Part one -  Bricks and Exploration 

Already awake for today, Urist stood outside and watched as the morning light trickled through the leaves. Although it was a nice sunny day with some clouds here and there he couldn’t help having a nagging thought in the back of his mind. 

Why hasn’t it rained once since we’ve been here? And why hasn’t the river water level not dropped because of it? Whatever. No rain means we have the full day to do whatever we want.

Throwing away his worries, the dwarfs began to make breakfast for today. The preparation was quick as they reheated the remaining stew from yesterday and had some smoked fished on the side. Finished eating, Urist and the dwarfs got to work on making shovels as he wanted to start gathering clay to make bricks.

Well, it’s more like bamboo-shaped hand shovels instead of actual shovels but whatever. 

To make the hand shovels faster Urist enlisted the help of the bamboo team. Thanks to their experience in handling bamboo these past few days, it didn't take them long to finish the needed crudely made shovels. As soon as they finished Urist took them headed over to the river bank.

“Hey Rork, Rat. It’s time to start digging when we’re done you can pull up the fish.”

“Ok, boss let’s gather this clay. The only question I have is how much do we need to dig?”

“Good question Rork first we need to find the clay. When we do, we’ll expand the pit so we can then easily extract.”

The choice of excavation site was near the river but not next to it as Urist wanted no one to trip. It was close enough that they had a good chance to find a clay layer so it should work. Hopeful to strike clay the three began to dig for clay thirty feet from each other to get a better sample size. With pretty excellent luck it only took them a few feet of digging for the party to hit a deposit of high-quality red clay.

Ya, see this color clay nephew? They type is perfect for making bricks and pottery!

A flash of memory passed through Urist’s thoughts as he dug his hand into the red clay.

Uncle. Wherever you are. Thank you for teaching me.

A somber feeling in his heart passed by as he thought of what next to do with the clay.

If we mix this with the sharp sand next to the river we can make some good quality bricks. If memory serves me right, the correct ratio for this type of clay to produce bricks is one part clay to one part sand. Although it wouldn’t be that strong when comparing it to modern bricks standards it will do for our needs.

“This is the material to make bricks boss? It seems pretty soft compared to wood.”

“I have to agree with Rat it seems like something not worth gathering.”

Shaking his head Urist responded to the two criticisms. “It might look weak now but after some treatment, it’ll be strong enough for our needs. Now come on let’s expand this hole.”

Despite having their doubts, the two followed Urists lead and expanded the hole to twelve feet long and twelve feet wide.  It might have taken some time to finish, but Urist felt it it was well worth it to make gathering easier. 

Wiping the sweat off his brow Urist got out of the pit, “Ok guys five-minute break before we throw sand into it.”

“But boss we just threw out all that soil!? We are we refilling it?”

“Are you just messing with us now?”

“Now now guys it’s all a process. We’re not completely filling it. It’ll be just enough to make a good ratio so we can mix them with our feet.”

Urist began to start eyeballing the ratios under the skeptical gazes of the two dwarfs. When he finished they began the heavy labor of stomping the sand into the clay making them sweat. With some cursing under their breath, Urist calmed them down by talking about how cool it was going to be when they could make their own knives. 

It took until noon for them to make a good consistency to start molding bricks. While the dwarfs were hard at work mixing, Urist took some time to head over to the rope team so he could ask them to make a brick cutter out of bamboo and underwear string.

Such a weird contraption came from them not having better materials such as hide glue or a drill device. To Urist, it was a good temporarily tool to use as a mold. Before leaving them to make bricks, he picked out a nice flat rock and made some scratches on the surface to set the dimension for the brick cutter. 

It didn’t take them long to make the cutter and head over to where Urist and co. were stomping clay. Taking out some finished material Urist put it on a large flat stone and began to cut it under the dwarf's gazes. 

“You see these bricks are cut in the shape of a rectangle on a flat surface like this. This serves a few things as this allows the brick cutter to make uniform bricks and the flatness makes it easy to work with them. When they are finished we’ll place them on an empty plot of land, this won’t make them completely uniform but it’ll do for now.”

