Me and Regina stood at the entrance of the basement watching as a tall muscular woman stepped through the door leading into the warehouse with a tesla cannon slung over her shoulder. The woman looked over and then I guess laid eyes on Regina before smirking and aiming the cannon at me, but I was already switching to my ghoul leather shield. She was surprised by my weapon changing all of a sudden but it was too late to stop the skill she activated.
A massive beam of energy came out of the Tesla Cannon and had I not had the ghoul leather shield equipped if I didn't die I would have been in bad shape because even with the ghoul leather shield it still did a little bit of damage roughly about 1/4 of my HP bar at the top left hand corner of my vision. I got an alert right as the attack stopped which indicating that the shield was 100% charged I guess for the unique skill. I figured I should return fire either way and activated the 100% charge energy cannon which had someone not come from behind her and pushed her out of the way and onto the ground she would have been the one in bad shape because the cannon that launched out of my shield was more of a beam that ate and melted parts of the concrete that made up the walls. My aim was terrible I guess I didn't have the strength stat to withstand it and I ended up making a big line from the door to the back wall and then it hit one of the boats that still remained on the surface by some miracle and blew it to pieces. While the woman and clearly an NCR soldier was stunned Regina moved around and aimed her gun at them although she didn't fire.
"Okay hit the pause button I might have jumped the gun a little." The woman with the cannon said getting up and helping her friend to her feet.
"Says the one who actually started this crap in the first place." I yelled back I mean seriously instead of trying to talk it out she fucking shoots a goddamn cannon at me why the hell should I even consider hitting the pause button, "Wait did you just say pause button."
"Yeah I'm assuming by that weapon you're like me then." The tall woman said a lowering her Tesla Cannon and showing off the back end of it which contained a jewel, "I'm the heavy weapon hero and my name is Linda."
"Wait you're one of the summoned heroes too." I say a little surprised as I signaled Regina to lower her weapon, "I mean I thought I heard you say the name of a skill before you fired the gun but I didn't know if anyone else could do that besides the heroes."
"Yep that's a unique skill for this weapon called disintegrator Ray." she said, "It fires a massive beam of energy that bypasses defense and energy resistance by 50%." Linda said, "In fact depending on my enemies energy resistance I can do between 1% and 50% more damage if they have nothing."
"I guess it's a good thing that the shield I was using cuts the amount of energy damage by 50%, so I guess I just got hit with the base damage of the weapon."
"Yeah I might have felt a little bad I just mistook you for a legionnaire because you're walking around with a slave girl although looking at you you're not really wearing the armor." she said chuckling awkwardly, "but I guess I should have considered it a little strange that you let her have a weapon."
"Ma'am before we do anything else I think we should bring him back to McCarran." said the large woman's party member, "He obviously wasn't summoned by the NCR and he's walking around with a legion slave so if he was summoned by the legion we need to capture him."
"Sure give Master Derek a reason to dislike your government I'm sure that'll work out well." said Regina in a surprising act of defiance, "Considering he's pushing Caesar to a ceasefire although temporarily."
You ever felt embarrassed and just felt your whole body seemed to heat up and you get light-headed cuz that's what just happened. it pretty much felt like I was about to pass out I mean getting called master Derek in private is kind of embarrassing but getting called master Derek in front of other people was on a whole another level. The two women looked surprised but mostly the NCR soldier given that It was Regina who was obviously a slave given her clothing was defending the legion's summoned hero.
"Don't worry civilian you'll be set free once we get back to McCarran." The soldier smiled at her reassuringly causing Regina to look at her curiously.
"She thinks I'm forcing you to say that." I said to Regina which made her look at the soldier angrily.
"I could have left whenever I wanted and he doesn't have the stats to stop me yet." Regina said, "Besides he couldn't help it that he was summoned by the legion."
"Well you have a point but..." The soldiers started.
"Not to mention the fact that the only reason he is staying with the legion is because of the civilians and slaves still in legion territory." Regina said, "Not everyone in legion territory is a member of the legion there are plenty of civilians and slaves alike who are going to be defenseless when the wave hits us in a few weeks."
I think Regina just spoke a little too much given that that was likely a secret but having her defend me that much considering we just met the day before made me a little happy. The NCR soldier looked a lot more conflicted now while Linda just looked over at her waiting for an answer.
"No come back on that one Jess?" Linda asked causing the soldier to just remove her helmet and let her hair fall down below her shoulders a sign that she was done fighting.
"No ma'am."
"Good." Linda said turning back to me, "I do have a few questions like what hero are you and what kind of shield is that."
"I'm the melee hero I can use any melee weapon and I can also use shields." I say transforming my shield into the bark scorpion stinger, "As for the shield I used it's the ghoul leather shield."
Linda and Jess both look disgusted before Linda asks, "I know you had to copy that from somewhere but where the hell did you find it, in the legion?"
Now it was my turn to be really confused as I figured she would put it together that I got it from feeding my weapon something. Regina looked over at me confused as well I mean it was obvious right because Regina who wasn't a hero knew how it worked.
