It was very curious what the Fusion skill considered to be ‘one’ item. A two-piece bikini counted as one item. A whole set of Vcuber clothes counted as one item. And apparently, a small pile of War Shark feathers counted as one item as well.
In other news, I now had a very weird-looking knife with a bulky emerald handle and a thin blade made out of the aforementioned feathers.
I had been hoping for a result , but I honestly hadn’t expected it to actually work.
trelipideliberitation: maybe it knows what you want
trelipideliberitation: like you can guide the result or something
GeorgeDoshington: awww no emerald caltrop
“Hmm. You know, there might be something to that,” I mused. “But if that’s true, this skill is kind of insanely versatile, isn’t it? Way more than I thought it would be…”
Just like the gun being unreasonably powerful and the dungeon being way more intense than I’d expected for a D-rank…
“Well, I’m not gonna complain! Time to go make a door!”
I set to work on it. First, I cut down a suitable tree with my key sword again. One far away enough that there was no chance of it falling into my home.
Then I tested my new makeshift knife on the wood and found it quite hard, but once I channeled a bit of Ether through the knife, it went much better.
It still took me hours to cut out a few roughly plank-shaped pieces from the trunk I’d cut down.
“So… How do I make this into a door? I don’t have nails or anything…”
I hadn’t really thought this through, had I?
Eclipsoon: maybe you can Fuse the planks with each other?
GeorgeDoshington: time for plastic wraping to shine
“Hmm… That’s an idea… Uh, what are you talking about, George?”
GeorgeDoshington: fuse it with the planks for plasticreinforced door lol
I slowly raised an eyebrow and tried to put as much ‘I’m judging you energy’ into it as possible even if I knew that he couldn’t see me.
JamieWasTaken3: you kno itmight work
JamieWasTaken3: cuz it knows what u want right?
“Eehhh… I guess it might…?”
It sounded really dumb, but… Well, I should experiment with Fusion more anyway. I hadn’t really done much of that besides combining a few items. Granted, I was kind of limited on Ether right now.
“Okay, fine. Let’s try fusion then…”
I picked up the plastic wrapping from the Ether bar, stopped for a moment, and then piled it together with the paper wrapping from the Ether burger as well as the empty bottle from the Tempor juice and the empty can from the Ether pop.
In other words, a pile of trash. Sure, a variety of trash, but still, all of it was trash. Now the question was whether it would count…
I touched the pile of trash and focused on using Fusion. To my delight, all of the trash successfully turned into a blob of orange energy and not just the plastic wrapping I’d been touching.
“Heck yes, chat! I can even group things together with Fusion! Maybe that means I can combine more than just two items without having to soulbind things?”
Which would, in retrospect, make getting that skill kind of pointless.
Jeofffff: there’s proly some kind of disadvantage to that tho
Eclipsoon: maybe it dilutes the items if you use multiple at once
“Hmm, good point, actually… Well, let’s see what it does!”
I took the set of planks laid out in front of me and shoved the glowing blob of Ether into them, specifically trying to categorize all of them as one object in my mind.
The entire thing began glowing as it absorbed the blob and a moment later I was left with the final result.
“...Uh… I guess it’s a door…?”
It looked kinda like a door. The planks were haphazardly held together by pieces of plastic and paper wrapping. The whole thing looked like it could fall apart if I breathed on it wrong.
Well, I had used literal trash for this, so I probably shouldn’t have expected anything better.
JamieWasTaken3: yea idk
JamieWasTaken3: probably not gonna be very good
“Well… I mean, the quest doesn’t specify that it has to be a good door. And it’s not like I need a good door that badly, so…”
I gingerly touched the abomination and tried picking it up, fearing that it would crumble in my hands.
Surprisingly, the whole thing held together, although it didn’t quite feel like one unified whole with how parts of it moved independent of each other.
“Right… Eh, good enough…?”
I shot Appraisal at it just to see what it would say.
Planks + Trash (fused)
A fusion of two objects.
Yeah, I didn’t know what I’d expected.
Jeofffff: still probably counts as a door tho
I pulled the door outside of my shelter, frowned at it for a moment, and then simply covered the entrance with the door.
The size was a bit off and I had no way to make it swing open like an actual door. I would have to keep removing and then replacing it again instead of it opening on its hinges like a normal door would.
GeorgeDoshington: 10/10 door
GeorgeDoshington: would door again
I snorted and opened my quest window.
‘Good night’s sleep’ Side quest
Time left: 19d,17h,15m
Find a shelter to sleep in [ACHIEVED]
Create that shelter yourself [ACHIEVED]
Find some bedding and a pillow [ACHIEVED]
Have a proper door to your shelter [PARTIALLY ACHIEVED]
Pentalty for failure - 5SP debt
“Partially… Well, I guess it’s not really a proper door. But how am I supposed to make it into one?”
I assumed it referred to the way I couldn’t open the thing like a door, but I had no idea how to fix that issue, especially with the awkward triangular shape of my doorway.
Eclipsoon: maybe try fusing feathers with other feathers
Eclipsoon: and think about making door hinges.
JamieWasTaken3: just gotta believeeee maaan
“Hmm… Interesting idea.” I rolled my eyes at Jamie’s comment. “Uh huh.”
I reached into my backpack, pulled out a couple of the feathers, and carefully put them in one pile, before doing it again and creating another pile. Then I gingerly touched one of the piles – in a way that it wouldn’t cut me – and activated Fusion.
