Universe's End

When Rory awoke, he could instantly tell something had changed, the hairs on the back of his neck rising.

That’s not good. Not good at all.

He’d seen enough movies to know that there was no possibility he was imagining it. Tense, he clambered out of his small shelter as he took stock of the immediate surroundings for anything out of the normal.

Trees. Pond. Clover grass is still purple and gold. Bunny. The sky is blue, as always. Wait, bunny?

Doing a double take, Rory whipped his head back around, focusing on the small animal he’d all but overlooked. It was, all things considered, an ordinary bunny.

Given there had been no other signs of life until now, it was strange enough, but the world spirit Aelia had mentioned her new creations would appear soon.

“So, she went with a bunny?”

Tension easing from his shoulders, he began smiling at the cute little creature as it tilted its head at him.

Which, of course, was when the bunny lunged at him, revealing rows of aggressively pointy rodent fangs.

“Ack!” Rory yelped as he dodged under the small fur missile. The bunny from hell continued lunging forward, landing against a nearby tree before kicking off all in one fluid motion, tearing chunks from the force of its rebound.

I do NOT want to be hit by that thing.

Once more flashing through the air like a white arrow, Rory managed to intercept the creature, snagging it by its back leg as he flung it as hard as he could against the ground. The bunny monster hissed a rage-filled squeal as it hit the ground hard; Rory had used its momentum against it. Staggering upright, it focused on Rory, scrambling away toward where he had left his tools. While the bunny didn’t seem exceptionally sturdy, it had torn trunks from a solid-looking tree with relative ease; he had no desire to see what it could do to his rib cage. Hand grasping the handle of his makeshift knife, he spun around just in time for the bunny to slam into him like a cannonball. The impact was like a professional football player had struck him; he saw stars instantly, but his self-preservation instincts kept him moving even when everything else desired to curl up in a ball and puke up his guts. Crashing into the small pond with his assaulter, he thrashed about as he snagged the back leg of the bunny once more. This time, rather than fling it away from him, he dropped the knife he’d just grabbed so that he could re-adjust his grip. Now holding the bunny monster by the neck, he braced himself as he forced the creature beneath the false water, where it thrashed with all its strength. Freakishly strong as it may be, it was still only the size of a bunny, and without anything to leverage itself against, its strength meant nothing. Rory kept the bunny submerged for nearly a minute before it finally stopped thrashing, and at that exact moment, he felt a wave of energy crash into him.

Snatching his shoddy knife from the bottom of the small pond, he tromped out, soaked and grumbling, dragging along the monster bunny.

“...Sick sense of humor.”

Killer rabbits weren’t precisely what he had been expecting; he wasn't sure anyone would expect that, but at least he had survived with a trophy of his triumph to boot.

“Still need to come up with a name for the not-water.” Rory continued his grumbling as he began wringing the liquid from his shirt. His interface opened as if responding to his comment, showcasing a picture of the false water and a few quick sentences.

“Aisormba.” Rory read off. “Life-sustaining and cleanses excess ascension energy upon consumption. Huh. So, someone else gave it a name already.”

Rory paused for a moment, glancing at the rabbit he currently held.

“System, do these have a name?” Rory asked aloud. When nothing appeared on his interface, he shrugged, smiling briefly. “All right. Caerbannog.”

He wasn’t sure how many others would get the reference; after all, it was an older Earth movie, but it still brought a near smile to his face. Half-smile still on his face, a new pop-up appeared on his interface.

“Founder-Privilege applied. Species name: Caerbannog. A rapidly reproducing monster with a vicious streak a mile wide.” Rory scratched at his chin, thinking.

So, she went with calling us Founders after all. Or maybe the System named us that.

Thoughts of what Aelia had decided to call them aside, Rory scowled as he examined the bunny.

For all the talk of putting effort into shaping life, this sure feels like she just pulled a bit of plagiarism and stole the idea.

