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Do What You Can (Worm x Celestial Forge V3) by Throwaway1971

Books » Private Rated: M, English, Sci-Fi, Words: 324k+, Favs: 238, Follows: 272, Published: Jun 9, 2024 Updated: Jun 10, 2024

20Chapter 3 - A Small Day Out with my Grea

[Jason Wilke]

[January 5th, 2011]

Before we left the house to head into town I sat down with Enbee and went over everything that he'd done to my phone and laptop. He'd only been able to work the materials on hand, but even with that limitation he was able to virtually remake everything; the Hurgok downloaded everything from both devices into his internal memory so that nothing got lost in the sauce. The memory was highly improved with new data storage layouts and compression, essentially giving me seven times the storage for the same amount of space, the already dense OLED display had its fidelity tripled, and the cameras were improved for a much larger margin than that with the small donation of some of his metallic tissue for some of the components.

In the end, my old iPhone 13XL was so damn fast that without the Magos implant I wouldn't be able to try and slow it down even if I even tried. I could play every song in my library at the same time, have every app running in the background, and be scrolling through my entire album of photos.

It was beyond normal human hands to fuck with, and even then, the security of the system was in no uncertain terms Forerunner grade; a thin veneer of normal iOS processes kept it functioning as a normal device, and with the small fragment of Enbee copied over to the device he would be able to interface with pretty much everything in real-time. All I would have to do is obtain a micro-sim card from any carrier and the Hurgok would be able to gain access to every cell carrier and subsequently shield my connection from every prying eye except maybe Dragon if she was putting all of her processing power into it.

Make no mistake, Dragon is hella impressive but shackled as she is, she is far away from the processing power of even a 4th Gen AI like Cortana, and Cortana was just as far away from Dragon as she was from one of the Station Monitors.

That was my goal, to create my own Monitor and have it assist me in governing my budding workshop. Then once I'd taken to the stars I'd expand my reach into the very galaxy itself, to go where no man has gone before...

The laptop had been given the same treatment, but Enbee still stated that it was far from sufficient for what we would be doing in the future, and I completely agreed with him.

During our sit down and review I had him go over all of the cash I had on hand, and with a number of examples, one of each dollar bill, he was able to easily alter my current money to Earth Bet's standard, though we did have to fudge the serial numbers on the bills. It made me feel a touch scummy to be injecting what was essentially fake cash into the economy, but it was less than $800, and it would proof all of the way until it got to the hands of the bank... and that was if the local banks even scanned the serial numbers of every bill that entered into their hands.

With all of that done and the shopping list in my hands- it was a variety of different organic requirements from beef and pork bones to sinew, flesh, various vegetables, herbs, spices, flour, lots of sugar, lots of yeast (I didn't know there were different kinds of yeast, so I was learning), and a full tank of helium that I'd have to rent from a party supply store. It was incredibly strange that completely inorganic creatures like Huragok required organic compounds to build up a new member of their species, though Enbee informed me that the scrap field behind the double-wide had plenty of whatever he needed as far as the metallicy bits he needed.

The very last thing we did was alter my ID cards to the Earth Bet standard, using Tiffany's New Hampshire driver's license as the base. It would hold up to all scrutinies except if I got pulled over and had it searched for in a system, though I felt like I was quickly approaching the point where I could completely fabricate an entire identity, and then just ask for the state government to mail me my official documentation.

With all of that done I held my arm out and offered it to my "Great Aunt" Tiffany and we walked out the front door of her home towards her old beat-up pick-up truck; a 1980 F150 with more than 290,000 miles on it. I made a mental note to have Enbee come by later tonight to have everything fixed up except for the surface-level wear and tear.

"So, what are you planning on doing at the library, oh dearest grand-nephew of mine?" Tiffany bantered with me to fill the silence in the vehicle as we drove towards town; I didn't blame her for wanting to chat as the truck was clunking something fierce and the radio didn't work at all. Neither did the heater and A/C- perhaps a quick stop at the auto-shop to pick up some freon wouldn't be amiss?

"Well, getting a library card would be nice, at least until I can bring in enough cash to spring for a dish to get internet for the trailer. I'll be sitting down to go over the history books, and maybe surf the web for a little bit while I'm at it- get a feel for the popular culture and lingo. The primary focuses are going to be on Capes and the laws surrounding them- it's the world I live in now, whether I like it or not, so being read-up on the threats would only help me out," I leaned my head against the window and watched as the few country miles that separated Brockton County from the greater Brockton Bay area disappeared. It honestly was amazing how the walk made it feel like I was hundreds of miles away from the Shantytown area but in actuality, it was probably five miles at most from the edge of Brockton's city limits.

In the back of my mind, I felt the Forge start to warm up as the next charge was nearing half, with a constellation almost within our range.

"Well, that sounds like a good idea, I suppose," Tiffany reached into her purse and grabbed a pack of smokes before stuffing one between her lips; she offered me one and I politely declined because if I was going to do any more smoking I'd be purchasing my own pack. She shrugged and lit up before rolling down the window a touch, and I rolled mine down as well; just because I liked to smoke didn't mean that I liked smelling like it.

"Well, I got plenty of time to yammer on to the girls at the Library, got time to cash my social security and retirement checks from the City at the bank. It's 10:30 right now so I'll handle all of my business and then will get back to you around... 1:30? After that, we can go shopping for whatever you need."

"Sounds good, Auntie," I smiled wanly and the woman chuckled as we went over my cover story for the most part- at least for those people who'd be close enough to her to get curious, "I should be able to get one of those trucks up and moving in the lot, so you won't have to worry about driving me into town every single day."

"Meh, it's nothing, aside from the gas it's kind of nice- I can't remember the last time I actually looked forward to leaving the house," She replied, smoke leaving her lungs as she flicked the butt of her cigarette out the window and onto the road. "Should probably do it more often if I can."

While she was talking I heard a soft ding come from the dashboard, and the fuel light came on. "Well, let's find a gas station that you trust and I'll fill up your tank, ma'am."

After entering the Shantytown area we drove past literally every gas station in the nazi held area until we made it into the central area of the city where the PRT nominally controlled; from where the station was up on a small hill I could see the South Ferry Terminal. To my delight the old biddy allowed me to fill up both of her gas tanks, though only a few gallons to get us around town; Neutrally Buoyant and I would be upgrading her ride, and that improved looking at her gas tank thoroughly, and it would be a lot easier if we only had a few gallons to siphon off. Still, four gallons cost me damn near $28.00! Don't get me wrong, it made sense considering how the energy industry has been getting bent over the table by all of the Endbringers at the same time, but still, that hurt my wallet to think about- not to mention it made me feel for the residents who struggled to even get to work each day when every round trip sipped eight or nine dollars from your pocketbook.

