A burning sensation in his brain caused Blake to double over and grasp his head. He struggled to straighten his back and hold open his eyes as he slowly raised his spear. He was thankful he did, as the Ursa took that moment to charge.

I hate Psi Users!

Before he fully recovered, the massive monster reached him. Yet, the metal tip of his spear sat just high enough to become lodged within the beast’s shoulder. Blake, unable to dodge due to his mental anguish, was thrown backward as it crashed into him.

His brain cleared.

He immediately rolled to his side, lest he be trampled. Despite his decisive action, his movements were too slow, and pain flared in his left hand.

Blake grunted as his fingers went numb.

Get the spear!

He forced himself through the agony and found his feet. After he rose, he dove toward his weapon, still trapped within the Ursa’s shoulder. Both hands clasped the wooden pole, but only his right was able to tighten into a fist.

That was enough.

With his entire weight behind the maneuver, Blake shredded the monster’s limb. The metal tip of his spear ate through the muscles and ligaments until its front right appendage was almost severed.

His spear popped out of the howling monster, and Blake slammed into the ground hard on his right hip. Again, he forced himself to his feet to reengage the beast in combat while it was distracted by the loss of its limb.

He rolled forward, spear in his uninjured right hand, and thrust.

The Ursa shifted to dodge, but without the use of its leg, was too slow. His weapon raked along its long fangs before it slid past, and pierced the back of its throat.

The monster’s growl deteriorated into a gurgle. With one last shove, the tip of his spear slid between its vertebrae and severed its spinal cord. His enemy collapsed to the ground, and he was immediately presented with a notification.

You have successfully completed the Combat Scenario. Would you like to choose your reward now?

No.

Blake collapsed backward to regain his breath as he examined his damaged left hand. Two of his fingers jutted sideways at odd angles, obviously broken, while the others were purple and almost twice their original size. Only his left thumb remained undamaged.

Damn…

As he stared intently at the injury, his hand began to pulse with pain. Every time his heart beat, his fingers throbbed in agony. He momentarily held it above his head to lessen the pain.

I need to fix the bones before they heal wrong.

Blake delicately grasped his broken finger with his right hand. Before he could second guess himself, he wrenched it to the side.

He heard the bone snap back in place and screamed at the sharp pain. His lungs responded to the intense sensation with quick, panicked breaths. He ground his teeth together in an attempt to suppress the sensation.

When his breathing finally recovered, he opened his eyes and stared at the remaining broken finger in trepidation.

This is going to suck.

Ever so slowly, he gingerly grasped the fractured digit with his right hand. He stared at the injury in trepidation until he forced himself to act. With a single deft move, the finger snapped back in place, and waves of pain traversed his limb.

He forced himself to maintain slow, deep breaths as he suffered through the torment. Finally, when the discomfort waned to a heavy ache, he rose slowly to his feet. He shuffled to the deceased Ursa and extracted his spear from its open jaw, still favoring the injured hand. When the weapon was free, he slammed the butt of his spear on the ground and rested his weight against it. Right on schedule, his stomach growled.

This is bad.

He reviewed his stats within his heads-up display as he rummaged with his good hand for a snack bar. Before his enhancements, it would take six weeks to recover from the injury. Now, with his Physical Stamina at eighteen point five, his body would heal over three times faster than the average humans. The injury would be fully repaired in less than a fortnight.

The problem was, he did not have two weeks to spare.

Thank God it’s my left hand, or I’d be screwed.

Once he exited the scenario, he had planned to grind through Mander scenarios until he gained enough nano to purchase his class. With his fire-absorbent kite shield, the Manders were far less formidable than the giant Ursa.

This injury may have ruined those plans.

Without being able to grasp the shield’s straps tight, he could not use it to bash the Manders in their faces. However, it would still absorb the dangerous heat and fire based spells they would use against him.

He cursed his luck.

I can’t wait to get Regeneration.

As long as he had chi, the ability would increase his healing factor by ten. The two weeks to heal his wounded hand would be reduced to a little over two days if he kept the spell active as often as possible.

Once he leveled, he would be able to raise his Physical Stamina again, which would cut down the time needed to heal injuries even further. He glanced at his hand and imagined the swelling had improved.

