MHA Chaos' Whims Chapter 7: More Experimenting (Patreon)

“You sure, Scarlet?” Perched on the forearm I held up in front of me, Scarlet squawked, head nodding.

“Commentary: The featherbrain has already agreed to it. This reluctance to cut an animal is quite unbecoming of you, Master.” Hk-47 said from beside me, his built sensors handling the scanning of the surrounding trees and greenery just in case anyone came near the pond. “Query: You are the master. Why let the opinion of such a creature create inefficiency?”

“Wouldn’t that kind of logic mean stopping all your extra commentary?”

“Answer: On the contrary, master. My commentary serves many purposes. Advisement and a moment to moment review of your words and actions to name a few. Though, as with instruction, it is hardly my main function, I am programmed to perform all kinds of psychological assistance as well. Do you require some?”

I chuckled a little to myself, holding up Soul Solid. “Not now, but who knows. Maybe I’ll come looking for that assistance in the future.”

They were my familiars. The exact details of all that involved would only be revealed through time and tests. I was probably going to be cursing at myself for skimming the rules every time I had questions, wasn’t I?

So far, both HK-47 and Scarlet had been immediately aware of the fact that I was the one who summoned them, listening to my orders without question.  But what did summoning mean in this instance? Was I bringing them over from across time and space? Were they created on the spot for by the Chaos Gacha System?  Was there some god puppeteering them? Puppeteering me?

Well, I felt pretty real and so did this world. And, despite following my orders, these two displayed too much personality for me to consider them fake or treat them like emotionless tools to exploit and toss away when I got what I wanted from them.

…which is what I was planning to do to Toga.

No, that wasn’t the same. Whatever the nature of it, I didn’t have the security of some inborn loyalty when it came to dealing with her. For my own safety, no matter how things went, it was better to look at her as nothing more than a temporary risky asset. Nothing less, nothing more.

Carefully running Soul Solid along Scarlet, faint bits of blood marked the sword’s tip.

“Observation: Interesting. The bundle of feathers appears to be dealing with that shallow wound rather quickly.” Hk-47 noted at the same time I noticed just a bit of my energy traveling over from the connection I shared with Scarlet. “Query: Is that something you have control over, Master?”

Indulging the question, the moment I started thinking about stopping the transfer of energy, that’s exactly what happened, Hk-47 noting that the quickened healing stopped.

“Should we figure out if the same thing applies to you?” I asked, looking up at him.

“Agreement: That would be the wise course of action, Master. I am glad to see we both understand the folly in assuming I am anything like that featherbrain.” HK-47 said. Rather than waiting on me to do anything, he shifted aside his blaster and used the fingers of his free hand to bend and dig through the armoring of his left shoulder. I could feel my energy heading over to him but any healing that was being done was extremely slow, not to mention he was requiring far more of it from me despite no visible changes.

A product of their different ranks as familiars? Would that healing be faster if I dismissed them?

“Observation: It is gradual but the superficial damage I have inflicted upon my armor plating and the actuator below it are both repairing themselves.” HK-47 assured me. “Commentary: This is good, Master. With such a function, I can kill more effectively for you.”

Again, I couldn’t argue with that.

Refocusing on what this whole initial test was for in the first place, I brought the blade closer to me, licking the blood from it. The taste was bland to say the least. I didn’t feel any stronger either, my body not noticeably changing in any way.

“Observation: My scans have indicated a minor boost to your body’s natural regenerative abilities. Though weak, your flesh appears to be marginally more capable than others.”

So, a minor healing boost? It didn’t feel or look like any of my current injuries were going to be gone anytime soon but any boost to my healing was a welcomed ability that could result in quicker gains in the long run.

“I guess we better get back to fixing the weak part.” I said, refocusing on HK-47.

“Agreement: As best we can, Master.”

XOXO

I gritted, trying my best to focus.

My entire stomach burned. My arms, and pretty soon the rest of my body, were shaky, unable to remain still no matter how hard I tried. And weight; I didn’t know if it was my body itself, my mind, or just general exhaustion doing its work, but there was this weight telling to just let go and be free of all that.

