Deck the Halls

After providing Andrea with a breakfast that she described as “better than the shite they had at the monastery”, which was a compliment in his books, he set out to furnish the island a bit more.

First things first: the big living room. Setting the bed here was a good idea for yesterday when he was alone with Kaen but not when people could just drop in whenever they wanted. So the bed was ‘moved’ to one of the empty rooms, adjacent to the garden exit. The living room itself was filled with various seats like couches and bean bags and other things like coffee tables and some decorative things. His mana quickly ran empty though, signaling him that the creation of furniture, even without any complex functionality, cost him some amount of mana. He had spent roughly 349 MP just to create some furniture… Deciding to ‘play the odds’, he saved half of his mana in the Mana Well so he could create some furniture outside as well.

An hour later, the area around the crystal clear pond was furnished with some sunbeds, a stone terrace and some sunshades. It looked really cozy now, like something that John could see in some kind of sappy ad about ‘friendship’ and ‘cracking one open with the boys’, but it felt good.

By now the Nexus was empty again, and he was at 50% of his mana. Not wanting to spend more Mana or one of his (for now) limited mana potions, he decided to call it a day with that for now.

The question was though, what to do now… He could open up another Barrier and do something, he could craft some more.

He should spend his stat points before that, though.

With seven points to spend, he felt like it was probably a good idea to spend some of them on Endurance, both because more HP were always useful and because he still wanted to try to get that second Bionic Enhancement through Double Down (given that he was able to get that perk again). So he put four of those points in that, and the remaining points went into Agility, since it was probably the most useful stat he could level for his combat abilities.

Thinking about crafting, he should probably check the stuff he had received last night. He had received quite a lot of items from the Baby Steps achievement:

Taurus Skin
Skin of an iron bull, durable yet flexible. Not durable enough to help the bull though.

Frost Giant Ice
Ice from a Frost Giant from the realm of Jötunnheim. Can cool even magma down without melting. Also great for drinks.

Razor Spider Silk
Bundle of dried silk of a razor spider. More durable than its mundane sibling and as sharp as a razorblade. It’s supposed to make some good guitar strings.

Regenerating Potion of Fire, Lv. 5
Regenerate 10 HP/s for 30 seconds. Gain 100% Fire Resistance during that time.

Quicksilver Potion, Lv. 1
Increase movement speed by 250% for 3 seconds. Increases your perception as well.

Asura’s Potion, Lv. 10
For 5 minutes, gain two additional arms that work identically to your normal limbs. The arms can swing additional weapons and will be automatically equipped with the weapons from the next item set. Also increases rage gain by 200% for 25 minutes.

Shadow Tonfa
Rare
Weapon
One-Handed
10-15 Blunt DMG + 10 Element DMG (Shadow)
5% Chance to Blind Enemy for 5 Seconds

Most of those were pretty interesting, especially that tonfa and that Asura’s Potion, that sounded extremely useful. Looking into his inventory, he noticed that he had a lot of random junk in there thanks to all the different achievements and quests…

Should he sell that? Most of it surely wasn’t junk, but he simply didn’t have it in large enough quantities to securely use it…

But he had a way to duplicate them!

The Duplicator would work on these items, but most of them took a long ass time to duplicate… The shortest time was the Razor Spider Silk that took about 6 hours to replicate. But that sounded like it was probably worth it, a lot more so than spamming Scrap Metals. He already had 80 pieces of that by now, and he had better materials by now… So he put the Taurus Skin in there to maybe make some more durable gear.

If it were possible, he’d probably throw the Shadow Tonfa in there so that he had a set. Not that he could fight with two melee weapons yet, but potentially that wasn’t a problem for much longer.

Speaking of that, he still had a Perk point to use! The list of points was growing more and more:

Deep Pools
Increase all pools you have by 5 points.

Deep Pockets
Increase Inventory by 10%.

Bully
Deal 1.5x damage against enemies below your level.

Rubber Man
Become double jointed.

Magic Man
Increase magic damage by 1.25x.

Muscle Man
Increase physical damage by 1.25x.

Celestial Body
Your body has been blessed by angels. Immunity to diseases and poisons, +25 HP.

Dragon Skin
Your body becomes more draconic. Take 10% less physical damage and 25% less elemental damage.

Dragon Breath
You will be able to breathe fire like a classical dragon for a total of 30 seconds per day. The damage will be calculated from your Strength and Endurance. When your body is under the effect of Essences, the element of the attack will change.

Double Down
Take a second choice from one selection you had to select so far

Two-Weapon Combat
You’re able to fight with two weapons at the same time. All Damage by each weapon will be reduced by 50%.
Requirements: 25 AGI, Level 10, Perk Ambidextrous

Freebie
Gain a free level.
Requirements: Level 10

Jack of all Trades
Increase each skill by 1 Level.
Requirements: Level 10

Jumping Ahead
Evolve one skill that has not reached maximum Level yet.
Requirements: Level 10, 10+ Skills

Weapon Adept
Gain Proficiencies with 3 additional Weapons.
Requirements: Level 10, Melee Level > 10

Explorer of Worlds
Gain 25% more XP in Barriers created by you.
Requirements: Level 10, Create Barrier > 5

Animal Friend
Gain a new Pet.
Requirements: Level 10, CHA > 25

Loot Pass
Reduce Money gained from Barriers by 50%, but gain twice as many Loot Chests.
Requirements: Level 10, at least 5 Loot Chests obtained

Fast Builder
+2500 Mana for Nexus, +1 Basic Research in each category unlocked.
Requirements: Level 10, Nexus obtained, Construction Evolver built

Some of those new perks were pretty cool. Most of them seemed like time skips, enabling him to get certain benefits quicker. The Freebie was something he would save for some point later when gaining experience for a new level would be tedious. Some of the other ones were basically ‘neat to have’ but nothing really unique he couldn’t get by grinding.

The ones that interested him the most right now were Dragon Breath, Loot Pass, Two Weapon Combat, Animal Friend and Celestial Body in that order. Breathing fire was a pretty badass skill, but he wasn’t sure how Kaen would react when he was suddenly able to breathe fire… Getting double the random loot sounded pretty nifty as well, especially since selling the items in those boxes would probably be more valuable than the money he’d receive otherwise. Two Weapon combat was nice, but he wasn’t sure how much that would benefit him right now. Another pet was always interesting, but he felt like it was better to focus on the two he had already and get them to a good level before adding a third pet in there…

Being absolutely indecisive about the two highest perks, John decided to flip a coin for it, not being able to choose by himself between more gear and a badass ability.

Heads for Dragon Breath, Tails for Loot Pass.

Flipping the coin into the air, it landed on the ground with tails up top.

Loot Pass selected! Effects apply beginning with the next Barrier!

Hm… that almost incentivizes him to go into a Barrier now…