[Year 1]
Oh good, it seems that I have more followers on my hands now. The marshland tribe seems to like me, did you not learn a lesson from the deity? And now you are worshipping me?
[SE production: 0.87/y]
If you're worshipping me please be presentable, I like my people with dignity. Though I understand why they're like this, dignity would be a low priority for now.
Back at the Village, the Migrating tribe has learned the situation of their home by being told via quest from my villagers, also the forest is named by the migrating villagers as the Demon Forest, while the river close to it is the Foreline River. The village has adopted the name Foreline as its name.
Now, that the renewed Foreline Village has been officially named I would give them some respite, I could deal with the Deity because it has a strong connection with the Abyss like me, but when it comes to dealing with anything in Reality it becomes hard with me, I only exist in reality but I'm not tangible, yet.
So when dealing with problems like the dungeon, the Villagers needed to be ready. I sent out a few quests to the hunters to train a few more hunters. In exchange, I made a new skill, [Hunter Pack. E] and [Hunter Aura. E+], the E+ is expensive, over 50SE just for that plus mark.
Considering that rank D is over a 100SE, ranking up a skill is very costly. [Hunter Aura. E+] is a buff. Once hunters are close to each other their Str stat gets boosted by 0.5 for each member close together.
[Hunter Pack. E] on the other hand, boosts this considerably, the skill allows the Hunters close together to be aware of their fellow hunters even if they're out of sight, it also makes them aware of injuries to their pack, so by good decision-making, if their pack considerably gets injured they have a way to retreat.
Foreline Village has over 120 population, but sadly that's not enough to build an army, I don't have expendables—what am I even… I held my head for a while, I don't have the biological brain as a man anymore so I think very rationally here, pragmatic even. I need a little bit of empathy here.
I sighed.
Focus, focus yourself, Hadro. You aren't human now you're a god.
I looked at the total number of people in the village, 120 and the Marshland village is over 42, dead bodies count up to 47. The previous population of the marshland counts up to 89, the migrating tribe was previously settled in the marshland village so in total it's 161.
Man, we need a governing system over here. But the population is still over a hundred, much less than the Marshland village.
I decided to give them a task instead.
***
Asmai has been living in the Foreline village for a week. The only one who could talk with the locals was the old lady who was over a century old. Nobody knew she would be able to speak the same language as the locals near this river.
But then again, stories were passed down about how Deities ruled the plains and forced any sapient creature to do their bidding or just become their entertainment. Asmai had no confirmation of any of this to be true.
But, he has suspicions that they might be true. There was one story, told by his late grandfather. There used to be a city, one where they were so advanced that men flew with no wings and dug deep like no mole. They are a power like no other.
They lived in the plains, where the ground was flat. One day, as the advanced city was doing their usual business a Deity saw how rich and advanced they were. The Deity asked them to bow under him, worship and honour his name.
They refused, of course, seeing the greedy look of the Deity, this got the Deity enraged and attacked the city, the inhabitants fought till they couldn't anymore. The Deity fell at their hands but their city was left a ruin.
The only ones left are the citizens of the city, not the technology they have because all the scholars and the warriors were killed in the process, and they were left to ruin.
All that is left are the descendants who spoke stories of the city's majesty. One that the descendants never experienced. There is no evidence of this city.
But there is always one thing that is unique to its descendants. Their dark pupils absorb all light as if eternal darkness decided to swallow all light.
Asmai looked at Arkum, then at a child native to the village. They all have dark hair and eyes, just like the old lady.
Suddenly, all of their systems flashed up, Asmai had completely assimilated with their god, completely having faith in its name after it killed their oppressing Deity.
Asmai looked at the quest that seemingly had everyone's attention gathered.
[Quest]
[A road to leadership]
–find and vote for a chief worthy of leading your people. Do so by pointing out your choice.
Reward: 1+ to Int
~
'Isn't this simple?' asked Asmai in his head, but if it is then it wouldn't be made as a task for them. Though Asmai would question the god's intention, he knows a mortal like him is incapable of understanding it.
So he just decided to do what he was tasked for. He stood up and went towards the woman who had been of huge help ever since they came here.
Asmai couldn't help but admit that he liked her, though he doubted that she shared the same feeling. He went toward the woman who was hard at work, she only momentarily stopped gathering when she took a look at her system.
"Shaka."
Shaka, Kasha's older sister, has led the tribe in the ways of the village, she also wasn't shy in learning their language and way of life and even was happy when they taught her how to farm animals.
"Asmai!"
Shaka greeted him with a smile and he very much felt his heart flutter. He glanced at the basket she had filled with different kinds of fruits.
He pointed at them and said a single word "Gathering?"
Shaka understood what he meant and nodded, she then took out a stem, it had flowers in it and a few around it were berries. It is white-gold and it looks beautiful.
