Sitting down at the meeting table, I looked around briefly while opening my laptop. I hadn't used it in such a long time, but like riding a bicycle after so long I quickly get used to it.

In this meeting are myself, Deven, Jupiter, Geralt, Jokestar and Isabelle, who sat next to me as my assistant. Kate was nowhere to be found, but I knew she was currently working, helping plan and construct more dormitories and facilities for the new intake of people.

“Alright, let's begin today's meeting. Jokestar, how are your people adapting to the base?” Deven started the meeting, looking towards Jokestar who took the lead given.

“So far no problems. Before arriving here our Clan had a lot of doubts, but being able to see fresh water come from not only taps but also hot showers has evaporated any doubts we might have had. Not only that, but the size of the farm, the sheer amount of meat and so much more…I'm still wondering if I'd died, it's such a huge turn around from how we were living before.

“I do fear that those who are Useless, or even my own squad, will become far too complacent, compromising any sort of chance at removing the curse or getting stronger.”

“Not to worry, we have a working system for that.” I explain the contribution system to Jokestar, about the pricing for food, entertainment, weapons and more. He looked shocked that we had such a thing and remained silent for a moment after I explained everything.

“I see, that is indeed a very good system. The entertainment part means there will be less chances of people becoming lazy since you need to pay for it monthly. I'm curious though, how'd you get anime, movies, and so on? And such a high volume, doesn't sound like a System reward.”

“We will catch you up late, Jokestar. Now that the clans have been merged, we have approximately one thousand and three hundred people. If we remove the cursed ones, we are still around eight hundred people capable of working, fighting and building. First of all, I think we need to elevate the rankings of our fighting force.” Deven looks at me as I pull up our current roster.

Currently the way our squads worked is by assigning clusters based on their role. Close quarters fighters that preferred weapons like shotguns were under the lead of Rebecca, while those who fought on the frontlines to protect others, tanks basically, were under the lead of Dawn.

Each of them had their own assistant for times of combat and while it had proven effective, with the massive intake recently it will become difficult.

Looking at Sheep, I started relaying my thoughts. “It'll be best to start switching to an army type of ranking system. Battalions, I'm thinking of two hundred units per battalion for the time being. We will then have individual groups within them like a magician team, mortar and explosives team, frontlines and so on. Each team will have a ranked officer like a Captain, along with two to three Lieutenants.

“Within each Battalion, we will have a command post, where we will have a Major and use it for communications and relaying information. This Major will then report to the Lieutenant Colonel of the Battalion, who then reports to the Colonel.”

“The Australian army's ranking system is so confusing compared to the American one.” Geralt spoke up before grunting. “But that type of System will work very well, it'll allow us to adapt later. Outside of the Battalions you will still need a Brigadier, Major General, Lieutenant General, General and finally a Field Marshal. For Lieutenant General and General, I highly recommend they have their own team, a Special Ops of sorts that can do the dirty work like taking out threats to the general army and such.”

With Geralt’s ideas, we all began brainstorming and discussing every detail. It felt weird to be discussing the start of an army, complete with ranks and more, but it was always going to go down this route, especially as we got more people. Without this sort of proper structure and functionality, it would lead to all sorts of issues down the track.

Over the course of 12 hours, we discuss almost every detail, who would be what rank, the designs for each uniform and more. We decided that the rankings would stick regardless of combat but abuse of rankings in times of peace would be strictly prohibited. Uniforms were not to be worn unless combat based operations were occuring, like clearing Dimensions, fighting off hordes etc.

Questions arose like what if they didn't want to be in this army. The majority of us held the opinion that in a world like this, everyone capable of fighting absolutely should be fighting. After several considerations, planning of restrictions and more, we figured out a way to have non-combatants, but they must be ready at a moment's notice to fight.

“Now then, we've spent half a day on this one topic. Moving onto the next, which will be about expansion of the base. With so many new people, and with regards to future proofing, we need to start seriously considering the layout of the buildings.

“Since Aerith isn't with us right now, we won't go into excessive detail.” Grabbing a few pieces of paper I had prepared earlier, I passed one TL each person here. “Outlined here is my proposal. Yes, it's three walls and no this isn't Attack on Titan.” Shooting Jokestar a glare as he opened his mouth, I watched with amusement as he stuttered and closed his mouth looking disappointed.

“The inside, where we are now, will hold this office and the residential areas. For the area with nothing in it, this is where the mystical tree is. I estimate it has the potential to be as large as Yggdrasil, so we won't build near it. Plus having a location free of buildings will be good.

