774 T.D.o.N.B: A little bit of exploration
Seven days later I already accumulated a stack of 33 178 600 points. 33 percent of what I needed for the next upgrade. I also had 78 class points, but I kinda was ignoring them, since the amount was way too small for anything I could consider ‘an upgrade’.
I kept following the group to the cave, mainly because I didn’t have much to do, but also to keep watch on my daughter and John. Their first fight didn’t convince me they could take the boss on their own safely enough, but the fights after that one looked way cleaner.
They began understanding him, and their own capabilities in comparison to his, way more. The classes they bought also clearly helped. Tihana was investing in fire magic, and also in mele fighting, which John kept pursuing solely the close combat.
This led to me believing I’m not needed there as a babysitter, because by the end of the week they looked quite clean while dealing with the goblin.
The rest of the people also clearly grew in strength. We still kept living in quite terrible conditions, but with access to more points, you could see the investments around our little city.
People got stronger, and they also experimented more with their equipment. They kept training in their spare time, and they were all well-fed. The laughs and lively conversations became a quite regular view compared to just a few days before. For the first time, I felt not like we were behind the schedule, but rather on the right track.
The duels with the boss also improved John’s status. He stopped being judged by how he found himself among us and started being judged by his skills and openness to help others. It was mainly thank’s to Tihana, who kept the brat on a short leash often straight up ordering him around.
I don’t really know why he followed those orders. Maybe he felt bad because of how he treated her and wanted to pay her back. Or was it just the pure fact of me being around? The scariest motherfucker in the whole city. Undisputable, to the point only my family members dared to discuss with me any matters. The rest diplomatically backed down.
This marked the moment when I stopped following them to the cave and instead began exploring the world beyond the barrier. At first, I thought it would look quite the same, as I didn’t really do that many changes to the environment, but I was wrong.
Outside our dome, the season started changing. The lively colors disappeared, making room for darker and gloomier ones. Dark blue was the main one.
The vegetation looked quite similar, but I didn’t limit myself just to the immediate vicinity. I pushed way beyond that because I had the necessary speed to travel with ease.
Like that, I was able to find out that we were occupying a quite big island in the middle of a vast ocean. Beyond that were two massive continents, were not only flora, but also fauna was different. The colors reminded the same, a mix of green and blue, but the shapes were different. I’ve seen vast jungles of trees incredibly tall. Easily reaching above hundred meters. Some had trunks so wide, you could hollow houses inside them. A whole freaking apartment complex.
The first animals I’ve seen were the massive whale-like creatures occupying the oceans. There was probably more underneath the surface, but I didn’t want to get wet, so I put the exploration of that part of the planet on hold.
Then I saw birds. Quite colorful and exotic. There were flying lizard creatures, just as bright and vibrant as regular birds. Some of them are very, very big. The lands were occupied by many reptilians. Some surprisingly humanoidal. Quite similar to the apes in terms of intelligence.
Like that, another fourteen days have passed, allowing me to reach 61 269 500 in terms of points. In terms of class points, I hit the mark of 120. It made me begin to consider spending them on something, but I didn’t really know on what.
The idea came when I watched Celestine curse under her breath, as she was sharpening her blade. Its edge was looking quite jagged already.
She was sitting on a small stool she bought in the device, straight up in the city center, where many others, in a similar situation, were taking care of their equipment.
– We really need a blacksmith or something in here – she said eventually.
– Yeah – I immediately agreed.
More agreeing voices followed. Everybody seemed to be irritated with the quality of their weapons. They were pricey, and during fights with armed opponents got damaged quite quickly. The fact that they had to share the score among almost forty people, even with the crystals from the cave, made them annoyed about investing too much into new things.
It made me realize that after those two weeks I mostly spent away, there weren’t that many new weapons being bought.
– Maybe I’ll be able to help with that, at least a little bit – I added after a moment of thinking.
We clearly needed somebody like Rishi in Petrograd. I also needed new equipment. Not the weapon, since mine was almost brand new, but the hoodie and pants, since the good ones, made out of enchanted kevlar were gone.
The only problem was points since I preferred to invest them in the upgrade of the device since I was already over fifty percent done.
After careful consideration I came to the conclusion, that I could invest a little, tiny bit, to be able to at least enchant a bit, so the stuff we used wouldn’t get damaged so easily.
And no! I wasn’t considering utilizing the crystals from Loistavadvaar at all. Those were to remain a secret for the population of my city. They already knew too much about seeds and the device itself. Letting them find out about everything else seemed simply stupid, and a sudden surge of points from who-knows-where was the first step towards that.
So yeah… Like that another three weeks passed.