With the defeat of the newest wave of Tide monsters, it has become clear that my wall needs to start progressing faster, and soon at that. The good news about the attack was that I had leveled up several times again, bringing me an entire new group of fox-kin to summon.

[Level up 11-23] [Str: 11-23 Con: 12-24 Int: 12-24 Wis: 12-24 Agi: 5-11 Dex: 5-11] [19 Attribute Points Acquired] [x6 Additional summons available] [Mana Capacity: 110-230] [HP: 8-14] [Credits:13] [Radius Expansion: 27.5-57.5] [Trap Unlocked: Behemoth Spikes]

I felt slightly embarrassed to realize I hadn’t used my previous attribute points, not to mention my leftover credits, but I can’t exactly change that now.

I tell my fox-kin to take a rest for the time being, partly because they all seem tired and sore, but also because I needed time to think. They all make some gesture of thanks, before stumbling off to sleep.

19 points worth of attribute upgrades is quite an increase to just about any stat, but from what I’ve been experiencing I can tell that intelligence and wisdom are the most important due to my magical nature. I put four points into each.

The remaining 11 points are a different matter though, but frankly I don’t think I need to worry about my strength or movement stats since I still don’t seem able to move. Just in case I’m wrong, I put 1 point into strength, agility, and dexterity, leaving me with 8 points that I dump into constitution.

Now that I’d dealt with the matter of the attributes, I had the more complicated matter of credits. These credits were very valuable, allowing me to gain entire new abilities, though that seemed to be possible through leveling as well. Either way, credits had a high value due to the semi-rarity of them so far, and I doubted the system would continue to give me credits every 5 levels when I’m jumping so many at a time.

As for what to spend them on… there are a lot of powerful things I could get, but what caught my non-existent eye was the abilities called [Empower] and [Golemancy] which could potentially solve multiple of my problems.

[Sorcery: Empower] [Empower is an additive spell which can effectively double the output of a given spell. This includes certain non-living summons such as {construct/phantom}, as well as attack spells such as {storm/quake} and {Arrow/bolt/missile} doubling in length and quantity respectively.]

[Sorcery: Golemancy] [The field of Golemancy consists of artists and sculptors using animation magic to bring their creations to a semblance of life. No golem is truly life-like however, as their material construction impacts their mobility and strength, for example, a granite carved golem would be able to survive and deal strong hits and would last for a long time, but it’s mobility would be more limited that that of a cloth and stuffing golem.]

The total cost of both skills would bankrupt me of all my credits, but it would solve both my labor and defense problems.

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See, if I were to use [empower] with [phantom workers], I’d effectively triple my workforce, not to mention the additional fox-kin I’ve yet to summon. As for the [golemancy], it not only doesn’t specify any limit on how many I can have, but it also means I could theoretically have an infinite army of stone-skinned warriors protecting myself and my foxes.

I’m not saying I don’t expect some gimmick or quirk of the skill to screw with my dreams, but I deserve some hope, right? In any case, it means I’ll not have to worry about my fox-kin dying in battle, instead just cleaning up dust and debris.

Regarding cleaning, I once again absorb the tide bodies I can reach, paying special attention to the Behemoth as it slowly comes apart. Sure enough, the rate of absorption is slower even on the thinnest parts of the massive beast, compared to the full body of the hellhounds and blood thirsters.

also is it just my perspective or is the grass a darker color?

I’m sure that’s fine.

Back to my mess of a status screen, I’ve got 6 new summons available, but I’m questioning if I really should summon them. Sure, food doesn’t seem to be an issue since they seem content eating the hellhound meat, but with the number of enemies increasing each time I worry about losing any of them and whether they get resurrected through summons.

I’ve got a few theories about the summoning system, but I won’t divulge into them without more evidence. One of the good things that would come about form summoning these new fox-kin would be the doubling of my current workforce from 6 to 12. Combined with the empowered phantoms, I’d be getting 36 workers for the construction of the gatehouse.

Again though, I’d be summoning 6 random fox-kin from across the world to me, displacing them from their Masters, who in turn would likely hunt me down for stealing away their servants.

As much as I hate to admit it, I need these fox-kin or else I’ll be dead within the next few attacks. I’ll discuss it with the others next morning.

I purchased the two abilities now and move my attention to the barracks.

[Empower: 7 Credits] [Golemancy: 6 Credits] [Abilities purchased: 0 Credits, next Credits at Lvl 25]

The first thing I do is shift the storage room further back enough until it touches the edge of the leftmost foundation, before carving a door to connect them. After that I extend the storage area and shift the present supplies into that spot, before dividing the newly cleared area off from the storage with a wall and door. This new area gets populated with cupboards and cabinets, and ice box and a much larger fire pit, soon covered with stone to form a rudimentary oven.

The last touch is fetching a spare barrel from storage and filling it with plenty of salt. I’ve no idea why, but my awakening materials included over 50 pounds of cooking salt, and I don’t exactly want to consume that, so into the brand-new kitchen it goes. Last thing to do is struggle to write a note to Kohaku about the new kitchen.