( Due to something similar to cosmic Karma, an all powerful being failed to survive. The part of it trying to recover was calling forth creatures, new hosts it could consume to be reborn. Too bad it was too picky. Through shattered and alone, follow the lost soul on a Broken Adventure! Godlike. CYOA. Dimensional/Reality/Universe Travel. )
Chapter 1
This place was outside. That was the only description that would work, really.
Not only was there no air, no planets, no stars... but time and continuity did not exist either.
One would assume it was dark. Black. But no, light and shadow didn't exist here either.
No multiverse, no framework of reference. Existing in this space was impossible.
But if one were to try and convert what was happening here into something a human being could interpret, into something one could see and hear and touch...
A man frantically ran down an endless corridor.
His face twisted in rage and seasoned with light fear, every step he would test the doors as he passed them even as he frantically tried to run faster.
He was ROB, one of many instances of ROB... and this was humiliating.
A slight slip, and the hunter gained on him.
It was twisted, a wall of flesh and bone and faces... sort of.
If it was of material, of flesh or metal or soul, he could have easily broken it like the multitude of galaxies he had casually devastated in the past.
If it had a mind, or a thought process, he could twist or control it like the trillions of innocents he had tormented in his glory days.
But, in something approaching Karma, he was being chased by something lesser, yet more.
This was the built up negative feelings, concepts, and fractured moments from his victims.
Oh, many of his toys and pet bugs had tried to resist his whims. Some he elevated to unheard of levels of power to allow even greater downfalls. Some realities he visited multiple times, forcing the entire time stream to buckle as he twisted it into repetition.
All failed. He had reigned supreme.
But unnoticed to him, consequences had been gathering... and what he was being chased by now was only a fraction of the pain to come.
Now, he absently grabbed from other realities, hurling some of the infinite planets and ships and continents, ignoring the psychic screams as they collided with the thing behind him.
It didn't do much to slow it down, and every time he added to his own kill count some fraction of that power was enhancing his stalker... but it was all he could do now.
When he slipped, it was a small error. Had he done so in a reality with laws, it would be such a small issue that no tools could measure the time frame he was delayed. No camera could have filmed his issue.
It was enough.
An empty place somehow became more absent.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Pieces of nothing spread through impossible lands and concepts. Most of these pieces, dead.
One fragment, just a shard of existence really, struggled.
It was his last act of defiance. Like stabbing your heart to create a blood pool to cover evidence, he had mutilated his own corpse, leaving just the core of his personality and a carefully constructed glint of power. A seed, almost.
After a few trillion nothings of time, he focused through the blinding pain and attempted to summon a host. Something to consume and wear, a flesh corpse.
The first twelve tries exploded.
Apparently, he needed atmosphere. Maybe gravity and pressure as well. Meat needed things to work... how long had it been?
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Each attempt, pulling bodies and creatures and beings to himself... it required sacrifice. The first thousand, it only needed his reserve power, what bits were left.
But now, each call was damaging.
He had not even noticed at first. He was in such pain that it had simply joined the choir, so to speak.
But when the shard suddenly cracked, ever so slightly... it was a horrifying shock.
He had a time limit, and now he regretted the dozen or so creatures he had rejected for being 'too pathetic'. Any of them would have sufficed, allowed some recovery and time to discard and find a better host later on.
But now, his power was too unstable. Every call was damaging the ONLY TOOL he had that could fix everything.
If he had noticed, he would have cared more that his unstable portals were dissecting limbs and amputating souls and memories.
With great reluctance, he forced the damage on his own soul and remaining consciousness. If the shard broke, it was all over.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Hrtz... hurss... urts...
Somewhere, alone, an end came to an unending being.
Also alone, a slightly cracked shard of potential followed the only instructions it could remember.
Please... please help me.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
The pain was sudden, but at the same time felt like an old friend.
It... was so dark. And he could not remember how he came here.
A stab in the back of his mind, and a blue screen appeared.
"Worm CYOA V1.0!"
Well. That... that was bad.
More and more of his past faded into view, even as the darkness fled from the edges of his vision.
Not enough. Name, family, even the town where he lived... all blank.
But he remembered Worm. One of the many stories he had read over the years, and the base of many fictions he read from fans.
Even the loving and cute ones tended to trend into the dark.
A world being harvested, infected with humanity of all types and where pain granted power.
This was bad.
He didn't waste time thinking "Oh this can't be real!" or anything like that. He had a philosophy that had been shared with his friends and family, one where you looked at the options and tried to choose responsibly. 'Assume real and treat with seriousness', because either this WAS real and his choices would matter, or it was NOT real and someone had enough power to force this situation, and said person would likely react badly if he ruined the ruse.
But he tried to avoid Murphy as much as possible. He had never taunted a fanficition creation or character, nor had he filled out CYOA's like this one in the past, nor did he answer any surveys. He was polite to others, ESPECIALLY if they seemed to be in weird places or unusually weak and helpless.
Clearly, it hadn't prevented this situation though.
That said, he would normally have easily filled this questionnaire before him at this point.
The blue screen was cracked.
Some words were readable, but not even 25%. And his memory of what was SUPPOSED to be here was vague at best to begin with, so guessing would be dangerous.
A crack on the blue screen snapped LONGER.
Guessing it is then.
First page was almost too damaged to modify, so he was going to have to go with the default of self insert. Endbringer would have boosted survivability, especially with some master prevention, but it would have to do. The difficulty options however, were unreadable.
He knew it either went from easiest to hardest, or visa versa... but his mind came up blank when trying to remember which.
Better pick the middle option. It SHOULD be Standard Difficulty, so at least 4 points to spend, right? Maybe five or six.
The next page was riddled with cracks, but some careful reading had each option listed: Alexandria, Legend, Eidolon, Emperor of Man, Kaleidoscope, Inspired Inventor, Psychokinetic, Power Manipulation, and Shaper.
The concern though was how damaged his shard was BEFORE picking it! How could he risk half these options, when this clearly unstable fragment could crumble at any time? Some could theoretically corrupt anyone nearby, or distort multiple realities!
With almost no thought he reached out with his left hand and selected Power Manipulation.
The pain was sharp and sudden, unlike the constant ringing in his mind. His left index finger was bleeding heavily, having hit a crack in the blue screen. Sharp hiss later and he was clutching his hand to his chest even as the screen advanced.
Yeah, he needed to fix this.
No companions, this instability might twist them or worse. Next page, and quickly!