Ultimately, he severely doubted any IP lawyers were on the loose, so he highly doubted the World Spirit was about to be sued. Regarding creatures, Rory couldn’t deny that rabbits were a good choice. Exactly as his interface had said, they were rapidly reproducing little beasts, perfect for the propagation of life. They could quickly spread across the planet while providing an obstacle for himself and the seven other ‘founders’ as they had been called.

“Surely it’s not just the rabbi- the caerbannogs.” Rory mused. The world spirit had made it seem like she was planning to seed multiple types of life, and the caerbannog was just one. While it took an initial amount of energy, or whatever it cost to make life, she was a tier two planet; surely, she could do more than just the little white murderer.

Much as he wanted to continue mulling the train of thought over, from the corner of his eye, he saw motion. Something fluffy and white had entered the small clearing of his camp. Turning slowly, he came face to face with not one but three more of the caerbannogs. Letting the carcass drop from his left hand, Rory slowly rocked back and forth, arms raised as his right hand clutched his knife tightly.

When it rains, it pours.

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Stabbing forward, Rory swiped his knife through the jugular of another small white body before whirling around. He was covered in muck and gore, thankfully none of it his own, though he had a not-quite-minor collection of bleeding cuts and bruises all over his body. There was a frenzy in his eyes as he searched his surroundings, expecting yet another wave of killer rabbits to lunge at him as they sought to tear his throat out, but when nothing appeared for the first time in the last two hours, he let himself relax, every muscle shaking.

“Fuck me.” He finally uttered, collapsing in a heap next to the pile of corpses, at least fifty of the little terrors piled up. “What the hell was that about?”

Wave after wave had come after him. It had started with the single rabbit, then three, then five, then seven, nine, eleven, and a final wave of thirteen beasts. If it hadn’t been for the surges of energy that flooded him after each kill, he would have passed out long ago from exhaustion. It had been a brutal struggle, even after he’d begun understanding how they operated. Turning his back to them, he could force a lunge out from the little terrors; they would scramble over one another, desperately looking to attack him in a disorganized mass of fur and fangs. Had they attacked as an organized mass, he would have died after the third or fourth wave, that much, he was sure.

Pulling up his interface with a tired wave of his hand, he was greeted with the sight of his ascension progress, which was roughly eighty percent complete. What would have taken him around two weeks of ten-hour days of deep meditation, he’d achieved in a single day’s worth of a desperate fight for survival. He wasn’t sure whether he should be happy or annoyed, but at the very least, he’d made progress.

There’s no shot that was an accident, either.

If he were a betting man—not that there were any casinos to bet at anymore—he would have put money down that the world spirit had intentionally ensured that the caerbannogs were nearby.

A notification appeared as if confirming the thought, distracting him from looking over his worryingly low health percentages across the board.

“Caerbannog colony cleared. Wilderness territory secured. Establish settlement? Y/N.”

Rory took a deep breath, tremors wracking his body as the adrenaline receded. Steadying himself, he gave a curt nod, confirming his intent without needing to interact with the interface directly.

It’s a good thing the interface doesn’t require physical interaction, and that intent alone is enough because I don’t think I can lift my arms more than a few inches right now.

Instantly, for a few feet in every direction —with his shelter as the epicenter— the wild underbrush began to compress and shirk away, leaving his small camp in a proper clearing devoid of tripping hazards. A notification appeared only a second after his encampment had been cleared of significant foliage.

“Founder-Privilege recognized. Apply monster beacon? Y/N.”

Rory stared at the words, trying to process them.

“Monster beacon?” Rory finally laughed, an exhausted cackle. “As in, I can subjugate myself to more of that? Why the hell would I want that?”

He hadn’t expected an answer, but another notification appeared, which Rory took his time reading aloud in case he missed something.

“Monster Beacon application: Once a week, attracts monsters from a correspondingly appropriate distance. Allows for rapid expansion by drawing monsters toward established outposts or colonies. It can be used in place of standard search and extermination methods.

Rory paused, considering the idea. If it weren’t constantly drawing monsters, he would have time to recover between assaults.

Hopefully.

