Silver and I leaned over the corner of a half-finished building's empty window slot to look down at the base ground level... Where I saw a stream of the lowest level of etherals doing some weird nonsense.
"Ena abbuba habu!" Silver muttered as he waved an arm towards the distance, and I looked over to where the Bangboo was pointing, only to see at the end of the ethereal stream was a large serpent-shaped ethereal with sharp spikes of ether crystals acting as both a weapon and armor that covered it.
"What? You want to me to kill that ethereal in particular?" I asked in confusion, with Silver hurriedly nodding and looking back. I think Silver just really didn't like snakes for some reason as while we were chilling and watching some videos on the internet. He would cover his head when danger noodles of any shape and size came around.
"Don't be racist, Silver... Hell, you are a Bangboo, why are you even afraid of snakes anyway?" I asked helplessly.
And I listened with a dull expression as Silver explained how he saw another Bangboo get eaten by a giant python out in the Outer Rim on some Interknow video, and the Bangboo had to get cut out of the python before it ran out of power and died.
'Ok, so maybe there is some trauma that fuels the racism in my stuffed animal robot.' I thought as I wondered if I just got a Bangboo with extra personality because I was cheap.
But I just patted Silver on the head before I steadied myself as I held out a hand with a mass of soul energy forming a large Soul Arrow at the edge of my hand.
And with how the snake ethereal was following the stream of weaker ethereals at the back. It wasn't moving to fast either and with how Soul Arrows could track somewhat to what I was aiming at when I shot them off?
A loud explosion rang out as the Great Soul Arrow exploded against the armored head of the serpent ethereal, and Silver jumped up happily as the head was completely exploded into pieces and the ethereal began fading from sight.
But I didn't stick around as the horde of ethereals below screamed and began looking for us. I pulled Silver to follow the Carrot's data to head towards the bunker to see if I could restart the data flow.
The bunker itself had been built like a good half a mile away from the center of this Hollow. And at the center of the hollow, I could feel the rise in the ether in the air. Which meant that I normally would have less time before I start feeling ether corruption.
But uhhh I had the wonder ability of 'Shake it off' and seeing as no one else was with me. I didn't have any shame in just 'shaking off' any accumulated ether energy every ten minutes.
"Ena!" Silver pointed me towards an apartment building that was actually fully built and looking down at my map. I frowned a bit as I realized the Carrot data had changed and I needed to go through the ether portal as space was twisting too much.
"Let's go then," I said helplessly, and Silver swiftly ran ahead, and then swan dived with beautiful form into a suddenly formed ether portal. That was formed from it being disturbed by Silver's physical form.
Coming out of the spacial disturbance... Silver and I paused as did our 'friends'.
There was a moment of dramatic silence as we met the gaze of some hollow raiders in their typical motorcycle helmet-covered heads, going lock still as they stared at us.
I saw their halfway raised high-power crossbows pause as they looked between Silver and me... And then with a flash of Cybele, I made them blind as I turned the front layer of their masks into stone, and I grabbed Silver and yelled. "Runnn!"
Loud yells rang out along with whizzing crossbow bolts shooting past me and actually skidding across my armor! As I fled the scene, I wasn't scared of a bunch of weak goons...
I was scared of the big fucker in the back who was watching other goons load up ether materials that had a giant quad-barreled missile launcher on each of his shoulders!
"Get him! He saw us loading up the ether crystals!" The leader roared and I realised that he also had wrist-mounted guns as well... As he began shooting at me as I fled into another alleyway and began sprinting deeper into the alleyway.
'How the hell do low-level 'agents' block bullets with their swords and shit! This is just scary!' I yelled internally before I paused in realization.
Hey, I was also an agent. Sure, I sure as hell wasn't as strong or skilled as like Miyabi or any Void Hunter-level agents. But uhhh, could Miyabi or Yixuan throw a Blackhole?
I was already the ultimate 'remove that direction' solution to alot of problems in hollows... Actually, I was really curious as to what would happen if I threw a black hole directly at a hollow itself.
"Cursed technique... Black!" I yelled as the bullet's flying over my head as I ducked behind a pile of metal beams, which wasn't doing my mental state any help.
And the world went silent. As I, fucking done with getting shot at. Shart out a black hole from the palm of my hand, and that was as carelessly as possible. Thrown back at the hollow raiders without mercy.
Screams rang out as they were pulled off of their feet and I looked around the corner in morbid curiosity to see how these poor fuckers were going to die.
Only to pause as I realized that my 'virtual' black holes were more like the Chibaku Tensei in Naruto, as the central orb pulled the surrounding materials in like a normal black hole. But the actual spinning orb of 'destruction' was uhhh utterly harmless beyond the insane gravity it output.
But you know what wasn't harmless?
A five-ton wall of concrete ripped from a wall that slammed you into another thick concrete wall. Which then turned you into a red splatter that shot out of between the two walls, undoubtedly leaving me with mental trauma as a final fuck you.
The sounds of the surrounding buildings being torn down were utterly deafening. And it didn't help that the chaos gatcha was screaming in my ear as I earned three 'achievements' as well.
