Chapter 1 - Section 2: Ground Zero
The following day as I was busy in the kitchen preparing our breakfast, and even starting prep work on some lunchboxes reutilizing the leftover bento boxes from previously purchased in game food I had gotten from using my Gamer skill.
'MMWah'
Peeking over my shoulder I sighted Raisa, and Ruby walking into the dining room arms above their heads performing a very exaggerated full body yawn.
"Silly"
Next to me Kurama decided to comment on their behavior since compared to us who are up late, and early to rise, but well if I'm honest I can't blame anyone I mean after all only Herc, and me are true commoners. Raisa's spent years living on her own so she's lived by her own rules, and well the Komtesse is a former noble now so she's still adjusting to a commoners lifestyle which means she sleeps rather late unless someone forces her awake.
"Good Morning Kurama… Something smells really good Satou"
"Morning Raisa, we've got a full course breakfast ready to go"
As the last of the food left the pans on the stove and the plates with food piled high made their way to the table.
"Whoa! Is… is this y'know that food?"
Stating out with obvious drool forming as she hastily took up her seat at the table eye staring fixedly onto the steaming food.
"Well sort of, there are some ingredients from my skill but the rest is locally sourced or still leftovers from our stores procured in the city."
"Well meat and veggies aside what are these things?"
Stabbing a fork into the pile of roundels stacked up, and hoisting one such food wheel into the air
"Oh that, back in my world we called them pancakes, they are liked with some of this, or with butter or jam"
Sliding three different condiments towards her plate. The rest of the party sans Primrose had all taken their seats and started to likewise dish up since Satou had already plated up his own serving while the others were all surveying the meal they were about to consume.
Once all had filled their own plate everyone took the same stance with hands raised and heads bowed before closing their eyes.
A moment of silence reigned
"Thanks for the food"
"Thanks for the food"
With the sayso the entire party began to dive utensil first into the meal.
Morning hash, thick cut bacon, hot pancakes with accompanying jams, syrups, and butter, and lastly eggs four ways (scrambled, boiled, sunnyside up, and poached)
The mountain of food quickly disappeared with nary a scrap remaining the plates were all bussed away by Heracles while the rest of us moved from the dining table into the living room taking up seats.
"So what are your plans for today? Going to head over and start setting up the shop?"
"Well sort of, from what I saw of the exterior I'm most likely going to be spending a day or two just cleaning and setting things up before I can consider opening anything."
"Ah I see so it's a bit rundown then?"
"Nothing we can't handle just won't be ready to go right away"
"Well if you need a hand just give us a shout, and depending on our needs I might stop by to take advantage of that forge you mentioned yesterday"
"If that's the case, I'll make sure to start the clean up there. What are you going to be up to?"
"Well since Herc secured a lot, I'm thinking we will start the excavation to begin prepping for the temples construction."
"I see, so what kind of construction are you planning on doing? If I understand your skills so far I'd say you're going to be doing the temple out of wood?"
"That is correct, though while I'd normally want a temple to be made of stone, but since that would make it extremely rare in this village so going for wood construction would be better, even though stone would of course make it that much more awe inspiring, at the very least the statues and reliefs within shall be made of stone."
"Can you do masonry like that?"
"Oddly enough yes, I tried doing some minor experimenting last night, and it seems my mining skill actually applies to carving stone as well, though I can't automate the process like I can with potion making or clothes, since I'm going off a hand made recipe"
"Wow that's amazing so where are you going to get the wood and stone?"
"Urk… Um well honestly I don't know, at this point I'd have to say the forest for the wood, and perhaps scouting the mountains nearby for suitable stone and if I cant find anything then I'll 'shop' until I can find something that's worthy of the gods"
"Well if it's you it's going to turn out simply divine like everything else you've undertaken so far."
"Shall I accompany you on this endevour Master?"
"I'll join you in breaking ground and setting up the planning from the designs we came up with last night, but the collection I will do with Kurama, Raisa on the otherhand do you mind looking after Primrose today? I know you have your shop to deal with but can she tag along? Pretty sure she won't want to hang around a construction site all day"
"That shouldn't be an issue for me, but if I'm gonna do that."