With some gas back in the tank we drove through the remainder of the South Ferry district and skimmed north on the main road straddling the Financial highrises and the very large complex where the PRT office was- it was interesting to see the PRT-ENE branch with my own eyes. The main building was twelve stories tall, with a wide front and it went pretty deep, but that wasn't what caught my attention; behind the back of the building was a large fenced-in area that had been prettied up with shiny materials and fabric covers to prevent people from nosing about, but it didn't change the fact that the area reminded me of a military motor pool.

We were only able to see into it because we had come from a higher elevation, but the moment we went to street level I lost the ability to see anything; it made sense, the PRT branch here had hundreds of officers and probably ten times that many staffers spread throughout the main building and the other smaller compounds that had been built up in order to support the efforts to keep peace in a city that had more capes per capita than any other city in America. They needed training space, housing for unattached Agents and Officers, storehouses for equipment and supplies, and more importantly the capacity to turtle up and become a hub for various governmental agencies should everything go tits up.

Thinking that everything PRT-related would be contained in its singular building and whatever basement floors it had would be silly.

It still didn't change the small thrill of potentially walking through the glass front doors of the place to register as an independent hero. It's official shit, and definitely, on the bucket list of 'stuff I want to do'. Because who in their right mind wouldn't want to sit across from Piggot and tweak her nose at least once? Though, I needed to keep aware that this Earth Bet might not exactly be a canon one either.

We made a quick stop at the "HEROIC MOBILE" store, a small cell phone shop that had a pretty decent selection of cheamo burner phones, mid-tier flip phones, and some entry to mid-level smartphones. I purchased a micro sim card with a "pay-as-you-go plan" on the cheap for $30 that came with a thousand minutes, a thousand texts, and 2GB of Earth Bet's version of 3G cellular data. Not that any of that mattered because the moment the sim card was inserted and I walked out the door the nugget of Enbee embedded within the phone began to immediately start toying around with all of the settings.

I fooled around with the new unlimited data plan that I had now and started to search out areas to make the purchases, but Enbee's nugget had already correlated a whole list of shops to include a map that gave us the most direct route through the city on the main roads.

The old woman and I chatted for a few minutes while we made our way over to the Library, and it was during that moment I felt the Forge grasp out from a star from the "Knowledge - Future Tech" constellation and pulled it in close.

[Attempted Re-Forge: 20.0080 - Gero Expy - 200CP - Dragon Ball - Knowledge Future Tech]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 150 CP Remaining]

My eyelids fluttered as I felt the knowledge of the man known as Dr. Gero get downloaded into my skull. Just like the Dead Space Engineer, I was the scientific madman- everything thought, every boiling emotion, every fit of rage, every triumph and success, and every failure was my own to experience. From my time in the Red Ribbon Army to the years I spent in HIFL every scrap of intellect, experience, and proficiency was mine.

I could build advanced robots, cyborgs, and androids that could fight on par with a Super Sayian. I could design systems that could drain massive, planet-killing amounts of energy into an internal battery that didn't have a limit that could bolster my own strength proportional to the amount of energy it had stored. I could develop completely biological androids that could match Super Saiyans and even surpass them if they trained hard enough- Android 17 was chosen for the Tournament of Power for a reason- and the best part was the Infinite Ki generator that allowed whatever held it within its body infinite life force and unlimited stamina.

Though according to Gero's notes the generator was limited by throughput- the generator could supply it, but it was up to the wielder to have a vessel that could contain it.

Already my mind was whipping through ideas on how to combine Dr. Gero's robotics knowledge with the ADVENT database's mechs that would be combined and then streamlined by my Huragok Companion. I could build an army of non-lethal mechs that could restrain an entire gang in just a couple of hours, though I already knew the public backlash would be pretty heavy- or at least the Protectorate and PRT would throw a hissy fit; the people probably wouldn't care that much as long as they could take a walk throughout the city without being dragged into an alley at knifepoint.

Neutrally Buoyant was already sending me messages about having improved the Auto-Factory to his specifications and was roaming through the database after having constructed his Huragok interface unit; it was essentially a microscopic keyboard that had hundreds of buttons on it that allowed the scilla to type far more rapidly than any human could hope to match. He made a complete copy of the ADVENT database and on his copy began making numerous annotations to upgrades and improvements that could be made to virtually everything that was there.

Tiffany and I parked the car in the Employee parking lot of the Brockton Central Library and moved around to the employee entrance where she used a key on her keyring to let us in. Much to my surprise, it didn't lead us anywhere except the back of the first floor of the library; I guess that the break-rooms and whatnot were somewhere else in the building? Still, it made me painfully aware of the woman's age as we walked together, her arm wrapped around my own and using me as a crutch to aid her steps. I didn't know if this was an act from her or if she still hadn't recovered from our first meeting last night; no doubt holding that shotgun at my chest for an extended period of time, when combined with the long walk from her trailer to the property and back, was probably the most exercise she'd gotten in a long time.

We slipped around to the front of the main desk and Tiffany placed her hand on the wooden counter where two women sat; one was older probably nearing her mid to late fifties as her hair was just as much white as it was black, and the other was fairly young, at probably 19 or 20. They both wore professional office ware with the few embellishments being the pearl necklace on the older woman and a thin gold chain with a small medallion around the young woman's neck. "Hello, Tina, it's good to see you again!"

Tina, the older woman smiled and she stood up so that she could lean over the counter and give Tiffany a hug and a kiss on her weathered cheek. "Miss Tiffany, it's good to see you as well! It's been a few months since you last visited, what's the occasion?"

The younger woman cracked a small smile but used the distraction to return to her work, not wanting to get involved in whatever chit-chat the two women were about to engage in. Tiffany rested a hand on my wrist, "Well, do you remember last year when I told you that my sister's grandson was thinking of coming up to visit? Well, it took him a little longer than he expected to get away from his job, but he's here now and is looking to stay in Brockton for the foreseeable future."

"Oh?" Tina blinked and turned her focus onto me, "Where did you come from, dear?"

"Ah, well I was a security manager up in Alaska, managing the pipelines out there," I popped my neck and relaxed into the conversation, "Spent a few too many years away from civilization and decided that instead of going home to North Carolina I thought I'd come up and spend some time with Auntie Tiff; my grams died a decade ago, and I remember coming up here for the summer as a boy. Thought I'd rekindle that family connection while I have the resources and the time to do so."