[You have avoided an untimely demise via machine gun fire by killing everyone involved by turning multi-billion Dennies in property damage into a weapon of mass destruction. 1-Gold ticket]
'Uhhhh yay for property damage?' I thought even as I very much looked away from the bloody red smears that painted several large pieces of concrete even as I cut off the black holes energy.
And as everything crashed down and sent plumes of dust everywhere. I realized very quickly that I could NOT actually use this ability at all with my friends. They did not have my negation to the ability and it's projected gravity.
I swallowed down some bile as I saw what was clearly liquid life leaking through a particular piece of rubble and I was pulled out of my thoughts as Silver pulled at my armored leg with a soft mutter of Bangboo speak.
"Yeah... Let's keep moving Silver." I said quietly even as I mentally pulled the gold ticket.
[Tinker - Scraps]
|Rare Ability|
- This tinker allows you to build much more functional and useful technology out of scraps. You could probably build a working tank in a scrapyard, a phone out of a broken radio, a mech out of demolished cars, and can easily jury-rig existing technology out of subpar materials.]
'Gods... Why, why am I being railroaded into being a tinker! I want to be a Voidhunter combat god who will save New Eridu with the power of my fist and this fucking brick I found. Not sending legions of tanks and other nonsense to do my work!' I mentally screamed.
But, deep breaths. I kept moving with Silver until we went through another ether portal and as we came out. We actually came out right across the street from the bunker in question.
"Ena!" Silver yelled as we entered a new alleyway and I saw that the bunker entrance was covered up by alot of loose debris. Some broken wooden pallets, and small trash can's were stacked up to make a chaotic pile in front of the bunker entrance.
But there was a very clear hole in the very front of the mess that made my lips twitch as as Silver happily climbed in and out of the tunnel and waved at me aggressively to also crawl in as well.
"Yeah... I don't want a bunch of crap to collapse on me little dude." Just, give me a second." I muttered helplessly as I held up a hand, forcing my magical energy to form a layer of green energy outside of my hand.
A soft rumble rang out as I used the telekinesis spell from the Alteration branch of Skyrim magic to move the bottom layer of pallets from the mess pile.
And with a louder clatter, I moved the thick pile of debris out of the way to show a large armored door, and I quickly noticed its electric lock, which I was supposed to use to get in... Was busted.
"Some... Someone literally took a crowbar to this thing." I said with a frown as I could literally see the two-pronged groove marks that bit into the plastic and metal of the electric lock screen.
But below that was a 'doggy door' of sorts that clearly was meant for a Bangboo with Silver putting his hand against a Bangboo connection pad, and with a loud click. The small metal door enlaid on this larger door unlocked with Silver, pushing it open with a grunt of effort.
I exhaled softly in annoyance as I realized I didn't have a choice... I got on my hands and knees and then had to remove my armor to actually climb through the door as well. Thankfully, Bangboo's were pretty wide, so my shoulders and waist could fit.
And as we entered the bunker, it was dark. Only lit by the strips of emergency lights in the tunnel leading downwards.
"Alright, spooky tunnel. Check, tiny mascot holding my leg out of fear. Also check." I said helplessly as I looked down at Silver, who was shaking as he held onto my pant leg as we stared down the sloped tunnel that led out of sight, with how the tunnel lost its decline at the end.
We moved down into the tunnel, and at the end of the tunnel was the main extra bunker door. Thankfully, it also wasn't messed up, so I was able to put in the code I got from the HIA.
Pushing open the door, Silver and I jolted as the moment we stepped in. Haunting classical music softly hit our ears. And at the end of the long room filled with extremely expensive Hollow surveillance equipment was a 'throne' that was clearly made from the remnants of a Halloween store.
"Dun dun duuun!" A heavy voice spoke in Bangboo, along with dark, blood-red, electric eyes that dramatically opened from atop that throne.
The throne itself was made from stacked plastic skulls. Red paint oozed from between the skulls, and a heavy exhaust fan kicked on, which sent a thick mist along the floor from a fog machine placed underneath the throne.
And the corrupted Bangboo's words hit my ears all too easily. "Skulls of the living for the hollowed throne!"
"You little shit! You turned off the transmitters. I can literally see the giant power button smashed with an inflatable hammer!" I yelled out with the 'evil' Bangboo raised a plastic 'warhammer' that had another plastic skull duct taped to the end of the hammer.
And the bangboo roared back in turn as it hefted the hammer and aimed it at me. "Dunna duna dunnnaaa!" [And I would do it again! The world must be bathed in the light of the end!]
'Is this bangboo somehow related to the hollow cults and the Creator nonsense?' I wondered... But then, from out of nowhere, Silver came in with a 'Ena!' Roar as he came around the side of the throne as the evil bangboo was focused on me.
And smashed the evil bangboo over the head with a plastic pipe that made a loud bonking noise.
The evil bangboo was thrown off of the throne and after a moment of silence. My moment of worry about the connections the bangboo had with terrorist groups. Was utterly ruined as the evil bangboo began kicking the ground with it's stubby legs and screaming like an autistic child being told they couldn't get GTA at a gamestore.
"Alrighty... I am going to have to bring you in to be reset. It's clear your memory stores have been corrupted." I said helplessly as I went over and flipped several switches according to the directions I was given. So that I could reset the survelliance equipment.