Chapter 46: Sigil Lake, A Prosperous Future Ahead

  It had been a full week since Theo and Grace had completed the Abble Tree dungeon together for the first time. In that time, Theo had tended his garden every morning before helping Willam with his own chores and fieldwork before assisting anyone else with their needs. Being helpful was not just fulfilling by itself, but it sure helped his skills grow.

  While focused on his gardening, Willam’s farming work doubling down on many of the same aspects, the greatest strength of Level Two and Level Three skills was not the percentage boost it gave unto itself, but the effect it provided to all skills—Theo’s stats. The more skills he had, the more effective his future Level Two skills would become. Even with that being the case, though, Theo enjoyed helping and feeling needed.

  He wasn’t the greatest at anything, but his attitude towards learning and helping made it difficult for the others to leave him out. Days went by where the only things he’d do besides farmwork and gardening was helping with the construction of the Barge. His sore hands—filled with splinters from the rough handles of hammers and aching thumbs where the hammerhead had thumped against him—were signs of pride in his eyes.

  Opportunity, something a fresh town had in abundance, was key to improving oneself, not least for a blank slate in an adult body like Theo. His Essence of the Lunar Empress trait made itself known many times over the past week. It stated that the world would always watch him and treat him more favourably than others. It did.

  Sometimes it took longer than Theo would’ve liked. Sometimes it took just a single attempt. But the world watched him and found him deserving of skills as a reward for his efforts.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level One skill Wind Affinity.

  Wind Affinity (Level One): Fssh. All stats +5.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level One skill Weeding.

  Weeding (Level One): Plant racism. All stats +5.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level One skill Carpentry.

  Carpentry (Level One): Wooding in the morning and wooding all night. All stats +5.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level One skill Construction.

  Construction (Level One): You have started your journey as a baker of buildings. All stats +5.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level One skill Building.

  Building (Level One): Raise the roof. All stats +5.

  Construction and building, while related, didn’t mean the same thing, it turned out. While helping construct a building had netted Theo a bunch of building-related skills—more than even those—Theo had also earned a variety of others. He gained the fishing skill and the filleting skill from a short tutelage from Hunter. While they rarely filleted the fish they grilled, higher forms of cooking often required it, making it a nice skill to know. He’d also earned a skill for foraging with Phoebe Phoebs, and a short stint in the woods under Julie’s watchful gaze awakened woodcutting within him. The latter were the ones that had taken a bit of time.

  His garden was flourishing, and according to Willam, would soon bear fruit and berries. The violetberry bushes were looking good, their varied early growth having long since evened out. Dotting the bushes’ flowery branches were small green growths that were almost spherical. In a short time, their colour would change to a pale blue as they grew, before red would start mixing in. On reaching the colour that was their namesake, they were ready to harvest. A trait of the sour berries was that they could linger for quite some time on their mother bush before going bad, giving Theo ample time to harvest them. The faster he did though, the faster more berries would grow back.

  His gingerelli and limen would all take a few more days at least before Willam considered them harvestable, an estimate that considered the quicker-than-normal growth Theo’s water and soil provided. The banaberry bushes, which were already the largest of his plants by far—though their trunks were bare except for a fuzzy-leaved top hat—would take another week at minimum.

  Food wasn’t a problem for the villagers of Sigil Lake yet. Even without taking Phoebe’s foraging and Hunter’s fishing into account, Fischer had finally tracked what amounted to a horde of deer to the place they called home. Theo expected them to be more nomadic, but these deer commuted to graze before returning home with their bellies full. Being overconfident in hunting them could still scare them away, but this was where Fischer’s skills lay—knowing which deer to stalk, knowing when to strike and when to stay his hand.

  Overhunting wasn’t too much of a risk with a single hunter and so few mouths to feed, but having depended on butchers in his previous town, Fischer’s skill in parting the animals was sub-par. This resulted in various pieces of carved meat containing pieces of bone and cartilage they shouldn’t, but that didn’t diminish the joy of juicy red meat. They needed proper utilities to prolong the meat’s life, such as a smoker or at least a cooling box. Now, every few days, they held a grand feast to gobble down the deer Fischer hunted for them.

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  Besides this, the town was rich with fresh abbles from the nearby dungeon. Grace delved into it whenever it allowed her, taking a new batch of the crimson delights with her when she cleared it. Theo had joined once more, earning himself some experience with spell weaving in a more stressful situation. He learned the 92% accurate Wind Blade glyph, managing an average of 85% of it at any time. At least it worked, and he started weaving it and water bullet both. As a reward, he got another identical set of clothes as his previous run, which may or may not be because the dungeon heard his plea the first time around.

