AN: Hello again lads and lassies! Hope everyone has been doing fine ever since Ch 2 and all that.
This chapter is basically a small part 2 to the last one, set after the Chimaera-Lupine fight. So don't expect anything too extravagant or some such-that's next chapter :)
Without further ado, I hope you enjoy.
Ch 3: Arms Deal for Future Endeavours
About an hour after that whole ordeal with that monster, ambulances arrived after someone managed to get a signal and contact for emergency aid. With three ambulances worth of paramedics looking over the civilians, I was still sitting against the carriage watching everyone get looked over. I myself was already looked over by the medics and thanks to Gamer's Body, the paramedics were mildly confused by the lack of any notable injuries before pushing that off to the side and going to check on others. Internally, I was mildly miffed I didn't get a Dungeon Key from the Chimaera, but I still liked the nice helping of experience that I got from both the monster and the main quest.
Speaking of the Chimaera fight, the military dude that I borrowed the pistol from woke up about 15 minutes after the paramedics did and lemme just say-despite being a bit stereotypical with his gruff speech, he was quite a nice guy to briefly talk to. We had a bit of an exchange, small sentences here and there before I gave the man his pistol and he wandered off to get looked at by the medics. Standing up, I began to stretch out my arms and legs with sighs of relief escaping my mouth.
Hearing a horn blow, I looked to my right to see roughly 3-4 buses drive up, with one of the drivers stepping out and making an announcement.
"If I can have your attention!" The driver called out, a megaphone helping his voice carry across the field with many of the civilians looking over to him, "Due to this inconvenience, buses have been sent out to transport you all to the City M train station. When you're ready, please orderly board any bus you so wish." announcement made, the driver retreated into his respective bus, followed by all the civilians that were already looked over-including myself. Snagging a window seat in the middle of the bus, I rested my head backwards and got comfortable.
Only, seconds later after I closed my eyes, I felt a small bump against my left arm from behind me. Looking over my left shoulder and my seat to the row behind me, I saw a kid-a boy roughly around 5 years old with curly ginger hair-his finger poised to poke me again. Raising an eyebrow, I watched the kid shrink into himself sheepishly while having an embarrassed grin, myself absentmindedly noting the gap in his front teeth.
"Yes kid?" I asked him softly so as to not scare him. I watched as the little boy composed himself and leaned forward so I could better hear him.
"Thanks for saving us mister." he said softly, the kid's blue eyes shining with gratitude and a hint of leftover fear from when the monster rampaged. "I was scared the monster would come for us." the kid began to tear up, out of the corner of my eye I noticed his mother sorting out some bags before seeing her child crying. Looking back to the kid who was no-doubt minorly traumatised by the prospect of an approaching death, I put on a kind smile and spoke to the kid.
"Hey kid," I spoke softly, the boy looking up at me through mildly teary eyes, "Just know that whenever trouble arises, be it the regular criminals or a monster attack, there's gonna be someone there to take care of it. Sure, they could be in it for the glory, some for the reward or even just the fun of it. But I like to believe that as long as you're protecting people from threats and putting yourself in harm's way for them, then I'd say you're doing pretty good. After all, isn't that what Heroes do?" My words seemed to have the intended effect as it snapped the young kid out of his fearful and rekindled some light in his eyes.
Throughout my entire speech, my mind wandered to two faces that fit the criteria that I mentioned; Tank-Top Tiger for the glory and Saitama for both the money and fun of it (man's gotta eat after all). I am acutely aware of the possibility of there being many more people that fit those three, but I can't remember everyone's names, faces and motivations. Regardless, despite how shallow some of the future members of the HA would turn out to be, as long as they put themselves in the line of fire for the sake of the average person, then they're doing alright I'd say.
The kid looked up at me eyes that looked like they're sparkling, hints of awe in his expression. "Are you gonna be a Hero mister?" he asked me, me smiling down at him. I nodded, the boy's expression shining in adoration and awe before his mother called out to him. Seeing as the boy's attention was elsewhere, I turned back around in my seat and watched as the landscape passed by-my little interaction with the kid taking so much of my attention that I never noticed the bus began moving.
City M here I come...
=Time skip; 1 hour, 36 minutes=
Thankfully, the bus ride to the City M station was less eventful and passed quite peacefully. Having now arrived at City M, I pulled out the paper with the weapon smith's address-some mental mapping putting the address near the warehouse docks.
