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2024-10-29 19:42:56Eriane was sitting in a sniper’s nest atop a brand new guard tower at 9KCCC (Nine Kings Central Command Camp) when George climbed up the access ladder to join her.
“How is it?” George asked.
“Hot.” Eriane complained. It was in the middle of the afternoon and the guard tower only had a few bare branches overhead for shelter.
“Sorry. I’ll see if I can get people to put more work into the guard towers, but everyone’s busy right now.” George winced.
Eriane thought about that for a while, then nudged George. “How you?”
“Me?” George shook his head. “I’m fine. Feeling a bit useless, but I’m healthy.”
“Useless?” Eriane’s head twisted to one side quizzically.
“Well, because there’s not much I can do to help.” George explained. “We have plenty of experienced and skilled commanders, and even better fighters than me out there. I just approve the receipts and pay for what little I can pay and keep writing letters to ask for help.”
E
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“I thought you were trying to force Yin to come. I don’t see him here. Is he coming?” Gary asked. “He is.” Cooper said grimly. “No matter what!” Oh, by the way, because of the upcoming contest between the Cosmic Guild branches, Cooper was dead set on having the rather-stay-in-bed genius Tang Yin join the training camp. He was serious. Gathering three other guys from Club Saturn, they went to hunt… err… cordially invite Tang Yin the sleepyhead over to the Compulsory Camp That Everyone Must Go To! “Spatial Lock!” “Paralysis!” “Shock Stun!” “Living Chains!” “Binding Vines!” “Wind Whip!” “OW!” Tang Yin spluttered. “What’s with the whip!?” But nobody answered or apologized. They simply hauled him out of there bodily. They bundled him into a carriage and rode off into the sunset… Actually, no, they went to a large observatory on a tall hill just outside Ecclesia City. It took them roughly an ho
Kingdom of the Weak 276. I hate this world
There was a dirty little girl running for dear life with a loaf of bread in her hands. Behind here were two burly men with snarls and knives, and… “Earth, hold them.” Remian whispered to the ground. During his time harvesting cores, he’d learned a few things about ‘using magic’ in this world. First, he couldn’t make something out of nothing. He could only affect things that there were already around. For this reason, fire had become the least available, while earth and wind were usually in abundance. Second, he had to tell them what to do. He couldn’t just say ‘earth’ and expect what was in his mind to occur. The rules in this world required him to specify what he wanted. Rather than ‘spells’, it was more like he was giving out commands. Third, whatever he wanted, he had to say it out vocally. It didn’t matter if it was loudly or softly, he could whisper it if he wanted, but there had to be a spoken word into the atmosphere for something to ha
Kingdom of the Weak 277. Environmental Changes
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Kingdom of the Weak 278. Big Li and Little Li meet Little Yan
When he went to buy stuff this time, Remian loaded a small hand-cart with sacks and crates. He doubled his foodstuff calculations to include Little Yan’s needs, got extra wooden dishes and utensils (they used chopsticks), herb-gathering tools, a second set of bedding (otherwise he’d be sleeping in the chair again tonight), two hats, three masks, four scarves and five sets of clothing at roughly Little Yan’s size. “Two sets of tunic and pants; three casual plain robes.” Little Yan hugged her new clothes when he showed them to her. “Thank you! I love them!” Remian breathed a slow sigh of relief. He’d been worried she’d ask about skirts and dresses, all of which he basically knew nothing about. The clothes he’d gotten her were functional, almost utilitarian, and there was nothing particularly pretty about any of them, but they were clean, new, and well-made (at least he thought so). Big Li or Little Li would be horrified to wear such poor, plain clothes, but Lit
Kingdom of the Weak 279. Word of another continent
Eh…? There was a sudden, dumbfounded silence from everyone present. “Where is that?” Little Li asked, suddenly curious enough to forget all about chairs and such. “That’s… where I come from.” Remian tried not to blurt out anything else that might get him more attention. He was in enough trouble as it was. “There is truly no slavery?” Little Yan stared at him, eyes wide. “There was, but not any more. We ended it.” Remian told her. “How?” “We killed the slavers and drove them out.” That was as simple a summary as he could make it. Zhao Feng snorted. “You? You couldn’t kill time if you tried.” Big Li let out a snort of laughter. Hearing that, Mu Hou’s laughter suddenly stopped. [Crap. Zhao Feng scored a point on humor.] “I had a crossbow.” Remian said, not mentioning magic. “And a lot of friends who fight in close combat much better than I do.” [I see. It wasn’t like he was their leader. He just happened to
Kingdom of the Weak 280. Possible Cures
“There it is.” Remian said, as he and Little Yan approached the old herb garden he’d learned about in the Alchemist Guild Hall. “Pod, land in the middle of that garden.” [Confirmed.] “Little Yan, hand me the crossbow.” Remian said, squinting. “There’s a Blue Fang Ferocious Wolf hanging out around the edges. I don’t want it chomping us down for dinner.” Little Yan carefully picked up the black assassin’s crossbow that cost them their entire earnings from their first foray together and handed it to Remian. Even with heavy bargaining, the best Remian could do was lower the selling price from 120,000 to 100,000 Black. They not only emptied out everything they earned from selling the cores to Elder Yun, they had to fork out more money to buy Tier 4 ammunition for the crossbow. After all the spending, Remian was pretty close to broke. But looking at that wolf now, he felt it was worth it. That was a Tier 4 wolf, and Remian didn’t want to engage in a long, e
