ã€ŠThe Survival Plan (LitRPG)ã€‹


 Prologue - In Which Everything Goes South

    On the day of my mother¡¯s funeral, the world ended.

    She had collapsed at work and her coworkers called the ambulance.

    ¡°Brain aneurysm,¡± the doctor said when I arrived at the hospital. ¡°I am so sorry for your loss.¡±

    We gathered at the family cabin to scatter her ashes, as it was something she often mentioned that she wanted.  My uncle Ben, my mother¡¯s younger brother, his wife Emma, and my cousin Emily, came early in the morning and left soon after we did what we came to do.

    ¡°Are you sure you want to stay here alone?¡± Ben asked before they left.

    ¡°I¡¯m sure. I¡¯ll be fine.¡±

    ¡°Suit yourself.¡±

    He got in their car and they drove off.

    Ben and Mom didn¡¯t get along. Ironically it was because of the cabin and because Grandpa and Grandma left it to Mom and not him.

    I didn¡¯t understand why my grandparents would leave the cabin to Mom, and why he was so upset about it. There was nothing special about the small log cabin. It was half an hour away from town. A small stream flowed behind it and there were a few similar cabins scattered around the surrounding woods.

    ¡°I think it is the principle of the thing,¡± Mom used to say when I asked her about it. ¡°He wants it because they left it to me, and he didn¡¯t get it. He was always a bit spoiled.¡±

    I decided to spend the night and water my grief with wine. I didn¡¯t like wine but Mom loved her reds and always had a couple of cases stocked at the cabin. We spent many summer evenings on the porch, cradling her wine glass. I¡¯d tell her that her wine was getting warm and that she should hold it by the stem, but she would just wave me off.

    The weather was very pleasant. It was late spring and the woods had already turned green. I changed out of my black dress into old ratty sweatpants and my mom¡¯s blue sweater. The nights were still relatively chilly, so I set out to chop some wood for the stove.

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    The cabin was one big room, with a tiny bathroom. There was a small kitchen on one side, with the stove that we used for cooking and heating. A couple of mismatched couches were in the centre of the room, with a coffee table that was covered in mug rings. There were two bunk beds on the other side and a loft with a double mattress that you had to climb onto with a flimsy ladder. Whoever built the cabin included a small basement to serve as a cold room. We kept it reasonably well stocked with canned goods, but it wasn¡¯t much.

    Mom came here about twice a month on the weekends, and I¡¯d come with her sometimes. She¡¯d invite me with her all the time, but I¡¯d turn her down more often than not. I was busy, first with school, then with work, and sometimes just wanted to enjoy the social life of a twenty-something woman, and not spend my weekends in the middle of nowhere.

    I thought we¡¯d have more time.

    Behind the cabin was a shed where we stacked firewood to dry and where we kept the gardening tools. Some seed packets were on one of the shelves, as mom wanted to start a vegetable patch this year. Everything was organised neatly, so I found the axe quickly and started chopping.

    I must have zoned out because when I snapped out of it there was a huge pile of split logs all around me. My arms and hands were screaming in pain. I wasn¡¯t very good at chopping logs.

    ¡°Well, they¡¯re not going to stack themselves. ¡± I said out loud. I always talked to myself when I was alone.

    The late afternoon crept up on me as I tidied up the shed. My stomach rumbled, reminding me that the only thing I had to eat that day was half of a tuna sandwich I got from the supermarket in the morning.

    I made some tomato and cheese sandwiches and sat on the porch. I ate automatically and the food tasted like ash.

    Finally, everything caught up with me. The hospital, the blur of cleaning out my mom¡¯s apartment and her stuff, the cremation and the hollowness of the words we spoke this morning, everything.

    For the first time since finding out that my mother was dead, I started to cry. My mom was gone and I was completely, utterly alone.

    That¡¯s when everything went to hell.

    First, it was the birds. Something had spooked the crows and they all started to caw loudly. Suddenly, the flock left the branches of the surrounding trees, making the sky dark. The air started to buzz with electricity as if there was a big thunderstorm brewing and the lightbulb on the porch light went out with a cracking sound.

    Finally, a loud, booming voice projected inside of my head. It sounded inexplicably bored.

    ¡°Greetings, the sapient species of Earth. We will commence the System integration protocol soon. Please stand by.¡±

 Chapter 1 - In Which We Watch an Ad

    ¡°Please stand by. ¡±

    The words echoed inside my head. Then everything went dark. I couldn¡¯t see a thing.

    Suddenly, something I can only describe as a video suspended in an empty space started playing. It was like I was in a pitch-black theater and the movie just started. I couldn¡¯t feel my body at all. A panic like I never felt before overwhelmed me. But I couldn¡¯t scream. I had no mouth to scream with anymore.

    ¡°Greetings, Earthlings. Welcome to the Universe!¡± An extremely upbeat female voice exclaimed, followed by equally upbeat music. Planet Earth spun in place in my mind, like in those documentaries about the cosmos. The invisible woman continued. ¡°As your planet has reached a level of social and technological advancement, it has become eligible for Universe Integration. This is a fantastic opportunity for you to become full-fledged citizens of our great Universe and grow stronger alongside others who have already taken the plunge. Our state-of-the-art System will help you accomplish just that and aid you in achieving your dreams. ¡°

    While she was talking, a whole flurry of images changed in front of me. They showed all kinds of beings, humanoid and otherwise, participating in different kinds of activities, like farming, crafting, singing in sci-fi-looking bars, and so on.

    Something about the pitch rubbed me the wrong way. Other than, you know, how fucking insane the whole thing was. I felt like I was watching a travel ad for a trip to a country ruled by a dictator, made with a budget of a piece of string and chewing gum.

    Then the theme changed and strange animals were roaming through the savanna, then the woods, crossing flooded rivers, and swimming in the sea.

    ¡°Right at this moment, your planet is being seeded with different kinds of monsters to challenge you. The rewards are great for those who dare to risks. The Universe welcomes the strong.¡±

    The images slowed down and faded to black. The music also stopped and some strange script showed up. Somehow I was able to understand it, but at this point, I gave up on questioning things.

    ¡°According to Section LDF-459 of Terms and Conditions, the System''s creators are not responsible for any consequences of System Integration, including, but not limited to death, breakdown of society, and cannibalism,¡± Another voice read quickly, like in a medicine commercial.

    I found myself on the floor of the porch, face down. I felt something like a pinprick in the back of my neck, and a tingling sensation spread down my spine, right on the edge of being painful. It went away after a few moments, but an echo of it persisted a while longer. I was nauseous, and my stomach threatened to bring up my dinner.

    The feeling subsided soon, and I pulled myself up on my knees. The woods around me were eerily quiet.

    Usually, I wasn¡¯t afraid to be alone up here. But the lack of sound was unnerving.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how you and your mom do it,¡± my friend Angela told me often when I¡¯d mention the cabin. ¡°I¡¯d be scared shitless. You could get axe murdered.¡±

    ¡°I guess you could get all different sorts of murdered in the city too, ¡± I¡¯d reply.

    The truth was that I wasn¡¯t particularly afraid of dying from an axe murderer. Statistically speaking, a woman is more likely to get murdered by her romantic partner than anyone else. Random murders are rare. As I was single and on pretty decent terms with all of my exes, I didn¡¯t want to let my fear keep me from doing things alone.

    Of course, I wasn¡¯t stupid. I didn¡¯t leave my drink unattended in a bar and I crossed the street at night if someone kept walking close behind me. I kept the chain on my apartment door at all times and even carried pepper spray in my purse.

    At the cabin, Mom changed all the windows so they could be bolted and the doors were decently sturdy. Every night we would check the windows and the doors. In all of my years staying at the cabin we haven¡¯t had a single incident and that kept me feeling safe.

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    Now, I didn¡¯t feel safe. At all.

    For a brief moment, I considered if my grief had made me black out or hallucinate. I was sure that it was something that happened to people. However, that notion quickly evaporated from my mind as soon as I noticed something in the corner of my vision. A small, green, pulsating logo of an eye hovered in the right-hand side of my vision. I tried to shake my head to make it go away, but it persisted. I closed my eyes, but there it was.

    An ominous green eye.

    I could feel my heartbeat starting to climb rapidly and I recognized that I would get a full-blown panic attack soon. I used to get them often as a teenager, but I hadn¡¯t had one in years.

    Being aware that I was panicking didn¡¯t help me calm down, of course.

    My breath kept getting caught in my throat and my hands started shaking. I forced myself to slow down my breathing and took huge breaths. I put my hands on the wooden porch floor.

    It took some time, but I calmed down. The eye was still hovering in the field of my vision, but I ignored the feeling of panic that threatened to bubble up from below the surface. I focused on the eye and a transparent green window opened in front of me, like in the old web browsers.

    ¡°Okay. This is fine. For sure,¡± I said and giggled nervously. There was a browser window hanging in front of my eyes and that¡¯s just fine. There was nothing weird or unusual about that.

    Again, there was that strange angular script and I could still understand it perfectly. The window had three tabs: Status, Skills, and Inventory. I focused on Status and a list showed up.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A (0/100 exp.)

    Strength: 2

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 30/30

    Points to distribute: 0

    ¡°Yep. I¡¯ve gone insane. Go away.¡± I said and the window disappeared. The eye was still there in the corner, watching me. I decided to ignore it. It wasn¡¯t real. There wasn¡¯t a character sheet in my brain.

    I got up from the floor, my knees protesting as I did. I went inside the cabin and fetched a bottle of wine and a glass. I struggled with the bottle opener as usual. I silently cursed my mother for buying the nicer wine with the cork, and not the bottles with a screw top I¡¯ve been known to enjoy in my missions to get as drunk as possible for the least amount of money.

    The woods around the cabin were still eerily silent. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. Something deep inside the lizard part of my brain screamed for me to hide, hide, hide. I wasn¡¯t going to ignore my body¡¯s warning, so I got up as quietly as possible, picked up the hatchet from the porch, and went inside the cabin, the wine forgotten on the table.

    I spent the next few minutes frantically locking the front door and making sure every window¡¯s latch was secure. I even pulled the curtains on for good measure, and stood next to the window, peeking into the outside world.

    It was still fairly light outside and soon I was able to see the very thing that awoke the primal fear of the wild and unknown, forged by the thousands of generations that resulted in me. A large bear-like creature walked into the clearing in front of the cabin and made my blood run cold.

    It was a horrifying sight. The animal was slightly bigger than an average male brown bear and had the same colouring as one. It was quadrupedal, with each paw ending in long claws that promised to disembowel you if you gave it a chance. Its head was massive for the size of its body and its maw was the scariest part of it. Instead of a snout, it had an angry red hole lined with a few rows of teeth, as if someone lit a firecracker where its mouth used to be and it blew up and later healed. As I watched it approach, a transparent green box popped up in my vision and read Grizmorph level 15.

    I quickly slid down on the floor, with my back pressed against the cabin wall, gripping the small hatchet. I was screaming inside my head, but I forced myself to keep quiet. My heart was threatening to break out of my chest.

    I could hear the Grizmorph climbing up the few steps onto the porch and the breaking of glass as it nudged the coffee table. I didn¡¯t dare to take a look through the window. All I could do was sit quietly and hope that it would lose interest and go away.

    My prayers were answered after several excruciating minutes. The beast had left the porch and I steeled my resolve and slowly got up on my knees. Through the window, I could see it retreating. Only after I couldn¡¯t see it for ten minutes did I let myself breathe again.

 Chapter 2 - In Which Some Things Get Reinforced

    ¡°What the hell is going on?¡±, I asked the empty air around me and slumped down on the floor. The night had already fallen, and I couldn¡¯t see much into the woods. However, the sounds of birds have returned, but they weren¡¯t as loud as I was used to them being. Or perhaps my imagination was running wild.

    ¡°Okay, what do I know so far?¡±

    One, there is some strange monster bear thing lurking outside. Two, aliens? I wasn¡¯t sure how much more I could speculate about that. Three, I now had some character sheet I could call up anytime.

    To make sure I still could, I focused on the ever-present eye in the corner of my vision. Like before, a window hovered in front of me and followed my gaze. I focused on the Status tab.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 0/100 exp.

    Strength: 2

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 30/30

    Points to distribute: 0

    I didn¡¯t know what those numbers meant other than what they represented at face value. But I wasn¡¯t too stupid to understand that there was a levelling component in this situation. I wasn¡¯t much of a gamer by the standard definition of the word. I dabbled in RPGs, but I mostly enjoyed crafting and strategy games.

    ¡°Okay, I guess I can work with this.¡±

    I then focused on the Skills tab. It turned up empty.

    ¡°No skills, huh?¡±

    The Inventory tab was a different story though. Earlier in the day I had mindlessly put some rubbish in my pockets and there it was: a crumpled nut bar wrapper. I focused on it with the intent to take it out of Inventory. In the blink of an eye, I had the wrapper in my hand. I let it drop on the floor.

    I looked at the side table and picked up one of the many little porcelain figurines my grandmother left behind. I put it in the pocket of my sweatpants. I wasn¡¯t surprised when it showed up listed in the inventory tab. My pocket felt suspiciously empty when I patted it down, and I put my hand into it, grasping at nothing.

    That was weird.

    I kept my hand in my pocket and imagined the figurine appearing in it. Sure enough, that''s exactly what happened.

    I took it out and imagined it phasing out of my hand and showing up listed in the Inventory space. The figurine disappeared. I pulled up the Inventory tab and there it was.

    ¡°This is so weird.¡± I dismissed the inventory. I decided to put the whole system out of my mind for now.

    I felt a strange sense of calm wash over me. I guess I ran out of panic. A scary beast was roaming outside and I was positive if I stepped in front of its path it would attack and kill me. There was no doubt in my mind that I wasn¡¯t equipped to deal with it as is.

    For a brief moment I contemplated getting into my car and driving back into the city, but it was already pitch black outside and I didn¡¯t like to drive through the woods at night in the best of times. And this didn¡¯t qualify as the best of times.

    I looked around the cabin, a plan forming in my mind.

    There was a lot of furniture I could pile up at the door to block them off. There were two bunk beds and a few small side tables that were littered around the place. If push came to shove, I could jump into the basement and close the trapdoor. The Grizmorph didn¡¯t seem to possess opposable thumbs, so it wouldn¡¯t be able to open it. I would be trapped but there was food down there and I could wait it out.

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    ¡°This is a really dumb idea.¡±

    So I set about to see my vision come to life. I had to choose between either working quickly or working quietly. Afraid that the beast would come back, I chose the former. I decided to chop down the posters that separated the top and bottom bunk to make them easier to stack. If I put them sideways, they would just slide down on the floor and make a racket.

    My muscles burned as I removed the old dusty mattresses from the first bunk bed. I wasn¡¯t particularly strong, so every movement hurt like hell. This was the first time in my life that I felt regret about not working out more. I knew that by the end of this exercise, I would be completely useless, but the sense of danger lurking outside kept me going.

    Somehow I managed to flip the first bunk bed on its longest side. The strain of physical exertion made me feel like I was going to be sick, so I took a break that was long enough to settle my stomach. After I took a few sips of water, I grabbed the small hatchet in my hand and steeled my resolve.

    A chiming sound went off in my head, like a bell you trip off when you walk into a store. I opened up my character sheet and saw that I now had another tab called Log. I opened it up and I saw a notification:

    Due to your actions, you have earned an increase in an attribute: +1 Strength

    I stared at the words floating in front of my face. I flipped over to the Status tab and there it was; my Strength attribute now equaled 3. The hatchet in my hand felt a lot lighter than it did mere seconds ago.

    Deciding that there would be more time to process whatever the hell there was to process, I turned back to the bunk bed on the floor.

    ¡°Let¡¯s get this done,¡± I said and went back to swinging my hatchet at the poster.

    After some time, I was interrupted by another notification sound.

    Skill Unlocked: Wood chopping, level 1

    ¡°Huh. ¡± I guess I had a skill now.

    Pushing the thought away, I dismissed the notification and went back to work.

    I would lie if I said that the idea of having quantifiable skills didn¡¯t appeal to me. I had always had a mind for numbers, and perhaps I could have gone into hard sciences, like physics or mathematics, but I was too practical for that. So I became an accountant.

    It wasn¡¯t a glamorous living, but it was stable and reliable. I made enough money to have a decent life and put away some cash for a rainy day. That¡¯s all that mattered to me.

    It took me the better part of an hour to finish my makeshift barricade. I occasionally peeked outside to see if something was coming to the cabin. So far, nothing was lurking out there.

    I examined my handiwork. The extra point in strength made it much easier to move the beds. However, even with a 50% increase in this stat, I was only able to stack three beds on top of each other, as the fourth one would simply be too high for me to reach. Three beds and two mattresses divided me from whatever danger lurked outside. I had no illusion that they would stop anything, but I hoped that I would at least slow down whatever came knocking on my door.

    My inspection was cut short by another notification. But this one was way more interesting than the previous one.

    Skill Unlocked: Reinforcement, level 1

    It was pretty self-explanatory what this skill was about, or at least I hoped so. I reinforced the front door, and therefore I received the Reinforcement skill.

    ¡°I may be getting the hang of this. ¡±

    I moved on to the next part of my plan: making my last stand spot in the basement. The basement was about half the size of the cabin above it and its ceiling was barely tall enough for me to stand in it. Even though I could stand up straight in it, I always bent my neck subconsciously whenever I went down. The shelves with canned food were on two opposing walls and there were a few boxes with wine bottles in one corner. The air smelled musty and there was some mold on the walls.

    For whatever reason, whoever made the cabin decided to give it a reinforced concrete basement, instead of digging a hole in the ground and putting some wooden planks to keep the dirt at bay. I wasn¡¯t one to complain because it gave the cabin more structural integrity. I was grateful for that.

    I dragged a few pillows and blankets downstairs and all of the water bottles I had with me. I had brought a few litres just in case, even though I usually drank the water from the well unless it was raining. As it was, I could be right in the basement for three or four days, if I rationed my water.

    I hoped it wouldn¡¯t come to that.

    Finally, I propped up the trapdoor that led to the basement and tied a piece of rope around the ring that was used to pull it open. If worse came to worst, I would be able to just grab the rope and slam the basement trapdoor closed.

    With that done, all there was left for me to do was to pull up a chair and keep watch through the curtains.

    The world outside kept still.

    <hr>

    Diana''s character sheet

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 0/100 exp.

    Strength: 3 (+1)

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 30/30

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 3 - In Which There Is Some Bird Trouble

    The morning rays of sun peeked through the window and found me sleeping on the chair, the hatchet resting in my lap.

    I couldn¡¯t remember falling asleep. There wasn¡¯t much opportunity or frankly will to sleep the past few weeks since Mom had died. My brain must have taken over from my fear and made me pass out before I could start hallucinating from sleep deprivation.

    To be fair, I still wasn¡¯t sure I wasn¡¯t going insane. I spent most of the night pulling up my character sheet and dismissing it repeatedly until the words had burned into my retinas. When I wasn¡¯t doing that, I was staring outside the window, hoping that nothing would stare back.

    There wasn¡¯t much activity around the cabin, at least none that I could see. I heard animal calls coming from the woods, but I wasn¡¯t able to catch the sight of anything concerning. The night was moonless and dark, and I had no light, given that the power was out.

    At some point last night I had accepted that whatever was happening was truly happening. It was just easier that way. If Mom could be dead from a random burst blood vessel in her brain, then the aliens could also do some fucky shit with Earth. Two plus two did, in fact, add up to five today.

    I got up from my chair, my stiff muscles screaming in protest. Surviving the night was just the first step of the plan. The rest of the plan was just to survive point blank. Last night I felt that more nuance than that was too much to ask for at this stage. But now I had to figure out what the step after would be.

    Some vague notions about getting to my car and driving to the city were bouncing in my head. Depending on what I found there, I¡¯d make my next call. I couldn¡¯t help but think that the rest of the world was in full panic mode, but I couldn¡¯t know until I got there.

    Feeling somewhat satisfied about my next steps, I gathered some of the stuff I had into the overnight bag I had brought. I didn¡¯t even bother with having breakfast. The sooner I was out the door, the sooner I¡¯d get to the car and get on my way. Something told me that speed would be of the essence.

    I threw the backpack on and took a quick look around the cabin. I wasn¡¯t sure when I was going to see this place again. But I didn¡¯t have the time to be too sentimental.

    Carefully, I unlocked the front door and opened it a quarter of the way through. I stuck my head outside. At first glance, the green in front of the cabin was as calm as ever. But upon further inspection, I noticed something very odd.

    Bushes.

    About halfway towards the woods, were three bushes that went up to my knees and glistened with morning dew and sickly yellow light. They were not there yesterday.

    Well, I¡¯m not going to go check them out. I thought to myself, even though my curiosity was piqued. This smelled of a trap. I wasn¡¯t going to let myself get into a trap that easily.

    The sight of my car 300 meters away caught my eye and pulled me back to the Plan.

    The Plan was to survive.

    I carefully closed the cabin door, locking it behind me. It took me a few seconds and I did it more out of habit than anything. There was no immediate danger that I could see. The path to the car was clear from both sides, and the woods only started after. I geared up and started sprinting.

    Soon, the air in my lungs started to burn. I hadn¡¯t run like that in years. The last fifty meters or so found me gasping for breath and skipping to the car. It was overall an abysmal display of my fitness.

    Somehow, I managed to reach my car and unlock it. I quickly jumped inside, locking the door.

    A notification sound distracted me and I pulled it up.

    Skill Unlocked: Sprinting, level 1

    Despite still not being sure how the skills were helping me, the notification cheered me up. I was making some progress.

    Dismissing the System, I turned my attention to the task at hand. I turned the keys in the ignition and heard absolutely nothing. I tried again, and again, but the engine stayed silent.

    ¡°Fuck. ¡° I slammed my fists on the steering wheel in frustration.

    A crow landed on the hood of the car. It stared right into my eyes, making me uneasy. Crows weren¡¯t supposed to stare at you. Its eyes shone with a dim green light.

    As I focused on it, a description appeared.

    Crowling, level 1

    The Universe¡¯s scavengers, these little guys migrate to newly integrated worlds. They know there will be many fresh corpses to feast on. However, if they are starving, they won¡¯t hesitate to attack. They are especially fond of freshly plucked eyeballs.

    ¡°Shoo!¡± I yelled.

    The bird just stared at me. I knocked at the windshield, trying to make it go away. It cocked its head as if to say that¡¯s all you got? Then it started pecking at the glass.

    ¡°Stop, you stupid bird!¡±

    The crow was not to be scared away. After a few pecks, a small hairline crack appeared in the glass and it got bigger with every peck. I tried turning on the car again, but no dice.

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    My mind was racing, trying to think of a way out.

    The glass exploded in my face before I could come up with anything. I managed to shield my eyes just in time, but I felt the sting of the small cuts on the exposed skin. The crow¡¯s sharp beak soon followed.

    Screaming, I waved my hands, trying to hit it. It was relentless in its attack, so I kept my eyes firmly shut.

    I managed to unbuckle the seatbelt, and patted on the car¡¯s door with one hand, hitting the damned bird with the other. It evaded most of my attacks. Finally, I managed to open the door and promptly fell on the dirt floor. Somehow I grabbed the creature¡¯s wing and snapped it with all that I had. It cawed in pain and I took the opportunity to grab its neck, ignoring the pain and the blood that was flowing down my face and hands.

    Snap! The bird fell lifeless in my hands.

    You defeated a Crowling level 1. 5 exp gained.

    The notification spooked me and I dropped the now dead monster on the grass. Its body shimmered with the same green hue as the notification messages. This stopped me as my curiosity got the better of me. As soon as I focused on the green shimmer a text box appeared.

    Loot? Yes/No

    I mentally accepted the prompt and the green shimmer disappeared.

    You gained 1x bird meat.

    You gained 1x Universal Credit.

    The items have been added to your inventory.

    A sharp pain in my foot brought me back to the here and now. A creeping vine with very sharp-looking thorns had wrapped around my left leg. I screamed and started maniacally stepping on it with my free foot. The monstrous plant loosened its grip and started to retreat. I could have sworn that it let out a quiet pained Ow! When I hit it.

    I wasted no time analyzing it. I quickly grabbed the overnight bag from my car and sprinted back to the cabin. I cursed myself for locking the doors less than 10 minutes ago. My bloodied hands were shaking as I fished out the key from my pocket.

    Once inside the cabin, I put up my makeshift barricade to block the door once again. With that done, I let myself collapse on the floor. It seemed like I was doing a lot of floor collapsing lately.

    ¡°Well, there goes that plan.¡±

    A hysterical giggle escaped my mouth and burst into laughter that I couldn¡¯t push down. I forced myself to take a deep breath to clear my mind. It only sort of worked.

    By the time I was calm enough to check my injuries, the scratches on my hands had stopped bleeding. I rolled up my sweatpants and saw that there were only tiny red dots where the vine squeezed my ankle. As I was looking at them, they disappeared right in front of my eyes.

    ¡°What the¡­¡±

    The skin on my ankle was whole and smooth again. I made my way to the bathroom, as there was a small mirror there above the sink. I had to see what was the damage to my face.

    Given the amount of blood that covered my sweater, it wasn¡¯t that bad. The scratches were shallow and criss-crossed my cheeks and nose, but they had already scabbed over. I was lucky I didn¡¯t lose an eye.

    I admit I wasn¡¯t an expert in wounds, but there was something fishy about this. I was pretty sure that I was supposed to be still bleeding. This whole thing had System bullshit written all over it.

    I pulled up my character sheet in search of answers.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 5/100 exp.

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP:23/30

    Points to distribute: 0

    That piece of shit bird cost me almost a third of my HP! I doubt that we were tete-a-tete, as it were, for more than 30 seconds. I wasn¡¯t sure what would happen if I got down to 0 HP, but something told me that it wouldn¡¯t be good. If I were to follow video game logic, which seemed like the most¡­ Logical thing to do, I¡¯d probably die.

    I felt a headache coming up. This was all a bit too much.

    Here I was, sitting on the floor of my mother¡¯s cabin, after almost being scratched to death by an overgrown chicken.

