My mind floats in a sea of dairy’s delicious cheese wheels as I churn bucket after bucket of homemade cement.

I’m oh so tempted to focus on figuring out how to timeskip this, but I persevere! I can’t jump to running before I’m able to walk properly or however the saying goes. Gotta walk then call a cab.

Without distractions or breaks, my mind sinks into the skill and the way my hands feel as they brush past handfuls of sand – each grain rubs against each other with a little zip and forms teeny tiny little sleeper bonds. Weak little strings connected by a spark of friction. My fingers then seem to catch onto that web of bonds, knotting it together and gluing it into more bonds. The whole bucket slowly begins to feel incredibly goopy as if filled with…well glue. Webs become tangled knots become goop as they are too tightly wrapped to feel individual strands anymore.

My first farmhand – lets ignore Mr gnome – has drastically increased efficiency. Drastically!

As soon as Len is done dumping, I give him more readymade cement. Its heavy and he struggles to carry and manuver with more than a quarter of the sludge each time, but can fly up dump and fly back for a refill multiple times a minute.

It’s almost anticlimactic how quickly we finish the top of the wall when working together. Len flies up higher than I can reach on tippy toe and I figure that’s high enough for a ceiling. The top mold boards had been glued in place by me standing on a rough stool – three boards glued together in a N shape – and I’m starting to think I could have made it smaller.

I don’t want a cramped feeling room – sue me!

Our next step is obviously creating a roof. We have a few options I can think of and a few methods of creating those options. Idea one is to build it into the top of the wall – make either a slope or V or something by gluing wood across the area. Idea two is to create it on the ground and then lift it up onto the top at the end.

Idea one means I have to get better at reaching the top of the wall – either by gluing together a ladder or building the scaffolding I should have already made to create this wall…and idea two means we need to get really really good at lifting stuff. I’m talking an army of you guys lifting from the corners. Everyone willing to lend a hand trying their best.

Some vague part of me almost wants to try and make a second story but I’m squashing that right now. Silly Sam wants too much. Maybe I can build an extension of the side of this later, but I’m more worried about finishing this single structure right now and being happy with it.

Another part vaguely wants to make the top of my house a garden bed. Waterproof the bottom. Fill it with dirt. Cover in plants.

That part also needs to be squashed. As nice as it might look it would be an awful pain to pick and stuff. Watering is the easiest problem to deal with – Len can fly above in a minute or two – it would still involve a lot of work to deal with. Feels like the sort of thing you might do if you didn’t have plenty of empty space still.

Or if you wanted to be fancy.

I want to be fancy!

But you know. We have to be more responsible. Yada yada.

What does everyone else lean towards? I’m leaning towards a single slope mostly built on top with some portions built on the ground first. It hasn’t rained yet and it’s hard to tell if it’s ever going to rain, but my gut says the bigger the space gets the more realistic it will turn. I’m definitely expanding the space in the future so it’s best to build for that eventuality.

What's the plan for the main covering? I kind of want to make shingles but it feels like it might take a while.

Like…I could try making cement and then pouring it out into flat disks I can glue on top? But how many will I need to make?

Maybe I should test first just to see…

Bucket of cement less than half full so I can carry it…try and make it extra runny but strong.

Walk along the sand of the beach dumping dolops as I go. Step back and pick up one of the set chunks near the start.

Not the nicest shape but it seems like a good material. Heavier than I was expecting actually? I mean it is stone but it looks so thin. Ah well.

I think this proves it's viable?

I thought about it a bit more and I think we should make a bunch of supports. Kind of like the columns but sideways? I can place a board down and then on one side make a little bump for it…8 boards with 8 little columns to stick them up seems good. They can fit nicely in between each pair of columns going down the long direction.

If I make them all down here we can lift them up one at a time afterwards.

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Okay! Let's try and make them as even as possible.

Chopping off 8 of the thickest leftover branches I take some time to try and make them all the same size. I then focus on gluing them on one side of 8 boards on an angle. Some string helps me sort of make a mostly right angle and I use that to make sure each upside down L will go up and then downwards on a slope.

Its slightly longer than the short direction of the roof because I’m afraid of it being too short and falling off. Better to have them droop over the edge a bit then not reach far enough.

How do I evenly stick the corners together you ask?

Ungodly amounts of glue. Lots and lots and lots of glue is how I’m dealing with this. I wrap each end in teeny tiny little wedges and handfuls of glue sand in all the cracks. They don’t look the prettiest so I end up nearly completely hiding my messy corners with glue sand. They look sort of like elbows or something with how bunched the sand is around each one.

It’s past noon by the time I finish all 8 of these. They are heavy enough I can barely lift one up on the ground – I don’t think I want to try carrying them up a ladder.

Guys? It’s time. Time to hire more help.

