I yawned as I stared at the piece of shark meat being grilled.

I felt a bit better today. Taking it slow and relaxing after building the makeshift shelter yesterday had definitely helped. Even if it had already been almost a week since I’d done anything when it came to traveling or exploring dungeons…

Not that I was particularly eager to get back to it after last time. I needed to prepare more. Properly prepare. Not just haphazardly walk inside and hope for the best.

In fact, I needed to organize myself better overall and stop… yoloing it all.

That was why yesterday, after my call with the police detectives, I took the time to give some of my regulars the moderator role, made a few more group chats, and invited some new people into them. Group chats, such as ‘Language deciphering’ and ‘World history’, just to give people space right here in the stream chat to theorize and piece things together, rather than having to go off on their own community Dissonance server that I couldn’t even access.

Honestly, it was a bit difficult to keep up with all of the group chats at this point, but I didn’t necessarily need to read everything at all times. People could alert me if something important was happening in one of the group chats.

Or, you know, I could get the Stream Overseer upgrade once I had enough skill points…

Yeah, maybe later.

“So, chat… I’ve been thinking… I’m gonna leave the exploration of the city dungeon for later,” I announced.

Speaking of the city dungeon, I’d idly mentioned the odd feeling I’d had in addition to the usual dread to chat and we quickly agreed that it probably meant that this dungeon was an Intra-based one. Although we still had no idea as to what that actually meant.

But either way, I wasn’t exactly eager to run into enemies with psychic attacks in there. I would have absolutely no way of defending myself if that happened.

GeorgeDoshington: wtf why

uptonMIKE: yeah probably a good idea

trelipideliberitation: gonna go exploring?

I hummed.

“I’m gonna go back in there… but only to retrieve my stuff. Then I’m gonna leave. And then… well, I was supposed to be trying to cross the river and then go toward that other building, right? Kinda got distracted a bit…”

Story of my life. Constant distractions.

I really ought to do better, though. Especially if a distraction could end up with me poisoned and suffering for three days straight.

Oh yeah, I had plenty of time to reflect on what had happened. I’d been acting incredibly reckless. From the moment I’d hatched, I’d just been doing whatever I pleased without thinking too much about it. And of course, save for a couple of people, most of my chat had only encouraged that.

Well, I’d learned my lesson now.

And it only took nearly dying a few times and being poisoned and miserable in cold rain for a couple of days! Wow, incredible job, me!

Sarcasm aside, I was serious this time. No more half-assing things.

I didn’t want to die. And it had become very obvious that I wasn’t invincible. Far from it.

In fact, chat and I had continued our heated discussion on my weaknesses and how to make up for them yesterday.

Considering how the second dungeon’s enemy’s attacks had slid off of me, we had concluded that the archer’s arrows were either very sharp, or they had some kind of armor-piercing effect in addition to the poison.

Because of course they would. Why wouldn’t the first dungeon I entered have the perfect counter for my new build? It was like the water park countering my fire build all over again.

With that said, if I had to fight the archer or a similar monster again, I would probably have to resort to using my Bullet TIme and finishing it as quickly as possible before I could get poisoned again.

Not that I was planning on trying to clear that dungeon anytime soon…

trelipideliberitation: can we get more ads pls

uptonMIKE: did you complete the quest yet?

“Of course you want ads.” I rolled my eyes. “Quest…? Oh, right. The one about building a shelter.”

I brought up the quest info.

‘Good night’s sleep’ Side quest

Time left: 19d,23h,15m

Main objective:

   Find a shelter to sleep in [ACHIEVED]

Side objectives:

   Create that shelter yourself [ACHIEVED]

   Find some bedding and a pillow [ACHIEVED]

   Have a proper door to your shelter

Rewards - 3SP

Pentalty for failure - 5SP debt

“I totally forgot about this. I guess I did end up building a shelter, huh…? Hmm, I could complete it right now… Or I could try and make a door.”