Yeah, that was something not really shown in One Punch Man, life outside of the cities. We got that brief portion with Tatsumaki being flown to take care of the Ancient King, but outside of that, nothing. See, life outside of the cities mainly comprises of mining operations in some mountain regions with mining towns near those ops. 'Course, this is mainly because all of the cities are on one big continent of course. Just something I should point out.
Moving on from that tidbit, I began my trek to the City M warehouse district while a mindless tune, simply enjoying the walk. Wanting something to occupy my time, I flicked open my Gamer screen only to be greeted by a pop-up.
=New Skill unlocked: Inspiration (Level-Beginner)
The ability to give inspiring words to those around you, often to lift up people's spirits and to expel the fears plaguing them, bringing hope to all. Using this skill with allies in combat will give both them and yourself numerous buffs.
Current stats: Using 'Inspiration' on allies grants +0.5% bonus HP regeneration, +1% bonus Mana regeneration, +5% bonus damage, +10% bonus defence and +10% bonus speed to them and yourself. Expels up to 2 emotion-plaguing debuffs from civilian individuals.
Oooh, new cool skill. Must've been when I gave that speech to the boy on the bus. Looking over the buffs that are granted, it's interesting to note that it uses a flat damage boost instead of say a Strength boost, but cool nonetheless. One thing I'm interested to see is how the buffs will increase upon the skill levelling up.
Dismissing the message, I took in the sights of City M and noted that it's quite like City K in that it's not all that special-though that would no doubt change should the whole debacle with King accidentally stealing Saitama's fame would come into play. Presently however, it was a decent city with nothing too notable about it.
Roughly 15 minutes later, I began to see the Warehouse District down the street-a quick double check of the address telling me I'm on the right track. Passing by some warehouses, I took note that there wasn't a whole lot of activity in the area, but put that off in favour of focusing on reaching the weapon smith. It took a bit, but eventually I reached the given address, standing in front of one of the many warehouses. Balling my hand into a fist, I loudly knocked on the door and hearing a muffled "Hold your horses!". Absentmindedly clicking my fingers, I waited for maybe a good minute before the door opened.
And let me tell you, I expected a few things for how the gun smith appeared, but I did not expect Torbjorn from Overwatch, prosthetic claw and all. As I stared with most likely a gobsmacked expression, the Swedish (of whatever counts for Swedish in OPM) engineer scratched at his beard.
"Can I help ye?" he asked, shaking myself out of my dumbfounded moment.
"Uh, yeah, actually. Um, I was told that you could help me out with weapon manufacturing?" I enquired, the 4'7" engineer grunting before walking back inside the warehouse while motioning for me to follow. Entering the warehouse that serves as his workshop, I stared wide-eyed in amazement at the various machines Torbjorn has to work with; from a metal foundry with moulds to basic tool racks with an assortment of wrenches, hammers and other metal working tools at his disposal.
"Nice place." I complimented the Swedish man. "You got a name I could call you by?"
He grunted, "Much appreciated, and call me Torbjorn." 'Figured.' I thought to myself, "Now, what's this about a weapon?" he asked me, standing behind one of the many tables scattered around the workshop.
"Well," I began the explanation, "My police chief, Taika Wotan, gave me your address when I asked him about anyone who could help me with obtaining a suitable weapon for dealing with monsters." Torbjorn, upon hearing about my request, began to stroke at his rather large beard whilst humming contemplatively.
"Aye, I hear ya lad." he said, walking to one of the many wooden boxes strewn about the workshop, "What kin'a weapon you after? Sword? Axe?" he asked, pulling out two examples of the aforementioned weapons, setting on the main table a standard broadsword and two-handed battle axe. I found it a little weird he'd consider these for modern times, but I can only assume that since Torbjorn's in this world then so is Reinhardt, and he's got a giant hammer with rocket propulsion (which is actually exciting since I liked the character of Reinhardt).
"I was actually curious if you made firearms."
He bobbed his back and forth, "Aye, I can make a decent gun. Any specifics you after?"
I looked down, contemplating my options here about the type of weapon. In the fight between Death Gatling and Garou, it's stated that Death's minigun with the Death Shower skill utterly eviscerated monsters into nothingness essentially. Thing is, I don't even know if Death Shower is obtainable for me since it was never told how that skill was used other than "here is a big gun, ripping apart big monsters".
But it'd be dumb of me to pass that sort of ability up, wouldn't it?
"Is it possible to fashion a minigun in place of my left arm?" I asked, rolling up my sleeves to show him where my arm was bisected at. As he looked over my remainder of an arm, he eventually shook his head with eyes closed, the expression telling me that such a thing might not be possible-at least, not yet anyway.
