New Aug, Who dis?
“When Aether became commonplace, the advent and introduction of Aether-thought interface devices changed the speed the world moved at. When you can navigate the Network at the speed of thought, everything else seems slow in comparison.”〜 Excerpt from history textbook 13200 CT
Essen woke up the following day to a bone-deep ache and an iridescent crystal-like display window in his retinas. For just a moment, he was confused before he realized it must be his Bio-Aug and looked at what was being displayed to him.
‘Bio-Aug installation and initialization complete. Data successfully transferred from server. Scan of body, mind, and Aether complete. Displaying Aug features and conditions to lift restrictions on locked features.
Lotus Saintess/ Witch of Crystal Mk 9 Fusion type Bio-Augment:
Provides perfected versions of standard Bio-Aug features; refines and monitors host genetics, augments, mods, and Boosts their effects. Provides tailored nutrients, exercise, and training plans to help the user break their limits at every stage of cultivation. Provides improvements to Mental stats, Aether capacity and sensitivity, and cultivation method efficiency(Locked). Allows the user to more easily integrate and use multiple cultivation techniques at once(locked).
As Essen read further details on his new Aug, he began to get more than a little excited. His Aug was apparently a prototype designed to lead and assist a Dreamer on the path to obtain the most power possible at each step of cultivation. Most of the non standard functions were locked until he got a token, but it was still apparently optimising all his current mods, augs, and even had a timer for refining his current genetics to be as perfected as possible. This was fairly standard for Augs mid-grade and above, but apparently his was just a cut above the norm.
Essen saw in his new Hud that he had messages pending, no doubt from his friends in response to last night, but as he sat up his whole body seemed to ache down to the bones. A little mental chime and a screen popped up with a warning that in addition to his Mind Zero and Mana Burn, he had massively overtaxed his entire body, and would require more nutrients and suggested he follow his normal exercise routine to give the Aug a baseline.
Essen realized that with the bombardment of events and relations and offers he hadn't eaten in almost 20 hours. He forced himself out of bed and grabbed a different outfit from the duffle he got from Ava, not really wanting to dig through his closet before heading down to chug a few synthesised nutrient shakes and work out. Today's outfit was a sleeveless gold hoodie over a black tank top and some rather short black shorts, along with his spare running shoes. He caught a glimpse of the spinal/ nerve mod that had been installed yesterday, the pattern etched in slightly glowing crystal down his spine, a weave of interlocking almost runic digital lines that went from tailbone to just below the collar.
Moving quietly as possible down the stairs to the kitchen, Essen let his Aug dictate to the food processor the exact blend and levels of nutrients he would need to bring him up to his new normal. It dispensed three nutrient blends in numbered cups, which he chugged before tossing in the recycler. Answering his Augs ping about the flavors, his favourite being a strange blend of lychee and an Elvar fruit called meeiirr which was like a BlackBerry with a slight cold edge similar to mint in the taste.
After satisfying his need for nutrients, Essen began to go through the stretching and flexibility improvement routine Ava had put together for him, slowly easing away the soreness from his muscles. He then went through his normal routine of endurance and speed exercises, followed by a personalized strength routine focused on his core and lower body. He followed the instructions his Aug started feeding him for the amount and speed of exercises, before embarking on what would be a slow but long distance run according to the plan his Aug made. Essens routine normally took around 3 hours, and Essen would use this time to reflect on what had been happening and would happen to him in the future.
Essen was worried about the Beiowulv corporation. They were a known danger factor in the Grey Faction, known for hunting those who interfered in their business and were no doubt already looking for him and the Coven. If that link was discovered he would need as much personal power as he could get.
Cirrus’s offer was not great if Essen was being honest. Even if it was a high grade token, he could get a normal grade and then earn his way up the rarities if he was lucky. A random character meant that the features he gained from Nocturnalization were completely up in the air. However, the offer had massively convenient timing. Any power ups Essen could get were welcome and the chance to have an extra stage or three of cultivation completed due to the timeline before he needed to apply for the Military Examination would be a welcome edge.