Despite that I kept at it, ignoring the sweat dripping down my face and how breathless I felt. Scarlet stood on a patch of dirt in front of me, her caws and other noises encouraging at first, but at this point I wasn’t even paying much attention to her.

Hk-47 was torturing me. He had to be.

My arms finally gave out on me and hit the cold dirt with a grunt.

“Observation: Impressive, Master. You consistently perform above what my scans indicate a meatbag of your build should manage.” I had a sarcastic remark loaded but I couldn’t even be bothered to fire it off, just rolling over onto my back and looking up at all the branches and leaves above.

He’d put together a more complete workout compared to the stuff I was haphazardly doing. He had also requested to see other meatbags as he called them as well as me buying more specific workout equipment to help with particularly muscles that required a more focused effort to build.

But I couldn’t really be seen walking around with a droid full of technology that was literally out of this world. As for buying workout equipment, that should be possible. Maybe. How expensive could some pieces of metal built in a specific shape be?

“Statement: Your allotted rest time has passed, Master.” HK-47 said.

Groaning, I rose up, preparing for whatever else he had in mind.

I really missed spending weekends either cooped in my room brooding my time away or, in my other set of memories, just writing away. Neither of those were as painful as all this.

XOXO

“A gym membership?” Aunt Nozomi, in the middle of a break, her room door left opened so I’d know, looked over the monitor set up on her desk as she set down a mug of coffee. “And you’re sure this girl you’re friends with is just a friend? It sounds like you’re trying to impress her to me.”

Of course she was bringing that up. I already knew how this went though; I could keep denying it but somehow someway things would be led back to the girl I was apparently talking to. “Would you say yes if I was?”

“I’d say yes either way, buddy. We’ll make time for it tomorrow. Maybe I should get myself one while we’re at it.” She trailed off, talking more to herself than me by the end of it. I was planning on pushing myself hard, so I wasn’t too keen on having anyone else with me, but who was I to tell her no.

“Thank you.” I said, leaving the door to her room ajar and heading back into mine, dropping my aching body onto my bed.

I’d admit, while I wasn’t a fan of working out, a hot shower and a soft bed after a long day of doing exactly the hard work I planned to was just as fulfilling, if not more, than hitting that first 100k word count in something I was writing or finishing a hard ass game I’d been chipping at between all my other responsibilities.

Even if I didn’t have to worry about some self proclaimed demon lord and other crazies trying to lay waste to society, I at least would’ve been having fun with all the experimenting to use my abilities anyway. Hero work? They got paid the big bucks so if I got something overpowered from the gacha it wouldn’t be a bad way to live life.

Unfortunately, I doubted my reality was going to be so carefree.

Vrrrrmm!

I reached over to the end table beside my dresser and turned my plain black phone over. A message from an unknown number.

???: Akaguro!? 😺

Who’s asking?

???: U know, if anyone says that in movies that pretty much always a yes 🤔

???: Its Toga. Toga Himiko from school. 😸

Right, I had come up with some excuse about my phone then gave her my number during our gym period.

Hey, Toga. How was the whole karaoke and arcade thing?

Backing out of the conversation I kept her contact simple, just throwing in her name before heading back to the messages. She texted a bit more about the day she spent with her friends, using that to jump to whole another subject.

Toga: U said u were free over the weekend right?

Toga: Want to meet up and hang out this Sunday? Just so you know, I might not be able to get everyone together, so it might end up being the 2 of us.

Toga: Hope u don’t mind 🐱

She was a quick typer, the three messages coming back to back without any chance for me to respond. Why she didn’t just send it all in one text? I had no idea but plenty of psychos liked to text the way she did.

I sent a simple thumbs up and so began the planning of our upcoming hang out.

Until I figured out ways to get other tickets, hanging out with her was about my only sure fire way to get more tickets. As much as I wanted actual abilities that weren’t trash ranked or traits that instantly proved my body or something, if I ended up pulling more summons on the same level as HK-47 or even better, I might not ever need to get into any dangerous situation personally.