NOVEL NEXT V1CH6 Crafting Stuff & Thangs
The next day I decided to shop for some things to hunt that succubus down as it would have several things that are of use to me. While it may seem callous of me to not feel anything about hunting a living thinking being, she was a hunter herself. Just like the sheep can’t be mad at the hungry wolf, the wolf can’t be mad at the protective farmer. Not that my motive were quite so pure, but my conscience, or at least the empty husk of it hollowed out by unreality, was clear.
My first couple of stops the next day were at various religious sites to collect faith for the first of my projects.
I spent the next several hours visiting churches, mosques, and synagogues around the city. I would have visited more, but America tends to only have those around. After I collected a bunch of faith into a golden sphere, I returned to my hotel room with said ball and various other supplies to start crafting artifacts.
The artifact that I was collecting faith for was the Holy Straight Razor. It took the form of a white straight razor the handle covered in golden swoops and whirls. The blade featured golden symbols of various religions: a Dharmachakra representing Buddhism, a Cross representing Christianity, an Om representing Hinduism, a Star and Crescent representing Islam, a Star of David representing Judaism, a Torii representing Shinto, and a Taijitu representing Taoism.
The blade purpose was to quickly disable/kill a target with only one hand. The straight razor had a conceptual relationship with slitting throats. As such when used in that way the artifact received a small boost. This boost was critical as I was quite physically weak.
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Holy Straight Razor
“Dead slump or devout kneeling, Looks the same to me.”
Tier One
A straight razor empowered by faith
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The next artifact incorporated the clown’s flexibility and stainless steel from a refrigerator, the Suit of Armor. The steel granted durability and the flexibility made what would have been incredible stiff clothes into some of the most flexible dress clothes in the world. The ingredients lead to the suit being a dull grey. Its purpose was simply to provide some protection to my fragile body.
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Suit of Armor
“The modern man’s suit of armor”
Tier Zero
An Italian cut suit with unnatural durability and flexibility
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The other artifact was one I was holding off on until I had an actual need for it. The artifact was named The Energy Baron’s Stomach, and its main job was to store apples. I did not need this earlier as rat apples were so widely accessible. Sinner apples provided much more time, but I could only hunt every so often. While it may be overly optimistic, it’s entirely possible that I may have more than five apples sometimes. Also, it will allow for longer intervals without a hunt.
I created the artifact out of a bunch of stomachs I picked up from a butcher and an entire bucket of rat apples. I now had a small red leather pouch hanging at gut level off a leather cord. No reason for the cord being leather other than personal preference and the fact the animal product mildly resonated with the stomach attributed crystal.
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The Energy Baron’s Stomach
“This will go straight to my hips”
Tier Zero
A magical amulet that stores an energy source called apples
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My next artifact was The Mentalism Ring. It looked like a pink gem shaped into a brain wrapped in black chains that also made up the band. Its purpose was to store mental related abilities, currently that was just Cole’s psychometry.
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The Mentalism Ring
“I’m seeing a J”
Tier One
A ring that grants the following mental abilities: Psychometry
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For my next artifact, I infused an undershirt with some muscles, read various cuts of red meat, I got from the butcher. This created a pink undershirt that I named Muscle Shirt. This increased my physical abilities to the level of an average man.
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Muscle Shirt
“Strong like bull”
Tier Zero
A pink undershirt that grants the wearer physical abilities matching the level of an average man
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To finish up my wardrobe, I created a gray pair of dress shoes named Cement Shoes. They just made me harder to move at the cost of sinking like an anchor in water. They were made from a pair of Cole’s shoes and cement picked up from a hardware store.
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Cement Shoes
“Get this man some shoes of the cement variety”
Tier Zero
Shoes that make the wearer harder to displace at the cost of cursing them to sink in water
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The last of the artifacts were created to take advantage of the power system in this world. You see, apparently in this world people can grow stronger and evolve by feeding off an energy produced by negative emotions, usually fear. Learned that from analyzing the clown and some other regular people from this reality.
This method was innately corrupting though, which meant that most of the monster hunters just trained in the standard fantasy methods, magic or mystical martial arts.
My solution was a mask. This was possible due to a mask’s ability to become the face of an identity and the mask in question was designed to absorb that energy. I doubt that I am the first to have this idea, but I’m probably the first that can create a mask that has the potential to truly reach the heights of this world.
The artifact would also help with fear collection by making me more recognizable. It wasn’t just when observed though, a mask would make linking my deeds together easier thereby speeding up the creation of a legend.
The mask would solve a much more mundane problem in addition, hiding my face. The mask achieves the best of both worlds: recognized when I want and unrecognizable when I don’t.
I took inspiration for my mask from one of my favorite creatures back home, the wasp jackal. They were remorseless, unyielding, vicious hunters that never stopped until they or their targets were dead.
I constructed it out of bone I got from the same butcher as the stomachs and some bubblegum for stickiness essence. I ended up with a stark white jackal mask with visible lines denoting the exoskeleton and a mouth that split apart two different ways. It was just a mundane mask that stuck to my face when worn.
When I put it on though, it reacted to me and turned a stark black. I felt the mask connect to what I can only describe as a story carved into reality itself. The mask imparted said story.
The black wasp jackal was distinct among his kind. He was a solitary creature that was forever both hunter and the hunted. To understand why you had to understand how most wasp jackal swarms worked. Each swarm had a queen that only really had two abilities empowering the swarm and enslaving it. While everyone else were slaves and hunters. However, sometimes a wasp jackal gains the ability to resist the queen’s commands. This had happened a few times before and the wasp jackals are usually killed, but he was powerful enough to fight the rest of the swarm and kill the queen. When that happened, it set off a series of events: the wasp jackal’s exoskeleton turns jet black, all the other drones died, and the strength of the entire swarm was concentrated into the black wasp jackal. From that point on, the black wasp jackal lead a life of hunting other swarms for their power.
The reason my mask turned black was due to concept resonance. Both the black wasp jackal and I lost our home and became all the stronger for it. both of us were unique. Both of were doomed to forever be hunters. This empowered the mask and bound it to a legend. I fed The Black Mist Ring to it. This, due to the similar concepts of hunting and stealth, strengthened the contained ability and allowed the mask to create Black Smoke. This solved the problem of such a useful ability only being available in this world.
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The Black Wasp Jackal’s Face
“We all wear masks, this is mine”
Tier One
A mask that grants the following abilities: resistance to mental and soul-based attacks & creation and manipulation of Black Mist
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At the end of this I ended up with an amulet, a mask, some clothes, and a week to live.
Current Equipment:
Head:
[The Black Wasp Jackal’s Face]
Earrings:
[]
Necklace:
[The Energy Baron’s Stomach]
Clothes:
[Suit of Armor]
[Muscle Shirt]
Rings:
[The Mentalism Ring]
Bracelets:
[]
Shoes:
[Cement Shoes]
Armaments:
[Weaver’s First Armament]
[Sense Cane]
[Holy Straight Razor]
Storage:
[Various Essences]
[Murder Weapon: Axe]
[Green Thumb]
[Glass Eye]