Creating a place to sleep overnight with his construction skill felt like the safest option for now. Also when the sun was already setting he felt it was really bad and dangerous idea to try and go back to the clearing right now. In his eyes that would practically be suicide. Go on a trip in a dark forest possible filled with monsters? No that wasn’t the best of ideas. Instead he decided to go tomorrow morning but for now he would at least try to create a bit of a safe space to sleep. He decided to take a look at his mana to see what he had to work with.

Since it had still taken quite a bit of walking after he had summoned the Bat he,d regained about 60MP, thinking this would be enough to atleast make a little spot for him to safely overnight he activated the skill.

As soon as he activated the skill he got a new popup screen appearing in front of him.

Construction [Info] [building mode]

1. Defenses

2. Miscellaneous

3. Furniture

4. Mechanisms

5. Landscaping

6. Base building

7. Resources

there were more options than he was expecting. Looking at the 7 options, he got very excited. He had always had a passion for creating and building things. So the skill was truly a great fit for him. He quickly opened up the information list for the skill to at least figure out a few basics before he tried anything.

A catalogus of things he could build opened up, He scrolled through the list and quickly saw a-lot of helpful things he would be able to create. The level of tech that he could build right now was along the lines of the year 2020 on earth. Each item in the catalogus had a short description of how it worked and the mana cost it would take to build . It would also indicate if there was a water source detected before you placed the pump. After looking the 7 calatogouses through he decided on what he would do for now. What he needed to focus on right now was shelter.

To really start building though it would be smart to enter the building mode he could activate for the skill. In building mode he could preview how everything looked and what everything would cost before he could finalize the build and then Construction would make it. He could also test if things such as mechanics really worked before applying them to reality. Also if he didn’t like how stuff was arranged he could start moving things around in his build mode.

He looked at what it would cost to make a 2 meter wide 5 meter long and 2 meter tall rectangle into the rock.

He looked over his desired shape and the preview of how it would look into the wall. Building mode was a truly handy feature the skill came with. After he had decided that it looked right he checked out the price in terms of mana. Now the cost was surprisingly not as high as he had thought. Only 30MP to dig out that space. Wondering why it only cost 30 Mp to dig out such a big space he quickly reread a little information that the skill info tab gave him.

After rereading a bit of the info he came to the conclusion that it actually made sense it wasn’t that expensive.The price of Construction basically came down to a few things. The kind of material it was made of, the stronger or rarer the material was the more expensive it was to build. Then came if he was creating something from nothing or if he had already gathered the materials. The cost would drastically decrease if he gathered the materials beforehand. The more advanced what he created was the bigger the mana cost. And the bigger it was, the more expensive it was.

Then as for destroying things, that was a-lot cheaper since creating something from nothing was costly but destroying or re-shaping something already there was overall pretty cheap.

So he looked over the hole and seeing as he still had 30MP left he decided he could also make the cover for it right away. So he put back some rocky wall at the entrance only leaving a rectangle of about half a meter wide and one and a half meter tall in the wall as a doorway. So he had a kind of closed hole in the big rock the only way in was his doorway which if he had enough mana for, he would add into there. But for now he was out of mana, he would finish it another time. The rocky wall was only rocky towards the outside. It looked very natural and it would be very hard to see that that piece of rock-wall was man made. Because he,d thought of a great plan for what he would build tomorrow. And a rocky wall that looked normal and blended in was a core part of that.

Finalizing the build he exited out of build mode and the Construction started happening. As it happened he slowly felt the energy drain out of him. The Construction took about 20 minutes to fully happen.It was a strange thing to see the construction happening, the best way to describe it was as if the construction was growing into existence. In the 20 minutes time the construction had taken, he had just looked over the different stuff he could build with Construction at level one. And seeing the kind of stuff he could already build at level one he was starting to get excited for the stuff he could build at the higher levels. Now the more technical things like computers which he was able to build, were way too expensive in terms of mana for his taste. What would have been a thousand dollar gaming computer cost 750MP in terms of mana. Something he didn’t have by a long shot.

