Episode Transcript
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This is a promotional episode. Sen returned home to his mother
and Yara. When he got to the house, he
noticed that his mother was already starting to put the
money he left her to good use. The facade of the building had
been cleaned and new flowers were just starting to bloom in
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the planters outside. Slowly, it was beginning to look
more like the house Sen grew up in.
He had dinner with his family that night.
His sister wanted adventure stories, but Sen knew he
couldn't breathe a word of his stint with the Sons of Heaven
gang. His mother would have a heart
attack if she knew just how dangerous his latest venture
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was, and he didn't want to spoilthe mood.
The whole family was happier than they had been in a long
time, and when his mother had learned he'd been spending the
night, she splurged and ordered more food than they could
possibly eat, a luxury that was far beyond their reach a month
ago. She was always frugal, having
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come from a poor background herself, but Sen was pleased to
see that she was willing to spend a little more for things
that made her happy, even if sheonly did it because her children
could enjoy them as well. Instead, he told them of a
copper tooth Panther hunt. Although there were some
embellishments, namely the way he described it, he had a whole
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team of fellow hunters there with him to keep him safe.
Yara made fun of him for hiding behind others instead of
fighting the copper Tooths himself, but Susanna was visibly
gladdened by the image of her son making friends and being
safe. That night Sent read Yara her
favorite story. While he read, he thought back
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to the fight earlier that day. I'm obviously getting stronger,
but that was a good reminder that I've got a long way to go.
Sarah Aaron really is as strong as they say.
If we're going to fight again, Ineed to be sure I'm improving
all the time. She certainly will be.
When Sen fell asleep that night,he had a plan.
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The next day, he didn't head back to God's sanctuary.
Instead, he got on the tram and took it to Marshall Hall.
He hadn't spent much time in thelocal Marshall Hall.
They were expensive and the mostexposure he got to it was on a
field trip. Almost a decade ago, public
schools did not have the fundingto teach advanced martial arts
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and kept their curriculums rather simple.
Either way, Sen would not have been able to learn hyper Geno
arts without getting Geno pointsfirst, and you couldn't get a
chance for that until you graduated.
And hyper Geno arts were the primary focus of Marshall Halls.
They developed and practiced techniques that required their
user to have already upgraded their body.
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The techniques would shape thoseupgrades in unique ways
beneficial to the user. Inside Sen's backpack was an
envelope full of cash. In ancient history, martial arts
masters would generally come from wealth and would teach for
the benefit of humankind, but that was no longer the case.
Now they taught for money. It was a flawed system that kept
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many warriors from reaching their true potential, but at
least now Sen was equipped to operate in that system rather
than be rebuffed by it. He arrived at the famous Aries
Marshall Hall and marveled at its grandeur.
It was somewhat similar to the Starlight Marshall Hall, but the
builders of the Aries Marshall Hall had the benefit of modern
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technology that would not function in God's sanctuary.
The result was a building that was far more imposing.
Although it did not contain the amenities for the massive
exhibition matches that the Starlight Marshall Hall would
host, it's space was far more practical, dedicated solely to
connecting fighters to their true potential and separating
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them from their money. Sen walked into the lobby of the
building and noticed the walls were covered in portraits.
Most of the portraits were of older people, most of whom gave
off an air of respectable authority and knowledge, but one
portrait stood out. It was of a scraggly, rather
ugly old man whose unkempt stubble and wild eyes made him
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look more like a beggar than a teacher.
Sen knew who he was by sight. Old Devil, a veteran of some
particularly violent battles with the Shura civilization.
After a horrific injury, the OldDevil was forced to retire from
active duty and open the Aries Marshall Hall to teach humanity
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what he knew for a price. While the teachers he hired were
all top notch, there was no doubt that it was the old Devil
himself that made the hall so famous and successful.
While Sen was looking at the portrait, he felt a tap on his
shoulder. He wheeled around, surprised not
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to hear someone sneak up on him like that.
Standing in front of him was thereal old devil.
The little man's head wouldn't reach Sen's chin even if he
stood up straight. He growled at Sen.
Young man, show some manners. Sen bowed low to the grouchy old
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man, and the old devil began laughing to himself.
Stand up straight, kid, I'm messing with you.
You here to learn something, or did you just come to Gog with
your mouth hanging open? I'm here to learn, Sir.
Sen knew the old man was speaking casually, but something
told him he was still a man to speak carefully to.
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Well, good for you. We teach all sorts of stuff.
We got fist fighting weapon skills, a few hyper Geno arts,
brewed some of those up myself. He winked and produced a
brochure from somewhere in his robes.