'Huup'
Swiftly kicking up from the couch to her feet
"I should get the little princess out of bed, you boys all have fun out there, and Kurama you make sure your Master is safe out there"
"Protect! Always!"
As Raisa left the room heading off to invade Primrose's bedroom and give the former Komtess what would wind up becoming a rude awakening the likes of which we knew from first hand experience overhearing these wakeup calls during the trip north to this village.
"Shall we head out to start work today Sir?"
"Sure, I've got all the tools we should need so we can get started on phase 1 before we split up to get the materials needed"
"We can head out right away then sir"
"Nuh Uh we can't not just yet, if we're doing construction there's no way I'm going to let you go out wearing your Butler Armor, once you've change to standard work clothes then we can head out"
'Whooosh'
In a flash as if a line descended from head to toe, his clothes changing right in front of our eyes. As Heracles armor was removed and replaced with regular looking clothing that didn't standout much from what the other regular citizens were wearing around town.
With that accomplished we departed heading out the front door, and down the dirt roads until we came to a fair sized vacant lot just off the main street of the village.
"Ok so first stage is to string this lot, that way we can know exactly where to dig and get the general formation setup"
"Sounds good Sir"
"String!"
The first task the three of us set out to perform was the placement of wooden pegs with string tied connecting them creating a stringed out visual plot of the building we were going to create.
From the designs we'd created last night the plan was to create the main temple floor, but also a hidden basement sanctuary since temples are both places of worship as well as somewhere for the masses to seek shelter in the event of emergencies, while the majority of the temples construction will be wood, the basement construction is planned out to be made of stone.
Stringing out the entire lot saving some space on all sides for grass and other plants to give the temple a better look since all the surroundings are dirt with the only sizeable patches of grass being located outside the village walls.
Even if the villagers are to question why grass is present and growing healthy we can just claim its caused by divine protection which nurtures the soil and promotes growth
After stringing out the entire lot, Kurama toddled over to me before tilting her little head to one side, questioning the strung out lot we had created.
"Don't worry it'll make sense soon I swear"
"Kay"
"Preparations are complete Master"
As he headed over towards the pair of us standing there, meanwhile I started to remove the construction tools from my inventory so that the three of us could start performing the excavation.
Shovels, hoes, pickaxes multiple of each tool came out appearing before us on the ground, additionally I'd brought out some panel style walls that we could install to act as cover preventing anyone from seeing what is going on in this lot.
---
A couple hours passed by with all three of us taking up arms and delving deep into the ground, to help make the work go quicker I summoned, Hogaan, Creed, and Rocky along with a passle of goblins to also join in the work. And in almost no time at all a massive squared hole had been dug into the ground.
"This work would be so much easier if we could just use Earth magic"
"Magic?"
"Ah yes the mysterious powers of this world, but surely for one such as yourself performing such a feat shouldn't be to difficult"
"Well I mean it's not that I can't use magic, it's just that with my current skills I'm limited to Fire, and Shadow magic right now, and even though I know I can earn other skills now that I'm here, magic is something new to me so I wouldn't know how to go about learning magic from scratch, or even how to perform the magic of this world since I currently use the chantless magic of my skill."
All the dirt we excavated went straight into my inventory since there wasn't much choice in the matter unless we decided to haul it outside the village.
"Perhaps we could achieve something by using alchemy to achieve something similar to earth magic but I'd have to research that since the only alchemy I've practiced so far is for potion making, not item creation, or attribute adjustment."
"As I've said before, if it's you we will be able to achieve anything."
"Ok well with the digging completed we should move onto the next faze which will be to create the foundation before installing the general structure."
"What do you require Master?"
"Well first things first we'll need a mixing tub and tools to create our agar. Next up would be wood and stone which I will handle since we'll need to use my inventory to transport them."
"If you provide me with a list I shall purchase or attempt to imitate whatever tools and supplies you need sir"
With that after dispelling most of the monster summons, and the writing down of a list of construction supplies we would need. Kurama and I left the site heading to the location detailed to us of the new
"It's a little early but perhaps we should find some snacks, or even dessert that we can bring to the girls for their hard work."
