Chapter 292 - My SI Stash #92 - Bringing a Pickaxe to a Power Fight by AkallasvonAerok (Worm/Minecraft) (1/2)

-More Minecraft-power MC~ This one is set in Worm with one of my favorite mods, Thaumscraft! Also some kidnapping via nether portals and trapping peeps into tunnels filled with traps.

Synopsis: ???

Rated: ???

Words: 50K

Posted on: forums.spacebattles.com/threads/bringing-a-pickaxe-to-a-power-fight-worm-minecraft-si-reincarnation.713077/ (Akallas von Aerok)

PS: If you're not able to copy/paste the link, you have everything in here to find it, by simply searching the author and the story title. It sucks that you can't copy links on mobile (´ー｀) -I'll be putting the chapter ones of all the fanfics mentioned, to give you guys a sample if you wan't more please do go to the website and support the author! (And maybe even convince them to start uploading chapters in here as well!)

Chapter 1.1-1.9

Amelia Lavere

”Are you hurt?” a boy asked.

Instead of t-shirt and pair of jeans that everyone wore, the boy before her who was her age wore an oversized yellow helmet with flashlight and bright yellow overall pants and a white t-shirt. On top of this oddity, he had an oversized pickaxe slung over his shoulder.

She stared at him, dumbfounded.

He looked at her, his exasperation clear on his face. ”I asked, are you hurt?” he repeated.

She shook her head.

”Then what's wrong?” he asked. He asked a lot of questions.

”... My new family doesn't like me.”

He raised an eyebrow. ”Don't families normally adopt you if they like you?”

”They don't like me.”

”A very weird conundrum.”

”Conundaram?” she repeated.

”It means a confusing problem.”

”Why do you use big words like a_d_u_l_ts?”

”Because I am one.”

”No, you're not.”

”Are too.”

”Are not.”

”Are too.”

”Are not.”

”... I work.”

”So?”

”I live by myself.”

”... Okay.”

”...”

”...”

”Do you want to come and see where I live?”

She looked at him funnily. ”Why?”

”Because you're sad and don't like your new family. You can come live with me if you don't tell anyone where I live.”

She frowned. ”Fine. I'll see where you live.”

He grinned stupidly. ”Okay!” His pickaxe disappeared. She gaped.

”Y-You're a cape!”

”Am not.”

”You have powers!”

He looked around before turning back to her.

”You're not supposed to say that out loud. Trouble comes if you do.”

She whittled. ”Sorry.”

”It's alright. But I'm not a cape.”

”But powers…?” she whispered, very confused.

He just shrugged. ”I don't wear masks. It's stupid.”

She gasped.

She couldn't keep her jaw from dropping upon entering the boy's ”domain.” He led her through this portal, and they came to a rocky tunnel. There was another portal on the other side, and when they went through the second portal, she came to a weird but fun place!

It was a cave, but it was so large and wide. There were apple trees growing and grass and flowers and -!

And a skeleton inside a cage?

She stared at the skeleton before turning back to the boy.

”You're a cape.” It was not a question but a statement, because who else but a cape would imprison a skeleton.

The skeleton stared at her with a blank stare as equally devastating as the boy's own blank stare; they weren't effective on her at all.

After staring at her for few moments, he shrugged and continued deeper into the cave of glowing stones, greenery and waterfalls. As she followed him, the brightly lit and humongous cavern changed into a narrower corridor, lit up not by the glowing stones she saw in the cavern but torches that gave off light and heat but no smoke. The rocky walls gave away to large stone bricks and wooden doors. All of the doors were bigger and taller than her.

Then he led her to another door at the end of the corridor. It was a wooden door, too, but there was something different about it. For one, it was far more worn out than the other doors.

He opened it… and she saw other kids. Only one among them was older than her and the rest of the kids.

”Welcome to my home,” he said as he led her inside. ”If you want to stay here, then these kids will be your family. Introductions, everyone!”

After that, it was a whirlwind of talking and shouting and giggling and laughing. She played games with them, ate meals that tasted good, and slept soundly.

She found a new home and liked this place more than the other home.