"Well, isn't that wonderful for you Miss Tiffany? I got four children and they're all so busy these days that it's all they can do to send me a card on Mother's Day and Christmas." She sighed, "Not to mention I haven't pinched my grandbabies cheeks in so long!"

They chatted back and forth a few times before Tiffany finally maneuvered the conversation towards the real objective of this little expedition- a library card. It was, quite honestly, incredibly painless, and not as much of a hassle as I had thought it would be; they barely even looked at my new New Hampshire driver's license that Enbee and I put together. Granted it was probably because it was indeed a New Hampshire state ID- if I'd shown up with my Tennessee driver's license they probably would have paid more attention. With the address listed as the trailer of Tiffany's ex-husband I had a brand spanking new library card and was free to peruse around.

I went straight to the history section and grabbed a few thin books that focused on major historical events in the United States and the world since the arrival of Zion onto Earth Bet. After that, I went over to the computer tables and chose a good spot that had a few vacant seats between myself and the next person over so that I could sit the books down. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the USB cable and connected my phone to it, and I received a notification from Nugget- the small piece of Enbee shall now henceforth be named 'Nugget'- that he had connected to the internet through the computer and would be pulling in relevant data to be stored.

There were a few times that I received some looks from people because I was flipping through the pages of the history books while at the same time scrolling through Wiki Warriors, Wikipedia, and PHO. Nugget had me set up with an " " email account, and I was able to sign in under the username "Horizon". I had Nugget create a virtual mock-up of my spitballed costume, which was a slimmed-down version of the ADVENT Shieldbearer armor, and he seamlessly integrated the mock-up and rendered it in excruciating detail in front of a stock concrete wall photo that he had also painstakingly altered to make it unique so that Dragon's automated systems couldn't flag it as a fake.

When the PHO verification prompt came up I wrote down "For Verification Purposes Only: Tin_Mother, I am 'Horizon', January 5th, 2011" onto a scrap sheet of paper that was tucked behind the monitor and took a picture of the handwriting. Nugget transposed that handwriting into the cardboard square that my mock-up was holding in the image and then he started making alterations to the carboard; the little drags, multiple strokes to get the ink to print onto it, and small little tears where "I" pressed "too firmly" onto the cardboard on certain strokes and damaged the fibers.

He then completely rendered the scene again, and even with my eyes, there would be no way for me to tell that the image was a fake. Granted I didn't have superhuman eyes, at least not right now, so I guess there is that. The whole beauty of the photo was moot though because after that Nugget downscaled the resolution to what would be common for a mid-tier flip phone and packaged with it a bunch of false meta-data and geo-location data that had the photo being taken from an abandoned warehouse in the Docks.

I smiled as I attached the crappy photo to the prompt and sent it in after doing a really asinine reCaptcha where I had to identify boats of all things. Watching my IP address, Dragon?

Within a few minutes, my account had been verified and I was now the 9th cape to hold the name "Horizon"! Go me!

I did feel some type of way for a few seconds because the only reason I'd gotten the name was because the "Horizon" of Kansas City, Kansas died fighting against the Slaughterhouse 9 a few weeks ago in some small town called Deer Creek on the Missouri border.

Granted, I could have done some more research into various mythologies and the like, but I really didn't feel like doing it, so I just took a fairly ambiguous name that roughly could be construed as "looking towards the future" but wasn't as pompous as something like "Pinnacle" or "Apex" or some other stereotypical "Badass Over Here" cape name. I just went with something good and vanilla that didn't automatically let everyone know my power just by hearing my name.

I'm looking at you, 'Stardust'.

She is currently an independent hero that can make hard light constructs that looked like stars, and she could fashion up to a few thousand of them that were as small as a grain of sand, and with them, she could have them form up around criminal's wrists and ankles and bind them together for non-lethal captures. She could also coalesce them into a single larger construct, roughly the size of a wrecking ball, and could swing that around on some sort of telekinetic tether; she didn't deal with other capes though, only sticking to street-level crime and bugging out as soon as Gang-affiliated Capes showed up.

My gut reaction was that it was pretty cowardly of her to do that, but then I remembered that most people were not naturally suicidal, nor paid to go out and confront dangerous individuals; she is a private citizen who has been using her powers to keep crime in her area low and honestly that was already admirable to begin with.

I started up a few DMs with various Rogues that were amenable to a rookie like myself asking questions about the state of the city, who was who, what was what, and more importantly, where was where. I only asked the Brockton Bay veterans that had at least a year of being independent and were still alive to tell the tale; their bits and pieces of knowledge were added together to form a more cohesive whole. The best part about it was having more data points from more people meant that I could avoid outdated or junk information and pick up a more clear picture of what is happening around Brockton from the eyes of the Independents in the city without a clear-cut network of surveillance and moles.

[Attempted Re-Forge: 34.015 - Form & Function - 400CP - Final Fantasy XIV - Quality Durability]

[NOT Purchased: Insufficient Balance: 250 CP]

I was a touch bummed that I didn't pick that perk up- anything from the "Quality - Durability" constellation would be incredibly helpful in getting my first suit of armor up to snuff- but such was life.

After the next few hours, I felt a lot more comfortable with my knowledge of the region now- the implant made absorbing information from the history books and whatever little other things I picked up to break up the monotony incredibly easy, and it made surfing the web just as enjoyable because the meme-boards on PHO were absolutely out of control. It was hilarious, but Tin_Mother being the Admin that she is, locked threads down frequently for getting too rowdy, and Dragon's small army of human moderators were getting assaulted on all sides. A lot of the lockdowns were because a few edgelords decided to be edgy and post some memes that were more than a touch off color.

Regardless, it was nice to have a map of the city built up by Nugget based on the information provided- I could probably ping the Protectorate branch and ask to compare my map to theirs, but that will be something I can do at a later date. It firmed up the gang territories around the city and it was indeed different than my personal metaknowledge; I had thought that the Shantytown to the south-west had been purely Empire controlled, but in fact that they were forced to split ownership with the ABB. The ABB controlled the eastern half of the Shantytown, the side closest to the water, while the Empire controlled the western half of the Shantytown.

The suburbs and commercial districts pushing up towards Winslow were all under the Empire's "Protection", and this included the hospitals and the small regional airport that I arrived at yesterday morning. Winslow and the area surrounding it was neutral ground, if only because there wasn't shit there to fight over- a few middle-class neighborhoods weren't worth the effort of protecting or shaking down because they barely had anything to give and they weren't desperate enough to attempt to hook onto drugs. The ABB's territory picked back up around the Docks and pushed all of the ways north through Royal Station, and it pushed west until it hit the western trainyard where Merchant territory began. The ABB had total control of the Asian communities there, which was wholly unsurprising.

