Chapter 57: Home “Improvement” |
“So, what do we want to build?” Derek asked, manifesting a small illusory replica of the plateau above the bridge’s central table.
“Mountain chalet feels about right,” Atticus offered. “You know, big fireplace, bearskin rug in the middle of the living room …”
“This place is boiling already; a fireplace would be suicidal,” Mimi pointed out. “And there aren’t any bears on this planet.”
“Okay, a general ‘chalet’ vibe should work, though,” Atticus amended.
“I like it,” Derek agreed, changing the illusion to match, then split it in half to show the interior. “What if we do something like this: big open space in the center, skylight overhead, balcony around the outside, everyone gets one side of the second floor as their room, and the first floor gets turned into a shared space. Kitchen, pool, living room, the usual. Maybe excavate a cellar for the hell of it.”
“If you want a cellar, we’re going to have to build it somewhere else,” Mimi pointed to a couple of spots on the illusion. “Otherwise, the ground’s going to crumble away before we even leave.”
Derek winced. “Is there anywhere we can build it?”
“Sure, just not right at that spot. I’ll figure out where to put it once we have a final design,” she told him.
Derek nodded. That was a much better way of going about it. It was faster, and they were less likely to wear down their engineer’s patience. Design first, then figure out where it went, and finally, once that was settled, figure out where to go to get the materials.
Three hours later, Derek found himself standing in the nearby woods, realizing three things:
First, using magic in a non-magical environment was genuinely absurd. A brief activation of [Variable Weapon Empowerment] made his rapier about as effective as a chainsaw, letting him hack cleanly through even what was easily the equal of some of Earth’s hardest woods. It just went to show how skewed his perspective had been by the magical surroundings he’d grown up in.
Second, this was fun. Making something with his bare hands, seeing it take shape entirely due to his efforts, was enjoyable in a way he hadn’t really experienced before.
And thirdly … boy oh boy were they bad at this, the fact that they’d nearly dropped the first tree on Mimi only having been the start of things. Though in Derek’s defense, there’d been three-hundred-and-fifty-nine other degrees in which the damn thing could have fallen, and everyone would have been fine.
Though in everyone’s defense, she’d also been on the extreme end of where the damn thing could have reached.
Plus, if it hadn’t happened, he wouldn’t have gotten to see her hair poof out, which had been funny, even if he never would have provoked it on purpose. She could take having the ship get shot to pieces around her, no problem, but a tree was what had gotten that kind of reaction?
Either way, the Sionnach Sidhe’s fox-ears were still flattened against the top of her head, practically vanishing into the rats’ nest her hair had turned into, and they were all doing their best to make sure there wasn’t a repeat performance by having Ye-in hold onto one of the tree’s top branches while flying, allowing her to control the direction it fell. Oh, even she, with her focus on physical stats, was not strong enough to actually carry the tree, but she didn’t have to. All that was required was for her to stabilize it and then give it a gentle push in the direction they wanted it to go.
As for the trees themselves … they were basically perfect for construction. Almost as big as giant redwoods, shaped like baobab trees, with a massive central trunk that only branched out at the very top, giving them a hell of a lot of wood requiring very little trimming, and the wood itself would have solidly earned the label of “ironwood” on Earth. Hell, it was dense enough that it couldn’t even float.
Derek slashed a quick sideways “v” into the side of the tree, kicked the wedge out of the trunk, and then quickly retreated while Ye-in pushed so it would fall down next to the ones they’d already cut down.
There, Atticus would trim off the branches, then work together with Mimi to transport the trunk ten kilometers to the landing site using a combination of weight- and gravity-manipulation combined with good old-fashioned telekinesis.
They also stuck several plant samples under some of the more versatile scanners in the engineering bay, then sent the scans back to Earth for someone with the necessary skills to fully interpret them and look them over. That’d take a bit to get anywhere, but it’d likely be interesting to see what came out of it.
A little over fifty trees later, they were finally done, the final tree carried off ten minutes earlier, while Derek and Ye-in finished distributing the chopped-off branches more evenly, making sure they didn’t wind up in a massive pile, the likes of which was unlikely to occur naturally.
Which left them to trek back to their landing site alone.
The ground underfoot began as the typical jungle underbrush, albeit a little lighter, even if the dark color of the vines and ferns gave the entire affair a spooky feeling, almost as though the darkness had locked out the sky overhead.
“Spooky,” Ye-in commented. “I like it.”
Derek shrugged. “Now all we need is some kind of alien superpredator to show up, then we’ll have the makings of a wonderful horror movie.”