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Shaka extended her hand, offering the flower to Asmai. Asmai froze for a moment, what does this mean? His gaze slowly lifted to Shaka, but he was only bombarded with a bright smile that he froze in place.
Wasn't his goal to vote for the chief of the village? He stiffly reached out and accepted the flower, Shaka's cheeks flushed for a moment before she left.
Asmai was left to stand like a stone.
He changed his mind thinking of Shaka to be the chief, now he wants her to be his lover.
***
I just saw that Asmai is one of the travelling tribes, it seems that he's in love with Shaka and Shaka seems to be the same.
Well, it doesn't matter honestly, if they had a child the children born from that affair would speak two languages, and so on with the others. This will be a good thing since they will be united more.
I need to connect the Marshland village to Foreline village sooner or later.
Anyways. I experimented with the SE I have. According to the Abyss info, I could make weapons with it, the problem being that I need a lot to do so. Not only that it will also become a physical thing instead of only metaphysical, however, but the weapon would also be strong against the metaphysical and in reality.
I could also enchant said item with SE or enchant things with SE overall. It also seems that my subject dominion (Particle) is much easier to control.
I tried to, per se, make lightning, fire, water and other things. But it was expensive, very expensive. But, if I do it by its scientific cause like the particles explosively shaking to burn some oxygen in the air the same cost of SE isn't that much expensive.
When I cast lightning with SE it probably skips the other things like when vapour rubs each other to get some charge. It's just immediate lightning, no cause just lightning, the effect.
Anyhow, these experiments I conducted with SE are the preparation for my venture into the Abyssal Dimension. I have no idea how long I would be there so I would prepare for the Foreline village as much as possible.
Oh, there we go. They have promoted a chief. It's the old lady, she kind of complained that they're making an old lady do work but eventually, she relented with their sincere pleas and reasoning.
"Ha… I'll do what I can. Now, why did Hadro make this task—"
I gave her several quests, I would be gone for I only know how long.
[Quest]
–Gather a group to connect with the Marshland Village.
Reward: spirit 1+
–Organize a group of hunters, prepare and lead for a hunt. Do this at least 5 times this year.
Reward: [Leadership F]
–Help Kasha, Kavo, and Mari to grow their understanding, and if possible help them spread their knowledge.
Reward: [Leadership Aura F]
~
With those, I set off towards the Abyssal Dimension. With 4,000 SE I'm confident that I have enough power to stay and claim territory.
With 50 SE I opened up a gateway to the Abyssal Dimension, setting foot in the same forest I have entered the first time. It was lush as ever, the air fresh and the fauna active.
The weapon I have in mind is a dagger, but considering the village's circumstances, I would have no way of getting more income for SE to have a weapon to be made.
So instead, I had one of them offer me some of the dried leaves. I made my rope according to my previous memory. It wasn't a lot nor was it very long. But it's long enough to make me some weapons.
I thought something was wrong when my stomach rumbled. My stomach rumbled something that never happened in the Mortal Realm. I ignored it for the time being and moved forward.
The fauna is quite the sight, a rabbit with the most jacked legs, a badger the size of a car, and the most goody one is the anteater that has goofy eyes.
I am about to test my limits here, I looked around the ground and found a solidly flat rock, one that seems rigid and almost sharp on one edge. With my mind clear, I started manipulating the rock.
My SE usage is 1 per second. I applied my touch to this rock, so I didn't waste any. My target in sight was locked, and with thought the Rock was lifted in a burst of speed, leaving along with my influence with it. I only used three SEs for the job.
The target was a mammal, it had black-orange fur, a monkey to be exact. The rock that was flying towards it at high speed collided with its neck. Needless to say, it killed it. After shattering the skin and spreading blood everywhere.
[320 SE+]
However, that did give me a prompt from my system. After my kill, however, the body started disappearing, or more like disintegrating because the body was slowly turning to dust, Peter Parker style.
I wondered why, I tried scouring the Abyss info and nothing particular came up. Strange, I went to another animal, this one a snake, and it had the same treatment as the monkey.
But before disintegrating I focused my entire brain power on observing this snake. The SE was absorbed from the snake into my body, then it started disintegrating.
From this point, it's quite easy to deduct a few things. The SE was taken from its body since it's devoid of any soul energy that its metaphysical form cannot hold or rather it's just the nature of the Abyssal Dimension, which I assume is the correct one in the former.
I'm curious now. I killed another snake that was around and the moment SE filled me I also brought SE back to the snake. I observed what would happen but my expectations were correct. If I filled the snake with SE it wouldn't disintegrate.
My stomach rumbled again and I couldn't help but sigh. I looked at the snake, my thoughts thinking about how it would look once it was cooked.
I shook my head at this thought, why am I hungry right now?!
I just sighed and with my power, I dismantled the snake in parts, since I didn't have anything on me right now I just collected the bones and kept them in my pockets while the organs were kept in a leaf, some rhubarb I found and a splinter from tree bark was enough to store the snake organs.
