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If the question is "as a weapon" then the answer is "it's a knife". Knives are absolutely worth carrying--as tools. An impossibly sharp and unbreakable pointy stick is a mediocre weapon in a world with guns.
A fairly good point. I guess it's utility as a weapon is relegated to being circumstantial. It does win out in reliability, bar user error, unlike guns. The big question is, will indestructible guns be noticeably more reliable than their mundane counterparts?
 
L.32
If there's one good thing that came from the whole debacle with Skidmark and Lung, it's that you're sort of rich now. Lisa gave you 60% of the haul, as an apology for (accidentally and by proxy) entrusting your life and wellbeing to an unreliable dumbass (that you'd later go on to trust said dumbass with even more things is a separate issue). The Number Man didn't just launder the money, for a small extra fee he also set up a front business to your specifications.

That's how you became the proud owner of Big Hank's Whole Hog Steakhouse, a totally real restaurant located at an address that definitely exists. Don't laugh at the name, it does exactly what it's supposed to do. Which is to let you convert portions of your newfound wealth into dead animals on a daily basis without raising eyebrows. Now that you're rich, of course your first priority is to feed your dog properly.

You arrive at the slaughterhouse in your guise as Hank's niece (complete with driver's license, thanks again Number Man) and park your newly bought beat up old truck around the back. What? Cars are technology. You're an excellent driver as long as you keep industry and forge wisdom active.

Even though it's only the third time you're here, it's already routine. You announce yourself, an employee helps you load up a carcass. Clearly the guy has very little to do on Sundays, because he sticks around and tries to chat you up. You're just about to shoot him down when another parahuman shows up.

No, really. Another parahuman shows up, also in civvies, driving a truck the same model as yours. Is someone pranking you?

"Sorry, got another customer," flirty guy excuses himself.

You bum a cigarette off him and pretend to smoke it, just to have an excuse to stick around and watch. Mostly you just hold it near your face and wait for it to burn out on its own. How do people ever manage to get addicted to these things? It's disgusting.

The other parahuman is a Changer too, you conclude after some study. And he's buying a dead pig, just like you. What the hell is going on? Well, you're not a Case 53, so the resemblance isn't perfect. Also not male - although with Changers who know knows, right?

What really gets you is that you know Brockton Bay's entire parahuman population by heart, yet you have no idea who he is. New in town? He's not visibly mutated, which may or may not indicate that he's a hero. Then again, Changer. Perhaps his true form is hideous. At any rate, you definitely need to investigate.

Industry and forge wisdom provides helpful advice on how to tail a car without being spotted. Huh. You wouldn't have expected to find that in the domain of 'understanding technology', but at least this once your twisted copy has proven to be unquestionably superior to the original power.

You tail Mr Changer to a house in the suburbs and make note of the address. You'll have to stake it out later, Fenrir is waiting for his lunch.

---

You return wearing different clothes, and a different face. You park a block away and casually stroll past the house, studying it from the corner of your eye. A spacious garage, yet there are not one but two vehicles in the driveway. You catch glimpses of several people through the windows, all parahuman, all Case 53s. An entire team, then. Almost certainly not heroes.

The garage has a set of windows up near the ceiling. They have curtains pulled across them, but you can make out yet another parahuman glow coming from inside. Which, given your viewing angle, means that whoever is in there is either clinging to the ceiling, or something like ten feet tall. At least one obvious mutant, then.

You continue around the block and make your way back to your car, pondering the situation. It's unfortunate that they're all Case 53s. Well, maybe not. Copying an unmutated Case 53 should be safe. Probably. For a sweet enough power, you might risk it. Extended surveillance will be required to determine who they are, and how they may be approached/infiltrated.

The Travellers arrive in town before their quarters - and more importantly, the secure vault for that thing - are finished, so I put them up in one of my spare properties in the meantime. It will technically leave a trail tying them to one of my shell companies, but they won't be going out in costume until I've moved them into the base proper. No one will even realize that they are in town, much less discover where they're staying.

