The Third Broken Adventure Arc!
Following 'Broken Adventure: Arc 1: Origin' and 'Broken Adventure: Arc 2: Cultivation.'
A fragment of a powerful being is sent on further Adventures... And manages to crash right into one. A child, hurt and lost and alone needs help, and Adam {Name Redacted} is JUST the Warehouse to save the day!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
[[[Flashback]]]
When Adam entered the Abyss, he used raw power not to punch through a barrier, nor to force a path... but as a fuel source.
His energy would plot a trajectory, as odd as that thought was in a space without directions, and the 'cost' he was calculating was actually determining the accuracy of his trip.
More power, better 'searches', more control over which of the trillion of billions of Realms he actually entered.
Even then, there were an infinite number of near misses with each attempt. Nearly identical Realms, but some with slightly warmer bagels being made in that cute French restaurant that no one visited back in 1933, for example. Others with louder fish off the coast of California, or slightly more blue rocks on that one mountain in Tibet. When that mountain even existed, at least.
Point was, normally Adam was being shot on a path, with energy acting as a force and a protective barrier for the journey.
This time, his Shard was self-propelled.
If he normally flew through the nothing at the speed of sound, right now he was taking a hesitant step every few days or so.
His massive list of requirements, needed to define his wanted destination, was now broken into a tiny thought fragment: "Body Modification." The Shard Adam was interested in creating physical changes similar to the conceptual changes that System Core could create. Eventually.
...It probably shouldn't surprise anyone that Adam's fragment was going to spend a long... LONG time traveling this time through the Abyss. Retconned or not by using Time Travel for returning the results, it would take at least a few eternities for this sad travel attempt to pan out.
So it was a bit of a shock when something in the Abyss found Adam's shard first.
[[[Flashback Ends.]]]
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
If luck was a lady... well, that would imply a lot of things. An army of people worshiping her and cursing her, unrelated events and bad choices being blamed to her name... A woman tired of never ending luck puns and people singing 'Luck be a lady tonight' nonstop.
But luck also tended to be transactional... while it was possible for EVERYONE to have a lucky break, normally good luck for an individual meant bad luck for another.
In this case, the odds were both very good and very bad.
Adam's Shard was... ooching along.
Very slowly. Infinitely slow. Almost stopped.
And while that wouldn't matter in the long run, as time only existed outside the Abyss, it mattered here.
Because location was also fickle here. Adam was many places, but also almost nowhere. All the time.
And he hadn't created the Abyss. It always existed, it had always would exist eventually, and will have been existing beforehand. Forever.
Others can, would, did, will, and have been traveling here.
Chances of contact? Less than any rounding error.
If two individuals, using matching transportation methods, traveling directly into each other on a single trajectory, traveled on those paths for unlimited time?
Statistically, they have no chance of ever meeting each other. Zilch.
There was too much... nothing. Not space, nor time... the chance of either traveler even existing at any given moment was remote, forget actually intersecting with each other.
Adam was close to a 'Planeswalker', a being that used a Spark of Divinity to survive the Abyss long enough to reach their own cluster of multiverses. Only his method was more powerful, his soul was consumed and regrown until able to ignore the void, and his range was conceptually more vast... He traveled by choice.
Luck, if she was a lady, decided to smack Adam with a fish.
Because Adam Shard Explorer impacted a 'sponsored jumper'. One in the midst of failing her 'Jump Chain', one who's sponsor had already abandoned her as its entertainment was considered lost now that it knew she wouldn't 'pass' this particular challenge.
In the Abyss, in a small multiverse that had been filled with smaller universe clusters distributed to higher beings of mild boredom, Adam's Shard impacted a decaying Warehouse.
Lucky for the Warehouse, Adam's fragment was able to adapt to the situation.
Lucky for the Jumper, he had a habit of meddling with situations that seemed impossible.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Pain. Again. Because of course, traveling the vast empty spanse couldn't be fun. Nooo.
He could feel... things. Colors, tastes, smells, and so much energy... but all out of focus.
Also... rot. Decay. Damage.
Right, what the hell was wrong this time.
While Conceptual Adam managed to refine his own versions of the original powers, Adam Shard was limited (again) to 'Research', 'Growth', and 'Purification'.
So first, apply 'Growth' to the local area, 'Purification' to the energy and concepts coming in, and let 'Research' watch it all!
...Shit.
Adam was in some sort of high level multidimensional construct.
Which was fine.
It was something like an egg.