The pile turned into an orange blob as expected and I shoved it into the other pile. A moment later, the glow abated and I was left staring at…
A pile of jagged sharp objects that looked like a cross between caltrops and used razors. They kinda resembled door hinges if I squinted enough and ignored the spikes, but… could I even use them as such…? Maybe I could use the spikes as built-in nails…?
“I… don’t know about this, chat.”
JamieWasTaken3: you didn’t believe hard enough
“Uh huh. Since when is this about faith? Am I supposed to pray to the Fate Weaver before I use Fusion now?” I asked deadpan, and looked back at the mess in front of me.
I shook my head and picked up one of the things before looking it over.
Eclipsoon: it’s crude but it could work
Eclipsoon: for the quest if nothing else
“Hmm… I guess I can try it…”
I proceeded to use my makeshift emerald knife’s handle to hammer one of the things into the door near the top, one in the middle, and one at the bottom. Surprisingly, the door didn’t fall apart as I jammed the things into the side of the planks.
Then I hammered the thing into the shelter’s main entrance. It was an absolute pain, since I had to constantly hold the door in the right position after I got one of the hinges right.
After hours, the door was attached.
Frankly speaking, I had no idea how it still held.
I tried opening and closing the door, and although it didn’t open straight, it actually worked.
GeorgeDoshington: 11/10 door
GeorgeDoshington: would door again
“You’re repeating jokes, George.”
Regardless, I took a look at my quest window and…
Have a proper door to your shelter [ACHIEVED]
Yup, it actually counted.
“Well, that’s all I needed! Mission success, I guess. Who cares if this door is a crime against nature? My job here is done!”
JamieWasTaken3: lol proper door my ass
I ignored Jamie and instead mentally prodded the system and confirmed that I wanted the quest to complete.
‘Good night’s sleep’ Side quest complete!
Find a shelter to sleep in [ACHIEVED]
Create that shelter yourself [ACHIEVED]
Find some bedding and a pillow [ACHIEVED]
Have a proper door to your shelter [ACHIEVED]
Have that shelter be very far away from any other civilization. [ACHIEVED]
Small Combo expansion ticket
‘Completionist quester’ achievement unlocked!
A ticket fell into my hands as the system confirmed the quest completion.
Instead of scanning the ticket though, my attention was focused on the quest completion window.
“Shelter that’s far away from any civilization…” I murmured. “Chat, that… That implies that there is civilization somewhere out there. The world isn’t totally barren.”
JamieWasTaken3: oh shiittt
GeorgeDoshington: hell yeah aliens exist
Eclipsoon: that’s great news!
I felt the smallest ember of hope light up inside me… and then quickly squashed it. If it was an explicit objective in a quest, then said civilization had to be really far away.
…And considering one of the tier five achievements was about jumping to another planet, said civilization wasn’t even necessarily on this planet.
I slumped again but didn’t voice my thoughts.
Instead, I checked out the achievement I’d gotten along with this quest.
Completionist quester - Achieve all side objectives of a quest. [COMPLETE]
“Huh, neat. I guess I haven’t done that yet.”
Jeofffff: more juicy skill points
“Mmm, yeah. Got eleven now… I can afford a few things…” I mused as I opened my crappy door, got inside my shelter, and closed it behind me.
I could get Dual Wield on Soulbound Item… I could get its tier 2 variant, Soul Strike… I could get Rend… Hmm, I had a few options.
I also didn’t need to rush into getting anything. After all, spending the points mid-fight to give myself an edge had already saved me once, so if I had multiple options and wasn’t sure which one to get yet, I could just hold onto them for now.
Instead, I took a look at the ticket in my hands. This one was black with white text that read ‘2%!’ I scanned it with Appraisal.
Small Combo expansion ticket
A system consumable that increases your total Ether, Intra, and Tempor reserves and regeneration by 2% when consumed.
“Whoa, what?! All three of them? Nice!”
I wasted no time in consuming it.
Consume 1x Small Combo expansion ticket?
Eclipsoon: waitwaitwait
“What? Something wrong?”
Eclipsoon: I was just thinking that it’s a percentage boost
Jeofffff: oh shit ur right
Jeofffff: you get more Ether as you grow right?
I blinked again and then slapped my forehead.
“You’re right! I should have waited! The more Ether and stuff I have, the more effective those tickets are!” I groaned. “That’s why the tickets exist at all, isn’t it? So that you can save them for later if you want to…”
trelipideliberitation: and so you can trade them probably
Jeofffff: maybe it’s retroactive tho
“Yeah, that too. Hmm… it could be retroactive…” I frowned. “But that would be really hard to tell…”
“Well, what’s done is done, I guess… I’m gonna try to hold onto any more tickets, I guess, and use them later…” I frowned. “But that would make me weaker in the short run, wouldn’t it? If I died in a dungeon because I didn’t have enough Ether or something, then it would be pointless to save them…”
Ugh, a classic gamer dilemma. Play it safe or be greedy with your resources? Usually, I would go for the greedy option in games, but if I was risking my own life…?
“...You know, what? Never mind. I’m not going to save them. Don’t want to get too greedy. And who knows? Maybe it’s retroactive just like Jeoff said.”
Then I took a deep breath and clapped my hands.
“Anyway! This door took way too long to make! So long that most of my Ether regenerated already on its own! So while I munch on my pizza, you guys give me your best Fusion suggestions!”