Wildcard Assembly's Squad Base,

Multiple Locations

Current Phase Points:

135705

Current Ascension Tokens Applied:

25

End of Phase Two: 25

D:08H:57M:51S

"The only thing that could make this more cliche would be if you were wearing one of his shirts and drinking a steaming cup of coffee."

"We didn't-" I started to say but Freakenstein let out a long whistle to accompany Pinky's catcalling that completely drowned me out as Swansong blushed hard at my side.

"You two spent the night together Loops, I don't care if you sat around playing with Lego all night, I'm getting my jokes in," Pinky teased, walking up to Swansong and throwing an arm over her shoulder. "That said, I reeeally hope that's not all you did last night. Codex said you two were still sleeping and we figured you two could probably use the extra sleep after a night of some sort of fun."

"It was a nice night," Swansong said in a small voice, walking forward with Pinky as they headed toward the kitchen.

"You could have woken us up…" I said, looking over at Jon who shrugged with a knowing smile.

"Dude I opened your door half a foot, saw you two and noped right out of there. I sure as hell wasn't about to interrupt any of that," he said with a laugh.

"Besides, we already hunted down the first tokens of the day, Brain's array in California is up and running now, it gives us an expanded range for using our trackers and Freak's still… well freakishly good at predicting where they're going to show up in the city. We were waiting for you two to drop them into the upgrader," Pinky said with the wave of a hand.

"The points will be nice to have. It'll extend my lead on the board to keep my Championship Ring at its full effectiveness," I said with a nod. "Shit, I still have to do my Ability Augmentation and stat assignments for Level 22 now that I think about it."

"Not to mention we got loot boxes to open damnit. You two sleeping in mighta been a nice break for yah, but we do got shit to take care of and places to break," Freak said, hopping over one of the couches and onto a cushion next to BrainCraft. "Miss Mist is waiting for us out in Washington Heights, I think we're gonna clear some Forges today if you guys are up for it cause I sure as hell am."

"We sure that Hydramental doesn't have some sort of trap up his sleeve?" I asked, looking after Pinky and Swan who had begun to whisper between each other before moving over to the couches and taking a seat myself.

"Miss Mist said they are still crawling with droids but there's practically no surveillance equipment that she's been able to see. Brain hooked her up with some communication disrupters to get in place this morning that he'll be able to access when you guys go in," Jon said, clicking a few things before a map of the city appeared over our holo-table. "Who the hell knows what the hell that crazy bastard is up to, especially after his not so subtle news appearance, but maybe attacking these places will drag him out."

Swansong looked over her shoulder at me, giving me the briefest of nods as I looked around at the group. Other than Miss Mist, who Freak had at least accounted for, the entire squad was somewhere within view, with Duskbreaker sitting with a bowl of cereal at the small dining table we had off to the side, Freak and Brain in the pit area, and the girls standing around the coffee machine while Swansong prepared herself a mug.

"Yeah… so about Hydramental," I said, looking at the map of the area that Jon had actually created a literal map with arrows pointing from one forge to the next in a "suggested takedown order." "I sort of bumped into him last night… not that he remembers."

Although Duskbreaker had been the only one in the squad, at least present, that didn't know about my Hidden Power, I decided to throw caution to the wind as I looped him in on the ability, explaining the brief encounter we had. There wasn't exactly much to tell, but pretty much everyone took the same lesson I did. Whatever Hydramental had been after with trying to make me look suspicious on the news wasn't extending so far that he was going to try and make himself look like a good guy to us.

"I was wondering why you had shaved so much time out of your bank but assumed I was just being polite by not asking if you had to use it to fix some mistake you made with Swan last night," Jon said, his eyes focused even if his words were joking.

"Loophole was a perfect gentleman if you must know," Swan said, walking down into the pit with her cup of coffee before she dropped onto the couch right next to me.

"Well there's a first time for everything," Jon rolled his eyes. "Seriously though Loophole, only you could have the kind of luck that would make you run into the dude who's effectively your archnemesis in a city the size of New York…"

"I don't know if I'd call him my archnemesis…"

"Please Loopie, dude has a hate boner for you in a way that should be embarrassing for him. He's definitely your archnemesis," Freak said with a laugh.

"Terminology aside, can we drop that for right now before we spend our entire break talking about it? I mean, I think we've waited long enough, can we open loot boxes already!?" Pinky asked, jumping onto the couch as Duskbreaker made his way over from the dining room.

"I already opened mine last night, I wasn't expecting much but I did get a new book on something called four dimensional space… not quite sure how that ties into my powers but I'm going to do some experimenting," he explained.

