The temporary camp was set up faster than Mathew had expected. Apparently there are more professions and classes related to day to day stuff than he expected. Beth filled him in on a few of the more important roles.

Mathew found it odd that there was a profession related to survival aspects like camping or foraging. They were common tier professions, yet those who picked those always had techniques related to their chosen paths.

The first wave of people went in, they were each given a timer of two days max. The reason was to get everyone through quick enough to be back long before the suspected hoard came.

“So, when do you want to go in?” Beth asked.

“I’ll go in either later tonight or tomorrow. I’ll be in there longer than two days, as a fair warning. How long exactly will depend on a few things.”

Mathew was already thinking of ways to progress himself. Firstly he needed to test if Rituals were even counted as part of the crafting criteria. Enchanting would for sure, and he could just enchant a bag and end it there.

Yet, he would also need to make the bag. The rules for the Challenge were very specific. Beth was more than happy to explain it all to him.

He could request any material of Novice or Beginner rank. There have yet to be any Apprentice rank items that have been requested as of yet that were given.

Of those two ranks, you could get either raw or refined materials. However, it can’t be a processed item.

For example, you could request a chunk of Beginner rank iron ore. You could also request Beginner rank iron ingots. You can’t request Beginner rank molten iron or steel ingots. Since steel is a material that is processed.

Mathew was thankful that leather was an option. He had zero practice making bags, but if he was going to enchant a bag, he would need it. He could use canvas as well, sewing wasn’t that difficult of a process. It would be a horribly made bag, but damn it, it could hold a lot of shit inside of it.

“What about you? Has Mark been pushing you to craft something as well?”

“He didn’t need to. I’ve been crafting various items. I haven't picked up the skills or spells to do it. So, I stuck with something much more mundane, which is masonry. I know a single earth element spell, and the thought of being a walking mountain sounds fun. We have hundreds to thousands of levels ahead of us, anything is possible.”

Mathew hadn’t thought that far ahead for himself yet. Not really. Sure, he wants to acquire more summons, refine his rituals, and grow in power. Beth seems to have a whole plan. A walking mountain? What could he become?

What did summoning creatures, rituals, contracts, and everything else he had thus far amount to? Mathew couldn’t imagine anything but him at a stronger tier. Doing the same things but at a grander scale.

The ability to slice mountains in half was interesting. Or rather, pierce through them.

Once dinner was over, Mathew decided he wanted to go in now. There were zero threats in the area. He felt safe going in, and trusted that Beth could hold her own with the help of everyone else.

Once he heard of the Challenge, he wanted to go in. Either alone or with others ensuring he wouldn’t be bothered. There was zero reason to think anything bad would happen. Jonathan had miles of tunnels scouted out for any sniff of danger.

“Good luck in there Uncle Matty. Get a good reward for Clan McGonald!”

Mathew looked at his niece. “I’ll get a good reward for me. You don’t have to do everything for your dad.”

Mathew walked through the swirling portal. Leaving behind everyone. He entered an empty workshop. It was only roughly twenty feet in all directions with a single table in the middle.

A blue screen popped up, unusual for challenges. It's the first he had seen so far.

Challenge of Crafting

Prove your skill of crafting to The System. You are allowed to submit only one finished product. If you require additional materials, simply speak so out loud. If you require a tool, simply ask outloud.

Rewards are based on three criteria: Quality, Rank, and Complexity.

The first thing Mathew did was summon Agnox. He imp dramatically stretched out with a yawn. “I was asleep, thank you.”

Mathew ignored his whining. “You are fine, you aren't even fully corporeal when unsummoned.”

“We don’t know that! It’s just impossible to prove either way.” Agnox pointed out. He looked around at the empty room. “Whoever lives here needs to decorate. I would have said redecorate, but there is nothing here!”

“It’s a Challenge.” Mathew filled Agnox in on everything. Agnox nodded and understood Mathew’s rash and sudden unsummoning. He was silently wondering what was going on through Mathew’s head now that he had reunited with his family.

Mathew looked around, “First thing to test…I request an Apprentice Mana Core.”

