That day, I found a little over a dozen minor points of interest that I felt were worth reporting. It was incredible how much was out here in the unexplored wilderness, just waiting for someone to come along and find it.
I suppose it makes sense though, I thought with a smile. As far as I know, no human has ever been through this area before. Of course, there would be all sorts of things here to find.
Beyond the information I was finding, there were also plenty of fights to be had. Just that day, I fought just over twenty Beasts, nearly as many as we had been fighting in the much more dangerous mountains.
It was an odd experience fighting alone again after so long with companions, however, I found it easier than I had expected. I was far from the person I was at the beginning, instead being well-armed and armored.
The full suite of nano weave armor reduced damage taken to my entire body, and when I combined that with my Skin Hardening and my high Toughness I rarely took more than minor cuts or abrasions.
Even when I took more than that, I could shrug the pain off for long enough to finish the combat. While I couldn’t blow the enemy away at the same speed as when Linnea and Adam were along, my new pistol was more than capable of gradually finishing them.
It turned most fights into a war of attrition that none of the beasts in this forest could beat me in. Not when I did more damage than they did and could take more punishment.
By the time I was setting up camp for the night, I was overjoyed at the progress I’d made. Just the Beast cores from this day alone would net me over four thousand credits, which was far more than my daily expenses.
Having reduced my overhead to just food, medical supplies, and flights, I was actually making good money and should make even more when my reports started getting approved. That night, I logged out and fell into a more relaxed sleep than I could remember having.
The next day proceeded much the same, except that my reports for the first day were processed. They approved only about half of them as viable, however, it was still a solid boost to my finances.
Each individual report didn’t net me much money, between five hundred and a thousand credits, however, between all of them it added up to over four thousand credits for the day.
Eight thousand credits a day would more than cover my real-world expenses if I kept it up, in fact, I could save a good portion of it. I figured that if I explored like this for about two-thirds of my time in the game, I would save plenty for doing large expeditions in the remaining third.
It was a solid balance that I was ecstatic about. No longer was I going to be sitting on the edge, barely making it by. Instead, I could save up and fully fund an expedition from the start.
If I made all my money back, or even a profit, as I had so far, then great. If not, I could go back to farming credits after benefiting from the non-monetary finds. This was particularly important for the next two facilities that I was hoping would both upgrade my item attunement ability again.
The next two weeks passed in a pleasant blur as I continued to explore. It turned out that eight thousand was roughly what I could average as long as I explored a full day. Some days I’d find fewer fights or points of interest and be under, while others I found even more than usual.
What was important was that it appeared to be consistent in the long term, allowing me to finally relax into playing the game.
Speaking of which, my experience was skyrocketing from exploring alone. Not only was I getting full XP from every kill, rather than shared XP, but I was also beginning to think that group travel had slowed me down even more than I thought.
I was getting more XP from fighting alone than I had expected and I eventually figured out that it was probably because of my level. I had always been lower level than the people that I traveled with due to mostly getting shared XP rather than the kill.
What I now realized was that the XP gain from Beasts was based on the person who killed it, thus when my higher-level companions killed a Beast, the initial XP and thus the shared XP was lowered. Now that I was alone, I was getting appropriate XP for my lower level and I reached level eight and got halfway to level nine by the end of the two weeks.
I selected the Scouting skill, which boosted my perception when looking for resources or danger. I hoped it would help me find even more things to report, as well as help to avoid ambushes. After selecting the skill I put my two free points into Will as I had already planned.
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I even progressed my Assisting the Guild (Path of the Explorer) quest after finding a large coal patch in a field. Coal was still an important part of steel production and was thus important enough to tick off one of the three key things I had to find for the guild. That was my best day for money and helped cover for several low-value days I’d had.
By the end of the two weeks, I was running low on food and medical supplies, so I decided I deserved a break. I sent a message to Brian and was soon flying back to the city.
Upon arrival, I rushed to the store that purchased Beast cores and dumped my full backpack on the table. It was lucky that the cores of normal Beasts were so small, otherwise, I would never have been able to carry all the ones that I had gathered.
