Much as the modifiers would be good, it doesn't help as much since it's only for Borderlands creatures to modify, of which would only be the Jabber it gives.
Metal Slimes have Seeds of Agility to extract or could even be given to Nimue much later on for a monster that gives great exp for levelling up classes.
Edit: had to get you back for last time
Also might as well add them too since I really want to see Compendium reaction to why he has a giant monkey with a gun now.
[X] 0 Zuru + 200 Metal slime + 100 Badass + Micro Bonus
[X] 0 Zuru + 200 Metal slime + 100 Elemental + Micro Bonus
Yeah Metal Slimes are great to have for the Dungeon always nice to have those big EXP dropping monsters, and the fact we can get Seeds of Agility from Material Extraction is a plus. And both modifiers will be good in the long run if we land on Borderlands more often.
"0 Zuru + 200 Metal slime + Micro Bonus"
and
"0 Zuru + 200 Metal slime + 100 Elemental + Micro Bonus"
Does anyone wish to change their votes?
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Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert.
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Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert.
Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert. Filler to trigger an alert.
Apropos of nothing, I really hope we roll something that can cast Haste some point soon. Battery made it clear how much she'd love something like that ages ago and we've just been very unlucky to not have gotten one for her.
[X] Refuse politely.
[X] Creature
Creature Roll: (580 points)
Category Roll D50=9 Super Mario/Zelda/Metroid, Entry Roll D455=453
100 Yamplot-X, 100 Zazabi, 0 Zuru
Category Roll D50=31 Borderland, Entry Roll D106=104
400 Spore Warden Class, 100 Badass, 100 Elemental
0 point reroll Category Roll D50=10 Dragon Quest/Blue Dragon, Entry Roll D120=5
200 Shell Slime, 200 Dragon slime, 200 Metal slime
Sub-vote results: 0 Zuru + 200 Metal slime + 100 Elemental + Micro Bonus
Banked: 280
For this chapter, I managed to cover more than two whole days! I'm getting better. Enjoy.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Saturday, 05/28/2011 (5 PM)
Thankfully, Cernunnos did not press me for an answer. As he wandered through the garden, I considered his proposal carefully. I weigh the pros and cons. I consulted with my partners. And ultimately I came to a decision.
The god of nature must have felt my resolve because he came back just as I was about to call him.
He was the first to speak up. "Have you come to a decision Keeper?"
I bowed to him. "I have lord Cernunnos. I apologize for the wait. Your offer is extremely enticing. I felt that this matter shouldn't be rushed."
"And so?"
This would be the delicate part, in mythologies the gods had a reputation for being touchy. Refusing a blessing? That could be considered a grave offense, angering them, and it had a good chance to earn yourself a curse instead. Still, I did not think that Cernunnos was among those that would take offense.
"I must politely decline. While receiving your blessing would be an immense honor, the prospect of one day being able to work with you would be a far superior gift. Even if the odds are low and subject to the vagaries of the Celestial Menagerie, I am willing to wait for such a chance."
His face was instructable as he mulled over my answer. After a minute of silence, he nodded and spoke up. "Your words show your wisdom, Keeper. Very well, I accept your answer. And I will look forward to working with you in the future. Farewell Keeper."
With those words, I felt him triggering Unsummoning and disappearing in the ether. I let out a sigh of relief. That had been stressful. It was a little bit of shame to miss out on the blessing but the possibility of one day having Cernunnos as a partner was too enticing to pass up.
There was one last chore for me to do before I could go back to relaxing. Material Extraction has been for a long while now a power that was central to my strength. Using it took a fair amount of time each day, and some organizations put away the resulting materials fast enough, but it wasn't exactly difficult.
Today I received a pleasant surprise, I found something unexpected inside a Gasha Nut. Instead of a ring, there was a heart-shaped blue jewel the size of my head with another red jewel in the center also in the shape of a heart, something called a Piece of Heart.
It was beautiful. And also by itself useless. However, if I could gather four of those, I could fuse them to create a Heart Container, a powerful lifeforce-enhancing magical item.
In time, the Nut could provide me with the three missing ones, but no more than that. I could do that, wait to gather four pieces, and then use them. That would be shortsighted. No, instead what I would do is give this one to Nimue. Currently, she wasn't strong enough to produce them, but soon she would be able to.
That would be a fantastic prize for future dwellers and me.
When I popped into Nimue's core room to give her the Piece of Heart she was overjoyed. If she could have she would have been jumping for joy on her pedestal. Gawian also demonstrates his gratitude by bumping into me and allowing me to pet him. From the aloof guardian this was the best thank you I could receive.