Poking the brick Rat asked with curiosity, “I see that the clay has gained some strength but it’s still soft boss. How do you fix that?”

“It’ll take a bit, but first we sunbake them so that they dry before we put them in a fire to harden. If we don’t, the bricks will crack and pop from the water content making them useless. The bricks we’re making right now will be used to craft the forge. The next series after that will be fire-baked inside to make them stronger for other construction projects.”

“Okay. Then how long does it take for them to be ready?”

“Give or take a few days to dry enough. But since I wanna collect some shells to make mortar it works out.”

“Mortar?”

“What’s that?”

“Like what I always say one step at a time. Let’s focus on the bricks first. After I do a few cuts do you guys think you will be able to handle it?”

“Yeah, this is piss easy boss. We can do this when we wait to pull up the fish. So what are you gonna do?”

“I’m going to make some custom parts for the forge over on the side. You can take turns to watch as I make them.”

“Oh? Such as?”

With a small chuckle, Urist shook his head, “Come on now. What would be the fun in telling you? Just watch and see.”

Leaving the two stunned dwarfs Urist turned and grabbed some clay before beginning to shape the other objects they needed for the kiln. Such custom made bricks that needed to be made were the entry point brick for the billows intake and the firing stone where objects would sit to bake. He wished they could make a water mill for the billows, but they didn't have the tools or the manpower to create such a thing.

One step at a time, Urist consoled himself. If the weather holds then we should finish gathering the mortar materials and be ready to make it after the sunbake. 

After he made the custom parts he went to go search the mountain range ravines for any iron or copper sticking out. With such large mountains, there should be, shifts of exposed minerals and metals. I wonder what we’ll find? With the information, I’ve been given I know that this whole world hasn’t been touched by intelligent hands. So the chance to find unmolested pockets of metal should be an easy find. Maybe we could even find metal in our cave. Nah it would be stupid to do something dangerous.

Why he thought it was stupid came to a few points. First, he didn’t know how stable the walls were and a potential cave-in would spell disaster. Another reason is that he didn’t have any wood supports, lighting, breathing apparatuses, or tools to carry the dirt and minerals away.

It was too dangerous a task, without many pros that it was rejected until further notice. With that in mind, he set out into the wilds with a bottle of rations and smoke fished wrapped in leaves along with the bronze sword as protection.

Even if he hadn’t come across any carnivores in the jungle, one couldn’t be too safe in the unknown. Since he went south last time he headed north together with Uora and Briana of the medicine making group in case they found any plants to bring back.

They had similar loadouts, with the exception being their weapons as Urist used a bronze sword and they wielded rock knives. The group didn’t place any markers as the place they were heading was hugging the mountainside the destination being between two mountains.

He figured it wouldn’t take them that long to scout out judging by the vague estimation of distance and how light they were packing. If all went well they would be back before dinner was served. His eyes lit up with excitement as he hoped of finding a source of iron or copper on this trip.

 

Part 2 -  Lodestone

 

Using a game trail to enter the mountain range, it took the group hours of hard walking before they saw any change in their environment. Their progress was slow thanks to the dense underbrush. Urist made a note to himself that next time they come they’d cut a path. Two hours in, the trees and bamboo that covered the area thinned out to the point to reveal a rocky landscape.

With the lack of plants surrounding them and with such a vast area to explore. Urist had decided that they would split up to cover more ground once they had reached their destination. Looking around a bit, they decided to meet up at a large rock in the distance. Rolling up his sleeves, Urist moved to the east while the girls went into the jungle to search for plants to gather.

Finding a good hammerstone nearby, Urist smashed it into other rocks to study the mineral structure of the broken fragments. After doing this for about close to thirty minutes he was quite pleased to have found magnetite, a rock that had a high iron content.

Finding magnetite also meant there might be some lodestones around which were rocks that were magnetized. If he could get his hands on a magnet this early they could make a basic compass and also use the lodestone to pick out iron sand instead of crushing stones to powder.

