Chapter 05-01

“So, what is your master plan?” Obsidian asked. Her and Alex were strolling down the street. She felt that it was far too early in the morning, but it seemed that complaining did nothing to change Alex’s mind.

“We have a little money in the bank, so I want to pick up some gadgets. We also have to make it to tier three today. No exceptions. If we can execute this event properly, we will have a piece of property to call our own.” Alex explained making chopping motions with his hands to show his seriousness.

“Alright, gadgets I like the sound of that.” Obsidian said with a nod.

They found themselves back at the Tailor’s guild main building. Buying from the guild was less risky than buying from another shop in Winter’s Garden. With the town ran primarily by villains there was a chance that each purchase could be considered a villainous act.

Scanning the booths Alex found the vender that he was looking for, equipment. The tall man, very similar looking to the man who had constructed his suit smiled down at Alex when he approached. This man’s appearance differed in that he was wearing an intricate set of goggles that would aid him in crafting small items. As well as his extremely slim angular bone face his suit was well pressed and perfectly kept.

“Good day sir! I see that you are enjoying a Tailor made set of armor.” The man said with a slight bow.

“Couldn’t be happier.” Alex said returning a slight respectful nod.

“Wonderful! How can I help you today?” The man asked.

“I’d like to look at your equipment.” Alex said.

“Of course.” The man said handing Alex a tablet that didn’t seem like much more than a pane of glass.

The moment that the tablet touched his hand Alex’s HUD in his mask lit up with content on the screen. Using only his eyes he was able to scroll through the choices and focusing on an item in the display showed him more detailed information on whatever item he was looking at.

The number of items available was staggering. The prices on the items as he scrolled through the list were equaling as staggering. Alex noticed an item that he mentally noted.

-Xander’s Pocket Gateway

-Used to access a network of teleportation nodes that allow for point to point travel.

-10 Uses Per Charge.

-50,000t

Expensive? Yes, but Alex knew that if he had one of those, or well two being that he had Obsidian, they could move between key locations around the world in the instant and they wouldn’t need to take the teleportation power. At the moment that was a dream for the future, and they had other things that they needed. Going through the list he started to add items to his purchase list.

-Health Serum I

-Boosts Health Restoration.

-Restores Health Equal to 50% of Max health over Thirty seconds.

-Debuff for continuous use. -10% per use.

-100t

~~

-Energy Serum I

-Restores Energy

-Regain Energy Equal to 80% of Max Energy instantly

-Debuff for continuous use. -5% per use.

-100t

Alex added four of each of the serums to the purchase order. There would be two for each of them and if they needed more than that it would probably be wise for them to retreat.

-Mini Stealth Recon Drone

-Used for Mission analysis

-Can operate for a total of 10 minutes between charges. 4 Hour recharge time.

-1000t

Without a scan ability Alex needed to drop the cash on the drone. It was a tool that they could maintain and continue to use so it would most definitely pay for itself in the long run. He had a high-level version of the same drone as an admin that made a fairly decent mechanical pet.

-Wave Emitting Sonic Function Suppressor

-Low Level Enemies Lose the ability to function.

-1 use on each charge. 10 Hour recharge time. Area Effect

-800t

Alex clenched his teeth a little as he pressed the commit button on the purchase order. Twenty-six hundred dollars was a lot of money in their current financial state and he wasn’t eager to spend the cash, but at the same time it was in an effort to make more money.

“You’ve got to spend money to make money!” Alex said as he removed two of each of the serums that he’d purchased and handed them to Obsidian.

“Some serums are the gadgets that we needed to get? We could have gotten those without coming all the way down to the Tailor’s guild.” She scoffed.

“I got more than the serums, plus I want to strengthen my relationship with the Tailors at every chance that I get.” Alex said. He opened his character window and scrolled to the relationships status. He moved over to the factions tab.

-Gold Teeth Rats – (Hatred) -256 (Max)

-Venomous Strikers – (N/A) – N/A (This faction has been disbanded)

-Major Archana – (Angered) – 100

-Tailor’s Guild – (Friendly) – 50

-Cyphon – (Noticed) – 25

“Did you know that the Strikers have been disbanded?” Alex asked closing the status window.

