The next morning during breakfast the kids were sitting with Dan and Danny while she was busy making some of her energy balls.

"What's wrong with your legs?" Asked Naomi.

She looked down and wrapped the blanket around her skinny useless legs.

"I was born like this."

"Didn't you talk to a healer?" Trish wanted to know as she fed her slime one of the berries from Danny's fruit mixture. She has become more interactive with those around her and was mostly thanks to her friendship with Naomi and Jack, and of course her pet, Poppy. Jack had insisted she call it poopie, but there was no way that she would call her pet poopie, even if it does say that it's a unicorn poop slime, so Poppy it is.

"When my mother was pregnant with me, she drank some medicine that was supposed to help her with her sickness. Doctors only found out later that the medicine causes problems in unborn children. I was lucky, some of the other children had it much worse, I still got my legs but the muscles did not grow right, so I ended up with useless legs." She ruffled Trish's hair as she knew the kids hated it.

Naomi looked at Danny's covered legs. "I bet auntie Sher can heal them or maybe uncle Louie can make you a new pair, as he did for uncle Joe when he lost his arm."

Dan met Danny's eyes in shock. "He made an arm for somebody?"

"Yea, they were fighting a monster with two heads and it exploded, ripping uncle Joe's arm off. Uncle Louie took a golem arm and made it into a new arm for uncle Joe. Now he has a new metal arm and his arm works as good as new, I bet he can do the same for you."

They looked at each other over Naomi's head

Dan ruffled her hair, "we will talk to them thanks squirt."

She swiped his hand away and straightened her hair while scolding him.

Taking their breakfast on the go, Louie together with Leon and two of the guards, Sean and Barry, had gone back down to the bridge and had taken on guard duty while he had done the last finishes on the bridge and the structures on the pier.

The pets and BOB had left earlier back across the river and up to continue with their building or weaving project.

With the radius of his Construction> spell at just under twenty-five meters, it was easy to smooth off the small things even in the low morning light.

Louie was happy as long as the arches over the river were intact, and he made sure that he compressed the stone of the bridge till it was more than enough to support ten times the weight of the stone used in sculpting the structure.

After he was finished with the bridge and some shelters on the pier, he started by widening the footpath he had sculpted the night before and turned it into a proper road up to the place where they made camp and where he intended to make the first hairpin bend for the switchback road up the cliff.

By the time they reached the campsite, everybody was done with breakfast and the site was cleared and packed up, everybody was waiting and fell in as he continued with the road up the cliff.

He widened the hairpin bends and sculpted benches and seating for twenty people because he thought that the road down or up the cliff might be more taxing to some than others and a place to rest your weary legs would always be welcomed by other travelers.

As they were taking a breather and a sip of water from his canteen he looked at the walls.

"Damn, this canyon is filthy with metal veins."

"Really?" He looked around but didn't see any veins.

"Yea." But he shook his head at Leon, "It's not visible to the naked eye, and I don't get the option to claim any of the veins as I did at the mine. I don't understand this, there must be something that I'm missing."

"Maybe it's something to do with this 'structure' that you claimed."

"Maybe. It's just that I don't like mysteries much."

Leon shrugged and looked out the opening and up the cliff, "maybe we will find out more when you reach the cavern up above."

Louie joined him looking out and up at the hole in the cliff about thirty meters above them.

"Yea I hope so."

They went back to the rest of the party and he started on the next piece of the road again.

Instead of just dumping the excess rock as he had done with the road down, he had decided to use the stone the same way he had at the bridge, by compressing it into the walls, roof, and supports of the roadway, in doing so he minimizes the need to dump the excess rock out the openings and lessening the risk of the rocks actually damaging the bridge or structures below them on the canyon floor as well as strengthening the road.

They reached the spot across from where Louie had claimed the structure in the opposite canyon wall and after making sure there were no monsters inside he opened a hole in the wall and they entered the cavern.

The cavern looked the same, if somewhat smaller, like the one in the opposite cliff except with one big difference. There was what looked like a big ass stone door in one of the walls, there was no handle and it was unlike any stone that they had ever seen before.

His Construction> did not affect the door.

