Contact

The creature had a relatively strange look. It had a humanoid shape with four arms, two legs, a singular big red eye, a round mouth with seemingly shark teeth, and an overall gray skin that matched up the rocky environment of this place. It had no ears, hair, or fur either.

An extraterrestrial being. Or maybe I'm the alien here since I'm not this planet's native. Maybe it woke up due to the sudden change in the atmosphere. Either way, it seems angry and hostile. I will be damned if I'll have to deal with an entire species trying to eat me.

"I shall first try direct contact, just to confirm."

I start walking up the cyclops' (let's call it that) location.

After getting closer, it seems way bigger than I thought. Around 2 meters and a half. And it had muscles. I don't think any human being would stand a chance. I gotta be careful here.

One hundred meters distance between me and him.

After waiting a bit, he noticed me and stood still for a while as if trying to understand what he was seeing. An awkward situation indeed...

Until at last, he moved. And fast.

"!!!"

He advanced forward with extreme speed, covering more than a hundred meters in moments. This very fact instinctively made me aware of its goal and made me jump back and run to get a safe distance.

However, this wouldn't be enough to get out of his track. He was going to quickly catch me up in no time. It's clearly a superhuman for normal people's standards. I had to do something and prepare to counterattack.

I stopped running and turned my body to face him. 20-meter distance between him and me now.

Think. What kind of power can I use to help me in a combat situation?

....

10-meter distance between us.

...

5 meters.

..

As the entity gets real close to me, it tries to attack with a punch-like movement. A sure hit would be fatal and at the very least break several of my bones.

He successfully punched me.

Or so he thought.

After hitting me, his body bent and flew away into a nearby rock, completely breaking it.

The answer was simple.

"Kinetic energy."

Energy is what allows motion, which is basically movement itself. A punch like that carries enough kinetic energy to break trees and fragment steel. As someone who manipulates energy, all I had to do was reflect it back at him.

After getting up, the cyclops looks confused due to what happened, but it quickly recovers and prepares to attack.

"Now that I got the gist of it, the chances of me receiving any harm had dropped to 1%"

Indeed. Basically, everything that has mass and is moving carries kinetic energy. This would include all kinds of attacks. Punches, kicks, projectiles, falling objects, and so on. If someone was able to reflect all that, they'd be basically invulnerable to most dangers in the universe.

"So, what will you do?"

The cyclops ignores my words and aggressively advances towards me.

After getting closer, he jumps and tries to bite my head off.

I manage to dodge his attack and hit him with a left jab on his right cheek.

No effect. As if he was made of steel. It seems I still lacked too much in the strength department.

"Damn it!"

The cyclops quickly turns his body in my direction and grabs my right leg with one of his hands.

"Shit-"

Before I even had the chance to utter a word, he threw me on the ground while still holding my leg. And he did it again, and again, and again. The ground was already heavily fragmented due to the constant hits.

However...I didn't feel a thing. Not even a single shred of pain. And the weirdest fact was, my body was still intact. No injuries at all.

The cyclops was completely dumbfounded.

I used that chance to counterattack and grabbed his arm that was holding me, with both my hands. After exerting godly amounts of effort and force, I quickly managed to break his bones.

"Woooarrrhhhggg!!"

The creature, screaming in extreme pain, let go of my leg and jumped 10 meters away from me.

"Exactly what I thought. It seems I can not only reflect but also absorb energy."

Back when cyclops was hammering me into the ground, my body kept absorbing the kinetic energy that came from each impact, leaving my body completely harmless. When I got out of his grip, I used the energy that I had absorbed from him and acquired enough strength to break his bones as if I was breaking a wood stick.

"Quite the convenient power I'd say. Let's see what I can do more."

But before I could realize it, the creature had run away.

"Ah..."

~~Minutes later~~

Now that I had established a stable atmosphere, I'd need food.

So far my options would be:

1. Explore the planet to see if there is anything edible.

2. Find one of those creatures from earlier and feed off of them.

3. Try to create food out of nowhere via the Quantum Reactor.

Option 1 would seem the most prominent at glance, but it could take one to any finite number of days to find anything useful, so it's also risky.

Option 2 is the most dangerous one. I already struggled to deal with the cyclops from earlier, and if there is a whole lot of them around there, there is also a chance of some being superior to others. Either way, it's the last thing I should account for, for sure.

"Let's try to create something then."

With the <Quantum Reactor>, I have the manipulation of molecules, allowing me to analyze and transmute them at will. But it is unknown the limits of said ability.

"Since we are in a need of food..."

I pick up a nearby rock that was the size of my hand.

I put both my hands on the rock, and tried to transmute its molecules into a beef.

My eyes start to shine bright blue and the molecules of the rock start changing their structure on an atomic level.

From my view, the rock first gets enveloped by a white aura and starts to glow, with its atomic structure being gradually changed into the shape of a beef. It's beautiful, in a way.

After the process is done, I take a good look at the new material.

"Success, thank God."

With that out of the way, I'd now have an unlimited supply of food. Or at least, the sufficient for a lifetime.

"Next step: a shelter."

This one should be fairly easy, theoretically.

All I'd need to do is try to imagine how my home would look like and apply the <Quantum Reactor> on the ground for it to take shape.

"Let's try it."

I take a seat and put both my hands on the ground.

I can feel it. The rocks. The molecules. The atoms. Everything. I suppose it wouldn't be too farfetched to say I could model this entire planet as well, would it?

As I get used to this feeling, I activate the <Quantum Reactor> on the ground.

While trying to imagine the ideal shape of my house, the surrounding earth begins to change anew.

Four walls emerge from the surface in a square-like format. Then from the top of each of those walls, a roof is formed.

The process is repeated a few more times and three more rooms of those are created, with each one being connected to one another.

"Hmm, no, not like this."

After thinking twice, I discard this format and try another way. Three of the rooms are destroyed.

"We should be...a little more discreet."

I bury the remaining room into the ground. Well, not exactly buried, but placed underneath the ground. My shelter would be an underground base, so that way I could avoid any confrontations from strangers and be out of sight.

However, just being placed underneath is no good if there isn't an entrance to said place, to begin with. So I created a 5 m² room with a door, with its insides having a trapdoor in the center, which would then lead me to my basement.

"Yosh, now we gotta hide the entrance."

By changing the terrain a bit, I cover the sides and the top of the entrance with rocks. Looking from a few meters, it only appears to be a small hill. I also made it so that the door is the same texture as the rocks, so it's basically camouflaged.

"This should be it."

I open the initial door and go to the trapdoor. After opening it, I jump and land in the room I "buried" earlier. It's a 40 m² room. All but smooth rocks though.

"Maybe I should add a few pieces of furniture..."