It was also much more efficient than scouring the land in pursuit of monster dens. Hell, he hadn’t even known there were monster dens. The only caveat was that there would be no retreating. It was do or die.

Well, I could always try running away.

That was an option if things got out of hand, but that raised a question of what would happen to the settlement if he ran, even if said ‘settlement’ was nothing more than a single shelter and small clearing. On the one hand, it might lead to nothing, just some monsters that would need to be cleared out if he wanted to be able to sleep in his shelter again.

On the other hand, he could potentially lose the settlement, and Rory could not know if he could establish more. If it was solely up to the world spirit, he couldn’t see why he wouldn’t be able to. As much as she wanted to push them, she also needed them to advance her ascension, so preventing them from trying again would be against her self-interests.

But

But there was a chance that the establishment of settlements was an ability that the System itself had taken over, something that would irk the world spirit, no doubt, as she had lost total autonomy over her planet.

So, what should I do?

Rory mentally paced back and forth as he weighed the benefits against the negatives before finally flicking his hand out and tapping the interface, which had no physical form but still reacted at the touch.

“Monster Beacon Applied. Countdown timer until the next wave is created.”

Rory read the words, and just as indicated, a timer appeared in the corner of the interface.

“Six days, twenty hours. What gives, aren't I being shorted four hours?” Rory snapped at the System, almost imagining it snickering at him.

“Timer applied based on initial contact with the first monster defeat.”

Rory frowned again, something he’d found himself doing a lot lately. It meant that rather than basing itself on when the waves were defeated; the timer was started from the first appearance of the monsters.

“So, the timer started when I first saw one of those rabbits?”

This time, the system did not provide further clarification; the only movement on the interface was the slowly ticking timer and the occasional change in his health status.

“Is this the reward we were promised?” Rory bemoaned as he poked one of the corpses with his barely functional knife, flakes chipping off after a prolonged battle. “Death by monster rabbits?”

He wouldn’t be surprised if the world spirit really did think this was some reward. As much as she took the mannerisms of a human —and, to some degree, the few other races on the planet— she was still, at the end of the day, an inhuman existence. She cared first and foremost about her ascension; she’d said so herself; it was quite literally an innate part of who she was as a world spirit. Forcing her ‘founders’ to grow through monster assault was just her way of speeding along her ascension.

It didn’t help that she wasn’t wrong. The waves of caerbannog had pushed his ascension rapidly. Instead of requiring two weeks to reach his second ascension —technically, his first proper ascension— he could be there in only two or three days.

“At which point ascension won’t be plausible through ordinary energy gathering, will it?” Rory suddenly questioned, running the math in his head. From a rank zero ascension to rank one, it took several days of mediation. Rank one to rank two required what appeared to be around ten times as much energy. Simple pattern recognition suggested that the difference between ascension rank two and ascension rank three would need a hundred times as much energy as zero to one. A process that had initially only required a little over a week had become a process of years.

“Fight monsters, grow. Use that growth to fight stronger monsters. It does sound like a video game.” Rory exclaimed. Not to mention, that wasn’t even an aspect created because of his Law creation; ascension had likely been intended to function as such from the very start, Rory could only assume. It could be said that his System creation had made it a more… complex matter, though.

Rory was beginning to regret that he hadn’t played more games in the last few years, but perhaps that was for the best. If he’d had a more solid image for a game system when he’d created the Law, it likely would have mimicked it in much closer detail.

“No point thinking about things that can’t be changed.” He huffed as he slowly rose, wading over to his small pond. He was dirty and gross, and he absolutely wanted to cleanse himself of the filth, but there was the little issue of the pond also being his only drinking source. Debating back and forth about the best solution for the predicament, he settled for stripping down and scooping handfuls of the aisormba with his hands and scrubbing himself outside the pond. It wasn’t a perfect option, but he felt marginally better by the end.

Clean —or as clean as he could get for the time being— he was left with a new consideration. Part of him wanted to crawl into his shelter and sleep for the next forty hours. His body had been badly abused several days in a row now. He could tell he hadn’t recovered even without his interface showing as much, but he only had a week until the next attack.

