Nimbletainment’s ‘Physics 4 Kidz’ educational album is a sacrilegious excuse for music produced by tone deaf corpos, ran through so many AI generators that any semblance of creativity has been eroded off until only soulless, nothingburger slop is left behind. I would genuinely rather shove the spines of a Model Five into each ear than listen to another second of MC Newton’s ‘How Do You Like Them Apples’, as at least the former would result in a slightly less painful death.

  -Jeff Lance, in a blog post, later deleted after he had been promoted to Nimbletainment’s Head of Music

  It took me a second to realize that I had been thrown off terra firma and was now flipping through the air ass over teakettle. Mostly because the attack had really hurt. Luckily the move had knocked me out of range of the Twenty-Three’s bite, but that didn’t change the fact that I was, in fact, falling off a cliff.

  Brain finally decided to put two and two together, which resulted in me righting myself as fast as possible with my boots and sending thrust into them to slow my fall enough to not break my legs. It was a little close, only slowing enough not two feet from the ground, but I was able to land somewhat gracefully. Somewhat meaning falling on my ass as soon as feet hit dirt.

  The earth-shaking crash of the monster that landed mere feet away was a great reminder that I couldn’t remain on the ground for long. So I didn’t.

  Being in open air was a much larger advantage for me than it was the Twenty-Three. While they were not true propulsion equivalent to a jetpack, my boots were plenty still enough to vault safely over any swipe made my way like a grasshopper on caffeine. Since the Twenty-Three was far enough away from the hive to no longer have Rudy on the mind, all it could do was swat at the little pest currently annoying it. Unfortunately, I still couldn’t hurt it, so we were at a stalemate. At least for the moment.

  “I assume that the Twenty-Three isn’t going to exactly stay still when we come crashing down with whatever you’re cooking up,” I said, bounding away from another failed lunge in the meantime. “We need a way to restrain it.”

  The Model Twenty-Three would only need to be held in place for a minute or two at most. There are several options that would work for the brief period in question, although I am currently partial towards the Bun-G Elastive Ensnarement Grenade. You’d need six to be able to sufficiently hold it down, each one costing thirty points.

  “Well, I’m not gonna say no here. Buy it.”

  Purchased: Bun-G Elastive Ensnarement Grenade x6 - 180 Points

  Point Total: 2814

  I had to take a second to not drop the half-dozen pink orbs that literally fell into my arms. And when I meant they were pink, I meant solid, bubble gum pink. It looked like I had just raided a candy factory. “One for each limb, the head, and tail?”

  Bingo. Throw it as hard as you can at the part you want to gum up.

  With the dragon now barrelling towards me in the moment it took to get everything set up, I was happy to oblige. The first baseball pitch went straight for the head, but it was a bit too low and flew just under the jaw. As soon as the ball hit the dirt, it literally exploded in size, almost immediately enveloping the Twenty-Three’s neck and leaving the monster squirming in its new bubblegum neck brace. All remaining limbs followed suit as I circled clockwise around the beast, and but a minute later the Antithesis had been essentially glued to the ground by each ball in a messy hot pink hexagon.

  “That’s more effective than I expected,” I blurted out, tilting my head at the very weird display. Something akin to a spider web made sense for trapping something, like the Flytrap earlier, but…gum? Really?

  The Bun-G.E.E. is quite the wonderful tool is it not? A masterful mixture of elastic durability and adhesion. In layman’s terms, you could even say it has the properties of both rubber and gum.

  That phrasing was just too specific. “Is that a reference to something? That sounds like a reference to something too old for me to know.”

  Didn’t you just say you’re not ‘completely out of the loop’ minutes earlier? How disappointing. Regardless, I recommend we ascend back up before the Model Twenty-Three breaks free. The gum is unlikely to give, but the ground holding it down is another story.

  My boots made little work of the scaling back up the quarry, vaulting up the ledges in a single bound. Once up above once more, I looked on at the lizard below, still writhing wildly in an effort to get itself free. It was subtle, but I just now started to see cracks forming around where it was thrashing about.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “Alright Cal, it’s now or never.”

  Purchased: “Deathnail” Custom Impalement Gauntlet - 800 Points

  Point Total: 2014

  The item that appeared on the ground in front of me was, surprise, another gauntlet. While my Newtons stretched just about to the middle of my forearm, this right handed glove of metal reached all the way to my elbow. Half a dozen thruster-shaped tubes covered the top and sides, making its payload delivery method exceedingly clear. The two traits that stuck out to me most were its color, that being a gaudy, blood crimson, and the single massive stake attached to the knuckles. Frankly, it looked like somebody had just taped a railroad spike onto the end of the thing.

