I was rendered speechless. I mean… no, to start with, Mia and myself appeared in a rather Adam and Eve way, so I can understand the misunderstanding. However, this lass in front of me is not worried or concerned about the fact that two girls would share one guy; she was worried that Mia would be jealous.

Speaking of which, would she? I mean, is that right? I have the option to create myself a harem with ease, not to mention that the religion the God of Chaos proposes has no restrictions regarding multiple partners… Huehuehue!

“She won’t mind (probably). Are you okay with that though? Thought you didn’t like me.”

[What? No… I was keeping an eye on you since the whole situation was quite strange when we were brought here, but you helped me and the rest of the elves a lot. So I have no reason to dislike you.](A)

“I see. However, I won’t sleep tonight since I need to keep guard. There are many night predators besides the guys, out there in this forest.”

[…](A)

Surprisingly this blushing pretty elf is quite easy to tease. She might be heroic and stuff, but when it comes to love, girls will be always girls. In addition, that’s quite calming and soothing to be honest, when taking into consideration this whole swirling maelstrom of horseshit that I was thrown in.

[I’ll join you as well. If something happens, I’m the strongest one in the group and I can fight the best.](A)

“Nope! You will sleep. However, you can sleep beside me if you want. That way, if something happens I can wake you up.”

[Nevertheless,…](A)

“No arguing about it. You can prepare our beds facing the South and get six other people, but not from the scouting or the hunting group. The ones you pick will become sentries facing East, West and North in shifts. First shift will be until the moon crosses half of the sky and the second shift will start after that, all in order not to exhaust them. Also, have campfires be lit in the surroundings of the clearing. While moonlight is resplendent and we might not need them, the fire will keep beasts at bay. By the way, how many people learned to make a fire?”

[Miss Mia is still explaining the reasoning behind it and some of them learned. You can see them looking very intently at her in order to pick it up faster. I think she might’ve promised a reward to the guys, as well as the girls. However, is not that easy to pick up that trick you showed us. Both the ‘flint’ you found and the method with the ‘friction’ require a bit of skill and not everyone can pull it off…](A)

Progress made in Tools research technology through discovery.

75 research points have been awarded!

“Hahaha! I think you might underestimate their thirst for knowledge. You can go and prepare. If there’s anything that you need to consult with me about, don’t hesitate and come over. Also, please tell Mia to join me for a second.”

[Will do.](A)

For the first time since the pocket-mines, I had a feeling that I was on the right path. But that also entailed the fact that there’s a shit-ton of work to do. And since this ain’t no sitcom, I should clarify things with Mia and see what’s her standing in all this. While she might be an AI, here on Midgard she’s a member of the elven race as well as a precious family member for myself.

[Master, you wanted to see me?](Mia)

“Mhm! I asked Alexandra to sleep next to me tonight.”

I decided to throw a straight ball out of curiosity.

[That’s a very good idea master! Everybody looks up to Alexandra and if the rest of the girls see her, they will be more likely to follow her example. In addition, master should have at least one other girl do the same. Since the numbers are not equal between both sexes, polygamy should be easy to introduce.](Mia)

“And here I was worried… actually I’m a bit disappointed…”

[Master?](Mia)

“Nothing, nothing! Tell me then, do you want to sleep by my side, or do you want to sleep with your new friends?”

[…](Mia)

The internal struggle was strong in this one. Just look at her… An all-knowing AI, unable to make a decision even if she has all the data available. Logically speaking, the best choice would be to sleep next to me in order to enforce the whole ‘introduction of polygamy’ thing. Nevertheless, for this child that was born not long ago, Midgard was like a sandbox, while the Elves are her toys and friends (not exactly in that order and figuratively speaking). So emotionally, she was unable to make a decision.

“How about you sleep with them for tonight, and then sleep with me and Alexandra next night, after which we just redo the process. Sounds good?”

