Act 6- Working Out and Knocking Out

--- Joshua ---

Getting up on Sunday a part of him remembered the fact that it had been just over a week since he’d talked to the Malice Merchant who had told him, ‘We’ll find you, when we want you.’ Meaning he was likely to have his second encounter with the merchant any day now.

He also remembered how the Malice Merchant had mentioned something about deciding how they’d continued depending on how his powers had progressed by said meeting.

(But aside from figuring a couple of things out I haven’t really made any solid progress.) Sure he figured out how to move his tags, and how to use a weaker version of Chris’s old ‘rule of cool’ power, but beyond that he didn’t really have anything in the way of tangible progress either.

And so, with this thought in mind he rolled out of bed and grabbed one of his malice vials from the case next to his bed. He knew taking a vial would temporarily amp all of his powers, making breakthroughs just a little easier, but with what he had in mind the increase to his healing factor alone would be more than enough for his purposes.

“Time for a serious workout.” He told himself before downing the vial of copper and strawberries.

Scene Consequences

-New Power: (???) Enhanced Strength at Lv. 1 (0/4)

--(A/N: From a game perspective every level of this ability gives us a +1 to Strength, which affects melee damage and Strength reliant skills and abilities.)

--All Physical and Reflexive abilities are slightly easier to learn.

---

By the time he finished with his workout, eaten enough for a decent sized family, and showered all of the sweat off, he was capable of doing a little over a hundred push ups in a single sitting as well as over fifty sit-ups.

A marked improvement from his not even passable results of a week ago.

(Too bad I don’t seem to be getting any actual muscle out of this.) He couldn’t help but frown as he poked at his stomach and arms, feeling roughly the same amount of flab he’d had at the start of the week. “Maybe there’s some kind of increased muscle density kind of thing going on.”

Which would kind of suck given how he had to have done nearly a thousand push-ups and a few hundred sit ups in the course of a week, an exercise quota that would make most introverted nerds -such as himself- vomit from the mere idea of. All without any visible gains.

“I’m sure I just need to keep pushing it, and I’ll get that super six-pack soon enough.” He assured himself, since his brother still had all of his muscles despite retiring and severely cutting back on his old workout regiment.

Shaking his head at his regular teenage body issues, he instead turned his attention towards the remaining two vials of Malice in his case.

He knew the Malice Merchant was going to take him for a meeting, but he didn’t actually know when that meeting was going to be. Nor did he know if actually had enough power to be of interest as anything more than a guinea pig to his patron.

The malice vials however could offer him a quick power up, the ability to show off his powers at their potential level rather than their actual level.

(Though that’s only if they don’t dock me points for using it mid-test…)

He gnawed on his lip for a moment before nodding as he made his decision.

---

Given how he knew he was going to be tested soon, but not how he was going to be tested, he decided that making a trip to the library to try and find some books on different fighting styles wouldn’t hurt.

Admittedly he could probably find said styles on the internet, but given how he didn’t really know what he was looking for he had no way of knowing if he was missing out on a better style for him or not. And while this wouldn’t change much at the library, the trip to said library gave him ample time to play around with the power he’d spent half of his childhood hoping for.

A power that was currently making him trip over his own feet, crash into people, or walk into a brick wall every time he used it. Each in an increasingly convoluted manner that he couldn’t quite follow after a certain point in which the pain racked up.

“I’ve just got to get used to working this power is all.” He told himself limping away from his latest pain inflicting power usage. (I just have to suffer for my art a bit.)

Scene Consequences

-Rube Goldberg Field gained 1XP

--Currently: Lv. 1 (1/4)

---

After a long series of disasters that left him with a pounding headache, he finally made it to the neighborhood library. (I just remembered that most powers -especially Madness powers- are supposed to leave the users with headaches if they use them too much.)

He kind of wished he’d remembered that before his eyes started stabbing him in an attempt to escape his skull.

“You know what? I’m just going to take a nice seat on this bench and until my head quits pounding, then I’ll figure out this whole… fighting style mess.” He groaned, closing his eyes as he took a seat on one of the benches next to the staircase leading up to the library.

Of course, it was just as his headache was beginning to recede that something decided to rudely cheapshot him.

---

*Scene Interrupt*

“Fuck.” He groaned as consciousness slowly returned to him.

A quick glance around the room revealed the familiar face of the Malice Merchant from the week prior. “Really Doc, your guys had to knock me unconscious? You could’ve just asked me to tag along.”

“I’ll keep that in mind for next time.” The man assured him. “For now we have other things to discuss such as your power development after this first week.”

“Oh…” He swallowed suddenly feeling a little nervous about what progress he had made.

“Quite.” The man nodded, writing down something on a clipboard.

(Shit. He noticed my nerves.)

“So, why don’t we get that over with first, hmm?” The man started, spinning his pen between his fingers. “Tell me, how much progress have you made in the week we’ve left you alone for?”