He needed to be ready. Not to mention the small hill of bunny corpses stacked outside his shelter.

Food.

The miracle liquid had sustained his body, but he wasn’t sure if that was sustainable itself, ignoring the fact that the pond was only so large. Eventually, he had to eat.

Eating raw meat may not be wise.

Fire. What he needed first, then, was a fire.

Cautiously exiting his camp's perimeter, he searched through the forest for any fallen branches that looked appropriate for a fire. As he did, he kept his head on a swivel, not enthralled by the idea of being assaulted by more killer rabbits. Thankfully, none appeared. The system hadn’t been mistaken when it said that he’d killed the nearest colony of murder bunnies, which meant that as long as he didn’t wander too far, he should be safe from the rodents from hell.

“Limit the scope,” Rory muttered, scrunching his nose. It was a good thing no monsters had existed on the planet until recently; if they had, he was confident he would have died on his first day.

He returned to his camp with that cheery thought, dropping the wood he’d gathered next to the corpse pile. Getting on his knees, he grabbed a rock and used it to shovel a small basin into the earth. Satisfied, he piled the branches and twigs together before grabbing a rather sturdy piece between both hands, a small log nestled between his legs. While Rory wasn’t exactly a survivalist, he at least knew the basic principle of friction and heat. Getting as comfortable as he could, he began to twirl the stick between his hands as he rubbed it against the log. It took nearly twenty minutes of splinter-inducing work before he saw something for his efforts: a few small plumes of smoke. Reinvigorated by the clear sign it was working, he spun the stick with even more intensity until he had the beginnings of a flame only a short bit later. Blowing gently, he stoked the fire until he was confident it wouldn’t die without constant vigilance. A speck of a flame secured; Rory took the small flame and gently placed it within his woodpile as he watched the flame slowly spread. Within seconds, the fire roared to life, and he sat in awe of his creation. Hopeful that the reinvention of fire would benefit his current situation, Rory opened his interface, searching for anything new in the Significance Triumphs. Alas, Rory was met with the same results as earlier.

“Either someone beat me to it, or creating fire isn’t recognized as much of an achievement.”

Perhaps creating fire would have been a more significant accomplishment at the dawn of humanity. Still, at this point, it was a well-understood science that also seemingly translated into this new universe.

With a sigh that his efforts hadn’t been rewarded with a shortcut to his next ascension, he accepted the consolation prize of having a cozy fire to bask in. Rory silently sat there, doing nothing more than take in its cozy warmth for several minutes. After several minutes of silent comfort, he stood up, grabbed his knife, and cut open one of the fluffy monsters. Not exactly sure what to do, he opted to pluck out anything that didn’t look recognizable as things he’d normally eat, mainly organs and bones. Content he’d done as good a job as he could, he proceeded to remove as much of the fur as he could before, at last, stabbing a sharp branch through the rodent and thrusting the entire thing into the fire. Waiting until the whole thing looked fairly burned, the only way he knew it had been cooked well enough that he wasn’t about to die of dysentery, he tore a bite out of the carcass.

It wasn’t good, not by a long shot, but it was food and the first bite he’d had in—

Days? Or billions and trillions of years? Does this count as relativity? Whose timeframe is the correct one?

Suddenly ravenous at the thought of billions of years since he last ate, he tore apart the small morsel, shredding it as he eyed the next one.

Nearly an hour later, Rory finally reclined, content with his feast. The meat, speaking frankly, was chewy, flavorless, and burnt all at the same time. Still, it filled him with energy that had nothing to do with metaphysical force. It was just pure and simple nutrition that he had been sorely missing. The pile of monster rabbits was reduced by a fifth, yet he had more than enough food for the next few days.

Even if they would last him several days, Rory wasn’t sure if he should keep them that long. First, it was possible they would rot. Technically, the bacteria responsible for rot and decay might not be present, but it wasn’t something Rory specifically wanted to discover. The next, more immediate problem was the possibility so many corpses would attract other monsters, and maybe even more dangerous ones.

