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Social Grafitti
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> Social Grafitty is the act of injecting elements of the original world’s (usually Earth) “pop”, “geek”, or “nerd” culture into the societal norms of a foreign world. Not to be confused by Technological Injection. Technological Injection represents a boon to the society with the introduction of technological and scientific concepts that can cause them to leapfrog hundreds (or, as is usually the case with magical fantasy societies and their negligible technological advancement, thousands) of years of advancement. Technological Injection (TI), when stripped down to the scientific details is beneficial to the target society, while Social Grafitti (SG) is not.
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> Even TI has its drawbacks, mostly for the transmigrator. Weak descriptions of the technological advancements without a deep understanding of the underlying scientific theories may hinder or make replication outright impossible. Different laws of reality or watchful deities that don’t wish such technological advancements lose upon their world can lead to catastrophic setbacks. And finally, greedy and powerful individuals may capture and enslave the transmigrator for their knowledge. We advise transmigrators to refrain from doing TI unless they are 100% certain of their own safety.
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> Social Grafitti can be done by injecting names, places, and useless traditions into the foreign world’s society as baseless ego-boosting and wish-fulfilling acts of vandalism by the transmigrator. It is prompted by a definite rejection of the transmigration itself, which the transmigrator might not even fully realize. Most of these foreign elements introduced through social graffiti vanish over time but enough of them gain significant momentum and are immortalized by historians, bards, and even just as folklore in the foreign world.
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> Some scholars claim that while the vast majority of social graffiti is useless or harmful, a very small portion of these elements have at least one facet that might be useful or constructive. To them, social graffiti work as trail markers for future transmigrators. That these elements can help transmigrators find something concrete to anchor themselves and find succor in the harsh reality they were, most often, forcefully thrown in. The authors disagree.
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> The positive social values inherent to a particular social graffiti most probably can be taught without the “pop culture” references. A conscientious transmigrator can change names, places, characterization, and even mask technological gadgets as magic, psionics, or even martial arts techniques (depending on the foreign world’s mystical elements) to avoid causing irreparable harm to the cultural development of the native people.
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> - On safely interacting with transdimensional cultures, chapter 2. Wallenstein, Wallenstein, et al. University of Wyoming.
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After I let them go, they were assaulted by the women, unaware of their Royal status. They were thoroughly scrutinized and had to reveal everything about me. What I liked to do in bed, if I hit them, how good it felt, and more importantly when it would be their turn. That's when Mona became the hero of the Palace's female staff. She told them how she resisted my lewd advances until she earned a promise that I would consider bedding them.
They negotiated to let me chill until after the party, drew sticks to organize the schedule. I noticed the hungry stares from the maids and knew I had no other choice so I read the mind-benders' grimoires on enhancing pleasure with magic. it wasn't Mind magic but Illusion as the sensations were created externally. And it wouldn't end with the maids either. I had to remain open for business (marriage business) so the noble ladies had something to dream of and their fathers could negotiate with me. Having a commoner-born woman as the first wife was... not good.
At least that was the Imperial tradition. To which I had zero fucks to give if I could. It wasn't the time for open rebellion. So I let the women plan for a welcome party that would also double as a secret wedding celebration and went to Windemere for the quarterly Ressurection Bonanza. After my divine duties to my worshippers were fulfilled and I got a shit-ton more "fur tags" from more people who decided to follow the only Goddess that still made Her presence known to the world, I went to the Senate.
I had an idea after I made M&M both Royalty. If a deity could sponsor the hereditary rulers of a nation, why not the elected rulers of a nation? So I went to the Senate in Haru's form and presented my case. The Senators would receive my blessing and a special Perk but would be beholden to me as well as the Tabard. Which was worn by the Prime Minister now as Mirina was the last Royal in Windemere and she never had any child.
Oh, well, that made me twice as angry about what the Dallas Visitor did to me. If I became Percival a few centuries sooner, I could've impregnated Mirina.
The Senate would put the issue up for a vote, and I would learn about the results after they deliberated. Oh, democracy. From there I went to the Academy, to give Marlowe a copy of the magical texts on Flesh magic I obtained. Then I realized he had procured other grimoires on the subject and we ended up exchanging knowledge.
After I confirmed that everything was well on this side of the world, I went back to the Empire.
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I went to the Secret Garden and prepared to forge weapons for the girls. The staves they used were nice and dandy but their combat styles would be best served with other weapon types. As I pondered about it, I noticed I'd screwed up on the Class allocation. I should've given the [Paladin]-based one to Mona, and the caster one to Madge. Because Mona was unable to stand in the back and throw spells. She liked to deliver powerful blows and bowl her foes. To her, I would make a mace that would double as a magical staff. One with a longer haft for reach and more momentum.
