I made it back to the ship a couple hours later, body completely full of Tom's fattest wieners, and I stood over the map in the war room. The rest of the rebel leadership were with me, and they lounged around almost like lazy teenagers. I couldn't blame them. We had just won a decisive victory, after all.
"No objections?" said the Card King.
Everyone confirmed with moaning nods and grunts.
"Then it's settled," he said. "All hail Queen Jenna, I guess."
I nodded to myself. That was that. We all knew, of course, that installing a new Queen with the same level of power as Marianna would be insane, so they made the position ceremonial. If anything, they just demoted Jenna from being the leader to being a politician. I didn't disagree. As proud as I was of her for being as strong as she was, I knew it would be safer for her here.
Let her have her life of luxury. She deserved it.
"Anything else?" I asked.
The Card King blushed and looked away. "You... promised," he said. "You promised we'd play cards again."
+1 Nuke
New recipe unlocked.
I glanced over to one of the nearby screens and saw Jessie's tank idling on the deck. Several members of her engineering crew looked down the main recycling chute with worry on their faces, and simultaneously, they looked at the bridge--at me as if looking through the screen--and I sighed.
"Tomorrow," I said. "And send word across the ship. It'll be the biggest tournament of the season."
"Very well, Redrim. And if I do not see you at the finals, I will consider your promise broken."
I smirked. "Don't worry. I got a trick up my sleeve."
I hurried back to my room, just to get away for a moment.
Jessie's voice crackled through my internal comms. "Redrim. We now have nuclear capability."
"Cool."
"You... realize what this means, right?"
"Not really. I know it's like an off-brand world-killer weapon, right?"
"Promise me," she said. "That you won't attack innocents with this."
I paused. I knew Jessie wasn't exactly known for her moral compass, and I knew she typically held to her principles when it came down to the bottom of the bottle, but this came out of nowhere. Was this weapon truly so powerful?
I took a deep breath. "Alright. Fine. What can you make for me with this?"
"Hmm..."
As she hmm'd to herself, I opened the door to my room and found it a complete mess again. I really needed to start nailing things into place before doing our next set of battle maneuvers. I clicked my fingers, and a recycler clanked in behind me.
"Do you want an engine or a weapon," she asked.
I considered it. "An engine," I said. "It's hard to maintain flight on something so big."
I felt her smile on the other side of the comms. "Okie dokie," she said, and the line cut.
Hopefully, it was the correct choice, but fuck all I could do about it. Jessie would likely make whatever she wanted to make.
I dropped myself into my comfy chair. The recycler was on the other side of the room, readjusting paintings and furniture, and the Dungeon Mob Trash Knight--dressed as a fuckin' french maid for some reason--swept the floors.
I stared out through the stern windows of the captain's room and watched the sunset over the still-smoking city skyline. The war had been won, the last pocket of enemy resistance popped, and now the rebels were out policing the streets and partying with the formerly-oppressed locals and visiting their old families.
And here we had an existential crisis.
For the most part, the rebels were done. They just wanted to dethrone Marianna and liberate Lambston, and now that they had accomplished their objective, the rebels would leave the ship.
And I would be out of a crew.
I groaned. I was lucky before with the Card King and his rebel officers managing recruitment and logistics and pay and all that shit, but with them gone, I would need to do all shit myself. What a pain in the ass.
Not much of a point to worry about that now.
Instead, I went ahead and checked the progression systems for any updates.
> Work Order
>
> Hull Repair
>
>
>
> Caution: Not enough resources
Goddamnit. I forgot that we had practically run our reserves dry in that fight, and now that we were essentially docked in the middle of the city, I couldn't just mine out the dirt willy-nilly. Not only would it be noisy as hell, but I couldn't trust the local youths not to get zapped out of curiosity.
I gave up. Nothing had progressed anyway since we left the last city
With nothing left to do, I laid back, emptied my mind, and watched the night pass me by.
----------------------------------------
A knock at the door startled me awake.
The lock clicked itself open, the handle twisted, and the door creaked open before I could even react.
Standing there was the Phallomancer, and behind her was the Gimp King.
"Why hello, young knight--mmyes," she said. "I have come to you tonight to share my newest phallic inventions."
"Indeed, brother," said the Gimp King. "I, too, was summoned from my darkest gimp slumber to partake in this phallic fashion show."
