Karasuba frowned at the Invincible jump doc- I had, finally, convinced her to actually read the goddamn things.
"...Why the hell is the Alien origin so horny?" Karasuba asked.
I probably would not be able to convince her to keep reading them.
"The show's two major alien characters were Alan the Alien and Nolan Grayson," I said. "Both of whom were buff studs who canonically fucked like champions. Which was mostly wrung for comedic value- the protagonist of Invincible, Mark Grayson, is Nolan's son, and so, y'know. There's humor to extract from 'Mark's dad fucks like a champion,' as well as 'Mark's dad, after the divorce, crashes on the couch of a coworker who also fucks like a champion.' However, at the same time, you are... very probably having a very different reaction to that shit."
"So these perks were not intended for waifus," Karasuba said.
"Karasuba please for the love of god don't say the word 'waifu,'" I pleaded.
"It's called 'reclamation' when I do it," the literal anime character I was dating said. "Anyhow, so these perks are instead intended for becoming some sort of superhuman gigachad?"
"More or less, yeah," I said.
"Okay, well," Karasuba said. "We're never having kids, right?"
"More or less, yeah," I repeated. "I do not at all desire to raise children, and after a decade spent growing older where that didn't change, I don't anticipate that changing in the future, either."
"Then I can safely ignore the Alien perk that lets me curate what my children inherit from me."
"I- that- why is that an Alien perk?"
"The hundred point one makes me very seductive and good at sex, too," Karasuba said.
"...Why the hell is the Alien origin so horny?" I asked.
"Remind me again why you picked this Jump?" Karasuba asked.
"The Drop-In origin's capstone perk is extremely powerful," I said. "It gives me permission to pull whatever sci-fi ultratech I want straight out of my ass. Plus, there's other useful stuff on offer- the suggested build I sent you would make you a flying brick who heals from everything short of death better than perfectly, with anything damaged getting stronger in the process."
"Sorta like a Saiyan," Karasuba said. "...You know? From Dragonball?"
"Oh, right, that bit," I said. "Sorry, the whole 'gets way stronger after almost dying' bit was... mostly only relevant in the Namek arc? Which I didn't pay that close of attention to."
"Right, well." Karasuba grunted, and closed her laptop. "I'll take the Viltrumite Database item with my leftovers, since that seems like a useful thing to have. Speaking of, what the hell are Viltrumites, and what exactly does it mean that I'm one of them?"
"Technically half-Viltrumite, but..." I shrugged. "Anyway, the Viltrumites are a human-like species whose main community are a fascist imperium whose self-destructive views on the nature of strength have reduced their population to, like, fifty people, of which Nolan is one. The idea here is that you, Karasuba, are a young Viltrumite who's defected from the Empire of Viltrum and fled to Earth to blend in with the locals; this does mean that we're in direct conflict with the Viltrumites, but..."
"But, we were going to be fighting them anyways, weren't we?" Karasuba said dryly. "Another corrupt throne to grind beneath our heels..."
"Pretty much, yeah," I said, nodding. "Also, y'know, fighting them is the plot of Invincible. Except this time, since neither of us is a teenage boy with other shit on his mind, we're gonna be able to break that shit in less than a year."
"Don't feel like another extended stay?" Karasuba asked.
"I do not."
"Neither do I," Karasuba said. "I'm not really the 'settle down' type, I don't think. Or maybe I am, and I just haven't found somewhere I'd like to do that."
"Yeah, fair enough," I said. "Anyhow. Once I've got the comic book super-intelligence from Invincible, I'm hoping that it'll also come with enough actual problem-solving ability to help me pick out some more busted-ass Jumps to make me insanely powerful."
"What, you need super-intelligence for that?" Karasuba asked.
"...Honestly, no," I admitted. "I just wanna check my work, really."
Karasuba chuckled quietly, shaking her head.
"It's endearing, how much of a dork you are," Karasuba continued. "You remind me of Matsu, except..." She trailed off.
"You were going to say 'less of a horny freak,' before you remembered our last two years together, huh?" I asked.
"Okay," Karasuba said. "You're even more like Matsu than I thought."
"I still can't get over how you thought light bondage and anal were freaky kink shit," I said. "Like, babe, I can turn into a tentacle monster."
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
"I am intimately familiar," Karasuba said.
"But don't worry," I continued. "One way or another, I will frogboil your libido until you need at least three anatomically improbable kinks involved to cum. One day..."
"You're lucky you're hot," Karasuba said.
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When I went into the SWTOR Jump, I hadn't just bought Perks and Drawbacks and the like. I had also taken a challenge, of which the doc had many. The one I took was called Pax Jumperia, and had a Light Side and Dark Side option, and I'd chosen the Light Side option- prevent war from breaking out, and then keep war from breaking out for three thousand years. I didn't have to be there for all of those three thousand years, of course, I just had to set things up so that war wouldn't break out for three thousand years, and I managed that just fine.
