[X] So animals can be placed in your syladex. Does that mean you can also convert them into punch cards? If so, this may open up accessible options for armor, and possibly weapons.
Indeed. Sadly, they cost more grist to make than they give in return, and after testing a few combos it seems they have a tendency to make pretty expensive stuff. Nothing viable as of yet.
[X] Get a small piece of thick high quality steel or titanium from the hardware store, combine with clothes and/or protection gear. Should result in armor, hopefully stronger armor than random household items.
[X] Combine bike protection gear (if we have any) with our cutlery to see of it'll improve its armor rating, do the same with a shirt and pants and if it works put all of it on the same card to serve as a costume.
-[X] See if ejecting it from the sylladex will equip them on us.
Alright, a bunch of attempts at combining metal with clothing later, nothing worked. It seemed to always want silk, and some other type (or type
s) that I've yet to discover.
[X] Combine a few Weed Seeds with a Spiderweb
[DANDELION && COBWEB]
DANDYSKIT
20 Build, 5 Propolis
Uh. Success? I've made a dandyskit.
Dandyskits are apparently a kind of... Eight-legged fluffy plant-bug thing. It looks like, and is about the size of the head of a dandelion, with eight small green stalks supporting it. It's mouth is proportionally huge, giving it the appearance of it splitting it's own body in half whenever it opens it, kind of like a gulper eel. If it has eyes or sensory organs, I couldn't see them.
It tried to scuttle away as soon as it was created. I captchalogued it.
Okay, so my power was capable of creating life. I already knew that I guess, considering I could copy birds and stuff, but this seems to be an entirely new life form.
...Wasn't that like, really bad? I'd heard about other tinkers who do this kind of thing. Wasn't that Blasto guy over in Boston also able to make new life forms, and the only reason he wasn't considered an S-class threat was because his creations don't self-replicate?
I looked down at the card. The white fluff, if that's all seeds, then... this could get really out of hand, if I released it.
Okay. This one probably stays in the card. Whether or not the thing is actually dangerous, I'm not sure I'd even want to chance testing it.
[X]Combine hunting rifle with Pepper spray. Use both possible combination variants. One should be a pepper bomb rifle, long ranged nonlethal, the other a bullet spray, close range, portable, concealable extreme damage last resort.
[HUNTING RIFLE && PEPPER SPRAY]
???
200 Carmine
Not enough grist!
Not even close. Still, I really want this to work. Maybe I could try some other way of combining them? Like, punch all the holes from both the cards, rather than just the matching ones?
[HUNTING RIFLE || PEPPER SPRAY]
???
10 Carmine, 10 Propolis
Not enough grist!
Nope. Not
that expensive though, I could probably get it if I set my mind to it.
[X] Practice with Modus. What's the furthest you can be from an object to capchalogue it? Can you do it through walls? From behind glass? If you can't see the object but know it's there?
10 feet exactly, no, no, and yes.
-[X] On that note, change up where you hunt rodents, etc. No need to potentially get eyewitnesses to birds spontaneously vanishing in the same area each week.
Easy enough to say, but it's not
that easy to find an excess of small animals where you wont be seen, and also where you can go without getting mugged.
[X] See what the grist cost would be for addition ammunition. Try to help offload the cost of buying more.
Looks like it only takes a single carmine to make a bullet. But I decline to make it. My dad is buying after all, how would I justify to him where they're coming from?
[X] Find a camera. Maybe there's one in the basement?
-[X] [CAMERA && CAPCHALOGUE CARD]
[CAMERA && CAPCHALOGUE CARD]
???
5000 Build, 500 Silk, 500 ???, 500 ???, 500 Propolis, 500 ???
Not enough grist!
Why. How in the world am I supposed to ever be able to make this?
What about fishing, including illegal fishing? Fish can be larger than a pigeon, and a successful throw of explosives, even small ones, into the water or an electric shock will give us up to several dozen fish. Especially if you lure them in advance with food in one place.
Hm. that's an idea. I'm not sure how I would go about getting explosives or electrical charges though...
Stun gun + weapon bullet looks like a good combination.
[TAZER && BULLET]
???
10 Carmine
Not enough grist!
I'm starting to think that maybe trying to make all these weapons with only two carmine at my disposal isn't really going to work.
[X] Catchloge your own blood, you are a cape and as one you know it will be needed. Maybe go chat to the hospital to see if you can Catchloge viable organs. You can do a very good deed by having reproducible functional organs for transplants.
Okay, now THAT is a great idea. If I could spin this into some kind of healing power, that would be amazing. Let's see...
I pricked my finger, and dripped a few beads of blood into a cup.
CUP OF BLOOD
10 Carmine, 10 Shellac
Not enough grist!