...A little odd.
The person using this egg, this 'Jumpchain Jumper', was converted into a mess of concepts, biology, energy, some... more odd powers, and more.
Over that slurry of a person was built a 'Warehouse', a powerful shell designed to aid the young Jumper in his or her journey to (eventually) be born. If things were going well.
...They were, in fact, going poorly at the moment.
Adam felt his Shard sliding deeper into this 'Jumperchain' egg, shards of material sinking deep into what felt like over ripe and decaying goo. Fragments of past data and information were being examined in real time by 'Research' as he slowly approached the 'yolk' of the system.
This child, the Jumper, would be sent in his or her egg from reality to reality. The resources supplied by the Sponsor would ensure safe travel, offer 'Choice Points' to the young being at every major stop, and a list of options related to the new world. Or universe.
One could accept more challenge or danger to earn extra 'Choice Points' to spend, and the abilities to buy could range from cheap trinkets to new powers and skills... ones harvested from the local destination by the Sponsor after the Jumpchain document was filled out and applied.
Most of the process was automated, with only a constant cost via the Patron Sponsor needed to keep the young one growing. The other bored deities and beings even created nice templates and suggestions and so forth to make it easier to 'keep the show going!'
But every show had an end.
This one, Adam could feel from the data and read in the logs, had recently been scared. Terrified really. A bad Jump a few worlds back had made her very cautious. No 'Drawbacks', no 'Challenges', no accepting 'Scenarios'... She just accepted each jump, took the most stable and safe 'Perks', and lived the required 10 years until she could leave. No friends, no bonds, no choosing interesting starting options with their memories and families... just 'Drop In' after 'Drop In'.
And being so careful, so scared, so... safe?
Her Sponsor lost interest.
Just... left. Pulled its investment away, causing the little one much harm in the process, and left her here to fall apart.
Even the protocol to send her back home to the moment she left was disabled due to how much was damaged.
This... this was not right.
Every check confirmed it, all information remaining proved it: This 'higher being' had just shafted this young child.
If they had just left, she would have failed the Jumpchain and gone home.
But now she was unstable.
The bastard even did it MID JUMP.
Her soul and current 'Drop In' body was still on the world below, suddenly without powers, and unable to reach her safety zone, her Warehouse. Which was probably a good thing, as her Warehouse was exposed to the Abyss right now and being consumed.
Shit.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Hide.
She had to hide.
This was the smallest space she could find, she had used trash to block the entrance... nowhere strong enough to stop the creatures, but hopefully enough to slow her scent from spreading any faster. Make it harder to sense her heartbeat and heat signature.
Her pathetic gun had run out of useless ammo a day ago, so hiding was... well, it was the only option now.
Safe, or at least more safe than she had been for hours now, she felt darkness claim her as sleep denied her any more time.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Wow.
This kid's 'Higher Power' was an asshole.
'Research' had fairly quickly pointed out that the documented 'history' was showing some... logical flaws. Some odd phrasing.
Like... seriously, at this point? Even the mentioned 'horrific event' that caused this child to 'fail' her Jumpchain was looking suspicious. VERY suspicious.
Jumpchains were basically a way for these higher dimensional beings to procreate. Send their eggs (Warehouses) to a dimension, either supply power or allow their children to accept drawbacks to harvest power from the new location, and watch em grow.
THIS jerk was cutting ALL the corners.
Not letting her choose her 'Starting Time & Location', nor her 'Age & Gender'. Not letting her choose her 'Species', drastically reducing her options on her 'Perks' list while mandating a good harvest from her picking on the 'Drawbacks' pile... even going so far as to remove the safety limits on the Drawbacks list so she would be forced to consider even MORE selections to earn enough 'Choice Points' to survive.
But the dickery doesn't end there either! Her Perks were listed as slightly more expensive than they should be, the supposed 'Sponsor' leeching off her precious options even as it made several effects less effective (Or even TEMPORARY), making them cheaper to provide and some consumable by her 'Sponsor' when she progresses to a new world.
And don't get Adam started with the stupid 'Items' list! The only actual cost to the provider was the 'Fiat' protection of the things (Refilling, no maintenance, returns to the Warehouse when damaged or destroyed), so of COURSE that was the only 'feature' disabled!
More and more, it looked like it was luck and destiny alone keeping this poor woman alive for the last... Twenty jumps!? And she wasn't even that far above base human yet!?
