Ch.18
“When you remembered everything? What the hell does that even mean?” Chris asked, his tone somewhere between paranoid and snarky.
“About six weeks ago, I fell asleep and woke up in another world. I was asked to make a character, so naturally, I made one of the kinds of characters that I like, you know, an anime style martial artist. I was then told that I was now a Dreamer and then let loose in what’s basically a Black Spirits-style dungeon. Eventually, I got too tired to keep going, fell asleep, and woke back up, here, not remembering any part of the Dream. Every night since, I’ve gone back there, waking up at what they call a Hearthflame, the standard Black Spirits campfire thingie, and go back out fighting again.”
Chris was listening closely, for which I was thankful, but I didn’t give him the chance to interrupt. “Anyway, last night, two of the mooks that I had beaten up at the dojo knocked on the front door. I was completely distracted and opened the door to the two of them holding pump action shotguns. They opened fire. I died. They left. I spent two Hero Points, then blew a bunch of Qi on Healing and was more or less fine.”
Chris squinted his eyes at me. “There was supposedly a gruesome gangland-style murder last night at a warehouse in northeast Portland. Six guys were murdered, the news said they were basically torn apart...”
He didn’t ask if I had done it, but Chris was a smart guy. He was that dude that read detective and mystery novels and figured out whodunnits way before the end of the story if there were enough clues given to be able to do so. I appreciated him not accusing me even though I could tell that’s what he was thinking.
A +20 Sense Motive modifier makes reading normal people ridiculously easy, after all.
Why wouldn’t he think that, after all? A well-made dual-class 3rd level L&L character against a half dozen 1st or maybe 2nd level non-optimized goons? He knew it wouldn’t even be a fight.
“They’d kidnapped Jojo and had beaten the hell outta him, man. I’d just gotten a text from them insisting I come to that warehouse when the two mooks rang the doorbell... and you know what happened then. After I Cheated Death, I went to the address they’d texted me, and went in to get Jojo... since I could now remember that I was a total bad ass L&L character. I heard them talking before I rescued Jojo, and Dimi had sent them after me without his boss knowing. Anyway, it turns out six Mafia mooks with guns can’t even touch a dual-classed melee combatant with every BS Feat in the books!”
The Grand Method has decided I was Neutral Good. That meant that, according to the G.M., for me, doing good, you know, helping people, defending the weak, etc., was the most important thing. I found that I liked that idea. The Federovs thought they were untouchable, or else they wouldn’t have murdered me in my own home for a fight that THEY started! Being Neutral Good meant that following the law was important to me, and I did it when I could and when it made sense... but those bastards had REALLY made me mad.
The law obviously couldn’t touch them, if they were willing to casually murder someone in broad daylight like that. They were, even with me trying to be as objective as I could, pure Evil. If the law couldn’t deal with bad guys, then sometimes good people must.
Chris just sat there shaking his head. “What did you do, Ray?”
I chuckled at the Ghostbuster reference. “I couldn’t help it. It just popped... in... there...” Hell yeah, I went with it!
He genuinely laughed, the cheese of the lines from the original Ghostbusters movie enough to break the somber mood at least a little. It was sort of a running joke going back to high school.
“Look, they’d just literally killed me, and they were certainly trying to, again. I just... objected. My objections were strenuous and involved some seriously brutal kung fu wizardry. Listen, I’m not telling you all of this to brag, man. What’s happened to me is going to happen to most EVERYONE ON EARTH sooner or later! Its gonna start small and get bigger as it goes, man. According to what I’ve been told, becoming a Dreamer, sooner, has to do with knowledge of RPGs, physical fitness, self-defense training and combat experience... and we both know you want to be a Dreamer sooner rather than later.”
Chris was already highly successful at his job; he didn’t need to know about that part of things.
He groaned and covered his face. “Which means that if I want to become one of these Dreamers, I need to start going to train at Sensei Kai’s with you, again?”
