A massive explosion was seen as a Hyperion train derailed and began smashing its carriages into the frozen tundra. Amidst all the fiery destruction flies a glowing red ball with a collection of people.
In the split second I had before the explosives went off, I’d erected a barrier around everyone and used about half of my mana to both strengthen and speed up my creation. And it's a damn good thing I made it too, because with everyone being less than 10 meters away from what was likely 1 ton or more of dynamite, I really wasn’t sure if they would’ve survived otherwise.
The ball itself is sporting cracks all over, and everyone is thrown around rather violently inside it as we’re sent bouncing between wrecked carriages and the ground below. It’s anything but a smooth ride as the hamster ball we’re in slams around and bounces a few times before finally shattering and throwing everyone onto the ice.
(-235 MP)
Ow. I’d slammed headfirst into the ice and I’m certain I would have scraped my face off were it made of flesh.
From that experience I can confirm that pressure waves and debris didn’t get through my shield… otherwise everyone bar myselfs insides would be paste… but you know what did get transferred? Fucking momentum! The moment the shield was up it was launched into us fast enough to basically knock everyone that wasn’t me out.
MP- 1319
Just looking at the MP I have left makes me wince. Luckily for me, the gang is alive… I think. Mildly concussed at minimum but still, better than dead. They’re still a bit scraped raw in some areas though, so I unstick my face from the ice to get up and start healing them. Currently I can only heal flesh wounds so their headache will last for a while longer- something I’m glad to not have a fleshy brain for.
The only one who seems to be mostly fine is Maya… who’s waiting to ask me a million questions, but is polite enough to not ask while everyone is getting healed up… anyway, the only reason she’s fine is because Krieg decided to become a literal meat shield for her. I’d call him a simp, but it’s honestly kinda cute.
It was interesting that while I was healing her, Scan showed a not insignificant amount of what felt like mana running through her system… Everyone else did have a tiny amount, but it was like comparing a drop to a lake's worth. I wasn’t going to do anything… but damn if I didn’t want to absorb it. It’s a shame I’m not like Tyreen or I would’ve probably been tempted to kill her. Moving on…
Something that's a bit strange is Zero, or maybe his suit? Either or, I can’t get my scan through whatever he’s wearing, a shame too since I wanted to solve the conspiracy theory of whether he’s an alien. The heal still works on him regardless, and his helmet flashes a ‘:D’ when I’m done.
Salvador recovers absurdly fast from the entire thing (something about it not being as bad as last time?!), and is more concerned with a meal than actual healing. After a bit of consideration, I give him the Snickle, and (To my horror) he digs in with gusto before asking if I have any more. I then remember the shit state of food on this world, yet am luckily saved from having to explain the reason behind me even having such a cursed culinary abomination as the sound of a robot complaining about having to dig up more dead Vault Hunters echoes from nearby.
A single wheeled yellow robot appears from behind a large piece of ice, before catching sight of us and speeding forward to introduce himself-
“Wait a minute, you’re all not dead! Yesss! Now I can get off this glacier! Claptrap, your metaphorical ship has finally come in. Allow me to introduce myself, I am a CL4P-TP steward bot… but my friends call me Claptrap… or they would if any of them were still alive… or had existed in the first place! Oh! I’ve got something for you!”
I’m sure I’m not the only one who notices the Hyperion design of the bot. Though everyone's wariness abates slightly as he hands out several bloodstained and obviously looted ECHO Communicators.
“Here! Take this ECHO communicator that I TOTALLY didn’t loot from some corpses. It comes with a Digistruct backpack, complete with a Minimap! Now, come come friends. Let’s get you inside.”
Quest Added!
(To Kill a Hero)
Objective 1 - Reach Sanctuary
Objective 2 - Kill/Subdue Angel
Objective 3 - Kill/Subdue Jack
Bonus (?) (?) (?) (?)
Reward - 1,000,000xp, $100,000,000, Mythic Gacha Token, Unique Title, ?
Don’t ask for much do you Ridley?
[Indeed I don’t]
Do I have to kill him personally or does it count as a failure if someone else offs him?
[So long as he’s dead and it’s even slightly related to your interference, it’ll count.]
Got it, now I just need to get Claptrap some upgrades…
The bot turns and starts rolling away, and with a shared look between everyone, we decide to follow it… I also accept the mission. As we’re walking we get to hear Claptrap talk about getting his revenge on Jack for destroying his product line… and also hear the first contact from Angel trying to be all cryptic saying she’s here to help us.
Speaking of Angel… I wonder how hard it would be to save her? Can I even heal severe Eridium dependency? Actually… I may have to get her earlier than I thought. Since she’s a natural technopath, what’s to stop her from just taking control of any machines I create?
It might be the case of having to be on the same network… but I’m not risking Jack getting his grubby mitts on any of the insane tech I’ll be making… Which is even more reason to talk with Gaige before building my own death robot, though so far as I know Angel just never decided to try controlling Deathtrap… something I can’t risk if I get my hands on a jaeger or death star.
Speaking of robots, we’ve followed Claptrap into his home made of 70% ice and 30% broken Claptrap units, some of which I discreetly drop into my inventory when nobody’s looking. I didn't stop the bullymong when it came in to steal Claptrap's eye and run away (gotta get that plot moving), and we then went out into the cold again to hunt it down. Aside from the distances being much larger than the game and not having fast travel stations, everything played out about the same… well aside from the boss getting its shit kicked in almost immediately.
Turns out you can’t do much when you’re phaselocked, have a Buzzaxe and mono-blade stuck in your stomach… and have to weather shots from a turret and small duel wielding lunatic. Also turns out I’m gonna need more methods of attack since everything is dead by the time I so much as look at it. A larger problem than it may appear since aside from healing the group I’m not really getting any XP.
After killing Knuckledragger, Angel opens up the hyperion barge which has a weapon chest and loads of ammo, this prompts everyone but myself to participate in a mini rock paper scissors tournament to get the crappy shotgun. A tournament that Krieg wins by the way. From there we start making our way to the bandit/bullymong infested town.
Jack calls in to place the million dollar bounty on our heads (The guys a trillionaire, his toilet paper is worth more than that! Fucking cheapskate!), and we slaughter the bandits before meeting sir Hammerlock, who then (after electrocuting Claptrap) promptly repairs his eye. Gotta say, it’s quite strange to see someone who looks like an 18th century explorer on a sci-fi world. I guess he was designed to fit the whole ‘Gentlemen, scholar, hunter’ shtick, which he nailed might I add.
He then reactivates the town's generator which turns Zed's vendor back on so we can buy a shield… they’re not nearly as good as the game, with common shields being able to block about 3 low caliber bullets before cracking and needing a recharge… make that 1 if it's an elemental or high caliber round. But they’re better than nothing so I begrudgingly bought one.
After everyone has a shield (Why didn’t they have one prior to this?) Hammerlock wants some miscellaneous tasks done, which the group promptly splits into two teams to go do- one for getting a nearby tower up and running as a base, and another to clear out the bullymongs infesting the town. I join team Bullymong extermination along with Salvador and Gaige.