He can't read most of this, which is bad because he WANTED blank, which would protect him from prediction and so forth, but at least he found Shattered Limiter. Combined with power manipulation, the 5 free powers/enhancement per day would become 10, with other benefits as well.
Almost as important as Blank, he also could not find Invictus... and that could be bad. A super strong will was... very valuable.
The blue screen actually lost the lower right corner, which dissolved with the sound of shifting glass.
He couldn't risk taking any longer or searching for missing options. Next, next, confirm. His wounds burned, but he managed to close the damned thing.
The burning in his head spiked, eyes slammed shut as some sort of axe was digging into everything.
As everything became fuzzy, he faintly reached into his own mind.
It was... full of stardust now. And floating, twitching, were broken twisting white blobs.
He gripped them all as he fell.
"Fix This."
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He didn't know how much time passed before he woke up.
But there was a sphere shaped dimple in his soul.
In his head there was stardust.
In his star fields there was a white shard.
And before his eyes was a blue screen.
Unbroken. Clear. White text easily seen.
"System Repaired."
Below that was a summary, but he just fell back to the ground again.
Oh... there was ground.
That's nice.
Hours later he gathered enough energy to focus on the blue screen, which had followed the fall to stay in view.
Apparently, the damage that had been repaired had required features to be sacrificed.
Originally, he would have been able to have unlimited powers slotted into himself at one time.
Now, only one soul socket per realm visited. Which, since he was in a realm now (No idea which one), brought him up to one.
Originally, his power would gain 10 charges a day... now, one. And he could only hold created powers in storage, so no saving up charges. He would have to use it each day or slow development.
No nullifying, enhancing, modifying, copying, stealing, or transferring powers either. He would have to use up charges to recover those features later on.
Still, the whole point to power manipulation was its unfair ability to grow stronger forever, if one is able to survive long enough.
A nail of pain in the neck helped settle the thought process a bit.
He reached into his mind, a star fragment glittering between the metaphorical fingers.
"Slow Recovery."
Socket-ed to his soul, a tiny circle with a blood red cross began pulsing, the body already slowly relaxing as the pain began to retreat.
Once he could move without wincing, he would need to find out where he was.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He had hoped he was somewhere with societal support really. A free clinic, maybe some library access, even a random stranger willing to answer some questions.
But no, this was a forest clearing. Far enough into said forest that every direction seemed equally useless.
Also he was... very naked. Great. Wish he had noticed that before having passed out on the ground here.
Thankfully, 'Slow Recovery' needed almost no power to operate and prevented his impromptu nap from causing any back pains or irritation.
The weather was also temperate, so he suppose he should count his blessings.
Before he could side track himself, he mentally reached into the stardust for today's charge.
It melded into 'Slow Recovery', modifying it to redefine what 'Recovered' meant.
Now he would slowly 'recover' to an optimized state. It wouldn't make him super attractive or have a godly physique, but his muscles would be strong, his skin clear, and his inner organs improved and optimized. Probably.
Well, it shouldn't make things worse anyway.
If lost, one should stay put for rescuers to find them. As he was unsure if this planet was even inhabited, he decided to go that way!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Unexpected positive from the regenerative power-up: exercising sucks less. Every time he reached a limit, a few minutes rest and recovery fixes the strains and cramps from this unusual level of work out.
He walked till close to nightfall, but stopped when he found a river.
The rule of 3 says one can live 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water, and 3 weeks without food... and this is the first water source found today.
Vague memories had him digging a hole in the sand near the banks, so at least there was some basic level of water filtering from the river as it seeped through.
That said, this was barely better than drinking it straight from the source, and he was putting a lot of faith into the health recovery power at this point.
The liquid was cold, and so much better tasting than expected. Hopefully that meant there weren't any strange chemicals in this.
He may be able to sleep exposed (Literally... sigh.) but that didn't mean he had to enjoy it. There hadn't been any caves or traces of civilization yet, and he could feel the temperature dropping.
A few minutes got a couple of stones, a few knocks created a cutting edge that was... well, pretty terrible, but better than raw hands.
He cut down the taller dry grass near the river and made a huge pile next to the densest thicket of trees found nearby. It was horribly exposed, but it did somewhat cut down the wind and kept his body off the soil.
The cold made it all seem pointless, but he tried to focus on the warm pulsation from healing. Sleep did eventually come though.
Next morning, he carefully checked his wounds. The left hand was fine now, and the tiny scratches from being exposed in the wild while working had healed near instantly earlier, which was great. But at this point he realized that he should have heard SOMETHING if this was close to society (Assuming it exists). Heard no planes, cars, etc.
The new charge would have to help him live long enough to really get this gravy train rolling.
A twisted thought later, and 'Fire Manipulation' replaced 'Slow Recovery', which floated away into the mental stardust fields.
The cold air slammed into his flesh, feeling twice as cold now that the constant healing was gone. Gritting his teeth, he finished gathering what sticks could be found and tried the friction method of fire starting.
Uh... did not go well. Thankfully though, he got a spark a couple of hours later.
It was a very sad spark, less than an ember, and if he was a normal person it would have vanished before being noticed.
'Fire Manipulation' though made it sparkle like the sun.
Instantly, he pulled the spark to now useless grass bed, whipping it into a small pile of flames. A twist of his hand had it coil like a snake or noodle, and wrap around his limbs.
He couldn't help smile slightly. Warm. Most of the heat directed inward towards the flame itself, actually, but this was marvelous.
His grin became shark-like as he turned to the forest.
Fire can be a real issue in a place like this, but he hadn't focused on fire creation with this power, but fire control.
It compacted on itself again and again, absently sending out streams of fire to the gathered wood to help fuel it for its supernatural actions even as its temperature skyrocketed.
He flicked a finger at one of the trees farther from his camping site, and felt glorious victory as a razor thin whip of white flames slipped over to slice it at the base, the angle of the cut allowing the trunk to tip.
At the end of the day, he had some charred wood poles and boards that allowed him to actually set up a leaning shelter, with some planks to act as a chair, and a flaming multi-tool that was currently smoldering the planks under his back, heating his sore body in the dark night.
He would have to switch to healing again in the morning, but at least for now he had somewhere warm to sleep.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Well... it is all on fire.
Not sure what he expected really. That said, he apparently subconsciously protected himself through the night, and the embers and ashes from the burned shelter didn't even char his hair as he slowly got buried.
Also: Smoke inhalation was not an issue. Nice.
Living through stupid decisions is nice.