Going through his samples he figured there should be a large amount of Iron in the dirt here. If they had lodestones they could easily pull out the iron in the ground.

If only lodestones worked on copper or tin it would make our lives much easier.

He wondered if the other mountain next to his home would have any copper or would it be an iron area. That's not saying more iron wasn’t bad, but having a copper supply had very nice properties that he wished to make use of.

At the very least, having both metals would be a great boon when we got started on forging. For now guess I’ll try to find a lodestone, if I remember right, one of the best ways to find a lodestone was to grab some iron-rich soil and throw it on the rocks. With some luck, the iron sand will stick revealing the stone.

After trying a few hundred times in a dozen different areas, he gave up and head over to the black stone meeting place. In a bad mood he threw the sand he picked up and threw it at the stone and watched in a daze as the sand moved towards.

What a huge lodestone! I can’t believe this big black rock is completely magnetized, it must at least stand over twenty feet wide and thirty feet long. 

Urist stood in awe. He had never seen such a huge black lodestone of such size. It made his blood boil in excitement thinking about the possibilities. With just this rock, iron collecting will become a breeze and with a quick check around the area. He discovered smaller magnetic rocks that had broken off the main rock. 

He looked around, etching the location of this stone in his brain. Urist then used his hammerstone to break some magnetic rocks nearby for samples.

Checking the timer and the sun he calculated that they still had some time before they had to head home. 

I can quickly check the mountain next to this one to see if it has another metal. Then I’ll check out the middle and the opposite mountainside to see what it has. 

Not wasting time, Urist made a quick search as he was running out of time. Even though he rushed his search he was happy with what he found.

Traces of Stannite ore meaning of a mix of Iron, Tin, Copper, and Zinc. Although it’s good it should mean that native copper is a pipe. Still, at least I found Chalcocite and Cassiter ores which is a treat.

Chalcocite, a great rock that contained high traces of copper inside the rock and Cassiterite contains a large amount of tin and was the chief tin rock in the ancient world. He also found some rocks that mixed copper and tin which he paid attention to.

Hmmm, how strange. If I remember right, tin and copper shouldn’t exist together. With what I could pull from referencing earth history, such pockets of copper and tin should be separated by hundreds if not thousands of miles. Such an occurrence where only straight down the mountains was unnatural. 

Was it created artificially? Then does also mean the clay deposit is artificial? I’ll need more research to reach a conclusion, but it just feels so weird that this spot just seemed to perfect for life to prosper. I’ll think about it later, I bet the medical team is waiting for me at the rendezvous.

Storing his samples in his shirt bag he met up with the medical team at the lodestone who had their shirt bags filled to the brim with medicinal plants. The three felt quite accomplished and smiled on their way back as they talked about what they discovered. Urists eyes lit up in their discussion when the girls said they had found wild green onions.

He didn’t know what was a better find, the metal or the onions that would save his taste buds. 

Today has been a great day. Only I worry about what is in store for us when the marketplace opens.  

As he marked the area by notching an X on a tree such thoughts flashed through his mind making his mood became somber. 

Whatever it is, sun or rain, we’ll face it together as a group. 

Renewing his resolve, his group reached the camp at around five p.m. where the dwarfs were hard at work. After saying hello and depositing his samples and lodestones he decided how the others were progressing. 

He saw that the dwarfs had finished sixty-three bricks and were still at it. Looking over at dinner he noticed that it was close to being done with today's dish consisting of fish and squirrel meat stew. Doing a quick wash of the onions, Urist shamelessly chopped up some onions and threw them in for flavor.

Quickly, the rich aroma entered the nearby dwarf's noses and made them drool. Uria frowned at Urist when he didn’t ask her for permission to put in the onions but let it go. She instead turned to the group of dwarfs coming close and yelled at them that it wasn’t finished and to get back to work. 

They all moped with displeasure and got back to work. Some of them even cursing under their breath.