[Yes!](Mia)

Look at how happy she is. I guess I should work a bit harder and put less pressure on her…

“Mia, open the user interface and leave it with me. It won’t affect you, right?”

[No master! But if you close it, you won’t be able to open it up again on your own.](Mia)

“It’s okay, I’ll manage and in the worst case we’ll just lose a day.”

[Then I should sleep with master…](Mia)

“Nope! You’ll sleep with your new friends. That way you will get along better and I will have some time alone with Alexandra and get to know her better. Come on, off you go!”

[Thank you master!](Mia)

She hugged and pecked me on the cheek after which she ran over back to the campfire. Seeing things up to this point, how is she any different from a normal human. I look forward to seeing her grow even more.

The user interface was left opened in the left corner of my eyes and I could easily grab it and begin exploring the new changes, however I stopped. Watching under the dimming light of the day everybody, work was quite pleasant (not in the proletarian way). Mia was dancing and singing with the rest of the girls around the fire, while the boys were drooling and gawking at them. Also, Alexandra instructed a group of hunters and scouts to stack up firewood in a circle around the World Tree. I was confused about why she used the hunters and the scouts when I told her otherwise, but I saw her going to the fire and plucking three guys from the festivities afterwards. She explained something to them, they wore serious faces at first and suddenly began wagging an inexistent tail, and looking at her like she was a goddess. I should make some time to talk to the guys and teach them how to behave like proper gentlemen...

Curious about the situation, I watched Alexandra go next and pluck three cute girls from the dancing squad and the same process replayed. Now I understood what was going on: rather than having two shifts, leaving a young couple for an entire night and quite a bit of a distance away from the rest of the people, would guarantee the fact that at least the dude won’t sleep a wink. Work hard young men! The future of our world relies on how good your game is…

Soon, the preparations for the end of the first day on Midgard were finished and darkness slowly enveloped the temporary camp, bringing silence with it. Only the sound of a hooting owl or a howling wolf could be heard from time to time, creating a truly serene atmosphere. If there would be only one thing to complain about, was the lack of stars… I should really fix that as soon as I can.

[I managed to make all the arrangements Michael.](A)

“Good. Come, sit next to me.”

There was silence, but it wasn’t awkward at all. Rather, it felt calming and it gave the night an even extra layer of tranquility. I wasn’t in a hurry to explore the user interface, as I was more interested in the beautiful girl by my side.

[Were you and Miss Mia really brought here by the God of Chaos?](A)

“Yup.”

I didn’t consider that a lie. It was more of a half-truth since we were brought here kind of against our wills and I am the God of Chaos… So, one could say that the God of Chaos brought me here.

[Can I see your Status Page?](A)

“Sure.”

She looked surprise by the fact that the attributes were normal. She raised a brow at the Identify skill but after seeing its description, she did not add anything else. I could safely assume that the last line of defense has fallen.

[What do you think the God of Chaos has planned for us?](A)

“Who knows… Maybe even he himself does not know. He’s not a God of Time or Fate, so he won’t see into the future.”

[I guess that’s so…](A)

“But, if I’m certain of one thing, is that if we ever encounter any troubles we’ll be given all the help we need.”

[How do you know that?](A)

“I just have faith…”

[I see.](A)

Okay, even I was ashamed at the bullcrap I was spouting, however it seemed to work. After all the excitement today and the running around hunting, this heroic elf’s eyelids were as heavy as lead. Slowly, through conversation, she fell asleep on my shoulder.

“I think I might have to work on my game as well, but given that this is just the first day, the results are not that bad…”

With nothing but silence and the pale moonlight to guide my senses, I brought up the user interface in order to start properly working. I reached out my index finger and lightly tapped on it, remaining aware of the beauty now resting on my lap…

“I wonder if she could see the interface. I should check with Mia tomorrow and see if that’s the case.”

Player: Michael Corbett World: Midgard Funds: 0SP Civlization Store

Looking at the all too familiar interface, I realized that nothing much changed. Except for the world having a name and instead of the World Management now being Civilization, everything else is the same. Yet… it all seems so different.