I finally get a level up on the first kill I make… it isn’t even an adult bullymong but whatever…
[Level Up!]
HP, MP, and SP restored.
Samus Cole
Level 17
Class - Healer, lvl 17/100 (1%)
Unique Class - Pure Mage lvl 17/100 (4%)
Production Class - Engineer lvl 1/100 (3%)
Race - Anodite (True Form)
Alignment- True Neutral
HP- 600 [120 per minute]
MP - 5130 [39 (117) per second]
SP - 600 [120 per 30 seconds]
STR - 10
DEX - 100
END - 60
INT - 393
WIS - 390
CHA - 10
LUK - 110
Stat Points - 10
Money - $2792
Mana Regen = WIS X 2
MP = INT X 10
SP/Health Regen = END X 2
HEALTH = END X 10
SP = END X 10
True Form = HP x 2 / Convert HP to Mana / MP regen x 3
Sage = Base MP regen +50%
Per second = Divide MP regen by 30
While it's tempting to use the stat points on either INT or WIS for the stat milestone, I decide to save it considering just how many things I’m no doubt gonna have to kill on this planet. Speaking of which… I get back to the slaughter fest and make sure to grab a decent amount of bullymong fur for both Claptrap and Hammerlock.
When I mention how I got my hands on some fur, Claptrap and Hammerlock offer a shotgun and sniper rifle respectively, something I accept and hand to Zer0 and Salvador… I can’t shoot for shit, and buying favors with crappy weapons seems better than fumbling around with them myself.
From there we discuss for a bit before deciding to go kill Captain Flynt to get Claptraps ship. On the way we get a few calls from Jack, mostly to insult us and gloat about his purchase of a pony made of diamonds… which he clarifies to be an actual living creature. Still not sure how he made a living creature made of diamonds, wouldn’t it be too brittle?
As we clear out the bandit camp before Boom and Bewm, I decide in one of my not-so-bright moments to open my big mouth-
“You had the chance to create a living creature made from diamonds… and you chose a pony? Why not choose something actually badass? Like a T-rex or one of the countless megafauna on this planet?”
The ECHO stays silent for a few moments before- “You know… that’s not a bad idea. Here, I think you deserve a prize.”
And with that ominous line we hear something break through the atmosphere to land before us. From the smoke unfolds…
[Observe]
Badass Constructor V2.0, lvl 100
HP- 32000
Thoughts- Executing Smartass Re-education Protocol
Oh… oh god. As a group we all backed up behind some nearby cargo containers that were previously being used by the bandits. Axton yelled to me- “WHY THE HELL DID YOU ANTAGONIZE HIM?!”
“PROXIMITY ALERT! BANDIT IN PROXIMITY! LAUNCHING PROTECTOR TURRET!”
I yell back to Axton while multitasking several ways to get out of this in one piece- “I DIDN'T THINK HE’D CARE!”
Fucking hell, the damn thing has more HP than the golem! I take the beam rifle and throw it to Zer0, I also take the quad blunderbuss out of my digistruct backpack and hand it to Salvador. With the mind partition perk I’m able to do this while also attempting telekinesis and trying to make a mana structure to tilt it onto its back. The telekinesis fails to do anything, as does the mana construct as bolts come out of its legs and lock it in place. I instead switch to make sure the turret it deployed is launched out of the camp at top speed.
“PROXIMITY VIOLATED! STAY BACK! HEATSEEKERS!”
We were forced back into cover from the remaining turrets hanging off its sides, and the rest pale upon seeing several missiles begin to shoot from its back. Luckily it’s actually something I can interfere with-
I use my telekinesis to shift the missiles enough that they collide in the air and detonate before actually becoming a threat. Zer0 manages to make an amazing shot that shatters the Constructors eye as it attempts to summon some Surveyors to shield itself. Salvador meanwhile gets behind it and pulls the trigger of the blunderbuss-
*BOOM*
And is literally launched into the air and out of the bandit camp as an entire back leg and turret of the constructor simply ceases to exist. It tilts and falls to one side as Maya uses phaselock to yank its front leg out of the ground. Krieg and Deathtrap manage to take out the final right leg and turret before thrusters come to life from beneath it and send them flying back.
“FIRING NUCLEAR WARHEAD!”
Now that… that gets everyone's attention. I create a dome directly above its firing port and hit the deck. As predicted, the warhead hits the dome and immediately explodes while still halfway in the silo- causing a giant internal explosion from the bot… followed by another even larger explosion a second later as the remains of the bot send shrapnel everywhere.
*BOOM*...*BOOOOM!*
I wince as a small piece of shrapnel digs into my side-
(-572 MP)
After several seconds of metal falling from the sky, we all peek our heads out to see a blackened crater where the constructor once stood. I forgot these things basically had a fucking Davy Crockett strapped to their ass…
No levels but at least it got me some damn good XP…
Class - Healer, lvl 17/100 (1%) -> (77%)
Unique Class - Pure Mage lvl 17/100 (4%) -> (92%)
Production Class - Engineer lvl 1/100 (3%) -> (6%)
And probably also some Rads… and a cut on my side… and burns on my clothes.
Jack chimes in with obvious amusement-
“Not too bad, but before you get your hopes up, I’m just gonna let you know that I made about five more in the time it took you to destroy one. You’re alive only so long as I’m not bothered enough to end you, don’t forget that, bandit.”
I was very tempted to be a smartass again, but as I was thinking about it I saw everyone else shooting me a glare… Fine. I let Jack (ass) have his moment and wisely kept my mouth shut, while simultaneously promising to myself that I’d blow up that stupid station of his soon.
Quest Added!
(Long Time Coming)
Objective 1 - Reach Helios
Objective 2 - Destroy/Remove Helios
Bonus (?) (?) (?)
Reward - 1,000,000xp, $1,000,000,000, Mythic Gacha Token, Unique Title, ?
A feral grin splits my face as I accept the mission. Shortly after, a very excited Salvador stumbles back in, his hair swept back and part of his shirt gone… the blunderbuss clutched happily in his arms-
“THAT WAS AWESOME! Hey Chica! How do you reload this thing?”
“...I have no idea.”
Jack seems to have left us alone for now and most of the others use the opportunity to take a break, so I go forward to help Salvador with his gun, yes, HIS gun. No way in hell will I be using it (I still grab my rifle back from Zer0 though). Hmm… I assume it works similar to a cannon… not that I really know too much about those either… yet.
Gunpowder goes in first, followed by a cannon ball or bunch of scrap right? We both can’t get it to work properly and I eventually promise to help him when we’re not in the middle of the freezing wastes in front of a massive bandit camp.
A bit later (After some healing) we continued our way toward Captain Flynt, Boom and Bewm didn’t even get a chance to fire the big cannon since I ‘spotted’ them before the drop down and had Zer0 dome them both. I then ‘graciously’ give Salvador my packet of skittles and give up any loot in exchange to sit in the cannon myself.