As soon as the construction finished he walked inside and just looked at the smooth stone room. He really needed to get that entrance covered tomorrow but now he was both too tired and out of mana to do anything about it. So he just laid down on the hard stone floor after ordering his drone to keep up patrol and come wake him up should anything happen. Wake him up in terms of hitting him on the head with its iron body. As soon as he finished ordering the drone and covering himself in his thick jacket he immediately fell to sleep.

The next morning he was woken up by a really cold breeze. He already missed his tent with a heater that had solar panels to charge it. He really had to get his backpack from that clearing today. The journey alone towards the clearing would take about 4 hours and the journey back another 4 hours which would be a big part of his day gone. So before he left he decided to make the basis for his doorway. Since last night before he fell asleep he had gotten a great idea that was possible with 250MP so if he did about 100MP worth of construction now and 150MP when he got back then he,d have a safe place to sleep tonight. At Least as safe as it could get for him at the moment.

Stolen story; please report.

So he entered building mode. His plan was to make a flush rock door. That fit and looked perfectly into the rock wall. This way he would have a hidden door that hid and protected him from anything that might want to harm him. Afterall you couldn’t be killed if you couldn’t be found. Deciding this was a great idea and him having already planned out the mechanism. He got to work on making the mechanics that would first pull the door a little back and then slide it into the wall so the doorway would open. And of course perfectly seal it up again when he wanted it to close. After taking about an hour to finish creating the mechanics he set it to work.

After that he immediately got to work on getting his backpack back. Because not only would it have food and water and a bunch of other useful stuff for surviving out here,until he got his basic survival needs met with the help of construction and his other skills he would need the rations in that backpack.. It also had a heater! a heater! oh how he missed that heater last night. It had been extremely cold and tonight he wanted a good warm nights sleep.

As he started walking towards the clearing which he could currently see from his elevated ground by the rock. He quickly summoned his drone to go in front of him by a hundred meters or so to keep a lookout for him. The journey to the clearing was a very boring one. He did encounter one rabbit though. The rabbit had already experienced a little evolution clearly, as it had purple fur and spit out some purple spit at one point that melted the bit of grass it had been chewing on.

Jake wanting to see if he could kill it for experience so he quickly ordered the drone to come back. As he grabbed his metal bat in hand just in case,and held it in front of him ready to attack. He ordered his drone to fly into the rabbit at its maximum speed. The drone which was basically a sturdy metal ball that could fly at 70mph, shot towards the rabbit which hadn’t cared for Jake or his drone. Before quickly looking up and trying to jump out of the way. Luckily just as Jake hadn’t been fast enough to dodge the panther the purple bunny hadn’t been fast enough to dodge the drone. The drone rammed into the rabbits side and the rabbit was sent flying.

Jake heard a crack, clearly the drone had broken some of the rabbits bones. But the rabbit hadn’t died yet. As soon as the rabbit landed it looked back towards the drone. The drone which had turned around and was already getting ready for its next charge towards the rabbit, shot ahead again at high speed. This time though the rabbit reacted in time and jumped out of the way. And instead of going for the drone the rabbit had somehow understood that Jake was the real threat here. Turning towards Jake the rabbit started running towards him.

Jake, having been ready for this possibility, got his bat ready to attack the purple bunny. But the bunny never got into striking range of Jake, instead it stood at about a 3 meter distance from him. And then it spit out a purple glob towards Jake. Jake not having expected the rabbit to attack from a distance looked at the purple glob with wide eyes. And out of reflex held the bat in front of him and the glob. The glob hit the metal bat and Jake heard a sizzling sound coming from the metal where the purple glob had hit.

The spot that had been hit looked like it had been rusting away in the rain for years and looked like it was about to break down. And right as the rabbit was readying for another glob shot as Jake decided to call it. The drone slammed into the back of the rabbit's head. Killing it instantly.

He got hit with a ping and a system notification appeared.