As you're making your second sweep (in yet another set of clothes and face), looking for a vantage point from which you can carry out more permanent surveillance, you hear shouting coming from inside the house, two male voices. It sounds more like an argument than alarm at being discovered, so you keep walking and pretend not to notice.

Then the voices stop, and one of the capes walks outside, slamming the door violently behind him. With that kind of disturbance it would actually be more suspicious to not stop and look, so you do. A young man with dark hair, not the Changer (you can tell by the power). From the look on his face, it was definitely an argument.

He gets in one of the cars, prompting you to rush back to your own vehicle so you can tail him.

He drives out of the city and into the woods, before stopping at the side of the road and getting out. Do they have a secret base out here or something? You drive past without slowing, parking further ahead out of sight and doubling back on foot.

You know approximately nothing about tracking people through the woods, but fortunately a loud racket up ahead lets you easily pinpoint his location. You proceed forward cautiously, keeping low to the ground and staying in cover as much as possible. You are painfully aware that you're roughly as good at stealth as you are at tracking.

Luck is on your side, though. The terrain slopes down towards a small river - only a couple of yards wide - and you spot your quarry standing on the riverbank, facing out across the water. He bends down and picks up a palm-sized stone, then straightens up and holds it out in front of him. His power activates, and the rock is fired into the river. There's a loud crack as it breaks the sound barrier, immediately followed by a splash that kicks up a huge plume of water. So that was what the noise was.

You watch silently as he repeats this several times. What a power. You're happy as a clam (happier - any actual clams around here are probably fairly unhappy at this point), but your quarry seems unsatisfied. He starts hefting up larger stones, and firing them into the trees on the other shore. It must have been quite the argument.

Well, far be it from you to turn down a free power demonstration. Do it again! Yes, take out your anger on that tree! Your lips part slightly and your breath grows heavy as you imagine what this power would do to Glory Girl's shield. Unfortunately you fear the he won't be able to keep it up for as long as you desire (approximately two full 40-hour weeks, you estimate - it's one of the tricky ones). Isn't that always the case with men, haha, etc. You start shapeshifting in preparation for the inevitable disappointment.

As predicted, he eventually works out his anger. For a while he just stands there, panting and surveying the wreckage. Your turn. You step out into view, and start clapping. "Marvelous show!"

He spins around so fast he loses his footing - or maybe that was deliberate, as falling on his ass lets him scoop up a handful of pebbles to brandish at you. Having just watched him wreck the shit out of the forest, you obviously know exactly what would happen to you if he fired those.

"Who are you?" he demands.

You toss your platinum blonde hair behind your shoulder and offer him a curtsey, as well as a beaming smile. "Quicksilver, at your service."

He takes a moment to mull over this response. You saw his face and powers, and in return offered your own face and cape name. A clear gesture of friendly intent, but still invasive.

"Ballistic," he eventually introduces himself. Very fitting. He lets the threatening pebbles drop to the ground. "At my service, are you?"

"How could I not be, after you provided such an excellent demonstration of parahuman might? I could barely contain my excitement!"

---

"Luke! I was starting to think something had happened to you. Are you alright?"

"Hm? Yeah, everything is fine."

"Look, I know Krouse can be an asshole, but... I..."

"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"You're smiling."

"Oh. I, uh... Well, I met a girl."
 
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What If: Coil
Since today's chapter was a bit on the short side, I'll add the bonus content originally posted in the SB thread

===

The trailer opens with an aerial shot of a coastal city. The camera zooms past a futuristic oil rig surrounded by a shimmering forcefield, past the tallest building in the skyline (the logo 'Medhall' can be seen flashing by), before diving down to street level. Night falls, and the glamour gives way to grime, gang members and homeless people. A voiceover plays.

"In the dog-eat-dog world of parahuman crime, empathy is a luxury few can afford."

The camera cuts to a man in a black body stocking decorated with a snake motif. He's seated behind a table, being interviewed by someone offscreen, behind the camera. A single hand can be seen in frame, writing down what he says.

"I view people as tools," the snake man says.

