“You are going to bankrupt me you if keep this up, boy.”

I hear as soon as I step into the smithy from the tall and strong man looking at me. Blackwood holds his hammer swing short. Putting it down he stands staring at me with his hands to his sides and a proud grin on his face.

“Well, that is what I came to talk to you about,” I say while approaching. Before I continue, he rummages through his coin purse and gives me 40 silvers coins for my work from yesterday and today.

“Here.” He says delivering the money. “One of the marked characteristics about people like you is that you learn not to think on the limited terms of the system, you come up with workarounds. Some that I never even heard of before. I know of a couple of ways to remotely work a forge, but you managed to convince it you were in the smithy.” He says as if I was a kitten that had left the playpen through a path he didn’t even think existed. Not that I mind the implicit comparison in his demeanor. For all I know he is hundreds of years old, and by those metrics, I’m just a pup.

I take the coins, and with a flick of my wrist, they head into my inner world. All except for five silver that I return to him.

“Later I’m gonna get a few ingots of deep steel to play with. Just keep them for now.”

“Ok.” He answers with a glint in his eyes at seeing my sleight of hand.

“Is bankrupting you something to be concerned with?”

“That is a complicated answer, there are aspects to why I cannot enter into, but no. At least not with the paltry sums we are talking about for now with +5 weapons.”

I wonder at the mechanics of the whole thing, and if he will be somehow using his money or something, but I let the question lie for now. What I ask next is one of the two main reasons I showed up.

“Can you pay me through the village bank?”

He stands back, and with a scrunched-up face holds his chin while looking at nothing particular in the celling. He stands there for a few moments trying to work something out in his head before answering.

“Yes,” He begins slowly but gains confidence with each word. “From what I heard about the village’s bank, I think that should work just fine. The one thing is that we will need some kind of ledger. I’m thinking a metal one where you strike a chisel to mark it. I can tell who worked the metal with ease. That would be enough of a guarantee, along with the same for whoever is withdrawing the money ….” He then starts mumbling with his head lowered, running through the possibilities in his mind.

“Ok,” I interrupt him. “There are a few details to work out. I will tell the guild to come here soon after I send my mana to the forge.”

“That works for me. By tomorrow I will have all the logistics worked out. Some things are a pain in the butt under the system.”

“Now onto the other reason I stopped by, do you take orders?” Hearing that, he shows a massive grim, but instead of speaking, he lets me continue. Wondering why he is so happy, I continue swinging for the moon. “I want to commission a plus 10 weapon.”

Hearing that he deflates a little at my outrageous request, but instead of rejecting me, he just answers:

“Sure, technically I could forge a +10 sword, but you don’t have enough mithril to pay for it. Nobody would even be able to be in the forge while it happened.”

With his words in mind, I try to make sense of it. And after a moment, I ask.

“How much would it cost to commission a +5 weapon.”

“The same price as all +5 weapons available.”

Almost like we were playing Charade or something, I pay attention to each of his words and gestures, trying not to miss a single hint he is giving out. I feel as if I’m inches away from something.

“What about a +6 weapon?”

“About 2 Gold, depending on the model.” Hearing that, I find it slightly strange. He has indicated that the next tiers cost about double the previous one. At least when we are talking +6, +7, and maybe +8. He has to be cryptic to pass along the information, but I got that much already. But we will be paying quadruple the current price. Curious, I then ask:

“What about +7 and +8 ones.”

With an excited tone, he shows how glad he is at this next question, and happily answers.

“They would cost 10 and 80 gold respectively.”

“So, we can order them, but they will be significantly more expensive than if we haven't unlocked the proper tier.”

“No comment.”

I don’t let his denial of further articulation on the subject detract from my mood.

“Do you do custom armor sets?”

“Yep, though at the moment only up to 4 defense points.”

“Cost?”

“Standard prices. Though I got to say, I thought I would need to bash your head before you to finally get it.”

“Well, it seems as if everyone in the village is more focused on making things themselves rather than ordering from the system. No offense.”

“I understand the feeling very well. I know it isn't personal, just you all being too stuck in your heads sometimes. Though after this last attack it was a matter of time. The enemy leader had a sword 2 tiers better than what blacksmiths normally produce without anyone talented working on his forges.”

“Well, in a few specific fields, it seems our village puled much of the talent pool. Not everything, mind you, but Charlies reports on other villages' progression, and the people migrating over are telling.”

“You guys already unlocked this knowledge but I will reiterate. Villages are fairly uniform people in them. Base personality, mindset, and talents follow along similar lines. Besides usually having everyone with at least 2 degrees of separation from each other.”

“Shouldn't a fair few of us remember each other, if that is the case?”

“I said 2 degrees of separation. The system purposefully excludes anyone you remember from being in the village with you. There are rare exceptions, and the village traits are rarely perfectly uniform with people manifesting them in different ways. But as a general trend, it’s easy to see things developing a certain way.”

“Interesting. Now, about my order,” I say pulling out a sheet from my inner world. “I was thinking. At first, I just want to test some of your capabilities. So I set up a varied set of parts.”

“Ok, let me look at it.” After a moment going over it, he continues. “You know that the system places limitations on many of the things these pieces are supposed to go in?”

“Yep, I just want to see what limitations there are for a few of my upcoming projects.”

“Like what?”