"Yay!"
The pair of us walked along the main street once again heading in the direction of the new shop having left Heracles behind to manage the purchasing and management of the construction site materials and goods. While I manipulated my menu to access the shop and purchase an yggdrassill dessert and snack tray, since this is a rural village desserts are not found except in the form of fruits.
"Wow when she said it was run down I didn't realize just to what extent"
Staring out at the decrepid front of the shop, the windows were boarded up and the front awning was barely hanging on with numerous tatters in the cloth. The front door also was broken with numerous small holes riddling the door.
Placing a hand on the latch before pushing the door open and entering the musty dark room.
A ball of light emitting from my palm illuminating the interior of the shop. The inside of which was covered in a thick layer of dust, numerous cobwebs scattered around the room.
"Odd, it's been a few hours already they should've been started already"
Standing in the doorway still staring out at the abandoned storefront.
"Forge"
Saying out while tugging at my sleeve.
"Ah yes that's right she did say they were going to start there didn't they, so that we could use it if we needed to for the construction. Perhaps we can also do up some things for around here while we're at it?"
Heading towards the side door leaving behind the dusty storefront, grasping the doorknob and opening the door.
'Whoosh'
A cloud of dust shot out from the new opening covering me from head to toe, and providing another layer of dust to the main storefront.
'Cough Cough'
"Ugh… gross"
Still blinking furiously as I tried to get the dust out of my eyes, feeling the small hands on my legs as Kurama remained hiding behind me tucked under the folds of my cloak.
"Splosion?"
"No.. at least I don't think so, more like overzealous cleaning"
Having finally cleaned my eyes enough to stare out at the side room which contained the smithy workshop inside the room was warm especially when compared to the room we were about to leave, though the job hadn't finished yet most of the cleanup work was already done. Raisa, Ruby, and Primrose were all working with dusters I'd created utilizing their dexterity skills to the utmost moving around the room at a blinding pace causing the kickup of dust which remained in the air. The room was small with only a pair of doors one that I was still standing in the door way of and the other which was open and lead directly outside.
To prevent another fluster of dust from coming our way, I removed a cloth tarp from my inventory which is used as the ground sheet for the tents, before moving to a corner of the room and raising the sheet up high above my head.
Bringing my hands down as hard as I could I flapped the sheet three separate times with all my might.
'Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh'
Three blasts of air rocketed in the room radiating from the sheet I was flapping, with only a single avenue to escape the room since Kurama closed the door I had entered from. With the upswell of air pressure the accumulated dust in the air was sent rushing out of the room with fervor. All the dust shot from the room and even areas that had yet to be dusted were cleaned by this unprecedented method.
When the wind finally settled down after the third blast passed by all that remained after lifting my head from the crouched position after having dropped down to provide the greatest amount of force to the final flap, there I saw all three of them standing with a look as if they had fainted while standing.
But all the hair on their heads was tangled and messy as if they'd just come out of a tornado. The room on the other hands almost sparkled with the level of 'clean' that just occurred as the concentrated forceful blasts of air cleaned the room down to a near molecular level.
"Sorry about that…"
Realizing that the three of them had just been hit with a force five hurricane without warning all I could do was apologize, I mean I never expected just flapping a piece of cloth would create such an effect boosted by my raised stats or not…
Guess that's why the guild's and other adventurers all say that S-Ranks are world changer, especially since I'm not even A rank and can already do something like this.
'Creeaakk'
The door leading to the storefront opened slowly before Kurama poked her head in through the doorway.
"Clean?"
"Yup all clean in here, but the ladies there might need some tending to if you don't mind"
"Kay!"
As I left the 'recovery' operation to Kurama I myself decided to occupy my time setting up a makeshift table and setting out the meal and other items.
"Seriously! How about some warning next time!"
The trio all came running up from behind me as I could feel four different sets of hands casually beating on the back of my legs, and back. Not with the intent of causing harm more just acting out and wanting to playfully hit something.
"Hey hey I did say sorry about that, I didn't expect it to be that effective"
"Hmph… I thought you said you could only use two types of magic, so just how did you use Wind magic just now?"