Amelia Lavere woke up, and wondered why she had that dream of all dreams. It was the first time she came to the Underground Orphanage, as the ”orphanage director” liked to call it.

”Amy, get up! It's time to eat!”

She grumbled as she pushed off the bedsheets slowly and stumbled out of her dark room. She opened the door and let the light of the common room blast her in the face. She squinted as she walked out of her room.

And the annoying voice of the ”director” grated on her ear again.

”Amy, go back in there and get dressed up. You know that I don't like my boys and girls eating in pajamas.”

She opened her eyes a bit more and stared at the ”director,” the same boy now a teenage boy who ran the entire orphanage with little help from anyone else.

He was a five foot eleven giant (not really, he was a fifteen year old boy, but it was the thought that counted because compared to him, she was tiny with her five foot three). He still wore yellow overalls, though these were bigger, much baggier, and a bit darker compared to the overalls he wore when she first met him. His short hair looked more like a helmet than hair because of how evenly he cut it. It wasn't exactly a bowl cut, though.

Overall, he looked dorky in those overalls and weird bowling ball hairstyle, but everyone in the orphanage knew better than to underestimate those overalls. He could tank rifle fire with those overalls, which made no sense and thus made him a cape, a title he still refused to take up.

As he demanded, because that's what it was, she went back into her room and came back out of it in her usual attire of blue t-shirt, sunset red knee-skirt, and black hoodie.

He saw her outfit, nodded in approval, and slid a plate filled with food in front of her from the center of the common room's kitchen table, which was kind of like a bartender's counter but filled with food ingredients and not alcohols.

Around the table were other orphans. Most of them were older teenagers like herself and him.

There was Cindy Marlene, the oldest of everyone at the tender age of seventeen. She wasn't a cape like him or her, but was an explorer. She roamed the tunnels that he made with two others and ”audited” to make sure that there was nothing going wrong with the tunnels.

An example of something going wrong would be a spot where torches hadn't been placed and thus was dark.

And dark tunnels spawned monsters.

Amy grimaced as she remembered fighting a zombie by herself. She had gone out to just take some time for herself when something scratched her in the back hard. She had turned around and saw a zombie. She lashed out with her power and killed it by causing it to seize all of its cellular functions.

It … had been harrowing because it was her first lone encounter with monsters.

On the other hand …

She looked at him as she ate another spoonful of scrambled eggs that he made.

Tyler was a weird person. He didn't talk like any of the kids but more like an a_d_u_l_t. He set out and created this place by himself at the age of six. He fought nightmarish creatures on a daily basis to get them what they needed. He was why other kids like Cindy tried to make themselves useful. Unlike other orphanages that some of the kids here had been to, Tyler's Underground Orphanage felt very much like a family, even for the outliers. Everyone took part in its activities, whether it was harvesting, fishing, or any of the other mundane things they wouldn't do elsewhere. They learned about each other and … it was safe here.

Amy actually talked to Cindy about what she was going to do once she became eighteen. Since Tyler was adamant about everyone getting their education, most of the older kids were ready to take the GED once they turned 18. Cindy said that she would take the GED, but it was only to prove that Tyler's work with her hadn't been wasted. She would stay at the Orphanage and help with its upkeep just like she did now.

She wondered what she was going to do. With her power, she could set up a clinic or something like that, work at a hospital or even the PRT.

”Done,” she said as she pushed the plate back to Tyler just as someone else entered the common room. It was Zoey, a eight year old girl Tyler picked up from the streets a year ago. She had settled in fine into the Underground Orphanage despite her initial passive aggressive attitude. Zoey quickly ran up and sat next to Amy.

Amy smiled.

Despite her own questions about her future, the fact that her status now as a member of the Underground Orphanage was secure. She was also one of the five capes of the Underground Orphanages, known to the rest of the city above as ”Tunnel Kids.”

Amy still remembered that fight vividly.

”Hey Amy, Amy!” Zoey called. ”Are you going to be working with plants again?”

”Yes,” she said. ”I think I want to make plant dogs this time.”

Zoey squealed and hugged her.

Before all of the cape business, Amy had been wary about using her powers. It made her so different from others and yet made her that much closer to Tyler.

But that before the capes of the city above decided to intrude into Tyler's tunnels.