Two hours later, I was in Audrey's apartment playing board games with Crystal and her friends. I learned that Audrey was a big board game enthusiast, she had more than two dozen games at her disposal.
We started with Cluedo, in teams of two because it would take too long otherwise. The teams were randomized so I didn't play with Crystal, but with Lars instead. We did everything we could but the girls teamed up against us, so we had no hope of winning. It was at this instant that I discovered that my girlfriend was extremely competitive when playing games.
It was only confirmed when we switched to Jenga for a few games. Crystal had no qualms at all about using her powers to play, using tiny forcefields to push the pieces with extreme precision or microlasers to snipe them from weird angles. Her friends didn't appear to be offended by her antics and cheered each time she managed an unlikely move. She won all three games we had.
Then it was a Pictionary. This time I was paired with Crystal. We made for an excellent team and won that game. It was great fun with bouts of laughter erupting each round.
After that, we relaxed with a few bouts of Labyrinth. It wasn't my favorite game but I could see the appeal. And I made a note of showing it to Nimue, maybe she could do a labyrinth. Maybe even a moving one?
We end things up with a long game of Catan. It wasn't a game I've ever played before, even if I heard good things about it. It didn't take too long to learn the rules and we had fun together.
It was nearing one in the morning when we left Audrey's apartment. We didn't walk far before I discovered another thing about Crystal. Winning put her in a very amorous mood.
Waking up with Crystal cuddling against me on Sunday was a wonderful feeling that I would never get tired of. I luxuriated in that feeling for a while, I didn't need to go to work before this afternoon so I was in no hurry. When Crystal stirred awake we shared a long kiss despite our mutual morning breath.
Half an hour later we were eating breakfast in bed with enthusiasm. Crystal didn't have anywhere to go this morning so we decided to watch movies together. She picked first, opting for a crime drama. It was a good movie, focused on a duo of policemen trying to solve a series of high-end robberies. The end revealed that one of the policemen was behind it from the start. Incidentally, this movie also revealed a quirk of my girlfriend's personality that I didn't expect. She tended to run a commentary about what was happening on the screen. It was kind of cute, but also kind of distracting.
For the second movie, it was my turn, I opted for an adventure fantasy. A very classical hero journey story, in a world ruled by evil faeries. There was nothing really original about it, but it was well-made and with fantastic special effects.
After the movies, we had lunch together, before we regretfully parted ways. Crystal wants to hit the gym and I need to go to work.
On the way to the Rig, flying with dragon wings instead of teleporting, I reviewed the two partners that I gained in the morning.
The first one, a Zuru, was an insectoid similar to a pillbug with an antenna that emits light. It wasn't anything special, hopefully, I'll find a use for it someday.
It was the second one that caught the bulk of my attention, for multiple reasons. My new Metal Slime came from the same universe/dimension as Minos, Ombre, Trick, and Yeti. Like them, it gave me seeds, but new ones, Seeds of Agility and Seeds of Life. Both of these were extremely interesting, increasing the eaters' speed and health respectively. With those, anyone eating enough seeds of all types would become a superhuman in all aspects of their beings. This evening, and for the next few days, I would forgo using Material Extraction on the majority of my partners and use Substitute Summoning to start a stockpile of these seeds.
In addition to the seeds, my Metal Slime gives me access to a few more items. Some Medicinal Herb, that I would give to Hug to see if he could plant them. I had better healing items, but more variety was always nice. There was also a type of semi-liquid metal called Molten Globules similar to mercury or gallium with some magical properties that I was interested in exploring even if I lacked the other materials necessary for the recipes given to me by the Menagerie.
And lastly, only once, I could also extract a Golden Tiara that could protect against some magical effects. I was tempted to give it to Crystal, but explaining where it came from might be difficult. We'll see.
If it stopped there, Metal Slime would already be a phenomenal addition to my retinue. But it didn't, Metal Slime had the wonderful ability to massively enhance the training speed of anyone that managed to kill them for a brief time. I could already see myself using it to improve myself, notably to train Chakra and Haki. But also to enhance the training of my partners.
Of course, killing a Metal Slime was far from an easy task. They possess extraordinary resistance to all sorts of damage and fantastic evasion skills. And if that wasn't all, Metal Slime could also go on the offensive with a minor fire spell. The only saving grace was that if one managed to hit the slime and bypass its defense, one hit was generally enough to put it down.
From the top of my head, 1000 Needles would be the easiest way for me to deal with them. But that wasn't something available to my partner unless I used Gifted Attack.
The last point that I need to take into account is that Metal Slime themselves could train and evolve into stronger forms. That was a factor that I'll need to consider when planning training for everyone.