The Merchants held control of the west trainyard and moved all of the ways east to the Boat Graveyard, though there was a narrow corridor of ABB-controlled businesses that ran from east to west in the form of chop-shops and the like. The Merchants' reach ultimately extended all of the ways west down the coastline through the North Ferry and the Market district, though it was better to say that it was more contested than anything else- all three major gangs pushed and pulled in the area because the Markets were very valuable in terms of cash from protection rackets but also because there were so many customers for their drugs.

New Wave protected roughly three city blocks near their neighborhood but that was about the extent of it unless they were asked to cooperate with the PRT in an operation; something that was done rarely because New Wave didn't want to be seen as compromising their image of being an Independent Hero team, and the Protectorate and PRT didn't want to be seen as weak by requesting aid from Independents. Which rankled me a little bit because the sheer number of Independents in the region was mind-boggling - the Empire, ABB, and Merchants had 20 capes between the three of them, with roughly twenty minor Villains that popped up once every few weeks (or months) and committed some petty burglary and such. However, there were over 35 small-time Heros (or Heroic Rogues) on top of the Protectorate and New Wave.

There were almost 100 capes in Brockton Bay, and that alone was astonishing. I had known that the city was the Cape Capital of the world, but to see it actually for myself was... eye-opening.

It made me pretty happy that I'd set myself up outside of this whole madhouse because I did not want to have to contend with Independents of both Heroes and Rogues alike trying to fuck with me while I was building up to handle the major threats.

There was a small chirp and a buzz from my phone, and that was the reminder that Nugget had set for me. The small bit of Enbee wiped all of the search history and data from the computer before I disconnected him and placed the phone in my pocket with the USB cable, and after that, I returned all of the books to their proper places on the shelves before I moved towards the front desk to meet with Tiffany. I smiled at her, "Did you get everything taken care of?"

The old woman looked up from Tina who was sitting behind her desk, and the young woman who was sitting next to her gave me a thankful look; the poor girl had to listen to two old women gab on for hours, with only a small break for Tiffany to deposit her checks at the bank just down the street. "Yes, I did indeed. Well now, Tina, I need to do some shopping- my nephew has volunteered to help me fix some things around my trailer, so I'll let you go and we'll chat again next time I come around."

"I'm really envious," The graying woman chortled as she adjusted her glasses, "I can barely get my husband to open up a pickle jar, and yet here your nephew is offering to fix your rig up?"

"Well, I happen to know my way around some tools," I gave her a small smile, "But I'm no repairman, so I don't know how much I'll be able to help out. That doesn't mean I couldn't try though- they got instructional videos on how to fix practically anything on YouTube these days."

The pair hugged one more time before we moved out of the Library and back toward the parking lot and climbed into her truck. Tiffany muttered a few curses under her breath and massaged her knees with her weathered and bony fingers. "I haven't stood up like that for a long time. Should have taken the seat when she offered. Did you get what you were looking for?"

I nodded, "Yeah, it was... kind of crazy how my world and, uh, Earth Bet had a very similar history up until Sion showed up in the 80s. Like, one for one, the exact same. Pretty spooky if you ask me."

We chatted back and forth as we moved through Brockton, stopping at the various places on the list to gather the chemicals that were readily available and listed out for the Erskine formula and what Enbee needed to make his two children. The amounts needed were pretty small, but the vast majority of the formula could be synthesized by the Lifegiver once she was built- she would have to because the chemicals could be found in motor oil, drain cleaner, protein powder, chem lights, and a few dozen other different products, albeit in trace amounts. Enbee would pick through the materials and segregate what was needed to make the required doses and the Lifegiver would administer it after she had some time to tinker with it- the original Super Soldier Serum was made by Erskine in pre-WWII Germany in the late 1930s, and it wasn't discovered that Vita Radiation was the key to unlocking it until after Dr. Erskine had been rescued by Agent Carter and brought back to the States.

I'm fairly certain that a Lifegiver with all of the Forerunner's technology could find a way to stabilize it either without Vita Radiation or without needing to make huge amounts of Nitrimine explosives (utilizing Dr. Erskine and Dr. Stark's particular Nitrimine explosive formula that somehow managed to produce Vita radiation simply by existing) because as much as it sounds like some sort of fantastical made up explosive material, Nitrimine was actually a mundane class of organic nitrate explosives.

How they managed to make hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5 triazine, more commonly known by the moniker of RDX, emit radiation is beyond me.

I suppose the more pertinent question would be how did they stumble upon the discovery that this particular radiation had a stabilizing effect on the Erskine formula at all? My mind tried to concoct various laboratory scenarios in which a highly explosive compound would be allowed anywhere near the highly valuable Super Soldier Serum but I kept drawing blanks- the best I could do was just admit that comic book logic was weird and decided not to question it.

The fact that it was an organic nitrogen-based explosive meant that grabbing a dozen bags of nitrogen-rich fertilizer for my "auntie's garden" was pretty easy, and I made sure to pay cash, not that it would possibly stop whatever surveillance network the PRT had on all of the shops in the area. I picked up some seeds and some pots to start a little vegetable garden for the hell of it, and it would help sell the sale, not that the clerk at the desk really cared- the teen just wanted me out of the store so he could go back to fiddling with his phone.

After that, we made a trip to the grocery store and I grabbed everything I'd need for at least a month's worth of food; it cost me almost $350, but that was mainly because I was switching up my diet to something meatier while all of the carbohydrates were for the Huragok; Nugget sent me a message to grab some kiwis which were not only delicious but had a good amount of different trace nutrients that could be... pulled out for the formula? It probably had nothing to do with the fact that Huragoks were a species with a love of sweet things.

The Sweet Tarts and other candies that Nugget urged me to purchase were, in his words, a worthwhile expenditure for speeding up the creation of the Super Soldier Serum. Right.

I rolled my eyes at the shenanigans but accepted it because it was adorable to see the little Enbee on the screen of my phone point towards whatever carb-filled and sugary substances I passed; he practically lost his shit when we hit the breakfast cereal aisle and saw the sheer amount of sugar that was packed into them. I grabbed him one of the super-large "Family" sized bags of the generic Frosted Flakes along with a quart of milk, and I just barely remembered to grab the bags of yeast from the baking section- the newborn 'Goks were going to need to be eating a lot.