The Phallomancer thrust her hand out to me and clicked her fingers. Instantly, my clothes somehow teleported off me and pooled into the floor nearby. Which was fine because I was just a metal dude walking around, but the Gimp King--my god--The Gimp King's bulge just sort of unraveled and flopped onto the floor.
This wasn't a dildo. It was his actual dick.
Somehow, and with a grunt, the Gimp King flexed his body, and his dick slurped back into his torso like sucking in spaghetti. After a moment of flexing and power grunts, he reduced his length and girth to more normal, more manageable levels.
The Phallomancer and I blinked at him.
He nodded proudly. The bulge of his soul throbbed with confidence.
Satisfied with two naked men in the same room, the Phallomancer clicked her fingers again at us, and I found myself wrapped in a leather vest... that was covered in dildos. Hard, spikey dicks. I looked down in horror at this fashion trainwreck on my torso, and I looked back at the Gimp King to see if he felt the same, but he was nodding to himself in admiration.
"Mmmyes--the penultimate in phallic protection. It enables the user to survive sudden shocks, and in a pinch, physical attacks." She flicked out a knife and shanked me! No. She hit one of the little dicks on my chest, and the dildo ballooned in size and popped.
She clicked her fingers again. The vest vanished--I sighed in relief--and with another click, I found myself wearing fleshy thigh-high boots. They were--oh no--dick boots. How did I not see this coming? They were less like boots and more like flesh gloves that I could slide my legs into, and where my feet were, the head of the dick was. Wiggling my toes would cause it to squirm a bit.
Having this on my body pulled an emotion from me. What was it? Sadness? Despair? All I wanted was to curl up into a ball and cry.
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The Phallomancer remained quiet as she studied the dick boots on my body. She nodded with satisfaction, then looked back at the Gimp King--still wearing the vest--and after a moment, clicked her fingers again.
This time, it was arm gloves. They ran up to my shoulders, these fleshy things, and the heads were down at my hands. I could almost grab things by "mouthing" my hands like a sock puppet, and they were soft and squishy enough that maybe they could be good for driving gloves or boxing protection. But at the end of the day, I'd just be wearing dicks on my hands.
I looked at the Gimp King. He looked at his hands and made the dick hole opening gasp wide and shut like a fish, and he even tried to pick something up off the floor. With his dick boots and dick vest, it looked utterly ridiculous.
"And finally," she said with a click.
Please, no more. Something manifested on my head. It was a hat. I didn't need a fuckin' mirror to know what was on my head.
I looked at the Gimp King, and he looked at me. "It's a dick, isn't it?" I said.
He blinked, stared, then nodded.
I whined and waved my arms. I was a dick starfish with little dick arms and legs and a dick head, and the Gimp King--for the love of all that is holy--the Gimp King wore his full set of dick armor proudly. He posed around like a fashionable dick starfish, and the Phallomancer admired him.
"Great," I said. "Thanks, but uh, I'm not so sure we could get everyone on board with this--"
"Hey, Redrim!" It was fuckin' Jessie coming in through the door, in full dick-regalia. "Hey, did you try on the new outfit! Whoa! You look like a starfish!"
I fell on the floor and curled up into my ultimate fetal position. This was only the beginning of a long, dick-filled night, and now Jessie was in on the fun.
----------------------------------------
The glow of flames lit Vil's face, and he smiled softly as another wall of the research center peeled off and slapped the pavement. Embers spilled and fluttered across the ground, and inside, the prison was filled with fire. It climbed up the walls and snaked into the ceiling, and I watched with him while that chapter of his life burned away.
"Lara made me do this," he said. "Well, I wanted to, too, but she's the one who made me actually do it."
"Fair," I said.
The burning lit his eyes, and somehow, it was as though a burden lifted from him. He seemed at peace.
"Redrim. You're staring at me, and it's making me uncomfortable."
I stepped back. "So, about Marianna."
He didn't pull his gaze away from the fire. He was transfixed. Locked into it. "I go where Lara goes, and--" He sighed. "Maybe I need a break."
"Fair," I said.
The roof crashed in, and a breath of hot air hit me. I winced, smelled the richness of the smoke, and I noticed Vil staring at me.
"Redrim," he said. "What the hell are you wearing?"
"Oh, this?" I flicked one of the rubber dicks attached to my dick-armor, and it wobbled perkily. "It's the latest in phallomancy armor."