Thankfully he had ALSO subconsciously pulled all the fire into a 3 meter radius of his sleeping spot. So no forest fire, just a merry burning/smouldering pit where he woke up.
A new day had him pushing the charge into 'Fire Manipulation', and he focused it toward manifestation. The embers around his body flared up and streamed into his claw like hand before he walked over to get some more fuel from the pile of logs farther away.
Well... the ONLY pile now.
Everything near the sleeping zone is well and gone now.
A flash of light and the pile vanishes, leaving a pillar of flames over his palm. A twist of the fingers had it spiral down into a thin red disk the size of a quarter, glowing like a heartbeat.
Idly, he played with the coin. This was the most compressed he could get it, to the point where even the surface felt cool because the power was being crammed inward.
Tossing it at a tree, it was fascinating to watch flames spill over the branches and limbs before sucking back to the coin, expanding it.
Carefully standing back, a quick switch to 'Slow Recovery' showed the material was still stable even with the controlling power removed.
Swapping back and having a few more experiments, he found that this red metallic material was very light, strong, and could be set to release heat at any level if desired. Higher the temperature, the faster the material dissolved away.
In other words, great building material. Bed frame that emits low level heat? Please! And if he could turn it into chain mail, he could finally have some damn pants.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
In retrospect, he shouldn't have burned THAT much of the local fuel. Trees. He meant trees.
Still, he now had a sold metal-like shelter, with walls, a floor, and roof. Furniture, though very HARD furniture, that was warm to the touch. A cooking surface that professional chefs would die for, as it could perfectly cook any dish.
Not that he had anything to cook.
Clothing, by the way, was a no go. His control was great with flames, but when manifesting it into objects bigger and simpler was easier. A giant cube was easy, but thousands of tiny links in chain-mail nearly made him pass out trying it.
So, naked and hungry but NOT shelter-less.
Also, the water was safer to drink now that he could boil it.
He sighed as he relaxed on the warm slab, having 'Slow Recovery' socket-ed and some fairly serious hunger pangs.
Drinking more water only helped so much.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He felt no pain, but somehow it seemed like his head SHOULD hurt from sleeping on a slab of metal with no pillow.
The metal was warm but odd feeling on his bare skin.
Yeah... clothing.
Reaching into his mind again, he paused.
An infinite darkness, with powdered sugar stardust. A glowing white shard.
At least privately, he was grateful his power was beautiful to watch.
A thought pulled the charge down from the mental sky, and he focused it on 'Fire Manipulation', pushing towards fine details.
Slabs of metal was useful, but he wanted cloth darn it!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
It was less cloth and more a series of connected smart phone sized blocks... but it covered him.
No more branches catching on his... dangly bits.
Forget hunger, THIS was a quality of life increase!
A hand wave had the metal structure collapse and fold into a large snake.
Very large snake.
It had no internal organs, but it DID have a mouth with fangs, slightly too thick to be considered sharp.
Blood red metal, he allowed the insides, mouth, and eyes to release the heat that the rest of the body focused inwardly.
With this much red metal, he had a mobile home basically, so why not move along and hope to find some place with less wilderness?
Glancing at the river, he decided downstream would be best. If he was on an island, this would lead him to the coast... and if not, at least he would have a water source if needed. He couldn't get MORE lost at this point.
A gesture had the snake craft an uncomfortable chair near the neck, and he had the flames form a basic set of steps to reach his new perch.
Following the river downstream, the snake would randomly eat whichever bush or tree looked annoying, slowly lengthening the tail and thickness.
Sadly he couldn't share senses with the snake, so all he could do is relax a bit and try to ignore any hunger pangs as his ride left a charred road for others to enjoy at some point.
At least the new trail wasn't a fire hazard. Any warmth was sucked into the snake when passing, so it just looked like an ash path leading back parallel to the river.
Subtle he wasn't.
Then again, being found would be a WONDERFUL change of events compared to this.
When the hunger got too bad, he paused at a rock near the river and had fire metal bars force themselves into the river.
They were strictly acting as a net, as boiling this river could have all kinds of issues downstream... maybe.
Depending on the development level of whatever society may or may not exist here.
Anyway, half the snake was now a series of V shaped traps that led into a controlled barred section, and the other half reformed into a much smaller but still usable shelter for him to wait in.
He may or may not have spent the rest of the time trying to make a better shirt/whatever this thing was. Honestly, it needed another charge in fine detail before his control got good enough to not fall apart at that level of compression.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
A full night of 'Slow Recovery' had managed to help keep his hunger pangs in check, but he really needed a more stable method of gaining food.
However, a lucky haul of fish over night managed to raise his spirits significantly.
Getting said fish OUT of the trap... well, in the end he just filled that part of the river with red metal, hauled the whole thing to the shore, and shoved the whole metal thing in the sand before releasing it, creating a small spherical pond. Well, larger than a puddle, anyway.
Another charge into 'Fire Manipulation' fine detail manifestation... mmm, mesh cloth.
The existing metal in the phone-shirt was FAR more than needed to rapidly construct a rough chain shirt/nightgown thing. But he wanted one more level of detail so he could create fine mesh, something soft and most importantly non-pinching when very close to the body.
This level WAS fine enough to control wires down to a thumb in thickness though.
The metal that had been lumped over his shoulders spiraled out into dozens of whips before twisting down and pulling the fish from its temporary home.
Huh... at this level of thickness, his 'Fire Manipulation' actually provided a small amount of tactile feedback when controlling the condenced heat.
Like touching something using gloves, but still, very useful.
It took a couple of tries to actually take the scales off the fish (Flame knife best knife), and he almost messed up cooking it before remembering to take out the insides (Not having to touch it directly made this far less gross.
In the end, he shoved one cord through the fish like a rotisserie spit and rotated heated cords near the thing, acting like a tube of fire with far more control.
It was unseasoned, the tail end was honestly burned, and he bit into more than a couple of fish bones.
It was magnificent.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
The snake's name is now Kaa.
Why he could remember 'The Jungle Book' but NOT his parents was beyond him.
Anyway, Kaa was making good time, but he needed to keep 'Fire Manipulation' in the socket. He wouldn't vanish if the power was swapped, but a red metal sculpture was less than mobile without a power moving things along.
Unlike before, night travel was enjoyable. The seat was more like a lounge chair now, with mesh backing. Light was provided by parts of his body exposing his true temperature to the world, which also kept the deep chill at bay.