Nothing appeared. “I request a Beginner Mana Core.”

On the table, a blue bumpy crystal appeared. Mathew picked it up and looked at it.

“Seems like a real one to me.” Agnox commented.

Mathew tried to drain mana from the core, but found himself unable to. “I can’t drain mana from it. Or rather, I am draining nothing. It’s like the food or anything else in here. You can’t directly benefit from it unless you directly make it.”

“Huh, too bad you can’t make a Dungeon Core or Hearth Crystal.”

Mathew nodded, “One day perhaps we can…” Mathew pondered to himself, “They come from somewhere right?”

Now that Mathew could acquire cores. There was only one thing to do. Abuse the treasure of a Challenge this place is.

“I request a Beginner rank 5 foot by 5 foot marble slab. I request Beginner rank engraving tools. I request a Beginner rank paper…” Mathew started to acquire more and more supplies. At one point the room started to expand for all the items he requested. There were a few things he couldn’t get. Like, a manual on rituals, or anything to do with the craft specifically

“Hhmm. I request a set of shelves for proper sorting and storage?”

No shelves appeared. Mathew clicked his tongue in disappointment. “How about a table?”

Another table appeared on the side of the room. Mathew started to sort through items he was requesting. Agnox and Jeffery were sitting in the corner of the room, out of Mathew’s way.

“So, how exactly is this exploiting the challenge, Boss? You can’t take any of this stuff out of here.”

Mathew held up a finger. “Correct. However, you still gain experience from crafting. The knowledge isn’t lost. Most people can’t stay longer than two or three days due to exhaustion or food. Plus, Mark is forcing a time limit. I don’t have such a limit, but I want to be out in the next five days at most. I don’t want to walk out to a surprise ambush from another random group.”

“You think you can make something that quickly?”

“The days are longer than normal. Compared to normal time, I have probably eight or nine days. I don’t need to sleep at first either every day. I’ll nap when I am recovering mana, or when I’m stumped on what to do next.”

Mathew pulled out his ritual book. It was filled with his own handwriting and side notes. His [Writing] skill was already working as teh requested paper and pen was floating around him.

“My first thought for a submission is a new ritual. I have a quest to create a Summoning Ritual, so I am going to do exactly that before I leave here.”

Skill Quest

Create a Summoning Ritual: 0/1

Reward: Upgrade to Writting or Ritual skill

The quest was simple and straightforward. Yet, that was what made it so complex. There was no direction, no answer, nothing to give him a clue on how to complete the quest.

Mathew started to shuffle through the rituals he had taken apart thus far. “The problem is, what am I summoning? A creature? Another person? An item? It doesn’t specify, so I am going to bank on the fact that it will accept any of them. Worst case, it want’s the most difficult, which is summoning a creature.”

Agnox didn’t respond. He knew Mathew wasn’t talking to him, but to himself.

Mathew started by drawing out a chalk circle and working on the Summon Sword ritual. It was Novice ranked, and took him only a few moments to create. He threw in a Novice Mana Core and enchanted Agnox’s sword.

It worked flawlessly. He can, one time, summon his sword to his hand. Previous testing showed it only worked within thirty or so feet. If something was restricting the blades movement, say, another person holding it, the activation did not work.

Mathew was going to use this ritual as his baseline. The problem was dissecting the section that was ‘summoning’ and not ‘summoning a sword’.

He had nothing to compare it to.

For now, Mathew was going to experiment. Worst case, he submits a very expensive and high tiered Beginner ritual. Combine two or three for a very mana heavy, but useful ritual.

One strange idea was to Combine his Campfire and Blood Scent rituals. Both were novice, but if he could modify how Blood Scent worked, and reversed it, he could have his solution to surviving the hordes alone.

There was also his Trapping ritual. He had yet to use it, but creating modified versions would be useful down the line.

“Hmmm.” Mathew hummed to himself as he flipped through his book. He had minor modifications to all his rituals. Mainly size, or targeted effects. Like his campfire and Illumination ritual combination.

Mathew’s [Ritual] skill was currently Beginner 4. [Writing] was Beginner 6 as well. If he played his cards right, at least one could reach Apprentice rank. Maybe both if he solved his Summoning Ritual problem.

