//------------------------------//
// Chapter 3: Life Start! 
// Story: Open World: Level Up 
// by BioQuillFiction 
//------------------------------//

Mei took me on a small tour of the ship as well as explaining a few of the rooms and their purposes. "And this is Storage A." She said, opening the door as I was met with a room the size of Barnyard Bargains back home filled with storage cabinets and shelves. "All the storage rooms are empty at the moment but it's better to have them now so we keep our Assistants uncluttered with stuff."

“Wow, this place is huge.” I said in surprise at how big this one room was.

"It's the same dimensional spells and technology used in basic building construction." Mei stated. "This size was good enough for now and we can upgrade the ships engines later to make them even bigger."

She closed the door and walked to the next one. "And this is our vault/treasure room. While dying doesn't cause penalties save for losing an hour or two, some people are capable of stealing money right out of your assistant or some dungeons make dying cost you, literally, so it's better to have a vault here and later on an account with the Bankers Guild."

“That’s...weird that people can just steal from your assistant like that.” I frowned.

"Abilities can bypass their security. They're not easy to get, but someone who's a career criminal can work their way towards them. Might take a few million years or so but once they have it they can use them to take money out. Kinda like pick pocketing, of course they have to be very skilled and careful, take too much out at once and the security will kick in." She stated. She walked me to the next door. "Here is my workshop." She opened the door. Machines ranging from large to small were all over the place, most unfinished and the finished ones were all on a table in the back of the room.

“Wow…” I said, wide eyed at all the machinery in her room. “This is all your work?”

"Most of it. Other stuff here or there are pre manufactured items I've been modifying or just reverse engineering to learn more about them."

“That’s really cool.” I said honestly.

"Heh, it passes the time."

"Hey, Mei, Button." I turned, seeing Tiara flying over to us. "Echo Dash says we're near the dungeon now. It will be a few minutes now. You ready?" She asked, giving me a smile and friendly tap on one of my legs.

“Well, ready as I’ll ever be.” I said, my inner gamer feeling super excited that I can get to explore a real life dungeon.

We all headed to the deck and shortly after getting there the ship stopped. Looking around the area looked like a volcano that erupted then went dormant, the only thing of keynote was the ten hundred foot tall dragon skull embedded into the side of the mountain, jaw opened wide for a stairway to head in.

"Welcome to the Dragons Den Dungeon kids." Echo said as he came out to join us.

I saw Tiara get her battle saddle and gun ready, Ali setting up some small camera attached to a band around his head, and Mei was also carrying her own gun, but nothing like what Tiara had. Mei's gun was white and black and seemed to glow blue at the front. Me, I just grabbed my hammer in my teeth as we headed inside.

So far this dungeon was your basic cave lit by torches. We came across some Shadow Creatures I fought against in Combat class. Now we saw these… they looked like mini hot air balloons on fire. Two of them were floating a fair distance away. "Flying Flames." Ali said. "Best use magic on them, bullets typically melt before they can hit them unless they're special against fire based enemies."

"I got this." Echo Dash said. He raised a good to his lips, huffing out a quick breath that left out his mouth with bits of snow. Suddenly there was an arrow of ice shooting out of the air he breathed and impaling, and killing the Flying Flame. He did it again for the other one.

“Wow.” I commented. “Amazing!”

Echo shrugged. "You'll get used to it Button. It's not that hard of a spell to do, an ice or frost gem or the right spell scroll and you could probably shoot off… four before your MP is depleted.".

"It's that expensive to use?" Tiara asked, trotting up to where the things died and looking at their drops.

"Fifty MP an arrow." Echo said with a nod.

“Really? Kind of thought a simple spell would cost less then that?” I inquired. “Is it not a level based spell system?”

"Well, there are weaker versions of this spell but typically the more MP a spell needs to be cast the stronger it is. You can use it with less MP with practice or find it's weaker counterpart but the damage is also reduced heavily, elemental advantages or not." Echo said.

“Yeah, that makes sense.” I nodded.

"Speaking of elemental." Tiara said, trotting back up to me with two glowing orange red gems in hoof. "Check it out. Fire Gems." She gave one to me, and absorbed the other one for herself. Right, just like class. I absorbed the gem and now had fire energy added alongside magic… wait what?

“Fire energy added alongside magic?” I tilted my head in confusion. “What, can I just...add fire to my attacks without using magic now?”

"That's part of it." Echo said as we kept moving. "You can control fire as part of yourself now, as well as cloak your weapons, armor, even projectiles in it but also it boosts spells that utilize it. For example, a basic fireball spell costs about ten MP to cast. A boosted fire energy one still costs ten MP bit now deals the damage of one that costs fifty, or more depending on how much of the elemental energy you add into it. You can also negate magic entirely and use only the elemental energy to perform pyromancy like spells, but that's a bit harder. Oftentimes combining the two works best but knowing how to cast elemental magic from only elemental energy is helpful too."

“This...is a lot more in depth then I first thought.” I said nervously.

"You'll learn about it in Magic class."

We continued through the dungeon, finding a larger chamber where several giant skeletal dragons walked around. "I got this." Mei said.

She lifted her gun, aiming not at the undead dragons but above them and fired. An orange bolt hit the ceiling above the two, forming an orange oval. Her gun then began glowing blue at the front of it and shot it at a wall next to us. To my amazement the blue oval soon became just an outline of blue and inside the oval I saw above those skeleton dragons.

"Oh, that's a portal gun." Tiara said with realization in her tone of voice.

"A classic, nice." Ali said, giving Mei a high five. Or so I hear it's called when have hands over hooves.

“You...made a gun that shoots portals?” I asked in amazement.

"No, it's existed way before this reality even existed. I just like the concept and design so I made this from parts back at my old job." Mei said, reaching into her utility belt pocket and pulling out a thin metal tube with a button. "This I made though. Say Amen everyone." She said, pushing the button and tossing it through the portal. It closed right after and I looked over and saw it falling between the undead drake's… then jumped back as my eyes were hit by a blinding, yet oddly calm and warming light that faded after a while and left me rubbing them to see properly again. 

"You made a Blessed grenade?" Echo asked.

"Yup." Mei said proudly.

When my vision returned I could see the undead drake's were gone, replaced by two fair sized piles of loot.

“Ah yes, the good ol’ holy hand grenade.” I brought up.

"Oh, finally watch Monty Python then?" Tiara asked me as she helped get me up and walking towards the loot.

“Yes, and it was hilarious.” I chuckled.

The loot was impressive. Dragon bones, raw iron, copper and nickel ores as well as a lot of coal and four hundred rem in total.

"Money goes in the vault?" Tiara asked.

"Would be best." Echo said.

"I can use the ore and bones for different armors and weapons." Mei said.

"And I just got six thousand viewers." Ali said, tapping their head camera.

“Six thousand people are watching this?” I asked in a little surprise.

"Not everybody can make the time or get the chance to go out and explore the hazard zones. Some groups that formed independent kingdoms or governments even forbid it. So, they catch streaming explorers like Ali here, donating to help them along or even just the ad revenue alone can support them."

"I get a fair amount from both." Ali admitted.

“Huh, didn’t know that.” I said honestly.

As we began walking Ali started chuckling. "What's so funny?" Mei asked.

"Comments, they're all posting eye roll emojis at Button." Ali stated.

“Well I’m sorry I still don’t know much about this place.” I huffed.

"Actually most find it adorable or funny your reactions to things." Ali said as we entered another tunnel. There was a small chest on the side of it. "Neat, freebie."

“And it’s not a mimic how or why?” I asked nervously, thinking just a random chest in the middle of a tunnel was a tad too suspicious.

"This is a level one dungeon Button. Mimics, while they do spawn here, only start showing up at about floor fifteen or lower, and even then they aren't too common in Level one dungeons." Echo said.

"Plus, you can find small hints here or there based on what they are hiding as." Ali said. "If this chest was a mini, you'd notice that it's too half, or the mouth, open slightly to breath."

"So we're good then." Tiara summarized.

“I’ve underestimated mimics one too many times.” I frowned.

Mei shrugged, walking up to the cheat and kicking it open. "Woah. Hey Button check this out." Mei said, motioning for me to come over.

“What’s up?” I asked while looking over to see what’s up.

Inside the chest I saw a small… egg? "It's a Phoenix egg. They are super rare drops." Mei said, taking out the egg and showing it to me. It was actually a shade of light orange, like there was a fire burning inside it. Given this is apparently a Phoenix egg, that's a possibility.

“What’s a Phoenix Egg doing here?” I asked curiously. “I would assume a dragon egg just based on what the dungeon looked like and it’s possible loot pool.”

"Loot is completely random." Echo stated. "While what the loot is, as well as quality, does scale, it's still random."

"Yup." Mei said.

"Super yup." Ali said.

“That’s...both weird, and a little nonsensical for the loot table to just be completely random.” I said honestly. “But...well I still barely understand this so what do I know?”

"Hang on." Echo said, looking through their Assistant. After a bit he pulled out a glass jar with a pillow on the bottom and some small machine on the top. He took off the machine and took the egg, placing it inside the jar on the pillow then placing the machine back on it and flipped a switch. "There. Temporal acceleration incubator."

“Cool.” I nodded. “I wonder how it can do that while looking like a normal incubator.”

"Time Gem." Mei stated. "I'm guessing… four hours til it hatches?"

"Two." Echo stated.

“What is this, Marvel?” I asked, trying to say ‘Mareval’ from back home but somehow the world autocorrected me.

"Oh there is an elemental gem for everything. Time, space, fire, water, ice, frost, air, terra, blood, wood, ect. There are even some artificial ones that are actually kinda cool." Tiara said.


“Wouldn’t blood fall under water?” I asked.

“Only after a lot of work and practice.” Echo said.

“No...as in...why is there a blood gem when you can just have it normally through a water gem?” I asked.

“Time saver, collectables, medicine, all that.” Ali said with a shrug.

“Fine fine.” I nodded. “So anyways, where to next in the dungeon?”

Echo Dash spoke. “We’ll be coming up on another chamber that takes paths down three routs. One leads to the already cleared boss room, another leads to a daily respawning puzzle room, and the last one leads to a lavapool that, if you are immune to lava heat, you can swim down and grab a rare item.”

“Darn, I left my lava proof suit back at home.” I joked.

“I didn’t.” Mei said, already pulling out something akin to a diving suit out of her Assistant. Echo rolled his eyes and Tiara and Ali chuckled.

“Well…” I started standing on two legs and putting a hoof on their shoulder. “Have a nice swim.”

“I’ll head that way then. You rest head over to the puzzle room.” Mei said, getting the suit on and heading off. We followed and once in the chamber went where Echo lead. 

The puzzle room was cold. Actually, it was very cold, too cold for this kind of dungeon. “The guidebook states this puzzle has three parts, First one is always the same, start a fire. The last two are a pathfinding puzzle, and a riddle.”

“Sounds simple enough.” I said while trying to create fire with my hooves thanks to that fire gem I got before.

“Hold it.” Echo said, “Elemental energies are powered by emotions. There are various ways to utilize this in combat, but the simple tasks actually prove to be hardest here.”

“How so?” Tiara asked.

“Using fire to form an attack is easy, the adrenaline and emotions provide plenty of fuel, but making a small, controlled fire requires enough emotion to spark and light the fire, but not something that will set the room on fire. Which is easier done than you’d think.”

“Couldn’t be too simple now could it?” I frowned.

“No, but, that’s what spells are for.” Echo said, smiling as he pulled two scrolls out of his Assistant. “This is a basic Ignition spell. No use in combat but it will light anything like a match. Anyone here got wood, or something burnable.”

“Nothing a kid should be smelling.” Ali said, gaining a look from all of us. “What? It’s all legal herbs…”

“And yet it sounds illegal when you start with ‘nothing a kid should be smelling’.” I deadpanned.

“Well you do have to be over eighteen.”

“Alright...so who has something to burn properly?” I asked carefully.

"Maybe my feathers?" Tiara offered, raising her wings to her muzzle and began plucking some out. Once a small pile had been made, Echo set the feathers on fire. The room suddenly got warmer and lit up, the floor was suddenly covered in tiles. Each tile had either a fire, a rock, or a fang on it. From where we were there was an altar ahead of us passed the tiles.

“Alright, so let’s see what our puzzle is going to be.’

"First we figure out which tile is safe and which are trapped?" Tiara said.

"Allow me." Echo said, placing a hoof on the fang tile. A giant spear shot down and pierced his back, through his torso and into the ground. He spat blood. "Ouch…"

“Sweet Celestia!” I panicked at Echo suddenly getting impaled.

"Shit!" Tiara yelped. She then turned to me. "Sweet Celestia? You do know that's not an actual curse phrase right?"

“I just got here not too long ago, I’m still used to saying things from back home.” I huffed.

"Can one of you kids pull this out?" Echo asked. "My healing factor can't push something this big out of me." Tiara flew up, trying to pull the spear out but couldn't. She then shot the end of the spear off and the part under Echo and the rest was easily pushed out. I watched amazed as the hole in Echo began fixing itself as if he downed the best quality healing potion from back home. "Thank you."

“How, why, and what?” I asked in shock.

"Abilities. Self healing is one of many perks to spending your time adventuring."

"That's the kind of abilities I'm working towards." Tiara said with a smile.

"Now if only it worked on my clothes." Echo said, sighing as their suit still had holes and blood stains. "Well, next one." He said, touching the rock one. Nothing. "Huh. Rock tiles are the safe ones."

"What about the fire ones?" Tiara asked.

Echo shrugged, touching the fire one as he was suddenly on fire. "That should have been obvious. Also ouch…"

“Uh...does his regeneration work on Troll logic?’ I asked nervously. “Fire and Acid get past it?”

"They do their damage then it gets healed." Echo sighed, holding a hoof up and water shot out and up, putting him out. His charred skin began healing and after a short minute he was back to normal. "And my suit is completely gone now."

“Well...isn’t there regenerative clothes?” I asked, thinking if people can just have regen then their clothes can to.

"There is but I didn't bring mine." Echo sighed. "Come on then." Echo said as we walked on the tiles. Well, Echo and I did, Tiara flew over. We made it to the alter.

I looked up, seeing the riddle in the stone.


A spark I create, to make the night great. I am older than wood, and weaker than stone. What am I?


“Flint?” I asked

The alter cracked, then fell apart, revealing a chest.

"Nice." Tiara said.

“Wonder what reward we’ll get?” I wondered, walking forward and starting to open the chest.

Inside I found a… helmet. I picked it up.


Armor of the Berserker.


