That night before leaving Jacob and I walked into his office at the church. I started recording with my Surveillance skill and watched him as he sat behind the desk and gave a heartfelt presentation on the System and the System devices. Once he was done he recorded me as I explained the Market terminal, warehouse, and how you could purchase things at the outpost. I also told them that I was building an outpost, gave instructions to it, and invited them to move there. Once I was finished, I sent my recording to Jacob so that he could edit them and said goodbye.
Back at the base, I checked the market. Somebody in Australia had purchased some of the videogames and game systems they had added to the warehouse, so we were up 205 Zerka. I didn’t know where they had got the money, but it didn’t really matter. Maybe their assistant AI had given them decent quests. Thinking about that…
‘Hey, Vera. Any chance you can give us more quests? Maybe something that helps us set up the base?’
‘Well, I can give you missions, and I can talk to Di, Jacob, and Paul’s AI assistants to make suggestions. But Tony and Tom aren’t fully connected so I can’t really give them missions until they are.’
‘In that case, can you do that?’ Vera said she would and a few seconds later I automatically completed several base-building missions. It was only another 250 Zerka, but it helped.
Di sent me message saying that she received a quest offering her 5 Zerka each for recruiting up to one hundred people, and I explained to her that I had asked Vera for the mission. Hopefully she would get other missions with time.
I looked through the quests I had left, and saw that they were all fetch quests. Things like “sell 20 kilograms of steel to the System” and “Collect 1000 kilograms of wood” filled my quest list. Selling the steel might be worth it now, at least.
I looked through the System Market under the Production category of goods. I needed to start turning the materials we were salvaging into useful things, so that we could be financially stable. There was only so much that we could do with just the four of us, and only two of us staying here. Two items did catch my attention. One was a simple device called a “Food Service Station”. It used the food that was stored in a linked Food Warehouse and would follow a pre-programmed recipe to prepare food. You could set costs for each meal, and people could just order them at the terminal and receive their food in less than a minute. The second was called a “Nanite Forge”. While it cost fifty thousand Zerka to buy one, we could use raw materials we gathered to produce System products. That could save us huge amounts of money in the long run.
There was also an Automated Mine, which could gather materials from a designated area, storing them in the Warehouse, and even dig tunnels. That might be a useful way to get raw materials, though I doubt we needed one now.
I bought a Food Service Station and carried it to the restaurant. It was a fairly lightweight kiosk which might weigh twenty kilograms at most. When I got there I set it up in front of the counter and linked it to the freezer, then played around with the system by setting up a few of the frozen diners to cook to various levels. The station could selectively heat different things, and even trigger different cooking effects, like browning the surface, so it kept my interest for over an hour. All of these prepared items were set to cost one Zerka each, or to be free to those in the “Settlement Employees” group, Tony, Tom, Di and myself. Variable pricing was an interesting feature which allowed you to charge different amounts to different groups of people. I suspected that with other facilities it could also restrict sales based on certain criteria, and, in fact, found that function in the food terminal when I looked for it. I would have to set it to only sell alcohol to people twenty one years of age and over once I had alcohol in the warehouse.
I made myself a TV dinner and sat down to eat it. When I was done and only had a plastic tray left I realized I would have to find a way to deal with trash. There was technically a Recycling device in the shop for dealing with garbage, but at 1000 Zerka it didn’t seem worth it at this point.
I returned to the main base and told the three others about the Food Service Station. They had just returned from a salvaging run at the local game store, seeing that that was the only thing that sold, and put their entire load in the warehouse. Di had talked to a few of the people at the Kitchen and said several of them were interested. Tony and Tom had continued working on the septic tank, and said that they probably only needed one more day to get it finished. Once it was done it would probably be large enough to handle around a hundred people. If we needed to support more than that they would have to add more tanks. Maybe the Recycling device would help with that. After all, it could break the waste down into chemical fertilizers.
Over the next few days we went about our normal business. Tony and Tom finished installing the sewage system and brought in the few more trailers. Keith came by and hooked up the sewage and water for everything, which cost me another $500. Di and I worked at the kitchen.
Jacob had finished editing the video that night, and Vera instructed me on how to set up the projectors in the kitchen to play the two minute video every hour on the hour that the projectors were being used, like an ad. Because of that, almost everyone at the facility had seen the video multiple times the first day, which resulted in many of them wanting to connect to the System. With several thousand people wanting to connect, I knew I couldn’t handle the job.
