Barret Allbright

"Counter," I muttered as the giant millipede tried to bite me. My palm glowed, and I caught the fang. The force of the bite redirected back into its skull. A sharp *Ting* the only sign that it had hit me. I created dozens of ice spikes and launched them up through the carapace.

Its shell cracked, and the corpse turned to dust as I created a shield of ice blocking a strike from behind me. Dodging an ant's pounce, I launched an ice spike through its head. I turned the shield into a bed of spears and forced them to fly at the seccond ant. Grabbing one of the spears, I spun it, embuing 'Counter' into it, as I deflected a chop from a skeleton knight, then pierced its head.

Falling on my ass and hyperventilating, I swiped my hand, to allocate my stat points. I focused on intelligence, and Sense but kept the rest at a decent level. Intelligence increased the power of my Ice and Counter abilities, and it would let me have more shadow summons once I became a necromancer.

Sense though? The more data I had for Numberman's shard, the more accurate my calculations would be. Increasing my Sense stat allowed me to collect much more data. The intelligence also helped by letting me calculate much faster.

Selling the drop items, I glanced at the door to the next room. It had a fog wall blocking it, and if Darksouls taught me anything? Fog walls always meant boss fights. Placing my hand on the wall I accepted the notification and entered the room.

The antechamber was a perfect circle. Lit only 5 braisers in the shape of a pentagram. The blue flame sparked and sputtered before expanding into pillars of flame, they seemed to hold up the ceiling. When I stepped into the center of the room, the Braisures started to spin arround me.

Removing a knife from my inventory, I saw something flicker from the corner of my eye and threw the knife. The only response I got was an inhuman shout of pain. Stomping ice expanded, coating the floor in a thin layer of ice. Equipping another knife, I spun, my blade glancing off the living shadow's bastard sword.

Buckling slightly under the swing, I moved in trying to grapple the shadow, but it moved through me. Selective intangibility, weakness? Attack when it attacks. Counters will get dodged. A normal attack would also get dodged. Pretending not to know the trick I stabbed forward, lulling it into a false sense of security.

It walked through me before slashing at my back, right before it hit I expanded the floor into dozens of spikes that pierced his legs, 5 ice spears coalescing in the air and piercing its head and heart.

When it 'died,' it split into two small shadows, slowly growing. One pounced while the other flanked, my knife cut the head off of it as it split into 2 more shadows, and started to grow faster. Grimacing as the fight turned into a dance of blades, ice spikes, and a seemingly ever-expanding army of shadows.

When the shadows were about the size of an ant, it stopped being a fight and just a slaughter. The army didn't seem to stop expanding, so I was forced, to actualy think. Sighing, I kicked over one of the braisers. The flame spread burning a fifth of the horde. Kicking the other braisers into the horde I just sighed. That was a shitty boss fight.

If I was weaker they would have overwhelmed me, if I was slower they would have grown into an army of full-sized shadows instead of the weak cannon fodder they were. That could have gone wrong, well it didn't, and I have no reason to harp on it. Walking to the center I reached down, and opened the ornate golden treasure chest that materialized after beating the boss.

Ripping it open I pulled out a shadowy cloth face mask it covered the lower half of my face, mainly the cheeks, nose, and mouth.

[Shadow's Secret

Rarity: Rare

Stats: Intelegence+5 Sense+5

Skill: Stealth +5

Ability: People will subconsciously look away from the mask.]

Equipping it in invisible mode I left the dungeon, fell into my bed, and went to sleep. The day was finally over, now all I had to do was the daily workout in the morning, and school left to suffer through before I could grind some more. The feeling of power was intoxicating, and I knew that when I gained the Necromancer job, my 'personal power' would only continue to grow.

Now, I needed to increase my other forms of power, I could get Legitimate power by bribing public officials. Coercive power comes from my strength. Reward power comes from my money, and Numberman's powers let me calculate the odds of many things thus I have a source of informational power.

Hmm, connections would be useful. Panacea is a Striker-12, if I can subtly manipulate her, I mean to show her the light I can get her on my side. Befriending her would be the first step, but I can't let her touch me, the increased muscle density, and active coronas would reveal me as a Para, and she might think I am a gangster trying to kidnap her.

Hmm, her mother is abusive and hates her, but she doesn't connect the dots because of personal bias, her sister is mind controling her into loving her. She has low self-esteem, and her sister has been trying to set her up with dates. So the way to befriend Panacea is to befriend GG, and... It's all coming together. God this is sounding way more sinister than I intended all I wanted was a friend.

The Status points changed my build quickly, I mean if Sung Jin Woo can change from a short weakling into a giant muscle man then so can I. Step 1 Befriend the collateral damage barbie.