Time for some easy XP! After Maya hauls Claptrap away from the gate, I blow it off the hinges and have an easy kill-box setup to mow down the 20 or so bandits that swarm through…
Unlike the game, aside from the psycho’s, every other slightly sane bandit took one look at the cannon… and did a complete 180 and ran in the other direction. Not so fast! I fired the cannon straight into the center of the bandit group, creating a scene straight out of hell with limbs flying everywhere. a few booms later and all that remains is an icy corridor of blackened soot and bloodied giblets. A few had managed to run, but overall, not bad.
[Level Up x 3!]
HP, MP, and SP restored.
I wonder if leveling up feels this euphoric for other gamers? It feels almost like a drug as my body feels stronger and my power grows-
Samus Cole
Level 20
Class - Healer, lvl 20/100 (13%)
Unique Class - Pure Mage lvl 20/100 (45%)
Production Class - Engineer lvl 1/100 (12%)
Race - Anodite (True Form)
Alignment- True Neutral
HP- 600 [120 per minute]
MP - 5760 [45.3 (135.9) per second]
SP - 600 [120 per 30 seconds]
STR - 10
DEX - 100
END - 60
INT - 456
WIS - 453
CHA - 10
LUK - 125
Stat Points - 40
Money - $2792
[Marksmanship] (1/100) -> (5/100)
[Observe] (10/100) -> (13/100)
Due to Intelligence reaching 400, a Perk was earned
[Mad Scientist] Passive
- Obtain 1 random blueprint per week
Due to Wisdom reaching 400, a Perk was earned
[Organized Mind] Passive
- Allows for much easier recollection
I really wanna bring the cannon with me, but I’m pretty sure the reason I haven’t been interrogated by everyone else yet is because they’re chalking whatever I do up to me being a Siren or storing things in the digistruct backpack… Sadly I think making this behemoth of a weapon vanish might be too much… especially with Jack's surveillance.
We continue forward and are pestered by Captain Flynt incessantly messaging us about how much easier it’d be if we just surrendered… and about how fun it was to torture Claptrap. Why the hell does everyone have our number?! Jack is a trillionaire with a technopath so I can understand it… but how the hell does some bandit in the middle of bumfuck nowhere get it?!
Did the echoes Claptrap gave us actually belong to some of Flynt's men? As we move toward the bandit oil tanker, now base. I don’t have to do as much frontline fighting so I just decide to fiddle with the ECHO device. And wouldn’t you know it… I’ve got the asshats ECHO number! Like any responsible adult would, I prank call him.
I ring the number after letting Krieg in on my plan-
“Hello? This is Captain Flynt! This better not be another godda-”
“PONIES MADE OF FIRE AND METAL! YOUR SOUL WILL FEED MY HEART! I AM THE END OF ALL AND YOUR EYES WILL MAKE A LOVELY SOUP!!!”
I could tell Krieg was having fun screaming into the ECHO, something Flynt was not amused about which gave everyone a laugh-
“GAH MY FUCKING EARS! WHO THE HELL IS THIS?!”
“LOOK AT ME!! I’M THE CAPTAIN NOW!!!”
“YOU AIN’T CAPTAIN OF ANYTHING YOU DAMN SKAGSUCK! YOU’RE ONE OF THOSE DAMN VAULT HUNTERS!”
“YOUR SHIP IS SHINY!! GIMME GIMME GIMME!!!”
“GRAAAAAHHHHHH!! GET EM BOYS!”
Seems Flynt figured us out, Damn. It was fun listening to Kriegs improv skills. We’d gotten to the entrance of the oil tanker and could see as the gate lifted and several bandit psychos emerged to attack us.
My thoughts with mind partition were whirring trying to create ways for me to be more effective at fighting. Mana constructs were extremely handy but slower to get moving… unless I basically supercharged them with a shitload of mana, which wasn’t viable in the short-run. So they were stuck being slow, and those few seconds meant a lot in a gunfight, sure I could create some damn good defense… but offense was way behind currently. So maybe getting my new skill up would work? Telekinesis was instantaneous but weak currently… or maybe I was just using it wrong? How much force would it take to pull out someone's eyeballs or crush them? For that matter, telekinesis doesn’t have an average number per second of use… so can I just dump a shitload of mana into it at once too?
I focused back on one of the psychos running at us and used telekinesis on him… but as a test I tried using a quarter of my mana-
-and the psycho just froze in place. I could see blood leak from under his mask as I’d basically made him run into a brick wall… I’m such a dumbass. He unfroze after a second and fell to the ground. Before he could get up I tried using 1/10th of my maximum mana to crush his head-
*Splitch*
-which popped with barely any effort. Well shit… Should have done this sooner. I could basically pop a head every 5 seconds now… but maybe I could optimize it even further? I didn’t need to pop their heads, I just needed them dead… A broken, crushed or twisted neck should work, or just make them shoot themselves.
And the 1/10th cost went down to 1/50th… There were some which required slightly more force… but I could keep it up with no issue. As we progressed I tried several different methods of attack using telekinesis- Eyeball pulling, making them shoot each other, activating grenades on their hips… one even went down from tripping from a high ledge. My favorite so far was making any psycho we came across immediately slash any other psycho near them and inciting a fight.
I’d feel bad but… I honestly found it kind of hilarious. It didn’t help that Salvador clearly did too.
Further into the camp, I noticed a major difference from the game. There was an area which in game was basically alluding to being a massive communal bathroom full of used tissues and risque pictures of Moxxi… The pump room if you will… but now… Damn. Knowing just how many Psycho bandits were around, imagine a room full of things that get them in the mood… their kitchen is nightmare fuel… but this makes me want to wash my non-existent eyelids with bleach.
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
The differences before that had been somewhat minor- the bandits occasionally being female, the distances being larger, mechanics changing… that place made even Salvador, FUCKING SALVADOR, uncomfortable. Needless to say I sped up the murder rate after that.
Beyond there, we breezed through the rest of the camp before reaching the top deck almost an hour later. We would have been faster but the rest (Salvador & Axton) wanted every semi-valuable item that wasn’t nailed down, and Gaige spent about 10 minutes dry-heaving after the pump room. That and Claptrap needed to use the elevator since according to him he wasn’t ‘Stairs compatible’.
[Telekinesis] (4/100) -> (10/100)
For the amount of bandits I’d just killed… I expected more… Maybe there's something I'm missing? Hey Ridley, I probably just killed more bandits in the last few minutes than I did with the cannon… so what gives with the lack of levels?
[XP received is based on 3 things, In order they are; Level, Difficulty and Contribution. The bandits you killed were lower level than you, plus they weren’t a challenge, and you had help. Of course you still get XP but at a diminished rate]
Diminished? This isn’t gonna take like a week of grinding to get a single level right?
