"Right now, we have three basic tasks to complete before sundown."
After their breakfast was over, Axel didn’t waste time and began explaining everyone’s tasks. After all, with their increased numbers, they would definitely be lacking in facilities, particularly tent space.
The small tent he made could fit one person, maybe two at most. It was far from enough to cater to all six of them now. And if they wanted to increase the number of tents, that would also mean extending their barrier further outward to gain more space.
[For that, I’ll be issuing a new quest~!]
Navi, who was invisible and inaudible to the girls, announced right beside Axel’s ears.
Quest: Expanding the Camp!
Requirements:
- Build 2x Simple Tent
- Build 30x Wooden Barricades
- Defeat 500x Zombies
- Defeat 1x Giant Zombie
Rewards:
- 50,000 Colts
- Emergency Medical Supplies x5
- Random Equipment (Weapon or Armor) x10
"... That’s quite generous of you, Navi...." Axel couldn’t help but mutter quietly.
After all, scamming... Ahem! Negotiating with the girls only got him 40,000 Colts in the end. But this quest was offering more than that amount at once, simply by expanding the camp and defeating zombies coming their way!
"But what is a Giant Zombie?"
He asked Navi to further clarify, however.
"It’s a variant of zombies about twice as large and twice as powerful." It was Arianne who answered his murmured question. "I can hold my ground against one, but defeating it would be difficult."
[Just as she said!]
Even Navi nodded along, but added a few more details.
[Giant Zombies spawn if there’s more than five people gathered in a single zone for a long time! Since there are six of you, one will surely appear later tonight~!]
"So one Giant Zombie for every six heads?" Axel raised a brow in wonder. "That’s game over for most, isn’t it?"
"Game...?" The smallest girl in the group echoed his words in curiosity. "What game?"
"No, just a figure of speech..."
"Huh..."
"Anyway!" Axel clapped his hands, trying to bring the conversation back on the right track. "Right now, we need to first expand the camp, second, add more tents, and third, protect it against the zombie horde coming to attack us tonight."
Right after, he began to extract a few items from his inventory, piling them up on one side.
"Now, we’ll be split between two groups. One group will stay here and build copies of that small tent around the bonfire."
He pointed at his tent, then to the materials he piled up on the ground. The exact materials for two more tents. "You just need to build them using that one as a reference, so it shouldn’t be difficult."
The girls looked at each other, as if deciding on who would be working on those... but Axel continued without waiting for them to finish.
"The other group will go around and gather old tree trunks, wooden branches, stones, anything you think can be considered as resources," he continued. "Simply gather and bring them back here. The more the better."
"Then I’ll gather resources."
"Me too!"
"I’ll... build the tent then. You should help on this side too, Prin—, I mean, Lady Eve."
"I-I understand... I’ll help with the tent building."
"I’ll follow Lady Eve."
Within moments, their job split was completed.
Arianne and one more, a tall, brown-haired woman dressed like a maid, decided to go around gathering materials, while the other three remained to build the tents. Axel noticed that two of them dressed like maids, but from Arianne’s earlier words that "everyone" was of a high stature, they shouldn’t be simple maids either.
Anyway, after reminding them to be careful of heatstroke and to regularly drink water, he moved to do things that only he could do.
He sat by the now-dead bonfire and started gathering the ashes of the burnt wood, suspected as hardwood. He then bought the cheapest animal fat oil from the shop, along with a few flowers and a pot. All in all, he spent 10,000 Colts in one go.
What was he doing? Of course, working on his next item to sell!
The Voodoo Dolls were profitable, but he couldn’t build them without a piece of cloth available. Technically, he could buy it from the shop, but doing that would hurt his profits greatly. Thus, instead of forcing the matter, he just moved to the next product for now.
Ashes, oil, and some flowers for scent and design...
Yes, he was trying to make traditional soft soap!
More than decorative items, practical items that never stop having demand, such as soap, are a better idea for a sellable item than any. Furthermore, if he could make many of them, then he’d no longer need to buy them and could simply use some of what he made!
’Zombies stink, after all. A fragrant soap is essential. Yep.’
If you’re asking why he’s not using the system to craft it...
[Soap making is under concoction and not crafting, so you need to unlock the feature first!]
He was flatly told he still had to unlock the Concoction tab. As to how to unlock it, Navi remained silent, saying it wouldn’t be fun if Axel knew.
"..."
Although pissed, Axel decided to put off his anger and irritation.
It was true that once he unlocked the feature, crafting soaps should be much faster and easier in the future. Though for now, he simply had to do it manually.
First, he used the pot to mix ashes and water, pouring little by little and stirring carefully until he made a lye solution. This is a strong alkaline solution that is required to react with the oil later on, creating the soap base through saponification in the process.
However...
"The ashes... aren’t working great."
Although he suspected the wood to be hardwood, which works best for lye-making, it seemed his guess was off the mark. He did make an alkaline solution, but it wasn’t as strong as he expected. Barely acceptable, at least.
He already had the materials anyway, so there was no way he’d stop there even if the lye was weaker than expected. He carefully set another fire the same way he did last night. Primitively.
After long, hard work of sweat and tears, the flame finally started, making him sigh in relief.
"I really shouldn’t let the flames die off, huh..." he lamented and noted for later.
Starting a fire from scratch, without implements, is just fucking hard!
Anyway, with a flame going, he arranged a few rocks around, enough so that he could put the pot over the flames safely. He waited for the lye to simmer before starting the main part of the concoction: adding the animal oil slowly.
Axel didn’t have proper measuring equipment, so he had no choice but to carefully pour the oil little by little. All he needed to do was wait for the consistency of the mixture to thicken before he could say that this process was complete.
After this, he simply needed to mix the flowers to let their essential oils blend in, simmer for a bit, then pour the thick mixture into a mold. Usually, one would let it cure for weeks, but...
"Who said I’d need to wait that long?"
Soft soap, as its name implies, doesn’t get hard like modern soap. After all, their bases are different, although it still needs a few days to cure to allow the unreacted alkali to neutralize.
But there’s a faster way to go about this!