The sound of his footsteps echoed around the inside of his truck-waggon as he climbed to the second floor.

The balancing act that he had to pull-off as he ascended them without being able to hold onto anything, was leaving him feeling more than a little bit queasy.

The dish was not that heavy in and of its self, even though it was made of stone, but the additional weight of the meat on top of it had had his muscles burning as he had carried all the way from the butcher in the village’s market place.

He would have stayed downstairs if he could, but he had left it empty of any attachments, and with both hands occupied, he could not use any of the pull-down shelves that were embedded in the walls. Meaning that the only counters he could rest the heavy dish on, were up above.

He eventually reached the top floor, and after placing said dish upon the nearest available surface, he let himself drop onto the tiny leather couch. A mistake, as its cushions began tempting with their comfort, filling him with the urge to just close his eyes for a second, not to go to sleep, just to give them a bit of a rest. A cat nap at most. Thankfully, it was too small for him to lie down, or he would have done just that. He had too many things to do today to waste the rest of it sleeping.

He forced his eyes back open.

He would need the meat.

And the meat…

He looked over to the stone plate resting on the shelf next to the stairs.

…was over there.

“Oh…gaaaaahd. I don’t wanna get up.”

He breathed in, preparing himself for what was to come next as he grit his teeth. Then, with excruciating effort and unimaginable force of will, he got off his arse.

Unwrapping the dish revealed a stone plate covered in meat, sliced, like he had asked for, and…fresh, which is what he wanted, but the problem was ‘why’ it was so fresh, knowing that without a doubt that the sounds that he heard those poor animals make would be keeping him up that night. And for many nights after it, most likely.

He still could not identify what type of meat it was; something he desperately needed to sort out or one day he really would end up doing a Hannibal.

“Right…”, he said, “where to begin?”

Despite his limited funds, he had bought the excess of meat for experimentation. Specifically, he wanted to look into long term storage of perishable goods.

Today’s theme: resources.

Goodie had thought to try and solve and exploit his, as well as others, eternal need for sustenance. If he could find some way to extend the longevity of perishable goods, he could at the very least increase the overall availability of edible food. Fire and slices of bread may have been mankind’s greatest inventions, but the refrigeration was what truly allowed them to thrive, with the average fridge roughly doubling the time before food went off, and as far as he knew, the freezer being able to keep something edible indefinitely.

“And the option to not eat that shit the supply master handed out each morning would be worth its weight in gold in the coming months.”, he remarked.

He sighed as he considered his next thought.

In his spare time, he had been messing around with [SUMMON SHADOW STUFF], seeing what he could do with it, seeing just how limited its abilities were. The summoning aspect of it was pretty much mastered, as far as he was concerned. But the ‘stuff’ part of it, that was what he had to yet find the limits for, it was magic, after all, so he wondered if the substance was bound to the laws of mundane physics. Not what those laws were, mind you. He really should have paid more attention in school.

He knew his current skill level and attributes would only produce substances that would possess about as much durability as that of cotton candy, but the purpose of the experiment was to produce a proof of concept, not a finished product. It would have been nice if he could have provided something he could work with, but he knew his limitations.

That is, until he had tried mimicking fire. It was an act of boredom rather than brilliance, but the end result had indeed been a flame of fire. And much like Her majesty, it had been translucent to the point of being invisible. A sliver of dull grey would flitter in and out of existence as the flame danced about within the confines of the jar that he had summoned it in.

For the past year, he had been limiting himself to only attempting to summon physical materials. Cloth, plastic, metal, and so forth. Discovering that he had failed to think outside of the box had blown his mind.

Further tests had shown that he could not only form his shadow stuff into physical things, but also conceptual ones as well. Almost like illusion magic, or anti-illusion, as they relied on shadows instead of light, with his imagination being the only limit. It was just unfortunate that he only possessed a total of nine points within that attribute.

He then had tried sticking all manner of things into the flame to see if they would burn, each attempt not even resulting in a slight blemish. Frustrated, he eventually did something stupid by shoving his left pinkie finger straight into the thing. Nothing happened aside from a minor irritation on the skin that had come into contact with the shadow fire. With the exception of its appearance, the flame appeared to have little in common with actual fire. It had felt a little warm, though, but he was not sure if that feeling was real or if he was just imagining it.

He briefly wondered whether or not magic could have a placebo effect, or if that was just drugs.

His attempts to mimic ice had met with similar results. The substance being a little cold, but that could just as easily have been due to it not having been in the sun for any amount of time, then it having actual ice like properties.

Not knowing if it was or if it was not, was driving him up the wall. That lack of knowledge would force him to commit more effort into testing in order to confirm or deny his findings. Wasting more of his precious time, time that he could not afford to waste.