He sighed, somehow disappointed, and looked back at the research center. The fires caught something good, and it flared up with blinding light and scorching heat, and the flames reached high into the midnight sky.
----------------------------------------
"Sir Redrim!" bellowed the knight. "My word, this place is amazing! Pray tell me how you found such a magnificent dining establishment."
I had brought the heroes to Tom's Fat Weiners, and at the table, they watched with caution as he wolfed down those hot dogs as if he had never eaten in his life.
The knight didn't wait for my reply. He dove his face back into the mountain of hot dogs while the healer begged him to pace himself.
"It looks good, but--you know," said the mage. "It's just a hot dog, right?" He took one from the stack and bit it. And he froze.
After a moment, the archer grew concerned, waved her hands in front of his eyes, thumped him on the forehead, and he still--
"Im-impossible!" grumbled the mage. His eyes stared wildly, and his mouth was agape mid-chew. "This-this hot dog. It's as if it knew the entire time. It understands me. It was made for me."
He held it up to show me--I already knew what it was--and he said, "How did it know?"
The archer groaned. "For goodness sake, lad. Yer just bein' weird fer the sake of it."
"No," he said. His eyes were almost haunted as if he had just seen a ghost or an angel. "I thought they were ordinary hot dogs, but," he showed her the partially eaten dog.
For the most part, it was indeed a regular hot dog, but inside was a filling of chili and cheese so pristinely packed in, it was as though it were conjured like that.
The mage's eyes were scared. Terrified. Humbled. "I never said I wanted a chili dog," he said. "But it knew. The hot dog knew."
The archer narrowed her eyes. She looked back at the knight. He was full-on weeping as he ate his avocado and bacon-filled hot dogs, and the healer was consoling him.
Cautiously, she picked one up, glanced at me for affirmation--I just shrugged back--and she bit into it.
The mage stared into her as if he were staring into an abyss, and the abyss of her own haunted expression stared back. Slowly, they both turned to me.
In her hands, a jalapeno and cheese hot dog.
Together they wept a tear of joy and began to work down the hot dog. Then the next. Then another faster, and faster, and before anyone could even say anything, they were now crying and wolfing down the dogs as fast and as messily as the knight.
The healer leaned back in her chair and groaned. "Oh, what will I do with you all?"
Tom walked by, noticed the heroes having a hot dog religious experience, and he smiled proudly. He was, of course, a level 100 hotdogmancer, and this was his magic. He continued on to the next table, conjuring another plate of cheap-yet-luxurious dogs for another hungry family.
"Say, Redrim." The healer glared at me. "What is with those pink gloves?"
"Dick-gloves," I said.
She pulled her eyes away from me sadly, and with nothing else to do, she picked up a hot dog--it shimmered faintly--and she bit into it.
The knight sobbed as he reached for another. The plate was empty, but beside it, a roll of money for more dogs.
He looked for me, perhaps to say thanks, but I was already gone.
----------------------------------------
My steps echoed through the massive concrete facility. It was a plain concrete grey, and the floors were painted white and marked with black and red lines. Along the walls were silhouettes of dust where equipment and computers and machinery used to be but were now looted by Jessie and her thieving little scientists.
Even now, I could hear them giggling like little delinquents down the hall and into the main room.
Something clanked hard and rolled across the floor. Someone yelled, then laughter, and I heard Jessie say, "You're getting whip duty, for that!"
I walked around the corner.
Jessie straddled some poor engineering crewman while she pinned his hands down, and to be honest, he seemed to be into it. The other members of her engineering team crowded around them, and it looked like their hands were just sort of... digging around between the two.
I coughed.
They looked at me.
"Damnit, Redrim," said Jessie. "We're about to have an orgy. Either fuck off or join us."
I nodded up at the structure pinned to the wall. It was like a ring set there like an art piece, decorated with cosmic gems and gold designs. I could see that some machines had been sitting around, but even those were stripped away.
"What's up with this," I asked.
"That's the gate," Jessie said. She lifted her arms, and one of her engineer girls pulled the shirt off her. One of the young men began to work on her bra.
"Bravo, Redrim," said Doc Jackelope behind me. I knew it was him because it sounded like him. "You have indeed found what is left of the gate."
"Gate to what?" I asked. "It just leads to an empty wall."