I'll break them all down in thishere brochure.
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See labeled elementary intermediate.
Those are the advanced classes there.
That's 10,100 thousand and the advanced der million Ross.
A few special topics that it'll cost you extra to.
What'll it be? Based on the look of you, I'd
say elementary. I want to learn ghost haunt.
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Sen didn't really know what Ghost Haunt was per SE, but he
had heard from his own father that it was extremely strong,
especially against opponents whoare more powerful than you.
Seeing as he would be going up against Sarah Aaron in the
future, who was definitely stronger than he was, he could
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use lessons on how to handle her.
Plus, Son of Heaven was gunning for him.
God, Sen thought, I've made a lot of powerful enemies.
The old devil was surprised by his answer.
He chuckled. Ghosh on Ho ho, aren't you
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ambitious? That one is not so easy.
And he pointed to a spot on the brochure and looked at Sen with
skeptical eyes. Expensive.
You've got 1,000,000. Sen opened his backpack and the
old devil's eyes widened. Would you look at that?
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Well, I'm not one to turn down agood payday, but I have to ask,
you know, for legal purposes, werecommend people only learn this
one if they've at least maxed out their mutant Geno points.
Again, I'll teach you anyway, but my lawyer says that if we
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kill too many students, we couldget shut down.
So. He shrugged.
Sen knew this was coming. Ghost Haunt was an unpopular
choice due to its high barrier of entry.
Most people who are even capableof learning it wouldn't choose
it because it was good against stronger opponents, and most
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people figured that if they werestrong enough to learn the
ability, they wouldn't need to worry about finding people
stronger than them. But Sen knew they were always
going to be those stronger than him, and it did not make him
stronger to deny that fact. Test me, Sen said.
I can take it. He wasn't really sure that this
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was true, but it was worth a shot.
We'll see. 10,000 up front for the physical fitness test.
Sen handed over a stack of billsfrom his backpack, and the old
devil shoved it haphazardly intohis robes.
He took Sen into a separate roomfull of sensors and had him
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strike a series of poses. Some of the poses were so odd
that Sen started to think it waspurely for the old devil's
benefit. The old man had a strange sense
of humor. Eventually, the old man stopped
him. All right, all right, you
passed, kid. Great, can we start now?
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The old man held out his wrinkled hand, palm up.
Sen took out 1,000,000 Levo fromhis bag and placed the massive
sum in the old man's hand. We can start.
The old man said as he pocketed the money.
Come with me. They went to a separate room
that looked exactly the same as the first, but this one had a
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sign that said screening room. It was empty save for a few
sensors. In the center of the room was a
single hollow lens. The old devil pressed a button
on the wall and the room lit up.Then he went to leave.
Sen called. Hey, wait, you're supposed to
teach me Ghost Haunt. I am.
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And he closed the door, leaving Sen alone in the room.
He could hear the old man's laughter growing distant as his
teacher walked away. Then the hollow lens sprung to
life, and an image of the old devil appeared in the room.
Hello student, welcome to your first lesson for Ghost Haunt.
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Good luck and don't die. The old devil may have been
irreverent and weird, but his teaching style was actually
quite straightforward. He would demonstrate the
elements of the technique, explain how they worked, and
then allowed the student to try them out.
The hologram would be able to spot mistakes and point them
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out, and this would continue until the student could recreate
them. Florida State Sen found himself
taking to ghost on. It was an odd technique.
Ghost Haunt was primarily A grappling style.
However, grappling was usually meant for subduing weaker
opponents. Stronger opponents could usually
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break out of your grasp. Also, a more powerful opponent
could usually dodge a grab. However, Ghost Haunt accounted
for all that. The fighting system allowed its
user to tap into the momentum oftheir opponent and approach so
that the opponent was at a disadvantage.
Using Ghost Haunt, Sen would be able to detect the perfect
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trajectory for a grab attack. Then Ghost Haunt would allow him
to find the least defended part of his enemy's body and stick to
it, forcing an opponent to expend vital energy as he
strengthened his grip on them. This is perfect against Sarah,
Sen thought. Her superior strength and speed
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won't matter if I'm able to execute this technique properly.
It's not all good though. She already thinks I'm a pervert
and Ghost Haunt is a grappling move.
If there's a way to beat her andconvince her I'm not gross,
well, this isn't it. As if agreeing with him, the
hologram Old Devil cracked a joke.
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And remember, if you're facing off against a female opponent,
remember to buy her dinner firstbefore you go using Ghost Hunt
on her. Can Sen really trust the old man
for teaching him the Ghost Hauntskill?