“The second layer will be our industrial area. While this would mean we would have to relocate all of our current warehouses, factories and more, it will also mean more space. Finally the last outer ring will be dedicated to defence. Outposts, weapons and more will be there as our first line of defence.

“As for the ring outside of the base, this will be where we build a full, proper farm. Expansion and future proofing means we need far more production when it comes to food, so over the course of however long we need we will move the farm there. For defence, we will figure it out but having it within the main base simply means it will not be possible to expand. Thoughts?”

Once again we started discussing ideas, such as having the farm be within the walls but with the ability to bubble outwards, keeping it within reach of us. Once again, several hours were spent discussing one topic, but everyone here was Lvl 2 or Lvl 3. Sleep wasn't a requirement for us unless we became completely exhausted which allowed for these types of meetings to flourish.

We soon settled on a pre approved plan for the base. The reason why it wasn't approved is because we needed Kate's approval as she'd be the one doing the work. Once we finished talking, the next topic came up from Deven.

“We need to figure out how to deal with the Useless Curse, and fast. Having over four hundred be nothing but sacks of living meat is a hindrance. Anyone got ideas?”

Jokestar knocked on the table, an annoying habit of his, before speaking. “Yea, so I checked out Rebecca's armoury before and I have to say that if the Useless are equipped with those weapons, there shouldn't be an issue.”

“Can’t do it.” As I say this, I remember that Jokestar has never seen more than a basic firearm. “Those weapons can’t be mass produced and the ones Rebecca has made are mainly down to luck. I can’t trust the Useless with them. If they were lost then it’s a lot of firepower down the drain.”

“Well, how about we keep a track of them? Only have the weakest of the graded weapons being used and only under supervision. As far as we know, as long as we don’t interfere they should make progress on their Useless quest.”

“I’m in agreement, but can they even use weapons like that? They’re not heavy, but certainly not light either…actually, if all we need to do is provide the equipment, can’t we just set up a tripod and a sniper, point them at a trapped group of Husks and have them go crazy?” Suddenly thinking of this idea, I look around and see everyone else blink in surprise as well. Everyone went into thought for a moment until Deven spoke up next.

“The only difficulty would be trapping enough Husks.”

“Leave that with the Lvl 3s. We should be strong enough to herd Husks up and lead them into something like a pit.”

“Shit, it’s like you’re talking about cattle. Just how much stronger did you get?”

Ignoring Jokestar’s probing question, I turn to Deven. “It’s just like past games, we kite them into a location and have the Useless pick them off over time. Might take a while to plan and execute, but it’s probably the best shot we have.”

“The only other solution is basically giving them a gun and pointing them at a horde…alright, we’ll get that all planned out next. Now, we’ve discussed a lot and we have a lot more to do. For now let’s disband for today and reconvene next week. About the approval for the expansion of the base, I’ll speak with Kate separately. Jokestar, we’ll need your guys to go through and be documented.”

“Sure, let me know when and where and we’ll arrange it.”

“I’ll add a function to label a profile with a ‘Useless’ tag.” Deciding to add a few more roles, like Traitor, High Risk and more as admin-only visible tags, I opened my laptop and quickly got the changes done, pushing it directly to prod. Closing my laptop with the knowledge that somewhere out there a Programmer is punching air at me pushing straight to prod, I got up and bid farewell to everyone.

Isabelle followed me out of the office as we made our way to my workshop. Giving Isabelle a few tasks to follow up for me, I entered my surprisingly dustless workshop. Walking around, I saw Fairies scattered about inside, treating it as a second home away from the tree. Slowly approaching my work desk, I booted up the desktop, sat down and pulled all of my schematics and blueprints over.

“I’ve missed this…right, I need to focus on Machinist for a while.” Muttering to myself, I flicked through the schematics before putting them down. Leaning back, I opened the Job’s talent menu up, revealing a menu I hadn’t seen in a very long time.

“Right, where was I…right, here.” Navigating through my talents, I arrived at the next section I had reached. “The nodes lead off to one…”

Mana Melding

Provides knowledge on melding mana into your work, providing Graded machines a big boost. This does not allow machines to be powered by mana, only enhanced.

Cost: 500 Job Points

“Huh, I thought this was different…did my evolution change my talents?” Looking at my amount of Job Points, I found I only had 378 left. Closing the menu, I leaned back, closed my eyes and consolidated everything about Machinery.