    Mom used to leave bird seeds on her balcony and they would sometimes leave behind bottle caps and other shiny treasures. She called them her caw-caws. She even used to baby-talk to them. I used to love crows because of her.

    I pushed down the pang of loss that came from thinking about her. I had to focus on the now and here. I had to stick to step 1 of the Plan: Survive. Mom would want me to do that. She would want me to toughen up and work all of this out.

    That damned bird had almost ended me. But at least I got something out of it.

    ¡°The loot!¡± I exclaimed to the empty cabin, and then immediately cursed myself for being an idiot. Being loud was one way to attract unwanted attention to myself. I had to learn to keep my mouth shut.

    There were too many things I had to do.

    When nothing came crashing through the cabin windows to gut me, I relaxed slightly and pulled up my inventory. Apart from the chocolate bar wrappers I put there the night before, there was also the Crowling meat I had looted from the bird¡¯s corpse.

    Without thinking, I willed it out of the inventory and found myself with a poultry fillet in my hand. I almost dropped it in surprise but managed to catch it before it splattered on the floor.

    This inventory thing would definitely take some getting used to.

    The meat was almost the size of a regular chicken breast that you could get from any supermarket. I wondered if it was poisonous, or if it would make me grow feathers or something if I ate it. I wasn¡¯t going to exclude any possibility.

    I focused on the fillet and a description box appeared.

    Crowling meat (raw)

    A protein-rich source of nourishment found across the Universe. Because of its bland taste, it¡¯s nobody¡¯s favourite. However, it keeps you fed, which is more than many could hope for.

    I dismissed the prompt, and put the meat back into my inventory. I would be alright for food for a while, and I wasn¡¯t sure I was ready to eat monster meat. Yet.

    And with that thought, I went to fix myself some late breakfast.

    <hr>

    Diana''s CS: No change.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 5/100 exp.

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP:23/30

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 4 - In Which We Do Some Landscaping

    As I was eating the last of my sandwich, a decently-sized scab fell from my face into my plate. I almost threw up right then and there. I quickly closed my eyes and sat back on the couch. It took a few minutes until I was able to open my eyes and not freak out.

    Sometimes just pretending that something didn¡¯t happen does wonders for your psyche.

    In the bathroom mirror, I saw that most of the scabs were gone from my face, and were probably littered across the cabin floor. In their stead, there were faint scars. Pulling up my character sheet, I saw that I had one more HP to go until I was fully recovered from the Crowling attack. I hoped that the scars would go away with that last point.

    ¡°Vain until the end, I see,¡° I told my reflection. My smile quickly turned into a grimace.

    ¡°You¡¯re doing okay. You have to stick to the plan, Dee,¡° I said to the woman in the mirror.

    The clock on the cabin wall showed half past 10, about an hour and a half since I tried to escape from this damned place. If my math was correct, I was healing 1 HP every 10 minutes or so. It wasn¡¯t much, but it was a vast improvement over what would have been days of recovery with medical intervention.

    I was grateful for that small mercy that this System had given me, even if it was the cause of these wounds in the first place.

    However, I truly hoped that my Constitution stat helped fight against germs because I was pretty sure I wasn¡¯t vaccinated against a monster variant of rabies.

    Mom¡¯s sweater wasn¡¯t as lucky as my face though. I had previously changed out of it but forgot to immediately soak it in cold water so that the blood wouldn¡¯t stick. All things considered, my carelessness was understandable, but I couldn¡¯t help but beat myself over it.

    ¡°Stuff is just stuff, Dee. We can always get more stuff,¡° I could almost hear Mom say. She wasn¡¯t one to be sentimental over something as silly as a sweater.

    Still, I went over to the bathroom to fill up a bucket with cold water, hoping to salvage it. The System had once again decided to show me the middle finger, as nothing came out of the tap.

    ¡°Fuck,¡± I completely forgot about the pump.

    The cabin had a small generator out back that powered all electric appliances including - you guessed it - the pump that pulled up the water from the well to the kitchen sink and bathroom. And since my power went out once this nightmare started, there was no running water.

    ¡°Okay. So what are my options?¡±

    Discarding the sweater, I went to the window that faced the back of the cabin. I could see the generator in the back, but I couldn¡¯t diagnose any problems from where I was standing. I probably wouldn¡¯t be able to tell what was wrong with it. I was an accountant for fuck¡¯s sake! I never messed around with this stuff.

    ¡°Now you¡¯re just being negative, Dee.¡±

    Various things might be wrong with the damned thing. It could be out of petrol, for once. Somehow I knew that wasn¡¯t the issue. I tried to think of anything else that could be wrong, but I came up short.

    Whatever made my car go kaput, was probably also wrong with the generator. The power went out the second the Integration was initiated, and it stayed out. Perhaps there was a strong electromagnetic pulse coming from somewhere that made the technology act out.

    My phone was also affected and had gone dead around the same time. It¡¯s not like we had much reception up here anyway.

    We still had an old-timey well on the property, with the hand crank and everything. It was not ideal, but it would have to do because it seemed like I was stuck in the cabin for the foreseeable future.

    The Plan just got a bit more complicated.

    Went to the other window that looked out to the stream and the well. Two very sickly-looking bushes, just like the ones in front of the house were guarding the path to the well. The distance was less than 20 meters or so. Before yesterday, I didn¡¯t need a game plan to cross that distance, but the sudden appearance of the plant made me pause.

    I tried focusing on it, hoping that a box would pop up with its name and level as it did for the Grizmorph and the Crowling, but nothing happened.

    ¡°I guess I would have to get out there.¡±

    That thought made me shiver. The cabin was safe, as far as I knew. I was safe inside. But I knew I couldn¡¯t stay inside forever. I would run out of food eventually. I had enough bottled water to last me a few days. But then what? I couldn¡¯t just walk to a supermarket to stock up. Walking back to the city was out of the question.

    The image of the monstrosity that was Grizmorph hammered that idea down. I didn¡¯t want to find out what the next worst thing was out there.

    I would have to make do.

    And making do meant that I had to do some landscaping.

    ¡°I need weapons. ¡±

    This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    A quick rummage through the kitchen later, I had two chef knives, one steak knife, a handful of butter knives, and an ice pick. I set aside the two chef knives and discarded the others. I doubted that I would be able to deal much damage to anything. I still had the hatchet too, and I had been keeping it within arm¡¯s reach at all times.

    Something that must be common to all residences that have been passed down through generations is the amount of random junk that almost magically appears inside it. I was able to find a wooden broom handle, sans broom. Many layers of duck tape later, I had a very, very bad spear.

    Chime. The unmistakable sound of a System notification went off.

    Skill unlocked: Makeshift Weapon Making, level 1

    I considered the notification for a second. ¡°I¡¯ll take it. ¡°

    I focused my attention back on the spear I made and was surprised to see a description box appear.

    Makeshift spear (Trash)

    Made from random stuff lying around, this spear was created by someone who only dreamed about a spear once and promptly forgot about it. Deals 2-3 points of damage.

    ¡°How the hell did the System create a description for this thing so quickly?¡±

    Rage suddenly burned inside of me, the kind I rarely felt. I felt like my every move was being monitored and evaluated, and I didn¡¯t like it. What was this System Integration anyway? I had no way of answering that question, and it made me even more angry.

    I had worked hard to have a decent, quiet life. I had plans of travelling around and eating at good restaurants. I had just gotten a job that paid okay and made those plans possible.

    I felt robbed of those dreams.

    ¡°I could die here,¡° I heard myself say.

    My anger deflated as quickly as it came. There was no point in going down that path too much.

    I had some bushes to take care of.

    <hr>

    Just like that morning, I cracked open the front door and stuck my head outside. There was no sign of Crowlings, but I wasn¡¯t going to bet my life that there weren¡¯t going to be any out there. I had to keep vigilant.

    I gathered all of my courage and stepped outside for the second time today. The deja vu was strong, and the fear inside me threatened to paralyze me, but I ignored it. I told myself I was more ready for monsters now than I ever was.

    As quietly as I could, I inched towards the bushes. My palms were slick with sweat, and I had to keep a death grip on my weapons. Finally, I was close enough to one of the damned things to trigger the description box.

    Vineslasher, level 1

    While pretty weak on the multiverse hierarchy, this plant can still deal some vicious damage. Just don¡¯t let it hug you!

    Taking the System¡¯s advice to heart, I quickly retreated to the cabin with my back against its wooden wall, hoping I¡¯d be out of range of Vineslasher¡¯s creepy tentacles.

    From my vantage point, I could see five plants: three in the clearing in front of the cabin and two to the western side, next to the well. There were a few of them behind the cabin for sure, given my shit luck in all of this.

    I was surrounded. I was royally fucked.

    This thought definitely did not make me freeze in panic. However, a now familiar sharp pain shot up my leg and stopped the freakout train in its tracks. Instinctively, I swung my hatchet down and chopped off the vine that had sneaked up on me.

    The severed plant limb trashed about a bit, like a fish out of water, and then stopped entirely. What was left of the tentacle quickly retreated to its bush, leaving behind a trail of yellowish slime. The sight made my stomach churn.

    I spared a second to inspect my leg. Just like this morning, it hurt a little where the thorns pierced my skin, but I was confident that it would be back to normal.

    I tightened the grip on my weapons. It was go time. I charged at the closest Vineslasher, swinging my hatchet like a mad woman.

    The plant was truly disgusting up close. It wasn¡¯t much taller than my knees. The main branches oozed the same sickly yellow slime as the wounded vine. A faint light glowed from the centre, and I could have sworn that there was a half-digested corpse of a rabbit stuck in there. I didn¡¯t have time to inspect it closely, as my hatchet slipped from my hand and flew a few meters away from me.

    I reacted in pure instinct, gripping my shitty spear with both of my hands and aiming it at the plant¡¯s glowing centre. I hoped that it would be a weak point.

    Thankfully, my hunch seemed to pay off, as the plant shook and shrieked in pain somehow when I stabbed it. The two unharmed vines tried to wrestle the spear out of my grip, but the wound I had inflicted on its main body seemed to have significantly weakened it. I easily plucked the spear out of their hold and stabbed the bush a few more times.

    The Vineslasher let out another scream that made my ears ring. I gathered all of my strength and stabbed once more at the dying light. The damned plant finally stopped squirming and died.

    You defeated a Vineslasher, level 1. 10 exp gained

    Loot? Yes/No

    I mentally accepted the prompt and felt something appear in my inventory. The feeling was unnerving, but I ignored it like so many things today.

    I pulled the spear out of the now-dead and crumbling plant. Unfortunately for my sensitive stomach, I could now see that I was correct about the dead rabbit.

    I didn¡¯t have the privilege of mulling over this disgusting discovery because there were other bushes just waiting to digest me like an overgrown fly in a Venus fly trap. I shifted my focus to the spear in my hands.

    Unfortunately, the knife I used as a spearhead had come loose from the electrical tape that was supposed to keep it in place. In a split second, I decided that retreat was the smart thing to do. I quickly sprinted back to the cabin before the other Vineslashers decided to seek revenge for their fallen comrade. I only paused to pick up the dropped hatchet before rushing back inside.

    <hr>

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 15/100 exp. (+10 exp)

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 3

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP:26/30

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 5 - In Which We Do Some More Pruning

    As soon as I returned to the cabin, I locked the door behind me and stacked all of the junk back up. Somehow this netted me another level in the Fortification skill.

    The second after I read the notification, I could see some weak spots in the way I arranged the bed frames and tables at the door. Someone who didn¡¯t even have to know what they were doing could just crash the door open and the whole thing would fall like a tower of cards.

    Even more worryingly, I became aware of a major weakness in my shoddy fortification of the cabin.

    ¡°The fucking windows,¡° I cursed. ¡°You¡¯re dumber than a bag of rocks, Dee.¡±

    The cabin windows, all wooden frame and single pane, were at least thirty years old. They didn¡¯t offer much protection against their elements or burglars, and not against any monsters.

    ¡°I¡¯ll put it on my damned to-do list, I guess."

    This apocalypse stuff was beginning to be very labour-intensive.

    I made my way to the couch and plopped down unceremoniously. Then I proceeded to have a nice, ugly cry. I let the feeling of hopelessness take me over completely.

    ¡°I could just give up,¡° I said to nobody in particular.

    The thought of giving up wasn¡¯t that appealing and I knew I wasn¡¯t that kind of person. And also, giving up wasn¡¯t a part of the Plan. I had to keep up with the Plan.

    The crying did make me feel a bit better, however. I poured myself a glass of water. I had to review the new information I gathered from my little yard adventure.

    First of all, I was surrounded by these damned bushes. Thankfully, they didn¡¯t seem to be very strong and they didn¡¯t deal a lot of damage. Still, they could get me if I wasn¡¯t careful and I could end up like that poor bunny. I shuddered at the mental image and moved on to the next thing.

    My cabin was a little better than sleeping in a tent. A more motivated monster could easily get in here and I would be done for. But I had some ideas on how to go about making it a little safer. I¡¯d probably have to shutter the windows. I¡¯m sure there were some nails in the shed, but I¡¯d be hard-pressed to find any planks lying around. This assumption could also be false as Grandpa was one of those people who would pick up a loose screw he¡¯d found on the ground and bring it home. I didn¡¯t know the full contents of the shed, other than the seeds and gardening tools.

    ¡°We¡¯ll cross that bridge when we get there, I guess. ¡±

    Next, I learned, almost lethally, that wielding two weapons at a time is a truly dumb way to fight. Especially when the person wielding said two weapons at the time wasn¡¯t particularly good at fighting with either of them. Apropos that, I had to figure out a way to make a better weapon.

    Finally, I had to figure out a way to get power back on, or at least get some water. All the stress and sweating made me stink to the high heavens, and I wasn¡¯t going to sacrifice any of the potable water I had for the cause. My vanity wasn¡¯t that bad. Yet.

    Sighing, I knew what had to be done first. I had to take care of the Vineslashers, as they were the most pressing issue on the list of my problems.

    There was the spear problem though. I picked up the offending weapon and inspected the damage. The knife was still mostly attached to the broom handle, albeit at a wrong angle. There had to be a better way to keep it in place.

    I looked around the cabin, but I knew I wouldn''t find anything useful. All of the possible tools that I could use were in the shed in the back, and I couldn¡¯t get to it without clearing the bushes first. It was a real chicken and egg situation, so I grabbed the roll of electrical tape, and put more layers around the knife. It would have to do.

    Skill unlocked: Weapon repair, level 1

    The notification made me pause. How did I gain these skills? And what were the recognised skills in the System¡¯s database? After all, I did make myself a few sandwiches since I got the System and I didn¡¯t get the cooking skill. Perhaps making sandwiches wasn¡¯t actually cooking, but sandwich-making was too niche to be recognized as a skill.

    Maybe there¡¯s only so much you can learn about making sandwiches. But I have had some really bad sandwiches in my life.

    The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

    Sandwich-making aside, it seemed that I had to put in a token effort at doing something, and I¡¯d get the skill. It was simple enough, at face value and getting another level in Reinforcement was proof that upgrading the skill was helping me be better at it. To be fair, my previous experience in fortifying a log cabin against monsters was minimal, so it was no surprise that the learning curve seemed steep.

    Aside from that bitter thought, the notification had helped me steel my resolve to follow The Plan. I was making some progress in this strange new world. A part of me still refused to believe that I hadn¡¯t gone insane. Perhaps if I wasn¡¯t alone and I had someone else going through the same thing alongside me, I would have accepted it more easily.

    However, this thinking wasn¡¯t getting me any closer to kicking some plant ass, so I pushed it aside for more useful things.

    The clock on the cabin wall told me that I had several hours before nightfall. If I was quick enough, I could get rid of most of the Vineslashers, and leave a few for the morning.

    ¡°Wait a minute,¡± I said and shifted my focus to the clock. ¡°Why is the clock still working?¡±

    The other technology that is now completely useless was powered by electricity and to some extent digital. The clock was analogue. There were no chips or little electronic components in it. My theory about EMP being the cause of this failure was looking more promising.

    Putting the thoughts of the effects of electromagnetic pulse on electronics aside, I changed out of my sweatpants into jeans. They were getting frayed from the vine thorns, and I hoped that the jeans would provide more protection as they were rather thick. I briefly contemplated having the hatchet hang from the belt loops on my jeans, but that idea had disaster written all over it. One nasty fall was all it would take for me to bleed out like nobody¡¯s business.

    I couldn¡¯t just carry it in my hand again, alongside the spear. Deciding to just leave it behind, picked up my spear.

    ¡°I can¡¯t put it off any longer. ¡±

    I went through the motions of breaking down my barricade and checking if the air was clear before I made a beeline for the closest of two Vineslashers in front of the cabin. I didn¡¯t wait for its creepy vine tentacles to come for me and I just started stabbing with my spear at its centre. Less than a minute later, the now-familiar green hue of a loot-able monster corpse and notification ding confirmed that the thing was dead. I got 10 EXP and some loot that I decided I¡¯d inspect later, alongside the loot I got from the first bush I killed.

    The plant¡¯s dying shrieks were still ringing in my ears when I approached the second one. This one put up more of a fight than its comrade. Its vines wrapped around my legs and squeezed hard, the thorns digging into my thighs. Somehow I managed to stay on my feet, as I stabbed at the plant and soon it also died a screaming death.

    I fell on the ground hard and stayed down. I was exhausted. I checked my HP and saw that this little altercation had shaved 6 HP off my total 30 points. I had to find a way to get my total HP up because if I messed up - which, let¡¯s be honest, will happen - I was toast.

    As if it was reading my thoughts, the System notification went off and let me know that due to my actions, I¡¯ve earned an increase in an attribute, and added a +1 to my Constitution, raising it to 4. Consequently, my total HP grew by 10.

    I got up from the dirt, feeling very much energized. I guessed that this particular stat was trained by getting hit a lot.

    ¡°Not something to look forward to,¡± I sighed and picked up my spear again.

    The front of the cabin was now cleared from Vineslashers. Encouraged by the increase in my HP, I felt good about my odds of clearing the perimeter from these damned plants. I felt like I could safely attack two or three more before I had to retreat to heal.

    With that thought, I confirmed that my spear was still in usable condition and moved to the side of the cabin with the well. I made short work of the two plants, only taking a few minutes to catch my breath and check for other threats between them. I was down 13 HP, which would take me about two hours to regenerate if my math was correct.

    ¡°You¡¯re not so bad at this, Dee,¡° I said to myself, almost cheerfully. It paid to be nice to yourself, especially when there was no one else around.

    I made my way over to the corner of the cabin and gave a little peek to see what was waiting for me behind it.

    ¡°Well, fuck. ¡±

    I don¡¯t know how I didn¡¯t notice it before when I was checking out the condition of the generator through the window, but to keep on the theme of being nice to myself, I have been going through some shit.

    The plant behind the cabin was huge, at least three times as wide and twice as tall as the bushes I had taken down until that point. Instead of the three tentacles, it had eight, their thorns looking very sharp.

    Vineslasher, level 4

    The daddy of all the little Vineslashers, this monster controls the lesser versions of itself around it.

    There was no way I was going against that thing with just my shitty spear. I had to change my strategy.

    <hr>

    Diana''s CS

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A (55/100 exp)

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 4 (+1)

    Intelligence: 4

    Wisdom: 3

    HP:27/40

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 6 - In Which Things Get a Bit Heated

    ¡°Think, Dee, think! ¡° I urged myself. There had to be a way.

    Unfortunately, whenever you need to think about something quickly, the mind will inevitably come up blank. I felt like I was in 8th grade again, doing my Biology test and the teacher was hovering above me, reading my answers. My brain would immediately go into overdrive, questioning everything I have written down as answers and promptly forgetting every single thing I have ever learned about photosynthesis.

    This was, of course, much worse than getting a bad mark on a test. The Vineslasher looked like it would fuck me up for good. My fear grew even bigger as one of its tentacles suddenly snapped towards the woods, and dragged a pheasant by its legs towards the plant¡¯s main body.

    ¡°Holy shit. ¡±

    The poor bird was desperately flapping its wings and clucking at the vine trying to escape, but it was useless. Soon, it disappeared in the bright yellow light that glowed at the bush¡¯s core.

    A chill went down my spine. I imagined myself being captured by the plant, rendered immobile by the thorny vines. That wouldn¡¯t be great for my health for sure.

    I sat there for a few minutes, hoping the bush wouldn¡¯t sense me. I occasionally peeked around the corner to monitor the situation. Slowly a plan started to form in my head, and I quietly crawled back to the front of the cabin.

    While back inside, I ransacked the place trying to find my next weapon.

    My logic was fairly simple. This thing was a plant. A very freaky, disgusting plant, but a plant nonetheless. What was something almost all plants hated more than anything? The answer was, of course, fire.

    For anyone familiar with teenagers and PE class lockerrooms, making a flame thrower is a rather trivial thing. All you need is an aerosolized can of something like cheap deodorant or hairspray, a lighter, and the understanding and acceptance that you might give yourself free first-degree burns on your hands and arms.

    My search turned successful when I found a can of bug spray under the kitchen sink. I shook it to see how much of the stuff was left and tested the nozzle. It was a stroke of luck that it seemed fairly full and easy to use. Sometimes these things would get stuck after the chemicals dried, but this wasn''t the case. The cabin also had a small basket of disposable lighters, and I picked out the one with the biggest flame.

    The possibility of dropping the can worried me. It was pretty bulky and my hands weren''t exactly big. For a wild second, I contemplated taping the thing to my hand, but that was dumb. I had to make something that would help me keep it with me.

    I took an old sheet and tore it into wide strips. Remembering a Home Economics class from sixth grade, I looped the strip into a crochet chain, long enough to wrap diagonally around my torso, and secured it with a knot. A carabiner would have been much better for this purpose, but I had to work with what I had. Next, I ripped one of the strips in half, wove it through one of the chains and wrapped it around the can, tight enough that it would stay in place, but not too tight so it would be hard to put back.

    Sure enough, I had a bug spray holster. I eyed my handy work and a description popped up.

    Bedsheet Holster (Trash)

    This is the worst holster the Universe had ever seen. Congratulations!

    "It gets the job done," I mumbled defensively.

    I dismissed the prompt and practised taking the can out and putting it back on. After a few tries and minor adjustments, I was satisfied.

    With all that done, I was ready to barbeque.

    Before going back out there, I quickly checked my hit points and saw that I had managed to regenerate 3 HP, bringing me up to a total of 30 HP. I hoped that would be enough. Images of my limp body being slowly digested by that monstrosity flashed through my head and shook me up. I had to learn to control my imagination.

    ¡°Come on, Dee. You can outsmart a fucking bush. ¡±

    The little pep talk gave me just enough encouragement to leave the cabin and get back to sitting crouched at the corner, my little hatchet in hand, and monitoring the Vineslasher. I couldn¡¯t see the pheasant anymore, but the bush occasionally sent some of the bird¡¯s feathers flying from its glowing core. It reminded me of a cat throwing up hairballs after a successful hunt.

    This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

    A System notification went off, pulling me out of thinking about increasingly more gross scenarios involving wisps of my hair and my phalanges shooting up in the sky.

    Due to your actions, you have earned an increase in an attribute: +1 Intelligence

    I wasn¡¯t sure what I had done to earn this, but I wasn¡¯t the one to complain. I instantly felt calmer about the situation, even though I could tell my plan was dumb. But since I didn¡¯t have a better one, I had to get in motion.

    Before I sprang into action, something caught my eye and instantly made my day much, much better.

    Next to the generator sat a small jerry can of gasoline that we used for powering the machine. I put the lighter in my back pocket for easy retrieval and pounced at the gasoline, grabbing it and opening it, all in one smooth motion. The Vineslasher¡¯s tentacle was already reaching for me, but I somehow managed to duck its reach and ran towards the plant. I swung the open container and the fuel flew at the plant, covering a not insignificant portion of the bush¡¯s main body.

    Before I could enact the second part of my plan, one of the vines had managed to grab me around the waist and squeeze me so hard I couldn¡¯t breathe. I blindly hit it with the dull side of the hatchet, causing it to shove me into the ground, before creeping away. I gasped for air and looked towards the retreating monster. Something didn¡¯t seem quite right.

    The way the plant moved seemed very off. Its vines twitched and seized, like a frog leg when you run a low electrical current through it. The petrol seemed to be poisonous to the stupid bush.

    ¡°Take that, you vile pile of compost!¡± I yelled at it in triumph. That was probably the worst trash talk ever uttered by the human mouth. I didn¡¯t care though, because I managed to hurt it, and that was the most important part.

    Of course, the Vineslasher wasn¡¯t done with me yet. This time, two of the tentacles grabbed and dragged me towards the plant, just like the pheasant from earlier. I panicked and started kicking at the monster¡¯s main body and trying to get out of the vines¡¯ grasp. I wasn¡¯t dealing a whole lot of damage, but in its poisoned state the plant was weakened enough that I wiggled out of it.

    However, before I could escape, the monster tensed and shrunk unto itself before it expanded and spat that disgusting yellow substance at me. Immediately, my skin started to tingle and burn, adding more damage to the numerous cuts and bruises I was already sporting.

    Words hung in the corner of my eye, making sure I saw them, but not obstructing my vision.

    Attention! You have been poisoned.

    ¡°Well, that¡¯s freaking great,¡° I felt like karma came for me a bit too quickly for my taste.

    If I wanted to survive, I had to hurry up and finish this and finish it quickly. It was the preferable outcome of this fight, so I ignored the yellow goo seeping into my clothes and skin and ran towards the raging bush.

    I got closer to the Vineslasher, ducking the remaining vines. I threw myself on the ground and rolled towards the plant. I had only one try to get this right.

    The smell of gasoline filled my nostrils, as I pulled out the lighter from my jeans pocket and the bug spray from my holster. I struck the lighter and pressed the nozzle at the same time. My hands were shaking, but the flame thrower did what it was supposed to do. The petrol-covered monster caught fire almost immediately.

