, please."
"You cannot begin to imagine just how often she used to get into scraps with people over that confusion. It's like she enjoys being loud and troublesome." Makoto grumbled even as they easily grabbed strips of eels and deftly unrolled the meat onto the grill, filling the air with both the scent and the sound of sizzling meat. "At least you're lucky, New Years means we had the time to prepare the meat. Advantage of both of us working the same shift. For once."
"Awwww, Makoto so loves a good grumble, you'd think he is a dwarf." Linh cooed even as she shook her head over her brother's trip-up. "Shame English just isn't suited to keeping the game rolling. Whenever we don't get the strangers, that's the small 's' by the way, coming, we can keep it going for hours."
"Hey, at least it isn't Catalan or Spanish, fukkin everything is gendered there." Outis snorted as she eased herself fully into the banter. It looked like she had come all Installed up for nothing… well, Firefly would probably put in good word about the funny new Stranger in town. If these two were at all indicative of the ABB, she could see herself getting a good working relationship there. Probably not membership, she didn't look her heritage anymore and there would be major headaches with the whitehats if she fully aligned with a gang, but being cordial with and taking the odd job from one of the power blocs around here would make things a whole lot easier.
Hmm, yeah, presenting herself as a freelancer with principles and standards could be the way to go here. She'd lose out on the big bennies of joining up properly with any given group, but on the flipside less enemies to get in the way of doing her world saving business. Also nobody asking awkward questions about her powers, which she had a sneaking suspicion would raise a lot of eyebrows even if Bitch's one trick pony stuff wasn't the norm.
She was broken out of her musings as the bowl was slid in front of her. A little bit misshapen, indicative of not quite experienced hand-craft, but the cheerfully loud red and green paint more than made up for it. Also, what really mattered was that it was a decent size and loaded full of glistening unagi on fluffy white rice.
[Food obtained. Perhaps not enough for the amount of exertion you performed but it will definitely take the edge off. You might need a proper meal in the near future.]
[Firefly… met, in a manner of speaking.]
'Soooo… mission accomplished?' Outis silently asked her partner as she snapped her chopsticks open with practised ease and dug in with a pleased hum. By all rights, it should be a headache to eat with the bandana on, but Assassin proved to be a sleeper hit once again by making it trivial.
[Affirmative. Firefly will need to be met in her parahuman persona to begin work on the Bond System.]
[Reward: 1x Saint Quartz.]
[Attention: Now that you've accumulated the bare minimum of Saint Quartz, the gacha Servant Card Summoning System has been unlocked.]
[While it has other uses as well, the primary function of Saint Quartz is to summon Servant cards. You can obtain Saint Quartz by seeking out and completing quests, undergoing time-limited challenges or, and this is the fastest way, spending money to buy more.]
[As you are currently in the United States, the current conversion rate is ten dollars to one Saint Quartz.]
Ow ow ow. Thirty bucks for one single roll!?
…Granted, she was getting actual legendary heroes here, instead of jpegs. But still!
[A bit more predatory than usual for the market. As it turns out, the economic situation of the local reality does reflect gacha exchange rates.]
[The system is obliged to remind you that you need money for things other than quick power as well.]
[I'd advise rolling in relative privacy.]
It took a bit of time and some doing to find an empty, dead end alley to hide away from the traffic of the Docks. Here, in dark backstreets, the vibrancy of ABB territory was stripped away, with old, muted tags and moss dotting the walls, in addition to grime and dirt. Amongst other things best left unmentioned. But it was empty of people, even the homeless, junkies or the drunks, so there was that.
The decor definitely didn't improve as Da'at muted the world for Outis yet again, the monochrome filter stripping what little colour there was. Then, an intricate summoning circle flashed in glowing blue before Outis, hovering in front of her. In the middle of it, a deck of cards floated.
[Welcome to the Chamber of Guf. Simply draw the card from the deck and Fate will bring you your Servant.]
"Let silver and steel be the essence, then." Outis whispered as she let the Install drop, indigo sloughing off her until she stood as herself and nothing else. Slowly, gingerly, her hand reached out to the deck. A jolt almost like static electricity raced from her hand to her heart as her fingers touched the card, stark white igniting into blinding iridescence as she pulled it free. Then, the light faded, revealing the stock image of Lancer on its back, before it, too, peeled away, revealing the figure of a young, pink-haired girl in a black goth-lolita dress. Dragon girl, rather, given the horns, tail and talons.
[Lancer: Elizabeth Bathory obtained.]