“Maybe that can be this place’s flagship export: film sets,” she laughed. “I can see it already: big-shot primadonna director blows ninety percent of his budget to fly to the ass-end of the galaxy to film on location!”
“And we’re somehow going to catch the blame …” Derek offered, which was more likely than it should be. Stupid people were often also stupid about assigning blame and often incapable of learning from their mistakes.
“Anyway, I …” Ye-in slammed her mouth shut when something erupted into the clearing in front of them amidst a cloud of dust, a leap having landed it straight in a random patch of sand, which was now concealing its movement.
But while he lacked the Perception to see through the spray of grit, his [Aura] ignored it entirely, so even though he wasn’t quite good enough with it to get a complete picture of whatever the hell was now lunging out of the cloud, what information he did get was more than enough to grab the creature’s top and bottom jaws and slam its mouth shut, then used his [Poltergeist] Aspect to reduce his mass to functionally nothing and swung his now weightless body onto its back, and where he not only returned his mass full-force, but even increased it by transforming most of his bones to granite, causing what he could now see was some kind of crocodile-thing collapse underneath him.
He’d slotted the Lesser Rock Titan Aspect in the slot unlocked by the 2nd Evolution, mostly because he had no idea what to put there, and being able to increase his weight via [Aspect Integration] would be useful when handling heavy/unwiedly objects.
As for the points he’d gotten for that from [Aspect Hunter], they’d wound up being added to Perception to increase the range of [Cosmic Gaze]. Sadly, even if he was mostly going to be using his ship’s sensors, he couldn’t entirely turn that into his dump stat.
And the creature underneath him …
“It’s cute,” Ye-in commented. “Murderous, but cute.”
Derek had to admit she had a point. The creature was a long-limbed croc that was likely capable of running at speeds no one would ever expect out of a crocodilian, with fangs like steak knives and claws for which the closest analog he could think of was a slightly smaller kukuris.
It also had the proportionally big eyes, high forehead, round cheeks, and overal large head that many earth species’ young had, including human babies.
“How about you take a picture so I can let this guy go?” Derek suggested.
Ye-in took a couple of seconds to dismiss the force fields she’d conjured and put away her brass knuckles before snapping a picture, and he rolled off the critter, which promptly ran off as fast as its legs could carry it.
“I guess these things still need to learn that they can’t eat humans,” she said.
Derek shrugged. “They probably won’t anytime soon. How long did it take us to traumatize Earth’s predators to leave humans alone?”
“Centuries,” Ye-in said. “Then we started nature conservation efforts, and they started losing their fear just in time for us to get the [System] and start manhandling them.”
After all, even a lion was a joke when its teeth broke on your skin, and you could send it flying with a flick of your wrist.
“I don’t think any of us need to worry, though,” Derek said. Even Mimi, who had the lowest combat potential of all of them, would be able to handle that thing, and basically anything like it.
He wouldn’t outright say it was impossible, because nature typically took something like that as a challenge, and even on pre-[System] Earth, there was a stunning array of plants and animals that felt like they’d been designed purely to prove that they could, in fact, exist, but anything big enough to hurt a member of the Dragonfly’s crew would likely be too big to not be noticed, which meant they could actually respond to its approach, and anything sufficiently small to sneak up on them would likely lack the power to be an acutal problem.
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The two of them crossed the plains and climbed the plateau without further incident, heading over to where the others were currently preparing everything they could on their own.
“Hey, guess what we found?” Derek called out when they were close enough to not have to outright shout.
Atticus looked them up and down, clearly spotting the leftover dirt from the croc’s distraction attempt, and dryly asked, “A sandblaster?”
Derek sniggered, while Ye-in pulled up the image on her phone and showed it to the other two.
“We got jumped by that thing.”
“Aw,” Mimi cooed. “And you didn’t bring it?”
“Pretty sure it’d have died of fright if we dragged it off,” Derek admitted. “But I think we should remember that there are things out there that’ll try to take a bite out of us because they don’t know they shouldn’t, so let’s try and be a little careful.”
“Yes, Dad,” Atticus rolled his eyes, pulling a truly stellar mimicry of an annoyed teen for a couple of seconds before snapping back into “excited” mode. “So, how about we get started?”
And get started, they did.
The overall process wasn’t all that spectacular, and certainly less of a shitshow than cutting down the trees had been, but it did take almost two days.