Uria turned to Urist, “So those are Onions. No wonder you wanted them so badly, they make the smell of the soup rich. But I ask you next time to tell me when you wanna add something to the dish. I’m the cook afterall. Besides that, how was the exploration? Did you find what you were looking for?”

Drinking from his water bottle Urist was sat relaxed.“Sorry about that Uria. I just couldn’t resist to throw them in, but next time when I wanna add something I’ll run it by you. As for how the trip went, I feel if I’m not mistaken that we have Iron, Tin, and Copper nearby. I know for a fact we have Iron, but the copper and tin I feel as if I need a second opinion.  Other then that the most important find was a large lodestone.”

Tilting her head in confusion Uria asked, “What’s a lodestone? Is it a spice?”

Shaking his head Urist took out a bamboo bottle filled with sand and a lodestone. 

“Watch carefully as I bet this will shock you.”

“Ok let’s see what crazy thing you came up with.”

“Heh. I can’t wait to see your expression.”

Popping the cap off the bamboo, he poured it on a large leaf and then made a circle motion with the lodestone. Uria watched mystified as black material began to stick to the rock.

“This here is a natural magnet that can gather iron from the sand. With this rock, we can collect high-quality iron particles to use them to make Iron and maybe one-day steelworks!”

Part 3 - Countdown

Time: 0 Days 1 hour 15 minutes until Market opens

Points Gained: 6674

Fire blazing in the night, Urist watched as the timer kept ticking down to zero. He wasn’t sitting alone though as Uria sat with him on guard duty to spend the last of the fading light together. 

It’s been quite a productive day with what we’ve gotten done. All that’s left to see is what comes after this timer. I told the others after dinner about how close the timer was to reaching zero. Only to get mostly shrugs saying along the lines of them having great faith in him dealing with any problems so they didn’t raise many questions.

Which he took it as. We’re lazy and don’t wanna think about it. You think better than us so it's better to leave it to you.

After that, they turned in to sleep leaving Urist to sigh to himself. How can they trust me with their lives? Do they not care about living? What if I fail? Even if I have useful hands now what if it’s not enough? 

Fear from the past and the unknown future crawled their ugly way into his head making him want to scream. The only thing stopping him was Uria sitting by him as he didn’t want to worry her of his mental crisis. They sat in silence, soaking in the heat of the flames that tickled their skin as the night grew darker. In the darkness, billions of stars twinkled in the horizon embellishing the three moons that came out to play.

Stoking the fire for a bit with a stick Uria broke the silence. “Hey, Urist. Are you sure that's how the market functions? If it’s like how you think then how will that be such a bad thing for us?”

Scruffing his hair Urist replied, “It’s what comes after the market that I’m afraid of. I’m sure I told you that I come from another world Uria and I was a human, not a dwarf. And this world feels strange, it feels… It feels too perfect. 

“The weather hasn’t changed much and it hasn’t been raining, yet the river levels haven’t dropped. We are catching a steady supply of squirrels that haven't fallen off and the metal on the mountain is split too well for my taste. Another thing is we haven’t run into any carnivores to speak of and there should be more poisonous plants.

“My cloudy memories are telling me to work faster as if it knows danger is on the horizon and as we are we’re not prepared to face it.”

Uria tilted her head slightly milling over Urist thoughts, “So you're worried because everything is too perfect and after the market releases things will change. And you're fearing such a change since you don’t know what those changes will be correct?”

Drinking some Woozoo tea Urist nodded his head, “I’m quite happy how we’re doing right now. You guys are my family now. I don’t want anything to happen to you all so I have to keep moving, thinking, and improving. I’m afraid… Afraid that we won’t be strong enough to what's to come.”

Urist kept staring into the fire listing off his thoughts as Uria watched the firelight flicker off his face. How serious he was, how deep his fear went and how he tried to carry the world on his back. It felt familiar to her and in turn, made her frown at how he was taking all the burden by himself. 

In a sudden fit, she leaned her head on Urist shoulder to try and stop him from rambling. 

Thanks to the close contact Urist began to stutter. “Wha-wha-what are you doing Uria!”