"Magic? I didn't use magic; I just flapped a sheet around…"
"Huh?"
Picking a napkin I'd laid down on the table up and casually flapping it up and down, a stiff breeze being sent from my hand.
"See"
"That's insane did you level up a ton when you went out hunting yesterday or something I though you said your stats didn't really improve much."
"I swear if you want to confirm you're welcome to check my card if you want"
Offering up my left hand in an attempt to prove my innocence.
"Bah you being a wanderer is one thing but to have this kind of an impact with only a strength stat of F is insane especially since you're a caster type class. Guess that just shows how much different the growth potential is of you Summoned heroes whether you receive the god's blessings on arrival or not"
"Haha well I'll take that as a compliment but if I who am just a shell of a hero am this amazing, it makes me wonder just how much better the real heroes really are."
"Well hopefully they'll live up to the hype"
"Well we can discuss everything over lunch it'd be a shame to let the food get cold"
The five of us now taking formation around the makeshift table, Primrose was still silently following behind Raisa lead; I can only assume something happened during the wakeup call this morning that made her this docile. Usually when in front of me she'll act like a giddy school kid who just chugged a 2 liter bottle of soda and was riding a never ending sugar high. The only times she ever settled down was at night while sleeping and after the two times she collapsed due to us letting her ride the bus (power leveling without being involved in the actual combat) though this couldn't be used as a solution forever mostly because I didn't want to have her max her level without actually being involved in the combat and learning how to manage and control that newfound strength.
"So you brought up the hero's again but are we otherworld summons that common here?"
"Well I only know what I've learned in my travels but Hero's appear here in regular intervals, the 'Hero Summoning' was a ritual passed down to the races by the gods in the age of calamity, thousands of years ago. At that time an evil presence was sweeping across the world and multiple nations and races fell to ruin until the gods bestowed the ritual allowing heroes descended from higher planes to come to our aid and fight alongside the races to defend our world. But the ritual being what I was could only summon a hero once in a hundred years. At the time each of the 8 countries given the divine summoning ritual used it without hesitation and anywhere from a single to four heroes were summoned before being trained up to then lead from the front lines. The war ended in the races favor with humanity being given most of the credit since all the summoned heroes always were human resulting in a rise in discrimination and persecution of the other races. And although the grand war has ended the hero summoning's are still going on. At first each nation would summon as soon as they could without fail even though there was no threat each nation still wanted to possess a powerful trump card in case another nation decided to try something. Then over time and many wars fought between human kingdoms, and those of the races the summoning became staggered and now with the way things are the age of destruction as some like to call it has come again with the ritual coming full circle since Mire is the first nation to once again call forth their heroes, the other seven nations in control of the ritual are most likely holding their breath since Mire has been provoking and posturing for a while now, and should they succeed in taking over the kingdoms handling the ritual they could in theory take custody of multiple Hero parties which would make them the greatest military power on the planet."
"Ok so I kind of get the history, but are summons really treated with such worth?"
"Well I mean yeah, the summoned heroes always have had a level limit of 99 whereas from what I've heard people of this world their limits are staggered ranging from the 10-70's one in a while a rare case will appear but we are almost always inferior when it comes to leveling, not to mention the goddess's blessing usually comes with a method of leveling faster than usual since at the time of the first summon the world didn't have years to prepare the heroes post summoning for combat"
"That's… That's not exactly true you know"
"Huh what do you mean prim?"
"Well I was told the reason there are 8 summonings are because each one was provided by each of the divine gods of the 8-pillars and with that each summoning grants a different blessing upon those who are summoned, so unless we know which god or goddess was responsible for Mire's summoning we won't know which blessing was bestowed"
"I'd love to give you a hint but my status when I was summoned gave me a different title than the others, and even when I try with my skill to expand on that title it doesn't show me anything further than just declaring I was extremely unlucky for being at the wrong place at the wrong time, so unless we can get our hands on one of the current heroes a guess is all we can manage"
"Well you're a throw away right not like the blessing really matters in the end, except that knowing it would give greater odds should we come against the heroes in any capacity. Since though their summoned as heroes only a handful actually fulfill the roll as true heroes the rest play the part for a while before using their power to fulfill their own desires, eventually pitting hero against hero until only one remains as the surviving hero who will lead the age until the time of the next age begins."
