This is a combination of a novella of sorts that I'm writing for fun, along with a lets-play (my first ever!). I'd like to let the story itself do the explaining, but to (hopefully) whet some appetites and set the scene a little, I want to explain the background a bit.
Our hero, Steve, is an aspiring member of an intergalactic order of monastic techno-mages. Their advanced magi-tech includes nano implants that allow Steve to shape and create objects with his bare hands, by extruding nanites into or through his bone structure to create useful tools. A lexicon of "recipes" is stored on an implanted nano-computer, allowing him to build and create the things he does.
His self-replicating nanite implants are also capable of "ingesting" objects and performing two-way mass-energy conversions to store items (ie: the inventory).
Steve himself is... well, a bit of an idiot, but he means well. Our story begins on...
Day 1:
Steve picked himself up off the ground, brushing dirt off his clothing. Confusion was not an unusual state of mind for Steve, however in this situation, it was entirely understandable. He looked around at his unfamiliar surroundings, with no memory of how he came to be standing in this picturesque and largely silent forest. His eyes darted from left to right, and his brow furrowed in consternation. His lips puckered to form a soundless "ooh" for a few moments.
The "oooh" prolonged itself and gathered impetus as well as sound.
"Oooooooowwwhere the... what happ... I... hello? Anyone around?"
He stood there for a few moments longer, gathering his thoughts, not really expecting a reply.
"A training exercise... this must be a... a test! Yes! I must've been selected for The Trial. Hah! Finally!"
He stood there another moment, not really expecting anyone to confirm or deny this.
"Ok Steve... think. Survival training... what's first? Umm... shelter? Food? No... assess your surroundings. Climb a tree! Yes!"
He started for the nearest tree that looked like an easy climb and then stopped short, as it occurred to him that he should probably assess himself, first. He looked down at his body, and began patting himself down, feeling a little silly all the while.
"No broken bones, no wounds, no... nothing."
His retinal display sparked into life on his mental command, projecting a green status indicator and some startup text into his field of vision. He ran a quick system check and everything seemed in order. He flexed his hands and triggered his Intra-Skeletal Nanite Toolset (ISNT) and giggled "ISNT working... " to himself. That joke never got old.
Relieved to find his cybernetics in full working order, he proceeded to tackle the tree, which proved itself a worthy adversary. Huffing and puffing, he hauled himself to the top eventually, thinking that he really should have spent a little more time and energy on his fitness regimen at the academy. This was not the first time this thought had crossed his mind, and it would certainly not be the last.
His breath already taken away by the climb, he was left speechless and wide-eyed by the pristine wilderness his new vantage point provided. His lips formed that silent "Oh" again as he turned his head from side to side, and then his jaw proceeded to sag lower and lower.
"Sweet mother of Help-Me-Rhonda... where in the blazes *am* I?"
His gaze took in the landscape in all directions. For the most part, he could only see the colourful foliage of the autumnal forest all around. In one direction, however... he shivered instinctively at the sight of an icy promontory surrounded by glacial drifts.
"Bleeding hell... that's clearly not where I want to be".
Unsure of what to do next, he made his way back down the tree and, pondering his situation, starting walking away from the glaciers and the frozen wasteland.
He stopped after a few steps, and smacked his palm into his forehead, perhaps a little harder than he intended.
"Steve you ninny... Mapwriter!", he exclaimed to himself as he remembered that he had recently acquired the cartographic software module for his Nano-comp. He called up the module on his display and grinned gleefully as a square mini-map of his immediate surroundings flickered into view. His grin slowly faded however.
"Well that's just great but... now what? Still have no idea where I am, where to go, or how to get there."
After a few more moments of frowning and lip-puckering produced no great insights, he resumed his trudging in the direction he now knew to be westward, and began mentally taking stock.
