27 27
In the back alleys of Night City's Waston District, people knew better than to travel there as it was Maelstrom turf. Gang members whose love of cybernetics was only eclipsed for their love of violence. So it was here in a loading dock area of an abandoned warehouse that connected to the back alleys that a dozen Maelstrom members gathered. Each one of them sporting drastic signs of cybernetic augmentations. Everything from replacing half their face with a giant glowing red lens, to outright removal of their upper chest cavity and stomach area. All of them armed with either pistols, rifles, or katanas. The area was illuminated by a circle of red led poles that revealed a large pentagram made of blood with a ice filled refrigerator placed lying down in the middle. Wrecks of dilapidated vans laid abandoned on the sides while pallets of wooden stacks littered the area as well. Off in a hidden corner laid a dozen dead bodies of those unfortunate to have been chosen to provide the necessary vitae to create the ritual circle.
From one of the trucks a woman exited. She was wearing nothing but underwear but her body was heavily cyberized. Four glowing red leds dotted her face, her four limbs replaced with sharp silver limbs, and a large bulk rebreather over her mouth. She walked with slow steady purpose towards the ice filled tub as the others around her took up equidistant positions around the circle. From their mouths came chanting, both in English and in binary from those with the vocal augments that allowed it.
Slowly she got into the ice tub and submerged herself fully into the cold icy waters. Within she quickly connected the various jacks into the back of her skull preparing her for the ritual. Tonight they would summon the daemon from the great Beyond that would grant them their just reward and power beyond imagination. Night City would be their personal paradise!
In most normal times this ritual would have done nothing, just another failed attempt at the occult by uneducated drugged up two big gang bangers that would have resulted in nothing. However, something was different tonight, for as a single butterfly's flap is stated to be able to cause a storm on the other side of a world; tonight something much, much larger, doing something much more active than flapping mere wings has occurred, in a place far further than a mere world that would bring a storm never before seen on Earth.
The woman began to scream as instead of dense streams of data her HUD began displaying incomprehensible colors beyond imagination and arcs of eldritch energies poured forth from her body lighting up the waters around her like a flashbang. The men around her watching immediately noticed something was wrong and attempted to get closer to stop the ritual, but it was to no avail. Before any of them could realize the danger the entire ritual circle lit up and exploded in flames that briefly exceeded that of a star. Their bodies instantly atomized and the ground turned to molten lava even as the various flammable items nearby ignited from sheer proximity to heat generated in that brief split second.
In a way the Maelstrom gang succeeded, they summoned their demon, for deep in the middle of the liquid molten rock a being from beyond, awoke.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I woke up to Pain.
Unbelievable burning PAIN!
I opened my mouth to breath only to choke on burning acrid liquid substance to flow down my throat causing me to want to vomit.
It was thick, viscous, but most importantly HOT!
My whole body was heavy as I desperately tried to claw my way though what felt like a pool of the burning tar like substance I was submerged in.
My eyes blind to everything as through my eyelids all I could see was red with only gravity giving me a indication of which way was up.
I surfaced from the pool of whatever it was burning me alive and suffocating me, upchucking whatever it was in my throat and stomach.
I cannot remember the last time I suffered such pain! What happened to my Pain Resistance?
"AHHHHHHH!" I screamed as I managed to make out a flat piece of ground in front of me that the liquid was not on.
Molten metal and rock, in a crater. I managed to deduce from the taste, the smell, the temperature, the PAIN!
I desperately dragged myself through the molten metal before it could cool on me, dragging myself up onto what felt like concrete.
Sweet cool cool concrete.
My limbs felt stretched, long, my nails clawed at the ground leaving furrows in it with ease.
I felt so weak, vulnerable, and in pain.
Where am I? When am I?
I tiredly wiped the metal from my face, ripping off muscle in the process, causing another bout of pain filled screams to erupt from my throat at the stupidity of myself.
I could now open my eyes and the first thing I saw looking down while on my hands and knees were claws.
Claws?
Not just claws, but my fingers....they were too long, too black with red long claw like nails.
My limbs too, they were...longer, thin, strange, also black.
Like...like a daemon.
My tongue licked the inside of my teeth flicking out the loose pieces of molten metal still left, causing me great searing pain in the process before I froze one more time.
My teeth. They were longer, sharper, more numerous.
I opened my mouth and felt it too wide, much too wide, I started grinning and laughing with a bit of hysterics in my tone.
My grin, it was too wide!
I finally looked up from the ground at the area around me, I was in some kind of small abandoned back alley loading zone.
