The Next Day found me and the Mech squad out in the wastes looking over Saul's buildings.

I was surprised, there was scrub brush everywhere. I had figured everything would be deader than doornails out here.

I had even spotted some varmints running about. Probably from some Gene-renewed stock, or maybe even the descendants of lost lab experiments.

Both building turned out to be huge, way more space than I likely needed.

In the end, I went with the Power Plant.

Wasn't the size of the buildings, I was looking at. It was the setup for defense.

The Manufacturing plant was a sprawling thing taking up a lot of surface area. Too many angles to cover. Too many ways into the buildings. Sure, I could mitigate it, but why, when I already had a better option.

The Power Plant had a ceracrete cinder block wall around it's perimeter. Not to big, but it was a start till I could build better.

The building itself was 5 stories of squat bulky ceracrete, that took up a quarter of the footprint of the other place. The outside transformers had been stripped to nothing, all the transmission wires were gone as well. All the furniture and equipment that would have been inside victims of time and neglect.

There were a couple of welcome oddities though. The three massive Generators, while missing some parts, had their cores intact. A much smaller backup Generator, still bigger than, I'd assume was for just the Plants lighting and operation needs was whole and functional.

The best part and the real reason I chose it, The building sat smack dab in the middle of a Ley Line. A weak, and sluggish one but a Ley Line, none the less.

I had a feeling it would make a difference.

I called up Saul and made the arrangements. 80000 NBs and it was mine. And a few square miles around it as well.

I was eager to see what the big deal was about Bases.

Now the question was, do I build it up first, or do I turning it into a Base first then build it up. The Base functions might include building options, they might not.

After a long internal debate of Pros and Cons, I groaned and hollered, "Fuck it!"

I pulled out the Authority Core.

[ Authority Core Options

Found a Base - 10 MC

Found an Outpost - 5 MC

Alter Hub World Features - Varies

Change Authority Core Appearance - First Time Free

More options currently unavailable. ]

Found a Base. Let's do this!

The Authority Core flared a bright silver. It lifted out of my hand and began to rotate rapidly. A thrumming noise sprang forth into the air. The light expanded outwards covering everything I could see.

[ Area Scanned.

Guided's thoughts scanned.

Base boundaries set.

Base Core formed. ]

A new silver orb appeared in front of me. It rested upon a pedestal made of a green marble with gold veins. Just boop there it was.

That would never get old. I chuckled at all the reality bending going on.

[ Base has been Founded.

Please access the Base Core for further Options. ]

The Authority Core returned to my hand.

Alright, cool. I hope it was worth it.

[ World Integration has Begun. 2%

Daily Quests have been opened for this World.

Please note that Daily Quests have been changed.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

At the current time, only one quest will be available daily.

Random Encounters have been opened for this World.

Please note that Random Encounters have been changed.

There will be far more neutral and positive options.

These will begin in 23 hours and 58 minutes. ]

[ World Quest I has been completed.

You gain 57 GC ]

[ World Quest Stage II

Defend Base from Weekly Incursion Events until Integration has completed.

Next Event: 23 hours and 58 minutes.

Rewards: Variable. ]

[ A World Boss has begun formation. 2%

Defeat the World Boss for increased Authority. ]

[ Base has been founded on a Ley Line (Minor).

All Benefits will be increased by 10%.

Base Building speed will be increase by 50%. ]

Well shit, that was a lot to process. Though, I could say with certainty that I was hating the sound of a World Boss. Major bad news.

Also, I was thinking I made the wrong choice, I should have built it up a bit first. It would have been nice to not have to rush so much.

Oh well, too late now.

I have 23 hours and change to get things setup. I hope the Base options can help.

I place my hand on the Base Core.

[ Base Status

Area: 3 square miles

Structures: One Abandoned Power Station

Resources: Water Well (100 Gallons per day / Slightly Contaminated ), Scrub Vegetation, Silica of various compositions, several undiscovered mineral deposits.

Defenses: 40 Turrets Various (Undeployed)

Allies Stationed: 0

Troops: 0

Minions: 4 Combat Bots, 1 Combat Drone, 1 Mule Drone, 4 Pallet Drones (Undeployed) ]

[ Resources

Construction Units: 0

Maintenance Units : 0

Crafting Units: 0

Personnel: 0

Sustenance Units: 10

Comfort Units:

Minions: 10 ]

[ Base Options

Workshops

Housing

Infrastructure

Defenses

Troops

Minions ]

Okay. Base Building and possible RTS themes coming up. Well, I was sure I could handle it. Eventually.

Workshops had every kind of crafting room you could want from this world. Rooms to craft Metal, Rooms to craft Bots, Rooms to craft Fire.