Terror rabbit (poison) level 1 killed + 40Xp

Jake,s eyes took on a sparkle at that notification. He killed it! he did it! this time without serious injuries! That feeling of glee quickly went away though as he remembered to never let your guard down even after winning. Not to mention he still had to get his backpack. Sending his drone away to scout again and also to point him in the right direction. Since he didn’t want to get lost. He quickly got back on his way towards the clearing. while walking he decided to check his Xp

XP: 188 / 300

188?! He was shocked at seeing 188/300 instead of seeing 40/300 Xp. Quickly thinking of why he had 188Xp he couldn’t think of any moments when he had killed other creatures. Then he thought back to the day earlier when he had wondered how crafting classes would gain Xp. And since technomancer was part crafting class. He quickly thought of a good possibility. What if he gained Xp for completing successful crafts. Such as his base in the rock wall, the drone or even the metal bat? If he had gotten Xp from creating those that would make sense.

Talking about his metal bat though. It didn’t look too great, the rust had spread from the original spot where the purple glob had hit. It also looked alot less sturdy now. Deciding it couldn’t be used as a weapon anymore he instead grabbed his knife back in his hand. He wouldn’t throw away the bat though. He was sure the material could be used for Construction at some point to lessen the mana cost.

As he kept walking towards the clearing with a pretty happy feeling overall from the progress he,d made he thought of the system notification. Terror rabbit huh? and it indicated poison behind its name. That means there might be other varieties. It seemed creatures that evolved developed an affinity and then gained powers suiting to that affinity. If the Terror poison rabbit was anything to go off that was. If monsters could also grow and gain powers though didn’t that mean there would be a big threat to humanity if these monsters kept growing stronger?

Imagine a rabbit destroying an entire town in a few seconds. Now that would be a horror rabbit. Deciding to not think about that as the information he had gained hadn’t been sufficient for him to start seriously worrying over these theories. Then a realization shot him. If earth was evolving would that mean the terrain would start evolving too? Would there be new minerals and marginal fenomena? What if floating islands came to be?! Now that thought got him excited.

Right as he was contemplating building a future hideout on a floating island if he found one. He arrived at the clearing. Looking over the clearing he noticed the corpse of the panther he had killed was gone. With a bloody trail leading into the forest. Jake immediately shivered a bit in fear at the thought of fighting another big animal so he just decided to quickly grab his backpack and go back to his hideout to finish the door.

Now where had he left the backpack.. After searching around for a bit and commanding his drone to do the same. His drone eventually found his backpack behind a tree. Now he knew for sure he hadn’t left it next to a tree. But he wasn’t about to go figure out why it was left there and just grabbed it, checked its contents, saw almost everything was still there. It missed a few pieces of dried meat. And quickly he left off towards the big rock and his hideout.

On the way back he remembered he should get the rabbit's corpse as he was dumb enough to forget that earlier. So he told his drone to find the corpse and then set off to get it when the drone returned after having found it a bit later. After he got the poison terror rabbits corpse he continued walking back to the hideout.

A few hours later he arrived,immediately chucking away the rabbits corpse in the corner of his hideout he got right back to work on the flush rock door. And another hour later he had almost finished it. Now he just had to wait two and a half hours for his mana to regenerate 50MP. And instead of doing nothing he,d rather make some preparations for the night.

First priority was sorting out everything he still had in his backpack. Then he set up the tent inside the hideout for some extra warmth. Then placed the heater outside so it could charge via sunlight. Sorted out his rations which would last him for about another week. In which time he would have to figure out food and water. Then he took a quick toilet break. After which he decided to try to take whatever poison the rabbit still had out of its body. You'd never know when you might need it. He quickly put on some gloves he had brought with him in the backpack and got to work carefully dissecting the rabbit. Until he hit something hard. He tried to grab whatever it was, it felt very smooth and had a glass like texture. And when he finally pulled it out he saw a small smooth blue rock.

minor mana stone found.. Absorb for 100 mana?