[STR: C, END: D, AGI: E, MAG: A, LCK: B, NP: D]
[Class Skills: Magic Resistance: A, Territory Creation: B]
[Personal Skills: Charisma: C, Torture Technique: A (Locked), Battle Continuation: B (Locked)]
[Noble Phantasm: Kilenc Sárkány, Báthory Erzsébet (Locked)]
"Hah, I don't think I'm qualified to be a manager, but welcome home Liz." Outis chuckled as the card melted into her hand, flipping through her memories of the Servant. She was drawing a fat blank on the unlocked NP, but Báthory Erzsébet temporarily summoned a castle turned stage to let Liz blast an entire army. Territory Creation was the 'proper' summoning of the castle, which acted primarily as a prison and torture dungeon, although with a bit of luck it could do normal castle things too. If she was insanely lucky, it'd even be able to be summoned on a temporary basis to imprison a target, but chances were that it'd just be a matter of multiple conjuration sessions bringing the castle into reality in sections. That MAG A should help there, at least.
There was also the whole concern of two Skills being completely locked together with an NP, but she could almost feel Da'at firing up the projector for a powerpoint presentation, so nothing to do but sit tight and let the tutorial carry on.
[Now that you have obtained your first Servant Card, let's go over the differences between Chromatic and Servant Cards.]
[Servant Cards draw Heroic Spirits from the Throne of Heroes into appropriately scaled down containers. In addition, due to the… peculiarities of the current situation, these containers have been outfitted with further limiters.]
[This applies mainly to Personal Skills and Noble Phantasms of Servant Cards. Parameters themselves are unrestricted on their own. Instead, the 'Ascension Stage' of the card determines for how long you can safely draw on Servant Card's physical boost, requiring the accumulation of 'levels' through Embers of Experience then their catalyzation with Heroic Quintessence and Monuments of Legend. Ascension Stages 1 and 3 furthermore unlock one Personal Skill each.]
[Furthermore, a Servant's Noble Phantasm, while available, is limited in power as a safety precaution. You will need a total of five copies of the same Servant Card to allow them the usage of the Noble Phantasm to its full potential.]
[Meanwhile, Chromatic Cards carry no such limitations.]
[Additionally, you will be able to obtain blank copies of Chromatic Cards once you obtain your first duplicate Servant. Either to create multiple skillsets of a specific Class or, if you are willing to take the gamble, to grant them to others.]
[Note that only you can upgrade a Chromatic Card.]
[More excitingly, besides Installing, Servant Cards can be used another way: To manifest a copy of Servant in question in the physical world.]
[For better or worse, depending on who it is.]
[Manifested Servants cannot astralize, with the exception of Assassins and other Servants in possession of sufficient Presence Concealment. Furthermore, their parameters will be capped based on their Ascension Stage.]
[You are limited to 5 Servants manifested simultaneously.]
[In exchange all the limits imposed on them, manifested Servants require no upkeep, generating their own magical energy based on their MAG parameter.]
"What sort of data dump are they getting here, given we don't have a Holy Grail mediating the process?" Outis asked after a moment, reeling more than a bit at the sheer torrent of information and latching into a very salient point. Namely, would these goobers even share a language with her? She didn't feel like trying to learn Hungarian just to hold a conversation with Liz, much less having to pick up Latin or Ancient Sumerian depending on who showed up.
[Knowledge equivalent to yours. Linguistic proficiency in English as well as your own native languages is assured. Skills such as Riding or pertaining to mastery of skill proficiencies are updated to keep up with 'mundane' developments.]
"Right, and how much of previous summonings will they remember? Liz has been around the block, just for starters." The Master of Guf, because pretentious titles were a must have for people in her situation, asked as another thought arose. If Chaldea was anything to go by, they would remember a fair deal, which… well, would be one hell of a double edged sword.
[They come with most of their character development intact, wherever that applies.]
"Alright. Burn three hundred bucks into Quartz and let's go. I need a break." Outis sighed, wincing internally at the sudden lightening of her wallet. The smart thing would be to at least do a 10-pull to get some more options, but her brain was doing a cauliflower stew impression already from all the mechanics she'd been bukkake'd with. So she'd just keep some SQ in her backpocket in case everything went to hell in a handbasket and she had to throw random Servants at the problem and carry on.
According to the map of the city, Boardwalk was a beach-side district running alongside much of the sea-edge of the Docks. It was also, conveniently enough, one of the best looking parts of the town, with cleaner, well-maintained buildings and streets. Getting out of the 'Asia-town' also meant a first glimpse at the massive oil rig sitting in the centre of the bay, surrounded by some kind of forcefield which made it look like a bad TV picture.