I glanced over to my makeshift shelter and wondered how I would even go about making a door. What would the quest even count as one? Could I just cut out a plank and then shove it in the openings?

Jeofffff: yoooo im early today

“Hey, Jeoff,” I greeted as I removed the piece of meat from the fire, blew on it, and began slowly eating.

Jeofffff: you better today?

I hummed in affirmation.

Jeofffff: nice

Jeofffff: so more dungeon?

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I grunted in annoyance.

“No. Like I was just saying, I’m just gonna go get my stuff back and then leave. I still wanna find out what that other building is, you know?”

Jeofffff: aww

Jeofffff: probably another dungeon tbh

GeorgeDoshington: what if ur stuff despawned tho

“Probably.” I grimaced. “I really hope it didn’t. That would really suck…”

I didn’t think it would, but I also didn’t know how exactly that dungeon worked. It was clearly different from the water park one, so there was a chance that it had just eaten my items.

Jeofffff: are you gonna do preparations?

“Preparations?” I asked as I chewed.

Jeofffff: like craft new weapons

Jeofffff: cuz you left your halberd there

I hummed.

“That’s true… If more monsters jump me, that would really suck without my main weapon…” Then I paused as I thought back on what had happened in that dungeon. “But then again, the naginata wasn’t very useful there… It was too bulky in the small room and too slow against the archer.”

As cool as it was, I was starting to think that I might need a different weapon. Something smaller and faster. Well, the key sword was alright. Maybe I could soulbind it and build that up instead of the naginata? Or, actually, I could unfuse the thing and just use the base sword again.

Jeofffff: combine your guns

I raised an eyebrow.

“What, because I need two heavy-hitting guns in one…? Actually, I wonder how that would end up working.” I grimaced. “Like… if I combine the handcannon into the water gun, am I gonna have to deal with hypersonic bouncing plasma balls? That sounds suicidal.”

Or maybe it would fire plasma balls that exploded, just like the water gun’s bullets did.

Jeofffff: maybe idk

trelipideliberitation: why not combine them with other stuff?

trelipideliberitation: like just random combinations

“What, like… combine the water gun with the emerald? What would that even do?”

trelipideliberitation: idk that’s what I wanna know

I hummed.

“You know what? You’re right. I should spend some time trying to combine things again.”

Although for that, I would need to swap around my skills again. And then I would have to wait for the cooldown if I didn’t want to risk not being able to swap back to my other skills in the dungeon.

Ugh, the cooldowns were so annoying.

“I guess getting my stuff back can wait a day,” I decided. “If they could despawn, then they would have already, I think… Yeah, let’s make today an experimental fusion day again!” I looked at my shelter again. “And I guess I can try making a door too.”

Jeofffff: hell yeeeeah

trelipideliberitation: nice!

trelipideliberitation: ad now?

I gave Trelip in chat a look, even if they couldn’t see it.

“Okay, sure. Have an ad, chat! I’m gonna finish my breakfast in the meantime.”

I let an ad play as I ate and idly watched it through the stream history. Without subtitles at first, just so I could watch it with subtitles together with chat later.

It was about some guy who looked sorta human, but then had these colorful feathers growing on his forearms.

Kinda like the lady from the other ad. Huh. Were those two related in any way?

He was happily chattering while showing the viewers some kind of futuristic-looking sci-fi handgun. I couldn’t understand the words, but it was obvious that he was explaining the gun’s functions and its ‘amazing’ qualities or whatever. The scene changed and it showed him actually using the gun, shooting very thin glowing projectiles with a comet-like tail that penetrated through the blocks of metal he had prepared. The gun itself was actually silent and apparently there was barely any recoil when he fired it.

Also, now that the camera angle changed, I could see that he also had an avian tail with the same colorful feathers.

Was he part bird? But he had no wings…? Weird.

The ad finished and I turned on the subtitles before watching it again with chat. It was exactly as I’d expected. He was advertising some kind of mass-produced gun that was supposed to be perfect for any dungeons with robots in them.