He was a Summoner class! It made sense he could create a ritual to summon things. Mathew groaned as he had no real direction to go. His best guess was to start upgrading his rituals. Figuring out how making each of them Beginner rank would work. Is it a direct power boost, or could he do more with them?

He had three Beginner rituals to base them off of. Including the one he less so created, and more so figured out.

“Agnox you pick. Upgrading the Sword ritual to use it more than once, or figuring out how to fuse Campfire and Blood Scent?”

“Sword please. If I get disarmed more than once ever, it won’t be a good time.”

Mathew nodded, and started to get to work.

First things first was to compare a Novice ritual to a Beginner one. Everything had ranks and variants in tier of power. Rituals were no different.

The main difference was the quality of items, and the use of mana cores. If a Novice ritual could be used once, a Begginer one, logically, could be used more than once. How many times was…dependent.

He had no multiactivated rituals, so he would need to find another solution. The first one? Giving the ritual a timer.

Mathew had several rituals with a time element. Either they last for so long, or be activated after a period of time.

Mathew redrew the ritual, but this time added two new sections. He added three symbols around where the mana core went. This was an obvious change for the new tier. The second section was how the mana entered the enchantment.

Instead of an instantaneous bulk, Mathew changed it to a stream over time. How long had yet to be determined. Once everything was set up, Mathew activated the ritual and enchanted the sword.

He watched the ritual activate carefully. Paying close attention to how the new additions actually worked. To his bemusement, it went flawlessly. The enchantment stuck.

Mathew threw the sword to Agnox. “Test it out.”

Agnox gave his sword a few swings, nodding that physically, nothing changed. He then threw it away from him and mentllay triggered the enchantment. The sword appeared in his hand after a few seconds, instead of the instantatnous he was used to.

“Again.”

Once again, Agnox threw the sword, this time further away. And again, after a few seconds, the sword appeared back in his hand. Mathew’s mouth turned into a grin. “We need to test it more, primarily range and how many uses. Does distance determine time? Does the blade itself? So many questions.”

Agnox summoned the blade twice more, but it didn’t come back a fifth time. “Sounds complicated. I’m glad I never got into rituals.”

Mathew nodded, “It’s like a big logistical puzzle. Figuring out the limitations of each section and pushing those limits to their fullest. It reminds me of a game I used to play. You were given a grid and a paragraph.”

“In the paragraph is a series of rules. For example the graph has were people are sitting, their names, and color shirts. In the paragraph it would have lines like ‘Jerry wears a red shirt’ then ‘Sally will not sit next to anyone wearing red shirts’, or ‘Bill will only sit next to Jerry’, and so on. You are not given all the answers. The goal is to figure out who is wearing what shirt, and where they are sitting.”

Agnox groaned. “I hate puzzle games. Give me classic checkers. I loved playing against some of the guards with that game.”

“You should try chess.” Mathew suggested as he started to draw the new Beginner ritual.

“I saw chess! It’s a very complicated game. Only smart people can play it.”

Mathew rolled his eyes, “I play it.”

“Becuase you are huge Greek!”

“Geek is what you meant, but you are still wrong. Yet, you are correct. I played the game a lot when I was young. As I mentioned before with my brothers.”

“You think they still play? It could be a way to reunite a bit.”

Mathew paused his drawing for a moment, then he continued the motions. “There is no point. I’m leaving as soon as the floor bosses appear. I’m only staying here to have protection if another monster wave appears.”

“Really? You are back with your family, who from what it sounds like, most are ecstatic to see you again, and you are going to leave them? Family is everything in the universe. It’s the only ones you can trust.”

Mathew glanced back at Agnox, “Like Morhtrus? What about your first master?”

Anognox clicked his tongue, “The first wasn’t my family, more like slave owner. The second…well, he was mostly family.”

Silence filled the room as Mathew continued to work. Yet, a muffled emotion kept making itself known in his heart. To belong to a family once again was something he didn’t deserve. Nor did he want them. His future was to be forged by his own hands. Just like how he created these rituals.