"Just to confirm something you do know you can absorb materials into the weapon by dropping them into the crystal right." I say to Linda which caused her eyes to go wide.
Me and Regina walk over to Linda and Jess as we had been keeping our distance but to their shock I dropped a gold bar out of my weapon and I handed it to Linda which caused Linda to gasp at the sudden appearance of the gold bar. Linda hesitantly took it and put her weapon down to her side then She dropped the material into the crystal which caused her and Jess to jump a little.
"metal series and Midas's celebration?!" she said looking to you for an answer.
"As far as I can tell a series is a group of weapons related to a certain subject. For example for the metal series there are branching nodes around the series name and one of them is for gold." I said holding up the bark scorpion stinger before switching it to the pincer shield, "for a better example both of these are in the scorpion series and according to the weapon tree there are nine different weapons in this particular series."
"What happens when you get them all?!" Linda said loudly.
"Not a clue, but in truth I don't know too much about the particulars myself It's just what I've managed to figure out since I got here last night."
"Wait a second." Linda said with her eyes going wide, "THAT SON OF A BITCH!"
Me and Regina jumped as Jess also realized something and her own face contorted with a sour expression.
"Who?!" Regina asked a little worried she was about to get yelled at for it.
"The long gun hero." Jess said irritably as she put her hand on Linda's shoulder in an effort to calm her down a little.
"Yeah, that son of a bitch should have been summoned to the legion given his misogynistic and egotistical personality." Linda said, "That asshole had to have known given some of the weird weapons he's brought back to base."
"Well we've never met him but it could be that he just assumed you knew." Regina said trying to be an optimist I guess, "I mean master Derek already had a bit of an idea because of what the help menu said."
"Well I guess I can't argue with that." Linda said going to walk out of the dock, "but let's talk when we're out in front of the building I feel a little better in the lobby and I'm sure the rest of my team is worried that they haven't heard from us yet."
"Why wouldn't they come in and check on you considering I reflected your attack back at you and in the process blew that boat to pieces." I asked surprised that she had an actual team with her although she is a hero and Caesar and Lanius both wanted me to come with a team of executioners.
"I ordered them to hold their ground no matter what unless they see Jess and I make a retreat otherwise we'll go and signal them when it's safe." Linda said as we walked through the shipping containers.
"Ma'am I do have to question that order It would be far safer if the entire group went in as a unit instead of just two people scouting." Jess said.
"If the building were larger you would be right however taking in more people than necessary would just complicate things." Linda said walking back into the lobby and sticking her head out of the door.
She held her hand up and waved over three other people. two of them were armed with rifles while the third a young girl who looked even younger than Jess carried some equipment and had only a small side arm. The three had their weapons drawn I guess ready for combat if there were still hostels however they fortunately decided to wait until Linda gave the orders. Now that they were standing at attention I could get a clear description of their faces. The first two were men with handsome features in truth they looked to be around 20 without any facial hair at all. The biggest difference between them was that one was Caucasian and wore glasses and carried a service rifle while the other was Asian and carried an assault rifle. The girl carrying the pack was Asian and petite to the point that she barely looked older than 16 she only carried a small sidearm.
"Starting in order from left to right is Jason steinman our survival expert, Mark Chang our hacker and a real crack shot with that assault rifle, and the cute little lady on the end is Rebecca Kobayashi I guess you'd call her our quartermaster." Linda said showing off each one of them and the two guys were kind of proud of the way she knew their skill set but Rebecca was a little shy, "and of course you met Jess their squad leader and my second in command."
"Good to know y'all." I said addressing the group, "The name's Derek I'm the melee weapon hero and this is my partner Regina."
The group looked on in shock at me and Regina and instantly came to the conclusion I must have been summoned by the legion at least that's what their faces conveyed with a mix of confusion and glances at Linda for orders here. The only reason that the caravan didn't know otherwise was because they probably don't really have much contact with any particular group, but the NCR soldiers know what heroes were summoned to them and due to my close proximity to the dam and the legion camp it was obvious to anyone with a brain.
"Don't worry soldiers they're all right." Linda said although they didn't seem to let their guard down, "Plus he's already leagues better than the fuck face hero that we have."
"Are you sure he's as bad as you say I mean he might have just assumed you knew about the monster parts." Regina said.
"I can't deny that given that Derek has already figured this out but this guy is a piece of shit." Jess said.
"Yeah this guy within a few days of arriving he started hitting on all the women around camp." Jason said
"Then for about 3 days he disappears making us have to send some soldiers to the freeside only to find that he's wasting time with gambling and whoring." Mark said with an extremely annoyed expression he was probably one of the people sent to find him.
"um...well he actually came and asked me to join his party but when I brought up the fact that he hit freeside he said he was doing some research and that he had a few places for grinding." Rebecca said which caused Jess and Mark and Jason to all look over at her in confusion.
Me and Linda however understood perfectly, I could tell as much by her face when she looked at me and all I could do was nod in agreement.
"Okay I'll give him some credit, It sounds like he was quest hunting." Linda said causing her four teammates to stare at her for clarification, "He was looking for people to help probably in the form of taking out monster dens and raider gangs."
