The huge feline would have plowed him into the dirt, crushing him beneath its weight. That was certainly what it had intended. Unfortunately for the beast, Matthias was still under the effects of his System-boosted strength. They landed on his shoulders and perched there, utterly confused that this short green man with horns wasn’t succumbing to its attack.
“Are you done yet?” Matthias asked in a bored tone. “Because I really have places to be. Namely that rock over there.”
Sensing something was very off, the cat leapt from his shoulders and landed back into the tall golden grass. He didn’t get a great look at the creature, other than it had golden tan fur and was roughly the size of a lion. The tan fur of the beast blended in with the wheat-like grass so well that it was nearly invisible to the naked eye. It was a beautiful beast, to be sure. However it could still be a threat, and he would eliminate it if it attacked him again.
Matthias sighed. “Look. Just… go away. I really don’t have time for this. It is getting dark, I have a ton left to do, and I am tired and annoyed. So just… go the fuck away,” he said, his eyes flat and devoid of emotion.
The cat just growled at him from the grass. It was positive the little green thing couldn’t see him. Its surprise attack failing was a fluke, it was sure of it. There was no possible explanation for the dominant predator of this area to have its attempt to hunt a new kind of prey frustrated by… it didn’t know what exactly.
“If you attack me again, I’m going to use you as a floor rug.”
The single statement, while not entirely understood by the feline creature, sent shivers down its spine. Perhaps hunting new prey wasn’t always the best course of action? It would observe for now, find a weak point, and then attack the new prey at its weakest.
Yes. This was good.
Matthias watched the creature slink backward through the grass with an annoyed sigh. He was beginning to wonder if this was some kind of garden world. But he was glad to see that wasn’t the case. There was very little NEX to be made on a world with no threats. After all, if life was perfect what need was there to buy anything? He was sure he would run into the beast again, or another like it at any rate. Nothing could be done now, so he wouldn’t worry about it.
He grinned and found amusement in the encounter. He then turned, making his way across the plains to the rock format rapidly. He was surprised when it took him both longer than he thought, and that the formation was larger than he initially estimated. The tall, triangular rock making up the foundation of the formation jutted out of the earth like a massive spear. It rose into the air like a monolith, definitely exceeding a hundred meters in height.
The rubble and stone arrayed around it created a cave-like opening in the side. Matthias cautiously approached the entrance and stared into the darkness. It descended so far into the darkness that he couldn’t guess at the actual depth. The depth would be perfect for his needs. Now he only hoped that there was a decent-sized cavern down there somewhere.
He pulled his collapsed staff off his belt and extended it to its full length. Tapping it twice on the ground the tip erupted into a soft white light, illuminating the area around him for roughly ten meters in every direction.
Matthias marveled at his staff. It was one of his masterpieces, created under the insane restrictions his prior employer had put on his abilities. The staff was a functioning true multi-tool, capable of a wide variety of utility and defensive uses. It could light fires, carve stone, illuminate areas, and had moderate healing functions in case he was injured. He had enchanted it, one tiny piece at a time, over the course of a decade.
He smiled to himself and walked into the depths of the cave with no hesitation. The large, open entrance, however, was a facade.
The path down was not smooth. Stalactites and mites jutted from the ceiling and floor randomly, making it very difficult to make his way further inside. Mathias had to duck, weave, and shimmy through sections. Once even having to take off his backpack and toss it through an opening before jumping through himself. The going was rough, but there was one silver lining.
He was sure nothing from the outside was within.
Granted, that didn’t mean there was nothing hiding in the cave. But there wouldn’t be a pride of those cat monsters inside either. After an hour of slow and tedious exploring, the cave tunnel began to widen. After making his way through a final set of jutting stone spikes and a small pool of water, he stepped out onto a jutting cliff and stared into a vast, dark cavern.
“This… place is awesome,” he whispered in awe, staring into the darkness. While He couldn’t see in pitch-black conditions, his staff gave off enough light for him to make out the far wall of the chamber. As well as the considerable roughness of the floor and the large pool of water on the far side.
This place would be perfect.
