Wish upon the Stars : A Superhero Cultivation LitRPG

I slept for like nine hours. It was amazing. I didn't even tweak my back sleeping on the training room floor because of my high Vitality. The luxury of just slumping down and sawing logs like a layabout was just...perfect. It felt so good to have some downtime that I decided not to work on my wishes or training until later in the day today, so I could ride the relaxation wave through the morning.

Hopping to my feet, I set off for the kitchen, shooting Benny a text to tell him we'd be doing breakfast here before we went out for the day, and starting the process of making eggs benedict. I was feeling fancy this morning, and I was going to show off a bit.

Callie, of course, basically floated into the kitchen on cartoon smell illustrations, and when she saw what I was making she squealed and tackled me. "You're making breakfast! You've been so busy lately its been cereal and premade meals. Real eggs benedict. I think I'm in love."

"With me or the eggs?" I said with mock concern. "Because the former has been established, and the latter might give me a complex. I refuse to share your affections with breakfast food."

She gave an exaggerated wince. "Oooh, sorry. Breakfast had me first. You're pretty decent, but if I have to choose I'm afraid breakfast and I have too much history to ignore." She winked at me. "Besides, are you telling me I don't have to compete with long hot showers for your affections?"

I shot her a grin. "I'm happy to share any time." I looked around for Cass before I said it, because I absolutely didn't want another 'why Callie and Shane do things you can't know about' discussion.

Sadly, it wasn't to be. She just patted my cheek fondly, resting her head against my back and putting her arms around me. "Sorry love, you shower for way too long. It would ruin my hair. Even Vitality can only prevent so much dehydration. Maybe if you can cut down your shower time a bit." At my appalled look she just giggled. "I thought so. Anyway, what's the big plan for today? You're having a guys day out with Benny right? Because Jessie and I are hitting a flower nursery and a swap meet."

"One thing for each of you huh?" I said wryly. "Does she know the very concept of loot turns you into a drooling lunatic? Because if I were her I'd keep you on a leash." She wasn't able to give her undoubtedly suggestive response though, because she was cut off by Cass barreling into the room excitedly.

"Shane is cooking!" She cheered. "I love your food! I'm so sick of eating cereal all the time. What are we having?" The little girl was practically bouncing in place as she grilled me on what I was making, but she too was interrupted as her brother strolled in behind her and pushed her lightly toward the table.

He gave her a stern look. "Cassidy, let Shane cook. I'm sure you'll like whatever it is we're having. It's not nice to bother him while he's in the middle of cooking."

"But Callie is doing it!" She whined loudly. "She's giving him a hug and he doesn't even care. My questions are probably way less distracting than that." I snickered slightly at the comment as Callie groaned softly and let me go, turning to walk over and plop down in a seat next to Cass.

She gave the younger girl a warm smile. "I was just saying good morning. We should let him cook for now. He's making eggs benedict, and that's really good, I think you're gonna love it. So, I didn't see you yesterday? Do anything fun with Tony and your Uncle Zeke?"

The girl gave a put upon sigh, informing her that Zeke had been busy and that Cark wasn't nearly as fun, and then giving a thorough if slightly disjointed account of her entire day, skipping around to different parts when they were more entertaining. By the time Benny made it to the kitchen, she was telling us about the new episode of her favorite cartoon for the third time, this time from the point of view of a side character with a cute dog that she really liked.

My best friend wandered in but didn't interrupt, yawning and dropping into a chair before resting his head on the table and starting to snore. Sadly for him, I finished cooking about then, and so I woke him up by slamming a plate down in front of him, startling him so much he fell out of his chair with a shout of alarm, sending Cass and Callie both into a fit of giggles, though my girlfriend had the decency to try to hide it at least.

"So." I said as he picked himself up, glaring at me. "Thought we could hit a couple local markets to look for some stuff for your Inventing. You haven't made anything new in a while, and I know you still have some cash from working that job to pay me." Since he'd been paying off wishes with attacks when I needed them, he had a small stockpile of cash, which would work well for buying Inventing materials.

He took a bite of the benedict, mollified by the delicious taste, and nodded thoughtfully before swallowing. "Yeah, I could probably use some new gear. Some of my merged artifacts are losing their punch. Some of them are great and plenty useful still, but stuff like the gut rope are pretty far past their best buy date. Plus with my Inventing at Intermediate I have a bit more influence on what I get, and I can work with much better materials. Where are we going to look around?"

I shrugged. "Not sure, but I asked around and heard about a few places. Maybe junk island would be fun. It sounds like an interesting place."

