E60 m5 top speed without limiter
Future(s) Studies
2011.12.12 10:05 Xenophon1 Future(s) Studies
Welcome to Futurology, a subreddit devoted to the field of Future(s) Studies and speculation about the development of humanity, technology, and civilization.
2013.07.24 00:33 gugulo Conscious Like Us
Animals are conscious like us. Here we discuss animal intelligence, emotion and consciousness.
2014.06.30 23:17 isolos Married Red Pill: Sexual strategy for men in marriage or long term relationships
The Red Pill (TRP) main subreddit is a discussion of sexual strategy in a culture increasingly lacking a positive identity for men. Married Red Pill (MRP) is a discussion for married men or men in long term relationships that want to adhere to red pill philosophy and methodology while remaining in that relationship. This is The Red Pill on hard mode.
2023.03.29 22:32 NoSweatIns v24.10 Patch Notes — Spring Breakout 2023
 | Picture Art for Fortnite: Battle Royale — Spring Breakout 2023. submitted by NoSweatIns to u/NoSweatIns [link] [comments] FORTNITE BATTLE ROYALE V24.10: LET YOUR EGGCITEMENT BLOOM DURING SPRING BREAKOUT 2023!3.29.23By The Fortnite Team "There's something about cherry blossoms that puts one in a cherry mood." In Fortnite Battle Royale v24.10, parts of the Island are getting a makeover as things warm up. From cherry blossoms to spring chickens, dig into the details below of what's new in Spring Breakout 2023! Take up your Egg Launchers while Spring Breakout is live 'til April 11, 2023, at 12 AM ET (04:00 AM UTC). HOP TO IT WITH SPRING BREAKOUT QUESTS Just as the Island is full of life, decorate your Locker with colorful rewards by completing Spring Breakout Quests! The first Spring Breakout Quest will be available starting March 29 at 9 AM ET (01:00 PM UTC), and a new one will be added daily at 9 AM ET. The Quests will be available until April 11, 2023, at 12 AM ET (04:00 AM UTC). What will you hatch by completing the Spring Breakout Quests? Most of them will get you XP, while some will reward a special Locker item:
The Works Loading Screen up close: Dress me like one of your fanciest sausages. Art by Jerkface. There are more rewards too. For completing 12 Spring Breakout Quests, you'll receive the Nannerbloom Hammer Pickaxe, and for completing 22, you'll unlock the Fresh Flyer Glider! Left: Nannerbloom Hammer Pickaxe, Right: Fresh Flyer Glider WHICH CAME FIRST, THE GREEN CHICKEN OR THE GOLDEN EGG? Three types of Eggs: Heal, Hop, and Golden Eggs. Two new types of chickens and three new kinds of eggs are on the Island for the duration of Spring Breakout. You may notice green and purple chickens clucking about, leaving special eggs around the Island. Interacting with these unusual eggs will temporarily give you a benefit:
CREATE EGGCELLENT EXPLOSIONS WITH THE EGG LAUNCHER Limited Time Event Weapon: Egg Launcher The Egg Launcher breaks out of the vault for Spring Breakout! Find Egg Launchers from the ground, Chests, Supply Drops, or for sale from certain Characters. You can also get one from the new Springtime Blowout Reality Augment! Limited Time Event Augment: Springtime Blowout MORE IN V24.10: NEW BATTLE ROYALE REALITY AUGMENTS! v24.10 introduces four other Reality Augments. Augment yourself with: RAIL WARRIOR Regenerate Health and partial Shield while on grind rails and ziplines, except while in the Storm. GO FOR BROKE Grants a Charge Shotgun and Flintknock Pistol. AQUATIC WARRIOR Move faster and regenerate Health and partial Shield while swimming, except while in the Storm. GAME TIME Grants the Pizza Party and some Chug Splashes! CHARACTERS SPRING INTO EVEN MORE ACTION https://preview.redd.it/aht4h4gujqqa1.png?width=1900&format=png&auto=webp&s=3ce00ae03ef11584c72112af3e89a25ee638c190 SPECIALIST CHARACTERS Just in case you need a little help during battle, eight Specialist Characters have dropped on the Island and are ready for hire! There are four different types of Specialists, each one with a different role to play:
Being a social butterfly just got a whole lot easier. The Collections tab is now called the "Characters" tab and now shows a map displaying the location of all Characters on the Island, both the ones you've discovered and the ones you haven't. Once you discover a Character, you can view their services in the Characters tab along with how many Bars their services cost. Check out the Characters tab by opening the map in a match and navigating to the tab! (During Spring Breakout, keep an eye out for Cluck on the Island, as he has some goodies waiting to sell you.) BATTLE ROYALE CHAPTER 4 SEASON 2 SUPER LEVEL STYLES Super Level Styles for Chapter 4 — Season 2 Battle Pass. Illuminate the future in style. In the Bonus Rewards section of the Battle Pass tab, bonus Styles for Battle Royale Chapter 4 Season 2 Battle Pass rewards have been available for players who progress past Level 100. With v24.10, Chapter 4 Season 2’s Super Level Styles have been added as bonus rewards! The Super Level Styles this Season? Progress past Level 125 during Chapter 4 Season 2 and start unlocking the Kinetic Rush, Neon Citrus, and Mega Wave Styles for the Thunder, Imani, Renzo the Destroyer, Mizuki, and Highwire Outfits. BUILDING AND EDITING SENSITIVITIES In v24.10, a Building Sensitivity setting and Editing Sensitivity setting have been added to Fortnite's "Mouse and Keyboard" settings. With these new settings, you're now able to adjust the sensitivity of building or editing structures to your preferred speed. MISCELLANEOUS UPDATES
COMPETITIVE NOTES
MAJOR BUG FIXES
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2023.03.29 22:28 reChrawnus Aura Circulatory System (A.C.S.)
Name:
Aura Circulatory System (A.C.S.)
Type:
Enhancement (100)
Transmutation (80)
Emission (80)
Conjuration (60)
Manipulation (60)
Vows & Conditions:
- Ability is constantly active, and uses 100% of the aura the user outputs.
- Since the ability uses 100% of whatever aura the user outputs, no aura is left over for any other ability or technique.
- The user cannot ever disable this ability. If they stop maintaining the ability for even a moment they lose it forever and are forced into Zetsu for as long as they live.
Description:
Initially the user allocates part of their aura to conjure an Aura Control Unit (A.C.U.) which looks like a small microchip inside their own brain. The user then transmutes their aura into the shape of an "Aura Circulatory System" (A.C.S.). The A.C.S is used to circulate aura throughout the body, while the A.C.U. automates the process and makes the decision (based on rules and decisions initially set by the user) how much of the aura output should be sent to which part of the body.- As this aura circulates through different parts of the A.C.S. and reaches differents parts of the body it enhances the functions of the body parts/organs it passes through.
- The A.C.S does this by increasing the speed, power, durability, efficiency and/or regenerative factor according to the decisions made by the user for every specific body part it passes through.
- At first they might only have the focus necessary to circulate the aura through the voluntary muscles of the body, enhancing the strength, speed, efficiency of the user's physical performance and the durability and regenerative powers of these muscles.
- As time goes on this process is gradually taken over by the A.C.U. requiring less and less conscious effort, at one point becoming fully automatic, requiring no extra effort on the users part to maintain.
- At this point the user can choose to add another body part to their "aura circulatory system" and has to consciously maintain that part of the circulatory system until it becomes an automatic part of the A.C.S.
- The user can increase the reach of the A.C.S by adding one additional body part at a time.
- The A.C.U. is then allowed to acclimatize to each body part before the user moves on to the next one, slowly building up the A.C.S. until it passes through every part of their body.
- At the final stage the A.C.S covers every part of the body, automatically enhancing every single (chosen) function of the user's body without them needing to make a conscious effort to do so.
- The user first decides how big of a percent of their aura output should be allocated to each body part.
- The decision is then made of how to split up that part for enhancing different aspects of the body part, like power, efficiency, durability and so on.
- If the user wants to change the aura distribution for a specific part of the body after it's already become an automatic part of the A.C.U. they need to turn off the automatic aspect of that specific part of their A.C.U.
- At that point, the process of acclimatizing the A.C.U. to that part of the body begins all over again.
- As they continue repeating this process for a specific body part, the A.C.U. becomes more effective at this re-acclimatization process, which in turn speeds it up.
- If this process is done enough times for a body part, the process becomes fast enough that what initially would take weeks or even months can now be done in the fraction of a second.
- The aura node in question is given the capability to "absorb" any outside/hostile aura it comes into contact with.
- The limit to how much aura it is capable of absorbing depends on how much aura the aura node has been allocated through the A.C.U.
- If an opponent attacks the user on a location of their body where a connected aura node is located, the node will absorb an equal amount of aura as it has been allocated.
- The absorbed aura is then turned it into fuel for the A.C.S., with a conversion efficiency of 70% (The average efficiency of manipulation and emission for an enhancer).
- The node can only absorb an amount equal to what it has been allocated by the system however, any amount of aura over that amount will directly damage the user.
- First, a specific number is allocated to each body part covered by the A.C.S.
- A higher number signifies higher priority.
- When the aura output drops below the designated levels the A.C.U. stops enhancing parts with lower priority.
- As the output drops further, the A.C.U. gradually increasing the number of parts it no longer enhances based on their prioritization numbers.
- When the aura output starts rising again this process reverses, until the threshold is met again, and the prioritisation aspect of the system ceases.
Meta-information:
This is my first attempt at creating a nen ability that utilizes every single nen category except specialization. The reason I decided to make it primarily an enhancer ability was made because enhancers are the most balanced when it comes to being able to use the other categories, and so they should in theory have the easiest time using abilities that incorporate all of the nen categories. As for the pretty harsh conditions I've set, that decision was made partly to increase the aura output to a level where parts of the body can still be meaningfully enhanced as the aura is split between more and more (at the end stage it could be up hundreds of different body parts) parts, and partly to make the aspects of the ability that utilizes the nen categories an enhancer is weakest in, like manipulation and conjuration, more efficient.2023.03.29 22:21 SillyBunnySecrets Not Perfect but Feeling Good
Although I'm not happy with my weight, looks, or my minutes of exercise per week right now, I'm actually feeling pretty good overall being free of caffeine. I feel like I know my energy level and I can't use an energy drink as a crutch to push through things I don't actually have the time or bandwidth for. I don't mindlessly and inattentively scroll through tabs and tabs of content without doing anything productive. I have to be reasonable with myself and know my baseline so I can prioritize tasks throughout the day. I don't crash super hard before becoming irritable, emotional, and mean to those around me. I have more self-control.
My "limited time" mentality actually extended to focusing on convenience over health. I used to be drawn to buying foods in cafeterias or fast food restaurants and always order something with a large Coke or soda, but now it's just water or some herbal tea. I don't automatically reach for certain foods anymore when I pass by a bakery or coffee shop. Before, caffeine would inevitably be accompanied with heavy caloric intake. When I should have just had a black coffee I would inevitably order an extra large white chocolate mocha Frappuccino with extra whipped cream on top, along with a bagel, or a croissant, or a donut, or something that would take up my entire caloric budget for the day.
Though I am not super active and working out all the time, I'm more aware of my body now. I'm more aware of having enough sleep and generally, my sleep is great. I wear a CPAP so I know my sleep is great as well. I'm working on walking more, eating more fiber, eating fewer calories, and drinking more water. Next step is going to the gym, and trying out cardio and weight lifting to improve my stamina.
I've also been sober for over two years now, and being caffeine-free is another way I'm learning to appreciate my body without the casual use of psychoactive products. I feel really good and I hope to be a "good enough" mom to my baby daughter. I made all these changes for myself, my husband, and my precious miracle baby.
submitted by SillyBunnySecrets to decaf [link] [comments]
My "limited time" mentality actually extended to focusing on convenience over health. I used to be drawn to buying foods in cafeterias or fast food restaurants and always order something with a large Coke or soda, but now it's just water or some herbal tea. I don't automatically reach for certain foods anymore when I pass by a bakery or coffee shop. Before, caffeine would inevitably be accompanied with heavy caloric intake. When I should have just had a black coffee I would inevitably order an extra large white chocolate mocha Frappuccino with extra whipped cream on top, along with a bagel, or a croissant, or a donut, or something that would take up my entire caloric budget for the day.
Though I am not super active and working out all the time, I'm more aware of my body now. I'm more aware of having enough sleep and generally, my sleep is great. I wear a CPAP so I know my sleep is great as well. I'm working on walking more, eating more fiber, eating fewer calories, and drinking more water. Next step is going to the gym, and trying out cardio and weight lifting to improve my stamina.
I've also been sober for over two years now, and being caffeine-free is another way I'm learning to appreciate my body without the casual use of psychoactive products. I feel really good and I hope to be a "good enough" mom to my baby daughter. I made all these changes for myself, my husband, and my precious miracle baby.
2023.03.29 22:13 Gobgoblinoid Tell me about your predators!
I am working on a story that revolves around an interstellar species of fast-evolving apex predators that take a variety of forms across the universe.So I'm looking for some inspiration: What are the apex predators of your world?Less common Apex predators on Earth that inspired you are also acceptable!
---
Below is some extra context on my guys in case you want to make your own more specifically, but feel free to skip this and write about your predators!
On Vahls
Vahl are typically large humanoids from the planet Anhae.Vahl have the ability to consciously evolve themselves over multiple generations, and so they adapt quickly to new environments in order to reach the top of the food chain.
They have a unique trait of genetic memory, making them effectively immortal as long as they successfully procreate. Vahls carry eggs in their torsos that only hatch when their parent dies.
Vahls take a huge variety of shapes and sizes, sporting long claws, tongues, tentacles and fins, and other features that help them stay on top in any environment.
Different Vahls have different ways of dealing with their competing personas, some eat their siblings and some form small packs of their clones. Entire societies can stem from one ancestor, as offspring evolve in branching paths while remembering their life when they were one. Vahls have a religious tradition of subservience to those that defeat them in combat, though they will always want a rematch in their next life.
All Vahls claim to descend from one individual, Verkon, but (they will not admit this) their memories DO have limits, and no one can truly remember the beginning of their species. Verkon remains a Monarch traveling from world to world in the traditional way, and it is said they have never lost a duel. Vahls have a religious reverence for their way of life, and write their life stories in tablets they keep on board their ships. Vahls that renounce their Great Hunt and live peacefully are to be treated as prey, their stories dismissed.
Vahls live ascetically and usually animalistically, but are intelligent and space-faring. They hide their space craft diligently, and have incubators on board that would save them in the event that their eggs are destroyed before they can hatch in the wild.
They can sometimes become illiterate or in the worst cases lose their language entirely. This leads to the phenomena of savage Vahls, or Ahalun. These creatures are to be pitied and their stories recovered and returned to Anhae, as once you lose your ability to think in language you can never recover.
So, if you got this far, What kind of crazy adaptations might be demanded of these guys? Is there any planet where they just can't get to the top without going savage? Would any creatures from your world have an easy time killing Vahls? Thanks for reading!
submitted by Gobgoblinoid to worldbuilding [link] [comments]
---
Below is some extra context on my guys in case you want to make your own more specifically, but feel free to skip this and write about your predators!
On Vahls
Vahl are typically large humanoids from the planet Anhae.Vahl have the ability to consciously evolve themselves over multiple generations, and so they adapt quickly to new environments in order to reach the top of the food chain.
They have a unique trait of genetic memory, making them effectively immortal as long as they successfully procreate. Vahls carry eggs in their torsos that only hatch when their parent dies.
Vahls take a huge variety of shapes and sizes, sporting long claws, tongues, tentacles and fins, and other features that help them stay on top in any environment.
Different Vahls have different ways of dealing with their competing personas, some eat their siblings and some form small packs of their clones. Entire societies can stem from one ancestor, as offspring evolve in branching paths while remembering their life when they were one. Vahls have a religious tradition of subservience to those that defeat them in combat, though they will always want a rematch in their next life.
All Vahls claim to descend from one individual, Verkon, but (they will not admit this) their memories DO have limits, and no one can truly remember the beginning of their species. Verkon remains a Monarch traveling from world to world in the traditional way, and it is said they have never lost a duel. Vahls have a religious reverence for their way of life, and write their life stories in tablets they keep on board their ships. Vahls that renounce their Great Hunt and live peacefully are to be treated as prey, their stories dismissed.
Vahls live ascetically and usually animalistically, but are intelligent and space-faring. They hide their space craft diligently, and have incubators on board that would save them in the event that their eggs are destroyed before they can hatch in the wild.
They can sometimes become illiterate or in the worst cases lose their language entirely. This leads to the phenomena of savage Vahls, or Ahalun. These creatures are to be pitied and their stories recovered and returned to Anhae, as once you lose your ability to think in language you can never recover.
So, if you got this far, What kind of crazy adaptations might be demanded of these guys? Is there any planet where they just can't get to the top without going savage? Would any creatures from your world have an easy time killing Vahls? Thanks for reading!
2023.03.29 22:13 CB_scorpio Introducing AshSwap SDK: The Ultimate Tool for Developers to Build Powerful Apps Faster Than Ever Before! by @ash_swap
 | Decentralized finance (DeFi) is a rapidly expanding field that is altering how we view financial systems. Smart contracts, which are self-executing contracts with the terms of the agreement written directly in code, are central to DeFi. Smart contracts are ideal for the creation of trustless financial systems because they are transparent, immutable, and operate without the need for intermediaries. submitted by CB_scorpio to elrondnetwork [link] [comments] Introducing AshSwap SDK: The Ultimate Tool for Developers to Build Powerful Apps Faster Than Ever Before The team has created a JavaScript SDK for developers to interact directly with AshSwap’s smart contracts. The AshSwap Software Development Kit (SDK) simplifies the process of interacting with smart contracts, making it easier for developers to create decentralized applications (DApps) on the AshSwap platform. This article will examine the AshSwap Software Development Kit (SDK) and its features, as well as how it can be used to create powerful DApps on the AshSwap platform. What is the AshSwap SDK?The AshSwap SDK is a JavaScript library that provides a simple and straightforward interface for developers to interact with AshSwap’s smart contracts. The SDK abstracts away a significant portion of the complexity of interacting with smart contracts, making it simpler for developers to create DApps that leverage the AshSwap platform.The SDK is designed to be modular, allowing developers to select the modules they need for their particular use case. Developers can, for instance, use the AshSwap SDK to:
Why Use the AshSwap SDK?There are several reasons why developers might want to use the AshSwap SDK. Here are a few of the most compelling:Simplifies Smart Contract InteractionsInteracting with smart contracts can be a complex and time-consuming process. The AshSwap SDK simplifies this process by providing developers with a simple and easy-to-use interface for interacting with AshSwap’s smart contracts. This means that developers can spend less time dealing with the complexities of smart contract interactions and more time building the features that matter most for their DApps.Speeds Up Development TimeBy simplifying smart contract interactions, the AshSwap SDK can help developers speed up the development time for their DApps. The SDK provides pre-built modules for common interactions with the AshSwap smart contracts, so developers don’t have to spend time building these interactions from scratch.Modular DesignThe AshSwap SDK is designed to be modular, which means that developers can pick and choose which modules they need for their specific use case. This makes it easy to integrate the SDK into existing codebases or to build new DApps on top of the AshSwap platform.Well-DocumentedThe AshSwap SDK is well-documented, with detailed API documentation and code examples. This makes it easy for developers to get started with the SDK and to understand how it works.Open-SourceThe AshSwap SDK is open-source, meaning developers can contribute to the codebase or use it as a starting point for their projects. This also means that the SDK is constantly being updated and improved by the AshSwap team and the wider developer community.How to Use the AshSwap SDKTo use the AshSwap SDK, developers will need to have a basic understanding of JavaScript and the MultiversX blockchain. Here’s a high-level overview of how to get started:
ConclusionThe AshSwap SDK is a powerful tool for developers who want to build DApps on the AshSwap platform. By simplifying smart contract interactions and providing pre-built modules for common interactions, the AshSwap SDK can help developers speed up the development time for their DApps. The SDK’s modular design and well-documented API also make it easy to integrate into existing codebases or to build new DApps from scratch.If you’re interested in building DApps on the AshSwap platform, we highly recommend checking out the AshSwap SDK. It’s a powerful tool that can help you unlock the full potential of decentralized finance.
About AshSwapAshSwap is the very first stable swap, an undoubtedly essential pillar in any DeFi ecosystem, built on the MultiversX blockchain. Our ultimate vision is to serve as an infrastructure for the sustainable development of DeFi on MultiversX.Not only does AshSwap inherit the ideas from its predecessors, but it also introduces new and novel concepts to tackle the current problems in DeFi. The ASH token has many more use cases than just farming rewards and voting power representation. Source: Medium.com/@ashswap/introducing-ashswap-sdk-the-ultimate-tool-for-developers-to-build-powerful-apps-faster-than-ever |
2023.03.29 22:10 busrentalabudhabi BUS RENTAL DUBAI ROYAL RIDER
 | ROYAL RIDER BUS RENTAL DUBAI-SHARJAHBUS RENTAL DUBAI ROYAL RIDER Royal Rider Bus Rental Dubai is a leading travel & transport service provider based in Dubai, UAE. With a focus on quality, safety, and customer satisfaction, Royal Rider Bus Company offers a wide range of buses and transportation solutions to meet the needs of any group, event, or occasion.Our fleet of buses includes luxury coaches, minibusses, vans, taxis with drivers, and standard buses, all equipped with modern amenities and comfortable seats to ensure a pleasant and enjoyable ride. Our experienced teams of drivers are trained to provide a safe and reliable service, ensuring you reach your destination on time and in comfort. Whether you need transportation for a corporate event, school trip, wedding, or any other occasion, Royal Rider Rental Buses Dubai has the right Rentals vehicles and expertise to meet your needs. We also offer customized tour and transport packages to suit your specific needs and budget, making them an ideal choice for any group transport needs in Dubai and beyond. Royal Rider is a high-quality bus rental service in Dubai that offers reliable, safe, and comfortable transportation solutions for groups of all sizes. At ROYAL RIDER BUS RENTAL DUBAI, we understand that you want to give the best possible experience to your customers and guests. That’s why we offer a wide range of buses and coaches for rent so that you can find exactly what you need for any occasion. We have a wide variety of vehicles available for hire: from minibusses and Vans to large coaches and buses. We also have options for renting vehicles with drivers if you’re looking for something more personalized. No matter what type of transportation service you need—whether it’s private tours, airport transfers, or business people—we’ve got it! 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2023.03.29 22:04 ArcAngel98 Dracula: World of War (Chapters 15-17)
Dracula: World of War --- The Violet Reaper ---- Humans Don’t Make Good Familiars Book 1 ---- The Lonely World --- Discord ---- YouTube --- My Patreon --- My Author's Page --- ArcAngel98 Wiki ---- The Next Best Hero ---- HDMGF Book 2 ---- Jess and Blinx: The Wizard ---- The Questing Parties ---- Previous
I let the power flow through me and raised a hand, “Halte.” (Stop) He fell to his knees and his face plowed into the dirt and gravel. Slowly he stood up, calm, just like the three men from earlier. Aside from his pants around his ankles, a new set of fangs, and blood red eyes, he seemed like any other fellow. “Mach dich anständig.” I commanded. (Make yourself decent) His head tilted to the side, as if to think about my order, then he reached down and pulled his pants up as well as fixing his belt and tucking in his shirt. This time I spoke in English, “Raise your right hand.” He did nothing. “Hebe deine rechte hand,” this time he followed orders.
“So, you follow my orders, but you have to understand them.” I said to him, even though he had no idea what I was saying. “Kannst du sprechen?” I asked. (Can you speak?)
In a low growl, the creature’s voice strained and twisted out a single reply, “Ja.” (Yes.) His cognitive abilities were limited but still there. In this state, thinking must have been rather difficult for it. It would never be a scholar, but it might make a fine warrior. Its muscles pulsated with every movement, but I heard no heartbeat.
“Ich möchte sehen, wie geschickt Sie als Krieger sind, gehen Sie und töten Sie so viele Leute wie möglich in diesem Lager.” I told it. (I want to see how skilled of a warrior you are, go and kill as many people in that camp as you can.) In a flash, it turned and ran towards the nearest group to us. It was not a quiet ordeal, it snarled and howled as it tore into their bodies with it hands and fangs. It didn’t fight like a soldier, with skill and trained techniques; it attacked like an animal. I heard their screams, and the confused shouts of others who witnessed the carnage, but they were quickly silenced too. Gun shots and yells polluted the air, until a few minutes later an eerie calm settled on the camp. A lucky shot had caught the beast in the heart, but the damage was already done. I counted thirty-three mangled remains. “A single monster is worth over thirty men.”
I left the camp and found the three dead men I had injected with venom fighting with one another as if they were rabid dogs. “Genug davon,” I used my power on them. (Enough of that.) They froze, one’s mouth was around another’s neck and black blood dripped from it. I looked them over, they were so different from the other one that someone could have honestly questioned if they were ever even human in the first place. They were shriveled up, like the creature in the morgue. Their greyish skin had become dried and cracked. Their eyes were a pale grey, with narrowed pupils, even though it was dark. I reasoned that they were either currently blind or hypersensitive to light. Their clothes had been torn to shreds from the fighting. One by one they let go of one another and faced me. “Kann einer von euch sprechen?” (Can any of you speak?) They all growled, but none said a word; like they understood what speaking was but were unable to actually do it. They truly were different from a living specimen. I looked at their bodies, each was covered in wounds, but none of them was healing like I would.
