The cloud dropped me back off at the estate, and I quickly found that Mara and Nathan had decided to join me. Only they hadn’t made it very far.

Both of them were passed out on their backs in the dirt about ten feet from the fast travel platform, their shoulders just barely touching, like they’d been stargazing before they fell asleep. Nathan was snoring up a storm, so I didn’t worry too much about waking them up as I crept by.

Ezzie said.

I said.

Ezzie said.

I brought up the lean-to outline and dragged it across the map, trying to decide where I wanted to put it. Given the snoring, some distance was probably needed. And I figured that they’d want their privacy, anyway.

So I dropped the shelter close to where I was standing, just a few feet from where the cloud showed up every day, which was about as far as I could get from my own buildings. But before I confirmed my selection, I rotated the building so that its opening would face away from everything else.

Ezzie screamed through the link.

I said.

I said, as I headed over.

I nudged Nathan with the toe of my boot.

He opened one eye, grunted, then went back to sleep. So I nudged him again, and he did the same thing.

“I built you a lean-to. And a pair of bedrolls.”

“Bed?” Mara said. She sat up, wavering in place a little, and squinted at the lean-to in front of her as if it were blurry and she was trying to get it into focus. Which was probably the case. “Ohhh.” She climbed to her feet and threw an arm over my shoulder. “Help?”

“Sure,” I said, as I led her toward the shelter.

Ezzie said.

“My Pilot wants to know what your mining skill is,” I said. “And apparently she thinks this is an opportune time.”

“Hundred something?” Mara said. She pulled away from me at the entrance of her lean-to. “Is this…mine?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I can make two of them, so you each get your own if you want. Or you can share, whatever.”

“This is a piece of crap,” Mara said, swaying. “And I love it.”

“…Okay?” I said. “I’m glad you uh, like it?”

She laid down on her bedroll, curled up into a ball, and passed out without another word.

Ezzie said.

I said.

Or we could use that building token we got from the mayor of Hillcrest a couple days back.>

I blinked. I’d completely forgotten about that.

Any building?>

I brought up the menus, determined to scroll through every last one of them.

I said.

{Personal Mine}

Cost: 20,000 Builder Coins

Benefit: Provides a steady supply of mining nodes. Mining nodes scale with the controlling Avatar’s level.

Ezzie said.

{Personal Mine} Upgrade: Gemstone Veins

Cost: 7,000 Builder Coins

Benefit: Nodes within the {Personal Mine} will provide 50% more Gemstones.

Selecting this upgrade will disable the Motherlode Veins upgrade.

I said.

Ezzie said.

I said.

Ezzie said. She deflated.

{Personal Mine} Upgrade: Motherlode Veins

Cost: 7,000 Builder Coins

Benefit: Nodes within the {Personal Mine} have a 10% chance to provide 250% more raw materials.

Selecting this upgrade will disable the Gemstone Veins upgrade.

Ezzie said.

I sighed. That was a pretty convincing argument.

Ezzie said.

Ezzie hesitated again, and there was a slight pressure on my lower lip, as if she were biting hers.

I said.

Ezzie said.

I brought up the builder client and scrolled through until I found the mine. I selected the golden icon, and an absolutely massive outline filled the entire sky. Damn thing was bigger than my whole estate. And it was red, too, which seemed to indicate that I couldn’t place it where it was. But no matter where I moved the mine, the huge outline stayed red.

Ezzie whistled.

I said. I hadn’t considered the estate would extend downward. Did it extend upward then, too? A thought for another day. I pushed the outline deep into the ground, until only a hill stood above the dirt with a little opening carved into it, wooden rafters framing the entryway. Finally, the outline turned green.

Ezzie said.

I took a deep breath and confirmed my choice, earning a prompt in response.

You have inefficient {Building Coins} to build this structure.

You have 1 {Building Token} to allocate.

Use {Building Token}?

I said. I nodded and confirmed my selection.

A single Constructor swept down out of the clouds and got to work, but it left as soon as the hill was finished. Then the ground began to buzz and seethe beneath my feet.

Ezzie said.

I said.

The link went dead, so I headed over to the cookpot. The crops we’d planted before hadn’t come in yet, so I just had the cookpot make eleven iterations of plain fish stew—one for me, the rest for Marcus—then pack each of them into my inventory.

Interestingly enough, I earned eleven full points in cooking, bringing my skill up to fifteen, and unlocking a few more recipes. One of them stuck out in particular:

Recipe: {Fish Curry}

Requirements: 2 Fish, 1 Rice, 1 Onion, 1 Tomato.

{Fish Curry}

Effect: Clears all hunger-related debuffs and provides the Well-fed buff. Also provides +2 Constitution for 24 hours. This effect does not stack with similar effects.

I didn’t have the materials for that yet—I hadn’t planted onion or tomato—but the presence of stat food so early into cooking was reassuring. I still had a ton of coins, so I planted a pair of seedlings for each of those vegetables over by the rest of the crops and decided to call it a night. One more day before the invasion. I’d have to make it count.