In fact, no matter how he tried he couldn't get his spell to work on any of the walls around the door, every time he tried anything near or around the door his spell would just fizzle out, it was as if there were something in the walls the door was set in that negated the use of the spell.

Even his said that there was nothing but ordinary stone there, no door, no nothing but stone, stone that his spells did not affect.

He moved around and started marking the walls with stone lines where his Construction> started to affect the walls and pretty soon they saw that the lines were all connected.

They backed up to where they entered the cavern and looked at the wall with the door and where he had used his spell to flatten out the walls leading to the 'door'.

The flattening all stops where it reaches the lines.

"How far can you 'reach' into the wall to sculpt the rock?" Leon wanted to know.

"Bout twenty-five meters, and it stops right there at the edge."

They looked at each other. "It looks like there is a room behind that door that your spell can't affect, this must be the structure that you claimed, and that looks like a kind of vault door, the kind you would use to seal off a cave from the rest of a building."

Louie nodded, "agreed, I think it was a security measure to keep people or things out of this cavern before it was opened when the mountain split, and there is something inscribed or worked into the walls of the structure that prevent you from just going through the walls into the structure."

Everybody looked excited at the new discovery.

"So what now?" Micheal wanted to know.

Sher shook her head and pissed on their batteries. "This is all wonderful and exciting," she waved at the door, "but we have a goal, we need to get to Paarl and see if there are people there that we can help and we need to set up a trading post so we can get a caravan back to our people."

She looked around at the sullen looks on the men's faces. "You guys can come back here later and explore this place to your heart's content."

Louie looked up at the door. *sigh* "You are right Sher, this place isn't going anywhere."

They decided that Louie would cover up the door and the cavern and move on, leaving the mystery for later when he knows more.

It took them the rest of the day to reach the top of the cliff, strangely it took less time to compress the stone into the road surfaces than it took to sculpt the road down, Louie just had to make sure that the road surface isn't smooth but had a rough texture, the last thing that was needed was someone slipping and sliding down the road when it gets wet or snowed.

It was getting late, but the sun was still visible between two peaks and there was enough light to see the bridge that the spiders made.

Louie sculpted a quick rest spot in the cliff after connecting his road with the existing one and modifying the space in front of the bridge by sculpting retaining walls closing off the open spaces next to it.

'Don't need children or over-eager adventurers slipping over the edge.'

Sher came up to him while the rest of the crew set up the camp and the tent, not that it was a lot of work, just imbue the campstone with mana and the tent erect itself.

"Have you checked your Vendor tablet?"

Louie stood up and looked at Sher. "No, why?"

"There are two dungeon locations nearly two kilometers apart, just in range of the tablet." She pointed south, the direction of the road, the direction that they would be traveling.

"You think that they might be near Paarl?"

"I hope so, we could really use a vendor now. There are so many things that I would like to ask it."

"Yea, it would have been nice if there were someplace we could go to get our questions answered. Like maybe a temple of Gaea?" Louie threw the hint at her.

Sher just shook her head, *sigh* "I have asked but the only response I received is my class quest that appears every time."

She shared the BB with him

Druid class quest

Gaea requests that you build five shrines and dedicate them to Her.

Reward:

Class advancement,

????

????

"Question marks?"

"Yea, I already made three, but I don't know if the third will count."

"Why not?"

"I made it down there, and there are no people down there." She nodded her head in the direction of the canyon.

"Aah, ok. Pity there is no counter showing how many you have done."

"Yea." She looked back to the road but saw that his attention was on the bridge that the spiders built.

He looked back to the camp.

"Tell everybody I will be back shortly, I'm going to check out the bridge, or is it a tunnel, a bridge-tunnel? Whatever." He chuckled as he turned towards the bridge.

Louie walked to the structure that the spiders had woven over the canyon. The inside was three meters tall and two meters wide, not big enough to fit the caravans but big enough for a person to safely cross.

He heard Sher shouting at him to not take too long as BOB joined him and they started walking through the tunnel over the canyon.

Louie tested the tunnel every now and then, he would stop and jump up and down even dropping a couple of blocks of stone in the middle of the bridge but it barely moved.