“Time for a test. Geh ins Lager und töte alle.” (Go into the camp and kill everyone.) Unlike the living one, these three were slow. They didn’t move anything like it did; instead, they scrabbled around on all fours like some kind of demonic dogs. Their fangs bared, they charged into the camp.
By the time the sun rose, I had performed several tests of this nature and had fifteen total creatures, seven created from the dead and eight from the living. The camp was in ruins, parts destroyed from battle, other parts were aflame. What was left was covered in blood and severed appendages; these creatures were viciously thorough. I could see unbridled malicious behind each of their eyes, so much so that it unnerved even me. They had my unsatiable hunger, but also a roaring fury. I don’t know how to describe myself, maybe as broken or vile, I know I’ve certainly been called worse, but them… they were evil. I knew they wanted to kill everything they saw, even me, but my abilities kept them in check. I couldn’t help but wonder… if I was a monster, what did that make them?
“How many beasts like you have I unknowingly released on this world?” I thought aloud. I decided that once the war was over, I would need to search everywhere I had been throughout my life and make sure I didn’t leave any behind. I may be long lived but I try to stay in the same ten countries; those are the countries whose languages I understand and speak. Which would be Romanian, Spanish, English, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese, German, Polish, and French.
I watched the sun just begin to peak over the mountainside and took shelter in what remained of one of the barracks. “Only one test left to perform.” I had given orders to all of the beasts, in fact I gave them all the same order… not to move, no matter what. The sun crested over the top of the mountain’s snow-capped peak and the light bathed the creatures. At first, smoke rose from their exposed flesh, then blisters formed, then each and every single one burst into flames. To my surprise, none of them moved, or even reacted to the fire and burns. I began to question if they could feel pain. The ones made from the living held out the longest, twice as long as the dead in fact, but within minutes all of the monsters were ash, not even the bones remained. A part of me was mortified at such a violent reaction to sunlight, another part of me was fascinated. I had spent time in sunlight before, it definitely has an effect, but nothing like that. I become weak, too weak to move if I stay in it uncovered long enough. Once during a test of my endurance, I even suffered blistering, but nothing like what I had just witnessed. “I must remember to run tests on this.” I told myself.
I turned my attention away from the ashes and corpses and towards my current situation. I was days overdue to meet up with the rest of the team, my partner was dead and rotting in the forest, and I have to explain how I managed to singlehandedly wipe out an entire German army encampment. I had at least half a day to think of a lie to tell that would be believable; that’s how long it would take me to rendezvous with the others. Since I was in the barracks, the was plenty of materials to wrap myself in, although some of it was burned it was still better than what I had now; a bloodied and bullet hole ridden German army uniform. I found a spare beige shirt and some light grey trousers; I traded the boots I had for a nicer pair of black, officer’s boots that had a much better fit. I also found gloves that went about halfway up to my elbow to protect my hands. For good measure I also put on a black button-up trench-coat and an old patched grey cloth hat; it reminded me of the type a newspaper delivery boy would wear.
Once I was as covered as I could manage, I set out and began my trek up the mountain to my comrade’s position. With blazing speed, I ran up the cliff, leaping over boulders and going in as straight a line as possible. I stopped only twice. Once to feed on a passing moose and again on a deer. By nightfall, I had the meet up location within sight. We had agreed on a signal that let them know that we were coming. If they were still there, they would see it. I was hopeful I had moved fast enough to meet the original deadline, but I was fairly certain I was still at least a day late. I pulled out a small square mirror from my pocket and aimed it towards their position. I placed my hand in an L shape and flicked the mirror up and down three times, then paused before repeating it twice; that was the signal that it was me and not an enemy. A few seconds passed and I saw a flash repeat the pattern from their position; that was the return signal. I walked slowly now, or at least at a normal human speed, and arrived at the campsite an hour later.
As I approached the camp, I smelt Reynolds and Baker before I saw them, one was in the camp and the other was behind me. I heard the chambering of a bullet into a rifle then, “hands up, and turn around.” It was Reynolds’s voice. I did as he instructed. As soon as he saw me, he lowered his gun and sighed. “Dang it, Alucard; you nearly gave me a heart attack. What are you wearing, and where is Akerman?”
“It was this or a German officer’s uniform that was a size too small.”
“Okay but where is Akerman?”
“He didn’t make it; he was shot in our escape. He’s dead.” I explained.
He lowered his head, “dang, that’s too bad. Was the mission a success at least?”
“More than expected, we took out the entire place, not just the artillery.”
“Whose there?” Baker called from the camp and poked his head around the entrance to the small cave.
“It’s Alucard,” Reynolds told him then slung the strap his rifle over his shoulder.
“Just Alucard?” Baker wondered.
“Yeah, Akerman didn’t make it.” Reynolds explained. Baker shook his head and performed a catholic cross, then pulled a cross neckless from inside his shirt and kissed it. “Alucard, you mentioned that the whole camp was destroyed, but how?” Reynolds asked as we walked over to Baker.
“I’ll explain while we pack up, let’s get out of here.”
“We realized that there could have been someone who knew how to repair them, so we thought it was worth the risk… I still think we made the right call.” I said.
“Even with what happened to Akerman?” Reynolds asked. “We both took one look at the camp and knew it was probably going to be a suicide mission. Honestly, I’m amazed I survived.” After that they were satisfied, and we left the cave to go back to base. Just like last time, we traveled only under the cover of darkness, at least for the first half. Once we had left the danger zone, we felt it was safe enough to travel during the day too. That took a day off of our journey. Three days was all it took, and we were safely giving our after-action debrief to the captains and majors in their tents in the trenches. The fighting had stopped for the time being, but I could tell from the smell of hormones that tensions were still high.
Our debrief was given to Captain Lance, the man who originally gave us the mission, as well as Major Blanchet. We sat around a table, each giving our version of what happened. Once the others had finished, they were dismissed as they didn’t need to be there for the rest of it and were ready to shower and get a full night of sleep. Only The major, the captain, and I were left. I detailed the mission exactly as it happened up until the detonation of the artillery. I made sure to tell them the same thing that I told Baker and Reynolds, including the slightly altered details of Akerman’s demise.
“Perhaps we can locate Lieutenant Akerman’s body for a proper burial once we march through there.” Major Blanchet stated.
I was surprised to hear this, and it must have showed on my face because Captain Lance felt the need to explain. “With everything you have told us, the destruction of the artillery as well as most of the encampment, we have a clear shot to take the enemy by surprise.”
“They will be expecting an attack from the front, not the flank.” The major added. I was slightly worried, the camp was in ruins, but I neglected to do away with any of the bodies that I didn’t turn into undead. If they were inspected then it would be obvious that they were not killed by bullets or explosions, but it would seem as if they were mauled to death by animals. I even feed on some of them and allowed my creations to feed as well so I could observe, meaning many of the corpses would be without blood.
A soldier walked in and announced, “Major Blanchet, a letter has arrived for you sir. It’s marked urgent.”
“I can handle the rest of the debrief major,” Captain Lance said.
“Thank you, Captain,” the Major said and excused himself walking out of the tent.
Captain Lance turned to me, “tell me Alucard, is what you have told us today the truth?”
“Yes sir.”
“Then please explain to me why I keep getting the feeling that you are lying. Not about everything, but as soon as you and Akerman go off on your own I feel like that’s when the lies start.” He said and stood up.
“It’s the truth sir, every word.” I lied. The captain walked away from the table and turned his back to me to look at a chalk board with pictures and diagrams hung up on it by strings and clothespins. He removed several pictures and brought them back to the table.
Pointing at them as he spoke, he said, “these are stills taken by scouts of the camp you were sent to. Here is the artillery and here are the munitions building that our scouts spotted. They are nowhere nearly close enough to have detonated due to the TNT we gave you. So, something doesn’t feel right.”
“Sir, the scouts were wrong, or they moved the munitions building.” I told him. He was getting too aggressive, and I had decided to use my abilities to make him believe me. I didn’t want to as I prefer to only plunder around with enemy minds unless absolutely necessary. But then something I never expected to happen… did.
His eyes flashed a pale green and he spoke, “tell me the truth, tell me what happened at the enemy camp.” My brain felt foggy, and I began having thoughts enter my mind that I did not think, but I never lost control of myself. I fought and wrestled control of my mind back from the captain and his unforeseen power.
I was in control, but not of my emotions, “GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” I bared my fangs and slammed the table, breaking it in the process. Captain Lance quickly stepped back and drew his pistol, pointing it at my head. He lost his concentration, and his power left my mind, allowing me to regain my composure.
“What are you?” He asked. The captain reached into his pocket and pulled out a small silver cylinder. I watched as it melted and reformed into a long thin metal stick of some kind.
“Apologies,” I said and retracted my fangs, “I did not mean to yell, but if you attempt to use Mind Magic on me again, I will be forced to hurt you… badly.”
“You are not human, and you know of magic, I will ask again… who, or what, are you?”
“My name is Vladimir Dracula, and I am what you may know as a vampire. Now you will answer my question; did Merlin send you?”
His eyes widened, “you know of Merlin?”
“You didn’t answer my question.” I said.
His gun was still aimed at my head, “no, Merlin did not send me. I haven’t seen him in a very long time.”
“I take it that means you are one of his knights then, yes?” I asked.
He nodded, “I didn’t think vampires were actually real.”
“Well until a few years ago, I didn’t think that Merlin and King Arthur were real either, so no hard feelings.”
“If I put my gun down, are you going to try and eat me?” He asked.
“I don’t eat my allies; I do have standards.” He put his gun down and we both sat in our chairs at the destroyed table.
“So, what really happened at the camp?” Lance, who I found out later was really named Lancelot, asked.
“Up until the artillery, everything I said was true, but the explosion didn’t destroy the camp.”
“And Akerman?” He wondered.
“He really was shot and killed, but it didn’t happen like I said.” We sat there for an hour, I no longer had a reason to hide the truth, so I told him everything.
“So… you created undead monsters to destroy the camp, then you let them be killed by the sun?”
“Yes.”
“Did you do that to Akerman?”
“Of course not, he was an ally.”
“How did you get these abilities?” He asked.
“I don’t particularly feel like telling you my life story, just ask Merlin when you see him.”
“Speaking of which, when did you see him last, and where? I have been searching for him for a few years now, ever since my memories began to return.” He questioned.
“The last time I saw Merlin was in Italy back in the 1910s, and he was old then, so he has probably reincarnated by now.” He seemed disappointed to hear that. “Aren’t there supposed to be quite a few knights, where are the rest?” I asked.
“I haven’t located any of them yet.” He said. We talked a few more minutes about the mission, and what I knew about Merlin.
“I think that’s everything Aluca- uh... Dracula.”
“Just call me Alucard, in fact… forget you know anything about me. It’s what’s best for everyone.” I told him.
He took a deep breath and stayed quiet for a moment, “fine, but I’m keeping an eye on you.”
“Fine, but if you insist on watching me then I have a request. I work better at night, you’re a captain you should have the ability to switch me completely to night shifts.”
“…Fine, I’ll see what I can do.”
The enemy had been attacking sporadically, short bursts to test our defenses. I was patrolling one night, not getting ready to hunt just watching for enemies, when I heard a few officers talking about news from all over the world. It was the first time in a while we had gotten any news at all, and most of it was bad. Zeppelins were dropping bombs on England’s coast, a submarine blockade had been declared by Germany against British shores, Britain had responded to a call of air from Russia against Turkish attacks, Russia suffered heavy losses after the battle of Masurian Lakes, and Germany had released hundreds of tons of poison gas against allied French and Canadian troops.
“Can you believe this, it’s only July and the world’s already on fire?” One of the men said.
“It’s been on fire, we are only just now hearing about it,” the other man replied.
“You two realize we are in the middle of a war-zone in a foreign country and have been for nearly a year right? We already knew the world was on fire because we have been in the middle of the flames.” A man, who was not a part of the conversation and simply interjected, said.
The other two stayed quiet for a moment, “…good point.”
I walked over to them, “where did you hear about this from?”
“I heard I from Captain Lance, and he said he read it from a stack of newspapers that got shipped to us.”
“Thanks,” I said and went back to my patrol. After my shift finished, I went to find these newspapers. I was just as interested to read what was happening as everyone else was. If Captain Lance had them, then they would probably be in the officer’s tent, or the communications tent. I checked the officer’s tent first. Captain Lance was there drinking coffee and reading a letter. Things weren’t as tense between us as they were at first, but that didn’t make them comfortable. “Captain Lance,” his eyes lifted from his letter, and I noticed he gripped his mug slightly tighter.
“Yes?”
“I was told that a shipment of newspapers arrived, are the men allowed to read them?”
He relaxed a bit and loosened his grip, “oh, yes, but they were taken to the mess to be put on display. We figured that was the best way for everyone to get a chance to read them without having everyone coming and going from the tent all day.”
“Thank you,” I said and left. The “mess” was at the back of the trenches. Really it was just a shack that cooked everyone food and handed it out on steel trays. I walked there and next to the shack was a wooden fence that was not there the last time I was here. It was about shoulder height and over twenty feet long. But the biggest eye catcher was that every inch of it was covered in newspapers. They had been nailed down at the top and sides so that people could flip them over and read the backs. A crowd of five or six people was gathered around the fence, some reading the same page, others were reading alone.
I’m not one for sentimentality, but there was something I wanted to know: how my home was doing. I was born in a small Russian village that I later learned became a small Polish town called Osowiec. I had heard that Russia was having a hard time against the Germans, and I wanted to know more about it. “Anybody see anything about Russia’s front?” I asked.
“Over here Alucard,” one of the men said and jerked a thumb at a page next to him.
“Thanks.” The article was about how the Germans had been trying to take several key positions over the last few months. The Eastern front was apparently nothing like it was here in the West, there were no fights ending in stalemate, no truces, and nothing even close to civilized combat. We had heard that the Germans were employing chlorine gas attacks in mass, but no one here had ever experienced it. It was commonly employed on the Eastern front, as well as other unsavory tactics. Then I read it:
German forces are still attempting to take multiple forts across Russian provinces. Retreats have been ordered from many areas, but some still remain. Most surprisingly is Fort Osowiec in Russian Poland. This fort has held its ground longer than anyone has expected it to, German troops try almost daily to take the fort but to no avail.
My home was under siege. It was surprisingly distressing to read; everyone I knew from there has long since died over a thousand years ago. Yet, those words bounced around in my mind, I couldn’t seem to let them go. Days passed, and I grew more anxious the more I thought of it. Perhaps it was some long dormant territorial instinct passed on from the beast that transformed me, the Bestia Krwi, or maybe it was some flicker of my former human life crying out. Either way, no matter how I tried, I simply could not put it out of my mind. I needed to act, lest I lose my sanity thinking about it. I decided to talk with the only person I could about it… Captain Lance.
I went to his private quarters and knocked on his door, which was a privilege the officers had that the rest of the men did not. Most of us made do with old blankets to keep our privacy, and to keep the bugs out. “Enter,” his voice called from inside. I opened the door and walked in. His quarters were bare, except for a single bed and trunk at the foot of it, as well as a desk laden with paperwork. It was a small and dimly lit room, but being so empty, it did not feel claustrophobic.
He turned and seemed rather shocked at seeing me, “Alucard? Did you need something?”
“I need to talk to you about something.” I said seriously and closed the door behind me.
“What’s wrong?” He asked and spun his chair around to face me.
“I think I need to leave for a while.”
His eyes widened, “What happened?”
“Nothing, I just have business I need to attend to.” He relaxed, perhaps he thought that his worst fear had been realized and I had eaten one of his men.
“What kind of business?”
“My home, where I was born, is under siege from German forces. I feel I must go and do something.”
He scoffed, “what do you plan on doing against an entire siege?”
“I don’t know, but I feel I must at least try to help them.” I felt like a sentimental fool; I knew I could do nothing against an entire army, yet every cell in my body screamed for action. The captain looked at the pile of paperwork on his desk and sighed.
“A soldier cannot simply leave his post… however, you are not a normal soldier.”
“I imagine if I were you would never even consider such a request, but let’s be honest… I scare you.”
“More accurately, what you might do to my men scares me.” We looked intensely at one another, as if daring the other in some way. “I will approve it on one condition.”
“Condition?”
“When you leave… don’t come back. I will tell everyone who asks that you grew ill and were rendered unable to fight and were shipped home. So, when you leave, stay gone.”
I thought for a moment, “…agreed.”
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Chapter 15: A Vile Night for the Living and the Dead
I injected some extra venom into the three dead bodies of the German soldiers before bounding over the wall and injecting venom into the nearest guard. He was standing by a metal building urinating when I quickly slammed my fangs into his neck and pumped venom in. He fell to the ground frozen but continued urinating for another few seconds. I fought off the urge to feed and instead let him live. He remained still, ten minutes passed, then twenty, then forty, until finally he stated to move again. Slowly he curled up into a ball and started clawing at his head. I watched as he hissed and rolled in pain for several minutes until finally stopping and lurched from side to side until he stood up in a hunched position. He stood, no longer a man, but a mindless beast, growling and snarling. Foaming at the mouth he turned to me and lunged like a rabid dog.I let the power flow through me and raised a hand, “Halte.” (Stop) He fell to his knees and his face plowed into the dirt and gravel. Slowly he stood up, calm, just like the three men from earlier. Aside from his pants around his ankles, a new set of fangs, and blood red eyes, he seemed like any other fellow. “Mach dich anständig.” I commanded. (Make yourself decent) His head tilted to the side, as if to think about my order, then he reached down and pulled his pants up as well as fixing his belt and tucking in his shirt. This time I spoke in English, “Raise your right hand.” He did nothing. “Hebe deine rechte hand,” this time he followed orders.
“So, you follow my orders, but you have to understand them.” I said to him, even though he had no idea what I was saying. “Kannst du sprechen?” I asked. (Can you speak?)
In a low growl, the creature’s voice strained and twisted out a single reply, “Ja.” (Yes.) His cognitive abilities were limited but still there. In this state, thinking must have been rather difficult for it. It would never be a scholar, but it might make a fine warrior. Its muscles pulsated with every movement, but I heard no heartbeat.
“Ich möchte sehen, wie geschickt Sie als Krieger sind, gehen Sie und töten Sie so viele Leute wie möglich in diesem Lager.” I told it. (I want to see how skilled of a warrior you are, go and kill as many people in that camp as you can.) In a flash, it turned and ran towards the nearest group to us. It was not a quiet ordeal, it snarled and howled as it tore into their bodies with it hands and fangs. It didn’t fight like a soldier, with skill and trained techniques; it attacked like an animal. I heard their screams, and the confused shouts of others who witnessed the carnage, but they were quickly silenced too. Gun shots and yells polluted the air, until a few minutes later an eerie calm settled on the camp. A lucky shot had caught the beast in the heart, but the damage was already done. I counted thirty-three mangled remains. “A single monster is worth over thirty men.”
I left the camp and found the three dead men I had injected with venom fighting with one another as if they were rabid dogs. “Genug davon,” I used my power on them. (Enough of that.) They froze, one’s mouth was around another’s neck and black blood dripped from it. I looked them over, they were so different from the other one that someone could have honestly questioned if they were ever even human in the first place. They were shriveled up, like the creature in the morgue. Their greyish skin had become dried and cracked. Their eyes were a pale grey, with narrowed pupils, even though it was dark. I reasoned that they were either currently blind or hypersensitive to light. Their clothes had been torn to shreds from the fighting. One by one they let go of one another and faced me. “Kann einer von euch sprechen?” (Can any of you speak?) They all growled, but none said a word; like they understood what speaking was but were unable to actually do it. They truly were different from a living specimen. I looked at their bodies, each was covered in wounds, but none of them was healing like I would.
“Time for a test. Geh ins Lager und töte alle.” (Go into the camp and kill everyone.) Unlike the living one, these three were slow. They didn’t move anything like it did; instead, they scrabbled around on all fours like some kind of demonic dogs. Their fangs bared, they charged into the camp.
By the time the sun rose, I had performed several tests of this nature and had fifteen total creatures, seven created from the dead and eight from the living. The camp was in ruins, parts destroyed from battle, other parts were aflame. What was left was covered in blood and severed appendages; these creatures were viciously thorough. I could see unbridled malicious behind each of their eyes, so much so that it unnerved even me. They had my unsatiable hunger, but also a roaring fury. I don’t know how to describe myself, maybe as broken or vile, I know I’ve certainly been called worse, but them… they were evil. I knew they wanted to kill everything they saw, even me, but my abilities kept them in check. I couldn’t help but wonder… if I was a monster, what did that make them?
“How many beasts like you have I unknowingly released on this world?” I thought aloud. I decided that once the war was over, I would need to search everywhere I had been throughout my life and make sure I didn’t leave any behind. I may be long lived but I try to stay in the same ten countries; those are the countries whose languages I understand and speak. Which would be Romanian, Spanish, English, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese, German, Polish, and French.
I watched the sun just begin to peak over the mountainside and took shelter in what remained of one of the barracks. “Only one test left to perform.” I had given orders to all of the beasts, in fact I gave them all the same order… not to move, no matter what. The sun crested over the top of the mountain’s snow-capped peak and the light bathed the creatures. At first, smoke rose from their exposed flesh, then blisters formed, then each and every single one burst into flames. To my surprise, none of them moved, or even reacted to the fire and burns. I began to question if they could feel pain. The ones made from the living held out the longest, twice as long as the dead in fact, but within minutes all of the monsters were ash, not even the bones remained. A part of me was mortified at such a violent reaction to sunlight, another part of me was fascinated. I had spent time in sunlight before, it definitely has an effect, but nothing like that. I become weak, too weak to move if I stay in it uncovered long enough. Once during a test of my endurance, I even suffered blistering, but nothing like what I had just witnessed. “I must remember to run tests on this.” I told myself.
I turned my attention away from the ashes and corpses and towards my current situation. I was days overdue to meet up with the rest of the team, my partner was dead and rotting in the forest, and I have to explain how I managed to singlehandedly wipe out an entire German army encampment. I had at least half a day to think of a lie to tell that would be believable; that’s how long it would take me to rendezvous with the others. Since I was in the barracks, the was plenty of materials to wrap myself in, although some of it was burned it was still better than what I had now; a bloodied and bullet hole ridden German army uniform. I found a spare beige shirt and some light grey trousers; I traded the boots I had for a nicer pair of black, officer’s boots that had a much better fit. I also found gloves that went about halfway up to my elbow to protect my hands. For good measure I also put on a black button-up trench-coat and an old patched grey cloth hat; it reminded me of the type a newspaper delivery boy would wear.
Once I was as covered as I could manage, I set out and began my trek up the mountain to my comrade’s position. With blazing speed, I ran up the cliff, leaping over boulders and going in as straight a line as possible. I stopped only twice. Once to feed on a passing moose and again on a deer. By nightfall, I had the meet up location within sight. We had agreed on a signal that let them know that we were coming. If they were still there, they would see it. I was hopeful I had moved fast enough to meet the original deadline, but I was fairly certain I was still at least a day late. I pulled out a small square mirror from my pocket and aimed it towards their position. I placed my hand in an L shape and flicked the mirror up and down three times, then paused before repeating it twice; that was the signal that it was me and not an enemy. A few seconds passed and I saw a flash repeat the pattern from their position; that was the return signal. I walked slowly now, or at least at a normal human speed, and arrived at the campsite an hour later.
As I approached the camp, I smelt Reynolds and Baker before I saw them, one was in the camp and the other was behind me. I heard the chambering of a bullet into a rifle then, “hands up, and turn around.” It was Reynolds’s voice. I did as he instructed. As soon as he saw me, he lowered his gun and sighed. “Dang it, Alucard; you nearly gave me a heart attack. What are you wearing, and where is Akerman?”
“It was this or a German officer’s uniform that was a size too small.”
“Okay but where is Akerman?”
“He didn’t make it; he was shot in our escape. He’s dead.” I explained.
He lowered his head, “dang, that’s too bad. Was the mission a success at least?”
“More than expected, we took out the entire place, not just the artillery.”
“Whose there?” Baker called from the camp and poked his head around the entrance to the small cave.
“It’s Alucard,” Reynolds told him then slung the strap his rifle over his shoulder.
“Just Alucard?” Baker wondered.
“Yeah, Akerman didn’t make it.” Reynolds explained. Baker shook his head and performed a catholic cross, then pulled a cross neckless from inside his shirt and kissed it. “Alucard, you mentioned that the whole camp was destroyed, but how?” Reynolds asked as we walked over to Baker.
“I’ll explain while we pack up, let’s get out of here.”
Chapter 16: A Hero’s Welcome?
The lie I had decided on was simple, the artillery was close enough to the munitions that when they detonated the explosion took out half the camp. In the chaos Akerman and I had stolen two high caliber rifles and picked off as many as we thought necessary. Once we had done so we started to run, but one of the soldiers that remained shot Akerman as we fled. They seemed to believe me, and only asked a few follow up questions. “Why not run after blowing the artillery, why stay to pick off stragglers?” Baker wondered.“We realized that there could have been someone who knew how to repair them, so we thought it was worth the risk… I still think we made the right call.” I said.