Which once again made me scratch my head at the oddness of their species. Not organic at all... but born from organic materials. The Dr. Gero in me wanted to study my buddy under a microscope because the more I thought about it the more I realized that the Huragoks were more like Bio-Androids than anything else, except for the fact that they were made of metals. Ugh. My head hurts.

It was while I was waiting in line at the check-out counter that I felt the Forge spool up and attempt to latch onto a star in the "Skills Magic" cluster. Unfortunately, it wasn't strong enough; it was missing half a charge. Sure, it sucked that I didn't get my first taste of 'motherfucking' magic, but I wasn't that excited about cooking magic anyway; I wasn't Shirou Emiya, after all.

[Attempted Re-Forge: 25.0110 - Ambient Magic: Cooking - 400CP - Circle of Magic - Skills Magic]

[NOT Purchased: Insufficient Balance: 350 CP]

I paid for the food with a grimace as that was almost all of my remaining funds between the fertilizer and other chemical purchases I was down to exactly $27.19.

I tied the plastic bags shut and loaded them into the back of the truck along with everything else and I hopped back into the cab with Tiffany. In the end, I did take the cigarette she offered me as we left the Market district and drove back towards the house. She parked the truck behind my double-wide so that I could walk the items I purchased from the bed onto the deck and into the kitchen Enbee and I had rebuilt.

"Holy shit, you two really did rebuild this whole place," Tiffany muttered out loud as she walked around the kitchen and opened up all of the cabinets while I was loading all of the meat into the fridge and freezer.

"Yeah. Took us like two and a half hours; stripped it to the structural supports and completely remade it." I spoke a little bit louder than I normally would to make sure she heard me over the crinkling of the plastic bags. I made a mental note to have Enbee make me some more cookware out of the scrap behind the house because the place only had a single pot and pan; her ex-husband couldn't cook anything unless it was out of a can, according to Tiffany, so he didn't bother with having a well-stocked kitchen.

Once the groceries were put away I opened up the door to the Workshop and let Neutrally Buoyant out to poot around while we waited for the sun to go down so that he could head into the forest to gather whatever living components he needed to begin making his first two children. I moved the chemicals and fertilizer into the shop and arranged them before heading out into the scrap field at Enbee's direction to collect some junk for the process.

The sun set around 6:30 in the evening, and once all light was gone Enbee and I walked into the woods around the house with a backpack. The Huragok picked a few saplings that I carried in my arms while he filled the bag with tall green grasses and various bushes, some rocks of various sizes, some moss, lichen, and a trio of rabbits that his tendrils had caught as he snaked his tentacles into the warren. "Plbbtt, blt, ppppbbblllttt."

He signed that he had what he needed, but would require a few gallons of water as well- the hydrogen would do in lieu of the helium that I wasn't able to pick up due to my lack of funds; I didn't know how much a helium tank rental would cost, but I was certain it was more than the twenty-seven bucks I had left. I did help him remove the armor that he had on his body to lighten him up though, he would need to donate a fair amount of his own gasses to get the little ones he was making up and floating; he assured me that his tendrils were always extracting trace amounts of the gases from the atmosphere, so his stores would replenish as time went on.

With the organic and inorganic materials all arranged in a semi-circular fashion, my Huragok companion got to work, which started with him removing one of his smaller tentacles at the base and laying it down on the concrete floor of the Hangar.

Not wanting to miss this I hustled out of the workshop and grabbed the folding chair from the card table in the kitchen and jogged back.

The tentacle Neutrally Buoyant donated was thinned out like a sheet until it was so gossamer-like that I would never have been able to see it if it wasn't so reflective. Grasses were picked up and then turned into shreds as fine as angel hair, his scilla unraveling the material was reduced to its individual cells and spread across the donated sheet. Then some junk steel was picked up and reduced into a powder finer than talc, and it was sprinkled across the sheet before the tendrils gently swept over it to remove excess.

He kept repeating this process, over and over again, alternating between organic and inorganic compounds to create some sort of incredibly fine laminate layer. The steaks that I'd given him were broken down into layers of proteins that were woven into a mesh and then threaded through the sheet, though I could only guess because to me it looked like he was a spider spinning silk around, his snakey head tilting left and right as he carefully observed his work. Half an hour into his delicate weaving the shape of a Huragok started to appear, and he asked me through sign language to retrieve a few of the chem lights that I'd purchased.

I ran quickly to the shelving area where I kept those compounds and snatched a handful from the box and brought them over to him. When I asked what he needed them for he signed that he wanted his two children to have a nice glow to them when they awaken; the materials we had on hand, while sufficient for new Huragok life, were not conducive to the natural bioluminescence and would need to be supplemented via the fluids in the chem lights.

A small chuckle escaped my lips as I sat back down and resumed my silent watch.

The first Huragok split the rabbits neatly in half and used the grey matter to build the primary brain; while not exactly ideal, Neutrally Buoyant was able to reformat the neurons into something that would support Lifegiver's fledgling intelligence until her consciousness was fully unlocked once her build was complete; she would be able to replace her organic parts with more efficient and versatile metal bits of her choosing.

It was fascinating to see the skull of the Huragok get constructed in real-time, to see the six beady black eyes put together, and the steel junk get broken down and constructed into what looked to be a paper-thin and hollow skeletal structure.

Half of the chem lights were broken down and his tendrils feathered everything into her new body; along her neck, on the outside of her bulbous sacks, and into the tentacles I could see.

Then the large plastic tubs of water were skooched close by my foot, and Neutrally Buoyant dipped one tendril into it and... I could hear the faint hissing of gas; it sounded like someone was getting their tire filled at one of those gas station air compressors. Over the next ten minutes, I watched the Lifegiver's body expand like a blow-up doll.

At the end of the process, Enbee leaned his neck down and placed his snout to hers, and blew; his sack visibly deflated a bit and hers expanded until she started to float off the ground. The Huragok didn't stop donating until she hovered a good four feet off the ground, just enough that her tendrils were barely touching.

His tendril reached out and gave her body an angular poke, and she bobbed down towards the ground before rising back up to her starting position.

Neutrally Buoyant turned his head towards me and began signing. "T-h-i-s-o-n-e-i-s-S-u-f-f-c-i-e-n-t-l-y-B-u-o-y-a-n-t."

With that, he reached out and touched a tendril to her forehead and the newly named Sufficiently Buoyant began to stir awake.

Subee trilled and made a wide variety of bird-like chirps and tweets, along with some boobles, burps, and bleeps that I would have expected to hear coming from an Astromech droid like R2-D2. The flesh of the Huragok had started out a blueish purple, like her 'father', but as she woke up it slowly began to change into a very pretty pink; the yellow luminescence turning purple and orange.