That was before she had to create abominations just to keep others alive and hold the fort when Tyler was out to whittle down E88 on the surface.

Now, she relied on her powers. She used them daily, improving everything she saw as necessary. If an orphan had eyesight issues, then she would fix it. If someone had early cancer, then she would fix it. If another abomination needed to be created to keep the Orphanage and its orphans safe, then she would create one on the spot.

And she did happily, because as Tyler said, everyone in the Orphanage was family.

”Hey, hey. Can you make me a husky? I always wanted a husky!” Zoey giggled.

Amy shrugged. ”I don't see why not, but you know how most of my things turn out to be.”

Zoey frowned. ”Eww. You mean they explode?”

She facepalmed. ”No. I meant that they're going to be red.”

”Eh. Tyler's red when he comes back from the portal. I don't mind.”

Amy winced. Tyler was only red because he was on the other side of the portal in a place he called the ”Nether,” slaughtering monsters there by the hundreds each day to pick up meager amounts of gold nuggets they dropped upon death, so that he could sell those to provide the Orphanage with things they couldn't get on their own.

”I certainly don't mind,” Tyler said from his place at the kitchen, making more scrambled egg even as his free hand pushed a plate of baked potato, scrambled eggs, two strips of bacon, and peas to Zoey. Zoey took it eagerly, frowning a little at the peas, and then started to eat. ”Give them bioluminescent lights, and they can patrols the mines, too.”

Amy blinked as she thought about that.

”Right. I haven't thought about that,” she muttered.

Tyler, despite how well he meant in everything he did, couldn't be more focused about the things he saw as necessary. Everything about him was focused on keeping the other orphans happy and healthy. It was why he made giant underground farms, spending hundreds of hours by himself, hauling literal hills worth of stone out. He made aquariums and underground lakes so that they could fish and grow fish for food. He provided them with library's worth of books, mostly educational and some entertainment.

He went and fought til he was in literal tatters in the Nether for scraps of gold nuggets to sell because one of the orphans said they wanted a exclusive Legend figurine. Nobody asked him for anything after that, too afraid to see him die. Even so, he went out everyday and fought, coming back with a bag full of gold nuggets and red from head to toe in the blood of the monsters he killed.

He didn't seem to realize that the kids just wanted him to be around.

He always had to do something, and his thought process seemed to be perpetually stuck there.

Tyler stopped, and then whistled.

There was a thud and then one of the doors opened. Joseph, a sleepy teen, yawned. He looked at Tyler. ”Yes?” he asked.

If she was the older sister most of the kids came to, then Joseph was the one who took after Tyler the most. Joseph certainly didn't spare anything less than his best in trying to do so after Tyler rescued him from the clutches of the Merchants.

”Cook for the kids. I need to check up on the surface,” he said as he pulled his apron off.

Amy sighed as did some of the other teenagers who were in one mind with her on this issue.

Tyler never ever stopped moving around and doing things for the benefit of the orphanage. They wished he would stick around more.

Joseph grimaced. He too thought the same as Amy, but couldn't turn down Tyler's requests for shit.

”Okay,” he said as he walked up to the kitchen and took over. The other kids, not teenagers, looked down at that. It didn't matter that Joseph was a better cook; they wanted Tyler to cook for them.

Tyler gave everyone who was in the common room a head rub before he headed over to the armory.

Chapter 1.2 Armsmaster

He stood across from Director Piggot.

”Is the money ready?” she asked him.

He nodded as he presented her the case. The money in the suitcase was not pulled out of banks or any checks. It was absconded from gang stashes and confisticated assets. They were lost as far as paperwork was concerned either because they were ”too damaged” or ”part of evidence required for investigation.”

Armsmaster hated that he and Piggot had to go this far just to keep the PRT ENE and Protectorate ENE afloat.

She nodded in satisfaction, but the fact that she was unhappy with this was clear to even him.

”When is he going to be here?”

Armsmaster looked at the clock on his helmet's UI.

”In an hour.”

The person they were waiting for was a … controversial individual.

In many circles, he was considered a paragon of independence and justice. To others, he was a dangerous vigilante with the power to destabilize the status quo and thus the stability of the world.