No more putting this off.

Blake finished his snack, took a deep breath, and began the trek back toward the portal entrance.

Lord Blake Summers, Scion of Humanity: I’m done with the scenario, you guys can come join us now.

Jason Karesek: Finally! I’m tired of this place already. It feels like I’m being squished into the ground.

Owen Yates: Don’t listen to him, Brent. It’s nice over here. You’ll like it, I swear.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Blake shook his head at the obvious lie. Owen obviously wanted to ensure his ‘friend’ suffered as he did. Even Blake found the gravity on the planet oppressive. However, with Blake’s injured hand and rapidly emptying stomach, he found it hard to care about their mild discomfort. They would all be safe, and a little discomfort would do them good.

Twenty minutes later, he entered the clearing dominated by the glowing spatial distortion. Jordan and Brent had traversed through the portal and, once through, had stopped using party chat. They clustered around a tree that held minimal damage, while Jordan leaned heavily on his ax. They were in the midst of an argument, and Blake was curious what it was about. As he approached the four men, they became aware of his presence and the yelling immediately ended.

Blake’s stomach growled, he was hungry again.

“Yo Blake!” Jason called and hiked his thumb toward Jordan. “Tell this asshole that as the woodworker, I need to be the one to cut it down.”

“If you do it, we’re going to be here all day. You’re too weak,” Jordan argued.

“I’m not weak, you’re just freakishly strong. Besides, if you do it, it won’t count, and we’ll have to start over again.”

“Actually,” Blake interrupted impatiently as he strode up to the group. “It doesn’t matter who cuts the tree down.”

Jason scowled at the answer.

“Then why’d we have to be here if you could do it yourself?” Owen demanded.

Blake shook his head. “I didn’t say I didn’t need you, I said it doesn’t matter who does the cutting.”

“Mind explaining?” Jordan drawled, dryly, in his southern accent, clearly annoyed.

“Okay, we need at least ten of these trees and a crap load of stone, right?”

Jordan nodded.

“If I’m here by myself, it doesn’t matter if I cut them all down and mine all the rock. The second I go through the portal, the scenario closes, and I can’t come back. That means I can drag a single log back with me.” He took a deep breath, “According to Metal, you two should have directives to retrieve the materials. It's a retrieval directive, not a harvesting one. Is that right?” He glanced at the stonemason and woodworker.

Owen frowned, while Jason nodded absently.

“Well, that’s free nano, just follow the directive. And, you should be able to send them directly to the warehouse without having to cart them all through the portal.”

“Ah,” Jordan finally caught on to his plan. “I should’ve thought of that.”

His ever-present hunger soured his mood, so he took a deep, calming breath and continued with his explanation. “It’s one of the reasons I chose the warehouse for our free building. Can you imagine us carrying all this crap through the portal, down the fire tower and across town?”

Jordan snorted. “Yeah, that’d be a problem.”

Blake nodded and held out his hand. “Let me see that ax.”

Jordan handed the steel tool over and Blake walked up to the base of the two-foot thick tree. He glanced over his shoulder. “You guys may want to step back.”

Once he ensured they were at a safe distance, he lifted the ax and swung with his full strength one-handed. A loud thud echoed through his ears as the head dug an inch into the tree. Unfortunately, at the same time, the wooden handle shattered.

Damnit!

Blake whirled around and pointed to Jason. “You didn’t help make the ax, did you?”

Jason backed away, concerned by the anger in Blake’s eyes.

“It was from Builder Depot,” Jordan explained.

Blake sighed, pushed down his hunger, and dropped the useless handle. “Normal tools aren’t strong enough. It’s why we have a blacksmith and woodworker in the first place. A nano-enhanced ax or pick would’ve been just fine.”

“What are we going to do now?” Brent frowned as he spoke up for the first time.

“First, I’m going to eat a snack,” he stated. “My empty stomach is making me ‘hangry’. After that, I’m going to abuse the crap out of my sword.”

“Won’t that dull it?” Jordan asked.

Blake shrugged as he stalked toward the portal and his duffel bag of supplies. “Doesn’t matter. It’ll repair itself automatically over time.”

“That sure is nice,” the constructor grunted.