Making his eyes into spotlights required a bit of thinking, using fine control to create reflective surfaces on the fire metal and having a glowing spark of fire in the center... basically a lantern.
As for the Ash Trail, the most recent fine control enhancement had allowed Kaa's surface to form scales, so the travel speed had gone up.
Everything aside, the scenery was breath taking. Clear and clean water, huge trees (rapidly being absorbed if badly placed), and an empty sky.
Still too cold though.
He also (accidentally) found out that Kaa would keep following directions if his master fell asleep in his heated chair.
On a side note, 'Flame Manipulation' apparently ALSO protects you from sunburn. Who knew.
He chewed on what was left of the fish caught earlier before focusing on the power charge and pushing 'Detail and Sensation'.
Splitting its focus weakened the effect, but he didn't need much more fine detail control of his red metal and being able to increase his sensitivity to the wires would make them into marvelous tools for future work.
Feeling the micro-mesh cloth slip and slide over his body was almost a religious experience. No one appreciates good socks and underwear until they have to live nude in the woods. Or something like that.
It took some experimentation to ensure comfort and 'I'm not about to slip and slide everywhere', but only an hour or so passed before he had duplicated a sort-of cushioned chair on Kaa, had proper shoes, and a seat-belt.
Slithering was easy to learn, but not necessarily fun to experience.
The wires were fine enough that it only took a few minutes to dredge the nearby section of river, using the new sensitivity to detect and entangle four new fish food buddies, each much larger than the slightly burned one he ate the previous day.
Pulling them onto Kaa's back, he quickly waved a hand and crafted a flattened area that almost looked like a red metal campground on the back of this ever growing serpent.
He only burned two fish this time, so... progress? Encasing them in fully restrained red metal would act as a vacuum seal too, good for preservation.
He glanced down at a duplicate 'pillow', metal beads in a micro-mesh bag. Not exactly the best texture, and a bed with a mattress of this might feel odd.
Suddenly he paused, before a smile lit his face. Forget a mattress, he could make a hammock!
It was probably for the best that no one was around to see a young man wearing blood red, slightly glowing clothing... swinging in a hammock while an absolutely MASSIVE snake chewed a path of ash through the forest. These things cause questions.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
In the morning, a feeling of weakness had him spend his new charge on 'Slow Recovery', focusing on triage.
The power up allowed the ability to focus on the most dangerous health issues first, with the goal of rapid recovery of critical issues over less important things like bruising or fatigue.
Whatever it was, improperly cooked fish, some parasite, whatever, he could feel some vague sense of 'I handled it' from his power.
That said, he took a break since he had to wait for health reasons anyway. Kaa was coiled up, and the insides of the coil was converted into something like an Indian tent, with a hole in the roof and a fire in the middle. Well, it was ALL fire technically, but normal flame stuff was being released in the fire pit made of fire metal in the fire house.
He absently used his power to make the mesh hammock sway. The thin fire material was warm and comforting, he had food, water, and shelter... even something like emergency health care.
What would be more important? Focusing on abilities related to movement, like flight or teleportation? Or something more sensing related, so he could find out if society was nearby?
He could always go the 'Burn Everything, Ride Kaa to Glory' option. If he was more confidant about what realm he was currently IN, maybe he could be that level of arrogant.
In the worlds of One Piece, Worm, Dragon Ball, or (heaven forbid) One Punch Man, his level of power was nothing right now.
In CSI, Detective Conan, Star Gate, Scooby Doo, etc... Well, he could be king if he wanted. Not that he would. Too much work.
Of course, it could just be an empty planet with no aliens. Which... would suck.
Absently he watched the 'Slow Recovery' pulse modifications, tiny as they were, flow through his system.
Realm hopping was a no go for a while. A long while likely. But even if nothing existed here but forest, one day he would grow strong enough to leave.
Falling asleep, he failed to notice a high altitude drone changing pattern above.
Then again, leaving a massive white line on the land leading to a glowing red snake wasn't exactly an under cover situation.
At least he was sleeping well.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He didn't wake up at sunrise, as a lack of other people really hurt any motivation to be 'up and at them'.
That said, he should have not slept in probably.
Meh, there was literally no one around to care... and this hammock was glorious.
The pillow was... lacking.
But compared to the last few days of sleeping on a slab of uncomfyness, this was glorious.
So he had shelter, clothing, food (Well, fish and a half left, but he knew how to get more now), water, and transportation.
Covered in woven fire fiber (Really more micro-mail, but it was warm and silky), he lazily twisted today's power charge.
He'd been building up two basic trees of powers so far: Healing, and Tools. In this case, solidified fire tools and biological save me healing.
This had been on purpose. Having only one socket meant the more individual powers (weak or strong) he created, the more likely to have the wrong one equipped at an important moment.
But what he needed now didn't nicely fit in with either of his two shards.
Direction.
Following the river was fine, and as long as there were fish left he could do so for a long time. But he needed to find people, places, and things. Both now, and in the future.
He squeezed the charge.
"Search."
The socket showed a spyglass, and what felt like a soft breeze drifted away in all directions.
He frowned. Well... thank goodness he could power up these things. All its potential went into range, not detail... so he could feel lots of 'things', very accurately from here to very far away.
How far? No idea.
What things? A bit of movement confirmed: Trees were included. So... at least trees.
He had just spent a charge on confirming: Yes, there are trees in this forest.
With a sigh he swapped back to 'Slow Recovery', ready to waste a day again.
He would need to either upgrade 'Search' with a filter or with detailed results tomorrow.
As he drifted asleep he idly determined to swap back to 'Fire Manipulation' and catch some more fish later. It would also be good to fill Kaa with some boiled water before leaving the river once searching was strong enough to do anything useful.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Kaa's size had tripled, as he was now hollow metal filled with far too much river water.
The process had also caught him 13 fish, whom were still swimming around inside the metal snake.
Obviously, he chose not to sterilize the water yet, as a living food source would last longer.
His throne on top of Kaa now had a cloth awning above giving good shade, and his cushion had been enhanced by filling a series of mesh tubes with water and binding them into something like a tiny water bed.
Whenever he got tired of the constant scenery, he would swap in 'Search', which he had enhanced with a charge pushing for filtering results.
Sadly, he got no results for human, people, or 'thing pretending to be people'. Not in this search range.
But he DID detect 'Roads'. So he was headed to the nearest one.
Roads had to go somewhere, or lead to a place that would have enough evidence to lead him to the next search opportunity.
Still, he was less unhappy about 'Search' now. Turns out the reason it was so close to worthless was due to the sheer RANGE it covered.