There were piles of garbage, rusted cars, and bodies. Freshly dead bleeding bodies. Human bodies.
I looked up and saw a clouded night sky with large industrial smoke stacks peaking over the tall walls.
Looking back down I noticed around the crater full of molten metal was what looked like a bloody circle with lines that got cut off by the new crater with 5 points lit by glowing red lights. A pentagram?
Where they trying to summon a daemon?
Why did I show up then?
Then I put 2 and 2 together.
No. NononononNONONONONONONO!
I desperately searched around and saw a large cracked mirror lying on top of one of the scrap piles.
I dragged my way over ignoring the weakness of my legs and the pain of dragging myself against the asphalt bare naked.
Reaching the pile I pulled my self up, my legs wobbling like jello as I pulled myself high enough to look down at the dust covered mirror concealing my reflection.
I wiped at the mirror to reveal my face, my hysterically grinning face.
And I felt something snap and the laughter came pouring out.
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!"
_________________________________________________________________________
Taking a minute or so to let out all my hysteria in my system I took calming breaths as I tried to regain my usual cool and tried to remember what exactly happened.
The memories of my time in the Warp came rushing back to me in a mish mash of pieces, but I could still remember the most important parts. Joe was dead, I was trapped at the Well of Eternity, Truck-Kun Jr showed up, and I got tossed into the Well while getting pumped up with Warp energy. That explained my new appearance. Also HOLY SHIT! I survived entering the Well of Eternity! That is some serious luck there as the greater that did it ended up a elderly madman and all I got was just a makeover. Hah! I wonder where I was, am I in another universe?
I sat back first against the scrap pile, ignoring the jabs of sharp bits digging into my back, using it instead to focus. I looked around to properly take in just where I was now, yep everything looked like what I saw. Loading dock area, dark smoggy sky, grungy back alley, molten crater in the middle of the place, and a pile of human dead bodies. Whew, looks like some kind of Human city, so a Human world, lucky. It was almost like where I landed the first time I entered the 40K universe, why was it always alleyways?
Instinctively I use my psyker power to try to get a scan of the area around me and check on the state of the Warp around me, bit strange the Chaos Gods did not try to finish me off, maybe they were still fighting Truck-Kun Jr? I immediately noticed something wrong. I could not feel the power of the Warp flowing through me whenever I channeled my psychic powers. Waving my hand I tried to telekinetically push the air around only for nothing to happen.
"Oh no." I immediately do the first thing that came to mind and opened up my character sheet, inventory, and skill sheets hoping that my fears were unfounded.
I winced at the sheer amount of corrupted texts that scrolled up before me and my heart wept at the loss. Everything including my character sheet was utterly covered in errors. My Gamer System was ruined.
As I was about to scream to the Heavens the screens flickered.
What?
The screens flickered some more before disappearing. Just as I felt my stomach about to drop the screens all came back, but this time the errors were gone.
With hope in my eyes I looked at what came back and frowned. The errors were gone, but most of well, everything, was gone as well. Most of my skills, items, perks, etc were not there anymore. Did I seriously lose ALL OF THEM?
That wasn't fair.
Character Sheet
NAME: Noman
AGE: ?
OCCUPATION: THE GAMER
RACE: HUMAN(?)/DAEMON(?)
TITLE: None
LEVEL: 97
NEXT LEVEL: ?
HP 5025.0
HP Regen 16792.545 per minute or 279.876 HP per second
MP 1657.7
MP Regen 15407.161 per minute or 256.786 MP per second
STRENGTH: 1701 (680.4)
CONSTITUTION: 1818 (181.8)
DEXTERITY: 1878 (187.8)
INTELLIGENCE: 1027 (102.7)
WISDOM: 843 (84.3)
LUCK: 355 (35.5)
