Early in the morning, I decided against waking anyone up as we won't be departing anytime soon. It is important that our precious Mini gets adequate sleep. So, I went outside for fresh air and sent two disks out on a hunt for breakfast, catching us a Squaill and something that looks like chicken, just larger and much more confident.

Combat summary

Enemies slain:

Squaill lv 4 x 1

Chick-Krav lv 6 x 1

10 syscred and 26 exp awarded

The chicken turned out to be some kinda martial artist. I clean and cook the two games for everyone—except myself, simple campfire meat on a stick BBQ. Which earned me an earful from Tiffany, should have waited for me to wake up, she said… I got about an hour of sleep as we waited for Mini to wake. I wake up feel fresh, like that's all the sleep I needed for the day.

After breakfast, a few hours before noon, we continued our journey. For me, it also became another day of devouring a monster corpse buffet. So, a few hours later—after stuffing myself up on attributes, I can see the decently massive wall that marks the edges of Henry, Jennifer and Mr. Herman's Territory, Rumah... Unless they've expanded.

Our approach caused quite the commotion along the walls when one of the watch spotted us. Which is why, only a few moments later, more than a dozen guards are standing above the ramparts observing our approach. They each wear high-collared short capes in a uniform design of red and white over a mishmash of everyday clothes.

"Halt! Who goes there?"

We stop approximately five meters away from the gate and look up at the questioner. This one has a star embroidered on the high-collar of his cape.

"Hi, I'm Zane. Just arrived back after a bit of a journey. Can I come in?" Murmurs of conversation sprung up at the mention of my name. I've only gone for two or so days, why are they acting a little weird?

After a few minutes of discussion, the watch… leader? Replied, "please wait while someone with a greater authority makes their way over."

Why… I shrug and reply with, "okay."

No reason to wait in discomfort, so I approach an abandoned building—ruined, as how everything unattended is nowadays—right by the road and merge the whole thing into a block of concrete, ditching everything not-stone to the side. I then began shaping it into a simple stone gazebo, complete with table and chairs for us to wait upon. Mini even nagged me for a candy bar, to which I obliged. Their attention never left us, if what I detect through Mana Sense is to be believed… Half an hour later, the gates open and Kirana approaches with caution.

"Zen?" She warily asks. "You're back?" My mom looked up at her voice with a grin on her face. I don't like the looks of that.

"Hi Kirana," I wave my hand, commanding the face on my armor to open. "What happened? Why is everyone so… guarded?"

"Can I see you grin?" She says, "do the thing you do with your teeths."

She trying to verify it's me? I open my mouth to show my currently human teeths before allowing my fangs to elongate to that of a snake's for a moment, then letting it melt back into those of a human's. "If you're trying to verify it's me, why not use our VICOS? I've met three other people who could do what I did with my teeths."

She has a stunned look on her face the moment my words register onto her mind. She then looks to her side where the watch leader stood ready and asks, "why did we not think of this?"

He shrugs, "not everyone has a VICOS. But for those of us that do, that's perfectly feasible."

Kirana nods at that and—by the empty looks in her eyes—opened her VICOS interface. Not a moment after mine chimed to indicate a new message.

Kirana: Zen where are you?

Zen: Standing right in front of you.

Kirana: Uh-huh. Spin around three times and bark like a dog!

I look away from my interface to make eye contact with her, and find her pointedly looking at me. "Not funny!"

She grins and beckons us in, "a couple had joined us after you left, turns out they were a little… unfriendly…" She tells me as we make our way through the gates. I wave for my family and friends to come with us and follow her in.

"They managed to slip into our warehouses and took some stuff before Linda found them inside and alerted us." She continued, "fortunately, they did not manage to steal anything of much importance, as Linda found them early enough. But both got away, and all we could find out about the two was that they're capable of disguising themselves as someone else."

This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.

"A very precise imitation at that." One of the guards following us added.

I look at him and reply, "I see." Before once again keeping an eye on where I'm going. The road is now made of smooth stone, and all along it, on both sides are simple stone buildings that seem to function as residence, shops, workshops, there may even be a gym of sorts. They have done much in a mere few days.

"Maybe we should keep track of everyone using our VICOS id, I'm sure The System's way of tracking people is almost perfectly foolproof, maybe." I say to Kirana. "Have someone keep track or something."

"Henry's working on it, you tell him." She answers lazily. We chat with each other till we finally arrive at Garuda Hospital where Kirana told me to just find an empty building and claim it for myself.

"Just make sure you text Henry so he knows." She finally said before rushing away.

"Zen, is there something you've been keeping from us?" My mom asks, a glint in her eyes. My dad beside her while a grinning Tiffany stands behind them.

"No, why?"

"You sure?" She asks again.

"Yeah, why?"