Blueprints race through my mind, being sorted between completed and all Job Points received, Useless and all Job Points received and finally either one but not all Job Points received.

Opening my eyes, I pulled my knee up to my chest and fell into thought. Right now, I had a heap of blueprints I could create and gain Job Points from. I didn't need to worry about parts either, Deven had informed me earlier that they had people keep dismantling and sorting everything while I was gone.

Glancing at the System Menu, my eyes landed on a particular area.

Primary Job: Machinist

Secondary Job: Undecided

Like Subclass, I had yet to select a Subjob and this is mainly because I had no idea at the time and other things to focus on, but now I had time.

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My mind went straight to Engineering, but I discarded it right away. I'd been filled in on what Engineers had as Talents. They had to choose between a selection of types of Engineering, like Social, Electrical, Motor and more. While a lot of the selections could in theory massively boost my machinery, there was a problem.

We don't get knowledge on what we select. At the time I picked Machinist, it had been a regret of mine but since then I've slowly figured things out and can now build small to medium machines without needing a blueprint…with enough planning and trial and error.

Time wasn't something I had in excess. Even without sleep, I had to train my magic, clear Dimensions, attend leadership meetings, act as a leader, train my physical body, study Void Magic and so much more. Studying another profession wasn't a viable choice right now, nor would it be once I start the climb to Lvl 4, which I could do at any time.

So then what would the choice be? Opening my selection screen, I slowly scrolled through the list, stopping at a few choices, like armour smithing or weaponsmithing. Discarding these choices, I kept scrolling but as I'm about to give up and move on, my eyes found one that surprisingly made sense.

Smeltery. Melting down metals into various shapes and sizes while also ridding them of impurities. At first I discarded it, but the more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea of taking it.

Simple yet fits machinery. Yes, the process for smelting would take a long time, but if I could create metals that suited my needs at any time, it would be a huge boon to machinery. While we had Smelters already, the majority of what they made is aimed at weaponry and building.

By making the metals myself, anything I wanted to create as a specialty, like the Expert combat armour I'm slowly unlocking, could be further enhanced by my choice of what metals and materials I used. In fact, I could very easily install a furnace and side area to this workshop to work on it. And if Smeltery had a talent like Mana Melding, would that not mean even stronger machines?

Most of the machines I'd make would be aimed at everyday use, with only a tiny portion for combat, but if I made a vehicle that had enhanced metals that could withstand bullets or made it more efficient, would that not be a huge boon to the base?

If I needed raw metals, I could easily request some from a shipment. Looking through the rest of the options, nothing else stood out to me. Scrolling back to Smeltery, I made my mind up and selected it.

Subjob selected: Smeltery.

You receive 2x Blueprints.

Picking up the blueprints that appeared in front of me and learning them, I found them to be basic ingot blueprints for copper and tin. Bringing up the talent menu, I found myself grinning like a 10 year old in a candy store after closing hours.

“Job Points are universal?! Well I'll be damned. Now the question is, what route do I take? No wait, there aren't any routes now, it just links into a single node.”

Selecting the first node, which gave me 2% Heat Resistance, I kept going. Heat Resistance, Burn Resistance, Decreased Melting Time, a knowledge node on removing impurities. The cost remained low, 1-2 Job Points, and as I selected the last choice, a blueprint for Nickel Ingots, it finally unlocked five routes.

“So many? Alright, sooo…Ah, so that explains why my supply isn’t as high as the others.” The node selections were Weaponry, Armour, Construction, Tools and finally Machinery. “Makes sense, while there are others who have picked up machines, it’s not a focus in our base since Jobs like Weaponry and Construction took priority.

Machinery Specialisation.

Your focus will be to create metals for use by a Machinist, providing metals befitting of long term use.

My excitement goes up before being cut down as I realise I missed a vital point in my selection. I can smelt my own metals, but I can’t shape them. Maybe I should’ve consulted with Jupiter before making this choice? But then I frowned and hugged my knees.

“Wait, then how do they shape metals? I didn’t see anything in the list about reforging and while some machines require me to reshape some metals, it’s not to the extent of reshaping an ingot…” Selecting the node and purchasing it for 10 Job Points, the rest of the options disappeared. “Ah, so you can only go down one path? That explains a lot.”

The next lot of nodes started appearing, two more Heat Resistance and one Burn Resistance before a new node showed up for more blueprints. Selecting it, a handful of blueprints show up and learning one, I grin like an idiot once more.