Thefishyminer. Let’s can perform the ritual of making you a body. To start…You’re going to need a lot of lift. Like a lot. I’m thinking more than two wings…maybe six? More than that and they might start getting in each others way.

Yeah, let's get going. Just give me a moment to buy some more wooden poles and old clothes and we can get started…

…

I’m back!

I’ve taken the time to think and I’m actually leaning towards 8 wings. These things we want you to lift are heavy let me tell you.

First off. I’m thinking we make a single strong “back” using this belt I found. I’m going to glue and fold some cloth to make six sideways legs and then we can use it to extend the back down in a sort of tail. Kind of like a weird…dragonfly harness?

No, your body won’t be weird – I promise! The wings are the most important part and will definitely take the most amount of time. I need to figure out a better way of making feathers – cutting up old shirts with scissors does not feel optimal. We need light a fluffy things – yeah that would be great but no dice. I checked the market they don’t have them.

Anyways, Each wing will have a mana feather on the very tip as well as two near the back in a cool V shape. I kind of like the misty, ghosty, special effect look they give the wings. I’m pretty sure Len’s wings are stronger than normal so this is definitely a good thing – I’m not just adding them because they are pretty I have methods. Methods!

Two tiny wings on the end are solely for steering. Six middle wings are for lift. I’m getting better at using these stretchy bands to make fake muscles – somehow I can tell I’m taking my wing skill a different direction from the clockwork marvels I saw when I got the skill.

Alright. And now we choose your eyes. Does this pair match your personality? How about this pair?

I’m thinking we give you these two tiny ones and cut out a little cloth tongue for you, so it looks like you are a snake with his little tongue stuck out.

Give me a moment to set up your face – it's kind of flat right now so I need to bunch up some of the leftover cloth and try and give you some structure.

Okay. We are done!

Let’s give you your eyes with as much flourish as we can – I crown you! I knight thee!

…

Alright, what do you think? Floppy? Yeah, give me a second to give you something to hold onto. Let’s temporarily glue you to the first rafter and then we can see how strong you are.

Let me just lift one of these myself first – I want to see where the center of balance is…here!

Glue your long body along the middle. Wrap each of you six legs around it with temporary glue. Glue your tail down back here…alright! Try and fly this up to the roof. You can do it!

Thefishyminer struggles a moment to achieve lift and then slowly but surely lifts the entire rafter up into the sky. We have achieved lift! Mwahahaha! We have our very own crane! CraneCopter!

…I have to glue that rafter in, don’t I?

Have fun testing out your new body I have to make a ladder real quick.

I take a few minutes to build the tool I should have made a while ago. Glue, Logs, bits of scrap wood. Weeee bit faster than I should have because I’m impatient. There! One super lumpy looking ladder!

I then firmly plant it in on one side of the building and glue the top end to the top of my wall so it doesn’t slip.

Safety first.

Clambering up, I wave down the byplane and do my very best impression of a plane runway flag waver. You know the gals who wave flags back and forth to tell planes where to land? I don’t know what they are called but I’ve seen them in tv before.

“Over here!”

I should have started gluing the ends of the rafter when it was still on the ground – We can try that for the next lift.

There we go. Come on in to your landing strip. “You are cleared for landing!”

Rubbing the end as safely as I can, I place the column side down in the middle of the wall. Mentally I relax a phantom muscle and can feel the Thefishyminer’s straps start to loosen. “You’ll have to slip out the rest of the way yourself. Good luck!”

Clambering down the ladder I start rubbing the next rafter. Few more of these and we will be ready!

…

It takes a surpisingly small amount of time to place the rafters. Enough there’s still plenty left of the day. I make a few shingles and glue them along the edge of the roof but I don’t think we can finish it today.

I could do a good push but it's time for my night job. That’s right – I still have a debt looming over me and need to get in the mana pearl grind. Washing my hands in the lake I buy a meal bar – it looks bad and tastes bad, never again – then get comfortable in my workstation at the end of the lake.

Comfortable backrest – check.

View of Thefishyminer and Len flying about above the forest – check!

View of dairy – FINALLY CATCHING A FISH! You go little guy. Smash your rubbery head against that hunting till you manage it. Check.

Feet pushed into the wet sand right at the edge of the water – feels so nice pushing my toes into this…check!

I’m ready.

Three hours of grind? That seems like a healthy amount for my night job.

…

I make a pile of pearls and dump it into the payment box before bed. Mana pearls remain the most tiring job I have to do. It’s just so dull and I have to stay still for so long.

Still watching that debt number tick down is satisfying. I don’t want to be the type of girl who fails her monthly payments.

A nightly walk about the property lets me check on everything and then I collapse into bed in a flop.

Hopefully tomorrow we can finish the house and see about getting a better bed. I’m tired of this cheap camping set. I think I might want to splurge on something comfy.

Night~