Salted Fish and System
"Fucking hell!!..again?!…ARRGGHH!!…
It was day 2 of me floating on the blue wide sea, is the view beautiful?. yes is I would say for the first day, but now?. it was torture, for the 11th time a fish jumps on board my small floating lifeline. And each time, I was injured by them. The fish was far from normal, a blow fish that I've just killed, that so rudely woke me up from my sleep was over a meter long, and not only it can puff up its body, but also shoot their sharp spike as a projectile that can bore through flesh like a hot knife through butter.
"At this time..I might end up naked by bandaging my whole body…HMM!!…This thing just made a hole on my thigh!…Huff!!…will this plank even hold out?…
Once again, I tore my inside t-shirt and made a bandage, to wrap my newly acquired wound on my right thigh. I suffered quite a few cuts, from the attacks by the fishes that jump on board my plank. I was transmigrated here, with nothing, I was still wearing everything that I wore before I died, my work jeans, utility belt that still holds a few of my things, inside t-shirt, red checker shirt, and denim jacket, and a fanny pack that holds, a 500ml mineral water, an energy bar, 1 pack of my cigarette, a lighter, my only now dried smartphone and a solar charger. On top of the Planks were just me, and a small pile of dead fish, that I have killed, the blowfish that I just killed using my fist and a stab to the head with a screwdriver, has now become the new additions to the small pile of gutted fish.
I am not a wasteful person or an idiot, I did not make an attempt to swim around, searching for a kill, instead, I decided to preserve my energy, why go search for food when they were going to find you anyway. I gutted the fish using my Retractable Utility knife, although I can do it, from my experiences, the fish's skin and bone are actually as hard as wood, which when the first time I gutted the fish, it's actually snap one of the knife blades off.
"At least if I eat, one fish for one day..I can survive for ten days….I just hope that Mahi Mahi won't come again….ha~ my hammer..".
Mahi Mahi fish here is actually as big as a 2-meter person, I was shocked when I saw it, it attacked my plank in an attempt to eat me, but I was quick to realize its attempt, after all, it was in the bright daylight, it bites off the edge of my plank, but retreated when I smashed my hammer on its eye, but sadly, the fish didn't die, but instead it swam away with my hammer lodge in its eye sockets.
"it charging nicely…I hope the phone still works…after all it was said to be water resistance..I don't think that I submerged that long…Hmm?…what is this?…".
As the Plank still has a little bit of space, laid out my phone and the solar charger side by side next to the lined of nailed gutted dead fish. As l touch the screen of my phone I noticed that there's a bump on it. I touched it.
"The…ARRGHHH!!…HOT!..HOT!!..
The moment I touched the bump, my finger felt like it was set on fire, instantly the burning sensations spread out until my elbow. Feeling the pang of pain, I submerged my hand into the water, right in front of my eye, I can see that my hand was red, akin to a burning metal, the water around it was bubbling, and surely it was boiling.
[Users Detected…Checking eligibility…].
"Oh…oh..I know what's going on…ow!..my hand!!..".
[10 Sea Monster Killed…Eligibility Confirmed...Proceed Resource Downloads...90%..].
[80%…..30%….20%..10%….0%..Download Completed..Congratulations, Basic Menu Systems is Online…].
"Hah~….finally my hand has cooled off…fuh~…not gonna lie, I am waiting for this…surely the god of Transmigrations won't forget about me…hehehe…Basic Menu System huh…okay..".
All the Novels got their system, so I was kind hopeful to get one, then lo and behold I got one. The after-effects of the system installed itself to me, left only a kinda futuristic tattoo on my hand, on my wrist, there's like a power button Icon, then from the end of my finger all the way up to my elbow was filled with intricate lines and dots, that has the similar look of a ram stick design. Kinda cool, but at the same time, if you gonna give me a tattoo at least be a little creative about it.
"System?…".
Hoping something will pop out, but nothing but a breeze sweep by.
"Menu?…Aha!..there it is…hmm..".
Looks like the correct command word was 'Menu' because as soon as I said it, a blue slate that looks exactly like an RPG menu appeared. The Blue Slate, have 4 options, [Status], [Inventory], [Shop] and [Crafting].
Thoroughly checking everything out, I found out the functions of every single option, in my Basic Menu System. [Status] option will show me a new tab of my own status. [Inventory] will open a new tab, which showed me a 5x5 blank boxes, which means 25 item slots, and thankfully the same item stacks, to how much I don't know because I don't have anything for me to check on. [Shop] also opened a new tab, it was the place for me to buy and sell stuff like food, materials, and skills, for now, not much thing was available, if I have to guess probably due to me being weak. And last, [Crafting] when clicked, it will open a new tab, which listed a recipe to make almost anything but with the game logic.
"Certainly..it looks gamey enough…but it's actually really covers everything basics…how do I look right now?…Status…".