The Boardwalk proper, the strip running closest to the beach, was in turn full of people loitering around even on New Years', even with the majority of the businesses closed. Even so, the street was being patrolled by serious looking, uniformed and armed men and women. They uniformly gave Assassin suspicious looks, what with the alley robber chic, but made no move to start trouble. Cape culture woo.
She didn't dare shit-stir to the point of giving them jaunty waves, but she did give them respectful nods and keep her hands where they could see them. No sense in upsetting a bunch of professionals just doing their jobs.
Unfortunately, New Years' meant any electronics shops around were closed, so getting a phone would have to wait. As a silver lining, Homerun was open, the restaurant tucked between a clothing store (closed) and some sort of hobbyist place (also closed), with a cardboard figure of an indistinct baseball player holding the bat serving as an identifying feature, with the opening hours written over the cut-out's shirt. While according to the animal shelter volunteer at least one of the staff was 'totally-not gang affiliated', and the place serving Japanese-style stir fry provided a similar excuse… Well, the suspicious amount of green and red in the colours of the baseball shirts hanging behind the front window and on the maps of Japan with team emblems pinned to it made it almost as brazen as the giant nazi logo graffitied onto the office building.
Honestly, why did it have to be nazis? Couldn't it just be a bunch of loons super proud of their viking heritage or something? That'd have been fun, especially if she rolled a few nordic Servants. Ah, well, no matter. Time to enjoy herself some stir-fry. It'd been a while since she had any and it should top her up.
Opening the door caused a chime to sound out. Inside, Homerun had baseball equipment lining its wooden, dark-brown walls, with a massive tv-screen hanging over the counter. All the tables were arranged in such a way that patrons could watch comfortably unless they deliberately took a seat facing away. There was a glass display with a couple of trophies and medals, too. The air was lightly scented with cigarette smoke, most likely due to relatively low traffic. The few patrons present, uniformly Japanese, looked away momentarily from the currently going baseball game, the display proudly announcing them as 'Aso Helldivers vs Mashiki Smashers' before going back to the match.
Outis wasn't sure if it was because Indigo Assassin was pretty low-key or because parahumans were really normalised, but she'd happily take the lack of awkwardness. She'd never had much of an interest in sports, but taking a seat facing the TV cost her nothing and she wasn't about to snub this establishment's whole deal. Or perhaps the lack of reaction was due to the establishment employing an equally, if not more so, open parahuman.
Although as she approached Outis' table, [Kanabo], helpfully identified by Da'at as Berserker, didn't exactly have a choice in the matter. The woman stuffed into a maid uniform just this short of being fetish wear was tall and blue skinned, with mane of white hair pulled into a ponytail, a pair of respectably long horns growing out of her temples and with golden eyes with black sclera. As she approached, Outis could definitely tell she was muscular as well. She also had a black baseball bat hooked up hanging from her waist.
In short, she looked amazing even if the maid outfit clashed more than a bit with her aesthetic.
"Welcome to Homerun." Kanabo greeted Outis with a curt bow, an eyebrow raised over a golden eye before she schooled her feature into pleasantly smiling professionalism. Then, she handed the menu over. "What will you be having today?"
"House special stir-fry, please." The Assassin replied without missing a beat, quietly pushing down the ponders of how fun a sparring partner the oni would be. Time and place. Also, it was very good to know that there were 'capes' with inhuman features, meant she could have Liz and many others around without anyone freaking out.
"Gotcha, should be ready in five to ten minutes." Kanabo nodded before patting her bat. "No pickpocketing, no startin' a brawl, no stirrin' shit inside. Cape business ends at the door. If it doesn't, it will be made to stay happenin' outside." With that, she walked away to the kitchen area, gently swatting wandering hands from the other patrons.
Well, Outis was definitely coming back.
January 1st
The New Years' Day continued to force Outis to adapt as everything big being closed meant libraries, with their public computers, were closed too. Bereft of phone or easy internet access, Outis was left hunting for internet cafes… none of which were on the Boardwalk, unfortunately. One of the Boardwalk enforcers, fortunately, knew of a few smaller internet cafes which made a tidy profit purely on being open full time. All of them were also located in the Downtown.
"Should be safe. Villains rarely start shit immediately after holidays and it's close to PRT HQ, so there's also that." The burly man assured her. "Worst that happens is a trooper trying to bug you into signing up."
"Seems like there is some rest for the wicked." Assassin chuckled, shaking her head softly, "Thanks a lot, have a good day!"
Aside from the nazi infestation, Brockton Bay was turning out to be a pretty pleasant place.