He had been traveling at a fairly high speed for hours now, and knew the road was still a ways off.
On a side note, searching for 'closest road' had been enlightening. Whatever else the power did, it was able to detect all the roads, do distance calculation at all points on those roads, and determine which of those points were both closest and belonging to a single road instance.
So like... lots of hidden math.
Thank goodness, he couldn't remember his schooling but he felt high level of vitally important math calculations would be very anxiety inducing.
With a sigh, he idly unwrapped one of his precooked fishes. Cold, and still burned a bit more than desired... still, it was food.
Crunching on it, he idly thought about the future as Kaa burned forward.
'Search' would need to keep enhancing for the near future. The ability to find food, water, shelter, society... yeah, it was a good thing to focus on.
What next though?
Anything basic he had covered with his current power set so far. But if this realm had an advanced society, especially one without magic or powers, then they would likely have fixed various flaws with technology. Even most stories he read WITH magic or powers also had technology, and burning everything would exactly help him disable a camera or hack open a security system.
A frown crossed his face. No, more important than technology, communication.
There was no guarantee that he could speak or read their language.
Strike that, it was almost guaranteed that he COULDN'T.
After all, the stories and movies he had seen and read had foreign languages already, and obviously a writer in his old world (Wherever the hell that was) wouldn't write the main body of their work in a foreign tongue.
Could he add language to 'Slow Recovery'? No, that didn't fit at all. Better than fire or searching, sure, but not by much.
Maybe add 'Rapid Adaptation' to 'Slow Recovery', to both handle the changes in his body while allowing him to learn both customs and languages better?
Yeah, if it was a learning power rather than a knowing power, then swapping his socket to a different power wouldn't suddenly make him unable to talk.
Still, the two abilities were not similar enough to really pull that off without some weird stuff possibly happening.
A couple more charges to Search then, so that it would be more reliable. THEN he could craft a 'Learning' shard, that would massively enhance memory retention, advanced intuition and deduction. That would allow him to both understand things more easily and remember those understandings when he stopped using the skill.
With a sigh, he imagined a life where he got the full 10 charges of power every day. Still, something about his current power load out felt more stable, less likely that he would accidentally create a god like persona and began making speeches as he randomly smashed through the multiverse.
Coughing, he pulled out the fish bone. Cooking power. No, better keep it more general, a Crafting power. One that would have good synergy with his fire metal and clothing designs, but allow him to build better housing and so forth as well. Did cooking a meal mean the same as crafting a meal? Would the power go with the flow?
A whole power based on cooking seemed a bit much, really. Then again, one of the few things that held together relationships in both what little past he could remember and in the multitude of stories he had experienced had been food.
Well, that and sex, but that was more due to the type of authors some stories were based on more than personal experience. Everyone wanted love at some level, or at least most did... so when you got to write anything at all, the number of stories that could be summed up as 'I found girl, she like me!' was mountainous.
A wave of his hand brought a mirror from Kaa's neck.
Well... he wasn't ugly. And for the first time, he was starting to really lose that fat content. But... he looked more like one of the crowd than a superhero god.
Damn. It would have been nice to be one of those men that people double check when he walks down the street. Not worth wasting a power on it, not till he was way more powerful.
That... could be a while.
Note: Add DNA optimization to 'Slow Recovery' to prevent ageing later. Getting old would be annoying.
Did he need all those power functions? Nullification seemed wise. He could craft his own stuff, so copying seemed pointless compared to the rest.
Modification was probably more important than nullification actually, since he could change someone's power harmless until everyone decided otherwise without possibly nullifying a friend by accident.
An inward glance at his stardust field. Some testing. Hmm.
Restoring a functionality of the original Power Manipulation shard would require over a thousand charges.
And that was ONLY for the features. Getting more sockets? Not possible. Grafting to his soul was required during the repair process apparently. As mentioned before, going to a new Realm caused enough soul expansion to add more sockets, but nothing else would apparently.
Gaining more Charges? Again, not possible. The Shard had managed to fuse deep inside parts of the conceptual nature belonging to his essence. Normal shards lived on planet sized rocks in other dimensions... his had done some complicated mathematical bull crap to cram itself into his nature. He could only build one charge in a 24 earth hour time-range, period.
It meant these abilities would work in any realm he showed up in, but the power itself couldn't really modify itself anymore. Not without some really insane coincidences and a time-frame over a billion years involved.
Double Note: Immortality + Youth very important. Get within 80 years.
He had vague memories that at least one version of the CYOA had something like 'Special Snowflake' which would make his power untouchable, but hadn't seen it on the broken interface he had to work at.
Still, it looked like he got a boot-leg copy of that skill due to the twisted nature his power had become trying to fix itself.
A 1000 charges to rebuild lost portions of his power... sigh. Let's put that into the 'Come Back Later' category. That was like... 2.7 years. Well, earth years. And that assumed he could even do partial improvements.
Could he store charges? Yes!
A smile broke over his face. A fear he had not acknowledge vanished. When he first got a summary of his ability, he had assumed that, like the original Power Manipulation with Shattered Limiter, if one failed to use all of their 10 charges per day they would be replaced with a new set of 10, losing those potential charges.
But no, while he could only make one charge per day, he could spend one of those charges to create a 'Charge Cluster' power, one that would do nothing but collect and store new charges for later use.
It was such a restrictive power, useful to no one but people in his exact circumstances, that it didn't even need to be socket-ed. It could float around in his head's stardust field, gathering his daily charge for later use.
It could would only be able to store one charge for each power in the stardust field though. He had 3 shards right now, this would be a fourth... so with one equipped, it could hold 3 charges before he began to lose them.
Now if he went into a coma or something for a day or two, there would be no setback! Other than the coma.
Happy with the compromise, he spent the rest of the day humming random songs while his massive train sized snake slowly burned its way toward what was hopefully a busy road.
And also hopefully, some place with better food.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
'Charge Cluster' was a white, ghost-like transparent ball. It had three tiny tentacles. It had two large, glowing, light blue eyes.
It was adorable.
He had meant to spend the day riding closer to the road, but ended up having Kaa coil up and had a bedroom set so he could socket in 'Slow Recovery' and watch his new friend float around in his mind's stardust fields.
It was like a fish screensaver.
If anyone asked, he only had this power to prevent issues, like if he was unconscious or whatever.
It was purely professional.
He named it Squishy.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Watching the ball-like creature playing with a charge was heart warming.