I was still mulling about that when I landed on the Rig's helipad.
I didn't have to do much today, after checking in with my colleagues I was off to gain more partners for the network. In South Dakota, at the Pierre PRT headquarters, I acquired a mischievous Magpie creatively named Maggie. Then I stopped in St Paul to meet with a Gecko called Spot.
Each time I was given a tour of the facility that I endured with good grace. Among the St Paul team, I met with a Tinker called Alloy who specialized in material science. She begged me for some samples of material I had access to. She already sources some blue steel but nothing beyond that. After conferring with Colin and Dragon, I agreed and gave her a few things. Last I saw her she was examining under a custom Electronique microscope a sample of White Stabilizer.
Then it was back to Brockton Bay for an afternoon patrol, my first one with New Wave members since I started dating Crystal. I was admittedly a little nervous. But it turned out that I had no reason to be nervous. Brandish and Lady Photon were perfectly professional during the whole thing, no mention was made of my relationship with Laserdream. Instead, they talked about the history of the open cape movement, how New Wave evolved from the Brockton Bay Brigade, the death of Fleur, and the decline that followed. It was all very interesting stuff that I knew only a fraction about and that I hadn't talked about with Crystal.
When I got back from patrol, It was time for my daily round of Random Summoning.
A friendly, water-manipulating spirit, yet another alien cat, and a giant croc with plants on his back. Nothing particularly useful within a twenty-four hours limit.
Immediately after that, I set out for Material Extraction. My AI self and Clank calculate the most optimal way to use Substitute Summoning on my new Metal Slime to quickly gather as many Seeds as possible while keeping enough partners in reserve so I could deal with an emergency.
This left me a hundred seeds of agility and the same quantity of seeds of life, one golden tiara, five medicinal herbs, and twenty molten globules. It was an excellent haul even if it meant sacrificing any other type of item for the day. I would do the same tomorrow, then I would decide what to do with so many seeds. A while back, I ate fifty seeds of strength, resilience, and wisdom, so I was inclined to push that number to a hundred and then do the same for agility and life. Going further than that makes little sense at the moment, even without Strength of Many I would already be beyond the majority of Brutes, and with it and other enhancement effects at my disposal, I could give a run for her money to Alexandria.
The next matter for me to attend were my Pokemons, I had a new TM for them to learn. Return was a normal move that grew in strength the more in tune the Pokemon was with its trainer. Let's just say that with the inherent bonds between us, it could be potent.
Watching my seven Pokemon arrayed before me, I also realized that I now had more Pokemon than the six that normally constitute a team in their home dimension. Granted my team was slightly unbalanced, both Perry and Buoy were water type and Durandal also shared a ghost typing with Buoy. In addition, Beta was limited in what they could do. However, that was more than compensated by the presence of Koraidon.
Teaching them all Return, except Beta, didn't take long and so they were trying it out with enthusiasm. Despite her apparent grumpiness, Sombra was particularly adept at it. And the adorable Replica wasn't far behind.
The rest of the day and part of the night was spent training both in the Dungeon and outside of it, focusing mainly on improving the jutsus I knew, Haki, and general combat prowess. And in the middle of that training, I killed a Mindless Metal Slime. While I did not gain instant mastery, I can confidently say that I improved much more than should be possible with just a few hours of training. While I found the idea of killing one of my own partners distasteful, I couldn't ignore the benefit it granted. And with the Mindless power, my conscience was clean.
Satisfied with that I allowed myself a few hours of sleep for the night.
My Monday was somewhat busy. In the morning I had another meeting with five candidates for Grant Summoning. All were chosen to receive Mental Partition with a small partner. Four Thinkers with a variety of powers and one Master able to create clones of himself.
The interview went well, and so far I haven't encountered anyone objectionable that I would refuse to give a partner to. The selection process to reach me was solid. I did not doubt that the Protectorate contained people who were in it just for the paycheck, or worse bullies who abused their position. Elytra's trigger event was still fresh in my memories. But for now, this program to enhance existing heroes or creates new ones to escape those sorts of things.
The candidates today were pleasant people. One candidate, Query, mentioned that rumors of the program were starting to filter through the Thinker network. For now, it wasn't too bad, but a leak could happen at any moment.
There was an awkward moment at the end of the meeting when Viewpoint, an admittedly gorgeous woman, started flirting with me. Refusing her advance without offending her, or revealing the fact that I was currently in a relationship proved to be tricky. She was very insistent. My statue, as a great catch, was still something that I was getting accustomed to. Ultimately I escaped by saying that I had another meeting to go to.