STAT POINTS: 485
MONEY: 0
Perks
Curse of Chaos Undivided, reduce all Stats by a factor of 10
50 Strength Perk: Herculean Strength - Increase damage from melee attacks by 50%
100 Strength Perk: A Knight's Raiment - Able to wear heavy armor as if they were one weight class lighter.
150 Strength Perk: Armor Bane - Melee based damage ignores 25% of armor reduction and causes 1% of damage to enemy armor
200 Strength Perk: Monstrous Strength - Increases Strength stat by 100%
250 Strength Perk: Mjolnir - Can wield two handed weapons as if one handed
300 Strength Perk: Say Hello To My Little Friend - Can wield non portable vehicle weapons as 2 handed
350 Strength Perk: And his cousin - Can wield non portable vehicle weapons one handed
400 Strength Perk: A King's Raiment all outfits - now do not reduce mobility or speed
450 Strength Perk: Heroic Strength - Increases Melee damage by 200%
500 Strength Perk: Tactile Telekinesis - Holds stuff together so you don't actually destroy it while lifting it.
750 Strength Perk: Demigod's Might - Increase Strength stat by 200%
1000 Strength Perk: Transcendental Body - Increase defense by 500%
1500 Strength Perk: God's Fist - Your physical attacks can now harm the immaterial
50 Constitution Perk: Healthy As A Horse - Gain extra 5 HP per Constitution point
100 Constitution Perk: Titan's Bones - Reduce damage to body by 50%
150 Constitution Perk: Healthy As A Troll - Gain extra 10 HP per Constitution point
200 Constitution Perk: Titan's Skin - Reduces elemental damage by 25%
250 Constitution Perk: Monstrous Vitality - Increase HP Regen by 5%
300 Constitution Perk: Titan's Armor - Reduces magic damage by 25%
350 Constitution Perk: Healthy As A Squat - Gain extra 10 HP per Constitution point
400 Constitution Perk: Aqua Lad - You no longer need to breath
450 Constitution Perk: Trollish Vitality - Increase HP Regen by 5%
500 Constitution Perk: Space Borne - You no longer suffer from exposure to the vacuum of space
750 Constitution Perk: Godly Vitality - Increase HP Regen by 5%
1000 Constitution Perk: Transcendental Recovery - Increase HP regen by 300%
1500 Constitution Perk: Solar Champion - Every 10 minute of solar radiation exposure gives you a minute's worth charge that can double Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution stats. Can double the bonus by halving remaining time. Can be done repeatedly, no limit to amount of charge hold.
50 Dexterity Perk: Cat's Grace - Always land on your feet, keep your balance easily, and reduce fall damage.
100 Dexterity Perk: Hunter's Instinct - Find enemy weak points easier and +50% to critical damage
150 Dexterity Perk: Dagger in the Dark - When undetected increase weapon damage by 100% and critical rate by 75%
200 Dexterity Perk: Spider Sense - Gain split second precognition of attacks directed at you with killer intent
250 Dexterity Perk: Contortionist - Your body can now bend in impossible ways even in full armor
300 Dexterity Perk: Monstrous Speed - All movement speeds increased by 50%
350 Dexterity Perk: A Tree Bends - Reduce physical attack damage by 50%
400 Dexterity Perk: A Slippery Blade - First stealth attack guarantees critical hit
450 Dexterity Perk: Speed is Strength - Apply Dexterity to melee damage
500 Dexterity Perk: Spartan Time - When in combat speed up your perception of time, causing everything to slow down for you
750 Dexterity Perk: Vital Perception - Be able to see weak points on the enemy and attacks on these points shall deal 100% greater critical damage
1000 Dexterity Perk: Transcendental Reflex - Increase physical speed and skills by 100%
1500 Dexterity Perk: Death's Eye - Grants perfect aim with any ranged weapon within its reach of attack
50 Intelligence Perk: Deep Well - Gain +10 MP from each Intelligence point.
100 Intelligence Perk: Eidetic Memory - Remember things easily and at any moment. +10% Experience Gain
150 Intelligence Perk: Destructive Science - Gain ability to gain blueprints when salvaging functional equipment for no resources
200 Intelligence Perk: Mana Affinity - Gain the ability to sense and manipulate mana 10% increase to MP recovery and 5% increase to total MP.