He knew that with his nanite toolset functioning, he could build a wide variety of tools, machines, armour and even weaponry. But what then? He was still operating on the assumption that this was his Trial, the passage of which would garner him the coveted rank of Adept. He had no idea what he was supposed to do to pass, but he reasoned that it must have something to do with escaping this place. Or... perhaps not. In any case, he'd have to find some shelter and that familiar rumbling in his midsection told him that food would soon be a priority as well.
On further consideration of escape, he thought that maybe with the recipes contained in his nano-compositor, he could build an aircraft or spaceship and... what? He kicked himself mentally for not having taken that astrophysics course, let alone the advanced astrogation subjects he would need to navigate his way back home. At least that's what he assumed he'd need.
His thoughts turned to magical pursuits. He had learned a fair bit about planar and dimensional travel, and considered himself a dab hand at thaumaturgy. But again, he didn't even know his starting point, and wasn't sure how to plot a path to... home. Wherever or whenever that might be.
Lost in this reverie, he was caught by surprise when he found himself at the forest edge, and as he peered past the treeline, his heart leapt and he let out a yelp of surprise at the sight of... "Buildings! Houses! Yes! I'm saved".
He plunged through the remaining trees, starting to sprint towards what seemed to be a small village. He hadn't even stopped to consider if the inhabitants were friendly, but in fact had not yet seen any. He was intent on having found civilization of some sort, and he trotted up to the large, imposing stone building directly ahead.
He paused at the door for the briefest of moments before opening it
and entering to find... nothing. A mostly bare stone room and a ladder leading up. He took to the ladder, heart pounding, and found another floor with... nothing.
Crestfallen, he looked up and down the ladder when he heard the sounds of movement outside. Excitement building once again, he practically flew back down the ladder and outside. He caught a glimpse of a door closing on one of the houses, and with barely a thought, dove right in.
Inside the dim interior, he saw bookshelves, some furniture and... an alien! An odd-looking humanoid that was, even more oddly, perched on top of a piece of furniture.
Puzzled by this position, but undeterred, he nervously greeted his host.
"Err... hello!"
Hardly magnanimous or dignified, but he was too excited to think far beyond that. In any case, his greeting elicited no response at all. The humanoid creature just stared at him with a blank look. Moving a little closer, Steve started again, this time adding some gestures which he hoped would demonstrate friendliness.
"Me... Steve!", patting himself on the chest. "You... ?"
The creature continued its blank stare, and then started to move! Steve nearly leapt backwards as it advanced towards him, hopping down from the furniture. Steve wasn't quite fast enough though, and was baffled and not a little frightened when the creature rudely shoved past him on its way to the door.
Steve dropped into a fighting stance, or what he thought a good, intimidating fighting stance might look like. Sadly, unarmed combat was another course he hadn't gotten around to. In any case, it was pointless since the creature wasn't showing the slightest interest, stance or no stance.
The creature took the exit and shut the door on its way out. Petrified by the thought of being shut in, Steve bolted after the creature and confronted it outside in the sunshine.
"Look, err... sir! I need help. Me... Steve! Help Steve? You? Yes?"
This was met by further blank stares, only now... Steve slowly became aware of other, similar creatures shambling about the area. He was momentarily afraid, but soon realized that they weren't particularly interested in him or what he was doing.
He turned back to his first acquaintance, only to see that he, she or it had wandered off again.
Puzzled, Steve approached another of the humanoids, and this time, amazed by his own daring, he extended a hand and touched the creature. He was further amazed when the creature responded to this by producing a picture of a green gem in one hand. It followed this by opening its other palm to show a picture of 14 chicken carcasses neatly drawn in a row.
Baffled, Steve looked at the creature's face. "I'm baffled", he stated, in case the look of utter confusion on his face was leaving any room for doubt.
Slowly, the creature started to move its hands back and forth, moving one towards Steve, the other back towards itself. It repeated this a few times and suddenly, Steve had an epiphany.
"Oh! A trade! You want to trade? My... gem for your... chickens? I get it! I get it! Hurray!"
"But wait... I don't have any gems. Or chickens for that matter."
As if understanding, the creature chose this moment to wander off, in silence.