[No. At the current pace your next level up will be in a few minutes… also don’t forget that this planet has billions of these lunatics and you’re unironically fighting some of the weakest among them]
Good to know I still got plenty of fodder left. Between the bandits, the wildlife, and the corporations… I guess I’m not gonna run out of XP sources.
[Don’t forget the vault monsters]
I didn’t but… Some of those things are invincibles. I’m semi-strong but I’ll wait till I have railguns or some other equalizer… or a massive boost in personal strength before I consider fighting one… except for the one in the Badass crater of Badassitude. For that I just gotta kill a guy and his monster truck t-rex thing.
[First you gotta kill pirate Charizard, speaking of-]
I focused back on my surroundings to see a Marcus munitions vendor… and a very boss arena looking area to drop down into. I was tempted to hand Zer0 the beam rifle again, but he’d gotten his hands on a decent Jakobs sniper earlier… That and I didn’t know how much ammo my gun even had left… Hell, it could already be empty. We all jumped down and watched as fire began to erupt from the nearby vents leading toward the bridge of the ship, all of them roaring with flame as the pyromaniacal asshole himself sat in a throne of bone above it. He raised an entire anchor above his head before yelling to his crew-
“Its our new torture dolls, boys! LETS TURN UP THE HEAT!”
[Burn, baby, burn]
Flynt then jumps down to the deck wielding the giant anchor in one hand, and a rifle in the other as he rushes towards us… seems I pissed him off more than I thought. Nearby pipes and huts have a steady stream of fire psychos and regular bandits pouring out as well. Also…
Christ Flynts a big guy… Krieg is the tallest in our group, and Flynt's still head and shoulders above him. Though bigger isn’t always better… as Flynt found out the hard way when I used telekinesis to trip him up and made his face and horned helmet hit the deck with a mighty CLANG. I tried to one-shot him by twisting his neck, which he literally shrugs off. I then tried pumping in more mana to pop his head, which only made his helmet let out a slight groan. I was able to rip the gun from his hand but had to stop when a wave of bandits started focusing on me to buy their captain some time.
From there I was forced to focus on the fodder. ‘Pushing’ or ‘pulling’ psychos into the streams of flame or tipping over the sheer drop nearby… I even incited a gunfight between a group of psychos and regular bandits after making one shoot the other in the ass.
I still kept idly tripping Flynt in the background while this was happening, while the rest were taking potshots at him. After another trip into a fire stream, he finally had enough and activated his flame coat. Before I could trip him again he steadied himself in place before spinning and throwing the anchor straight at me… ah shit.
I simultaneously used telekinesis and a slanted shield to try and make it fly off center. The shield shattered but did its job- as the anchor only ended up clipping my leg instead of center mass. Sadly, clipping was enough to turn my leg into paste (or at least that's how it looked with a glamor), it still felt extremely painful to have so much of myself forcefully dispersed.
(-1371 MP)
Fuckin ow. Far from lethal but damn. At least it taught me something, and no I don’t mean about antagonizing people.
MP - 2107/4389 (5760) (Maximum MP lowered)
With mind partition I was able to pull myself into cover while still dealing with the fodder, the final part of me was having a conversation with Ridley-
What do you mean my max MP is lowered?!
[You’re made of mana, and regular wounds will heal through MP regen. This wound however counts as a status effect]
Which status effect?
[Dissipated. You may not have any fleshy parts, but if enough of you is destroyed at once, it will take time for it to grow back… Your mana pool IS your life, the less of you there is, the less mana you’ll have available.]
Don’t I have enough mana regen to instantly get it back?
[You’ll certainly grow it back quite fast, but this isn’t just adding mana into the mana pool… it’s recreating the vessel for that mana to reside within]
Would a health/mana pot help?
[A health potion would add HP, which would automatically convert to MP… which would speed it up slightly… and an MP potion is much the same minus the extra steps]
…So I’m stuck with 1 leg for a bit.
[Only for about half an hour, you’ll be fine]
Fitting I have 1 leg on a pirate ship.
[Bandit ship… but close enough yar har]
Pirate ship! It even has a captain.
[No it doesn’t. Flynt’s actual first name is Captain]
…You’re fucking with me right?
[I’m not… you can observe him before he’s dead to confirm]
I poke my head out of cover and Observe Flynt-
[Observe] (13/100) -> (14/100)
Captain Flynt, lvl 50
HP- 16000 -> 6237
Thoughts- Angry, Annoyed. “One down, just gotta kill the other Siren!”
The captain part isn’t just his title?
[You remember Baron Flynt from the first game? That’s his brother… and also not an actual Baron, his parents just named him that… it’s basically the same for Captain over here.]
…Wow… their parents are assholes.
[By Pandoran standards, they’re actually pretty good… most just eat their children.]
…I’m not even sure where to start with that. The discussion with Ridley ends as I focus back on my surroundings.
Flynt is gunning for Maya while the rest slow him down, Zer0 in particular aiming for his knees which cause him to stumble. Not one to be outdone, I join in and trip him up again. An absolutely enraged (literally) Flynt gets to his feet as Salvador jumps on his back with a pistol firing at his helmet.
“STOP FUCKING DOING THAT!”
Well… at least I got him off Maya. Flynt picks up and throws Salvador over the edge before abandoning his previous assault to rush me. I grab Salvador using telekinesis before he can get far, and send him rocketing back at Flynt-
“HAHAHAHAHAHA THIS IS SOO MUCCCHHHHH FUNNNNNN!”
Salvador reaches Flynt right as Flynt reaches me. I levitate a centimeter or so off the ground and slide backwards just as Flynt's fist leaves a dent in the deck where I was sitting. Salvador meanwhile grabs one of Flynt's horns with one hand while bringing out a crappy bandit shotgun with the other.
Half of Flynt's helmet is turned to scrap as the shotgun fires, as a moment later Salvador is punted off by a punch from Flynt. It costs him though as he starts staggering while blood leaks from his helmet. He falls to one knee and raises an arm to try one last attack on me… right as I shoot the beam rifle at point blank into his head.
His outstretched arm holds for a second, as the sounds of me clicking the now empty rifle's trigger are all that can be heard… before he goes limp as his body tips forward and falls before me.
…Guess it had some ammo afterall.
[Level Up x 2!]
HP, MP, and SP restored.
Samus Cole
Level 22
Class - Healer, lvl 22/100 (2%)
Unique Class - Pure Mage lvl 22/100 (13%)
Production Class - Engineer lvl 1/100 (16%)
Race - Anodite (True Form)
Alignment- True Neutral
HP- 600 [120 per minute]
MP - 5284 (6180) [49.5 (148.5) per second]
SP - 600 [120 per 30 seconds]
STR - 10
DEX - 100
END - 60
INT - 498
WIS - 495
CHA - 10
LUK - 135
Stat Points - 60
Money - $3645
I momentarily forget about my leg as the level ups take effect.
Okay… I can’t resist. I use my stat points to get INT and WIS to 500 while saving what’s left.