  Theo’s new clothes caused some jealous feelings to arise within a certain faction within the town—the rest of the founding council. All the others had packed their own stuff for their travel to the town, but Wen and Willam had no opportunity to have done so. After their previous town failed the ranking and vanished from the face of the planet, all their things had gone with it. This wasn’t because of their unpreparedness, but a rule of the ranking; all things tied to the town’s economy, except for the bare minimum, had to remain behind. A failed economy had no place in this world, nor did the shoddy craftsmanship that produced such failed goods.

  Seeing that the nearby dungeon seemed happy to provide clothing, Wen and Willam had both joined the last delve. Grace wasn’t the most gracious of hosts during this run, at least not towards Wen, but the past week had done well for their relations even still. They still bickered more than anything, but Theo wasn’t the subject of most of their inane discussions anymore—not obviously, at least.

  The dungeon proved to be listening in on their conversations during the delve as Willam received the same trousers as Theo had, with self-cleaning abilities, but also a small sack of seeds. Rather than abble seeds as Theo suspected, the sack contained the seeds of a grain that was so rare neither of the two had even considered purchasing it—not like they could afford it if they had. Wen’s eyes lit up more than Willam’s at the sight, even as she held up her new favourite apron; the Abble-leather Apron of the Brewer. Besides the apron that provided fruitier undertones of all her fruit-based brews, Wen also received a pair of shoes; the Tavern Master’s Abble-leather boots, a pair of boots low enough for Theo to consider them normal shoes that absorbed spills from wooden flooring.

  During the past week, Sigil Lake had also experienced another of its firsts; visitors. There was no apparent reason for people to visit, nor room for them to sleep in, but each of the visitors had come for nothing else than to take in the effigy. Rumours had spread far and wide by then that the goddess Arcana herself touched ground in a nothing-town—whereupon her divine feet touched, a storm raged and the effigy rose in remembrance of the event.

  This wasn’t quite true, but considering how far the rumours had spread, Theo and the rest of the villagers could no longer stop them, no matter what they said.

  Grace was busy trying to convert the visitors to her new church. She had even dropped her other mouthful of titles for the more prestigious title First Storm of the Scorned Witch. Without a place for any to stay, she didn’t gain any new followers, but spreading the word of the religion that claimed the effigy was more important. Followers would come later. It didn’t help matters that people seemed almost terrified of the place, and most only came to check whether another set of rumours were true; that the effigy truly showed the Seat of the Queen, or maybe even the queen herself, a sign of utmost disrespect. That was true. While Grace, even Theo himself—the only to have shared a conversation with Arcana—had no clue why, Grace feigned knowledge as the First Storm of the Scorned Witch, the uppermost position of her church…as far as everyone else knew. Theo wanted no part in it, so his position as the true leader needed no attention.

  The First Storm claimed Arcana was upset with the Queen but would go into no further detail to anyone but the queen herself! It was a bold claim, and an even more daring challenge. The cleric claimed there was no way the queen would come, no matter the claims; doing so would be terrible publicity. Her people would have to believe the effigy was queen-commissioned and the town likewise formed by her deed. The queen would know, and she was powerless to say anything.

  Willam’s farm benefited from Theo’s magic just as the garden did, and after Theo’s endeavours of creating a well, realising only at the end that he hadn’t created a well at all but a crude reservoir, he was still happy with his experimentation and how much he’d learned from his efforts. This morning, there stood a large box there, half-buried in the hole he’d conjured. The planks of which it was made had deep grooves into which other planks could slide, making a tight seal that should contain the water finding its way inside the box. He spent the entire morning filling the reservoir with magical water to ease his own future burden and Willam’s. Now, Theo was no longer required to remain in the village every morning, and Willam didn’t require Theo’s help at all—though he appreciated it all the same.

  And now, whilst eyeing his latest system message with glee spread wide across his face, Bella Hankersson called for the townspeople to come take a gander at the last nail being hammered into the circular tavern-inn-town hall project. With the final nail, Sigil Lake would finally become a veritable town, not just a simple Fresh Start. Okay, Sigil Lake’s official designation would be village because of the temporary two-year immunity from rankings, but it would still be more attractive to skilled people wanting to move and make a new life for themselves.

  The townspeople gathered where Bella and Hank stood with grins as wide as Theo’s own had been moments ago. Theo’s heart pumped a marathon’s worth of blood, his fists clenching and unclenching in anticipation of what was about to happen. When all in the vicinity had gathered before the still-blue projection of the building, now filled to the brim with wooden bones, flesh, and muscles, Hank placed the final nail and drew his hammer back. A collective clenching was almost audible as the villagers’ breaths held.

  Thump!

  The expert builder required only one strike. Another message appeared beneath Theo’s previous one, and he smiled once more. Sigil Lake had a prosperous future ahead.

  Congratulations! You have earned the Level Two skill Water Affinity.

  Water Affinity (Level Two): Wet. All stats x1.05.

  Town Notification System.

  A Town-Central Building has been constructed within Town limits. New options available.