Of course, I did not just jump off the train, rushing towards a farm to kill and slaughter cattle. Frankly, that was begging to be caught and either shot or arrested. No, instead I simply took out my laptop and checked out google maps. Say what you would, but if there was just a week left of high end technology left? Even if I would not be able to get all the achievements I had been aiming for on my steam games or in warcraft, I had at least a few tools to scout out the farms and rent a truck.
After all, I was effectively going to be doing some cattle rustling, as I checked just how long it might take me to drive back. Twenty one hours. Huh. I would have saved time driving up. Ah well, live and learn. As it was, I pondered the next stages of my plan. Thing was, I was going to be doing a few mildly reckless things. Of course, my 'cunning plan' had a few steps, the first of which was already accomplished, given how I was already in Calgary. The second was done with a bit of research and google searches.
The third step was simply renting a truck that met the requirements to be able to handle the next step. Step four? Step four was casing the joint of the first target, the one that had livestock trailers and would indeed be the next place I was hitting. After all, I needed to be able to load up the cattle in place, as frankly? Butchering them and harvesting them there would be too much hassle and increased my chances of getting caught. Still, stealing a twenty four by seven foot trailer and then aiming to load it up? I did a few calculations (and some more searches).
All in all, the sixth and seventh steps would be the most risky. Those were after all, the actual heists, hitting up the yards and farms. The actual harvesting operation? Now, that depended on the amount of cattle I was able to load up, but I was going to try for ten. Sixty to two hundred and forty graft points, which while not exactly bad? If I wanted some of the more... high end shit the grafts were capable of, even if I was just level one? Those would eat graft points fast.
Then again, such was the price of enacting surgery to impart bonus feats... and ones that could in truth be described as preforming deeper levels of surgery on myself as flesh, blood, bone, mind and soul resounded with new narrative elements. In fact, to fully realize the seed of mythos feats I intended? To forge a saga of interwoven flesh and iron, melding with the saga of knowledge? Three hundred and ten mythos points. Of course, to unlock the full potency of my bound evolutionary essence, to be able to grow without restriction and with all paths open before me? Six hundred and thirty.
Frankly, no matter what some would claim, the path to power was one steeped in blood and suffering, and while I intended cattle to form the scaffolding of that bright and glorious future? That was simply because flesh hungered for flesh, to have the modern trappings unwoven and broken down into their potential before they were reshaped according to dreams and will along the lines of claw and fang. Human? Cow? Some random cryptid? So long as it had flesh to unravel and be returned to that primal state, to be recycled into new props for the tale, it was all the same.
But, I pondered, as I considered. Frankly, I would have to ditch the trailer after the harvest, if for no other reason than to help avoid detection in this narrow window of time. And so, I begin my plan, ready for the night ahead. Of course, there was something else I needed to do. Something that would have some consequences in the coming days, if things weren't going to fall apart anyway. Frankly, looking around for a local gang and trying to get a loan? Sure, not exactly the smartest thing to do under normal circumstances... but as the winds of cataclysm gather?
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Calgary Police Department
Internal Communications (16 Hours Later)
"So, I think we have something for the stock trailer. Apparently, the Greenfields were missing a few heads of cattle this morning, and when they looked around the fence line?"
"Cut open fence and tire tracks."
"Yup. As it is, the truck that towed the trailer had its licence plates covered. No identifying marks either."
A grunt of annoyed agreement. "No shortage of trucks around here."
"Yeah, likely an out of towner, but will be sending out some calls. The trailer should be easy enough to find."
An amused snort. "Wonder if the idiot thought things through though."
"Look, all signs point at this showing a bit more sophistication than the usual rustlers. Probably some idiot city boy that saw the dollar signs and was thinking this was some get rich quick scheme."
"Least we can be sure they won't be in any hurry to ditch thirty grand worth of breed cows."
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Outside of Winnipeg, Manitoba
Matt (20 Hours and fifty minutes after Cattle Heist)
I was whistling to myself, pleased as punch as I drove to the Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson Airport. Or rather, to the car rental that would be there. Sans the stock trailer of course. THAT I had ditched ten minutes down an off road trail somewhere in Saskatchewan with what was left of the cattle and all the graft points stored neatly in my soul. Three hundred and thirty two, because they were not using the stats I thought they were. No, they were using freaking Bison stats, so they had five HD instead of three. Which bumped their value really.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Granted, even as I pondered my seed, most of that was more of a level seven and beyond thing. Plans for the future... and largely speaking? I could just tear the seed from myself and refashion it as need be with Meat Reprocessing. I could upgrade over time instead of just building all at once. Plans really, as I patted my pug. Hells bells, even more pressing was the fact that I needed a glut of mythos points and experience to purchase the additional mythos and manifestations, sinking my resources into new growth.