And my reward for successfully doing that? A second galaxy for my Warehouse, where physics were even more malleable. Where I could invent whatever metaphysics I wanted, and my new pocket universe would obey them. As an author who had been playing with bespoke magic systems for... fuck, more than half my life at this point... I had a lot of ideas on how to abuse that.
"We'll figure something out, don't worry," Planetary Administrator Clover assured me.
For now, however, I wouldn't be. The reward was fairly clear about the pocket universe reward starting off with a single planet around a single star, and developing more space over time. Oh, sure, there had been plenty of time for growth while I did my emperor thing in the Warehouse, but still, I could afford to let it keep simmering. So, while I would go off and work on stuff in Invincible, I'd just crank up the time dilation for this pocket universe- the maximum was 400x, and given it was anchored to a realm where time past 100x faster than main reality, I'd be giving my new universe forty thousand years to grow and develop while I spent a single year in Invincible.
We'd see then about setting up the metaphysics to something disgustingly abusable, after everyone living in here had gotten a good, long time to come up with their own ideas. In the meantime? I was content to let it be just another part of my empire in my toy universe.
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"Superhero identities, huh?" Karasuba asked.
"They've heard of Star Wars in this universe," I said dryly. "So, y'know. I don't think going by Darth Thanaton or Darth Corvus-" I'd given Karasuba that title along with Empress, since she technically hadn't been made a Darth when she was named Emperor's Wrath. "-is going to go over terribly well."
"Fair enough," Karasuba said. "Well... Let's see..." She tapped her chin. "...We're arriving before the story begins, and before the protagonist gets his powers, right?"
"By a month or so, yeah," I said, nodding.
"Can I steal his name?" Karasuba asked. "Call myself Invincible?"
"...Names are hard, huh?" I asked.
"Well you come up with something if it's so fucking easy," Karasuba said, folding her arms and pouting.
"Thronebreaker," I said.
"...You've been waiting to use that one, haven't you?" Karasuba said.
"A little bit," I admitted. "Anyhow, you want a different one, or..."
"No, no," Karasuba said. "Thronebreaker works for me. What're you going to go with?"
"Well, I'm going to recycle a name," I said. "I've written a lot of self-insert fiction in my life, and one of those featured myself as a mad scientist in a superhero setting who chose to go by Doctor Ophiuchus. And, well..." I shrugged. "Still works for me. I mean, okay, Thronebreaker and Ophiuchus don't exactly fit into the naming schema of Invincible, which goes for more of a goofy callback to old-school comic books, but I want you to consider whether or not you want a name that fits into the milieu implied by Rex-Splode, Dupli-Kate, Atom Eve, Robot, and War Woman."
"You have a point," Karasuba said.
"Excellent," I said. "Now... let's see if we can rustle up some good costume designs."
"What, not gonna just stick me in a Power Girl costume and call it a day?" Karasuba asked.
"Your hair's the wrong shade for that," I said idly. "Anyhow, I'll run our names past Bunny, or whatever other admin is available, and see about getting some designers assigned."
"Before you do, I have a question about the Body Mod," Karasuba said.
"Yeah?" I asked.
"So, the Physical Prowess perk chain is phrased in terms of peak human strength, and the document says that it stacks with whatever your current form is by replacing 'human' with whatever other species you are now," Karasuba said. "I'm a Sekirei, and 'peak Sekirei strength' is something I'm very familiar with... and yet, I didn't get a hundred times that. I got a hundred times peak human strength. Why is that?"
"Well, that's because the benefits of your Sekirei nature were explicitly Perks in the Sekirei Document I used," I said. "And the Drawbacks we took meant that you couldn't bring past Perks with you, so that meant you were downgraded to ordinary human with a tad bit of relationship-based psychic bullshit on top, and then had your new Body Mod and Jump Perks added on top."
"I see," Karasuba said. "And... now that I'm going to be a Viltrumite?"
I hummed quietly, thinking it over.
"...I don't think it'll apply there, either," I admitted. "Since Viltrumite physical capability is such a strange, diverse thing, that's pretty dynamic as opposed to how relatively static it is for humans and Sekirei..." I shrugged. "I don't think the Body Mod is going to do anything noticeable there. I mean, it does give you all sorts of interesting magics that being a Viltrumite doesn't, but in terms of flight, durability, and punching people? Viltrumite's going to effortlessly overshadow anything the Body Mod lets you do."
"Dammit," Karasuba said.
"And then there's the fact that your regeneration from Invincible might conflict with the regeneration from the Body Mod- only the one of them lets you heal stronger than before, so uh... you might wanna keep the Body Mod one just turned off."
"And here I thought the Essential Body Mod was strong," Karasuba complained.
"We had a good run with the Essential Body Mod," I continued, "and I abused it very, very heavily... but we're in the big leagues now, and we're contending with far stronger kinds of bullshit here. So get ready, hon. We're gonna need to bring our A-Game for this."
"Well, when you put it like that, I just get excited. Let's do this."