The camera cuts to the same shot, but with a teenaged brunette with glasses being interviewed.

"I view people as tools," the brunette says.

Cut to snake man. "I only care about two things: How to keep them dependent on me, and how to maximize their usefulness."

Cut to brunette. "I only care about power."

Quick cuts of random capeshit CGI. A teenager on a hoverboard. An asian man turning into a dragon. A motorcycle helmet with a skull painted on it emerging from a cloud of darkness. The voiceover continues.

"In the feel-good comedy of the year..."

Cut to snake man. "My favorite person is someone with a simple, easy to grasp handle."

Cut to brunette. "My favorite person is a parahuman who uses their power constantly."

More quick cuts. The teenager is trying to tug his hoverboard free from the jaws of a monster dog. The dragon fights a man in armor, who conjures spears and barriers of metal. The brunette is sitting at a cafe table together with a freckled blonde. The blonde is facepalming. More voiceover.

"Marvel as the two scariest villains in Brockton Bay sociopathically focus their every effort on a single goal..."

Cut to snake man. "In order to maintain her loyalty, I must constantly feed her new powers. In order to maximize her usefulness, I must constantly feed her new powers."

Cut to brunette. "In order to Master him and gain control of his organization, I must fulfill his soul price."

Voiceover: "Making each other maximally happy."

Black screen. White letters slam home one word at a time.

TAYLOR x COIL

===

Bonus comedy content because the obvious candidate for Coil's charm is Avoidance Kata.

Avoidance Kata doesn't let you live in a second timeline. When you invoke it, it teleports you to where you would have been in the other timeline, and Masters everyone at either end into believing you were never there/there all along. But you'll have no idea where you'll end up ahead of time, and will be forced to think quickly and improvise to avoid suspicion.
 
Well, Avoidance kata is number two on my list for that. There's another charm that tells you which of two things would be better... I think it's called Wise Choice?

Taylor is such a heartbreaker, charming all the handsome men and dropping them the instant she gets what she wants. So villainous.

Guessing Ballistic will grant Heaven Thunder Hammer, incidentally.
 
I dunno, I'd eat at Big Hank's.

Same, not just for the meat but places like this always have the best fries or other side dish items you never expect them to specialize in.

So Oliver might arguably be the best power for her to copy. A power that lets her look human would let her safely copy Case 53's and capes like Alabaster.
 
Same, not just for the meat but places like this always have the best fries or other side dish items you never expect them to specialize in.

So Oliver might arguably be the best power for her to copy. A power that lets her look human would let her safely copy Case 53's and capes like Alabaster.
I don't think she would mutate from Case 53 powers, but I could be wrong. If she can get Alchemical Charms, Hulk-Sculpting Apparatus would fit very neatly for concealing mutations and such, but she does already have a shape-shifting charm. Maybe some kind of Shaping Defense, like Integrity-Protecting Prana. Would be useful if she ever pisses off Panacea, for example.

Alternatively, Oliver's power apparently gives him a boost to self-improvement, so Training Charms would also work, maybe Verdant Emptiness Endowment, would work with getting Parahumans to study too. Just need to hear one of them wanting to get better at something, or improve in some way, which she doesn't even have to try for many of them.

Noelle could go many ways, from Splintered Gale Shintai, to Devil Tyrant Avatar Shintai, to Wholeness Rightly Assumed, or some kind of Lunar Charm for regeneration/chimerism. Lots of possibilities, but SGS would allow for multiple identities at the same time, and is therefore objectively better. *insert pointing Spiderman-meme here*

Sundancer, likely some kind of Solar blasting Charm, or a Terrestrial Fire Charm with an AoE effect.

Either way, looking forward to seeing how this goes!
 
One of the most interesting fics I'm following ATM.
Pity it doesn't receive proper attention.
Yeah, for some reason it doesn't even show up in my normal feed, I only see it in my watched fics, or when I get an alert. Has anyone else had the same problem?
 