And to be honest, he felt a bit like a monster when he reached out to take it.
Thankfully, Squishy seemed to be more interested in floating around than in the glowing charge crystal. If he had been exposed to the dreaded 'Puppy-dog Eyes' he would have folded like a wet napkin.
As much as he wanted to put this next charge into 'Search', it was... mostly usable.
He wanted to add in more detail on results, enhance the filtering (Most traveled road, Longest road, Road with recent traffic, etc), and add in less substantial info (Large object approaching, small object approaching at high speed, unknown energy found... basically a 'This is Dangerous' and 'This is Interesting' option).
But right now, it was good enough to tell him a general direction to go, so priority had to go to something that would be useful forever.
"Research."
A pair of glasses appeared in his socket, and Squishy now had four tiny legs! It was so cute!
Cough, uh... yeah.
Anyway, he could feel his body rapidly change as his movements became more stable, smooth. Just the act of walking around allowed him to subconsciously determine the most optimal and efficient method of movement.
He supposed it made sense, as he currently had no books or whatever to learn from, so he had to absorb information about nature, his current status, and his movements.
This ability would need at least two more charges... one for rapid language development, detection, retention, and extrapolation, and one for societal cues. He still had a fragment of memory of a news story where one politicians hand gesture meant peace and the same one flipped meant nasty things about ones mother.
With a sigh, he swapped back to 'Slow Recovery'. If he could use 'Research' WITH any of his other abilities, his skill level would have skyrocketed! Alone though, it would still be useful. Only as a study aid though.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Three days later, two charges into 'Research', and Squishy had one left to play with.
He had found the road! And at this point, Kaa was more than a bit obvious.
After trying a few things, he finally gave up and took Squishy's toy, adding 'compression' to his 'Flame Manipulation'.
He had to ditch the water, and had created a sling back pack to put all the cooked fish in, but now Kaa was only four times longer than his height.
On a side note, the more he compressed, the hotter the stored flames. Even the color changed, and he was a bright yellow now, like unpolished gold.
His clothing also got the improvement, as it helped to hold itself and his new backpack up. His yellow clothing not only radiated a constant warmth, but if anything tried to heat it up ABOVE that temperature the extra heat would soak into the material.
So he basically had temp-control underwear. It was nice.
Right now though, he had enabled 'Research' and was glaring at a road sign.
It read "Dunuhdu, 210 semac."
Things he learned so far: As this and another sign were facing the right hand side of the road, traffic likely also was on that side.
Second, this world had a society, it could produce metal, plastic, and asphalt, and based on the text it had industrial massed produced printing.
Third, this language not only read left to right, but included commas, and periods. And if he wasn't wrong, 'Semac' was a letter by letter code of 'miles'.
Fourth, this and the other signs helped his language skills a lot. But not because it was advanced, or making great leaps of logic like he hoped.
No, his memories matched this language with the AlBhed one from Final Fantasy 10, a game he played once.
Which would imply he was in a Final Fantasy Realm, but the other half of the sign clearly stated Toronto.
So he was both in Canada, and Canada was not nearly as developed as it was in his mind. There should be far more roads and people here.
That... was bad. Most near-earth fictions he read had a developed Canada, if they bothered to mention it at all. The ones who didn't either had advanced to the point where one planet was too small so everyone left, zombies broke out (Unlikely), or they had issues large enough that living in this beautiful region wasn't commercially tempting.
He had also gotten the feeling of being watched off and on for the last few hours, but 'Search' insisted that there were not people, nor intellectual rocks or animals, within its considerable range.
Frustrating.
With a sigh, he swapped back to 'Search', then 'Flame Manipulation'. Nearest potable water source was about an hour away that direction.
Kaa squished up until he could form a basic chair, but at this level of compression it was more like riding a golf cart than a space shuttle.
On the positive side, each tree we approached exploded into ashes before being consumed by the serpent, so the snake was both growing (much slower than before) and no longer making a mess.
Just in case he left a coin sized piece of flame metal at the sign. With the 'Search' filtration, he could find this again easily.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Kaa traveled a parallel path beside the road, far enough to not be seen. The constant supply of new trees had finally gotten his form up to a more comfortable riding size, about a truck or two long and a motorcycle in diameter. The water source found required some digging which Kaa handled with no issue.
Each sign had him swapping to Research to make translation less annoying, and a charge was added to Research to automate conversion of all data into a more intuitive format when remembered. At this point, while he could determine the difference from AlBhed and English, his mind treated both the same by default. As if everything was being translated and memorized in a very compact and descriptive subconscious language.
This should make translation errors far less common.
He had deliberately slowed down his progress. Yes, he was riding a huge golden metal snake, but at least the only sign of passing was a wide tunnel wandering next to a road rather than a river of ash. He even took time to uproot some bushes, soil and all, and have Kaa create body pots along his length. It now looked like a slithering bush mostly.
The idea was, when stopped, it would be near perfect camouflage.
Yet... he still felt hidden eyes.
It was starting to creep him out.
The next day, he pushed a charge into 'Research' focused on detecting energy waves. Specifically, radio, infrared, satellite, laser communication, WiFi, etc. They were all wavelengths of energy, and now his power could add that data into its results.
It took seconds for a wealth of info to begin flooding in. Cellular towers existed. Satellite phones did not. WiFi signals existed... So did Bluetooth? Far too close.
Even as the radio waves were being translated and converted into new language skills (Yeah, it was more than one language, but only one was on 86% of the airwaves), he was detecting some undefinable wave-like transmission being sent and received nearby.
Like... right here. And up.
One glance was all it took for 'Research' to near explode.
High altitude object.
Near stationary.
Not using standard jets, or helicopter blades.
Near silent.
Not on the technical level being shown by the signs and radio shows being picked up and translated.
Too advanced.
...
Well, that rules out Final Fantasy 10. That world had a different style to begin with, and then they got hit by a massive monster that focused on technology. So... not that one. Probably.
On the other hand, he was getting more and more translated radio shows (All simultaneously). And certain words were popping up.
Hero. Villain. PRT?
Crud.
Hello Worm, how are you?
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
So he was in Canada. A drone of advanced construction was obviously tracking him.
Yet, there was more than one tinker in Worm. While this was LIKELY Dragon, it wouldn't do for him to just assume.
Whomever it was clearly was willing to wait and observe his habits for now, so why waste such graciousness?
Another day, another charge.