Madge liked to control the battlefield and deliver precision blows. She had enough coordination to wield two weapons at the same time so two short swords or maybe wakizachis. No. A long rapier and a parrying dagger would be better.
Thinking of how they would fight and how to better protect them, I remembered a game I played on the Playstation. In it, the protagonist, a Valkyrie, had two floating shields on each side who moved on their own to block incoming attacks. Well, in the game they were there just for the rule of cool, but I think I could emulate that in real life.
I knew how to make things float and even move around. All I needed was to teach the shields how to move to block blows and I could imbue them with rudimentary sentience and battle awareness. The cores of the Slender Trolls would be perfect for that. I could engrave the Cores and then embed them on the inside of the shields. Engraving a Core to create something like a Dungeon Core with hundreds of functions took months but these shields had only four simple tasks. Hover next to the owner, move to intercept incoming attacks and spells, do not block line of sight or their attacks and spells, do not bump into their bodies. Funny how three out of four were related to not hindering the user.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Before I started to work, I shifted {Technical Focus} from [Leadership] to [Enchanter]. That gave me more than a hundred Proficiency points after the workshop multipliers.
I sat at my shadowy workbench and started to engrave the rune words for these tasks and also to perceive the attacks. The shield couldn't help if someone hidden tried to strike, but I could focus a lot of enchantment points on Perception. Maybe add some rudimentary empathic communication so the user would know where the shields were even if out of their line of sight and receive warnings from the defensive gear too.
Making six such engraved Cores took a whole week. The shields were made of two layers of high-carbon steel with an Adamantite lining on the outside. The outer layer of steel worked as an insulator between the enchanted part and the magic-draining Adamantite. Meanwhile, the inner layer of steel housed the Core and a mesh of Living Silk to give it the ability to level up and grow.
> [Lenneth's Twin Shields] - Level 0
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> Price: 438 Kingmetal Coins
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> Materials: Engraved Core, Steel, Adamantite shell
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> Soulbond: Binds on equip.
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> MP generation/Storage: Self-sufficient even in areas of low mana density.
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> Self-repairing. Repairs 2,000 points of durability per day. May use wearer's MP to recover faster.
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> Hovers about a handspan away from the wearer, one on each side. Anchors to the wearer's position and can follow at any speed.
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> Detects enemies and incoming attacks and spells with a Perception score of 200.
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> Four times each hour can project a Force dome around the user when targeted by an area effect.
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> Moves to intercept attacks with a Block Proficiency of 350. Shields are immune to knockback.
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> Relays information about the position of Twin Shields and nearby enemies empathically to the wearer.
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> Attempts to never block line of sight, bump into the wearer's body, or block attack paths.
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> Upon command, can enter dimensional storage without touching the wearer. If an enemy attempts to grab one of them, shields hide in the wearer's dimensional storage for a moment and then return on their own.
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> Durability: 34,567. Hardness: 456.
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> Floating shields with a deep desire to protect their owners. Three sets were made with fairy magic, three sets were bound to one another in sisterhood. They hid their true strength from their creator, who cannot read this last sentence.
One of the shield pairs was for me, the other for each of the girls. All six were identical but they would quickly diverge as they earned Exp and leveled up. I hope they wouldn't become fully sentient. Maybe that's how Skynet was born. Anyway, I tested mine and loved the effect.
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No good deed shall remain unpunished. While the girls were happy with the new priceless artifacts, they quickly confabulated between themselves and presented me with a prickly question.
"Dear brother, please do tell," Mona said in her exaggerated theatrical way, "Who the hell is Lenneth? It sounds like a woman's name."
They stared at me until I surrendered the information.
"She was a legendary hero from my world. She had floating shields exactly like these ones. They were light blue as well," I said pointing at the adamantite outer shell.
They weren't convinced. Pouting, Mona continued, "You said your world didn't have magic!" She almost called me a liar to my face.
"Yes, but it didn't stop us from imagining magic. We had these machines who could create imaginary spaces where magic could be real. The same way illusions are made with light! Yes. So this glass panel we called a screen would create an image that could move as controlled by the machine, and in this image, we could emulate magic. Lenneth was a character in one such story played by the machine."
They still weren't convinced.
"Here, I can make an illusion of the machine that made these images that worked like illusions."
Mona shook her head. "I lost you when you said machine the first time."