I'm beginning to really hate carmine.
[X] Until more grist is obtained your primary focus should probably be to get out of situations alive. Hookwolf as an example is a giant walking mass of knives and MURDER. Try to find combinations that could help protect you in a fight, such as body armor. If it can be hidden or worn in public? Even better.
Ha! Hookwolf, that's a laugh. No, I don't think I'll be fighting him any time soon.
...
Although. Now that I thought about it... Maybe I could stand a chance? If I made a few hundred cards, could I just captchalogue his blades as he made them? I wasn't sure.
[x] Find a sword (maybe a fencing foil) and allocate it to your strife specibus
[x] Start exercising you need to be shredded if you want to be a cool kid 😎
I'm not sure that "sword wielding coolkid" is really the image I'd like to go for...
Although. I'm not sure
what my ideal image would be.
Maybe I should start considering that? At this rate, maybe I could get a decent weapon in, I don't know, a month's time? If I get lucky with the cost of something, and get a decent amount of carmine on the next hunting trip or two?
I lean back in shock. It's finally sinking in. I could actually be a hero. My power, with enough investment, can make basically anything. And I guess needing to kill stuff might not be as big a problem as I thought. Even if I can never get some types of grist from just killing animals, I can still make enough types to do some cool stuff. I could actually maybe start considering the details of my secret identity?
[X] Consider raising chickens or some other type of fowl collection. They're the easiest to raise, have the least suspicion over dying, and could provide more passive bonus materials. Probably not much, but every little bit counts, right?
[X] Buy a lizzard or snake , can see if You can reproduce the regeneration of the lizzard tail in the future, can captchaloge the venom and reproduce it.
I'm not sure about the chicken coop. Would dad go for it? Probably not, and it would be weird besides. I'm already deviating from how I normally am with the hunting, and I don't want him to get suspicious that there's something up with me. But pets in general might not be a bad idea... A quick Wikipedia search though tells me that there's actually barely any venomous lizards out there, all of them seemingly quite big and not exactly common. Some sort of snake might work better, but even then I'm not sure that venomous snakes are sold at pet stores?
A quick search online later, and it looks like the only obviously venomous thing they sell at PetSmart is the "Asian forest Scorpion". The venom is incredibly mild, with apparently zero human fatalities, but if anything that makes it better for alchemy, it's not like I really want highly-lethal stuff as anything more than a backup precaution.
[X] Write down any patterns you notice on what things give you what grist, so you know what to farm for.
(Grist Gazette added to info post.)
[X] Combine a lighter and the head of a hose, the lighter for the fire effect and the head of a hose to create a cone that will spread the fire, that's the direction I want this to go in.
The next day (+20 build), after another terrible day at school, I buy an adjustable hose head on a whim. I didn't really expect it to work, but-
[HOSE HEAD && LIGHTER]
IGNEOUS FLARESPEWER
50 Build, 15 Propolis
Okay, this thing is... not very useful, but it is cool.
It's basically a reskin of the hose head, now red and black and covered in tacky flame decals. But when hooked up to a faucet, it converts the water into flame.
Yes, I've made a flamethrower that uses water as fuel. This is objectively awesome.
Sadly, it's not exactly subtle. Nor is it particularly long-range, even at the highest setting. And requiring a water source and hose doesn't exactly make it convenient. Still, it's nice to have made something that so... Normal, but also clearly tinkertech. It's not just a copy of something else, nor is it random nonsense, nor it it existentially terrifying. It's even maybe kind of useful. If nothing else, it'll be a fine ingredient in other combinations.
Okay. Well, that was all fun, even if I was only able to actually make two new things. But what should I do now?
[] Write in ideas for a name, costume, signature weapon type, ect. Feel free to be as vague or specific as you like.
-[] Begin patrolling. Write-in where, and how to go about it.
--[] Bring the gun, just try not to hit vital spots.
--[] Bring the gun, don't use except in case of emergency.
--[] Don't bring the gun.
[] Save up for the jumper block extension. Maybe make a thing here or there, but mostly keep costs low. It is currently March 17th, saving up could take a lot of time.
-[] Suggest items to try and upgrade the alchemiter with, once you have the extension.
[] Write-in items to duplicate, or combine.
[] Buy scorpion.
-[] Write-in a name for it.
[] Don't buy scorpion.
[] Write-in.
AN: How does the draft system on this site work? I had this update mostly written, figured it'd be okay to close the browser and shut off my computer so it could update, on account of the autosave, but nope...
Also, suggestions that Taylor should work at a slaughterhouse will be ignored. Not because it's a bad idea- it's actually a really great idea- but I don't really have to stomach to research it enough to write it.
And, I should have clarified this earlier, sorry, but Taylor does not have a Strife Specibus. 