So, what do I do instead?

Uncertain of the best course of action, he sat numbly for several minutes before a spark of inspiration hit him. Getting up in a rush, he found several of the largest leafy plants, ripping off the massive leaves as he began to wrap them around a few of the kills. Once wrapped, he secured them with some vines before, at last, burying them nearby. Beneath the soil and protected by the earth, they would hopefully last longer in the colder, less exposed environment. As for the rest of the bodies, he began to toss them into the fire, burning them. Burying them without protection could also attract monsters, much like food left out at camps could attract bears or raccoons.

“Call it an offering,” Rory said, half joking as the flames consumed the small bodies. Tossing them in one at a time, he remained there until the last of the monsters had been well and truly cremated.

By that point, the day had begun to blend into the night, and the sun was nearly below the horizon. Letting the flame slowly wither, he soon retreated to the ‘safety’ of his shelter.

I just hope I’m not attacked during the night.

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Rory, much to his pleasure, was not attacked during the night. Instead, he slept like the dead; having a full stomach for the first time in days had caused him to pass out as soon as his body relaxed on his mossy mat. Waking with a somewhat exaggerated yawn and a long stretch, the first thing Rory did was flick open his interface.

His body's bruises and aches had finally begun to fade, supported by the improvement in his physical health readings.

All in all, Rory almost felt like a new man, ignoring the few persistent deep body aches from where a caerbannog or two had managed to tackle him. Stretching, or as much as he could in his cramped shelter, the first thing Rory did was flick open his interface, checking for anything new. When nothing immediately jumped out at him, aside from the timer now eight hours shorter, he closed it with a thought.

“Rise and shine.” He huffed quietly, noting a chill in the air, his breath lingering.

Does this planet have a winter season? He questioned inwardly, praying that it would be mild if it did. He’d spent enough harsh winters buried under the treacherous Chicago snow.

And that was with the benefit of snowplows.

Brushing the thought aside, he crawled out of his hovel. Nothing had changed outside from what he could see, except a few already thawing flakes, suggesting that some winter may not be out of the question. Confident, or as confident as he could be, that he wasn’t about to be jumped by some monsters, he started the day of productivity by scavenging branches, twigs, and other flammable-looking material before settling in to get another fire going. Once it had been reignited, he quickly unburied his hidden trove of caernabbog bodies, unsealing them and skewering them on sticks that he planted into the ground so that the gradually growing flames and smoke would slowly cook them.

“Now then.” Rory was about to settle on the ground until, on second thought, he walked off a short way from his camp, returning minutes later with a log dragged behind him. Dropping it in front of the fire, he sat himself on his impromptu wooden coach as he considered his plan of action.

“Where was I?” Rory said, hands over the fire. The earlier chill had already faded, but there was something supremely satisfying and human about warming your hands by a campfire. “Right. Plans.”

Holding up one finger, he glanced at the sky.

“First. The issue of the next wave.”

He had around six days until the second wave came, and without much information to reliably utilize, he could only assume it would likely be even more difficult.

That’s what you’d expect from a video game, and it fits with the logic of the world spirit. Seed the weaker monster close by so that we can grow steadily.

It probably hadn’t been in her plan to have a method of forcibly drawing the monsters to themselves; that was an aspect the system had likely created itself, but it didn’t change the overall trajectory of his thoughts.

“Second.” Rory held up another finger, watching the monster rabbits slowly cooking. “My next ascension.”

He wasn’t far off, and the reason the first wave had been such a shit show was likely the fact that he was tackling it an entire tier under what the planet was currently operating at.

Unless that’s supposed to be the norm?

It was hard to say, given he was one of the first intelligent life forms in the universe; he was operating off assumptions and guesses more than anything else. His first ascension, technically his ‘zero’ ascension since it only brought him up to where he was supposed to start, hadn’t significantly changed his physical capabilities. Still, that was because it had been entirely focused on remaking his material body into one that belonged to their current universe. It wouldn’t be out of the question that his first proper ascension could bring more benefits than the zero-ascension had.

