JOE REID HAS JOINED THE GUILD

WENDY MAYUKO HAS JOINED THE GUILD

RUNDELL ADLAWAN HAS JOINED THE GUILD

RAVERLY CRESENT HAS JOINED THE GUILD

STEFANIE KOEGEL HAS JOINED THE GUILD

KIKI MORIN HAS JOINED THE GUILD

The villagers also joined the guild. The next thing I did was try out the outhouse. Not Joe’s. Kalli beat me to that one as she always did. Once I got a look at his creation, it was a simple matter of selecting a rock to make a duplicate. The only difference was that mine wasn’t connected to any kind of a sewer or latrine system like Joe’s surely was.

He stood outside when I finished. “Now that I know you can copy my work, I’m going to need you to make five more of those.”

After creating a row of toilets for Joe, I made my way back to Laria to begin her education. Only, by the time I got there, a group of villagers were seated with her.

A short muscular man with the beginnings of a beard spoke. “Lord Melvin, we were all talking and looking at the books that you provided for Laria. We also would like to learn our trades. Please help us.”

I sighed and took a look at the group seated before me. They were the people I had assigned very important classes to. Beatrice the chef sat next to the man who had spoken. His name was Gavin who happened to be the Smith. Next to him was a bald man named Everard who was our tanner.

Creating some language primers, I set one down in front of each of them. “Today you are going to learn how to read. We should get the children over here too. Reading and writing are important skills that everyone should learn.”

“What about the others?” Laria asked, looking at the other villagers who were all absorbed in tasks already.

I was beginning to think about the next step when I replied. “I’d love to teach you all but the others have important things to do. You can teach them later once you’ve mastered your trades.”

My next task was to make a library for all of the books they would need. I took out my M-Phone to see if Earth’s YouTube would be accessible from Gaia. Unfortunately, my phone wasn’t fancy enough to have an interdimensional data plan.

Trying out guild chat for the first time, I said,

Can the kids come to the breakfast table? I have a fun game for them to play.

The kids showed up with Wendy in tow. She had been keeping them occupied so that everyone else could learn their new classes. Wendy eyed me curiously as she had all of the kids sit on the floor. “What’s up, Mel? Why did you need the kids?”

I couldn’t tell if she was still mad at me for assuming Joe was sleeping in her hut. “We are teaching the crafters how to read. I thought the children would be quick learners. Besides, they will want to learn sooner or later.”

“Sounds fun.” Wendy agreed, flashing a smile at me.

Satisfied that she wasn’t mad, I turned to her and Kalli. “Can the two of you begin their lessons? I want to see if I can change one of the huts into a library.”

“Sure thing.” Kalli chirped, picking up one of the language primers and flipping through it.

I decided to use my own hut for the experiment. While I could have asked Joe to make me a library, he was busy designing the rest of the village so I didn’t want to disturb him.

The hut was too small for what I had in mind so I focused on the hut and willed it to stretch, pushing mana into the walls.

ENTERING WORLD EDITOR MODE

The village suddenly became very small as I found myself staring down from above. When I targeted a building, a new type of menu that I had never seen before appeared.

Structure Name

Simple Building

Structure Grade

C

Structure Color

Brown

Structure Type

7

Maximum Capacity

2

Landmark

No

Upgradable

Yes

Out of curiosity, I scanned all of the structures in the village. The straw huts were F-Grade structures. Nearly every building in the village was rated for two occupants. I could target everything in the village, including the walls Joe had erected.

Outside of the village, I noticed that I could also target the surrounding area as well. The menu for things like trees and hills looked different from the structure menu.

Object Name

Papybara Tree

Object Grade

D

I was beginning to wonder why I was never offered a tutorial for the World Manipulator skill. All along, I had been under the assumption that ‘World Editor’ had been my skill that allowed me to edit objects. With that in mind, I took another look at my skills and traits.

Skills

Traits

World Editor

Bloodline: M

Manipulation

Bloodline: Shaw

Controlling Voice

Bloodline: Ramsey

Buff (Edited)

Enhanced Regeneration

Summon (Edited)

Enhanced Mana Regeneration

Command Attention

Absorption

Formulate

Control

Cloud Judgement

God Eye (Edited)

Assimilate Technology

Perfect Pitch

Mantis Style

Track Scent

Magical Disease Immunity (Edited)

Matechat[Kalliphae Hellquist] (Edited)

Inseperable[Kalliphae Hellquist]

Till Death Do You Part [Kalliphae Hellquist]

When it first popped up, I was shocked to see all of the new skills. Then I remembered the fact that I had picked up quite a few new ones when I touched the mana cores of the people Mr. Ramsey made me help. That, and I had touched my friends too.

There was also the matter of my cursed trait, Till Death Do You Part. I was going to have to be extra careful not to piss Kalli off. Getting dumped suddenly had a whole new meaning.

The two skills I was awakened with were World Editor and Manipulation. If World Editor was the menu system for world-building then Manipulation must have been the skill for editing items. At least that was my assumption.

Part of me wondered why the system hadn’t offered me a tutorial. I thought back to the two times that I had received one. Both times I had expressed a need to learn how something was done. The first time I was offered a tutorial was the time I gained a new skill and needed to learn how to apply it. The most recent time was when I wanted to teach the villagers how to read.

I didn’t need a tutorial in my current case nor did I want one. Part of the fun of using a new skill was figuring out how it worked on my own. The first thing I did was to place a moat around the village, just outside of Joe’s walls.