MP - 5284 (6180) [49.5 (148.5) per second] -> MP - 5284 (6200) [50 (150)]
INT - 498 -> 500
WIS - 495 -> 500
Stat Points - 60 -> 53
Due to Intelligence reaching 500, a Perk was earned
[Advanced Calculation] Passive
- You can process things 5x faster
Due to Wisdom reaching 500, a Perk was earned
[Monk] Passive
- Grants the Meditate Skill
[Meditate] - Active (1/100)
- Enter a calm state of mind, +50% MP regen while active.
[Loot]
1x Bandit Mask (Trash)
1x Flynt’s Helmet (Rare)(Trophy)
1x Tinderbox (Rare)(Unique)
4x Skag on a Stick (Common)
1x Flynt’s ECHO logs (Rare)
3x Gacha Token (Uncommon)
1x Gacha Token (Rare)
$11204
Hahaha, big numbers make happy chemical go whirr… seriously though, I hope Sals okay, it looked like he got hit pretty hard. I hop (literally) over Flynt's body to see the state of things-
The deck is littered with bandit corpses, Salvador seems to have broken a few fingers and a rib or two but is smiling, everyone else (Minus Krieg) has minor burns… and Claptrap is dancing over Flynt’s corpse. So anyway I started healing.
Everyone seems quite concerned about my leg (Which is nice, but I’m more concerned about not having enough clothing left to conceal me pulling things out of my inventory), and I just tell them I can use my powers to grow it back.
[Tis but a scratch]
… Maya is really starting to get desperate for a Q&A session, which I promise to go through once we’re sailing in Claptrap's ship. Said ship is just hanging off the back of the big oil tanker, and we hop in (literally in my case) and lower it after stripping any valuables we can find from the captain's cabin.
The boat ride will take a couple of hours, and right after changing my cloak to a crappier version from the Gamer Shop, I’m quickly surrounded by the entire group sans Claptrap. Queue the Q&A session.
Maya started the questions in an excited manner- “Areyoureallyasiren?alsoyouseemtoknowalotabouthemcanyoupleasetellmeohalsowhat’syourpowerand-”
I put a hand over Maya's mouth as Axton chimed in- “For what it’s worth, I thought you were a former Atlas assassin, what with all the red glowy parts.
“I’m a Siren, fuck Atlas, no I don’t know everything there is to know about sirens. My power is minor matter control… or you can just call it Phase-control… also in case it wasn’t clear Axton, fuck Atlas.”
Maya seems a bit confused and asks- “But what about the glowy shield and weapons?”
I smiled back- “Hardlight.”
I pretended not to see Salvador, Zer0 and Axton passing Gaige a $20 note.
Maya gaped like a fish- “Wha…you can digistruct?! That’s so strong!”
“Not digistruct, though it is a bit similar. Digistruct can make things I can’t, and I can make things it can’t. Though both make carrying things quite a bit easier.” I demonstrate by pulling out a skag on a stick and throwing it to Salvador, before continuing- “Siren abilities can diversify based on their wielder's will.”
“What do you mean?” An excited Maya fires back.
“Siren abilities (so far as I know) function as an extension of the user… you needn’t understand every detail, but I’d suggest testing the limits of your ability. Who knows? You may just be able to manifest a new power. For me that was healing… for you it might be puppeteering enemy’s or creating a massive elemental explosion.”
I was talking out of my ass while referring to some things I remember from her skill tree in-game… but I honestly had no clue how it functioned. Luckily she seemed to believe I knew what I was talking about and brought out a little journal to begin writing the info in.
A bit more back and forth questioning by Maya and myself occurred before the rest could start their own.
I was honestly surprised that nobody asked about the gray skin… but maybe that’s normal in some places? Or maybe they don’t give a shit, who knows? I had enough mana regen now to change my skin to look more in line with regular human levels… but seeing as nobody cared, I figured I’d just save myself the mana.
Something annoying was I had to tell Zer0 that the rifle I was using was alien tech… not my fault if he misinterpreted that as Eridians.
…but of course Sal had to ask the one question I didn’t have a great answer to-
“So where’d you get the sweet food you gave me? That stuff was tasty!”
Shit. I forgot about the horrible food again… Luckily for me, Axton piped up with a better excuse than what I was thinking-
“She can control matter, should be easy enough to separate glucose for treats. We used to have a machine that did something similar for our MRE’S”
“...What he said. They were somewhat experimental and took a lot of effort.”
I felt a bit sad seeing Sal actually looking rather guilty after hearing that.
“...Though whenever I make more I’ll let you know.”
And suddenly Sal’s face switched from guilt to glee in a second.
…
…Motherfucker, did I just get played? I guess I’m doing the same to a degree but still…
On the topic of manipulation-
From there I recounted a fabricated story about my background; that of a Siren born and raised underground on Pandora for most of her life, before then traveling to the surface after investigating the recent earthquakes. After that, everyone went around giving their own abbreviated version of their backstory, with Gaige’s story about making Deathtrap and cutting her own arm off being voted by the majority (Sal, Krieg, Me, Zer0) as the most badass. The shortest were from Krieg and Zer0.
Krieg- “THE BIG ZAPPY STOLE MY LIGHT!!!”
Zer0- “Assassination is easy / My life was repetitive / This seemed more interesting”
After that we still had about an hour or so before reaching our destination, during which Maya was busy charting out a path for her power to follow, and the rest had gotten bored (or too sick in Sal’s case) from questioning each other… besides Zer0 who I was 90% sure knew I was bullshitting… but so was he, so whatever.
I figured now was a good time to start reading the Gray’s anatomy I got earlier… My only other choice to learn medicine from on Pandora would be Zed (who lacks a medical license), or Doc Mercy (who has the medical license but leads a bandit group).
Were it not for my intelligence and stat perks, I don’t think I’d even be capable of absorbing the info being thrown at me (Thank you organized mind!). Yet through the books handy diagrams and my enhanced processing ability, I slowly but surely began making my way through understanding what was what. Hmm…
I’ll actually need to do some practical tests… and get some equipment, but this should be a good start. I wonder if I can enter a dungeon and start now…
Hey Ridley, how does the dungeon system work? Does time in this world freeze while I’m in one, or flow slower? Or maybe it remains the same… or possibly flows faster?
[Time will flow 10 times slower on the outside when you’re in a dungeon, unless you complete this world in which case it would freeze.]
How about my first mobs?
[What about them?]
What are they? Giant spiders, goblins, elf people? What am I gonna be killing? And will what I’m killing change or remain the same forever? Will I run out of things to kill in the dungeon?
[I can’t tell you what you’ll be fighting… but I can tell you that you’ll eventually unlock more dungeon ‘templates’ to explore and get loot from. They will spawn and respawn infinitely, but again; diminishing returns… though theoretically an infinite item and money farm.]
Right… will I ever lose access to a dungeon?
[Not unless you’ve beaten it, and then personally removed it]
Seems like a good place to make a base…
[Perhaps]
…But the way you so easily agreed to that makes me think there’ll be strings I can’t see attached.