“And third.” Rory grabbed the first stick he had planted near the fire, the charred bunny all but beginning him to take a bite. “The others.”

Taking a hearty bite of the rabbit, which was considerably less appetizing than the day before when he’d been ravenously hungry, he slowly worked his way through chewing the tough meat as his fingers danced through the air, his interface flickering to life. Mouth full, he let his intent control the direction of the interface as he flicked open a new ‘page’ on the interface.

Contacts.

There was only one listed.

-World Spirit Aelia. Contact availability: Limited.

Makes sense.

Usually, one would expect the spirit of a planet to be an existence that would be talked about as nothing more than a rumor or a once-in-a-lifetime sighting. His current perspective was only that of what it was due to being one of the first founders of the planet. Even then, he couldn’t simply call her up as if on speed dial.

Still, the option is there if the need arises for whatever reason.

Question of his ability to contact the world spirit aside, the more important point was that no other contacts were listed.

Another thing to consider.

Like it had sensed his thought, which it likely had, a grey question mark bubble appeared. Tapping in instantly, a small pop-up window appeared.

Contact details: Contact capabilities are limited by direct face-to-face interactions with other participating members of the System. Contact range is further limited by the level of individual planetary spirit, degree of interplanetary infrastructure, and planet-by-planet variables.

Rory nodded along, making sense of the information. Assuming he wasn’t mistaken, what it was saying was that you had to meet a person first to be able to send a message, and the second part, while perhaps a little less clear, seemed to indicate that the message still obeyed relative space. You couldn’t simply send a message to someone halfway across the universe without an established communications network established first.

Now that I think about it, it also indicates that space travel is feasible, or at least some sort of travel between planets.

Had it been a good five or so years earlier, that would have been a hard pill to swallow, the universe limited by the constant of light. But, even before the multiverse collapsed into some super-universe, humanity had been informed that FTL travel was possible, if indirectly. So, it was no surprise that such a thing was the same in this new, stranger universe.

Well, that assumes that the speed of light is even the limit here.

Another interesting possibility, but not one Rory was qualified to question, his understanding of physics began and ended with documentaries he had watched on Netflix.

“Nothing to do about the others for the time being. Better to focus on the first two priorities of the next wave and my next ascension.” Rory announced after he forced down another mouthful of the overly charred meat.

The question of his ascension wasn’t a difficult one to answer. Close as he was, he only needed to meditate for a day or two to obtain the energy required. It might even be a tad faster now that his body was made up of naturally occurring matter that wouldn’t react so unfavorably to being forced to make space for the ascension energy. The more significant issue of his two priorities was how to best prepare for the next wave.

Rory snagged another of his monster rabbit kebabs, chewing thoughtfully as he considered the quandary.

If the next wave had even more caerbannogs, there was a good chance he would be overrun. He’d nearly been crushed under their numbers and speed in the last wave, and without any direct improvements gained from his ascension, he’d be in a far worse situation.

So.

If direct conflict were likely to end in failure —if not death—he would have to do what humanity had always done when faced with natural predators who were far superior with their claws and fangs.

Tools.

The most obvious and perhaps oldest of humanity’s weapons would be the spear, but as small and quick as the caerbannogs were, a spear's length would prove more of a hindrance than a boon. A knife was small and fast but too small and fragile. His current knife was about one bad swing from breaking apart.

So, something sturdy enough not to fall apart but not too large as to slow me down.

Contemplating the idea, he poked at the ground with a stick. Absentmindedly, he began drawing a small sketch into the dirt, but given his relative lack of artistic skills, the best he managed was a ball.

It might pass as a baseball with the threads stitching it together.

Rory almost chuckled, staring at the badly drawn circle, until the thought gave him pause.

Baseball. That’s not a bad idea.

Baseball bats were made explicitly for pummeling high-speed objects repeatedly, with enough force to send them flying out of the ballparks. They also weren’t exactly tricky designs to replicate.

