Chương 8

When Oliver had crossed from his home biome over to the mushroom biome, he had simply flown over, completely oblivious to the border. He'd been focused on the massive fungal forest stretched out beyond him and not on the space where the two biomes met. Now on foot, however, he stood at the edge of the mushroom biome which starkly transitioned over into a stretch of metal street. It was a stark difference with less than a yard of raw, brown dirt to separate the two vastly different biomes.

He traded the soft, mushroom carpeted forest floor for the solid steel of the city. Never before had he felt so out of place as he did when stepping into that world of metal and neon. Skyscrapers towered to either side of him, making him feel tiny in their shadows. It had been so long since he'd seen such impressive buildings. Only vague memories of his life before the experiment could conjure anything similar to them. The streets were lit by flickering shades of purple neon.

Projected videos played and short advertisement clips seemed to almost pop off the walls. Vehicles hovered off the ground, skating along the roads. People wore bizarre outfits with hoops of neon lights and metallic visors covering their eyes. Oliver looked down at his own clothing. Black jacket. Black pants. Black boots. Black shoulder bag. His only bits of metal were a blunderbuss, shovel, and jewelry. Not exactly cutting edge technology.

He suspected that he would once again stand out like a sore thumb amongst the locals, just as he had in the mushroom forest. He sighed. At least this place had plenty of dark alleyways and shadows to hide in." Good. You arrived." The drone dropped from above. The buzz of its blades went unnoticed in the street filled with similar flying gadgets and noise. Unlike Oliver, a drone was commonplace here.

"Hello, [Technomancer]." Oliver greeted the new drone.

"Going to take me to meet you?"" Affirmative." The drone hovered over Oliver's head and he stuck his shovel between the landing gear and grabbed a hold just as he had with the previous drone. It whirled and slowly rose into the air.

"I don't suppose you know a vendor who I can buy more silver bullets from?" Oliver asked once they were a yard up. The drone hesitated and they hovered over the sidewalk for a few seconds." For your chosen weapon, a blunderbuss pistol, I know of an arms dealer who may stock such antique ammunition. However, her storefront is not en route to my base of operations. Is this an urgent matter? What is your current supply of ammunition?"

"Roughly around a dozen more bullets. Then I'm out."" Inconvenient."

"Yeah. I'm aware." He should have spent all of his money on bullets back in Ventri. He hadn't realized at the time that it would be so long until his next chance to stock up. The drone lifted him into the air and they were off." Do you have a skill that requires the use of your blunderbuss pistol specifically?" Oliver paused but decided there wasn't too much of a risk admitting this particular skill.

"I have Pistol Proficiency."

"Very good. I have an assortment of handguns in my personal collection that are at your disposal. Would any of them meet your needs?"

"Do any of them shoot silver bullets?"" They do not.

"They flew for a minute before the drone speaker turned back on." I will take you to the arm's dealer first,"[Technomancer] decided." Only a single neighborhood remains of Neo Nova City. Thankfully, the scoundrel's shop survived the biome merge. I cannot say the same of many of my other resources." Unlike before, the drone had to navigate around not only buildings, but also other flying objects soaring through the skies over the city.

[Technomancer] held no monopoly on the sky here and had to give deference to the dangers of the contenders for aerial space. Thankfully, his pilot clearly wasn't a novice at aerial navigation. He gracefully weaved his way through the crowds with ease. Oliver watched longingly as a pack of teenagers who looked roughly his age blasted past them on crotch rockets. He wondered how much Mel it would take to afford one. He made a mental note to ask later.

As a kid, he'd owned a dirtbike and used to race his friends out in the abandoned town north of his home. Getting back on one of those after all these years would be a dream. Especially if it could actually fly like the ones in this city. They'd thrown together some jumps out of scraps in the town but Oliver never cleared higher than five or six feet of air. A few minutes later, they rounded a corner and dipped into a backstreet.

Both druggies and rats alike scampered away as they touched back to the ground in the alleyway. Nobody wanted to mess with someone riding on a drone. They gave him a wide berth and hid from sight. Oliver doubted anyone cared about his gun or shovel. His weapons appeared obsolete without knowledge of his skills. No, these people instead feared the very obvious gun attachment strapped to the side of the mechanical drone buzzing in the air beside him. Oliver nudged a crumpled disposable cup with his boot.

This place was filthy. The entire city was covered in large screens but the ones on this dingy spot's walls were cracked and fuzzed with static. Most of the alley's windows were boarded up. He spotted a cracked backdoor into a busy ramen shop, the only redeeming feature of the alley. Unfortunately, the metal stairs in front of him were obviously the direction he was meant to go. A neon sign flickered. It read, 'Full Throttle Gadgets.' However, the only working lights instead spelled out, 'u rot get.'

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience." I will wait here. Please attend to your business promptly." The drone continued to hover in the air, standing guard over the dirty alley. Oliver, shovel over a shoulder, descended down into a basement shop. A bell dinged, announcing his entrance. There were shutters to either side of him, leaving only a thin passageway forward to a single cash register.

"Who's that?" a voice hollered out.

"A customer?" Oliver responded, a bit uncertain as he approached the register. His fingers twitched to his blunderbuss. [Technomancer] had vouched for this store, but it was still literally an underground arms dealer. Besides, he didn't actually know [Technomancer] all that well. Best to stay alert and as to not get shot in the back. A woman a few years older than him popped her head around the corner. Half of her face was replaced by green silicone.

Her purple hair was shaved on one side, revealing a metal plate screwed into her cranium. A robotic left eye twisted like a camera lens focusing as she examined him.