"Was it a Level 6 book?" I asked, my own curiosity piqued. "If that could get transcribed down into a Level 3 over in the Book Nook I wouldn't mind taking a look myself."

"New knowledge is never a bad thing," BrainCraft said with an approving nod before looking at me expectantly. "I'm aware you also have your level 22 stats and Augmentation to apply, but I have been looking forward to opening this S+:Tier with the benefit of your Luck Bomb since last night, so before anyone else can distract you, could we proceed?"

"Yeah yeah, sure. Sorry, you're right I can get distracted. Let's see what we got," I said, focusing on the group and the area as I willed us toward Loot Boxes with outright beneficial results. Once I had that clear in my mind, I activated Luck Bomb. "Okay, we're good to go. Although we should probably also try and work on upping the percentage on the Vibe Zone here in the base. The luck gain from those alone would probably nullify my need to use my Luck Bomb for this specific purpose all the time."

"Sheesh Loophole you really have an attention issue, that's a problem for future us," Pinky said, materializing five loot boxes onto the table ahead of her. Brain had a similar stack, though he was already reaching for the single box that looked different from the others, the gold-clad S+ box.

My stack wasn't nearly as big, with only two personal boxes and the S:Tier Squad Base box that was really meant for the entire group. Opting to get that one out of the way, I grabbed and opened the box, revealing the sole item it carried.

"Study Hall. Rare Squad Base Upgrade. Install this upgrade into an available Squad Display Case to unlock the Study Hall Expansion. This expansion occupies 150 square feet of your base's total size allocation and provides a dedicated space for personal growth. Each squad member may spend up to one hour per day, 4 days per week, utilizing the various study desks in this room to raise either their Intelligence or Ingenuity by 1 point up to a maximum of 35 base points in any of these stats. Additionally, twice per week, each member may choose one Knowledge Skill they currently have at any level and increase it by 1 up to a maximum Knowledge Level of 9 from this version of the Study Hall."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"Well hello there, you guys are gonna want to take a look at this," I murmured before making a few movements to toss the description onto the holo-table as the window overlapped the map of the city. Even BrainCraft, with his eyes still fogged over as he analyzed his S+ loot snapped to attention to take a look.

"Hmm, even with the stat cap, that's incredibly useful just for the knowledge bumps. I had been wondering how or if the levels between the major book advances worked. I'll be unable to use it to increase my Intelligence at all at this point, though I'm sure the rest of you will find a good use for it," BrainCraft said, a small smile on his face as the clunky goggles covering his eyes vanished, becoming replaced by a thin visor with a red light filling the center line of the mask now covering his eyes in their place.

"Did Brain just call us dumb?" Freak asked, flexing his hands as a new pair of gloves sat on them.

"Only comparatively based on the stat points we each have," BrainCraft corrected. "Though one of my powers is Super Intelligence…"

"Which means that comparatively we are all dumb compared to you Brain," Pinky said, leaning over as she looked at him. "I'm guessing this Star Trek visor thing is your S+ loot?"

"Indeed it is. Several large stat increases, primarily for my intelligence, as well as a useful feature called Analysis which will allow me to create and save blueprints based on any piece of technology I see," BrainCraft said. I could practically hear Jon perk up at this and BrainCraft must have predicted the question even I was about to ask. "Unfortunately there's a note on it that says it will only work on active, non-destroyed equipment. Meaning I still have no way of analyzing the remains of the object that created the Dead Zone within Perry."

"Still, that's a hell of a perk, especially if you are joining us on our Forge run today," I said and he responded with a sharp nod.

"I believe we should be able to have Duskbreaker transport Pinky back and forth at the designated spawn time for Tokens, unless we discover that the Forges take an oddly long amount of time to clear, there's no real point in holding any of our forces behind on the other side of the country when our designated enemy in that region are operating fully within the bounds of the game. It will really provide us a large strike force for making good progress," BrainCraft said.

"In other words, Pinky would have just complained all day that we were having fun while she wasn't if we didn't find a way to make sure she could be involved, right?" I said, raising a brow.

"Hey- Actually no, that's pretty accurate," Pinky nodded, moving on to the next of her boxes. While she didn't have an S+:Tier like BrainCraft had, she had still received an S:Tier for becoming a human missile that she had already opened with little commentary.

Her other boxes consisted of an A, a B, and two F:Tier loot boxes that she was slowly making her way through. As curious as I was to what each of my teammates had gotten, I still had two of my own to open and I really did need to stop putting off my Level Up assignments. Oddly, part of me actually did miss the enforced timelines that had come with the Acceptance Matrix, though I certainly didn't miss how little time I had to consider my options either.