“I see, reforging metals is a part of Smeltery! Or not…is that normal?” The blueprints were for frames of different types of shapes, like nuts, bolts, sheets of metal and so on. The vital thing however is that this knowledge is very easily decrypted, meaning with only a bit of trial and error I could easily shape the metal into any shape I wanted, all I needed to know is the Heat Resistance of the metals used for the frame and how hot the metal I want to shape can get.

I continued selecting talents, making my way through the list. Knowledge nodes allowed me to know how to better rid metals of impurities while the occasional blueprint node gave me more shape frames to build. Soon, I stopped, mainly due to a lack of Job Points, but also because the next node is a big one.

Graded Metals.

Depending on the Smeltery process, your metals may become Graded. Graded metals can then be used by a Machinist and increases their chance of a machine being higher Grade.

“Fucking hell.” Jumping up, I quickly moved to a corner of the workshop, pulling it apart as I cleared an area. Installing a table in the middle, I ran to the storage at the back and collected everything I needed to make a forge.

“I need ventilation, that’ll be easy to build. A mechanical forge will be great, but a blast furnace will be better…but I don’t know how to make one, it’s not a Machine…is it? I need to automate the process at some point too…” Getting to work, with the Fairies interested in my sudden burst of activity, I started the large amount of work required to build a fully functional smeltery in my workshop.

***

“There is a legend about an old hermit. It’s said that the old hermit went through many trials and tribulations, ups and downs. He mourned plenty, he celebrated much, he had lived a full life, one that he could look back on and be proud of. No one could shame him when he announced his intent to move to the mountains, seeking a peaceful life. After all, the old man had deserved it, all he wanted was a beautiful view of the sunset and a small chicken nest.

“The old man lived the rest of his life in peace, never once speaking to another living being before his death. Maybe he spoke to his chickens or cat, but no one could prove it. His family all agreed however that he lived exactly how he wanted to live, and had finally received his reward for doing so.

“So if an old man had to live an entire life to stay hidden away with no human contact, WHY THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU CAN LOCK YOURSELF AWAY IN YOUR WAREHOUSE FOR A MONTH!”

“Ah! Isabelle! Good timing, good timing, come come, have a look at what I made!” Turning and waving happily to Isabelle, who had at some point told a strange story about an old man, I grabbed her hand and tugged her over to my workbench. Sitting there is a pair of gloves, completely mechanical in nature, with the ability to shoot bullets from it.

“Midnight, did you finally make those expert level mechanical gloves?!”

“Nope, I failed at the last step! I spent 2 weeks on them too.” Seeing Isabelle facepalm, she turned to me angrily.

“You've just come back and already you've locked yourself away!”

“Ah, not true! The door has always been unlocked…and I attended the meetings!”

“Through the network. You made a program to virtually attend meetings so you didn't need to leave in a day. You can not keep locking yourself away like this!”

“Oh it's fine. Besides, I only needed this month. Anyway, I didn't want to show you these failed gloves, here, look at this.” Breaking a piece of metal off the gloves, I showed it to Isabelle who raised an eyebrow. “Check the System.”

Isabelle does and mutters what she reads. “65% Purified Mithril Metal, Grade…Blue?! Smelted metals can be Graded?! Who managed this?”

“Hehe. I did. I unlocked the ability to have a Subjob and took up Smeltery.”

“Why?! Wouldn't Engineering be far better for you?”

“I thought so too, but the time to learn Engineering from the ground up would mean I'd lock myself away for several months. Smeltery is a lot less complicated and gives me a big boost! Come, let me show you.”

Pulling Isabelle along, I keyed in the passcode to the Smeltery room. The doors open as a wave of heat hits us. There laid a massive blast furnace and a mechanical furnace working furiously to smelt more metals.

“Holy hells it's like the sun in here! How do you stand it?!”

“Heat Resistance talents. And ventilation and a bit of magic to keep the rest of the workshop cold.” Closing the doors, which completed the seal that Maji helped make to seal the heat into the room, I turned to Isabelle. “Don't worry, I'm not going to completely lock myself away. I kept my radio next to me at all times and had Deven show up every second day to check in. He agreed that if I could get the basics of Smeltery down quickly it would be a huge boon to me.”

Isabelle sighed before nodding. “Indeed, compared to when you'd isolate yourself during your programming days, this is a lot better. Are you leaving the workshop soon? Construction on the second layer has begun and they would want help soon.”