But as far as both Armsmaster and Piggot was concerned, this person was neither a paragon nor a threat to the world. This person was worth more to them than the far away authority of Washington D.C. and the powerhouses that were Los Angelos, New York City, and Houston.

”I have a question, director,” he spoke up. They had few minutes for a question or two, so he decided to ask it. It would affect his efficiency otherwise.

”Yes?”

”Why did you want to meet him after all this time?”

PRT and Protectorate ENE have been both in contact with him shortly after Marquis's incarceration. It had been a decade since then, and this made this individual the longest lasting rogue in all of Brockton Bay, one that survived Empire Eighty-Eight's assault and then counterattacked.

Director Piggot drummed her fingers once and then twice.

”I want to know what kind of person he is.”

The rogue in question was young, which made his survival and flourishing accomplishments that much more astonishing for everyone. In fact, when Armsmaster first met him, he wasn't even ten years old while Armsmaster himself had just graduated from the Wards program. So shocked at the revelation of such a young cape, Armsmaster had stumbled over his words. The rogue simply gave him a nod while Armsmaster was trying to say the right words for recruitment and just left him. The second time they met, the rogue came to him and asked if he was interested in an under the table deal.

Armsmaster was about to refuse before the rogue cited too many information about the failing nature of PRT ENE. He presented his deal as a way to keep PRT ENE - and thus the city of Brockton Bay - afloat. He took this deal to the then director of the ENE and got approval.

Continued to this day with Piggot's own approval, this single deal was responsible for providing for a half of the PRT ENE's budget.

A whole half of the entire budget!

The rogue never gloated over this, never tried to use his leverage to gain something out from the ENE branches, and never took on additional requests.

For some reason, this satisfied Armsmaster.

Apparently, it was not so for the director.

”Cape title: Pickaxe-”

”I know what his name is, what his age is, how tall, skinny, and so on. It was in your chronicled report.”

”Then what do you wish to know, ma'am?”

Piggot grunted. ”Cape or not, people all have things they do to keep themselves sane. I highly doubt that this deal is his because he could do far more with it than trading with us.”

This was true.

On average, Pickaxe delivered over a ton of gold each year. On ”good” years, he delivered over two tons of gold. This made him, as a result, one of the biggest producer of raw gold in all of New England, and outside of the PRT ENE's director, deputy director, the previous director, and Protectorate ENE's leader, Armsmaster himself, no one knew about this. Armsmaster bought all of those gold at half the market price and sold it to the market at market price as a third party company unrelated to the PRT or the Protectorate. The company paid all of the taxes involved, and the half of the profit went to PRT ENE … at a whopping 13.5 million USD.

That money was barely enough to keep the equipments constantly replaced when they broke, pay all of the bureaucrats of the PRT ENE, pay all of the field agents, all of the employee's health benefits, and so on.

The other half of the profit was kept in multiple bank accounts, all of them collecting interest.

It irked Armsmaster so much that they had to rely on what was basically a donation from a rogue to keep a federal agency operating just to maintain that edge against the villains of Brockton Bay.

No.

He hated it, because whenever he thought of any victory he might have achieved, that nagging part of himself at the back of his head would always tell him just how much he owed the victory to a pubescent rogue. He looked over his armor and saw just how much of his budget came from the rogue's donation, how much of the weapon's parts were bought with the money from the rogue, how much of the field agents were hired with the rogue's money, and how much -!

He calmed himself down.

He didn't hate Pickaxe. How could he? Pickaxe came to them at their lowest and brought about this donation in the guise of a business deal. It was what kept the PRT ENE afloat.

No, Armsmaster just hated his inability and self-doubt.

”I am aware,” he said to director's remark.

She grunted. ”I hate depending on him.”

”I agree.” It was why the other half of the profits was kept without being spent. If Pickaxe ever turned his back on them, then the ten year's worth of saved up money would give them another ten years to survive on and find other solutions to.

His UI alerted him. He only had forty-five minutes before he had to go.

”Director.”

She nodded to him.

He left her office to meet the legendary rogue of Brockton Bay.