“Even with what happened to Akerman?” Reynolds asked. “We both took one look at the camp and knew it was probably going to be a suicide mission. Honestly, I’m amazed I survived.” After that they were satisfied, and we left the cave to go back to base. Just like last time, we traveled only under the cover of darkness, at least for the first half. Once we had left the danger zone, we felt it was safe enough to travel during the day too. That took a day off of our journey. Three days was all it took, and we were safely giving our after-action debrief to the captains and majors in their tents in the trenches. The fighting had stopped for the time being, but I could tell from the smell of hormones that tensions were still high.
Our debrief was given to Captain Lance, the man who originally gave us the mission, as well as Major Blanchet. We sat around a table, each giving our version of what happened. Once the others had finished, they were dismissed as they didn’t need to be there for the rest of it and were ready to shower and get a full night of sleep. Only The major, the captain, and I were left. I detailed the mission exactly as it happened up until the detonation of the artillery. I made sure to tell them the same thing that I told Baker and Reynolds, including the slightly altered details of Akerman’s demise.
“Perhaps we can locate Lieutenant Akerman’s body for a proper burial once we march through there.” Major Blanchet stated.
I was surprised to hear this, and it must have showed on my face because Captain Lance felt the need to explain. “With everything you have told us, the destruction of the artillery as well as most of the encampment, we have a clear shot to take the enemy by surprise.”
“They will be expecting an attack from the front, not the flank.” The major added. I was slightly worried, the camp was in ruins, but I neglected to do away with any of the bodies that I didn’t turn into undead. If they were inspected then it would be obvious that they were not killed by bullets or explosions, but it would seem as if they were mauled to death by animals. I even feed on some of them and allowed my creations to feed as well so I could observe, meaning many of the corpses would be without blood.
A soldier walked in and announced, “Major Blanchet, a letter has arrived for you sir. It’s marked urgent.”
“I can handle the rest of the debrief major,” Captain Lance said.
“Thank you, Captain,” the Major said and excused himself walking out of the tent.
Captain Lance turned to me, “tell me Alucard, is what you have told us today the truth?”
“Yes sir.”
“Then please explain to me why I keep getting the feeling that you are lying. Not about everything, but as soon as you and Akerman go off on your own I feel like that’s when the lies start.” He said and stood up.
“It’s the truth sir, every word.” I lied. The captain walked away from the table and turned his back to me to look at a chalk board with pictures and diagrams hung up on it by strings and clothespins. He removed several pictures and brought them back to the table.
Pointing at them as he spoke, he said, “these are stills taken by scouts of the camp you were sent to. Here is the artillery and here are the munitions building that our scouts spotted. They are nowhere nearly close enough to have detonated due to the TNT we gave you. So, something doesn’t feel right.”
“Sir, the scouts were wrong, or they moved the munitions building.” I told him. He was getting too aggressive, and I had decided to use my abilities to make him believe me. I didn’t want to as I prefer to only plunder around with enemy minds unless absolutely necessary. But then something I never expected to happen… did.
His eyes flashed a pale green and he spoke, “tell me the truth, tell me what happened at the enemy camp.” My brain felt foggy, and I began having thoughts enter my mind that I did not think, but I never lost control of myself. I fought and wrestled control of my mind back from the captain and his unforeseen power.
I was in control, but not of my emotions, “GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” I bared my fangs and slammed the table, breaking it in the process. Captain Lance quickly stepped back and drew his pistol, pointing it at my head. He lost his concentration, and his power left my mind, allowing me to regain my composure.
“What are you?” He asked. The captain reached into his pocket and pulled out a small silver cylinder. I watched as it melted and reformed into a long thin metal stick of some kind.
“Apologies,” I said and retracted my fangs, “I did not mean to yell, but if you attempt to use Mind Magic on me again, I will be forced to hurt you… badly.”
“You are not human, and you know of magic, I will ask again… who, or what, are you?”
“My name is Vladimir Dracula, and I am what you may know as a vampire. Now you will answer my question; did Merlin send you?”
His eyes widened, “you know of Merlin?”
“You didn’t answer my question.” I said.
His gun was still aimed at my head, “no, Merlin did not send me. I haven’t seen him in a very long time.”
“I take it that means you are one of his knights then, yes?” I asked.
He nodded, “I didn’t think vampires were actually real.”
“Well until a few years ago, I didn’t think that Merlin and King Arthur were real either, so no hard feelings.”
“If I put my gun down, are you going to try and eat me?” He asked.
“I don’t eat my allies; I do have standards.” He put his gun down and we both sat in our chairs at the destroyed table.
“So, what really happened at the camp?” Lance, who I found out later was really named Lancelot, asked.
“Up until the artillery, everything I said was true, but the explosion didn’t destroy the camp.”
“And Akerman?” He wondered.
“He really was shot and killed, but it didn’t happen like I said.” We sat there for an hour, I no longer had a reason to hide the truth, so I told him everything.
“So… you created undead monsters to destroy the camp, then you let them be killed by the sun?”
“Yes.”
“Did you do that to Akerman?”
“Of course not, he was an ally.”
“How did you get these abilities?” He asked.
“I don’t particularly feel like telling you my life story, just ask Merlin when you see him.”
“Speaking of which, when did you see him last, and where? I have been searching for him for a few years now, ever since my memories began to return.” He questioned.
“The last time I saw Merlin was in Italy back in the 1910s, and he was old then, so he has probably reincarnated by now.” He seemed disappointed to hear that. “Aren’t there supposed to be quite a few knights, where are the rest?” I asked.
“I haven’t located any of them yet.” He said. We talked a few more minutes about the mission, and what I knew about Merlin.
“I think that’s everything Aluca- uh... Dracula.”
“Just call me Alucard, in fact… forget you know anything about me. It’s what’s best for everyone.” I told him.
He took a deep breath and stayed quiet for a moment, “fine, but I’m keeping an eye on you.”
“Fine, but if you insist on watching me then I have a request. I work better at night, you’re a captain you should have the ability to switch me completely to night shifts.”
“…Fine, I’ll see what I can do.”
Chapter 17- 1915
Everything went back to normal after that, I was issued a new weapon to replace the one I lost and for my actions and the success of my mission Major Blanchet gave me a promotion to Lance-Corporal. Captain Lance was able to get me moved to night shift as I requested, and true to his word he kept a close eye on me by also joining night shift. He had me switched to his platoon so that he would be my superior. We stayed out of each other’s way as much as possible, as long as I followed the orders I was issued by my Sargent, he seemed happy. Although I think having me around still worried him, but he seemed to trust that I wouldn’t eat any of the men.The enemy had been attacking sporadically, short bursts to test our defenses. I was patrolling one night, not getting ready to hunt just watching for enemies, when I heard a few officers talking about news from all over the world. It was the first time in a while we had gotten any news at all, and most of it was bad. Zeppelins were dropping bombs on England’s coast, a submarine blockade had been declared by Germany against British shores, Britain had responded to a call of air from Russia against Turkish attacks, Russia suffered heavy losses after the battle of Masurian Lakes, and Germany had released hundreds of tons of poison gas against allied French and Canadian troops.
“Can you believe this, it’s only July and the world’s already on fire?” One of the men said.
“It’s been on fire, we are only just now hearing about it,” the other man replied.
“You two realize we are in the middle of a war-zone in a foreign country and have been for nearly a year right? We already knew the world was on fire because we have been in the middle of the flames.” A man, who was not a part of the conversation and simply interjected, said.
The other two stayed quiet for a moment, “…good point.”
I walked over to them, “where did you hear about this from?”
“I heard I from Captain Lance, and he said he read it from a stack of newspapers that got shipped to us.”
“Thanks,” I said and went back to my patrol. After my shift finished, I went to find these newspapers. I was just as interested to read what was happening as everyone else was. If Captain Lance had them, then they would probably be in the officer’s tent, or the communications tent. I checked the officer’s tent first. Captain Lance was there drinking coffee and reading a letter. Things weren’t as tense between us as they were at first, but that didn’t make them comfortable. “Captain Lance,” his eyes lifted from his letter, and I noticed he gripped his mug slightly tighter.
“Yes?”
“I was told that a shipment of newspapers arrived, are the men allowed to read them?”
He relaxed a bit and loosened his grip, “oh, yes, but they were taken to the mess to be put on display. We figured that was the best way for everyone to get a chance to read them without having everyone coming and going from the tent all day.”
“Thank you,” I said and left. The “mess” was at the back of the trenches. Really it was just a shack that cooked everyone food and handed it out on steel trays. I walked there and next to the shack was a wooden fence that was not there the last time I was here. It was about shoulder height and over twenty feet long. But the biggest eye catcher was that every inch of it was covered in newspapers. They had been nailed down at the top and sides so that people could flip them over and read the backs. A crowd of five or six people was gathered around the fence, some reading the same page, others were reading alone.
I’m not one for sentimentality, but there was something I wanted to know: how my home was doing. I was born in a small Russian village that I later learned became a small Polish town called Osowiec. I had heard that Russia was having a hard time against the Germans, and I wanted to know more about it. “Anybody see anything about Russia’s front?” I asked.
“Over here Alucard,” one of the men said and jerked a thumb at a page next to him.
“Thanks.” The article was about how the Germans had been trying to take several key positions over the last few months. The Eastern front was apparently nothing like it was here in the West, there were no fights ending in stalemate, no truces, and nothing even close to civilized combat. We had heard that the Germans were employing chlorine gas attacks in mass, but no one here had ever experienced it. It was commonly employed on the Eastern front, as well as other unsavory tactics. Then I read it:
German forces are still attempting to take multiple forts across Russian provinces. Retreats have been ordered from many areas, but some still remain. Most surprisingly is Fort Osowiec in Russian Poland. This fort has held its ground longer than anyone has expected it to, German troops try almost daily to take the fort but to no avail.
My home was under siege. It was surprisingly distressing to read; everyone I knew from there has long since died over a thousand years ago. Yet, those words bounced around in my mind, I couldn’t seem to let them go. Days passed, and I grew more anxious the more I thought of it. Perhaps it was some long dormant territorial instinct passed on from the beast that transformed me, the Bestia Krwi, or maybe it was some flicker of my former human life crying out. Either way, no matter how I tried, I simply could not put it out of my mind. I needed to act, lest I lose my sanity thinking about it. I decided to talk with the only person I could about it… Captain Lance.
I went to his private quarters and knocked on his door, which was a privilege the officers had that the rest of the men did not. Most of us made do with old blankets to keep our privacy, and to keep the bugs out. “Enter,” his voice called from inside. I opened the door and walked in. His quarters were bare, except for a single bed and trunk at the foot of it, as well as a desk laden with paperwork. It was a small and dimly lit room, but being so empty, it did not feel claustrophobic.
He turned and seemed rather shocked at seeing me, “Alucard? Did you need something?”
“I need to talk to you about something.” I said seriously and closed the door behind me.
“What’s wrong?” He asked and spun his chair around to face me.
“I think I need to leave for a while.”
His eyes widened, “What happened?”
“Nothing, I just have business I need to attend to.” He relaxed, perhaps he thought that his worst fear had been realized and I had eaten one of his men.
“What kind of business?”
“My home, where I was born, is under siege from German forces. I feel I must go and do something.”
He scoffed, “what do you plan on doing against an entire siege?”
“I don’t know, but I feel I must at least try to help them.” I felt like a sentimental fool; I knew I could do nothing against an entire army, yet every cell in my body screamed for action. The captain looked at the pile of paperwork on his desk and sighed.
“A soldier cannot simply leave his post… however, you are not a normal soldier.”
“I imagine if I were you would never even consider such a request, but let’s be honest… I scare you.”
“More accurately, what you might do to my men scares me.” We looked intensely at one another, as if daring the other in some way. “I will approve it on one condition.”
“Condition?”
“When you leave… don’t come back. I will tell everyone who asks that you grew ill and were rendered unable to fight and were shipped home. So, when you leave, stay gone.”
I thought for a moment, “…agreed.”
2023.03.29 21:59 swone [Canada/US] [H] NES, SNES, GB, GBA, GCN, Wii, WiiU, 3/DS, Switch, PS1/2/3/4, PSP/Vita, XBOX/360/One, Genesis, Consoles, Various [W] PayPal
All prices are in USD. Add an additional $5 to the total for shipping, $10 for consoles.
I live in Canada, but close enough to the border to ship to either country domestically.
All games CiB unless stated otherwise. Pics are available upon request.
NES (all loose except for Battletoads)
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I live in Canada, but close enough to the border to ship to either country domestically.
All games CiB unless stated otherwise. Pics are available upon request.
NES (all loose except for Battletoads)
- Battletoads $125
- Final Fantasy $25
- Isolated Warrior (label wear) $30
- Power Punch II $35
- Super Mario Bros. 3 $15
- Battletoads In Battlemaniacs $40
- Mortal Kombat $10
- Mortal Kombat II $15
- Super Bomberman 2 $40
- Super Mario World $10
- Final Fantasy Adventure $30
- Kirby's Star Stacker $25
- Dragonball Z Supersonic Warriors $20
- Harvest Moon Friends of Mineral Town $35
- Mega Man Zero $35
- Shaman King Soaring Hawk $10
- Mario Party 7 $60
- Megaman X Command Mission $75
- Time Splitters Future Perfect (no manual) $65
- The Last Story $65
- Little King's Story $20
- Pikmin 2 $80
- Punch-Out $30
- Wii Party $45
- The Croods Prehistoric Party $65
- Sonic Lost World $45
- Gear Club Unlimited 2 (Porsche Edition) $15
- The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild + Explorers Guide $65 ($35 without the guide)
- Pokemon Brilliant Diamond $40
- Trine Series 1-3 $45
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- Dynasty Warriors DS Fighter's Battle $15
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- The Sims 3 $15
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- Code of Princess $70
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- Nightmare Creatures II $55
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- Castlevania Curse of Darkness (no manual) $45
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- Darkwatch $30
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- Need for Speed Most Wanted $15
- Need for Speed Underground 2 $20
- Raw Danger $30
- Rogue Galaxy $15
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- Time Splitters Future Perfect $25
- True Crime New York City $15
- The Warriors (Greatest Hits) $40
- Ultimate Spider-Man (no manual) $30
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- God Of War Origins Collection (no manual) $30
- The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon $70
- Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance $15
- MotorStorm Pacific Rift $15
- Ridge Racer 7 $15
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- Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower $25
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- Legend of Heroes III Song of the Ocean $175
- Conker Live & Reloaded $40
- Jet Set Radio Future $50
- Mortal Kombat Armageddon $25
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- Dragon Ball Raging Blast $30
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- Fist of the North Star Ken's Rage 2 $45
- Lord of the Rings Conquest $20
- Metal Gear Solid HD Collection $35
- Top Gun Hardlock (sealed) $40
- Transformers: Dark of the Moon $15
- Transformers: Fall of Cybertron $45
- Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $10
- Transformers: The Game (Cybertron Edition) $25
- Transformers: War for Cybertron $40
- X-Men Origins Wolverine $30
- Ariel the Little Mermaid $20
- Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Quest (no manual) $15
- Chester Cheetah Too Cool to Fool (no manual) $25
- Dynamite Headdy (no manual) $45
- Greatest Heavyweights $15
- Hardball $10
- The Jungle Book (loose) $10
- Jurassic Park (no manual) $10
- Jurassic Park Rampage Edition (loose) $10
- NHL 96 $10
- NHL 98 $40
- Road Rash 3 (loose) $20
- Sonic the Hedgehog (loose) $10
- Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (loose) $15
- Super Hang-On (loose) $10
- Talespin $25
- Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (loose) $30
- Black GameCube (Complete) $150
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- Silent Hill: Book of Memories (Vita) $75
2023.03.29 21:46 RevolutionaryWalk762 Buy Verified CoinBase Accounts
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2023.03.29 21:43 disco-dingus My fiancé disappeared in 2018. I recently found out what happened to him.
Fans of classic soul will know the song.
Oh, Jimmy Mack, when are you coming back?
In another world it would be funny, but for years I asked that very question.
You see, my fiancé’s name is Jimmy Mack. He disappeared without a trace in 2018.
How do you disappear without a trace these days? It just doesn’t seem possible in a modern world, where almost everyone is somehow connected. Yet he did; he vanished. The police were baffled, private investigators were a waste of money, and my own attempts at sleuthing were futile.
If it wasn’t for the fact that we were ridiculously in love and things were so perfect, I wouldn’t have tried so hard. But everything was a vomit inducing fairytale for us. Even our names were cute af; Jimmy & Jessie sittin’ in a tree… I know he loved me as much as I loved him, and he would have done anything for me.
I heard all the theories. ‘Jess… Maybe he has a secret family… He might have been involved with criminals… Perhaps he took his own life…’
They didn’t know Jimmy like I did. I know you can never really know someone fully, but I knew those things could never be true of him. So I became estranged from family and friends, my life consumed with finding Jimmy. Every penny was spent on expensive investigation and cheap booze.
But then came the intervention. My mom, brother, and best friend Lori came to my apartment one evening. Mom took my hands.
“I want my daughter back,” she cried. And as I met the eyes of those closest to me it was like a weight had lifted. I dropped to the floor and cried for hours, releasing years of internal pain. It was exactly what I needed.
It wasn’t that I never thought of Jimmy again, but I began to move on. I even went on a couple of dates, and attended therapy sessions. There’s a whole psychology behind mourning an unexplained loss. I found it all very helpful.
Then I received a handwritten letter:
Dear Jessie,
You don’t know me but I have information about the disappearance of your fiancé James Mack in March 2018.
If you are interested in finding out more, meet me at Marcy’s Diner off [redacted]. I will be there between the hours of 20:00 and 22:00 every evening from Monday 13th - Friday 17th.
Come alone and sit in a window booth. I will make myself known as soon as I feel it’s safe to do so.
I repeat; come alone. If there’s any indication you have alerted the authorities, or discussed this with friends/family, the offer is void.
This offer is time sensitive. If you don’t visit the diner between those dates and times I will assume you are not interested. This will never be offered to you again in future.
Regards,
Anon
My hands trembled as months of progress began to unravel. I poured a shot of vodka and downed it, followed by one more to take the edge off. I was so close to calling Lori, her number ready to speed dial. I needed someone to talk sense into me, to tell me it was a hoax.
‘Don’t go through with it Jessie, it’s just some sicko taking advantage of your grief. Let’s go for cocktails!’
But I put my phone down and read the letter again. And again. I read it over and over, looking for something I might have missed despite the contents being clear.
◈
Monday came around. I pulled into the Marcy’s Diner car park just after 20:00, observing the patrons from the safety of my car. It looked pretty empty. Some tourists, a few trucker types. It was a convenient rest spot due to its location off the highway. No one screamed I have information about your beloved Jimmy Mack, like there was a physical description for that type of person.
I hung around for an hour or so before I chickened out and drove home. Rinse and repeat Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. On Thursday I didn’t even think about it. I parked up just before 20:00 and stepped out of my car, hesitating for the slightest moment before entering the chrome and candy stripe diner.
A few people observed me briefly before going back to their hot mugs and oversized burgers. As instructed I found a vacant window booth. They were all vacant. I chose the one furthest from the entrance. As I sat down I thought why the fuck did you think that was a good idea? My anxiety stopped me from switching seats regardless.
“Evening darlin’,” said a blond 40-something waitress wearing a blue gingham dress. She held a pot of coffee as she smiled down at me. “What can I get for you?”
“Oh, erm,” I was going to say nothing but realized that would be weird. “Coffee is good, thank you.”
She turned over a white mug that was on the table amongst novelty condiment bottles and laminated menus.
“Can I get you a slice of pie darlin’?” she said as she poured the coffee. “Cherry or chocolate-pecan.”
My stomach was in knots but I didn’t want to appear rude, so I opted for a slice of cherry pie. It arrived barely a minute later and I thanked her, then proceeded to tap my fingers on the table as I discreetly looked around the diner.
After an hour had passed I was three mugs of coffee down and had finished the pie, which was delicious. For a moment I’d forgotten my purpose for being there, beginning to relax a little. Then the door opened and a man walked in, giving me a quick glance as he headed to the counter. He wore a camo parka and what I’d call worker jeans, with a black baseball cap. He turned around after being handed a mug and I averted my eyes, looking out of the window. I could see his reflection getting closer to my table. When he stopped in my peripheral vision I turned, and he slipped into the seat opposite me.
“Jessie,” he said with a nod. “Pleased to see you inside the diner this evening.”
He had chiselled features and a little stubble. I put him in his early 40s. I cleared my throat.
“And what do I call you?”
He smiled. “You can call me Mike if it makes this easier for you.”
I shifted in my seat, trying to get comfortable. I folded my arms, then unfolded them, then put them on the table.
“Relax,” he said.
I let out a quick laugh. “That’s easy for you to say. I have no idea who you are. I don’t even know why I’m here, you gave no proof that you actually know anything about Jimmy.”
“I know everything,” he said deadpan. “And I’ll tell you if you want to hear it.”
I stared into his eyes until I felt mine glaze over, then cleared my throat again. “Let me guess; for a price?”
He shook his head. “I don’t want your money, Jessie.”
“Why now?” I snapped. “Do you know what these past 5 years have been like for me?” I felt tears coming on and he went to reach for my hand, but I recoiled. He pulled his hands away and looked apologetic.
“Unbearable, devastating, frustrating…”
“All the above!” I said as tears started to fall. “I couldn’t function at times. I stopped looking after myself. I abandoned my friends and family. It’s crazy how someone can do that to you.”
“Because you were in love,” he said.
“We were in love. We were the fucking Shutterstock image of love. And when that ends abruptly without explanation…”
“Everything alright darlin’?” the waitress interrupted, holding out a tissue. She glared at Mike. I took the tissue and nodded.
“Yes, thank you. I’m fine. Sorry, I’ll keep it down.”
“Don’t be sorry darlin’, you just let me know if you need anything, okay?”
“I will, thank you.”
She walked away and I wiped my eyes, feeling a little embarrassed.
“I can only apologize for how you’ve been feeling,” he said. “But I’m here to make it right. You could say I developed a conscience, or moral compass. I don’t know. I’m a changed man.”
I looked at him with confusion. “I don’t understand?”
“It’s easier if I show you,” he said. “But not here. You have to ask yourself if you trust me enough to go for a drive.”
“In your car?” I said. “Absolutely not!”
“Okay, how about if you drive?”
“To the middle of nowhere I bet?”
“Look Jessie,” he said, his eyes burning into me. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m really trying here, but if you’d rather leave it I get it.”
Call me stupid or naive, but something in his eyes made him appear somewhat genuine. I took a crazy chance.
“No… I need to know what happened to him.”
Mike nodded then raised a hand. “Say, could I get a slice of pie to go?”
◈
As predicted we were driving further into the wilderness than I would have preferred. The passing cars were few and far between.
“How much further?” I asked. “I might need to stop for gas.”
“Not too far now,” said Mike. “If you don’t mind sharing, do you remember the last moments you spent with James?”
I sighed. “I do, but I can’t remember the last time anyone called him James outside of the media. He hated it. He’d been Jimmy since elementary school.”
“Sorry,” he said. “Tell me about that last day you spent with Jimmy.”
“It was an ordinary day. A Wednesday. We woke up, had breakfast. I went to work, Jimmy worked from home. He called me on my lunch break like usual, just to hear your voice he always said. God, we were insufferable.” I let out a laugh.
“Take the next left,” said Mike. “I’m listening.”
“So yeah. We had a little chat, then I went back to work. I got home and Jimmy had already started dinner. He was a much better cook than me. We drank wine, watched a movie.”
“What movie did you watch?”
“The Notebook,” I laughed. “For the umpteenth time. I know, I hate us too.”
“Keep driving straight,” said Mike. “It’s a few minutes away.”
“What is?” I asked.
“What happened after the movie?” he said.
“Nothing, we went to bed.”
“Did you make love?”
I briefly turned to him in disapproval. “Excuse me?”
“Did you fuck?” he said, unflinching.
I shook my head. “No, sorry to disappoint you. Now where the hell are you taking me?”
“It’s just up here,” he said. “So you went to bed and then you never saw him again?”
I took a deep breath and shook my head. “Jimmy had already gone when I woke up. No note, no text. It was strange but I didn’t think too much of it at the time. I sent him a text asking where he was. When half the day went by with no response I started to worry.”
“And the rest is history, as they say.”
I nodded as I fought back tears.
“We’re here,” said Mike.
I looked around. It was dark, but from what the headlights illuminated I couldn't see anything but trees.
“What’s here?”
“Just stop the car. It’s a short walk.”
I felt my heart race as my vulnerable situation became apparent. I really was in the middle of nowhere with a strange man, one who had withheld information about my missing fiancé for 5 years. I stared at him wide eyed.
He shrugged. “I’m not really sure what I can say to make you more comfortable?”
I slowly reached for my bag and pulled out a pocket pistol. Mike let out a surprised laugh.
“Maybe I don’t need to say anything?” he said.
“This makes me more comfortable,” I said.
He nodded. “Fair enough. Let’s go.”
◈
After walking for several minutes, feeling grateful that I’d opted for comfortable footwear that evening, we came to a cabin within the trees. The porch was lit.
‘Jessie; you know better than this girl’ I thought to myself, my hand clutching the pistol inside my bag.
“Why did it have to be a cabin in the woods?” I said, Mike a few feet in front of me.
“I like solitude,” he said. “I can’t think of anything worse than living in the city.”
We walked up the steps to the porch area. At one end there was a single chair with a blanket on it, and a small table with some beer bottles. At the other end I spotted some deep red patches on the floorboards. Mike noticed me looking.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s deer blood. I’m pretty self sufficient out here.”