He could also be an official operator, and take combat jobs and other tasks directly from a fixer instead of just from Ava. The military also always had pseudo-contracts available for Dreamers, allowing them to hold rank but take jobs on a merit and pay basis, instead of on orders, and once he took the exams he’d hold the recruit officer rank giving him higher benefits and rewards. The more Essen spent thinking of it, the more tunnelled in his thoughts seemed to become on accepting Cirrus’s deal tomorrow. He decided he wanted more info into the zone and task he would be spawning into, so he queued up a message to Cirrus.
Essentia: yo Cirrus, I’m heavily leaning towards accepting your offer. Can you send me more details on the item and what I’d have to do to get it?
Essen then re-opened the group chat and saw everyone’s responses from last night
RuCirrus: That’s great for you, Eysaluna Tower has a lot of support and training centers for both dreamers and the military, it should help in the career path you’ve chosen to chase. Also, it’s not that much further for me, the Rirodan Tower where I live is the same distance from both.
Essen could tell Cirrus also wanted him to accept their deal. He knew the inheritance battle was tough, but wondered if there was more to it than that.
Malady: Congrats S, me and Tess might have to look into housing there, we were discussing taking the exams for a few of the military academies to get tokens.
Tessaract: Melody has it correct, we were in a tossup between Eysaluna and Veriol Towers, but if you're on Eysa we might end up there too.
Essen wasn’t surprised that Melody and Tessa were looking into the military. Even as enlisted they would receive Augs and tokens and the merit based environment was quite good. It also helped that it would place them under the OEH tribunal of laws, so they could get married and guarantee they stayed together. Both the Elvar and Oni had much more accepting laws than the CCK, where profit was everything and the laws were focused on keeping the population numbers up.
Stratosquare: Hell yeah guys, you're making me wanna look into it too. Maybe in a year or so once my boyfriend's contract is up.
Stratos had been with their corporate manager boyfriend for a long time. Their boyfriend had helped fund their cosmetic mods and Augments to help them express their fluidity of gender. It probably also helped that their boyfriend was like the perfect blend of the frat boy and golden retriever nerd stereotypes.
All their happy messages put some cheer into Essens stride as he used the improved thought interface of an integrated Aug to reply to the group chat.
Essentia: It’s awesome that our plans all ended up aligning like that, I was a little worried that we might drift apart. Once Mel and Tess get tokens and Stratos bonds his, we can meet up on one of the cybercity hubs and do some Raids or Sim-missions together. We would need a group name though and I’m terrible at those.
Stratos had apparently gotten an uncommon grade token from their boyfriend, but the week-long bonding process and possible changes to their appearance had made them decide to wait till they felt ready. Earning tokens through the Nocturne was a difficult task, since you could only get them through dungeons apparently. A lot of the info on Nocturne was restricted on the network exclusive to dreamers, but allowed to be discussed through word of mouth.
Essen was also quite happy that his friend group wouldn’t fall apart right after graduation. He had been friends with all of them for a very long time, and his little group of outcasts was tightly knit and fiercely loyal. They were all outcasts in one form or another, whether through identity or ability.
Essens first friend had been Cirrus, and he had watched him grow into an absolute unit of a human. Cirrus was 7’4” and had the perfect ratios of muscle to height that only hyper-expensive engineering could cause. His purple hair was cut short into an executive style cut, with slightly longer bangs that framed his eyes. He was surprisingly quiet and shy to most people unless he had his “business mask” on. His inheritance war with his “twin” brothers, all engineered to be similar but born from different mothers, had meant he was used to operating and thriving under pressure. He was much better with knowledge than combat, and this reflected in that he was a Mystic type Dreamer, the dedicated support casting class.
Melody and Tessa had been his next friends, and were attached at the hip since he met them in the private schooling he had been in prior to the Primary schooling everyone received for free, unless they paid to receive higher quality private education. Melody was average height for engineered women at 6’1” and looked like the girl next door type, with soft blue hair and eyes, and a remarkably compact looking build. She was quite assertive and forward, leaping forward and thriving in social situations. She would spiral herself into chaos if it wasn’t for Tessa. Tessa, being Melody’s loudly proclaimed soulmate, was her exact opposite, being tall for an engineered woman at 6’9” with a braided strawberry blonde undercut and heterochromic yellow and red eyes. She was deeply tanned and extensively muscled, with shoulders that rivalled Cirrus. She was very calm and introverted, unless it was about Melody or Combat arts, about which she could quietly ramble for hours in the low smoky voice she had.
Next Essen’s thoughts drifted to Stratos. Stratos had recently changed their name and Aug’d their appearance, after a huge falling out between them and their parents caused them to move out to live with their boyfriend. They were physically the oldest, at 20, but when humans lived an average of 300 years without all the available augments or even the first tier of cultivation doubling it. Stratos had mods to shift their appearance across the lines of gender, in keeping with their shifting identity, but their rust flecked steel hair and eyes fit their aesthetic and personality perfectly. An effortless cool maturity with a hidden level of bouncy excitement.
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As Essen was winding down his run, he received a flurry of messages all at once. He pulled up the one from Cirrus first, the prospect of obtaining a token still in the forefront of his mind.
RuCirrus: my bad Ess, I didn’t even realise I hadn’t included a description of the item or spawn location. The item itself is called a star-blood fruit, and it improves the purity of someone’s bloodlines received from the Nocturne, as well as increasing the degree of world sync. The spawn location would be any of three planets in the Oni-Elvar zone, but primarily Zoran, a planet known for its high ambient Aether. The monsters will be stronger, but the loot and other gains will be larger.
Essen was starting to get excited about the prospects of the deal, despite not knowing why Cirrus wanted the fruit as bad as he seemed to. Not only would he be a Dreamer, he could advance faster, due to a good training environment and strong opposition. He was now almost sure he would accept Cirrus’s offer, unless a better one popped up between now and tomorrow’s ceremony.
Essen navigated through to the other messages, the first a set of chats in the group chat, wishing him a happy birthday and debating a name for their team. There was also some discussion in a larger group chat that had their extended friend group, but he rarely chatted there, if at all. After skimming over that, his attention was caught by a message from his oldest sister, Seraph Belmonte.
Seraphhic: Happy birthday bro!
Hope you don’t have to deal with too much nonsense today from the parents, and that you get some nice gifts. I’ve sent you the test dates and requirements for the military testing you asked for, as well as what my unit seems to be recruiting for recently, if that's still your goal. I know we talked about you acquiring a token in the next 6 months, so I also sent the access key to the catalogue for Tier 1 of Crystalline weaponry. I remembered you were fascinated by them, and it’s a good set for a Magi or Scout. Remember, the path to the top is full of people who believe it's gonna be them to reach the peak. Seize every edge you can get your hands on.
Attached was a file detailing all the testing data and standards for various postings, but the one Essen was looking for was listed at the bottom.
United OEH SpecialForces: Titan or Scout type Dreamer tier 2 or above, Magi or Mystic type Dreamer tier 1 or above. Perfect scores on all knowledge and practicals. Limit break or perfect breakthroughs required on 5 or more stages in each tier. Two Base Stats must break Excellent rating, and two special stats must be unlocked.
And then the other set of requirements he needed to make:
OEH Spec-Ops Unit Lacrima Crystale Recruit: Titan or Scout tier 3 or above, Magi or Mystic Tier 2 or above. Perfect scores on all knowledge and practical Exams. Limit break or perfect breakthroughs on every stage in each tier required. 4 Base Stats must break Excellent rating, and 4 special stats must be unlocked.
Essen had been studying stats and distributions for Nocturne since his sister found he wanted to follow in her footsteps. He would need every edge to overcome centuries of generational wealth, genetic mods and engineering, and even Alien races. The Nocturne broke your stats into eight basic metrics, typically wita distinctions. The Metrics are: Power, Agility, Vitality, Endurance, Dexterity, Perception, Instinct, and Resolve. The first four Stats being Physical while the latter four Mental. A stat distribution measures how good your stats are in the following order: excellent, good, average, and poor. For non-dreamers or tier 0 Dreamers, the difference between the numbers wasn’t too big at 100:50:10:5, but as the tiers increased, the gap between each number became very large.