250 Intelligence Perk: Territory Management - Unlocks territory management functions
300 Intelligence Perk: Strong Mana Affinity - 10% increase to MP recovery and 5% increase to total MP
350 Intelligence Perk: Deep Lake - Gain +10 MP from each Intelligence point.
400 Intelligence Perk: Multicasting - Can cast (Intelligence/100) spells simultaneously
450 Intelligence Perk: Army Management - Unlocks army management functions
500 Intelligence Perk: Legendary Magic Power - Magic effects increased by 100%
750 Intelligence Perk: Mythical Magic Power - Magic effects increase by 200%
1000 Intelligence Perk: Demigod of Magic - Increase magic effects by 300%
Reduce skill MP costs by 99%
50 Wisdom Perk: Perceptive - Increase ability to notice thing around you
100 Wisdom Perk: Common Sense - Increase Exp gain by 10%
150 Wisdom Perk: Insightful - Increase ability to understand what is below the surface
200 Wisdom Perk: Not So Common Sense - Increase Exp gain by 15%
250 Wisdom Perk: Sherlock - Gain greater ability to make intuitive leaps in logic
300 Wisdom Perk: Sage's Wisdom - MP Recovery and Magic Defense increased by 300%
350 Wisdom Perk: Teacher - gain ability to teach skills to students
400 Wisdom Perk: Sage Aura - Those around you share in your Wisdom, increase their Wisdom by 10% of yours
450 Wisdom Perk: World's Teacher - Increase student's ability to increase skill level by 100% while being taught by you
500 Wisdom Perk: Eye of Odin - Grant short term combat precognition
750 Wisdom Perk: Transcendental Sage's Wisdom - Increase MP recovery and Magic Defense by 600%
50 Luck Perk: Reaper's Presence - Increase chance of a critical strike by 25%
100 Luck Perk: Reaper's Touch - Increase critical damage by 50%
150 Luck Perk: Reaper's Embrace - Decrease chance of suffering a critical strike by 25%
200 Luck Perk: Reaper's Duties - Chance of defeating enemies restore HP and MP
250 Luck Perk: Bloody Mess - Chance of kills to cause explosions that damage nearby enemies
300 Luck Perk: No Fate- Your Fate defying abilities are so strong that Fate itself is unraveled around you. Prevents accurate use of precognition on you.
350 Luck Perk: Mysterious Stranger - When in a fight, chance of a mysterious stranger in power armor will appear and attack your current target before disappearing
Level 25 Perk: Blood Knight - Recover 10% of damage dealt as Health
Level 50 Perk: WAAAGGGHHH EXPOSURE!!! - Access to Orkish WAAAGGGHHH!!! Field energy to temporarily become a Ork, higher Orkoid forms consume more Wagghhh energy per second to transform into and maintain. Gain access to Ork racial perks and tech tree.
Level 75 Perk: Warp Resistance! - Due to excessive exposure to Warp Energies without being corrupted, your body has been filled past the brim with raw Warp Energy that has effectively formed a shield from other Warp effects. Gain 50% Resistance to Warp based abilities and attacks.
Cleaning Perk: Mr. Clean - Access to option to instant auto clean equipment
Cleaning Perk: Increase range of cleaning
Cleaning Perk: Increase ability to clean
Jump Perk: Double jump - You can now jump twice without a surface
Skills
Cleaning*** Level 2: A passive skill that allows you to clean things faster. 6660% to cleaning speed.
Cooking Level 50: A skill to cook food. Humanity has advanced their taste buds through making meals. Cooked food become better as mastery levels rise.
Damaged Gamer's Body Level Max: Grants a body that allows for the user to interact with Gamer System function. Sleeping in a bed restores 50% HP and MP.
Damaged Gamer's Mind Level Max: Allows the user to access Gamer System HUD. Low resistance to psychological status effects.
Jump Level* 46: A skill to allow the user to jump higher than before! Passively boosts jumping height by 1920% while actively boosting jumping height by 19200%. 1 MP per jump.
Inventory
Chainsword, laspistol, three las packs, a dozen corpsestarch rations
I had basically lost all my skills, all my inventory, and had lost most of my stats! And that was before taking into account that damn curse from Chaos! Fuck those tumors! Apparently they also maybe turned me into a fucking daemon! Well maybe considering I only look like one and am not disappearing into the Warp. Maybe a demi daemon? I was going to need to find out later. At least they did not manage to touch my stat based perks, but seriously what happened to everything else! I didn't even have an experience indicator anymore! Can I even level up? Hell I even lost the STC DATABASE AND MY CRAFTING SKILL! That was probably my biggest loss as that meant I could not just instantly tech up and replace everything. I even lost my nanite based power armor in the Warp during my escape and I loved that thing!
I haven't been this weak in years. I slammed my fist down on the ground next to me causing a small hole to form. Dammit.
Something about my skill list struck me, my eyes widened and I looked back at it. My Gamer skills were DAMAGED? So that's why I was so emotional! Also there went my mental defenses. Great. Reading Gamer's Body more carefully a sneaking suspicion came to mind.
Slowly I used one of my new claws to cut a thin line across the back of my hand and watched as blood welled up before healing before my eyes. Oh God. My body no longer worked entirely by game physics. Damage actually dealt physical damage instead of just reducing my health bar. This probably meant I also had to eat, drink, and sleep now. Then again I was also maybe a daemon so maybe not? A urge to throw up rose in my throat at the thought of being a daemon before I forced it down. I am going to make those tumors pay one day. I swear it. Did I even have a quest system anymore? A quick check showed me no. Great can't even get quest rewards anymore.
Staring up at the smoggy sky I pondered my current situation.