Just like organ harvesters and child traffickers, this baby god was being raised for harvest. And Adam showed up moments after the farmer tried to cleanse the fields, as it were.
What. A. Bastard.
Adam felt more of his crystalline structures reinforcing the egg, the Warehouse slowly stabilizing as he continued to strengthen what he could, harvest and purify what he couldn't, and force something close to usability onto the whole mess while keeping the 'embryo', or the core of the Jumper, stable and alive.
It helped that, even after grabbing everything valuable and fleeing, there was an income coming in.
This final jump? The 'Sponsor' picked a messed up doozy, probably to earn as much as possible before burning everything to the ground. Not just one crazy strong jump, nor one of the more valuable 'End Jumps' that can give birth to the new God, of course not! No, it decided to choose one of the many 'Crossover' Realms, ones that Adam could see covered in warnings and flags now that he was within the Jumpchain system itself.
No, it picked a crossover between Borderlands, Alien Vs. Predator, and (Because why not?) Predator.
Then it stuck her as a drop in, put her on a planet not even SUPPORTED by this Jump Document, let both Aliens and the Preditors loose locally... and started piling on the drawbacks to harvest those sweet, sweet 'Choice Points'.
The bastard heaped so many flaws on the poor girl that she was STILL earning more points after it left her to die!
...Which was good because it basically gave her no perks, no items, and then robbed her of what few abilities or equipment she had that it could harvest for a last penny or two before running away.
The data Adam was harvesting implied that, eventually, the entity would return here for the egg shell after the child actually died and finished decaying. As if no one would possibly intervene.
Well... it would be in for a surprise then.
Adam carefully examined the most stable of the documents, the 'Borderlands' one. As far as he could tell, the entity had only managed to send the girl here because the powerful features of the 'Borderlands' options sort of balanced the blatantly unfair double 'I be hunting you' setting.
After all, Borderlands allowed in world respawns, nearly unlimited ammo, a big inventory for stuff, healing items, and good tech. And guns.
All the guns.
Against incredible monsters and deadly hunters, having an acid sniper that launches missles? Or a pistol that acts like a machine gun, catching them on fire?
It would be survivable.
Adam carefully felt his edges attaching even tighter to the egg, even as 'Growth' began to slow down and 'Purification' started to ramp up.
First step: Fill up this entire area with crystal. The Warehouse sections for Jumper habitation could be rebuilt later, right now Adam needed mass and power to ensure everything stabilized entirely.
Second step: Once no longer being consumed by the Abyss or venting atmosphere, use 'Purification' to fix all this... horrible stuff. Radiation, poison, viruses, you name it. Everything was contaminated at some level, with the entity using will power to hold it all together like duct tape rather than spend valuable choice points to fix issues as promised.
At this point, 'Research' was needed just to ensure nothing of value was lost as 'Purification' ripped various sections into mulch. Cheaper and easier to record what was there, guess what it was trying to do, and just start over.
Flexing non-existent muscles, Adam got to work.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Sarah flinched awake, instinctively jerking back as far as possible from the wall crack, expecting a deadly claw or sharp weapon to be ready to end her last moments... And blink.
There was a floating text box.
She tried to lick her dry lips, having run out of accessible water a day or so ago, and tested out the words.
"Uh... 'Jumpchain Update Version 0.001 in Progress'?"
The box vanished... but a new one appeared. In the solid black room, a glowing blue box with white text (That didn't light up anything else) felt especially odd. This one had what seemed to be a changelog?
At least it distracted her from the heavy weight of despair and fear.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Adam sighed as he looked at the Borderlands 'Disadvantages' list... already filled out.
It looked like some had been unchosen strictly because they conflicted with the mountain of OTHER drawbacks already chosen.
Not because, you know, they were stupid options that were not worth their harvestable 'Choice Points' in return.
It was a bit of an odd thing really.
Normally, a Sponsor would benefit a tiny bit because for every 100cp a drawback earned the Jumper, the entity would get a dozen or so cp in return as well. It was basically a method to slightly alter the reality to loosen or weaken the cp from that Realm for harvest.
Hell, it was possible to combine 'Perks' and 'Drawbacks' to diminish or even negate the downsides, which were a temporary issue that allowed access to more powerful, permanent 'Perks' that could be enjoyed after leaving.
But trying to pile up the profits had strange effects here, ones clearly not planned for.
This planet, for example, had so many monsters and hunters on it that they were in a never ending war at this point, even though several of the 'Drawbacks' were supposed to have them all focus on the girl.
