Chapter 112: Constructing a Forest-Style Base

He hadn't used any sleep-enhancing magic this time—just let himself drift off naturally, following his own desire for rest.

It might not have been the most efficient way, but it was the most peaceful sleep Bell had had in days.

Ever since arriving in this world, he'd lived under constant anxiety. Even though he tried to suppress it, it never truly went away.

That lingering tension made it hard to sleep soundly at night. The slightest noise would jolt him awake.

After acquiring [Meditation], Bell began falling into a shallow meditative state each night—never fully asleep, always semi-aware of his surroundings.

Then came the Runic Letters. Every night since, he'd been using them to enhance his sleep—not only speeding up his mental recovery but also improving its quality.

In a sense, the Runic Letters had become his sleep aid.

But last night, Bell had forgone all of that. No magic, no efficiency tricks—just sleep for the sake of sleeping, indulging in the simple need for rest.

Because of that, he slept much longer than usual.

When he opened his eyes, he found himself blanketed by the presence of a figure looming over him.

'Ah, Goddess-sama stayed sitting up all night.'

He instinctively rubbed his eyes.

Bell gently sat up from Goddess-sama's lap, then turned to look at her still sitting upright on the bed, fast asleep.

"You sat like that the whole night just so I could rest properly?"

He shook his head with a faint smile, leaned over, and carefully wrapped one arm around her waist. Slowly, he guided her into a more comfortable sleeping position on the bed.

As he finished, Bell noticed her legs starting to twitch slightly—likely a side effect of supporting his head all night.

He traced a few Runic Letters into the air, and the spasms stopped immediately as the magic took effect.

Then, just to ensure she could sleep even more soundly, Bell applied a buff usually used for sleep enhancement. Already asleep, Hestia sank deeper into rest under the influence of the spell.

With that done, Bell straightened up his clothes and made his way upstairs.

After a full night of rest, he felt more refreshed than ever—better even than usual.

"Alright, time to get to work."

He'd already learned to rest when it was time to rest.

But now was work time—and during work, there was no place for thoughts of rest.

First things first: the base still needed to be completed. If not, he and Goddess-sama would be stuck sleeping in the basement every day.

Granted, the basement wasn't that bad. After being cleaned and organized, it was actually fairly cozy.

But if he had the option to live above ground, he'd obviously choose that.

The foundation was mostly finished, and the surrounding ruins had already been cleared out. The next step was building out the internal structures.

In this area, Bell didn't consider himself particularly gifted.

The best he could do in Minecraft was a glorified box, so he clearly wasn't cut out for this sort of design.

Even so, Bell had started to form a new vision—a concept of the future home he would share with Goddess-sama.

Constructing the future home for the Familia wasn't exactly Bell's specialty—but he could at least build a proper treehouse to serve as their unique base.

'In that case, I'll start from the edges.'

Creating a large-scale treehouse wasn't easy. The construction itself would cause quite a disturbance, so the surrounding layout had to be completed first before work on the treehouse could begin.

'If I'm going for that kind of design, then I'll need to adjust the core structure too.'

The outer walls weren't bad, but the overall aesthetic felt off.

Still, that part could be rebuilt.

The method was fairly simple, too.

Runic Letters were perfect for this sort of thing. With a bit of control, Bell could easily form the basic structure.

He pulled out some seeds from his four-dimensional space, then headed to the entrance of the Familia base. Casually, he flicked one of the seeds straight into the center of a stone pillar.

"Crack!"

The force embedded the seed deep into the pillar.

Immediately, vines burst out from the cracked stone, spreading outward. In no time, the vines had wrapped around the pillar, and the seed began growing outward from the center—eventually forming a towering tree.

Though calling it 'towering' was a bit of an exaggeration. At most, it stood about five or six meters tall.

Bell walked up and gently knocked on the trunk.

"Clang! Clang! Clang!"

It echoed like striking metal.

"As expected of an Spirit Tree seed. This thing could be used to make weapons."

The Spirit Tree was a rare magical tree grown at the heart of the Elf race's domain.

While Spirit Trees were highly prized materials, their incredibly slow growth made them even rarer.

Their numbers had plummeted further after many were burned by the magic swords forged by the Crozzo family, and outside sales dropped accordingly.

However, Spirit Tree seeds were a different matter.

The Elves treasured the trees due to their long maturation cycle, making each one a precious resource with little short-term return. But because they took so long to grow—and the seeds themselves were notoriously hard to cultivate—they weren't nearly as rare as the trees.

Spirit Trees were considered priceless, but seeds could be bought in bulk for around 100,000 Valis.

The Elf race had no plans to restrict seed sales. In fact, they were more than willing to part with them.

With such long growth cycles, mature Spirit Trees regularly dropped batches of seeds every few years.

Unfortunately,Spirit Trees couldn't be planted too close together. The fallen seeds had to be gathered up—otherwise, if they took root nearby, they could end up siphoning nutrients from the mature trees, causing the exact opposite of what the Elves intended.

So, the Elves sold seeds to outsiders every year.

Big, hard to raise, and ridiculously slow to grow—the Elves didn't care about them at all. It was more practical to exchange them for money and use it to buy other resources.

But for Bell, none of that mattered.

'Difficult to grow? Long development cycle?'

'Runic Letters can solve those problems.'

He had already bought a whole batch of Spirit Tree seeds for 100,000 Valis and stored them in his four-dimensional space.

He could pull them out and use them anytime—like now, to serve as building materials.