The cafe she eventually found was, indeed, small. A row of eight computers with just enough space between the boards separating them to not feel claustrophobic. On the plus side, for potential patrons, the owner offered snacks and drinks for relatively cheap. Going by some of the stuff installed on the computer Outis got, definitely leeching off the gamers doing stuff out of house.
None of her business, though. She was here to find out about the Endbringers and the world situation in general.
…
… …
… … …
An implacable, energy manipulating juggernaut. A, frankly absurd, hydrokinetic beast. And, the cherry on top, a precognitive telekinetic with some sort of mass mind-rape and love of domino effect.
"Fuck." Outis groaned softly as she leaned back on her chair. It wasn't that the superhumans were managing to keep them in check, the damn things were playing with their food. Taking turns, making themselves easy targets, being 'driven off' with just superficial damage. On the bright side, it meant she had plenty of time to get ready. However, the moment she started showing her hand to them, the kiddie gloves would come off and she had no clue how strong they truly were.
At least she could safely assume Da'at or whatever force was backing her up kept her out of sight of the Simurgh, simply because otherwise she'd have been crushed immediately from across the planet. How strong a protection against the super precog she truly had, however, was up in the air. 'Partner?'
[...]
[Depending on the precise nature of the enemy's precognition. Luck. Relative lack of data on variables composing you. Gacha.]
Right, the Luck Parameter, while doing what you'd expect, was also about defying what was 'supposed' to happen. That would be good for catching the bird flatfooted, but if it triggered too often Outis would get focused down on as a spanner in the works. Generally, it looked like she'd want to strike a balancing act between not displaying too much of what she and her Servants could do outside of scry-spoofing Bounded Fields and keeping on pulling new nonsense out of her perky ass. Chromatic Card upgrades, Servant Skill unlocks, new Servants altogether.
…Hm, would Liz's castle nature as something that kept things inside facilitate a Bounded Field like that? She'd have to check when she swapped to Violet Caster.
Beyond that, well, there was a very salient detail mentioned in her research of the terrible trio. Scion. The first and most powerful superhero of Earth Bet. An expressionless golden man who didn't talk, didn't understand task priorities and generally seemed completely clueless about how humanity did while trying to be helpful. Definitely a very lost, vaguely friendly alien like the Olympians. Pity that this wasn't the Age of Gods and humanity couldn't just faith-blast him into a proper deity.
Just. Fuck. She knew this wouldn't be an easy job, but goddamn. Why did it have to be precogs?
In dire need of distraction, Outis was provided for by the internet once again. Either due to the kind of clientele the cafe attracted or to make things easier on some regular, the computer she got had an internet forum as a default page set up. A parahuman-centric forum, luckily enough, with 'local' sub forums baked in for checking in on the exact city's cape scene one was interested in. And, because this was apparently the world she now lived in, there was an 'Endbringer tracker' thread banner stuck just below the header.
She couldn't help but give that a quick peek. Thankfully, it seemed all the Endbringers were far away and not acting oddly as far as everyone could tell, so that was a weight off her chest. Now, time to see what was going on in the Brockton Bay subforum.
The top pinned thread was the official PRT news feed. Immediately below, Protectorate 'recruitment' thread, a quick check inside revealed a pinned post revealing all the benefits of joining, especially for underage parahumans. Tellingly, the third pinned thread was an 'official' rogue thread, with one of the tags for it being 'red tape bullshit'.
From a skim there, she found out that 'rogue' in Earth Bet meant 'I don't want anything to do with this fucked up game of cops and robbers, I have a business to run' instead of 'rogues' gallery'. Neat, although there didn't seem to be many in the Bay. A clothier by Parian, a streamer duo by Uber&Leet and a few small timers who seemed just about ready to pick up sticks and move out of the city the moment they could afford to. Apparently when the rich parts of town were infested by nazis, it was something of a headache to run a business without playing sympathiser. So unless they got successful enough to set up shop in the Boardwalk, their only other neutral ground alternative was Lord's Street Market which would gouge them anything from 50 to 250 bucks a day for a tiny stall.
She did give a look at all the benefits that the Protectorate crowed about, but… honestly, it just fell flatter than her when she had the Throne of Heroes on speed dial. Sure, the Servants were kinda gimped starting out, but Liz alone already gave her the option to conjure a whole-ass castle without even being a Caster. Summon someone like Hohenheim and literally anyone with Golden Rule and all her money and supplies problems would vanish.
Still, something twinged her while reading the benefits. A feel-good line about inspiring the public and the next generation to heroism. Some quick googling and, sure enough, the government capes were stuck doing PR events every other week, and that wasn't counting 'patrols' only really meant to show the colours and sign autographs. That and the sheer amount of red tape and paperwork that would no doubt be part and parcel of being government affiliated put the last nail in the coffin of joining them.