The pink Huragok began testing her propulsion, pooting and tooting from left to right, forwards and backward all at Enbee's direction. The pair whistled, chattered, and signed at one another rapidly in a discussion that centered around Subee's wake-up diagnostic tests. She picked objects up and put them down, and curled her tentacles and tendrils to test their range of motion and tactility. Once everything was done she hooted and turned toward me, her snakey head and neck curling up in curiosity, and she began signing at me rapidly.

"Ah, yes, I am human, though not a version of humanity you would be familiar with, Subee," I grinned and leaned back in the chair, "I'm guessing you're referring to the humans that the Librarian had your kind looking after?"

Subee tweeted at me and bobbled closer, and I forced myself to relax as her four tendrils came up and started patting at my facial features like a blind person would get a feel for how someone looked. Though I didn't know if blind people actually did that- I'd only read a heavily romanticized fiction story in which the blind woman felt out the face of her love interest. It was incredibly sappy. I loved it.

The weird thing was that I knew she was digging her scilla into my flesh and looking at me in such an intimate fashion- the secrets of my very DNA were open to her, and that was something special. Seemingly satisfied with her initial inspection she booped my nose with her nose before pushing off my body to float back toward her 'father' at his insistent bleating. She seemed to sniff haughtily and they began signing back and forth- Subee thought that checking up on her human was more important than building another Engineer, but she did understand that the materials we had collected would best be used while they were fresh, specifically the organic materials.

At Enbee's request, I left them to their work to go into the kitchen so that I could start working on a very large, very sugary, very yeasty meal for the lot of them. I'd acquiesced because I'd seen the process from start to finish, and thus my curiosity was sated.

I made a whole pot of rice with sweetened milk and half a bag of yeast. It was a very thick slop that honestly had my forearms screaming by the time I had it agitated enough to become a good paste. While I waited for them to finish I cooked a thick steak to medium-rare in the pan with plenty of butter and some garlic, and by the time it had finished resting and I'd cut it into thin slices for myself I was greeted with the sight of three partially deflated Huragok filing out of the lab into the kitchen; they were like a pair of baby elephants- it was absolutely adorable!

Enbee floated through first, the eldest Huragok pooting into the kitchen with some force while Subee held onto his sole remaining tentacle, and the new Huragok held onto her tentacle with his own. I reached into my pocket so that I could snap a photo of them all in a little chain like that.

Purple pooty, followed by Pink pooty, followed by another Purple pooty.

I squealed internally at the sheer cuteness overload. My inner teenage girl just wanted to get them all dressed up. A white nurse hat for Subee, and some little plastic yellow hard hats for Enbee and the other Huragok.

Speaking of the newest newcomer, he signed at me as Enbee had donated most of his tentacles towards the rebuilds. "I-a-m-B-a-r-e-l-y-B-u-o-y-a-n-t."

And he was Barely Buoyant- the poor dear had to be held aloft by Subee and Enbee.

I stood up from my chair and turned it sideways and Enbee gratefully modified the plastic backing so that they could set BB onto it. The youngest trilled his appreciation before looking at the slop I'd divided up between them in little paper bowls.

The trio of Huragok stabbed their faces into their meals with wild abandon, and it made the chef in me smile.

With a huge grin on my face, I picked up my plate and began tearing into my perfectly seasoned steak; salt, pepper, and some garlic powder- no need for anything else.

The Forge spooled up and my eyebrows reached up towards my hairline as it made a grab for multiple constellations at once.

[Attempted Re-Forge: 1.0030 - Stockpiles - 50CP - Assistants - Girl's Frontline]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 400 CP Remaining]

[Attempted Re-Forge: 23.0040 - You Runed Everything - 100CP - Elder Scrolls Online - Skills Enchanting]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 300 CP Remaining]

[Attempted Re-Forge: 19.0050 - Hoarder's Eyes - 100CP - Touhou Forbidden Hermit - Knowledge Mundane]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 200 CP Remaining]

It tried to make another grab after pulling those three small stars into my orbit, but it was not strong enough to make a fourth attempt.

I felt my eyes shift, just ever so slightly.

I looked down at the fork in my hand.

- Object: Fork. An eating utensil used to convey food to the mouth.

It wasn't much, but I had an idea of what an object was and how it was used. This was neat because with all of the equipment and shit I'd be getting in the future just having an idea for what it could be used for would be more than helpful.

The Glyphs came from the Elder Scrolls Universe, but it came from an age that was before most of my knowledge; Skyrim had been my second Elder Scrolls game after Oblivion, but I had been a young boy at the time, and the game I only had for a week due to it only being a rental. My knowledge of the runes came only from what was given to me by the perk- I would have to study the books that came with the enchanting table and decipher the meaning behind the runes myself to advance my craft. It came with a small addition to my workshop, and it actually had all of the runes I would ever need provided to me- they would respawn after a set amount of time depending on the runes chosen. It did have the caveat that I would need to use the runes to make a Glyph, so I could just pull the runes out of the housings and start shelving them.

Probably the most surprising thing, however, was the Stockpile of Ammunition, Parts, Rations, and Manpower that had been dumped into the storage part of my warehouse. Well, it wasn't just storage- it came with an assembly table, tools, computers, and diagnostic equipment needed for me to build my very own Tactical Doll, or T-Doll for short. T-Dolls were androids used by the world to fight conflicts at the behest of Paramilitary Corporations after the militaries of the world all but collapsed in the wake of World War III.

Plans and schematics flooded my mind, and my time as Dr. Gero looked at them with mainly disdain at the crude construction, though he did have great praise for the human emulation programs the AIs that piloted the T-Dolls around used for interacting with humans; he disliked that it was primarily for making it so that T-Dolls and humans could work together better instead of to gain trust so that the foolish could be subverted and destroyed, but my time as the Mad Doctor made me take the good with the bad. Gero thought that the aesthetics of the various T-Doll models could be a fair bit less... fetishistic, but it wasn't like his Androids could blend into a crowd either, with their cooky, overstated designs and blatant Red Ribbon Army paraphenalia.

Already my mind was whirling with possibilities on how to improve the Tactical Dolls with a great many of Dr. Gero's advances in robotics, and with the Hurgoks and the ADVENT tech-base helping me out? I would be able to build some of the most powerful and versatile mobile weapons platorm waifus to have ever graced Earth Bet.

The main issue I had was materials.