"Although I've never met him I'm kind of getting the idea for what kind of person he is." I said, "I get the feeling he's the lone wolf type of guy who just does what he wants."
"Yeah although I still think it's pretty shady that he tried to lie to me about the weapons upgrade method." Linda said.
"What do you mean?"
"He was trying to brag about how good he was and told me some bullshit method that I know is not right." Linda said with an annoyed expression, "I tuned out about a quarter of the way through but to sum it up his way has no similarities to the real way."
"Was it some way other than customization?"
"customization?" Linda said quirking an eye, "The only way to upgrade the weapons is to use the mastery system."
I don't really think she's lying so I invite her and her group to join my party which they accept. I ask for a gun which Jason provided and put it into my weapon to be customized. I pull up the customization screen and the 3D model of the service rifle pulls up much to their surprise. I don't really want to mess with his gun too much so I put some leather around the grip and the butt to offer a bit of cushioning to his shoulder One thing I did add was some rifling (ridges along the inside of the barrel to cause the bullet to rotate) to give it some extra distance and accuracy. after the modification was complete I hit accept and the weapon materialized into my hands. I handed it back to Jason and told him to give it a few shots to make sure it worked right.
Jason took aim at a handicap sign that was in the parking lot and has he shot at the wheel he hit the mark dead center causing his teammates to just stare and shock at him.
"Derek what did you do to my gun It's never been so accurate." Jason looked at me with if I had to describe it, a sparkle in his eye, "I mean I'm not that good of a shot and the standard issue service rifle was never meant to be an amazing one of a kind weapon when you consider it was a mass produced throwaway gun."
"I added some rough leather to the grip and extra leather to the butt of the gun to cushion your shoulder." I said pointing at each spot as I explained, "Finally I added rifling to the inside of the gun which forces the bullet to rotate in the direction the rifling is going making it travel farther and more accurately."
"What the hell?!" Linda shouted as she looked at her own menu which everyone can see that the customization option was there now, "The customization menu wasn't there before how could I have missed it."
"I got a theory but could you tell me about the mastery system that you use."
Linda gave me a full breakdown of the mastery system.
mastery system: The mastery system has a few different components to it however it involves utilizing the weapons and mastering them which allows you to upgrade the weapon to a higher level not only making the ability stronger but sometimes unlocking other abilities.
weapon up: after using a weapon long enough you will have the option of upgrading its level which increases the skill attached to it and makes the weapon more powerful.
skill transfer: after a weapon reaches level 10 the active skill will be double it's original power or effect and can be transferred to another weapon which on the surface seems useless given that you'll learn the skill after mastering the weapon one time and the weapon the skill is transferred to will reset to its base however every time the skill is transferred it's power grows and by the time the next weapon can transfer its skills it will be 4 times the strength it originally had.
power transfer: although a skill is transferred through skill transfer the weapons power is a different story and can be transferred to an altogether different weapon increasing its potential.
weapon reset: after the power and skill is transferred from a weapon it is automatically reset to its base and can be powered up again allowing the transfer of its attack power or if another skill is placed on it allowing the skill to raise again.
summary: It allows you to mix and match the power and skill transfer options to optimize your build and although it can be a process the result is that you'll always have the weapons you desire with the skills increasing in power steadily if done right.
"Wow that sounds like an intricate system but if done right I see the advantages." I say checking my upgrade options to see that it's there now and that there was now a star beside the tribal spear indicating that it was ready to be upgraded.
"Hey heroes does this mean that you have to know about each other's upgrade methods to be able to power up your weapons efficiently?" Jess said just staring at each of us.
"It sure seems that way and if you did capture him he would have absolutely no reason to help you at all." Regina said chuckling.
Despite the fact that Regina had a smile on her face you could tell there was some venom in her words and Jess kind of flinched despite being a badass soldier and all she couldn't even mudder a come back to that statement. Me and Linda could both look around and see the faces of her teammates who kind of stared at the ground a little obviously they were thinking to capture me as well but I'll be honest I don't take offense to it I mean I am technically working with their enemy.
"Is there anything else I need to know about the customerization options."
"Not much else It's actually a pretty simple system compared to yours but if you absorb items and make new ones you can actually create schematics that can be used in the crafting option from the items menu or you can just go ahead and create the objects in the customization menu instantly if you have the right materials." I say giving an example by pulling up the schematic for the vector K-10 which I noticed had a copy and materialize tab.
I figured it wouldn't hurt to try and after hitting the button a blueprint materialized in front of me in my hand which I handed to Linda. She looked over the detailed schematic of the weapon which even in the hands of a weaponsmith could produce the gun if he had the right tools. She then put it into her weapon and she got the notification telling her that the schematic has been saved and in her own customization menu she had the option of producing it as long as she could get the materials together.
"The only other thing I should mention is that you can also customize your weapon for example adding a a beam focuser to an energy weapon or a rotation upgrade to a Gatling gun." I said giving her some basic examples but in truth I've never really specialized in heavy weapons in fallout so I only knew a few upgrades for them.