Chapter 18

“We need more water and food. We can’t keep going like this,” an exhausted-looking woman called out. I had been hearing grumbling along those lines for a while, but we had stopped for a water break just a couple of hours ago.

I looked over at the large group of people following me. Most looked haggard and ill-used. With my Identify skill, I saw that many were suffering under the Thirsty debuff again. Bloody hell, we’re almost there. Why didn’t they put more points into Constitution and Endurance? With my higher stats, I’m barely feeling the incline. And how are they hungry already? Those ration bars should have lasted them a full day, not just a little over half.

I shook my head and tried to quell my irritation. I knew these people were low leveled, those that had levels anyway, and they had spent the last week or two as slaves. Perhaps the ration bars went to clearing their malnourishment, not leaving enough energy for the rest of the day.

I checked my storage ring and saw that I only had a one-gallon sized jug of water left and a bunch of empty bottles. The only other source of water was my refillable canteen that ran off of Ki. I knew Magnus, Cody, and Rowan each had their own, with rowan and Cody possessing the Mana equivalent. This is going to take a while. With a sigh, I stopped the caravan.

“Fine. We can stop for a break,” I said. I opened the tailgate of our truck bed trailer and placed the empty bottles there. “Rowan, Magnus, can you two help me refill these?” I pulled out my canteen. It only held a liter of water, and would take a few minutes to refill after it was empty.

“I can do that, no problem,” Rowan answered first.

Magnus was only a moment behind. “Sure thing.”

There wasn’t a lot of room on the narrow road we were traveling on, but people did their best to get a little privacy as they took advantage of the rest break to relieve themselves.

When I checked my Ki reserves, I noticed I was at only half my usual capacity. I considered draining my Ki batteries to get a jump start on my cultivating, but after a moment, I discarded the idea. While they only contained basic Ki, it was still effective enough in an emergency and took a long time to refill. It was faster to just take five to ten minutes to refill my pool with basic Ki.

“Magnus, you got this for a bit? I need to refill my Dantian,” I asked.

“No problem. I’ll refill mine too when you’re done.”

I nodded, then found a convenient looking flat rock on the side of the road and took a seat. With a slow deep breath, I began drawing in Essence. I was mildly surprised to find the Essence to be thicker in the air here. It wasn’t quite dungeon delving density, but it was half again the usual.

As I converted the Essence into Ki, I split my focus and extended my Spiritual Sense. I wasn’t looking for any aura signatures, though I was aware of them. Instead, I felt for the underlying Essence.

Most of the time, Essence was just kind of there. It shifted about a little, but it never really seemed to go anywhere. This time, though, I could just barely feel it moving in one direction. It was incredibly slow, but like clouds, if you watch it for long enough, you can see it move.

The flow seemed to go in the same general direction we had been traveling in. By my estimates, we should be on the last incline leading to the valley pass. I wonder if it means anything. With an internal shrug, I dismissed it from my mind. It was something I could ponder at a later date. With my attention fully centered on forming my Ki, my pace quickened and I finished filling my Dantian and Meridians with basic Ki. I still had close to a hundred fifty Jade Flame Ki in reserve for emergencies.

With a purely habitual grunt of exertion, I stood up and walked over to take over for Magnus. Someone had managed to get everyone lined up in an orderly line. I was rather surprised.

“Oh, good. You’re finished,” Cody said. “Um… we, well, we couldn’t start handing out without you… You um… have all the food, and well… they’re hungry too.” Cody looked down, his face red. Based on his hesitation, I could only assume he was embarrassed.

“It’s fine. I should have set up the food before cultivating.” I looked through my storage ring and pulled out some of the plastic camping plates, then I started piling on the python steaks. Thanks to the nature of my storage ring, they came out as warm as they went in, steam still rising off of them. People would have to hold them in their bare hands, but it shouldn’t matter too much.

“What kind of meat is that?” The man in the front of the line asked.

I glanced up. “Reticulated python. Don’t worry, it’s safe to eat and fairly tasty.”

“Reticulated… it’s snake meat?” He asked, disgust clear in his tone and on his face.

“Take what you’re given or don’t eat. I don’t give a fuck. I’ve eaten plenty of this meat. It’s fine. You can expect to eat a lot worse than this in the future. Or haven’t you noticed, it’s the gods’ damned apocalypse.” My patience with these people was already short, so I answered a bit more harshly than I probably should have. But in my defense, the man wiped the look off of his face, and took his portion and water without another word.

There were plenty of other people grumbling about the meat, the water, the walking, and I didn’t even remember what all else. I just kept my mouth shut and let Rowan and Cody deal with them. They were better with these people than I was at that moment.

The line moved slowly. I could only fill two water bottles per canteen every few minutes, and Rowan was bottlenecked at about the same pace. I hadn’t considered how many people I might have collected when I reached my family. If I had known, well, I might have gotten bigger canteens or something. As it was, it took almost forty-five minutes to get everyone their drink. The upside was that people were returning their water bottles before I had run out.

Once everyone got their food and drink, I filled water dishes for the animals. Rukia was patient, and let the others drink first. With her Ice Ki, she didn’t heat up as much and didn’t need to drink as often with her high Constitution as well. Once Tess, Koda, Balder, Foxie, and then Rukia drank their fill, I was ready to move out again. The only animal that didn’t need a drink was Mufasssa, my son’s snake, and they didn’t drink water all that often.