Steve scratched his head and looked around at the other aliens. "Well I'll be a monkey's uncle." He quickly clapped his hand over his mouth, just in case these creatures were somehow related to monkeys. Or uncles. Who knew, and he didn't want to risk insulting anyone.
Glumly, he wandered around the village, kicking at pebbles in the gravel path between the buildings. On impulse, he stormed through the doorway of another house, and found a room lined with some odd furniture. Another of the villagers paced around the room silently. Steve's gaze fell upon a nearby chest and he casually strolled over to it, looking sidelong at the alien. Again, not the slightest interest in what he was doing. Emboldened, Steve lifted the chest lid, and found it half-full of implements and tool parts for shovels, picks, even a sword blade or two. Glancing again at the villager, who was still rudely ignoring Steve, he plunged his hand into the chest and pulled out a few of the parts. Still no reaction.
Looking straight at the alien, Steve activated his matter-condensator and a few of the parts disappeared into his portable nano-inventory with the familiar "pop". If that bothered the alien villager in any way, it was hiding it very well.
Steve was as puzzled by the villager as he was by the things he found. He emptied the chest of all the parts, and multiple popping sounds were duly ignored by the villager. Next, Steve laid a hand on the chest itself, and triggered the nanite matter-condensator import of the entire thing. Pop went the chest. Next Steve vacuumed up the tool stations and tables that were nearby.
Shrugging to himself, he ransacked the room of anything that looked remotely useful, and strolled outside with a final backwards glance at the alien, which was staring intently at a bare wall.
"Maybe they're robots", muttered Steve. That would make a lot of sense. Some sort of trade droids perhaps? With this "village" mockup added for... what, atmosphere? Perhaps. In any case, they seemed to have no problem with his wholesale theft of their property. Still and all, he found their soul-baring gaze and their near-silent shuffling entirely too creepy, and resolved to leave this place, but not before marking its coordinates on his Mapwriter interface.
Outside the village once again, Steve tried to pick up where he had left off in his stock-taking.
Join me in chapter two, when Steve punches wood and meets his first zombies!
Our hero, Steve, is an aspiring member of an intergalactic order of monastic techno-mages. Their advanced magi-tech includes nano implants that allow Steve to shape and create objects with his bare hands, by extruding nanites into or through his bone structure to create useful tools. A lexicon of "recipes" is stored on an implanted nano-computer, allowing him to build and create the things he does.
His self-replicating nanite implants are also capable of "ingesting" objects and performing two-way mass-energy conversions to store items (ie: the inventory).
Steve himself is... well, a bit of an idiot, but he means well. Our story begins on...
Day 1:
Steve picked himself up off the ground, brushing dirt off his clothing. Confusion was not an unusual state of mind for Steve, however in this situation, it was entirely understandable. He looked around at his unfamiliar surroundings, with no memory of how he came to be standing in this picturesque and largely silent forest. His eyes darted from left to right, and his brow furrowed in consternation. His lips puckered to form a soundless "ooh" for a few moments.
The "oooh" prolonged itself and gathered impetus as well as sound.
"Oooooooowwwhere the... what happ... I... hello? Anyone around?"
He stood there for a few moments longer, gathering his thoughts, not really expecting a reply.
"A training exercise... this must be a... a test! Yes! I must've been selected for The Trial. Hah! Finally!"
He stood there another moment, not really expecting anyone to confirm or deny this.
"Ok Steve... think. Survival training... what's first? Umm... shelter? Food? No... assess your surroundings. Climb a tree! Yes!"
He started for the nearest tree that looked like an easy climb and then stopped short, as it occurred to him that he should probably assess himself, first. He looked down at his body, and began patting himself down, feeling a little silly all the while.
"No broken bones, no wounds, no... nothing."
His retinal display sparked into life on his mental command, projecting a green status indicator and some startup text into his field of vision. He ran a quick system check and everything seemed in order. He flexed his hands and triggered his Intra-Skeletal Nanite Toolset (ISNT) and giggled "ISNT working... " to himself. That joke never got old.