    In the same instant, one of the vine tentacles grabbed me around the waist again, thorns digging into my side, and pulled me up from the ground. Then it threw me several meters away into the dirt, knocking all of the air out of my lungs. I felt my ribs crack.

    That saved my life. If I had stayed that close to the fire I would have been burned to the crisp.

    The realisation ran through my mind, but I had no time to be horrified, as I had to move further away because the heat from the flame was getting unbearable.

    The Vineslasher didn¡¯t die quietly. It shrieked and trashed its tentacles around, trying to put the fire away. It only made everything worse as the fire was spreading on the vines and dealing even more damage every second. It took several minutes until it let out its final scream and collapsed unto itself, the fire burning almost cheerfully.

    You defeated a Vineslasher, level 4. 70 exp gained

    Loot? Yes/No

    I accepted the prompt and sighed in relief. My entire body hurt like nothing I experienced before. My vision was getting increasingly blurrier and pocked with flashes of colour at the edges of my sight.

    I somehow managed to drag myself back to the cabin and close the door behind me. However, that¡¯s all that I mustered the strength to do before my legs gave out from under me. My ears were ringing with notification sounds.

    The last thing I saw before I lost consciousness was the green hue of the System script burning an image into my eyelids, like a channel logo on an old television set screen that never got turned off.

    You have collected enough EXP to earn Level 1. Level up?

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A (125/100 exp)

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 4

    Intelligence: 5 (+1)

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 2/40

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 7 - In Which We Get So High Its Out of This World

    When I came to, I was floating in a sea of colour.

    Everyone had that one friend in their late teens or early twenties who did LSD or mushrooms or something hallucinogenic like that for the first time, and who grossly exaggerated their trip. Or perhaps they didn¡¯t do anything stronger than weed, but they swore they were seeing dragons and or some shit like that after trying what they claimed to be Moroccan hashish that their cousin managed to source from "a guy he knew."

    I felt like I was living that exaggeration. All of my five senses melded in and out of each other, turning my brain into mush. I couldn¡¯t think or even be aware of myself. All I could do was just exist and feel. Time didn¡¯t seem to pass, or it crawled at a snail¡¯s pace. I couldn¡¯t tell either way.

    After a while, the intensity of feeling and experience started to fade and I was able to remember who I was once again. I wasn¡¯t floating anymore, but falling like a feather on a windless day.

    Finally, my surroundings changed and I found myself sitting on my front porch. The sky above was a Technicolor carousel, shifting through hues every so often. Still, I could tell that the night was drawing closer.

    The most curious part of the whole experience was the big grey alien sitting with its legs crossed in the chair next to mine, where Mom used to sit. It looked just like the stereotypical alien with a head too big for its thing, a long body. It had big black eyes, two small holes where its nose was supposed to be, and a tiny mouth. It cradled a wine glass in its hand, between two out of three fingers, the third being the opposable thumb.

    I was disturbingly calm, given that there was ET right there, drinking my rose. Not even that thought could get a rise out of me.

    ¡°You¡¯ve got a nice view here,¡° it started with a surprisingly nasally voice.

    I didn¡¯t know what to say, so I kept quiet. The Vineslasher¡¯s poison was still coursing through my body and it didn¡¯t exactly make my head clear.

    The alien took a sip of the rose and made what I assumed to be a satisfied sigh.

    ¡°This alcohol is superb. I wish we could have snagged a few cases before the integration was initiated. ¡°

    The wine was bottom shelf ros¨¦ that gave you wicked headaches if you had too much of it. But that didn''t seem like a pertinent detail to mention.

    ¡°You¡¯ve been on Earth before? ¡° I mustered to say. My breath was laboured and it hurt to talk. I guess that came with cracked ribs.

    ¡°Oh, yes, of course. I¡¯ve been on the planet''s surface for nearly 60 Earth years. ¡°

    It took another sip and expertly swirled the wine in the glass. It must have seen the confused expression on my face because it continued:

    ¡°Well, someone had to do field research and catalogue the cultures of the sapient species, before the System initiation started. It¡¯s the standard procedure.¡±

    ¡°Is that why we started having so many alien movies since then? ¡±

    ¡°Exactly. ¡±

    ¡°I guess all those UFO nutjobs weren¡¯t that nuts after all,¡± I said and then groaned in pain, my head throbbing. I tried to pull up my sheet to see how many HP I had left after that extremely stupid encounter with the Vineslasher, but I wasn¡¯t able to. Then I noticed that the green eye that was perpetually hanging in the corner of my vision was gone.

    ¡°You won¡¯t be able to do that while we¡¯re here. You¡¯re not technically awake, and I¡¯m not actually here,¡° The being said and paused. ¡°Well, not in the physical sense of the word here. ¡°

    ¡°What do you mean? Who are you anyway? ¡°

    ¡°Those are all very valid questions. ¡°

    The big grey alien sighed and finished its wine.

    ¡° My name is Blyb. You can think of me as a project manager. As I said, we were sent here to catalogue the cultures of sapient species before the integration started. It was a routine procedure, and we were supposed to be in and out. The process was supposed to take about 10 Earth years at most, and that was pushing it. ¡°

    I stayed quiet, hoping that the alien called Blyb would give more information if I stayed quiet. Some people can''t deal with silence so they fill it with the sound of their voice.

    ¡°We were a small, experienced crew who¡¯d done many cataloguing jobs together before. What we didn¡¯t expect is that we would like this planet. There were just so many things to do and see. So we kept delaying our final report for a few decades because we were having so much fun. Also, we haven¡¯t had a vacation in a while, so this place seemed good. The Integration wasn¡¯t on schedule until the beginning of Earth¡¯s 21st century, after all. ¡°

    ¡°Why are you telling me all of this? ¡° I asked. I was growing more and more suspicious

    ¡°I was getting to it! ¡± It snapped at me. However, it quickly collected itself and drew a deep breath. ¡°Look, the System¡­ It¡¯s been around for a while. Nobody is sure where it came from, how long it has been here, or who created it. However, a clever Lawyer-type bastard figured that they could exploit it as a legal loophole for colonizing planets with adequate resources."

    "Okay..."

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    "Several big corporations bid on planets for their precious gases, metals, and all that. Sometimes, those planets have sentient beings. There is a System-enforced protocol for how to approach those particular planets. First, you have to wait for them to reach a certain social and technological threshold. Earth had coincidentally reached it with the invention of the electric can opener in the 1960¡¯s. ¡°

    My eyebrows shot up in surprise.

    ¡°The electric can opener?¡°

    The being in the chair next to me waved its hand dismissively. Its skin was changing colour slightly by the second like someone was moving the slider on the RGB picker in character creation.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how these things are calculated. It is all very technical and boring. ¡°

    I was intrigued by the idea that electric can openers were the revolutionary thing to get us into this pickle, but I wasn¡¯t going to interrupt any more.

    ¡° Anyway, where was I? Yes, first the planet needs to reach the specified threshold, and then you have to catalogue the cultures and species and all of that crap for all the intergalactic nerds out there. Then, you can¡¯t just go all out and genocide the natives before you start drilling for goods. Are you following me so far? ¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I am,¡° I said, even though I wasn''t. Man, whatever was in that poison would''ve been a major hit in the 60''s.

    ¡°The System comes to all the worlds, whether they like it or not,¡° The being continued, its expression darkened. ¡° It seeds the planets with flora and fauna from all over the Universe. Then the planet gets about three Earth years of a grace period, where corpos can''t go in and do any of the digging and harvesting of stuff. They have to wait for the natives to adapt and give them a fighting chance, more or less. ¡°

    ¡°I guess the all-out genocide makes some people nervous up there,¡° I was beginning to question why I wasn¡¯t freaking out more about this whole conversation. Perhaps the Vineslaher poison worked great as a mood stabilizer, as well as an inducer of groovy vibes.

    ¡°Yeah, but not nervous enough to stop the practice altogether. The Universe is not a pleasant place, even on its best days. ¡°

    ¡°The Universe welcomes the strong,¡° I echoed the closing words from the intro video that was broadcast at the beginning of this nightmare.

    The alien nodded in understanding.

    ¡°Exactly. Anyway, about six months ago we got the notification that we had to wrap up our cataloging. And so we did. Then I found out that the corporation that hired us had sold its contract to another one. It was the same one which integrated my home planet. ¡°

    A wave of sadness radiated from Blyb, a sadness I thought I would know all too well, not too far away into the future.

    ¡°Barely a few thousand of us survived the integration. I have been furious ever since. And I thought I¡¯d find a way to give them the middle finger, as you humans like to say. That¡¯s where you come into play,¡° It turned its face towards me.

    I froze.

    ¡°Me? ¡°

    ¡°Yes, you,¡° The being made a gesture with its three-fingered hand and produced a big glowing golden coin that hovered above its palm. ¡°This little thing will give those assholes some really bad headaches. ¡°

    ¡°What is that? ¡°

    ¡°It is a land claim token,¡° Blyb said proudly. ¡°I¡¯ve been saving my credits to get this for my retirement. They don¡¯t exactly grow on trees and cost a pretty penny. ¡°

    ¡°How much?¡±

    ¡°Ten million credits. ¡°

    ¡°Ten million credits?!¡± I half-shrieked. My voice must have gone half an octave up. ¡°I think I managed to gather about 10 with all this Vineslasher culling. ¡±

    ¡°Yeah, the System doesn¡¯t reward you for killing monsters. You¡¯ll get 1-3 credits per kill usually. The real money is in trade. But let¡¯s keep on topic here, okay?¡±

    I nodded and filed that particular bit of information to unpack later.

    ¡°I will give you this land token to claim your cabin and the land around it. ¡°

    ¡°What? ¡°

    The alien smiled at my reaction, baring a row of tiny needle-like teeth. It was really, really unsettling.

    ¡°Why would you give me this? I¡¯m nobody. ¡±

    ¡°Exactly, my dear Diana Mond. You¡¯re a nobody. And that¡¯s going to piss some bigwigs off even more. ¡°

    I started at my name, but I wasn¡¯t going to question that. If I were to start questioning things, I wasn¡¯t sure I¡¯d like any of the answers.

    ¡°You just said that thing is worth ten million credits. ¡°

    ¡°Yes. ¡°

    ¡°Isn¡¯t that a lot of money? ¡°

    ¡°Yes, but¡­ ¡° the being smiled mischievously. ¡°In my role as a project manager, I haven¡¯t exactly been totally¡­ Above board, let¡¯s say. ¡±

    ¡°What do you mean? ¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s say that I have some very wealthy acquaintances who like to collect things. Those acquaintances like to collect stuff from pre-integrated worlds. You know how it is. ¡°

    The alien went silent and just blinked at me with its huge black eyes.

    ¡°I see. ¡°

    ¡°I¡¯m not ready to retire yet, and I¡¯ve become independently wealthy from my activities. I will be fine. So, do you want this? ¡° It extended its hand with the token towards me.

    ¡°What will it do?¡° I had to stop myself to reach towards the glowing object.

    ¡°Well, it will let you claim this land, a thousand square meters to be exact. It will become a safe zone that you will be able to extend by paying 10 credits per every additional square meter, according to the rates, since the last time I checked. ¡°

    ¡°Alright? And how exactly will this give headaches to the corporation that bid for Earth¡¯s resources? ¡°

    ¡°There comes the fun part,¡° The alien was giddy with malicious glee. ¡°They won¡¯t be able to harvest any materials from the area that you own. We¡¯d hit them where it hurts the most!¡°

    Blyb then burst into maniacal laughter that hurt my drugged-up brain. The high was notably going down, but I wasn¡¯t up to operating any heavy machinery any time soon. It was not a fun time, no matter what your hippy uncle would claim.

    The Gray one ended its laughing fit with little hiccups. It poured itself some more of Mom¡¯s wine, not bothering to ask me for permission or even offer me any.

    It inhaled deeply over the glass with its eyes closed and downed the wine. Then it turned towards me, eying me expectantly.

    ¡°We don¡¯t have much time left. I have to get back to my ship, and projecting into your consciousness is a lot of work. Do you want the token or not?¡±

    The alien extended its arm towards me once again, the golden token hovering above its grey palm.

    I thought about it for a moment. Well, as much as I could with my brain being actively fried by the Vineslasher¡¯s poison. I had no reason to trust Blyb, and even in my current state, I could see that this would come to bite me in the ass. But the future seemed bleak, and dying was a certainty.

    ¡°Oh, why the hell not?¡° I said and grabbed the token.

    Blyb went into another laughing fit, the sound of it echoing in my head as the world went dark again.

 Chapter 8 - In Which We Make Our Claim

    I woke up on the floor of the cabin, again. This was starting to become a habit that I wasn¡¯t too happy about.

    My head was pounding like I had a whole tribe of drummers spend the day practising in it. I tried to get up but a wave of nausea prompted by the headache washed over me.

    I fell back down, resting my forehead on the cool ground. The minutes tick-tocked by me, making me feel better by the moment. I finally mustered the willpower to get into the upright position. Thankfully this didn¡¯t cause my stomach to lurch anymore, but I still kept my head between my knees.

    After what felt like forever, the pounding headache had diminished to a tolerable amount and I finally got up. My clothes were filthy and shredded in places. They were beyond saving.

    ¡°I guess I will have to become a nudist soon,¡° I chuckled darkly as I stripped down from what was left of the garments. After chucking the offensive rags into the rubbish bin and changing into my second to last set of clean clothes, I poured myself a precious glass of water and sat on the couch.

    The night had fallen outside while I was flying high on Vineslasher''s poison, making the cabin seem dark and uninviting.

    I pulled up my inventory and my mood brightened when I saw that the land claim token Blyb gave me was there. Knowing that I hadn''t just hallucinated the entire exchange was comforting.

    Pulling the token out of my inventory and into my palm, I inspected it. The token seemed to be made out of some kind of metal and was cool to touch. It was round, and the colour of gold, with a symbol of a blazing sun etched into it. A pop-up description appeared.

    Land Claim Token

    This token confirms the purchase of 1000 square meters, with the option of expansion on unclaimed territory, as well as access to the Shop Terminal. The area claimed will be designated as a safe zone.

    ¡°Neat,¡± I said to the empty cabin.

    Now, what to do? Do I claim the land right away, or do I wait a bit later? I thought, tossing the little disc in my hand.

    My hopes of escaping from the cabin to the city were minimal. I was weak, unarmed, and alone. My car was busted and the trek on foot would take me about ten hours. That would be true if I was being extremely generous about my stamina, of course. More realistically, it would take me a few days and only if nothing found me along the way and made dinner out of me.

    There was no guarantee that the city would be safer, anyway.

    Here I had some food and the ability to grow more, water from the well that I could boil to make it safe to drink. I was low on clothes, but my modern sensibilities could go to hell. Besides, if the description for the token was right, I¡¯d have access to a Shop Terminal, where I assumed I could buy more clothes. People in the Middle Ages did it with two sets of clothes at most, and I could do it too.

    I chose to ignore the fact that most of them hadn''t believed in bathing either.

    On the other hand, if I chose to stay here and use the token, I might attract the attention and subsequent ire of an alien corporation. If Blyb was able to find and contact me without any consequences, what was my guarantee that they would leave me alone?

    It was a lot to take in.

    I decided to leave the decision to brew in the back of my mind for now. I remembered that I hadn¡¯t checked what I looted from the Vineslashers.

    I pulled up my notification feed and stared at the wall of text.

    Each of the level 1 monsters netted me 1 dry twig, 1 Universal Credit and 5 exp, and I have killed five of those. The level 4 one, however, got me 1 sac of Vineslasher poison, 4 Universal Credits, and 70 exp, which made me eligible for a level up.

    ¡°Wow, I am swimming in money,¡± My Universal Credits added up to 12. ¡°I should buy myself something nice. ¡°

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    I even got an extra point in the constitution for my troubles.

    With a tired sigh, I dismissed the System¡¯s interface. I didn¡¯t know what levelling up entailed and it would be better to have a safe space to do it in, so I ignored the prompt for now.

    I got up from the couch, my mind resolved. I was going to stay at the cabin and do my best to follow the Plan. I limped outside on the porch and focused my attention on the golden disc glimmering in my hand. As I did that, a pop-up appeared in my field of vision.

    Use Land Claim Token? Yes/No

    I hesitated for a moment. Blyb seemed like a trustworthy enough alien, but they were still an alien. Who was to say that this wasn¡¯t some elaborate plan to screw me over?

    I laughed at myself. I was already plenty screwed anyway.

    I had to take a leap of faith and extend my trust to Blyb. I would have to deal with the consequences as they came. There was nothing else to it.

    With that thought, I accepted the prompt and the token rose higher in the air and shone bright, like a miniature sun. Suddenly, it rushed towards me and crashed into my forehead. I felt my consciousness lift from my body and up in the sky above. I found myself looking down at my mother¡¯s cabin from a bird''s eye view. There was my car, the tiny well, the swing of trees in the wind. I could see the neighbours¡¯ cabins, but not as clearly as mine. There was even a frozen miniature of me standing on the porch.

    A grid appeared on the ground, with little me in its centre. Instinctively I knew what to do. I visualized the grid changing shape and moving around. I played around with it until I was satisfied.

    The well needed to be within the bounds of my property, as it would mean secure access to fresh water. Besides the well, I had to include the shed that had the tools and seeds I would need to start producing my food. After ensuring those two were covered with the grid, I distributed what was left of the land around the cabin as evenly as possible.

    The result was a somewhat irregular plot of land, but that wasn¡¯t that important. The sides of the cabin were more or less equally secure from monster attacks. If Blyb was to be trusted, I had three Earth years to buy as much land as I could. One square meter equalled 10 credits, and the math made my head spin.

    One square kilometre equalled a million square meters. I didn''t even want to think how much money I would need to make to purchase any significant amount of land.

    If I was going to be honest with myself, I knew I wasn¡¯t going to get anywhere near enough land to give some shadowy corporation any headaches. That wasn¡¯t in the Plan. Blyb had bet on the wrong horse here. The Earth was big, and I was all alone.

    All I wanted was to survive, and claiming the land as my own would give me a fighting chance. It was true that securing my territory aligned with my interest in surviving this damned thing, but I wasn¡¯t an idiot. There was no way I could make that much money.

    I mentally shook myself out of a math-induced stupor and focused back on the prompt hovering in front of me.

    Confirm land purchase? Yes/No

    I accepted the prompt and in a blink of an eye, I was back inside my body. The green eye in the corner of my vision flashed once at me and I opened up the interface. I had a new tab.

    Property: Name Unknown

    Area: 1000 sqm

    Location: Quadrant 709, Milky Way, Orion Spur, Solar System, Earth, Coordinates(******, ******)

    Population: 1

    Shop Terminal not placed. Place shop terminal? Yes/No

    ¡°Perhaps I could buy myself some clothes,¡± I mumbled. ¡°Or, you know, you could buy more food, Dee. ¡°

    I mentally pat myself on the back for being so cool and sensible and confirmed my intention to place the Shop Terminal. An outline of something that reminded me of a vintage arcade game appeared. I willed it to move left and right, and the terminal followed my intention.

    ¡°Let¡¯s see¡­¡±

    After some deliberating and playing around, I decided to put it against the back wall of the cabin, as it was the barest of all, now that I had moved the bunk beds to be used as a barricade.

    ¡°Perfect, ¡±I said, eying my work. The rest of my living space was not so perfect, though.

    The cabin was a total mess of furniture I sacrificed for the cause. The two couches and one chair were still left as is. One had little time to do housekeeping when trying not to die.

    Now that the cabin was as secure as it could be, and I wasn¡¯t in imminent danger of dying, it was time to level up.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: N/A

    Level: N/A, 125/100 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 5 (+1)

    Intelligence: 5

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 35/50

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 9 - In Which We Get A Bit Energized

    The ever-present eye in the corner of my vision pulsed with a green glare, practically demanding my attention. I remembered the last notification I read before passing out from Vineslasher¡¯s poison. With renewed energy, I quickly pulled up my notification feed. Sure enough, there it was:

    You have collected enough EXP to earn Level 1. Level up? Yes/No

    I paused. What would happen if I said Yes? Was this safe?

    Despite the ongoing seriousness of the situation, I burst out laughing. The whole thing was comically absurd.

    The aliens came, presumably destroyed our civilization as we know it, planted a bunch of alien life forms on Earth to exterminate us, gave us some childish System interface to encourage us to get ourselves killed more quickly, and here I was worrying how safe levelling up would be.

    I shook my head at my idiocy.

    With that thought, I braced myself for whatever was coming and accepted the level-up.

    A tingling sensation ran down my spine, just like when the System first appeared in my field of vision. It wasn¡¯t any less unpleasant than the last time, and I shivered, shaking it away.

    Congratulations on reaching level 1!

    Class selection available.

    Choose your class now? Yes/No

    ¡°May as well get this over with too,¡° I had been putting off levelling up long enough. I shouldn¡¯t do the same with the class selection.

    I don''t know what I expected but I had a short list of classes to make my choice. It was somewhat underwhelming.

    Gardener (Common)

    You can tell the difference between dirt and gravel. Good job! Aside from that, you have been the main cause of at least one plant¡¯s well-being.

    This class can be upgraded at level 25.

    This would be a handy class to get. But I didn¡¯t know if the classes came with weird abilities like making the plants grow faster, which would be great for food production. I wished I could find out more.

    Accountant (Uncommon)

    You have spent several years learning how to make sense of spreadsheets. So, so many spreadsheets. Accountants are valued members of the Universe¡¯s society at large, especially around tax season.

    This class can be upgraded at level 50.

    ¡°There is a tax season? I have to pay taxes?¡± I couldn¡¯t believe my eyes. ¡°We are in hell. ¡°

    I¡¯d have to understand the relevant laws and regulations as soon as possible. Blyb had gifted me the land claim token, but would it be seen as taxable income? There was no way I could pay it off in these circumstances. The image of alien tax officers, looking less like bureaucrats and more like guerilla mercenaries loomed in my head as I went over the next class.

    Homesteader (Rare)

    You are the one-stop solution to all the problems on your property. You raise buildings. You keep animals. You can make medicine even without using essential oils. The sourdough bread you make is out of this world. No pests can escape your keen gaze.

    This class can be upgraded at level 75.

    I considered my options. The Accountant class would be great if I were in a city and more familiar with this new world. However, I was in the middle of a god damned forest, and let¡¯s just say that I didn¡¯t know the first thing about applying for a job at an alien corp. What would I even say in my cover letter?

    To Whom It May Concern,

    Even though one of you bastards just fucked up my planet and caused the death of (I presume) many, I am writing to express my interest in the position of Accountant at E.T. INC. Please and thank you?

    Something told me this cover letter wouldn''t get too many callbacks.

    I hoped that there was a therapist class that specialized in System-related trauma. It seemed to me that there would be a pretty decent demand for that. Maybe the therapists were the ones behind the System. Maybe at some point in the past, they weren''t getting enough patients for the run-of-the-mill traumas, so they had to invent their own. Pump those numbers up.

    Shaking the thought of a Big Therapy conspiracy, I reread the description of the Homesteader class.

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    All I knew about homesteading was from those videos that I would sometimes get served on social media, showing women wearing colourful aprons and not vaccinating their kids. In some other, less System-y times I would have laughed at the picture of me elbow-deep in dirt and living off the land. I was a city girl through and through. I liked going to museums and bars and not thinking where my food came from.

    Suddenly, I was hyper-aware that the possibility of ever living like that again was slim to none. I¡¯d probably never see my friends again. Or Uncle Ben, or Emily. We weren¡¯t close, but they were the only family I had left.

    It took all of my willpower not to start bawling and I scheduled my breakdown for sometime later. I had to become resilient.

    ¡°Focus, Dee,¡° I took a deep breath. ¡°I will be okay. ¡°

    I dismissed the Gardener class, as the Homesteader class seemed to include it. Its description implied that having this class would be helpful in my exact situation.

    For a brief moment, I wondered how the System chose these classes to present to me. There were too many things I just didn¡¯t know and had little chance to find out. Why were some classes Common, Uncommon, or Rare? What did it mean that they could be upgraded?

    ¡°I guess there is only one way to find out. ¡°

    My mind made up, I chose the Homesteader class. There was no point in mulling over my options for too long. If I had more classes to choose from, or if my circumstances were different, I would have been more careful with my choice.

    I needed to grow food and I needed to make this cabin my home. That¡¯s all there was to it.

    Congratulations on choosing your class. You are now a Homesteader level 1.

    Class skills unlocked:

    Tend plants, level 1.

    Animal husbandry, level 1.

    Foraging, level 1

    Carpentry, level 1

    Scavenge, level 1

    Resource unlocked: Energy

    Tip: Energy is spent every time you use a system-generated blueprint or some class-related skills.

    You have 2 stat points to distribute.

    Distribute now? Yes/No

    The System had never offered any tips before. I wasn¡¯t going to complain though. I needed all of the help I could get. If only there was a manual for the System...

    Two of my neurons rubbed together, and I smacked my palm against my forehead.

    ¡°I am a fucking idiot,¡± I had the Shop Terminal. There was a certain big retailer that sold almost everything a person could ever need or want and a good few things that they didn¡¯t. This retailer also sold books. It even started its journey to world domination and rainforest destruction as an online bookstore. I would bet all of my credits that there is a guidebook to the System for sale in the Shop.

    ¡°Man, it really sucks to not have access to the Internet. Or Wikipedia. ¡° I once read somewhere that you could download the somewhat abridged version of the English Wikipedia and would fit on a USB stick. But then you would need a working computer to open it on and its usefulness to me in this situation would be nil.

    I sighed and forced my wandering brain back to the topic at hand. There were points to be distributed.

    I opened my character sheet and saw that I had an additional line on it, showing my Energy reserves. I figured that throwing one point into Constitution couldn¡¯t hurt and made sure I wouldn¡¯t. That stat was now 6 and meant that I had a total of 60HP. I still had no idea if I could improve the rate at which my HP recovered.

    Filing that as something to look into once I could get my hands on any kind of manual, I put my other point into my Intelligence stat and saw that my Energy totalled 60 as well. It confirmed my hunch that Intelligence would be connected to Energy.