[...]
“Finally, land!” A very seasick Salvador emerged from the captain's cabin with a green face and hopeful eyes.
In the distance I can see what looks like the bridge that Rolands men and the bandits will cross. Now, moral dilemma; do I save corporal Reiss prematurely by killing the bandits chasing him? Thus ensuring he gets away, possibly without knowing he received help and making it harder for us to enter Sanctuary… or do I let events play out and save him from the brink of death later? Ensuring his gratitude and easy entry?
…
I’m not an amazing person, but I should probably help early on… if only so Roland doesn’t get the chance to treat us as his personal fetch squad. I don’t mind helping people… but it rubs me the wrong way when someone just expects me to follow orders… even if what I’m doing is to help them.
Petty? Maybe. But I’ve got my own plans, which means aside from a select few, I really don’t care about their resistance… We both just have the goal of killing Jack, that doesn’t mean I have to like them.
“Hey guys, I’m gonna move ahead a bit. Anyone want a lift?”
Everyone bar Claptrap accepted, which gave me the perfect chance to try out the idea I had back in the tutorial dungeon-
[Mana Constructs] - Active (40/100)
A floating carpet! I made a flat platform with blocky rails around the edge, before hovering (after buying and equipping shorts… don’t wanna get upskirted) above it and moving at top speed for the bridge. Okay maybe less floating carpet and more floating ominous platform… eh, semantics.
Keeping the increase in size of locations as compared to the games in mind, along with the location of Claptrap's ship, it should only be a minute or so until they cross. There was a nearby Catch-A-Ride station that we could try accessing in the meantime, though annoyingly the bandit camp that should have been right next to it in-game was nowhere in sight.
Dropping everyone off next to the Catch-A-Ride, Angel barely got to say a word before distant gunshots and roaring engines were heard. Turning towards the sound, we were greeted with the sight of 2 trucks racing in our direction while exchanging fire- the first having some semblance of military coloring and weaponry, the second being covered in blood, spikes, skulls and bandits.
They were duking it out a bit further up the road from us, car #1 had the better gear like rockets and heavier armor… but the sheer amount of shots coming out of car #2 made it so car #1’s gunner could barely pop his head out.
“Well everyone, it looks like our ride is coming!”
I could see Sal and Krieg already anticipating our upcoming ‘acquisition’, Sal with a bloodthirsty smirk, and Krieg in the usual loud crazy way-
“THE MEATWAGON APPROACHES!!!”
Damn right it does, gotta make sure we don’t kill Reiss and co though, good (for Reiss) that Angel contacted us to relay that info-
“That car in front is one from the Crimson Raiders, the militia resistance of Sanctuary. Whatever you do, don’t attack them! They’re your ticket into the city.”
“And that’s important, why?”- Axton.
“If you want any chance at stopping Jack, you’ll need their help.”
I seriously doubt that, but it’s probably the best option for everyone else. The cars are still far enough up the road to be out of range for Telekinesis… but not out of range of our resident scary sniper!
Zer0 lets out a shot and I see the driver of the bandit truck violently fling back in their seat before the entire car swerves to the side and into a bullymong nest. While the bandits were trying to get their car back up and running… and still being picked off my Zer0… and the now very angry Bullymongs, the crimson raider car just stopped in place between us and them while (I assume) taking some pleasure in watching the bandits get ripped to shreds.
After the bandits had all been ripped from the vehicle by the Bullymongs, our ticket into sanctuary warily rolled up a little way off from us- Rocket turret being trained on us as another man on the side presumably radioed back. Jokes on them, the man in the turret can’t fire unless I allow it, same goes for the driver and touching the accelerator… who just so happened to be Reiss as he leaned out and greeted us-
“Thanks for the assistance, I’m corporal Reiss of the Crimson Raiders, you are…?”
“Vault hunters that Jack screwed over.”
“Vault hunters?”
He actually seemed a bit starstruck. At least I think so… a bit hard to tell with that helmet of his.
“Hold on, Roland’ll wanna hear this”
I couldn’t hear any of what he sent, but it must have been good since he was willing to lead us personally to Sanctuary (This seems absurdly easy, what’s stopping any of us from being Hyperion Assassins?).
“If you can get the bullymongs away from the bandit truck, we’d be happy to lead you back to base? Anyone wanting to screw over Jack is someone worth helping. That and Roland said to keep an eye out for any vault hunters we see.”
The group collectively agreed and (After removing the bullymongs and starting the bandit car) began following them back to Sanctuary. Funnily enough, only Axton and Zer0 could drive, with Axton now behind the wheel and Zer0 behind the turret. Salvador could technically drive but wasn’t tall enough to reach the pedals reliably… also he admitted to usually just crashing whatever he was controlling. Krieg could probably drive, but as much as I liked him, I didn’t trust my life to someone who screamed about meat bicycles… and Maya was basically a sheltered child who never learnt how to use vehicles… I also couldn’t drive which made it a bit funny that both the ladies who kill people with a thought didn’t know a damn thing about driving. Last but not least, Gaige admitted to only ever driving the equivalent of a moped.
Before we could even get far from the bridge we were back on the attack while driving through the massive cave leading further inland. This was the most I disliked the increase in scale as compared to the game I’d yet to experience- The game set this place at maybe 500m in length… but we had been driving through a maze of bones in this cave while fighting for over 10 minutes straight. And every second was a battle to get rid of the Bullymongs.
It felt like a scene out of Aliens, with the Bullymongs coming out of the goddamn walls! Their nests were never further than about 100 meters from one another, and with the distance we were covering I’d place a bet on there being over a thousand of the damn things living here. It certainly seemed likely with the sheer amount of bones littering the path, many being clearly human, some still stuck halfway in crashed cars.
Reiss and the Crimson Raiders had it quite a bit easier with the ability to turn a bullymong into mincemeat with a single shot from their launcher, but our truck had no exterior weapons aside from the swivel turret LMG (which took a concerning amount of concentrated fire to put down a single Bullymong), or the peashooter controlled by the driver, which wouldn’t be able to kill a regular bullymong anywhere near fast enough.
That left quite a few able to get close to the car, especially since we were trailing behind the Raiders. Small mercies were that Bullymongs tended to throw things at us or leap, both of which I could use telekinesis to redirect. That and just tripping them constantly. Maya also made one hell of a difference by throwing any that I missed away from the car.
When the cave opened up to flat ground, I finally had a chance for another rest… or browsing the gamer shop for a bit. From there it was a half hour drive to the gate of Sanctuary- amusingly, even after saving Reiss, there was still a bandit at the gate yelling to be let in. Fitting then, that Reiss’s gunner turned him to soup. After mopping up his friends, the gate was lowered and we followed Reiss and co through.
Scale was again different from the game… though not as drastically as before. Sanctuary (the walled portion making up the Dahl mining ship at least) was only about 5 times larger than I remember. The main difference was the enormous shanty town surrounding it, along with the shield pylons being further apart and covering a larger area.