"What is it?" Tiara asked.

“Armor of the Berserker?” I said. “Uh...I haven’t really read up on manga or anime before but isn’t this thing from that one really dark manga Berserk?”

"Hmm…" Echo said, putting a hoof to the helmet. "Appraisal." He said, letting a few seconds pass. "Well, it's similar. Same abilities as the armor Royal Guts wears, and is Symbiotic. Once this helmet is put on it merges with the wearer. Interesting…"

"What?" Tiara asked.

"It has skill trees. It can grow alongside the wearer, but I'm not sure if it's independent on its growth or the wearer chooses how it grows?"

“But uh...wouldn’t it turn me into...well a berserker?” I asked nervously.

"No. Items like this while bonded to a host, only trigger at the hosts will. Or if you get really pissed off."

"What should we do with it?" Tiara asked.

"Well, you kids can sell it, keep it. Maybe Mei can look it over… hey, where's Ali?"

Tiara and I looked around, the Kangaroo was missing. I know he followed us down this hall… right? Yeah, we talked about that first test.

"Where did he go?" Tiara asked.

"Oh, he'll be fine. That little doll will too." We turned to the entryway, seeing man man, human, I think, in a torn cloak, bandage armor and holding a heavy looking axe that pulsated with blue fire. 

“Uh...hello?” I asked worriedly to the cloaked man.

"Tiara, Button, Behind me." Echo said, stepping forward as we did just that. "So, let me guess, you're with one of the raider guilds?"

"Victor Gohun of the Smog Fire raiders Guild. A pleasure." He said, giving a mock bow. "Now, I'll be taking that helmet there, if you'd please."

“Excuse me, hold up.” I started. “There’s...a guild that not only condones, but supports crimes?” I asked carefully. “As in a place that got the go ahead by whatever or whoever is ruling this… just let’s it happen?”

"There's more to it than that, but I'll tell you about it later." Echo said. "So, I'm assuming you have Ali and Mei tied up in the chamber ahead?"

"Boss room actually."

"And you want the helmet or you'll kill us?"

"Got a quota to meet or are you freelancing?"

"Oh nothing like that, just assigned to mess with people who come here for the week."

“Well uh…” I started nervously. “Maybe we don’t have to fight?”

"Hehe, kid, it's rarely that easy." Victor said.

"Sadly." Echo added, taking a deep breath and then huffing out. I blinked, seeing a volley of ice arrows shooting at Victor. He swung his axe, a wall of fire catching the arrows.

"Wow! You're actually strong. And here I thought this would be easy." Victor laughed as he charged, Echo rushed in and clashed against him using what looked like his wings, only now they looked metallic.

"You two get out of here, find Mei and Ali and get out!"

“No need to tell me twice!” I said in panic as I rushed off to where I believed I saw someone point to the boss room.

I was hoofing it with Tiara flying above me. We made it to the boss room and oh fuck that guy isn't alone.

In the boss room, that was a platform above a pool of lava, stood what looked like he was a pony, like Tiara and I, but his body was human looking. He was… an earth pony, I think, green coat with an orange mane and equally orange eyes wearing a plaid red suit. Mei and Ali were tied and gagged next to him in the ground. "Ah, the kids escaped. Figures." He said, rolling his eyes.

“Oh come on!” I complained. “Really?”

"Well, it is an unspoken rule to travel into a dungeon with at least one other person." Tiara huffed, readying her gun.

"You two can sit quietly," he stomped on the ground, the earth under us giving way as I fell in and was stuck with just my neck and some of my right leg out while Tiara flew up and avoided it. I yelped as that Helmet the other guy wanted rolled next to me. "And wait for Victor to finish up your friend back there."

"How about you eat lead instead?" Tiara offered, biting the trigger grip and firing. The guy raised a hand as more rocks came out of the floor and blocked the gunfire, but was getting chipped and broken quickly. Unfortunately he could still launch large rocks at her.

Shit this is bad. Echo is busy fighting some other guy, Tiara's gun is good but once she has to reload she's not gonna last long and Ali and Mei are tied up. Oh yeah, and I'm stuck in the ground! If I could just crawl out of here… I eyed the helmet next to me… fuck am I going to do this?

“Well, just a simple thing, put it on.” I said while grabbing the helmet and putting it on, not caring about what’s gonna happen as long as I can save the others and get them out of here.


Armor of the Berserker Equipped.

Symbiotic attachment initiated.


I winced, feeling odd as the helmet melted into my head like water to a sponge and I blinked.


Symbiotic integration established.
Generating Symbiote personality.
Personality Generated.


Wait what?

I heard a whistle, looking up I saw… me. The only difference is that me is still wearing said helmet. "Quite the mess."

“Excuse me what?” I asked in confusion.

"Oh, hi, you're my host. I'm… huh, alive for a few seconds, need a name. Ah, call me Cheat Code. I am the Armor of the Berserker, and also a Symbiote. I'm a new kind of item, merge with the owner and alive alongside my wearer. And only you can see and hear me."

“Well...can you help me out? I’m kind of in a bind here…” I said nervously.

"Oh I can but you have to give me a reason why." He said, walking around me.

“Well...currently it’s to keep me and my friends alive against people who want to take you.” I told him simply.

"I'm merged with you now kid, and like in marriage til death do us part." He said with a laugh. "I'm armor for a berserker, Button Mash. If you want me to help you, I need you to give me fear, hatred, rage. Otherwise I'm just a voice in your head."

“Couldn’t you just...take over my body for a minute? Do you really need anger and rage right now?” I asked, the fear of getting murdered by crazy people was still ever present right now.

"Yeah I can't take over your body for you. Yet, that's several branches of skills away to unlock and even then I'd need your permission."

“Cause of course, nothing can ever be simple.” I growled, the annoyances of things not making any sense whatsoever starting to piss me off royally. “Even Dark Souls wasn’t this openly against basic rules.”

"You're just pissy that nothing ever goes your way. Life takes work and effort, not like you know anything about that. Mom did all the hard work for you, and now, you rely on them." He pointed a hoof. Looking I saw Tiara, looking in bad shape and out of ammo trying to reload. "Can you do anything by yourself?"

“I didn’t put you on and let you in my head just so you could berate me!” I snapped at him, stomping towards the thing and staring them dead in the eye. “I let you in so I could do something, not have you bitch at me. So are you doing to do something to help or not!?” I growled in pure rage at the symbiote.

"Ah, there it is." He said, vanishing. Angry I lunged at him… then realized I was out. That son of a-

Thunk

I turned, feeling something hit me but not hard. I saw the rubble of a smashed rock at my side. Looking myself over, this armor was covered in thorns, hooves ended in claws and felt more like a second skin than armor. Woah.

"Agh!" I looked back up, seeing Tiara hit the ground. Shit her wing looks broken!

“You hurt my friend…” I growled as I started walking over to the earth pony. “You done fucked up now!” I roared in anger as I charged at him a whole lot faster than I could normally run.

He raised a wall of rock between us, and I crashed through it like it was paper, ramming right into the bastard and into the wall. I felt something… shift and when I looked up the Spike's on my armor had grown long, and all impaled him across his whole body. Eyes wide I backed up, his body fell down limp… holy shit.

“I uh…” I blinked. “I didn’t mean to kill him! Beat the shit out of him, maybe, but not murder!”

"Ugh, Button, respawn, remember? That rule applies to everyone." I heard Tiara say. I turned around, another shift and the spikes on my armor returned to normal. I ran over and helped her up. "He'll be fine. Wake up last place he slept in an hour or so."

I winced, seeing her wing was broken and badly bleeding.

“We need to get you to a doctor, you’re really hurt.” I said worriedly as I put her on my back and moved over to Mei and Ali and untied them. “Come on, we need to get out of here.”

"Ugh, what about Echo Dash?" Mei asked, helping Ali up.

"Stayed to fight the first guy." Tiara said.

"Shit I hope he's alright. Raider guilds are some of the more violent guilds around." Ali said.

As we were making it out, passing the room where Echo and that Victor guy were fighting, we skidded to a halt as Echo arrived next to us. He was completely missing his wings and an ear, his body was in bad shape and was regenerating much slower than .before

“What’s wrong with your regeneration?” I asked carefully. “Normally you would have been fully patched up by now.”

"That fucker is as strong as I am. Thankfully we've worn out each other's regen a lot. Heh, and at least I still have all my limbs… minus the wings." He groaned, looking at Tiara. He pulled out a potion from his assistant and fed it to Tiara. "That will stop your bleeding, the wing will heal, just takes a bit longer."

"Thanks…" Tiara wheezed.

“Alright, but...I didn’t expect all of this to happen…” I said sadly,

"You can never expect what the villain guilds are up to. Now come on, that guy won't be stunned for long."

“I...still don’t understand why that’s a thing…” I sighed out, continuing to run with the others in my new armor.

"Once we're out of here I'll explain in fu-" Echo tripped. I looked down, scared as one of his legs was blasted off. "For fucks sake…" He groaned, getting back up on three legs.

There was a horrifying laugh from behind. "Not so fast now pony." Turning I spotted Victor. His left arm was missing, and there was a hole in his head where his left eye, and his body was covered in heavily bleeding gashes. His one still there arm held a rifle. "I haven't had this much fun in centuries."

I growled. “Take Tiara and run.” I told them, my anger flaring back up as another person got hurt in front of me.

"Button, you're green, he's as strong as me. Even with that armor you can't beat them. Their weak, yes, but it's not worth it." Echo said, grunting.

"Come on." Ali said, trying to push me along.

“No.” I growled. “I’m tired of letting other people do the heavy lifting.” I told them, my new claws cracking the ground. “I’m tired of seeing others get hurt.” I snarled as I let Tiara off my back. “And I am most certainly tired of this asshole!” I roared as I charged at him in fury.

He shot off at me, his bullets denting my armor but I kept charging. He kept firing, two piercing my armor. The pain was like nothing I have ever felt before. Bones broke and flesh tore open, but the armor kept me together so I kept running. Something flashed in my Assistant hud but I didn't read it as I charged at them… fire. I was on fire now, literally, and finally managed to ram into him. I bashed him against the wall, Victor catching fire and laughing. "You got guts kid! I like it!" He yelled, slamming his arm into my head. I felt my skull crack but I pulled back only to headbutt him more, feeling that shift as the spikes on my armor grew and impaled him like the other guy. He laughed again. "Hehehe… I'll see you around kid."

I pulled back, my armor spikes retreating as he fell over, his body not moving as he burned.

"Holy shit." I heard Mei say.

“Uh...yeah…” I panted. “Can...someone get me an aspirin and...a new nervous system real quick? I think I can taste the pain I’m in…” I asked, thankful that I was still able to stand right now.

Oh, no wait… falling now…


Ugh… my… wait a minute… I feel great! I got up, yawning as-

WHACK!

Ouch! My head!!!

"Reckless child!" I winced, opening my eyes. I was in the nurse's office back at the Caretakers Guild… and Nurse Iron Heart, an earth pony mare with a chrome mane and red coat, cutie mark a bandage, barked at me. I meet her about as often as I get hurt in combat class… so often. "You Isekai have no sense of self preservation I swear…"

“I think you do more damage than the people I fight nurse.” I joked. “But it’s also not my fault some bandits decided to come in and fight us out of nowhere.”

"And it's your fault for fighting them. Ugh." She huffed, leaving. 

As she left Tiara flew in. "Thank goodness you're alright." She said, giving me a hug.

I couldn't help but blush a bit at the sudden hug by her. “W-well...it’s not the worst injuries I’ve gotten so far right?” I asked sheepishly, not really sure what the full extent of my injuries were. “I’ve been shot before and...well I’m immune to fire so being on fire wouldn’t have hurt that much.”

"Your skull was cracked like a coconut, your ribs and left lung were torn apart." She deadpanned. "And no, having fire energy does not make you immune to fire unless you produce it. A fire attack on you still hurts but you do get some resistance to fire." She stated. "I did not know you were such a natural berserker."

“And let’s not forget the strange feeling of spikes shoved into my body.” I added. “And well...mom taught me not to get upset at games...but this…” I sighed out, not sure how to properly say this.

"Well, you now are a Symbiote host, so that's something else you'll be learning about. But hey, we got a new pet phoenix. I named her Mango."

“That’s adorable.” I chuckled. “Can I see her?”

"Sure, when you are ready to get back to our dorm. Also, I think we have to have a party when we get there. Mei, Ali and Echo are already getting everything together for one."

“So...what happened while I was out?” I asked. “And uh...why did I see my assistant flash up randomly? Was it because I was on fire or something?”

"Your assistant flashed? What did it say?"

“I didn’t notice, I was more preoccupied...keeping you all safe.” I said honestly. “But let’s look.” I said, bringing up my assistant to see what it flashed up.

Let's see… prior notifications.


Alert. New Ability Gained.
Loop has been obtained and activated.


Loop? Where have I heard that one before?

“Uh...why does ‘Loop’ sound familiar?” I asked curiously.

"Huh? Show me?" Tiara asked, looking skeptical. I showed her the notification and her eyes went wide. "Open your skill trees! Now!" 

“Uh...sure?” I said nervously while opening up my skill tree. “What’s Loop again? I probably forgot…”


Loop: While in an Arena, Dungeon or out in the Hazard zones, Loop cycles the energies of one's party and stacks them on one another. The effect only is active when in a combat zone or in a battle. Each Loop is ten minutes for a party of two and five added minutes per extra party member.


"Button! You have a Legendary Ability, capital L!" Tiara freaked.

“Excuse me what!?” I asked in shock.

"Holy shit this is amazing!" She said, flying circles around me. "This is going to be so amazing!"

“But...how did I get it? How would I have gotten it?” I asked in confusion. “You don’t just get a legendary ability out of nowhere like that.”

Tiara stopped, landing next to me. "Actually… Legendary abilities are… randomly obtained. No clear reason or… pattern. Some people just wake up from one day to the next with one. Granted there are still a class of legendary abilities that are rare, and Loop is one of them."

“So...how strong is this ability? Cause it looks strong from what I’m seeing but I’m not sure how strong.”

"Okay so let's say I have forty MP, and you have fifty. Well, with just the two of us, in ten minutes You will have ninety MP and I will have ninety MP. And ten more minutes, a hundred and eighty MP each. And you get where I am going with this."

“So basically...if we’re in a combat zone and just sit there for an hour, we’d be close to unstoppable?”

"Well, sorta. It only works on energy, like magic, fire, things like that. HP and stats are unaffected. So an hour to grow up energy would make us glass cannons."