He walked out the tunnel at the other side, looked around, and nodded as he started back.

Before he entered the tunnel he got a brilliant idea, he started back but gathered stone and started weaving thin strands of it through and around the strands of spider silk, and as far as he walked he sprinkled the crushed mana powder from his pouch to mix it in with the stone flowing around the spilk.

Luckily he had crushed a lot of powder last time that he had meant to use while experimenting with creating guns, but since that project was put on the back burner for now, he had a lot of mana powder that he hadn't used yet.

As he got back to the end of the bridge/tunnel, he nodded at himself, looked around, and bent down and touched the bridge.

His mana dropped like a ten-ton block of stone over the edge of a cliff.

'Ow shit.'

He saw Sher rushed towards him screaming.

He just knew that he was a bloody idiot and that he had screwed up again as the last thing he saw was Diedre as she collapsed next to the tent in the distance and everything faded to black.

Slowly everything started to come back to him, like he remembered his name and that he was a male, the rest were still a bit fuzzy. like someone waking from a bout of heavy drinking, and with a terrible hangover. Like the times after he lost Cindy, aah he remembers those times but wishes he didn't.

He groaned as he struggled to remember what happened.

There were BBs and notifications floating in front of his vision.

Selfish

You have been warned but disregarded the warning and in doing so you have placed those bonded to you in life-threatening danger and in doing so you have gained the title, Selfish.

This title grants your bonded a permanent +10SP +12MP +24HP

With this title, your bonded will receive a 60% regeneration in health, mana, and Stamina while your regeneration will drop by 50% while you act selfishly.

'Shit'

Vampiric

Your mana has dropped to dangerous levels and below and you have fed and drained the mana from your bonded to keep you alive nearly causing their deaths, your spell Syphon has been changed to Vampiric and now you will be able to drain not just the Lifeforce but also the Mana and Stamina from others.

Your Vampiric spell level one will drain a hundred points of which thirty points will be mana and ten points stamina.

'Double shit'

Structural Modification

You have used mana powder to infuse and improve a structure and in doing so you have changed the basic materials of this structure. By strengthening the materials you have raised the durability of this structure to unknown levels.

You can now use mana powder and materials to integrate into existing structures to improve and strengthen them.

'Shit did I really do something that stupid?'

The first thing he saw as he forced his eyes open was a very pissed-off Sher.

"Hi . . ." He croaked.

Suddenly she was in his face and she was definitely pissed. "DON'T YOU, HI, ME, YOU ARE A BLOODY IDIOT!... ."

"Sher . . "

"Shut up!" She screamed at him.

He saw the tracks of dried tears down her cheeks.

"Sher . . ."

*SLAP* Her palm cracked against his face, she gasped and held her hands to her mouth as she realized what she had done.

He reached out and took her hand and brought It down to his chest.

"I'm sorry Sher."

She started crying, "you almost died, we thought all of you died!"

He could barely understand her through the sobs.

Then he made out what she said. "All of us?"

Louie hadn't seen Leon enter the room. "Yea, we saw you and BOB collapse, then we found Diedre and Francine also down."

He thought about the BBs he had read. 'Shit'

He looked around and saw that he was in his bed in the tent. He looked back at Sher, she had stopped crying but she still looked angry.

"I saw you touch the bridge just before it started changing and I knew that you had done something stupid. Then we found the sisters. First, we couldn't understand why they were also unconscious, we thought that we were under attack, then we remembered that they are bonded to you." She hit him again but this time with her fist on his shoulder.

"You called me 'sis', that makes us family, and you are the only family I got, and then you go and do something so stupid and nearly killed yourself."

He still had her left hand on his chest, he pulled her down till she was on the bed and he held her to his chest. "Sorry, sis." He laid his forehead on the top of her head as she started crying again. Tears started to leak from his eyes and run into her hair, strangely he noticed that her hair roots had a green tint to them.

She smacked him on his chest with her open palm as she tried to get out of his embrace.

He released her.

"Sorry, Sher, Leon." He saw the rest of the company crowd around the door. "Sorry for worrying you guys."

