Genius Strategery

The next day, Gil spent the credits on Gacha, hoping to start accumulating resources. The odds of getting something immediately useful were pretty decent, honestly. According to the chart, he'd get a consumable, a binding, a character card, or a Tag more than 50% of the time. Even the crappy options weren't terrible; he'd honestly gotten more value out of the box of medicine and equipment from Rim Elm than he would have from some of the more quirky or fun oriented Company consumables he'd gotten in the past.

Gil had been bored enough to go so far as to calculate how long it would take to pay off before shelling out the credits. Even if he only counted prizes that had quantifiable credit costs, like bindings he could buy and (of course) the one credit booby prize, he'd be getting back an average of 1.1 credits worth of value per week.

That was also totally ignoring the chance of getting some kind of overpowered item like a love potion, which would be as good as a binding thanks to the love confession binding method. He hadn't really used that one at all yet, as it takes a truly gifted pickup artist or a deeply needy girl to get a genuine declaration of love after only 24 hours. Using magic or the like to grease the wheels was the normal way to use that method of capture, at least in tests where that was an option.

The moment he purchased the perk, a new tab opened up on his tablet. Extras contained only one thing at the moment: gacha. He pressed the button immediately; one does not make impulse buys, even carefully considered ones, to engage in delayed gratification.

Result: 8

Random tier 1-2 Character card.

Berelain sur Paendrag Paeron (WoT)

The card depicted an exceptionally beautiful woman of a medieval bent. A very liberal take on medieval society, to be fair, as her dress was made of sheer red fabric that showed off her generous cleavage. Her dark eyes and shoulder length black hair combined with a seductive, assessing sort of expression to make her look like something of a femme fatale. Of course, Gil noted, most femme fatales had a bit more of an athletic build. This woman was by no means fat, but she had the lush figure of someone who rarely needed to exercise.

The opposite side of the card revealed her to be the ruler of a small nation, skilled in political maneuvering and trading on her looks. She'd been trained from childhood in the many fields of study required to rule a small nation, and supplemented her formal training with the art of seduction. The description stressed that she didn't put out even one tenth as often as she strung people along, which wasn't an uncommon strategy in Gil's experience.

He'd seen worlds where women cultivated armies of devotees, collecting tithes from eager hopefuls whom they would never dream of touching. Once he'd even heard of such women successfully selling their bath water online, as if it were some incredible treasure. Lonely men were, on average, quite easy to manipulate. It could backfire or fail, of course, but a new sucker is born every minute and if you have bodyguards to draw upon it's much less likely to be a problem

Her list of abilities was much shorter than Cow Lady's. Interpersonal manipulation, political savvy, administration. She also had her appearance to offer, of course, and she did in fact have the "likes men" tag when Gil checked. A queen without a kingdom wasn't much of a prize compared to a superhero, but Gil was sure he'd find a use for her. Hell, summoning her to distract or bribe someone attracted to women would be good enough on its own. Alternatively, he could keep her appearance around if he ever captured a total butterface, or one of the many 700 year old women that looked like 5 year olds. They tended to slip through his 18+ only filter.

He spent the rest of that day trying, and mostly failing, to train with Blackpaw. The stubborn wolf had healed fully when the portal closed, and was ready to serve as a living weapon again. Unfortunately, tactics beyond basic flanking were beyond the wolf; even that would fall before the brilliant strategy of being a furry missile in most cases. The wolf acclimated to the retinue as the days passed, but that was largely limited to tolerance and a certain mild fondness for Snow.

••••••••••

He'd set an alarm to wake him when Flechette was captured, but he'd been somewhat busy when his tablet buzzed. Snow was slowly reaching a level of proficiency with her body where Gil wanted more out of her than a set of willing holes. He was coaching her on exactly how to properly cup his balls in her hands, as well as how to hold him near the edge to attain a more intense eventual orgasm. She also had difficulty swallowing any notable amount of cum when he finished in her mouth, which could only be improved with rigorous practice.

As such, he had the benefits of post-nut clarity when he reviewed Flechette's profile. Notably, he checked her sale price. That was really the only new information at that point, other than the new stamp credits.

Sell Flechette

10 credits, Red String of Fate (1 expedition), To the Victor Go the Spoils (binding)

"To the Victor as a full binding, eh?" Gil mused. "Not exactly the most efficient, but I'll take it."

To the Victor Go the Spoils was a method of capture that wasn't terribly popular with The Company. Simply put, you break it you buy it. When you or a member of your retinue lands a killing blow, you may choose to capture the victim. As a general rule this does not resurrect them, but it allows the player to get something out of random wanton slaughter. Gil could immediately see the utility. If he ever went back to Barovia and threw down with Strahd, this would let him convert the vampire lord directly into his sell price. Useful, but not in line with Gil's current methods.

Red Chains of Fate was one of the more esoteric and weak lures, in that it didn't actually force any degree of emotional attachment on its targets. Instead, it was a bit like a matchmaker. When active, anyone who would be open to the kind of relationship you desire with them will be extra noticeable. For Gil it always manifested as a faint red aura, but he'd been told by other testers that it varied from person to person wildly. The potential relationship it sensed tended to be sexual or romantic in nature for obvious reasons, but Gil knew that something like "willing to sell their soul to me if asked" would also apply. The only limit was that it needed to be a type of relationship he was actively looking to engage in himself, so he couldn't use it to sniff out traitors in an organization unless he was already feeling traitorous.