What's really coming for him in this room with no one but him
only? To find out what happens next,
(12:50):
follow us here on Spotify, and for more such stories, download
the Pocket FM app link in the description.
Sen emerged from the training relatively unscathed.
The technique was indeed trying on his body, but luckily it
appeared he was in fact strong enough to withstand the physical
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transformation it required. His flexibility was now greatly
improved, and he had a deepened sense of the physics of the
world around him, like his senses were now trained to
detect momentum in addition to sound and taste.
It was going to be tricky, he realized, finding an outlet for
practicing the new technique. As it was a close range ability,
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he wouldn't be able to use it onhigh level creatures as it would
leave him far too open to counter attacks, and weaker
creatures would not provide the necessary challenge to improve.
To be honest, best practice would be to get into a fight
with Sarah Aaron again. Sen had actually been itching to
fight Sarah again almost as soonas he left the combat training
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room. He was an excellent sparring
partner as he never had to worryshe was pulling her punches.
As Sen left the Aries Marshall Hall, he couldn't help but hope
Sarah caught him on his way backinto the sanctuary.
However, Sarah Arden was not waiting for him at the
teleportation center or at the shelter when he arrived.
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When he got to his quarters, he was disappointed but unharmed.
His mood brightened when he saw the state of the copper toothed
Panther in the cage. It was now very clearly a mutant
creature. The stone had not seemed to lose
any effectiveness, which had been a fear in the back of Sen's
mind, nor did it seem to evolve the creatures any faster.
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He considered whether or not to kill the animal now.
He therefore Geno points or cashor to allow it to continue
evolving into a sacred blood creature.
He ultimately decided it was time to shoot for the stars and
kept the Panther alive for now. If he could really get sacred
blood flesh from it, it would beworth the wait.
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He had to keep his eyes peeled as he headed out of the
sanctuary. He wanted a fight with Sarah,
but it had to be planetside if he wanted to be sure he'd
survive the encounter. It didn't appear that the Son of
Heaven had re established the checkpoints at the shelter after
the incident at The Cave. This made sense, after all,
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nobody thought the Golden Warrior was going to just show
up one day ready to get jumped. He headed out and looked for a
remote place to do some hunting.He found one in a remote spot in
the mountains, which were quickly becoming his favoured
Biome for hunting. There was a dense forest oddly
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placed in between peaks, and this was where Sen headed.
He no longer bothered to hunt for ordinary creatures.
He would only spend time killingprimitive creatures if he
thought there was something rarein it for him, like a
particularly exciting beast soul.
After all, he had now maxed out on ordinary Geno points and was
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at over 80 primitive Geno points.
The flesh of most primitive creatures wouldn't even grant
him anything. What he really needed were
mutant and Sacred Blood Geno points, but so did everyone.
Some people were content with a low level evolution, but many
thought of a mutant level evolution as the minimum
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requirement for a respectable goal.
Sen wanted all four maxed out when he evolved.
That was the best a person couldhope for, and far beyond the
average person's capability. But Sen had two things most
people didn't, the love and support of his family and the
mysterious Blackstone that upended everything Sen knew
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about God's sanctuary in the still of the forest.
Sen suddenly had a realization. Oh my God, I have a mutant
beast's soul from Sarah. I totally forgot I could have
used this before. Now let's see, what even is it?
He conjured an image of the beast's soul to his mind, and
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the voice in his head told him type of beast's soul from mutant
three eyed cat pet. Pet huh?
Well that seems perfect for my purposes.
While I focus on killing mutant creatures in the occasional
sacred blood, I can have my pet handle the remaining primitive
level creatures. OK Sarah, let's see what you
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gave me. He summoned his new pet.
The mutant beast's soul materialized in front of him.
It was a cat like beast with three golden eyes, incredibly
sharp teeth, and it was the sizeof a small rabbit.
Sarah, you better not have just given me the worst thing you
had. Of course you did, why wouldn't
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you? Can this thing even kill a
primitive creature? It doesn't look like it could
harm a family. He heard a branch snap and saw a
sharp scale Iguanodon nearby. It was a primitive creature, a
sort of lizard that walked on 2 legs covered in pointed scales
as thin as knives. It was an herbivore though, and
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relatively harmless, a perfect test for his beast's old pet.
He looked at it. How is he supposed to command
it? Just speak to it.
Go kill that iguanodon. Go on, get it.
The odd looking cat tilted its head at him.
He gestured to the iguanodon, which had bent over to pick up a
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leafy plant at the base of a tree.