    Finally, I checked out the newest tab in my System Interface labelled Blueprints. It seemed that I already had some blueprints available.

    Plank

    A long piece of wood.

    Resources needed: 2 wood

    10x nails

    They are nails.

    Resources needed: 1 iron

    Brick

    Building block.

    Resources needed: 1 clay

    Raised bed

    Useful for extending the growing season, raised beds are a simple agricultural technology.

    Resources needed: 4 planks

    I would have to check out the Shop Terminal to see if I could purchase some more blueprints. My mind raced as I imagined a cabin decked out in alien high-tech. I couldn''t even begin to imagine what kind of upgrades were possible. Only pure sci-fi concepts like the Holodeck came to mind, so I racked my brain for some more mundane ones.

    A food synthesiser? No, that sounded kind of gross. Medbeds? Nah, I already heal freakishly fast.

    I sighed and moved on from that line of thought.

    All in all, I was pretty happy with my choice. My new skills seemed pretty cool, especially the Scavenge skill. I didn¡¯t have a description of what it did, because that would be too easy, however, it didn¡¯t seem hard to deduce. There was a lot of random junk lying around the cabin, and I also had my car. That was about 1,000 kilograms of pure rubbish now.

    With all of that out of the way, I could truly relax for the first time since the System came, at least for a little while. I felt like some retail therapy was in order.

    I was, after all, pretty rich.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 25/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6 (+1)

    Intelligence: 6 (+1)

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 40/60

    Energy: 60/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 10 - In Which We go Shopping

    The Shop Terminal emanated a subtle green glow. Its exact hue seemed to become my constant companion since the System arrived.

    ¡°Well, that¡¯s annoying,¡± I hoped I could turn off the light somehow in the settings so that¡¯s the first thing I set out to do. Unfortunately, there wasn¡¯t a familiar cogwheel that is present in almost all modern user interfaces or anything that could reasonably be the settings option.

    I sighed and accepted that I would have to get used to the light. I focused on actually seeing what I could buy.

    The interface reminded me of those kiosks found in fast food places where you could order your quadruple cheeseburger after a boozy night out, but there were seemingly unlimited options to choose from. There was a search bar and an almost endless list of categories. I scrolled and scrolled for a few minutes but I couldn''t get to the end, seeing Recreational Drugs, Procreation Aids, and Scales, just to name a few.

    Of course, curiosity got the better of me and I selected Procreation Aids. The items were not recognizable to me, looking more like torture devices than the bedroom toys I was expecting to find. Perhaps I was just the wrong species to appreciate them. The Scales category turned out to be a mix of kitchen scales to weigh flour and scales of actual creatures. I saw that 25 grams of scales from an alien animal called Zzzbbzd went for 60 credits.

    I typed Blueprints into the search bar and was immediately inundated with so many different ones, most of them useless to me and my situation. While a blueprint for a Gluber-sized microscope might be useful for whatever a Gluber scientist looked like, it wasn''t something I needed.

    It quickly became obvious that I would have to know exactly what I wanted to buy, to filter out all the bullshit I didn''t need. I was becoming overwhelmed with options, so I stepped away from the Shop Terminal to catch my breath.

    "Calm down, Dee. It''s okay, " I reassured myself and sat down on the couch.

    The first rays of the sun were peeking through the cabin windows. The birds were waking up as well, their song letting me know nothing nasty was prowling outside my property limits.

    The core of the problem was that I didn''t know what needed to be done first. I''ve always had issues prioritizing tasks, switching between them as soon as I became aware of a new thing that needed to be done. It often drove Mom insane, as I''d leave a third of the laundry unfolded or only vacuum half of the apartment I spent my childhood in.

    "Sometimes I wonder what''s going inside of your head, " She''d often say. " If you''re going to do something, do it all the way. Don''t leave things unfinished. "

    She was, of course, right. Mom was almost always right. I wished she was here to tell me what to do. She knew how to tackle problems head-on.

    I don''t know when the tears came but they did, and I felt six years old again. I just wanted my mom.

    After some time of wallowing in my grief, the sun had risen to signal mid-morning. I was hungry and I felt gross. All I wanted was to take a hot shower, crawl into bed, and be miserable all day. However, since the first step of this required me to have running water and a heater, I gave up on it altogether.

    Instead, I walked back to the Shop Terminal and typed in The System Guide in the search bar. The top result was a book called So You''ve Been Integrated: A Practical Guide to the System For Dummies. It cost 10 credits, which was most of my wealth. However, most things available for purchase were over 50 credits and I needed all of the information I could get. I confirmed my purchase and was met with a message on the Terminal screen:

    Thank you for buying So You''ve Been Integrated: A Practical Guide to the System For Dummies.

    We noticed that you don''t have a book reader linked to your account.

    Purchase now? Yes/No

    "Now that''s just stupid!"

    Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

    My anger was barely contained when I tapped Yes on the screen. When I saw that the reader cost 500 credits, I kicked the damned thing, giving myself 3 points of damage and making the machine''s green glow pulse. The pain made my temper deflate and I hopped around on my uninjured foot until the feeling subsided.

    The absurdity of the situation wasn''t lost on me. My life was getting more and more ridiculous with each passing hour.

    I had just wasted the little money I had. It wouldn''t have bought me much, but it was a start. I almost paid with my life for those credits. I wasn''t looking forward to what that meant for my future.

    "No point beating yourself up about it, Dee. You couldn''t have known. "

    And it was true. Perhaps I should have expected an asshole design made to extort money from you. It happened all the time with humans. Why did I expect the alien store to be different?

    I went back to the purchase confirmation screen and tapped No.

    Your book will become available on your book reader.

    Thank you for shopping!

    "That''s something, at least. "

    I decided to see what the clothing options were, as I was running dangerously low. I had one bucket and a half-used bar of soap. We didn''t have a washing machine in the cabin since we lived pretty close and never stayed longer than a week at a time. The only washing machine I had available ran on elbow grease and sweat.

    After trying out different search keywords, I was able to find a pack of five of Human Female Adult Underwear for 50 credits, Human Female Adult Cotton T-Shirt for 70, and Human Female Adult Work Boots for 350. There were some tech-wear-like garments available as well, but they were so out of my price range that I didn''t even bother giving them a closer look.

    I made a mental note to buy some underwear first, as I could re-wear the same shirt for a few days, but underwear was non-negotiable.

    Before I could step away from the Terminal, an icon of a coin caught my eye in the bottom right corner. I tapped it and the background colour swapped from white to black, keeping the signature green hue of the text.

    Welcome to the Seller''s Market!

    As a species that has been recently integrated, you get a discounted fee on sales transactions.

    After your planet''s trial period, the transaction fee will increase from 1% to 5%.

    Terms and Conditions Apply.

    Join the Seller''s Market now? Yes/No

    A wave of relief washed over me. My eyes filled with tears for the second time today, but this time from joy. This changed everything.

    I eagerly tapped Yes and scrolled past the Ts and Cs, and confirmed my enrollment.

    Sell Now? Yes/No

    I looked around the cabin and grabbed a handful of old pencils from a cup on the table. A sale confirmation came up on the interface and I got 1.98 credits for 6 pencils, with 0.02 credits going to the store. I was just overjoyed.

    If someone was standing outside the cabin window gazing inside, they would see me jumping up and down and screeching in pure happiness. The little happy dance was followed by a frenzy of selling all the useless bits and bobs that had ended up in the cabin.

    After I stopped myself from selling off all my cutlery, I''ve amassed a wealth of 38.57 credits.

    Those 38.57 credits were proof that I could make it, and I felt like a million bucks.

    I decided that a celebratory meal was in order. I have secured the cabin, picked out a class that promised to keep me fed, and found a way to make an income without putting my neck on the line.

    I pulled out the Crowling meat from my inventory. It still looked and smelled fresh, implying that the inventory put things into some sort of stasis. I was pretty sure it would have started to smell funky by now.

    I had a very distinct memory of a similar-sized chicken fillet, smelling up a storm in my apartment. I had pulled it out of the freezer around noon, thinking it would thaw by dinnertime. Then I went out to grab a coffee with a friend it turned into a very late night. I woke up hungover as hell, and the smell didn''t help my nausea.

    Some lessons were learned the hard way.

    With this in mind, I went to the kitchen and opened the fridge, to see what I could just chuck into my inventory and keep as long as possible. There wasn''t much. The milk had probably already gone bad, but there was some cheese and dried meat that was still good.

    It had only been two days, but the fridge was reasonably well insulated, and I hadn''t opened it much.

    After a few days of living off sandwiches, I was pretty set on my decision for my next meal.

    "It''s time to make a little Crowling stew," I said and cackled like a witch in her forest cottage, about to eat little kids.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 25/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 3

    HP: 38/60

    Energy: 60/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 11 - In Which Things Get a Bit Heavy

    Thankfully, the cabin had a good stock of onions, garlic, and potatoes. Those were probably all brought up by Mom the last time she was here.

    I pushed down the heartache while I imagined her unloading the groceries into the basement where they would stay as fresh as possible.

    "You must always have some food in stock, Dee," she often said. "You never know what might happen.

    I used to laugh at her doomsday prepping, but I was never so grateful for her paranoia.

    "Thanks for taking care of me, Mom, " I whispered.

    Other than canned goods, the shelves in the basement were also stocked with pasta, a few bottles of cooking oil, and bags of sugar and flour. I would be eating alright for some time. All I had to do was catch my protein.

    The idea of hunting filled me with dread. I never killed anything before the Vineslashers and the Crowling, and I wasn''t particularly looking forward to it. I was sure that the Shop Terminal had meat, but it would be a waste of credits when the forest was full of game. That reminded me that I hadn''t seen any monsters around the cabin since I used the Land Claim Token.

    I had assumed that they would skirt around the boundary, ready to pounce as soon as I stepped one foot outside. It was something to investigate.

    An hour later, the sun was high in the sky and I had a steaming bowl of stew in my hands. I was sitting on the cabin''s porch, thanking the stars for having an old wood-burning stove, rather than an electrical one. However, it made the inside of the cabin sweltering hot, even in the mild late spring weather.

    The summer would be unbearable, as opening the windows only gave some relief.

    I sighed and ate another spoonful of my delicious Crowling stew. It was a worry for the future Diana.

    While I ate, I scanned the edge of the woods. A flash of grey fur caught my eye, and I almost dropped my bowl in surprise.

    "That''s not good, " I mumbled when I saw more movement in the distance. It seemed that I had summoned some company.

    I spent some time just sitting there and weighing my options. I would have to go over there and investigate, but I also had to start working on my food production as soon as possible. Also, I had to test my new class skills as well.

    My to-do list was getting longer by the second. Remembering the half-digested corpse of a rabbit, I hoped that it was just some bunnies, minding their own business. I decided that I would mind my own too, as long as they let me do my own thing.

    After hauling some water to the kitchen and rinsing the stacks of dirty dishes, I couldn''t put it off any longer. I decided to go about making some raised beds. This way I would kill two birds with one stone.

    If my understanding was correct, the raised beds are used to extend the growing season of crops. That''s at least what the System''s blueprint description stated. But before I could start with that, I had to make some planks.

    Since planks needed wood, I walked back to the shed where we kept our chopped firewood. I picked up one piece and stared dumbly at it. I felt rather silly not knowing how to make one I pulled up the blueprint for the plank.

    Plank

    A long piece of wood.

    Resources needed: 2 wood

    "That''s so helpful."

    On a hunch, I activated my Scavenge ability. I stared dumbly as the length of firewood in my palm glowed green and slowly faded into nothing, leaving behind just a few splinters.

    "What the actual fuck?" I yelled. The birds flew off the nearby tree, spooked by my rude interruption. In return, I was interrupted by a notification.

    If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.

    Due to your actions, you have earned an increase in an attribute: +1 Wisdom

    My irritation lessened somewhat, and I crossed my arms on my chest. Where could the damned wood have gone?

    I pulled up my inventory, thinking that it was the only probable place for something to end up. when one of my inventory slots showed 1 wood, I was pleasantly surprised to be right. The System seemed to be rather intuitive, at least in some cases. The main page of my character sheet showed that I have used 1 Energy for the action, leaving me with 59 left.

    When I tried to pull the wood out of my inventory, I found that I couldn''t. It was like wherever the inventory space was located was corraled off by thick iron bars, and my hands just couldn''t reach through.

    "Alright. Be like that, " I snapped in frustration. Then I shrugged. I didn''t need to pull it out, but I was curious about what the wood looked like after I used my ability on it.

    Making myself comfortable on the floor next to the pile of firewood, I started turning it into the wood resource. I needed a lot of it for my vegetable garden. I was just one person, but I had to produce as much as possible. The growing season was already underway, and the thought of it gave me massive anxiety. The winter was long in the mountains.

    After a few times turning firewood into just wood, the novelty wore off and I was getting pretty bored. It took a little less than a minute for approximately 1 kilogram of firewood to be fully transformed into wood in my inventory, and I was never that good at doing boring things.

    As I used my Scavenge ability for the fifteenth or sixteenth time - I lost count at that point - a horrible feeling started growing in the pit of my stomach, like someone grabbed my internal organs, and started slowly squeezing and squeezing. I struggled to catch my breath when the System''s eye sent a pulse of green in my vision.

    Warning: You have been encumbered.

    Please remove excess items from your inventory.

    I didn''t have much to remove, just the dried twigs and Vineslasher poison the bushes had dropped when I killed them. I quickly willed them out, and the feeling subsided, but wasn''t entirely gone. It took me a few minutes to gather my wits, and then I pulled up my inventory, trying to puzzle out what had just happened. I poured over my screen and then saw a small print in the lower left corner that explained it all.

    Maximum weight: 16.5 kilograms

    "Well, fuck that. "

    When I thought about it, it made sense that I couldn''t just dump a bunch of stuff inside of my inventory. It kinda sucked, but I had to accept it and move on. There was so much to learn about the System and the Universe as a whole, and I was bound to learn some painful lessons. This one wasn''t so bad.

    With that in mind, I decided that I should start making some planks. I needed a break from the monotony of using my skill, and I had enough wood to make two raised beds. Two wood per plank and four planks per raised bed. It was simple mathematics.

    I opened up my blueprints screen and focused on producing planks. This time, an outline of what I assumed to be a standard-sized plank appeared on the ground in front of me.

    Blueprint cost: 2 energy

    Create plank now? Yes/No

    I accepted the prompt, and then the real deal materialized over the next 20 seconds or so. I repeated the process until I ran out of the wood resource in my inventory. Satisfied, I eyed the eight planks on the dirt floor in front of me. With a quick look at my character sheet, I saw that I had 29 Energy left.

    "I must have regenerated some while working. "

    Still, I decided to take a short break to have some water. I stood on the front porch, looking for glimpses of fur between the trees, but saw none. It paid to be paranoid though. Remembering the Grizmorph, a chill went down my spine. The monster hadn''t returned in these couple of days and I hoped it would stay that way.

    I shook my head, banishing the unpleasant thoughts. I surveyed the front of the cabin. If I remembered the layout of my land correctly, I had about 7 meters of the front yard for my use. I couldn''t be sure, so I decided to play it safe. I''d put five rows of raised beds in front, leaving a gap of 30 centimetres between them, so I could move easily between them.

    I hauled the planks to what I mentally referred to as the front yard. Then I had the blueprint ready, the outline of a raised bed moving back and forth in my vision. I spent longer than necessary on placing the bed, trying to plan for the future layout.

    "Just do it, Dee. You can always start over."

    Confirming my placement, a pop-up appeared above the outline.

    Planks needed: 0/2

    Energy invested: 0/5

    I smiled, looking like a complete idiot. I was following the Plan.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 25/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4 (+1)

    HP: 50/60

    Energy: 28/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 12 - In Which We Meet Something Fluffy

    Ultimately, I only managed to make four raised beds before running out of Energy. It was pretty decent progress. However, I had to figure out how to step up.

    If my calculations were correct, I regenerated about 4 Energy per hour, which made sense with my Wisdom being 4. I spent way too long thinking about whether a bigger pool of Energy would be more beneficial than a higher regen rate. In the end, I figured keeping them balanced wasn''t a bad choice.

    While working on making the beds, I decided that I would have to focus most of my vegetable growing on potatoes.

    Potatoes are an amazing vegetable. They are high in calories and delicious, no matter how you prepare them. They keep well and they are kind of like an endless food hack. If you have some, you can grow some more.

    In the shed, I found different seeds: carrots, beets, beans, peas, zucchini, and seed onions.

    There was only one little problem with my plan to grow food: I was more or less clueless about how to take care of any of these vegetables. Sure, my class ability Tend Plants gave me some idea that I had to put them in the ground with some space in between and remove weeds when they popped up. The only reason why I sort of knew how to grow potatoes was because I once read a book about a botanist on Mars.

    "I guess I would have to throw some seeds against the wall and see what sticks, " I sighed. I hoped that it would be enough.

    After doing some chores around the cabin, I sat on the porch, munching on some leftover stew. I felt useless just sitting around waiting to regenerate more Energy to make more planks. At least the night was getting closer.

    Screech, screech.

    The sound echoed from the woods, yanking me out of my thoughts. I was on my feet in the blink of an eye, balancing the almost empty bowl in my hands. I scanned the edge of the forest for the source of the sound and gasped once it caught my eye.

    Two grey bunnies the size of a golden retriever ran towards my property. I panicked, my weapons nowhere near me, and dropped the bowl on the wooden floor. It bounced once and didn''t break. In practically no time I was inside the cabin, and barricading my doors. I don''t think I ever moved so fast in my life.

    I peeked through the curtained window and saw the two creatures standing less than ten meters away. They were moving in place like there was an invisible barrier preventing them from moving forward. They were standing right where the end of my property was. At least I had the proof that the Land Claim Token kept the monsters out.

    I focused on the rabbit things and a description box appeared:

    Rabidasher

    These furry little creatures can grow up to be a real manace. Where there is one or two of Rabidashers, there are probably more around. You might have an infestation on your hands!

    "Fuck." An infestation would not be good.

    I considered my options. I could ignore them and hope they would go away on their own, or I could go out there and kill them for some XP. They were level 1 and 2 respectively, so I probably stood a chance, although fighting them together would be a pain.

    "But if I stayed inside the property and they are kept out..."

    An idea started brewing in my mind. I unbarricaded myself and picked up my trusty hatchet. Things were about to get bloody, I was sure.

    As I got outside, the sun was starting to set through the trees. I could see the monsters more clearly. Their eyes were blood-red and they were foaming at the mouth. Sharp teeth and claws gave me some pause, but they were the proof that I had to get rid of them as soon as possible.

    I approached the fuzzy, yet not cute monsters and the sight of me set them off. They started trashing against the barrier, trying to get to me.

    If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

    Taking a deep breath, I swung my hatchet and hit the level 1 Rabidasher between its eyes, killing it instantly. Its crimson blood sprayed at me and its companion. I was glad I raised my Constitution because I was sure I would have lost my lunch at the sight if I hadn''t.

    A siren went off in my head and green script clouded my vision.

    Warning: You have initiated a boundary breach. Your property safe zone status is revoked for 5 minutes. 4:59... 4:58...

    The timer shifted in the corner of my vision as soon as I read the announcement. I didn''t have time to swear because the other Rabidasher took advantage of my distraction and bit down hard on my arm.

    Attention! You have gained condition: infected. Healing slowed by 50%

    "Fuck you!"

    I didn''t know if I was cursing at my own stupidity, the monster hanging off my arm or the System. I swung my arm back and forth, until the damned Rabidasher flew off it, taking a chunck off my arm and my shirt. It screeched in pain as it crashed into the dirt but was back on its feet in no time. It flew at me, its clawed paws aiming at my chest. I tried to block it with my non-bleeding arm, but it was useless.

    The claws were razor-sharp, and they penetrated through my clothes easily, leaving deep scratches in my skin. Both sleeves of my shirt were soaked in blood, but I managed to keep hold of my weapon, ignoring the pain.

    I swung the hatchet at the monster, barely dealing any damage. The clock in my vision showed that less than thirty seconds had passed. My mind raced for a solution as the beast kept coming at me. I knew I''d be done if it got me two times more.

    Suddenly I had a flash of inspiration and pulled the vial of Vineslasher poison out of my inventory, just as the Rabidasher prepared to jump with its teeth bared, aiming at my throat.

    For years to come, I would look back at this moment and thank the stars that I was able to pull this off. I threw the vial at the creature and it instinctively bit down at it, crushing the glass with its jaws. I dropped down and rolled away from it, its claws missing me this time.

    The poison seemed to take over the fuzzball quickly, and it collapsed in a screeching heap. The foam at its snout was now the familiar sickly yellow colour mixed with blood. It twitched on the floor, bringing up a cloud of dust.

    I took a second to catch my breath and then doled out the same killing blow that ended its companion. Right between the eyes.

    You have defeated Rabidasher, level 2. 15 exp gained

    Loot now?

    I looted both of the corpses and saw that I received a rabbit skin, a rabbit foot, and two credits. I pulled out the foot, curious to see its description.

    Lucky rabbit foot

    Some people believe that keeping a rabbit''s foot will bring them luck. We cannot confirm nor deny this belief.

    I laughed at the sheer ridiculousness of the loot, before doubling down in pain. My arms were shredded in ribbons. It was impressive that I could still even lift them at all.

    "I have to get some armour. "

    The timer in the corner of my vision showed that I had 3 minutes of vulnerability left. I knew that I couldn''t relax until it went down to zero, so I stayed crouched on the ground holding back the trickles of blood on my arms, while still staying alert. The night was almost upon the cabin and it was hard to see if any potential dangers were lurking around.

    Seconds passed like minutes, and eventually, the timer went down.

    Property safe zone status restored.

    I breathed a sigh of relief and just let myself fall and curl up in a ball in the dirt. This was a close call.

    I was stupid to think I could exploit the safety barrier to my advantage. Of course, it wouldn''t work. It was a too obvious idea and someone must have come up with it before me. The System wouldn''t tolerate an easy weakness like that. I was lucky to learn this lesson with some easier monsters, rather than something worse.

    "Easier my ass, " I mumbled as the pain in my arms became hot. At least the bleeding had slowed down somewhat at that point.

    After some time, I felt well enough to get up and drag myself back inside the cabin. I rinsed my wounds in the bucket of water I pulled out of the well earlier in the day, painting the water pink. Then I went to the couch and let the infection run its course.

    It was time for bed anyway.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 45/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 14/60

    Energy: 7/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 13 - In Which We Plant Some Potatoes

    I spent the entire night tossing and turning on the couch, fighting off the infection. I didn''t have the willpower to climb up the ladder to bed, and I didn''t want to soil the sheet either. I was caked in a disgusting mixture of sweat, blood and soil.

    Finally, the fever broke around dawn, putting me out of my misery. I still had a way to go to be fully healed, especially since the infection debuff was still active. I probably had to wait until I was at 60/60 HP to restore my regular regeneration rate.

    Around 9 o''clock, I was at 50 HP and felt well enough to start my day. I wanted nothing more than to stay rotting on the couch and feel sorry for myself, but my sense of disgust prevailed.

    I stripped out of my soiled clothes and grabbed a bucket and soap from the bathroom. Outside, I hauled some water from the well and poured it over my head.

    "Ah, goddammit."

    The water was freezing and I clenched my teeth to keep them from chattering. I repeated the process a few times, with a thorough lather in between, until I finally felt clean. It got easier after a while.

    Despite my efforts, I managed to reopen some of the wounds on my arms, giving myself a few points of damage, and setting myself back in my recovery. I just had to grin and bear it.

    After that was done, I put on my least disgusting set of clothes and went to the Shop Terminal to sell the Rabidasher''s skin. I finally had enough credits to buy some underwear. That was a cause of celebration. This was the first time I was going to buy a physical object and I was curious to see how it would be delivered. Would it fall off the sky with a little parachute? Would there be an alien delivery person with a company hat and vest on knocking at my door?

    The reality was both extraordinary and underwhelming at the same time.

    My five-pack of underwear just popped into existence in the air in front of me and plopped on the floor. There was nothing unusual about the package or the underwear itself, other than the System''s standard script. I could have just picked it up from my local store.

    "That''s just... Fine, " I was unimpressed.

    However, there was not much else to do about this other than go make some planks before breakfast, to give myself more time for Energy regen.

    After using my Scavenge ability to gather wood resources for the tenth time that day, I got a System notification.

    Class Skill level up! Scavenge, level 2

    I cheered at the good news and immediately set out to scavenge more wood, to see if there would be much of a difference. All in all, there wasn''t much. The process took slightly less time if my estimation was correct, and I didn''t have to focus as hard. But all improvement was welcome, even if it was just a little bit.

    After getting encumbered the first time around, I made sure to switch between making planks and transforming firewood into the wood resource. Remembering the heavy feeling, I shuddered and went back to work.

    I was done in less than an hour and was now a proud owner of eight raised beds.

    One coffee and breakfast later, I found myself trying to wash my clothes in a bucket at the well. It was backbreaking work and I wasn''t very successful in getting the stains out.

    I know you''re supposed to rinse the blood as soon as it gets on, but I was a tad busy. I thought bitterly. I would never take the little creature comforts the modern world had provided us for granted ever again.

    Giving up, I left the clothes to soak in the bucket and sat down on the ground.

    "What am I doing?" I asked myself.

    I was jumping from one task to another, without any rhyme or reason. Sure, having clean clothes is great, but I had to think long-term.

    "Get it together, Dee."

    From now on, I would wake up, work on making more raised beds, and then have breakfast. After breakfast, I would work on planting my seeds until I run out of raised beds. When that is all done, I would then do any odd chores around the cabin. It took 15 hours to fully restore my energy at this stage, which was less than ideal. But that was what I had to work with, and I had to get over myself.

    With a renewed sense of purpose, I got up from the dirt and set out to plant some potatoes.

    I fished out the net bag containing all my precious potatoes. My expert eye calculated that I had about 3kg of potatoes of various shapes and sizes. I dumped them all on the ground in front of the cabin and started sorting them into sizes, and the ones that had started sprouting already.

    Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

    If my memory of the brief description of potato growing was correct, you could cut up the bigger ones into pieces, making sure that they had at least one or two ''eyes'' on them. That ''eye'' was where the shoots were going to sprout from.

    "Thank you, dude who wrote that book. I hope you''re safe and alright," I mumbled while cutting a big potato into three pieces. Who knew that particular piece of information would come in handy one day?

    I had set aside a few for tonight''s dinner but I figured I might as well plant the rest if I could. It was lucky that the frosts had ended and these little spuds could grow big and strong, and feed me into the winter.

    Somehow I knew I had to space them around 40 centimetres apart and that I had to plant them at about 25 centimetres deep. I guess I could thank my Tend Plants class ability for that. It was still kinda freaky how this knowledge got implanted into my head, but there was no point delving into that subject too deeply. I would just drive myself insane that way.

    I crouched at the first raised bed and put 4 pieces of potatoes about 40 centimetres apart from each other. A bed was roughly one square meter, so this was the maximum amount of potatoes that I could plant in one to have them grow comfortably. As soon as I covered the fourth potato with soil, a box appeared above the plants.

    Potato plants

    Time until harvest: 71 days 23 hours 59 minutes

    Quality: Good

    Energy investment: 0/60

    "This is something new, " I mumbled. Having a timer like that was pretty handy for someone like me, who had no idea how long things were supposed to grow for. The energy investment was interesting, but I didn''t have much to spare, as I was saving it for making more raised beds. It would have to wait for now.

    I repeated the process with the other beds, and the same timer popped up, showing that the plants grew for 72 days.

    Suddenly I heard Rabidasher screeching from the western side of the cabin, and I quickly went on guard. My hatchet was on the porch so I grabbed it, trying to keep myself calm. The memory of the bite was still fresh, even though the supernatural healing this new world gave me barely left a scar.

    I walked in the direction of the screeches that were only growing louder but made sure to stay within my property boundary. I had learned my lesson in blood.

    The woods on that side of the cabin were thicker, so I couldn''t see anything no matter how hard I strained my eyes.

    A tall figure broke into the clearing from the woods, chased by three fuzzy monsters. They were carrying a person on their back, running with all their strength, but I could see even from my vantage point that they were close to losing their footing.

    "Over here! Quickly!" I shouted, startling them. I saw that the person was a teenage boy, tall and lanky, carrying a middle-aged woman. One of her legs flew limply on the side and was covered in darkened blood.

    The boy finally spotted me and turned to run towards me, the change in direction slowing him down.

    Without thinking, I jumped into action, hoping that if I kept the monsters away from the boundary when I attacked them it wouldn''t trigger another breach.

    "Go inside the cabin, now!" I yelled and the boy seemed to follow my instructions in stride. The woman on his back whimpered in pain every time her leg moved.

    I fell in behind them, hoping to slow down the creatures and give the two time to get to safety. A quick glance at the Rabidashers told me that two of them were level 1, and the third one was level 2.

    Lucky, I thought. I could take them.

    It was a foolish thought, and my actions were even more foolish. But I wasn''t thinking straight anymore.

    I swung my hatchet at the higher-level monster first, hitting it in the spine with the sharp blade. The red-eyed rabbit fell on the floor, while the other two snapped at my sides. I hit one with my weaponless hand, dealing more damage to my fist than to the monster. The other one bit into the side of my hip making me yell out in pain.

    To say that I wasn''t having a good time would be an understatement.

    Still, I made myself continue fighting through sheer willpower alone. The level 2 monster was still on the floor, and I put all my might into my foot and stomped it hard. The sound of the snapping bones made the hairs on the back of my hair shiver, but I knew I killed it.

    That''s their weak point. The spine. Go for the spine!

    I swiped the hatchet in an arch in front of me, making the two remaining monsters retreat. I took advantage of this and lunged towards the left one, my weapon finding its target.

    Unfortunately, for a brief moment, I had my back turned to the other Rabidasher and it dug its claws into my lower back and slid back down to the ground, leaving behind a track of blood in my skin.

    We went back and forth like this for a good few minutes, dealing damage to each other. It was only when I dealt a killing blow to one of them that I was able to believe that I would survive this.

    The last of the Rabidashers finally fell in a lifeless heap in front of me not long after.

    I was alive, and the boundary breach didn''t trigger. The wounds would go away.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 20/60

    Energy: 3/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 14 - In Which We Make New Friends

    After looting the Rabidasher corpses, I dragged myself back to the cabin. I hesitated at the door, not knowing what to say to the two strangers, but I gathered my wits and walked in.

    The woman was lying on the couch, and the boy was crouched at her side. They both turned towards me when they heard me enter, and the boy quickly got on his feet.

    "How are you doing?" I asked stupidly.

    "We''re alright, thanks to you, " the woman said, grimacing in pain. Her leg didn''t look alright to me. "I''m Laura, and this is my son Tobi. "

    The boy nodded at me, shuffling his feet awkwardly.

    "My name is Diana, but you can call me Dee, " I smiled, hoping to put them at ease, but it was useless. Tobi looked like he might pass out from stress any minute now.

    "You saved us, Dee. "

    "Don''t mention it, " I said, my face growing hot. "Anyone would do it. "

    Laura nodded and closed her eyes, her breathing turning shallow. She really didn''t look so great.

    "What happened? How did you guys get here?"

    "We were staying in my uncle''s cabin for the week. Maybe you know him, his name is Sirius. "

    Of course, Sirius. The old man''s cabin was the closest one to ours. He was a good neighbour, always jolly and ready for a good laugh. He''d drop by occasionally, leaving some homemade berry jams or smoked game behind, always flirting shamelessly with Mom. She''d laugh and take his gifts. He was well into his seventies but was so full of life.

    "I haven''t seen him in a few years. "

    "Old age spares no one. He can''t go hunting as he used to, so he doesn''t come up much. Tobi had a week off school, so we thought we''d spend a week outside the city. "

    I nodded. Tobi was pacing back and forth, occasionally glancing through windows and scanning for threats.

    The poor kid must be traumatised.

    "We had been up here for five days when the System came, " Laura continued, trying to sit upright and examine her leg. Her hands shook and her face was awash with cold sweat.

    I grabbed the scissors from the kitchen and cut up her bloody jeans leg. What I found there was an absolute horror show. It took all my willpower to remain calm and to let any sign of disgust show on my face. The leg was mangled from the knee down, with bits of bone sticking out. I wondered how it was still in one piece.

    "Mom!" Tobi screamed when he spotted the state of her limb. He then promptly shut his mouth and ran towards the window, checking the outside for anything that might have heard his outburst.

    "Don''t worry. You''re safe here," I said. "This cabin is a safe zone. "

    Laura slumped back down, her lips pale. Tobi turned towards me, a question on his lips, but I shook my head. Now was not the time for explanations. She had lost too much blood.

    "Do you have a class?"

    The boy shook his head.

    "I don''t have enough exp."

    "How did this happen?" I asked, gesturing at the prone woman.

    "We were attacked at our cabin. We stayed inside after the System arrived, and these bushes appeared all over the yard."

    "Vineslashers?" I asked.

    He nodded. "They doubled in size every day until they were big enough and started to wrap their tentacles around the cabin."

    I shuddered at the image. Those things were disgusting. And the idea that I could have suffered the same fate wasn''t lost on me. It was lucky that I dealt with them when I did.

    "Mom decided it wasn''t safe there anymore and packed our stuff. We managed to leave the cabin without running into the bushes, but then we bumped into those monsters. One of them bit her on the leg, " his voice was cracking like he was trying to keep himself together. "I picked her up and started to run. "

    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

    "You did well, " I said, trying to reassure him. "She''s still alive because of you."

    He turned away from me, his face wet with tears. I started to say something but decided that it could wait.

    I had no idea how he did it, but then again, Laura was a rather petite woman. There were stories of people lifting huge boulders to save their loved ones. This was possibly one of those situations.

    I forced myself to focus back on the problem at hand. She was shivering and her breath was shallow. I was surprised she even had any blood left.

    My mind was racing for a solution. I went to the Shop Terminal, trying out different searches. I had no idea what I was looking for. I would lie if I said that I wasn''t panicking a little.

    "What is that?" Tobi asked, pointing to the Terminal. Laura was grunting in pain on the couch. I ignored him, turning back to the woman.

    "Laura, how much HP do you have left? "

    I was about to ask her again, thinking she might have passed out, when she replied.

    "Three. I have a Bleeding condition, " her voice was small and strained.

    "No shit. Is there a regeneration penalty? "

    "It says that my healing is suspended while I have the condition," she whispered. "I''m losing 1 HP every 5 minutes"

    I cursed some more and went back to the Terminal. There was an item that seemed promising.

    The Bandage of Minor Healing

    When applied, this bandage restores 5 HP.

    Price: 35 credits

    Killing the three Rabidashers chasing the mother and son pair gained me two skins and one Lucky Rabbit Foot. After selling that and my credits, I had 42 credits. I quickly purchased the bandage. The package appeared a meter in the air and unceremoniously plopped down on the floor. Tobi jumped back in surprise.

    "What the hell, lady!"

    "Tobi, language, " Laura mumbled, and I had to laugh despite the situation. Mothers.

    I unboxed the bandage and quickly went to Laura''s side. The package didn''t give much instructions on how this was supposed to work, just apply the bandage on the wound. A memory of the first aid training class I took ages ago was vaguely coming back to me, but I was rather clueless on how to proceed best.

    Hoping that wrapping it around would do the trick, I did just that as gently as possible, trying not to do even more damage. But the leg was in such a bad state that it was useless. Laura twitched in pain, instinctively moving her leg away from me. I had to hold it firm while I worked.

    As soon as I finished, the bandage glowed green and tightened around the leg. Laura screamed in pain as the light grew brighter until it became unbearable to look at. I shut my eyes, opening them a moment later, only to find the bandage gone and the leg looking much better. That is to say, there were no exposed bits of bone poking out, but the wound was still pretty angry and lightly bleeding.

    "What does your HP say?"

    "I have 8 points, " she answered, a bewildered look on her face. She tried to move it around, but it was still broken.

    "What''s your total? Do you still have the Bleeding Condition?"

    "I still have it. My total is 40 HP. "

    "Goddamnit, " I cursed. We only bought her another 25 minutes.

    Tobi moved to his mother''s side. You could practically smell fear coming off him, and I couldn''t blame him.

    "I''m out of credits, " I said, looking around the cabin for something to sell. There was a bunch of random junk around, but I knew it wouldn''t fetch enough coins to get another Bandage of Minor Healing.

    "Do you think this might help?" Tobi asked, producing the head of an orange flower as big as the palm of his hand. It kind of looked like a marigold, if marigolds were gigantic and their petals swayed of their own accord in a non-existent wind. As I extended my hand to take it, a description box appeared.

    Sunflare Blossom

    The flower of this plant has been revered across the galaxy for its medicinal properties. A common ingredient for healing tinctures and salves, this flower never grows in the same place twice.

    "I think that you are a very lucky kid, " I said. "Where did you find this?"

    "I was walking in the forest before dinner when the System came. After that introduction video thing... You saw it too?"

    "Yeah. It was really weird. "

    Laura had fallen mostly quiet and seemed to pass out, probably because the adrenaline wore off. Her short brown hair was matted to her scalp, but at least her lips weren''t as pale anymore.

    "Yeah... When I was able to see again, there was this flower. I saw the description and thought I may as well pick it, " he paused. "Then I was attacked by a giant bumble bee."

    I grimaced, my imagination running wild at that image. It was not a pleasant one.

    "Well, let''s hope I can make something out of this. "

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 23/60

    Energy: 5/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 15 - In Which We Make a Potion

    In a flash of inspiration, I knew what to do.

    Or rather, I came up with a plausible yet totally bullshit idea. I was too scared not to try it. The clock was ticking and Laura''s life was fading with every point of HP.

    I just hoped that it would make a difference.

    The kid was pacing back and forth in the room, oscillating between staring pleadingly at me and checking up on his mother. The flower in my hand was still swaying gently. I wondered how long it would do that if left alone to dry out,

    "Tobi, can you please go to the back of the cabin and fetch some wood? I need to boil some water," I said, my mind made up to follow my plan.

    He just nodded and practically tripped over his feet in his hurry to follow my instructions. A few minutes later we had a merry little fire in the stove and a pot with half a cup of water on top of it. In the meantime, I washed the chopping board and knife to the best of my ability, hoping there wouldn''t be too many germs on them. This was an open wound we were talking about.

    I briefly considered the possibility of an infection, but I dismissed it. She was more likely to die from bleeding than an infection at this point. We would cross that bridge if we came to it.

    "There are some clean towels in the bathroom in the cabinet. Can you get them and cut them into two strips?"

    Tobi was quick to do what he was told.

    I took a deep breath, sending a prayer to any deity that was listening and started chopping the flower petals as fine as possible then transferred them to a ceramic bowl careful to not waste a single crumb. Then I added only a little bit of the boiled water into it and mashed it with the back of a spoon. I thought I was losing my mind but I could have sworn that the mashed petals were starting to faintly glow yellow, giving away the reason for the plant''s name.

    I worked until I got a paste the consistency of mashed potatoes. I then rummaged through the kitchen cabinets until I found a jar of honey. Tobi watched with confusion as I added a few spoonfuls to the mixture and stirred until it seemed to be evenly combined.

    Finally, I spread the paste evenly in the middle of the towel strips.

    I hoped that my idea would work. In my mind, it made some twisted sense. The Sunflare Blossom was a healing plant. Honey has anti-bacterial properties, and has been used throughout history to prevent infections. Mixing the two had to make some sort of salve.

    As soon as I was done with spreading the concoction on the two towel strips, I was rewarded for my efforts with a floating description box.

    Granny''s healing bandage

    In the true spirit of wise women all over the Universe, this bandage was crafted by necessity and knowledge gathered throughout generations. When applied, this bandage heals 10 HP.

    Not wasting any more time, I knelt at the foot of the couch and redressed Laura''s mangled leg. I waited for the telltale flash of green light to take effect, confirming that the healing had taken place, and repeated the process with the second bandage.

    For all of the pain Laura must have been going through, she remained mostly quiet through the whole ordeal, making the smallest amount of sound possible. She seemed like she was holding onto consciousness with all of her willpower, but her breathing had stabilised. I peeked under the bandages and saw that fresh skin had covered one-third of the wound. It was still pretty gnarly though.

    "Laura?" I asked, squeezing the prone woman on the shoulder to get her to focus on me.

    "Did it work?" Tobi asked, his face twisted with worry. He hadn''t stopped packing about the room the entire time.

    You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

    "I think so, " I said. "Laura? How many HPs do you have?"

    Her brow creased and she replied after a few heartbeats.

    "Twenty-six. "

    Her eyes were unfocused and her face was awash with sweat. But at least some colour had returned to her face, which was a good sign.

    "Do you still have the Bleeding condition?" I hoped she didn''t because I was fresh out of ideas. I didn''t think I could pull another one out of my ass.

    She shook her head no, and I let out a breath that I didn''t even know I was holding. This was good. There wouldn''t be a death of a mother today.

    At least here. I thought to myself, shaking my head. I didn''t want to think how many children had been left parentless since the System arrived. Or how many parents were left childless.

    I got up from the floor, and Tobi took my place kneeling next to the couch.

    I decided to get out of the cabin to give the mother-and-son duo some privacy. I was wrung dry from the stress anyway.

    The afternoon air was fresh from a cold breeze and was just what I needed. Sitting down on the porch, I only then became aware of my injuries. My arms were scratched, but the wounds didn''t seem to be too deep. I couldn''t see the injury on my back, but one quick flex of the shoulders told me that I was in pretty bad shape. My clothes were completely wrecked, but at least the blood had already started to crust over. I had regenerated 3 points, bringing me up to a total of 23.

    This System really makes no sense. I should be in worse shape than Laura, with my points being lower than hers. How the hell am I not a mess?

    I closed my mind and gingerly leaned back in my chair, attempting to not aggravate the cut on my back. My mind was too tired to speculate further on the nature of the System. I just had to gather 500 credits to buy that damnded book reader and dig into the manual I''ve bought.

    So You''ve Been Integrated: A Practical Guide to the System For Dummies. I remembered the title. What a wonderful name. It better be helpful,

    "Dee?" Tobi''s voice pulled me out of my thoughts and I opened my eyes to see him standing next to me.

    The poor kid looked like shit. It was only natural, given the circumstances, and I was sure that he was in better shape than me. I could see the six-year-old he used to be, even through his height and lankiness.

    "Thanks for helping us, " he said, his voice breaking and tears pooling in his brown eyes. "If you weren''t here..."

    "No need to thank me, " I said. "Like I said earlier, anyone in my position would do the same. "

    He nodded and wiped his face with the back of his sleep.

    "How''s your mother?"

    "She''s asleep."

    "She must be exhausted. I''m sure she will bounce back by tomorrow, " I frowned. "Are you okay? You didn''t get injured?"

    He shook his head, still trying to pull himself together. "I''m okay. They didn''t get to me."

    "That''s good."

    "Do you..." he started, clearly uncomfortable. "Do you have any food? We kind of left in a hurry."

    "Of course," I said and immediately got out of my seat, with a little bit too much eagerness. It was not a good idea. "Fuck!"

    "What''s wrong?" I could hear panic in the kid''s voice.

    "Ahh... I got a little scratch on my back, " I cringed. "Those Rabidashers need to visit a manicurist. "

    Realisation dawned on Tobi''s face. I think the kid just then realised that I was pretty bloody and beaten up.

    "I''ll be fine, " I said before he could work himself to a tizzy. "You''ll have to help me cook, though. "

    He followed me back into the cabin without saying another word, and we spent the next hour making a vegetable stew. We didn''t talk much, as he seemed to be a pretty serious kid and I was too tired to even attempt to keep a conversation. Besides, I didn''t know what to talk about with sixteen-year-old boys who had a rather traumatic day.

    Laura didn''t stir until the evening. She had a helping of the food and promptly went back to sleep. I couldn''t blame her.

    After setting up a mattress for Tobi on the floor next to the couch, I grabbed one of my mother''s bottles of wine and poured myself a little bit too much.

    Given that I had a safe zone all for myself and that they had nowhere else to go, I figured that Laura and Tobi would be staying here. They seemed to be decent people so far and I was happy to not go through this bullshit alone. It was rather fortunate that they ran in my direction.

    It would stretch the food supply for sure. My once three-week supply of groceries was cut to only a week. But we would figure it out. We had to.

    I took a sip of the wine and looked at my raised beds. There was work to be done tomorrow.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 47/60

    Energy: 29/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 16 - In Which Our New Friends Settle In

    "You''re telling me an alien came to you when you were high on Vineslasher poison and gave you a token that made this place a safe zone?" Laura asked me the next day after I relayed Blyb''s visit to her and Tobi. She was fully recovered and her leg didn''t even have a scar. My wounds were gone as well. I hoped I would stay unwounded for a while longer.

    I grimaced. "When you put it like that, it sounds pretty insane."

    Tobi and Laura stared at me with identical brown eyes. A chuckle escaped my lips like every other time I was nervous. She just kept shaking her head.

    "I wish I could prove it to you somehow, but that''s what happened. "

    Finally, Laura shrugged.

    "Well, it seems that the safe zone part is true anyway. I haven''t seen any monsters here since we arrived. "

    I automatically moved to check out the woods. I couldn''t see any Rabidashers lurking between the trees, but that didn''t mean there weren''t any there. If that one description box were correct, at some point I''d have to head out there and see if there is a nest.

    "Either way, you and Tobi are free to stay. It would be a bit cosy in the cabin for a while, but it is safe here and I just started to grow food. "

    Laura''s eyes filled with tears. She turned away from me for a moment to wipe them away with the corner of her grubby sleeve.

    "Thank you, Dee, " she said simply. "This that has happened... What''s happening to us... It''s just horrible. "

    "I know, " I whispered. Tobi walked away from the porch and went to examine the beds I''d raised. The boy seemed to be on the edge of tears himself. I couldn''t blame him. Video games were fun when they happened behind the screen. This had not been fun. Not one bit.

    The beds didn''t look much different than the day before, other than the timer ticking down.

    Potato plants

    Time until harvest: 71 days 1 hour 39 minutes

    Quality: Good

    Energy investment: 0/60

    I turned back to Laura.

    "We will have a lot of work to do if we want to survive. Plus you two haven''t reached level 1 yet. "

    "What are you suggesting?" she asked, only a hint of panic behind her voice.

    "I know this sounds crazy, but we might have to go out there are hunt some monsters together, so you two can level up and unlock a class. My class has helped me make these beds, and I''m sure I''ll figure out more things in the future."

    She kept silent and I sighed, knowing not to push it.

    "We''ll get back to this. But right now we should focus on making this cabin a more permanent place to live. "

    "What do you have in mind?"

    "First, we have to plant more crops. Then, we have to sort out the running water situation. I don''t know about you but life is much better when you don''t have to haul water to flush your toilet. "

    Laura nodded. "You''re right about that. We didn''t even have a well like yours in our cabin. "

    "Next, we will have to get more clothes for all of us."

    "We didn''t exactly have time to pack," she said bitterly. Her tone caught me by surprise, but I decided to shrug it off. It was a rough week.

    "Alright, " I slapped my knees and got up. "We''ll figure that out later. But my Energy is fully restored now, so I better go make some more raised beds. You two should take it easy today. You''ve had a rough one yesterday. "

    "I can make us lunch, " Tobi piped up from the garden.

    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

    "He''s a really good cook, " Laura said, filled with obvious pride.

    "That''s awesome. I''ll be looking forward to it. "

    I spent the next hour going through the whole motion of scavenging the wood to make the wood resource, making planks, and finally making raised beds. Then I decided to mix it up a bit and plant some zucchini.

    At first, I considered planting beans but remembering my 6th-grade biology class I reconsidered. I remember us soaking the beans until they sprouted and then planting them. I couldn''t remember the specifics of why we did that, but my inner sense of plants told me it would be easier that way.

    Beans, like potatoes, are pretty awesome. They are rich in both protein and fibre, which are a staple of every diet. I was sure that I would be sick of them after a while, but being hungry was worse than not having variety.

    "But zucchini would have to do for now, " I mumbled.

    There was again the issue of not knowing what I was doing. I never grew zucchini before. I just knew they were delicious when roasted.

    Perhaps we could build a barbecue or some sort of outdoor cooking station. That would solve the issue of getting the house too hot in the summer.

    I know some people had summer kitchens in their cabins. I wished my grandparents had the foresight to make one so I wouldn''t have to, but they made those choices and I''d have to live with them. From my memory, they never spent too long up here, three or four days tops. They''d bring enough bread and cheese and cold cuts and spend the days hiking through the woods. They had one of those small portable barbecues they would bring up and take back with them to their house. Mom didn''t want to change the cabin too much, hoping to preserve it the way they left it for as long as possible.

    "Well, it''s not possible anymore, " I mumbled.

    I sent a silent plea for their forgiveness and went back to the zucchini at hand. I was worried I''d crowd the plan too much, so I put the seeds about 40 centimetres apart just like I did with the potatoes, but only covered them with a bit of earth. As soon as I was done planting the last seed, I got a System pop-up.

    Zucchini plants

    Time until harvest: 49 days 23 hours 59 minutes

    Quality: Good

    Energy investment: 0/37

    I repeated the process with the other three beds and then hauled enough water from the well to saturate the earth in all of them. When I finished pulling up my twelfth bucket, I got a ding from the System informing me that my Strength stat went up a point.

    "Not bad for a day''s labour!" I said, and put down my bucket.

    "Dee?", I heard Tobi''s voice behind me. "What''s happened?"

    I turned around to face him.

    "I just got a point in Strength! How cool is that?"

    "Really?"

    "Yeah! I have been hauling water for the crops and I just the notification. I''m at 4 now."

    His eyes widened in surprise. "Seriously?"

    "Yup." I was a touch too smug about it.

    "I''m only at 2 points in Strength, " he mumbled.

    "Don''t worry kid, " I said with my best encouraging smile. "You''ll catch up to me in no time."

    "Yeah," he didn''t seem too convinced. "Anyway, lunch is ready. I took some canned vegetables and onions from the basement. I hope that''s okay. "

    "Of course, " I said and picked up the bucket again. "I''ll just finish watering the last bed and I''ll come over. "

    He nodded and walked back to the front of the cabin.

    When I was done with the watering, I quickly washed up the dirt off me as best as I could and joined the mother and son on the porch. Tobi made a fantastic tomato and mushroom sauce and some pasta. Laura''s words weren''t just words said by a loving mother. The kid could cook.

    "This is great, Tobi! Thank you so much for cooking. "

    He just gave a shy smile and continued with his meal.

    "He was always interested in cooking and baking, even as a little kid. He would insist on helping me and started cooking for the family regularly in the last few years. He''ll surpass me in the skill soon enough, " his mother praised.

    "Speaking of skills, did you get a cooking skill since the System arrived?" I asked the boy.

    He nodded. "It''s at level 2 now. "

    "That''s so interesting. I''ve been preparing meals for myself the entire time and I still haven''t got it. I wonder why, " I said, a bit miffed. I was never the best cook in the world, but I was pretty decent. I figured that would count for something. "I did get some other skills, like Wood Chopping and Running almost instantly though. "

    "There are too many things to learn about this System, " Laura said, the echo of the former bitterness still in her voice. "I truly hope there is a good explanation for this horrific thing that has happened to us."

    "I hope so too. But we have to keep learning and figuring things out, " I said, trying to be encouraging. "That is the only way we survive. "

    They both nodded and we ate the rest of the meal in silence. I couldn''t help but feel somewhat hopeless about our situation though. My plan for improving the cabin and our chances of survival was vague and I felt like I was a headless chicken running from one problem to another, only making marginal progress.