They all pushed into the room, asking questions and wanting to know if he was ok?

He looked at Sher. "Diedre, Francine?"

Everybody except Leon rushed out of the door to go look in on the sisters, he took the opportunity to struggle out of bed, noticing that he was only dressed in shorts.

"BOB?"

"He is here. The spiders brought him into camp, he is too heavy for us to carry, what happened Louie?"

Louie looked down in embarrassment as he started to dress. "I didn't think. *sigh* Sometimes I do stupid things without thinking, I must really pull my head out of my arse and start using my brain, I could have killed us."

"Diedre and Francine?"

He nodded before he closed the door.

"I would like to keep this a secret, I will tell Sher and Joe later."

He told Leon about how he had changed the bond linking him to his bonded without meaning to, and that he would like to keep it a secret because it is a terrible weakness since anybody that wants to kill him can just kill one of the sisters and all four of them will die.

Leon swore to keep it a secret and a glow enveloped him indicating that he had taken an oath.

Louie slapped him on his shoulder. "Thanks, bro."

They left the room and entered one of the other rooms in the rear of the tent where the sisters were sitting on their beds.

Everyone wanted to know what happened but the sisters remembered to keep the fact that their bid changed a secret and just told them that they didn't know.

Everybody was happy that they were all well and awake.

"How long was I out?" Louie asked Leon.

"Three days, it's noon of the third day since you went to 'check' on the bridge."

"Shit, three days?"

"Yip, three days."

'Damn' He left the tent to go check up on BOB and found him sitting next to the fireplace with a bunch of the spiders crowding around him, they made space as he neared and he threw his arm around BOBs head.

"Sorry buddy, I was stupid again and I nearly got us all killed."

He got a distinct feeling from his pet as if he asked 'what's new?'

Louie gave a soft laugh as he rubbed BOBs head.

"Come on champ, let's go check the bridge."

Everybody streamed out of the tent and they started walking to the bridge.

Louie gave a soft whistle as they neared the bridge.

It had changed, it was still a tubelike tunnel that crossed the canyon but now it looked like it was spun from frosted glass with a stone floor as well as sections of transparent panels that serve as windows. The whole structure looked like something you would see in some fantasy fey kingdom.

"Damn, all that's missing is some high elves as guards at each side of the entrance."

"I know right, I told Sher it looked like something made by the elves of Lothlorien from Middle earth."

Louie started to cross the bridge but stopped when he was grabbed and held back.

"What?"

Leon shook his head, "we don't know how strong it is, we only sent Blue over so far."

Louie shook his head. "It might look like glass but my notification says that the structure got a lot stronger and the first time I crossed I dropped a couple of stone blocks in the middle and there was no movement."

BOB chuffed from where he stood on the bridge and as they turned to look at him he jumped up into the air with his front legs smashing down on the bridge, giving off a soft ringing sound like crystal but there were no marks or any indication that the bridge was damaged.

"Well, there you have it. The bridge is BOB approved."

They gave nervous titters as they all slowly started walking onto the bridge. After a while, the novelty wore off and everybody returned to the camp.

Everybody was busy using the time to work on their skills before taking to the road again tomorrow.

"Well, this bridge will cut the distance to Mountain holm with two days except if you got a wagon or something big then you will have to take the road down the canyon."

Louie agreed with Leon. "Yea but I think it will be some time before people will start moving with wagons. I think most groups will carry their stuff with them or on their pets or mounts. Talking of mounts, have any of you seen any mounts except the couple of horses in Starter Town?"

Everybody shook their heads except Derek who coughed.

"I saw some horses near the river while we were in Worcester, well I think they were horses, they might have been monsters. They were huge, but they were white, something spooked them and they all jumped in the river and disappeared under the water. I didn't see them come back up again."

"Damn, Kelpies, nightmare fuel."

"Aren't Kelpies black and aren't they supposed to be in Scotland or somewhere around there?"

"Yes, but there were always stories of someone seeing Waterhorses and Watermeids near Laingsburg in the tabloids."

"Damn, Watermeids, Merpeople?"

Jenny nodded. "I loved to read the Son."