Chinese-Union Imperials

"Lord Zero, three bases have been attacked by an unknown parahuman. We believe them to be a Brute, Shaker, Blaster, Mover, Stranger, and Master. They have shown the ability to fire multiple colored beams with various effects, mainly a red beam that causes pain and a green beam that causes instant death. He has shown the ability to teleport, telekinetically move objects and people, move with inhuman grace, and dodge attacks from his blindspots while deflecting bullets with a sword. We believe that he is in search of materials because tinker resources have been the main targets, but this may be a ploy to manipulate us. Seven of our parahumans have been taken. it is unclear what he plans to do with them or if he is to ransom them. Our Thinkers have proven incapable of getting a clear reading on him or his location. The only information we have on him is he is tall, and wears a black robe that lets no light through"

Zero seemed to ponder for a moment before speaking, "Capture him. He will be useful to the cause."

Greg sat at his desk. Fighting the desire to post on PHO, he knew it was an addiction that he would do better without, but it was hard. Like knowing cigarettes would kill you but not being able to quit. He wanted to share the video to show how heroic he was, but that would fuck over the case. She fucking cracked his skull, but at least the bitch got in trouble with her patrol officer.

"Getting beat up by a ward got me into Arcadia. What the fuck." He muttered in shock before re-reading the email. Yep not halucinating. Shaking it off, Greg walked over to his pet tree and placed his hand on it. Scanning the way the tree photosynthesized, how every cell worked in perfect harmony- near perfect harmony, how he could improve it, make it better. He had scanned as many things as he could get his hands on, which mainly included house-flys, cats, dogs, various insects, and humans.

His goal? The creation of a self-sustaining suit of biological power armor. The final product was beyond him for now, but it had merit. A beetle's strength, the healing of a sea cucumber, the eyesight of a hawk, and fly. It might work if he knew how to actualy get it to work without falling apart into a slurry that smelled awful and forced him to clean his room.

The ability to create biological material Ex-Nihilo allowed the creation of a basic suit of armor. The strongest-biological material was Lipets fangs, but he had never seen a Lipset. So 'forced' to make do with spider-silk He started to design a costume.

Spider silk was actualy very easy to use. Generating it was very cheap, and it looked great when dyed, and that process was made easy with Greg's powers aswell.

The outfit he ended up creating had multiple layers to maximize protection. The innermost layer consisted of a simple near skin-tight bodysuit made from a spider silk mesh weave that through the creative use of his power didn't impede movement. Above that was a pair of dress pants, and a long sleeve tunic with a surplice neckline that crossed from right shoulder to left hip, the ensemble included black boots and gloves. The final layer was a dark blue spidersilk hooded cloak, and a bright blue scarf wrapped arround the lower face.

Greg thought the outfit was much better than most amateur capes' first appearances. Most of them would wear normal clothes and a mask. He didn't feel safe going out yet though. Just because he had powers didn't mean he knew how to use them.

His mother agreed to let him join a cheap boxing gym, and he started to do parkour and practice throwing knives made from his bone. Bone is actualy a great material if you could shape it right. Human bone is 5x harder than steel, and the ability to just fucking generate them over time made them a pretty much infinite resource.

He had to make sure that the bones he used did not have the same DNA as his. So people couldn't just find his actual identity through that. Black and blue was a great combo for the clothing but He liked the stark white of the bone weapons it let him see them better in the dark so he could teleport to them better.

Despite the power he gained he wasn't satisfied. Internally lampooning over not choosing some of the broken powers, like PTV, or crossing over with some uber-powerful comic book character. How could he kill Zion with his powers? Create an army of super soldiers armed with power armor? Create a virus that could kill entities or shards?

Cracking, Greg opened PHO and went to the Brockton bay board, and opened the top section. Reading about a new cape in Brockton dressed in what looked like a knockoff Jedi-knight armor using powers similar to The Force? He wasn't alone, that should have terrified him, but it calmed him. He wasn't alone there were others, and at least one of them seemed on the side of the angels.

Seriously, they only needed to survive for 10 years, and with Star Wars tech, they could just leave the planet. Make a death star to fight Zion and his race. The Force was corruptive though, you could be ripped from the light to the dark after a single misstep, with no hope of return. A scary concept.

He fought who! I nearly screamed. How the fuck could a new cape fight him and win? Fuck, I would have only been able to run, and even that isn't a sure bet.

Running across rooftops, nearly flying would have been fun if Brent wasn't forced to feel how rotten this world was. Hundreds of people were in various states of depression or anxiety. Waiting for the next Endbringer fight, waiting for the next robbery or murder to take someone they love from them. The next rape or kidnapping was to be turned into breeding slaves because they did not have the right skin color.