Not that she hadn't had the corpse already all laid out when she realised she was basically a whole faction of her own right once she got going.
Another pertinent point repeated in rogues' thread was an almost desperate plea for any newbies to avoid attempting to get 'street cred' by taking on the villainous capes, even the independent ones. Did powers mainly manifest in teenagers? This warning and the emphasis the whitehats put on trying to recruit underage capes pointed to it.
…Then again, if a stressed the fuck out salaryman got superpowers, he may be inclined to go on a bit of a power trip too. Teenagers didn't have a monopoly on dumbassery.
A bit more research didn't turn up much info on the age ratios, at least not without slogging through meandering statistical papers from years ago and she couldn't be arsed, but what it did tell her was that indies hounding for street cred were rare. Or rather, ones who stuck around as independents after their first night out and thus got actually noticed as such were. Not only was the distinction between villain, violent vigilante and mercenary particularly hazy, but villainous capes had the tendency to quickly get absorbed by the gangs or actually get caught by the heroes and had no one to bail them out (and if a suspiciously similarly powered hero seemed to debut soon after in another city, no one in mainstream media questioned it). Additionally, the mortality statistics for parahumans trying to play independent heroes were just depressing. The only ones who were notable in Brockton Bay were New Wave, who in the past championed 'no secret identities for full accountability' cause and seemed to have some success taking down one of the most powerful gangs in Bay, only to seemingly drop the activity when one of the founding members got murdered in her home.
In Brockton Bay, the most notable independent villains were Trainwreck, Skidmark, Squealer and Mush. The first was noted to hang around the Trainyard and generally amuse himself by occasionally taking on heroes and being a low-key menace but was otherwise content to sit in his corner minding his own business. Skidmark, Squealer and Mush were primarily drug dealers but realistically doing whatever crime they could think of, with the former two understood to be an item. While they seemed to command some level of authority and obedience of the other 'unaffiliated' drug dealers, they held no territory beyond a known meeting place in an abandoned lighthouse and didn't really have any consistent pattern to their activities. As such, no one was quite ready to call them an actual gang. Still, all four were in the 'business' for long enough it was agreed they had the brains to make it work and as such, a newbie only getting a hang of their powers would most likely get taken to the cleaners.
Well, hopefully Trainwreck wouldn't be too grumpy about a merc setting up shop in the yard. Even if he was, though, she'd rather upset a completely solo indie than encroach on the territory of a proper gang.
If Boardwalk and Downtown were illusions of Brockton Bay still being a somewhat prosperous, healthy city, the closer one travelled through the Docks towards the Trainyard, the more the facade fell off to reveal the post-industrial depression. Abandoned buildings, mostly factory buildings and associated housing, abandoned markets, all broken down and overgrown with plant life. Trash, abandoned appliances and wrecked cars littering the streets. An entire district serving as the city's trash heap. The Trainyard itself was fenced off, even if the fence wouldn't stop a motivated teen, let alone any flavour of superhuman, full of abandoned, rusty boxcars and more trash. Only some of the train tracks were cleared and looked to be actually maintained, even if the station itself seemed as abandoned as the rest of the area.
About the best place to summon Liz in. It was clean and had plenty of room, so the Countess hopefully wouldn't raise too much of a fuss. All it took was a twist of her hand and the card popped out from her fingers like she was a street magician. A flick, and it had embedded itself in the ground in front of her, melting into the concrete as a summoning circle spread like an ink stain. Then, it began glowing pure white, before seven orbs rose into the air and began spinning in a circle, their glow turning rainbow for a moment before they coalesced at the centre into a pillar of pink light.
Then, the pillar dispersed, revealing Elizabeth in all of her five foot nothing, midget glory. The meaty, long tail flicked lazily around before snapping with a crack in the air as the teen Servant struck the butt of her spear against the ground, looking around the abandoned station with thinly veiled disdain before she focused her attention on Outis. She clicked her tongue and put her hand on her hip.
"So… you're the new manager, huh? Not quite sold on the whole 'start up indie studio' vibe you've got going here, but I suppose that'll just make my career even more dazzling in its success?"
"Just about. Gotta keep a low profile while we set everything up for your debut, after all." Outis said with a crooked grin as she effortlessly slid into the role presented to her, bandana already down around her neck so her Servant could see her face, "Other idols may need to get a few unofficial appearances before the big debut to build up some hype, but you? We just need to line up the venue and time right."