We entered the cabin and Mike turned on the lights. It was quite basic, not overly decorated. There were some framed pictures on the walls, a dinner table, and a living area with some chairs, a small television and a log burner.
“I’m kind of disappointed there’s no stag’s head mounted on the wall,” I said as I took in my surroundings.
Mike shrugged. “I don’t see the animals as a prize. It’s food, survival. There are a few skulls out back if you want to check them out?”
I shook my head. “I’m good.”
Mike put the slice of pie he’d got from Marcy’s on the kitchen counter.
“Water, beer?” He opened the fridge and pulled out a beer bottle.
“This isn’t a social visit,” I said. “And call me paranoid but that would make me very stupid."
He nodded. “You’re right, I hope you don’t mind if I have one though.” He screwed off the cap and took a swig. “Let’s sit.” He motioned to the living area and I followed him.
“You know it’s dangerous to leave your fire burning when you’re not home,” I said, feeling the warmth from the log burner as I took a seat on an armchair. I kept my bag by my side and my hand on the pistol.
“It gets cold in here,” he said, sitting on another chair. “I’ll take my chances.”
He spoke about his cabin for a while, the whole time I became increasingly more uncomfortable due to the fact that I’d needed the bathroom since leaving the diner.
“I’d like to get straight to the point,” I said. “But I really need to use the bathroom.”
“Sure,” he said, pointing to a door down a hallway. “Over there.”
The bathroom was clean enough, though I did my business without touching the toilet seat. Something that had become a habit when using strange or public bathrooms. As I washed up I heard a groaning noise that sounded like it came from another room in the cabin. My heart jolted.
“Mike?” I said, creeping out of the bathroom. I had my bag over my shoulder and my shaking hand gripped the pistol. “What was that sound?”
I peeked over to the living area and couldn’t see him. I started to panic.
“Mike?” I said loudly. “This isn’t cool. Where are you?”
I heard that muffled groaning noise again and jumped, turning on the spot. There was another door further down the hall. Against my better judgement I crept closer to it, flinching each time the groan was emitted. It got louder the closer I got to the door.
“Mike?” I said, my whole body trembling.
“Sorry Jessie,” I heard Mike say from behind, and suddenly a cloth covered my mouth. My bag slipped from my shoulder but I still had the gun in my hand which I lifted as I struggled. Mike brought his other arm around me and squeezed tight, pinning my arms to my body. I became lightheaded as I breathed in chemicals.
“Shush,” he said quietly in my ear. “Just let it be.”
As I blacked out I was screaming inside my head. ‘You stupid girl!’
◈
When I came to my vision was momentarily blurred, but as I focused I saw Mike opposite me. We were sitting at the dinner table.
“Welcome back,” he said. I attempted to stand but my right hand was cuffed to the table leg. I pulled on it several times until pain shot through my arm. “That’s solid oak. I mean, you might get free but probably at the expense of your wrist.”
“You bastard!” I screamed. “Let me go. Help! Help me please!”
“Calm down Jessie,” he said. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you there’s no one out here to help you.”
I started to cry as I shook. “Oh God… What are you going to do to me? Are you going to…”
“I told you already, I’m not going to hurt you! Though that wasn’t completely true because I’m sure you have a splitting headache right now?”
He got up and retrieved a small bottle from a cupboard, then filled a glass from the faucet. He placed the glass in front of me as well as two pills from the bottle.
“Paracetamol. You’ll thank me later.”
“I’ll never thank you!” I screamed, then moaned as my head pounded. I reluctantly picked up the pills and swallowed them with water. “Why am I cuffed?”
As he spoke he walked across the cabin. “Because I believe what you’re about to hear would cause you to run. When I’m done you’re more than welcome to leave, you have my word.”
He returned with a MacBook and placed it on the table. It looked alien amongst the cabin interior. My surprised expression must have been clear.
“I’m not a Luddite,” he said. “I have WiFi and Netflix just like you city folks.”
“Great,” I said sarcastically. “But you really need to start talking.”
“I don’t think you’re in any position to give demands,” he said. “But very well. Here’s the first thing you’re not going to like hearing: I’ve been inside your apartment.”
My jaw dropped. “Wha… What?”
He opened the MacBook and tapped on the keyboard, then showed me the screen. There were several images of my apartment interior. I picked up the glass and took a swig of water, wishing it was something stronger. “Why were you in my apartment Mike?”
“Well, here’s the next thing: I’m a serial killer.”
I shifted back on the chair and pulled on the cuffs, starting to hyperventilate. “Oh God oh God oh God…”
“Calm down Jessie,” he said.
“Give me a fucking break,” I shouted. “Jesus Christ!” I clung onto the cuffs with my free hand and pulled hard, groaning. The table only moved ever so slightly but I felt like I’d run a marathon. I sat up and stared at Mike as I breathed heavily. “You killed Jimmy?”
“I target lovers,” he said. “I observe them for months before I take things further. When the time is right I abduct one. Which one I choose is more down to opportunity than anything else. Then I pose a question: Are you prepared to sacrifice yourself for the one you love? Make a choice; you or them.”
I covered my mouth with a trembling hand. “Oh Jimmy… You sacrificed yourself for me.”
Mike tapped on the keys some more. “I install secret cameras in the lovers’ homes when they’re out. Like I said, I observe them for months, and not just outside. I need to get a feel for their relationship before I intervene. It has to be true love or it just doesn’t feel right. And you only get to see the real deal when no one else is looking. Excessive PDAs are often a sign of insecurity, they mean nothing really.”
He turned the screen back to me and a video was playing. “I edited this just for you.”
It showed Jimmy and I sitting at our breakfast bar. In the corner of the screen was Mar 7th 2018, 07:54.
“Wait!” I said, pausing the video. “I don’t think I want to see this.”
“You have to, Jessie. I’m sorry. You’re free to leave once it's over.”
I felt my heart through my chest. “Can I at least take you up on that drink?”
He got up and walked to the fridge, taking out a beer.
“Do you have anything stronger?” I asked.
He nodded and reached under the kitchen counter, then returned with a whisky bottle and two tumblers. He poured two measures and pushed one towards me, then sat back down.
“We’re all out of ice unfortunately.”
“Fuck the ice,” I said, downing it in one gulp. I closed my eyes as I felt my chest burn inside, then signalled for Mike to top me up. After a moment I hit play on the screen.
◈
Mar 7th 2018, 07:54
Jimmy and I eat breakfast. He picks up a strawberry and rubs it against my lips.
“Stop it,” I say, giggling as I slap his arm. “I have to leave shortly.”
“Come on Jess,” he says. “Open wide.” He puts the strawberry in my mouth then gently kisses my lips.
“To be continued,” I say, getting off the stool and grabbing my things.
“No fair!” he sulks.
“Have a good day babe,” I say, kissing his cheek.
“I love you, Jess,” he says, momentarily holding me against him.
“I love you more,” I say, pulling away to run to the door. “See you this evening.”
09:11
Jimmy comes out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around him, then goes to the bedroom.
10:36
Jimmy sits at the table on his laptop and takes a few work related calls.
12:05
Jimmy takes another call. “Hey you. Yeah. No, she won’t be back until like 7 at the earliest.”
I took another sip of whisky and briefly met Mike’s eyes as he watched me. I held the glass close to my chest, my knuckles white.
Jimmy continued. “Absolutely, I’d love to see you… Great, see ya soon.”
12:48
The buzzer rings and Jimmy uses the intercom. “It’s open.”
I downed the whisky and pushed the glass towards Mike. He leaned over and poured another measure.
Jimmy opens the door and in comes my best friend Lori. She embraces him.
13:09
They sit on the couch together.
“Shit, I’ve got to call Jess,” says Jimmy. “It’s our thing.”
“Seriously?” says Lori.
“Yep, every lunch break without fail. She’ll get paranoid if I don’t.”
Fucking asshole. It was never something I asked for or insisted on. Whatever makes him feel better.
He makes the call and puts a finger against his lips. In the meantime Lori unzips his fly and feels inside.
“Hey baby, how’s your day going? Ah, that’s awesome! Yeah, it’s been a productive morning. I’m gonna heat up some soup, what are you having?”
He puts his other hand behind Lori’s head and pushes it into his lap. His head slowly tilts back.
“That sounds amazing. Okay, well I just wanted to hear your voice baby. And you, can’t wait to see you later. Love you too. Bye.”
16:32
They come out of the bedroom and Lori puts on her shoes. Jimmy puts his arms around her from behind and nuzzles her neck.
“Do you have to leave already?” he says.
“What if she comes home?” says Lori.
“I promise you she won’t be home for a while. Come on.”
She turns and slaps his chest. “You’re a bad boy, Jimmy Mack.” They kiss.
17:43
They chop vegetables in the kitchen.
“I wish we were cooking for us,” says Jimmy.
“Me too,” says Lori. “We really should tell her soon. It’s gone on long enough.”
Tears stream as I finish my third whisky.
He nods. “I know. I keep trying. I already know how tonight will go. We’ll eat dinner and then she’ll want to watch some shit like The Notebook.”
Lori laughs. “I feel so bad for you.”
“She’s such a hopeless romantic,” he says.
“Hopeless being the operative word,” laughs Lori.
“Me-ow!” he laughs.
Mar 8th 2018, 01:22
The door to our apartment opens and in comes a tall figure dressed in black. They slowly open our bedroom door and creep inside. After a few minutes Jimmy leaves the room in a t-shirt and boxers, his hands up as he’s followed by the figure at gunpoint. They leave the apartment.
◈
I sat in silence staring at the screen.
“I’m sorry for what you’ve been through Jessie,” said Mike. “But as you can see he didn’t deserve your pain and suffering.”
I put the glass on the table and wiped the tears from my face. “Maybe not. But he didn’t deserve to die.”
“Would you say the same if you knew he chose you?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Well, like I said. I take one of the lovers and give them a choice. I’d never experienced something like this, having only observed genuine love. It threw me. He was a lying piece of shit but I still posed the question.”
Mike found another video and played it.
Jimmy is sitting on a chair in a dark room under a hanging light, his arms tied behind his back. He struggles to free himself.
“James Mack,” says Mike offscreen.
“Who are you?” screams Jimmy. “I’ll fucking kill you when I get free!”
“How much do you love Jessie?”
“What?”
“Would you die for her?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Jimmy shouts.
“Would you die for her?” Mike roars, coming into shot and putting his forehead against Jimmy’s. He holds a gun at his side.
Jimmy recoils. “I… I…”
“It’s you or her James!” Mike cocks the gun and holds it against Jimmy’s head. “Make your decision.”
“Her!” Jimmy cries. “Take Jessie! You’ll be doing me a fucking favor you psycho!”
Mike stopped the video as I covered my mouth. “How does that make you feel Jessie?”
I shook my head. “I’d like to see what your response would be if someone held a gun to your head.”
He nodded. “Fair point. But just so you know, I’ve targeted 5 couples so far and they all chose to sacrifice themselves.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I hate him for this but he still didn’t deserve to die.”
Mike came over and took a key out of his pocket, then released the cuff around my wrist. I gripped it with my other hand and held it against my chest.
“Oh, he’s not dead Jessie,” said Mike, walking to the kitchen counter. He picked up the box containing the pie.
“What?”
He walked across the room down the hall, then stopped at the door at the end.
“You’re free to go Jessie,” he said. “Or you can come say hi.”
He pushed open the door then disappeared. I got up and frantically looked around the cabin. I saw my bag sitting on a coffee table and rummaged inside. My gun, my keys, my phone were all there. I ran to the main door and breathed in the cool night air, then hesitated. I looked over my shoulder.
You stupid girl I repeated in my head over and over as I approached the door down the hall. There was a staircase leading down into a dimly lit basement. I could hear Mike’s voice and some groans as I slowly began to descend, my body trembling. There was a vile smell that got worse with every step. It made me retch.
When I got to the bottom I saw Mike standing over the figure of a pale man that sat with his back to me. He was wearing rags, and the skin I could see was dirty and covered in sores. His skin was impossibly stretched over visible bones. He was eating noisily as he groaned.
“Is that good James?” asked Mike, and I saw the figure nod enthusiastically. The back of his head revealed long thinning hair with bald patches.
Mike looked over his shoulder and smiled when he met my eye. “Oh my, James. You’ll never guess who’s come to visit?”
The figure looked up inquisitively, then turned his head in my direction.
I could see it in his eyes. His handsome features had been buried under a pale, gaunt complexion. But I could tell it was Jimmy by his eyes. It took him a few seconds to acknowledge who he was looking at but suddenly his eyes widened, the thin skin of his forehead flaking as it wrinkled. He had pie smeared across his mouth. He had some teeth missing and the ones I could see looked jagged and broken.
“Jessie?” he said, in a voice that wasn’t quite the same. It was weathered, like that of a senior citizen with a bad smoking habit.
My lips trembled as I nodded. “It’s me Jimmy.”
He suddenly stood and lunged towards me, his hands outstretched. I flinched but he was held back by shackles around his ankles.
“Jessie!” he groaned. My heart couldn’t take it, feeling like it was going to explode. I fell to my knees as the 5 year mystery was solved in the most horrifying way.
“Isn’t it nice of Jessie to stop by?” said Mike. “Even after the way you treated her.”
Jimmy became restless, pulling on the shackles. He kept groaning like he was in pain.
“How could you do this to him?” I cried. “Even a rabid beast doesn’t deserve this!”
Mike shrugged. “I guess I felt bad for you. I’d never really considered the feelings of anyone else until I saw just how much you loved this man. And when I witnessed his betrayal day after day I just grew to hate him more. I knew a bullet to the brain wasn’t enough for this piece of shit.”
Mike turned to Jimmy and started rubbing his back. “But you know, over the years this piece of shit has grown on me. We’re like family now, aren’t we James?”
“No!” Jimmy screamed, making me fall back. “No no no!”
He buried his face in Mike’s neck, making him scream in pain. Dark blood cascaded down Mike’s shirt. Considering Jimmy was wasted away to nothing, Mike's attempts at freeing himself were useless. He fell to the floor and pushed himself against the wall, holding the gaping wound on his neck.
“James… Don’t…” he managed before Jimmy pounced. It sounded like a wild animal devouring its prey. I covered my ears as I watched in horror, my body refusing to let me look away.
Before long Mike was silent and still, his eyes remained open as he slouched against the wall. Jimmy turned to look at me, at first appearing shy or embarrassed. His face and chest was covered in Mike’s blood. He licked his lips and attempted to wipe it away with the back of his skeletal arm.
Eventually he started to crawl towards me, only stopping when the shackles wouldn’t allow him to get any closer. He groaned, but it wasn’t in anger. His eyes became glassy and he started to cry.
“Jessie,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
My hands trembled as I reached out to him, scared beyond belief but my heart was breaking all over again. I was in two minds, but eventually my hand met his and I felt his bony fingers between mine.
“Oh Jimmy,” I said breathlessly. “I forgive you.”
We held hands for a moment before I stood up. “I’m calling for help.” I made my way to the stairs.
“No!” Jimmy shouted. His eyes pleaded with me. “No Jessie. Please.”
It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but I think most people would have done the same from a place of love.
Jimmy Mack is never coming back.
dd
DB
submitted by disco-dingus to nosleep [link] [comments]
Oh, Jimmy Mack, when are you coming back?
In another world it would be funny, but for years I asked that very question.
You see, my fiancé’s name is Jimmy Mack. He disappeared without a trace in 2018.
How do you disappear without a trace these days? It just doesn’t seem possible in a modern world, where almost everyone is somehow connected. Yet he did; he vanished. The police were baffled, private investigators were a waste of money, and my own attempts at sleuthing were futile.
If it wasn’t for the fact that we were ridiculously in love and things were so perfect, I wouldn’t have tried so hard. But everything was a vomit inducing fairytale for us. Even our names were cute af; Jimmy & Jessie sittin’ in a tree… I know he loved me as much as I loved him, and he would have done anything for me.
I heard all the theories. ‘Jess… Maybe he has a secret family… He might have been involved with criminals… Perhaps he took his own life…’
They didn’t know Jimmy like I did. I know you can never really know someone fully, but I knew those things could never be true of him. So I became estranged from family and friends, my life consumed with finding Jimmy. Every penny was spent on expensive investigation and cheap booze.
But then came the intervention. My mom, brother, and best friend Lori came to my apartment one evening. Mom took my hands.
“I want my daughter back,” she cried. And as I met the eyes of those closest to me it was like a weight had lifted. I dropped to the floor and cried for hours, releasing years of internal pain. It was exactly what I needed.
It wasn’t that I never thought of Jimmy again, but I began to move on. I even went on a couple of dates, and attended therapy sessions. There’s a whole psychology behind mourning an unexplained loss. I found it all very helpful.
Then I received a handwritten letter:
Dear Jessie,
You don’t know me but I have information about the disappearance of your fiancé James Mack in March 2018.
If you are interested in finding out more, meet me at Marcy’s Diner off [redacted]. I will be there between the hours of 20:00 and 22:00 every evening from Monday 13th - Friday 17th.
Come alone and sit in a window booth. I will make myself known as soon as I feel it’s safe to do so.
I repeat; come alone. If there’s any indication you have alerted the authorities, or discussed this with friends/family, the offer is void.
This offer is time sensitive. If you don’t visit the diner between those dates and times I will assume you are not interested. This will never be offered to you again in future.
Regards,
Anon
My hands trembled as months of progress began to unravel. I poured a shot of vodka and downed it, followed by one more to take the edge off. I was so close to calling Lori, her number ready to speed dial. I needed someone to talk sense into me, to tell me it was a hoax.
‘Don’t go through with it Jessie, it’s just some sicko taking advantage of your grief. Let’s go for cocktails!’
But I put my phone down and read the letter again. And again. I read it over and over, looking for something I might have missed despite the contents being clear.
◈
Monday came around. I pulled into the Marcy’s Diner car park just after 20:00, observing the patrons from the safety of my car. It looked pretty empty. Some tourists, a few trucker types. It was a convenient rest spot due to its location off the highway. No one screamed I have information about your beloved Jimmy Mack, like there was a physical description for that type of person.
I hung around for an hour or so before I chickened out and drove home. Rinse and repeat Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. On Thursday I didn’t even think about it. I parked up just before 20:00 and stepped out of my car, hesitating for the slightest moment before entering the chrome and candy stripe diner.
A few people observed me briefly before going back to their hot mugs and oversized burgers. As instructed I found a vacant window booth. They were all vacant. I chose the one furthest from the entrance. As I sat down I thought why the fuck did you think that was a good idea? My anxiety stopped me from switching seats regardless.
“Evening darlin’,” said a blond 40-something waitress wearing a blue gingham dress. She held a pot of coffee as she smiled down at me. “What can I get for you?”
“Oh, erm,” I was going to say nothing but realized that would be weird. “Coffee is good, thank you.”
She turned over a white mug that was on the table amongst novelty condiment bottles and laminated menus.
“Can I get you a slice of pie darlin’?” she said as she poured the coffee. “Cherry or chocolate-pecan.”
My stomach was in knots but I didn’t want to appear rude, so I opted for a slice of cherry pie. It arrived barely a minute later and I thanked her, then proceeded to tap my fingers on the table as I discreetly looked around the diner.
After an hour had passed I was three mugs of coffee down and had finished the pie, which was delicious. For a moment I’d forgotten my purpose for being there, beginning to relax a little. Then the door opened and a man walked in, giving me a quick glance as he headed to the counter. He wore a camo parka and what I’d call worker jeans, with a black baseball cap. He turned around after being handed a mug and I averted my eyes, looking out of the window. I could see his reflection getting closer to my table. When he stopped in my peripheral vision I turned, and he slipped into the seat opposite me.
“Jessie,” he said with a nod. “Pleased to see you inside the diner this evening.”
He had chiselled features and a little stubble. I put him in his early 40s. I cleared my throat.
“And what do I call you?”
He smiled. “You can call me Mike if it makes this easier for you.”
I shifted in my seat, trying to get comfortable. I folded my arms, then unfolded them, then put them on the table.
“Relax,” he said.
I let out a quick laugh. “That’s easy for you to say. I have no idea who you are. I don’t even know why I’m here, you gave no proof that you actually know anything about Jimmy.”
“I know everything,” he said deadpan. “And I’ll tell you if you want to hear it.”
I stared into his eyes until I felt mine glaze over, then cleared my throat again. “Let me guess; for a price?”
He shook his head. “I don’t want your money, Jessie.”
“Why now?” I snapped. “Do you know what these past 5 years have been like for me?” I felt tears coming on and he went to reach for my hand, but I recoiled. He pulled his hands away and looked apologetic.
“Unbearable, devastating, frustrating…”
“All the above!” I said as tears started to fall. “I couldn’t function at times. I stopped looking after myself. I abandoned my friends and family. It’s crazy how someone can do that to you.”
“Because you were in love,” he said.
“We were in love. We were the fucking Shutterstock image of love. And when that ends abruptly without explanation…”
“Everything alright darlin’?” the waitress interrupted, holding out a tissue. She glared at Mike. I took the tissue and nodded.
“Yes, thank you. I’m fine. Sorry, I’ll keep it down.”
“Don’t be sorry darlin’, you just let me know if you need anything, okay?”
“I will, thank you.”
She walked away and I wiped my eyes, feeling a little embarrassed.
“I can only apologize for how you’ve been feeling,” he said. “But I’m here to make it right. You could say I developed a conscience, or moral compass. I don’t know. I’m a changed man.”
I looked at him with confusion. “I don’t understand?”
“It’s easier if I show you,” he said. “But not here. You have to ask yourself if you trust me enough to go for a drive.”
“In your car?” I said. “Absolutely not!”
“Okay, how about if you drive?”
“To the middle of nowhere I bet?”
“Look Jessie,” he said, his eyes burning into me. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m really trying here, but if you’d rather leave it I get it.”
Call me stupid or naive, but something in his eyes made him appear somewhat genuine. I took a crazy chance.
“No… I need to know what happened to him.”
Mike nodded then raised a hand. “Say, could I get a slice of pie to go?”
◈
As predicted we were driving further into the wilderness than I would have preferred. The passing cars were few and far between.
“How much further?” I asked. “I might need to stop for gas.”
“Not too far now,” said Mike. “If you don’t mind sharing, do you remember the last moments you spent with James?”
I sighed. “I do, but I can’t remember the last time anyone called him James outside of the media. He hated it. He’d been Jimmy since elementary school.”
“Sorry,” he said. “Tell me about that last day you spent with Jimmy.”
“It was an ordinary day. A Wednesday. We woke up, had breakfast. I went to work, Jimmy worked from home. He called me on my lunch break like usual, just to hear your voice he always said. God, we were insufferable.” I let out a laugh.
“Take the next left,” said Mike. “I’m listening.”
“So yeah. We had a little chat, then I went back to work. I got home and Jimmy had already started dinner. He was a much better cook than me. We drank wine, watched a movie.”
“What movie did you watch?”
“The Notebook,” I laughed. “For the umpteenth time. I know, I hate us too.”
“Keep driving straight,” said Mike. “It’s a few minutes away.”
“What is?” I asked.
“What happened after the movie?” he said.
“Nothing, we went to bed.”
“Did you make love?”
I briefly turned to him in disapproval. “Excuse me?”
“Did you fuck?” he said, unflinching.
I shook my head. “No, sorry to disappoint you. Now where the hell are you taking me?”
“It’s just up here,” he said. “So you went to bed and then you never saw him again?”
I took a deep breath and shook my head. “Jimmy had already gone when I woke up. No note, no text. It was strange but I didn’t think too much of it at the time. I sent him a text asking where he was. When half the day went by with no response I started to worry.”
“And the rest is history, as they say.”
I nodded as I fought back tears.
“We’re here,” said Mike.
I looked around. It was dark, but from what the headlights illuminated I couldn't see anything but trees.
“What’s here?”
“Just stop the car. It’s a short walk.”
I felt my heart race as my vulnerable situation became apparent. I really was in the middle of nowhere with a strange man, one who had withheld information about my missing fiancé for 5 years. I stared at him wide eyed.
He shrugged. “I’m not really sure what I can say to make you more comfortable?”
I slowly reached for my bag and pulled out a pocket pistol. Mike let out a surprised laugh.
“Maybe I don’t need to say anything?” he said.
“This makes me more comfortable,” I said.
He nodded. “Fair enough. Let’s go.”
◈
After walking for several minutes, feeling grateful that I’d opted for comfortable footwear that evening, we came to a cabin within the trees. The porch was lit.
‘Jessie; you know better than this girl’ I thought to myself, my hand clutching the pistol inside my bag.
“Why did it have to be a cabin in the woods?” I said, Mike a few feet in front of me.
“I like solitude,” he said. “I can’t think of anything worse than living in the city.”
We walked up the steps to the porch area. At one end there was a single chair with a blanket on it, and a small table with some beer bottles. At the other end I spotted some deep red patches on the floorboards. Mike noticed me looking.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s deer blood. I’m pretty self sufficient out here.”
We entered the cabin and Mike turned on the lights. It was quite basic, not overly decorated. There were some framed pictures on the walls, a dinner table, and a living area with some chairs, a small television and a log burner.
“I’m kind of disappointed there’s no stag’s head mounted on the wall,” I said as I took in my surroundings.
