Leica went out to hunt regularly again to replenish its food supply. After he had completed the rough outline of their new home, they still had one major problem left, namely their ailing water supply, because the reserves in his storage facility would not last for long, just as little as the slowly drained miniature lake directly in front of it, your front door!
Magna didn’t really want to imagine the chaos in the kingdoms in which two rivers were now missing, which probably countless cities as well as villages used for their water supplies, trade and also for borders. Historically, rivers have had a long history of defining the boundaries of areas. The sudden absence not only revealed the inevitable failure of drinking water or water for irrigation of fields, although you could draw some from wells at the water table, but it did not change the missing natural barrier. For many empires lying along these rivers it was an opportunity to be about an attack on their neighbors or their misfortune with the intention of their neighbors.
Even in the magical border forest, this should lead to a renewed imbalance, such as the shifting of territories. What was true among humans and presumably many other races also applied in the natural kingdom. In addition, its current area, as well as its immediate surroundings, got a serious change in the concentration of mana. Presumably more dangerous creatures would migrate in this direction, the nature around the new hill perhaps assuming the extent of the deepest forests, whereby the blood pastures would also become a whole new challenge.
On the other hand, those surroundings offered a lot of opportunities for him too. The resources were almost saturated with mana, as you could already see from the stone. Perhaps the mana that rose into the sky struck again as precipitation that kept the area at this intensity for a very long time.
He would not even have been surprised if the center of this whole huge forest had been another ruin, another ancient civilization that had ruined it grandiose.
Sitting in his new bedroom, he was a little greedy for his rewards; the new books were supposed to advance his magical studies as well.
[System: Do you want to claim your rewards?] He
almost exclaimed "Damn it, yes." Because when he put his ass back on the gold scales that decided his life, then he finally wanted to get his rewards.
[Reward: Alchemy IV - VII / Enchantments I - V / Golem Technologies I - II]
That might not look like much to many, but he bet his lucky ass that some of this knowledge was not easy to achieve in this world. Especially the technologies of this civilization for research on golems! A few more hands have always made a huge difference.
With the usual confirmation, the documents materialized right in front of his face, whereupon he would have turned the pages happily, had it not been for other matters. Before he could turn to magical studies again, he had to secure his livelihood again.
The expected increase in rewards must have been reflected in the additional tiers. He probably wouldn't have been able to do most of what mercenaries or knights wished for. In addition, the higher grades became a real nuisance. He didn't even want to think about how many creatures of the same tier he would have to kill for a lousy climb, much less how many higher tier ones, and he could hardly play the safe variant of uprooting the blood willows, which is ultimately an excellent, if dangerous, one Defense.
In order to secure his livelihood, he first had to dig a well, hoping to find underground rivers or a high water table from which he could draw his drinking water.
The only question was whether he would have created the fountain inside or outside, but ultimately decided on the inner workings of the hill. He could do it outside, but inside would always have safe access to his water supply.
In a side room that he created, he decided to take a spiral staircase down into the depths of the earth, but this time the interior of the column was empty so that it could function as a fountain. The spiral staircase into the depths was supposed to be used to find out where the water level was and whether he also came across something interesting like a cave system!
In his accustomed speed, as well as thanks to his spatial thinking, the stairs into the depth took on a rapid shape. In the other rooms he had already renewed the mana collecting enchantments, as well as the lights.
Passing various layers of rock, which he examined carefully so that he could be sure of a certain stability and perhaps also a source of ore, the construction went down quite smoothly, always taking a few meters at a time. After a few meters he actually came across something like a water table. This made the event relatively satisfactory, if not surprising. As expected, the water was already at a depth of between 15 and 20 meters. One of the steps was suddenly surrounded by groundwater. Finally, he decided to leave it that way so that he could always check the water level effectively. To be on the safe side, the hollow column went a little deeper so that the water could also be accessed.
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With a little negative pressure, the water could be created via a shaped metal tube, which he molded into the shaped stone of the central column, a small fountain, which easily brought the water upwards.
For this purpose, another smaller column was created from stone in the middle, which ended up to a handful of vertical meters just below the first stairs. The metal tube was higher than the ground, which is why he pulled the stone of the outer central column at waist height above the ground level so that he could scoop more easily.
An enchantment to purify the water on the false floor, which was let into the column, was intended to remove all impurities from the water, although he doubted that there were any. Water from these depths was mostly of excellent drinking water quality, but he was a little afraid of the standing pool created. He enlarged the space around the fountain into a small hall, which he furnished with a few decorations.