“Well...at least it’s not overpowered like I thought it would be.” I said sheepishly.

"But still so powerful." Tiara said, gushing. "If we weren't a party, I'd be jealous."

“Well...I suppose so.” I said honestly. “Just wish it would have helped in the fight.”

"Actually… when you caught fire, that was a lot, even for rage fueled. Maybe it did? Well, now it's two reasons to celebrate."

“But...this ability said it takes ten minutes to work…” I frowned. “Eh, screw it. I got something really cool and beat a boss, so hooray!” I cheered.

"Raider." Tiara corrected.

“And you wouldn’t say he was a boss level enemy?” I asked her.

"Well, sure but Echo Dash did weaken him a lot. Eh, enough nit picking. Come on, you got a legendary ability and a new cutie mark." 

Wait, I got my mark?!

“Wait, I got my cutie mark!?” I asked as I looked at what my cutie mark was.

I blinked in awe. It was a beat up, rusty shield, but it had a green arrow going up with the letters LV over it.

“That’s amazing.” I said with a smile of pure joy.

"Come on, the party is in your honor so, let's get going."

“I’m coming.” I said happily as I got out of bed with a spring in my step.

As I walked I almost got upset at hearing him talk. "Well that was fun." Cheat Code said as he appeared next to me. "Happy to have gotten to be the hero?"

“I’m in such a good mood, hearing you talk isn’t actually upsetting me.” I said simply.

"Hey, pissing you off saved the day. Where's my party?"

“You’re...a part of me?” I asked in slight confusion. “Is that right?”

"Down to the DNA. While I have my own mind, personality, skill trees, I'm you. Til death, perma deaths due us part."

“Then you’re also getting the same party.” I said honestly.

He shrugged. "Either or. You know, a Legendary Ability is going to get you a lot of attention. Both good and not."

“Please don’t tell me there are ability stealers…” I said worriedly.

“No, Mother made sure of that.” A nurse told me as they passed by.

"But there is an ability that copies abilities. Granted that one is about as rare as loop and can only copy legendary abilities with the original ability owner's consent." Cheat Code added.

“Okay thank...whoever.” I sighed out thankfully. “Wouldn’t want to know...wait, how do you know that? I thought you were just born not too long ago?” I asked Cheat.

"Dunno. Spawned in life forms like myself know things we shouldn't. We should be as dumb, if not more so than an Isekai, yet I think, I know and I can do. All we can summarize it as is, Thank the Mother."

“Well...I guess so.” I nodded. “So thankfully there isn’t someone out there trying to become the ‘ultimate lifeform’ by stealing every ability in the universe.”

"Doesn't stop people from trying. So, what comes next for you, button?"

“No idea…” I sighed out. “But right now, it’s party time.”

I looked over at Cheat Code but he was gone. I shrugged and kept on walking.

The party was amazing. I ate more cake and ice cream than I have since Pinkie Pie's Hearth Warming party four years ago. 

I woke up in the realm of dreams, being kicked by Cheat Code. "Get up, this is the only reality where I can have an independent body." He said, kicking me again.

"If you keep kicking me than no." I told him bluntly.

I got up and shoved him off. "So, what are you gonna do?"

“No idea.” I said. “What do we have around here?”

“It’s the realm of dreams bro, fun and games for as long as you are asleep.”

“True...well then let’s have some fun.” I said honestly.

As Cheat and I walked down the pathways, I began noticing a few ponies kept eyeing me. None ponies too. Are they looking at my Cutie Mark?

“Uh...why are they all looking at me?” I whispered to Cheat nervously.

“Heh, remember what Echo and Tiara told you about when you asked why you were roommates with a filly?” I nodded. “Sex is such a casual pleasure everyone takes for a ride so long as both, or all, depending on the number of participants, say yes. You, bro, are getting looked at.”

“Uh…” I didn’t know how red my face was at that but all I know is that I was blushing up a storm here.

“You’re bisexual right?” He asked, motioning to a few males that gave me those kinds of eyes. I gulped.

“Can we not...focus on that?” I asked nervously. “I haven’t even gone on a date yet...why would I think of that so soon?”

“Well, you’re alive, you got the organs, the rules of no sex in the Caretakers Guild don’t apply in the realm of sleep, I know for a fact you’ve had the fantasy about being with Sweetie Bell that way since you learned about sex in school… And Cheerilee? Wow, then again she is a looker.”

“Sh-shut up…” I grumbled, looking away as I could swear I felt steam coming out of my head.

“Oh come on.” He said, elbowing me. “Don’t be so shy and wishy washy. Where’s the balls to the wall murdering psycho that killed those two raiders earlier today?”

“I was pissed, not horny.” I huffed. “And that’s partly your fault for being an asshole.”

“And you’re welcome.” He said with a laugh. “Well if you aren’t gonna get laid you might as well find out when you’ll get laid.” He pointed a hoof at a tent, the tent was neon blue with two cloaked and hooded figures that stood guard outside the entrance flap. Their cloaks were neon blue and black with hourglass images all over them.

“Time Travelers?” I guessed, seeing the cloaks and hourglass imagery it seemed pretty obvious.

“Yes and no? Time Walkers, one of the three guilds The Mother personally oversees. They’re more like the grim reapers of reality. They’ll tell you a general summary of your future for free but no details.”

“Well...alright.” I nodded, trotting over to the tent. “Might as well see what I can know.”

“And while you go do that, I’m getting laid.” Cheat said, quickly running off. I rolled my eyes and walked over to the tent.

Once inside I saw a desk with two chairs, and a desk between them. One chair has one of those cloaked people in them, the other was empty. “Take a seat.” He said. He had a rough voice, but he spoke fairly softly. “Button Mash, right?”

“Yes, that’s me.” I nodded while taking a seat. “How are you doing today?”

“Well. Now then, shall we get down to it?” He asked, summoning a grey chrome and black sword with a blue eye at the tip.  He held it over the desk and a book appeared. The book had my name on it, and my new cutie mark.

“Well...what’s my future hold?” I asked politely.

He disbanded the weapon, picking the book up and opening it. “Let’s see here… Change. Your life will be changed greatly soon. Yours and your friends. With this change, great challenges, trials, rivals, yet also friendships, adventure, wealth, power, and love. You will earn a place among this world's greatest.”

“Wow.” I blinked in surprise. “I...didn’t think that would happen…”

“It will take time, as all things will, but the changes coming soon will start the ball rolling.”

“Well...do you know why I got Loop?” I asked. “Considering your...well, time walkers and all.”

“I do. I’m not allowed to say.” He shrugged.

“Really?” I asked curiously.

“All in time. Anything else you want information on?”

“Hmm…” I started. “When am I going to...get a girlfriend?” I asked nervously.

He looked through the book. “The first will be found, the second will find you, the third will save you, and the last will admit what they have been hiding to you, when you have hit your lowest.”

My lowest… wait, four?!

“Wait, I’m gonna have four girlfriends?” I asked in surprise.

“Wives. And that’s only in the first fifty years or so.” He said. “The full number is…” He looked up at me, then back at the book. “Yeah I can’t pronounce that number.”

“What?” I asked in shock. “Herds are okay here?”

“Herds, harems, same thing, all legal, a lot of people who adventure like you get many. It’s part of life.”

“Really?” I asked. “Cause...getting a lot of wives isn’t entirely normal for me…”

“It will, trust me. I have three hundred back home.” Holy! “And fifty husbands.” Woah… “The trick is an ability that you’ll get later on.”

“Indestructible hips?” I joked.

“Okay two abilities you’ll get later.”

I couldn’t help but chuckled. “Okay, so what’s that one ability? From personal experience at this point?”

“You’ll get it when you really start to need it. So, anything else?”

“Um…” I started. “Is there any way back home?” I asked carefully.

"I can not confirm, nor deny that."


“Why?” I asked. “What’s stopping you from at least giving that answer?”

"An oath." He stated simply. "You, like everyone else in creation will just have to wait and see what happens."

“And when will we see what happens?” I asked. “But...can you ask how long being here is compared to back home?”

"That is unknown. Whether Time here and there moves at the same pace or slower, faster, we can't say. We just don't know. As for when, well, there will be announcements when they are ready."

“Well…” I sighed out. “Alright. I still barely understand this but...at least we’ll know when it happens ahead of time.”

"As with every major change to our reality. So, any more questions?"

“Um…” I hummed, trying to think of anything else to ask the Time Walker.

I began thinking about some things to ask, bit he can only give me vague answers. Eventually I said thank you and left, wandering around to find something new to do.

As I was looking for a snack cart I ran back into Cheat Code, who was covered in lipstick smooch marks and waving off a group of females. "I'll definitely be seeing you ladies again later~" He purred to them before turning over to me. "Hey bro."

“I see you had...fun.” I started.

"Yup. First time getting laid and it was an Orgy." He stated proudly. "Oh gods it was amazing. So, how about you? Time Walker does their usual vague answer stuff?"

“A bit yeah, but he said I would need an ability to deal with all the...unknown amount of spouses, that isn’t indestructible hips.” I said honestly. “That was the least vague.”

"Oh so my little brother is gonna lose that V-card! That's good news."

Little brother? I'm ninety percent sure I'm older than, no, a hundred percent I am older than him.

“I’m the older brother here my guy.” I told him simply.

"Yeah, keep telling yourself that." He said, patting my head. "Well, I'm gonna go find more people to rutt with. You go check out the games and at least get kissed." And with that, he was gone.

I huffed, shaking my head and found myself at a milkshake bar and sat down, enjoying one.

“It’s gonna be so fun dealing with that asshole all day everyday…” I grumbled as I took a drink from my really good milkshake.

I sighed again, mostly just looking at my milkshake. I heard someone take a seat next to me. I looked over and nearly fell off my chair. Victor?! "Sup?" He asked, giving me a smile and two finger wave.

“Wh-what are you doing here!?” I asked quickly, trying not to panic but...kind of failing right now.

"Relax." He said, laughing at my panic. "I'm off duty. Besides, The Sleeping realm is neutral territory. Only assholes cause trouble here." He said, ordering his own milkshake that arrived quickly. 

“And you’re not an asshole how?” I asked carefully. “Even if we can’t die...you nearly killed Echo.”

“Cause my work with the guild is just that, work.” He said, tapping his Assistant. After a bit, his bandage armor was off. His dirty tan skin with jet black mane, er, hair were now visible as he wore only a blue shirt with jeans. “That’s how it is.”

“Really?” I asked. “That whole thing...it was just a job?”

"Well, I'll admit I did get carried away. That Pegasus guy was the first in a long time I've had good fight against. At least in the past three hundred years. Part of why people join the villains guilds is to find those sparks, that reason why you picked up a weapon and went into the hazards zones. Yeah there are some people who genuinely just like being evil but at the end of the day so long as they play the rules of the villains guilds it's fine."

“And what about those that don’t play by the rules?” I asked carefully.

He sighed, taking a sip from his milkshake. "Chaos Guilds. Unlicensed and they have no real rules. In the licensed villains guilds, there are some basic rules that are in place from day one of their founding. No killing children twelve and under, no killing pregnant women and newborns, and no torturing anybody unless it's a requirement for planned events and battles against the hero guilds. Chaos Guilds kill for fun and will even knock someone out to reset their respawn so once they come back they can kill them again. They also run slaving and cannibalism trades. The worst we do is wreck a city or try and take stuff from adventures like yourself. That helmet I was trying to take from you, that was the job for my time there. I had a list of items that would spawn in there and whoever got them I had to steal it from them."

“And what’s stopping Mother from just...stopping all that? Or the Time Walkers? Or anyone with any form of decency?” I asked, thinking of how big this world is, thinking that there were still pure evil that did whatever it wanted. It was weird.

"It's more complicated than that." He sighed, taking another long sip from his milkshake. "The Mother and the Family built this reality on the belief of freedom. Anyone can become whatever they wish so long as it doesn't threaten the whole of creation. The hero guilds often fight against the villains guilds, but we both work together to help deal with chaos Guilds when they pop up. The Family and the mother only step in if the guilds can't handle the issue."

“And...when was the last time one of them had to step in?” I asked worriedly.

"The Morgan Incident." He sighed. "It was the early days of reality, and chaos Guilds were way more common. A chaos guild of serial killers and cannibals, they found a way to perma kill people by melting down a Void Admin, alive, into a weapon. Time Walkers, Void Admins, and level five dungeon bosses are the only ones who can perma kill in reality. To melt one of them down into a weapon bypasses that fact since one of those, as a weapon, still counts as that being making the kill despite who is holding it."

“Sweet lord…” I muttered in fear.

"The act itself was made impossible to repeat by the mothers word, the recipe for the weapon was erased from reality, and the void admin who became that weapon, didn't survive long after getting turned back to normal. The trauma started early Madness. After that hero and villains guilds worked together to put and end to the chaos Guilds. These days only a few actually keep their names out there and have any actual numbers. Most of them are just a group of a few people who want to cause trouble."

“Good to know.” I nodded. “Well...at least we’ll know this won’t happen again.”

"Yeah. So, now that you know that, any more questions?"

“Has there...ever been a time where people can go home?” I asked. “The Time Walker was vague about ‘when or where’, only that we’ll get an announcement...has it happened before?”

"No. I did know a few people who met people from.their reality before. Sometimes friends, family, but it's not that common."

“Damn…” I muttered. “Have you...met anyone old enough that still wants to go home?”

"Lots." He said with a laugh and a sigh. "Every isekai like yourself wants answers about their home, if their family is even still alive. The closest you can get to any is knowing if anyone from your world ended up here. Sometimes they are from your worlds future, past or the same time era as you."

“That’s...really interesting.” I said honestly.

"I don't know what goes on in the Time Walkers or The Family, but once someone cracks that open, they'll let us know."

“I’m a little surprised no one has considered...well you said you lived for more than 300 years, and I’ve been told here and there people don’t ‘die’ so…” I trailed off, realizing I was going into a tangent about other things.

"Heh, there's people way older than me, and not even they know."

“Damn.” I said in surprise.

"So, how was that helmet anyway? Looks like it was a very good item."

“It is, but the person I’m with is...well kind of an ass.” I sighed out. “But I suppose that’s to be expected from a berserker symbiote.”

"Heh, yeah. Their personalities are actually randomly generated so, guess you just got unlucky. So, tell me about yourself. I don't believe I got your name?"

“Button Mash.” I nodded. “I’m...still new here…”

"Button, nice to meet you. So, tell me about yourself? What was your life like back in your home world?"

“Well...I was a gamer.” I said honestly. “Even if…” I stopped myself bitterly, looking down sadly as thoughts of home came back.