Mike shrugged. “I don’t see the animals as a prize. It’s food, survival. There are a few skulls out back if you want to check them out?”
I shook my head. “I’m good.”
Mike put the slice of pie he’d got from Marcy’s on the kitchen counter.
“Water, beer?” He opened the fridge and pulled out a beer bottle.
“This isn’t a social visit,” I said. “And call me paranoid but that would make me very stupid."
He nodded. “You’re right, I hope you don’t mind if I have one though.” He screwed off the cap and took a swig. “Let’s sit.” He motioned to the living area and I followed him.
“You know it’s dangerous to leave your fire burning when you’re not home,” I said, feeling the warmth from the log burner as I took a seat on an armchair. I kept my bag by my side and my hand on the pistol.
“It gets cold in here,” he said, sitting on another chair. “I’ll take my chances.”
He spoke about his cabin for a while, the whole time I became increasingly more uncomfortable due to the fact that I’d needed the bathroom since leaving the diner.
“I’d like to get straight to the point,” I said. “But I really need to use the bathroom.”
“Sure,” he said, pointing to a door down a hallway. “Over there.”
The bathroom was clean enough, though I did my business without touching the toilet seat. Something that had become a habit when using strange or public bathrooms. As I washed up I heard a groaning noise that sounded like it came from another room in the cabin. My heart jolted.
“Mike?” I said, creeping out of the bathroom. I had my bag over my shoulder and my shaking hand gripped the pistol. “What was that sound?”
I peeked over to the living area and couldn’t see him. I started to panic.
“Mike?” I said loudly. “This isn’t cool. Where are you?”
I heard that muffled groaning noise again and jumped, turning on the spot. There was another door further down the hall. Against my better judgement I crept closer to it, flinching each time the groan was emitted. It got louder the closer I got to the door.
“Mike?” I said, my whole body trembling.
“Sorry Jessie,” I heard Mike say from behind, and suddenly a cloth covered my mouth. My bag slipped from my shoulder but I still had the gun in my hand which I lifted as I struggled. Mike brought his other arm around me and squeezed tight, pinning my arms to my body. I became lightheaded as I breathed in chemicals.
“Shush,” he said quietly in my ear. “Just let it be.”
As I blacked out I was screaming inside my head. ‘You stupid girl!’
◈
When I came to my vision was momentarily blurred, but as I focused I saw Mike opposite me. We were sitting at the dinner table.
“Welcome back,” he said. I attempted to stand but my right hand was cuffed to the table leg. I pulled on it several times until pain shot through my arm. “That’s solid oak. I mean, you might get free but probably at the expense of your wrist.”
“You bastard!” I screamed. “Let me go. Help! Help me please!”
“Calm down Jessie,” he said. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you there’s no one out here to help you.”
I started to cry as I shook. “Oh God… What are you going to do to me? Are you going to…”
“I told you already, I’m not going to hurt you! Though that wasn’t completely true because I’m sure you have a splitting headache right now?”
He got up and retrieved a small bottle from a cupboard, then filled a glass from the faucet. He placed the glass in front of me as well as two pills from the bottle.
“Paracetamol. You’ll thank me later.”
“I’ll never thank you!” I screamed, then moaned as my head pounded. I reluctantly picked up the pills and swallowed them with water. “Why am I cuffed?”
As he spoke he walked across the cabin. “Because I believe what you’re about to hear would cause you to run. When I’m done you’re more than welcome to leave, you have my word.”
He returned with a MacBook and placed it on the table. It looked alien amongst the cabin interior. My surprised expression must have been clear.
“I’m not a Luddite,” he said. “I have WiFi and Netflix just like you city folks.”
“Great,” I said sarcastically. “But you really need to start talking.”
“I don’t think you’re in any position to give demands,” he said. “But very well. Here’s the first thing you’re not going to like hearing: I’ve been inside your apartment.”
My jaw dropped. “Wha… What?”
He opened the MacBook and tapped on the keyboard, then showed me the screen. There were several images of my apartment interior. I picked up the glass and took a swig of water, wishing it was something stronger. “Why were you in my apartment Mike?”
“Well, here’s the next thing: I’m a serial killer.”
I shifted back on the chair and pulled on the cuffs, starting to hyperventilate. “Oh God oh God oh God…”
“Calm down Jessie,” he said.
“Give me a fucking break,” I shouted. “Jesus Christ!” I clung onto the cuffs with my free hand and pulled hard, groaning. The table only moved ever so slightly but I felt like I’d run a marathon. I sat up and stared at Mike as I breathed heavily. “You killed Jimmy?”
“I target lovers,” he said. “I observe them for months before I take things further. When the time is right I abduct one. Which one I choose is more down to opportunity than anything else. Then I pose a question: Are you prepared to sacrifice yourself for the one you love? Make a choice; you or them.”
I covered my mouth with a trembling hand. “Oh Jimmy… You sacrificed yourself for me.”
Mike tapped on the keys some more. “I install secret cameras in the lovers’ homes when they’re out. Like I said, I observe them for months, and not just outside. I need to get a feel for their relationship before I intervene. It has to be true love or it just doesn’t feel right. And you only get to see the real deal when no one else is looking. Excessive PDAs are often a sign of insecurity, they mean nothing really.”
He turned the screen back to me and a video was playing. “I edited this just for you.”
It showed Jimmy and I sitting at our breakfast bar. In the corner of the screen was Mar 7th 2018, 07:54.
“Wait!” I said, pausing the video. “I don’t think I want to see this.”
“You have to, Jessie. I’m sorry. You’re free to leave once it's over.”
I felt my heart through my chest. “Can I at least take you up on that drink?”
He got up and walked to the fridge, taking out a beer.
“Do you have anything stronger?” I asked.
He nodded and reached under the kitchen counter, then returned with a whisky bottle and two tumblers. He poured two measures and pushed one towards me, then sat back down.
“We’re all out of ice unfortunately.”
“Fuck the ice,” I said, downing it in one gulp. I closed my eyes as I felt my chest burn inside, then signalled for Mike to top me up. After a moment I hit play on the screen.
◈
Mar 7th 2018, 07:54
Jimmy and I eat breakfast. He picks up a strawberry and rubs it against my lips.
“Stop it,” I say, giggling as I slap his arm. “I have to leave shortly.”
“Come on Jess,” he says. “Open wide.” He puts the strawberry in my mouth then gently kisses my lips.
“To be continued,” I say, getting off the stool and grabbing my things.
“No fair!” he sulks.
“Have a good day babe,” I say, kissing his cheek.
“I love you, Jess,” he says, momentarily holding me against him.
“I love you more,” I say, pulling away to run to the door. “See you this evening.”
09:11
Jimmy comes out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around him, then goes to the bedroom.
10:36
Jimmy sits at the table on his laptop and takes a few work related calls.
12:05
Jimmy takes another call. “Hey you. Yeah. No, she won’t be back until like 7 at the earliest.”
I took another sip of whisky and briefly met Mike’s eyes as he watched me. I held the glass close to my chest, my knuckles white.
Jimmy continued. “Absolutely, I’d love to see you… Great, see ya soon.”
12:48
The buzzer rings and Jimmy uses the intercom. “It’s open.”
I downed the whisky and pushed the glass towards Mike. He leaned over and poured another measure.
Jimmy opens the door and in comes my best friend Lori. She embraces him.
13:09
They sit on the couch together.
“Shit, I’ve got to call Jess,” says Jimmy. “It’s our thing.”
“Seriously?” says Lori.
“Yep, every lunch break without fail. She’ll get paranoid if I don’t.”
Fucking asshole. It was never something I asked for or insisted on. Whatever makes him feel better.
He makes the call and puts a finger against his lips. In the meantime Lori unzips his fly and feels inside.
“Hey baby, how’s your day going? Ah, that’s awesome! Yeah, it’s been a productive morning. I’m gonna heat up some soup, what are you having?”
He puts his other hand behind Lori’s head and pushes it into his lap. His head slowly tilts back.
“That sounds amazing. Okay, well I just wanted to hear your voice baby. And you, can’t wait to see you later. Love you too. Bye.”
16:32
They come out of the bedroom and Lori puts on her shoes. Jimmy puts his arms around her from behind and nuzzles her neck.
“Do you have to leave already?” he says.
“What if she comes home?” says Lori.
“I promise you she won’t be home for a while. Come on.”
She turns and slaps his chest. “You’re a bad boy, Jimmy Mack.” They kiss.
17:43
They chop vegetables in the kitchen.
“I wish we were cooking for us,” says Jimmy.
“Me too,” says Lori. “We really should tell her soon. It’s gone on long enough.”
Tears stream as I finish my third whisky.
He nods. “I know. I keep trying. I already know how tonight will go. We’ll eat dinner and then she’ll want to watch some shit like The Notebook.”
Lori laughs. “I feel so bad for you.”
“She’s such a hopeless romantic,” he says.
“Hopeless being the operative word,” laughs Lori.
“Me-ow!” he laughs.
Mar 8th 2018, 01:22
The door to our apartment opens and in comes a tall figure dressed in black. They slowly open our bedroom door and creep inside. After a few minutes Jimmy leaves the room in a t-shirt and boxers, his hands up as he’s followed by the figure at gunpoint. They leave the apartment.
◈
I sat in silence staring at the screen.
“I’m sorry for what you’ve been through Jessie,” said Mike. “But as you can see he didn’t deserve your pain and suffering.”
I put the glass on the table and wiped the tears from my face. “Maybe not. But he didn’t deserve to die.”
“Would you say the same if you knew he chose you?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Well, like I said. I take one of the lovers and give them a choice. I’d never experienced something like this, having only observed genuine love. It threw me. He was a lying piece of shit but I still posed the question.”
Mike found another video and played it.
Jimmy is sitting on a chair in a dark room under a hanging light, his arms tied behind his back. He struggles to free himself.
“James Mack,” says Mike offscreen.
“Who are you?” screams Jimmy. “I’ll fucking kill you when I get free!”
“How much do you love Jessie?”
“What?”
“Would you die for her?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Jimmy shouts.
“Would you die for her?” Mike roars, coming into shot and putting his forehead against Jimmy’s. He holds a gun at his side.
Jimmy recoils. “I… I…”
“It’s you or her James!” Mike cocks the gun and holds it against Jimmy’s head. “Make your decision.”
“Her!” Jimmy cries. “Take Jessie! You’ll be doing me a fucking favor you psycho!”
Mike stopped the video as I covered my mouth. “How does that make you feel Jessie?”
I shook my head. “I’d like to see what your response would be if someone held a gun to your head.”
He nodded. “Fair point. But just so you know, I’ve targeted 5 couples so far and they all chose to sacrifice themselves.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I hate him for this but he still didn’t deserve to die.”
Mike came over and took a key out of his pocket, then released the cuff around my wrist. I gripped it with my other hand and held it against my chest.
“Oh, he’s not dead Jessie,” said Mike, walking to the kitchen counter. He picked up the box containing the pie.
“What?”
He walked across the room down the hall, then stopped at the door at the end.
“You’re free to go Jessie,” he said. “Or you can come say hi.”
He pushed open the door then disappeared. I got up and frantically looked around the cabin. I saw my bag sitting on a coffee table and rummaged inside. My gun, my keys, my phone were all there. I ran to the main door and breathed in the cool night air, then hesitated. I looked over my shoulder.
You stupid girl I repeated in my head over and over as I approached the door down the hall. There was a staircase leading down into a dimly lit basement. I could hear Mike’s voice and some groans as I slowly began to descend, my body trembling. There was a vile smell that got worse with every step. It made me retch.
When I got to the bottom I saw Mike standing over the figure of a pale man that sat with his back to me. He was wearing rags, and the skin I could see was dirty and covered in sores. His skin was impossibly stretched over visible bones. He was eating noisily as he groaned.
“Is that good James?” asked Mike, and I saw the figure nod enthusiastically. The back of his head revealed long thinning hair with bald patches.
Mike looked over his shoulder and smiled when he met my eye. “Oh my, James. You’ll never guess who’s come to visit?”
The figure looked up inquisitively, then turned his head in my direction.
I could see it in his eyes. His handsome features had been buried under a pale, gaunt complexion. But I could tell it was Jimmy by his eyes. It took him a few seconds to acknowledge who he was looking at but suddenly his eyes widened, the thin skin of his forehead flaking as it wrinkled. He had pie smeared across his mouth. He had some teeth missing and the ones I could see looked jagged and broken.
“Jessie?” he said, in a voice that wasn’t quite the same. It was weathered, like that of a senior citizen with a bad smoking habit.
My lips trembled as I nodded. “It’s me Jimmy.”
He suddenly stood and lunged towards me, his hands outstretched. I flinched but he was held back by shackles around his ankles.
“Jessie!” he groaned. My heart couldn’t take it, feeling like it was going to explode. I fell to my knees as the 5 year mystery was solved in the most horrifying way.
“Isn’t it nice of Jessie to stop by?” said Mike. “Even after the way you treated her.”
Jimmy became restless, pulling on the shackles. He kept groaning like he was in pain.
“How could you do this to him?” I cried. “Even a rabid beast doesn’t deserve this!”
Mike shrugged. “I guess I felt bad for you. I’d never really considered the feelings of anyone else until I saw just how much you loved this man. And when I witnessed his betrayal day after day I just grew to hate him more. I knew a bullet to the brain wasn’t enough for this piece of shit.”
Mike turned to Jimmy and started rubbing his back. “But you know, over the years this piece of shit has grown on me. We’re like family now, aren’t we James?”
“No!” Jimmy screamed, making me fall back. “No no no!”
He buried his face in Mike’s neck, making him scream in pain. Dark blood cascaded down Mike’s shirt. Considering Jimmy was wasted away to nothing, Mike's attempts at freeing himself were useless. He fell to the floor and pushed himself against the wall, holding the gaping wound on his neck.
“James… Don’t…” he managed before Jimmy pounced. It sounded like a wild animal devouring its prey. I covered my ears as I watched in horror, my body refusing to let me look away.
Before long Mike was silent and still, his eyes remained open as he slouched against the wall. Jimmy turned to look at me, at first appearing shy or embarrassed. His face and chest was covered in Mike’s blood. He licked his lips and attempted to wipe it away with the back of his skeletal arm.
Eventually he started to crawl towards me, only stopping when the shackles wouldn’t allow him to get any closer. He groaned, but it wasn’t in anger. His eyes became glassy and he started to cry.
“Jessie,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
My hands trembled as I reached out to him, scared beyond belief but my heart was breaking all over again. I was in two minds, but eventually my hand met his and I felt his bony fingers between mine.
“Oh Jimmy,” I said breathlessly. “I forgive you.”
We held hands for a moment before I stood up. “I’m calling for help.” I made my way to the stairs.
“No!” Jimmy shouted. His eyes pleaded with me. “No Jessie. Please.”
It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but I think most people would have done the same from a place of love.
Jimmy Mack is never coming back.
dd
DB
2023.03.29 21:35 PixelPerfic Thoughts on the New Skill Livestream
I watched the livestream yesterday and the mods suggested a few roadblocks that they will run into during the development of each.
I’ll try to highlight a few that I thought about and share a few ideas. I’m curious to see what other people have come up with.
Taming Problem: “Will Taming interact with Combat?”
My answer overall would be no, but that’s the lazy way of going about this. I’d like to take the approach of trying to make it work first.
The mods seemed to stall on the idea of combat. They felt like it would be weird to have a pet like a wolf or dragon that could be very handy in combat stand there doing nothing, but also felt like it’d feel equally weird if they acted like Thralls, doing 1-3 damage when they do attack.
My idea would be to have a combat passive on the creatures, as well as a secondary special attack bar on creatures that can be tamed at level 60+ without having them attack normally to do damage.
Imagining a wolf in this case giving you a + bonus on slash weapons or a speed bonus with a spec that works similarly to the dragon daggeclaws would make sense in my mind. That way you’d have a satisfying weapon to time in combat thats maybe disabled from your pet taking a few hits of damage.
Sailing: “How will sailing work mechanically?”
The mods already mentioned how they’ve been brainstorming a couple of different ways to input movement for ships into the game. I feel a mechanic similar to how routes are drawn in The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass could work well. Have a more intuitive map that allows charting a course for the boat to automatically follow and have the player’s focus on a camera angle set behind the boat instead of a top down one. It will add more of a unique feel while sailing and could also provide the opportunity to more accurately click on areas immediately around your vessel to make attacking approaching monsters or fishing out sunken loot easier.
The mods mentioned wanting to create more dynamic ocean tiles vs. the simple blue tiles that are currently in game, which I think is a great idea. Having islands that will pop up from time to time or ghost ships could be an interesting twist too.
As far as a passive way to level, perhaps providing your crew with resources to use throughout an expedition that they go out to do themselves would be good. The return would be xp and a variety of non-tradable loot/resources you can use for upgrading your vessel over time. The experience would be less than going out yourself, but would allow you to work on other things while they do some work for you.
Shamanism: “How will weapon enchantments work?” or “How will the spirit realm be implemented?”
I personally haven’t gotten to end game content, so I don’t feel informed enough to tackle the questions surrounding how they’ll balance the weapon enhancements. I’ll instead talk about what I’d like to see from the spirit realm.
The mods were spitballing whether to build an entirely new area or have a mirrored overlay of Gielenor that looks different in some ways. Think of it looking like a texture pack with a very similar layout, but with different content and NPCs rather than a different area entirely.
I personally would like to see an entirely new area built around the concept of a spirit realm. Perhaps with referenced passed away characters from the lore that lived in different eras mixed with unique races. It would be interesting to have shamanism as well as some other skills work differently in the spirit realm versus the over world with different resources to work with.
All this being said, shamanism definitely should be fleshed out a bit more before suggestions can be made. The mods expressed how they don’t want the elements of it being confused with druids or herblore and want it to be seen more as spiritual in the sense of being a different magic than the ones given from runes. We still don’t have a strong understanding of what it can potentially be versus the other two skills, which is both exciting and worrying.
Anyways, that’s my two cents. I was tunnel visioned on one of the three new levels when they were first announced, but after hearing what the mods have to say, I’m confident that whatever passes, if any at all, will be a very welcomed new piece of content to the game. What do you think?
submitted by PixelPerfic to 2007scape [link] [comments]
I’ll try to highlight a few that I thought about and share a few ideas. I’m curious to see what other people have come up with.
Taming Problem: “Will Taming interact with Combat?”
My answer overall would be no, but that’s the lazy way of going about this. I’d like to take the approach of trying to make it work first.
The mods seemed to stall on the idea of combat. They felt like it would be weird to have a pet like a wolf or dragon that could be very handy in combat stand there doing nothing, but also felt like it’d feel equally weird if they acted like Thralls, doing 1-3 damage when they do attack.
My idea would be to have a combat passive on the creatures, as well as a secondary special attack bar on creatures that can be tamed at level 60+ without having them attack normally to do damage.
Imagining a wolf in this case giving you a + bonus on slash weapons or a speed bonus with a spec that works similarly to the dragon daggeclaws would make sense in my mind. That way you’d have a satisfying weapon to time in combat thats maybe disabled from your pet taking a few hits of damage.
Sailing: “How will sailing work mechanically?”
The mods already mentioned how they’ve been brainstorming a couple of different ways to input movement for ships into the game. I feel a mechanic similar to how routes are drawn in The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass could work well. Have a more intuitive map that allows charting a course for the boat to automatically follow and have the player’s focus on a camera angle set behind the boat instead of a top down one. It will add more of a unique feel while sailing and could also provide the opportunity to more accurately click on areas immediately around your vessel to make attacking approaching monsters or fishing out sunken loot easier.
The mods mentioned wanting to create more dynamic ocean tiles vs. the simple blue tiles that are currently in game, which I think is a great idea. Having islands that will pop up from time to time or ghost ships could be an interesting twist too.
As far as a passive way to level, perhaps providing your crew with resources to use throughout an expedition that they go out to do themselves would be good. The return would be xp and a variety of non-tradable loot/resources you can use for upgrading your vessel over time. The experience would be less than going out yourself, but would allow you to work on other things while they do some work for you.
Shamanism: “How will weapon enchantments work?” or “How will the spirit realm be implemented?”
I personally haven’t gotten to end game content, so I don’t feel informed enough to tackle the questions surrounding how they’ll balance the weapon enhancements. I’ll instead talk about what I’d like to see from the spirit realm.
The mods were spitballing whether to build an entirely new area or have a mirrored overlay of Gielenor that looks different in some ways. Think of it looking like a texture pack with a very similar layout, but with different content and NPCs rather than a different area entirely.
I personally would like to see an entirely new area built around the concept of a spirit realm. Perhaps with referenced passed away characters from the lore that lived in different eras mixed with unique races. It would be interesting to have shamanism as well as some other skills work differently in the spirit realm versus the over world with different resources to work with.
All this being said, shamanism definitely should be fleshed out a bit more before suggestions can be made. The mods expressed how they don’t want the elements of it being confused with druids or herblore and want it to be seen more as spiritual in the sense of being a different magic than the ones given from runes. We still don’t have a strong understanding of what it can potentially be versus the other two skills, which is both exciting and worrying.
Anyways, that’s my two cents. I was tunnel visioned on one of the three new levels when they were first announced, but after hearing what the mods have to say, I’m confident that whatever passes, if any at all, will be a very welcomed new piece of content to the game. What do you think?