But once I reached certain milestones? I would be able to do something that raw personal power just simply can't. I would be able to be a power broker, dealing in the only currencies worth a damn. I would be, in many ways, something valuable. Of course, I had to balance that with personal power and being appealing enough for rising powers to court... without them trying to destroy me to deny me offering up my services to their rivals.
But, it was time for part of the plan. Buying a long term parking pass and waiting until a plane was landing before heading out with my smugly girls carrier and a travel case before heading to the car rental desk. Behold, renting a new car, not a truck, for a few days before crashing at a Best Western to assimilate the experience points and sleep. Or sleep and assimilate the EXP. Frankly, it was a bit of both. Just because I needed half the sleep I did before didn't mean I wasn't looking forward to some shut eye.
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Cattle Raid Snippets
As predicted, one of the hardest things about the whole affair had been chaining the trailer to the truck and speeding off... though not by much. Frankly, my claws made for good wire cutters and I could see in the dark. I moved as quietly as I was able, as quickly as I could. All in all, my first major crime was.... well, less exciting than you would expect. Then again, I was targeting something with limited resale value and high visibility, so security was meh. Still wore a covid mask to help hide my features a bit and took off my glasses.
Actually locating a cattle herd? Part of why I spent a few hours driving around earlier in the day after picking up the technological version of a scrying spell from Best Buy. Why, hello not needing a licence for a drone! Yeah, first time really using one, but all said and done? It made finding potential targets a lot easier. A hard to notice scout, that combined with a camera? Yeah, he was just taking a look and some photos, after he decided that even if the world was going crazy, he was going to try for a coast to coast road trip.
It was a nice and believable lie, particularly after the last few years. That, and having an old pug seated in the shot gun seat did not exactly scream criminal mastermind. Rather it projected the image of a young man eager to try and do something with his life. Granted, after finding a target? Some sleep, some cuddling the pug and getting ready and returning to Calgary to pick up the trailer around midnight. Then returning to the cattle. Who frankly?
Some apples and carrots and they followed onto the trailer, quite happy after being roused. Then I simply locked the trailer doors and began to drive off for a few hours. No seriously, between the drone, some research and prep work? It was way easier than I expected. Like seriously, I was half expecting to be discovered and shot and then need to fight my way out.
Instead, I drove for a few hours, unlocked the trailer and stepped in, claws breaking my skin with a snicker snack. Frankly, it was less of a fight than a slaughter, butchery that began and prepared for the next stage of it all. Claws moved, dyed red, carving and skinning as choice scraps were peeled and taken, as flesh and organs were exposed to the air and then...
How to describe it? It was not unweaving or melting them, reverting them from a physical state to one that was information, idea, and spirit, except that it was. Physical and metaphysical, as the flesh, blood and bones were taken, as all that made them cattle was ground away and purged, leaving behind nothing more than the idea and the potential of flesh, of the essence of biology that would be rewoven to forge and form new shapes and patterns. Life, in some respects, that through death would be transmuted into something new.
But, what exactly, I pondered, as I looked at a cats cradle of veins and arteries in my hands, marrow, bile, blood and brain matter twisting through them, forming words as old as predator and prey as the moonlight filtered through them, crooning to that ancient hunger that rested inside all organic life.
After all, Flesh desired to become One once more, even if merely to spin out new ideas from and of itself.
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As I closed my eyes, as I drifted off into sleep, I heard a ding, as the system integrated the experience I earned.
[For killing Fifteen Cows (CR 1 Animals), you have earned 4500 experience points! Congratulations, you have enough experience to reach level two! Congratulations, you have enough experience to reach level three! Apply level up process? Yes/No]
[Congratulations, for committing a theft worth 30,000 dollars or more before the system fully unfolds, you gain ten free skill points that can only be spent on rogue skills!]
[Congratulations, for killing fifteen animals before the system fully unfolds, you gain a least Beastbane Weapon Augment Crystal!]
[Congratulations, for reaching level three before the system fully unfolds, you may roll for a scroll!]