"I take it there was a reason you were a gamer and they weren't happy ones?"

“When your dad apparently ditched your mom after he figured out she was pregnant and her being really busy all the time...you had to do something to fill in the void.” I said sadly. “Then when she had time to...well help me, I just brushed her off…” I started to tear up. “And now I’m probably never going to see her again...never be the son she deserved…”

He said nothing, taking a sip of his milkshake again and looking thoughtful. "Parenting isn't easy. You give all you can to your kids and most of the time they don't acknowledge it. They're blind to it. It hurts, sometimes, but when you're a parent you go into it blind and not knowing what's wrong and right. In the end, no one ever knows if what they do is enough of even good. So long as your kid grows up and is healthy, happy, you did good enough. There's no perfect parents, and there aren't perfect children either. In the end, so long as both love and care for each other, it's all worth it."

“Well...I’m never gonna know that now that I’m stuck here forever…” I said bitterly.

"Do you love your mother Button?"

“Of course I do!” I told him swiftly.

"And did she love you? Take care of you?"

“She did, she cared about me more than the world.”

"Then despite your brush offs, it was worth it to her, and I bet she is proud of you. And knowing how you're doing now, even moreso." 

“Really?” I asked, hoping what he was saying was the truth, that mom would be proud of me after everything I’ve put her through.

"I talk from experience. My kids, I love them but you think I'm an asshole on the clock, they're jerks 24/7. Lawyers, and despite their flaws I still love them and I'm proud of them. They know it, and they are happy to know it. Every so often we meet up, take a trip or something for a while to catch up. And while they can be assholes it's usually sarcastic or unintentional. In the end we still care about each other and treasure the time we spend together."

“Well...that’s good.” I nodded. “I’m...glad to hear all of this.”

"Heh. Yeah, but it won't feel good until it's from your mom huh?"

“Yeah…” I nodded. “I...just wish there was some way to reach home...even if it’s just a letter.”

"We'll just have to wait and see. So, did your mom ever talk about your dad? Was it kindly or spiteful?"

“Well...his name was Pro Go and she talked about him in a kindly way, always saying great things about him, even how excited he was about mom being pregnant with me...then just one day he up and vanished.” I explained. “Nobody’s found him since, no body, no letter, not even a magical signature…”

"Pro Go… where have…" He said, taking out his Assistant and skimming through a list of people. "Hmm… say Button, mind doing me a favor and tapping into your Assistants Genealogy app? It will tell you who your ancestors were from the dawn of your species."

“Uh, sure.” I said while bringing up my assistant and going to the specific app.

After finding it and opening it it showed my picture, and above that was my mom, Cream Heart, and my dad to the left, Pro Go. Victor tapped on his image and it brought up a box with numbers. He then looked back over at his Assistant. "Well I'll be damned, it is the same person!"

“Wait what?” I asked nervously. “You know my dad?”

"Looks like." Victor said. "Pro Go, works with the Miners Guild on Dechamore, in a new town called Valley Basin. Last time I saw him he sold me the ore I used to make that axe I used against you guys. That was about sixty years ago. Should probably see if he has anymore if that ore…"

Sixty years ago? I'm only fourteen? So he arrived here before I was born and has been here longer than me? Longer than I have even been alive?

“Well...I suppose that kind of means...time is six times faster here?” I suggested. “Cause I’m fourteen and he’s been here for sixty or so years.”

"Oh no, two thousand." What?! "But trust me, don't try and make a time table to figure out how long it's been exactly. People have tried and failed. But wow, your dad's here in this reality and Alive and well. I know where his shop is so once we wake up I can call the caretakers Guild and help you out with that."

“Please.” I said quickly.

"We'll have to wake up first." Victor said with a laugh. "So, this calls for a celebration. I know a ski resort that the mountains are made out of ice cream. Wanna crash into some of the place?"

“Yes please.” I said happily.

And so we went. Upon our arrival we were atop what looked like a giant ice cream Sundae and as far as the eye can see was ice cream of every flavor. I got a spoon shovel and proceeded to eat possibly my body weight in ice cream. No brain freeze was awesome. Victor is an okay guy. I'm amazed he worked for a villains Guild but just goes to show not everything is as it seems.

When I finally woke up the next day it was a loud belch. Eating food in the realm of dreams is the same as eating it when you are awake, and I was full of Mint, Strawberry, chocolate, vanilla, sherbet and cookie dough ice creams. My stomach felt like it was gonna explode and then after a while it went away. Huh?

"Sweet Mother how much did you eat?" I turned to see Cheat Code standing next to my bed.

“Exactly.” I told him with a smile.

"Yeesh, and I thought I ate a lot last night." I don't know in which term of phrase he means that and I am scared to ask. "So, you look peppy. Finally get laid?"

“No, I’m gonna see my dad!” I said happily.

"Wait, what?" I explained to him about my run in with Victor and how we found out my dad was in this reality and he knew him. "Woah. That's a rare thing to happen. Cutie mark, legendary ability and now you get to finally meet your long lost dad. Someone In the family must like you."

“Thank Mother for it.” I said happily.

I almost skipped into the living room to tell Tiara. She was amazed at it. Surprised about Victor but happy all the same. "So do you know anything about him?" Tiara asked as we ate at our food.

“Besides his name and what little mom told me about him and what Victor had to offer...not much.” I said honestly. “I’m...really excited to see my dad.”

Some times passed and the time we'd normally be teleported to class, Tiara and I were still here. It wasn't till Noon that Echo Dash and Victor walked in. "Button, we have some news. News I know you know already, but there is something… else apparently." Echo stated.

“I just wanted to meet my dad today, what’s going on?” I asked worriedly.

“Well, as it turns out I know your dad.” Echo said, Victor nearly let out a laugh. “And, well…” He sighed, looking back at the doorway. “Pro Go, you can come in.”

Entering the room was a pony, my same mane color and a shade darker coat color. Their cutie mark was a pickaxe over an anvil. They were a mare. “Button? Is that… actually you?” They asked, walking up to me.

Umm… excuse me what?

“I...was told you’re my...hold up what?” I asked. “Aren’t...aren’t you supposed to be a guy?”

“Heh, well that’s the awkward part…” Echo said, a shade of blush on their cheeks. 

“I swap my gender every century or so to keep life interesting.” She said, looking me over. “Oh my word, you make Cream Heart’s eyes!” She then hugged me.

“Pro Go… is my girlfriend…” Echo said, and Victor began laughing.

Even Tiara was chuckling.

“What would mom think?” I huffed, the fact that Echo and my dad were dating not fully connected as I was still trying to connect the ‘my dad’s now my mom’ bit.

“Knowing that mare she’d have been into it.” Dad said… and now my brain is broken… oh and now Cheat Code is laughing at me too.

After I had time to… process this information and everyone stopped laughing at my situation, dad, mom… eh I’ll just keep calling them dad, started talking about how they arrived here. “It was about a week after your mother told me she was pregnant.” They started, taking a long breath. “I was really excited to be a father, and she even more so to be a mother. I mean, it’s basically her special talent to take care of foals. I was down in the gem mines under Ponyville when I fell in a cavern and… I hit my head… then woke up in one of those churches on Homeworld. I spent the first five hundred years here looking for anything to get back home but… I didn’t know how time passed there and here.

“I had thought you and your mother had already lived your lives. After a while I began working with the Blacksmiths guild and after a while began… getting back out there. A hundred and forty years ago I shifted genders to see why your mom liked… certain things. I know why now, and ten years ago I met Echo Dash and, well… Here we are.”

“I’m only fourteen dad.” I said honestly “But…” I wanted to say something, but just shook my head and hugged my dad. “I’m...just glad your here.”

“I wandered so much for so long.” They hugged me back. “If you were a colt of a filly, if you looked like your mom or me. But… this means you are still alive, your mom… with hope, we can see her again.” Dad said, giving me another hug.

Echo nodded. “Yes, and now comes the next part. Button, as the Caretakers Gild only cares for parentless Isekai children, you’ll be placed into your fathers care…”

“But, Button and I are a team! What about me?” Tiara asked, worried.

“That’s where I come in.” Victor said. “I’ll be adopting you.”

“Huh?” Tiara and I said in unison.

“Not many people know this, but Isekai children are classified as Orphans, and therefore can be adopted by an adult who meets the proper requirements. Victor applied and by tomorrow you will be his daughter Tiara.” Echo said.

“And I just got a place in Pro Go’s home town, Valley Basin.” Victor said. “You kids will be neighbors.”

“Really?” I asked in surprise.

“Yup!” Dad said, giving me another hug. “We spent all morning talking about it, and it gives us all a chance to be a family. And with luck, maybe your mom will appear here, or a means back will show up and we can form that herd she always wanted.” Wait what?

“Excuse me, mom wanted a what?” I asked in shock.

“Oh there are things that mare wanted that honestly scared me. It’s why I loved her.” Dad said, sighing happily. “If I wasn’t dumped here you’d have had four mothers and three dads.”

“Oh she so belongs in this reality.” Victor said with a chuckle.

“From what I’ve learned from Time Walkers on how many wives I’ll have...I can agree if that’s what mom wanted.” I said nervously.

“Awh, she’d be so proud to hear that.” Dad said happily.

“So today is our last day here?” Tiara asked.

“Yup.” Victor said. “And once we move I can help you both get better at adventuring full time while Echo and Pro Go work.”

“Wouldn’t it be weird considering the guild you're in?” I asked Victor curiously.

“Nah, lots of my co-workers have kids or family in the hero guilds. That guy I was with you spiked to death, his wife is in the heroes guild that directly rivals our raider guild. Heh, caught those two sneaking off in a war once. Didn’t see either of them til after it was over. In the end, it’s all jobs, almost like acting but with actual violence and death. We respawn and do it again when told. It’s better than letting chaos guilds and other threats pop up.”

“That is massively true.” I nodded.

Dad gave me a look. “I gave him the rundown on why there are licenced villain guilds.” Victor said.

“Well, let’s get packing then.” Tiara said, flying up and over to her room.

“I don’t have much to pack so I’ll be back soon.” I nodded, heading off to my room to get what little I actually had.

Once inside I began putting my few possessions into my Assistant storage, handy. “So your pops is a chick, dating your Caretaker's Guild Guardian, and your best friend here is getting adopted and you two will be neighbors. Damn, that when that Time Walker said soon, he meant it.”

“Certainly was soon for one thing that’s for sure.” I agreed. “I’m just...glad to have dad here.”

“Wonder how your two are gonna make up for lost time? Does it count as father son bonding or mother son bonding.”

“Parent child bonding at this point, and I’m just glad it’s happening.” I shrugged.

“Eh. Still, who’d have guessed your mom was into some kinky stuff.”

“I’d rather not think of what my mom got into in bed alright?” I blushed brightly.

“I wonder what will pop up for her reflections if I google her name?” AGH! I do not need or want that image or thought! “Holy shit there’s a lot of incest.”


In the main hall


“Do you hear screaming?” Echo asked Pro.

“Oh Button must have googled his mom.” They shrugged off. “He’ll be fine.”


Back in Button’s Room


“Okay...okay...I think I’m good…” I panted heavily from my screams of anguish.

“Oh, call one to screw nearby. Now if only I had control of your body.” Cheat sighed.

Fuuuuuuck.... Why… Why is he like this… Random personality generation sucks!

“Why are you like this!?” I whined.

“Random personality generation!” He declared with pride. “It’s better than getting stuck with a pervert, ya know, one who wants you anyway. Can you imagine them showing you, well, yourself in ways you don’t wanna see? Yeah trust me, I’m already better than most people’s symbiotes. Your multidimentional incest with your mom aside, what are the odds at this rate she shows up here? Cause honestly the fact you and your dad are here is already falling into the impossible category.”

“Well...I was told the impossible is possible here, unless it’s literally revoked from existence.” I said honestly.

“Fair point. Fair point, so that means it’s not impossible you’ll at some point bang your own dad someday.”

My screams could be heard all around Homeworld.


The next day finally came and Dad and I were getting off his ship, my dad drove a flying train, cool! Valley Basin was… woah. The whole city was built into the sides of a massive ravine that went down so far deep it was pitch black, and from what dad told me, that darkness kept going down for a long, long, long… long way down. The town, being built on both sides of the ravine, had long bridges holding buildings for housing, shops or just travel leading from side to side of the ravine.

Dad lived on the mid section of the left ravine wall, direct access to the pathway to the mines where they worked and back up to where most people parked their vehicles. Dad’s place was nice, like many buildings on the wall wise was built in the wall, but the inside was still larger on the inside than the out. My room was about the size as it was back in the Caretakers Guild, but with blue wallpaper and lots of rocks in a pile.

“This is a pretty good place you got here dad.” I said honestly.

“It’s cheap, housing in pre-built places is actually pretty cheap. They only get pricey if you wanna build your own. So, those rocks in the corner there are for you. They are Geodes. They hold anything from gems to ores. Break them open and whatever you get we’ll make some weapons together for you.”

”Sweet.” I nodded, walking over and trying to break open one of the Geodes. “Give me something good.” I said while stomping down on one of the geodes.

I got a small, black slip of rock. “Flint. Not the best, but can be useful.” Dad said, picking it up. “A little flint at the end of your sword or hoof armor can be perfect for any needed campfires.”

I huffed. “Can’t really use that much of it though…”

“Still useful.” They shrugged. I opened another one. This one dropped a glowing blue chrome ingot. Wow, a premade ingot too! “Mana Iron. Nice.”

“Mana Iron?” I inquired.

“Iron ore imbued with natural mana. It’s good for enchanting weapons, armor and things like that. Jewelry too. All ores have a Mana infused counterpart.”

“That makes sense.” I said honestly. “Considering how magic is...even more prevalent to everything than back home.”

“Heh, tell me about it.” I cracked open another one. This one dropped a silver ore that seemed to be… shaking? “Woah, take a step back son.” Dad said, pulling me back. “That’s Vibranium. Perfect for armor and weapons, but scary if you don’t know how to handle it.”

“Why is it dangerous? And why is it vibrating?” I asked curiously. “Also I don’t remember Captain America’s shield vibrating like that.” I said, remembering a comic from back home.

“Vibranium is a metal that can absorb and disperse vibrational energy at the molecular level. In it’s raw ore like that, it’s pretty unstable in how it absorbs and disperses the energy it collects.”

“I didn’t know that.” I said in surprise.

Dad nodded, pulling a tool out of their Assistant and carefully putting the vibranium in a special holding tube. Once that was done I opened another one. It was yellow. "Gold." They stated with a smile.