If he only knew for certain, he could leave and be done with it. If it was all in his head, fine…whatever. If there was an effect, even better.

Actually, that last one would lead to a new problem for him. Weakness. While he had been training his skill as much as he could, it would do little to help as it primarily affected the amount of shadow stuff that he could summon, and how long it lasted. The power of his ability, however, relied more upon his willpower.

The attribute that is.

He did not know if those numbers on his character sheet actually represented his body and mind, or if they were a separate thing, something that would disappear should the [SYSTEM] ever fail. But he preferred to think of them as an accessory that had come into his possession. Not truly his, but still free to use.

His [SHAMAN of SHADOWS] skills relied heavily on his willpower, which currently sat at a disappointing 7, and without the city’s near-endless rat population to sacrifice, he would have little hope of increasing it out here in the wilds. Which would mean his shadow stuff would remain weak for the foreseeable future.

He sighed.

After a moment he sat up

“I’m wasting time.”, He groused.

“Right, vacuum packing!”, he yelled, trying to psych himself up.

He did not have access to refrigeration, but vacuum packing was supposed to have similar results. If that was true, it would be nothing but a boon for him.

Grabbing a single slice from the dish, he began his experiment.

He smothered the meat with his shadow stuff, forming a semi-visible plastic coating that was airtight and waterproof. Still in contact with the substance, he used his skill to begin forming a tiny bubble on one side of the parcel within his hand, small punctures appearing on the surface covered by the bubble. His hope was to extract what air and water remained within the bloody flesh by slowly expanding the glorified pimple on its side in hopes that it would extend, for lack of a better term, the life span of the contents within. After sealing the pinholes within the main package, he popped the bubble. Blood and air. An odd, metallic scent invaded his nostrils.

He looked at the end result of his efforts. He did not know if he had succeeded in what he had been trying to accomplish, hell, aside from a vague idea, did not even know what he was trying to do. But he had done it. He had half expected a notification to pop up announcing that he had crafted 1X [SHITTY PACKAGE OF POSSIBLY HUMAN MEAT], but it did not, so he moved on to the next experiment.

Similar to what he had done before, he had extracted the water and air with an expanding bubble. But this time, as the bubble grew, he slowly introduced a liquid form of shadow stuff into the meat, with the intent that it would replace what was being taken out. He did not know what effect that might have, or if it would even be safe to eat, the toxicity of shadow stuff being something he had only just considered.

He had to finish soon, as the effort and concentration needed to create such simple, little things, was surprisingly high, the two attempts leaving him feeling exhausted. But he continued.

Repeating the same process of these two experiments a few more times, he created a batch of packeted meats which would allow him to see if there would be any variation in how they decayed.

He then covered a number of slices in both plastic and paper-like sleeves of shadow stuff.

Following that, he stuffed a jar with a few pieces before filling it with the more familiar liquid form of the substance.

Finally, he ended off with covering a few slices in a waxy form of shadow stuff. He had aimed for creating something similar to candle wax, but with his lack of power he ended up with a gooey mess.

He then took the whole batch over to a drawer. After filling about an inch of it with the icy form of his stuff, he unceremoniously dumped the packages inside. He then summoned more shadow stuff, drowning the whole lot in the inky like substance, continuing until the whole drawer was filled to the brim. It was silly to think so, but as he looked upon that blackish jelly-block that he had formed, he thought that the drawer contained not just the meat that he had bought, but also his hope for a better tomorrow. For him at least. An extremely stupid thought, but he was just too tired to care.

The lot of it would soon decay, but he had to remind himself that the whole thing was meant to be a proof of concept, not the finished product.

He rubbed his eyes as he yawned, before looking back at the draw.

His experiments were done. Hardly scientific in his execution, but it was the best he could do.

To finish things off, he placed two slices of meat on top. A control subject, or slice…or was it sample. A control sample to see how the meat would normally rot without any efforts to preserve it. There was the risk of attracting bugs, but he also needed that to see how the local pests behaved.

He really wished he could get experience for killing bugs, regretting that the system would grant it only if said bugs were dangerous. Otherwise, he would have to wait until they swarmed, but even then, even if they came in the thousands, it would only grant him the equivalent of the XP he would get for killing one rat.

He walked over to the tiny couch and sat down.

He was finished.

He thought over everything he had done, trying to see if he had forgotten anything. There were a few pieces of meat remaining on the plate which had kept aside for a light snack, so dinner was sorted out. Was there anything else?

Then he remembered something he had forgotten. Getting up, he retrieved the silver lantern containing the wisps essence and placed it on the block of shadow jelly. Hopefully delaying the rate of its inevitable decay.

NOW…he was finished

Now, he could finally consider that nap.