Matthias walked to the wall and began the tedious scramble down to the floor of the cave. The entire time he stayed as quiet as possible, listening for any sounds, movement, or noise that could signify a creature or a collapse of the cavern. He paid particularly close attention to the quality of the air, watching for any staleness or odd smells. Being underground had its own dangers, many of which were not related to anything that wanted to eat him.
He headed towards the center of the cavern, finding a relatively smooth location on the floor. Taking off his backpack, Matthias removed the BSK orb. He stared into the cyan depths of the item, holding it preciously in his hands. His mouth was dry as he procrastinated using the item. He only had one. He would never get another. Not without significant sacrifice… or immense luck.
One of which he didn’t have… the other he wasn’t willing to make.
Swallowing dryly again, and beginning to sweat even in the cool air of the cave, he injected power into the Business Starter Kit.
{BUSINESS START KIT}
CLASSIFICATION
CORPORATE KIT
{ACTIVATE}
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Y / N
Matthias hit yes, and the orb flared brightly, bathing the entire cavern in a cyan glow. He threw up his hands to block his eyes, dropping his staff on the floor. The intense light was casting shadows over everything nearby and was far too bright to look at. After several seconds, the blinding light faded, leaving him standing in a circle of pale light being emitted from his staff.
“That was intense,” he muttered, picking his staff up. Then he noticed a significant and out-of-place new feature in the cave. There, in front of him, hovered the BSK orb… or what had been the BSK orb.
The cyan orb was now a deep blood-red color and was hovering above the floor at a stable chest height. It was an ominous-looking thing that gave off a sense of sheer raw power that Matthias couldn’t begin to fathom.
But he would.
That was the goal, after all. Create a company and establish a presence that wouldn’t be easily defeated when the bastards in mid-management found him.
Matthias wasn’t quite sure what to do next. He had read about the BSK and the setup process extensively, made sure he chose the right one and hidden it away. Now? Now he was lost. There were no instructions on how to proceed from here. Each company formed using a BSK moved forward uniquely. Some failed. Some became wildly successful. But each used methods that were secret to those companies controlling executives.
He wasn’t even sure how to use the orb in front of him.
The orb rejected Power directed at it. It just wouldn’t connect, an issue that he had never experienced before. He tried touching the orb, talking to it, yelling at it, even trying his abilities. The only one that worked was {POWER OVERWHELMING}, but the cost of editing the orb was so fantastically astronomical that Matthias didn’t even know the number for how many zeroes he saw.
Finally, frustrated, he screamed in rage and punched the damn thing. His fist slid off the smooth surface, sliding into the air above it. The force of his punch, however, tore open the side of his palm. Several drops of blood landed on the orb in front of him, even as he brought his hand back to nurse his wound.
The moment the blood touched the surface, it began swirling with red, black, and green colors. Matthias watched in amazement, his wound all but forgotten, as a huge menu appeared in front of him:
BLOOD BONDING COMPLETE
{SINGLE-USE ABILITIES}
NAME CORPORATION
CREATE HEADQUARTERS
{ABILITIES}
CONSTRUCT
MANUFACTURE
{SKILLS}
CONSULTATION
“Oh. Yeah. Probably should have just punched you before this point. Would have saved myself the fucking headache,” he grumbled at the orb. Typical of his interactions with the odd device so far, it stayed silent.
He looked around the cave, ensuring that nothing had tried to sneak up on him during the lengthy process of getting the rob set up. Seeing no danger, and not sensing that he was being watched anymore, he turned back to the magical device.
“I need to get some basic things going here. I need a workshop and a way to sell my goods,” he muttered, looking through the options.
He tapped the {CONSTRUCT} option at the top of the abilities list. The entire cave lit up, showing him his options for editing and altering the area that was currently claimed. The claimed area did not, unfortunately, yet expand into the tunnel leading down to the cavern itself.
He touched a stalactite near him, opting to remove it. The action cost fifteen NEX. Blinking at that, Matthias played with the removal and altering of the cavern. The {CONSTRUCT} ability allowed him essentially free reign with editing the claimed area in real-time. The only restrictions were the cost of the action in NEX and the available material. Currently, all he had to work with right now was stone. So he could not, for example, create a wooden bench or an adamantine desk.