First, they cut holes for the columns that’d be holding up the roof and first floor into the stone, Derek by way of hellfire, while Mimi used some kind of engineering-related cutting [Skill] deeply lacking in combat applications, while the other two lifted out the stone blocks.
Second, they cut the wood to shape, which was easy enough to do as the Dragonfly’s armory held more than enough long blades, and they’d all been taught at least some weapon-enhancement [Skills] by Isaac. Really, the only issue that might have arisen would be them building something the wrong way, but Mimi was sufficiently on top of things that that did not happen.
And third, they put everything together, bridging the space between columns with pre-cut beams, which were then braced with further pre-cut sections, then nailed together with lengths of plan ol’ steel that barely had anything in common with regular nails, pushed through with casual ease thanks to [Piercing Strike].
The only even remotely exciting thing that happened was Derek having to briefly fly off-planet to grab a small nickel-iron asteroid so they could make more nails without dipping into the Dragonfly’s stockpiles of far more expensive and valuable alloys necessary for ship repair.
Atticus had wanted to try and make a mine down here, but finding a suitable deposit would have taken longer and required them to use the ship’s sensors, which would have, in turn, required the Dragonfly to first take off, which was a sufficiently complicated endeavor that him simply flying up and grabbing a suitable rock was the, well, simplest solution, odd as that was to say.
Also, Derek got to see Mimi use her [Order of Opperations] [Skill] first-hand, putting one end of a beam in place in a way that would normally have the thing fall out, then freezing it long enough to walk over and put the other end in, then further keeping things in place while she marched back to the ship to get some more nails.
Creations that normally would have required two, if not three, people to both hold things in place and then add whatever would keep them there were something she could do all on her lonesome with ease, and made the rest of them look downright incompetent by comparison.
Also, they’d learned what “wasn’t perfect” about the planet, as stated by the [System], according to the analyses they got back from Earth a few days after sending the scans.
The local plantlife would utterly wreck most human crops on this world. Or non-local plant life in general.
Of course, the same was also true in reverse: the alien biosphere had adapted to drain everything it possibly could from the scorching local star, but at the same time, even with their hyper-efficient processing capabilities, they’d wither and die without it.
Oh, given a few generations to evolve and adapt, that near-total absorption ability would make them an absolute menace on any world, but the sheer amount of artificial help it’d take to get that far would still prevent there from being issues barring deliberate malice.
But aside from requiring a few minutes to read and providing “permission” to take some of the plants with them when they left, the report did not change much, even if it was a tad interesting.
And, soon enough, the house was finished, a large central room with a mezzanine running along all four walls, accessible by a spiral staircase in each corner, a skylight in the center that could be made to magically block out all light or act as a crude telescope for when they wanted to watch the stars at night.
Oh, and Atticus had gotten his fireplace after all. Well, the “fire” with a very hefty asterix attached to it, it was actually a stone construction in the general shape one expected to house a mountain chalet’s roaring bonfire, but a few simple enchantments had instead turned it into the house’s primary source of cool air, a pipe leading down into the ocean below pulling up water, into which the magic would then push the room’s heat, and then be swept back down into the ocean along a second such pipe.
Simple, elegant, and the illusion of flickering blue firelight that Derek liked to occasionally throw over it really made the main room feel all the more cozy, the pale local wood painted in the dark pigment of its leaves in places to create a borderline mesmerizing contrast.
Meanwhile, the furniture told a very different story. One that showed, quite definitively, that not even Mimi had the knowledge necessary to make it, it being even further from her skillset than architecture was.
For example, the sofas were just stone benches carved into the desired shape with spare mattresses thrown over them. Which was … well, it bordered on the “should have expected that.”
The ship’s fabricators had the patterns for some Ikea-style furnishings; however, stubbornness had kicked in, so they’d decided not to use them. For now. If they ever decided to stay here long-term, or just longer, that’d change, but for right now, their own personal creations would have to suffice.
As for Derek himself, he’d tried to change that, to acquire some knowledge on that front, expanding his knowledge pool on engineering, creating [Skills] based on them, and then folding them into [Starship Upkeep] in an attempt to turn that into a better, and more general engineering ability, but that hadn’t worked. He’d gotten the knowledge, obviously, and the [Skill] had jumped two whole Levels, but that was about it. Apparently, there was a bit more to it than just being able to calculate stresses and load distribution. It was something to work on, he supposed.
And upstairs, he had an entire side of the house to himself, looking out across the plains below, the local not-dinosaurs so small they looked like toys. It was also completely empty right now, Derek having yet to drag over a mattress from the Dragonfly, but somehow, that made this place just that much more special, for just a moment. It was a blank canvas, and while it was sure to be filled shortly, right now, all he saw was possibilities.