I contacted Tim to see if he could help with the situation. He told me that business at the hospital had been extremely slow, thanks to the Plague curing every other disease. Most of the cases the hospital got now were broken bones or traumatic injuries. While, as a paramedic, both of those were part of his job, the low number of cases meant that his work hours had been cut to one twelve hour shift per week. This left Tim with plenty of time to help out. Due to his financial issues, he agreed to use Align Nanites or Repair Corrupted Nanites on the people to connect them at a cost of $10 per person. He would be coming by on weekdays where he wasn’t working, treating everyone that wanted the service and could pay until he ran out of nanites or energy. I would then cover those that couldn’t afford it, but only on Saturdays. That would deal with the demand while not drawing away too many people that could pay but didn’t want to.
Two other notable things happened that week. First, that Thursday I was walking to the restaurant to eat supper when Olivia came over. “Hey, Greg, do you mind if I ask you a question?”
“Sure”, I said, stopping my walk. “What can I help you with?”
“I want you to explain Paradigms to me. Specifically, I want advise on which one to choose.”
I smiled. “So you are already at that point, huh? Well, I can tell you that I have the Role Playing System paradigm, because I like the idea of a video game system, and Di has the Space Wizard paradigm because she liked those movies. I also know a priest with the Christian paradigm and another guy with the Enlightenment paradigm. Can’t really tell you about any paradigm other than my own, though.”
If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
“That’s fine.” she said. “Yours sounds the best out of those three anyway. So, it’s like a videogame? Do I get XP and level up or something?”
“Only your skills really level up. Stats have mostly have to be trained. It has a feature where after using a skill it will go back over your memories to try and get more information from the use, so you learn things a lot faster than with other paradigms. You do get to pick a class, though, which gives you a talent for things related to the class, and suggests skills to you based on it.”
“That sounds a lot like what I was wanting. I don’t tell many people, but I love JRPGs. Also the Eldest Scroll series.” With that she said goodbye and left.
After that I noticed that several laptops, tablets, and televisions had been placed in the Market by her and that many of them had been sold to other settlements. Apparently, either she or Lawrence had figured out how to earn Zerka of their own.
Two days later, on a Saturday, I pulled in at the same time as Tony and Tom. Two women got out of the truck with them, and followed them into their trailers. A little over an hour later, I was sitting by the fire scrolling through the Market when the two ladies left, and Tony drove them back to town.
Tom came out with a beer and sat down beside me. “I hope you don’t have a problem with us doing that.” he said, motioning at the truck as it pulled away.
I shrugged. “I don’t have a problem with you hiring prostitutes. In fact, now that the Plague cured all other diseases it’s probably safer now than it was a year ago. That said, you should probably make sure you use birth control still.” I told him the story of Sara the Rhinoceros, and how, as a fetus, she grew so large that she killed her mother from the pressure. “Now, the System can prevent that, but you aren’t fully connected yet, and I seriously doubt she is, so I suggest you take precautions.”
He looked a bit uneasy, and nodded. A few minutes later he got up and walked next door to the convenience store, only to return with an armload of condom boxes which he quickly fed into the Market terminal.
The next day Di and I were about ready to leave when I heard the sound of small explosions, like fire crackers, coming from between the PriceCo and the gas station. I went over to see what was happening and saw Olivia standing twenty meters from the building holding her hand towards several soda cans that were on top of some stacked pallets. As I watched, a small ball of fire formed in her palm, then flew at the cans. She did this several times, but only hit them about half the time.
“Practicing your new powers?” I asked, walking over to her.
“Yep. Fay says she can only give me four powers or skills at a time until I get used to them, so I’m trying to grind my Fire Magic and Fire Bolt.”
“Who’s Fay?” I asked.
“Oh, that’s what I call my AI assistant. There was this video game where a fairy followed the main character around and gave him advise, so I figured it would be an appropriate name.”
I smiled. “I remember that game. Makes sense. In that case, I take it you picked the Role Player paradigm?”
“Yep, I’m an Elementalist class. They are basically a Wizard subclass that focuses on basic attack spells and a few utility spells.”
“That seems to work well for you. In that case, how about we have a contest tonight. I bet you five Zerka that I’m a better aim than you with a Firebolt.”
“I accept,” she said, holding out her hand.
I quickly put together a rough Firebolt spell based on what I saw her use. The nanites just needed to stick together in a cloud and heat up the surrounding air. When I was done, the System recognized it as the Firebolt ability and set it at level 4. That was good enough for now. I held out my hand at one of the cans and fired my firebolt at it, knocking it off the pallet. “Well, then, see you tonight.” With that, I went back to my car and left.
As it was a Sunday, I had to let myself into the kitchen. Earlier that week I had ran wires between the Outpost, Kitchen, and Church, providing power for all of the buildings, so I didn’t have to worry about the gas generator they were using before. We got to work making bread and I realized how much easier everything would be if I just bought them a Food Service Station. Maybe I could get them a Food Warehouse as well, so we could store everything more easily. The other three kitchen staff had agreed to let me connect them with the System, so once their connection was complete they could be set up as managers of the Station and just input recipes. If they didn’t want to put the device out front, we could even set it up in the kitchen and serve the food the old fashioned way, just using the device to prepare it. I would have to bring up the idea with Jacob.