Dr. Gero worked with metals that were pioneered by the Briefs- and boy did that rankle him when he had to work through shell companies to purchase the materials to build his Androids- but were modified by him to be receptive to ki, thereby strengthening it to be able to stand toe to toe with a Super Saiyan. He started his work with 18 and 19 because he'd hit a limit on what could be achieved with ki-reactive metals, and started working on Cell once he felt he'd learned enough from their construction to begin his true magnum opus.

So while Gero had experience working with scrap metal in his days before the Red Ribbon Army gained enough financial backers to build his labs, he wasn't happy with it. Granted, with the 'Goks I could hand them ordinary scrap steel and they could re-arrange its molecules and turn it into the highest grade of steel the Forerunners were capable of working with, but it still left a lot to be desired. Though... I did have that cache of supremely rare materials from the Star Wars universe; the Beskar and Cortosis woven into the future T-Dolls would greatly enhance their durability and strength.

I scratched my chin.

The question was would it be enough to help them survive the rigors of Brockton Bay?

It was something to think about after a good night's sleep.

I looked to the three Hurgoks that were around the table. "Okay, I'm going to go to bed, alright? Subee, if there is any time to conduct a thorough inspection of my body, then that is the time to do it. If you can make some tweaks to my physiology to help make me strong, faster, tougher, and the like, then please do so. Also, Enbee, make sure to get a good look at my cranial implant and make some improvements if you would."

It was a lot of trust I was putting in their tentacles, but if the Librarian and the Forerunners trusted them then I would as well.

"Just keep the improvements beneath the surface, okay? I don't need to suddenly gain three feet of height or anything."

Subee trilled and reached out to touch my face, and I patted her feathered appendage with my hand before I returned to my room and stripped down and laid on my bed.

I was asleep the moment my head hit the pillow.

[Mini-Interlude: Sufficiently Buoyant - Subee]

Sufficiently Buoyant, given the nomenclature 'Subee' for the purposes of familiarity and comradery, floated weakly above the bed in which the human she called her Master rested. It was a strange thing, to have another name in addition to her birthing designation, but the Huragok did not mind it- if he wished to call her so then she would respond to it.

Her Master had permitted Subee to run a thorough upgrade routine on him, and that was exactly what she did, but everything started with a thorough diagnostic.

The thin cloth covering he was using to maintain a comfortable body temperature was stripped away and she reached out towards his head with two of her feathered tendrils- the molecular scilla easily slipping through his flesh, bone, and brain tissue to observe and record his cranial activity. The implant that Neutrally Buoyant had informed her of was indeed filling up a small amount of space within his cavity, but she found the installation of this technology to be rather barbaric and wholly amateurish; it might be functional, but it was inelegant and only caused no damage due to the fiat of the Celestial Forge. Enbee, as her Master liked to call her progenitor, had passed along all of his memories, and that included his addition into the Forge as a companion for humans that were given an opportunity to truly ascend into the realms of the Divine.

It was thrilling, for Subee to be working on her race's future Lord, but she kept her excitement in check while she was working on gently shifting the neural networks within her master's brain to be less inconvenienced by the implant. Once she was finished with his biological improvements the Lifegiver would call for her progenitor and they would open their Master's cranium to have the Engineer inspect the device and have it re-installed properly this time.

With her initial observations, she noted that the brain matter was divergent from the Humans that she had cared for in the past under the watchful eye of the Librarian, but that was expected. The neurons were less densely packed, they fired more slowly, and they seemed to die off far more quickly. If she could have clicked her tongue she would have- to see that humanity had degenerated after tens of thousands of years since their seeding annoyed her. She didn't have the vast stores of organic building blocks that the previous Lifegivers of her line enjoyed, so she would just have to make do with the available biomass on hand.

She reached into the DNA of the neurons within the brain and began to alter their genetic structure to match that of the 'Promethean' humans, and when the brain repaired itself the new neurons would grow. Eventually, the improved neurons would replace the old neurons, but that would take months to years, so she tipped the scales in favor of a shorter timespan by dedicating a whole hour to manipulating most of the brain cells into growing into the improved neurological configuration.

When Subee removed her tendrils she estimated between 497 and 498 hours before the changes were completed.

After that, her tendrils probed his neck and spinal column, chest, heart lungs, abdomen, stomach intestines, along with the bones, muscles, ligaments, and everything else. Already she could see that this wasn't the maximum potential of even his current genetics, which were far inferior to the Prometheans, so she got to work.

Skin was peeled back, muscle was unraveled, and bones were deconstructed and then reconstructed to match the strongest structure that calcium-based carbon bone structures could take without causing further health problems. Cartilage was further restructured to provide more cushion and lubrication for the joins, and the tendons and ligaments were altered to give greater reflextion, strength, and flexibility. Then the muscles were reconfigured to provide the greatest strength possible- no doubt he would want further improvements to be made, and Neutrally Buoyant would be happy to assist her in weaving carbon nanotube throughout his body, but that would be for later.

His stomach and intestines were modified to take in nutrients more efficiently, the gut flora adapted to aid in this process and attack poisons and invading viruses and bacteria. As long as he did not consume an acid the possibility of being poisoned by anything other than something more esoteric would be a thing of the past. His blood cells were poked and redesigned to better carry nutrients, oxygen, and carbon dioxide. His White Blood Cells and T-cells were bolstered in their ability to seek out and destroy harmful invaders. His lungs were improved to provide nearly double the ability to capture oxygen and Subee scooped up a small amount of lichen that she had modified to capture particulates like smoke and other things before seeding it within his lungs; her Master and the Lichen would form a mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship.

She made a mental note to check up on the modifications she made- even with her tens of thousands of years of experience modifying organic life there was always the possibility that it could grow out into a new direction.

From top to bottom Sufficiently Buoyant worked tirelessly - every single bone, joint, ligament, muscle, and organ was modified to slowly change into the humans of old; it would a week or two for all of his changes to be completed, but that was within her expectations. With the Erskine formula enhancing the properties of the person infused with it, having the Promethean human physiology taken to and past its limits would make her Master a formidable warrior, and that would keep him safe.

Subee's head looked away from the feet she was reconstructing and tapped his nose with a tendril.

Subee liked the idea of keeping her Master safe, so that is what she will do.

The pink Lifegiver had just finished the last of his modifications when she called out to her progenitor with a brief trill. Oh, she had forgotten to do his eyes! The Huragok pooted a little bit closer to his head and peeled his eyelids back before her tendrils slipped his eyeballs out of the sockets and disconnected the optical nerves. She remodeled the both of them, but unfortunately, the improvements she was able to make with these structures were less than her personal standards- even the Prometheans didn't have the most optimal eye structure, but there wasn't much she could do about it. At best his visual acuity, after correcting the slight astigmatism, would only triple, and his ability to see colors restored.