I nodded. “Probably. Honestly, for all I know you may be a Dreamer already. I can tell you this, though. While things like names and places were hard for me to remember while I was a Dreamer, I remembered everything else just fine. That’s important because I didn’t tell you the other, other part. Supernatural powers are limited in the real world for now. That will change at some point, but at least for now I can’t channel external supernatural energies. I have Fist of the Four Elements and Broken Chains as my two Combat Arts... and I can’t use Fo4E pretty much at all here on Earth, but everything from Broken Chains works just fine.”
Chris looked at me curiously. “Ok. So, what?”
I laughed and gave him a gentle one finger poke to the chest. “That means that you, Mr. Lover of All Things Magical, need to figure out a class build that will let you fight and synergize decently with being a Wizard! The person I spoke to, she’s essentially an NPC quest giver, that gave me a lot of the info I have about all of this, indicated that it was all because some crazy shit is gonna happen in the real world! Being some awesome magic-slinger isn’t very useful without being able to use magic, yet! But you WILL be able to, eventually!”
Chris narrowed his eyes, becoming thoughtful. “How much L&L stuff will I have access to?”
I grinned. “As far as I can tell, we have access to most optional rules and every single 3rd party book that’s out there. All of the older, compatible stuff, too!” Which means L&L 3.0 and 3.5, which leaves a LOT of stuff open! We were starting to get into gamer nerd territory, which excited both of us.
“Holy cow, Ray, that’s... that’s just crazy!”
“Yup. You get two full, primary classes... that’s how the Grand Method, or GM, the system that runs everything, refers to them, too, indicating that there may be secondary classes, whatever that means? That wouldn’t surprise me at all, since the L&L system has included classes and character archetypes from a TON of other video games. I saw stuff from Phantasial Finale, Realms of Battlecraft, Diabolic 1, 2, and 3... pretty much, you name it and it was in there! You can just buy Feats and Masteries, AND you can buy one Talent and two stat points per character level, too!”
“Wait, what? That’s... man, that’s just obscene!” Chris said, eyes wide yet again.
“It is... but if I can do it, other people can, too, and I haven’t even told you about one of the first monsters I fought. It was a 4th level fighter with THREE, separate, STACKING racial templates! Second group of monsters I fought, too. It pretty much one-shot me! So, yeah, make your character as crazy as you can, bro.”
We started to go back into the house, chatting about options for an L&L character for Chris, when an odd look crossed Chris’ face. “Listen, man. Really, thank you for telling me about all of this... I still can’t believe this actually seems feasible to me.” he said, shaking his head. “But I need to know what you're planning to do about the Russian gangsters?”
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I paused too, grimacing. “The plan is to go full Batman/Daredevil on them, the Daredevil TV series, not the movie. I’m hoping Jojo can point out a couple of their hangouts to me and I use them to work my way up from there. I have around a 29 AC, DR 4/-, and stealth, perception, and intimidate checks all starting at +15. Flurry plus a ton of ways to get AoOs, and my basic strikes hit for 1d8+1d6+11 to 14... oh Style Master and Fuse Style with 5 Style Feats already, too... like 20 Qi, and Fo4E plus Broken Chains Combat Arts... and that’s not including Sneak Attack damage, another +1d6, +2d6 next level! Basic regen and basic Qi recovery, plus Swift Recovery. Unless they have an Awakener, too, these guys just have no chance at all against me!”
Chris’ eyes get really wide, obviously doing some quick math. “Holy shit, Ray. How many Feats do you even have?”
I shrugged. “I’m really not sure. Forty? Probably more like fifty? Feats from my classes and general advancement I just choose when I get access to them, but I can only buy one a day... except when I was 1st level. I bought a ton of them at first level. You just pay what’s called Records for them, which is experience by any other name as far as I can tell. I’m assuming that’s a reference to the Akashic Record?” I trailed off, realizing I’d started rambling.
Chris started chuckling. “You big ol’ fucking nerd!” he told me.
I grinned back at him. “Heh. Me? A nerd? Sir, thou dost woundeth me!”
Chris sighed. “Do you really think you can handle people like that if they’re ready for you?”
I chuckled. “Watch for a second, then you tell me.” I spent a point of Qi into Qi Rush and started running... at a bit over 50 mph. A second point of Qi had me sprint back to where I’d started, a couple of feet away from him.