The dragon girl nodded happily along, making a pleased noise as her lips curved into a smile. "Good, good! Nice to know my manager knows a thing or two about the business. Since you seem to know what you're doing and I am obviously not ready for my debut, I assume there's a reason we're having this chat? Even if the exact choice of locale…" She trailed off, even as she dismissed her spear in a shower of pink particle effect and crossed her arms across her chest, looking at Outis expectantly.
"Yes, it leaves something to be desired, but it was the only option short of going into the woods if we wanted to avoid busybodies." The Assassin chuckled helplessly, splaying her hands as if to say 'what can you do?', "Mostly, I wanted to consult you on the matter of our studio. I can turn just about any empty building in this city into a humble one without anyone the wiser, but if you'd like to use Territory Creation instead, then this here Trainyard and the woods further north are the only places where nobody will notice before it is time for your debut."
That actually caused Elizabeth to perk up. "Oh, you want to use Csejte? Really? My previous manager wasn't keen on the idea, not much space in the first place, he said, and out on the tour we were constantly on the move so there was no point to put it up fully. To think I would have an opportunity…" The girl babbled with a happily carefree smile. "Sure, sure, go ahead! Once you've got the living quarters and amenities set up, feel free to call me up regardless, I've missed a bed fit for me. And the wardrobe, and…"
'So precious.' It was a relief that at least this incarnation of her didn't have any baggage tied to the castle. Outis couldn't help but smile, posture and tone both relaxing into something light and friendly, Liz's cheer was infectious. Truly, she had what it took to be an idol, "Yeah, I expect we will be mainly operating in Brockton Bay for a long while, so no reason not to get comfortable."
After all, her most likely backer was the Counter Force, which meant Outis wasn't dropped off here on a whim. The city had to be very important for whatever the Force was scheming. If there was a need to move further afield, Da'at would let her know with a quest, she was sure.
"Then, sure, you've got my permission to use the card-me to set up the castle. No hurry to power it up, though, if I understand the system correctly, it's not like you'll get much benefit from my skills that you couldn't get just from ordering me around in the first place." Elizabeth nodded once she got out of daydreaming about noble comforts. "Do keep me out and about when possible, kay, manager? Gotta keep rehearsing for the debut."
"Will do. Hardly fair to be living it up in your castle if I only summon you for business." Outis chuckled, only not sketching out a shallow bow because it was best not to give Liz ideas. Same reason she wasn't calling her 'Countess' or 'my lady'. "Have a good sleep, I will call you again once everything is up and running."
After all, Da'at didn't scrub away the ego of carded Servants like Pandora's Box, simply lulled them into a deep sleep. With that, and a flex of mental command, Elizabeth burst into a cloud of glittering, pink particles which coalesced back in Outis' hand as the dragoness' Servant Card. A roll of her fingers and it was gone, shifted back into Da'at's storage.
[Now that the introductions are out of the way and you have had time to digest previous information, it is time for everyone's favourite.]
[More data!]
[Now that you've manifested a Servant from the card, it's time to introduce a new system.]
[Command Seals.]
[This one is fairly simple. You've got three charges refreshing at a rate of one a day, at midnight. A charge can be spent on any Servant member of your party to perform Full Heal, Charge Up or Summon. Alternatively, you can use all three to perform Full Party Restore.]
[Full Heal is, I hope, self-explanatory. Charge Up allows for a Servant to fully restore their energy reserves immediately. Summon allows for the Servant to teleport to your side if you have the need for them and they are beyond your immediate reach.]
[Full Party Restore combines the effects of full Heal and Charge Up and covers the entire party.]
[As your Bond with Servants reaches a high enough level, Command Seals will unlock additional functions.]
[Furthermore, a parahuman you've reached a sufficiently high Bond with will be able to receive benefits of Command Seals as a member of your Party as well.]
[Speaking of Bonds, you've managed to diplomance your way to Level 1 with Elizabeth.]
[Keep the pace up and things are bound to get interesting.]
'Can I use them on myself? Summon won't do anything, obviously, but Charge and Heal…' Outis trailed off, an unholy grin on her face at the prospect of the absolute chicanery she could get up to with that on tap. Idly, she astralized her gloves, admiring the brilliant red pattern tattooed on the back of her left hand. A large X, with four thin lines connecting the whole thing like a DNA helix for all it resembled a chainlink.
If she giggled like a schoolgirl, that was between her and the ghosts of whoever had jumped onto the tracks.
[Affirmative.]
[Note that Command Seal functions can be substituted with Saint Quartz expenditure.]
[The system is suspiciously Pay-2-Win, isn't it?]