Chapter 1.3 Tyler

He nodded to Armsmaster, and Armsmaster nodded back as the two exchanged their goods. Armsmaster handed him a suitcase, and upon opening it, Tyler found bundles of hundreds within. He counted the number of bundles and then randomly selected one of them to count the number of bills.

Armsmaster grunted, and he grunted back to him.

”I have more than the agreed upon amount,” he said as he always said.

Tyler rolled his eyes, but it wasn't shown to Armsmaster because of the modified diamond helmet he wore. He knew that he gave Armsmaster more than what was agreed upon, and it was something he'd done every single time he met up with the Protectorate ENE leader.

Nothing more was said after that as he turned around with his now closed suitcase and left.

”Thank you.”

Tyler stopped, surprised. ”It's just business. Citizens pay their taxes, and I sell to you to keep this city safe.” Then he continued walking forward. He heard Armsmaster leave the secluded area of the Trainyards.

With but a few swipes, he pulled out a pair of Elytra from within his inventory, an action that still confused him despite the fact that he had done this everyday for the last decade, and equipped it, which pushed the diamond c_h_e_s_tplate armor he wore into his hands as a pixelated thin slab of … something. He stored it in his inventory, and then he took off on a run.

He pulled out a single unit of Firework and a potion of leaping.

Funny thing about potions. As long as he added ingredients that was literally the real world version of the game item, like a real rabbit's foot, then the potion came out as if I had used the dropped game item.

He popped the cork, and downed the entire green potion in one go. Then he jumped … and just as he began to descend, his wings opened up, and he used the firework to propel himself high into the air.

With a boost and a whistle, he soared high into the sky. Wind buffeted him as he flew higher away from the gain but seemed to gain no distance to the moon. And then as his ascent came to a crawl, he tilted down, and glided towards where his nether portal in the city was.

He had six portals present within the city of Brockton Bay and its immediate suburbs.

Three of them were duds that only led into the nether and had no other portals that led anywhere else nearby. While people could go through one portal and come out any other portal that are in the nether, the travel would be narrow and fatigue-inducingly hot at the least and death by lava at the worst.

Yes, the things they don't tell you about the Minecraft Nether was that the place was mindnumbingly hot away from the lavas, and skin burning close to it.

The other three portals led to different places. The first of these portals led to the garden that was connected to the rest of the Underground Orphanage. It was guarded by a dozen iron golems in the tunnels between the actual orphanage and the garden itself. The second portal led to the deepest parts of the mines he'd created, which was nearly three kilometers below the sea level, and those mine shafts had no lighting to them whatsoever. It was effectively speaking a trap to deal with intruders where monsters constantly spawned from the edges of the giant chasm upon which the portal was situated at the bottom of, even he had trouble surviving down there without his full max enchanted diamond armor set.

And the last portal? It led to his little stash deep inside the earth, far away from any other place underground locations. It was where he held his truly impressive items.

It was also booby trapped to kingdom come. Secret entrances, tripwires, stone plates, arrows, firebombs, one block vertical tunnel down to lava, and whatever else. You name it, and it had been built there. Of course, just because it had been built didn't mean that it would stay there.

The one he was looking for was, however, the nether portal to the garden. Out of all of the portals within Brockton Bay, that particular portal was the best hidden portal.

He glided down into an alley, and no one saw him in the darkness of the morning. He set down on the ground and walked deeper into this alley. He set aside the garbages to find the tunnel down.

Now, most people would think that this vertical one meter by one meter tunnel with its ladders would lead down into the sewers, because honestly, the tunnel was built right next to it.

No, it wasn't. He missed the sewers by margin of a meter and went straight down.

He got into the tunnel, pulled the garbage pile over him by dragging the net they sat on over him and the tunnel, and then headed down.

Chapter 1.4 Tattletale

It was supposed to be a quick exploration.

Coil told her to explore Pickaxe's portals and through it. She, of course, didn't want to. There were still horror stories about what happened to Empire Eighty-Eight when they fought Pickaxe in his own tunnels. Unfortunately for her, Coil didn't give her a choice. He told her to do it.

Or else.

So… she did it, but none of the others among the Undersiders wanted to.

In the end, Coil gave her three fully armed and armored mercenaries to work with her in her exploration.