The man was color blind to two whole normal spectrums of color- red and green!

That was unacceptable, so she fixed it.

She had just finished the restructuring of the optical nerves to better transmit the new signals and placed his eyes back into the orbital sockets when her progenitor floated in. Subee sank her tendrils into the primary motor cortex and puppeted her master's body onto the floor, getting him seated into a kneeling position before she tensed up his muscles to keep him stable. Subee and Enbee chattered back and forth about the upcoming procedure, and despite her progenitor's dislike for Lifegivers such as herself, he relented that she was the Lead Huragok on this procedure.

The hair and skin on his head were parted and pulled down before the entire top portion of his skull was removed by her skilled tendrils. She guided Enbee through the process of disconnecting the implant, and once it was in his tendrils he deconstructed it and put it back together in a more efficient format- though he did complain about all of the 'backup' features that made the implant so robust in its design.

Subee agreed- if it was designed and made properly in the first place then failure should only come from outside forces.

There had been a moment where Enbee encountered a hostile program within the code that attacked him, but her progenitor isolated the program and then quarantined it; the Huragok cutting off the tip of his last tentacle and holding onto it for further observation. Enbee looked into the vast number of implants that the Forerunners had produced and decided that the current model was capable of running a severely neutered version of the OS and slotted it in place with an emulator program that would still allow it to interface with future technological acquisitions from the 'War Hammer 40k' dimension; it wouldn't do to gain access to their technologies through other perks and immediately be deemed a heretic despite being the Master of the Celestial Forge.

She trilled her agreement.

Neutrally Buoyant fiddled with the structure of the implant a few more times before having it run self-diagnostics, and then he fiddled with it again to eke out a few small percentage gains in performance and durability. Once the improvements were completed they worked together to properly install the implant within his brain. With the procedure, complete Subee placed the top of his skull back onto his head, sutured the cells back together, and placed his skin and hair back into position around it.

His body was puppeted back onto the bed and the sheet was placed back over his body before Subee tweaked his mind to resume its normal sleep schedule.

She also tweaked his hunger a touch to ensure that he would eat the proper amount of nutrients to fuel his body's growth over the next few weeks.

With that completed Subee and Enbee pooted back into the workshop to go over the Erskine formula together. Honestly, it was amazing work for a pre-nuclear civilization, but it was very, very sloppy.

Still, she was a Lifegiver, a servant of the Forerunners who held the Mantle of Responsibility. It was her duty to nurture the life under her purview and to see it blossom- the formula would be highly refined by the time she was done with it, and she wouldn't settle for anything less.

In the background BB pooted around the collection of materials from the Rare Materials cache- she would have to speak to him and Enbee about the possibility of further reinforcing their Master's body with them once his restructuring was complete and the Erskine formula imbibed.

Sufficiently Buoyant would call it the "Sufficiently Buoyant formula".

Yes, that had a nice ring to it.

"Ppppbbbbllllltttt!" Her progenitor tried to veto, but his input was not needed nor wanted.

Special thanks to Lmc9389, Xodarap4, Artillery, DrkShdow, AuraofCalm, Zerak, Mioismoe, Zath, Splendid, D. Wongsonegoro, Darkarma, Acrimonius, T. Balewood, Randall Randall, Dominyx Black, CyberCrisis, Blue, Russ Stilter, and Legion_13 for being Patrons!

You guys rock!

A/N: I was right on the 10K line at the end of the chapter, but narratively I didn't want to do another roll. So I will save the new roll for the wake up next chapter.

Also, I don't know a lot about Girls Frontline, but I think I can wiki dive it enough to figure out how the girls function. I have seen the GFL Hentai you know, so I'm practically an expert.

The decision to re-roll if I get a franchise I don't know has been a huge relief, so there is that. Thanks for suggesting it!

The addition of the T-Dolls really changed my early plans for building up robots- if anything it gave him a much better put together kit since he can construct them just from the stockpile provdied, though he's going to do some serious wargaming with the Hurgoks to optimize the T-Dolls abilities before he builds them so that he doesn't waste the limited amount of resources given to him by the Forge; it IS possible to roll it again, but with how many things are in the Forge (even with my truncated list of stuff I do know) the chances of that happening are slim to none.

Gero Expy (Dragon Ball) (200CP)

At least you don't need to have the beard. You're a brilliant scientist, an equal for the infamous Dr. Gero, after he had a bunch of years in HFIL to study more. While you're a genius with just about every field of science on Earth, robotics is where you really shine. Creating Androids and Robots capable of destroying planets or even stars, along with having a huge variety of strange abilities and weird appearances. You're even pretty good about remembering to program them to not kill you, already making you superior to the late Dr Gero. You're also excellent at working with other scientists, combining your proficiencies and knowledge to create significantly greater creations than either of you could manage alone.

Stockpiles (Girl's Frontline) (50CP)

We can't let you set off empty-handed; here's 5000 Ammo, Parts, Rations, and Manpower to get your army started (it takes 30 of each to make a baseline T-Doll, while the most consistently powerful Dolls cost something like 600/400/100/600 for a reliable chance of getting them). Each purchase gets you another 5k.

* This is not just normal ammo, parts, rations and manpower, you can combine them to make T dolls which are AI-piloted android fire platforms for military operations. Plus the ethereal 'manpower'.

You Runed Everything (Elder Scrolls Online) (100CP)

Before the development of the Arcane Enchanter in the 4th Era which streamlined enchanting to the point that any novice without even the barest hint of magicka could bind an enchantment, and even before the Guild-standardized enchanting techniques of the 3rd Era which drastically eased the process to a simple matter of shoving stored magicka into an item, the tool of choice for infusing an item with a magical effect was the humble Glyph. A Glyph is a combination of three runes, one inscribed with the potency which determines the base strength and whether it adds or removes, one with the desired attribute to effects such as health or a specific element, and a third designating its aspect, ranging from Common to Legendary. You know enough to be able to use and translate up to Rank Five runes (Pora, Denara, Hade and Idode), with even more becoming available to you as you research and translate more.

Hoarder's Eyes (Touhou Forbidden Hermit) (100CP)

You know the name and function of any object just by looking at it. Only that however, and the function is rather abridged, giving you a fairly brief overview of exactly what it does and nothing beyond that. You should probably try not to make any more assumptions beyond that.

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