Relieved to find his cybernetics in full working order, he proceeded to tackle the tree, which proved itself a worthy adversary. Huffing and puffing, he hauled himself to the top eventually, thinking that he really should have spent a little more time and energy on his fitness regimen at the academy. This was not the first time this thought had crossed his mind, and it would certainly not be the last.
His breath already taken away by the climb, he was left speechless and wide-eyed by the pristine wilderness his new vantage point provided. His lips formed that silent "Oh" again as he turned his head from side to side, and then his jaw proceeded to sag lower and lower.
"Sweet mother of Help-Me-Rhonda... where in the blazes *am* I?"
His gaze took in the landscape in all directions. For the most part, he could only see the colourful foliage of the autumnal forest all around. In one direction, however... he shivered instinctively at the sight of an icy promontory surrounded by glacial drifts.
"Bleeding hell... that's clearly not where I want to be".
Unsure of what to do next, he made his way back down the tree and, pondering his situation, starting walking away from the glaciers and the frozen wasteland.
He stopped after a few steps, and smacked his palm into his forehead, perhaps a little harder than he intended.
"Steve you ninny... Mapwriter!", he exclaimed to himself as he remembered that he had recently acquired the cartographic software module for his Nano-comp. He called up the module on his display and grinned gleefully as a square mini-map of his immediate surroundings flickered into view. His grin slowly faded however.
"Well that's just great but... now what? Still have no idea where I am, where to go, or how to get there."
After a few more moments of frowning and lip-puckering produced no great insights, he resumed his trudging in the direction he now knew to be westward, and began mentally taking stock.
He knew that with his nanite toolset functioning, he could build a wide variety of tools, machines, armour and even weaponry. But what then? He was still operating on the assumption that this was his Trial, the passage of which would garner him the coveted rank of Adept. He had no idea what he was supposed to do to pass, but he reasoned that it must have something to do with escaping this place. Or... perhaps not. In any case, he'd have to find some shelter and that familiar rumbling in his midsection told him that food would soon be a priority as well.
On further consideration of escape, he thought that maybe with the recipes contained in his nano-compositor, he could build an aircraft or spaceship and... what? He kicked himself mentally for not having taken that astrophysics course, let alone the advanced astrogation subjects he would need to navigate his way back home. At least that's what he assumed he'd need.
His thoughts turned to magical pursuits. He had learned a fair bit about planar and dimensional travel, and considered himself a dab hand at thaumaturgy. But again, he didn't even know his starting point, and wasn't sure how to plot a path to... home. Wherever or whenever that might be.
Lost in this reverie, he was caught by surprise when he found himself at the forest edge, and as he peered past the treeline, his heart leapt and he let out a yelp of surprise at the sight of... "Buildings! Houses! Yes! I'm saved".
He plunged through the remaining trees, starting to sprint towards what seemed to be a small village. He hadn't even stopped to consider if the inhabitants were friendly, but in fact had not yet seen any. He was intent on having found civilization of some sort, and he trotted up to the large, imposing stone building directly ahead.
He paused at the door for the briefest of moments before opening it
and entering to find... nothing. A mostly bare stone room and a ladder leading up. He took to the ladder, heart pounding, and found another floor with... nothing.
Crestfallen, he looked up and down the ladder when he heard the sounds of movement outside. Excitement building once again, he practically flew back down the ladder and outside. He caught a glimpse of a door closing on one of the houses, and with barely a thought, dove right in.
Inside the dim interior, he saw bookshelves, some furniture and... an alien! An odd-looking humanoid that was, even more oddly, perched on top of a piece of furniture.
Puzzled by this position, but undeterred, he nervously greeted his host.
"Err... hello!"
Hardly magnanimous or dignified, but he was too excited to think far beyond that. In any case, his greeting elicited no response at all. The humanoid creature just stared at him with a blank look. Moving a little closer, Steve started again, this time adding some gestures which he hoped would demonstrate friendliness.