“Well...that can sell for quite a bit if gold is still worth something.” I said honestly. “Probably not as much as Equestria with how rare it normally is.”

"It's worth a bit, but it's best for making electronics." I opened another one. This one dropped a purple slime ball that kept a ball shape. "Purple Slime."

“Yep, it’s both slime and purple.” I nodded in agreement at how...on the nose the name was.

"It's good for alchemy in anti poison potions or poison and acid resistant armor."

“That is really nifty.” I nodded. “Uh...question, since I have Symbiote Armor...do I need to eat things to get bonuses or something else?”

"I don't actually know. Check your and their skill trees."

"Yes, please, let's see just what I got." Cheat said, appearing next to me.

"Let's check." I nodded while pulling out my assistant and checking my skill trees.

Opening it up I didn't see all that much aside from Loop.  Cheat had one so far. Living Armor. Name says it all really. Oh wait, there's also Needle Peirce. That's the one that makes spikes that stab people around me. Hm… and still no Skill Points.

"That's weird." I frowned. "Why don't I have any skill points? I thought at beating Vincent and that other guy would have at least given me a few." I said honestly.

"Getting skill point is… a pain." Dad said, sighing as she… yeah I'll ask later, sighed and sat down. "Skill points are a pain in the ass to get, but working on Guild Quests or doing work related to a guild you are a part of rewards you more skill points combat alone can't. For example, for every fifty pounds of ore I mine out of the ground, I get rewarded a skill point by the guild, and some other rewards and or money depending on what I mine up."

"But I fought two very powerful enemies, even if one was injured, I should have at least gotten one when you think about it." I said honestly.

"You'd think, but no… it doesn't matter how powerful the person is when unaffiliated with a guild, only the kill count. With a guild through, you'd have been rewarded."

"That sucks." I frowned.

"Heh, we'll sign you and your team up tomorrow with the adventures guild. With luck you'll get something for beating Victor and his friend."

“Alright.” I nodded.

I opened up another geode. It was a rock with a flower in it. "Fossil." Dad said.

“What kind of fossil?” I asked curiously. “Cause...well given this world is still new to me, there might be new kinds of fossils.”

"Well, could just be a daisy, or some magic flower, or something neat. You'll have to revive it at a later date."

Dad and I spent a lot of the afternoon opening the geodes and writing what they are down. Out of all that was there, a good forty percent of them were ores good for weapons or armor. With that done dad got to work on dinner and I went to go check out Tiara's new home.

Victor's place was a block away, built into the wall also and unlike dad's it did look like a house. “Hey button.” I looked up, seeing Tiara poking her head out from the upstairs right window. “This is amazing!”

“Yeah, it certainly is.” I said happily. “So how’s life with Victor going?”

“His place is cool! He has a hall of taxidermy monsters he buys from this guy in another city. And an indoor swimming pool!”

“That’s pretty cool.” I nodded. “So far me and dad have done some geode breaking, I haven’t really seen most of his house yet but it was fun.”

“This city is really cool.” Tiara flew out her window and down next to me. “I already emailed Mei and Ali, so they will be bringing the ship around here soon so we can plan out what to do next.”

“That’s good.” I nodded. “So I learned that skill points are not earned through common sense, and dad and I are going to find out which guild I should join soon.”

“Oh yeah, Adventurers is the best for earning them by clearing dungeon floors. Plus other fun rewards, and the custom quests options.” She said with a nod. “So, wanna explore the town, see what’s fun and what’s not?”

“Sure.” I said with a smile. “Let’s do some adventuring.”

The first place of note Tiara and I saw was the local Church of the Mother, then the Charcoal Bar, Mega Mega Mart, community center, which counted as the public library, pool and gym all in one. Lastly was an indoor mall where I found a magical place called, Game Stop. Tiara had to drag me out of there kicking and screaming.

Lastly was an indoor carnival, where games of all kinds were available like in the dream realm. Huh, what the? My Little Pony, complete Generation four DVD set. Seasons 1-9 and movies with shorts! Ah, Tiara did say some realities saw our home worlds as TV shows, books or video games.

"This is amazing." I said in amazement.

"Oh, look, prize maze." Tiara said, eating a corn on the cob as she pointed to said maze. It, from this angle, was all walls and such. "You wander around aimlessly and it drops things like snacks and other stuff people donate to it."

“Really? That’s...really cool.” I said honestly.

"Come on! Let's see what we find." She said, rapidly finishing her corn as we headed off.

As we entered there was a sign above us.


 Attention!

This Loot Maze is themed, Apocalyptic, and a fee of 500 rem is required to enter. Loot is between levels one and three tier and are randomly scattered across a pre-generated environment. Each individual is placed in their own environment and given three minutes to find and gather any and all loot they find.

Please enjoy.


"Huh, must have good stuff if they charge that much for an entry fee." Tiara said.

“It also sounds like we might have to fight something if it’s themed after an Apocalypse.”

"Or avoid it. Well, see you in three minutes." She said, walking up to the entrance and vanishing in a flash.

I did the same, walking into the maze. I Paid the fee from my hud, and in a blink I was in a really worn down, dusty and mold infested building. It looked like a mall, not the one we were in, more… pony themed. Old images of an all brown mare enjoying a bottle of soda, some decayed clothings were at my hooves, too destroyed to be of use.

“Jeez, they weren’t kidding when they said ‘apocalyptic’.” I said while rushing around to find stuff in here.

I was definitely in a mall, must be some pre generated structure for ponies. The Wonders of this world are always amazing. My first found object was a small gun, built to be held In a ponies teeth. It had two bullets. Best give guns to Tiara.

The timer in my hud read 2:42. Gotta hurry. 

I rushed myself to the back storage area. Typically these have all the good stuff. I found food, ammo, what, given the box I found them in, I assume is medicine, lots of soda and some bones. Pony bones. That gave me the creeps. They taught us all these things are decorative but still, creepy.

I was down to a minute and rushed to a large locked door. Hmm… okay, okay… angry thoughts… I thought back to Tiara getting hurt, That… day with Spike and Sweetie Bell… I opened my eyes, finding my armor over me as I quickly dashed in and broke open the door.

“Okay...that certainly got it…” I muttered to myself as I continued my hunt for more stuff.

Once inside this place I was met by… legs. Legs with wires sticking out. A torso, also with wires poking out..  what the? I spotted a desk in the back, atop it was a… body. A headless body. I got closer and noticed it was also sticking out wires and such. A robot? Where is… I looked in a few boxes next to the table and spotted it… a head. A robot pony head. It was in better shape than the body or parts around. The head was all white, but the mane was really dirty, I couldn't tell the colors.

I placed the head on the neck of the body and to my surprise the wires instantly linked together. The eyes of the robot opened, flashing me with bright yellow lights. Slowly it raised its head up, looking at me. It's mouth opened but all that came out was a low pitched static.

“Uh...hi?” I waved my hoof at the creepy robot. “We’re gonna need to fix your voice when we get back.”

They nodded, feeling a hoof along their neck. They pointed at me, then at themselves.

“I’m...not entirely sure what you mean…” I said while gently putting a hoof on them. “I’ll get you fixed when we get back.”

The managed to get themselves off the table. Their back right leg wasn't moving properly. They looked around. Grabbed something from under the table. It looked like a mechanical...horn? They placed it on their head, and after a bit it lit up with magic. They smiled, and now they used said magic to lift up a book. 

The cover was really bad. Torn or dirty, only the yellow bold words saying User Manual were visible. They tapped the word User, then pointed at me, then back at themselves.

“Oh uh...well...let’s hope the entire book isn’t as bad as the cover is.” I said nervously as I flipped it open to see if it was legible.

Not all of it was. Infact only one area seemed readable, but it was some technical stuff that went way over my head. Suddenly, the both of us were back in the front entrance of the maze. Damn, time ran out. 

"Hey- Woah! You got a robot pony?!" Tiara said, flying around the two of us. "So cool!"

“Really is, only problem is that...well I have no idea how to fix them.” I said nervously.

They shook their head.

"Maybe your dad or Victor knows. Come on, let's go." Tiara said, leading the way.

Once at her and Victor's place, the raider was examining the robot over. "Wow, she's old. Like, way old." He said.

"She? How can you tell?" Tiara asked.

"Her figure for one. Stallion models of her breed of bots are larger."

“Well...alrighty then.” I nodded nervously. “So uh...how do we fix her?”

"Well, two ways. Find a Synth hospital or a Nanite Injector."

"That's the syringe of microbots that can alter a synthetic beings body to be basically identical to an organic one." Tiara stated to me. "You have one?"

"Kid I have a little of everything." He stated, pulling said injector from his assistant.

“Well...comes with the territory when you're over a hundred years old.” I shrugged.

"Four thousand." He informed me. He then put the injector on the robots neck, soon lines of blue trailed along her body. After a bit, a messy, kinda dirty two toned mane of light pink and a creamy purple shot out of her head, and the same for her tail. She then began coughing a lot, spit and dirt getting spat out. 

"Sweet Luna that's bad…" She groaned. Huh, her voice sounds kinda familiar? It was a soothing kind of voice, one that sounded vocally capable of reaching all kinds of notes while in song. "Ugh, dirt tastes terrible."

“You...sound familiar…” I started. “Who are you?”

"One moment Master." She said- Wait Master?! She gave one final spat of dirt covered saliva to the floor. "Eeew… So, name. I am S.B MK7, Model 42." She informed.

“What...what does...S.B. stand for?” I asked carefully.

"Sweetie Bot." She stated. "Personal all service android capable of everything from household taste, intense manual labor in a working environment and, of course, musical entertainment."

“S-s-sweetie!?” I took a step back, my eyes widening. “B-but...why would you be a robot?”

"Hm? Oh, well for that information I must explain about the company that made me." She stated. "Years ago on my world of creation Equestria went to war, and in this war many new branches of science and magic evolved. One such company, Buckbotics, made them for residential or business use. I was crafted in the image of the pop idol of the era, Sweetie Belle, going as far to have me perfectly emulate her voice, personality, and all the details of her body and body language. I was mass produced and sold to private buyers and public and private business. There were even a few combat models of myself produced."

“Huh...for...some reason I had this weird idea that Rarity wanted a little sister and just...built you.” I said sheepishly. “I know that sounds weird but...don’t know why it was my first thought.”

She shrugged. "I have been deactivated for… two hundred years or so. At least that's what my generated backstory states."

"Yes that's a thing." Victor said. 

"And upon my activation you set yourself as my new master." She finished, looking at me. "A pleasure Master Button Mash."

I...legit couldn’t believe what I was hearing right now. “So...I...now have a robot...of a mare I liked back home...that started dating my friend...am I getting this right?”

"Looks like." Tiara said, patting my back with one of her wings. "I have a feeling someone is messing with you, no idea who, but this is concerning."

“First...I got my dad...now I basically have a robo marefriend…” I took a deep breath. “Well...it could be either worse or weirder right?”

"And he jinxed it." Victor said, chuckeling. 

"Marefriend?" Tiara asked me. "Heh, fast aren't ya." She said, giggling as she elbowed me.

I blushed. “I-i-I didn’t mean it like that!?” I tried to backpedal in this conversation fast. “Uh...I didn’t mean...uh...she...gah!” I sat down and flung my hooves in the air, upset at my own screw up.


Back home Dad decided to see what Sweetie Bot could do. And the answer is about everything. Once she was cleaned up and looked… like the Sweetie Belle I always had a crush on. She could cook, clean, make weapons, armor, building repairs. Really is built to, well, do it all.

I walked over to my bed, yawning as this long, interesting day was now over.

“Sweet lord...today was just one thing after another…” I groaned as I flopped down onto my wonderfully soft bed.

As I was relaxing into sleep I got an odd feeling. Opening my eyes I was eye to eye with Sweetie Bot staring at me from the edge of my bed.

“Uh…” I looked at her. “Is...there anything you need?”

“Would you like me to complete any nightly activities for you Master Button Mash?” 

“Uh...what do you mean by ‘complete’?” I asked nervously.

“Is there anything you wish for me to work on while you sleep. Any tasks or should I go into standby mode til morning?”

“I...suppose standby mode right now.” I said. “There’s nothing you or me need to do.”

“Very Well. Setting up start up for six AM.” She said, eyes closing as she now stood there, completely unmoving. Right...

“Should get her a bed soon…” I muttered to myself. “Still...weird that Sweetie Belle had a robot made after her…”

“Well, a version of her had a robot made based on her.” Cheat said, jumping into view and looking Sweetie Bot over. “Huh, actually she might have been older than the mare you knew. You two were forteen, but she looks about… late twenties to mid thirties?” He said, circling her now.

“Well...she was made from a different universe, where Sweetie was a Pop Idol.” I said honestly.

“Yeah. Still, makes you wonder who else in that world got a robot counterpart.” He said, eyeing her- Hey! “Woah. Hey Button, ever wonder how she looks back here? Yes you have, and you can see it now.”

“Sweet lord Cheat, don’t…” I blushed brightly.

“Oh get off your high horse. I bet you anything if you asked her for it she’d do it.”

“And I’m trying not to cause that feels...wrong somehow.” I said nervously.

“Oh, but you want to?” He asked… crap!

“I can’t just take advantage of her though.” I told him bluntly. “And get away from her.”

“I’m not near her. I’m in your head, manipulating your visuals and auditory receptors to make it look like I’m next to her.”

“Fine.” I huffed. “But...I’m not going to just use her like that...she’s a sentient being like me…”

“Then at least go to a brothel… It’s paid sex so, the use is completly mutually understood.”

I rolled my eyes, turning around and going to sleep.

I woke up in the realm of dreams, heading off to a theater to watch a movie or two before morning.

“Wonder what movies are here?” I wondered, not really having the time to see what movies or games are around this place.

I got my tickets, snacks and all that as I took my seat and began enjoying the begging of this movie. Shrek.

It was funny, different from anything I’ve seen before. The next movie I was going to watch was Bicentennial Man. As I was taking my seat in the theatre, I jumped at hearing her voice. “Hello Master Button Mash.” Nearly falling out of my seat, I recovered, seeing Sweetie Bot in the seat next to me.

“Please don’t scare me like that.” I said nervously. “But howdy, how are you doing?”

“Confused. I went into standby mode, and then booted up here, in this theatre.”

“That’s...strange.” I said honestly. “But...I honestly don’t know how robotics works in this world, cause I still believe you’re a sentient being that’s beyond this ‘master’ programing stuff…”

“Well, my learning matrix integrated into my AI and personality Matrixes, allows me to grow and evolve mentally. Of course my primary programming of serving my designated Master takes priority over my mental growth as an artificial intelligence.” 