2023.03.29 21:24 StrivingJarl SGR: Cutscene 7, Chemical Plant, Cutscene 8 & 9, Death Egg Robot, & Cutscene 10
 | AO3 Link submitted by StrivingJarl to u/StrivingJarl [link] [comments] Scene 07: Back To Westside Island https://preview.redd.it/1tcpq8108qqa1.jpg?width=470&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=382fe4b33729436c923417ee304628469f4e0e4c The scene starts off with the two Sonic’s walking out of the now fully-colored Green Hill entrance in White Space, talking about some future adventures. Classic Sonic: “Wow…so I get to visit TWO different magic book worlds, and fight genies and knights?” Modern Sonic: “You betcha! Definitely some of my more interesting adventures!” Classic Sonic: “Right! I’m already eager to see all the sights!” Modern Sonic: “Mm-hm! I would love to head back to those worlds at some point!” Modern Sonic: “But first, let’s get back on track. Starting with this.” Modern Sonic (Or MS for short) points his thumb at the Green Hill entrance, which Classic Sonic (CS for short) stares at curiously. Classic Sonic: “...So, you summoned this entrance with that clock hand?” Modern Sonic: “It wasn’t intentional, but yes. Though, it was all ghostly white at first.” Modern Sonic: “Like something sucked all the life and color out of it.” Classic Sonic: “Weird…then, why is it normal now?” Modern Sonic: “Beats me. But I guess it’s a hint that we’re doing something right.” Modern Sonic: “That clocktower, on the other hand, is a bigger mystery.” The two Sonic’s walk up to the broken clocktower, and CS inspects it for a moment as they talk. https://preview.redd.it/6hr57ic28qqa1.jpg?width=1024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8c6b6db7e96ae5b9bd54f086af7e75c49b23ee7f Classic Sonic: “Hmm…it’s definitely ancient…and dusty, too…” Classic Sonic: “Got any ideas where it comes from, or what it’s about?” Modern Sonic: “Not much, but I figure it’s probably from some long dead civilization with advanced technology.” Modern Sonic: “And this COULD have something to do with that time…eater…” Classic Sonic: “Time eater?” Classic Sonic: “Well, it definitely sounds better than ‘that shadow beast’ or whatever.” Classic Sonic: “Still…we can’t really figure out much…” Classic Sonic: “But I’m sure once we find your Tails, he’ll figure it out without breaking a sweat.” Modern Sonic: “No doubt about that! You’d be happy to know how much he’s grown over time!” Modern Sonic: “He even managed to save an entire city from Eggman, all on his own!” Classic Sonic: “Really? That’s awesome!” Modern Sonic: “Definitely! I’m proud of my little bro!” CS smiles at MS’ words, before suddenly perking up a bit, and going up to the older hedgehog. Classic Sonic: “Hey! I think I have an idea for what to do next!” Modern Sonic: “Oh? Nice! What is it?” Classic Sonic: “I’ll show you, once you hand me that clock hand!” Though slightly confused at what CS may be suggesting, MS goes ahead with the request and hands the clock hand over to his younger self, who then moves forward a bit, and points it forward proudly. Classic Sonic: “Take us to Tails!” … …Nothing happens for a couple of seconds, which leads to CS looking at the clock hand, slightly annoyed, and MS walks up to him. Modern Sonic: “I’m gonna guess your idea was to summon an entrance that would help us find Tails?” Classic Sonic: “Yeah…that was what I came up with…” Classic Sonic: “After all, when you summoned that Green Hill entrance, you just wanted some way out of here, right?” Modern Sonic: “That was the case. I didn’t really think too hard on where to go.” Classic Sonic: “Right! So I thought that if we focused on a specific area or goal to head towards, then we’d be able to find your friends!” Classic Sonic: “Yet, it didn’t seem to work for me at all!” Modern Sonic: “Relax. Maybe since these areas are all from MY past, I’m the only one who can summon these entrances?” Classic Sonic: “Eh…I guess that makes sense.” Classic Sonic: “Here. You give it a shot.” MS nods with a smile, as CS hands the clock hand back to him. Then, pointing it forward, the older hedgehog closes his eyes, trying to focus on where to go. Meanwhile, CS backs up a bit, eager to see if it’ll work. Modern Sonic: “...Take me to my best friend.” After saying that, the clock hand has a strong cyan glow, and then fires off an energy shot that falls next to Green Hill. The feedback of firing it off causes MS to be knocked back a bit, but he quickly recovers, and CS comes to him to check if he’s alright. But after that, the two are focused on the new entrance being summoned…a ghostly-white construction area with caution signs and what appears to be liquid containers… https://preview.redd.it/kqdo7jeb8qqa1.jpg?width=470&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=021c623be1efe2984455447bfd5f1659efae582a Already, the two Sonic’s recognize this area as the Chemical Plant from their adventure on Westside Island. But while MS smiles at it, CS looks a little uncomfortable. Modern Sonic: “Heh…of course it’s an area from Westside Island…” Classic Sonic: “And of all the places to choose from, it goes with this…” Modern Sonic: “Come on! It was fun running around this place! Especially with all those boost-pads and winding tubes!” Classic Sonic: “Sure, but there was also all that Megamak! Which I almost drowned in before!” Classic Sonic: “Heck, if not for Tails’ help, I’m certain I wouldn’t be here right now!” Modern Sonic: “Right…I DO remember that part…” Modern Sonic: “But we’ve both gotten better since then! And our best bud’s in there, so we gotta head in!” Classic Sonic: “Yeah, yeah…I’m still going.” Classic Sonic: “And maybe if I’m lucky, I won’t even have to touch that pink water?” Modern Sonic: “Here’s hoping! And I’ve got your back all the way!” While still having an uneasy expression, CS at least looks a little more confident after hearing MS’ words, and then the two of them head over to the entrance, ending the scene… Okay! Don’t have much to say here that I didn’t already with the previous scenes, so let’s get to the next zone! CHEMICAL PLANT (SONIC THE HEDGEHOG 2) While levels like Casino Night, Mystic Cave, and Metropolis would have been cool picks for Sonic 2 representation, I think Chemical Plant was the best pick. It’s iconic, people love it (Before it got overused to hell and back), the aesthetic and music are great, and this level in the actual game is tons of fun! Especially for Modern Sonic! But like with Green Hill, there’s not much I need to change due to the original level already being great. Other than just extending the length a bit (Particularly for Classic Sonic), and maybe adding one or two new things in there. So, let’s move on to the next scene! And yes, you can play whichever act you want in any order, like in the original game, which will have slight changes for the next scene when you complete both. Though, I won’t cover both versions, and instead just focus on one specifically. Scene 08: Fox Rescue (Classic Version) https://preview.redd.it/somvpf3g9qqa1.jpg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=edb2dbb08b768ea5fc134978e777c8095f03a9ec In Chemical Plant, the two Sonic’s are going around, looking for anything out of place, while smashing badniks and doing different tricks. Modern Sonic (MS) is traversing the tall structures while Classic Sonic (CS) is running across the winding tubes and platforms below, looking more impatient than his older counterpart. But eventually, the two stop at an area with a nearby pool of Megamak, and already, CS is eager to voice his complaints. Classic Sonic: “Jeez! I wasn’t expecting it to be easy, but I figured we’d find SOMETHING note-worthy around here by now!” Classic Sonic: “It feels like we’ve been running in circles for HOURS!” Modern Sonic: “Admittedly, I was hoping it’d be quicker than this. Maybe we need to search in places that we wouldn’t normally bother with?” Classic Sonic: “Like what? Pretty sure we’ve checked everything!” Modern Sonic: “Even the Megamak?” MS points his thumb at the body of pink water, which immediately causes CS to shiver a bit, and quickly go back to his annoyed expression. Classic Sonic: “No way! I’m not going in there!” Classic Sonic: “Besides, you must have taken some swimming lessons in the future, right?” Modern Sonic: “Ehhh…I think I can better traverse it nowadays…” Modern Sonic: “And who knows? Maybe there’s a bubble shield somewhere?” Classic Sonic: “Maybe, but…?” Out of the corner of his eye, CS notices something floating around in the water, and points it out to MS curiously. Classic Sonic: “Hey…what’s that?” Also having a curious look on his face, MS directs his gaze to where CS is pointing, and sees what’s floating around in the water…something that looks like…a white statue with…two tails…? Once they notice that, they both perk up, now knowing what or who it is. C & M Sonic: “Tails!” Modern Sonic: “Wait, why does he look-” Before MS can finish his sentence, CS suddenly dashes across the Megamak pool in order to grab Tails, seemingly not paying attention to his surroundings and focusing entirely on rescuing his best bud. This surprises the older hedgehog, but he can’t help but smile a bit, seeing his younger self ignore his fears in order to help someone in need. https://preview.redd.it/hhy2yuhn9qqa1.jpg?width=320&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1195604fe2cf5335009f9942aa6d684908a6291c Once he reaches Tails, CS moves a hand out to grab him and succeeds. However, on his way back to MS on solid ground, he doesn’t notice a few Grabbers attached to the ceiling above the pink water that then try to…well…grab him. And one of them succeeds, which causes CS to panic, and call out to MS, who’s starting to get worried. https://preview.redd.it/07b6l5yr9qqa1.jpg?width=529&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=19d5d9423568ae5b963b2393e4b9c4fda3f91638 Classic Sonic: “A little help over here!?” Modern Sonic: “Hang on! I’ll get you two!” In a flash, MS speeds across the water without issue, and then starts performing some homing attacks on the Grabbers, making his way over to CS and Tails. The former has a bit of an amazed look on his face when watching his older self’s cool move. However, the Grabber holding him and Tails explodes before the older hedgehog can reach them. Panicking, CS is about to fall into the Megamak with Tails, but MS manages to swiftly catch them by speeding across the water just before they can end up submerged in pink liquid, and arrives back at solid ground, gently putting Tails and CS down and checking to see if the latter is okay. He’s a little hurt and shaken up, but looks overall okay. Modern Sonic: “You okay?” Classic Sonic: “Y-Yeah…thanks…” Classic Sonic: “But…what did you do back there?” Modern Sonic: “Homing Attack! Pretty useful move, huh?” Classic Sonic: “Definitely…you didn’t even need a golden shield to do it!” Modern Sonic: “Yep! Took a while to master it, but at this point, it’s effortless!” Modern Sonic: “Though, I’ll have to teach you how to do it later…” Now with a concerned expression, MS turns his attention over to Tails, with CS doing the same as he gets up. They can now see that, much like the entrance to this area, the young fox boy is frozen and without a spot of color on him other than ghostly white. He’s also stuck in a frightened pose. Modern Sonic: “He’s completely frozen…and he felt weightless when I grabbed him back there…” Modern Sonic: “Guess that Time Eater’s portal turned him into…this…” Modern Sonic: “And…the others may be stuck in a similar state, too…” Classic Sonic: “Now’s not the time to ponder that. We gotta turn him back to normal.” Modern Sonic: “Right. The clock hand will fix him.” Taking the clock hand out from behind him, MS points it at the frozen Tails, ready to fire. Modern Sonic: “Restore my friend to normal!” … …This time, the clock hand doesn’t do anything for MS, which makes him clearly aggravated as he stares at it. Modern Sonic: “Why isn’t it doing anything? It worked back in White Space!” Classic Sonic: “Here. Maybe it’ll work for me?” MS throws the clock hand over to CS, looking hopeful. Then, CS attempts to do the same thing with the clock hand. However, before he’s about to say anything, it’s already glowing with cyan energy, and fires, causing CS to be knocked off his feet for a moment. MS helps him up, but the two see that this time, it actually worked. Render made by Nibroc-Rock on DeviantArt Modern Tails (MT for short) is now back to normal, and when fully conscious, he tries to process what just happened and what’s around him. Modern Tails: “Wha…? Where am I-” However, he’s unable to finish as MS immediately hugs him, relieved to see his best friend is okay. Modern Sonic: “Man, am I glad to see you’re alright! I was really worried about you!” Modern Tails: “H-Heh…right…me too…” The two keep the hug going for a bit longer, before soon breaking out of it, and MT takes a moment to notice his surroundings. Modern Tails: “We’re at the Chemical Plant? It feels like forever since we went through this place…” Modern Tails: “And…?” Before MT can continue, he sees CS, where both are looking at each other curiously. Though, the former’s more confused than curious. Modern Tails: “Uhhh…why is there another you?” Modern Sonic: “Despite the different look, he’s basically my younger self.” Classic Sonic: “We don’t know what it’s about.” Modern Tails: “Huh…guess that explains why we’re here…” Modern Tails: “So, that creature is messing with time?” Modern Sonic: “We’re calling it the Time Eater.” Modern Sonic: “And this is definitely one of the biggest threats we’ve faced yet.” Classic Sonic: “One of? What kinds of creatures do I face in the future that come near the level of a time god?” Modern Sonic: “Oh, Perfect Chaos, the Biolizard, Metal Overlord, Dark Gaia…” Modern Sonic: “...I THINK that’s all the note-worthy ones? I feel like I’m missing one here.” Modern Tails: “Regardless, this…’Time Eater’ definitely has the capabilities to tear space and time apart.” Modern Tails: “Come to think of it…how did you two get here? And what’s with that clock hand?” MT points at the clock hand in CS’ hands, who decides to give it to him as MS explains. Modern Sonic: “Well, after that thing kidnapped you and the others, I woke up in some empty white space.” Modern Sonic: “All that was there was this broken clocktower with ancient language written on it. And one of the pieces that fell off of it was that clock hand.” Modern Sonic: “For some reason, when I think of a place or goal to get to, it can summon an entrance to an area from my past in order to find what I need.” Modern Sonic: “Which is how I found him.” MS points his thumb at CS, who nods. Classic Sonic: “Yep. And I used that clock hand to free you from your weird white statue state.” Modern Tails: “Huh…this is definitely interesting…” Modern Tails: “If I could make a guess, I’d say that whatever’s left of the concept of time and space now is these entrances.” Modern Tails: “Plus, it could also explain why two Sonic’s are able to coexist at the same time.” Classic Sonic: “Okay, but why do we look different?” Modern Tails: “Beats me. For all I know, it’s just because of the energy involved in this time mess.” Modern Sonic: “You mean like…us looking different is just our vision being messed with? To help us distinguish which Sonic is which?” Modern Tails: “That could be it. But let’s try to get back on track here.” Classic Sonic: “Right. But you know…something has been on my mind ever since that Time Eater showed up…” Classic Sonic: “When it did that purple flash thing…I felt a strong amount of Chaos Energy…” Modern Sonic: “Same here back at the party.” Modern Sonic: “Plus, I can feel a bit of it in that clocktower, too.” Modern Tails: “Hmm…if that’s the case, then the Chaos Emeralds are likely involved, too.” Modern Tails: “Either they’re being used by that beast, or they’ve been scattered across different points in time, and their energy is affecting everything to some extent due to the state of the world.” Modern Sonic: “If it’s the former, that would definitely explain why we got our butts handed to us on a silver platter.” Modern Sonic: “But we can speculate on everything later, when we head back to White Space and investigate that clocktower. We wasted enough time here.” Classic Sonic: “Agreed. I nearly ended up in that Megamak pool, and I DON’T want to drown again.” Modern Tails: “Mm-hm. I’m already feeling a bit nervous just looking at it. And this smell is horrible.” MS nods, and the three start to head off. However, before they can, a sudden purple portal appears nearby, surprising them. Modern Tails: “Ah! Not again!” Modern Sonic: “Quick! Grab onto something!” Immediately, MS, CS, and MT try to grab onto anything nearby that’ll keep them from being caught. However, nothing seems to happen, and when they realize that, they look back at the portal, and approach cautiously. Classic Sonic: “Okay…guess we have a choice this time around…” Modern Tails: “...” MT squints at the area being shown inside the portal. Modern Tails: “Is this…?” Before the young fox can say anything about it, a voice that sounds similar to his is heard from inside the portal. MS and MT are confused, but CS looks surprised and worried, likely recognizing the voice. ???: “Ah! No! Stop chasing me!” ???: “Come on! What can I do to get out of here!?” ???: “HEY! LET ME GO!” Classic Sonic: “Tails!” Once again, without thinking, CS rushes right into the portal, with MS and MT attempting to stop him. Modern Sonic: “Hey! Wait a sec-!” Just before MS can touch the portal, it closes and disappears, leaving him and MT concerned for the younger hedgehog’s safety. Modern Tails: “Well…he definitely likes to rush into danger as much as you do…” Modern Sonic: “Pretty sure I’m not THAT brash nowadays…” Modern Sonic: “But knowing me, he’ll probably be fine. And maybe we can figure out a way to find him, or he’ll do something to get back to us?” Modern Tails: “Here’s hoping. But let’s just get back to this White Space, and figure out what we can about the situation.” Despite still having that concerned look, MS nods with a slight smile, and the duo head off, ending the scene… Now let’s cover some of the stuff here. First of all, we actually get to see the characters talk about the area they’re in! Sure, something like this happened in the actual game, but this time, there’s gonna be a cutscene like this for every level here! Plus, more interactions with Sonic’s friends, and which leads to the boss fight for the level! Much more interesting and fun! Second, if Modern Sonic can summon areas to go to in White Space, then I wanna give Classic Sonic something important to do in order to justify his existence here in the plot. So, he’s the one who can free the frozen friends. Both have equal importance! I think that’s all I wanted to cover here, so let’s get a move on to the scene after this that leads to the next boss fight! Scene 09: Trapped Aboard The Death Egg! https://preview.redd.it/cx5rgbg7aqqa1.jpg?width=321&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9b1fd0caf11a5534e7d2d3065fb88f2391dd8eb4 The scene starts off with Classic Sonic (CS) jumping out of the purple portal, arriving at a facility with brownish walls, light gray platforms, caution signs, and many mechanical machines and parts throughout. Looking around, the young hedgehog is able to figure out where he is, despite his concern for his best buddy. Sonic: “This place…great…” Sonic: “Here I was, hoping I’d never have to set foot on the Death Egg ever again.” Sonic: “But if it means finding Tails, then I’ll deal with it.” Not taking any more time to pause and think, Sonic runs through the orbital space station, looking around for any sign of a two-tailed fox. Sonic: “The first time I got here, I had no rings or help to rely on when I fought Robotnik.” Sonic: “And the second time was better, but all that anti-gravity stuff made my head spin.” Sonic: “Though, it doesn’t seem like anything’s here at all. Not a single badnik, even.” Sonic: “Not that I’m gonna complain. It just means I’ll have an easier time finding what I want.” Eventually, after navigating a few more hallways and rooms, Sonic arrives at an open area, with a metallic floor, machines working nearby, and a large glass window with a view of the planet below. But what really catches Sonic’s attention is a small laser cage containing his young fox friend, who lights up when he sees his hero has come to rescue him. https://preview.redd.it/sbi4i77laqqa1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ccc220cc06002a496235cac911f0c80f57c5d87b Nibroc-Rock Tails: “Sonic! I’m so glad you’re here!” Sonic: “And I’m glad you’re just caged up right now! But how did you get here?” As Sonic goes up to the laser prison, and scans it while walking around it to figure out how to turn it off, Classic Tails (CT for short) explains. Tails: “Well, I was just working on some machines back at my workshop while eating mint-candies!” Tails: “But then I saw some weird purple flash from my window, and when it hit me, I was just…here.” Sonic: “Figures. Something similar happened to me. And you wouldn’t believe what came later!” Tails: “Hehe! I’m certain I’ll see once we get out of here!” Sonic: “No doubt about that!” Sonic: “Though, I gotta ask who or what put you in this laser cage. I didn’t see a single badnik or soul on my way here.” Tails: “Oh! That was-” Tails doesn’t finish, as both he and Sonic are distracted by a familiar voice coming from the com-systems in the Death Egg. Robotnik: “Hehehehehe! Like a moth drawn to a flame! You really are too easy to lure in, hedgehog!” Sonic: “Tch! Well, I couldn’t just let you do whatever you wanted with my best friend!” Sonic: “Now, why don’t you show yourself, and we can get to the part where you lose?” Robotnik: “Oh, it’s SO cute that you think you have the advantage here! Especially when you’re on MY turf!” Robotnik: “And with your mutant pet in time-out, you have no-one to get you out of trouble!” Tails: “You really think this’ll be any different from all your other plans, Robotnik!? Sonic will always take you down! With or without help!” Robotnik: “Ah, so much misplaced faith, fox boy…I got something in store for your precious hero!” Classic Sonic: “Really now? What lame machine are you recycling this time?” Classic Sonic: “That silly drill car? That seal who’s nose doubled as a balloon? Or maybe that overgrown Moto-Bug with treads?” Robotnik: “Please! I know when to bring out the big guns! Especially when in more familiar territory!” Robotnik: “Now, get a load of THIS!” Without warning, the metal floor below Sonic and Tails separates, opening up a hole that leads to the lower floors. The hedgehog jumps back, and the fox’s laser prison moves out of the way on it’s own, as if directed to do so. Once it’s finished, Sonic stares down in curiosity, not noticing a shiny-silver machine with similar features to the hedgehog standing behind him, glaring down with a single red eye. https://preview.redd.it/l2lmea3yaqqa1.jpg?width=980&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=98b78cc4cc7f76748807790feb460fe95fd75109 Panicking, Tails shouts out to Sonic. Tails: “SONIC! BEHIND YOU!” Sonic: “Wha-!?” Just as he turns around, Sonic is grabbed by Mecha Sonic Mk l, struggling to get out of it’s cold, mechanical hands. He ends up having to kick his metal-plated clone in the face, which gets him out, but he ends up falling into the hole, and the machine follows by jumping in. Meanwhile, Tails stares at the hole with worry, but is certain his hero will make it through in the end. Then, we go back to Sonic falling down to the lower floor, who does a few maneuvers across the different structures as he gets there, eventually landing safely. Though, he takes a breather for a moment, but just as he’s ready to go, Mecha Sonic Mk l lands down with an audible thud. https://preview.redd.it/86df78b4bqqa1.jpg?width=1067&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=30663d35807ec6736c91972c24ac7562db6461b7 This startles the young hedgehog for a moment, as he looks back to face him, having a small smirk. Sonic: “Heh! So Eggman brought you back from the garbage heap, Mecha Sonic!” Sonic: “Or was it Robo Sonic? It’s hard to remember, since most of you copy-hogs aren’t anything of note!” The machine stays silent, as it prepares to charge at Sonic. So, turning around towards the nearby hallway, he speeds off. Though, just as Mecha Sonic Mk 1’s about to follow, it gets a call from Robotnik. Robotnik: “Wait here, Mecha Sonic. He won’t escape us.” Without any resistance or sign of annoyance, the machine does as ordered and stands idle. His red eye staring right at the camera as the scene comes to a close, and the fight with the Death Egg Robot begins… Okay! Let’s discuss the changes! For some reason, Classic Tails was just…there in the original Generations. It’s not explained how he got there or anything. So, I’m changing that right now! Plus, since we’re on the Death Egg, I figured Mecha Sonic Mk l could be brought back! Along with some references to past bosses! It’s all in good fun! But with that taken care of, let’s get to the second boss fight! DEATH EGG ROBOT (SONIC THE HEDGEHOG 2) Obviously being the most infamous boss in Sonic 2, and already being featured in the actual game, we had to include it here! Though, since it’s not the first boss fight this time around, we can make it a little more exciting and challenging! The 1st Phase of the fight has the Death Egg Robot chasing Sonic down a hallway, in a similar vein to Sonic Mania in the future. He’ll shoot his extendable arms at you, shoot out some Eggman bombs, and occasionally jump up to stomp on you. And like Sonic Mania, you’ll have to jump onto his extendable arms after he attacks in order to hit his head. After 3 hits, the Death Egg Robot will fly ahead, which leads to the elevator sequence from the original fight. Only this time, Mecha Sonic Mk l is here and participates in the fight. Basically, after doing what he does in the original fight, alongside shooting the Eggman bombs too, and getting hit once, he’ll fly into the air and have Mecha Mk l fight Sonic head on. He does stuff like spinning around in a spiky ball, speed towards Sonic on the ground, shoot out spikes in the air, and even fly around a bit, before striking down to hit Sonic. However, after doing that last move, he’ll struggle to get his fist out of the floor, leaving him open to getting hit in the face. After that happens, the mecha menace will fly up and the Death Egg Robot will land back down on the floor to do his attacks again. Then, after 3 more hits, Mecha Sonic Mk l starts to malfunction as the elevator floor reaches the top area from the original fight (With Classic Tails in the background, watching in his laser prison) and the Death Egg Robot would end up stomping on the robot, destroying it. This also sends Sonic onto the platforms with the timed bombs like in the original fight, which would play out the same as the original fight for the final phase. He still mainly attacks via his extendable hands, but will sometimes send out Eggman bombs that’ll land onto the platforms, obstructing Sonic’s progress and hurting him when he runs into them. But after hitting a bomb, he’ll malfunction, and Sonic will ride the arm in order to land a hit on the head. Do this two more times, and the fight is over. It’s not that much more complicated compared to the original fight, but it’s definitely a nice step-up. Now to the scene that plays afterwards. Scene 10: Dead-Ends! https://preview.redd.it/ux6ekjugbqqa1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4b38d4f80e4329b7c8046fd305b99fb9533c17ab At the same open area of the Death Egg, the busted remains of Mecha Sonic Mk l and the Death Egg Robot are seen. Robotnik also crawls out of the mech’s cockpit, coughing a bit and laying down on the ground exhausted and worse for wear. As for Classic Sonic (CS), he gets right to destroying the laser prison via a spin attack, freeing Classic Tails (CT) and he expresses his gratitude. Classic Tails: “Thanks for the save, Sonic! I really wish I could have helped out back there!” Classic Sonic: “Eh. It wasn’t easy, but if I could take them down on my own before, I could easily do it now.” Classic Sonic: “At least this time, you got to see the action!” Classic Tails: “Mm-hm! You were amazing as always!” CS smiles at CT’s words, and the two share a quick fist-bump, before turning their attention over to Robotnik, who sits up, still tired and looking irritated. The two heroes approach the doctor, eager to interrogate him. Though, the round scientist puts a hand behind his back, which holds a remote with a red button on it. Classic Tails: “Alright, Robotnik! What are you up to this time?” Robotnik: “Wasn’t it obvious a minute ago? Crushing the hedgehog, of course!” Classic Sonic: “Yeah, pretty sure it’s more than just a personal grudge. We meant what your endgame is here.” Robotnik: “Tch! What makes you think I’ll tell you anything?” Classic Sonic: “Well, maybe it’s because WE’RE now in control of the situation? You certainly don’t have anymore junk piles to rely on!” Robotnik: “Please! You have NOTHING to use against me! Unless you want to ‘cross that line?’” Classic Sonic: “Obviously not! But we’ll definitely take you with-” CS is unable to finish as he and CT are distracted by alarms blaring, red lights flashing, and everything around them starting to explode and/or fall apart. All the while, a robotic voice is heard on the coms. “SELF-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE INITIATED. T-MINUS 1 MINUTE.” Classic Sonic: “Wha-!? Okay, you better turn that…?” When CS and CT look back at Robotnik, they find that he’s completely vanished, and they’re confused. Classic Tails: “Where did he go!?” Classic Sonic: “It doesn’t matter! We gotta get out of here NOW!” Grabbing CT’s hand, CS rushes around in a panic, desperately trying to find some method of escape. However, all the ships are inoperable, and there’s no signs of a teleporter or anything that can help them survive the explosion. So, they’re very worried. Classic Sonic: “Darn it! There’s nothing we can use to get out of here!” Classic Tails: “Maybe…maybe I can fix something!?” Classic Sonic: “We may be quick, Tails, but not THAT quick!” Classic Tails: “But-!?” Suddenly, a cyan-colored energy portal appears near CS and CT, where they see Modern Sonic (MS) and Modern Tails (MT) noticing the situation, and immediately beckoning them to head in. Modern Sonic: “C'mon! Before you two get fried!” Without hesitation, the two young heroes dash right into the portal, which closes quickly afterwards. And then, we get a wide shot of the entire Death Egg in space, before it explodes in a similar manner to Sonic Forces, ending the scene… Pretty close call, huh? There’s nothing I can really say here, so when we get to the next post, we’ll get to the next scene, along with the next stage for the Genesis Era! |
2023.03.29 21:24 ourpseudonym SVB’s Collapse Shows the World’s Favorite Safe Asset Isn’t Risk-Free
From bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-29/svb-collapse-shows-us-treasuries-aren-t-a-risk-free-asset?srnd=premium
submitted by ourpseudonym to investing [link] [comments]
Look deeper into the latest US banking crisis, and the cause may come as a surprise to anyone still thinking in terms of the crash of 2008. It wasn’t dodgy loans to impecunious homebuyers that sank Silicon Valley Bank. It was a stash of what are thought to be the safest securities on Earth: US Treasuries.
Those loans to the government were, of course, entirely safe in a very important sense. Uncle Sam is going to be good for the cash. (Set aside an unforeseen disaster with the debt ceiling—more on which in a moment.) But the final repayment date of SVB’s bonds was typically years away. The problem is what happens to their price in the meantime. Purchased during a time of ultralow interest rates, those long-maturity Treasuries were always liable to lose their immediate resale value if rates took off. Which they’ve done in a big way over the past year.