Quicksilver would probably be a good persona to have join Uber and Leet. Leet would almost certainly want to use her services to fix his power and she could rely on the two of them not to needlessly put her in life and death situations (unlike the E88 and ABB).
 
Quicksilver would probably be a good persona to have join Uber and Leet. Leet would almost certainly want to use her services to fix his power and she could rely on the two of them not to needlessly put her in life and death situations (unlike the E88 and ABB).

I thought Uber and Leet was gonna be next until today's chapter actually. Would have make sense as her next target since drugs are bad, pancakes are bad for you, and joining the ABB would be a terrible idea with Lung not safely birdcaged yet. Having the Travelers show up seems like a pretty big signal that there will be no U&L infiltrating though since that'll be the last of her time before escalation starts kicking into high gear.

Also since that knife is clearly a Simurgh plot, and the literal only thing it's good for is killing Glory Girl and Alexandria, I'm guessing this is Ziz's cauldron assassination plot this time around?
Seriously she sacrifices everything useful about her knife in her need to defeat powerful brutes and ends up making something hyper specialized to only be useful against exactly 2 capes. Possibly 3 if you include Brandish. It does literal nothing against regenerating-type Brutes and there are way more of those you're likely to fight than forcefield Hardness-monsters. Definitely the Simurgh poking at her irrational grudge against Glory Girl for the sake of ganking Alexandria.

What three dot Artifact would she have been better served by if she wasn't Ziz'd? Assuming the lack of materials means she needs to stick to a knife, probably something that can be thrown and return while having something to help hit what she aims at?
 
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L.33
Four capes soar across the city along a course parallel to, but out of sight from, a certain prisoner transport. A hand-picked team of the Empire's finest: Hookwolf, muscle. Rune, transportation. Low Key, brains. Krieg, blatant cheating. (Fenrir, invisible, facing the wrong way).

No, really, you are the brains. With Hookwolf and Rune to handle Brute and Mover, your primary role is 'wolf senses'. Which counts as Thinker. And you did provide the intel telling you when to strike. You suspect that Lisa gave you a ridiculous discount, compared to the street value of hacking the PRT. You don't feel bad about that though, the Lung situation is at least a little bit her fault.

Wait, did you say Empire? You misspoke, no Empire involvement here. Civilian clothes, plain white masks. Clearly an unaffiliated team. ...no, you don't expect anyone to believe that. You personally think Hookwolf is entirely unrecognizable, since he's wearing not just a shirt, but a suit and tie as well. But that will only last until battle is joined. The 'giant monster made of chainsaws' thing is a bit of a giveaway.

What, the jig is up even before that, since you're all riding Rune's favorite rock? No, no, Rune reported her vehicle stolen earlier today, honest. Main suspects are the devilishly handsome cape team of, uh, Sawtooth, Hoverdisc, Lycan and Buzzkill? You didn't actually bother coming up with new names.

The paper-thin deception is a statement, 'we're not acting under orders from Kaiser.' That way Kaiser can claim that he does not condone interfering with jailbreaks (true), and that you were punished for doing so (unfortunately also true, most likely). All because he's scared of a future, hypothetical non-ABB (worthless without Lung), non-Merchant (just worthless in general) rival gang doing the same to him.

The question is, will anyone believe that? Possibly. It's only slightly less plausible than the bullshit capes usually get away with, just ask the guy auditing the Palanquin's tax records (RIP the Palanquin).

You spot a tell-tale glow appearing on a distant rooftop. A second later another one appears one building over. And another.

"Go time!" you shout. "Oni Lee!" The way he teleports, leaving a short-lived clone behind each time, is unmistakable. The first light you spotted winks out as the clone dissolves.

Rune swerves the rock sharply towards the transport. Krieg hops up onto a smaller rock, which Rune sends shooting ahead as soon as the transport comes into view.

A normal person would fall off if fired like that, but as mentioned previously, Krieg is cheating. It says 'Brute' on the tin, but the way he gets there is unusual. His power? Making physics his bitch. He can make a speeding truck hit like a slap on the cheek, and vice versa. Fiddling with air resistance and inertia enough to remain standing is no problem for him.