"Lad, such a thing isn't as easy as it seems." he started explaining, lifting up his prosthetic claw for a demonstration, "Putting on a prosthetic limb of any kind needs to be able to be manipulated by signals sent through your muscles. See my claw here for example is simple, since it's basically like clenching any we fist. But a minigun, a rotary weapon, is a lot bleeding different than clenching a fist."
I pursed my lips, doubt creeping across my face. I am utmost confident that the Gamer System can rectify that issue almost laughably easily, but trying to explain that to the Swedish Engineer would be not only difficult, but awkward as hell. "So there's no way anything like that could work?" I asked Torbjorn, the small man sighing as if exasperated by this whole ordeal.
I don't know whether to sympathize with him or be mildly insulted.
"Truth be told lad, something along those levels of prosthetics is-while not impossible to make-would be incredibly difficult to manage." he wandered off to the side of the workshop, "But what I can do for ya is supply ya with a damned good substitute." After rummaging through some crates, he pulled out two different items.
The first is a black military grade assault rifle that, to someone who has little knowledge on gun types outside of games, almost appears like an M16 AR. Grabbing at the trigger, I lifted the gun only to grunt in surprise since it was weightier than expected. A closer look also showed me that the magazine was also a bit bulkier in width than any normal M16. Putting it down for the moment, I looked over to the second item and was surprised.
As it turns out, Torbjorn just happened to have a prosthetic arm just lying around. Coloured a basic gun-mettle grey, the metal prosthetic arm was no doubt designed for someone whose arm was removed at the elbow instead of mine that was separated higher up towards the shoulder. Additionally, this arm was modelled after a right arm instead of a left, so that in of itself was an issue.
"I made this arm awhile back for a customer of mine, but unfortunately he passed away before he could collect them. Just gimme some time to fiddle with this lil' thing here and it will fit right as rain." he patted the prosthetic arm before motioning to the gun, "That beauty was also a point of experimentation for me since, despite being an assault rifle once upon a time, it's now made to use heavy duty calibre rounds instead of the normal rounds an AR would use." He sounded quite proud of his work, which I guess is understandable.
Despite me not being to equip the arm right now, I still appreciated the gesture. "Thank you, for all of this. Anything I can do in return?" I asked him, the man stroking his beard in thought.
"Frankly lad, I'm just glad you're taking these puppies off of me since, well, they were hogging some space." He picked up the arm, putting on a workbench that had a board of tools ready for use. "If you can give me a number I could use, I'll hit you up with a message saying that this lil' thing is finished."
I smiled in gratitude, "Thanks a lot for all this. Is there any way I could pay you back?" I watched as Torbjorn waved his hand in the air dismissively at the offer of payment.
"Not this time lad, consider this a free-be for taking these off my hands. As for your proposed 'minigun-arm', well, I send ye a check hehe." he said, myself nodding along before making my way out before he called out to me, "Come back in three days, they should be done by then!"
With a thumbs up thrown behind me, I left Torbjorn's workshop and simply went, eager for some food and rest.
AN: As mentioned, this is but a small continuation of the last chapter, since I've wanted to get to the real good stuff-with the next chapter being the first Hero Association entrance exam!
Additionally, at the bottom I'm taking to label which skills are new editions-a thing I glossed over in the initial writing for this story. As for the whole thing with including Torbjorn, that's gonna lead into a future story arc with the multiverse and that sort of stuff. But if there's any characters that you'd think could be interesting additions in this little story of mine, feel free to comment their and source material.
With that, I now leave for now.
Until next time, Redsummer out.
-Statistics-
Name: Kai Sikamaru (Level 2)
?: N/A
HP: 140
Mana: 40
Strength: 12
Durability: 9
Agility: 10
Intelligence: 9
Wisdom: 7
Luck: 4
-Inventory-
Leather wallet - Contains personal ID and 1655 Yen
Bowie Knife
Cargo Pants -Equipped-
T-Shirt -Equipped-
Combat Boots -Equipped-
-Skills-
Gamer's Mind (Level - Grandmaster)
Gamer's Body (Level - Grandmaster)
Combat Experience (Level - Intermediate)
Blade Experience (Level - Trainee)
Tactical Prowess (Level - Intermediate)
Marksman (Level - Beginner)
Evasion (Level - Trainee)
Auto-Loader (Level - Beginner = ?)
[NEW] Inspiration (Level - Beginner)