Meh, I'll save them for something important. I'd invest in mobile podding, but I don't plan on going anywhere for now unless I absolutely have to. So, it's back to sitting on my ass and waiting for absolutely nothing to happen. If I'm lucky another monster will wander into my domain. Well, at least today seems warmer than yesterday. Talk about freak weather patterns, I wonder if it will be warm enough to start melting the snow? Well I'll figure it later today. Now the corpse flowers finished regrowing over night, which means it's minion time. Hmm actually I wonder if I can upgrade my minions some more? I open the design function and pull up the level eight twigling template. Now, let's see if I can add more levels. To my glee I'm able to modify the template adding more levels but again hit a cap, this time at level thirteen. Interesting, I'll have to keep an eye on this part. I’m again seemingly limited to only being able to do four fifths my level, but I don’t know if that’s a rounded or accurate number. I'll test it some more in my coming levels. I go to distribute the new points from the levels and find to my surprise I have a new skill I can add to it.
Apparently I can give the twiglings throwing proficiency as a skill then level it up using points, interesting. I can still also give them the universal comprehension skill, but I'm not wasting points on that for twiglings. Still, my other skills that I got with my race and class don't show up for the possible skills on the template, which means that only general skills not related to race can be applied. I wonder how it would work for classes and what not, if a twigling managed to obtain a class would the skills automatically be given? Eh, I might never know, I don't see a way to apply a class despite the fact it's over Level ten, and hell if I know why. Might have something to do with it being a twigling, none of the creatures around here have classes despite being well over level ten.
I'll leave throwing proficiency off for now, I might experiment with it later but at the moment I can't think of anything they could throw and do actual damage, maybe I could make spears for them but that's a lot of work and I want to focus on getting numbers up first. I distribute the points evenly between strength, Agility, and endurance. What I'm left with is an upgraded twigling that costs a bit more in terms of resources, but should be able to square up with the locals a lot better, maybe even take a hit without dieing. And yes, it still has the purple Afro.
Race: Twigling: Level 13 (Lesser)
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Health: 123/123
Mana: 82/82
Stamina: 544/544
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Strength: 38
Agility: 33
Endurance: 33
Magic: 5
Fortitude: 15
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General skills:
* Flora Network Connection - Level: 1 (Max)
Perfection, I immediately start growing a new one nearby. Surprisingly it grows fine despite the fact it's buried under four feet of snow. Speaking of buried under snow, apparently the outer petals of my pod come with a heater function, because all the snow from that last storm has melted away. The twiglings on the other hand is buried, and I run into problems a few minutes later when the base starts to grow. It's got no room to grow because of the snow, so I have the other two go over and dig it enough space to grow. The temperature means nothing, only the space to grow is needed. I suspect that only works up to a certain point. Something tells me it wouldn't grow well if it was hot enough to spontaneously combust. After enough snow is cleared the process resumes and I focus patiently on getting it done.
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It's going to cost a bit more mana and nutrients, almost fifty percent more for both. The time to grow on the other hand is down to about an hour and a half. I think it would take longer to grow than the level eights did before, but the skill upgrades have cut that down drastically. That's good, because I plan on having a lot of these guys running around to keep my ass from getting weed whacked again.
About half way through the growing process I notice water starting to pool under the snow, and I'm pretty sure it's lost an inch or two off the top. I guess the sun is finally getting around to melting it. Now that I think about it it does feel a bit warmer outside, the cold has lost its edge.
After an hour and a half the twigling is finally ready. It steps off its docking station and plants its spindly legs to the floor with a small splash, the water from the melting snow is starting to pool. Hopefully it won't get bad, I'd hate to get flooded. Wait, flooded …. I turn my attention to the den I cleared the other day. Thankfully it's not filled with water, the natural drainage seems to be keeping up with the inflow, for now. Actually this is a great opportunity to compare the old and new twiglings. I order the twiglings to go to the cave and haul the corpses. Imminently they all rush off in that direction and it quickly becomes clear which are better. The old twiglings had a head start but lost it by the time they got to the den. The increased strength on the level thirteen twigling meant it had less trouble dragging its assigned corpse out of the den and across the snow, that combined with the increased speed meant that the other two were only half way back by the time the new one finished its delivery to my pod.
Unfortunately the twiglings aren't very smart and I have to order the retrieval of every corpse individually, can't say go haul corpses until there are none left. What I can do is queue up the orders thankfully, so I take a second and do that. Once that's done I turn my attention back to my network, I do a pull to check nutrition levels and am pleased to find the corpse flowers have produced enough for another level thirteen, so I get to building. I really need a way to automate this process.
An hour and a half later I have another level thirteen twigling, and more snow has melted away. I don't know what's up with the freak weather patterns around here but it has gotten a shit ton warmer in the last hour and a half. I'm happy I ordered the twiglings to start moving the bodies when I did because the den is basically flooded now. On the plus side, in a few days I'll have plenty of material for twiglings.
Snow will be gone by tomorrow too at this rate, although I might have to worry about flooding with all this water. I'm at the edge of the valley but who knows with the weird shit going on around here. Knowing my luck a waterfall will appear on top of my ass and wash away all my hard work. Hmmm, maybe I should build myself a house. I doubt I could stop a flood, but I might be able to do something about the excess water and cover against any snow that might get dumped on me in the future. Problem is I don't have much left to work with after growing the twiglings. I want to eventually make myself a small fort of sorts, but that's a long way off, and I'll need lots more corpses to do that. I can dream, but for now I'll have to be realistic. I can probably build two walls and a roof over my head, but that also begs the question. Can I survive with a roof over my head? I'm part plant right, the pod is clearly a plant, plants need sunlight. The question is how much, I can probably get away with no light as long as I'm connected to the pod and it has light. But will naturally reflected light be enough for it if I add a few windows? Currently I can't modify the designs for the most part, I can do things like Level up the twiglings and change the hair/less color but I can't make functional changes. So I can't change the shape of the walls, thankfully one of the prefabs has a window. It's a decent size wall, five foot long, half a foot wide and six feet tall.
Problem is given the current size of my pod I'll need two prefabs put together on each side to make a box big enough for my pod. The windows are one foot by one foot so I'll have two moderately sized holes on every side to both let light in and allow my ass to be got at from outside. Well, can't have it perfect I guess. Thankfully I also have a version of the wall without a window, so I guess I'll just go with one window on each side. If I need more light I'll add more windows. Now, how am I going to get a roof? I'll probably just have to grow it out by hand, a pain in the ass but necessary since I do have anything resembling a roof in my designs.
With that I get to work, I order the twiglings to start clearing away snow. It takes them a while to move that much due to their claws not being rated for snow removal, but eventually they get there. While they run off to shovel the space for the next wall segment I get to work on the first. Slowly a structure of thick interwoven vines starts to grow from the ground. I watch as the vines grow to the approximate shape then thicken and bulge until the wall is complete. That took like ten minutes, this should be easy to build at least. The process repeats with the second wall, this time the vines curve and bend apart, only to then entwine again at the top of of then rectangular hole in the middle of the structure. The two walls are so close together you could pass a coin between them but nothing bigger. With that the first side of my house is complete.