"Maybe a girlfriend you failed to introduce to us?" My mom clarified.

"Mom, she's not!" Fortunately, the person in question is long gone. "Anyways, let's go find a place for you guys to stay."

They agreed. But no buildings near the hospital are available, all are in use one way or another. So we kept walking back the way we came until we ended up standing before the boarding house I used to occupy pre-integration. Hmm~.

Zen: Hen, is unit 2b still mine?

Zen: It's an 8 x 4 meters unit on the 2nd floor.

Zen: But now, I want one on the first floor. Can we trade or something, maybe a 5 x 6 meters land. I'll be generous, you can keep the excess area. :D

Henry Soejima: Where are you?

Zen: By the boarding house.

Henry Soejima: Wait there!

Zen: Hurry up, I'm with mom and dad.

He did not reply. I fashioned a few shaded stone benches on the side road and had them sit while I go explore my old abode.

As I ascend the stairs, I can hear it creak with every step, I do not like that. While inside, all wooden furniture seemed to have degraded by at least ten years, every single piece heavily rotted and fragile. I ignore them and proceeded towards my bedroom—suddenly, the floor made a slight cracking noise, I waited for the situation to settle before taking another step, which caused a much louder crack that sent me, and my unit floor crashing down onto the first floor.

I can hear panicked screams from where I am under the ruins. Unexpectedly, I feel no pain. I reorient myself through use of Mana Sense, comparing my current position with everyone elses. Done, I manhandle the ruins to reorient myself and kick upwards at a slight angle. The rubbles above me explodes outwards, sending pieces of concrete and metal flying outside of the territory fence. I then stand up covered in dust only to find everyone frozen in the middle of whatever they were doing.

From the looks of it, my family panicked, Henry was flustered and in the midst of organizing a rescue. While Atech is—still, laughing out loud beside a calm looking Acek Ardi.

"I'm okay!" I yelled, and that only made Atech laugh louder, which made Acek Ardi facepalm to hide his embarrassment. They probably did the maths and, from what they know of my attributes, knew I would be left unscathed.

After a few minutes of checking to make sure I'm okay, my mom finally let me go, luckily, I had managed to sneak in a few Unsoils before she got to me. Henry approached and began apologizing for allowing our boarding house to be left neglected but I made him stop. The builders were making their way here, one building at a time and were going to come do their magic here later today. But I got here first.

And that was how I ended up flattening the whole building into the ground, creating a sturdy floor of compressed stone and concrete. After watching me, Henry said that the builders couldn't affect concrete, so they bury them underground before pulling up stones to create new buildings.

A System notification pinged me about the destruction of Unit 2b, my Territory, under Rumah and inquired as to what I want to do about it in regards to the contract. I decided against any retaliation and allowed the matter to rest. Then bought new land from Henry, in exchange, he is giving me a cheap price of 750 creds / meter square instead of the 1000 he and Mr Herman had agreed upon for current land purchases. I agreed as long as my ownership extends infinitely below and above.

With that I found myself the owner of a seven meters cube of land right by the east gate, south of the main road for 36,750 creds. I then spent a majority of my creds to purchase a rank four Mana Tower that costs upward of three billion and is now left with only a bit more that 100 million creds, let's consider this an investment. Once again targeting Mana Tower inside The System store, 'inspect.'

** DING **

Mana Tower. Various ranks. A five meters diameter tower that consists of one entrance room as well as several rooms each above and below ground. While within, the Tower boosts mana regeneration by a percentage and as much as half that percentage outside, for a few kilometers radius around the tower. It owns a mana pool and mimics its owner's base mana regeneration. The owner may register a number of spells that the tower may use according to set parameters, spending its mana pool in the process. Various Tower functions scales with Rank. Spatial Extension sold separately.

It's amazing! The potential for Spatial Extensions as well as the various rooms, mana regen that affects an area, its own mana pool and automatic spell casting. Searching the System Store for mana tower results in various interesting upgrades; an upgrade that allows all owned Mana Towers to be linked via portals, to mention one.

I take my eyes off the interface and instantly notice the five meters tall tower standing before me, plain but beautiful in design. It is constructed out of a marble like material in shades of gray and black with hints of dark blue. When and how it got there? Nobody I asked knew, one blink and it's there. I love it already!

The Towers interior only consists of a number of plain empty rooms and a fenced stair that circles the far walls. Mine—a fourth rank—has eleven rooms both above and below ground, an increase to mana regeneration by 170% while indoors, it has a mana pool of 16,500 and is capable of memorizing nine spells. With my rate of regeneration of 14 mana per minute, it will attain its maximum pool in a little less than a day. I also figured out that the rooms are malleable! And, I found out that in the top-most room lies a pedestal, upon which a core hovers majestically. The Tower Core.