"What do I do now? I am not in 40K anymore. So I don't think I need to worry about surviving against anything like what was in 40K considering it was the higher end of the danger spectrum of universes to be in. Then again I was apparently summoned so magic is probably a thing here, but hidden considering this summoning location. Where the hell are the summoners anyway? Did they get melted by my arrival? Maybe. Ughh, my mind is so slow. Now I kinda understand the point of view of the Eldars." I said out loud with a shiver.
Before I could continue my musing a new screen popped up in front of my face without prompting showing a surprising message.
DING!
SYSTEM HAS SUFFERED CATASTROPHIC DAMAGE!
ACTIVATING SELF REPAIR SYSTEMS!
INFECTIOUS MEMETIC HAZARDOUS ENERGIES DETECTED WITHIN SYSTEM!
QUARANTINING AFFECTED AREAS!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED SKILLS!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED PERKS!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED ITEMS!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED QUEST SYSTEM!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM!
LOCKING AWAY INFECTED SKILL SYSTEM!
BEGINNING SELF REPAIR PROTOCOLS!
EXPERIENCE UTILIZED TO BEGIN REPAIRS!
WARNING! INSUFFICIENT EXPERIENCE TO COMPLETE REPAIRS!
MINIMAL REPAIRS DONE TO STAT, SKILLS, AND INVENTORY SYSTEMS!
NO REPAIRS STARTED ON RELATIONSHIP AND QUEST SYSTEMS!
ALL EXPERIENCE GAINED SHALL BE DIVERTED TO SYSTEM RECOVERY UNTIL COMPLETE!
SYSTEMS SHALL BE RELEASED PIECEMEAL AS THEY ARE RECOVERED!
WORK HARD! GANBATTE!
What?
I read carefully the sudden prompt and was relieved. My system was not fatally broken and could heal.
That also explained where my experience gauge went and why I still had a few skills and items. Even better was that this implied I could regain everything eventually.
That took a load off my mind as I can actually recover even if slowly. Not sure how much experience I was going to need but it was likely a shit ton.
Well, not like I was in any rush, given the fact that no daemons have attempted to eat me despite my weakened state, that probably meant I wasn't in 40K anymore as I doubt the Chaos Gods would give up a chance like this given how many daemons I permanently killed over the years.
So I could take my time, gain experience, recover, then eventually figure out how to get back to the 40K universe at the head of a new army and finish what I started.
Thinking about going back made me remember that Joe was dead, torn apart by daemons and devoured. I wasn't going to be able to bring him back with his soul eaten. Damn them.
That led me to remember everyone that died on the planet when my self destruct activated. Everyone in the system was likely dead except for those he tossed into the warp tunnel.
Just another reason to go back to make the daemons pay. A vengeance served cold but served it will be.
Getting up I found myself much more steadier now and walked over to the pile of corpses, examining their outfits.
Looks like they were industrial workers based on their overalls and helmets. I noticed that they had visible augmentations, but nothing like the mechanicus, these were much more streamlined and humanoid. They all had these ports and usb cables in their necks and hands. A universal connector perhaps? I also noticed some had cybernetic eyes and throat augments while some did not. Looks like augmentation was much more available if even industrial workers could have personal augments. Even more surprising due to sheer lack of use for the past years was that they had English worded manufacturing logos. It has been so long since I had to read something not Gothic of some kind or advanced Federation lingua.
Their appearances were within standard human norm so that meant my own appearance was likely going to attract attention. I could probably say my appearance was a result of surgery, unless the extent of surgical modification is lower than what I presumed, or if they have any psyker equivalents.
I begin looting their bodies finding nothing but their clothes, leaving their cybernetics alone, I was not going to immediately resort to chopping apart the dead just to acquire resources, not unless I had to.
Using the cloth and my own sharp claws I crafted myself a larger version of the workers' uniform as my new form was much taller and lankier than my previous Human one.
Making sure the helmet was secured on my head and that I looked visibly normal enough if no one took a serious glace at me in the dark I proceeded to locate and utilize the nearest exit to whatever main street there is.
A minute later and I was out on a relatively quiet main street with my back leaning against a vending machine that sold guns!
Looking up at the various holographic and digital advertisements I saw one that seemed to be a news channel based on the stereotypical reporter set up. Man it felt so weird to hear people speaking English again.
Listening to the news channel revealed some startling facts. I was on Terra, Earth, I was back on my homeworld, and I now knew the name of the city I was in along with the current date.
"Night City? I guess it fits. Time to find a better information source. Wonder if they still have libraries in 2066?"