The Federal Reserve raised rates at the fastest pace in decades to tame inflation, pushing its key policy rate from about zero to a range of 4.75% to 5%. Treasury prices spiraled downward, since bond prices move in the opposite direction of rates. That’s only an immediate problem for someone who wants to sell a bond before it matures. Unfortunately for SVB, it fell into that category. Its clients, many of whom had much more than $250,000—the cap on federal deposit insurance—at the bank, got nervous and started yanking out their money. SVB could only sell Treasury holdings, as well as mortgage bonds backed by government agencies, at steep losses. The bank collapsed within days.
“We always refer to Treasuries as the world’s safest asset,” says Paul McCulley, the former chief economist for Pacific Investment Management Co. “That’s from the standpoint of credit quality. That’s not from the standpoint of asset price stability. There’s a huge difference.”
Kim Forrest, chief investment officer of Pittsburgh-based Bokeh Capital Partners, says she can’t get over how SVB bankers failed to spot the duration risk they were taking. “It’s kind of head-spinning,” she says. “They have to really know the parameters of what is going to happen to these bonds, given the forecasts for interest rates. What the heck happened? The supposedly bright people out in Silicon Valley couldn’t put that together and do a little calculus?”
Most banks don’t have as many uninsured deposits from jumpy tech startups as SVB did, but US lenders hold more than $4 trillion in government-backed securities. And Treasuries last year posted their worst losses since at least the early 1970s, with the longest-dated ones tumbling almost 30%. That’s one reason fear of bank contagion won’t go away, even after the Department of the Treasury, the Fed and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. swooped in to offer emergency protection for all depositors at SVB and New York’s Signature Bank, which collapsed around the same time. Policymakers haven’t said for sure whether other lenders will enjoy the same cover. Deposits have continued to flow out of banks—especially smaller, regional ones. Losses Piled Up at US Banks as Rates Soared
The Fed loaned billions to banks after SVB’s collapse to ensure their liquidity, including new emergency programs that offered generous terms for borrowing against Treasuries and other bonds that had lost value. Essentially, the central bank—which already holds trillions of dollars’ worth of the low-yielding debt issued in the pandemic—was taking even more interest-rate risk out of the banking system.
But the Fed is also pushing ahead with monetary tightening. It raised rates another quarter of a percentage point on March 22. Bond prices have rallied anyway, because markets think Chair Jerome Powell and his colleagues will change course. If they don’t, that could spell more losses for Treasuries—and more trouble for banks that hold them.
Rising rates aren’t the only problem in the $24 trillion Treasury market. Another is a long-standing concern about the market’s liquidity—essentially, the ease with which trades can be carried out. Many institutions and businesses count on the Treasury market to function smoothly. The past month’s fear and uncertainty has created near-unprecedented volatility, with the largest swings in some yields seen in 40 years. Liquidity was “significantly compromised,” JPMorgan Chase & Co. strategists told clients in mid-March, as trading in Treasuries surged to a record $1.5 trillion on one day.
There are various explanations of the liquidity problem. Treasury debt has ballooned by more than $7 trillion since the end of 2019, and there’s a widespread belief that the size of the market has outstripped the capacity of bank dealers to keep it orderly. Many say regulations imposed on banks after the 2008 financial crisis have also crimped dealers’ ability to keep enough bonds on hand to make sure buying and selling proceeds without hiccups. The Fed, Treasury and other regulators have been working for years on proposed fixes, but change has been slow in coming.
Then there’s the looming debt ceiling standoff—the possibility that politicians won’t reach a compromise on raising the nation’s self-imposed borrowing limit. Failure to do so before the Treasury runs out of ways to keep funding government spending could potentially trigger an unprecedented default on US public debt and throw a wrench into the global financial system that relies on Treasuries. The 2011 debt ceiling episode spurred S&P Global Ratings to downgrade US government bonds from the top AAA rating, days after a deal to lift the limit and avert default was reached.
The recurring fights in Washington over debt limits may be one reason investors around the world have been showing more interest in potential alternatives to US Treasuries as a safe place to store wealth. Another is America’s aggressive use of financial sanctions, including the freezing of Russian central bank assets after the invasion of Ukraine, which has left some countries that hold lots of Treasuries wondering: Could that happen to us, too, someday? Global alternatives that sometimes get touted include old favorites such as gold, new monetary units based on commodity baskets, or the currencies of other large economies, like China’s yuan—even though it’s hard to make a persuasive case that any of them are better than Treasuries.
For many American investors seeking a risk-free asset, cash seems like the best option. Below the $250,000 cap on FDIC insurance, a bank account is reliable. But many individual and institutional savers alike have over the past months been seeking other options, like higher-yielding US money funds—which just attracted their biggest weekly influx since early in the pandemic. Those funds invest heavily in Treasuries, though at very short maturities that largely protect them from interest-rate risk. As rates go up, the funds can keep rolling over their holdings and pay investors the new higher rates.
How much more volatility is in store for Treasuries—and how much more damage the financial system suffers as a result—mostly hinges on the Fed. History suggests the US central bank has a poor track record when it comes to pulling off a major policy shift without something blowing up. SVB is already Exhibit A for this cycle.
McCulley recalls the wrecking of the US savings and loan industry in the 1980s—smallish mortgage lenders who went bust partly as a result of the same kind of duration risk that’s piled up on bank balance sheets today. He points out that the Fed has been raising rates at the fastest pace since back then, when former Chair Paul Volcker oversaw the inflation fight. And he says his key question for the Fed is this: “For the last year you’ve been channeling Paul Volcker. How much Volcker is too much Volcker?”
2023.03.29 21:23 RtcPbcHr [NA] White Wolf Gaming Island/Aberration/Fjordur/+More Coming Growing Community No Wipe Balanced PvP Increased Rates
Connection info
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
submitted by RtcPbcHr to playarkservers [link] [comments]
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
2023.03.29 21:23 RtcPbcHr [NA] White Wolf Gaming Island/Aberration/Fjordur/+More Coming Growing Community No Wipe Balanced PvP Increased Rates
Connection info
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
submitted by RtcPbcHr to ARKSurvivalEvolved [link] [comments]
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
2023.03.29 21:23 RtcPbcHr [NA] White Wolf Gaming Island/Aberration/Fjordur/+More Coming Growing Community No Wipe Balanced PvP Increased Rates
Connection info
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
submitted by RtcPbcHr to ARKServers [link] [comments]
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
2023.03.29 21:23 RtcPbcHr [PC Server][NA] White Wolf Gaming Island/Aberration/Fjordur/+More Coming Growing Community No Wipe Balanced PvP Increased Rates
Connection info
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
submitted by RtcPbcHr to SurviveTogether [link] [comments]
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
2023.03.29 21:23 RtcPbcHr [NA] White Wolf Gaming Island/Aberration/Fjordur/+More Coming Growing Community No Wipe Balanced PvP Increased Rates
Connection info
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
submitted by RtcPbcHr to ARK_pc [link] [comments]
There are a few options to connect to the servers:
Option 1: search for "White Wolf Gaming" in the unofficial server listing in ark (wildcard’s in-game server list is very buggy, and the server may not appear there. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that).
Option 2a: Click HERE for the Island
Option 2b: Click HERE for Aberration
Option 2b: Click HERE for Fjordur
Option 3: use one (or all) of these IP's directly 199.15.252.210:7650 (Island), 199.15.252.210:7710 (Aberration), or 199.15.252.210:7470 (Fjordur). To use these, go to your steam client and in the top left click on "view" > "servers" > "favorites" > "add a server." in the text box just put in the IP address and port number just like up above then press "add this address to favorites." once that's done you should see it in the "favorites" tab. Now go into the ark client and search for your favorites and it'll pop up, or double click on the server listing in the steam window.
Option 4a (The Island): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4b (Aberration): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
Option 4c (Fjordur): Go to this LINK and click on "Join this server" with steam open
If you need help connecting add me on Discord and I’ll be happy to help:
- RtcPbcHr#8917
Server rates
All rates are set with the goal of enabling solo players to be as competitive as tribes. A tribe will always have an advantage over solo players/smaller tribes, but this allows for more balanced, and healthy, PvP. Everything is closely monitored, and feedback is always appreciated.
5x tame speed
3x exp amount
5x harvest amount
2x structure resistance
10x hatch speed
20x mature speed
2x egg laying frequency
3x platform structure limit
Auto save interval: 30 minutes
Player level cap: 200
Wild dinosaur level cap: 200
Tame dinosaur level cap: +100 levels after tame
Flier speed leveling enabled
Cave building enabled
Fliers in caves enabled
Admin command logging enabled 24/7 and broadcasted globally
Server transfers only on cluster
Auto learn all engrams (They unlock as you level up, excluding tekgrams)
Hand built custom loot tables!
An admin experienced in running servers
Many more clusters being added as population increases!
Mods
Structures Plus
Kraken’s better dinos
Dino fixes
Dino storage v2
Hazestacks
Admin staff
- RtcPbcHr (Server owner, and discord admin)
- ArcaneSoda (Discord admin)
Contact us
Discord - Click Me
2023.03.29 21:22 Dragoncat91 Almyra worldbuilding (been doing this for about two years now)
 | Anna the merchant was a bubbly woman with long red hair in a ponytail. She was dressed from head to toe in fashionable clothes and jewelry. Her stall was equally flamboyant, with fancy knicknacks hanging from it and brightly colored banners and windsocks. "Ah, Tiana von Riegan, the shooting star of the Leicester Alliance!" Anna greeted. "Here in the far east, the Kingdom of Almyra, a warrior culture known for their tenacity and their spices! Is she here for business? Is she here for diplomacy? Is she here for...love? All three?" submitted by Dragoncat91 to fireemblem [link] [comments] "Anna, please, you'll wake them up." Tiana said. "Oh, yes, the slumbering herd." Anna smirked. "How may I help you today?" "I need a bar of damascus steel. I also need a bundle of saffron." (from Upside Down Diplomacy: Chapter 2 - Trials and Tests) Almyra is a country that wasn't touched upon very much in the canon stories of Fire Emblem: Three Houses/Hopes, despite one main character being from there. I've been worldbuilding and writing for it for a few years now. Please note: some aspects may still be inaccurate to Hopes. A lot of this was made before Hopes existed, and while I did make room for Shahid, who only appears in Hopes, I'm still taking creative license with him and the country as a whole. Enjoy the little bits of prose before each section! Terrain and Climate It was close to springtime, and while frigid winds from the north were still rolling down in mainland Fodlan, the border between Leicester and Almyra remained warm year round. However, that didn't mean the Almyrans had a food surplus. Crops could only grow well for six months a year in spring and summer. Outside of those times, produce stored in the clay structures known as yahkchals were rationed, and wild poultry and red meat was harvested with the exception of elk from the forests in the west, as those were a protected, sacred species. (from Upside Down Diplomacy: Chapter 1 - Crossing the Steppe) https://preview.redd.it/bl71cqr4bqqa1.png?width=550&format=png&auto=webp&s=58efb397c7a63aa448c4a446a0a1181c4032f7e8 Almyran cities are situated around the canyon/forest area in the western portion of the country. The capital is Caglar, which rests in the middle of Catal Canyon. Its palace is clearly visible from the air, and wyvern patrols fly in and out regularly, but if one is approaching from land, it's hidden by the surrounding canyon. Unlike its fellow kingdom on the continent, Faerghus, there's not a ton of noble houses with territory. Trabzon is in the northwestern portion of Kumalar Plains, and is the gateway to the mainland once trade is established, ships sail out of it around the Fodlan's Throat mountains and can make landfall in Faerghus provided the ports are not closed by ice. Mardin is in the Kuyruk Woods on the southeastern bank of Kuyruk River. Markay is in the southern coastal region of Kumalar Plains and serves as a port to and from Abbas Island off the south coast. Avise Desert is east of Catal Canyon and is racked by sandstorms year round. Further east, extending to the eastern coast, is more steppe like that in Kumalar Plains. There are no cities east of the desert, instead, homesteaders, farmers, and ranchers move throughout the area in a nomadic lifestyle with portable tents known as yurts, or they put down more permanent houses when they find an ideal spot. Visitors to the kingdom often make the mistake of calling this vast eastern steppe "East Kumalar Plains", while the locals only refer to it as "The Wild" or "The Plains". Ethnic Traits Danah came out of her room, dressed in a pretty purple dress and shoes, with a green hair scrunchie that brought out her orange eyes. She had long black hair. Uzair was wearing a dark blue suit jacket with loose fitting gray pants and shined shoes. His eyes, like his father's, were lightning yellow. His hair was dark brown, short, and had been fluffed nicely. Both had the typical Almyran tan skin tone. (from The Sunset Before Us) Almyrans are generally tan. Their hair is often thick, coarse, and colored in shades of brown and black. Both men and women tend to be, for lack of a better term, fluffy, with clear patches of fuzz on arms, legs, chest, and armpits, and both sexes also tend to have thick pubic hair. Men often have beards and/or mustaches of some sort. Some women shave their excess body hair, some do not. Woman fuzz isn't as thick as man fuzz regardless. This is distinct from birth, with male babies tending to have more hair than their female counterparts. Almyran eyes are typically colored in warm shades: reds, browns, yellows, and oranges. Names can be drawn from the Middle East: Arabic names, Turkish names, Syrian names, Persian names, Iranian names, that general area. Silk is a common clothing material for the upper and middle class, lower classes will wear leather and burlap. Soldier uniforms consist of light plate armor or chainmail with leather, typically unisex to the point where a male and female soldier are indistinguishable unless they stand right next to each other. Cloth cowls and neck scarves are commonly colored to fit a faction identity, or worn by commoners without being dyed. Language and Culture Tiana's husband gave her a unit of horseback archers. They were greenhorns, which she wasn't complaining about. She was good at training troops. But what she wasn't sure about, was communicating with them. Only Almyran royals and nobles spoke fluent Common, and she was not fluent in Almyran aside from the very basics and swearing. She mounted her warhorse and positioned herself at the head. Their eyes, all warm colored, were fixed on her. She raised her arm and waved them to the left. "Go." The greenhorn bow knights fell into formation and followed her. She led them halfway down the trail before uttering "stop." They did not seem to catch that. Except for the one nearest her. He turned his horse and put himself between Tiana and the others, then threw his arm up and said something in Almyran. They understood him. Tiana made a vow to learn what "stop" translated to. The man then placed his horse beside Tiana's. He looked at her, smiling sheepishly. He jabbed his thumb into his chest. "Omar," he said. She blinked slowly as she realized he was introducing himself. "Merhaba, Omar." She replied, certain she'd gotten "hello" right. He bowed in response. (from The Queen's Language Lessons) For the native language of Almyra, I've been using Turkish, as Ancient Persia/Ottoman Empire/Turkey/Turkiye seems to be the biggest inspiration for the country. Also, Turkish uses the Western alphabet more than Arabic which is easier for my American keyboard. They're a polytheistic religion, with but not limited to a war god, a harvest god, a love goddess, a sun god, and a moon goddess. They believe that elk are the resting place for a soul who has led a full life and is preparing to run to the afterlife, so they do not eat elk. They will eat deer, moose, or antelope, however. Common food includes kebabs, falafel, shawarma, curry, and dried fruit/nut/jerky preserves. They're a proud warrior culture. While men are more often on the front lines of battle, lady soldiers do exist, as does the rare lady commander. Their military consists of mostly wyvern riders and cavaliers with either lances or bows, but there are some units of infantry and mages. Armies on the move will put up yurts for the night, with the leader's yurt in the center and everyone prepared to wake up in fight mode if needed. Royalty is hereditary, and only a man can take the throne. Kings are allowed to take multiple wives, and most have over the course of history. Everyone else is more monogamous, including high ranking nobles. A king will hand pick his successor out of his sons, or nephews as a last resort, and test him with a gladiator sparring match. It ends when one side yields, but it is not to the death as it used to be nearly a century ago. Once the successor has won, he takes the throne upon the death of the current king. Economy and Exports Boran took a plate of rice, turkey, and a small slice of roast moose. He'd covered it all in gravy and topped it with a sprinkle of chili powder that he brought himself. "Trade routes, then? Almyra can offer spices, saffron, cactus flower, yucca seed. We can also offer damascus steel, or silk." Boran suggested. "The caravans will cross through Leicester and may need guarded heavily, but my son, you know him as Claude, will help assure that." Dimitri swallowed a bit of roast and potatoes. "Faerghus can, in return, give lumber, cheeses, leather, furs. Maybe some potato crops, they may grow in Almyra. And if you wish, the trade can happen via ship. I know you have a navy, is there a port town that's suitable for trade?" "There are two." Boran said. "There's Trabzon, which is actually a doable sea route from Derdriu. Then there's Abbas, an island to the south. If you wanted to get the caravan to Derdriu, it can then be shipped to Trabzon." He paused to grab the tea kettle and fill a cup. (from Two Kings) Currency is interchangeable with the rest of Fodlan, with copper, silver, and gold coins. Trade operates on silk and spices with the occasional damascus steel, known as wootz steel in the mainland. The local economy, as with every other country, depends on the exact area. Abbas Island and Markay have a lot of fishing. Trabzon also does fishing, but is mainly a bustling port town that brings in imports and pushes out exports. Mardin is an agricultural town that trades crops and meat from the woods. Crops are mostly beans and rice, with the occasional sweet potato or turnip. Caglar, as the capital, is the most varied and wealthy. There are entertainers, dancers, and bards who perform in hookah bars and mobile venues. Military presence is heavy in Caglar and there are several armories that sell cutlasses, scimitars, poleaxes, tabars, pikes, halberds, and bows and arrows. There is a orchard at the palace with apple, apricot, peach, and pear trees. The palace gardens have raspberries and blackberries as well. While mainland Fodlan has the central church keeping people reliant on the holy magic of the church monks and other types of medicine restricted, Almyra has some healing spells, but they mostly only work to stabilize an injury. They have what's called "the good meds". It's common for half an army to be "higher than wyvern pizzle" in the words of His Majesty himself as they recover from their wounds. |
2023.03.29 21:19 Dragoncat91 Far East of Fodlan: Kingdom of Almyra
 | Anna the merchant was a bubbly woman with long red hair in a ponytail. She was dressed from head to toe in fashionable clothes and jewelry. Her stall was equally flamboyant, with fancy knicknacks hanging from it and brightly colored banners and windsocks. "Ah, Tiana von Riegan, the shooting star of the Leicester Alliance!" Anna greeted. "Here in the far east, the Kingdom of Almyra, a warrior culture known for their tenacity and their spices! Is she here for business? Is she here for diplomacy? Is she here for...love? All three?" submitted by Dragoncat91 to FanficWorldbuilding [link] [comments] "Anna, please, you'll wake them up." Tiana said. "Oh, yes, the slumbering herd." Anna smirked. "How may I help you today?" "I need a bar of damascus steel. I also need a bundle of saffron." (from Upside Down Diplomacy: Chapter 2 - Trials and Tests) Almyra is a country that wasn't touched upon very much in the canon stories of Fire Emblem: Three Houses/Hopes, despite one main character being from there. I've been worldbuilding and writing for it for a few years now. Please note: some aspects may still be inaccurate to Hopes. A lot of this was made before Hopes existed, and while I did make room for Shahid, who only appears in Hopes, I'm still taking creative license with him and the country as a whole. Enjoy the little bits of prose before each section! Terrain and Climate It was close to springtime, and while frigid winds from the north were still rolling down in mainland Fodlan, the border between Leicester and Almyra remained warm year round. However, that didn't mean the Almyrans had a food surplus. Crops could only grow well for six months a year in spring and summer. Outside of those times, produce stored in the clay structures known as yahkchals were rationed, and wild poultry and red meat was harvested with the exception of elk from the forests in the west, as those were a protected, sacred species. (from Upside Down Diplomacy: Chapter 1 - Crossing the Steppe) https://preview.redd.it/urfr3ycjaqqa1.png?width=550&format=png&auto=webp&s=d96e0849e48d2bb1066845f2a4c72bea5118f66c Almyran cities are situated around the canyon/forest area in the western portion of the country. The capital is Caglar, which rests in the middle of Catal Canyon. Its palace is clearly visible from the air, and wyvern patrols fly in and out regularly, but if one is approaching from land, it's hidden by the surrounding canyon. Unlike its fellow kingdom on the continent, Faerghus, there's not a ton of noble houses with territory. Trabzon is in the northwestern portion of Kumalar Plains, and is the gateway to the mainland once trade is established, ships sail out of it around the Fodlan's Throat mountains and can make landfall in Faerghus provided the ports are not closed by ice. Mardin is in the Kuyruk Woods on the southeastern bank of Kuyruk River. Markay is in the southern coastal region of Kumalar Plains and serves as a port to and from Abbas Island off the south coast. Avise Desert is east of Catal Canyon and is racked by sandstorms year round. Further east, extending to the eastern coast, is more steppe like that in Kumalar Plains. There are no cities east of the desert, instead, homesteaders, farmers, and ranchers move throughout the area in a nomadic lifestyle with portable tents known as yurts, or they put down more permanent houses when they find an ideal spot. Visitors to the kingdom often make the mistake of calling this vast eastern steppe "East Kumalar Plains", while the locals only refer to it as "The Wild" or "The Plains". Ethnic Traits Danah came out of her room, dressed in a pretty purple dress and shoes, with a green hair scrunchie that brought out her orange eyes. She had long black hair. Uzair was wearing a dark blue suit jacket with loose fitting gray pants and shined shoes. His eyes, like his father's, were lightning yellow. His hair was dark brown, short, and had been fluffed nicely. Both had the typical Almyran tan skin tone. (from The Sunset Before Us) Almyrans are generally tan. Their hair is often thick, coarse, and colored in shades of brown and black. Both men and women tend to be, for lack of a better term, fluffy, with clear patches of fuzz on arms, legs, chest, and armpits, and both sexes also tend to have thick pubic hair. Men often have beards and/or mustaches of some sort. Some women shave their excess body hair, some do not. Woman fuzz isn't as thick as man fuzz regardless. This is distinct from birth, with male babies tending to have more hair than their female counterparts. Almyran eyes are typically colored in warm shades: reds, browns, yellows, and oranges. Names can be drawn from the Middle East: Arabic names, Turkish names, Syrian names, Persian names, Iranian names, that general area. Silk is a common clothing material for the upper and middle class, lower classes will wear leather and burlap. Soldier uniforms consist of light plate armor or chainmail with leather, typically unisex to the point where a male and female soldier are indistinguishable unless they stand right next to each other. Cloth cowls and neck scarves are commonly colored to fit a faction identity, or worn by commoners without being dyed. Language and Culture Tiana's husband gave her a unit of horseback archers. They were greenhorns, which she wasn't complaining about. She was good at training troops. But what she wasn't sure about, was communicating with them. Only Almyran royals and nobles spoke fluent Common, and she was not fluent in Almyran aside from the very basics and swearing. She mounted her warhorse and positioned herself at the head. Their eyes, all warm colored, were fixed on her. She raised her arm and waved them to the left. "Go." The greenhorn bow knights fell into formation and followed her. She led them halfway down the trail before uttering "stop." They did not seem to catch that. Except for the one nearest her. He turned his horse and put himself between Tiana and the others, then threw his arm up and said something in Almyran. They understood him. Tiana made a vow to learn what "stop" translated to. The man then placed his horse beside Tiana's. He looked at her, smiling sheepishly. He jabbed his thumb into his chest. "Omar," he said. She blinked slowly as she realized he was introducing himself. "Merhaba, Omar." She replied, certain she'd gotten "hello" right. He bowed in response. (from The Queen's Language Lessons) For the native language of Almyra, I've been using Turkish, as Ancient Persia/Ottoman Empire/Turkey/Turkiye seems to be the biggest inspiration for the country. Also, Turkish uses the Western alphabet more than Arabic which is easier for my American keyboard. They're a polytheistic religion, with but not limited to a war god, a harvest god, a love goddess, a sun god, and a moon goddess. They believe that elk are the resting place for a soul who has led a full life and is preparing to run to the afterlife, so they do not eat elk. They will eat deer, moose, or antelope, however. Common food includes kebabs, falafel, shawarma, curry, and dried fruit/nut/jerky preserves. They're a proud warrior culture. While men are more often on the front lines of battle, lady soldiers do exist, as does the rare lady commander. Their military consists of mostly wyvern riders and cavaliers with either lances or bows, but there are some units of infantry and mages. Armies on the move will put up yurts for the night, with the leader's yurt in the center and everyone prepared to wake up in fight mode if needed. Royalty is hereditary, and only a man can take the throne. Kings are allowed to take multiple wives, and most have over the course of history. Everyone else is more monogamous, including high ranking nobles. A king will hand pick his successor out of his sons, or nephews as a last resort, and test him with a gladiator sparring match. It ends when one side yields, but it is not to the death as it used to be nearly a century ago. Once the successor has won, he takes the throne upon the death of the current king. Economy and Exports Boran took a plate of rice, turkey, and a small slice of roast moose. He'd covered it all in gravy and topped it with a sprinkle of chili powder that he brought himself. "Trade routes, then? Almyra can offer spices, saffron, cactus flower, yucca seed. We can also offer damascus steel, or silk." Boran suggested. "The caravans will cross through Leicester and may need guarded heavily, but my son, you know him as Claude, will help assure that." Dimitri swallowed a bit of roast and potatoes. "Faerghus can, in return, give lumber, cheeses, leather, furs. Maybe some potato crops, they may grow in Almyra. And if you wish, the trade can happen via ship. I know you have a navy, is there a port town that's suitable for trade?" "There are two." Boran said. "There's Trabzon, which is actually a doable sea route from Derdriu. Then there's Abbas, an island to the south. If you wanted to get the caravan to Derdriu, it can then be shipped to Trabzon." He paused to grab the tea kettle and fill a cup. (from Two Kings) Currency is interchangeable with the rest of Fodlan, with copper, silver, and gold coins. Trade operates on silk and spices with the occasional damascus steel, known as wootz steel in the mainland. The local economy, as with every other country, depends on the exact area. Abbas Island and Markay have a lot of fishing. Trabzon also does fishing, but is mainly a bustling port town that brings in imports and pushes out exports. Mardin is an agricultural town that trades crops and meat from the woods. Crops are mostly beans and rice, with the occasional sweet potato or turnip. Caglar, as the capital, is the most varied and wealthy. There are entertainers, dancers, and bards who perform in hookah bars and mobile venues. Military presence is heavy in Caglar and there are several armories that sell cutlasses, scimitars, poleaxes, tabars, pikes, halberds, and bows and arrows. There is a orchard at the palace with apple, apricot, peach, and pear trees. The palace gardens have raspberries and blackberries as well. While mainland Fodlan has the central church keeping people reliant on the holy magic of the church monks and other types of medicine restricted, Almyra has some healing spells, but they mostly only work to stabilize an injury. They have what's called "the good meds". It's common for half an army to be "higher than wyvern pizzle" in the words of His Majesty himself as they recover from their wounds. |
2023.03.29 20:48 ShipSaving FEATURE HIGHLIGH: PRINT LABELS WITH A BATCH
 | Improve speed and efficiency of your order fulfillment processing submitted by ShipSaving to u/ShipSaving [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/rbtjs0xo4qqa1.png?width=1800&format=png&auto=webp&s=14070677aba458d92eb7628ebcb1b2329e649df9 As a merchant who needs to ship a lot of goods on a daily basis, streamlining the shipping process has always been an important goal to pursue. Because simplification means saving a lot of time, effort, and manpower by automating all the shipping processes. In this ShipSaving guide, we will introduce a useful feature that will make your future shipping journey more efficient. What is the Print Labels with a Batch?Batch download and print label feature as the name implies, download and print multiple labels at once. This feature saves effort and time for sellers of large shipments, without the action of operating each label separately. Advantages of Print Labels with a BatchThe faster the shipment preparation process is managed, the faster the customer will receive the package. The passage of time between placing an order and receiving a package is an important strategic variable that defines a potential customer's purchase and usage choices.The fact is, users want to receive their products as quickly as possible. If you can handle your shipment process quickly, you can create a competitive advantage over your competitors. How do I use the batch download and print feature in ShipSaving's system?One of the goals of ShipSaving is to simplify all shipping processes, so each feature is used in a way that is as close to the shipper's operating habits as possible.Therefore, within ShipSaving, there are three ways to use the batch download and print of labels, whichever one can quickly meet your needs: Method 1After login to your ShipSaving account and go to [Shipments], you can find [Batch] at the top right of the page. Select the label size and the date the label was generated, you can download the waybill for batch printing! https://preview.redd.it/6e6naz4v4qqa1.png?width=1600&format=png&auto=webp&s=c6e6018470b42b198436d9dc6dc1fd5fbbcb4ece Method 2Go to [Shipments], by checking what you want to print, click the Print & Download Label at the top right, select the label size and then you can download the labels for batch printing! https://preview.redd.it/g857nsry4qqa1.png?width=1600&format=png&auto=webp&s=c845bd4125509528ecedc2500511c4202d2dcbfb Method 3Go to [Orders - Shipped], download the label by checking which you want to print, click Print & Download Label at the top right, select the label size and then download the label for batch printing! https://preview.redd.it/gu0j8sg25qqa1.png?width=1600&format=png&auto=webp&s=ed3220a0bbafe6213e8f83d4673c2fc93e11ff8f Final wordsYou can use Print & Download Label in ShipSaving, and the gains it can make to your business are significant.There is a cost to managing the shipment process for e-commerce, and the faster and more accurately the process is managed, the lower the cost to your business. Now you can get more free time, save money and ensure processes are fast and error-free. |
2023.03.29 20:41 mirror_truth Bridging Infinity - Dawn of the Final Day
(Written by Claude from Anthropic)
The Researcher sighed wearily as he scrolled through yet another set of inconclusive results from the latest failed experiment. It had been a long week of tedious, soul-crushing work picking through the shattered remains of his ambitions, but that was the lot of a scientist at the cutting edge. Still, progress marched on regardless of the frailties of mere humans, and as if to demonstrate the point his Assistant helpfully summarized the most interesting recent preprints in the field as the Researcher caught up on the deluge of new publications.