Through the editing of the area around him, Matthias learned that there was a second option available to him. Instead of simply removing the material outright for the full cost, he could opt to convert it to usable materials and place it into the {CORPORATE STORAGE}. This was much cheaper and had the added benefit of giving him some raw materials to work with. The why of it being cheaper eluded him, but he guessed that it had something to do with the removal of matter itself. Teleportation of any kind was expensive, and it seemed that teleportation through the System was no exception.
He spent a few hours editing the area around him and option to simply smooth the entirety of the cavern floor out at once. That deposited several thousand stone blocks into the {CORPROATE STORAGE} and cost him around four thousand NEX to complete. But it was done instantly. Matthias then created a basic work area against the short cliffside just next to the main entrance, created a stairwell from that area up to the platform in front of the entrance tunnel, and built large stone doors over the entrance itself.
He eyed everything he had done and nodded. It was a good start. The Orb made everything infinitely easier when it came to construction. He had expected to do a lot of this by hand or spend vast amounts of NEX to complete it all through his abilities. At least within the sphere of his control, it was fairly cheap and instant. Granted, bringing in outside materials was going to be a challenge, but that was completely expected. Overall, he had burned through fifty-five hundred NEX. He felt the evaporation of the coins from his pouch, wincing as they vanished.
Before he could do anything else, he needed a source of light. He had been planning this for a century, and his preparations had included a full knowledge set of basic and intermediate enchantments. Unlike an actual enchanter, however, he didn’t need the ability. Instead, he would impose his intent on the world around him through his abilities using NEX, completely ignoring the need for an entire class devoted to enchanting. The only drawback was that his Power was entirely reliant on Power he couldn’t get back unless he spent NEX to do so.
He activated {BALANCE SHEET}, nodding at the numbers displayed in his mind:
{BALANCE SHEET}
REMAINING POWER – 37
NEX BALANCE – 275,500
DENOMINATIONS
10K NEX BARS – 6
1K NEX COINS – 52
500 NEX COINS – 327
“Not as much as I would like, but more than enough for my purposes,” he muttered. He withdrew a stone slab from the {CORPROATE INVENTORY}, placing it on the ground in front of him.
He spent a single point of Power to convert the stone slab into fifty round stone balls. Setting ten aside, Matthias focused on the remaining forty and activated {POWER OVERWHELMING}. The remaining spheres lit up in his vision and impressed his intent to embed a basic lighting enchantment into them.
{POWER OVERWHELMING}
BASIC LIGHT ENCHANTMENT
1 BASIC LIGHT ENCHANTMENT = 1 POWER
POWER COST – 40
He burned another 10K NEX bar with {CONVERT WEALTH}, bringing his power up to one hundred and thirty-seven, then bought the enchantment immediately dropping him back down to ninety-seven. He took the remaining ten and placed them back into storage. Mathias then spent the next hour placing twenty of the orbs around the cavern, lighting it up nicely.
That only left the pool of water to be addressed.
Most people might think a pool of water was harmless, a positive feature even as it brought it fresh water to wherever someone may need it. Adventurers, explorers, farmers, homesteaders. They would all utilize fresh bodies of water, pools in caves and dungeons, or even saltwater from the ocean for various purposes. Few of them would identify water itself as an immediate threat. But Matthias was no fool.
That pool of water was deep, clear, and when he touched it just as cold as the river he had crossed earlier. He used the remaining stone in his inventory and shaped a large cover for the pool, leaving a small stone-hinged flap that he could open to access the water when needed. This would prevent anything from crawling out at will and eating him when he was asleep, or the cavern from flooding. Water alone could be incredibly dangerous and should not under any circumstances be treated lightly.
Particularly not water that could freeze you to death in moments.
Nodding at his improvement, Matthias stepped back and examined the cave. The floor was smooth and yet unfinished. The usable area in the cave was immense. The entrance had been covered by thick stone doors, the water properly contained, and an area set aside for his workstation and shop. He was well on his way to completing the first steps needed to open his business.
Then he would be able to move to the much more fun, much more complex, second step.
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