Whatever, focus Adam.
Right. What Borderlands Drawbacks will affect her?
{Money Don't Grow On Trees: +100cp} [Though you can find plenty of ammunition, grenades, and health, you never seem to find that fat stack of cash. All the money you make here will be by trades or helping people, there is no free cash lying in Skag piles for you to kick free. (Besides, that's not exactly laundered money...)]
Hmm. This seems to only apply to Planet Pandora. And this implies there are loot drops? Hang on, it should be listed in the 'Skills, Abilities, and Powers' section...
{Looter Shooter: -200cp, free for the duration of the jump} [Bandits, dangerous animals, ancient alien constructs and just about everything in this world that will put up a fight with you seems to have something at least semi-usable on its person that just falls off of them the moment they die... Or you could just start checking inside random Portable toilets, dumpsters, and just about anything that's unlocked and find something. The quality of the med kits, bullets, grenades, grenade mods, firearms, shields, class modifications (etc.) that you get from your scavenging varies wildly with better and more loot or even unique and powerful drops often coming from those that are the most dangerous in the area. Of course since you're paying for the drops here each piece of equipment is guaranteed to work via benefactor Fiat for as long as you own it.]
Wait, that's not right... it should work even on this nameless planet, right?
Adam checked a few more things as 'Purification' continued to grind away the corruption and decay affecting the various systems. And mentally sagged.
Of course the child's 'Sponsor' would decline a god damned FREE option that would make her life better.
He couldn't turn on that bit either now, not with the damage done at this point. But he COULD purchase the permanent version, once she had 200cp to spare... at which point she wouldn't be able to find cash until Adam got her out of this mess. The drawback would rewrite the world to ensure this worked... a man with a wealthy wallet would suddenly have left the contents at home the one time he tried to kill her, for example. All those minor reality modifications generated the cp for the document, oddly enough... not sure how though.
The 'Drawback' {This Ain't No Vending Machine} was similar to the Money one, taking away all the random loot that one would find searching outhouses, car trunks, small boxes, etc. Thankfully it wouldn't stop the loot engine from rewarding kills, treasure chests, and logical sources (Wow, guns in a gun shop! Who woulda guessed?), so if Adam could scrounge up enough cp to grab {Looter Shooter} she could still benefit from this mess locally.
So push {Looter Shooter} to the top of the list, at least so she could scrounge up some ammo and hopefully a gun strong enough to get through this... but powers and perks later, what is left on this mess of flaws?
{PSYCHO!: +200cp} and {Vault-Infected: +300cp} were, thankfully, not compatible with this mess. Both would have made the poor girl nuts. Not a terrible drawback if she was close to ascending, but would have already killed her by now if they had been selectable.
{Corporate Target: +200cp*X, X10}, which made a major gun corporation hate you irrationally, had been taken a whole bunch of times... but didn't matter since the entity had shoved her onto this nameless death planet in the middle of nowhere. Same with {Out With the Old: +300cp*X, X4} and {In with the New: +600}, since having all the original and new video game main characters out to hunt you down didn't matter when they were all back on the (Somehow safer!?) Pandora deathtrap planet.
And {New-Them: +600} means that in the Realm respawning system, the 'New-U Stations'? They exist for everyone else to use. Not you. Even monsters and animals get to live forever thanks to this dick move!
How does an 'Alien' even sign up for a regeneration account!? Adam wasn't even sure they had a language, not like the 'Hunters' did anyway.
Whatever, when he got this girl strong enough she could just find a safe area and keep killing the same morons until they willingly stayed dead or decided to stay out of her way. It would also allow her to 'grind' areas for loot or 'farm' bosses for specific versions of their special equipment or weapons... Hell, maybe this will be a good thing in the long run!
A small shift in his mind had Adam sense a new counter being added to his vision... with a slowly increasing amount of 'Choice Points' being added. Seriously, how many 'Drawbacks' would one person have to stack to just earn a steady supply of cp like this!?
Adam sighed. It would remain a mystery... The other two Documents had been so corrupted that 'Purification' just ended up dissolving them to stabilize the Borderlands choices.
Right, his new girl needed some support like decades ago! What free stuff could he get her?
Let's see... Her age was rolled as a 20 year old woman, obviously the free options were chosen for her. Location was stolen, rerouted to this death planet... maybe that was a drawback from the other two documents?
Her 'Background' was 'Drop In', because free... but at least that should earn her some discounts elsewhere. And not having a personality and history shoved into her head was a good thing, considering how messed up this reality was to begin with.