He nodded in agreement.

After Blake inhaled three snack bars, he no longer felt as if he were dying. Now, he was merely hungry.

Good enough.

Blake stalked back over to the damaged tree, unsheathed his sword, and swung at its base. The edge bit two inches into the wood, and he felt the blade vibrate hard against his hand. When he extracted his weapon, he examined the sharp metal edge.

Looks fine to me.

Eight more swings, and the stout arbor was felled. When it finally crashed hard to the ground, he turned to Jason. “Did you get credit for that?”

The woodworker frowned and crossed his eyes. After a moment, he shook his head.

“Okay, come over here and try to send this to the warehouse,” Blake ordered.

Jason gave him a look of disbelief. “Are you serious? That has to weigh two tons! Especially with the shitty gravity on this planet!”

“Just try it,” Blake persisted.

“Fine,” the tall man shook his head and stumbled over to the downed tree. He leaned over and rested against the thick trunk while he concentrated. Suddenly, the entire tree disappeared, and he fell to the ground.

“Ow!” Jason complained.

“What about now?” Blake asked, unfazed. “Did you get credit?”

The woodworker rubbed his sore shoulder while he checked his directives. Finally, he nodded. “Yeah, it says it’s fifty-four percent complete.”

Blake frowned. “I thought we needed more than two trees worth. Is this a directive for the faction hall, or just for cutting down trees?”

“Just trees.”

“Okay then, let’s do another and finish that up for you.” Blake strode over to the next closest arbor and began to chop it down. A few minutes later, it crashed to the ground. “You’re up again, Jason.”

This time, the tall man was ready for it to disappear. When it vanished, he grinned, “It says I got five hundred thousand nano! Ka-ching!”

“Nice, fam!” Owen congratulated him.

“What’s the next directive?” Blake asked.

“I got two of them. One says to cut down ‘foreign’ trees, whatever that is, and the other is to cut the wood into planks.”

“Pretty sure these count as foreign,” Jordan added dryly as he gestured toward the surrounding forest.

Owen snorted. “Yeah, dumbass.”

“Dude, don’t act like you knew any better!” Jason yelled at his friend.

“Okay, kids, that’s enough,” Blake admonished them and again tempered his annoyance. “We need to get back to work. This is going to take a while and I have a lot to do.”

Jordan gave him an odd look, but remained silent.

After another two trees were harvested, Jason threw his hands up into the air. “Boo-yeah! Another five hundred kay! At this rate, I can upgrade my muscles this week.”

Brent frowned. “When do I start getting nano?”

“When the faction hall is built, we can make you a constructor like Jordan. Then you can help build the town,” Blake answered.

Brent turned to the ex-contractor. “How much nano have you made so far?”

Jordan shrugged. “Almost ten million.”

After that, Brent grinned and rubbed his hands together in anticipation.

It took another hour and five snack bars to harvest the rest of the trees they needed and collect their stone. During Blake’s labor, his chosen reward, a pair of hide boots which increased Physical Resistance by two, finished its assembly, and he eagerly replaced his current footwear.

When he was done, Jason and Owen wanted to continue to complete more directives and earn greater amounts of nano. Jordan added his own support behind the measure, as he wanted to build up a reserve.

Blake disagreed.

“No, we got what we needed here. I need a real meal and to get back to grinding out nano, so I can get my class. Once I have magic, you can join me again, and we’ll take the time to build up our off world supplies.”

“How long will you take?” Jordan asked.

Blake checked his status and saw that he held a little over four hundred million unused nano.

If I do three scenarios a day, that’s close to a hundred and fifty million. I might squeeze in two more before dark, even with my broken hand, so that’s…

He closed his interface and looked at Jordan. “Probably three days. Maybe four.”

The constructor frowned. “Faction hall will be done in a little over two.”

Blake shrugged. “At this point, I don’t care. I’m tired of starving all the time.” As if to punctuate the statement, his stomach growled.

“What do you want me to start on once I’m finished?” Jordan asked.

“Whatever my mom needs for her directives,” he responded.

“And if we run out of nano in the treasury?”

Blake frowned and rubbed his injured hand. “Either use your own, or just wait till I get back. I can’t put off getting a class any longer.”