“Well…” I looked nervous here. “Is there anyway for you to...focus on your mental growth?” I asked carefully.

“Nope. It’s my secondary function, and if any attempts to alter that programming happen, I factory reset.”

“Oh…” I started. “I...didn’t know that.”

“It’s in my User Manual.” She stated, bringing out that old, nasty book. “Hm. Perhaps I should look for a readable copy.”

“That would be for the best.” I nodded.

“So, what now? I’m not sure what tasks I can complete for you here in this… wherever we are.”

“We’re in the dream world.” I said honestly. “And right now you don’t need to obey my orders, just have fun, do what you want to do.”

“Okay… What do you want me to do?”

“What do you want to do?” I asked bluntly. “This is the dream world, you’re dreaming, and you don’t have to follow programming...I think…” I started. “God I still don’t know anything about you or how robotics work…” I groaned.

“I want to do what you tell me to do.”

“Oh my god…” I grumbled. “Fine, then sit down in this seat and watch the movie with me.” I huffed.

“Okay.” She said with a nod, turning and watching the screen…

I sighed… She looks, sounds… just like her… acts absolutely nothing like her. This is gonna be a long… long… whatever this is.

When the movie was over She followed me through the streets. There has to be something that will get her acting… like a person.

“Come on, there has to be a booth around here somewhere…” I muttered, continuing to look around this massive carnival to find a robotics booth to help me figure this out.

Okay, okay, come one… Oh thank The Mother! 

I spotted a small tent filled with robotic limbs of all races set around. Entering I spotted a… Large, ten foot wolf humanoid being, torso longer than my body and arms as large as me. He sat hunched over a mechanical arm he… I think it’s a hewas working on.

“Hello?” I asked politely.

“Welcome to Moonlight Mechanics. Parts and programs for all Synthetic for the past four hundred thousand years.” They said, sounding like a male as they looked up at me. They then looked confused. “You’re not a synthetic.”

“No, but I need help because of her.” I said while motioning a hoof to Sweetie. “Her User Manual is complete garbage because of the prize maze I got her from, and I need help figuring out...well a lot of things.”

He looked over at Sweetie Bot, then laughed. “Well I’ll be damned. I haven’t seen a Sweetie Bot MK 7 in two thousand years.” He got up… his full height now reaching fifteen feet. He walked over to Sweetie Bot, kneeling down and looking her over. “Poor things, one of those bots stuck with highly restrictive programs and AI rules.”

“Well...is there anyway to help her?” I asked nervously. “Cause...I don’t know how to handle her being...like this.”

“Well I can remove those restrictions, but I’d have to erase her entire AI as it is. I should be able to save her personality, memories, but with how her models were built there’s a high risk her factory reset kicks in, and that will erase everything of hers.”

“Couldn’t those nanites that brought her back to normal be used to take away those restrictions without the factory reset going off?” I asked curiously.

“You’d have to find her original manufacturers factory, and admin codes to do it safely, but those were all long missing even before the merge of the realms for two hundred years. Odds are if they still exist it’s as a drop in some dungeon but I don’t know really.”

“Crap…” I sighed out. “Why can’t things be simple…”

“I can install some extra modules to give her a wider range of personality, self aware thoughts and independent interests, but she will still follow her programing.”

“Well...it’s better that she has more room to think for herself than waiting for me all the time.” I said honestly.

“That’s always better. Alright then little mechanical lady, you ready?”

She looked over at me. I rolled my eyes, nodding as she smiled and… well that's creepy, her head opens up like a thousand pieces of connected tiles. The wolf person grabbed a few things from his desk and then began working on her. It was a total of fifteen minutes before it was over and she closed her head back up. She stood still for several moments, eyes rotating, literally. 

“She’ll just complete a quick restart and the modules will kick in. I also copied her AI and OS programs so I can work on reverse engineering it. Last time I worked on a Sweetie Bot MK 7 the girls Master had me make her anthro.”

“Interesting.” I nodded. “Well thank you mister...uh, how much would this cost?” I asked nervously.

“Greg.” They said. “Given the… rarity of her kind these days, I’ll just charge you two hundred for this and fifty for anything I manage to make from what I learn about her software.”

“Alright.” I nodded while giving the good wolf his fair. “Thank you, and the names Button Mash.”

“A pleasure. Here.” Greg said, kneeling down and tapping his Assistant to mine.


New Contact Registered: Greg Postar


“If I manage to make anything I’ll let you know. And if you ever find parts for her again, bring them by, might be able to make her a sister.”

“Alright.” I nodded. “I’ll keep a lookout for any info or materials.”

After a moment Sweetie Bot blinked, looking around. “Oh wow, I have independent thinking capabilities. Hm… And a wider range of emotional processing… And now I realized that the movie I saw twice was funny. Heh.”

Already an improvement.

“This is already a massive improvement.” I said with a warm smile.

"I'll be seeing you Button Mash." Greg said with a nod.

With that Sweetie Bot and I wandered around some more. I noticed now she was much more aware of everything around her. As if she was actually seeing things for once.

“So how do you like feeling stuff right now?” I asked curiously.

"It's all new. It's one thing to analyze and process something as beautiful or interesting. It's another to feel it." She said, looking around and eventually just kept looking up at the starry night sky.

“The sky is beautiful.” I said honestly. “But...what do you think of me right now?”

"Hm?" She said, looking at me. "Well… you are my Master… you got me back online and for that I am thankful."

“Well...it’s more than just ‘you’re my master’ and having nothing after that I suppose.” I shrugged.

"You have an interesting life, a father turned mare, a friend who seems loyal and honest with you and seems to really enjoy when you two are doing any activity, and a pervert symbiote. A mechanic and builder who wants an individual Identity, a navigator who mostly just wants to explore what isn't explored."

“And now I have a wonderful robo friend.” I said with a smile, not even bothering to question how she knew about Cheat here.

"You also, based on prior words you've spoken, you have a crush on an organic alternate version of myself, but based on your bio chemical readings when it is mentioned I take it there was a bad event that happened?"

“A...friend of mine, I thought was my wing man...I don’t think he wanted to stab me in the back, but...well what can you do?” I sighed out bitterly.

"According to my data bases, there are healthy and unhealthy habits for getting over a crush and a backstabbing friend ranging from payback to a rebound. With Tiara you got the friend part down so maybe you should try and find a date to get over the girl."

“Well…” I started nervously. “Just...you being here...I…” I wasn’t really sure what to say here.

"I have various courtship rituals in my databanks as well as a beta Wing mare program. If I can link to a network in this place I can see popular locations for people of your age range."

“Well...I can always choose you.” I said honestly.

"Hm? Well, I am equipped with the proper equipment for romantic intercourse and my baseline romance program can adapt with my learning programs aid. Do you have any requests on how to… proceed?"

“W-well…” I blushed a bit. “I...I’m not entirely sure...I’ve never actually been on a date before…”

"Hm. Running romance database… setting up Romancing Protocols. Set up complete. Master…" She paused at saying that, looking like she was thinking something over. She gave a quick cough. "Button Mash, would you like to go out?"

“Of course I would.” I nodded with a smile.

"Perfect! Now then… let's go find a place to enjoy ourselves."

“Let’s.” I said happily, glad to finally go on a date.

We walked on over to a bakery where I got two jelly filled donuts and Sweetie Bot got the same. We took our seats and while I started eating I noticed she was just looking at the pastry.

“Something wrong?” I asked curiously.

"I just, I was built with taste buds to help aid in cooking and sexual fetishes," I nearly choked on my donut at that one. "But I've never actually needed to… eat. That injection gave me a functional stomach and digestive system, and while I can taste I never did before. My memory banks say I was purchased for auditory stimulation in the store you found me in."

“Well...right now you can try food for the first time.” I said honestly.

"Yes, and that's why I am hesitant. What if I do not enjoy it? Oh, never had that thought cross my mind before."

“Won’t know unless you try.” I said simply. “A whole world has opened up to you now.”

"Hmm…" She said, looking the pastry over. After a bit she lifted it up with her magic, sniffed it, and finally bit into it. She was still for a few seconds before she chewed and finally swallowed. "My word, is this what sweetness tastes like?"

“This is what a pastry tastes like, if you want to know what sweets are, then I’ll show you what sweets are.” I said with a smile, my young knowledge on junk food going to come in really handy right now.

"I think I would like to know more about tastes." She said with a smile.

After finishing the donuts we ordered some buttered toast with sugar and some tea. She loved the toast, and I showed her how tea tastes with different amounts of sugar and we ordered several other kinds of tea so she would taste them. After that was juices, to which she tried Orange, Apple, Grape, Mango, Pineapple, Strawberry, Blueberry, And lemonade. She enjoyed them all. 

I did wonder how she was packing all that away, and was worried she'd overeat, but at the same time I didn't want to keep her from her newfound joy. In my confliction Sweetie Bot ate an Apple, Pecan, Blueberry, Peach and Pumpkin pie and finished it all off with cobbler.

“So...question, can you overeat as a robot?” I asked nervously. “Or am I just concerned over nothing by either that or because we’re in a dream realm?”

"Hmm… My original body came equipped with an organic matter converter, converting any food I might eat or… other organic byproducts Into power, along with several backup power talismans to hold it all. My scans tell me that injection took what I had and added to it or evolved it so I should probably just have one of those backups full on power and the other maybe a quarter of the way full. Let me run a check and… Primary talisman at 100. Secondary at 100. Back up 1 at 100. Back up 2 at fifty six percent. Back up 3 at zero percent. I'll be good for a while."

“Must be really good to have five stomachs.” I chuckled.

"I guess that is a good comparison. So, are we going to eat all night or will we be doing anything else?"

“Well, there’s still a lot of other things to do.” I said honestly. “Is there anywhere else you want to go?”

"When I first started up in that theater I overheard A group nearby say something about someplace called Summer Falls. It sounded pleasant."

“Sure, let’s go to Summer Falls.” I nodded. “Wherever that is…”

I looked it up real quick and once I knew how to get us there we took a train, yes a train, there. It was a surprisingly short ride, lasting only five minutes and when we got off my jaw dropped. We were atop one massive floating chunk of land, one of many all within the vicinity of a massive waterfall pouring possibly millions of gallons of water at once down itself. Unlike prior places I've been, the sky here was a clear and bright daytime blue illuminated by various rainbows the falls gave off.

"Wow, this place looks amazing." I said in surprise.

"It is indeed beautiful. So, I believe in this situation we go for a walk?"

“Yes we do.” I nodded. “Let’s take a walk and see and the wonderful sights...together.”

She nodded, looking at me for a moment before taking my hoof with hers as she pulled me along.

Holding hooves back home is considered an important show of trust. For parents and foals, it means they help you walk and keep upright while young. For couples, it means we support each other, both emotional and physically. Walking on three legs isn't easy, so by holding another pony's hoof you both support each other up.

Even with her pulling me along, she was helping keep me up.

We walked like this while going through this place, seeing trees that sparkled like gemstones, flowers that bloomed out into a mini light show of colors and shapes. We took a seat next to one another at the edge of this floating island. I got my date with Sweetie Belle. It's not how I expected, or even the same… her, but Sweetie Bot here isn't the mare I had a crush on back home, she's some pony new and, worth it, I think.

“This...is amazing.” I said happily.

"I'm glad you are happy. Your emotional health seemed… unstable, on my first scan of you."

“It’s...just been a lot…” I said nervously.

"So far my profile of you is all good things. Despite your hardships you still retain hope and you try over giving up. I can't understand why the version of Sweetie Belle from your world didn't go after you herself."

“Probably because...well back home I didn’t really...have any drive like I do right now.” I said honestly. “I…” I sighed out. “Not as many people cared...and even the ones that did…” I rubbed my temple in bitterness at myself.

"Sounds like you mostly just needed some good friends." She said, standing. I was confused for a moment, then flinched as she laid herself onto my back. I blushed madly. Typically stallions lay on the mares back, a way to be protective and… for when things get heated everything is already aligned. For parents and foals it's mostly a means of keeping them warm and safe. "Are you comfortable?"

“U-uh...y-yeah…” I stuttered lightly.

She then wrapped her legs around my body. My blush got brighter. "My romance programs say this Is a form of comforting and that physical contact best for strengthening bonds. I… I'm already yours, but I want to… know that I can be more than just rebound or… a servant. I know you mostly already see me as more than those, but I need to convince myself… that I am more than my AI."

“That’s...kind of why I was so adamant to...well, get you like this.” I said softly.

"I know, but my primary programing is still… dominant. These modules help reduce, or weaken it but it's like trying to stand on a middle ground line but… getting pulled in one way all the time. I'm confused a lot, my new thoughts and emotions conflicting with my original programing."

“We’ll figure it out Sweetie.” I told her with conviction. “I promise.”

She rested her head on mine. "Thank you Master."


Morning came and Sweetie Bot greeted me with a smile as she headed off, getting breakfast and all that ready. "Finally!" I jumped, seeing Cheat next to my bed. "You had a date."

“Oh shut it you.” I muttered to Cheat.

"So, how did it go?"

“It...was really good.” I said honestly.

"Good, that's one step closer towards you getting laid." I threw my pillow at him, but it passed through him.  

I rolled my eyes as I got up, Cheat leaving me be for now. Once in the living room I found dad- Ah!

"Morning Button." She said, wearing one of those face mask things I've seen mom wear at the spa back home, hair curlers and all. "Looks like you and Sweetie Bot got a lot done in the realm of dreams last night."

“My eyes~.” I joked as I playfully looked away with a hoof up. “But yes, we got a lot done in the land of dreams.” I told her simply. Is it she or he? “Okay, should I call you dad or mom?” I asked them.

"Well, I am your father biologically. I might be a mare now but that is a simple change I can do whenever. Despite my gender, I am your father, so call me dad." 

“Alright, cause I was getting confused by that.” I nodded. “So what’s for breakfast?”

"Pancakes and fried potatoes." Sweetie Bot said.

I took my seat. "So, any questions for me?" Dad asked. "I imagine that summary I gave you yesterday of my time here left some questions still."

“A lot.” I nodded. “There’s...so much in this world...what have you done all this time?”

"Honestly, not that much. The first five hundred years I spent trying to get home, researching and exploring dungeons and uncharted lands. Nothing. I got depressed, so I started doing some things Cream and I always talked about. Took up some sports and hobbies. When all those began running out I started on the more… lewd lists she made. Hence my appearance now." Dad said, pulling their face mask off.

