I woke up on a giant floating island. My new prison. Well, prison-slash-home, I suppose. Whether or not the living conditions improved depended entirely on me. The rock drifted in the middle of a starry sky with nothing else in sight, like I'd been dropped into one of those Minecraft skyblock challenges. Not that it mattered. This place only existed so I could rest between excursions.
To explain how I ended up here, we have to go back. My name is Alex Winston. I was the underachieving "accident" born into a family of relentless overachievers. My poor grades made me the black sheep early on, and things only got worse as I grew older, until a final blowout ended with me leaving home and cutting all ties. With no support and no qualifications, I ended up working at a LEGO factory, overseeing production. It was tedious, stressful, and paid about as well as loose change in a couch cushion. My only real comfort came from the games, movies, and books I collected.
Then came the day everything went sideways. On the way to work, the bus I was on got t-boned by a train. Where the train came from, I have no idea. But when the dust cleared, I found myself in a cubicle, sitting across from an "agent" of some eldritch being. He had an offer. You see, at the LEGO factory I had a little… coping mechanism. Whenever stress got to me, I slipped unique extra pieces into packages. They didn't fit anywhere. Buyers would spend hours trying to figure out where they went, never finding the answer. Imagining their frustration was my guilty pleasure. But it came back to haunt me—one of those poor victims made a deal with an eldritch entity to make me suffer. The mysterious train was step one.
My options were simple:
1. Accept the job offer.
2. Go back and get turned into paste by said train.
Not much of a choice. The job? Become a merchant traveling to different worlds, selling items that could change destinies. After haggling through the details with the eldritch HR rep, I was sent here.
Curious, I checked out my new power. A translucent screen appeared before my eyes: the Chaotic Merchant System. Normally, it was a pretty powerful setup. With credits, you could buy just about anything. But because of my "punishment package," I was barred from most features. I could only use tickets in the Chaos Gacha to get items. Anything above Legendary was automatically confiscated and replaced with better-quality tickets as compensation.
I had 10 bronze tickets, 3 silver tickets, 1 silver trait ticket, and 1 silver ability ticket—the best I could negotiate. First up, the trait and ability:
[Floating]
Rarity: Uncommon Ability
Allows you to cloak yourself in winds that carry you, letting you fly through the air.
[Aware]
Rarity: Rare Trait
You have an enhanced sense of awareness, far beyond the average. You can easily tell when something is wrong with your body, it is hard to catch you by surprise, and you can more easily sense what's happening around you.
Not exactly combat power, but both were solid for staying alive. After testing Floating by looping around the island a few times, I cashed in the silver item tickets:
[Threaded Cane]
Rarity: Uncommon Item
Bloodborne – A hunter's weapon from the workshop. In cane form it can cut through beasts, and in whip form it splits into numerous blades that shred flesh at a distance.
[Trinket of Chi]
Rarity: Uncommon Item
Calamity Mod – A trinket once held by a monk who stood still until they became a statue. Standing still for more than three seconds increases your health and energy/mana regeneration.
[Sahara Slicers]
Rarity: Uncommon Item
Calamity Mod – A pair of arid daggers that let you manifest 10 arid shivs every 30 seconds, unleashing them as a volley.
Then came the bronze haul:
[Can of Febreze]
Rarity: Trash Item
A can of Febreze that sprays infinitely. From Walmart.
[All-purpose Tool]
Rarity: Trash Item
DnD – A screwdriver that reshapes itself into any mundane tool such as hammers, knives, chisels, etc.
[Justice's Shades]
Rarity: Common Item
Helltaker – Cool shades belonging to a blind demon. Wearing them lets you tell when someone thinks they're lying to you.
[Hideout Realtor]
Rarity: Uncommon Item
Hunter x Hunter – Creates a secret hideout in a location of your choosing. It's stocked with essentials, and only accessible through the door you create.
[Durable Baseball Bat]
Rarity: Common Item
An extremely durable bat. It would take at least a nuclear bomb to deform it.
[XII – The Hanged Man]
Rarity: Common Item
Tarot Card – Absorb all wounds and ailments of a target, lessening their intensity by 20%. Cooldown: 120 hours.
[Gold Ring Gift]
Rarity: Common Item
A gold ring that reshapes itself to match whoever you gift it to. Restock timer: 48 hours.
[Doyens Hair Cream]
Rarity: Common Item
Hunter x Hunter – A tub of cream that permanently grows thick, luxurious hair wherever applied. Gloves recommended. Restock timer: 168 hours.
[Five Hundred Cigarettes]
Rarity: Trash Item
Exactly what it sounds like.
[Weapon Voucher]
Rarity: Common Item
A ticket for any one mundane cold weapon. Tear it and think of the weapon to summon it.
Overall? Not bad. I decided to keep the Hideout Realtor and the Sahara Slicers for myself. The Threaded Cane was tempting—being a Bloodborne fan—but in practice I'd probably whip myself into the hospital. The Trinket of Chi was also solid, but credits were a higher priority.
I currently had 100 credits, which I spent on food and water as a precaution and a fallback plan in case my wares didn't sell.
With everything stashed safely in my inventory, I opened the Destinations tab. Only one option was available: Random World. I took a deep breath, steadied myself, and pressed the button. Winds roared as a portal opened before me.
Gathering what courage I had left, I stepped inside, ready—or not—for whatever world awaited me.
And hopefully, it wasn't Warhammer.