Shaper of Metal Post-Apoc Progression LitRPG

Jack settled right back into the grind of physical training and exercise over the next day and a half. He'd been quickly assessed as good to go for power training right after his lunch with Highfive, too, which was pretty awesome after also having just had the big duel with the snakey bastards. It was a good damned day for progress!

He was able to get used to and practice with the Fragile Spike technique he'd gained, doing some target practice utilizing moving Augmented Reality disks as well as animals and human-sized targets. More marksmanship training utilizing Throw, which he continued to steadily improve on in accuracy, speed, and intuition.

His operational range exploded during this period, proceeding with leaps and bounds thanks to his greater Control stat facilitating the potential. Throw especially went outward, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty meters, though at reduced accuracy. But he could hit a human-sized, stationary target with a dart at forty meters routinely, and then less and less as the target was moved. Meanwhile, his ability to actually directly manipulate memorite went out to twenty-two, twenty-three meters, with general high functionality, and then rapidly fell off between that and thirty meters. Thus, when he threw something, which involved pumping his initial full strength something like a coil and launching the object, his adjustments after it fired only went out so far.

They moved on from this into the intensive grind of Shaping training. Starting with the Demonstration Center, working very fluidly with shape changes he was bridging toward, effectively closing in on the final steps necessary to do whatever he wanted with metal material fluidly.

It was exciting! It was only days ago he'd envied the potential he was capable of, and now he was knocking right on the door. Perhaps he had a long way to go when it came to large masses and efficient use of energy, but that was going to simply take time and levels. Shaping metal was now under the power of his work ethic, and he was going to squeeze every sliver of power he could from that.

When he went back to the real world, his capabilities did not seem very far behind at all. He got faster and faster at base shape changes, quickly re-forming and integrating controlled metal into existing shapes. Cubes, cylinders, blocks, thick sheets, spheres. Cables and chains, but they were a little trickier and took longer, especially cables, which would need a bunch of prep work to create many wires to wind together. It was worth it, though. Flails were great for smashing, cables were great for whipping and entangling. He learned the concept so he could do it if he ever lacked them and had the time to prepare. But, in a pinch, a hammer/mace of some sort was quicker and more efficient. Or a spear (generally as a Fragile Spike), when skewering was efficient.

Due to his aptitude with Cord, he did learn quick and dirty forgings and practiced with their application. Instead of wound-up, naturally flexible bundled wires, he made more of a snake-like tendril from a base metal core, effectively 'liquid-like' when it moved. Trickier, but quicker to form, and, once at the target, since he was already directly manipulating it, he had great flexibility to change it suddenly. If he pulled his control away suddenly, it would be rigid. That actually had some pluses. He could wrap a target up and then release control, leaving them in a rigid trap without requiring maintenance.

Builders of Great Things was a little bit particular in how it worked. As long as he created something permanent and then moved it around, it maintained its material strength benefit. If he was doing something 'morphy,' it was not a permanent construct while he had direct control. But if he released something he'd fashioned and reshaped, boom, it was a permanent construct. The point was fairly moot in terms of improving when he was controlling something: he could already keep it together efficiently if he had his vast number of control points interlaced through it. But it did help when he let go of something, improving its default strength outside of his control.

Lindsay instructed him that it was high time to focus on Collect: Sphere to quickly improve his multitasking capabilities from a central control sphere, which happened to also trend toward involving tendril cord work. His ability to do this in the real world had drastically improved overall. From a central sphere formed out of random steel pieces and levitated, he could reshape it and form whip-like tendrils that could grow in length with a steady speed. At a faster clip, he could make a branched out tendril stretch and narrow itself, covering distance more efficiently. He could also focus on a given point and fire a high-speed dart via Throw, pretty much anywhere there was metal. At best, though, he could only levitate the rest of the metal, freezing it temporarily, if he wanted to cast a dart at full power.

I wonder if I'll eventually be able to fire bullets like an automatic rifle. Heh. Well, the Control stat has a lot of power contained in it. It wouldn't be a bad idea at all to balance it as much as possible with Create.

He focused doggedly on the efficient combined training of Collect: Sphere, Cord, Shape, and, by extension, base Control, striking, swinging at, tripping, and entangling targets with branches from the sphere.

In the evening, they did their routine race in the park. Lindsay no longer played around: she went all out. Right off the bat, she exploded in a sprint and took the lead. Jack pushed with everything he had left to catch up, willing his body to strain, moving muscle and bone with every iota of power.

He caught up! He was right behind her!

And then she glanced out of the corner of her eyes and seemed to shift into another gear. The hell demon gear, by the look he caught on her face. Rapidly, she ate the ground with her sneakers and created separation, as Jack watched helplessly in dismay!

She touched the fountain many meters ahead of him, and dropped onto it, hanging with her arms, her hands likely in the water.

Jack made it a point to sprint all the way to the fountain, despite the horror of his loss. He touched it, then fell into the dirt panting, as was customary. Of course, his panting was fairly mild compared to once upon a time. "Damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it! Nooooo…"

Lindsay was huffing and puffing, not even saying anything for a long spell. She barked a gleeful, hysterical laugh once. Finally, she managed, "You… are… scaring… me… but… yay! Crabs… yay crabs!"