'At least I can make money the fun way.' Assassin chuckled as she let her gloves fade back in, taking off northwards. Time to see if she could get away with the full castle hiding in the forest without the commute being a pain in the ass. '...Probably the whole reason it accepts money. Forces me to get out there and do things. Anyways, how much Quartz a pop?'
[One per Command Seal being substituted for.]
'Huh, just ten bucks for– you know what, I'm not going to complain. Too busy planning how to get an entire castle set up… before…' Outis' mental voice trailed off as she kicked off another roof, shooting through the air like an arrow, 'Fuck, I may have to sandbag to not tip off the bird. At least until I get the notice-me-nots and anti-scrying up and running in full. Maybe if I start with the perimeter walls and set the Bounded Fields on them first of all? And don't use Quartz in their place unless I well and truly have to. Best case scenario, she doesn't even know about Command Seals for the longest time, worst case scenario, she at least thinks it's only one restored per 24 hours.'
Plus, well, it'd be a good litmus test for how attentive the damn thing was. If she got targeted the moment the castle was fully up, she knew she was fucked and had to start spamming Servants. However, she doubted it would be so bad. She just had to trust her backer was the Counter Force and so she would be afforded enough time to set up or at least given some warning if she was about to get checkmated on turn two. Well then, time to hit the forest and start on accomplishing the power fantasy of owning land and property.
It wasn't even that far away from the station, just some hundred, maybe hundred fifty metres from the outer edge. Well, the proper location would probably be a bit deeper in, just in case. Navigating the derelict trainyard wasn't even particularly hard, plenty of space and the parts of the train cars were torn up for copper and other materials over time. On her way out, Outis spotted the hulking, crude armoured form of Trainwreck making rounds through the place. The parahuman walked slowly and languidly, without a clear destination but obviously attentive to his surroundings. Despite how haphazard it looked, his gear was also surprisingly silent and the movements were smooth and effortless.
Da'at helpfully classified the man as a [Caster].
Outis may chat him up later, see if he was down for a no-strings-attached sparring session. It would be fun AND hopefully unlock the Caster grinding fields. Ah, well, thoughts for later. Right now she needed to find a good spot for Hungary's most infamous castle.
It was getting late by the time Outis found a spot she liked, her Hand swapped to Indigo Assassin, Elizabeth and Violet Caster. Switching Installs was an… interesting experience, no doubt exacerbated by Liz's additional bits. Perhaps a change from Chromatic Card to a 'proper' Servant was to blame as well, as Indigo faded away from Outis' features, her hoodie and sweats replaced in a gust of wind and flutter of cloth by a black dress. She only belatedly realised that said dress only had a couple of straps covering her chest and quickly chose to focus on trying to figure out what the spikes on the boots were even meant to do. Thankfully, she was properly distracted soon enough, as she was treated to the sensation of her tailbone bursting from her back and horns extruding from her skull. The fingers took the cake, though, even over having a brand new limb. They were the same rigid material as her horns, no muscle or bone, yet they bent just as easily.
A quick check with Da'at showed that the only thing she didn't inherit from Elizabeth was the colour palette, so she had black hair rather than bright pink. It actually worked with the purple of the horns and the colours of the dress, even if her grey eyes left a bit to be desired. Still, less time contemplating her looks and the possibility of a minor Mystic Code to properly match coloration and hairstyle, more doing magic construction work.
With a deep rumble and a wellspring of pink light (which the trees and afternoon sun blessedly hid away), the walls slowly arose. Muted white stone to protect and, perhaps more importantly, delineate the boundary between the Outside World and her domain. While the castle itself was the domain of Elizabeth's Territory Creation, the Bounded Fields planned for it were not, and thus, it necessitated another quick swap. Inhuman features vanished and black bled away into violet as an oversized trenchcoat and almost comically large, stereotypical witch's hat were placed over Outis together with a flat faceplate she could somehow see and breathe through. At least the sweater, cargo pants and boots underneath it all were well fitted, and she did like the feeling of swimming in her clothes. Swishy sleeves were good civilization.
The next portion was, despite the mysticism involved in putting up the anti-scrying and general detection avoidance fields, fairly tedious. She had to walk alongside those walls, circling her new domain, slowly carving in the anchor-symbols with flicks of her wand and flashes of violet light. Then, there was the fact that this portion of the work actually felt more tiring than the summoning of the walls. A difference in MAG and Territory Creation ranks, most likely. Which probably meant that she would need to burn up a Command Seal or two just to finish setting things up, what with weaving the second layer of magical energy to form the Fields. She didn't know what the fuck Elizabeth's previous Master was on about in regards to the castle being too small, the perimeter wall was huge. Granted, it had to accommodate gardens and grounds, but still.