So, that was the house done. Derek found himself a clear place to lie down, then flounced onto it and let out a happy sigh, staring up at the ceiling.
His house.
Well, not his, it was a shared home, but even so, it was still his in a way nothing else in his life had been. It was … alright, admittedly, repeating the fact that it was “his” was hardly the most eloquent of statements, but who cared? It wasn’t like anyone was going to hear his thoughts. And if someone could, he’d have a very different kind of problem.
He continued to lie there, a wide grin splitting his face in half, for what had to be a good hour at the very least. And then he fell asleep.
Derek woke to the sound of knocking, and rather than standing up to open the door, he twisted space to put the door’s handle within his reach and opened it.
“Hi,” he tiredly waved at Ye-in.
“Atticus hunted a dinosaur, and he’s grilling it,” she told him. “You want some?”
Derek was on his feet in an instant.
“Let’s go,” he announced, and not even five seconds later, he skidded to a halt at the rough-hewn table that had appeared in the center of the living room while he’d slept. It was clearly a rush job, but it was equally clear that the unrefined appearance was the only negative consequence that it brought with it.
The table was also already set, complete with a place for him, which drew a soft chuckle out of him. Clearly, they’d realized he’d never turn something like this down.
Then, the moment he sat down, the very same nanosecond Derek’s ass came into contact with his chair’s seat, Atticus loudly announced: “dig in.”
And so, they did.
It … it was not good. The smell was like someone had tried to recreate cinnamon using base chemicals while only going off of second-hand accounts of what it was supposed to be like, and the taste was … certainly something.
The closest Derek could come to describing it was a combination of the way freshly cut grass smelled, metal, and bechamel sauce. That last one may have been nice in isolation, but when combined with the rest, it somehow managed to get worse.
“Okay, that’s that,” Atticus declared, taping his plate with a sigh, then cast a spell on it, instantly replacing part of the faux-cinnamon smell with something remarkably close to roast beef. “Alien dinosaurs taste weird.”
“[Cross-Species Cousine Shift]?” Derek asked, gently pushing his own plate towards the other man, who repeated the spell.
This particular working of magic had been a gift from an old friend of Atticus’ parents, and transformed alien foodstuffs into something the caster could eat, and was suited to their biology, while maintaining the cook’s “intention.”
For example, a spicy curry would burn the tongue of whoever ate it, no matter which species they belonged to, but the heat would be scaled up or down based on the average spice tolerance of the species as a whole, creating something slightly more predictable.
It was a great spell, with one glaring drawback: it made alien food boring. Sure, it made the culinary Russian roulette into a far more enjoyable experience, but at the same time, a lot of the extraordinary and, well, alien was stripped out as well, resulting in something only barely no more exciting than eating something prepared by another human culture. Less so, in many respects, because nowadays, international cuisine was all the rage, so a lot of the transformed alien food would be nothing new.
Then again, the creator of the spell was from a Stone Age society, with a comparatively shallow pool of recipes, so just about anything was new and extraordinary. Oh, and just about every other biosphere was lethally toxic to him, so the spell had been an absolute necessity.
Atticus quickly cast the spell on the girls’ plates as well, and soon enough, the meal transformed from everyone trying to avoid gagging to a lively discussion, though it quickly drifted to just how they’d manage to hang the dinosaur skeleton from the ceiling, and whether or not putting it under the skylight was a good idea.
And then Ye-in wound up grabbing the final chunk of dinosaur meat off the central platter, Atticus’ own fork missing it by less than an inch, lightly but audibly scraping across the porcelain.
Ye-in glanced on and winced, suddenly realizing that had, in fact, been the last piece.
“I can share,” she offered.
“Who said anything about sharing? This is a robbery.” He replied, brandishing a knife, though any menace the action might have held was severely undercut if not negated entirely by the fact that he’d chosen to grab the butter knife.
Ye-in burst out laughing and pushed her plate back over to him, steak included. They did wind up splitting it in the end, though.
Later that night, Derek was back in his room, now lying on a mattress, staring at the ceiling.
This house truly was beautiful. So was this planet. And even though there was a whole host of reasons why he shouldn’t, part of him was tempted to retire here on the spot. A small part. Tiny, really, bordering on the infinitessimal, ssuawshed not least by the fact that he’d likely get bored in a matter of weeks.
Although … the house was now built. He felt like he should move on to something new. Like the ocean, perhaps?