Which wasn't entirely false because I had three more cities to visit that day. It was only after lunch but she didn't need to know that.
Starting at one, I continued my journey through the United States. My first stop was in Wisconsin, where I met the youngest Ward I knew off. The six-year-old girl called Princess Bubble proudly showed me the big aquarium where her Goldfish lived. All the while she talked nonstop about everything that caught her attention, most often fishes and aquatic animals in general. To her delight, I allowed Ariel the Goldfish to fly around so she could pet him more easily. Yes, him, because it's a male fish but nobody had the heart to tell her that.
In addition, while I was talking with the Protectorate Leader, Monumental, to distract her I used Gigantification to make Ariel big enough for her to fly on him around the room.
Her bouts of laughter made for some pleasant background noise as we talked.
My next stop was North Dakota, where I gained Pogo the Bearded Dragon. It acts almost exactly like a dog, including wagging his tail and playing fetch.
It was on my third stop that I had my most interesting encounter. I was led by a trooper toward a sort of lab. I'll say sort of because it didn't look like any kind of Tinker's lab I've ever seen, it was much more artisanal. On the right side was a wooden workbench with only a few different sorts of pliers, pincers, and scissors. At the back of the room were stored piles of spools with different types of wires, cables, and ropes. And on the left side were dozens of statues made of the aforementioned material. Most possess a humanoid shape, a few looked vaguely like animals, and the leftovers were more alien in shape.
Sitting at the workbench, was a woman in costume that I recognized from the brief, Filament. She was a short and thin woman, with a colorful costume that looked like it was made from countless strings. When she heard me, she was quick to get up and greet me.
"Compendium, it's an honor to meet you."
I inclined my head. "The pleasure is mine."
We exchanged a few pleasantries before I turned toward the statues. "So one of those is supposed to become my partner?"
She nodded with enthusiasm. "Yep, one of my Wire Golems. I'm curious to know how our powers will interact. The dossier I was given mentioned autonomous drones, and projection as things that could work besides animals."
"I can already confirm that they qualify for my powers." The unmistakable glow of Creature Acquisition was present on all the statues.
From what I understood, Filament's power allows her to infuse energy into any sufficiently string-like object, granting it a form of life. However, as long as it remained as a loose string, it was weak and barely able to move. The solution that was found was to shape the strings into statues, with more length compressed over a smaller area the string became strong enough to move.
Filament walked toward the statues and I followed her. She gestured toward a humanoid one made of metallic wire.
"In that case, this is the one that was chosen for this, Fred. You can do your thing whenever you want."
Placing my hand on the "torso" of the statues I activate my power without any problem. As I absorbed the flood of information that the Menagerie was giving me, I heard a gasp.
"Wow, that was weird." She was looking in wonder at the statue. "I can't feel it anymore. I even regained the length that I invested into it."
She focused her attention on it and gave an order in a sharp tone. "Fred, walk toward the door!"
Fred remained motionless. Filament frowned. "It's not working."
I gave her a reassuring smile. "Don't worry, it's normal. Let me fix it."
Out loud I addressed Fred. "You are to follow all orders given by Filament as if they were my own." Mentally, my Minds gave it more detailed instructions. Including the chain of command of the Protectorate and PRT, how it shouldn't harm civilians, and that its main goal was protection and healing. Of course, one of my Minds could always give it orders by telepathy but giving it some basic orders to follow would make things easier.
Filament gave me an interrogative glance and I nodded. "Go on."
Again she addressed the statue. "Fred, walk to the workbench."
This time the Wire Golem obeyed stoically and crossed the room.
"Nice. Thank you."
I didn't stay much longer after that, however before leaving I gave some materials to experiment with, mainly various types of spider silks and a few rolls of Cloudtwine. With such soft materials, she would need more to have any solidity in her golems, but a small one with different properties could still be useful.
After saying my goodby I returned to the Bay. I had something important to do in the training field, two things in fact. But before I could reach it the Menagerie sprang to life and dropped two new partners and a Modifier on me.
First, we have an Elephant Shrew, a cute little thing./Despite its appearance, it's not a rodent at all, it belongs to a completely different order. It's in fact closer to an elephant than to any sort of mouse./And it possesses the flexible snout to prove it.
It was indeed very cute.
Next and much more significant, we have a Jabber and a Modifier called Elemental that can only be used on it./Or on some specific creatures from the same Dimension, but we don't have any./The Jabber himself looks like an ugly monkey. But he's smart enough to use tools, or at least throw objects he got his hand on. And also throws corrosive spores that he can produce./With Elemental we can access four different variants of Jabber, Charged, Gassy, Burning, or Frosty. With the corresponding elemental affiliation. So by himself, he's not very impressive, and his aggressiveness meant that using it with civilians around carries some risks, but he can be very versatile.