It was only an hour later that we had finally crested the last incline, and I had my first look at our new home.

It was a good-sized valley. I estimated it was about two miles long and about a mile wide. The back half was covered in pine trees that went most of the way up the mountain sides. I could see a small lake, or a large pond in the middle with a rundown cabin close by.

I reached out with my Spiritual Sense and felt for the flow I had noticed earlier. I was right; it was moving down the valley. I cycled some basic Ki to my eyes and focused on being able to see the energy moving.

The sight was… beautiful. I was seeing Essence with my own eyes for the first time. It actually reminded me of that old animated Pocahontas movie. Specifically, the song about painting with the colors of the wind. Every color I could conceive of shifted and flowed down the west side of the valley where we stood. As I watched, I noticed it was gradually swirling at the far side, like it was being sucked down a drain, but in slow motion.

I couldn’t sense what was causing the strange effect. The…drain, for lack of a better term, was well outside the max range of my Spiritual Sense. If I cycled my basic Ki through my Brain Meridian, I might be able to stretch it another five hundred feet or so, but not the mile and a half I’d need from here.

I was snapped out of my contemplations by people screaming their heads off. As quickly as I could, I stopped cycling Ki to my eyes and flooded my Bone Meridian with elemental Ki. My axes practically leapt into my hands as I spun around to find the danger. What evaded my spiritual sense? Another shadow cat?

Looking around, I couldn’t spot anything I’d consider a threat, even to these people. It was then that I’d noticed where everyone was staring, pointing, and trying to run away from.

I looked up into the sky, and what I saw sent a blend of wonder and fear shivering through my very soul.

Giant fucking manta rays! These graceful creatures swam through the air, at least a mile over our heads. An entire school of them soared past, their fin-like wings undulating gently. They had to be over a hundred feet across, and their spiked, rope-like tail stretched out behind them for over two hundred feet.

The two dozen creatures didn’t seem to notice us as they continued their flight over the rocky mountains, heading east towards the great planes. “Damn, and I thought I’d seen everything. I even came across a full-grown dinosaur,” I muttered.

“Wow, they’re beautiful,” Rose said from my side. “Just imagine taming one of those. We could go anywhere; we could even build a house on their back.”

Once the panicked crowd realized they weren’t in any danger from the flying behemoths, they too fell into a quiet awe. We all stood there for long minutes, until the last manta ray flew out of sight, beyond the peaks.

“Okay, let’s get a move on,” I called out. The dirt road went straight down into the valley at a gentle grade. It ended in a weed filled gravel parking lot only a couple of hundred yards from the rundown cabin.

I had everyone except my original group, my wife, and my son stay in the parking lot. I had Rukia keep an eye out for trouble, and Magnus left Koda there with her.

As we approached the cabin, I stretched my Spiritual sense to its fullest extent, trying to get a feel for the immediate surroundings. My senses extended into the forest and just barely touched the base of the mountains to either side.

There were plenty of creatures out in the woods, mostly on the Path of Mana or the Path of Ki. There were, however, some that didn’t seem to be on any Path of Power. They lacked any form of advancement, they just felt… mundane.

Pushing past the creatures, I felt something vaguely familiar. Deep in the forest, at the base of the mountains, it was… something. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. “Magnus, do you feel that? It’s strange, just under half a mile over there,” I said, pointing.

“Feel what?” Magnus asked before he closed his eyes. I could sense him pushing out his own Spiritual Sense, trying to find what I was talking about.

I remembered how the Essence had moved in that side of the valley. That draining area… yeah. It was right over there where I felt… “Dungeon. Of course. It’s a dungeon. That’s why all the essence was flowing over there and looked like it was draining into a hole. The Dungeon is sucking it in!”

“Well, butter my biscuit and call me a rodeo star! We done struck gold here,” Magnus declared with excitement.

“Dungeon? What’s a dungeon?” Rose asked. “It sounds familiar.”

“It’s an extra dimensional pocket space filled with monsters and treasure,” I answered.

“I accidentally fell into one before even leaving Utah,” Cody added.

“They’re worth a ton of Xp too,” Rowan said.

“I don’t know… they sound dangerous.” Rose’s brow was creased with concern.

“I’ll check it out before we let people in,” I said. “But it’s a great place for cultivating, leveling and gathering resources. From every book I’ve read, settlements with dungeon access have a distinct advantage. That’s why I kept this.” I pulled out the blank dungeon core from my storage ring.

“I had been planning on trying to incorporate this into the settlement for that very reason, but if we already have a dungeon so close, I wonder what else it can be used for.”

“Well, instead of sitting around with our dicks in our hands, let’s find out,” Magnus said. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

“When you’re right, you’re right,” I said, then I started walking closer to the building. “From what I understand, you need to be inside the building you want to designate as the admin building when you activate the City Core.”

I swapped out the dungeon core for the City Core as I reached the front door. When I turned the knob and pushed the door in, the screws holding the hinges to the frame slid out in a puff of dust and the door came away with my hand. The floor creaked ominously as I stepped inside, the boards giving slightly under my weight.

Hoping I was right that the core would probably repair the building, I focused my attention on the City Core.

Do you wish to activate City Core and establish a System recognized Settlement?

Y/N

Of course, I selected yes. Then, just like when the very first prompt appeared on earth, the world froze around me.

Congratulations Sapient.

You have established your Settlement. As this is your first System recognized Settlement, a onetime Tutorial has been granted.

View Tutorial?

Y/N