"Me... Steve!", patting himself on the chest. "You... ?"
The creature continued its blank stare, and then started to move! Steve nearly leapt backwards as it advanced towards him, hopping down from the furniture. Steve wasn't quite fast enough though, and was baffled and not a little frightened when the creature rudely shoved past him on its way to the door.
Steve dropped into a fighting stance, or what he thought a good, intimidating fighting stance might look like. Sadly, unarmed combat was another course he hadn't gotten around to. In any case, it was pointless since the creature wasn't showing the slightest interest, stance or no stance.
The creature took the exit and shut the door on its way out. Petrified by the thought of being shut in, Steve bolted after the creature and confronted it outside in the sunshine.
"Look, err... sir! I need help. Me... Steve! Help Steve? You? Yes?"
This was met by further blank stares, only now... Steve slowly became aware of other, similar creatures shambling about the area. He was momentarily afraid, but soon realized that they weren't particularly interested in him or what he was doing.
He turned back to his first acquaintance, only to see that he, she or it had wandered off again.
Puzzled, Steve approached another of the humanoids, and this time, amazed by his own daring, he extended a hand and touched the creature. He was further amazed when the creature responded to this by producing a picture of a green gem in one hand. It followed this by opening its other palm to show a picture of 14 chicken carcasses neatly drawn in a row.
Baffled, Steve looked at the creature's face. "I'm baffled", he stated, in case the look of utter confusion on his face was leaving any room for doubt.
Slowly, the creature started to move its hands back and forth, moving one towards Steve, the other back towards itself. It repeated this a few times and suddenly, Steve had an epiphany.
"Oh! A trade! You want to trade? My... gem for your... chickens? I get it! I get it! Hurray!"
"But wait... I don't have any gems. Or chickens for that matter."
As if understanding, the creature chose this moment to wander off, in silence.
Steve scratched his head and looked around at the other aliens. "Well I'll be a monkey's uncle." He quickly clapped his hand over his mouth, just in case these creatures were somehow related to monkeys. Or uncles. Who knew, and he didn't want to risk insulting anyone.
Glumly, he wandered around the village, kicking at pebbles in the gravel path between the buildings. On impulse, he stormed through the doorway of another house, and found a room lined with some odd furniture. Another of the villagers paced around the room silently. Steve's gaze fell upon a nearby chest and he casually strolled over to it, looking sidelong at the alien. Again, not the slightest interest in what he was doing. Emboldened, Steve lifted the chest lid, and found it half-full of implements and tool parts for shovels, picks, even a sword blade or two. Glancing again at the villager, who was still rudely ignoring Steve, he plunged his hand into the chest and pulled out a few of the parts. Still no reaction.
Looking straight at the alien, Steve activated his matter-condensator and a few of the parts disappeared into his portable nano-inventory with the familiar "pop". If that bothered the alien villager in any way, it was hiding it very well.
Steve was as puzzled by the villager as he was by the things he found. He emptied the chest of all the parts, and multiple popping sounds were duly ignored by the villager. Next, Steve laid a hand on the chest itself, and triggered the nanite matter-condensator import of the entire thing. Pop went the chest. Next Steve vacuumed up the tool stations and tables that were nearby.
Shrugging to himself, he ransacked the room of anything that looked remotely useful, and strolled outside with a final backwards glance at the alien, which was staring intently at a bare wall.
"Maybe they're robots", muttered Steve. That would make a lot of sense. Some sort of trade droids perhaps? With this "village" mockup added for... what, atmosphere? Perhaps. In any case, they seemed to have no problem with his wholesale theft of their property. Still and all, he found their soul-baring gaze and their near-silent shuffling entirely too creepy, and resolved to leave this place, but not before marking its coordinates on his Mapwriter interface.
Outside the village once again, Steve tried to pick up where he had left off in his stock-taking.
Join me in chapter two, when Steve punches wood and meets his first zombies!