Along the way we got to see some Crimson Raiders running in formation along the perimeter- clearly still in training as what I assume was the sergeant? fired the occasional shot just behind the slowest runners. There were also multiple pill-type bunkers on the outskirts which were manned with mounted turrets and multiple soldiers, who each eyed our truck… with the turret aimed and at the ready.
Once we got far enough, Reiss slowed down a bit to talk- “Hey listen, I’m needed for an important task. I’ve radioed ahead for someone else to let you in through the next gate. That said, this is Sanctuary. You follow the rules, everything’s peachy. Don’t, and it’ll be anything but. I’m not saying you can’t shoot anyone… just make sure whoever it is, deserved it. Got it?”
Everyone agreed fairly easily, and, after nodding to everyone, he directed us forward before peeling off and heading for the nearby power station.
While he was no doubt going to replace the old core like the player did in the game, unlike the game, we didn’t hear anything about Roland going missing, but instead were briefly told that he was out on a secret mission of sorts, and that we’d have to wait until he got back to talk.
I guess we just have to wait until he’s captured by the Bloodshots, which I prefer since it gives me some time to start grinding levels and skills. First stop for that- Scooter! If I want to get better at engineering, he’ll have to be my teacher… unless he comes onto me too much, he is a bit of a horndog afterall.
The group split up once we were in, most of them heading for Moxxi’s bar to get some food, drink and bed. Before that I stopped Gaige to ask about possibly learning from her sometime. She was obviously skeptical about teaching me everything from scratch, and was even more exasperated when I told her that a part of my power was greatly enhanced learning speed. After negotiating pricing and potential healing benefits, she was much more open to the idea… It certainly helped when I made it clear that I'd mainly need her help to build death robots.
After that I headed for Scooter’s garage, which was currently open with some Crimson Raiders guarding the shop. Figures he has some muscle around seeing as he’s basically as important to the resistance (if not more so) than Roland.
I’m wearing a cloak, but my entrance still catches Scooter's attention from underneath a nearby truck that he’s working on. He slides out on a little board and stands up to wipe the grease off his hands while talking- “You’s one of them Vault Hunters what saved Reiss’ hide? Most of you end up dead before the Raiders find ya, glad you ain’t. Preciate what ya did for him case that ain’t clear. Whaddya need?”
Despite obviously still sizing me up, he did look genuinely appreciative… hopefully enough to accept an apprentice- “I need to learn engineering, from what I hear you’re one of the best chances I got. So… willing to teach me by any chance? I can pay with cash or unique materials and blueprints”
He looks a bit troubled while thinking about it- “Not that I mind… but how much do you actually know about machines? Cos starting from scratch’ll take years, and I ain’t really got that kinda time with Jack around”
“Not a lot… but I do have access to a few blueprints that could possibly increase the effectiveness of the resistance?”
He doesn’t believe me… which is fair- “I’ll need to see some proof for that… but assuming you ain’t pulling my leg, we’ll have a deal.”
“You got something I can draw on?”
He wordlessly grabs a blueprint (as in the actual big blue kind) from a nearby workbench and motions for me to go ahead. I’m not gonna give them things that would massively break the balance- such as the exosuit from District 9 or the Omnic Titan from Overwatch. Instead I used telekinesis to draw an exact replica of the Tumbler from Batman. Worth noting is that I had the blueprint for a stock tumbler… as in, the fully kitted out military version.
Halfway through drawing it, I knew I had Scooter's attention. His expression had changed from mild boredom to genuine interest. In the end I needed an extra 5 blueprint sheets to get everything copied.
I figured I was a shoe-in for an apprenticeship… but Scooter started tearing it apart pretty damn quick- “Look, I don’t mean to be rude… but this things at least a century outta date. Ya ain’t got any ammo digistructs, the engine is a relic, and while it’s still pretty good, it’s also about 5 times less efficient than anything built this century. The rocket out back should give more thrust than anything else on the road… which would be good if it didn’t need a crapload-a-fuel to work. Speaking of the road, with the ground clearance on this thing, it won’t work anywhere that doesn’t have damn good ones… which is most of Pandora.”
He sighs and gives me the final verdict- “I won’t bullshit ya and say it don’t have any worth or parts I wanna use on my own pieces… but it’s a matter of price versus performance. And for how much it’d cost to make just one o these, I could instead make like, 3 regular cars minimum… and that’s if I’m going purely off of material costs, realistically this thing’ll cost way more. The best parts of this that I can see are those minelayers out the back and the motorcycle converter out front. But I already got blueprints for minelaying vehicles from Atlas, and I’d cut into my own profits if I sold 2 vehicles as one.”
And to think I was so proud of it…
Hell… I get the feeling he actually took it easy with the criticism.
“Well damn…”
“Don’t feel too bad, it looks badass as hell! Just gonna need some love to bring it up to standard. While I don’t think it’s worth too much as an assault vehicle, it is still worth a bit as a collectors piece. I’d wanna buy it if you’re willing?”
“...Yeah, uh, sure?”
We went back for a bit haggling over how much each piece was worth before Scooter made a contract allowing him to be the sole owner of the design and its connected parts.
A couple minutes and $100k later, and I was left standing outside of Scooters garage.
Well that backfired. I either have things that would be far too powerful… or not worth his time. The spidertron may still be an option, but I want to hold onto it for my own projects. I still have Gaige to fall back on, but her expertise lies more in offensive weaponry and robotics. I need a proper intro and run-through… and Scooter was basically the only one I had lined up for that.
I pulled up the gamer shop, there has to be a beginners guide or something right? I filter the shop to show books and type ‘engineer’-
Tens of thousands of results popped up before me… uh, a little help Ridley?
[I’ll narrow it down to what you might want]
Thanks. What remained was a short list of exactly what I was looking for-
[Advanced Engineering Guide] $250
[How to; Engineering] $120
[Engineers Guide to World Domination] $10,000,000
[How to be an Engineer in a Magic World] $10,000
[How to Kill a God: An Engineers Perspective] $1,000,000,000,000
[Engineers Guide to 50,000B.C] $500
[Do’s and Don’t Of Engineering] $100
[Space Engineers Blueprint Book] $20,000,000
[Gamers 5-Step Guide to Engineering] $10
[Engineers Startup Guide] $500
Which crazy sonuvabitch authored a book detailing deicide!?
[You’re gonna have to be more specific. That’s not nearly as uncommon as you’d think.]
…
…You put that in there to mess with me didn’t you?
[Me? Never.]
…I’ll take everything $10k and under.
I message the other Vault Hunters that I’m gonna be unavailable for the next 24 hours. It shouldn’t be weird considering the day we’ve had and how everyones getting some shut eye, and I phrase it in that way by saying; “anyone who calls and wakes me up before 24 hours is up, better be prepared to find a boot up their ass.”
Just in case, please set a timer for me Ridley?
[It’ll alert you when 24 hours has passed out here]
Great.