Kingdom of the Weak 281. On Second Thoughts
[I can buy stuff online?!] [Error: Datalink failed. Running internal diagnostics. Communications Equipment damaged, patchwork repairs detected, only rescue beacon and theft report functions are available.] Rescue Beacon?! Remian hesitated. What would happen if he called for a rescue? Would he be able to find a way for this alien civilization to cure him? Would they be friendly? Or would this gamble end up destroying both him and this Qi World? Thinking about the people who built the Pod, Remian felt assured that they were unlikely to destroy this world off-hand. It was much more likely they would try to sell the locals their products in an Always Happy manner because Always Happy Means More Sales. Then again, doing so would change this world forever. Was it worth it? Everything to gain for him, but this world’s destiny would be changed irreversibly. Oh, come on, that wreck in the Red Mists meant they were coming here already anyway, or
Kingdom of the Weak 282. Big Movements
George tried to talk sense to the other side. “Admiral, a direct attack was pointless, we still have no way to Seal the Rift! Admiral! Admiral!” But which great Admiral would listen to a child? “All forces forward!! For glory!” “What are we going to do?” George was half-tearing at his hair in frustration. Tim sighed. “I’ll take the west side.” “What? What do you mean? What’s going on?” George blinked. “See that?” Tim pointed to Darian’s back. “That’s East.” “So?” George still didn’t get it. “I’m going that way.” Tim pointed in the other direction. “Why?” George was still blur. “To raise a ruckus and draw the Tier 8’s out to fight us. Otherwise that Libertarian fleet is going to run right into a wall of Tier 8’s and get themselves slaughtered.” Tim explained. “We have to draw their attention away from that fleet.” Mindy jumped up. “Chirpy and I will join you. We’ll let the Wind Emperor back Darian up.”
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523. Comms
Somewhere along the line, he’d lost consciousness. George only realized it when he woke up to a splitting headache. “Ow.” He groaned. “What... where...?” “We’re on the way back to Sorrel.” Grace told him, appearing by his bedside. And it was a bedside, he realized. He seemed to be in the Kara’s Medical Bay. “I’m sorry. We had to retreat.” “Our... people?” George managed. “The HAC Troopers made it back. The Mechs... did not.” Grace paused. “We have the refugees though. And the Robotic Assembly Plant for Mining Drones. That’s all they managed to grab.” George slurred. “Mech pilots?” “Alive, if battered.” “Good. Alive is good.” George sighed. “This... didn’t go so well.” “Hey, at least we got the guys we were trying to save, and some machinery on top of that. You might say it was a success. A costly one, but a success.” “Casualties?” George asked. “Plenty of injuries to go around, but no deaths. So far.” Grace paused. “Some of the really badly injured might change that before lo
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522. Second Aid Mission
“Were these really the best you could do?” George asked, eyeing the six hulking figures in front of him hesitantly. “Mmm.” Juni grunted. In front of them were six brand new Mechs. 2nd Generation products, they were armored weapons platforms on legs, with jumpjets for the signature ‘jumps’ that earned their generation the nickname, ‘Jumpers’. Or were they? George wasn’t entirely sure. When he looked at them, they really looked more like 1st Generation Walker-types. Those Jump Jets seemed to be an afterthought, an added equipment haphazardly strapped to their backs. “Would they really work right?” Juni shrugged. Given the time and materials he had to work with, George supposed he couldn’t expect better. He had only just received 2nd Gen tech. Until now, he’d been working with 1st Gen expectations and schematics. One of these Mechs seemed a bit worn, evidence that it had been built quite some time ago, and only recently been modified for George’s requests. “Fusion Cell for power, Pu
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521. Next Step
It turned out that they also needed to acquire salvage rights to haul away ‘scrap metal’. Fortunately, that was a simple affair now that they had local currency. 50 USD and the matter was done. Grant, being the nearest specialist on matters of scrap to their location, graciously offered to transport their ‘scrap’ directly to their vessel out of sheer goodwill. Finally Benny and Sam went to try out the barbecued skewers. At Grant’s recommendation, though, they didn’t go to the Starport roadside stall. They ended up at another roadside stall run by a ‘foreign refugee’ someplace downtown not too far from Grant’s workshop. There, each skewer was loaded with rows of thick, juicy beef sausages, and only cost 20 USD for 10. Benny stretched. “Not bad for our first day. We’ve got three days here, don’t we? But we’ve already got half of what we wanted.” “What’s the other half?” Sam asked. “Technical manuals on engineering, power and propulsion. Tech, basically.” Benny yawned. However, whe
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520. Uber States Colony