Name: Azmel
Sex: Male
Age: 27
Trait: Calm
Race: Human+Elves
Level: 1 0/100 EXP
Attribute:
Health Points: 4/10
Mana Point: 5/5
Stamina: 11/20
Physical Strength: 1.2
Mental Aptitude: 1.9
Reflex: 1
Skills:
Handy Man {A} (Passive)
Calm Minded {A} (Passive)
"...Since when I am half-elves?...Elves does have a longer life span…it's okay I guess?…I don't know if 1.2 physical strength is strong, normal, or weak?…I supposed I know when the time comes…Let's check [Shop] next...Open Shop….".
When I said the command word, the [Status] tab closed by itself and the [Shop] tab opened up before me.
[You Have 10 Lower Grade Crystal in your Possession, do you wish to convert them into S-Coin?].
"OH~..so this small pearl is Crystal…hmm..well they are lower grade anyway..exchange..".
[You now Have 10 S-Coin…your purchase will be sent directly to your Inventory...Happy Shopping~..].
The small box of notifications disappeared after 5 seconds.
"I wondered how to unlock more items in the shops?…it must be leveling up..for sure…At the very least, I now have a water source…for now..let's see what we have in here…".
I can see there's a lot of items to be unlocked, but only 2 buyable items that I can buy, which are valued at 1 s-coin each, it's a 1 Litre Mineral water and Meat Curry and Rice MRE pack. In the Material sections, there's also 2 option for choice, a 5-meter long wooden log which priced at 1 S-Coin and 10 Kg of Fertile Dirt which priced at 1 S-Coin.
"Wow..my system really is staying true to its name…every single skill is basic...[Basic Appraisal], [Basic wood cutting], [Basic Swords Art]….in terms of defending myself…I think I got everything covered..I supposed is need to have the must-have skill…buy [Basic Appraisal]…".
Unlike the previous 2 tabs in the [Shop] selections, the Skills tab list was filled, I have to scroll down 5 times before I saw a skill that was greyed out of options. Right now I only have 2 skills in my arsenal, both of them were passive, I needed to buy the [Basic Appraisal] skill, as my priority. All because I am not a native of this world, yes I have all the information I need to know about BlueWall, but what I have was just a basic general idea of it. I don't have the native knowledge about anything, what is a dangerous monster, what I can eat, and what I can't.
I, not a firm believer that, if want to survive they have to master the art of sword or something, I am not a flimsy boy or entitled bastard, anyone who lived in a hardship knows how to fight and survived if I ain't got no weapon, I will punch, if I ain't got hands I'll bite if I can't do anything I run, simple as that. I am more worried to not know what I ate, who knows the fish might look delicious but actually poisonous.
"I supposed I need to start saving my coins now…just a basic skill already cost me 3 coins..let's just buy the 1-liter water and 1 MRE…I supposed that's about it...Open Inventory..so how do I take things out and in?…like this?…uh~...Cool~..now I don't have to worry about losing my stuff…".
I figured out how to use my [inventory] in a single breath, it was very simple, all I have to do is when I wanted to store something, I just have look at the thing and it will prompt a small menu asking stored item or not if I chose yes the item just vanish and appeared inside my inventory. If I want to take out something all I have to do is just either, tap the icon on the [inventory] space or just think about it and answer yes when the small menu of option yes or no comes out, then the item will magically appear on wherever I wanted, as long as it was close to me.
"Now..onto, the Crafting..open Crafting~".
I'm in a happy mood now, I was singing tunes at whatever I do. When you are alone, in the middle of nowhere it is good to be happy at small things. On the [Crafting] tab, things are much simpler to understand, just like any other crating menu in any game, there is a recipe for standard items, but eh rest you have to unlock your own, by simply dropping a new item in the crafting item slots.
"What do…oh, let's try this fish…guess it…I guess I need salt now..".
Since I don't have anything in my possession that I willing to make an experiment on, the gutted fish will have to do. I grab one of the fish and will it into the Crafting item slots, with the fish turn into a game-like icon, 2 new recipes unlocked, one is [Salted Fish] and another was [Fish Fillet]. [Fish Fillet] is useful, but not now, so [Salted Fish] is my option to go to, but I lack one ingredients combinations which are [Salt].
"Can I?…Ouh~ yeah~…yes I can~…1 liter is the maximum numbers without any containers huh…well that should do it..1 liter of seawater can be crafted into 100 grams of salt…the calculations a bit off…but the heck, it is what it is….Perhaps I can sell this salt once I reached any town or cities…".
Nothing stopping me now, I when I was playing a game I was the kind of person that didn't mind grinding, in real life those traits of mine even shine. I keep on crafting [Salt] using the seawater as I was drifting with the waves. After 3 hours, I finally found out the stack limit of my inventory item slots. It was 999, kinda guessing it already, it was either 99 or 999 or 9999 or whatever. So as of now, I got 9 tons and 99 kilos of pure Salt, I just made one stack as I don't want to waste space, who knows I might run into something. As for the 10 fish, they are already salted and dry, ready to eat as soon as I am done crafting them.it was standardized in the inventory as Medium-Sized Salted Fish. When I pulled them out of the Inventory, the size is about my 2 palms put together, so I considered them quite large, which suitable for a 1-day ration.