Ah here we are again, 'Skills, Abilities, and Powers'! What could he give her for the 'Drop In' discount?
{Boom, Baby, Boom: -100cp, Drop-In: 0cp} [You love explosions. And they love you. Your hearing is effectively immune to damage from loud booms, and you always know the perfect angle at which to walk away from any explosions you cause. As long as it's physically possible to be at the minimum safe distance from your own bombs, you'll always be right there, wearing shades. However, don't expect this to help you with OTHER people's big booms, and if you look at an explosion, you could still be blinded.]
Hmm. Not immediately useful, but free is free! Adam felt the discharge of some of his personal energy to allow the connection between the Warehouse's Jumper Embryo and her Avatar on the planet spark as the benefit was deployed.
She WAS mid Jump after all.
Right, next?
{Your Face Will Remember That: -200cp, Drop-In: -100cp} [You have an uncanny sense for the turning points of history (or at least relationships). While you may not be able to predict them in advance, you'll always get a sense that you just did something that the person you're talking to will remember forever. Whether they'll enshrine it as a heroic moment for all time or use it as a reason to kill you, who knows, but you'll know that you just did something that mattered big time.]
Nope. Cheap 100cp cost aside, this would be possibly offered to her later when actually staying alive wasn't so tricky.
{Legendary Luck: -400cp, Drop-In: -200cp} [Probability works in strange ways around you. You seem to find a lot of loose change on the ground and always find the necessary part to repair that broken thing in a very timely manner. If there's a fork in the road you always seem to guess the one that leads to your destination. Shrapnel from explosives seems to fly "around" instead of "through" you. Patrols that hear you might discount the sound as the wind or a mouse. An enemy with a perfect killshot on you might even have their perfectly clean gun jam. Beware though, as Luck has only so much power over the world around you. If you get surrounded by a horde of enemies with guns, they won't all jam, and there's sure as hell no lucking your way out of getting incinerated by a nuke.]
Adam stared at the ability, basically the 'Capstone' or ultimate power for this particular background. And only 200cp? To ensure almost no accidental injuries, to reduce 'impossible' down to 'highly improbable'?
...Damn it, {Looter Shooter} was still more important, but this was likely to be number 2 on his list for purchase. After all, super luck but no guns and ammo? Still seems worth it.
The 'Bandit Lord' background had some good options, though only {Bandit Gunsmith: -100cp, Bandit Lord: 0cp} was both cheap enough and useful enough to consider for now... Basically, turning scrap parts into something usable would hopefully let her turn the crappy junk that {Looter Shooter} tosses her way into something reliable.
'Vault Hunter' offered {Fight For Your Life: -100cp, Vault Hunter: 0cp}, which would allow you a short time of calm, movement, and dexterity for around 20-30 seconds just after a 'death'. While slowly bleeding out, if you managed to attack and kill someone else during this period you can transfer some of your wounds to their corpse and be able to stand up and fight another day.
Which would be on the buy list eventually, but it needed a long range attack method FIRST, or there was no point to even bothering with it. Not many foes would walk up to her cooling body and let her strangle them out of the goodness of their hearts after all.
Best get loot, then luck... Even the gunsmith option first. Eventually.
With a sigh, Adam skipped the rest for now. The 100cp abilities and powers and such were amazing on their own, but they WERE the lowest options on this list... of course he would want to send her all the things!
A glance at 'Corporate Raider' background made him pause. Financial stuff? Useful on planets with actual economies, but for now? Maybe check it out later. A LOT later.
Best focus on the short term.
Which, under 'General Perks', seemed to be {Bad Ass: -200cp}.
{Bad Ass: -200cp} [You are a particularly imposing specimen of... whatever you are. You're in peak physical condition, or maybe a little bit farther, and your pain tolerance is MUCH higher than normal. Expect to be able to run around in truly heavy armor, or win fistfights against even Pandora's animal life. Alternatively, any creature you summon with the Phone A Friend skill is much tougher than it should be.]
Hmm. {Phone a Friend: 300cp} fell into the 'summoning' category... but wasn't relevant for now. Maybe eventually, but the cost was too high and the description made it clear this would only be an assistant. Not strong enough to solo threats and keep your girl safe.
Right... so, in order? Loot, luck, body, smithing. When possible.
Anything else free?
Skimming the document, Adam found something in the 'Gears and Supplies' section.
