Getting a rather disappointed stare from Alice, my question is answered with another question.

“You do know what a mana core is, correct?”

“...Oh come on, if a mana core is the same as a golem core why didn’t the prompt just say ‘missing 1 mana core’?”

“Because they are not the same thing you fool, actually pay attention. A mana core is the little crystal you have buried in the base of your neck within the spinal cord that connects you to your mana.”

“Well, I knew that. The mana core getting to a certain size is what gives humans access to The System and connects them to the Mana Plane. I got that information drilled into my head many times as a kid.”

“Yes that is the basics of a mana core, congrats for knowing the same things as any 5 year old not dropped on their head repeatedly would know. Now as for a golem core the basics are the same but it must be modified so that the golem master can actually control the construct instead of just creating a mindless statue that does nothing but look like a blob of dirt.”

“Huh.”

After sitting through a long lecture from the AI who refused to put on a teachers outfit when asked I began working on digging out the mana core from the base of my least favorite goblins spine. I had gone to start using the stick when Alice yelled at me once again. Apparently the knife will work now since the goblin is dead and whatever skill it was using to make itself so durable will have weakened considerably.

Picking up the knife that was responsible for my death, I flipped over the goblin and with the unhelpful comments and quips of Alice, managed to dig out the mana core. Thankfully my memories from this world and the training my parents put me through gave me a stomach durable enough to do the carving no problem. Not that I am really all that thankful for being taught to harvest monsters for my 12th birthday.

Now with a rather sticky and gross mana core in my hand I can get to work converting it into a golem core. Thankfully that just requires me pumping a bunch of my mana into the thing until I bind it to myself and my golemancy magic. Alice had a few comments on how incredibly rare it is to have two types of magic which surprised me, though when I thought about it more I realized that getting your mind and soul merged with someone else by a god probably does not happen very often.

After flooding the core with mana for a while I finally feel a connection form. Getting the go ahead from Alice I bury the core in the ground and chant my skill once again.

“[Create Golem]”

And with a tiny rumble the ground begins to pull in towards the golem core as if being attracted to a powerful magnet. Slowly the golem starts to take shape and within a few seconds the process stops and the little golem stands up and faces me with a blank look on its nonexistent face.

“Well, it is kind of cute, but I am not sure how much help it will be.”

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Standing before me is a three foot tall stubby legged vaguely humanoid clump of dirt that looks like it would fall apart from a single hit.

“How am I supposed to fight with this when it looks so fragile and can’t even hold a weapon with its stumps that have no hands?”

Clearly exasperated Alice reminds me once again that I am expecting far too much from level 1 skills. And while I get that, I don’t understand how I am going to level up my skills or survive when my only attack option remains a single pointy stick. I had always seen other people use magic in my training and they would create huge fireballs that would explode the targets or slash them apart with blades of water. I know those people were much higher level than I am but at least they had attack skills, Light beam really can’t deal any damage on its own and my little golem here is well…

[Dirt Golem - Lv : 3]

“Hey, why is it only level 3 when the goblin was level 9? That seems kind of unfair.”

“Some of the mana from its core went to you when you killed it which resulted in your level ups and some dissipated upon its death. Also your own level and maximum mana play a role in it as well, you didn’t seriously expect you could just buy a level 100 mana core and use it to make a level 100 golem did you?”

Once again I receive a disappointed glare.

“If anything you are lucky that the core is level 3, otherwise you would have had a very difficult time controlling it.”

“Oh, I uh, totally didn’t think about that. Anyway, what can Alpha here do?”

Ignoring my uncreative name for the pile of dirt Alice begins my lesson using my skill. Which sadly is a rather short lesson as the golem can’t do much. At the current level of the skill It is more like a remote control toy than anything else. I can order it around with my mind, which the resident AI girl finds strange considering the system can’t. Not bothering with wondering why that is I play around with the golem making it run and jump and dance, all of which is rather clunky but quite fast for something made out of dirt and moving through magic.

It is quite surreal to see a pile of dirt trying to moonwalk. Moving the golem around it is quite intuitive as it more responds to will rather than explicit commands. Sure I can say “jump” in my mind and it will jump but I can also just feel like it should jump three times and spin around and it will do it exactly how I had envisioned it. Another thing I tested was how durable the little guy is, which apparently is more than I thought. I had expected the thing to crumble from me punching it once but the dirt barely moved at all. Which I guess makes sense in hindsight considering it seems to be rather densely packed but at the same time the particles of dirt are just loose enough to slide past one another allowing for it to move. My punch gets diffused into it more than anything and the dirt can just reshape itself afterwards.

Alpha’s strength does not seem to be very high though when compared to its durability. It could lift up the goblin corpse just barely but anything beyond that would clearly be impossible. My guess is the structure of the golem and how thick and stubby its limbs are what is making it weaker. Its range of motion just doesn’t allow it to produce enough force to do much.

After about an hour of experimenting with the golem it begins to slow down and eventually comes to a stop with its head hung low. It looks a bit like a robot that has entered a lower power mode, which according to Alice is a mostly accurate description. It seems that if I have it on the move it uses up quite a bit of mana and will run out and need to be recharged after an hour. Rather than refill it I simply flip a switch in my mind that connects to the spell and let the dirt crumble.

It was rather early in the morning when I woke up in this forest but now it is almost past noon and I need to get moving, food, shelter, and water are my primary focuses now that I understand my skills enough to maybe avoid dying if I run into something. I hope.

Picking up my pointy stick, silver knife, and dusting off the golem core to refill with about half my mana then shove in my pocket. I check my status before setting off.

“Status”

[Status]

-Lua Knight-

Species: Human

Level: 3

Class: 1

Magic: Light, Golemancy

Skills:

[Lesser Identification]

[Lesser Clean]

[Lesser Repair]

[Light Beam] Lv-2

[Create Golem] Lv-1

[Flash] Lv-1

[Passive - Solar Regeneration] Lv-1

“Oh, right I have [Lesser Clean] and [Lesser Repair]. Totally forgot about those.”

Using the skills immediately to repair a bit of my shirt and remove some of the gunk from my hands and wounds, I turn towards my snarky companion.

“So, uh… Which way to civilization?”

“You know my answer to that.”

“Right, System assistance only. Shit.”

And with that I begin to trudge my way further into The Sea of Trees.