They went for the amount I expected, giving me over eighty thousand credits for just the cores. When combined with the information I had sold, I gained about hundred and fifteen thousand credits from the trip.
When you subtracted the cost of flying there along with food and medical supplies, I gained over a hundred thousand credits in profit. I could barely believe it after all this time, and with an enormous smile, I withdrew money from the game for the first time.
It was a bit of a painful process as VSO first took a five percent processing cut, after which I had to register the income with the government for tax purposes. However, after a bit of work, I had withdrawn two months’ expenses. It was just in time to, as my real-world funds had been getting low.
It was a massive relief and allowed me to think about perhaps improving my living circumstances. The area around my apartment building had only been getting worse since I’d been mugged with more and more incidents happening every day.
The city’s private police force couldn’t give a damn, as my district couldn’t afford to pay its fees. This left everyone to fend for themselves, leading to ugly results. Now that I was actually making money, however, I felt like I could afford to move up from my rock-bottom living.
I resolved to research other options over the next few days before deciding. With my money sorted, I gave myself the rest of the day off after being so successful over the last two weeks.
First, I checked up on my friends to see how they were going. Adam and Linnea were both out on jobs, which amusingly turned out to be guarding people out gathering at the locations that I had found. It was a bit of a shame since I had intended to talk with Linnea about the situation between us, however, there wasn’t anything for it since I’d come back unplanned. I organized an afternoon out with her in two weeks’ time for when I planned to be back again.
I didn’t quite call it a date, however, I kind of wanted it to turn into one. I would have to wait to see how that turned out and whether I had been right or was misreading the situation.
I also let both her and Adam know I was planning another big expedition, but it would probably not be for about three more weeks. I expected that to be when I would reach the base of the next mountain at a slower rate I was now traveling at.
By that point, I would have saved enough to at least mostly fund the expedition outright, allowing me to progress my primary goals without putting too much of a burden on my finances.
I also heard from Elana. Her job with the mine was going well, and she asked if we could meet up for a quick chat. I agreed and that evening we talked about the next expedition.
She had heard from Linnea about the robots we had encountered and brought back from the facility and was eager to join me on the next trip to get some of her own. Unlike the others, she would be more of a partner than an employee, trading her efforts for the rights to any robots we salvaged.
Given how useful she had been the first time, I agreed for up to a hundred thousand credits’ worth. I would sell any more beyond that, as usual. It was still a solid sum of money, however, I felt like it was worth the investment.
Bringing her along would allow us to easily traverse the facility even with an AI still present as she could hack the doors. This would make exploring monumentally easier and reduce the time we had to spend inside, thus reducing how much I had to pay our escorts.
Besides this, her skills simply reduced the risks associated with it. I wasn’t entirely confident about stopping a self-destruct if it happened again, while she already knew how to do so.
After organizing that, I booked a room at the Guild and logged out for the day. Out of the game, I pulled up several local sites and began looking into alternate housing options. One dedicated VR facility quickly jumped out at me.
It was a hybrid full dive facility having all the requirements for longer stays in the pod, while still having the option to stay out if you desired. It was quite a bit more expensive than my current lodgings, however, it was a full package that included housing, a VR pod, Internet, and food.
It was a solid deal and one that I could afford, as long as I kept up with my new exploring strategy for much of my time in the game. It felt like the best option for me, however, I decided to sleep on it before making the plunge.
The next morning, I logged back into the game and returned to the wilderness to continue exploring. Over time, I noticed a small, but definite increase in the level of danger as I continued heading north.
This matched what I had heard before, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise, but it was something I would have to pay attention to. It also came with a small increase in the value of what I was finding, something I put down to the same increase in background Psi energy that was making the Beasts more dangerous.
It turned out that a lot of the plants that were valuable out here had at least a small amount of Psionic potential, enough to increase their value. The further north I went, the more frequent and potent these plants became.
Over the first week, I decided for sure that I was going to move to the hybrid VR housing and began the application process. This would take a couple of weeks to complete, as I had to fill out a significant amount of paperwork and prove that I was making enough money to pay for it.
It was during the second week that an incident occurred which made me wish I’d moved out earlier.