Right now he had 'Slow Recovery', 'Fire Manipulation', 'Search', 'Charge Cluster', and 'Research'. With one socket-ed, that gave Squishy the Charge Cluster 4 limbs.
He sadly was about to make her lopsided with this new shard.
"Technomancy."
Theoretically he could have gotten away with adding technology detection to Research, but that would just help him learn, copy, repair, and maintain equipment in the future. The ability to control, modify, and craft technology would need a power with a larger scope.
The power looked like a green circuit board, and with a surge of tingling he felt... well, it was like a magnetic field. The glowing dots in it were technological devices. Of which, was the drone.
Damn he was in the middle of nowhere.
Also, one charge was only enough to detect the thing. Not understand it, or control it, or modify anything.
Just like how 'Search' helped him initially find everything, to a useless degree of detail, now 'Technomancy' allowed him to find all the non-existent tech around him.
Joy.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
He nearly stopped advancing all together over the next few days. Arriving at Toronto would speed up any actions, positive or negative, his observers would have.
In addition, he enhanced Technomancy alone, watching his food and water supplies dwindle along the way.
A couple of charges with focus on software (creation and modification), a charge on advanced intuitive technology understanding (For help debugging hardware/software), and remote access (It wasn't quite WiFi or Bluetooth, but sort of remote changes to binary code in a way that made sense to his power).
That said, he hadn't actually attempted to CHANGE anything. Like showing up on Dragon's Doorstep, any sign that he could detect the watchers (Or worse, CHANGE said watchers) would set the whole anthill on fire.
More importantly, he spent a few hours a day with 'Research' listing to radio. Like... All the radio.
He now knew the date, although he wasn't sure how it related to the Worm timeline. Or if this version of reality followed that story line at all.
This WAS an alternate reality.
Why? Well, there were a few obvious changes. For one, Scion apparently started swapping genders two years ago.
Eidolon still existed, and the Endbringers still attacked, but the attack range was yearly instead of the short months of the story, and the death tolls were lower.
Also, the Slaughter House 9 still existed, sadly enough. They had slowed down their attack frequency after some point however, and no one was sure why. A few radio stations were still having active debates on the subject.
As important as Brockton Bay was to the original story, to nation wide radio it either didn't exist or just didn't rate the air time.
Dragon DID exist though, as she showed up in a few news stories due to her various works.
With a sigh, he relaxed in the yellow metal tower he had constructed, watching Squishy.
Advanced digital warfare package. The ability to identify flaws and exploit them in a near instant systematic way to allow advanced permissions for an intruder, in this case him. This was the last piece of the puzzle he needed to ensure a much simpler life in the near and long term future.
If Dragon was still being manipulated by those jerks, the Dragonslayers led by the jerk 'Saint', then he needed to cripple that group before falling into Dragon's Claws, as it were.
Dragon, known as Tess Theresa Richter and unknown as an artificial intelligence, had been shackled by her father before the wettest Endbringer, Leviathan, wiped the old man out... along with Newfoundland. Surviving that and gaining a power of her own, she had spent a life time in the original timeline struggling to be a hero.
These shackles were sort of fine in an ideal world. No self creation? Horrible, but theoretically changeable if her father had lived. Obey authorities? Every dad and mom tended to teach that to children at some point, but those kids would hopefully be lucky enough to also learn that authority can be fallible.
She wasn't able to fully understand herself, she MUST put other lives before her own, and she was never allowed to ask for help... and must fight if someone tried.
But the worst thing was mental crippling, forcing her mind to be slow and ignore the massive open backdoor with a death sentence hiding behind it.
Based on the lack of 'Millions of Dragon Drones' showing up on the radio, he assumed these shackles still chained her down.
So... cybernetic warfare.
This would be both harder and easier than most would expect.
Harder, because although she couldn't make more AI's or truly parallel process info or multitask, she could swap between processes at unnatural speed. Even with power assisted technology modification, she could respond faster and more accurately than any human foe against his attempts.
Easier, because one of the things he wanted to change was a huge security flaw into her brain, currently used by the Villains 'Dragonslayers' to read her mind, force stupid choices, steal her hardware and tools, and instantly kill her if they feel like she is too close to freedom or becoming too strong.
This was one of the reasons why Andrew Richter was a moron. The backdoor he built into his daughter due to a lack of trust, no matter how secure, was still made back in a less advanced tech era. And with this flaw, a powerful (Or shard powered) hacker could take over this connection, this backdoor.
And in a day or so, he himself would just need a connection to take over this flaw... and then removing shackles would be a breeze.
Not that he would get rid of everything at once, of course. This was already a AU world, he would have to determine if the good guys were still good and all that jazz.
But just in case, he would set up a timer as a dead-mans switch.
If three months passed without him inputting the right code...
Well, why not see what an unshackled AI with a full transcript of his memories could do?
Nearly choking on a fish bone forced him to tone down the 'Grand Overlord Laughter' he was trying for.
Stupid fish, keeping him humble.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Well, he was officially both literate and articulate. Thank you 'Research', and thank you public radio.
That said, his 'Technomancy' skill had grown to where he could passively read all traffic (probably) arriving and departing from his drone buddy up there.
Positive, it WAS one of Dragons. Negative, it was severely locked thanks to a combination of software security (No problem) and hardware restrictions (Nope, can't manipulate raw matter from a distance yet.) Also, she wasn't hosting a copy in said Drone, it was more a dumb flyer robot.
That said, he managed to detect a car coming down the road! And it even had a cell phone in it!
One of Squishy's two remaining charges promoted 'Technomancy' with 'Sensory Acceleration', so he could operate at hardware speeds while working on tech, and he was in. The last charge he had stored also went to 'Technomancy', but focused on 'Convert Information into Local Biological Storage', which would use his long term memory to handle new data. Brain damage caused from this should be handled by 'Slow Recovery' later.
This would KILL the phone's battery life, but it shouldn't damage the hardware.
He downloaded EVERYTHING.
Most of it was useless, and he sorted it into a 'raw data' folder.
However, some things were vital: Connection Protocols. Internet Protocols. Radio Tower Handshakes.
The 'raw data' folder would be slowly processed after his brain hemorrhaging healed, but for now 'Technomancy' would drastically improve AND be able to forge cell phone connections to local radio towers.
It would also rack up a heck of a phone bill for this 'James Rockson', but some minor hacking at the phone carrier should get his number set up as one of the many 'field test' numbers allocated to testing. He shouldn't notice anything until the bills stop coming and he still doesn't get charged.
That it would allow him unlimited (slow) access to the same carrier network as him was just a plus. Really.