"So basically summary being that at some point there could be anywhere from 8-40 heroes in the world, along with any other unfortunates like myself who were taken along for the ride"
"Yeah though with Mire having confirmed four in their summoning, the chances are pretty good that the numbers will be high this time around, and well with what you've told us of the other side if there are really that many people in close quarters like that then the chances of numerous people coming through at once would increase."
"Hmmm you've got that right, the only time most people are distanced from others on the other side are when they are at home, but with how hectic life is the amount of time spent at home is significantly less than the amount spent everywhere else, so I suppose it would be rare for an individual to be summoned on their own"
Our conversations remained on the topic of heroes for the remainder of the lunch break
"So with lunch over, care to explain your purpose in coming here and causing a dust explosion?"
"Yeah that wasn't cool mister; I probably have dust in my brain now"
"Uh yeah again sorry about that, but honestly you guys blasted me first, my blasts back were just a wee bit stronger than yours"
"You deserved it for trespassing, should've waited until you had permission to enter"
Next to her Primrose just stuck her tongue out at me.
"Alright alright my bad once again, but to get back to the point, I'm here cause we were going to try and use the workshop to create some building materials for Herc to use for the temple. After that I'm going to have to go back to the forest at some point to collect some wood for the building as well."
"Wait you're not going to build it out of stone?"
"Yeah, Stone would look so much better for the benevolent gods"
"Well yes, as I explained earlier to Heracles stone would be more imposing, but in a border village like this it would just stand out way too much, plus wouldn't it be bad if a new religions temple appeared grander than that of the state religions temple?"
"Hmmm that would definitely draw attention to us, given we are trying to hide out. But in the end isn't the goal to only stay here until the monster stampede is over before heading on to the next destination?"
"Well I mean yeah, but even beyond that where am I supposed to get that much stone? Enough for statues I can manage but to build an entire temple I don't think there's a quarry anywhere around here, and even if I can summon a tone of golems doesn't mean I can just create one in the middle of nowhere that also would draw a ton of unnecessary attention"
"Well the country did put out that decree to not mess with you but, I do see where you're coming from by not advertising your location and I do also agree that announcing your involvement with the creation of a new religion to this world would be bad, especially if it were found out you were an other worlder Hero or otherwise the knowledge you could give to a country is invaluable, I mean I've only seen what you've created so far out of profit but if I was a nation I would love to have a retainer like you in my camp"
"I understand I'm a valuable commodity especially if you consider I'm the best defense against the new heroes, assuming that I'm even a match for them in the first place but I'm not looking to get involved if I can help it, I mean I'm just an old man can't go picking on kids"
"Well then guess we'll just have to go ahead with your plan then, so you need to make use of the smithy then?"
"Yeah, was going to use it to create some nails, and some other woodworking tools to allow me to create the best possible temple I can"
"Well with your help this place is all cleaned out so if you don't mind lending Kurama to us we can get started on the storefront while you're working in here?"
"I don't mind she's only limited to being near me but that's not to say she can't be in a separate room from me"
"Can Help!"
With that the four girls all packed up their cleaning supplies and headed off towards the store front to continue their cleaning mission leaving me all alone in the now cleaned smithy.
Pulling supplies out of my inventory I filled the forge with charcoal before lighting the starting fire. While the flames built up, I proceeded to pull out tongs, hammers, and other smithing tools. Lastly I pulled out a couple small boxes loaded with sand into which I pressed a single nail creating a fresh new mold for the soon to be created nails.
Time passed and hundreds of nails were created in a relatively short amount of time since all that was required was to heat the iron up until it became molten before pouring the liquid metal into the mold and allowing it to cool a bit before placing formed nails onto a plate in the forge to mass heat them all at once until they get to the indicated temperature recommended by my blacksmithing skill once heated dropping the red hot nails into a bucket of water to quench and harden them.