“It isn’t fair dummy.  You shouldn’t be thinking about this by yourself. If you think of us as a family then share the burden with us even if they are lazy they’ll help out. And don’t beat yourself over the future look at how far we’ve come! We can filter water, grow food, make bricks, bowls, tableware, and soon a forge where we can craft metal. In just a week we’ve done so much that I can’t even name everything off the top of my head.”

Tilting her head up she looked Urist in the eye, “So rely on us more you dummy we’re all in this together.”

Urist stared at her big brown eyes as a shy smile slowly crept on his face, “Thanks Uria, I needed that. Hey, Uria can you promise me something?”

Raising an eyebrow Uria asked, “What?”

Coughing, Urist brought up his resolve, “Can you always be by my s--”

Warning. Dear inhabitants, the world is evolving. Please get to safety as changes might be violent in your area.

The market will open at the intended time for civilization leaders.

This is the only warning.

You have been advised.

0 Days 0 hours 59 minutes until Market opens

Points Gained: 6674

This time, Urist wasn’t the only one to have the warning resound in his brain. Uria and the other dwarfs sleeping inside the cave had gotten the message and were confused. Urmom came out of the cave leading the pack bewildered dwarfs. “Boss is that the red text you’ve been talking about? What should we do?”

Urist face turned serious and got up together with Uria. He gave everyone a long stare before his thoughts settled and started giving out orders. “ Everyone, ready your stone spears by the entrance of the cave. Throw more wood on the fire and make it as bright as we can for tonight. We’ll keep two people guarding the cave entrance as usual and if anything happens the guards will yell to alert the rest of us.  

“If they ring the alarm grab your spears near the wall and we’ll use the bamboo door as a defensive wall and stab anything that tries to come in after the guards fall back. Is everyone alright with this? If so go back to sleep and get some rest we’ll have a hard day ahead of us.”

Everyone felt more at ease with Urist instructions and head back to sleep after putting their spears on the wall. Leaving Uria and Urist alone once again on guard duty soon silence resumed and the two sat near a blazing fire.

Uria was the one to break the ice, “So umm, before that whole warning what were you saying?”

Urist blushed and looked away, “It’s nothing don’t worry about it, don’t worry about it!”

Seeing him act in such a way Uria chuckled feeling mischievous, “Don’t worry dummy I know what you said.”

“Wha?”

Leaning on his shoulder once again Uria whispered, “I’ll always be by your side.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

It would have been a touching moment between the two if it wasn’t for beasts roaring in the surrounding area. Unconsciously Urist and Uria were holding hands and readying their weapons for a fight.

Part 4 - Market Place and Civilization Stone

The howling of beasts could be heard within the darkness. Hearing the noises, Urist and Uria readied themselves to sound the alarm. Thankfully as the market timer ticked down to the minutes the beasts never came to attack.

30,29,28...15,14,13… 8,7,6… 3,2,1.

The Market has opened! Civilization leader, please take a look!

You have mail!

Bamboo Seeding timer activated 6 Days 11 Hours 59 Mins

Rat Tide timer activated 13 Days 11 Hours 59 Mins

Beast Swarm timer activated 21 Days 11 Hours 59 Mins

Frowning at the new timers Urist wasn’t surprised in them showing up he was more worried about what these events would bring. Guessing by the names, he knew that with their current strength they would be destroyed within the month if they didn’t remedy their defenses.

He decided to put off planning their defenses until he scouted out the market to see what it had to offer. But before he could open the market, an envelope with a message saying he had mail appeared in his mind. Bewildered he shrugged his shoulders and mentally clicked on the envelope. 

Civilization Stone(Tier 1) 1x

Armament Stone(Tier 1) 1x

Do you accept Y/N?

Urist accepted the strange items and with a small flash of light two boxes appeared in front of him floating in the air. Uria watched in amazement as Urist reached out for the boxes and handed them over to her.

“Keep these safe I’ll look them over afterward.”

“Ok?”