    Don''t be so hard on yourself, Dee. You''ll figure it all out. You have to.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 4 (+1)

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 2/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 17 - In Which We Get a Shiny Guest

    The Xantari known as Blyb was sitting in his very comfy chair on the ship''s bridge. The screen in front of him showed Jupiter in all its glory, which was only natural as Blyb and his crew were currently hiding in the orbit of Jupiter''s moon Callisto. It was a precaution more than anything, as there wasn''t much traffic in this corner of the Galaxy. Sure, the Earth had been recently integrated, but so have many other worlds at the same time.

    Blyb knew that the leeches at Void Ventures would keep a casual eye on their future investment, and he didn''t want to risk it. He also knew that he would have to high tail out of reach, but the delicate question of where remained to be answered.

    "Captain", Zulk the first mate said as she approached him. She was a Xantari like himself, but she was younger and was born after their planet was integrated.  "Have you made a decision yet?"

    Blyb sighed. The crew was itching to get the hell out of there. Not all of them enjoyed their stay on Earth and wished to seek out the next green pasture. If they only knew what he had done...

    "I''ve been browsing leads for new contracts. Nothing has caught my eye so far."

    Zulk''s eyes narrowed.

    "Permission to talk freely, sir?"

    "Granted. "

    "With all due respect sir, I think you are stalling. " she paused, watching his face for a reaction. " There is nothing left for us in this System and the crew is getting impatient. They would like to know why we''re not moving."

    Blyb sighed again and jumped out of his seat in one fluid cat-like motion. He officially ran out of time.

    "Gather the crew in an hour. I''ll make an announcement."

    With that, he left the bridge and briskly walked towards his quarters. As much as he wanted to stall, he knew Zulk was right. They had spent the last 60 Earth years here, on and off, of course, and it was time to move on. The cargo bay was full of merchandise and their pockets were not exactly flush.

    Once inside his cabin, he pulled out a small metal cube that fit neatly in the palm of his hand and pressed one of the seamless buttons integrated into its surface. A green hologram popped up and he quickly typed in a series of instructions. After he was done, he lifted the lid to the tube that led to the rubbish chute and threw the cube inside.

    "Computer?"

    "Yes, captain?" came the smooth voice of the ship''s AI.

    "Please open the rubbish chute. "

    "Of course, captain."

    Blyb didn''t need to see it to know that it was done, but a sense of unease filled him still. Zulk was right; they couldn''t stick around here much longer. In all of the years working with her he learned to trust her judgement. But the years also taught her to see right through him. He knew that she knew that he was acting odd, and he couldn''t afford to have her get too suspicious. She wouldn''t understand.

    They would leave the Solar system, and stop in some places to drop off the goods. Then, he''d let the crew choose a place to let loose a little. Perhaps they would go to the Pleasure Dome in the Procyon system. That would cheer everyone up.

    Blyb took the time to put on the air of authority and left his quarters. It was time to face his crew.

    He just hoped the human would take advantage of his new gift.

    <hr>

    The three of us had fallen into a quick routine for the last two days. I would work on the veggie garden until I ran out of energy, and then either Laura or Tobi would make us lunch. After that, we would do various chores around the cabin and plan our next big project. The threat of running out of food was looming over our heads, putting a damper on our already damp mood.

    We had twenty raised beds so far, planted and growing. The day before, I decided to sacrifice 1 Energy to see what would happen to the potatoes. The counter above the plants went down by two hours, meaning if I invested all of the 60 possible energy, it would only shorten the growth time by 5 days. It was better than nothing, but it still left us with two months until we could harvest our first spuds.

    Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

    Fortunately, Tobi was searching through the Shop Terminal and stumbled upon these Snack Packets that cost 1 credit and were seemingly compatible with our biology. I scavenged some wood resources to sell and we bought one just to try it out.

    "This is disgusting, " Laura said with her mouth full of the protein bar-like thing we received.

    Tobi just nodded, too busy chewing to say anything.

    "I''m afraid we''ll have to make this work, as much as I hate to admit," I said. The Snack Packet was the colour of wheat and was wrapped with a thin layer of oil that was impossible to get off, so we just bit into it. There was no other packaging to speak of.

    Of course, there were some more appealing-looking Meal Kits we could buy, but they went for upwards of 20 credits each. We just didn''t have that kind of money.

    The Snack Packet kept us satiated for several hours, and we decided to get one every day for breakfast. We''d split it three ways and wash it down with lots of water. It was disgusting but it meant stretching our real food a few more days.

    I was hauling some water from the well when I heard Tobi''s panic-filled voice calling me from the front of the cabin.

    "Dee! Please come over here! Quickly!"

    I put down the water-filled bucket on the ground and ran towards his voice.

    A very big and very bored-looking sheep was standing next to my veggie garden, and starting at Tobi with eyes that reminded me to those of a fly. Its coat was white with an iridescent sheen, that changed hue between purple, pink, and blue every second. I quickly pulled up my hatchet out of the inventory but the animal didn''t attack, or do anything much at all, other than turn its freaky bug eyes towards me.

    "Bleeeeugh, " it said and lowered its head to graze at the grass. A description box appeared in my vision.

    Zerathian Skymbala

    A native species from Zerath Prime, this animal is coveted across the known Universe for its fast-growing wool that has wide applications in high fashion. They are rather intelligent herbivores and have a mischievous streak.

    "Where the hell did this thing come from?" I asked Tobi who was inching backwards towards the cabin door with his hands raised.

    "I''m-m not sure. It just came out of the w-woods and walked over here," he said. "I thought the boundary would keep it away like the other monsters, but it just strolled through.

    "Bleeeeugh, " it said again, seemingly offended by being compared to other monsters.

    "What''s going on? What''s that noise?" Laura said as she left the cabin, drying her hands on a tea towel. She froze in place, her mouth gaping open, as she took in our shiny guest.

    "I am not sure, " I said slowly, trying not to let the creature out of my sight. It cycled between staring at us and chewing on the grass.

    "What are we going to do?" Tobi whispered.

    "Should we kill it?" Laura asked. At those words, the animal turned sharply towards her and let out another bleeeeugh that sounded very threatening.

    "Uuuh, Laura? I don''t think we should use the k-word around our friend here," I said.

    "Bleeeeugh, " the animal made it sound like That''s right, you better.

    The Skymbala trotted over to Tobi, who stood motionless, probably too scared to make a rash move and provoke the creature. It lowered its head and rubbed it on him, bleeeeughing happily. The three of us stood there, not daring to move a muscle, taking in the scene.

    "I think... I think it likes you?" I said, not sure what to do. The creature didn''t seem aggressive and looked to be more intelligent than any other alien monster we have encountered. Tobi visibly relaxed and lowered one hand to tap the Skymbala''s head, which replied in even happier sounds.

    "Can we keep it?" he said looking between his mother and me.

    "I''m not sure..." Laura started, not knowing what to do with the situation.

    But then the animal did something that sealed the deal. It moved a little away from the boy and its fur started to shift like it had a mind of its own. It swirled and moved towards the creature''s back where it gathered into a neat pile, before separating from its owner''s fleece and falling on the ground in front of our astonished faces. The iridescent hue of its coat never stopped shifting.

    Raw Zerathian Skymbala Wool

    A luxury product sought after across the known Universe. Once properly processed, it can be used as lining in light armour and as embroidery in high-fashion gowns.

    The chi-ching of money rang in my head as I read the description.

    "We will call you Cloud!" Tobi announced and the Cloud walked back to him for more head pets.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 4 (+1)

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 6/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 18 - In Which We Take The First Step

    "Well, that was disappointing, " I mumbled.

    The Raw Zerathian Skymbala Wool Cloud gave us only netted 150 credits. It was more money than we had before, but I guess I expected more than that.

    "Perhaps if we could process it somehow, we would get more?" Laura suggested as we stood next to the Shop Terminal.

    I typed Zeranthian Skymbala into the search bar and there were dozens of hits. I filtered out the clothing and armour which started at ten thousand credits for minor items like hats and gloves, not bothering to look at bigger ones.

    "A skein of a hundred meters of yarn costs 300 credits. A square meter of fabric is 2500, " I said.

    We both stood there contemplating this in silence for some time.

    "This is still a good haul, " Laura said.

    I nodded.

    "However, I don''t know how often we can get more. I don''t know how to shear a sheep and I doubt Cloud would like that anyway. "

    The strange creature was a mystery. All the other ones I saw were monsters dead set on killing me, so I was somewhat apprehensive about the Skymbala. But where did it come from? Why is it not aggressive?

    "Either way, I am glad that it showed up. Tobi seems to enjoy taking care of it," Laura paused, obviously mulling over something. "This apocalypse... Whatever you call it... Tobi hasn''t taken it well. "

    "I don''t think any of us have."

    "Yes, but... He is behaving differently. He used to be a typical teenager, you know? Angsty and defiant and trying to act all grown up."

    I waited for her to continue, not knowing what to say. Her eyes filled with tears and she wiped them with the sleeve of her shirt.

    "It''s almost as if he aged back a few years. Like he is a little kid again."

    She started crying outright and I pulled her for a hug. She sobbed into my shoulder for a few minutes, trying to keep it quiet so her son wouldn''t hear her. Tobi was outside, hanging out with his new pet.

    Laura pulled away and chuckled awkwardly through her tears.

    "I''m sorry. Your shirt is all wet now. "

    "You have nothing to apologize for," I said, squeezing her hand in mine. "I can''t imagine how you''re feeling. I''m not a mother, but I know it can''t be easy. He is your son. You want him to be happy. This is a fucked up situation to raise kids in. "

    "All my mom had to worry about when I was 16 was me drinking too much peppermint schnapps at a sleepover, " she laughed again. "I am jealous."

    "He will be okay. We will be okay, " I said, trying to pour as much confidence into my voice as possible.

    ¨Ž©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥©¥¨

    Despite my hopes, Cloud didn''t drop any more wool for us to sell. We figured it would happen at some point, but we had no idea how to encourage him to do it. All we could do was continue to work on the garden and watch the woods for monsters.

    For some reason, the lack of activity around the cabin made me nervous. The scene from my first night with the System was burned into my mind. Grizmorph, the monstrous bear thing was still around, I was sure of it.

    Another thing that became increasingly obvious was that 1000 square meters wasn''t all that large. The space in front of the cabin was already used up with four rows of seven raised beds I''ve made and planted. The back had the shed, the now-useless generator, and the stacks of firewood that needed replenishing.

    The cabin was also getting a bit stuffy with the three of us sleeping in one room without any privacy. The list of things to be tackled kept growing, and I spent an awful amount of time trying to figure out how to start.

    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

    To be fair, I had no prior experience with building projects, especially not housing. In the before times, the biggest project I worked on was building a bookshelf from a cheap mass-produced furniture store. Laura didn''t either, given that she and Tobi also lived in an apartment in the city.

    "Dee?" Tobi called out to me, bringing me out of my thoughts. I was sitting on the front porch, taking a breather.

    "What''s up?"

    "I was looking through the Shop Terminal and I''ve found a blueprint for a small sheep barn, enough for two or three sheep," he paused, looking more nervous than usual.

    "Okay, " I said, trying to keep him going.

    "Cloud needs a shelter and I was thinking we could build him one. This blueprint I found costs 50 credits, and I could help to build it. I looked at the plan and it would even have space for me to stay with him inside." The words came out of him like a waterfall.

    "Bleeeeugh, " Cloud added.

    "Did you talk to your mother about this?" I asked, ignoring the alien sheep.

    "She told me to ask you, as this is your property. "

    "That''s fair."

    I took a moment to mull over his proposal. I wasn''t against the idea on principle, but even some back-of-the-napkin math was telling me that this was going to be a serious credit and energy investment. On one hand, I was kinda sick of making the same four raised beds every day for the past week.

    We had 28 of them in total, and they were pretty evenly seeded with carrots, beets, beans, peas, zucchini, and onions. We''d have our first harvest of veggies in about five weeks, which was not great, but we would power through with the Snack Packs. We were almost out of real food, having enough for two or three days more.

    I sighed and looked at the boy and sheep duo.

    "Can you please call your mother over?"

    He disappeared inside to call her, leaving me to have a staring contest with the bug-eyed Skymbala.

    "What''s going on?" Laura asked.

    "Tobi asked me about building a small barn for Cloud. "

    "I told him that it wasn''t my call. This is your property."

    "That''s true. But this is now your home too," I said. "But I won''t be able to build a barn by myself. It would take months at the pace I can work at now. "

    "We''ll help!" Tobi said enthusiastically.

    "I was getting to that, " I said and took a deep breath, preparing myself for what I was going to say next. "We need to get you and Tobi to level 1. "

    Laura stared at me like I lost my mind. "Out of the question. "

    "I''m the only one who has access to Energy and to System-assisted crafting. We''re running out of food and need to make things to sell, if we are going to do this. "

    "You''re suggesting we get out there and kill monsters. Are you out of your mind?"

    "We can do it safely, Mom, " Tobi said, his voice betraying that he wasn''t so sure of that.

    "You stay out of this, Tobi, " she was getting angrier by the second. I tried to keep myself calm, but it was hard.

    "You''ve already killed some monsters before, " I said.

    "Because we had to! We weren''t going out of our way to get ourselves killed! "

    "Mom, Dee is right. We have to get stronger. "

    "I''m not going to put my son in danger!" her voice got a shrieking quality and her hands, balled into fists, were shaking.

    I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. This was as difficult as I predicted it would be. However, I had to keep my ground on this topic. It was getting increasingly obvious to me that we needed the System to make a difference in this new world. It did get in this mess, but that was done now. Raising our skills and levelling up was the way forward. Otherwise, we will barely scrape by. And we will be royally fucked once the aliens came to mine the Earth''s resources.

    "Look, just think about it. You need 30 more EXP and Tobi needs 20. That''s ten level 1 monsters, " she opened her mouth to protest once again but I cut her off. "We can prepare and take it slowly. We''d stay as close to the cabin as possible. Besides, according to the System description for Rabidashers, we have an infestation on our hands. We will have to do something about that anyway. "

    She seemed to deflate somewhat. She glanced at her son, who was absent-mindedly petting the Skymbala on his side.

    "We can do it, Mom. We have to, " he said.

    "Let me think about it, " she said and walked away behind the cabin. Soon, we heard the sounds of chopping wood. Somehow, the chopping had a distinct angry quality to it.

    Tobi, Cloud and I stayed where we were, all of us lost in our thoughts. After less than half an hour later, the chopping sound stopped and Laura returned, a determined look on her face.

    "I''m sorry I yelled at you, " she said.

    "That''s okay. I know what I''m suggesting is crazy, but we don''t have much choice. "

    "How do you suggest we do this?"

    I gave her and Tobi a wild grin. "I''ve got some ideas."

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 4 (+1)

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 6/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 19 - In Which We Take a Few Shots

    "I look ridiculous," Tobi said, a pained expression on his face.

    He was not wrong about looking completely absurd. Laura was adamant that he needed some sort of armour. Since we couldn''t afford anything from the store that would give him any meaningful protection, we had to resort to some rather... creative measures.

    The cabin, as was tradition of any cabins owned through the generations, had a lot of different junk strewn around. We found an oval serving tray and I punched holes in its corners. Then we used the remains of a sheet I used to make that horrible belt thing and tied them as straps around his body.

    The result was so bad that the System didn''t even attempt to classify it as armour but it was better than nothing. The metal serving tray would, in theory, provide some protection for his internal organs.

    We also sacrificed a couple of pillows and made them into smaller cushions that we attached to his legs. I tried to raise the issue of lowered mobility but Laura wouldn''t budge. Thankfully, she conceded to not putting them on his arms which would make wielding weapons nearly impossible.

    As for weapons, I stuck with my trusty hatchet and a steak knife. I stashed them both in my inventory to summon on command. Tobi got my old broom handle and knife spear that we improved with some air-dry epoxy-like substance we bought from the shop for 15 credits. The blade felt like it was much more secured than before, but that was not a surprise given that it was previously held up with layers of electrical tape.

    "You need a weapon too, " I said to Laura.

    "Can we make anything?" Tobi asked, still a bit annoyed about his outfit.

    I shook my head. "I don''t think we have anything left. "

    We looked through the Shop Terminal but all of the weapons were out of our budget. We had 137 credits left when all was said and done. Thankfully we didn''t spend them on other necessities before we decided to get out there and find ourselves some monsters.

    "I have an idea, " Laura said. She approached the Terminal and typed something in the search bar. I looked over her shoulder and saw that she was looking at slingshots. Some of them were pretty high-tech looking and cost upwards of 10k. She filtered the selection to under 200 credits and there was only one item left.

    SlingShot FunBlast: Auto-Return Edition (Common)

    A perfect blend of excitement and safety for kids and kids at heart, this slingshot comes with 10 metal pellets and a mechanism that ensures you never lose ammo again! Return radius: 5 meters.

    Price: 170 credits

    "What do you think?" Laura asked.

    "Hmm... I''m sure we can figure out something to get the other credits. And it would be good to have a ranged weapon," I said, but I was a bit sceptical. It was a toy after all.

    "It''s worth a shot," she said with a smirk.

    It took all my willpower to not roll my eyes at her.

    "Alright, " I said. "Maybe we could try to sell the chopped firewood for some quick credits. I''m out of Energy so I can''t make any more of the wood resource, but maybe the raw wood would be okay. We have plenty right now."

    "What will we use to cook?" Tobi asked, a look of concern on his face. "

    "We''ll just have to go to the forest and cut some down, " I said. "We''re going there anyway, so we may as well. "

    We spent the next fifteen minutes hauling all of our chopped firewood to the Shop Terminal and selling it for some credits. The task was made easier by the fact that we could just put the logs into our inventory, making sure to not get encumbered. I was a little surprised when I saw that the maximum weight I could carry in the inventory was raised to 22 kilograms. The only explanation I had for that was that my strength stat increased from 3 to 4 from the last time I checked, and that was somehow related.

    A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

    The number went up and that''s all that mattered. Every little increase was another step forward in The Plan.

    In the end, we sold around 40 kilograms of chopped firewood and that put us over the needed credits. I found a way to open an account on the Terminal that would keep all of our credits together. It was pretty easy to transfer the credits over to the account, but we couldn''t transfer them back to us. That served us just fine, as we didn''t have any other way to use them.

    "Alright, " I said. "Let''s get this SlingShot FunBlast. "

    "That''s a very stupid name, " Laura said as I tapped ''Buy'' on the shop''s interface.

    As before, a package appeared from thin air and fell on the cabin floor with little ceremony.

    "This never gets boring, " Tobi said.

    The slingshot was in one of those hard-to-open plastic packagings, with garish red and yellow letters cheerfully stating SlingShot FunBlast: Auto-Return Edition.

    I remember when I moved out of Mom''s place into my apartment I ordered a pair of kitchen scissors and they came in one of those clear plastic things that needed scissors to open. The rage I felt was unparalleled to any other. In the end, I had to knock on my neighbour''s doors to ask to borrow some before I hurt myself with a knife. Old Bernard was pretty amused at my predicament.

    Thankfully, the cabin came with some sharp kitchen scissors and the toy was out in a quick second. The ammunition went all over the floor as we opened the packaging. It felt heavy and promised to deal some damage.

    The toy was made of plastic, a step or two above the toys you bought in the toys aisle of a budget box store. It was also an electric blue colour and fit comfortably in Laura''s hand. There was a pretty obvious yellow button in the middle of the handle that presumably activated the return of ammo.

    "You should go outside and practice some, " I said to Laura as I handed her the loose pellets. "We have to see how this retrieval mechanism works. "

    She nodded and we followed her to the well, where she placed the few logs of wood we didn''t sell. She aimed and shot a few times, missing every time.

    "I''m going to take this stuff off. I''m getting a bit hot, " Tobi said and walked over to the front of the cabin where Cloud was happily gazing.

    "This might take a while, " she said, a frustrated frown on her face.

    "You probably just have to practice some. Maybe you will get a skill if you repeat it enough."

    She ran out of ammo in a few minutes. After pressing the retrieval button, the ammo floated a little above the ground and just disappeared. We looked at each other in confusion.

    "Oh!" Laura exclaimed excitedly, "It went into my inventory!"

    "Oh wow, that is handy."

    "This toy is really good for the price. "

    "It makes you wonder how much better the expensive slingshots are."

    She continued training. I watched as she improved in real time. First, she would hit two in ten, then three in ten.

    "I got a skill. "

    "What is it?"

    "Slingshot, level 1, " she said and smiled.

    "Do you want to practice some more?"

    "I think this should be good enough, " she said, a shadow passing over her face. I could see that she still didn''t like the idea of us going out there, and getting ourselves in danger.

    "Hey, Laura?" I said.

    "Yeah?" she pressed the ammo retrieval button and turned to face me.

    "Thanks for doing this. I know that you''re not happy about it. "

    "I''m not, " she paused, gathering her thoughts. "But I also know you''re right, Dee. We have to get stronger if we want to survive. We need food and clothes to make this cabin more liveable. "

    I nodded and decided to drop the subject.

    We walked back to the cabin porch. Tobi was leaning against Cloud who was lying in the grass next to the veggie garden. The alien sheep greeted us with a cheerful Bleeugh when he spotted us.

    "Did you get a skill?" Tobi asked.

    "I did. I am ready, " she said and then frowned at him. "You shouldn''t have taken off your armour. I wasn''t practising for too long."

    Tobi rolled his eyes in a way only teenagers can. "It''s hardly armour. Plus, it was making me sweat. "

    We secured the metal serving tray back on his chest and the little cushions on his legs. Then we checked if our weapons were in place. Finally, there was nothing else to do but go pick a fight.

    "Which way?" Laura asked.

    "Let''s go in the front. I should check out my car anyway. "

    And so we headed out to go find ourselves a few monsters to kill.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 70/200 exp

    Strength: 4 (+1)

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 6/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 20 - In Which We Look For a Fight (1)

    Cloud watched us leave from his spot in the grass with little interest. I paused briefly to take a deep breath before stepping outside the safety of our little homestead. The car was only 300 meters away, but we walked slowly, keeping our eyes open to potential threats, our weapons ready.

    We made it there without any issues, but my encounter with the Crowling left a mark on my psyche and I kept scanning the air and the woods around us. The car looked the same as I last left it, the driver''s door opened and the windshield was a mess of glass on the dirt floor.

    "We should push it back to the cabin, " Laura suggested.

    I nodded. "Watch my back. "

    I brushed the broken glass from the driver''s seat and saw that the keys were still in the ignition. Sitting down, I gave it a token attempt to turn it on, but it only gave me a slight hiccup of a sound in return. I sighed and pulled up the handbrake.

    "Tobi, you and I will push it back there. Laura, you keep an eye out. "

    They followed my instructions without comment, getting into our positions; Tobi and I at the front side of my little Suzuki, Laura behind us, her slingshot at the ready.

    We pushed and the car moved easily down the slight slope towards the cabin. I quickly realised how stupid this move was because the car accelerated and was heading straight at the garden beds.

    "Fuck," I let out, but it was too late to stop it.

    Suddenly, a flash of iridescent fur jumped in the way of the car before it could slam into my days of work, stopping the vehicle in its tracks.

    "Cloud!" Tobi screamed next to me and started sprinting straight, his voice filled with panic. Laura and I were close behind him.

    The alien sheep stepped away from the car, clearly unharmed. He had a slightly annoyed look on his face, which I didn''t think possible for a sheep to have, and gave us an equally annoyed bleat. He didn''t seem to be injured, only put out by our stupidity. Tobi rushed at him, and threw his hands around the Skymbala''s neck, burying his head in the lush coat.

    I went to check out the car''s trunk and stopped in my tracks. There was a decent-sized dent where the alien had collided with my Suzuki. I made a mental note to never piss off Cloud, if possible. Just what level is Cloud? Why can''t we see his level? He''s not a monster but surely should be able to see it.

    I filed these thoughts as something to think about later and turned to the now less annoyed alien who was leaning into Tobi''s hand as he petted him.

    "Thank you for saving my garden, Cloud, " I said and approached him to join in on petting his technicolour wool.

    "Bleeugh," he said, obviously enjoying the attention.

    "Uh, Dee?" Laura said. I turned to the woman and saw that colour had drained from her face. She was pointing at a bright orange shape at the edge of the forest wood. It seems our loud voices had attracted something. The monster was definitely coming towards us, but its movements were erratic and slow, almost like the one of a man stumbling out of a pub after having one too many to drink.

    Soon I was able to see it more clearly. It had a general shape of a fox, only it was double the size of any I had seen before and it had two thin tails that kept twisting and untwisting around each other. Its head also sported two different snouts that were alternating in snapping at the air. The sight was extremely unsettling, but I remembered what we set out to do.

    "We need to step away from the boundary. We can''t attack it anywhere near it, because it will initiate a breach. "

    "What do you mean?" Tobi whispered like the monster hadn''t spotted us yet.

    I whipped the hatchet out of my inventory and firmed my grip on the weapon. "I mean that if we attack while still inside, the safe zone will go on a timeout. I don''t want to have to defend the cabin. "

    A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

    They both seemed to comprehend my words and readied their weapons. Taking a deep breath, I started walking towards the fox, hoping that we come out of this encounter without too much damage. None of us were fighters but we would have to become one.

    The monster had already made it halfway, even with its slow hobble, and we were closing the gap quickly. We were perhaps 20 meters away when the description box appeared.

    Vulparx, level 3

    This unfortunate creature is a result of some rather unethical scientific experiments. Its creator, Bulthar Malvek, wanted to engineer a perfect specimen to honour the image of a god. Unfortunately, her test subjects had escaped her lab and multiplied.

    "Laura, shoot it!" I yelled, making the woman stumble. However, she recovered quickly and shot at the monster repeatedly, until she ran out of ammo. She missed several times, but each time her aim flew true the Vulparx yelped in pain. Its voice sounded a little too human.

    Once she ran out of ammo, I moved quickly, swinging my hatchet back and forth. I absentmindedly noticed that I had much more control over the weapon than I previously did. The hatchet''s edge made contact with the monster and it let out a unison of blood-curdling screams from both of its throats. It retaliated with both of its tails that slashed me across my face like whips.