Within a few seconds his new water supply filled with wonderful fresh underground spring water!
After the water supply was stable again, he could turn to other things. On the one hand, he also removed the useless stone blocks from his dimensional memory, on the one hand, because they simply wasted space and, on the other hand, because every stone in the area that was permeated with mana was likely to be much more valuable.
The additional intelligence that expanded his supply, as well as the improved regeneration, gave him the opportunity to work with a lot less rest than before! Besides, if some of its rooms survived, then maybe some of the city's rooms too? He had seen the center of the explosion, but that didn't mean that everything was lost, even if everything was lost, stones of special quality, crystals, or other things of considerable value were sure to be created.
In addition, the satisfaction of one's own curiosity also had a special note to experience what the gigantic mana eruption had for further consequences, because those who could already think about.
Now he could choose to begin either with the magical study or the excavations. The latter gained his undivided attention, which is why he began to form a few vestibules, from which he penetrated deeper into the lower areas of the hill.
To this end, he created a massive tunnel that would lead to the middle of the hill where the explosion had occurred. Unfortunately, the progress was interrupted again and again by collapsing parts, more than usual he was forced to compact the stone more, to create columns at the edge and in the middle, as well as to use different supporting structures.
After all, it took him a few tiring days to drive the main tunnel far enough before he reached the former city limits. On the way he couldn’t find any of the former places they had once crossed. Not even a bit of metal was left of them, but the stone became so permeated with mana that it had a natural glow. This stone probably had a value of its own.
The identification gave the stone a surprising name,
[Manastone: layers of earth and rock that was so penetrated by mana that its basic structure changed, whereby its characteristic glow has become part of its changed state. Can be used for a wide variety of enchantments, as well as other uses.]
This stone seemed valuable in itself. Of course, he did not have the means or the resources to mine this stone in large quantities, but it could not be denied that he could be of some use if he did not take a few bricks in large quantities.
As soon as he penetrated into the former urban area and thus also into the area that was occupied by the underground system, there were always small cavities in which some strongly glowing mana crystals seemed to form.
The deeper he penetrated, the more cavities filled with various crystals that were forming he could find. But also more of the shining stone. The city proper was nowhere to be found, but various metals could be found that were no less permeated by mana. Finally he worked his way into the central system, where the massive crystal was previously located, but not a single trace of the crystal itself was to be seen.
From the distance where he could see the Mana eruption, he couldn't make out this, but instead of the crystal there were new incredible amounts of the largest crystals he ever saw in this cavity and what the pyramid was always made of seemed to be one to have become a new luminous floor for this cavity. All the books, laboratories, everything was gone. Except for the natural resources, like the mana-rich slag that seemed to form the bottom of the cavity, none of it was left.
The system called what seemed to be spreading before his eyes Mana Mud, which was described extremely rarely, if not of course hardly present. However, the applications suggested for this were missing. Perhaps it could be used to mold enchantments to last?
If he had named it himself, the only words he could think of would be Mana Magma. Even if he could no longer harvest knowledge there, he could still gather resources that might be priceless. Just one of the massive crystals on the walls would completely fill his memory.
Instead of looting everything or overlaying his camp, he decided to pocket some of the smaller crystals, cut a few bricks-sized stones from the mana-richest stone that even surpassed the previous one, as well as collect some of the slag to experiment with it. It could also be easily formed into a ball via mana manipulation and stored in the memory.
Already in his previous life he possessed a presumptuous number of strategies, with which he consistently avoided work. On the one hand he was interested in studying magic, but did he want to continue playing with his stone sculpting?
Of course, he dug a few side tunnels, with which he found more small cavities full of crystals. Presumably the wealth stored in this place was enough to drool entire kingdoms. After a few more days, he got tired of digging with magic. Besides, he still couldn't find any ore veins. For that purpose he might have had to dig deeper into the ground. Most of the knowledge he had about forging was mostly superficial and a result of his enthusiasm for developing technologies, but it should be enough to forge a few simple things, at least he hoped it would.
Ultimately, he could not postpone his magical studies forever, and he finally had to face the equipment of his alchemy seriously.
Before that, however, he first had to renew some of the rooms, such as his previous alchemy laboratory, which was completely lost, and simple rooms were added that were to be used for other experiments. Another important point was replenishing its herbal resources.
After he rejoined Leica on the hunt and spent his afternoons studying magic, time went by much faster again for him. In addition, it took a certain amount of time to find stagnant water in which the algae were also found. In addition, he developed a plan to form a stagnant body of water inside the hill, where he could grow the algae under ideal conditions.