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The Most Dangerous Gamer by chimmon

Books » Worm Rated: M, English, Adventure, OC, Bonesaw, Siberian, Words: 431k+, Favs: 3k+, Follows: 3k+, Published: Mar 8, 2021 Updated: Feb 27, 2023

1,306Chapter 6: Interlude - Eidolon

Eidolon looked over the report. One survivor - who was currently going through Master/Stranger protocols in the Dallas Protectorate. It wasn't uncommon for there to be survivors of the Slaughterhouse Nine. It unfortunately also wasn't uncommon for small towns like Brooke's Creek to be wiped off the face of the earth either. What was uncommon was for a single person to survive. In fact, this was the only time it had happened.

The most powerful parahuman on earth scowled. To think that HE was here. Not in his city, but close enough for it to not really matter. The person who'd killed Hero. The Siberian - Manton - had started the end of everything, and he'd make him pay one day. David closed his eyes and exhaled. Getting angry wouldn't bring him back. It wouldn't save anyone else. A calm mind might.

The reasons for letting them live, for letting the horrors they committed go unpunished remained. For all the evil the Slaughterhouse Nine committed, the chaos they made, it was worth it. He had to believe that. Each visit of theirs - that left people alive - was one more roll of the dice. One more chance for SOMEONE to appear who could save the world - either at their hand or from a Protectorate volunteer. It was also hoped that one day some of their members might be turned to the good of humanity. Ediolon wasn't sure about that.

The Slaughterhouse Nine were close. Watchdog had already sent people to Brooke's Creek in order to try and piece together where they vanished to. With Cauldron and Contessa working against them, they'd never track them. Would they come to Houston? Eidolon didn't know what he'd do then. It was one thing to read reports of what they did in other places, but he couldn't turn a blind eye if it was in HIS town. Killing Manton would be easy. One power for targeting, one for enough mobility to stay out of her range, the final one to end the person who'd killed Hero.

No. If Manton died, one of their strongest potential weapons would be lost. In one form or another, the Siberian must survive.

Back to their latest survivor. The girl claimed to have been saved by an unknown hero. No one had seen or heard from any other survivor. If a parahuman had helped her, it was most likely a new Trigger. It was also likely that they were now dead. So much for their 'plan'. What was the point of getting new parahumans if the Nine killed them as soon as they popped up. Well, if whomever it was that saved the girl couldn't fight off the Nine, they couldn't kill Scion.

A dark rationalization for a dark world.

The last page of the report was the most worrisome. Watchdog had come across the phrase 'Simurgh bombs'. The Simurgh had only visited the United States once, but that would be enough. The quarantine zone hadn't been air-tight. Could someone from there have joined the Slaughterhouse Nine? Eidolon wasn't sure what the Simurgh could do to make them any worse. Jack Slash was bad enough. Perhaps the 'bomb' was someone driven to join them - like Alan Gramme.

Now that was a depressing thought. Mannequin was bad on his own, but so much worse being part of a group. If they picked up another cape of his power...

Watchdog was worried about the girl being a bomb that Jack somehow made. That's why she was under lockdown in Dallas. He'd notify Doctor Mother. Contessa would be able to determine if she should be allowed freedom in order to cause more chaos. That and free her with no one being the wiser.

Eidolon put down the report. Nothing to do until they got more information. He picked up the next file. The continuing effort to find the Fallen continued, and they couldn't use Thinkers for that because of Mathers. Another group allowed to flourish because of 'the greater good'. He didn't know who were the real monsters.

Author's Note:

Here are some details behind the mechanic's of Kevin's powers. They've been vaguely alluded to in story, but haven't been explicitly stated. So if you're interested in this kind of thing, read on. If not, it won't impact the plot.

Kevin's Shard is 'Optimize'. It's focused on improvement in general and making something work best in narrow circumstances in particular. When he Triggered, it gathered buds from the nearby parahumans and made its own cluster. This cluster is his power and is referred to as "The Gamer".

The abilities it gained were:

Gamer's Mind came from Mr. Price's Interface Shard. It's main effect is to shield Kevin from reality so it's more like a game. He can still feel emotions and attachments, but they're more removed. Extreme ones are negated entirely. Lesser ones still work, in the same vein as feeling sad because you watched a sad movie. It also handles getting everything to work together and is responsible for the notifications he sees.

Gamer's Body came from Crawler's Adaptation Shard. It synergizes with Optimization and enables Kevin to improve his stats. Optimize adjusted it to be a Breaker effect as a secondary expression based on Manton's Shard.

Observe came from Jack's Broadcast Shard. As such it's very adept at getting information. While not as wide of scope as Broadcast, it does excel at doing certain things more. Such as analyzing objects and postcognition.

Inventory came from Mannequin's Enclosure Shard. It doesn't grant Kevin any information about technology. Instead the insights from that tech was used to create his pocket dimension. Most other powers piggyback off of Inventory for their range.

Whenever Kevin has significant interactions with a parahuman, another bud is gained. This interaction can come from a quest or by killing them. The buds are inactive until resources are allocated to them. For the ones that directly come in as new abilities, such as the Party system. They are granted said resources automatically. For ones that come in as Perks, they have to be selected. Only then will Optimize begin to devote resources to their improvement.

Other buds can be gained internally from the cluster, such as the Solid as a Rock perk. These are offshoots of existing buds, or Optimize itself. So increased strength, speed, intellect, or even limited precognition are possible - if the resources to improve those aspects were already spent.

Internal buds are limited by what's available in the cluster. For example, Jack's Broadcast can project his knife's physical effect. Observe cannot. The cluster cannot create this effect as that aspect doesn't exist inside of it. In order to get it, Kevin would have to get another bud from Broadcast.

Buds typically can be level 1 to 5. With level 1 being roughly as strong as a grab-bag cape's primary power. Level 3 is around a strong parahuman's power. Level 5 is closing in on unrestricted power similar to the triumvirate. Leveling buds takes exponentially more exp. i.e. 1000, 10,000, 100,000, and 1,000,000 exp. Quests and incorporating another bud of the same Shard can speed this process up.

Kevin can gain a crafting Perk internally, but it would only be able to craft objects he knows how to make. Speed and quality would be improved. Other Tinker's shards could bud into a crafting system for their specialty. If he obtained multiple Tinker buds, they would all be combined into one Perk.

His Summoning Perk is similarly limited. However, it can draw upon his innate understanding of biology using his body as a guide. So until he knows the details of an object, he can't summon a working copy. Naturally occurring animals are within his scope. His summons also have a size restriction. The smallest unit he can make is a pixel. So anything smaller than a mouse won't be effective. For example, he could make a cockroach, but it would be hard to recognize as such, he would have no control, and all it could do was move around randomly.

Chapter 279 - 6