Luck Bomb was obviously working as I opened the S:Tier, finding a sleek looking ring in it that would be the perfect replacement for the Gambler's Ring that only gave me a single additional point to my Luck.

"Oddsmaker's Ring. Platinum Tier Equippable Ring. You've already made quite the little name for yourself where Luck is concerned and this ring just cements your place as a master of it in all forms. +10 to Luck. +3 to Ingenuity. This ring comes with the House's Edge feature."

"House's Edge. When fighting with your squad within a territory you have laid a claim on, provides an increase to all squadmate's Luck stat equal to 10% of your total Luck if your claim is contested and 25% of your total luck if your claim is uncontested."

I swapped the new item with my Gambler's Ring, looking down at my gloved hands. I wasn't exactly sure how the system was accounting for the fact that I was essentially wearing two pairs of gloves along with a few bulky rings, but it really didn't feel like it was much different than if more hands were completely bare. I still hadn't managed to figure out what the hell the Hidden Upgrade on my gloves were, though the stacking Target debuff they gave hadn't left me caring all that much to dig too deep. That was probably irresponsible, but I had had plenty of other things on my mind.

I turned to my last box, the A+ and opened it to find 5000 Credits, a Satchel of Superior Stamina Syringes, and a Satchel of Duraweave Patches. Much like the Viper Skin I had harvested early on, these were crafting items that I could have attached to my gear, though each of the five patches in the set would grant me a +3 bonus to my Toughness. I dematerialized those into my B.E.L.T., planning to tackle it either before we headed out for the first forge or once we decided to take a break for the day.

"Not necessarily a bad haul," Jon said, his voice in my head as we turned to my stat points. "What are you thinking for the points and your Ability Augmentation?"

"Two in Luck as usual and I figure I'll just make it easy and go with Strength this time since I upped my Toughness during the Level 21 increases just to keep it ahead of Ingenuity for the bonus points," I said looking at the stat window as I dropped the points into the stats. Once that was done, my Catch Up feature activated and it randomized between my Style and Ingenuity, which both sat at a base score of 10 before finally settling on Style, increasing it to 11. "As for the Augmentation… I could add another one to my EchoStrike, but I've been considering trying Float Like a Butterfly for a while and I think now is as good a time as any."

"No argument here, you use it enough that it makes sense to see what you can add to the ability," Jon agreed as I prompted the window and quickly found the ability.

"Float Like a Butterfly. Level 5 Activated Ability. This ability gives you an increased chance to dodge hand-to-hand combat strikes of 10% plus 1% for every point of Luck you have for 30 seconds. This ability has a 5 minute cooldown."

"First Modification Option! Extended Flutter! Your dodges become so graceful you're able to find the zone and extend the length of this ability. Each successful dodge during the duration of this ability adds an additional 3 seconds to the duration, these added seconds are in turn removed from the ability's cooldown."

"Second Modification Option! Opportunist's Window! Part of being a good brawler is knowing when to strike and when to take advantage of a perfect dodge. When you dodge an attack while this ability is activated, the attacker goes slightly off balance, lowering their defenses by 10% while also giving you a 15% increased chance of delivering a critical strike."

"Third Modification Option! Flutter Burst! When this ability's duration ends, you immediately gain a burst of speed, launching you 5 feet in any direction of your choice. If you direct yourself toward an enemy, your next physical strike deals 50% increased damage, calculated after all other bonuses have been applied. If you direct yourself away from any enemy, you may choose to briefly go intangible to pass through any solid object."

"Well shit…" I muttered, causing both Pinky and Swansong to look over at me curiously before I shook my head. "Sorry, just got a handful of good Augmentation options for this ability. Was kinda hoping for a cut and dry easy choice."

"When in doubt, choose the one that lets you hit harder," Pinky said, holding up a finger as if she was making a perfect point.

"The lady's got a point," Freak said with an approving nod.

I looked back at the modifications as I heard Jon humming in my ear, clearly taking his own time to read through the options.

"Any thoughts," I asked. I was actually almost evenly split between the options and could see the benefits in all of them one way or another.

"As much as I like the idea of Flutter Burst, I'd nix that one first just because the other two seem like better options in general. Yeah it would give you a nice damage boost and some movement, but you're not really lacking for either of those," he said, his hand rubbing against his chin. "Personally, I'd say go for Extended Flutter. In a big enough fight, you could extend that so long that it wouldn't even have a cooldown."

"Sounds like as good of reasoning as any," I said, quickly selecting the option before either of us could overthink it. The rest of the squad had cleared the table of their loot boxes and were looking over toward me intently. "Okay guys, I think we've kept Miss Mist waiting long enough, who's ready to break some droids?"

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