“I know, I know. Deven told me earlier. It’s why I’ve begun mass production of various tools. Thanks to the auto assembly the parts are all done, it’s just a matter of sticking them together. You should’ve received an order to have the parts transported to the other Machinists in the base to start piecing them together, I even included a tutorial on how to do it.”

Isabelle frowns before opening her laptop and looking through. “I updated my client this morning so…ah, I must’ve missed it. Alright, I’ll get arranged for you now. So what do you plan to do now, Midnight?”

“Let’s see…in terms of what I need to be personally present for, there isn’t much. We’re still organising the rankings, Geralt and Jokestar are interviewing potential leaders for the army stuff, the merger with Jokestar’s Clan and temporary rankings have been done. Lumisara is currently training Silver in swordsmanship so he can train others. Honestly everyone has been very efficient with getting their jobs done, last I heard the plan for a pit far from the base has begun so we can soon get the Useless project underway.”

“So what you’re trying to say is that there is nothing you can do right now so might as well jump straight back into the workshop and lock yourself away again?”

“No no, I’m well aware that I need to be out and about, don’t worry, Isabelle. There are a fair amount of things I need to do, like hunting for another water source. From what I’ve heard, while we’re good for water, we’re seeing signs of running out in between recharges for the well. If we are to expand even more, we’ll start seeing water running out, especially now we have more public showers.” We had gone from three public showers to ten, with them running very often.

“I believe Mr Lemon has plans to reuse the water from showers. He is currently testing a filtration system to reuse the water while keeping it fresh where possible, but he is having some difficulties since you can filter water only so much.”

Isabelle and I exit the workshop and into the bright light of the sun. “There are a lot of logistical issues like that. Tell Lemon to split the used water into halves, resupplying them with fresh water every so often. It should keep the water fresh while maintaining good filtration. I can assist with a filtration machine once he has figured out the best ratio of fresh to used.”

“Noted. Aerith is looking to redo the entire electrical and plumbing grids to future proof it. As it is, it’s not correctly aligned to supply the second and third sections.”

“Tell her to seek Lemon out and work with him for the grids. Oh, and have them go to Cass and her team to receive feedback and polish it down. We can’t afford to have either of those two deploying something that isn’t peer reviewed by others first.”

“Got it. About moving your workshop, Aerith has stated that she plans to keep your workshop, along with Winter’s, exactly where they are. The reason…” Scrolling on her laptop, Isabelle nodded before continuing. “She states that your buildings give her the sense that if moved could ruin their special effects, especially yours. So instead she has made plans to work around your workshops.”

“That’s fine then. In that case, tell her to house anyone with Jobs that could utilise the workshop and I’ll give them access to certain areas when I expand it. Oh, and ask her to leave room for expansion.”

“Already done, she’s given you plenty of space. Ghost has begun work on the farm, they have simply decided to expand the current one and working with Aerith they have decided to not build the second wall where the expansion will happen and will dedicate nearly half of the second section and over a quarter of the third section for the farm. Once the second wall is built, they will dismantle the first wall where the farm currently is. As a safety precaution, the farmland will have a wall built around it.”

“Ensure that the wall around the farmland has adequate space for defences. If anything is a priority for protection, it’s the farm.”

“Noted, I will inform Ghost and Aer-”

“My Lady!” Maji suddenly teleports in front of us, and judging by her tone of voice, and the fact she’s revealing herself to Isabelle, means something has happened. “My Lady, please, come to the tree!” Maji disappears quickly as Isabelle blinks in shock.

“Was that a Spirit? I thought it was Death himself!”

“It’s Maji. She’s the one who attacked you in the office.” Snapping my head towards the tree while speaking, I sent a pulse of mana out towards the location before turning my feet in that direction.

Walking a bit faster than usual, I avoided running in case those around us became panicked. Afterall, if I’m running somewhere something is happening. The pulse comes back to me, revealing that Lumisara, Maji and Greyback were all there along with a few thousand Fairies. Not sure what the emergency was, I soon arrived as the sun started to set. Approaching Maji, I could see on one of the small branches of the tree the egg I had received as a reward.

I didn’t need to ask why Maji had asked for me to be here. I heard a crack coming from the egg, and quickly realising what was happening, passed my laptop to Isabelle before sitting in front of the egg. There, a crack ran through the top half of the egg, meaning it would hatch soon…