“Must have happened when their leader’s head was, you know, removed from his body.” Obsidian said making a gesture that imitated the removal process.

“Just so you are aware I simply adore how dark you are.” Alex said with a smile.

“Thanks, I think.” She said.

“Don’t mention it.” Alex said.

The duo left the Tailor’s Guild building. Having acquired some equipment, it was time to form a plan. The first step took them to a building across the street from the building that the system had indicated was occupied by their rival.

They walked around to the side of the building into the alleyway. Alex grabbed Obsidian by the waist and the two of them flew up to the roof of the building. The flight was very easy owing to the points that he had allocated in the power. They landed them with a silent thud.

As they approached the far edge of the gravel covered roof, they caught there first whole glimpse of the property. Alex immediately felt that he may have bitten off a little more than they could chew. He took a deep breath and scratched his forehead.

Across the street stood a factory. Clearly owned by the Goldys, it was set up to construct electronic components. The cinder block building took up two blocks. Trucks would drop off raw materials on one street and the finished product would exit the other side of the building onto trucks that would take it away. Most of the building consisted of one large rectangular room, but there was a small office/observation room as a second story in the center.

Alex took the new drone from his pocket. He pressed his thumb to a small pad on the side. Instantly the drone was synced with his phone and in turn it was synced to his mask. Information was already being sent back and displayed before his eyes like the temperature.

He held the little drone in his palm. A small arm extended from its sides and then a third from it’s rear. Blades began to spin until it began to hover of its own accord. He was ready to begin his mission.

Alex assigned the building as the target and scouting was the mission. Before their eyes the drone flashed into invisibility. They could, however, still hear its little rotors spinning away. The sound began to drift off and towards the building.

At the drone’s price tag, it was not one that would feedback direct sight or anything. Instead it would send back the number of enemies on site and tag their general location. After a few moments’ information began to appear on Alex’s HUD in the form of a map of the inside of the building with red dots indicating the position of the enemies.

Most of the enemies were in the center of the building around a cluster of machines. Alex assumed that these would be goons like the ones that they fought at the docks. They were there to do work. There was a small group collect in the office on the second story. There were also a couple of groups that were wandering around in something that looked like a pattern which to Alex seemed like a loose patrol. Once the drone finished its sweep of the building it returned to Alex.

-Total Enemies: 47

As the small drone landed on his outstretched hand Alex was struck with an idea. He removed the case from his inventory that held the weapon, the sonic device that would incapacitate lower level enemies with sound waves and placed it on the ledge.

Inside the case was the device, a small metallic orb with blue glowing seams, four pairs of ear plugs that would stop the hurtful sound, but allow normal sound to pass into their ears, and a chip with instructions for use. Alex had used one before and knew exactly how it worked.

There were three triggering options, timer, remote, and proximity. He elected for remote tapping his phone on the device. A window appeared in his HUD that had a function labeled trigger.

The device itself was very light and to be the most effective would need to be set off from the center of the building. With a little ingenuity and a piece of wire they found on the roof Alex was able to affix the device to the drone, and it was still able to fly. The stealth system would not extend to the sonic device, so he would have to cross his fingers and hope for the best.

“This is insane.” Obsidian said watching Alex work.

“The best kind of insane.” Alex said grinning madly, though with his mask on he realized that she could not see him, “I’m grinning like a mad man.”

The drone flew away for the second time. Alex simply had it repeat its recon flight that it had already completed. The drone began feeding back information to Alex’s HUD. Silently they waited Obsidian completely in the dark on what was happening.

When the moment came Alex triggered the device. Instantly the red dots in the center of the building began to vanish until a single dot in the center around the machinery was remaining. The office dots were not affected nor were the patrolling dots, but the vast majority were down for the count.

“Looks like our little bit of insanity took out about twenty-nine baddys.” Alex said.

“Nice!” Obsidian said doing a fist pump.

“Let’s go!” Alex motioned for the factory and jumping up onto the wall. Obsidian jumped up as well. She wrapped her arm around his waist, and they dropped off the side of the building gliding towards the factory’s side door.