“For now, I don’t know the exact forms yet, but one of them will definitely be some form of transportation. If I could get an airplane working that would be great, but I think we will have to start smaller.”

I watch as he smiles mischievously.

“That’s my boy. Keep being ambitious, it will serve you well under the system.”

“Are flying contraptions that big of a deal under the system?”

“Yes and no, I can’t get on specifics, but there are a few limitations in place and special environments that are harsh on flight craft. Now, if there is nothing else, go on, get on with your projects.” He shoos me out of his shop, and I’m left stumped.

Well, at least he is excited about the prospects, that must mean something good. I accelerate the wheeled wooden contraption carrying me. Not to full speed, or anywhere close to it, but this time feeling more confident as the wound to my side is healing nicely, I go at about twice walking speed. I could actually walk with some support, but this is faster.

Not that I can go much faster with the current setup, but I can always come up with an improved method of driving my tricycle.

As I arrive at the start of a visible grove growing around my favorite sleeping spot in the village, I enter it and start to expand it. I would spend the next couple of days here, so this was the least I could do. It only takes me about a thousand mana and a few minutes to have something perfect for a short stay. It’s cozy and has a small workshop for my tinkering.

Next, after having dealt with a couple of things I wanted, my awareness goes back to the roots spread all over the village and beyond. I keep this up only for a few moments. I drink in the feeling of connection. When I’m calm and centered, I try to get in the same state I was in when I finished making the coin.

The mental headspace where I can almost see the individual cells. I look inside and take single leaves or one of the sprouts growing in the earth to experiment. I try each of them. What do they taste like, their texture, feeling, resemblance, and what are their system effects? Everything I can think of is meticulously cataloged.

Having everything in a row is not the ideal state, but it’s not too big of a problem. And I will continue to learn about each of them in the time to come.

I note down each of the effects they have on my body. Not only the system-induced effects but the normal ones that all food brings. A few increase healing, others mana, and finally, I find one likely to increase stamina. For some strange reason, stamina is neglected, but at least now we have access to it.

My goal is not that for now. Taking a few of the sweeter ones, like the equivalent of carrots and beets, for their sugar content, and a few smaller and softer fruits similar to tomatoes, I earnestly start to experiment.

The people from this village that have tomatoes are lucky. Well, we do have carrots, and a couple of other things so it was not that big of a trade-off, but come on. They have tomatoes.

Tomatoes trump everything, except for berries.

One of the most common complaints I hear is about the lack of fruits. And yeah, other fruits would be nice, but I want my wild berries. I will not rest until I get some of them.

With the components picked out and tested, I start to mesh them. Rather than proper DNA editing, what I can do is closer to grafting plants to each other. Dozens, hundreds of attempts follow. A few mana points, grow them to about the size of a pea, try them and go back to tinkering.

And so a long and repetitive process of trial and error starts. I play around for hours, and more than ten thousand mana goes into growing these make-shift fruits. In the end, I fail miserably to achieve my initial goal.

I try with many combinations, and I begin to understand more and the underlying limitations of this technique. So what at the start may have taken me hundreds of random attempts to get right, I can do on the second or third iteration by the end. There are however a few fundamental limitations in place.

Hours later as I’m almost giving up, a couple of people arrive at my temporary abode to take the planting contraptions. With my roots, I bring enough seeds for this initial wave over the next few minutes, and as I put them all into the planting staffs they start to carry them away. I needed to send a steady stream of mana their way to grow a few this fast, but it was worth it.

“So, just send the barest sliver of mana to activate it while the staff is touching the ground?” One of them asks me after I explain how they work.

“Yep, there is no secret to it. It uses very little mana, only about a tenth of a point to drive each of the seeds underground. Now, the main focus should be to plant them at most 20 meters from each other. In long lines, instead of trying to cover space. Covering wide areas can be done later.”

“Fine with us.”

“And start with lines to my home. Make sure they are redundant, like at least three, and each seed at around 10 meters from each other.”

“Ok, is that all?”

“Yeah, go ahead.”

The head scout, hurries everyone up, before heading behind them.

After the interaction, I’m a little re-energized. Even if I utterly failed to get anything close to a proper berry, my knowledge is far from useless. I can make something that everyone else will enjoy.

Concepts for fruits within my capabilities to make, considering my base components and skill level, swim in my head until I decide on something.

I begin with a tomato. After adding a significant amount of sugar, taking a bit of the distinct flavor, and lastly mixing part of the flavor from a couple of the herbs and roots I gathered, something very similar to a persimmon comes to life. It isn’t perfect, and it’s been years since I have tried one, but it was the only fruit I knew to be within my current capabilities. At least with actually resembling the original fruit.

Almost 20 mana goes into growing a full-sized one in a minute or so, and I take a big bite out of it. Different from my experimentation witch was more like tedious work, this is a simple experience I was missing. As the juices hit my tongue, I can think of nothing else I would rather be doing right now.

It seems as if after only two or three bites, I’m already licking my fingers. Though I could always make thousands and absolutely stuff myself, that seems wrong. I feel grateful for the capability that Pando’s seed brought me, and start working on my next ideas.

After all, if I could ‘create’ a fruit from scratch, why couldn’t I improve on the mana leaves or their cousins gathered from the other villages? Now, that is something marketable. It seems most of my actions always have some way to be monetized. Well, it’s not a bad thing, I will need a lot of money to leverage some of my plans.