He leaps off as he passes over the transport, and lands on top of it with a feather-light impact. Just in time, too. A pair of semitrucks (sans trailers) come speeding into the intersection ahead from opposite directions, running the red lights and swerving across lanes to pancake the front police escort between them.

"Jesus," Rune says, and you're inclined to agree. Their first move was to straight up kill one or more police officers? The normal cape rules of engagement have been thrown out the window and down a well.

The driver of the transport is forced to hit the brakes to avoid a collision (Krieg, of course, does not fall off). Before it has even come to a complete stop Oni Lee is there, scattering grenades around in a fashion most inadvisable unless you're a disposable clone that would die in three seconds anyway. After a glance from Krieg, they explode like wet firecrackers. The clone manages to look affronted as it puffs into white dust, its timer expired.

Another Oni Lee appears behind Krieg, stabbing towards his back. You don't see exactly what happens when the knife hits the Brute, but Krieg does not seem troubled as he turns around. A casual strike with the back of his hand sends dust exploding across the street.

The rear police escort, not having the benefit of a physics fiddler on the roof, blows up.

The driver of one of the trucks that took out the front police escort manages to get the door open and stumbles out. He may look dazed and unarmed to others, but he is glowing alarmingly to you.

"Tinkertech!" you shout, pointing. Rune immediately sends a rock slamming into him.

He detonates in a bright purple flash - which triggers a secondary detonation from inside the cab of the opposite truck, this one greenish-yellow. The first blast cuts everything around it into regular one-inch cubes, the other turns things inside out.

"Dafuq?" Rune asks.

"They're tinkertech suicide bombers," you state grimly.

"Vat ist dis? Britain?" comes Krieg's disbelieving voice over the comms.

That's when you spot the reinforcements coming up the street from behind the transport. Dozens of unpowered people in ABB colors, on foot. You spot them because they glow.

"They're all suicide bombers."

Krieg doesn't hesitate. "Hookvolf. Take zem out."

Hookwolf leaps from the rock, transforming in midair and landing on springy serrated coils. The coils scrabble on the ground, bounding forward with crude quadrupedal locomotion as the last of his flesh melts away into metal and he starts to assume his signature wolf shape. He's still growing more blades as he pounces on the first mook. Who, predictably, blows up in his face. Not that he lets that deter him. He keeps charging forward, regrowing his damaged parts as he goes. Though he does compromise a bit on the wolf shape, growing several long, whip-like appendages to take out the next set of bombers from slightly farther away.

Not all of them explode as he tears through them. Which is not to say that you were wrong. They're tinkertech bombs, regular explosions would be entirely too mundane. There are pillars of ice and flashes of lightning. Earth, wind and fire. Bursts of light in every color of the rainbow. Concrete turns to jelly, fields of magnified gravity crush people and vehicles flat. Hookwolf continues forward through it all, unmindful of the damage he's taking.

Someone either has great respect or great hatred - or both - for their boss, if their plan was to throw all that at the prisoner transport and expect him to walk it off.

Fenrir materializes. You spin around to see Oni Lee caught in his jaws. Your trap worked. With you and Rune 'alone' and 'distracted by the battle', he could not resist the temptation to appear behind you and stab you in the back. He screams as Fenrir bites down, bones snapping and blood spurting. You kick the grenade he dropped over the side.

Fenrir violently shakes him back and forth, then flings him away with a final twist of his head. He puffs into dust before he hits the ground - a clone. But when you catch sight of him on a nearby rooftop he's sprawled down, bleeding from a double row of teethmarks. He didn't get away quite in time, then.

When Rune sends a rock to smush him he starts retreating, teleporting away across the rooftops. You report as much over the comms. "Goot, very goot" Krieg says. Hookwolf doesn't respond.

"Take us down," you tell Rune. "Clear the way for the transport."

While she gets started on that, you mount up and dash off to check on Hookwolf and the suicide bombers. You pass Krieg, who has jumped down from atop the transport and is having a tense but civil discussion with the driver. He nods at you as you go by.