"It's a portal," Jessie said. She was naked now, and the guy she was straddling was currently losing his pants. Her crew were already making out with each other. "It's what they call the 'Outer Reaches,' or in this case, Dimensional Worlds." She shook gently as the guy beneath her began to work at her nipples. "Remember, I told you. I came from one of those worlds, and I--uhnn, and I, uh--" her face reddened, and her body began to sway up and down.
"We're moving it," Jackelope said. He stepped past the developing orgy and tapped at the ring of cosmic gems. "While indeed it is good to celebrate this victory, such a device must be brought back for research. Marianna certainly has the capability to create more, but this right here," he tapped it, "is our only chance to replicate it."
One of the other engineer girls sat on the bottom guy's face, and she pulled Jessie's head in for a kiss. Some of the other guys were positioned themselves to, uh, resolve the strange setup.
Jessie moaned loudly as her body rode the wave of them. "R-Redrim. You want--unh, yeah--you want in on this?"
"Uh..."
"What about you, Doc?" she asked. "You down to fuck?"
He looked at me, shrugged, and flexed his torso. His shirt shredded off like popping a balloon, revealing his perfectly sculpted body.
It was at this point I regretted not bringing my dick vest or dick gloves or dick boots. I was again dickless in a sea of sex.
With a resigned sigh, I activated my Kraken Heart--they fleshy tentacles creeped out from across my skin, and I stepped over into the writhing mass of naked people.
----------------------------------------
The crowd cheered.
Jessie slammed her fists on the table. "Fucking bullshit!"
I grinned confidently and shrugged. "Don't blame yourself. Blame fate for dealing you a bad hand."
She narrowed her eyes at me. "Oh, I'll show you a bad hand." She reached over the table and gripped my throat. The crowd tried to stop her. She was bent over the table, the cards spilling over, and she tried to throttle me while mumbling something about [Mandatory Overtime] being too overpowered.
One of the soldiers yanked her off and dragged her away.
"I'm gonna make you a pair of balls," she said after, "just so I can crush them!"
This was yet another victory, and here on the top decks of the ship, several tables away, the Card King had just pummeled another player to near-death. He had his own little crowd cheering for him, and all along the decks of the ship, countless tables with countless more soldiers playing countless card games in our little card tournament.
The tourny bracket was a mess, sure, but I was shooting through it like a jet. It seemed like it was a given that I would end up fighting the Card King, and at this point, all I needed to do was coast for another few games until we hit the semifinals.
My next opponent: Vil.
He sat across from me with a bored expression, as usual. "Well, Redrim, are you ready to be dealt a defeating blow?" He smirked as he shuffled his cards.
"Weak," I said. "Four out of fifteen. I play [Bureaumancer - Intern]."
He smiled as he slid off his cards and looked them through. "Encard, you say? Very well." He tossed one out onto the field. A one-power mage. "It's a shame about Jessie."
"What is? That she lost?" I played another bureaumancer.
He tossed in another mage. "She seemed really upset."
I put in my next card, [Bureaumancer - Project Manager]. "I... suppose she was mad, but she gets mad at a lot of things."
He clicked his tongue and shook his head. "You wanted to focus on the card game rather than--you know--being nice to a promiscuous woman."
I narrowed my eyes at him. He was obviously setting up a pun, but--
He slammed his hands on the table. The cards spilled over the sides. His eyes were feral and mad, and he shouted, "You put the card before the whores, Redrim. Do you not see it? You put the card before the whores." He flipped the table. "Fifty-five point seven out of fifty-five point seven!" He hurled his deck of cards at me because, in his mind, he had already won.
The soldiers had to drag him away.
A voice crackled into my ear. "Supreme Admiral," said one of the techs. She seemed out of breath. "We've received reports of Marianna's location."
"Excellent," I said. "Gather the officers, and we'll come up with a battle plan."
"S-Supreme Admiral," the tech said. "She's with the entire imperial navy, and it appears that... she's attempting to activate an ancient machine."
"The world-slayer?"
"It-It appears so, yes."
I grinned. I was nervous, a little bit scared to lose what we had gained in this victory, but I grinned with anger, with madness, with resolve.
This was the sea of battleships they talked about, and the only force in the world that could stop it was this broke-ass beached whale of a ship we were currently having a card tournament on.
The tech continued. "Shall I go ahead and inform the chain of command?"
"No," I said. "Tell no one."