After completing the process of making nails I heated up a second set of iron and hammering it out on the anvil spending time to make a couple chisels, claw hammers, and planers. All the required tools needed for wood based hand construction. The final thing to do was create some axes that we could use for the deforestation that would take place to secure the wood required for the construction. Thanks to the woodworking skill I could turn logs into planks, or even dry the wood allowing me to shave it down into pillars.
I've had part-time jobs while I was in school back on earth but to be in charge of a construction site from the ground up I'm leaning heavily on my skills to make sure the work goes well. But that's not saying much pretty much everything I've done since coming to this world short of cooking, buying, and selling has been through the use of my skills none of these professions are really a normal everyday thing for anyone back on earth.
Having finished up my smithing work by creating tools I leaned the one I wouldn't need in the forest up against the wall, before approaching the storefront door.
'Knock knock knock'
'Creeaakk'
A tiny fox-kin face poked out from the opening in the doorway
"Yeess?"
"Is it safe to enter?"
"Nope, ladies say go around"
"You do know if I go around the building you'll be forced to follow me right? Cause the minute I step outside that door over there 'shwoop' there you'll be by my side"
"Hmmm… can't help then"
With that the door handle was released and it swung open fully allowing me access to the storefront once again.
As I walked in the room looked markedly different from before, not exactly 'clean' just yet but way better than it was originally. All the cobwebs had been cleared away and a good portion of the dust had also been cleaned up as well.
"You ladies have been working hard in here"
"Of course we are, what did you think we were slackers?"
"Not exactly what I mean it was supposed to be a compliment…"
"Oh don't mind her, she's a bit irate right now had a couple spiders try making nests in her hair"
"I see well I just wanted to check in with you ladies before I leave to see if there was anything I could get for you or that you'd need?"
"Hmm well most important would be a new door, after that if you can a couple cabinets, or shelves for the store would be good?"
"I should be able to manage that once I get the wood from the forest, and the only cost I'll ask from you would be to deliver the tools I left up against the wall of the forge to Heracles when you get a chance. Oh and I'm not sure when I'll be back from the forest as we might spend the night to collect all that we can since a building is going to require quite a lot of wood after all, that and I'm thinking of making a trip to the mountains to see what kind of rock we could get for the gods statues."
"You make sure to take care of him Kurama"
"Stay safe Kurama!"
[Is it just me or did I become the third wheel overnight?]
Waving our goodbyes the pair of us left the store behind before quickstepping it out of the village and progressing all the to the eastern forest. Since we would be doing significant logging I figured the eastern forest would be better to use than the western forest we visited the other day. Since the stampede and invading monsters are all coming from the east no one should be just hanging around in the forest. The western forest is the hunting ground for new explorers and adventurers
After entering the eastern forest the contrast between the two was like night and day. Where the western forest was warm and full of light and life, the eastern forest was dark, and the air felt heavy and sick almost like a curse lay upon the woods.
'Grrrrr'
"yeah I know I don't like this place either, so we should get what we need quickly but make sure to keep your guard up I don't want to get ambushed while we're here"
[Summon: Beast F]
[Summon: Creed Summon: Rocky]
Two stone golems, and a pack of wolves appeared in front of us.
"Alrighty, we're going to divide into two teams, Rocky and Creed are with me on lumberjack duty, meanwhile Kurama you take charge of the pack take down any simple monsters you come across and ward away any humans or other races that try to approach us. At the end of the day though make sure you come back alive I haven't experimented how death works for my monster summons yet"
"Gotcha!"
Performing a semi salute before turning to the wolf pack and conveying orders to them through a series of growls. While I turned to the pair of stone golems standing before me, pulling three different axes out of my inventory. Two massive axes that could only be wielded by a massive creature like the golems or a Goblin lord or even an Orc and one that was about half the size still completely oversized for a human but after a couple practice swings at the forge it was the most I could handle with my increased strength thanks to leveling up, though I did have a bit of an issue. Since the system recognized me as a caster if I swing the axe with the intent of it being a weapon I would drop it immediately, but if I swung it in the process of 'chopping wood' my grip would hold firm, and I would even see a target in my heads up display showing the weakpoint of the wood I was cutting.
