Magical Engineering

Since I got my new quest and realized that you could stack the bonuses for having no weapon equipped, I’d been considering what exactly counted as a weapon. So far, my fists didn’t seem to count. It was possible there was a point where I became skilled enough in pugilism that they did, but for the moment, I was going to operate under the idea that weapons were only things that were primarily used as such. What would that mean if I started getting myself a nice tool belt full of useful things? As an engineer, I’d used all kinds of implements that were never designed for or meant to harm anyone, but I had certainly maimed myself by accident many times. So my current plan, after I ran this by Mel for his opinion, was to get a nice craftsman’s mallet and see how the System treated it.

“Afternoon, Dave. Ya look a lot better today than ya did yesterday; that mean you're healing up well then?” Mel asked the moment I stepped into the room. Fresh chapters posted on novel-fire.ɴet

“More or less, gave myself a mana backlash headache last night, at least I think I did. I only learned they existed this morning from the brothers,” I responded. The pain was finally gone, and I had a pleasantly full stomach after breakfast. Maybe I could consider branching out a little on my routine.

“Ah, so that special skill of yers was useful then?” Mel asked, his voice dropping to a whisper.

I looked side to side and didn’t see anyone in the room, but followed suit anyway. “Yeah, hit level fifty-seven in a single night. Probably going to play around with it again tonight. This time, though, I’ll be a bit more careful at how much I push myself, but I’m actually here for a different reason. The System is knowingly pushing me towards cheating, or as the description said, exploiting reality. What’s your thoughts on that?”

“I’m going to talk to ya as plainly as I can for a minute. I like ya a lot, Dave, especially the way you’ve been looking after those two kids. If they’d gone to the Arena instead of with ya, I think they’d already be dead. Yer walking a mighty dangerous path here, not that I'm saying ya have much of a choice in it. The System seems to want something changed, and fer better or worse yer the one it’s expecting to make those changes. This is gonna make ya a giant fucking target one day, not that the whole Sanquar shit wasn’t already going to, but ta put all this on a newbie, well, it ain’t right. So what I’m trying to say here is yeah, do what the System suggests and push yourself as hard and as fast as ya can because bad shit is coming yer way, and yer going to need to be as prepared as possible.” The speech had been the sternest Dave had ever heard Mel’s voice become, and his color had shifted into a deep, almost blue shade of green.

“Well then, I’m going to need a craftsman’s mallet and maybe a few other tools if you have them, and I need to stress this. I don’t want any weapons, only some tools and possibly a belt to put them in. And who knows what kind of smelting I may have to do? Got any flame retardant gear to go with it?” I asked, figuring I may as well try to cheat the armor modifier as well.

“I think I see where yer going with this, and yes, I have everything,” Mel said, giving me what I was pretty much sure was his nod of approval.

“Oh, almost forgot, why are some dungeons persistent? Elicec thought you might know, and I was curious. I think one of my goals is to take out the desert one, is that even possible, though?” I asked.

“Yeah, it’s possible, and maybe you’ll even be able to knock it out in a year or two, but it still won’t be easy without a full-sized raid party with you. The problem with persistent dungeons is that unless you kill everything in them, things start to respawn, so there’s no going back for supplies in between sub-bosses. Yer stuck taking them all out, including the big one, all at once. I don’t know exactly how they form in the first place, but once they’re there, they’re crazy dangerous, so please don’t go running into that one thinking yer ready to take it on anytime soon,” Mel explained.

“Don’t worry, wasn’t planning to. I’ve got a bunch of stuff to experiment with tonight anyway,” I answered. I still wanted to take on the dungeon, just not yet.

“Good, now come get yer stuff,” Mel said with another nod.

An hour later, I was standing back in my room, looking like I was ready to play around in a crucible. I had to spend ten points moving my Body Temperature Regulation up to twelve to handle how fast this outfit was making me overheat. Wrapped around my waist was a tool belt loaded with a few different items. I’d gotten the mallet as I’d originally intended, but I’d also decided to add in a prybar and a couple of screwdrivers. I sat down in front of my interface and checked what the new modifier I had received was.