"A [Grave Robber]? That explains the shovel. Where'd you come from? We ain't got graves in Neo Nova. Poor sell the organic material for cash and rich incinerate. I like your jacket and hat. Nice macabre sense of fashion. Matches the class nicely. You find it in a grave? Eyeshadow is a bit much. Wait, no, that's soot, isn't it? You roll around in a bonfire's aftermath? What's with you? You're certainly a weirdo."

"From out of town." Actually… he had taken this particular jacket from a corpse. But he decided not to disclose that fact.

"Well, you got something to sell? Anything good scavenged from the graves? Prosthetics? Guns? I'll even buy organs if you kept them fresh."

"I'm here to buy."

"Customer? Hazzah! Name's Velocity. What're you shopping for? He set his blunderbuss on the countertop.

"Running low on ammo. Silver bullets if you have them."

"Interesting." She poked at his gun with a finger.

"Silver isn't the best metal for ammunition. Not dense and fucking soft too. Makes them hard to aim and slow. You sure you don't want good ol' lead for this oldie?"

"It needs to be silver."

"Fine, fine. Suppose it goes with your whole dark and brooding hottie aesthetic." She clapped her hand and the shutter on the left rose up, revealing a wide assortment of guns.

"I keep a few silvers about. Probably a hundred years since someone wanted one. But I got 'em. How many?"

"What's the price?" Oliver looked at some of the guns. He was tempted to grab a plasma rifle or something with more oomph than his current pistol. Or even a plasma pistol, since his skill would doubtlessly apply to it as well. But he liked the synergy with his Silver Potency skill. Nothing else here seemed likely to match his current weapon combo's damage. Judging based on his fight back in the mushroom village, it seemed his skill made any opponent susceptible to the metal.

"Silver ain't exactly flying off the shelves. Like I said, it's kind of shit as ammo. Tell you what, I'll give you a deal, 'cause you're cute." She winked her mechanical eye at him.

"2 Mel a bullet." He sighed. That was the exact same price as the vendor back in Ventri. Every time he visited a vendor he was starkly reminded of his horrible Speech stat. Velocity might be giving him lip service, but the prices told the stark truth of his situation. As he reached for his money pouch, Oliver paused. There was quite a bit more in there than there had been back in the mushroom village. Only then did it click that he'd ignored the earlier kill notifications of the [Witch] and [Harvester].

They'd probably been carrying money that automatically transferred to him on a kill. He wasn't rich, by any means, but it was a nice surprise.

"Give me a hundred shots." He dolled out half of his remaining Mel. These bullets might be effective, but they certainly did cut into his savings.

"Gotcha." Velocity passed him five small boxes.

"Anything else on the menu?" Oliver hesitated. He only had another 200 Mel. Most of this was well outside his price range. Then his eyes landed on something in the corner.

"Are those… grenades?" Velocity scampered over.

"What kind are you looking for? Plasma? Gas? Flash? Noise? Incendiary? More shrapnel? Less?"

"Um." He knew next to nothing about types of bombs. He'd been a child still before he got whisked off to a world of vampires and ghouls.

"For shrapnel grenades, by any chance, do you think you could add silver to the shrapnel?"

"Oooh, you want a modification? It'll cost a bit more, but I can do it. And cheap too, since I got a skill for that. I'll only charge you 90 Mel a piece. A steal." That basically cleaned him out after just two. Still, he agreed and handed over the money. She launched herself into the task, giddily peeling apart the outside of a grenade like an orange. Meanwhile, Oliver went and sat back on a stool and closed his eyes. He hoped [Technomancer] didn't mind the slight delay.

Velocity assured him it would only take ten minutes to switch out the explosive's insides. This was the first moment of peace since leaving his sanctuary back in Ventri. Despite his stats in Resilience, Oliver felt the weight of his journey crash down on him. He reflected on his fights. So much violence in such a short amount of time. Everything had been a blur of movement ever since cracking open his coffin.

And now, he simply sat on the hard wooden stool, listening to Velocity work, clicking pieces together and swearing to herself. He couldn't help but note that Velocity felt different from the people back in his biome. Like she had more substance to her personality. He could forget she wasn't a person like him when she spoke. It unnerved him."' Kay. Two handheld death explosions with a side of silver, as ordered. Anything else I can getcha this fine day?"

She raised a singed eyebrow at him as she held out the two grenades.

"Grenades aren't the only thing I can modify." Her eyes flicked down at his full body. Oliver opened his mouth to tell her that he had no money left to spend but was cut off by a boom." Citizens of Neo Nova,"a loud voice said from a speaker outside." We ask you to stay inside your homes at this time. We have tracked a dangerous criminal to this location. Any interference will be dealt with. Lethally. Thank you for your time."

"Is this normal?" Oliver asked.

"Eh. Maybe every other week? Crazy guy with robots been harassing the law enforcers for the last two years. Probably up to his normal shenanigans again today."

"This… guy with the robots. He wouldn't happen to be a [Technomancer] by any chance, would he?"

"Out!" Velocity yelled, immediately on her feet. She slammed a fist into a button and the shutters shot down throughout her store.

"Out! Out! I am not getting my shop wrecked again by the peace officers! Hurry up!" Her robotic hand dislocated from her wrist and began pushing him back up towards the exit.

"Wait, but the law enforcement—" Oliver started to say.

"Not my problem. Unless, that is, you stay. Then it will be my problem. Tell Benny that I love his money, but to be more discreet in the future. Get those drones off my doorstep!" With those parting words, Velocity pushed him out the door and back into the alleyway. He was greeted, not by a friendly hovering drone, but by fire and screams.