Choosing not to chop the trees on the edge of the woods we moved a ways into the forest before I handed out instructions of the type of trees to cut down to my stone golems. They were to only chop down trees of a certain height and greater than a specific width after chopping them down to trim off all the branches before separating out the thin branches from the thicker ones.
After the orders were given the pair moved off and started the work, meanwhile I headed off in the other direction following the same criteria.
Having found my first target I drew back the axe holding it like I was about to perform a baseball swing.
'Swiinngg'
The iron axe sliced into the wood of the tree, but rather than an impact the slice just kept going only coming to a stop when my arms willed it to the tree on the other hand just shook from side to side a bit.
"huh, I'd swear I just swung within the range of the axe…"
Approaching the tree and giving it a couple of pats to reassure myself that it isn't an illusion
'Teeeerrrrrrachh'
With those couple of pats the tree tilted before careening towards the ground landing with a thunderous impact the leaves on the canopy branches swaying up and down
"Wow there wasn't any resistance to my swing, is that just cause I'm that strong? No no no that couldn't be if that was the case the tree would've exploded from the impact not sliced through so my blacksmithing skill must give quite a nice strengthening impact to sharpness when I use a grinding stone, though that makes me question it's durability since the sharper something is usually the easier it is to breakdown"
Still staring down at the axe held in my hand, coming to terms with the fact that if I decide to create more weapons in the future to sell I'll need to seriously think about not putting my all into their creation since an army with super sharp weapons could cause serious chaos on the battle field if wielded by the wrong sorts.
After coming to terms in my own head I proceeded to trim the tree, and pocketed all the usable branches, before taking the entire trunk into my inventory.
Using up the rest of the day until only a tiny amount of sunlight remained in the sky having collected all the harvested material. Sadly though the system didn't pop drops to double the amount of wood I collected. Even though in the game you could chop trees to collect wood this world didn't work with the system on that front, perhaps due to the fact that the amount of wood collectable from a physical tree was orders of magnitude greater than that dropped in the game.
When chopping a tree in game 1-2 logs would drop per tree, but the tree would respawn afer a couple minutes whereas here a 50 year old tree would be worth it's weight in usable wood, so for only 1-2 logs to drop from something like that is unreasonable.
Having concluded our work for the day, the Kurama and her wolf pack returned each carrying a fresh kill which they presented to me before thanked them before dispelling them. Kurama seemed very full of herself for not only completely her mission but also secureing what would become the main course for our supper.
Creed, and Rocky took up sentry positions, while I worked to setup a simple tree top campsite stringing a pair of hammocks between tree's high above the ground.
After that was completed I made a simple rustic stove to cook the meat from the horned rabbits, and other small monsters that had been hunted.
Cooking them on the makeshift griddle along with some chopped of veggies from my inventory plating up the cooked meal for both myself and Kurama.
Even though we were alone I had already gotten used to going through the motions of praying to the Hellenic gods, back on earth I wasn't religious even to say the least but well here with the presence of gods being absolute even if I was praying to a set of gods that didn't exist here it still felt more real than anytime I'd ever prayed back on earth. Almost like a 6th sense telling me that someone was actually listening to me.
So I presented a quick prayer to multiple gods and goddesses all at once, for the food, safety, magic and other like things.
The meal was still lacking when compared to what I could achieve back in the city, but that being said even my campfire cooking far surpassed the food anyone could find back in town, so I sort of feel sorry for Herc and the girls they'd have to go out for food tonight and even possibly all of tomorrow depending on how long it takes us to get back.
My plans for tomorrow is to start processing the wood we've collected and then carry on towards the mountains to hunt for marble or a similar type of stone that would make a very fine quality statue that I can use to carve the figures of the Hellenic's given the scale the amount of the stone needed will be quite significant so just finding a handful here or there won't do.
With that being decided I quickly cleaned up from our meal busing the dishes by simply placing them into my inventory to wash later or even just replace altogether. Lastly I doused the fire and scattered the remains to coverup signs of our camping site, before climbing up the trunk of the nearby tree to my lofty bed for the night.
With the sounds of wolves howling at the moons in the distance, with their colored luminences bathing my bedding as I shut my eyes and quickly drifted off to sleep after a hard days work even if it didn't feel all that taxing on my enhanced body.