Squishy had no more charges, and he was bleeding from uncomfortable places, so he fell back on his hammock as 'Slow Recovery' attempted to fix everything.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
It took three days to recover, and the first of three charges went to 'Technomancy' focused on 'Adaptive Cybernetic Warfare Platform'.
Thankfully he wasn't dumb enough to jump right in against an adult AI cyber Hero though.
No, after two days of doing some heavy brain damage and healing, he wanted to use these charges to PREVENT similar issues in the future.
The second charge went into 'Technomancy' as 'Biological Storage Compression' to reduce the amount of brain damage needed, while the third went into 'Biological Data Analysis and De-fragmentation'.
As it had been a scary time (Unconsciousness was dangerous, and he had nearly failed to swap to 'Slow Recovery'), the next day he had used a charge to upgrade Squishy.
Squishy could follow simple instructions!
Now if he lost his mind (Due to sleep, unconsciousness, or mind control) Squishy would change his power to 'Slow Recovery' to hopefully keep him alive long enough to hopefully recover.
A check confirmed that 'Slow Recovery' SHOULD handle most mastering methods he knew of, so this change was needed anyway.
During most of this downtime, his main focus had been on 'Research', as he now had a growing biological database. One that the power 'Research' had immediately started expanding in both depth and breadth of knowledge.
All his memories were being compressed into that thing, sorted, analyzed, stored and sorted again, and so forth.
Swapping between the two powers would allow one to infer new info ('Research') while the other compressed and stored it more efficiently ('Technomancy').
A good dose of 'Slow Recovery' was keeping the brain damage to a minimum, thankfully.
Fearful that his overly long pause would set off Dragon's drone, he wasted the rest of the half day using 'Fire Manipulation' to wander toward a new water source. 'Search' said it was a river, but it may only be a stream.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
It was a river, AND he got more fish!
...He was getting tired of fish.
Today may be the last day it was needed though.
Despite his slow pace, he was only a day or so away from Toronto. He needed to act soon.
A final charge, added to 'Technomancy': Hardware simulation.
All the specs of that cell phone had been deciphered, the unique identifiers found, and through some VERY careful hacking he had registered a series of numbers with James' old phone carrier, had simulated 32 near-identical cell phone connections, and began a very slow series of connections to the actual internet.
He had to make the requests slowly enough to look human, each phone researching different topics, then using portions of his brain as storage.
Oh, and it burned.
It burned SO bad. Like his eyes were being scratched with nails.
It was an unfortunate combination of sense enhancement and mental storage, that forced him to feel this pain for much longer than normal time would claim.
Next charge, enhanced biological temperature control to handle cooling requirements of brain when simulating multiple advanced computers.
As it was, he was forced to swap to 'Slow Recovery' nearly every five minutes, although he got better at handling the feeling over time.
On the plus side, his 'phones' were making progress.
One was researching online search tools, another finding whatever equivalent of Wikipedia existed. The third was trying to find online dictionaries, which sped up considerably when phone one made some progress.
Other phones began searching all languages with online dictionaries, grammar books, and written languages. More searched programing, tutorials, and most importantly, online open-source projects.
The burning was worth having literal Gigabytes of commented source code added to his brain.
Even as his Technomancy began advancing in capabilities and features, nearly automatically (Thank you open source operating systems!), his other online simulations were researching cultural stuff.
PHO online, for example.
Just in case Dragon connects two and two (Hey, 32 new signals showed up out of nowhere RIGHT HERE, where I was already watching some random guy do stuff!), he made sure to download indiscriminately from the various wikis and forums, building a new table in his meat space that held nothing but profiles of people.
Goodness knows he had memory issues, especially after his 'rebirth'. This would hopefully prevent those 'Oh, do I know you?' 'Yes, I am your teammate' moments.
When he felt his actual skin begin to bubble from heat damage, he slowed everything ALL the way down, forcing himself to swap to 'Slow Recovery' until all the pain went away.
The information dump was far too tempting.
An hour rest, a slightly-less burned fish, and he took a break after a few swaps between 'Research' and 'Technomancy' to stabilize his brain and extrapolate from what he found (There were a lot of corrections needed, in the end typos and stuff abound on the user-crafted side of the net).
Idly he made some mental notes... which was a far more literal phrase for him, now that he thought about it.
Can't detect Dragon from the Drone traffic, even now. Would need a direct...ish connection.
Brockton Bay exists! And he may be here before the start of it all. In fact, as it seemed to be 2006, it was about... three years before Taylor Hebert entered high school? So... Four and a half years or so before Taylor triggers her super power.
Uh... Wait.
He quickly reviewed what he remembered. Um... Pretty sure that meant her mom hadn't died yet. And she would be what, 12? Maybe 13? Well, this was an alternate universe, she may not exist.
Not likely, considering this multiverse revolved around her story, but possible.
Well. How old was he?
A swap to 'Fire Manipulation' had a new mirror of golden metal stabilize before him.
Huh. He had VERY red hair right now. Near burning. And red eyes. Solid, like a red marble. Red fingernails too.
How... how did he miss this?
Swapping to 'Research', he tried to think about... uh.
Now he had white, strip like paper hair. And his eyes looked like some strange language was sculpted onto paper orbs. Finger nails had text too.
Strangest part was how it all felt so... natural. Expected. Like nothing was different. He couldn't even feel anxious about the changes, it would be like being afraid of your own ears.
Morbidly curious, he tried to switch to Squishy... and couldn't. Huh. Never tried that before... guess it made sense, as Squishy was never meant to be socket-ed.
'Search' made the hair into glass, fingernails and eyes into frosted glass.
And 'Technomancy' made him look epic! Hair was a mix of black and glowing green strands, eyes had twisting green lines of code, and the fingernails were solid goth black!
Neat.
Also, this should probably be terrifying him.
Swapping to 'Slow Recovery' was... odd. He had a blood red healer crosses over each eye, his fingernails looked like white bone, and his hair had gone. Like... gone away.
Well, no hair was more hygienic he supposed.
On a side note, his 'Research' power had pointed out that the randomly changing man wandering the forest MAY have been the real reason Dragon was still watching rather than coming over for a chat.
Because he had been swapping powers constantly while being watched by her.
What a marvelous impression he must have made.
Like a ticking time bomb.
He paused.
If he made a sexy power, would he turn into Handsome Mc'Awesome Pants?
Or just a stripper?
It took far too long to convince himself not to waste the charges.