Then I brought the treeline closer, enclosing the village in a dense forest. A single trail was the only way in or out. I lined that with a winding paved road that let out into the surrounding area.

My concerned girlfriend interrupted the project. Mel, something is happening outside of town. The trees somehow came to life and have moved right up to the walls.

The others echoed her concerns. Joe asked, Why is there a moat? Did somebody dig a moat without telling me?

I decided to answer everyone in guild-chat, considering the villagers were probably concerned as well.

Don’t worry guys. I am just doing a little terraforming.

Joe fired back in group, still not used to chatting in the guild. What? How?

I’m going to be doing some work inside town soon. Don’t be shocked if the buildings change.

Joe practically growled in group chat. You had better not damage my buildings. I just spent the last two days fixing them up.

The villagers probably thought I was having a one-sided conversation. I shrugged it off and decided to get to work on the village. Starting with the structure that Kalli and I shared, I decided to see how much I could edit it.

The first thing I noticed was that I could change the name. As that part was purely cosmetic, I decided to call it “Kalli’s Place”. Then I tried upgrading the structure grade.

ERROR: ADDITIONAL MATERIALS REQUIRED

I added it to my bucket list to figure out what was needed to make an S-ranked structure. Thinking of Kalliphae, I changed the color to red. Of the structure types I could choose, types 7, 8, and 9, each represented a different style. Types 1 through 6 were not allowed for the current type of structure.

Joe had chosen to make all of the buildings type 7, so I changed ours to a 9. I also wanted to make our house bigger so I increased the maximum capacity to ten. Landmark must have been reserved for something else because the system didn’t allow me to change that category to ‘Yes’.

I dropped out of the World Editor Mode to check the results of my handiwork. The entire village was gathered around my hut when I appeared on the ground.

Kalli gave me a curious look and asked, Were you just flying?

It’s part of a new skill I have, called World Editor.

While I called it new, I was just embarrassed to admit that I had it all along and never tried it out properly. Kalli and I toured our new home while the others peeked in the door. One new feature of our house was that it suddenly had stairs leading to a second floor.

Hmmm, it looks like the building grows upwards when it doesn’t have space to stretch out.

Kalli nodded and smiled, not knowing what to make of my comment. The building itself was still rather plain and made of the same materials that Joe had put into it. I was going to have to do some research if I wanted to improve on the design.

When we walked outside, I was bombarded with questions from everyone.

Wendy asked, Can you make my house green?

Joe insisted on upgrades of his own. Make mine bigger just like yours.

Several of the villagers also wanted bigger homes for themselves. It turned out that the kids were all housed together because their parent’s huts were too small to house the entire family.

I started by filling all of the requests. The result was a mismatched cluster of houses of various colors and sizes. Another thing I noticed in World Editor mode was that I could move structures around the village. The initial placement of the huts was not very efficient which resulted in a lot of wasted space.

By placing the houses closer together, I freed up a lot of space and was able to make some additional buildings by making copies of the existing ones. I was surprised that I didn’t need additional materials when I did that. The cost seemed to come out of my mana pool.

The editing process was a huge drain on my mana. As the afternoon wore on, I became more and more exhausted. Before I stopped, I managed to make a dining hall, library, and a classroom for the villagers.

When I left World Editor Mode for the last time that day, I managed to edit a couch and slump into it. Kalli could feel that I was back and asked, Do you want to come to dinner?

I shook my head and replied.

I don’t think I can move. Can you bring me something?

She giggled. Sure. We got another meat for dinner today but Beatrice says it might not taste good. She tried to make a roast using just the pictures in your guidebook.

The way I feel right now, I can eat anything.

She brought back a heaping plate of food along with Wendy and Joe. I was starting to think that they were giving me extra food when they still didn’t have enough.

I was about to edit another couch when Joe held up a hand and what appeared to be nano-bots emanated from his arms. I watched intently as he created a couch in front of us.

Joe snickered at me and said, “You aren’t the only one that can make fancy things.”

The meat was rather bland as Kalli has warned me. The seasoning that Beatrice used on the meat was unlike anything I had tasted on Earth. I edited some Worcestershire sauce to make the meal palatable. Joe laughed at me and said, “You’re ruining the natural flavor of the zagriel meat. I know it’s a little gamey but I’m told that the monster was very difficult to hunt down.”

I shrugged and said, “I guess I’ll just have to get used to it.”

Once I managed to fill my stomach, I asked Joe, “How long until you’ve made us a wagon? We need to start making our way to those other villages. I’m worried that more people may die the longer we delay.”

Wendy smiled and replied, “Joe was telling me that we should be ready to go tomorrow. The last thing that we need to do is have you create a stockpile of food for the villagers. We were thinking of a grain silo or a good supply of rice. You can summon something like that, right?”

The thought of editing large quantities of food made my shoulders slump. I nodded quietly and said, “I suppose we can do both. Do you need me to make the silo too?”

Joe shook his head and said, “I think I can handle that. I know you have a lot on your hands. We also need to take a couple of the villagers with us as guides. I was thinking we take two of them just in case. They probably can’t spare any more than that in the first place.”

Wendy had just taken my plate and I was about to climb into bed when there was a knock on the door. Beatrice poked her head in and said, “I know it’s late but the kids want milk and cookies. Since we are going to be losing you soon, I think it’s about time you tell me how they are made.