Jack sat up with his arms resting on his knees and scowled at her. "You better be scared. I was so damned close…"

Lindsay laughed again, then dropped to the dirt, her back against the fountain with her head up to the false sky of Rosenblum Park, still breathing open-mouthed and sweating from the all-out sprint of a Non. "I'm enjoying… my remaining time… kicking your ass… star pupil…"

Jack grumbled to himself but finally sighed and accepted his fate. Soon. So soon.

After Lindsay had caught her breath, he asked, "What Fitness grade are you at, anyway?"

"Superior," she replied as she wiped her forehead of sweat with a cloth. "It's the expected minimum grade for us, and we get the stink eye to falter lower. Peak is above it; that's for the real gym rats and such. This is referential to homo superior, by the way. Superior is the Peak of anyone else. You're at Good, and then there is Excellent, and then Superior. Anyway, you're close even two grades lower because you have higher speed and power potential. Running is not just fitness, especially for us. For the most part, those factors will rise with Fitness anyway."

"Got it. Ugh. I hope these crabs aren't too bad…"

"Bad?! Don't be silly, Jack, they're pure divinity!"

They were not. They were annoying to get to the meat, requiring some ridiculous tool to crack and another to dig with — what the hell?! Jack eliminated this annoyance by just using his memorite to dig it out, which he got pretty efficient at. But even then… it was better with butter, but wasn't that true of everything?

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Worse was the cost. He didn't even want to think about it. All for a bunch of stupid, ugly crabs.

In his free time that night, he ran a metric shit ton. Through the park, around the big circle, alternating sprints of varying degrees with jogs. Run, run, run. Drink, eat, sweat, run, run, run.

He awoke the next day to a bit more physical improvement and a much thinner film of gunk. Trimmed fat and built up muscle. Nice biceps, nice filling out of pectorals.

Argh! Get to default, already!

He checked with Mini about Fitness progress, which was never directly ascribed to numerics, and was told the grade was 'ballpark, over halfway.' Cool. He also checked about the status of Aquatic Adaptation and whether it was ready for full operation and testing, so he could meet with Neex. This was deemed to be a safe bet for the next day, so long as he kept up heavy nutrition, especially before bed. He would make sure to eat until bursting before bed, then.

The swim date is set! Finally, I get to see my bondsmate again.

Training with Lindsay was heavy again that day, which was an off-day for the simulation training. Channeling, channeling, channeling, taking hold of his brother-materials by innumerable connection points, warping and changing those raw ingredients locked in 'temporary shape' into whatever he willed them to be. They were definite objects no longer. It was all a substance tapped into his veins, merely separated by gaps in the environment. He closed them with ease. He made metal into a dancer shifting liquidly from stance to stance.

No longer 'must' flow, no longer 'beginning' to flow. It flows. At my many fingertips, it flows.

After routine basics hammering his instinctual shaping down, they jumped back into combination sphere training, honing things from the prior day, with various improvements, to try and pop base Control on top of the individual technique increases.

This time, though, Lindsay got directly in on the training to spar in various ways, being quite elusive and dodgy. He attacked her with the floating sphere, spawning numerous branching tendrils like little snakes, feinting with many of them at a time via tiny 'vibration-like' allocations, while he attacked directly with one or two at a time. He managed to sneak one tendril or another to wrap around her leg, arm, or her defensive staff with great regularity. As odd as the 'puppet tendril sphere' was, it was very effective at cheating through the typical methods of human defense. He forced defense on too many angles at once, and the collapse could be delayed, but was inevitable if he was inside someone's guard.

As Jack had Lindsay entangled around the ankles by many tendrils, held suspended and upside down, her hair dropped long and loose and brushing the dirt, her staff flung far aside, she glared at him with her arms crossed. "Wipe that stupid grin off your face, Jack! You're getting way too much of a kick out of this, you know. Hmmph! Okay, let's spar for real! I just have the staff. Melee only. Use your sphere if you want. And I'd suggest your shield. I will get to you."

The sparring went slightly differently than it had in the past. When he moved his sphere in her way, she had no choice but to deal with it, cracking tendrils to block them as she attempted to skirt around and get to the master. But if she did, she got flanked and, at minimum, tripped up. And tripping was a death sentence if she didn't roll perfectly.

She was fast, though. A couple of times, she juked the sphere out and sprinted in a mad bull rush at him, bringing her staff to bear. Two times, he fended her off with the shield, and two times she was so damned quick she got around his guard. The first time, she tripped him, then finished him off with an expert follow-up, and the second time, just totally twisted him around with a nasty feint, flanking him and clocking him on the head.

But that was it. Two times out of ten. Eight times, she had to cry 'Uncle!' in annoyance, wrapped up by the sphere like a 'liquid metal' wrestling master. The tenth total time, and his fourth win in a row, she was panting in the dirt, her uniform a dirty, disheveled mess by then, and she called, "Alright, I admit defeat! Damn, I created a monster…"

Laughing, Jack walked over to offer a hand and help her up. "So it seems, Shifu. But you did make it clear how much I want to keep people out of my face. Thanks for that and thanks for making me a 'monster' especially."