"Uggh," Dan and the other Teens groaned as she laughed.

They talked about their likes and dislikes and what the future might hold while they checked their armor and weapons.

Louie took the opportunity to grind his and skill by filling in his maps that he started to draw in ST as well as restoring everybody's clothes and armor while they talked till late into the night.

The first rays of sunlight were just starting to tint the darkness as Louie stepped out of the tent and up to the fire and saw Diedre busy stirring some Oats for breakfast. He handed her a stack of blueprints that he had made from the clothes he restored last night.

She took the blueprints but didn't say anything since she was still angry at him for not thinking before he acted.

Once everyone had breakfast and took care of necessities, they got everything together and packed up, and started down the road again.

The road was definitely going down so it looked like they might be getting out of the mountains soon.

They were moving past a dell on their right-hand side when Jack was attacked by some strange stealth creatures when he made the mistake of relieving himself against a nearby tree.

After the fight, Louie analysed one and the spiders were immediately sent out to see if they could capture two breeding pairs.

Husse (uncommon) deceased

This normally placid creature is easily recognizable due to its long, floppy ears that can drag on the ground and convex "Dwaren nose" muzzle with sharp shark-like teeth. Because of their acute hearing and innate curiosity, this creature mistakenly comes across as an ambush predator, but its biggest weakness is its insatiable curiosity. They have been known to hunt in packs of up to twenty during the breeding season but can be found in trees where they will sit unmoving for up to two hours if something interesting catches their attention. This creature is sought after for both meat and dairy if they can be captured and domesticated. Although they don't produce as much milk as other domesticated creatures, Husse milk is very high in fat content.

The spiders returned with seven of the Husse tightly wrapped in silk cocoons and after they were stunned by Louie using they were unwrapped and five, two males and three females, were captured using the Orb Traps to try and domesticate them when they have a base or when they return to Starter Town.

Louie marked the spot on his map and made a note about the possible usefulness of the Husse in his Bestiary.

They only saw one other husse just as they left the dell which Jack snuck up on and dispatched with a couple of quick backstabs. The skills that he was practicing would never have been possible pre-pulse since Louie was sure that no twelve-year-old kid would have been able to sneak up on the creature, but then a creature like the husse sure did not exist in the prepulse world.

The sun was starting to go down and they started looking for a spot to sculpt an overnight camp when terrain changed again and just as they came around the bend in the road they all stopped.

"Well, I'll be damned."

Louie's words were echoed by everybody as they all stopped at the side of the road.

They stood on the edge of the old road looking out down the mountain slope. To the left, the road followed the mountain and in the distance, he could see the road turn right to cross the bridge that he hated, he couldn't see what the conditions of the bridge were because it was too far.

He explained to them why he thought that they should go down the slope here and that although the mountain slope was steep but not impossible it might be better to create a road down the slope instead of following the road and then If that bridge were out, they would have to backtrack because there was no way that he would be able to fix it since the bridge was too high.

They all agreed to go down the slope. In the distance, they could see smoke, but if you squint really hard then you could also see where the buildings of Paarl started, well the surrounding neighborhoods started and they would rather be near or in Paarl than stuck another couple of days trying to repair a bridge that might be broken.

They decided that it would be for the best to make a camp for the night and then start on the road down the next morning.

Micheal set to harvesting one of the husse as the rest of them set up camp.

The night was peaceful and everybody stayed up late watching the fires burning in the direction of Paarl. There was a scuffle when a couple of ratlike creatures tried to sneak into camp but the spiders took care of it real quick.