It was a fantastically popular lure for people doing "pure" runs. Tons of people didn't want to compromise the minds of their potential romantic partners, but most people hated rejection. Especially in a blind playthrough, or one where you forget that you have any unique cheat abilities, having a sixth sense for who wants the exact relationship dynamic you have in mind is a godsend. Even if you have extremely questionable tastes in relationships, there's a very good chance that at some point in your life you've briefly encountered someone on the bus who would be into BDSM furry pet play if you'd only been willing to ask them out and broach the subject. They just, like you, have the tact necessary to keep that under wraps in mixed company.

There was even an upgrade available for triple the price that added a fate manipulation mechanic. If you took the upgrade then the only four attractive girls in the city that would be interested in forming a harem for you will somehow just keep running into both you and each other as if by fate. Alas, this disposable version seemed to only be the first tier.

Overall it was a good haul, but Gil wasn't going to sell her. He considered it, long and hard, but in the end he had another option. He was going to use her instead. He called over Rose, and explained the plan. He was going to fuse her and Flechette together, landing him an exceptionally powerful superheroine. Rose was probably his most trusted retinue member, at minimum she was the one he was most honest with, and giving her a massive power boost and a living body seemed like the right play.

"I'm glad you're being reasonable." Rose said, manifesting for the important discussion, "in truth, I'd assumed you would put off doing this for at least a few months based on what you said and thought."

"I want you to be happy, and I think this method might let you keep some of the ghost powers in some form. As much as anything I'm curious how that'll play out." Gil shrugged, "being a bad boss doesn't really pay off most of the time, not unless you put a lot more effort into maintaining it than I like to."

Ireena listened, eating from the day's soup thoughtfully.

"You speak like someone who has wielded power before." She said, "And yet you look and act like a vagabond."

"Appearances are deceiving, my lady." Gil said, a smile tugging at his lips. "I've been a thief, a king, and everything in between. In my first life I was a brewer, actually. A damn good one if I do say so myself; if I ever get the equipment I can make some pretty incredible beer. They never took that from me, since it's specialized and part of my initial self. The guys who studied martial arts their whole lives before becoming testers have all the luck."

"As fascinating as this is, you had plans?" Rose prompted, irritated. "Do not dangle a prize before me and then snatch it away."

"Right, right." Gil said, nodding. "Well, the fusion isn't a physical item. It's an option on my tablet. Are you sure you're ready right now?"

"Abundantly." Rose said, eyes aglow, before fading. She needed a certain level of focus to manifest, and it seemed she was too excited at the moment.

Gil tapped a few buttons on his tablet, and time seemed to slow to a crawl while he made additional choices.

Location: Rose or Lily

It occurred to him that this should have probably been an obvious question. He'd assumed that the end result would be deposited on the skyblock and made peace with the likely blowback. In the moment, however, it occurred to him that having an agent in the Wards would be extremely handy if he ever went back to that world.

Once that thought occurred to him, he felt silly for phrasing it as a hypothetical. He was absolutely going back to Brockton Bay at some point. It was far too valuable a treasure trove, if for no other reason than the third portion of the Fuck/Marry/Kill mission. If he could sleep with Vista, whatever she looked like (it hardly mattered at this point though he'd prefer if she was hot) he'd get a large pile of credits and a binding. He wasn't going to let that vanish on him.

Hell, in many tests with a mission based format, a retinue member could complete a mission on one's behalf. Gil wasn't planning on spreading his retinue to the four winds to act as field agents, but he wouldn't begrudge Rose taking Vista to bed to finish the mission either. In fact, that might be the best thing he could do.

With agonizing slowness due to the warped time, Gil went into his bag and pulled out Rose's pen and ink. He wrote a message in slow motion, explaining her objectives, as the slow motion girls looked on, even answering him with voices too slowed down for him to ever hope to understand. Finally, he picked up the tablet again and chose "location: Lily" to send Rose away to Brockton Bay.

There were a dozen other options like Normalize outsider perceptions (yes), and appearance mixing (he went with no, since he was fond of Rose's look). Adapt powers (yes), maintain outgoing emotional connections (no), and more. He was slightly disheartened to find that Lily didn't contribute any appreciation of the male form to the mix, but such is life. Maybe she'd be better at seducing Vista; who knew.

The end result should be a version of Rose that maintained all of Flechette's memories and abilities, and who was perceived as Flechette by all friends, family, and coworkers, but nonetheless had no strong inborn attachment to anyone or anything in Brockton Bay. Gil didn't intend to keep her there forever, after all. He wasn't sure if the new powers would put up red flags, but supposed that would be up to Rose to determine and adapt to.

Sale complete: Rosevalda Durst.

Received: 5 credits, Soul Talent.

"Alright ladies. It's just the three of us for a bit." Gil announced. "I just want you all to know I totally intended to do that."