You have to slow down when you reach the field of battle - despite each individual blast only having a radius of a few feet, there were enough of them to almost block the whole street. You carefully pick your way between areas that are still on fire (who knew concrete could burn like that?), or glowing bright blue (you don't know what it does, but you're staying away), or frozen in time (a severed whip-appendage hangs in midair, reaching into the gory center - he must have used another bomb to blow it off in order to get free).

Shit's fucked up, is what you're trying to get at (but still considerably less awful than what you saw in Ottawa). There are other bits of Hookwolf strewn about too, from individual hooks to entire chainsaw limbs. He may have overestimated himself a bit here.

You find the man himself surrounded by a particularly dense set of danger zones, having just crawled out of a pit filled with what looks like the same white dust Oni Lee turns into. He's... he's seen better days. His head, one arm and part of his torso have transformed back, but there's easily a dozen yards of unspooled chainsaw monster still extending below that, twitching and coiling uncontrollably.

Ah, you see the problem. A... metal-eating plague(?) of some sort is working its way up towards his fleshy bits, black metal turning green and runny and gradually sloughing off. Dibs on not touching that.

"I've got this," you tell him. "Hold still." He complies, doing his best not to twitch a chainsaw into your face as you dismount and step in close. You materialize your orichalcum knife, charge it with power and sever the infected limb with a single stroke, well ahead of the advancing infection. "There."

Hookwolf's human parts shudder as the knife passes through, and he turns around to see what you did. "Move," you say, disappearing your knife and shooing him away from the dripping green mess you just separated him from. "Don't touch that."

"No shit." He moves over a bit and finishes transforming back into a human without further incident. "Thanks," he adds.

You shake your head. "I did nothing. I am not secretly packing high-powered tinkertech weaponry." That's the second time in as many weeks you reveal a trump card to someone in the Empire. You really hope they can keep their mouths shut.

He chuckles at that. "Whatever you say."

"Can you walk? Or do I need to load you onto Fenrir?" Fenrir snorts in disdain on hearing that. You glare at him. What's his beef with Hookwolf? "What are you, a unicorn? You can carry someone who isn't a fair maiden once in a while. Especially when-"

"I can walk," Hookwolf interrupts the argument.

Rune and Krieg meet you halfway. Glancing behind them you can see the blockade cleared out, and the prisoner transport gone. "Mission accomplished," Krieg reports. Hookwolf grunts in satisfaction.

"I think that went pretty well," you remark.

"I for one am looking forward to being chewed out by Kaiser for for doing him the biggest favor of his life," Rune agrees.
 
. Up to (Essence) times per day, the attuned exalt can spend 10 motes of essence to 'charge' the knife
...remembering that we didn't need to worry about Essence requirements for Charms...which can be construed as meaning Tay has E10. Also remembering that Tay essentially has infinite motes. They Endslayer is born people :p

Step 1: Cultivate for 99 years.
Is this in reference to needing transhuman Essence? If yes, it is a bit of a maybe yes, maybe no since it depends on how much time they spent at various stages of enlightenment.

and Masters everyone at either end into believing you were never there/there all along.
Is the Master effect an Illusion, Emotion, or Shaping effect?
 
...remembering that we didn't need to worry about Essence requirements for Charms...which can be construed as meaning Tay has E10. Also remembering that Tay essentially has infinite motes. They Endslayer is born people :p

No it isn't. Taylor has Essence 3. Also that knife isn't even within orders of magnitude of endbringer-killing. Scrub is hundred thousand times better at doing damage to an endbringer than that knife is, as is Damsel of Distress, and neither of them have a snowball's chance in hell against one that isn't sandbagging.
 
Honestly me too, that's some protagonist grade plot armor.
I think it's reasonable, tbh hookwolf is huge, and in this chapter was specifically mentioned as creating longer limbs to stab out with, rarely does bakuda seem to make anything with a large AOE in Canon. For some reason. Also hookwolf is stupid OP in the Regen department.
 

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