[ID Create]
Let the grind commence!
I appear in a forested area very similar to the tutorial… in fact, I’d place a bet it’s practically the same with the possible exception of a larger area and greater quantity of greenskins.
Not that I’m gonna hunt them just yet. First things first- I’ve got some engineering books to read. The smallest and most relevant of which is that 5-step guide. I create a small cube with a recliner inside from mana before hopping in and devoting some concentration to bring it far up into the air and maintain.
It’s not like I need air, and being so far up should keep me safe from the mobs below… probably. The 5-step guide is literally just a small booklet (if it can even be called a book) with only 6 pages (It’d be 5, but it has a glossary because why not I guess), I open the first page detailing the steps I’ll be following, in order they are- Materials, Craft, Automate, Diversify, Learn. I open the booklet up to the second page and begin reading about materials-
—------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Step 1: Materials
Where are you getting that material from? How much can you acquire? Are you able to get the correct types? All of these need to be solved. All other steps are near useless if you don’t have the materials to practice and gain levels with. The easiest method is to get your hands on an automatic miner/refiner/recycler of some variation- preferably all 3. As a Gamer, you have an infinite backpack as well as the option to figuratively bash your head against a wall until it breaks, so make sure to capitalize on it! Getting a stable supply of materials is paramount to your success, and if you can’t? You’re basically capped on how much you’re able to achieve… sorry to those stuck in extremely primitive worlds, and good luck with your Gacha.
Methods: How to get those materials
Sponsorship-
Depending on the world you’re in, you may have the chance to be sponsored by a government, corporation, suspiciously rich individual or eldritch abomination. All have their merits, but it will be up to you to identify if they outweigh the demerits. Any of them might give you practically anything you could want… but might also force you to essentially be under 24/7 surveillance with a bomb collar. Choose wisely!
Buying-
Maybe you only decided to try engineering after creating your own business or being stupid levels of rich? Well this is the option for you! The only limiting factors with this option are money, limited stock and downright refusal. Even if you’re rich, this option may be out if the prices are ridiculously inflated or the supplier just doesn’t like you, the same may apply if you’re in the terrible situation of only being able to buy a certain allocated amount. While this option is mainly directed at worlds post industrial revolution, you always have the option to buy from the Gamer shop!
Recycling-
If you’re in a place full of trash as far as the eye can see, why not make use of it! Recycling is a mixed bag, both literally and figuratively. If properly set up, you’ll be acquiring quite a few resources for free, maybe even with the locals thanking you for your service. If improperly set up, you may just uncover a deadly virus or become a source of envy that will get knives pointed at your back. While a recycling plant is comparatively harder to set up than any of the other options on this list, it is a viable option that many a Gamer has used to achieve greatness.
Self-Acquisition-
The method everyone favors by far. Yet also the hardest to acquire by a landslide. If you have a mining machine or device in your possession, they’re usually pretty easy to set up and use. Yet precisely because of this, their price is through the roof (as would be expected of a machine that basically prints money). To those of you reading this while possessing the blueprint for one? I’d like to congratulate you on your imminent trillionaire status. Luckily for most of us, there's the option to do it the old fashioned way- get your hands on a crappy miner, then use the materials it mines to acquire experience as an engineer, then upgrade the miner. Rinse and repeat until you have a machine that eats planets.
Stealing-
Yoink! Why not just take what you want? Perhaps someone has what you need? Maybe it’d be better off in your hands? While fairly straightforward, the downside of this option is obvious. While a quick way to acquire materials, it is also a quick way to gain lifelong enemies. Not to mention that you want a stable source of materials, and while that can be achieved through theft, it will also draw far more attention to yourself when a shipment of materials gets stolen for the 10th time. Generally it is recommended to either steal a single large haul of materials, or steal amounts small enough to be unnoticed for long periods. Though if you’re smart with the use of your inventory and stealth, the world’s your oyster!
—------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's… actually quite helpful. I close the rest of the book to read later. They’re right… without solid material supply, I’m not gonna get far… and it pretty much halts my enthusiasm to read the other books knowing I won’t be able to put the info to use yet.
…
With the exception of Torgue, I’m not a fan of any corporations, and I don’t think they’d sponsor me without any decent rep regardless… especially Jack. I can buy materials from the Gamer shop, at least in the short-term, but I don’t wanna rely on that, nor do I have enough money for it to be reliable anyway. Pandora has a place literally called the trash coast, so recycling may be viable? It’d still be difficult with all the bandits.
Speaking of… Stealing may be a good option with all the bandits around, not like I’d feel bad taking their shit anyhow. If I recall correctly… didn’t Baron Flynt have a giant mining platform as his base?
Actually… What about all the abandoned Dahl mining equipment? Isn’t there a bunch of it underneath Sanctuary? It’s basically guaranteed to be up for grabs in the semi-near future… Provided I can clear out all the Varkids and Spiderants.
This all has a single major issue though… I really REALLY need to take Angel out of the equation first. I can’t get effective automation up and running so long as the possibility of her hijacking it exists… not to mention Jack just shooting at it from orbit, which would require the covenant spire to be deployed to resist it… which can’t be done with Angel around anyway…
Ugggghhhhhhhhhh.
…
So… I just need to break into the most secure facility on the planet, cure the equivalent of an extreme drug dependency that uses liquid alien energy instead of meth… and then hide her away from her psychotic trillionaire father who controls an entire army of machines and a satellite the size of a small moon.
I brought my hands up and started rubbing my face while groaning. UGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.
…
The obstacles between me and Angel are, in order-
A wall that de-atomizes any non-Hyperion personnel.
The BNK-3R or Bunker, A.K.A, the giant flying death machine at the top of the mountain.
A door that only opens for Handsome Jack.
…and a literal robot army.
Yeah. no sweat.
The wall is easily circumventable, at least if it’s slightly the same as the game. The Bunker and door… much less so, and speak less of the thousands of regular bots that would fight me the entire way.
…
I only see two paths to pull this off… grinding. A metric fuckton of it. Like enough so that I can just brute force my way through the issue…
…or following the plot.
It does work out in the end… but do I really want to be following a script I couldn’t give two shits about?
…
…No. I’m the wildcard in this world. I don’t want to be forced onto a linear path, I’ll carve one all my own!
Although… I don’t necessarily have to use the front door. I’m a fucking Anodite! I’ll just magic the shit outta this! I’ll make it my main goal to create a skill or ability to get to Angel, but I’ll also get strong enough to survive even if shit hits the fan… I just have to buy a stasis pod or something to store her in until my healing is up to snuff.
Quest Added!
(Defy Fate)
Objective 1 - Rescue Angel
Objective 2 - Cure Angel
Bonus (?) (?) (?)
Reward - 100,000xp, $100,000,000, Legendary Gacha Token, ?
I ACCEPT!
Now for the somewhat fun, but mostly annoying part…
I looked beneath my bastion in the sky to see a small green horde amassing in the distance… I think it’s time I did some powerleveling!