"I spent a lot of time switching back and forth between stallion and mare, even was both for a while. In the end I realized a lot of things and settled on swapping my gender when I either felt like it or got bored. I got back out there, dating mares, stallions, herms and people of all races and genders. Then I met Echo and, heh, well… your mom always told me I treated her like Celestia herself… and that's how Echo treats me. So we've been dating ever since." Dad sighed. "Heh, went on a tangent there, but yeah, the most interesting thing I did was explore the unexplored lands."

“What were the unexplored lands like?” I asked curiously.

"Well, their name says it all. It's land that hasn't been explored and mapped yet. The minimap in your hud shows what's there because people mapped the area already and it adapted over time. Exploring the unmapped areas can be dangerous but overall it's no different than the Safe or Hazard zones depending on which zone you are in."

“To be honest, I’m surprised their’s unexplored places left.” I said honestly. “Considering it’s been long enough with enough people looking.”

"Well remember, these worlds are massive and new ones are popping into existence every day… probably even every hour… maybe even second. So there's a lot of space to explore. Last I knew Dechamore was only… not at all fully mapped out at all."

“Damn.” I said in honest surprise.

"I'm sure your friend Ali can tell you more." Dad said. 

Sweetie Bot served us, and herself as we all ate. After a bit I realized something… is there a school here? I don't think I saw one yesterday but there is still a lot of the city I haven't seen yet.

“Is there a school here?” I asked. “Or...in general?”

"Oh, well, there is the Miners Academy but no actual schools for your age. Schools in this reality teach you from age five til ten, and from ten til thirteen some basics on combat, magic and the various academies that exist if you choose to attend them."

“Huh...thought there would still be the normal school system.” I said honestly.

"Some towns and cities do that but most follow this system since it's actually better and you don't spend an extra four to five years in school."

“Thank the lord.” I sighed out happily.

"You best get ready, your friends should be here soon and Victor is going to help you all in applying for the guilds and such."

“Alright.” I nodded, starting to eat my breakfast and thinking of what guild I might join today.

After breakfast and getting ready, Mei, Ali, Tiara and Victor arrived just before noon.

We all went over to the ship, Sweetie Bot staying home so she and dad can talk.

Once on the ship Victor spoke to us all in the control room. "Okay, first order of business." He started, wearing that bandage armor from when we first met him. "Any of you currently affiliated with guilds already?" He asked.

"Formerly affiliated with the Heroes Guild, currently affiliated with the Mechanics, Inventors, and Coders Guild." Mei said.

"Mappers, Streamer and Scavengers Guilds." Ali said.

"None." Tiara said.

“None.” I said to the bandaged person.

"Alright then. If you all are going to be proper adventures, you'll need to join the Adventurers Guild. They pay you for beating Dungeon Bosses in money, Skill Points, and Loot. Basic floor bosses pay about average and Other boss types pay more or less depending on the boss themselves."

“What...boss types are there?” I asked with a raised hoof.

"Main floor, Bosses that have to be killed to progress a dungeon. Optional bosses, bosses that offer a unique gimmick or challenge in their fight, usually these are hidden but can also wander the dungeon floor and are sometimes multiple. Then there are secret bosses. The Pathway to them is completely hidden behind some barrier unlocked by either a puzzle or keys. Or dumb luck. These drop the best items and the Adventures Guild pays the most for taking them out."

“Good to know.” I nodded.

“So we go and sign up with the Adventurers Guild.” Tiara said.

“Yes. I’ll set the course, you lot take this.” He handed me a notebook. “I wrote up a fair amount of dungeons and hazard zone areas with some neat stuff, and decide where to go to.”

“Neat.” I nodded while taking the notebook.

We headed down to a… I guess you can say it’s a meeting room of sorts, just a room with a long desk and lots of chairs. “Okay so first on this list is Castle Ruins Caliporion. An Arena Class Dungeon who’s loot consists of largely medieval jewelry, weapons, armor and some elemental gems with classic flintlock firearms and a few modern ones tossed in, mostly on enemies.” Mei said.

“Castle sounds cool.” Ali said. 

“An arena class dungeon?” I inquired.

“When you think Dungeons, you imagine caves or buildings built to be like multi floored and with a boss guarding the exit to one/entrance to another?” Tiara asked me.

“That’s basically the standard yes.” I nodded. “Sometimes mini bosses in certain rooms to keep you on your toes and the like.”

“Well Arena dungeons are basically like that, but set up over a large field. A city or a forest or things like that, but abandoned and filled with monsters.”

“That’s interesting.” I nodded. “Strange that a hazard area would be considered a dungeon but I still don’t understand a vast majority of this crap.”

“It’s how it is.” Ali shrugged.

“Next up is Marrow Mines. A Tower class dungeon made entirely of the skeleton of a dead snake reaching the depth of sixty two thousand miles down and within the giant skeleton are the bones of other, various monsters it ate and were killed within it before the beast died and now are large minable corpses. The inside holds largely undead enemies, rock and ore golems, and mole/subterranean monsters.”

“That sounds...gross.” I said nervously. “Wouldn’t that place be a cesspool of toxin’s and the like?”

“The snake and monsters are all already dead, skeletons.”

“Kind of thought the dungeon would have been filled with rot and decay, not just...it’s all bones.” I said sheepishly.

“If you want Decay the Cemetery of the Damned is a good one.” Mei said, flipping the page. “Loot is completely random.”

“I’d rather not.” I said nervously. “So anyways, anywhere else we’re supposed to go first?”

“Lots… and lots.” Mei said with a sigh. “How about we start off at the top and work our way down so long as there's at least one boss there?”

“Sounds fair.” Ali said.

“With all of us, we should be able to handle it.” Tiara said.

“Let’s hope we don’t have any random bandits invade us while we’re at it.” I said honestly.

“No promises!” Victor’s voice yelled out from down the hall. We all gave a laugh at that.

Arriving at the Adventurers Guild was nice. A quick scan of our Assistants and we had our Guild affiliations and were off to the first location. Castle Ruins Caliporion. “Okay, according to this the only bosses are Mad Man Mark and Prisoner Knight Hale.” Ali said as we exited the ship. “Slave Master Elizabeth was alive until roughly a month ago.”

“Huh.” Mei said with a shrug.

“Wonder who beat Elizabeth?” I wondered. “Also..Slave Master? I thought Slavery was illegal?”

“It’s just her name, no actual slaves.” Ali said, setting up his camera.

Mei took out her portal gun and Tiara her gun. I brought up my armor, thinking about Tiara’s injury in the last dungeon.

“Alright, let’s go kick some ass.” I growled, ready to fight in this dungeon.

Entering the castle I spotted some Shadow Creatures and these sickly human… things walking around, almost like zombies. Some had guns, others has weapons and other stuff.

“I...kind of expected more from looking at these things.” I said honestly.

“This is just the initial entrance area. They’ll get worse the closer to the castle we get.” Mei said, opening a portal on the ground atop a clocktower nearby and another under a zombie person. They fell in the portal under them then out the one on the clocktower, falling to their death. She did this again for several of them.

“I’ll take out anything flying and scout ahead.” Tiara said, flying up and taking to the air. Her guns shooting out in the distance.

“And I’ll keep it rolling- WOAH! Instant ten thousand viewers?! Shit I knew that video of Button got popular but I wasn’t expecting this.” Ali said.

“Excuse me what?” I asked curiously.

‘Well, when you went Ape Shit with your armor fighting Victor, I was still recording. My viewers lost their minds.” Ali said.

“Well...let’s hope I can give them another good show.” I shrugged as I charged after where I heard the gunshots.

My armor’s spikes shot out without me thinking, killing these monsters all around as I ran down the road. “You do know you don’t auto pick up loot, right?” Cheat said, sounding more in my head than around me.

“Well that’s just bullshit.” I growled, having to turn back to grab all the loot. “Seriously, wouldn’t an auto loot pick up be too hard to have starting off?”

”Later on then.”

After grabbing all that and knowing now to stop and pick up the shit they drop, I found myself at an old shop. Some rem, a few rings fit for humans, a broken axe, some apples. Hm, not bad.

“Alright, so far so good.” I nodded while running back towards the gun shots I heard.

Turning a corner I saw Tiara shooting a crowd of monster people from a rooftop. I ran into it, the spikes on my armor getting the rest. “Not bad.” She said, starting to reload her gun. “You work really good in that armor. Guess you don’t really need weapons then.”

“Would still be good to have one when my spikes are taken up.” I said honestly. “Just in case and all that jazz.”

“Isn’t that why I got your back from above?” She asked, finishing her reload.

“True.” I nodded. “You okay Tiara?” I asked, knowing she would have been safe if she stayed far away from these things but I just wanted to make sure.

"Yeah. Nothing flying so far so I'm in the clear." She said, taking to the air and looking around. "Turnover cart down the road! Might be loot in it."

"Sure." I nodded, running over to the cart to find any loot in it.

There was some rem, a mace and some books.


Tomb of Magic: Ice Lance
Tomb of Magic: Summon Spirit, Wolf
Tomb of Necromancy: Raise Lesser Undead
Tomb of Magic: Barrier.


"Well...let's read these." I said while going through the tombs. "Gotta have more abilities than just spikes and punching."

"Offended." Cheat said.

"You know I'm right." I huffed. "But maybe it could be added to the spikes I don't know."

I pocketed the tombs for later, Mei and Ali ran back up to me. "So, what's the plan?" Ali asked.

"Should we go after Mad Man Mark or Slave Knight Hale?" Mei asked.

“Um…” I thought for a bit. “Which one would be easier?” I asked nervously, not sure how difficult either of them are or what they even do.

"Mark." Mei said. "Hale is a secret boss so he'll be harder. Mark is notoriously hard to hit but with multiple people fighting him it should be easier to damage him."

“Alright, off to beat Mark.” I nodded.

"He should be in town square." Ali said.

"Is he in a jester outfit with a flaming hat?" Tiara asked.

"Yeah, actually. You see him?" Mei asked.

"Yeah, he's doing a solo waltz over there." She pointed over some buildings.

"Guess we were closer than we thought." Ali said with a shrug.

“Well...can’t call him ‘mad man’ if part of his outfit wasn’t at least on fire.” I said honestly.

Tiara flew down and we all walked over to the town square. Once in I noticed a thin crystal like barrier go up around the square, keeping us with Mad Man Mark.

The heater danced his solo waltz, keeping in tune to music only he could probably hear with a partner that wasn't there. "Such vibrant and lively guests to arrive so late for the party." He said, not looking at us as he kept up his dance.

“You started the party too soon.” I countered.

"Ah but I am just the fool, subject like the rest. I did not start it but like all I shall entertain until it ends." He stopped, turning to look at us and oh… is… is he blind? "For this act, I require assistance from the audience." He said, mouth opening impossibly wide as he reached a hand down his own throat, and pulled out several flaming knives and began juggling them. "Any takers?"

“Are you blind?” I asked worriedly. “Like...I’m just asking to know if you’re okay and all…”

I jumped, a flaming knife hitting my armor in the muzzle guard and staying there. I could feel the tip touch my skin but not cut it. "Sight or not does not a jester make. But the silliness of his attire and the lacking of his sanity." He stated, shooting off those knives in rapid succession. Ali and Mei took cover behind me as Tiara took to the air and began firing. 

In response to that Mark began cartwheeling to dodge.

"Shit, your good Button?" Mei asked, pulling out the knives from my armor. Thankfully non actually managed to cut me.

“He’s pretty accurate for a blind guy.” I growled as I dug into the ground, ready to charge at him.

"We need a plan. Ali, can you actually use any weapons?"

"Most of my combat is hand to hand when I did fight but I can shoot a gun if that's what you're asking." He said.

"Good, here." She said, pulling some rectangular weapon from her assistant. It looked like… well like a rectangle. With a barrel and trigger. She then handed it to Ali. "This shoots 12.7 MM pistol rounds and the mag should last you for six hundred shots. If you can pin him into a corner I can portal Button in close to make him a pin cushion."

“Hot damn that’s a lot of ammo.” I said honestly. “But you think it can work?”

"It's better than nothing."

Nodding Ali began shooting at Max and with Tiara's help getting the jester to go where they wanted. Once he began getting against a building, Mei shot a portal at the ground. Nodding I backed up to get a running start in, charging and jumping into it right as Mei shot the exit portal behind Max.

Falling down then finding yourself flying across the ground was a very abnormal sensation, but I rammed into Max's back, my armor spiking out and impaling Max across his torso, arms and head. When my armor retreated the spikes and I got off him Ali and Tiara kept shooting and they downed jester. After a while he just vanished… or rather, faded. Where he once was was now a small wooden chest.


Mad Man Max, Defeated. Victory!


“Sweet.” I nodded. “But uh...what happened to him? I...don’t think I saw what happens to a person when they die…”

"Well, bosses sorta just… fade out, like the meme. Since their HP is normally higher than the dungeon requirement for bosses it gets a chunk designated as their boss HP, and once that runs out they fade out and get sent back to their guild." Mei said, taking the gun back from Ali. "Us though, we wake up in our beds an hour later and if we come back to where we die we can find the old body. It's… creepy." Mei said with a bit of a shutter.

“That is indeed creepy.” I said nervously.

"Let's see the haul." Tiara said, flying down and opening the chest. It vanished when she opened it. "Four grand in rem, Max's flaming hat, fifty throwing knives of fire and seven healing potions."

I blinked, a message appearing in my assistant hud. 


 Adventures Guild Bonuses:
(Divided among Team)

×50 Skill Points
4,500 Rem
×14 Pulse Shock Grenades
×2 Flaming Swords
Balancing Ball


I got 12 Skill Points, 1,125 rem, 3 of those shock Grenades and the Balancing Ball.

“Sweet.” I nodded. “Now I can finally start working on that beast of a skill tree.”

Hmm… where to start. Well, Scan first, that will be really helpful. Next… oh, let's check out Cheat's skill tree. Hmm, my options first are Hunger and Munch… okay?


Hunger: At the cost of your own stored energy from eating, your Armor can become twice as dense and the spikes can pierce tougher enemies and armors.

Munch: Your armor will occasionally lash out and consume weaker monsters, gaining you bonuses based on the creature it eats. Baseline time limit is 10 minutes for these bonuses. Stack if another of the same monster is eaten.


“Okay that’s cool...wonder if I can get both…” I muttered curiously.