  A part of me wanted to lambast Cal for what was clearly a jerry-rigged piece of equipment by Protectors standards, but the clock was a-ticking. Mocking could always wait until my life wasn’t in danger.

  I took off my right Newton and slipped on the gauntlet. It was heavy, to the point where I couldn’t hold it out with just one arm. “One shot at this,” I ended up mumbling to myself, taking a few steps back to get a running start.

  A second passed, then through grit teeth I ran forward.

  The second my foot hit the very edge of the drop I was sent skyward by my boots. I let my arm drop so the Deathnail was simply facing downward towards the ground. A red dot appeared in my vision down on the ground of the quarry, one that was creeping closer to the head of the Twenty-Three the farther forward I was launched. This had to be the work of Sagesight; that purchase was definitely earning its price of admission.

  All I could do was wait for the dot to reach the top of the Antithesis's head while I soared through the air. Closer. Closer. Almost there…

  “Now!”

  To say I was pulled down violently by the force of the attack was a gross understatement. My senses couldn’t even keep track of what went down with how fast it sent me to the ground, but what I did know is that my arm hurt really, really badly the moment the boosters turned on. A tormented scream threatened to escape, but the noise never got out my throat as all my breath was forced out from my body in the descent.

  The impact was heavy; the entire area shuddered from the blow. As soon as contact was made, the stake of the Deathnail punched clean through the Twenty-Three’s skull, leaving the fist-sized hole it bore out for itself and embedding several feet into the ground beneath. There was no death scream from the monster, only the momentary ripple of force travelling through before it slumped down dead.

  Defeated: Model Twenty-Three (K-Variant) - 600 Points

  Point Total: 2614

  The entire quarry was left deathly, unsettlingly silent for a moment, savoring that killing blow. Everything then came back into focus, including the agonizing pain in my arm that made me give out a choked, exasperated scream.

  “Fuck fuck fuck! Cal, Nanos! Now!” The inhaler fell into my free, not completely fucked up hand, and I forced all that healing down my throat as fast as my shaky, panicked body could manage. Those nanites flooding my system tingled unpleasantly once they reached my arm, and the sensation of the bones in my upper arm refusing together was equally uncomfortable.

  You may need a second dose, or possibly even a higher tier of treatment. The bones in your arm splintered in several places along their entire length, and your shoulder is also dislocated, among a multitude of smaller issues.

  “I can deal with that second one myself, thanks," I hissed. I tore the Deathnail off my arm, or more accurately the remains of the Deathnail. Disregarding the absence of the weapon's titular nail, the entire front of it crumpled like a car accident and some of the boosters had been blown completely off. I was afraid the damage had spread to my prosthetic proper, but a quick glance and evaluative flex of the fingers showed the damage was limited to a few dents at most. Hardly a cause for concern, and could be blown off as giving the arm character.

  Now for the less fun part, I twisted my arm up over my head and bent it in such a motion that my shoulder slipped back into place. Quite painfully, I might add, as indicated by the choked breath of suffering. You learn a few tricks in fighting, mostly ways to avoid a doctor's visit. That shit always came out of your paycheck.

  I took another huff of the good stuff and leaned against the corpse of the big lizard of death, to which I was shortly after greeted by the silver floating head drone I had bought.

  “I'd like to inform you that you've earned a token for killing the Twenty-Three,” Cal said aloud.

  “Lucky me,” I replied, too exhausted from all that hurting to put any excitement in my response. “Good to know I got something more than a point deficit fighting this lunk of plant. Don't think I didn't notice the Deathnail put me two hundred in the hole.”

  “My options were limited based on your style of fighting. Imagine how much easier this would have been if you just used a gun.”

  I gave a scoff. “But where's the fun in that? How's Rudy doing?”

  “His AI has been keeping me informed enough, and apparently he has been doing quite well. The Seventeen has been taken care of, and he is currently disposing of the remains of the hive to the tune of Vivaldi's Winter suite.”

  “Well, good to hear that he's enjoying himself.” I slid down to the ground, letting my back rest against the rough skin of the lizard while taking several labored breaths. “I'm just gonna lay here for a bit and enjoy myself too.”

  “You do know that can be taken as an innuendo, right?”

  “Shut up.”