I could probably improve upon them.

He’d seen in history books how Meso-American civilizations, specifically the Aztecs, had once used weapons that looked like wooden paddles with shards of obsidian embedded into them, the obsidian so sharp that they could slice individual cells. While he wasn’t sure of the claim's validity, it was worthwhile for the fact that almost all the stones he’d seen looked nearly identical to obsidian; he was in no shortage of the stuff.

“Obsidian bat it is.” Rory poked at the burning logs with his stick, readjusting the coals so the flames would burn more evenly. “I can do more than that, though.”

Intimidating walls had once protected ancient fortresses, only becoming obsolete as the weapon advancement far outstripped the defensive prowess of such walls. Here in this unsettled world, with the most advanced technology being a piece of obsidian tied to a stick with some vines, that wasn’t a problem. The issue was that if he wanted to push his capabilities, he would need a new set of tools that were more precise than his mucked-up recreations of an ax and a knife.

“That settles it. The first order of business is to make new tools.” Rory stood up with a sudden burst of vigor. While not one for energetic outbursts, he wasn’t so laid back as to waste his day away in lethargy when he had things to do.

For the better part of an hour, Rory sifted through the undergrowth and low-hanging trees, snatching any branches or sticks that looked as if they might be suitable for his needs. He needed strong-looking pieces of wood, but not too thick as to be unwieldy. Furthermore, they needed to still be young and green on the inside; without proper craftsman skills, he wasn’t confident in his ability to reliably create tools with both rigidity and flexibility without relying on the greener, still-living pieces of wood.

With two large bundles of branches under each arm, he returned to his camp, dropping into a seated position atop his log as he let the branches hit the ground into a pile. Sorting them by size, he soon had five piles at his feet.

First, something to make a new knife.

A knife would be perhaps the most essential tool, allowing him the precision shaping of branches or logs as well as the ability to slice through vines more easily. Sifting through the pile of handheld-sized twigs and branches, he weighed his options before reducing the pile to three finalists. The first was thinner than the other two, but it had a shape that seemed to fit his grip to a shocking degree. The next was a thicker, sturdier piece of nearly the same length but without the natural grooves that seemed to fit his fingers. The final piece was somewhere in between the thickness of the first two pieces of wood but nearly twice as long. It was still comfortably within the size range of a knife hilt, but it allowed a two-handed grip. Taking a minute to mull it over, Rory finally grabbed the second piece of wood, chucking it into the fire as he saved the first and third. He’d intended to make a single knife, but both sticks seemed too valuable to stop at only a single knife. The first could be a simple carving knife; the more fitting grip but the thinner piece would fall apart in short order if forced to be used in a fight, but it would be perfect for precision cutting. The second piece of wood would be ideal for a combat knife, solid and sturdy but not too large so that it might prove unwieldy.

First, the carving knife.

If he wanted the rest of his tools to be made well, he should start with the tool that would allow him to make higher-quality tools. With the knife's hilt settled upon, next was preparing a blade for it. It was a relatively simple, if tedious, process. Grabbing large obsidian-like stones, he began bashing them against each other, chipping off flakes and shards. After two or so hours, he’d gotten the hang of bashing them together in a way that would result in the chipped-off shards being roughly the shape and shape he was going for. However, it wasn’t until another two hours later that he finally gingerly picked up an obsidian shard approximately three inches long. It was thicker than nearly all the other shards he'd produced, good so that it wouldn’t shatter or snap suddenly but not too thick that it would be unable to do precision work. There was even a gentle curve to one edge of the stone blade. He wasn’t sure how he’d managed that, but it was perfect for his needs. Grabbing his old knife, he was about to whittle a small groove for the obsidian blade of his new knife when he paused.

I can do better.

It wasn’t the blade or handle that he felt he could improve, but how he attached them. His first tools had been obsidian shards jammed into roughly hewed grooves and twined with the nearby vines. While they got the job done, they were hardly sturdy; every jostle or bit of friction would dislodge the blades a bit more than previously. What he needed was a way to prevent any shifting from occurring.