She shook her head, taking a few steps away from the white stone. A flick of her wrist transmuted a ring of rock from the dirt, which she quickly etched and loaded with a far smaller version of what she was building. Only barely large enough to lay down spread eagle in, the layers of scry-spoofing and notice-me-nots would hopefully mask her usage of Command Seals to recharge while finishing the work on the perimeter wall. It didn't cost her much and every card counted to stack the deck. Heh.
It took a Command Seal, a whole lot of walking and wand-waving and more cooling charms than she cared to count (overheated Magic Circuits sucked smegma covered donkey dick), but soon enough she was done. The pictograms flashed vivid violet and something almost like heat haze shrouded the castle's outer perimeter before fading out of visibility. She treated herself to a long chug of ice cold conjured water (by wit of the cup being made of ice) and a good sprawl on the grass before sighing and picking herself back up.
A flash of violet turned pink and it was once more time to keep raising Csejte.
Slowly, a round tower rose, blue-grey walls and deep purple tiled roof, breaking through the forest ceiling and imposing over the land. Next, the main keep, with a smaller clocktower attached to it, square and sprawling, a truly luxurious space. Another, smaller tower connected to the keep, before it was done. All in the span of hours, as the night fell and the windows of the keep lit up with the lights within its corridors.
Good to know it came refurbished. Now, time to give everything an once over before she went and saw what all the hype was about with those beds.
Immediately past the wrought iron gates of the perimeter wall, there's an actual, honest to god stable. Although judging by the silence and the (lack of) smell, currently empty of horses. Still, something to take note of. There were other buildings dotting the castle grounds here and there, but otherwise, the space in front of the castle proper seemed to be empty right now.
As for the keep itself… The doors swung open on their own, ominous creak and all. The corridors were bright enough, although with plenty of shadows around, walls lined up with tapestries of family history and coats of arms, with the occasional suit of armour holding a weapon tucked into an alcove. Also, ghosts. Well, the technical terms would be Wraiths, Outis supposed, but semantics. Ghosts of the household, mostly maids and caretakers, in this portion of the keep, it seemed. They parted way before Outis, pale, colourless silhouettes as they were. Just enough detail to them to recognise their gender and maybe a detail of the face, or the hairstyle, bowing their heads for her as they milled about. Perfectly harmless to the lady of the castle.
Kindly ignore the glints of steel in their skirts. Those were for unruly guests.
Outis entered the great hall on the way to Elizabeth's solar, which was an entire tower in and of itself. The hall cut an impressive sight, three stories high, with rows of columns on the sides of the room casting great shadows while the fire in the hearth to the side roared merrily, smoke rising towards the ceiling where it was dispersed outside through discreet vents. Two rows of tables run along the length of the hall, close to the walls, leaving the middle empty. Then, on the dais at the opposite end from Outis, another table, put horizontally to others, shorter, fit to comfortably seat about seven people, with middle chair being meticulously carved with draconic imaginary, a shield hanging above it painted rich crimson with three silver teeth coming from one side of it. Behind that chair, there was another door, the one leading to the solar.
Thanks to Install, Outis also knew the hall was designed with acoustics in mind, to make the sound carry from the lady's throne clearly all the way across. There was a temptation to sit on the throne and try those acoustics for herself, but this was Elizabeth's home. It would be beyond rude. Besides, she was more interested in the solar's bed right now. Draconic blood propping her up right now or not, today had been a rollercoaster and she was ready to crash.
Across the hall, up the dais and through the doors, then most likely up the stairs. At least the decor didn't have much in the way of the bright shade of pink Elizabeth's mana and the woman herself seemed to favour. It did feel like the first three floors of the solar were there mostly to elevate Elizabeth's personal quarters above the rabble servants, mostly looking to store an assortment of junk that otherwise didn't quite fit the impression the rest of the keep wanted to give on its singular rooms. Then, on the fourth floor, a quick look inside revealed an office, while the fifth room an obvious recreation room, with musical instruments and unfinished paintings.
Finally, the sixth room, at the very top, turned out to be a fully furnished bedroom, with massive king size bed taking the centre of it, with heart-shaped pillows and light-red curtains, surrounded by mirrors and wardrobes under the walls, with a single, lonely chair by the window. And… were those three layers of mattresses?
Someone might've been just a little spoiled and thus got a skewed perception of comfort.
Not that it made Outis any less eager to faceplant into it. Unlike the throne, this was fine. Solars were often shared with important enough guests, the Install's knowledge whispered into her brain. That was really all she needed to jump right in and let this rollercoaster of a day catch up with her.
[Consciousness fading. Initiating Emergency Uninstall.]
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone