This is a humorous synopsis of Book 2: The End of the Trucking World. If you haven't read that book yet, it contains MAJOR spoilers! Don't read it if you don't want that!
For those returning after the hiatus, I hope you get a few laughs out of this.
System Log #4.1178e10
Triggering Event: Destruction of Settlement Core “Billings” by Regional Mana Concentrator
Analysis: Mana flow disruption corrected
Sapient loss ratio: High
Sapient loss mission impact: Negligible
Sapient Anomaly Detected: User Jill MacLeod
Beginning low-detail surveillance…
Warning! Local System Adaptive Algorithms anomalous!
Log may be silly.
After her harrowing high-speed highway hijinks evacuating what people from Billings she could, and a night’s sleep, Jill took on her most challenging post-apocalypse task yet: dealing with bureaucracy and logistics. She just wanted to get moving to Boston, but had unfortunately filled her truck with all of these defenseless low-level people who needed ridiculous things like food and a place to sleep. The Billings airport was likewise swarming with refugees, many of whom declared their loyalty to Bertha the moment they saw the badass, red-painted, bullet-spewing, death-roaring truck.
This added to Jill’s logistical problems, but saying no to them or kicking out would have felt far too much like emptying a sackful of puppies in the middle of a scorpion sanctuary. Besides, they were officially joining the so-new-it-still-had-that-new-Settlement-smell Settlement of Berthaville. If they belonged to her truck, and were paying their Mana tax, Jill really couldn’t get rid of them. Magical truck upgrades, plus a little bit of negotiating with the not-at-all-authoritarian new leader of the airport for the location of a food warehouse, took care of her problems. Then it was time to hit the road!
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
They encountered an underwater monster that was a bit snappy, and a road that was strangely stretched, but otherwise their journey to the food warehouse was uneventful. Except that it was now a space-expanded monster Lair led by a titanic bedeathrayed sunflower that nearly fried Bertha to a crisp. Jill dealt with the problem the way she did most things: by applying Bertha at high velocity and punching the ensuing chaos. She held down the truckfort, getting her ass moderately kicked in the process, while her combat trio - Babu, Ras, and Mia - invaded the Lair and dealt with the beastly boss. At some point in the middle of all that, somehow, politics happened. Yay!
Thus followed an interlude in which Jill killed Pikachu and penetrated a young man’s ass. (Want to know more?! The Kindle Unlimited and Audible copies of Battle Trucker Book 2: The End of the Trucking World goes out on July 23rd! Narrated by Zura Johnson and video available through OnlyBertha).
After creating a kilometer-scale dimensional pocket inside of Bertha, no big deal, Jill and the rest continued on their journey to the out-of-contact military bases they’d agreed to check out way back in Battle Trucker: What the Truck. They discovered and investigated the remains of a covert military research facility whose staff had made poor choices. The whole ordeal was somewhat traumatic and made worse by the discovery of a gruesome murder on the Bertha express.
They continued to the second base, through higher-mana and more-dangerously-besnailed regions, and discovered a wrecked convoy of survivors. Jill et al then fought their way through an oddly-passive ring of guardian monsters and entertained an unusually smart, portal-wielding, invisible T Rex to rescue the remaining base personnel. One super-powered kick to the nuts later and they were clear!
Unfortunately a few days later whoever had been murdering people decided that letting a Corrupted Abomination onto Bertha and trying to take control of the Settlement Core was a good idea. A fight ensued in which Jill went full Transformers but still got the shit kicked out of her, Sangita got stabbed in the back, and Babu lost his marbles. Said barmy-boy then murdered a whole roomful of people who all totally deserved it, honest, before Jill used the power of friendship and swearing, backed by a Perk Point and System-fuckery, to fix him.
Abomination driven off, for now, they continued on their journey, deeper into more-stretched space. Even though Bertha’s ridiculous driving speed was being countered by having more miles to travel they were still making progress, right up until they ran into the source of all the new terrain and the high magical density: a line of blazing mana singularities reaching into the sky. Their radar revealed a tiny path through, but it was far too dangerous and Jill had to turn back. Depressed but determined to find another way around, maybe to the south, she went to bed.
Instead of her usual dreams of trucks, she found herself experiencing an oddly lucid but very much dinoified vision. The T Rex shared its story and offered to portal them to the other side of the Rifts if only Jill helped kill the abomination which, let’s be real here, she would have done anyways. After a scream-inducing portal-hopping kaiju-surfing drive, Jill ran over the monster with Bertha. That didn’t quite do the trick so she backed over it and revved the murder-wheels. Task complete, she and the triumphantly titled Tammy the T Rex then portaled through a tiny hole in the Rift, earning Jill a new class upgrade and causing no side-effects at all!
End Log
Supplemental Log Available: The Adventures of the Best Fluffiest Biggest Doggo Boy, Sanders!
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