If only I had glue.

It was a shame, but he couldn’t exactly run to the store and pick some up. Picking the blade and hilt up again, he could only grumble before setting it down.

“No. That won’t do.”

Perhaps it was a bit of perfectionism in him, but settling on worse quality tools when his life could depend on them didn’t inspire confidence. Unsure what to do, Rory stared at the fire for half an hour, tapping his foot on the ground.

Glue. Or a paste of any sort. Mud maybe?

Sure, hardened mud was suitable for sealing gaps in a wall, but it wasn’t precisely craft-quality sealant.

Cement then?

He had no limestone on hand, but the idea was worth considering.

Can I do something like cement or concrete?

Again, he wasn’t sure of the exact science behind it. The gist was that a porous and sturdy material could be made when limestone, or calcium carbonate, was ground, heated, and hydrated. It would be the best material in this stone-age world he could find.

More confident that concrete or something like concrete was the way to go, Rory still could only guess how he could get the materials for it.

Eyes locked onto his fire; the answer was all but staring him in the face.

“Ash. That’s it.” Rory said, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards in a half-baked attempt at a smile.

Ash was, as he’d heard about from the history books regarding the ancient civilization of Rome, a rather impressive binding agent-

I think it was a binding agent. Honestly, does it matter?

-A rather impressive ingredient in creating strong concrete. It had largely been useless to a planet-wide civilization but limited to small usage; it was perfect. Not just that, while he didn’t have calcium carbonate in the form of limestone, he did have plenty of charred caerbannog bones intermixed within the ash at the bottom of his makeshift firepit. Suppose he took that ash and ground-up bones and mixed it with the naturally occurring soil already infused with large amounts of obsidian dust for extra structural strength. In that case, it might result in something akin to cement.

Getting up from his log, he grabbed a large, roughly oval-shaped chunk of obsidian before grabbing a smaller piece and banging the two together methodically. It was slow, exhausting work, but an hour later, he had a crude-looking obsidian bowl.

Perfect.

Using a thicker branch, he began shoveling some of the ash from the bottom of the small pit, along with as many caerbannog bones as he could, toward the edge, before scooping them up with his bowl. Filled up, he slowly ground the material down with another stone until it was as fine of a powder as possible. Pleased with the mix, he gently placed the bowl directly in the center of the fire, where the heat would dry out any remaining moisture from the powder.

While that cooked, he began slowly fashioning a second bowl, the entire process faster now that he’d done it once. Once complete, he gingerly withdrew the first bowl from the fire using two nearly even-length branches, setting the red-hot bowl down on the dirt. New bowl in hand, he quickly scooped several handfuls of dirt into it, grinding it down into as fine of a silt-like powder as he could before sticking it into the fire. Turning to the retrieved bowl, he carefully hovered over it, crushing the now dried-out mix into an even finer powder. Once that was done, he sat around for several minutes, waiting until his dirt had been adequately dried out. Giving it another ten minutes —time he was able to conveniently track now that he had a timer counting down until the next wave— he retrieved it shortly after. Tipping the contents into the same bowl, he slowly pulverized the two together until it became a uniformly gray-colored dust.

Perfect. I think.

That would be the basis for his faux concrete; all that was left to do was rehydrate the stuff. Glancing over at his pond, Rory felt the beginning of disquietude taking over.

What if that doesn’t work in the mix?

He didn’t know enough about the false water to say if it would work, but he couldn’t afford too much time to experiment. While six days felt like a lot, he’d already used up most of the day just producing the small amount of powdered maybe-concrete he had.

I need something I can be sure of.

Water no longer existed; without it, the only liquid he knew of was the Aisormba.

“No.” Rory corrected himself, eyes darting to his wrist, already cringing. “There is one other liquid I know of, one that I know for a fact does allow for thickening.”

Wincing inwardly, he raised a shard of obsidian toward his arm.

This isn’t going to be fun.