The cat turned to the iguanodon.Then, as though it was a
creature 10 times the size, it pounced with a little squeak.
Landing on the creature's tail. It sunk its claws and teeth into
the beast. The sharp scale iguanodon looked
behind it ponderously, barely registering the attack.
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Then it flicked its tail, which tossed the cat beast into some
fallen leaves. The leaves didn't move for a
bit, and Sen started to worry that the iguanodon had actually
killed his new pet. However, after a moment, the
leaves began to rustle and he heard a mew.
The cat popped its head out and blinked its three eyes.
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Then, without looking away from the iguanodon, it walked
backwards towards Sen's feet, where it nestled its head
against his fins. The beast was cute and Sen had
never had a pet before, but right now he was too frustrated
to appreciate the tiny fuzzy monster rubbing its head against
him. He was busy thinking about Sarah
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Aren. She tricked me, he thought.
I could have sworn I saw her smirk a little when she gave me
the mutant beast's soul, and nowI know why.
He tried to urge the cat in the battle again, but this time the
three eyed cat wouldn't even fight the larger creature.
It just stayed with him. But Sen wouldn't give up that
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easily. He tried everything to make the
mutant beast's soul pet fight. He tried tossing the cat at the
Iguanodon, but the Iguanodon simply pivoted and smacked the
cat out of the air with its tail.
He tried hyping up the cat, giving a battle cry.
The cat mimicked the cry with its own high pitched.
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Sen even attacked the Iguanodon himself and, using Ghost Hunt,
managed to pin it down, wearing his armor to prevent its razor
scales from hurting him. He flipped the Iguanodon upside
down and held it still, revealing a spot on its chest
where its scales were scarcer. He pointed at the Iguanodon's
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weak spot and grunted. Bite cat thing.
The cat's three eyes narrowed and looked at the flipped
Iguanodon. It looked like it was actually
going to attack. Maybe it was going to get
revenge. But instead of biting down on
the creature's weak point, the cat charged at it and delivered
a mighty head butt that sent thecat bouncing back to the ground.
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The cat immediately popped up. This time it was totally unhurt
physically, just a little dazed.At least it seemed to have the
durability of a mutant beast soul.
Sen shook his head as he released the Iguanodon, which
took off after the cat beast, chasing it around the trees in a
big circle. It was clear that he would not
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be using this beast soul to huntanytime soon.
Sen decided to take pity on the tiny cat.
He stood up and jumped in the way of the chasing iguanodon.
He activated Jade's skin on his hands and delivered a terrific
punch to the lizard's head, killing it.
To the cat beast's credit, it did try to get revenge on its
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now dead arch enemy, the Iguanodon, but the cat's teeth
just didn't seem to be able to Pierce the creature's scales.
Sen sighed. It was no use.
Still, the cat attempted to gnawat the foot of the Iguanodon.
It gave up after a few minutes and gazed up at scent with a
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mew. He couldn't help but smile.
The silly thing didn't know its own size and always seemed to
bounce back. The creature sort of reminded
him of his younger sister, Yara.I wish Yara was as durable as
this cat thing. Then I wouldn't worry about her
so often. By the time Yara was born, the
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Han family was already in dire financial straits, and she was
given so few toys she may do with her one doll.
She called her doll Nilly, and imagine Nilly had a great big
house with all the things Yara didn't.
Nilly even had a cat, and she had named it Mauser because it
gobbled up all the imaginary mice in Nilly's imaginary home.
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He remembered Yara meowing in the corner, imagining Nilly
petting her beloved cat. I'll name him Mauser.
Send decided. He skinned the iguanodon and
sliced a piece of flesh off for Mauser.
Mauser was hesitant at first, sniffing the meat, but once he
was satisfied with his investigation, he gobbled the
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whole piece in a flash. Sen laughed.
Oh, you're hungry, huh? Mauser jumped onto the skinned
iguanodon and began to eat ravenously from the much larger
lizard. Sen leaned against a tree and
watched as Mauser ate its fill. It's nice to have something else
out here with me. Most living creatures I come
across in the wild either run for me or want to kill me.
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Come to think of it, most peoplein the shelter feel the same
way. Maybe it won't be so bad to have
a pet. Sen closed his eyes and listened
to the gentle ripping of lizard flesh, enjoying the calm.
But just beyond the reach of Sen's jade skin enhanced
hearing. Something big and thunderous was
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coming to upend it all. What's coming next for Sen and
how will he face it? Does his encounter with the cat
is just a coincidence or something more?
To find out what happens next, follow us here on Spotify, and
for more such stories, download the Pocket FM app link in the
description.