Looking at the Jabber in the Mental Realm, I concluded that he would never be among my favorite partners but I would be willing to use him on occasion.
At the moment I had much more important business to deal with.
Reaching the training ground I observed with my own eyes as my partners trained. Flying above Jet was firing a mix of Gravity Spheres and Electrical Rays at Aylamon, currently a Lotosmon, who was doing everything in her power to dodge. Glutton was enduring repeated salvo of electricity from ROV. AndPerry was sparring with Replica.
I approached the wooden clone supervising the training and absorbed its memory at the same time as I dispelled it. I already had access to multiple viewpoints of today's training, mainly from the point of view of the trainees themselves or the Harvest's units scattered around the field. Having the memories of a version of "me" gave me a different perspective. They were doing well, very well even.
Halfway through the day, I gave each of them a Mindless Metal Slime to kill. Some of them had an easier time than the others, but with the Slime remaining motionless they all eventually succeeded.
And two of them in particular warranted my attention today. I wait for a break in the action before calling a halt to the training.
I congratulated everyone and spent a few minutes listening to Aylamon's retelling of her progress. Then it was time for the main event. First I called Glutton. The Zeta Metroid was ready to transform. I dismissed them and immediately resummoned them, there wasn't much difference. Evolved Zeta Metroid was an intermediary stage. The only real indicator of the change was the predominant orange pigmentation, the additional pair of eyes, and the green fur on their back. It was however a real boost to their strength and soon they would reach the Omega stage.
After examining them for a bit, and watching a demonstration spar against Aylamon I was more than satisfied with this.
While that was already great progress the real prize of today was Replica. Unlike my other partners, they'd been training every day instead of once per week. The Menagerie alleviated a great deal of the consequences normally associated with such an intense training regimen but it was still a lot of work for the little Pokemon. All that to reach a specific milestone, learning Transform.
I crouched down and hugged the cat-like Pokemon. "Congratulations Replica! You did it!" In my arms, the little Pokemon blushed while my other partners cheered in their own ways.
Replica was still blushing when I let them go, clearly embarrassed. I clapped my hands. "Let's try it."
It was a resounding success. When copying other Pokemon, Replica could do everything they could with the same amount of skills and strength. Even Koraidon could be copied. The only weakness was that Replica retained their own health state, so most of the time they're more fragile than what they transformed into.
Transforming into things other than Pokemon worked too, but Replica couldn't be called the equal of the original. We tried it with Lotosmon, and while Replica could perform Seven Fantasia just fine, it was far less effective. Still, I could already see plenty of use for that move. And not just with Replica, Fusion Summoning opened many doors, and Gift Attack was very promising.
There was another benefit to having Replica know that move. They could now produce eggs with some of my Pokemon. It wasn't something I intended to do right now however, I had too much on my plate to raise baby Pokemon. Maybe in the future.
I spent around an hour with my Replica and my other partners experimenting, just having fun with this new toy. Then it was time for some more Random Summoning.
(D142=22 Fell Seal, D53=46 Speedy (300)) Modifier applied to next roll if possible. -> (D142=109 One Punch Man, D33=13 G4 (400))
(D142=137 Persona, D117=83 Rangda (Persona 5) (700))
(D142=76 Slay the Spire, D29=18 Acid Slime (L) (300))
Nothing major this time. The robot that came with its own temporary modifier was nice. It was in fact a small robot that was piloting the bigger one. We sparred for a bit and it was fun, a real workout. He gave me his giant sword as a memento. It integrates some interesting technology, notably it could fold into a disk. It reminded me of the weapons I'd found in Evernight Castle.
After that was a type of spirit that I had never encountered before, a Persona, while I was always interested in learning more about new types of creatures, this one was extremely distasteful. I barely spoke a word before she started pushing for me to kill people in her name. I dismissed her right away.
As for the last one, it was just a slime. Nothing interesting about it.
I had better rounds of Random Summoning. At least I got a giant sword out of it, so it wasn't all bad.
When I returned to the Rig, Aggretsuko had good news for me. The first attempt to extract someone from a Grey boy's bubble was scheduled for tomorrow, finally.
Wordcount: 4556
Excess words: 750
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nothing major but a lot of little things.
For the roll, 280 (Banked) + 480 (Chapter) + 0 (Excess words) = 760 points.
His reaction to G4 is Bullsh!t!!! That thing is cool as sh!t! A giant robo! I want One Piece joke, but I'm afraid that if I do someone's not going to get it and I get even more dumb warnings.