“Black Fang, you are cleared for docking. Follow the designated path and welcome to Trifer, colony of the Uber States.” Benny stood on the observation deck of the Black Fang below the bridge, listening to the conversation between the comms officer and the dock authorities. He eyed the massive sprawl of structures and smoke emitted below and wondered. “This is what they call a ‘small’ colony?” The colony was bigger than Craggy Falls, Kara-Goth and Nightshade City put together. “Just how many people live here?” Benny asked next. “According to our sensors, about half a million.” The bridge crew told him. Okay, that was less than the human population of the Sorrelian Migration, which, after including the Cumin survivors, was over 800,000. They shared the sensor feed with Benny, Sam and Foxy. Looking at the scope, Benny realized that most of the colony below consisted of machinery and robots. Furthermore, what he saw on the surface wasn’t even half the colony. The entire complex went
- Kingdom of the Weak
519. Scoop
That evening, Benny and Sam left with Tim’s battle group, headed for the nearest Uber States outpost with medicine in the cargo holds. This left only one freight galleon to ferry materials and regretful space miners from the surface to Sky Haven. “It’s going too slow.” Remian decided. “I need to call Raven.” With Mindy busy trading across star systems, Raven had inherited (bought over) her airship fleet and company on the surface. They built more gunships and scout ships than freighters these days, mainly focused on providing recon and fire support to ground forces fighting Undead. But it was those freighters Remian needed now, the bigger the better. “We need them refitted for extreme high altitudes, as high as they can go.” Remian explained. “Also we need them spaceworthy, at least up to low orbit.” “You want our airship freighters to fly into space?!” Raven spluttered. “Yes, but not on their own. I want them to haul cargo and passengers as high up as they can. Around 30km woul
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518. We should call Remian
“Relax, I’m not asking you to build them from scratch. You’ll need to remodel a Galleon and a trio of our current Dropships. We do want proper Mech Carriers in the future, but for now, we need to deploy urgently, so we’ll just remodel what we have.” Ermine brought up some projections. “The Mechs in question are going to be Light Walkers, designed and built by J-Armory. Juni’s had a workable prototype for a long time, but it’s never been needed until now. Live testing is scheduled to start in three days. They’re powered by Fusion Cells, the kind that looks like dustbins, so you won’t need to worry about fuel lines, just cell-swapping. You won’t need to worry about replacing the He3 in the Fusion Cells either; spent cells will be sent back to J-Armory for recycling or refueling or whatever it is they do. Same goes for the weapons; Jamie’s J-Arsenal will handle maintenance and replacement and all that. The ship only needs to carry the Mechs, deploy them, and run basic maintenance. Repai
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517. Objectives and Objections
They met online the next day. Remian opted out, letting them handle it. Upon bringing up the subject of the Woofers’ request for more aid across different planets… Ermine snorted. “I refuse.” “What?” George stared. “I refuse to help them.” Ermine said stoutly. “I know that you guys all have some sort of savior syndrome, and it’s something that Remian seemed to have passed down from the very beginning, the sort of meddlesome hero complex that has you all trying to save the world at personal cost, but I’m no hero. I’m Tau, and we’re practical survivalists. We simply can’t afford to go around saving everybody. We need all our strength and resources to save ourselves. As for the Woofers, as a collective, they are a Class 5 Star Civilization, a whole class more advanced and stronger than us. They have their own governments and their own fleets. Let the Woofers help the Woofers.” Xiao Yan cut in. “As you say, they are a Class 5 Star Civilization. Since you’re talking about praticality, t
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516. Changing Gear
“Go, go, go!” green light flared in the bay of the Dropship as the floor fell away. George and twelve other figures were unceremoniously dumped on the ground nine feet below. They landed with heavy impacts. George staggered, realizing the gravity on this world was at least twice what he was accumstomed to back home. For a moment, he regretted leaving his Frame back on the ship, but they were here to clear the bandits out from a city center, meaning tight spaces, narrow access points, and needing to take care to avoid civilian casualties. Or at least, that was the plan. George and his squad had been deposited on the outskirts of the city, at the very border of a suburban district. “Incoming!” someone yelled. George crouched as something exploded; the ground shook and chunks of dirt flew through the air. “Get to cover! Return fire!” George called, even though he wasn’t entirely sure where the attackers were, exactly. The guys diving behind nearby garages and a public toilet clued hi
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514. Out there
Quite predictably, the first of those calls to reach Sorrel II was from their dear friends, the Woofers. Three Paws explained it. [This is from Kelso III. It’s an agrarian world, roughly eighty hours’ flight from here for our fleet. Local gang bosses have titled themselves warlords and suppressed the citizenry with brute force. They take whatever they want, and demand whatever payment they like, on pain of death or torture. Local law enforcement has been completely overrun and even planetary militia couldn’t save the settlements under their control. The best our local paws could do is contain the situation and prevent it from getting worse.] Remian sipped hot coffee. Eighty hours flight for the Woofers Fleet should mean a bit less than seventy for the Tau fleet. “That’s rough. But what’s the point of calling us here to tell us this?” [We can help them. Just one division of your fleet could make a huge difference against these local gangs.] At the moment, the Sorrelian fleet consist