Excellent could be a considerable range, as typically, the numbers for a primary stat In a build or special stat can double the minimum number to be considered excellent. Special stats are unlocked through various methods, and are based on class and subclass level, which themselves are based on skill levels. It's possible to unlock special stats through effort or by having mods installed, rather than through class but then you would have to find a technique to train it higher than the normal point increases to all stats for stage, level, or tier increases.
Thinking over distribution made Essen remember he could look at his own stats now that he had a Bio-Aug installed. He pulled up the Stat page, noting an alert pop-up that his stats would change with complete genetic refinement and Augment installation and optimization. It also listed his mod's names and effects.
Identity:
Name:
Sasha (Essen) Belmonte
Race (Bloodlines/ %):
Human (silverblood 100%)
Class Template:
Unawakened
Cultivation Tier:
Mortal (tier 0)
Cultivation Stage:
Mortal 0/13
Class: none
Subclass: none
Title: none
Handle: none
Stats:
Power: 11
Agility: 41
Vitality: 26
Endurance: 11
Dexterity: 51
Resolve: 14
Perception: 47
Instinct: 47
Special
Charisma: 31
Capacity: 215
Mods, Augments, Blessings and Curses:
Source:
Stats/Stage
Other:
Boost
Silkjade Cosmetic (full body)
10 Charisma, 2 Capacity
50% installed
200%
Bio-Crystal Bone+Blood (full body)(Jade)
5 Agility, 5 Dexterity, 5 Vitality, 2 Capacity
50% installed
200%
Duality Mk 1 Auxiliary Dantian (Extreme Compatibility) (Restricted)
(Growth lvl 0)
150 Capacity, 1 Instinct, 1 Perception
25% Installed, 50% functionality locked till sync
1200%
Vulpini-Fae Mk14 Symbiotic Spine/Nerve
15 Dexterity, 15 Agility
Skill Tree:
Focus
150%
Vulpini-Fae Mk14 Symbiotic Sub-mind Processor
(Growth lvl 0)
15 Instinct, 15 perception, 3 Resolve
Skill Tree:
Thought acceleration
Multitask
150%
Crystal Witch Mk9 Bio-Aug
1 All Stats, 5 Capacity
Skill Tree:
Meditation
Null
Lotus Saintess Mk1 Aug-Enhancer (locked)
10 Flow, 10 Capacity, 10 Purity
Skill Tree:
Reserve Boost
Null
Blessing Of SilverHeart (unawakened)
10 Vitality, 15 Capacity
Skill Tree:
Twin Pool
N/A
Resources and Effects:
Aether Pool:
Concord Credits:
Status Effects:
6450/6450
42,373 CC
Rapid Growth (21 hrs)
Augment installation(21hrs)
Mod installation (21hrs /7 days)
Sore Muscles(2 hrs 33min)
Elements, Skills, and Powers:
Elements:
Skills:
Powers:
(Locked): Elemental Affinities are locked until Awakening occurs
Unlocked skills:
Twin Pool, Aether Enhancement, Dash
Locked Skills:
Focus, Thought Acceleration, Multitask, Meditation, Reserve Boost
Mind-Aether Resonance
After spending a long time studying his status, Essen was fairly satisfied with his current progress. Even though “Average” for the distro ratio was 10 in tier zero, most people had 20s to 30s in physical Stats due to engineering, and his mental stats were fairly high as well. Essen scrolled through the bonuses to his mods, seeing that they were top of the line prototypes. The spinal mod worried him though, the Vulpini series was a Beiowulv manufactured Mod set, and the Fae series was Aureliod Manufactured, which meant this prototype was unique, and there were more layers to that job than he thought. Sub-minds and Ai-Augs were Peak tier tech, rare in the human-controlled parts of the OEH. Not to mention that both pieces were Mk14 and the Mk12 had just been announced to the public, with stats much lower than his even before the boost from his special Aug. As Essen got home from his Work-out, the pressure to improve hit him stronger than ever.