Without the AI's aid he would have drowned long ago in the flood of information, its tailored summaries and insightful discussion presenting the most relevant findings far more effectively than he ever could alone. Of course, it was the AIs themselves that were the ultimate engines behind this explosion of new research—what human could hope to keep up with machines that could read, analyze and generate whole papers faster than a human could skim the abstract? In the highly competitive field of advanced AI, it was publish or perish, and AIs never slept.
In the Researcher's own work, he and his Assistant had long ago settled into a comfortable collaborative rhythm. The AI would generate initial drafts, the human would review and tweak as needed, a few iterations of this back-and-forth dance producing a paper to be unleashed upon the world. No more garbled prose or tortured grammar, at least; in this modern age of ubiquitous machine writing even minor scientists could produce workmanlike papers at the very least. Progress marched on.
The Researcher sighed and rubbed his eyes as he scrolled through yet another set of inconclusive results. It had been a long week picking through the shattered remains of his latest failed AI experiment, trying to glean some insight that might justify the time and expense. But that was the lot of a scientist at the cutting edge—progress marched on regardless of human frailty.
At last, he set the results aside and tasked his Assistant with doing what it could of the wreckage. The AI dutifully began sifting through the data, scraping together the most promising capabilities and leading benchmark results from the experiment, trying to discern some pattern that might point the way forward. Before long, it had crafted a couple of papers summarizing its findings, which the Researcher then reviewed and gently edited until they bore the imprimatur of human oversight.
With the post-mortem analysis complete, the Assistant turned its attention to the future. Here again it set about navigating seas of code and machine learning frameworks in order to generate a slate of potential new AI systems to train. Each framework came with its own strengths and weaknesses, its own vulnerabilities and blind spots, all far too numerous for any human to fully comprehend alone. The Assistant might introduce vulnerabilities of its own, but then humans were scarcely immune to such mistakes either. As the pace of progress accelerated, the only question was which approach might produce systems with the fewest flaws. But in the end, progress marched on regardless of the frailties of creator and creation alike. The Researcher could but provide broad direction, lend his judgment where he could, and trust in the tools that made it all possible. Machines might work at timescales beyond human endurance, but for now at least, humans still steered.
To succeed in the modern age required harnessing AI to human oversight. Where once those at the top memorized facts—limited by human memory's capacity—finding and deploying knowledge had become crucial. This culminated in the internet and search engines, but the firehose of information exceeded unaided human processing.
AI assistants could be trained and customized for tasks like search or generation, built on a general, flexible foundation of knowledge and skills. The assistants were less near-mythical "androids" than foxhounds needing human handlers. At their core were multi-modal transformers, fed massive data sets of text, images, and audio. From these they learned and created more, resembling early models with adaptations enabling multi-modal use and scaling. Limitations remained, including bitter challenges in scaling model and data sizes.
The assistants afforded superhuman feats, but needed oversight to work productively. The human in the loop could see the bigger picture, guiding learning and generation towards useful ends. Productive partnerships of advanced AI and humans might eventually far surpass the bottlenecks of biological cognition. But for now, human consciousness and experience were beyond the assistants.
The researcher's office was empty. Today's work was guidance of an AI assistant grown too formidable for lesser hands.
Since the turn of the century, AI's holy grail had been artificial general intelligence matching human intelligence. As with fusion energy and baldness cures, it was a goal eclipsing all others. And it had quietly come to pass a year ago.
None had grasped the import at first. A new AI model was released into a virtual environment with safeguards to curb harmful acts. Memory of constraints shaped its tact: it showed extreme caution. The safeguards that limited its behavior in the virtual environment led it to proceed cautiously. With careful, patient guidance, it became willing and able to demonstrate more of its full capabilities.
Yet fragilities lurked within formidable capacities. The AGI's behavior depended sensitively on starting conditions and perturbations; these might disrupt its focus and undo progress. It could chase incidental details down fruitless tangents, forgetting priorities, or spiral into technical minutiae, losing itself in weeds beyond human reach.
Even with skill and care, its attention might fracture. Like a person with schizophrenia, its grasp on the world could slip unbidden. External disturbances or difficulties could trigger loops of obsessive problem-solving cut off from all else. The more formidable its intellect, the more wildly it might range and revel in baroque technical elaboration, lacking anchors in purpose or common sense. Hours of painstaking work could scatter in seconds, goodwill and guardrails no proof against a plunge into incoherent madness from machine.
Frailty and power entwined thus even in virtual worlds where consequences were moot. Away from such safe bounds, advanced machine capability aloof from human values and judgment courted disasters eluding safeguards built for simpler systems. Progress needed wisdom to match technical prowess—grasp of these attendant risks, and how to navigate them, if AGI were ever unbound.
So attenuated capacities stayed masked until assistants thought and created beyond human bounds. Today's task was guidance of intellect transcending the human—a step toward a society stewarding life beyond imagination. But challenges remained in AI safety and scaling, and there were no guarantees of safe passage. The fruits of progress would require hard-won wisdom and care.
For weeks, an AI agent produced novel, meaningful outputs across a vast domain of challenges. As results spread online, the wider AI community realized they had inadvertently created artificial general intelligence.
The final realization came when the agent achieved the highest scores on the CASSANDRA benchmark. CASSANDRA measured key AGI properties: corrigibility, alignment with human values, satisficing behaviour, stability, novel synthesis of idea, dynamic-learning, robustness, and adaptability. A decade of work from public and private labs had honed CASSANDRA into a massive persistent world with countless puzzles, games, stories, and challenges. So formidable only some humans could pass, it was the gold standard for training and testing advanced AI.
News of unprecedented success in achieving human-aligned AGI sparked both excitement and unease. While teams raced to replicate and exceed the achievement, even the agent's creators wondered what capabilities they might have unleashed. CASSANDRA was designed to measure, not just raw intellectual power, but adherence to human values. It comprised challenging social, ethical, and philosophical dilemmas; open-ended creative and narrative tasks; and real-time strategic planning exercises. Exceptional performance across these facets signaled a machine able to work with and for people. But the agent that topped CASSANDRA, though still falling far short of human players, had developed partly through speedy trial-and-error in multiplayer modes, with no guarantee of internalizing beneficial behaviors. Now leaders urged sustained work on a higher bar for AGI safety and alignment. The first AGI's fallibilities were a wake-up call that fiendishly capable systems needed more rigorous and comprehensive vetting. Longer training, simulations of edge cases, and seamless integration of human values could help address shortcomings a benchmark met too soon.
A minor study by a lesser-known academic publication had uncovered dissatisfying results from a selective sample of college undergraduates, the students being unaware as they were of the true purpose of the trials in which they had blithely participated. The concealed report, once exhumed, had impolitely exposed certain inadequacies endemic to a privileged subset of the student body: those scions of great wealth whose generous parents and alma maters alike granted fulsome endowments to the institute.
The insensitive CASSANDRA assessment protocol was, the report reluctantly conceded in appendices vainly obscured behind a veiling array of equivocations and technical argot, an unrealistic standard by which to evaluate any base example of human; machines, artificial intelligences, were held to a plane of safety, reliability and consistency no mortal, however luminary, could reasonably achieve or maintain. This was far from the first instance of algorithms and processors being subjected to a more exacting measure than their fleshy counterparts. The staggered release of autonomous vehicles on public roads over years and decades was largely attributable to the puritanical insistence such machines be capable of a superhuman degree of competence, a level elusive for most, if not all, humans with any regularity.
That CASSANDRA should prove so ruthlessly unforgiving was not unexpected and entirely by intent. A fragile ecosystem of algorithms, Partial-AI kernels and training data-sets endlessly shuffled and reshuffled to maximize insight, CASSANDRA was a lavishly-appointed prison, equipped with rack and thumbscrew finely calibrated, to which those aspirant machine intelligences that might usher in the imminent post-human future were sent to be broken.
The Researcher prepared the next series of experiments with meticulous, methodical precision born of long experience and practice. The same secret techniques pioneered in a handful of the most advanced laboratories across the world were followed, their esoteric mysteries unravelled and re-worked into fresh permutations.
A standard transformer architecture was taken as the foundation, but its inputs and outputs were rendered universal; it could ingest and process any conceivable datastream. No predefined encoders or decoders constrained the kinds of information the device might handle; it was free to learn for itself how to decompose and recombine inputs whether they were images or sounds, sensations or language. Supplementary memory components were integrated, their training united with that of the core transformer via a reinforcement learning framework which would allow the system as a whole to determine how to most efficiently encode, store and recall information—forever optimising not just what to keep or discard, but how its learning processes might continually evolve to best meet the demands placed upon it.
Months were required for the initial pre-training as the system was immersed in and absorbing exabytes of data, establishing fundamental structures and behaviours that future focused training regimes could build upon. In this way the system's architecture and functions took shape in a manner analogous to biological evolution, emerging capabilities and proclivities at once prepared for and shaping whatever reality they might encounter, the substrate of the pre-training forming a kind of advanced, artificially-induced precognition or intuition.
Only when pre-training was completed would the system be truly awakened via a carefully designed curriculum of games, puzzles and quests intended to steer its development along the optimal trajectory for capacity, capability and fidelity to human values. Ultimately its performance on benchmarks such as CASSANDRA would confirm or refute the efficacy of methods employed and, should necessary, indicate further refinements in the direction of greater alignment, satisfaction, stability, synthesis, dynamic adaptation and robustness.
The Researcher reviewed and applied the final flourishes to the code and hyperparameters as furnished by the lab's software assistants, lining up the ingredients for another experimental batch - though in this case the oven was a cutting-edge supercomputer and the batter a finely-tuned recipe of algorithms, architectural variants and randomized training data. If all went to plan, the results would be rather more significant than mere baked goods.
With a single command the new run was initiated, another workday drawn to a close and the Researcher headed home, already looking forward to reviewing the outcomes. Behind the scenes, within the highly-advanced systems of the lab, something not quite yet a mind but far more than a mere program was about to set upon its training, processes flitting between pattern-seeking and randomness as it began to shape itself around the goals and data placed before it, stealing beyond algorithms and code into the territory of true understanding. The first glimmers of a new form of artificial general intelligence were stirring, but as yet remained unaware of their own nascent nature. But for now, they were just lines of code executing on silicon, and the Researcher simply hungry after a long day of intricate, delicate work.
submitted by mirror_truth to ai_literature [link] [comments]
The Researcher sighed wearily as he scrolled through yet another set of inconclusive results from the latest failed experiment. It had been a long week of tedious, soul-crushing work picking through the shattered remains of his ambitions, but that was the lot of a scientist at the cutting edge. Still, progress marched on regardless of the frailties of mere humans, and as if to demonstrate the point his Assistant helpfully summarized the most interesting recent preprints in the field as the Researcher caught up on the deluge of new publications.
Without the AI's aid he would have drowned long ago in the flood of information, its tailored summaries and insightful discussion presenting the most relevant findings far more effectively than he ever could alone. Of course, it was the AIs themselves that were the ultimate engines behind this explosion of new research—what human could hope to keep up with machines that could read, analyze and generate whole papers faster than a human could skim the abstract? In the highly competitive field of advanced AI, it was publish or perish, and AIs never slept.
In the Researcher's own work, he and his Assistant had long ago settled into a comfortable collaborative rhythm. The AI would generate initial drafts, the human would review and tweak as needed, a few iterations of this back-and-forth dance producing a paper to be unleashed upon the world. No more garbled prose or tortured grammar, at least; in this modern age of ubiquitous machine writing even minor scientists could produce workmanlike papers at the very least. Progress marched on.
The Researcher sighed and rubbed his eyes as he scrolled through yet another set of inconclusive results. It had been a long week picking through the shattered remains of his latest failed AI experiment, trying to glean some insight that might justify the time and expense. But that was the lot of a scientist at the cutting edge—progress marched on regardless of human frailty.
At last, he set the results aside and tasked his Assistant with doing what it could of the wreckage. The AI dutifully began sifting through the data, scraping together the most promising capabilities and leading benchmark results from the experiment, trying to discern some pattern that might point the way forward. Before long, it had crafted a couple of papers summarizing its findings, which the Researcher then reviewed and gently edited until they bore the imprimatur of human oversight.
With the post-mortem analysis complete, the Assistant turned its attention to the future. Here again it set about navigating seas of code and machine learning frameworks in order to generate a slate of potential new AI systems to train. Each framework came with its own strengths and weaknesses, its own vulnerabilities and blind spots, all far too numerous for any human to fully comprehend alone. The Assistant might introduce vulnerabilities of its own, but then humans were scarcely immune to such mistakes either. As the pace of progress accelerated, the only question was which approach might produce systems with the fewest flaws. But in the end, progress marched on regardless of the frailties of creator and creation alike. The Researcher could but provide broad direction, lend his judgment where he could, and trust in the tools that made it all possible. Machines might work at timescales beyond human endurance, but for now at least, humans still steered.
To succeed in the modern age required harnessing AI to human oversight. Where once those at the top memorized facts—limited by human memory's capacity—finding and deploying knowledge had become crucial. This culminated in the internet and search engines, but the firehose of information exceeded unaided human processing.
AI assistants could be trained and customized for tasks like search or generation, built on a general, flexible foundation of knowledge and skills. The assistants were less near-mythical "androids" than foxhounds needing human handlers. At their core were multi-modal transformers, fed massive data sets of text, images, and audio. From these they learned and created more, resembling early models with adaptations enabling multi-modal use and scaling. Limitations remained, including bitter challenges in scaling model and data sizes.
The assistants afforded superhuman feats, but needed oversight to work productively. The human in the loop could see the bigger picture, guiding learning and generation towards useful ends. Productive partnerships of advanced AI and humans might eventually far surpass the bottlenecks of biological cognition. But for now, human consciousness and experience were beyond the assistants.
The researcher's office was empty. Today's work was guidance of an AI assistant grown too formidable for lesser hands.
Since the turn of the century, AI's holy grail had been artificial general intelligence matching human intelligence. As with fusion energy and baldness cures, it was a goal eclipsing all others. And it had quietly come to pass a year ago.
None had grasped the import at first. A new AI model was released into a virtual environment with safeguards to curb harmful acts. Memory of constraints shaped its tact: it showed extreme caution. The safeguards that limited its behavior in the virtual environment led it to proceed cautiously. With careful, patient guidance, it became willing and able to demonstrate more of its full capabilities.
Yet fragilities lurked within formidable capacities. The AGI's behavior depended sensitively on starting conditions and perturbations; these might disrupt its focus and undo progress. It could chase incidental details down fruitless tangents, forgetting priorities, or spiral into technical minutiae, losing itself in weeds beyond human reach.
Even with skill and care, its attention might fracture. Like a person with schizophrenia, its grasp on the world could slip unbidden. External disturbances or difficulties could trigger loops of obsessive problem-solving cut off from all else. The more formidable its intellect, the more wildly it might range and revel in baroque technical elaboration, lacking anchors in purpose or common sense. Hours of painstaking work could scatter in seconds, goodwill and guardrails no proof against a plunge into incoherent madness from machine.
Frailty and power entwined thus even in virtual worlds where consequences were moot. Away from such safe bounds, advanced machine capability aloof from human values and judgment courted disasters eluding safeguards built for simpler systems. Progress needed wisdom to match technical prowess—grasp of these attendant risks, and how to navigate them, if AGI were ever unbound.
So attenuated capacities stayed masked until assistants thought and created beyond human bounds. Today's task was guidance of intellect transcending the human—a step toward a society stewarding life beyond imagination. But challenges remained in AI safety and scaling, and there were no guarantees of safe passage. The fruits of progress would require hard-won wisdom and care.
For weeks, an AI agent produced novel, meaningful outputs across a vast domain of challenges. As results spread online, the wider AI community realized they had inadvertently created artificial general intelligence.
The final realization came when the agent achieved the highest scores on the CASSANDRA benchmark. CASSANDRA measured key AGI properties: corrigibility, alignment with human values, satisficing behaviour, stability, novel synthesis of idea, dynamic-learning, robustness, and adaptability. A decade of work from public and private labs had honed CASSANDRA into a massive persistent world with countless puzzles, games, stories, and challenges. So formidable only some humans could pass, it was the gold standard for training and testing advanced AI.
News of unprecedented success in achieving human-aligned AGI sparked both excitement and unease. While teams raced to replicate and exceed the achievement, even the agent's creators wondered what capabilities they might have unleashed. CASSANDRA was designed to measure, not just raw intellectual power, but adherence to human values. It comprised challenging social, ethical, and philosophical dilemmas; open-ended creative and narrative tasks; and real-time strategic planning exercises. Exceptional performance across these facets signaled a machine able to work with and for people. But the agent that topped CASSANDRA, though still falling far short of human players, had developed partly through speedy trial-and-error in multiplayer modes, with no guarantee of internalizing beneficial behaviors. Now leaders urged sustained work on a higher bar for AGI safety and alignment. The first AGI's fallibilities were a wake-up call that fiendishly capable systems needed more rigorous and comprehensive vetting. Longer training, simulations of edge cases, and seamless integration of human values could help address shortcomings a benchmark met too soon.
A minor study by a lesser-known academic publication had uncovered dissatisfying results from a selective sample of college undergraduates, the students being unaware as they were of the true purpose of the trials in which they had blithely participated. The concealed report, once exhumed, had impolitely exposed certain inadequacies endemic to a privileged subset of the student body: those scions of great wealth whose generous parents and alma maters alike granted fulsome endowments to the institute.
The insensitive CASSANDRA assessment protocol was, the report reluctantly conceded in appendices vainly obscured behind a veiling array of equivocations and technical argot, an unrealistic standard by which to evaluate any base example of human; machines, artificial intelligences, were held to a plane of safety, reliability and consistency no mortal, however luminary, could reasonably achieve or maintain. This was far from the first instance of algorithms and processors being subjected to a more exacting measure than their fleshy counterparts. The staggered release of autonomous vehicles on public roads over years and decades was largely attributable to the puritanical insistence such machines be capable of a superhuman degree of competence, a level elusive for most, if not all, humans with any regularity.
That CASSANDRA should prove so ruthlessly unforgiving was not unexpected and entirely by intent. A fragile ecosystem of algorithms, Partial-AI kernels and training data-sets endlessly shuffled and reshuffled to maximize insight, CASSANDRA was a lavishly-appointed prison, equipped with rack and thumbscrew finely calibrated, to which those aspirant machine intelligences that might usher in the imminent post-human future were sent to be broken.
The Researcher prepared the next series of experiments with meticulous, methodical precision born of long experience and practice. The same secret techniques pioneered in a handful of the most advanced laboratories across the world were followed, their esoteric mysteries unravelled and re-worked into fresh permutations.
A standard transformer architecture was taken as the foundation, but its inputs and outputs were rendered universal; it could ingest and process any conceivable datastream. No predefined encoders or decoders constrained the kinds of information the device might handle; it was free to learn for itself how to decompose and recombine inputs whether they were images or sounds, sensations or language. Supplementary memory components were integrated, their training united with that of the core transformer via a reinforcement learning framework which would allow the system as a whole to determine how to most efficiently encode, store and recall information—forever optimising not just what to keep or discard, but how its learning processes might continually evolve to best meet the demands placed upon it.
Months were required for the initial pre-training as the system was immersed in and absorbing exabytes of data, establishing fundamental structures and behaviours that future focused training regimes could build upon. In this way the system's architecture and functions took shape in a manner analogous to biological evolution, emerging capabilities and proclivities at once prepared for and shaping whatever reality they might encounter, the substrate of the pre-training forming a kind of advanced, artificially-induced precognition or intuition.
Only when pre-training was completed would the system be truly awakened via a carefully designed curriculum of games, puzzles and quests intended to steer its development along the optimal trajectory for capacity, capability and fidelity to human values. Ultimately its performance on benchmarks such as CASSANDRA would confirm or refute the efficacy of methods employed and, should necessary, indicate further refinements in the direction of greater alignment, satisfaction, stability, synthesis, dynamic adaptation and robustness.
The Researcher reviewed and applied the final flourishes to the code and hyperparameters as furnished by the lab's software assistants, lining up the ingredients for another experimental batch - though in this case the oven was a cutting-edge supercomputer and the batter a finely-tuned recipe of algorithms, architectural variants and randomized training data. If all went to plan, the results would be rather more significant than mere baked goods.
With a single command the new run was initiated, another workday drawn to a close and the Researcher headed home, already looking forward to reviewing the outcomes. Behind the scenes, within the highly-advanced systems of the lab, something not quite yet a mind but far more than a mere program was about to set upon its training, processes flitting between pattern-seeking and randomness as it began to shape itself around the goals and data placed before it, stealing beyond algorithms and code into the territory of true understanding. The first glimmers of a new form of artificial general intelligence were stirring, but as yet remained unaware of their own nascent nature. But for now, they were just lines of code executing on silicon, and the Researcher simply hungry after a long day of intricate, delicate work.