Warming up

When he connected back into the game, the next day evening, Keith found himself in total darkness. Reassured that nobody dug up the few rocks he stacked around the entrance of the small cave, he finally came back to business.

Today, Keith was motivated in smelting some of the ores he extracted yesterday and try a few things with it. Back at his base, he breathed out a sigh of relief after noticing that nothing has been touched while he was away.

Amber was not supposed to be coming here today, but he could not get over the fact he was in a precarious situation. Even if the New Dawn guild allied with him, his base could still be found by a random player who may decide to ransack everything.

'Maybe I should have joined their guild, after all.' Keith meditated. Whenever he would be disconnected from the game, he could be counting on the guild to preserve their base and all. However, he had already made the decision to work on his own for now. There were so many things he wanted to experiment, and working in a group would prevent him from doing everything he had in mind.

Keith left his base and dug up the ores he burried a few hundred yards away from there. Once he was done, he spent the rest of the evening trying to refine metal using his campfire.

He realized it would be a much more complicated task than he imagined since there were so many impurities in the ores. The result would be mediocre at best, and he could not even forge a straight looking stick. However, the 'System' came in handy this time around since it would be clearing a lot of the impurities from the fused metal.

It still was almost as hazardous as it was back when Keith tested it, but only activating it when refining metal proved really useful to him. In any case, after a few hours of experimenting around with his copper ores, he managed to make his first pickaxe out of this orange metal.

To achieve such a feat, Keith started digging up the shape of his pick on the flat faces of two brittle rocks which he would be using as a mold. Satisfied by his design, he then extruded of a strong stick so it would have a square end. By the time he was finished, the copper he left warming up on his campfire was totally melted.

Putting the wooden stick between his rocks, he then poured the liquid metal over a small hole that he left there. Once it was totally cooled off, Keith removed the two rocks from his tool just to find a perfectly looking pickaxe.

Well, it was not actually perfect, but Keith was so happy about making his first metal tool that he jumped around his base for a bit. There was still a long copper thread protuding from the end of the pickaxe, where the liquid metal was poured, but Keith got rid of it using a sharp-looking flint. After sharpening the tool for another hour, the young man smiled happily and started swining with his tool.

The handle did not seem to be coming out of the pick and it had a good momentum in his opinion. He could not wait and test his pickaxe on the walls of his cave. Last time and tried and excavated some ores, he ended up spending several hours because his flints were digging so little of the rock.

However, now was not the time to do so. It was late into the night and he still had to make some tools for Amber, who was supposed to be coming the next day. By the time he was done, Keith disconnect from the game and fell flat on his bed as his phone displayed 2:24 a.m. on its screen.

_______________

'His base did get upgraded since last time I visited.' Amber realized. Keith made several wooden crates to store all of his resources in an organized way, and he also started excavating some parts of the walls of his cave to make a more comfortable interior. His bed was lying in a corner, but his body was nowhere to be found.

In Project Overworld, a player's avatar would stay around even if said player was disconnect from the game. As such, they could easily be killed and their inventory looted while they were away. In the end, players had to be far-sighted and protect their bodies using some strong defenses or by hiding it in the most improbable place they could think of.

'Is he still connected or did he hide himself before disconnecting?' Amber wondered. She could not determine what type of player she was working with, and she managed to see whether he was connected round the clock or not.

Amber's curiosity led her to search around the man's base for something out of the ordinary, but she was disappointed as there was nothing interesting to her. 'I guess he focused on organizing his base for now. He also must be keeping all of his important resources on him.' Not wanting to waste any more time around here, her attention was suddenly attracted by a reflection of the sun.

Crouching to take the small shiny object between her hands, Amber noticed it was some sort of a metal thread. 'Is he already refining metal?' She was really surprised about her discovery. After making sure there were no hidden storage, she left Keith's base and went back home.

However, when she got there, she found Alan striding around the camp with a grave expression.

- "What are you doing?" She inquired.

- "Things have degenerated back at spawn. Large groups started fighting over the control of the area, and smaller guilds started moving towards safer places. Some of them moved a few miles away from our position, and we're not sure whether they will attack us or not."

- "That sounds quite bothering. Should we start packing everything up and go away too?"

Alan chuckled at her comment and declared : "No. If they ever dare to attack us, we'll fight back and chase them off towards somewhere else. We're not to be underestimated with the size of our guild, after all. For now, let's just focus on our project. Oh, you should tell Keith that we'll need more weapons from now on."

- "Yeah, I thought as much. I did see him this time around, though. He may be disconnected from the game but I'm not really sure."

- "We're not that short on time, don't worry." He replied with a grunt. "However, whenever he comes back to the game I want him to start working immediately. You should go back there tomorrow evening, maybe you'll have a better chance of coming across him."

_______________

'Finally back!' Keith breathed out locking the door of his flat.

After a whole day of not being able to connect to the game, Keith was really eager to refine more of the metals ores he collected.

It was about about six in the afternoon, so he had quite a bit of time before him.

Once connected into the game, darkness welcomed him. Just like every day, Keith hid his avatar in a small cave a few hundred feet away from his main base. He felt like he needed some more security since Amber came across his base and that was the reason why he only disconnect inside this well-hidden hole.

Coming out of his hideout, the daylight dazzled him for a few seconds. After his eyes adapted to the luminosity, he rushed towards his cave.

Starting a weak fire to cook some meat, he went around and collected the resources Amber brought him. This time, there was a lot more packed up because it has been two days since she last came to this place. He was really low on his food and wood stocks before he disconnected, so he was relieved by the sight of these beautiful resources.

He then patiently waited for his campfire to warm up and proceeded to eat until the food gauge of his character was full. Afterwards, he packed up several torches and took his newly crafted pickaxe before diving into the darkness of the grotto.

'Let's find some other metal this time around. I'd like to experiment a bit and check which is the most useful for making tools.' Keith motivated himself. 'I can't wait and finally find some iron! I should be able to make so much different things with it.' He excitedly thought. In fact, iron was one of the most important resources humanity ever came across.

Since he also had access to all the materials needed to make some gunpowder, Keith was even thinking of making a rifle. This simple fact renewed his excitement as he climbed down towards the deepest part of his cave.