Chris was just chuckling and shaking his head. “What the hell, Ray? How fast are you?!”
I was grinning from ear to ear, not even breathing heavily with my 22 Con score. “60’ base move, +30’ from a point of Qi into Qi Rush, plus the Run Feat for a 5x multiple when I sprint instead of 4x... about 51 mph? 34 mph without the point of Qi?”
I walked over to the stump he’d been sitting on and carved off about a four-inch-thick chunk of it effortlessly with a karate chop. “Dragon Style plus Versatile Unarmed Strike, Discipline Mastery for both Broken Chains and Fo4E, a 19 Strength, Power Attack, and Brawler Mastery Talent! Oh, and Greater Unarmed Combat plus Iron Palm Stance... and I have three Broken Chain maneuvers that still work, including the Boost that lets me ignore DR for a round and adds +2d6 to all my attacks! They can’t see me coming, they can’t catch me if I run away, they probably can’t hit me, and even if they do, my DR is gonna mean I take less damage AND I can heal myself, and I’ll almost for sure one-shot them if I go all out... plus I have like, so many ways to get AoOs its just silly!”
Chris exhaled, shaking his head. “Yeah, the numbers definitely say you should win, I get it. It's just... it's hard to wrap my head around all of this, Ray.” he told me, still shaking his head.
“I get it, this is all freaky. That’s why I told the U.S. Marshal friend of Kai’s about all of this. The Feds need to know what’s coming. It just seems like the smart way to go, ya know? How long before some shit head makes a necromancer or starts summoning demons? Can you imagine what an Axiomite or a Protean would do on Earth? I mean, a few ghouls or any of the incorporeal undead under the control of a psycho, and whole cities could die. How would you even stop something like that? That’s to say nothing of the stronger undead! A damned Ghoul is only CR 1! Heck, the Animate Undead is a 3rd Circle spell that can be taken at 5th level, and lets you make plague zombies!”
Plague zombies were the classic zombies of video games, TV, and movies, where one bite would infect a person, and short of powerful curative magic would kill them, bringing them back as a plague zombie, too. In other words, all it took was a 5th level spell caster to start a zombie apocalypse!
Chris just shook his head. “Fuck.” he said, eyes wide in realization as to how easy it would be to kick off an undead apocalypse. “So, uh, I’m thinking we should build a big-ass concrete wall around the house, buy lots of guns, and tell the Hales to come here if shit gets crazy?”
I started laughing. “I was already gonna ask you if I could build a metal and concrete warehouse with a big basement to put all the crafting stuff that I’m planning to buy... I already have Alchemy, Weaponcrafting, Glassmaking, Cooking, and a few other crafting skills... and I’m planning on buying a LOT more of them!”
“Lemme guess, your gonna buy all the magic crafting Feats, too?” he asked, shaking his head.
“Of course, I am. Once I get a furnace, anvil, and some tools, I’m gonna start turning out Mastercraft weapons and selling them online. With bonuses from Mastercraft tools, I can probably turn out two or even three Mastercrafted weapons a day just by Taking 10! I’ll probably be able to sell them for a couple grand, each. Once more people start Awakening, I’ll have more customers than I have time!”
Chris grinned at me. “You mean that WE’LL have more customers than we know what to do with, right, pardner?” he said with a grin and a fake Southern accent.
He enjoyed the crafting side of things, too, and knew a good thing when he heard it! What was I gonna do, tell him no? It was his property, after all! Plus, there was no way I’d be able to keep up with the demand by myself once more people started Awakening. There had never been enough people willing to make gear in games OR real life!
Chris and I headed back inside, to put in an order for some work from a construction company, buy a bunch of tools, read a bunch of L&L supplements, and probably look into taking out a few loans.
---------------
After I’d helped Chris clean and load the 9mm Beretta, Remington semi-auto shotgun, and Winchester 30-30 his dad had left him that were in our house, I’d gotten in touch with Jojo and asked if we could meet. His parents were totally not down for that, having grounded him for eternity, basically, so I tried to figure out what to do next.