For their friends or family members to be forcefully addicted to drugs and whored out for the chance at another hit. It was disgusting, and his disgust for Cauldron's methods grew, it was for the greater good he got it, the survival of humanity hinged on the power to fight Zion, but was it worth it?

If humanity was willing to do this to itself, to rip each other apart, to kill murder, and rape because they have more power than others? Yes, it was, for the victims, the innocent, and the children. It was worth it, but that didn't mean he had to like it.

His unexpected arrival in this world had come as a shock. To not see his family for a decade, to fight for an entire decade against the corruption and darkness that seemed so deep-rooted in this world. Earth bet was putting it nicely as a 'fixer upper.' Something that needed some elbow grease, and some mousetraps(read as gratuitous amounts of DAKKA) to have any chance of surviving into the next decade.

Honestly, it was a miracle that the world was still functioning, with the military might of the Chinese-Union Imperials mentally programmed parahumans, the warlords of Africa, the blasphemies, and the murder hobos that were the Slaughter House Nine, and Eidolons opponents.

If He could have remembered the name of the homeless man that controls Zion there was a chance that the world could be 'saved' in under a month. Through liberal use of force and mental manipulations to get the homeless man to talk Zion into suicide. A single explanation of the concept of suicide would suffice, but no his memory wasn't perfect.

Standing on one of the rooftops of Brockton, the Rig visible floating in the water of the bay, like a beacon in the night it shone. The Medial building, and the leading contributor of medicine inside of Brockton Bay, but also the base of the Nazi emperor of Brockton.

The crunch of gravel beneath his boots as Serenity walked down a dark alley, eyes glowing slightly, his face a mask of perfect calm. Silently force-jumping and climbing up a fire escape, he allowed his mask to crack for a seccond before clamping it back down with Gamers' Mind. Drawing his sword and cutting the lock off the roof entrance, the lock falling into his inventory before it could alert the guards.

His steps were swift, yet silent, like a ghost. 2 Guardsmen wearing red and green stood guard on the hall, back to the stairs. No one would come from above right? Why would they escape into the building?

'3, 2, 1' Force threw one of the guards into the wall his boot landed squarely on the head of the seccond. Following the will of the force, his blade cuts the hand of the first guard before kicking off his head only to land on the seccond, the blade cutting the radio on his hip in half, and backflipping his head kicking the other guard and knocking him out.

Stealth was no longer an option Serenity kicked open the doors and shouted for them to run as he sprinted down the hall, attacking a seccond group of guards, dodging the bullets with inhuman grace, and deflecting one of the bullets back into the gun that fired it.

A spark of hope in the new 'recruits,' a chance not to be sex slaves for the rest of their lives, they took it. The frantic footsteps followed Him while he cut his way through the ABB members, Force Pushes, and Pulls breaking their ranks when they tried to shoot his charges, breathing turned harsh, not from exertion but from exhilaration.

The feeling of fighting his way through hordes of men who would have kicked his ass no less than a week ago. The Force guided his movements, correcting his errors, showing him where to strike, how to move, and how to protect as many as he could. Fighting his way out of the building the woman, no they were girls, little more than teens, ran there was a disturbance in THE FORCE.

Death and rebirth, a perversion of life, something that shouldn't exist. Paradoxically a newborn and an adult, innocent and mass murder. Spinning blade going for the throat the Oni-masked abomination didn't hesitate, dropping a grenade at my feet, telekinetically flinging it at where he reappeared Serenity spun The Force offended at his prolonged existence.

The abomination was a perversion of life, every teleport was a death, and rebirth, the clone taking the place of the original. It wasn't teleportation but the creation of a clone in that location and the death of the original body. Seemingly losing more of the man behind the mask with every jump Serenity launched himself at Oni-Lee, the teleporter firing from blindspots, throwing dozens of grenades.

The ash coating the ground, the explosions just another distraction as Brent fell deeper into the force, his movements swifter, stronger, more agile. Dozens of notifications flashed, and every attack dodged until they weren't, and Oni-Lee went for a knife to the back. Spinning the blade caught one of Lee's eyes, but before he could get the seccond he turned to dust a scream of rage came from a nearby rooftop as the abomination teleported away.

Nearly collapsing where He stood Brent wanted to scream, he wanted to rage, to allow the- Bad thoughts, fight it. Clamping down on his emotions he stood to his full height shook his head and hobbled away, the shrapnel bore itself between the plates and embedded in raw flesh, every step sending jolts of pain through his body.

"good time to learn force healing" he indignantly muttered miffed at his loss. His gaze flicked to a terrified pedestrian pointing their camera from a window, giving them a wave and tilt of his head before running off Brent just wanted to collapse and never get back up.