"Me too," Mona said. "This is too convoluted. What aren't you saying?"
I must admit, I honestly tried to explain computers to these medieval savages several times. The person who got closest to understanding it was Marlowe and just because [Wizards] also codified instructions in their magic circles, which was one of his specialties. I tried one more time with them and obtained the same result as most other attempts.
I even showed them some gameplay footage from my memories using illusions, but they weren't convinced at all.
"She looks sexy in this armor," Madge said.
"Yes, I loved the way she combined breastplate and a skirt. Why did you put leggings in our armor, Percy?" Mona added and challenged.
"We want armor like hers," Madge decided. "That plate you crafted is outdated anyway. We can wear heavier armor now."
"And one of those magical boxes people play games on. I don't if care they're based on Lightning magic," Mona cheekily demanded.
What have I done?
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"Dammit, my frog got eaten again! Stupid beast!" Mona protested as the pixel amphibian popped back to the other side of the jungle. Instead of cars, wandering monsters prowled to the left and to the right on their lanes.
I took a wooden block, slapped a stick with a ball joint in the middle and a button on one corner, varnished everything, and enchanted the block to send commands to a glass pane, then enchanted the glass pane to play the games with a tiny inscribed Core controlling it.
Frogger, Pong, Castle Invaders (formerly "Space"), and Labyrinth Coin Robber (Mona renamed this game, claiming "what the hell is a Pac") made their debut on Yznarian. I made a magic-powered video game. The limit of what I could do without spending years and years engraving every dialogue of a JRPG was the equivalent of an Atari 2600 with four games in its memory.
Yet Mona now spent most of her time playing it.
"Your armor is ready, useless [Princess]."
"It's 'Your Useless Highness," she snarled back without removing her eyes from the glass pane.
"Okay, that's enough. {Shutdown}," I gave the command to the gaming console. The glass became just glass again as the illusion faded. "Your armor is ready, I think you'll want to see it."
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> [H&H Forges’ Battle Maiden Heavy Steel Plate] – Level 78
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> Price: 14 kingmetal coins
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> Materials: Special Steel, living silk, Adamantite casing.
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> Defensive bonuses: Blunt: 80%, Slash: 90%, Pierce: 90%.
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> Damage Reduction: 45 (75).
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> Critical Chance reduction: 50 (78)%.
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> Minimum Strength: 90.
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> Minimum Dexterity: 65
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> Minimum Endurance: 80.
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> Enchantments: All Attributes +9. Strength, Endurance +21. Dexterity, Mind, Willpower, Soul, Luck +11.
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> Durability: 3,745. Hardness: 300, Adamantite (123, steel)
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> Living Silk Perks:
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> +30 Damage reduction.
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> Recovers 135 points of durability per hour.
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> +20 bonus to either Willpower or Charisma against harmful mental effects.
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> +38% critical chance reduction.
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> +35% evasion when near another similar armor
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> +40 bonus to Dexterity regarding balance and footing.
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> +70 bonus to Mind for Perception tests.
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> +100% movement rate.
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> Linked Twin Shields cannot be forcefully moved away from armor.
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> A suit of plate armor made with inspiration from a game from another world by a sage dwarven smith and imbued with living silk padding. Only two such suits of armor exist in the world. It will grow as the wearer gains Exp while wearing it.
I used the former suit of plate armor as a base and added a lot of engraved Core slivers and gemstones to the plate until it looked ready to go out at the Rio de Janeiro carnival. Then I covered these gems with more metal and living silk, tripling the plates' thickness and weight and adding a tough silk mesh that would stop almost any weapon from puncturing through. Sandwiched between the layers of metal, the crystals would be safe from damage and even if they cracked the living silk would repair them.
The skirt was made of layers of silk and chain but allowed a full range of leg movement. The hem ended a handspan above the heels so they wouldn't trip on the skirt. Finally, an unenchanted layer of steel insulated the magical armor from the adamantite outer covers. To fit one over the other, I had to shrink the armor with magic and then let it return to its normal size inside the cover. A sufficiently strong blow could dislodge the Adamantite plates but a blow this strong would seriously injure the wearer. But aside from a boss-level monster or a deity, old dragon, bugged monster, a Demon Lord, the [Emperor], and a few other people, nobody would deliver such a devastating strike. Oh, wait. That's a lot of entities. But to come out only seriously injured from such an encounter was already a blessing.
The welcome party (and secret wedding party) which took two weeks to prepare was ready to start. Time to be the good politician and sway the hearts of my Palace staff. I needed their utmost loyalty for what was to come.