If in the beginning, I could look at this whole situation as if I would at a game, but now I can’t do that anymore. Not while the breath of this beautiful girl warms my skin, or the feeling of her flowing golden hair between my fingers. In addition, if this whole thing is real, then I need to step up my plans a little bit.

“Well then, let’s take this one step at a time. I already know what is in the Constructions tab. What about Social Policies?”

Social Policies

Mainly used in representing the non-scientific or religious advancements of your society.

Also used to decide the order of cultural advancement, it consists of ten different branches one can chose between and invest in creating a unique civilization.

Each choice can influence a specific field, like for example increasing the amount of Social Policy points, increasing the amount of Faith gained or even improving the Production or Research.

Available social branches:

Tradition Exploration Liberty Commerce Military Navigation Piety Technology Aesthetics World Order After your civilization resides more than one day in one location, the gain of Social Policies Points will become available.

Of course, stability is required for the creation of a society. Because of continuous travelling nomad tribes are just that, tribes. Therefore, I need to make out of this clearing a proper living space for the elves. Two hundred trees that could serve as living quarters for them could be created, but I would rather have less.

“Didn’t I want to create a paradise consisting of beautiful elves? How could I be so heartless and not allow others to enjoy it as well? Let’s have a distribution of one guy – two girls for the moment. If later down the road there is the possibility of having that increased, we’ll do it at that point. Therefore, for the split up, with Mia and myself there are 202 people. I’ll claim one of the elven huts for myself and them, so that leaves 129 girls and 70 guys. I don’t want anyone to remain alone so there will be 59 girls left, meaning that 11 guys will for now have only one girl as companion, while the rest will have two. I guess that’s that.”

I wondered exactly how is this type of ‘move’ was going to affect the Social Policies… Anyway, now that’s taken care of, with only 71 elven huts required for housing it should be easier to create a design of the space available in this clearing. We might be required to expand it into the future depending on how big those trees actually are, but the entire forest on this continent will soon become home for my civilization.

“I should leave the future for the future me. What about the newly unlocked tech tree?”

Research

Used to decide the technological advancement, it consists of multiple branching paths one can chose, each one belonging to a specific time.

Once a minimum of technologies have been researched, you can advance to the next era. Each era advancement will provide you with certain benefits.

Current technologies available for research:

- Tools(1000 RP);

- Farming and Gathering(1500 RP);

Current Research Points available: 350

Current Research Points growth: 0/day (assign people to researching a specific field in order to increase growth)

“So while there are only two available technologies to research, their cost is stupidly high. But once tomorrow comes, I can have the people create tools under Mia’s supervision and the growth should go up a bit. In addition, by taking the lead and creating some new things myself, extra Research Points should be awarded when the people learn how to make them. Because we have enough food for tomorrow, I can focus on taking everyone to the river and search for usable rocks, create some axes and hopefully some pickaxes (although I doubt I could actually use them to mine…).”

What I had in mind was to begin woodcutting as soon as possible and with some improv shovels, I could start reclaiming farming land. Both of those actions would most likely give me some progress regarding Farming and Gathering research, while the creation of the objects themselves will improve the rate at which the Tools research will be completed.

Even more important, we’ll drag the chopped up trees back to the clearing and check if they count as resources and exactly how much. There must be a trick to finding out or… I could just ask Mia.

“Sometimes I forget that the biggest cheat I have available isn’t the fact that I can participate directly in the game, the knowledge I have or the World Tree. Mia is probably the bigger one. Not only does she possess more knowledge than anyone else does, but the elves also adore her for some reason. I guess the fact that all of them are, well, blond and she has her beautiful red hair but still retaining the pointy ears and all other racial features the elves possess, raised her status quite a bit in their midst. I mean, even Alexandra is respectful towards her. I should make sure I give some gifts to this beautiful cheat of mine, whenever possible. After all, I'm a generous Chaos God...”