Mark got up and went to breakfast. Conversation was excited. Tom was talking about the Burrow Cluster being a goldmine and said it should be the priority for the camp. Elias and his family insisted that the southern zone was more important, as the wheat was a literal goldmine.
Ava cut in and said that it was more important to explore and find new places or animals. Most everyone else disagreed with her. Dale jumped in, letting everyone know that food and a variety of it were needed. Bread was great, but if that was all they ate, they would not last long.
Mark found the conversation entertaining, but he also had many things on his mind. He had to manage a growing number of goals. He needed labor to build and gather items, more space for people near the cave, and an organized plan before everything went out of control because he could not keep track of it all.
Today he needed to understand the outpost system. He had upgraded Forest’s Rest from Levels 1 through 3 without examining every benefit, so he opened the interface. Among the Outpost Level 2 benefits, he found Settlement Task Tracking. It sounded like exactly what he needed. He ended up with a screen listing options.
[TASK TRACKING INTERFACE]
Active TasksAvailable LaborSettlement Supply PoolContribution RewardsInfrastructure PrioritiesContribution Ledger◈ ◈ ◈
Mark selected Active Tasks.
No active tasks detected. Would you like to create one?
He clicked yes and was prompted with fields to fill out. He needed a task name and things that would contribute toward its goals. He created a task named “Expand Southern Trail” and listed what his desires were.
[Task Created]
Expand Southern Trail
Requirements:Clear obstaclesWiden path for haulingMark safe route
Estimated Contribution Reward: 12–20 Contribution Points or Equivalent XP◈ ◈ ◈
[Warning]
No active Settlement Supply Pool detected.
Task rewards unavailable until supply reserves are established.
◈ ◈ ◈
With no supply pool, he selected that option.
[Settlement Supply Pool]
Registered settlement goods may be allocated toward:task rewardscontribution exchangesexperience conversionemergency reserves◈ ◈ ◈
That was interesting; he clicked on experience conversion.
[Experience Conversion Notice]
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
Experience rewards require equivalent settlement value allocation.
Settlement reserves will be consumed during reward distribution.
◈ ◈ ◈
That explained why tasks offered contribution points or XP. The system was not creating XP from nothing; it converted value stored in the Settlement Supply Pool. He could donate personal items or transfer goods from general settlement storage. The system would search registered supplies or calculate the value of a newly deposited item. He found an extra shovel in inventory and added it.
[Experience Conversion In Process]
5 contribution points added to your Contribution Ledger.
◈ ◈ ◈
The ledger showed Mark with five contribution points. He experimented with several more items until he passed fifty.
Mark said, “That is so cool.”
The background conversation around him suddenly stopped, and all eyes looked at him. Then the others started asking what was cool. Mark then explained what he had found in the settlement tasks, including contribution rewards and tasks that could earn contribution points or XP from the settlement.
The next thing he noticed was other names appearing on the contribution ledger. It became a race to see how much everyone could add. Mark laughed and checked the pool. Dale was in the lead, adding lunch and dinner packs. They had known about the system for only ten minutes and already seemed to love it.
Mark then went back to the active task list and started adding items. He added trail maintenance and new trail construction to various POIs in the zone, including the rock pit, the marsh, and the Burrow Cluster. He also added wood collection for firewood, logs for construction, and trail runners to carry supplies to both Cave Camp and Lakeside.
Mark was impressed by how the system judged the value of tasks. Greater distance and difficulty increased the reward. Carrying goods from Forest’s Rest to Cave Camp paid a small amount, while the trip to Lakeside was worth nearly twenty times as much because of the distance. Travel tasks even listed expected completion times.
He also found that tasks could be open to anyone, or they could be limited to affiliated people or members of the settlement only. He spent more than an hour creating every useful task he could think of.
He then went into the settlement inventory and found that he could organize the items by suggested supply amounts and excess items, which he could transfer to the contribution pool. He ended up transferring almost half the items to the pool.
He then went into the control interface and gave Dale, Tom, Elias, and Mara access to add tasks and explained to them the limits of what he wanted for tasks.
He then switched over to the Cave Camp settlement and found that he could manage most settings from anywhere. However, he could not set up settlement tasks until it reached Level 2, and he could not upgrade it remotely. He had to be at the outpost.
Well, going there was now on the list, but he had to tell the others his plans first.
At that point, he closed his menus and turned to the group. “We need to talk about our future. I overheard the conversations earlier today about needing goods and even more space or settlements down south.”
At that point, they all started talking at once, everyone sharing their ideas and wanting to get the final word. Mark let it go on for a while, and when they were done arguing, he finally said it. “I think my long-term plans are to move south. You have convinced me that we need room and that the wheat fields would be a huge boost to long-term survival and growth.”
Mark continued, “But we need a plan. We need more people to do it right. We need people who can construct real cabins and buildings. And this will not happen overnight. In a few days I would like to go to Lakeside with a load of wheat and see if we can trade it for temporary workers to build roads and construct cabins; we will need crafting buildings. We will need wheat-processing facilities and general infrastructure. We will also need to put a call out for tradespeople that want to try and help us make something of that area. And we are not abandoning this area. We are going to use it and build it up as well. But the system and the available space both limit how far this place can grow without cutting the forest back a few hundred feet, and I don’t feel that is the right thing to do.”
When he got done speaking, everyone was just looking at him. And then the conversation really started.