Caravan members

Lewis (Louie) Poren: Leader: Darkness: pet (BOB) Leon Koen: Metal(2IC) pet (Seera: Black Widow) Sheralee Van de Merve: Life(Healer) pet (Ansi: Queen spider) Mainey Fish: Light(Medic, indentured) pet (Stitch: Orb Weaver spider) Celia Malan: Life (Merchant) pet (Jon: Goliath birdeater) Naomi Malan: (underage) pet (Blue: small jumping spider) Trish and David: (Orphans) Diedre Viljoen: water (Tailor, indentured) pet (Sisy: Weaver spider) Francine Viljoen: Air(Jeweller, indentured) pet (Bling: fantasy Crystal spider) Micheal Nasser: Nature(Leathersmith)pet (Rover: Huntsman spider) Derek Samuels: Fire(Novice Blacksmith) pet (Ember: fantasy fire spider) Kotche: Earth (Soldier) pet (Stomp, brown widow spider) Counsellor: Air (Wedge, spear)pet (Wolfie: wolf spider ) Christian Else: Water(Water mage) pet (Rob: blue Tarantula) Shadow: Fire(Scout) pet (Selina: Assassin spider) Jackson Pollok: Air (Warrior) pet (Zephyr: Wolf spider) Debbie Poerstamper: Earth (Warrior) pet (Bar: big Spiny Orb-weaver) Witney: Air (Warrior, guard,) pet (Ula: Tarantula) Sean: Air (Air mage, guard,) pet (Sweep: Tarantula) Barry: Fire(Warrior, guard,) pet (Papi: Tarantula) Garth: Water(Ranger, guard,) pet (Eeak: Weaver)

Scouts:

Dan: Barberian?

Jenna: Firebrand

Danny: Chemist

Jack: underage rogue (system locked)

Apollo: ?

Artimus: ?

Status

Name:

Lewis (Louie) Poren

Race:

Human (Male) Lvl 11 "319,975/409,600" = Lvl 12

Class:

Seeker (5) (25%).

Sub-classes:

(exterminator) (2%)

Titles:

Jack Black Brodifacoum, Trailblazer, Liberator. OFS (One Finger Salute) Dungeon pioneer David Selfish ?????

Affinity:

Darkness 0.001%

Affiliation:

N/A

Statistics

Health points (HP):

484

Mana Points (MP):

451

Stamina (SP):

583

Critical Hit Chance:

4%

Attributes

Strength:

22

Agility:

17

Constitution:

21

Perception:

20

Intelligence:

26

Willpower:

15

Charisma:

7

Luck:

5

Free attribute points:

0

Skills

Skill

Level

Progression

Wu shu:

5

95/100

Improvised weaponry:

T1: 2

05/100

Glacial Rage:

6

30/100

Meditation:

5

55/100

Regeneration:

T1: 0

00/100

Mana Manipulation:

9

80/100

Survival:

9

55/100

Cooking:

0

10/100

Restoration:

T1: 0

50/100

Social Sharing

1

20/100

Harvesting:

7

20/100

Herb Lore:

0

00/100

Whittling:

0

00/100

Pain resistance:

T1: 0

00/100

Poison resistance:

3

42/100

Cat`s eye:

7

55/100

Senses:

4

85/100

Armourer:

5

95/100

System Minimap:

4

35/100

Cartography:

3

45/100

Public speaking:

5

05/100

Spell Transformation: *

2

10/100

Backstab:

0

00/100

Skewer:

0

00/100

Scholer:

0

00/100

Learning:

#

#

Quick study:

#

#

Know-how:

#

#

Class Skill Proficiencies

Skill

Level

Progression

Investigation:

6

35/100

Tracking:

4

40/100

Intuition:

T1: 1

95/100

Analyse:

T1: 6

90/100

Lore:

2

10/100

Monster Expert:

3

55/100

?????

0

00/100

Spells

Spell

Level

Progression

Activation

Improvise:

T1: 1

05/100

Touch

Mana Construction:

T3: 1

85/100

Cast

Structural Modification

0

00/100

Touch

Liquefaction:

T1: 4

80/100

Cast

Earth Sense:

T1: 3

35/100

Touch

Weapon Schematics:

T1: 2

80/100

Touch

Vampiric:

0

00/100

Cast

Darkorb

0

00/100

Cast

Transfusion:

0

00/100

Touch

Electrocute:

0

30/100

Cast

Suffocate:

0

15/100

Cast

Waterboard:

1

55/100

Cast

Cauterise:

0

25/100

Touch

Shadow Step:

0

15/100

Cast

Fear:

0

00/100

Cast

Concussion Blast:

0

00/100

Cast

????

0

00/100