Housing was everything from single bedrooms to ARCs though the cost of the smallest ARC design was...well my brain had to reboot. What were we talking about?

Infrastructure was Power Generation, Production be it Food, Water, Mining, Smelting, Waste Management. Also roads, paths, pipes, conveyors, cranes and so on.

Defenses would allow me to buy new Turrets, but only just like the ones I already had, for GC. It would also allow for the purchasing of Munitions for the turrets, as well as Towers, walls, spotlights and so on.

Troops, well there's a surprise. There were two options, Mimirian Hoard Collectors and Dark Horde Goblins Scouts. Huh? I shrugged. Let's see this tab also has barracks options, bunker options, and Armament options which only has Mimirian and Goblin gear.

Minions allows me to buy more Bots and Drones. Again, only just like the ones I already have as well as Maintenance structures for them. Recharging stations, Repair Stations, Control Hubs.

Wooo. It was a lot to parse. My increased Intelligence was getting a workout.

Hmmm. That was a small blessing. Otherwise I might have been buried under all this choice. I had a feeling I was going to have to offload a lot of this on to a new V.I., once I had the chance to design one.

I was gonna need a Construction crew and Several sizes and styles of Fabricators and Printers. Better to save the GCs and spend the NBs instead, where I could.

Saul wasn't going to be able to handle all of this in time for the first wave, so I turned to Meowser.

He tracked down deals from fairly reputable sources. End Cost including expedited shipping, 176,236 NBs. Most of it would be here within the hour.

I did call Saul for seed stock for whatever trees and plants he could find, as fast as he could get it to me. He said it might take a while, which was fine. I wanted a handle on defenses before I had to defend anything I cared about.

I got started and spent some GCs on Two Large Scale Water Condensers and 10 High Efficiency Solar Panels. Or rather I bought 12 Construction Modules from Purchase Options. I was going to put them up myself but I discovered a neat trick quite by accident. I was still touching the Base Core when I grabbed the first Silver cube that was a Construction Module.

[ Basic Construction Module Detected

Please select Room or Structure to Build. ]

I selected a Large Scale Water Condenser. I got a birds eye view of my Base with a green square on it, I could move the square as I willed. I got it pretty quick after that. I placed it within the walls.

[ Large Scale Water Condenser is being Built

Time Remaining: 1 hour

Please assign building or construction assets to reduce time. ]

"Oho!" I yelled this just got better. I quickly placed the other Condenser on the other side of the Plant while still within the Walls. I placed the Solar Panels on the roof spaced a bit apart so they weren't likely to all get taken out by one attack.

Then I tried to be clever, I touched one of the Turret Kits to the Base Core.

Hahaha! It worked.

Each corner of the roof got one Flak Cannon, one Smart Rocket and one point defense turret. The center got the remaining Flak and Smart Rocket turret. Gotta protect the roof.

Then the Construction Crew came. One Large Bot the size of a Large Scale Excavator, or half the size of my Power Plant, it was damned massive.

Its treads tore up acres of ground at a time. It had dozens of arms, in a multitude of styles, for every task at that scale. Mining, Clear Cutting (Not a lot of need or desire for that.) Road Work, Building Shells for Megastructures. It had its own fabricator and printer, its own smelter. With some reprogramming, I could make it build copies of itself. Neat. It was 100,000 NBs and I felt it was going to be well worth it.

For now though, I had it start a mining operation for crushed stone and silica for the production of ceracrete blocks, big ones. These Block would be used to build a defensive wall a bit further out from the Plant itself.

I wanted to be able to Grow a Grove inside the Walls. That sounded silly in my head, but it would need to be defended.

Next were the Two Medium Bots, about the size of My Bronto. Both also kited out for an exhaustive variety of tasks. I had them begun clearing the land for a few hundred yards in every direction. Once they were done with that, they would build a simple path out to the mine area and then assist the Large Bot out there.

The 10 Small Bots were about human sized with four extendable arms and four extendable legs. They were mostly for internal work, framing, building furniture, and laying in infrastructure like wires and pipes. I have them go to work on the the already constructing turrets and Solar Panels to finish them faster.

Using the Base Core had made it so easy, and the Core could interface with the Bots, allowing for simpler management of tasks.

I did run into some problems. For example, My Condensers finished but I wasn't seeing more water being available.

They needed power, and piping for the water to count. So I found a Water tower Setup in the Infrastructure options and bought the Construction kits needed to fill out the wires for power, and pipes for waterflow. Then more wires to hook up the Solar panels and the turrets.

Ah, there has to be a better method.

On the good side of things, one Construction kit provided tons of wire, and quite a lot of piping, varied a bit depending on the types needed but I didn't get the sense of being scrudged by Guide here. Also the Construction Bots could resize some things if needed.

I was starting to get the hang of this.