I could! I nabbed both and went back to my tree for now, with 9 left to spend I put one in strength. Two got me this cool one called High Jump. Two more got me double Jump. The last 4 I put into my HP. It was at this point I noticed my Energy bar for mana and fire were… bigger- Right, Loop! We have been here for twenty minutes. Woah. MP at seven hundred and Fire Energy at two hundred.

“Okay so uh...who want’s to face the secret boss? Cause we’ve been here for twenty minutes so our abilities stacked twice already.”

“Shit.” Everyone said in unison. 

“Well… If we do, we should wait a bit longer. Secret bosses are typically a level two in their strength so it’s better to have all that as high as possible.” Mei said.

“Would be best.” Ali shrugged. “Plus it let’s us explore this place more.”

“Yeah, cause before it sounded like this place was cleared out not too long ago.” I said honestly.

“Well without any bosses to worry about it’s just the higher level enemies to be concerned with. Oh, and Mei… did you make that gun?” Tiara asked.

“Oh, heh, yeah. I buy a lot of gun parts for cheap and either modify or customize or custom build guns. I don’t use them that much since I don’t really enjoy direct combat.” Mei said, rubbing the back of her head.

“Alright, so right now we just explore and see what’s around.” I said honestly, deciding to test out my new high jump to see how high I could really jump.

Woah! Before when jumping I’d get maybe my head’s length off the ground. Now I’m jumping over Ali and… oof… Okay, still puts weight on the legs but, I can get used to that… Still cool! “If you’re gonna be doing that you might need some compression shoes.” Mei said.

“Or I could have double jumped to make sure I didn’t hurt myself.” I said honestly.

“Separate Ability.” Tiara said.

“I...can’t use both?” I asked curiously.

“You can but in terms of Abilities Double Jump and High jump have to be unlocked separately.”

“Well I have both.” I said while doing a quick double jump. “I got it along with a few other things from all the skill points I got.”

“Nice.” Ali said.

And so we went off to explore some more. So far everything here was pretty neat. There were giant spiders. Giant as in they were half my size but Tiara shot first and did not even wanna touch the loot. I can’t blame her.

The closer to the castle we go the more those human monster things had either better armor or weapons and some were in whole knight get ups. Inside the castle grounds that was all that was there.

Thankfully medieval armors and swords are no match for Tiara’s 5.56 MM machine gun. Those with guns though were dealt with by me since they are either using low caliber handguns or flintlock pistols. Ali was streaming everything and Mei stood near him, helping with her portal gun from afar. Sending enemies either falling to their deaths via portals on the floor and atop a building or sending us potions when needed. Inside the castle we began making out way down to the dungeon, where Slave Knight Hale was located. Loop had been running for about an hour now so my MP and Fire Energy were really piled up now.

“Alright...so let’s see how strong my Fire energy is now…” I muttered while raising a claw and trying to create fire with it.

Let’s see… He said emotions, so like activating my armor I need… Hmm… let’s start with something small. The taste of chocolate-

The place before me was all blackened by a rapid burst of fire in under two seconds… I looked at my Fire Energy bar, seeing it was half gone… Damn!

“The hell did you think about to cause that?!” Ali asked.

“Chocolate?” I gave them all a sheepish grin with my response.

“Yeah Hale is a goner…” Mei said. “Also, I’m going to work on making you some conductors for that raw power…”

“Uh...I also need a recharge on my fire energy...it’s half gone.” I said nervously. “Also seriously, I didn’t expect that to happen…”

“Let’s have lunch then take Hale on.” Tiara said. We headed for a safe room nearby and began eating lunch. Getting my armor on and off was getting easier now that activating it was set to a trigger.

This dungeon safe room was some office looking room with a ruined desk and empty chests. I ate bacon cause having Omnivore teeth gave me a larger variety of food to try and Bacon is amazing.

“Okay so…” I started. “Being able to eat meat is...something really new, but also Bacon is amazing.”

“I know, but trust me, once you get the taste for it you wonder why you were originally born a herbivore.”

“Which seems a little worrying to be honest.” I commented.

“Eh.” Tiara shrugged, eating her ham sandwich.

After lunch we headed back out into the dungeon and opened the door the leads to Slave Knight Hale. It was a large pure iron door half red with rust. It opened with a high pitched squeak. Once it was open it was a long dark stairway down.

“Cliche but still creepy.” Ali said.

“I just wanna know why these pathways are always soaking wet on the stones?” Mei questioned as we began walking down.

“No idea.” I shrugged. “But let’s hope our quick lunch break didn’t mess up Loop.”

"Doubt it." Tiara said.

Once we were all the way down there, we entered a rather large chamber lit poorly by torches. Against the far wall was a large, twenty foot tall partly rusted suit or armor chained to the wall, the chains two inches thick wrapped around the arms, torso and neck.

“Hello?” I called out to the massive suit of armor.

It shifted, looking over at us. "Trespassers blood shall be spilled, in the name of my King." Hale spoke, his voice deep and vibrating the very air with each word. He stood, pulling his chains which ran through the wall behind him. He pulled, and pulled, stones breaking and cracking until it gave way. The end of those chains came crashing through the wall, and at the end of those chains were large spiked balls, the size of me.

"Well then…" I started. "Let's see how this thing stands up to fire." I said, this time focusing on anger to shoot fire at this giant knight.

The flames were a direct hit, my anger focusing on my old life as the heat hit them. When my fire ran out Hale still stood, his armor so hot It glowed white and his spiked chain balls were melted slag 


Slave Knight Hale HP: 130/5,000


Well… at least he is weaker now.

"Holy fuck, How did you do that?" Hale asked.

"Anger at my old life...and about an hour of Loop stacks."

"You have Loop?! Shit, that's impressive. Welp, guess I can take a few extra measures considering you nearly one shot me." He said, his armor cooled to a glowing orange red as he reached into the stone ground below him, breaking it and pulling out a massive Ultra Greatsword made from the melted armors of other knights. It then began to permeate a sickly purple aura. He swung it, blowing that aura all around the arena. Breathing got… hard.


 Poison Cloud! 2 Minutes til Death.


“I might have made a mistake.” I stated, only to charge after him immediately after I said that.

As the timer counted down I could hear everyone coughing, Tiara shooting her gun off at Hale. With Scan I could see the last of his HP chipping down. Thankfully I managed to get hear him. He swung his sword and I couldn't dodge, a coughing fit stunning me. Thankfully my armor spiked out, sticking me to his blade. Damn it… the only magic spell I know is Levitation… wait.

I brought out my Warhammer fast, and using levitation to move it managed to pour all my MP into that swing. Right as Hale flung me off my hammer hit, smashing his helm, and head, to a slash of scrap metal, gore and bone fragments. With that I hit the ground, his body falling over and after a bit faded. When he vanished, so did the poison as breathing became easier.

“Is...is everyone okay?” I asked worriedly.

"Been worse." Ali wheezed.

"Not fun…" Tiara sighed.

"Wow that hurt…" Mei groaned.


Slave Knight Hale, Defeated. Victory!


“Well...at least everyone’s alright.” I coughed. “So...where’s our rewards?”

And right on cue.


 Adventures Guild Bonuses
280× Skill Points
Long Chain Maces
Corpse Ultra Great sword
15,000 Rem
Rewards divided equally.


I got 70 skill points and 3,750 rem.

“Outstanding.” I said happily as I immediately went to my skill tree to start spending. “Seventy whole points, I wonder what I could get with it all…”

"Let's decide that once we get home." Tiara suggested.

"Yeah, I could use my bed right now." Ali added.

“Yeah...uh...sorry.” I said sheepishly. “I didn’t think he would do that if he was almost one shot...I didn’t think that was a thing…”

We headed back home and I felt amazing after getting all I could from the Skill Trees. I ended up with eight points leftover. With a yawn I laid on my bed late at night watching Youtube to pass the time. Tomorrow Mei and Ali will tell us our total earnings money wise from what we all put away into our vault.

“Man, today was great.” I muttered with a smile. “Can’t wait to see what all my new skills can do...hmm…” I hummed as I looked up some stuff on Rage’s, since it seemed rather diverse in the skill tree.

“Button?” I looked up, seeing Dad poke their head in. “There’s something I want to give you.” I got off the bed, Dad pulling a wagon with some metal stuff in there. If all that clanking means anything. “So after sorting through all those Geode finds from earlier I managed to make you quite the little arsonal.”

“And what’s gonna be my little arsenal dad?” I inquired.

“Well, firstly, we have something I’ve named Friendship.” Dad reached into the wagon, polling out a massive Mace. “Mana Steel body and ball with mana iron spikes, enchanted with a rank three featherweight spell to allow much easier, faster swings and can act as a spellcasting catalyst and adds magic damage to elemental energy attacks.” I looked at Friendship. It’s body was a faint sky blue with the spikes a darker blue, it’s name engraved just above the bite grip.

“Wow, it’s amazing dad.” I said in honest amazement at how great it was.

"And next." Dad said, pulling out two horse shoe claws, their metallic shine perfectly reflected my face, each shoe had four claws on it. "Vibranium claws, perfect when in or out of your armor."

“Fantastic.” I said as I put on the two horseshoes. “And they fit perfectly.”

Dad smiled, fishing out… oh no. "Now, I know you aren't a fan of guns but everyone needs some form of ranged combat so I present to you, Thunder Crash." Thunder Crash was a rifle… of sorts, the length of my front leg with a large... boxy back side and a barrel of a long metal maw holding in a blue glass tube where small sparks of electricity sparked from the end to the front. "A short electric rail gun capable of shooting any caliber of bullet and other things than can fit in the ammunition compartment."

“Uh...huh…” I said as I looked over the gun.

"Being electric, a rail gun has far less kick than a normal gun. It won't feel any stronger than a 9mm. I don't expect you to use it all the time but don't be shy about using it."

“Well...I have no idea how to use a firearm so I’m gonna need to learn that first.” I said honestly.

"I'm sure Tiara would love to teach you." Dad said.

“I’m sure she would honestly.” I said honestly.

"And lastly." Dad pulled out a small set of metallic rods, each about an inch long each. "The last bits of metal I used to make these. Special ammo for the rail gun. They are a metal shell covering various, explosive types. Your Assistant can tell you what's what."

“Neat.” I nodded. “Can’t wait to probably never use a majority of it.”

"Don't be like that, You'll use them. Maybe not all at once but you will use them." Dad said, giving me a hug. "Oh, and tomorrow after you and your friends do some exploring I am taking you down to the mines to learn how to dig up your own materials."

“Sounds like a good day.” I said with a smile, hugging my dad back happily.

After a bit dad let me.go and I was off to bed…

"Hi Button." I blinked, seeing Sweetie Bot in my bed.

“Hi Sweetie.” I said in surprise. “What are you...doing in my bed?” I asked carefully and nervously.

"I don't have a bed of my own… or a room. Pro Go shares theirs with Echo every other night, tonight being such a night, so they suggested I bunk with you. At least until my bedroom is added into the house."

“Uh...sure.” I said honestly. “I’m sure my bed is strong enough for the both of us...”

Carefully and slowly I got into the bed, Cheat was making kissing noises in the back of my head and I hope to the Mother one of these days I can kick him for it. To my yelp Sweetie turned me over, cuddled her body right up against mine and wrapped herself around me. "My databanks tell me this is what two people sharing a bed typically do and given we… are a couple it seems appropriate." She stated, resting herself just below my chin.

“Well...yeah, this is called cuddling…” I blushed at how close she was to me. “And...this is nice…”

I tried to relax… come on, go to sleep, go to- No No No!

"Oh! I figured this could cause arousal but did not expect it to be so sudden."

Kill me now! I was pleading while Cheat was laughing from the back of my head.

“I’m sorry...I’m trying my best not to…” I said, my voice barely a whisper as I pleaded for the sweet release of death at this point.

"It's only a natural biological response. No need to feel embarrassed Button. Besides," I yelped, suddenly under Sweetie Bot as she now halfway stood above me. "I was built to service such needs, and I believe I stated last night I am already yours… this will just allow me to factor in that, in this relationship, I am yours… and you. Are. Mine." She stated that last part with firm authority as she put her lips to mine…


To say last night was the best night of my life would be an understatement. "Morning Button." Dad said as I arrived at the breakfast table.

“Morning.” I said happily, still super happy about last night.

"Have a good screw?" I nearly dropped my juice.

“U-uh…” I was at a loss for words at this point, not sure what to say.

"Oh I planned that. Echo wasn't even here last night. I figured you needed something more than fighting in dungeons to keep you happy. Besides, Sweetie Bot is a Lover class prize person, so it was going to happen sooner or later."

“Lover class?” I asked. “Um...I don’t remember if I was told about that.”

"Guess they didn't cover that in the Caretakers Guild. Well, A Prize Pod Person typically someone created from within Spawn Loot, where all Dungeon loot comes from, and is awarded to whoever receives. They fall into three classes. Lover, meaning they are more an instant girlfriend or wife and the love between you both will always be true. Ally, meaning for a year they follow you to help in combat and after a year can choose to leave or stay. Lastly, Servant, they work for you for things ranging from house work to construction and such."

“Uh...huh…” I said honestly. “And...are the prize people a select few or what?”

"They can appear whenever for whoever. Or do you mean is there more than one of the same person?"

“Select few people, sorry.” I said sheepishly. “But is there a specific few people that it could be for those roles or could it be...literally anyone?”

"Anyone. I wouldn't be surprised if Lover Class versions of us are out there as well."

“That’s...not going to be awkward at all if that ever happens.” I said sheepishly.

"I have seen videos and heard stories of people getting gender bent versions of themselves. It's some of the funniest things on the internet to watch."

“I can only imagine.” I shook my head at that with a soft chuckle

Sweetie Bot came by with breakfast, giving me a kiss on the cheek as she left it for my dad and I before skipping along elsewhere. "I see she enjoyed it. That's my boy."

“It was an amazing night, that’s for sure.” I said sheepishly.

"Good. Now hurry up and eat, Echo will be here in a few hours and I plan on making sure I'm skipping and pleased just as much as Sweetie Bot."

”I’d rather not know things about your private times dad.” I groaned.

"Hey, I heard you two screaming all night, I want my turn."

“Y-y-you heard us!?” I panicked

Dad simply nodded. "Word of advice, if you want to keep the bedroom noises in the bedroom, doors have to be closed all the way honey."

“I thought I did…” I said worriedly. “I’m sorry…”

"Eh Don't be. So, your group has plans today?"

“Uh...I don’t remember…” I said honestly. “We might go on another dungeon run though.”

"Sounds fair. Well, best go grab Tiara then."

“Yeah, let’s hope things go as well as yesterday.” I said honestly.