The meat now was next, with SE I created a fire in the palm of my hands. I made camp with what I had, some short branches I yanked from its tree and some vines.
I started cooking, and the snake meat pierced through the branch. While doing this something hit me, this world isn't like Earth, animals would avoid humans as much as possible but humans in this world are prey, and I AM imaged as a human.
They would avoid me, right? Oh goodness, I hope I didn't jinx myself. I watched as the snake meat got cooked in the skewer as its juices flowed down the makeshift bonfire I made.
The bonfire is a-ok but the skewer isn't, it's from the branches I just yanked, and I couldn't just use some particles and shoot them at the thing to make a perfect cut, ionising things is the last thing I want on materials that I would use.
I looked at the shrunken snake meat, it was larger when I dismantled it but whatever, I dug in and it wasn't that bad. It has the texture of fish while it tastes like chicken.
After finishing my meal I looked around, since I would be in the same place as the mortal realm, topographically, I started flying, only to notice that I was losing SE.
C'mon.
I just decided that I would make a base here. The very same place as the camp. I went around and found some sharp rock, flinging it to the trees. It might make some noise, but I'll take a gamble that the noises will deter any animals from coming here.
Which I was wrong.
A predatory gaze fell on me, two slit eyes and a flicking tongue. A giant constrictor snake with a pattern of brown and muddy yellow the size of a truck appeared in front of me like a chameleon removing its camouflage.
"Oh… Shit."
I tried not to move but that's a stupid idea, I ran away with all of my might and the boa seemed to understand what I was doing, I'm not in a good stance to throw something. I felt something hit my back and I went flying, trees brought down by my body.
"Argh!!"
I felt pain, a whirlwind sensation of pain, it felt like I've broken bones, no scratch that, I HAVE broken bones.
"You fucking snake!"
I used SE to heal myself, it's expensive since I'm not averse to mending the body. I stood up wearily and looked at the snake whilst gritting my teeth.
It was nowhere to be, the sound of leaves and branches snapping was alarming. My head snapped towards every sound although my sight was utterly useless as a tail whipped me as soon as my eyes landed on it.
"Ugh!"
My arms started flailing as I flew back from the sheer force of the hit. But not before I could glance at the giant snake. It was moving way too fast for its size!
I healed my arms and gunned myself to the trees, hiding behind them always moving to one place or another. That snake launched me through several trees. I don't think hiding behind one is a good idea but always moving to a new place is.
I constantly ran, running away from the snake, but I kept hearing the rustling of the leaves. This is not good, While I was running I ducked down to grab a rock, just any rock would suffice.
I looked at the snake, it was using the trees to blur its presence, but I have a general idea of where it is.
I had the stone floating in my hand, then shot. The stone breezed through the wind, a couple of branches cracking then a 'pang'!
I kept running, but the forest was silent. It was so much more silent than when I came here. Whilst running I took a glance behind me.
The snake is bleeding from its side, the scale ruptured and was torn out of its skin and by its look it's angry. I knew at this point that I was not going to be let go, so I grabbed as many rocks as I could on the dirt floor and started aiming.
The snake lunged at me with the intent to coil around my body, I of course didn't allow that. The damage I incurred against the giant snake was above its unblinking eyes. Just on its brow.
I aimed for the already damaged part of the snake, but it was moving swiftly and sporadically, knowing my set of attacks it must've reacted like that.
But you know, I'm eager to take you out.
I just shot sporadically as it moved, making it hiss in pain and even stop for a moment after I shot out all of the stones I had in hand.
However, it only did the same damage as the first rock I ever launched, just scratching its scales enough to bleed. The snake launched its tail and coiled on me. But now without shattering my left arm, I scream in pain.
The snake aggressively coiled around me as soon as it got the chance, I cursed as it started constricting. I wanted to conserve as much SE as I could since coming here but it seems I needed to let go of that thought!
With SE I cast lightning, for a second, the snake hissed and its constriction got tighter. I just said fuck it and continued using SE to fuel the lightning.
The snake convulsed, I wasn't particularly affected by the lightning, I used my SE for it.
The snake had its grip softened and I took the chance as I landed on the ground, I grabbed the nearest rock and shot it to the head, where the previous injury was.
It penetrated the skull of the creature, leading it to slump to the ground.
[4,700 SE+]
Isn't that near the Deity's SE range? Don't tell me that this snake is the same or at least stronger than that of the catfish deity. I started giving the corpse my SE, I need to get as much as I can from this corpse.
With further ado, I just started dismantling, like pulling the flesh off the bones keeping the bones clean of flesh, organs also separated and the bones stored in a singular place.
I checked my SE for how much I have.
SE: 3,220.
Great, I came with more than I have and stayed with less. Whatever, thanks to the snake's rampage the place is devoid of standing trees. I just decided to claim this land since it would be a hassle if I went somewhere else.