{ECHO device with HUD: 0cp} [Essentially an extremely bulky smart phone that you don't have to touch or look at to use, with powerful health and equipment monitoring capabilities. The ECHO device can tell you things like your overall health, your current shield capacity, let you manage the contents of your storage deck (AKA, Inventory), send and receive video calls and more!]
Adam blinked. Well. Damn! And right below it, something actually useful!
{A Melee Weapon: 0cp} [Not everyone is strong enough to punch Skags to death barehanded, but you're eventually going to run out of bullets, grenades, and rockets! Then you're going to need some other way to strike back. This is a decently strong melee weapon and holster styled to fit with the rest of your setup for this jump. While easy to use and intuitive, it doesn't come with that much knowledge of how to use it but you can at least swing a hammer or thrust a knife right?]
Hmm. Considering how strong and fast the monsters are down there, most melee weapons would do jack and or squat to the things. Natural armor, acid blood, and the warriors hunting the things have ranged weaponry and bombs...
Still.
Adam felt a grin as he began manipulating the form of this new melee weapon... Even as the slowly increasing cp counter stalled, this would give her SOMETHING to work with!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Sarah sat in the dark, hugging her legs, as the soft blue screen glowed with scrolling text.
While she knew it was foolish, to let down her guard for any reason, this soft light somehow made her feel safer. Maybe even a bit warm.
Her thoughts jerked as new text scrolled:
.
Skills, Abilities, and Powers:
~Drop-In Background
~~{Boom, Baby, Boom: -100cp, Drop-In: 0cp} Purchased!
}}INSTALLING{{
.
Her vision went white! Fireworks, the soft night air, the smell of spent charges, soft applause, a feeling of invulnerability in a torrent of flames!
Even as her heart raced, even as she recovered, she forced her breath to stay slow and her body to not twitch. While the rush somehow made her hunger pangs fade and her thirst parched throat relax, she couldn't risk alerting the predators out there.
Moments later though, her frantic thoughts were given another shock:
.
Gear and Supplies:
~{ECHO device with HUD: 0cp} Purchased!
}}INSTALLING{{
{{Errors Detected! Correcting.}}
~Action Skill, not selected.
~Ammunition, not detected.
~Compass, calibrated!
~Damage Highlight, calibrated!
~Experience Bar modified, Choice Point Bar calibrated!
~Grenade Count, Grenades not detected.
~Health, calibrated!
~Item Summary Box, calibrated!
~Mission Objective Summary, calibrated!
~Reticle, calibrated!
~Shield, not detected.
~Team Summary, no team detected.
.
Her black vision suddenly gained more images that didn't exist, with numbers and symbols!
The bottom left showed a gray box, an empty shield bar, and a health bar... currently marked as '125' and mostly empty of the red color. The right hand side showed a 'Mission Summary' with 'Survive' listed, while the bottom right showed she had no grenades, no gun, and no ammo.
However... Her bottom middle view had a bar like compass. One showing that she was almost facing east at the moment, not that she cared... but more importantly was the information shown below that.
Because below the compass was marked 'LV 0 Jumpchain Child', with a 'Choice Point' bar showing a slowly growing white bar with 'Looter Shooter: 200cp' as some sort of goalpost. She had 68cp so far... did that mean she could actually choose some this time?
Bleak memories of her kidnapper laughing at her despair, letting her see all the features and abilities locked away from her desperate grasp filled her thoughts...
Something major had happened. Her tormentor would have never done this.
Her thoughts focused again as the update window alerted again:
.
Gear and Supplies:
~{A Melee Weapon: 0cp} Purchased!
}}INSTALLING{{
{{New Equipment Detected! Updating ECHO device.}}
.
A strange feeling vibrated down her spine... and into her right hand.
From white particles, a short spike spawned within her grasp... and this light DID light up the small crevasse she hid in, if ever so slightly.
...Even as her eyes burned from the unexpected pain of seeing light again, she couldn't stop feeling another flame deeper within.
Hope.
Her vision suddenly had a small window open up as she cautiously examined the white spike... oh, was this the 'Item Summary Box'?
.
Spike of the Blue Flames
~Formed from an unknown bone, this spike can extend and retract in length at the will of its owner.
{{Due to impossible flames, damage ignores armor.}}
{{Wielder is immune to impossible flames.}}
{{Wielder is strongly resistant to heat damage.}}
.
In the no longer dark hole, a young woman watched blue flames dance in the shadows.
Warm. And no longer all alone.