I considered telling Kai, Jojo and the rest of the Hales about Dreamers, but that felt... premature? I would let them know, but I wanted to find out more about what the Feds, The Marshals and the FBI, mostly, were going to decide to do, first. Telling Chris was one thing, but telling a whole family the size of the Hales? There’s no way that wouldn’t leak. Someone would say something at the wrong time and in the wrong place, and it would cause me a headache... which was something I was prepared to face. But not until I found out what attitude the government was going to have about it all.
Luckily, Jojo’s parents had grounded him to staying in his house, pretty much permanently from the sound of it, but they hadn’t taken his phone.
daRayMan: Heya, Jojo. Important question.
Jo-bro: Hey, man. Wut’s up?
daRayMan: You said that you knew those guys from the neighborhood? Is there someplace they hang out?
Jo-bro: Uh, yeah. A couple of ‘em hang out at the Chinese food joint, Panda Palace. Besides that, one of ‘em said something about the strip club, Sinful Delights?
daRayMan: K. Thx, lil’ bro. Take care!
Jo-bro: Uh, shoulda asked before. Why u need 2 know?
daRayMan: 😉 Keep it to yourself. Later!
Panda Palace had perfectly ok Chinese food. It wasn’t the greatest, but it WAS cheap, and they always delivered it to you while it was still hot. I ate from there occasionally.
Sinful Delights on the other hand, was a strip club. I’ve been to strip clubs, of course... I mean, I’m an adult male that lives in Portland, Oregon. For whatever reason, Portland has more strip clubs, per capita, than Las Vegas and Reno! There are a couple of small towns in Alaska that cater to the fishermen and the guys that work in the oil fields that apparently have more per capita than Portland, but anyone that’s watched the Deadliest Catch understands why THAT is!
Talk about needing some stress relief in your down time!
It didn’t surprise me at all that an organized crime family owned a strip club... hell, it would probably surprise me more if they didn’t own several!
Tonight, the scum of Portland would tremble at the inaugural appearance of BatRay! DevilRay? The BatDevil?
No, but seriously, I had no plans to dress up as either a flying mammal or a conflicted, blind, Catholic lawyer. All black seemed like a good idea, though, for the same reason it had seemed like a good idea last night, less visibility, blends in better with darkness. It might not give me bonuses to Stealth, but at least it wouldn’t give me penalties.
I wanted to make myself gear, but I had literally nothing to do all of that with, at least for now. Right now was a slow time for construction in Portland, so we’d found a crew to come do what we wanted for a lot less than we could have a few years ago, and they’d be available to start in 2 days!
Cheap and fast! What’s not to love?
Finally, I just couldn’t wait any longer and headed out. I was nearly out the door, when Chris stopped me.
“Hey. Where are you headed?” he asked me.
I just stared at him, not wanting to answer so that he’d be able to genuinely say he didn’t know where I was going. Plausible deniability was important if it came down to the law getting involved. I hoped that wouldn’t happen, but I was pretty sure that if the Federovs ever figured out that I was responsible for killing Dimi and the rest of them in the warehouse last night, they’d come after me and everyone I knew.
It seemed inevitable, at this point. The Federovs wanted the land NW Kajukenbo was on. Dimi’s death wasn’t going to change that. The next attack from them was only a matter of time.
What I was going to do tonight was me being pro-active.
He got it. “Oh. Shit. Are you sure?” I still just stared at him. He realized what he was doing, stopped doing it, and nodded. “Dammit, be careful, you big doofus.” he told me with a sigh.
If I didn’t tell him anything, he couldn’t be accused of aiding or abetting me. Guessing that someone was going to kill some criminals doesn’t get you in trouble. Being told that was going to happen and not trying to stop it CAN.
I patted him on the shoulder and walked out the door. I was doing this as much for him as for me, to be clear. If those guys had shown up on any other day, Chris probably would have been the one to answer the door, and they probably would have just blown him away then gone looking for me.
My plan was to give them other problems than worrying about me. As long as they had no way to know that I was the one doing all of this, they’d probably look someplace else. After all, other than the years I’d spent training under Sensei Kai, I had no qualifications, no hints in my background to let them figure out I was capable of what I was about to do.
Basically, as long as I didn’t give myself away somehow, they should have no real way to figure out that it's me.