Sam started with the first option which was construct. A new menu appeared in front of him, and he read through it.

Construction options

Buildings

Terraforming

Agriculture

Defence

There was a list of yet more options, which Sam opened up. All four of them were filled with hundreds of possibilities, but what was most important now was the defense option. Setting the readout to only display things that he could afford, basically anything that was under 10 million credits, accounting for the faction resources, Sam checked it out.

Defence

Basic Trap:Spike, Pitfall or Deadfall:50 Credits

Turret:Arrow:2500 Credits

Turret:Gun:2500 Credits

Turret:Aura:2500 Credits

Turret:Healing:2500 Credits

Mana Cannon:10,000 Credits

G Rank Concrete Walls:250,000 Credits per mile

G Rank Steel Walls:500,000 Credits per mile

Superior Mana Cannon:1,000,000 Credits

Anti Air Defense Array:1,500,000 Credits

Everything after that was far more expensive, ranging up to the tens of millions and even billions of credits. Why a G Rank faction would need anything that cost that much was beyond Sam, but he supposed that the more members there were in a faction, the more money they could field. That brought another question to mind. Taxes. That was something that he would not discuss in front of the people in the yard, but rather when all of the captain places had been filled. For now, the most useful thing seemed to be the wall. It would allow them to quickly encircle their dominion and protect it from assault.

Sam turned to Jeffrey and told him what he had found. The man agreed that this was the best use of Sam’s credits, and he quickly tallied up the cost of a full wall that would encircle the area of control. Unfortunately it seemed that they would need a bit over 31 miles of wall to encircle the 10 mile radius of the Metropolis Core. That would cost a little under 8 million credits. Emboldened by the support that he had received before, Sam cleared his throat.

“There are now more purchases made available by the core, and the one that seems the best, the walls, will cost a little under 8 million credits. If this is an acceptable cost, I would encourage you all to contribute. If not, we can always make do with less.”

A few people grumbled, but they coughed up the money eventually, and Sam paid for the walls. A ring of bright light appeared around the camp, traveling out quite some distance. However, it did not immediately go into action.

31.42 miles of G Rank Concrete Walls will be finished in 23:59:54

It would take about a day to finish. They had some work to do in the meantime. Even worse, when Sam checked in one the core again, he found that it refused to let him build anything else when the wall was being constructed. Apparently it took up too much energy. With the main line of defense being constructed, it was time for some planning.

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Over the next day, much was completed. The natural strength and speed of the members of the faction made constructing simple dwellings out of the nearby trees quite trivial, and many of them decided to use the tents that the aliens had left instead of that. There were no housing shortages, that was for sure. The other problem was food and water, which was solved when a man with some sort of tracker class found a storage device at the center of the alien camp that was filled with literal tons of food and water. They would soon need to create actual farms, but for now they had enough food. It all looked strange, but it was edible enough and did not taste too bad.

As the group started to transform the surrounding land, Sam waited for the captain applicants to be processed by Lao. There were only about thirty hopefuls, but there were still only four spots left. It took Lao five hours to go through them all, and another two to decide. Eventually he sent the four over to the cabin in the fort, which was what they were using for a meeting room. Sam had not been there, but Jeffrey had, and he had greeted them. Sam was yet to see the new recruits, but he would after the walls were constructed.

Sam had asked Jeffrey how exactly he had constructed the fort, and apparently the man had simply made it with his bare hands and some mana. Sam realized that he was probably more powerful than a construction machine now. His fists were wrecking balls, his legs were like pistons, and his arms were like forklifts. In addition, raw mana could be used as a sort of primitive arc welder, which was how Jeffrey had gotten rid of all of the gaps in the wood. It worked without a flame, just raw power, so it did not set the wood on fire. It would only do that if Fire elemental energy was added to it.

Most of the day for Sam was spent lazing around and waiting for things to finish. He did not sleep that night, instead looking out at the slowly developing wall in between bouts of elemental cultivation. Now that he would have more free time, it was time for him to build up his Earth Meridian. After a few hours of cultivating, he ranked up his meridian to the next level, causing a shockwave of yellow light to surge throughout his body.

You have reached 3% mastery of your Meridian of Earth.

Sam could feel his connection to the element deepen a bit more, only by a tiny bit, but still enough for him to utilize it more effectively within his body. So far he had only used his elemental energy to augment his skills in battle, rather than use it in its own right as a source of skills. He had touched upon it by using the energy in concert with his Mana Bulwark skill, but not to the point that he had created a new skill. That was his next goal, as that seemed like something that would be achieved through time rather than just ideation.

Eventually the wall finished, and the ground underneath Sam rumbled. He stood up and climbed the ladder of the fort, coming out on the top. The stream of workers coming in and out of the door had stopped, and they were all looking at the long line of darkness on the horizon. The wall had arrived, and it was a lot larger than Sam had expected. It was at least 30 feet tall, and towers dotted its length. Sam could not make out the finer details, but he would be able to see it later.

He hopped down off the fort, its walls short enough for him to hop off without suffering any injury. He landed on the ground, near a large group of people, and started running for the wall. With a loping gait, he started running. At his top speed, he could go faster than a car, but he couldn't keep that up for very long. The most that he could go at for a prolonged period of time was about 50 miles per hour, which meant that it took him about 12 minutes to reach the wall.

As he neared, he noted something about it. It appeared to have been built all in one piece, and there were no individual bricks or pieces visible. Sam made for the nearest tower, and walked up the stairs inside. The only problem about the wall was that it would be extremely hard to patrol. A quick mental calculation told him that even if the full force of the faction were to keep watch, there would only be one guard every 66 feet, which was not really enough to hold it properly against invaders. Hopefully more people would flock to their banner soon. In any case, this would be a good deterrent against any forces who sought to attack them. As he stood there, the world shook again, this time more violently. The visage of the System Overseer responsible for the universe appeared in the sky.

“It has been one day since the end of the tournament. Now the next stage of the initialization will begin, one of conquest and defense. There will be three main threats that you will have to deal with in order to lay claim to the planet, and you will shortly be receiving a new quest. I will not explain them, as the quest will do so well enough.”