Solomon's Crucible 59. The Rest Stop (4) (Patreon)

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Solomon got dressed and poked his head out into the hotel room. The other two had already turned in, the system-provided lights put away. He retreated back into the bathroom. Much as he'd like to go to sleep himself, he had a bit more work to do first.

The system presented itself like a game, but it wasn't quite the same as any game Solomon had played before. Rather than levels and experience points, the system ran on skills and grids. If you demonstrated proficiency in a skill, the system would offer you the chance to add that skill to your sheet. If you did, you were rewarded with grid points: one for the first skill level, two more for the second level, three for the third, and so on.

Those points could be used to buy out spots in system-provided grids. While the system presented the grids with about as much pomp and circumstance as a frequent-shopper punch card, the benefits were no joke. Every grid provided attribute points that Solomon could spend to improve his physical or magical performance, along with special abilities. He had already built up an array of passive improvements to his capabilities and a menu of active abilities that allowed him to perform outright supernatural feats by spending MP.

Each first level grid became available when a skill was added to his character sheet. Filling them out gave two options for second level grids. As soon as one was picked, the other vanished. Finishing the second level grid opened up a pair of third level grids, and so on. The first level took seven grid points to fill out, the second level nine, and so on up to the fifth level that cost a whopping fifteen points to finish.

Solomon had filled in quite a few grids already. He'd been picking them based on a combination of his immediate needs and his guesses at which would prove most useful in the long run. He hadn't paid particular attention to which tier each grid belonged to. That is, if a seven point grid offered more immediate value than a thirteen point grid, he hadn't hesitated to fill out the seven point grid.

He didn't regret it. He'd done what he had to do survive. After listening to Kanmi's explanation of the system, though, he had realized that he hadn't been giving enough weight to grid tier. That higher tiers always offered more powerful skills, even if the descriptions were underwhelming.

In particular, he had his eye on the fifth tier of the marksmanship grids, Powder Adept. The two abilities granted by buying the grid hadn't jumped out at him before. Powder Charge would allow him to ingest magical gunpowder for a temporary boost to all physical stats and bonus MP. Powder Ken would let him use the power up from Powder Charge to affect bullets in flight.

Both abilities were a little vague and seemed like they might not amount to much. If he took it as a given that fifth level abilities were impressive, though, then that vagueness pointed the other way: at a tremendous scope of power and versatility.

Of course, the wonder and power of a fifteen point grid required that he have fifteen points available to buy it out. Solomon had three. He'd been earning points in bunches, but he'd also been just scraping by through some dangerous situations. He didn't want to keep putting his life on the line for grid points, even if it did mean the system would grade him generously. 

To pick up twelve points he would need to raise his Marksmanship skill to five. Or raise Marksmanship and Explosives to four. He wasn't sure what he could do with explosives that was more impressive than taking out the goblin mob, but he figured he could always make a bigger bomb.

Impressing the system with his marksmanship was also going to be a little tricky. Even with all the boosts he could use to power up his shots, killing something with his homemade smooth bore muzzle loading pistol from any kind of distance was tricky.

It should be possible to adapt a more modern firearm to use his magical gunpowder. Or at the very least, to make a new firearm to a more modern design than his primitive hand-cannon. He wasn't sure off the top of his head how such a gun would ignite the powder. Usually a firing pin just had to deliver concussive force to a cartridge, not actually touch the propellant.

His dad might know how to do it. Or, if not, at least he'd know somebody who knew. In the mean time, Solomon would have to do the best he could with what he had.

That started with dismissing his character sheet and pulling more materials out of his inventory. He'd bought quite a bit, planning to arm his family as best he could for the trip. Now that he had a working trigger design, though, he had a more immediate use for more pistols. 

He couldn't re-load, but there was no reason he couldn't come into a fight with multiple pistols pre-loaded. He could fire one, drop it, and draw the next. It would give him two or three shots before he had to resort to the hatchet on his belt. Carrying around that many weapons might be a little awkward, but it was a small price to pay for more firepower.

The strategy of waiting for a monster to get close and then shooting it before it could kill him was working for him so far, but it wasn't something he wanted to rely on forever. The whole reason he'd pursued firearms so enthusiastically was so that he could kill things from a distance.

As he went through the now-familiar motions of crafting another pair of pistols, his thoughts turned towards the other looming problem. He didn't just need to arm his family, he needed to provide transportation back to his territory.

Moving his family alone wouldn't be a problem. He had enough savings to buy a mount for everybody. From his experience with the faux horses so far, they even had the strength and endurance to carry two people all day long, if he needed to pinch pennies.

The problem was exemplified by Monty as he snoozed away on his cot. The average person seemed to be doing even worse at navigating the system than Solomon had feared. He could help Monty back to his friends and wish him luck, but he didn't think he'd be able to be so cold in the face of his parents' neighbors or his sister's friends asking for help.

For that matter, he didn't want to be cold blooded like that. Every person he saved would help make his territory that much stronger. It was just a question of whether they'd survive the trip.

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