That sounded mighty fine!_Afterlife - Next World's Auction House

With the dawn of the new day, light flooded the bedroom and Mia began squirming like a child that does not want to wake up for school. I found it amusing and chuckled a bit.

[Good morning mashter…] – she said while yawning

“It’s Michael, sleepyhead. How did you sleep?”

[Great! The furs are comfortable and smell so nice…](Mia)

“Yeah, yeah! Just don’t fall asleep again. I need your advice on something.”

[Acknowledged! What could I be of assistance with master?](Mia) – she said while standing up

“I already told you that you should use my name… Anyway, you’ve already read through the description for the Social Policy options right?”

[Indeed.](M)

“What’s your take on the order to acquire them?”

[Tradition, Liberty, Military, Technology and then take a pause and move forward depending on the policies unlocked by the four.](M)

“Why not the Exploration after Technology?”

[Because it is too early to start upgrading the rest of the elves using Faith points. Alexandra is waking up…](M)

[Big sister, you are awake already. Is it morning?](A)

Seeing the amount of cuteness overloading, I stood up from the bed before something else might.

“Good morning Alexa. Take your time, there is still a while until the sun fully raises, so do not be in a rush to get out of bed just yet. I’ll go grab some fruits for breakfast.”

[Mhm!](A) – she nodded obediently

Once I left the house (tree), I saw the sleepy sentinels that kept watch and greeted them.

“Good morning guys! Anything worth reporting?”

[Good morning Mister Michael! Nothing relevant sir. It was peaceful.](Random Elf no5)

“That’s a good thing to hear. Bear with it another hour or so and you’ll be able to go sleep. Thanks for the hard work!”

[Thank you sir!](Random elf no5)

Reaching the ‘storage room’, which was pretty much a spot on the ground covered with leaves on which different types of fruits, vegetables, plants or meat was placed, I realized another problem my civilization had: lack of properly cooked meals!

As a person that worked under one of the best chefs in the world (well, at least back on Earth) and holds a shitload of recipes in my head, how could I allow a diet that’s based on grilled meat and raw fruits or vegetables for my civilization?

Returning to the bedroom with a leaf on which there were different fruits, I found the two girls laughing happily. Apparently, they no longer need to sleep and the drowsiness has long left their eyelashes.

“Breakfast is served my ladies! Now, while you will be pleasing your taste buds with the things in front of you, I need your opinion on something. What do you think of the current diet?”

[Mas... Michael, are you referring to the lack of diversity when cooking the food?](M)

“Indeed!”

[Unfortunately, I cannot be of help since grilled food and some other raw vegetables are the best I can think of Michael… Do you have any ideas?](A)

“Quite a couple of them. But I want to do something different instead of me cooking them…”

[You want to have some people develop the Jobs.](Mia)

“Correct again! It would be better if we can have a group of four to five people that could learn some recipes and take care of the cooking for the entire camp. That will ensure warm food to be available and the three main meals of the day. Do you think is possible?”

[If Denise managed to get the Job of Craftsman after crafting continuously, it shouldn’t be too hard to find five people that have aptitude for cooking. There are at least three that I think of which enjoy making food for everybody else, which I saw the last couple of days.](A)

“I’ll leave it to you girls then. Mia, basic recipes would do for now and we’ll focus today on pottery in order to prepare the required tools for cooking. Have a word with Denise as well and have her prepare some spoons, forks and… that’s it because I can’t really see knives made out of wood...”

[Understood! The recipes should focus on nutrition.](Mia)

“Indeed! It is important to make sure there will be as balanced as possible, since otherwise we might have medical problems we cannot yet solve. Alexa, there is one more thing that we will do today, so you will have to gather the previous hunters that went with us and another 40 people. We’ll begin preparing for the dungeon.”

[Understood! Should I focus on something in specific as well?](A)

“Just make sure they are people capable of handling a spear, throwing a javelin and that are not afraid of spilling some blood on their clothes.”

[I will get right to it!](A)

“Don’t rush! The rest of the people are still sleeping…”

This girl… when it comes to fighting monsters she’s way too excited. I think I could trade her to Odin for at least another couple of hundreds elves-worth of Soul Points. After all, he and any other War Gods will surely know how to appreciate a good berserker.

All jokes aside, I should prepare for some fighting exercises between the dungeon diving group. Having them participate in different drills together will give them an idea of how to move and fight as a whole unit and can also get better acquainted with each other. As for the said exercises… for now, I should focus on stamina building ones, as well as others that require teamwork.