It was supposed to be a quick exploration. A confirmation of things on the other side, if you will.

It went really bad, really fast.

When they came out of the portal on the other side, it was … it was just hell. As far as the eyes can see, she saw red stuff making up the ground and lava far below.

And it was hot as hell. She began sweating a minute into the exploration, and wanted to get out by the fifth.

But Coil was adamant about exploring Pickaxe's worlds, because it couldn't be anything else.

On the seventh minute of their exploration, one of Coil's mercenaries spotted a weird creature. The best way she could have put it was to call it a ���zombie pigman.”

Docile at first, the zombie pigman began to approach them slowly. Alarmed, Coil's mercenaries put a bullet into its head, killing it instantly.

That … was a wrong move.

Squeals and pig snorts rose up in cacophony, and then screams and shrieks were following them as zombie pigmen rushed down at them in hordes. At first, a dozen chased after them, squealing and shrieking. When they fell to the mercenaries' guns, two dozen followed.

Next, four dozen.

Then, a hundred.

And finally, far more than she could count on the spot joined the attack, and the mercenaries, who depended on their shiny tinkertech, died as they were torn to pieces.

She ran.

It was supposed to be a quick exploration.

'This is how I'm going to die,' Lisa thought to herself as she stumbled forward. 'I'm going to die to zombies.'

It was ridiculous, and she would have laughed hysterically if she had the strength. Instead, she coughed through her parched throat and collapsed. Hours of running had finally taken its toll on her.

Her power didn't stop working though, and told her just how perilous of a situation she was in.

Muscles overheated and lacking in energy. Lack of water from the body denotes a cessation of energy production. Extremely dehydration bordering on medical emergency.

She couldn't move, though. She just didn't have the energy.

She was so tired.

As her conscious slipped into the Morpheus, she heard the squeals and shrieks of those monsters.

And an odd sound that didn't belong with them.

Her eyes opened slowly.

And met a pair of brown eyes that shined a lot.

”Ah. She's awake!” the voice of the eyes said before they -and the head they resided in- pulled away.

She blinked slowly and wheezed.

Someone came into wherever she was with the quiet thud of a door opening. Oddly enough, Lisa didn't hear the sound of joints.

”Can't believe another one was in the nether of all places,” someone grumbled. ”Why doesn't Tyler just shut those portals down, for God's sake?!”

Lisa slowly turned her head towards the voice and saw someone different. Unlike the first pairs of eyes that she saw that was full of innocence and playfulness, the teenager before her had eyes that spoke of self-doubt. It wasn't written on them, so to say, and more her powers telling her every little detail she wanted and didn't want to know.

Girl is extremely familiar with this place. Annoyed at someone else. Her words indicate that this 'Tyler' is responsible for the ”nether.” Nether is where she was before. Nether gates are the product of Tyler. Tyler is Pickaxe.

Then Lisa saw what the girl was holding.

A cup of water.

The girl saw her eyeing the water and helped her with it. She placed the cup of lukewarm onto her hands, helped her grasp the cup and tilted it back slowly. Lisa's lips caught the edge of the cup, and her throat opened up instinctually for the life-saving water. Water tipped over the edge and trickled into her mouth. Her tired and fatigued arms wanted to push the entire content into her mouth as fast as possible, but the girl was preventing her from doing so.

Girl knows that she wants the water. Girl doesn't want her to choke, and is preventing her from choking herself with water.

Lisa didn't care, damn it! She wanted the goddamn water!

And then it was gone.

She stared into the crystal clear cup, confused and angry. Why was the water gone? She barely had a sip!

She had thirty-two sips. Her current d_e_s_i_r_e for water shortened the perception of time.

She knew that! Her power didn't need to tell her that!

She didn't know that before she was reminded of it.

… F_u_c_k_i_n_g power.

She smacked her now wet lips together, but the act was weak and fragile. Lisa frowned as she realized just how close to …

How close to …

Sobs wracked her body as she curled into herself.

She almost died.

Chapter 1.5 Amelia Lavere

”What did I say about rescuing outsider capes?”

Tyler didn't respond. Instead, he just looked to the side and played cool with her.

”Tyler!”