After we were done for the day Di brought over a group of ten people. They had all been connected to the System by either me or Tim and wanted to join our settlement. “Very well,” I said. “I don’t have a way to move you all there at once, but I guess I can take you three or four at a time in my car.”
“I think I can help with that.” Jacob said. “A kind Salvager heard about the settlement and gave us an old school bus they found to move people. They said they had been by there a few times and it looked like you had a good place.”
“In that case, thank you. I’ll contact Tony and have him come and drive it for us, as I don’t know how and I know he does.” I sent Tony a message via the System, and he agreed to drive the bus. He and Tom had both not decided what paradigm they wanted to use, but they could still use many of the System functions.
Thirty minutes later we pulled into the settlement, Tony and Di in the bus and me in my car. The people got out and Di started showing them around. Once they were done, she sent them all invitations to join the settlement, and they all agreed. Gary now had fifteen registered members for the settlement, Tony, Tom, Me, Di, and Olivia, plus the ten new people.
I showed them to the restaurant and gave them all 5 Zerka so that they could use the terminal to get some food. After a meal, everyone got sorted into one of two trailers, six women in one and four men in the other. For now we would separate them that way, and only combine the housing when they asked for couples housing or the like. Thankfully we had no children in this batch, as that might get complicated.
I told them that I could set up jobs for them if they wanted, and that anyone that worked for the settlement got free basic meals at the restaurant. They seemed interested in that. I also told them that if they didn’t want to work for us, that would be fine. They could use the Market terminal to earn money by salvaging, or find some other work in the area. I could also have Tony run a bus to town and back for now, if they wanted me to. Tony agreed to drive the bus to town every morning at 8am and every night at 8pm, in case they wanted to go to town.
With that out of the way, I met Olivia beside the building and we had our contest. It was a close contest, but after twenty shots she managed to hit her target eighteen time, while I only managed seventeen. Apparently I needed more practice.
I was surprised at her large mana reserve and when I mentioned it she pointed at a bracelet she was wearing that I hadn’t noticed. It looked like a simple silver band with three black stones in it. When I got a good look at it, though, I realized that the stones looked familiar. “Is that a System device?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yep. The middle stone is a generator, and the two side stones draw in nanites, charge them, the feed them into me. It really helps my mana regeneration.”
“Must have been expensive.” I responded. I hadn’t realized that there were things like that in the Market.”
“It cost me two hundred Zerka, but I still have enough. Maybe you should get one as well, so you can practice more.” I nodded and sent her her winnings. I would definitely start practicing more so that I could win next time.
With that I went and had a chat with Gary. I wanted a way to entice Salvagers into giving us what they salvaged and to figure out how much the various items were worth. After a quick discussion, I decided to offer Salvagers 10% of the sale price any time we sold something they brought in. This was retroactively applied to everything Tony and Tom dropped off, lowering the money in the settlement’s account slightly. I also told Gary to pay citizens that worked for the settlement 2.5 Zerka per hour, up to eight hours a day, not including the salvagers, as they had a different way to earn money. This would mean that an eight hour shift guaranteed them 20 Zerka per day.
Hopefully the salvagers would feed the warehouse random things in hopes that something would sell.
The next morning the settlers came to me to ask what could be done. I told them about how I had set up the pay for settlement employees and salvagers, but that I didn’t have that many jobs available at the moment. I asked who had experience in cooking and one of the women answered that she had a culinary arts degree from the local tech school. I set her up as the manager of the Restaurant, showed her how to enter new recipes, and gave her $500 to buy any other ingredients she thought she might need to cook proper meals. Yes, she was basically unknown to me, but as she was my employee I had to show that I could trust her.
After that I told everyone I would try to set up more jobs, but just needed to know what they could do. Most had worked in retail, which wasn’t really useful at this point. One was a Nurse. I told her I would consider building a clinic, then. Though, as little work as Tim had, I doubted she would have much to do. I wrote down what the others had experience at, but didn’t know exactly what to have them do at the moment. Most jobs would be obsolete with the System devices, after all.
With a promise from me that I would try to create jobs for everyone, the four men agreed to help Tony and Tom for the day, and the five other women decided to try their luck salvaging the rest of the shopping center.
With no one wanting to go to town, Tony had no reason to drive the bus, so they headed out with their crew. The group of women headed towards the clothing store beside the restaurant, and DI and I headed towards the Kitchen.