After a couple of hours passed, we split the 200 elves in groups. There were the 60 people unit for woodcutting (50 woodcutters and 10 guards), 35 in the mining unit (25 miners and 10 guards), the 49 people that Alexa picked for the dungeon diving unit, we were left with only 55 people. Out of the 55 there were the suddenly 10 people with Denise included that wanted to craft things only (probably due to someone messing with her dreams…) and because apparently she woke up even before sunrise and crafted like a madman, we currently have 2 extra carts that we can use beside the one I poorly made.

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Obviously, I had her increase that number up to 10 as first priority and assigned another 20 people to the task of going back and forth between the resources spot and the camp and carrying them. The ratio was 7-3, with seven for the lumber and three for the stone, because we are currently in dire need of such a resource for the buildings…

That left me with 25 people unemployed. Out of those, twenty were the people that yesterday played with the furs and learned how to sew shit together, so there was nothing to do about them, while out of the remaining five were the ones that Mia and Alexa picked to learn how to cook…

“In situations like this the low number of people becomes obvious… I really need to get more people fast. Right! Let’s pick the social reform Tradition before I forget…”

Tradition social reform has been selected!

The cost of selecting it is 7 culture points and you currently have 8 points available.

Would you like to proceed? Yes No

“Yes!”

Major achievement: Socialist

Congratulations!

Your civilization took its first step onto the political ladder and with it, the people will feel more at home.

Your civilization acquired Tradition and received as benefits an increase of 3 culture points per day and a faster expansion rate of your territories borders!

Due to the effect Tradition reform has on your world’s population, the people’s happiness increases!

There was that vague thing about people’s happiness again, but no actual numbers. However, now I can begin properly developing my civilization.

[Master, have you seen the achievement?](Mia)

“Not yet. Does it have a good reward?”

[The reward is all right, however master might be more interested in something else.](Mia)

Seeing as how she was rather cryptic about it, I decided to take a look in order to satisfy my curiosity. However, boy was I surprised about what I saw…

Socialist

Requirement: acquire the first social policy for your civilization;

Rank: 3rd

Reward: 500AP

“Third place? Two others have made a pick before we did. How? If everyone starts with the same number of culture points per day, then it doesn’t make sense for me to be third…”

[However, do not forget that we had an entire day that we missed in the beginning master…](Mia)

“Right… there was that. So you’re implying that the other two didn’t?”

[Indeed.](Mia)

“I guess that makes sense… Anyway, we’ll catch up fast because we have something that they don’t.”

[Elves?](Mia)

“Pfft! Hahaha! No, I was thinking something more among the lines of the dungeons. Given that we have the Military reform and a group of Tier 1 dungeon divers that I’ll get ready to fight soon enough, we’ll overtake them soon enough.”

[… So my answer was correct…](Mia)

“…I guess it was. My bad love.” – I honestly said after patting her head

With everyone having their designated assignments and with the reminder that, in the end this is still a competition, I walked towards the dungeon diving unit waiting patiently for my instructions.

Seeing its composition from afar, my dream of having a Spartan unit shattered with each step…

“Why are only six guys in this unit!? Oh my bad… there’s one more there in the back… and there’s me as well… why the hell are there eight guys only!? How?”

Seeing my expression, Alexandra shrugged and pretty much said through that: ‘it is what it is…”. To avoid depression, I began thinking about what the hell I’m I supposed to do if I can’t create a unit capable of using shield wall to protect themselves.

The only idea I could come up with was the obvious… guerrilla tactics.

“Okay everyone! The tactics we’ll be employing in the future will heavily rely on your stamina and coordination. So from now on, we’ll hold daily exercises here in the clearing in the morning, go out, hunt in the afternoon and again do more exercises in the evening before sleeping. Any complaints?”

[[[None!]]]

“That’s what you say right now. Let’s see how you manage to hold out after the first set. All right, let’s get this party going, shall we? We will begin with laps around the clearing. Everyone split up in five rows of ten people and stay at an arm’s length away from each other. Come on, quickly!”

To my utmost delight, the group had a really good discipline and were quite expectant. Everyone heard the story of the first dungeon diving expedition against the damned Murlocs and quite the number of souls had the desire to fight sparked inside of them. Now if I could add some military next to their current discipline, the future expeditions will surely become easier.

“Alright! Let us get started! We’ll all start running now until we reach the first tree of the forest, then circle around the clearing.”

[When do we stop Michael sir?](Random elf no6)

“When your feet can no longer carry you! Go on, get moving!”

Following an ancient rule, as Commander I also had to follow the orders that I gave in order to enforce that there is no difference in ranks when it comes to military rule. With something like an ironclad rule in place, it will be very difficult for them to break it and they will be more likely to follow it to the letter.

Therefore, our bitter stamina training had truly started…

“Breathe in through your nose, exhale through your mouth. Find your rhythm. Actually, listen to my voice and pace yourselves based on it! Listen because you will sing along!

Hi Ho Diddly Bop