We chatted a bit longer, but Cass finished eating and got bored, wandering away with Cark trailing after her, lecturing her about not saying thank you as she ignored him as usual. Jessie had shown up and grabbed a plate, presumably after a bad night, because her face looked haggard and her eyes ringed with dark circles. She ate quickly and then went to go get ready.

Callie finished last, having taken her time to enjoy the meal, as well as having seconds, but as she finished she rinsed her plate and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek. "Have fun on your day off. Try to relax a bit. I know I can't convince you not to train later, and I wouldn't if I could, but rest is an important part of improvement, even Abel admits that."

I grinned at her. "I know. I promise we'll waste tons of time and do many things that are pointless and unnecessary today."

"Well." She said wryly. "As long as you're sure." She looked at Benny. "Look out for him for me? You know how he tends to get into trouble. I swear he can't leave the house without getting wrapped up in some kind of dark conspiracy. " She giggled at my affronted look and bolted from the room before I could protest, leaving me to sulk as I finished my own food.

Benny looked...sad. I cursed at myself, because us being affectionate probably made his own situation harder. Not that it was something I did on purpose. It just...kind of happened. Shoveling my food in I stood up abruptly, announcing while still chewing. "Alright. Time for us to go. We need to get to the bus stop since Jessie is going with Callie."

My best friend half grimaced half laughed at me talking with a full mouth, and started teasing me as we took off. We walked to the bus like we had as kids, talking about anything but his relationship or cultivation, which admittedly didn't leave many options in our current lives.

When we arrived at junk island, I had to admit the place was interesting. It was an entire closed off island on a lake, full of hundreds of run down shacks and buildings piled with random junk.

There were weapons, tires, machines, appliances, furniture, and dozens of other things. Some of it was old and looked valuable, some was just trash. Some of it was heavy in the way that let me know it had Impact, even though visually it looked so destroyed as to be completely worthless.

Benny dove into the shopping with gusto, picking up items and exclaiming excitedly what they were, or trying to puzzle it out based on context. His Inventing Mastery was a wish granted Skill, so he had an absurd foundation, but that only went up to Beginner, because you had to tweak skills in Intermediate to your own use to progress them, so wishing for Intermediate Skills did more harm than good.

"So." I said as we sifted through random junk. "Any ideas on what you're hoping for? I know you can only really do so much to predict what the outcome will be, but you have to have something in mind right? For what would help you most?" Inventing was annoying to deal with, but even if he couldn't control much about what he made, he could predict what certain things would do based on the attributes of the material I was pretty sure.

He shrugged. "If I could pick, I'd probably go with some kind of mobility artifact. I'm thinking I'll try using this." He held up what looked like a corroded dark yellow metal wrench. "I'm almost positive this is a gravity artifact of some kind. It's so busted and rotted through it probably won't ever function again, but the best thing about Inventing is almost anything can be used in production."

I reached out and took it, noting that it was heavier than expected. "So what? Just melt it down and throw it in with some other stuff?I'm not sure if I love the randomness of Inventing or hate it."

"Tell me about it." Chuckled my friend. "But there's something...amazing about it. Mad Science is just pure chaos. Sure, you can make something useless or even dangerous, but really, that's the fun. You're offering your fate up to the universe, putting yourself at the mercy of the whims of random chance. Isn't that what being an Ascendant is about? Seeing where the future takes you? Getting swept along by the current?"

I nodded contemplatively. "That's a decent point. I can see the appeal, and I know you can make some pretty crazy stuff. Stuff that enchanting wouldn't be able to make at anywhere near the same level. The randomness is balanced out by power. Risk and reward. I guess that is kind of a microcosm of what it means to be a cultivator."

He pocketed the wrench, paying the stall owner a few chits, and then we moved on. We spent hours there, combing through garbage to find a few worthwhile items. Benny spent a surprisingly small amount of money, given how hard some of the stuff was to find the people selling it didn't always know what it was worth. They were here to bulk sell random trash, if some people got lucky that was on them.

Once we finished shopping we went out for dinner, eating somewhere relaxing and then heading home to begin training and working for the day. The bus ride back was just pleasant. We'd relaxed and calmed down, let ourselves recharge, and now it was time to get back to the grind. With the downtime behind us it was almost exciting to get back to training, and I couldn't wait to see what my next skill would be.

Once we got back Benny did his wishes, five tranq blows for twenty points of might, bringing him up to two hundred twenty nine Might and five hundred eighty three total stats. With that out of the way we each set off to do our own thing. I was happy for Benny especially. Seeing him so excited about Inventing instead of worrying about Celine was a nice change. Plus it would be cool to see what he came up with.