After getting up, she grinned and re-wrapped her hair in a bun behind her head with effortless practice. "My job and my pleasure. But you still have energy, so let's get back to it. I want you to work on extensions. More range on the tendrils and getting a bunch of them on target quickly. It'll make this sphere even deadlier! Muhuhahaha!"

"I like the sound of that! Muhuhahaha!"

"Yes! Laugh maniacally with me!" She cast her head up to the ceiling. "Muhuhahaha!"

They laughed maniacally like nerds for a spell, and then got back to work. Longer tendrils, quicker explosions of action, more snap-second capacity at shaping metal. Transitions of shapes at the target. Spontaneous barriers. Flowing from shape to shape without thinking. Intuitive mastery.

After power training and a rest, he had a scheduled study period with Highfive, conducted in Jack's room. Getting the big guy on target wasn't easy. He was easily distracted by random subjects coming into his head.

'Did you see the Dragons game, bro? Ohhh, duuude, you missed a game!' No, Blondy, stay on target. 'Hey, are you ready for the next season of Smegheads In Space?! Dude, I've been waiting all year! Whaaaat?! Only season one?! Dude. You're a smegface. A bonafide smegface and smeghead. You better get caught up, bro. You'll be completely out of touch all year. Everybody watches it.' No, they don't, Blondy; stay on target. 'So can you do some cool stuff with metal, yet? Show me some tricks, bro!' Later, you ass — stay on target!

Somehow, with the patience of a true saint — and occasional yelling — he got through it, and maybe even a few things stuck in the great zoo of Highfive's busy, busy noggin'. He also showed off his powers, as promised, reshaping some aluminum around into various geometries, and even some custom shapes — he did a mask in the semblance of the icon of the Mantles, with the eyes like slanted teardrops.

Highfive was thrilled with all of it, but he acted like the mask was a blast of fireworks going off. He held his head with both hands in disbelief. "Holy fraggin' hell, dude, that's awesome! Can I have this?!"

Jack shrugged, smirking at him. "Eh, sure. Take it." He floated it over where Highfive was sitting and dropped it into his hands.

The big guy inspected it like a prize. "It's perfect! The eyes — and it's even silver! But it has a roughness to it, too. Can't get that with some store-bought piece."

"Silver, eh? That's what it should be?"

"Oh, El Santo's mask? Damn right. Well, it was more sparkly, maybe. He was a luchador, a masked wrestler and entertainer. A hero, more or less, a good guy. Did movies about them. He more than played the role, though. He lived it."

"And that's what the Mantles are all about?"

Highfive blinked over at him and shrugged. He held the mask up over his face and looked through it. He was definitely grinning behind it. "I think so, bro. For me, it's about jumping in head-first to soak the pain others would have to. Fighting for what's right, fighting for my community." He pulled it back down and turned it around to look at the front. "No matter the… adversity. Having principles, being a role model. We wear masks and take being anonymous seriously. Just because we do, though?" He looked up at Jack and grinned. "It doesn't mean we're faceless."

Jack nodded slowly and soberly to this.

"Anyway," Highfive continued, "Thanks, man. Makes a nice showpiece. Too bad it isn't silver, though." The last was in a joking tone, with a smirk.

Jack chuckled. "Bring me the silver and I'll do it."

Highfive waved his hand dismissively. "Naaah. Just messin'. This is better. An industrious, common metal of the people." He rose and stretched his arms. "Anyway. Time to go work out and get all this law shit out of my system…"

"You actually want to retain information, not clear it."

"Yeah, yeah — you know what I mean, though. Oh! Hey, now that I think about it, do you run?"

"Of course."

"I'm running with Bo in a bit, maybe you could meet her? Light can't make runs much these days, though she says she's committed to working out with Bo, and I can't adapt her to my workout routine. I've tried! It's for the advanced superboy physique, you feel me? Hell, even running, bro… shit, I run fast all the time…"

"Blondy, are you seriously inviting me to run with her because I'm slow?"

"No-no-no-no!" Highfive waved his free hand, snickering a bit as he did. "Hey, I mean, if you get a running partner, cool, but that's on you two. I figure it's just an excuse to meet. I'll be running with. Slowly. But say 'nah' and we'll shrug it off, no prob."

Jack rolled his eyes but shrugged and said, "Sure. Let's do it."

Highfive clenched his fist with an exaggerated victorious expression on his face, top biting his bottom lip. "Hell yeah, Jack! Pocket that introvision for a while and get out there! That's how you meet awesome people like me, right?" He flashed a winning grin.

As Jack propped his chin on his fist, he maintained a poker face, just to take some piss out of his new friend. "Uh-huh. Also, it's 'introversion,' not 'introvision.' So you know."

Highfive was dumbfounded. "Really? Damn! Alright then. That. Pocket that and meet us, bro. One hour!" He pointed, made a thumbs-up, and hurried out. "Gotta jet! Later!"

I need some more run time, anyway, and this is meeting a potential teammate. These socializations are important. Like the big guy said, I need to keep an eye out. Network, while otherwise steering clear of mere, temporary Delights. Hehe.