With a thought, a screen appeared in front of Urist that had a single button that had the words world market. Clicking the button, a scale appeared then disappeared as new tabs appeared.

Buy, Sell, Trade, and Auction. The names are self-explanatory, but what can you buy from the market anyway?

Following his curiosity, he clicked an info icon on the buy button and started reading.

So I can use the points we gained to buy items from the system. And I can buy up to tier three items, with tier two costing ten times and tier three one hundred times more than normal, thanks to us being a tier-one civilization.

With this information, I wonder what the other civilization leaders will spend their points on. For now, I guess I’ll buy something like the Tier 1 information on the world after I do more research on the market.

Urist decided not to be tempted as he limited points to spend and each choice would decide their fate of survival. Next, he clicked the sell tab to confirm what he expected only to get a warning telling him to activate a Civilization Crystal. The same thing happened with the trade option when he tried to activate it.

He was able to open up the auction tab, only nothing was available on the list to bid on. Interested, in the option he tried to put an object up for sale which was one of his bamboo water holders. He was denied as well in doing so until he set up his Civilization Stone.

So I can’t activate three out of the four buttons without the stone. This little thing will be pretty important to us, from now on I’ll have to put it in a safe place and defensible place to not lose it. Guess I’ll put the two in the deepest part of the cave and call it good for now.

“Uria, I’ve checked through the information. Can you give me the boxes back? I have to place them inside the cave to go further.”

“Here you go. Although, can you tell me what you found out?”

“After I confirm all the options I’ll tell you what I discovered. Alright?”

“Sounds good to me.

Boxes in hand, he opened them to reveal two faintly glowing stones. Raising an eyebrow Urists thoroughly inspected the two stones. The Civilization stone was shaped like an orb and gave off a blue glow and the Armament stone had a sharp spear-like shape that glowed red.  

With the stones in hand, he thought about it for a bit before making up his mind in where to place them. Urist put them back in a box and opened the buy menu to try and buy a torch. Thankfully, it worked and he only spent one point on it. Impatient to set up the two stones, Urist lit the torched and walked into the cave quietly. He found who he was looking for and woke up two dwarfs as it was their turn to take over guard duty.

Bewildered at the stick on fire the dwarfs asked Urist what it was. Urist answered telling them it was called a torch and said he was heading to the back of the cave and not mind him.

With Uria in tow behind him, the two dwarfs who had awoken watched them make their way to the back of the cave. Walking in silence the two got to the end of the cave and placed the stones on the ground. Reading the instructions that came in the box and figured out what he had to do to activate the stones.

Using the bronze dagger, Urist pricked his ring finger and squeezed out two drops of blood on the stones. Urist and Uria watched in curiosity as the drops of blood were sucked into the stones like magic. Suddenly a flash of light exploded out of the stones blinding the two dwarfs in an instant.

The light then converged into Urist’s head causing the information to start flowing into his brain making him drop the torch. Regaining her eyesight shortly after Uira looked around just in time to see Urist fall to the ground fall down and start spazzing. Quickly she grabbed the torch and moved it away from Urist to make sure he didn’t catch fire.

With that danger out of the way, fear took over causing her to scream down the tunnel.

“The boss is acting strange I need help!”

The dwarfs woke up quickly and moved as fast as they could down the tunnel. When the party reached them Urist was already awake rubbing his head mumbling, “So that’s how it works… And that’s how we use the Armament stone… Man, what magical bullshit items they are.”

Besides looking at their leader the dwarfs glanced around in shock and awe. As this section of the cave wasn’t a cave anymore, now there were walls with small white crystals embedded in the walls. In the center of the new room, two pillars stood with a red crystal on one and a statue of a dwarf on the other.

Rat spoke up kneeling in front of Urist, “You alright boss? What happened here? What is with this fancy room?”

Holding his throbbing head, “I’ll tell you tomorrow. I’ve grown tired and need rest, just prepare that two new dwarfs will be here tomorrow…” Urist whose head shook back and forth passed out in Uria’s lap.

“Boss? Boss!”