Rick cleared his throat, bringing the attention of the others in the meeting room to him. “It’s time we begin our comeback. A lot of our previous plans need to be scrapped, but some should still be doable with some modifications, thanks to the unexpected blessings descending on us. I’ve brought myself up to date on our situation over the past week, so we don’t need to go over that and can immediately get to work on plans for the future,” he said.“Can you tell us what your blessing is, shepherd? If we’re to come up with new plans or modify existing ones based on blessings, we need to know what yours is,” the strategist asked. While he was telling the truth about that, he was also just as curious as everyone else in the room as to what exactly Rick could do now.“My blessing enables me to enter people’s minds, monitor their thoughts,” Rick answered, then his eyes flashed purple as he continued speaking through the threads of belief that connected him to his high-level confidants. “And

Timothy heard the hatch to the cargo hold hiss open and almost fumbled the atomic printer he was still holding in his hand. He paled and gingerly set it down, then turned around and saw his “wife” coming into the hold behind him.“Holy fuck, you startled me!” he exclaimed.Catherine was taken aback for a moment, thinking, ‘Aren’t reapers supposed to be hardcore badasses? Psh, a little door scared such a big man.’ Then, a mischievous grin crossed her face and she got a truly wicked idea.“Honey, I have a headache,” she said, slumping down to sit on the floor next to him. She leaned over and rested her head in his lap and practically purred at him. “Rub me?” she asked, blinking innocently and conveniently ignoring the fact that she was still wearing nothing but a sports bra and compression booty shorts. Timothy awkwardly fidgeted in place and didn’t know where to put his hands. There were so very, very many options, and not many of them were good. He poked her forehead and growled, “Fo

The next day.Timothy and Siobhan got out of bed at three o’ clock in the morning, neither of them requiring much sleep thanks to their enhanced physiques and various implants. In order to maintain their covers, neither of them would be accessing the simulation unless an emergency came up. Augmented reality was also limited, preventing them from using it for things like virtual keyboards and screens. What remained was mostly akin to a HUD that would give them increased situational awareness without the possibility of any outward signs that they were using imperial technology.Even their old beat-up pickup truck was exactly what it seemed, just an old truck. Their only imperial technology, beyond the necessaries like their WESS and other layers of security systems, had been safely tucked away in various slicks and the growing underground facility that the atomic printer nanite colony was currently building and expanding. Their implants had informed them that the facility had reached in

Fifteen minutes after the miserable end of the spar.Aron had been revived after being given a once-over by Nova, who was worried about his state of mind whenever he experienced a death in the simulation, much less one as... devastating as his most recent. After all, she fully expected there to be some sequelae after experiencing death firsthand, something that had already long been an issue with the harsh ARES training. But while the issues were similar, the solutions were most definitely not. ARES troopers could have their memories deleted, or at least reduced in intensity to around the same level of impact that dying in a dream would have, while Aron’s mental defenses, not to mention the system riding in his consciousness, was absolutely impenetrable to any form of mental manipulation that came from outside the system. Even when Nova had spotted the issue during Aron’s first upgrade, she had been incapable of interfering until the system recognized what she was doing and relented

Aron’s speech had hit the target, inspiring and riling up everyone that watched it. From beginning to end, the reactions on social media only grew wilder and wilder as people rapid-fired their views on the imperial feed all over the internet. Even Panoptes had had to spawn a whole host of VI assistants to ensure that the opinions were neatly tucked away in their own individual echo chambers, lest conflict arise from opinion clashes.That said, a few examples still had to be made of those that egregiously violated lese majeste law, though there weren’t that many who crossed that line. Most people were reasonably supportive of the empire, having experienced the sweetness of imperial citizenship benefits already. Life was good for imperial citizens, and it showed in the general optimistic trend in the background, with very little need for propaganda to reinforce or alter peoples’ opinions.Events like the speech Aron had just delivered as the empire of mankind were only occasionally nece