Oh boy, if only I’d had that back when I’d hatched.

Interestingly, he also said something that caught the chat’s attention.

trelipideliberitation: oh humans are making these?

trelipideliberitation: so they make them using fusion?

“Hmm, good point. I haven’t really thought about it, but you could use the Fusion skill to keep creating the same stuff over and over and then sell it, huh?” I huffed. “Not that that’s useful for me.”

It was interesting to think about though. If each race had its own set of skills, what kind of ‘roles’ were available to every race? With human skills, I could see a dungeon conquering-focused ‘build’, an item-crafting ‘build’, and maybe an exploration ‘build’?

On the other hand, the phoenix skills were heavily focused on fire-based combat and… perhaps traveling or hunting? Heat Vision and Featherfall would be useful for both.

Well, that was just from the tier one skills. Who knew what else phoenixes could do?

Damn, now I was curious what skills the various races had access to. Would I ever find out? Maybe an ad would show someone using their skills one day.

“Alright! Time to get started!” I exclaimed after having finished my breakfast.

As always, I summoned John and pointed him at a random tree before sticking my hands into his view and counting down from seven.

“Goooood mooorning, my precious little Aquamarines!” I cheered as I finished my countdown and had John turn to face me. “It’s me! Aoto Nana, your favorite wilderness survivalist!” I coughed into my hand and looked to the side. “If you’ve been keeping up with my epic adventures, you might know that, uh, I’m kind of terrible at that though. Nearly died to poison and all that jazz.”

I forced a smile back onto my face.

“But it’s all good! I’m alive and I learned my lesson! Don’t rush into dungeons even if they seem relatively easy at first! Preparation is key!”

I began walking toward my shelter.

“With that said, even though I feel much better today, I’m gonna take another day off before venturing back into that dungeon to retrieve my stuff! But don’t worry! That doesn’t mean that we won’t be doing anything interesting this stream!”

I ducked down and crawled into my amazing shelter before locating my backpack I’d dropped in the corner and rummaging through it.

“Today, we’re doing two things! One: Make a door for this shelter to finish the quest. And two: More experiments with Fusion! We have so much more stuff than the last time we’d done this! So many exciting combinations! I hope to get something cool again!”

I began pulling stuff out of the backpack and putting it on the grass bed inside my shelter.

“Well, making the door might get easier once I actually make some new stuff. Maybe I could try to fuse this emerald thing with my key sword? Or maybe I can somehow craft a knife out of it to better carve that door? Who knows! Of course, though, you guys will be helping me with all of this!”

GeorgeDoshington: let’s gooooo

GeorgeDoshington: plastic wrapper into gloooove

I scowled.

“George, stop trying to get me to craft garbage again. I have more Ether to work with than last time, but it’s still limited!”

Jeofffff: fuse your gun into the turtle

Jeofffff: remote controled sentry gun

trelipideliberitation: I say use the emerald on gun

trelipideliberitation: see what happens

“...Huh. You know, that’s a cool idea, Jeoff. But… I’m still kinda wary of controlling Gargles again like that.” I grimaced, remembering the little Intra episode. “...But then again, it would probably be a good idea for me to get a better handle on it, just so I know my limits, huh? I mean, who knows? Maybe I’ll need to actually use it one day.”

Maybe I would find a small crawl space where I couldn’t fit and would have to send Mr. Gargles on a quest instead.

“Alright, chat! One more item on the agenda, then! Coaching Mr. Gargles on becoming the best scout ever!” I paused. “After John, of course.”

Speaking of which, it was strange that using John didn’t drain Intra. Or maybe it did, but it was much lower? Still, it was strange it worked like that considering John and Mr. Gargles fulfilled similar roles.

Maybe it was because John’s point of view was just an additional screen whereas Mr. Gargles’ vision literally overlaid my own?

Still odd.

Anyway!

Time to fuse stuff!