    Something sticky flowed down my cheeks, but I ignored it, swinging again and missing. This time one of the monster''s jaws snapped and bit down hard on my left arm. I punched its other snout with my right fist which was still holding my weapon.

    I felt a sharp pain on my chest as Laura''s pellets missed the Vulparx and hit me.

    "What the hell, Laura!" I managed to yell out.

    I didn''t see her reaction as I was a bit preoccupied, but the barrage stopped, and my HP going down didn''t. The beast let go of my arm and whipped its tails at me again. This time it pulled me to the ground and wrestled me until it was on top of me. I pulled my arms up to shield my face and it kept dealing damage to my forearms with every bite.

    The rain of pellets came again and the monster turned around to see its other attacker. I tried to get up and shake it off of me but it had me firmly fixed in the dirt. My arms were a bloody mess and I finally dropped my weapon after I received another bite.

    "Can someone please help me out a little?" I screamed as I felt sheer panic envelop me. What the hell were those two doing?

    Somehow I kept lucid enough to pull out a knife out of my inventory and make a stab at the monster on top of me. Nobody was more surprised than me when I managed to hit the monster right in the eye.

    Unfortunately, this wasn''t enough to kill it outright, but it did jump off me and I took the opportunity to roll away from it. Laura''s bullets wooshed again through the air, dealing some damage to the beast.

    "Tobi!" the boy turned towards me at the sound of his name. He was shaking and just stood locked in place. "Use your goddamned spear! Aim for the head!"

    I didn''t know it was possible to shake as much as he did and still stay on his feet, but he still approached the beast that was rolling on the floor in pain, my knife still in its head. He hesitated for a second too long and one of the tails snapped towards him, but ultimately missed him. That seemed to give him some courage as he steadied his hand and aimed the now less shitty spear at the monster''s head.

    The Vulparx let out its last scream, sounding more like a crying child than it did before.

    We all just stared at its body, trying to catch our breaths. Laura''s face was still pale and Tobi looked like he was going to be sick. I was still on the floor, but I felt my arms bleeding less as whatever healing power was kicking in.

    You defeated a Vulprax level 3. 20 exp gained.

    "Can someone please loot the body?" I said, my voice small and breathy. The mother and son duo turned to me at the same time, a silent question on both of their faces. "Just approach it and accept the prompt. "

    Laura did as I instructed and Tobi helped me get up, trying to avoid antagonising the wounds on my arms.

    All of a sudden we heard something, something all three of us knew very well, something that made every hair on my body stand up straight.

    A chorus of Rabidasher screeching was approaching us and it was approaching us fast. And there were many of them.

    We are so fucked.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 90/200 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 33/60

    Energy: 9/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 21 - In Which We Look For a Fight (2)

    We wasted no time going back to the safety of the cabin''s boundary. The screeching was getting louder by the second.

    As we reached the porch I relaxed a bit. It was not a second too late because the pack of monsters came out of the woods.

    "We might be a bit screwed, " I said quietly, as I counted the Rabidashers that were staring at us from the edge of the safe zone. They were walking back and forth, resembling caged wolves more than rabbits. There were about seven of them, two of which were significantly bigger and meaner-looking than the others. I suspected they were at a higher level than the others.

    "What''s the plan?" Tobi asked, his eyes not breaking away from the mass of creatures milling about our front lawn.

    "I''ve got nothing. Anyone else?" I said.

    The three of us stood there in silence, plus Cloud who hadn''t moved from his position in the grass. The alien sheep was watching the scene with boredom.

    I wish I had his attitude, I thought, only a little jealous.

    "Well, they can''t cross the boundary. So we are safe, " I said in an excessively cheerful way. The mother and son duo just looked at me, their eyes conveying the same message.

    "How are your arms?" Laura asked me.

    I looked down at the offending limbs hanging by my side. I had forgotten about my injuries, as usual.

    "They stopped bleeding. But I lost quite a few HP. It''ll take a while for me to be able to do anything about... this, " I gestured at the monsters who didn''t seem to show any intention of leaving any time soon. They were constantly screeching and periodically testing the boundary by slamming bodily at it, but it held.

    I sent thoughts of thanks up to the cosmos and for one specific, slightly creepy alien.

    Tobi sat at one of the porch chairs, and we followed suit, not knowing what else to do.

    "You looted the Vulprax, yeah?" I asked Tobi.

    He nodded and took out a bright orange pelt out of his inventory. The thing was huge, the size of a six-person dinner table, and the fur was especially luxurious-looking.

    "We can sell this, " Laura said.

    "I don''t know any other use for it, " I said, my tone turning playful. "Although it would look quite nice in front of our fireplace."

    Again, the two of them gave me a look. Tough crowd.

    "I''ll go try to make some dinner, " Laura said and got up, taking the pelt with her, and leaving Tobi and me to keep an eye on the monsters.

    "Do you think they will get bored? And leave us alone?" he asked, his face etched with concern.

    "I don''t know, " I said, looking at a pair of Rabidashers who had started rolling in the dirt together and playing fighting. At least, that''s what I hoped they were doing. The rest were still stalking back and forth, circling our little patch of land, trying to see if there was an opening.

    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

    These bunnies were stubborn little piles of fluff and death.

    <hr>

    After some time, Laura came out with a tray of roasted vegetables, the last of what we had until our first harvest. She also gave us a third of a Snack Packet each. My face scrunched up in disgust, but I took it anyway. Calories were calories, after all.

    We all dug into our food, savouring the taste of the roasted vegetables. The monsters were still there, making a whole lot of noise, but not trying to break into our safe zone as much anymore.

    "I''ve been thinking... I might have a plan, " Laura said uncertainly.

    I immediately perked up.

    "Yeah?"

    She looked between me and her son before continuing. "These Rabidashers, they''re kind of like rabbits, yeah?"

    "Demonic rabbits who spit venom, but yeah? I guess?"

    Tobi started coughing hard. Both of us snapped to look at him and he shook his head.

    "Snack... packet.. too dry..."

    Laura poured him a glass of water and turned back to me.

    "I think I know how we can attack them. "

    "What do you have in mind?"

    "When I was a little girl and staying at the cabin with Uncle Sirius, he used to grow a small vegetable patch. It was nothing big and he didn''t maintain it well, but he hated when rabbits would get in it."

    I wasn''t sure where exactly she was going with this. Rabidashers were sort of like rabbits, in the same way dolphins and sharks were like each other. Alright, perhaps that was a bad analogy, given how dolphins aren''t exactly fuzzy little innocent creatures that totally don''t assault other creatures for pleasure, and sharks are mostly harmless to humans. However, I had nothing better to propose, so I just gestured for her to continue.

    "I remembered he would buy these tablets and put them inside burrows. They released a gas that would suffocate them or something. "

    "So you think we could find something similar? I don''t think those specific tablets would work in our particular situation. "

    She shook her head. I looked around the Shop while preparing dinner. While I couldn''t find tablets that worked like that, I found a canister of sleeping gas for 150 credits. I also saw that we could purchase some steel nets for pretty cheap. "

    "How cheap are we talking? We''re not exactly swimming in credits. "

    She made a face. "A hundred credits each. "

    "That''s not cheap, Mom, " Tobi said, having finally washed down the dry food... thing.

    "I misspoke, okay? Anyway, the Vulprax pelt sold for 350, so we can buy one of them and the sleeping gas."

    An outline of a plan was starting to sketch itself out in my head.

    "So you suggest that we throw the gas at them to get them to sleep, and then tie them up inside the steel net before we eliminate them all?" Tobi voiced what I was thinking.

    "It might work..." I said cautiously.

    Laura sighed and took a sip of water from her glass.

    "Look, I know it''s not a good plan. I have eyes, and some brains." she glanced toward the mess of fur and foaming jaws in front of our cabin. " I hope. "

    I leaned over the table and squeezed her hand. "We''ll give it a shot, okay? Besides, I think we are on a bit of a time crunch. "

    "What do you mean? " Tobi asked, his eyes already wide in panic.

    I sighed. I didn''t want to frighten the boy more than necessary but life itself was pretty scary right now.

    "This crowd might invite over a bigger crowd."

    We sat on the porch a little longer, the last bites of our dinner forgotten.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 90/200 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 54/60

    Energy: /60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 22 - In Which We Regroup

    We bought the steel nets and the sleeping gas. My HPs were almost full at least. The scratches on my arms had stopped bleeding and scabbed over, making my skin uncomfortably tight.

    Laura stood beside me as we surveyed the scene before our cabin and took a deep breath.

    "Are we ready?" she asked me and Tobi.

    "I feel like we should do a few more things."

    I went back into the cabin, grabbed the final rags from the bedsheet and started folding them together to form a thick padding.

    "What are you doing?" Tobi asked. I hadn''t even noticed that he walked in after me.

    "I''m pretty sure we would also be affected by the sleeping gas if we just threw it at the monsters. I saw on TV that if you''re in a fire, you should wet some cloth and tie it over your face to act as a filter for the smoke, " I explained as I worked. "So I figured it might work against the gas?"

    I wasn''t sure that it would work, but it was better than nothing. If we all fell like bowling pins we would be monster dinner in seconds. The overwhelming feeling of uselessness suddenly clutched at my chest. The bedsheet rags fell out of my trembling hands and I felt tears of frustration pool in my eyes. I was not cut out for this.

    Tobi bent down and picked up my project.

    "Are you okay?" he asked, concern evident on his face. The kid looked like he must have lost some weight since he and his mother showed up on my doorstep. It made me wonder if he had been keeping himself from eating to make the food go further for all three of us. If my memories of being a teen were any indication, they needed a stupid amount of food to fuel their growth and a bucketload of sleep too.

    I pushed the thought away. It was a worry for another day.

    "I''ll be okay, " I said and took a deep calming breath.

    "You go outside and take a minute, " he said with conviction that left no room for argument. "I''ll finish these masks. I think I can see what you were going for. "

    He turned away from me and picked up the sewing kit from the bookshelf. Then he started working on the masks with determined concentration.

    That was one tough kid.

    I left him there and went outside to find Laura sliding a cut piece of garden hose into the petrol filler of my car. Cloud was still lying on his side, munching on a piece of grass, looking as bored as ever. She turned to the sound of me approaching. The Rabidashers have turned down the screeching and were congregating in a gross pile of rotting fur and saliva. It struck me then that they faintly smelled like meat that had gone off.

    "I figured we might try to make some Molotovs with the petrol, " she said and looked at me as if daring me to say something against it.

    "That''s a great idea. I guess it is lucky that we wheeled the car back when we did," I said.

    I was a bit ashamed of myself for not thinking of making Molotovs first. Laura sucked at the hose until the petrol came out and let it pour into the bucket she prepared. The petrol must have gotten into her mouth because she spat on the ground and coughed like crazy.

    "I hope that doesn''t give me cancer, " she said and gave me one of her rare smiles. "But maybe there isn''t cancer in this new world, with all of the regeneration and stuff. "

    "Huh," I didn''t think about that.

    "We have some empty wine bottles?" she asked, as she stood up.

    "I think so, yeah." A thought nagged at me. "Wait. I have maybe six more bottles of wine."

    "Do you want to empty them?"

    "No," I said, grinning. "I have a much better idea."

    I ran into the cabin and pulled out the last of my mother''s wine from the basement. I wasted no time offering it to the Shop Terminal.

    "Jackpot!" I exclaimed, and Laura peeked over my shoulder and whistled.

    "Six thousand credits!"

    "Oh yeah. This will make it all better."

    I hesitated for a brief moment, as the grief I''ve been pushing down for the past few months flooded at me, but I confirmed the sale anyway. Mom''s favourite wine would be wasted anyway if I wasn''t alive to enjoy it.

    I bought fifteen empty bottles for 60 credits, and I just stood there as they materialised with a light clink. I was officially out of ideas.

    Laura must have noticed my hesitation because she gently pushed me away from the Terminal.

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    "We all need ranged weapons. This close-quarter fighting is not good," she said and started searching through the Shop.

    "They are all too expensive," she hissed.

    She was right. Even with our newfound wealth, we were as poor as church mice. There were different types of composite crossbows and energy pistols, but they were all in the range of tens of thousands of credits.

    She punched the side of the Terminal in frustration. Of course, all that move accomplished was her losing a few precious HPs.

    "Fuck," she said through gritted teeth.

    "Let me have a look. You go and make the Molotovs."

    She rubbed her fist which was quickly turning a pretty shade of purple and nodded. She picked up the conveniently packed glass bottles and walked outside, still cursing under her breath.

    "I''m done," Tobi said and handed me a thick mask with ties for securing it to the face. It was a bit rough-looking with big uneven stitches, but it looked like it would work.

    Makeshift Facemask (Common)

    A simple face mask repurposed from a bedsheet, designed to filter out gas and protect the lungs. Made by a beginner sewist. Wet with water before using.

    "Wow, Tobi," I said. "You work fast. Also, you managed to get it to a Common quality. Good job. "

    The boy just shrugged. "I took a sewing class at school last semester. It would have been neater with a sewing machine, but I think it will work fine."

    I agreed. "They will serve their purpose. Now, let''s see what we can get."

    We spent a few minutes sorting through the neverending list of items. Finally, something caught my eye.

    Steel-tipped Whip (Common)

    A durable whip with a steel-tipped end, designed for precision strikes and enhanced impact.

    "What do you think, Tobi?" I asked. "It''s practically a bargain at 700 credits."

    "For you, maybe. I don''t like weapons, " he shifted his feet uneasily. "Besides, I think I would whack myself in the face if I tried to attack something."

    "I don''t like them either, but your mom is right. We have to have something that deals some damage. And keeps you away from claws."

    He thought for a few seconds. "What about those darts that you blow through a tube or something? The poisoned ones."

    I bought the whip for myself and then typed his vague description. Sure enough, there was a hit.

    Blowgun (Common)

    A blowgun that launches small darts with a simple breath, for short-range attacks. Equipped with an easy reload mechanism straight from the user''s inventory.

    "Short range is better than no range, I guess. And only for 200 credits! That''s cheap as chips, at this point," I said and looked through the related items. There was a pack of 100 darts that looked to be the same design as the blowgun, tipped with something called Xelthar neurotoxin. They were a bit steeper in price, at 600 credits for the whole lot.

    And just like that, we were 1500 credits poorer, but feeling much more secure to continue with the plan. Like all of our plans so far, it was pretty stupid. It had to work though, because it was so stupid.

    Laura had come inside with the bottles filled halfway with petrol. We showed her what we had scored, and she nodded.

    "What about me?"

    "You have the slingshot," I said. "We don''t have the money for anything fancier."

    She approached the Terminal once again and typed something in the search bar.

    "What do you think of this?"

    Weapon Upgrade Kit (Good)

    Enhances your weapon''s damage and accuracy, providing a moderate boost in performance for more effective combat.

    "I figured there might be something like that in the shop. it makes things appear out of thin air. So I thought it might have something to add to the weapon."

    "Good thinking Laura. And it''s in our budget, 1500 credits," I said and confirmed the purchase. Just like that, half of our credits were gone.

    A palm-sized metal box plopped on the floor before us, with a big red button on top of it that just begged to be pressed.

    The three of us exchanged looks, and Laura grabbed the thing off the floor and pressed the button. The box started unfolding until it became a flat square about a meter square in area, and as thin as a sheet of paper. Then it spoke, making Laura almost drop it in surprise.

    "Please place the weapon to be upgraded," a disembodied voice said, coming from all around us, or maybe inside our heads. It was a female voice, but it had a computer-like quality, the kind you heard in cheesy hacker movies from the early 2000s.

    Laura placed the metal sheet on the coffee table and then pulled her toy slingshot and the ammo from her inventory. We all stepped away as soon as she placed her weapon in the middle, lest it explode on us or something. Fortunately for us, the sheet just wrapped itself around the toy like aluminium foil around a packed sandwich, and for a second glowed a subtle green light.

    SlingShot FunBlast: Auto-Return Edition (Good)

    Now with enhanced tension and precision, this slingshot packs a stronger punch, increasing pellet speed and range, while the auto-return mechanism ensures faster reload times within a 7-meter radius for continuous fun!

    The newly upgraded slingshot seemed more... substantial if that made sense. It was still the same electric blue colour, but the material upgraded from cheap plastic, to that hard stuff kitchen appliances were sometimes made of. The ammo looked bigger too.

    Laura grabbed the slightly deadlier weapon and looked rather pleased with herself.

    "Let''s load these bottles with some fabric and let''s get this started. We have prepared long enough."

    "Ugh, we''re going to be out of bedsheets," I whined.

    "Just buy some more, Mrs. Moneybags," she quipped and we got to work.

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 1, 90/200 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 54/60

    Energy: 26/60

    Points to distribute: 0

 Chapter 23 - In Which We Do Many Dumb Things

    We were finally ready after finishing the Molotovs. I took a few cracks with the whip until I unlocked the skill. It was decided that Tobi would get most of the firebombs as they offered the most range. The mass of Rabidashers seemed to have increased to ten. Thankfully the new ones were level 1 or 2.

    The moonlight reflected off feathers in the trees, and I cursed rather loudly.

    "What?" asked Tobi, his hands clutching the deep grey polycarbonate tube of his blowgun.

    "It seems we have more company, " I said and pointed at the trees where two or three monsters of the bird variety sat watching us. "Fucking hell."

    "We have to assume that there are more out there, " Laura said. She pulled out her face mask out of her inventory. "Tobi, put on your mask. You too, Dee."

    Tobi and I complied wordlessly. The wet cloth was cold on my face. I just hoped it would work the way I thought it might. The kid did a good job with them either way, given the materials we had on hand. At that moment it occurred to me that we had money and that we could have just bought some better ones. However, there was no point in bringing it up as Laura was taking the sleeping gas canister out of her inventory.

    "Whenever you''re ready, Laura," I said and gripped the handle of my new weapon. My palms were sweaty.

    The monsters must have noticed that we were up to something, because they turned more rabid, for the lack of a better word. Their screeching picked up and they separated from the pile they were resting in.

    Laura pulled the tab and gave her best shot at throwing it in the middle of the monster mass.

    The canister hit the ground with a hiss and a thick bluish smoke started pooling on the ground.

    Unfortunately, we forgot about one pretty important thing.

    Warning: You initiated a boundary breach. Your safe zone status is revoked for 5 minutes. 4:59...

    The words flashed green in my peripheral vision and I felt the adrenaline hit me harder than ever.

    "Shit! The safe zone boundary is down!" I yelled through my mask.

    This was very, very stupid. If there was a record for the stupidest thing ever done by a human, our pictures would be in the book.

    Immediately I jumped into action and started cracking my whip at the monsters. Thankfully, they seemed to be affected by the smoke and were moving like through molasses.

    Laura produced the steel net and threw it, catching one of the big Rabidashers in it, alongside two lower-level ones.

    "Tobi! Don''t just stand there!" she snapped, her voice tinged with panic. "Throw some fire at them."

    If he had said anything in response, I didn''t hear it. My ears felt like they were stuffed with cotton balls, and all sounds became muffled like I had put noise-cancelling headphones on. All I could focus on was the disgusting bodies with their dripping maws in front of me.

    The whip snapped and coiled like a python around the big decomposing fuzzball''s neck and I pulled it tighter. I felt its snapping neck vibrate through the weapon. It made my stomach churn, killing a creature like that. But the sensation lasted only half a breath and faded away.

    I was getting better at killing things.

    With one fluid movement that I had no idea I could execute, I tossed the lifeless body aside. A lit bottle flew above my head and I jumped back on pure instinct. It was lucky because the glass shattered barely two meters away from where I was standing. Another stroke of luck was that it instantly blew up into a fireball on a level 2 Rabidasher. Its slimy fur somehow caught fire and died a scorching, screeching death shortly after.

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    I almost felt sorry for it. Almost.

    I looked back and saw that Tobi was already lighting another firebomb with shaking hands. I was surprised to see Cloud standing next to the kid, his fur lazily shifting through iridescent hues. The alien sheep appeared to be the calmest creature in a hundred-kilometer radius.

    Laura was busy lighting her own Molotov and throwing it at the monsters that she caught in the steel net. I snapped my focus back to the situation at hand. There were five Rabidashers left to go. Barely thirty seconds had passed since the boundary was breached and we were doing okay.

    "Keep going, we''re halfway through!" I shouted.

    Of course, I shouldn''t have said that. Everybody knows that if you say shit like that, you''re going to jinx yourself. It appeared that I did just that because the really big Rabidasher, the level 5 one seemed to snap out of whatever the sleeping gas was to it.

    Its red-rimmed eyes still had a bit of the daze, however. I had the pleasure of seeing that detail up close and personal because the damned thing body slammed me and jumped on top of me. Its claws sunk into my chest, pinning me on the ground and I screamed.

    The monster at least had the decency to let out a pained screech when I punched it. I punched it again, this time in the neck, and it snapped at my face, its disgusting spittle flying everywhere. I never knew I would be thankful for a wet wad of cloth securely strapped and covering my face.

    My brain went on autopilot and I kept pounding at it, probably dealing minimal damage, because the monster wasn''t budging.

    "Guys! A little help, maybe!" I managed to yell out.

    The claws kept sinking deeper into my chest. I was worried that one jerk from the creature would make me rather chest-less.

    A heartbeat later, a peppering of darts and metal ammo hit the Rabidasher''s side. As it howled in pain, I grabbed its paws and yanked them out of my flesh. It was possibly one of the most painful sensations I have experienced in my life so far. I almost passed out then and there.

    A pair of hands grabbed me by the armpits and dragged me away. I managed to crack my eyes open and saw Tobi''s sweat-slicked face. He also had a thin trickle of blood running down his temple.

    "Are you okay?" he asked.

    I tasted bile and I didn''t trust myself to open my mouth, so I just nodded.

    "I''m going to give mom a hand. Cloud, watch over her, " I heard him say, and a second later I felt the sheep poke me with one of his hooves.

    Goddamned walking sweater, I thought. My mind was fuzzy from the pain and I didn''t dare move just yet.

    There was one more minute and some change left on the timer. I heard the crash of glass as someone threw another one of our homemade Molotovs, followed by the now-familiar sound of a dying Rabidasher.

    "Fuck!" Laura''s voice echoed through the clearing. "Not in the garden, you piece of shit!"

    My brain registered what she was saying, and a part of my mind was screaming at me to get up. However, my body refused to comply. All I was able to do was look as the seconds ticked down on the back of my eyelids.

    I heard two more creatures die and everything suddenly went silent.

    "Dee, are you alive?"

    This time I forced myself to fully open my eyes. Laura was crouched on the ground next to me.

    "More or less."

    "How much time until the timer''s down?"

    "About 15 seconds."

    She sighed in relief. That''s when I noticed that her eyebrows were badly singed, bordering on non-existent, and she lost her mask somewhere along the way. The stench of gasoline and burning flesh permeated the air around us.

    I sat up with Laura''s help as the timer approached zero.

    That''s when one of the birds that were watching us from the trees decided to take its shot and swooped down at me.

    Our resident sheep jumped high above me and caught the bird in his mouth. A bone-chilling crunch resounded all around us. Cloud landed gracefully in the grass, spat out the corpse, and looked very pleased with himself.

    "Bleugh!" he said. The monster''s blood dripped down his bug-eyed face.

    Property safe zone status restored

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 2, 43/300 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 13/60

    Energy: 26/60

    Points to distribute: 1

 Chapter 24 - In Which We Learn A Few Things

    After Cloud''s theatrical performance, my brain decided it would be a great time to give up and go dark. Laura and Tobi must have dragged me inside because I woke up in bed. The morning light was coming through the window and the world was still.

    I was tucked in rather snugly in there, but everything was disgusting. My clothes, skin, and hair were just filthy with whatever made the Rabidashers'' fur was coated in. The smell of fire and gasoline clung to me like a second skin. I couldn''t bring myself to care though. All I could do was lie back in bed and feel sorry for myself.

    The eye in the corner of my vision was glowing faintly, reminding me that I had notifications to sift through. Overall, the little stunt we pulled the night before had netted me 153 exp, pushing me over the threshold for level 2. It seemed that the System divided the experience between the three of us¡ªthe formula of how that escaped me.

    I didn''t care for the formula. We made progress and that''s the only thing that mattered.

    You have collected enough EXP to earn Level 1. Level up?

    I accepted the prompt and tingling passed down my spine, just like the last time.

    The new level came with a point to distribute. After some consideration, put it in my Intelligence attribute. I figured that extra energy was extra good.

    After I finished that, I got up and moseyed down to the bathroom, trying my best not to wake Laura and Tobi.

    The cabin was getting too cramped. Making that barn Tobi wanted was going to be our priority.

    I finished my business and walked to the Shop Terminal. It was about time I got my hands on that goddamned reader. I almost forgot I had been saving my credits for it, with everything happening since the early days. The device arrived the usual way: appearing out of nothingness and falling on the floor with a soft thud. I picked it up and went back to my nasty nest of a bed. It was time for some quality reading.

    I booted up the device. After a cheery animation of a swirling galaxy passed, there was a prompt in the infernal green:

    Link device to account? Yes/No

    I confirmed it, and there it was: So You''ve Been Integrated: A Practical Guide to the System For Dummies was waiting for me.

    Chapter 1: Welcome to the Apocalypse: What Just Happened?

    If you are holding this copy of So You''ve Been Integrated (in further reading SYBI), it means that your planet and the sentient life upon it have recently joined the not-so-prestigious club of unlucky bastards scattered across our Universe. My condolences! However, it was bound to happen sooner or later, so there is no point in being angry about it.

    The System comes for all of us.

    I, Tzarok of [Kepler-38, Milky Way Galaxy] was in your shoes once. I was just a hatchling when the world changed and brought change and destruction upon us. We thought we were alone in the Universe and were a low-technology planet. We were very much unprepared.

    Therefore, I decided to put together this guide for anyone who comes after to give them a better chance than we had.

    Nobody can for certain say when the System arrived and started infecting everyone. Nonetheless, the consensus is that there was a time before the System. Over the centuries, many different theories have been proposed and discussed at length.

    Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

    One such theory says that the System is an organism that lives in symbiosis with all life forms found in the known Universe. There is some evidence to support this theory, as thousands of scientists have identified an organelle that exists in similar forms in all living cells, regardless of which element they are based on.

    This guide is not here to give a detailed explanation of how that works. You can find suggested further reading at the end of this book.

    I had to set aside the reader for a minute. The thought that I was infested with some seemingly intelligent life form was a bit too much for me. Just the first page brought up more questions than I would ever have the time to find answers for.

    Also, this theory didn''t make sense with what Blyb had told me about corporations bidding for a planet''s resources and having to go through the System-enforced protocol of Integration.

    If the theory were true, how long would it have been since humans had these organisms inside of us? I sensed that I was missing a big piece of the picture. But that was hardly surprising, given that I had to pick up a book called So You''ve Been Integrated: A Practical Guide to the System For Dummies.

    I heard Laura stir on the couch below, and I got up, leaving the reader in the sheets. I would get back to it.

    Tobi was still asleep on the mattress on the floor. Laura had gotten up and was fixing the blanket that he was covered with, tucking him in.

    Mom used to do that, even when I was all grown up. She didn''t sleep that well at night; something about giving birth made her go to the bathroom often. If I was sleeping under the same roof as her, she would check up on me and tuck me in.

    I steeled my heart and smiled at her. She motioned me to go outside, and I followed.

    "Goddamn it! My garden!"

    I was pissed off beyond belief when I saw the devastation. The raised beds that I spent so much time, energy, and Energy on were scorched by all of the Molotovs we threw at the monsters. At least three of them seemed destroyed beyond repair.

    "The fucking potatoes are ruined."

    Some of the plants had started to sprout. I was extremely proud of myself for getting the garden up and going. And now I''d have to do it all over again.

    "Calm down, you''ll wake up Tobi. And besides, we''re alive," she said sternly and then gestured at the beds. "We can make them again."

    Despite her words, I was shaking with rage and my eyes started to sting with tears.

    "What were we thinking?" Fire so close to the cabin?"

    "We weren''t. We have no idea what we''re doing. "

    "I guess not," I said and took a deep breath to calm myself down. Everything about this sucked big time.

    I wasn''t cut out for all this survival bullshit. The things I would do for one more boring day in the office. Hell, I''d even have Jon steal my lunch again, the bastard.

    Thinking about my now-former coworker had a grounding effect on me. He was probably dead by now if I was going to be completely honest.

    Jon was an overweight man in his fifties, who smoked like a chimney and was out of breath climbing up the one flight of stairs to our office. Given that I almost died several times in the past few weeks, and I was much more fit than Jon, the likelihood of him being alive was not good.

    I shuddered. It was a line of thought that if followed, would find me curled up in our basement dry-heaving in panic.

    "Get it together, Dee, " Laura said, much more kindly this time, having noticed my distress.

    "Okay, " I breathed. " It''s going to be okay. "

    I crouched at the closest raised bed and surveyed the damage. A description box popped up:

    Raised bed

    Useful for extending the growing season, raised beds are a simple agricultural technology.

    Damage: 62%

    Cost to repair: 6 wood resources, 5 Energy

    Repair now? Yes/No

    "At least we can fix them. "

    "There you go. There''s no point crying over spilled milk. "

    "We''ll have to go cut some wood today, so we can start on the repairs. We completely depleted our firewood."

    "Do we have to do it today?" she moaned. "I had a little too much action lately."

    "Me too, but we have to keep improving this place. We need food, " I said. "But let''s wait until Tobi wakes up. I vote we get a good lunch pack from the Shop for food today. If I have to eat one of those snack things today, I will love my ever-loving mind. "

    Laura nodded. "Then Tobi and I need to level up and choose our classes. We should discuss the options together. "

    "Holy shit! I completely forgot about that. "

    She just gave me a sad smile. "That''s what yesterday was all about. "

    I didn''t know what to say to that. It needed to be done and we went out and did it. Sure, I almost died and they probably got some injuries out of it as well.

    But that was the name of the game in this new world. The sooner we all get comfortable dancing on the tightrope of life, the easier it will be.

    It was obvious to me that we had to take risks to improve our chances of long-term survival. I just hoped Laura would see things the same way soon.

    "I''m going to wake up Tobi, " she said and went inside.

    I stood in my scorched garden and just let myself enjoy being alive under the morning sun.

 Chapter 25 - In Which We Grow

    <blockquote>

    The HUD (Heads-up Display) can be customised with the use of implants. The modifications can bring it to a level where it can become a powerful tool and weapon. However, those implants do not come cheap. Nothing good ever does.

    Excerpt SYBI, Chapter 1: Welcome to the Apocalypse: What Just Happened?

    </blockquote>

    "I accidentally shot myself in the thigh with one of my darts, " Tobi said, his face as red as a cherry tomato.

    It was about mid-morning by the time Laura and I woke him up. Fortunately, the two of them fared much better than me. Laura only got a few scratches and burns, barely decreasing her HP by a quarter. On the other hand, Tobi suffered from self-inflicted friendly fire, giving himself a Poisoned debuff that cost him 1 HP per second for 7 seconds.

    At least the darts weren''t that powerful.

    "How on Earth did you manage to do that?" I asked him, completely perplexed.

    His blush deepened, and he just mumbled that he didn''t want to discuss it.

    Everyone agreed that we should treat ourselves for a job well done, and get a meal pack for each of us. The description assured us that the food would be compatible with our biology and came with a price of 80 credits a piece.

    The food arrived in familiar takeaway boxes and was a standard meal of meat and veggies, but overall a complete mystery. The vegetables looked like nothing I had seen on this planet before, all odd-shaped and vibrant in colour. The meat looked like a standard beef steak but had the extra toughness you didn''t get in a well-prepared cut. We didn''t stop to contemplate them for long.

    Perhaps because the food we had been eating was bland and lacking in variety, but this meal tasted like heaven. It was probably the first meat we had in weeks. I was kind of getting worried about becoming iron deficient. Maybe the shop would have a conveniently-priced multivitamin we could buy so we don''t get all kinds of sick.

    Thankfully, the portions were huge so Laura and I could have seconds later in the day, but Tobi scarfed it down like a starving man. It only confirmed my theory that he was holding back the last few weeks. The food situation was getting more urgent.

    "Alright, who wants to level up first?" I asked once we were done with the meal.

    "I''ll go first, " Laura said and moments later shuddered when she levelled up. "That was uncomfortable."

    "Yeah, that would happen," I said with all of the wisdom of the marginally more experienced.

    Laura''s eyes went unfocused as she read her status notifications.

    "It says that I can choose my class now. Hm... I have three options here."

    "Which ones did you get?" Tobi asked, seemingly bursting with impatience.

    "My first option is a Writer class, " she said with a frown. "That''s pretty useless."

    "Why would it offer that?"

    "Mom works... worked as a copywriter."

    "Yeah, before all of this started. I wrote a few novels too, but I never did anything with them."

    "That makes sense. What''s the next one?"

    "A Cook. Apparently, both of these are uncommon classes."

    "All three of us can cook, " I said.

    "My Cooking skill is at level 3 at this point," she said.

    I was very jealous about that. I haven''t reached level 3 in any of my skills yet. I didn''t even have the Cooking skill, even though I cooked plenty.

    There was no justice in the world.

    "What''s the last one, mom?"

    She smiled awkwardly. "A Woodswoman."

    "A Woodswoman? What''s the description of that?"

    "You feel the pulse of the forest, in a weird, sort of creepy way. But you know which berry won''t kill you and which critter you can kill. Sometimes even the trees ask you for directions."

    This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

    The three of us shared a look.

    "Does anyone feel like these System descriptions are kind of... inconsistent?" I asked.

    "Yeah, this thing can''t stick to a style to save its life."

    "Which one do you think you''ll pick, mom?"

    "The Writer is useless, as I''ve said before. The Cook... If we had more people around, I guess it would make sense. "

    "Yeah, perhaps it would give you skills to boost your speed while cooking or somehow get the most out of food."

    "The Woodswoman though... I don''t know how I feel about that."

    "Why''s that?"

    It took her some time to gather her thoughts. Cloud wandered up on the porch and settled on the floor next to Tobi. The boy started to pet him absent-mindedly and the sheep let out satisfied gleeps. Cloud was a very strange sheep.

    "I guess..." Laura started. " I guess it is still hard for me to let go of my life before the Integration. I loved my job. I was good at it. I probably wrote millions of words over the years. I didn''t always like the words I wrote. It was a job after all. But I liked writing them. And having to let go of it is... upsetting."

    I understood her very well. I didn''t work as an accountant that long, in the grand scheme of things. But I worked hard to reach that point and it was starting to become a part of my identity.

    My name is Diana. I work as an accountant. I am 25 years old.

    These sentences were lumped together in my head.

    "I think I will take Woodswoman," she said, practically radiating determination.

    "Are you sure?"

    She nodded. "It''s time for me to be a grown-up and start looking forward. In an apocalypse, writers starve."

    She must have confirmed her class selection because her eyes went all unfocused again, as she surveyed the skills she received.

    "So I got five skills here. Hunting, Repairing, Foraging, Woodcutting, and Navigation, all level 1. It also says that I have unlocked Energy."

    "Those are great skills! I have foraging as well. Not that I got to use them much."

    "I also have two points to distribute."

    "What do your stats look like?" I asked.

    [Author''s note: I''ll just write it in a block, like Dee''s stats.]

    Name: Laura Baumgartener

    Age: 39

    Class: Woodswoman

    Level: 1, 112/200 exp

    Strength: 3

    Constitution: 4

    Intelligence: 3

    Wisdom: 5

    HP: 40/40

    Energy: 30/30

    "I''d put both of the points in intelligence if I were you. I figured out that Energy is directly connected with it, as the maximum amount you can have."

    "I think I will put one in Constitution, and one in Intelligence. I would like to be as far away from dying as I can, " she said. "Tobi, it''s your turn."

    The boy took a deep breath and shivered as he accepted the level-up. As he read his choice of classes his face turned pale.

    "What did you get?" his mother asked.

    "I already know which class I will take," he said after a brief hesitation.

    "Tobi! Tell us the options!"

    "Doesn''t matter. I already chose Weaver as my class," he said with the stubbornness only a teenager could have. He stood up, and Cloud followed suit. "I''ll go get some water from the well."

    Without another word, the pair started to walk away.

    "Tobi! Come back here! What the hell did you do?! Tobi!"

    He ignored her and disappeared around a corner with his pet on his heels. Laura slumped back in her chair and let out a frustrated sigh. I kept my mouth shut. The sky was darkened by clouds threatening to unleash a river upon us.

    She seemed to calm down a bit after a while.

    "He''s a good kid, " I said.

    "He is. But so stubborn sometimes, " she said. " Why would he do that?"

    I shrugged, but I doubt that she noticed. Her eyes seemed a thousand miles away.

    "He reminds me of his father in that way. He died when Tobi was four years old. "

    "You haven''t told me that."

    "It''s still painful. He was gone so suddenly. We never got around to getting married, didn''t see the point. I wish we did because Mathias was a wonderful man. A good father too. I wish we got more time with him."

    "What happened?"

    "A car accident. A drunk driver T-boned him as he was driving home from work. He was an EMT."

    "I see."

    "I just wish to know what possessed Tobi to do this."

    "I''m sure it will be alright."

    "It will have to be. What kind of class is Weaver anyway?" she said and rubbed her face.

    "Well, he can process the wool Cloud has. Not that the big cotton ball had given us any since that first time."

    Laura laughed, tension seemingly pouring out of her. "The big cotton ball indeed."

    The sky finally reached a tipping point and poured its heart out onto us.

    <hr>

    Name: Tobias Schneider

    Age: 16

    Class: Weaver

    Level: 1, 109/200 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 5

    Intelligence: 3

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 50/40

    Energy: 30/30

    <hr>

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 2, 43/300 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 13/60

    Energy: 26/60

 Chapter 26 - In Which We Rebuild

    <blockquote>

    First off, if you want to avoid becoming monster snack, your best bet suitable shelter. Depending on whether you''re somewhere in the city or stuck in the boonies, this will look different. There are three things that all good shelters will have in common: access to resources, reinforced walls that can take a good beatdown, and decent escape routes. Once you''ve secured a location, your survival rate goes up. But not by much.

    Excerpt SYBI, Chapter 2: Staying Alive When The World Wants You Dead

    </blockquote>

    We spent the next couple of days cleaning up the destruction. Thankfully, it wasn''t as bad as I first thought. Most of the plants were unharmed and only three beds were beyond saving. It pained my heart to pull them apart and scavenge the planks for the wood resource. It quickly became apparent that we had to make an expedition to the end of the forest to gather more wood.

    "Tobi, you will stay behind, " Laura said. The kid looked like he wanted to argue, but his mom was still angry about him choosing his class without talking to us first, so he just nodded and sat on the porch. Cloud laid down on his side to keep him company.

    "We''ll be back soon, don''t worry, " I told the pair.

    Laura and I left the safety of our boundary, each armed with our weapon of choice. I gave her my hatchet as we figured she''d be better all that tree-felling business with her fancy new class. I was sad to give it up, given how many times it saved my ass but it was for the greater good.

    I kept watch as she hacked away at a medium-sized spruce tree.

    "This is going too slow. The wood is too fresh and this hatchet isn''t up to the task," she said. We were there for all of five minutes.

    "Should we walk in there and see if there are any old trees?" I asked, pointing to the forest.

    She swung at the tree one more time and huffed in frustration.

    "I guess we would have to, " she said, putting the hatched away in her inventory. It was still freaking seeing items appear and disappear out of nothing. "But we will only go in there a few meters and keep an eye on the cabin."

    "Let''s do it," I said. I don''t know when I developed a taste for danger, but I squared my shoulders, tightened my grip on my weapon, and stepped among the trees.

    "Let me go in front," she whispered.

    I did what she said and we walked a bit further in, ensuring we could still see the cabin through the trees.

    "There," Laura said, pointing at a tree that had fallen over, perhaps another 50 meters away. The woods were quiet and noisy simultaneously with the rustle of leaves in the wind and calls of hopefully non-monstrous birds.

    The fallen tree seemed to find its way to the ground relatively recently, given the lack of moss and rot. The recent rains were quick showers that didn''t stay on the ground for long, so that must have helped as well. It had scorch marks, suggesting that its demise was orchestrated by a lightning strike.

    "Keep an eye out," she ordered, and I obeyed as she started chopping the treetrunk into more manageable pieces.

    The sound of the hatchet hitting the bark echoed all around us. I kept my whip at the ready, as I was getting nervous we would get ambushed. Then I noticed a bush of ripe forest blackberries, a few meters away. It had the faintest glow of green around it. I figured my Foraging skill got activated. It was confirmed when a description box popped up.

    Blackberries (edible)

    Blackberries are berries with a sweet-tart flavour, found on thorny bushes on Earth. Pretty boring. Pretty tasty too. Compatible with your biology.

    "Laura," I whispered, trying to catch her attention between the hits. "Laura!"

    "What?" she hissed. She had already disappeared a few lengths of wood into her inventory.

    "We should grab those!"

    She followed my pointing finger with her gaze and nodded.

    This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.

    "We''ll get on that after we''re done here. I''m almost at my capacity, so you''re next."

    She finished her work and I put away some wood as well. I must have miscalculated the weight of the wood because the breath got knocked out of my lungs and my internal organs felt like they were tied in a knot.

    Warning: You have been encumbered.

    Please remove excess items from your inventory.

    Focusing on doing just that was extremely difficult with not having the ability to breathe properly, and I found myself on my knees, clutching at my chest.

    That''s when Laura screamed. I managed to remove the last piece of wood from my inventory and looked up to see a yellow spider the size of a dinner plate hanging just above her head, having somehow sneaked up on her. She grabbed the creature with her bare hand and threw it away with a pitch that would have had many baseball teams come knocking at her door. It happened so quickly I couldn''t even identify the monster.

    She was still screaming when she pulled me up to my feet and dragged me back to the cabin.

    Cloud and Tobi rushed over to meet us as we crossed over to safety. Laura just plopped on the ground hyperventilating.

    "What happened?" the kid asked.

    "S-s-spider," she stuttered.

    "Ah," he turned to me. "Mom has arachnophobia."

    "Will you be okay?" I asked the woman kneeling in the dirt.

    "The phobia is not so bad, but she still hates them."

    I wouldn''t call the display I just witnessed not so bad, but I guess it could have been worse. She could have just frozen and got herself killed.

    Laura took a few minutes to calm down. But as she seemed to get it together, she screamed again, this time in frustration.

    "Fuck!"

    She lifted her palm to show us the thin dark yellow hairs sticking out of her skin. The skin itself was also tinged yellow around the puncture points. It was pretty gross.

    "That thing poisoned me."

    "Is it bad?" I asked.

    "Only 10 HP lost, " she let out a sigh and got up. "I''m going to take this out and then I''m going to lie down for a bit.

    She deposited the wood from her inventory and disappeared inside.

    Tobi and I just shrugged, and I started the process to repair the damage. That meant making a lot of wood resource.

    Having Tobi unlock Energy was pretty helpful with the restoration, even if he only had 30 to use. By the time Laura came outside a few hours later, we only had 3 beds left to repair.

    "How are you doing?" I asked her.

    "I''m okay. At least I got a free point in Constitution," she said and rubbed her temple.

    "That''s awesome!"

    "Yeah... I was thinking. We should set up traps around the cabin," she said.

    "That''s a good idea."

    "I have some idea on how they should be made and where they should be set up. I assume that''s from my class or something. But I would like to buy a few books on different traps so I don''t stumble in the dark. Can I use your reader?"

    "Of course. Knock yourself out."

    She came back out not even five minutes later, with the reader in hand. Her face showed just pure defeat.

    "Mom, what''s wrong?" Tobi asked.

    "Only Dee can use it because she linked it up with her. "

    I was starting to feel some of that defeat itself. We couldn''t escape capitalism even in an alien apocalypse.

    "Just... Just buy yourself one. You''d have to do it at some point anyway."

    She gave me a weak smile and went away to do just that.

    We pooled our credits together, having opened something called a provisional joint account. The notification just popped up on the Shop Terminal one day, letting us know about the possibility. Somehow my having the land claim token unlocked it.

    The contract we signed was denser in legalese than a neutron star was in matter. But we managed to glean that we could open a full account once we had enough funds pass through our account. Then we''d be able to access all kinds of services and there was even a possibility of making an annual interest on the banked credits.

    That was something to think about a lot further in the future. But the account was handy so we didn''t have to juggle our credits around whenever one of us wanted to buy something.

    Once Laura was done, we bought our first expansion to the homestead, making it 50 square meters bigger. Then Tobi bought the blueprint for the barn that we would make into a home for him and Cloud.

    "Thanks, Dee," he said once I confirmed the expansion in my Property tab.

    "No need to thank me. This is your home, Tobi. And we can start building tomorrow. "

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 2, 43/300 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 4/60

 Chapter 27 - In Which Things Start Spinning

    <blockquote>

    One good thing about the System is that it is not that hard to identify threats. There''s usually a greenish glow surrounding the point of interest, or a notification pops up, or both. However, you have to stay vigilant. Until you get stronger, you are never truly safe. But the Universe welcomes the strong, so make sure to become one of them.

    Excerpt SYBI, Chapter 2: Staying Alive When The World Wants You Dead

    </blockquote>

    Over the next few days, Laura and I took several more excursions into the forest to gather wood and forage. We encountered the spider once more, and the System let us know that it was a level 2 Venomweaver. I somehow managed to kill it before Laura could freak the fuck out again. It was not an easy kill because the little bugger was as quick as the wind. But I was getting much better at wielding my whip, while Laura peppered it with pellets from her slingshot. Looting the body produced a vial of glowing sun-yellow venom and a couple of credits.

    My foraging skill increased by a level once we stripped a blackberry bush clean. Later that day we ate all of them, making all three of us positively ill. I swore I wouldn''t eat another blackberry for years. But I ate some the next day anyway. The fruit really helped break the monotony of those snack packs we now had to eat for every meal.

    We still had flour, salt, oil, and sugar in the kitchen but we decided to keep until we were in dire circumstances because it didn''t go off.

    Laura and I were growing more confident with each trip outside our safety cocoon, and I figured we would soon expand our area of exploration. She had also started planning the ring of traps that she would place around our home.

    "Can we place the blueprint now, Dee?" Tobi asked me after a very sad lunch.

    "Sure," I said and the four of us walked to the newly expanded area on the side of the cabin. I wasn''t sure how this was going to work.

    When we purchased the blueprint for Cloud''s barn, it popped into existence in my Blueprints tab I tried pulling it out and only received a prompt back.

    Barn (Small)

    A housing unit suitable for different species of domesticated animals

    Place Blueprint Now? Yes/No

    I accepted the prompt and I found myself looking down at the cabin from a bird''s eye view, just like when I used the land claim token. It was disorienting for a hot minute. I heard Tobi and Laura saying something but it was like they were talking behind a wall of water.

    I quickly realised I made a mistake in expanding our land. I kept it too close to the cabin and now the new barn would have to be built with little space between the two structures. It was dumb and short-sighted. But it was something to think about the next time we decided to expand. Just because the blueprint asked for 50 square meters of land didn''t mean that we should only add 50 square meters to our total claim.

    Sighing deeply, I played around with the positioning of the barn. At least we didn''t have a bunch of animals that would stink up the place. Cloud was a suspiciously odourless alien sheep, which was a relief.

    I confirmed the placement and I was back in my body in a blink of an eye.

    "Dee, are you okay?" Laura was holding my arm, concern clear on her face. "You went completely blank on us just then."

    "I''m fine.

    "Look!" Tobi called out for our attention. In the space where I positioned the blueprint there was a hologram of the barn we were going to build, in the usual System green. As I focused on it, a description box appeared.

    Barn (Small)

    A housing unit suitable for different species of domesticated animals.

    If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.

    Resources needed: 566 planks, 625 roof tiles, 4100 nails

    Energy: 5271

    My heart sank as I read the material and Energy requirements to build this structure. We were going to spend so much on it. Without even considering the amount of Energy we would need to make all the items, it would take us 45 days of dumping our full reservoirs once a day. It was a staggering amount.

    The mother and son duo probably came to the same conclusion, if their faces were any indication of what was going to be necessary. As it were, I was the only one able to make planks and nails from wood resources that I pulled from the trees. This was a nightmare.

    "Well, we better get started!" I said with a hollow excitement in my voice. Nobody bought it.

    "I think we should add more to the garden first," Laura said and we all turned to the rows of raised beds where our little vegetables grew. I raised my hand to send the Energy I had banked, even though it wasn''t strictly necessary. All we really had to do was intend our energy to go to the garden and it would just go there. Anything to make the veggies grow a tiny bit faster.

    Cloud must have sensed our disappointment because he bleeped at us and nudged Tobi in the side. His fur did that strange shifty dance and fell on the floor in a pile that just begged to be spun into thread.

    "Good for you to finally contribute!" I chastised the alien and gave his bug-eyed head a pet.

    "Thanks!" Tobi said, his mood shifting significantly upwards. "I can finally try out my skills!"

    "What skills did you get, Tobi?" I asked.

    The boy blushed and looked to the side.

    "I have Spinning, Dyeing, Weaving, Knitting, and Sewing."

    "Those are all good skills," his mother said carefully. She was likely still upset that the kid didn''t tell us his Class options but didn''t want to start an argument. Tobi seemed to be a flight risk, escaping whenever he thought there might be an argument or chastisement.

    I just figured he would tell us whenever he was ready. We all experienced more than our fair share of traumatic experiences since the Integration. It would make anyone

    Tobi picked up the hue-shifting wool off the floor and left it on the porch table.

    "I am going to look for a spindle in the Shop. Is that okay?"

    "How many credits do we have left?" I asked.

    "We have 2743. I checked this morning, " Laura said.

    "Then go for it."

    He shot off inside the cabin and came back with a small wooden object in his hand. He sat down on the chair and started working. He took a handful of Clouds wool and gently pulled on it to separate the fibre.

    I walked up to him and he gave me a shy smile. Laura went back behind the cabin, probably to fetch some water from the well. We always needed more water.

    "I have some idea how this works, but I think I will have to practice a lot."

    I eyed the wool that the sheep graciously decided to bestow upon us.

    "So, what are the steps? I''ve never seen it done. I don''t think a whole lot of people know how to do it."

    "To spin yarn?" he paused uncertainly. "Well, I think there are a few steps that I won''t have to do because Cloud''s wool seems processed somehow. I don''t know how to explain it. Just watch, okay?"

    I nodded and sat next to him.

    He took a small piece of fibre and carefully hooked it onto the spindle''s metal hook, giving it a gentle twist to secure it. Holding the fibre steady in one hand, he spun the spindle with the other, setting it into motion. As the spindle spun, he slowly let the fibre slip between his fingers, allowing the twist to work its way up, transforming the loose wool into a fine strand of yarn. With a slightly awkward drop, the spindle spun toward the ground, leaving behind a small length of iridescent, newly spun yarn.

    "That''s awesome, Tobi!" I said.

    "I think I will get better as I go on."

    "Dee, you have to see this," Laura''s voice took our attention away. She walked hurriedly onto the porch.

    "What''s up?" I asked.

    "I think it is better if you come in the back and take a look."

    Tobi and I followed her behind the cabin. I surveyed clearing but I could only see scorched remains of Vineslashers that I didn''t really care to clean up yet.

    "There," she pointed to the woods. A blue haze was coming through the trees, pulsing in intensity like a heartbeat. It had a rather ominous quality to it.

    "What the hell?" Tobi said.

    "Language!" his mother chided him. The kid had the decency to look somewhat chastised.

    I sighed.

    "You know what this looks like?"

    Both of them gave me one of their signature looks.

    "It looks like we''re going out on a little mission."

    Name: Diana Mond

    Age: 25

    Class: Homesteader

    Level: 2, 58/300 exp

    Strength: 4

    Constitution: 6

    Intelligence: 6

    Wisdom: 4

    HP: 60/60

    Energy: 4/60