Chapter 45: Cleared

Date Tuesday, August 27th, 2261

A little more than two weeks later.

Waking in the wee hours of the night as I normally did, I laid there for a bit, thinking back on what we've accomplished over the last 15 days.

Gramps and I spent August 12th collapsing the last of the exits and continued clearing the cave of molemen while Alice did her thing back in the foundry. Over the next two weeks after that, I gramps, and Alice, who joined us on the second day when her armor was ready, spent most of our time clearing the cave system of all remaining molemen.

We didn't get a whole hell of a lot of things accomplished in this period, the molemen extermination mission being the exception, which is finally out of the way. However, since it's no longer occupying most of my time and focus any longer, I can start sending my robots into the mine and cave to start mining. In addition to that, I can initiate my plans of expanding the foundry into the mine for the extra storage space that I'm getting very close to needing for all the shit I'm accumulating.

While the robots are taking care of most of that, I can return to working on my projects and tasks such as designing the new weapons and robots to further build out my growing force. Establishing drug and medicine production, and seeing if those luminescent plants I discovered have any worth.

Furthermore, I need to deliver the last shipment of weapons and ammo to both Alice's father and my own, not to mention all the other things I want to put time into, so I got a monstrous amount to do in the coming days.

And if that wasn't enough, I also have that leveling I need to take care of since I'm no longer being held back by the moleman extermination, which is the sole reason why I haven't used any of the huge amount of exp I've earned.

I probably could have leveled without issue, however I don't believe it would've been worth the risk, at least in my eyes when I could already handle basically everything we encountered in the cave. Hence, why bother going through something that could fuck with my combat ability and accuracy when I can simply delay the leveling till a later date where I'm not trying to remove a looming threat.

Speaking of which, now that I'm not dealing with the molemen anymore, with them all dead, even the newborn pups I came across. I think I'll undergo that leveling today, though it will have to wait until gramps drops Alice and I at the facility, so in the meantime I'mma go hit the gym and keep grinding and building my physique.

[ Loot Gained ]

| Weapons |

7.62mm Hunting Rifles (576) - Colt Python .357 Magnum Revolvers (934) - CSG10 Submachine Guns (699) - DMG-15 Double Barrel Machine Gun (1) - M240 Machine Guns (15) - Pickaxes (4,121) - Remington Model 870 Shotguns (1,765) - Sawed-off Double Barreled 12 Gauge Shotguns (2) - STAR-25 Assault Rifles (24)

| Weapon Magazines |

5.56 STANAG 30 Round Magazines (189) - 7.62 STANAG 10 Round Magazines (2,757) - CSG10 Submachine Gun 30 Round Magazines (2,651) - DMG-15 Double Barrel Machine Gun 75 Round Box Magazines (6) - M240 Machine Gun 100 Round Box Magazines (44)

| Ammo |

.357 Rounds (27,813) - 10mm Rounds (76,334) - 12 Gauge Shotgun Shells (53,843) - 5.56x45mm Rounds (4,812) - 7.62x51mm Rounds (31,735)

| Miscellaneous |

Metal (98,794) - Stealth Pack (1) - Other Misc Items (88,111)

[ Creatures Killed & EXP Gained ]

Colossal Gila Monster (1) exp 22,500 - Giant Gila Monsters (5) exp 5,063 - Molemen (6,435) exp 1,082,486 - Molemen Guards (39) exp 21,938 - Moleman King (1) exp 2,250 - Total exp 1,134,237

Done thinking for the moment, I got up out of bed and headed off downstairs and got to work. A good many hours later, I arrived at the Genesis Foundry with Alice and gramps although gramps took off since he didn't need to hang around with us constantly with the molemen threat dealt with. As the old man went off to do whatever he had planned for the day, Alice and I went on inside and to the planning and relaxation area so I could inform her of what I had planned for us today.

Walking in, the two of us sat down together on one of the several couches before I started giving her the lowdown. "So here's the plan for today. First, I've gathered a ton of exp from the molemen extermination mission and have two quests to turn, so I need to undergo another level up."

"Shouldn't grandpa John be here in case something happens?"

"Nothing major happened last time, so we should be alright without him."

"As to what we're going to do after the level up, we're going to go hit the gym here and when we're done, we'll work on the ideas we came up with recently and get the designs and necessary paperwork drawn up. We'll do that for a few hours before you have to go work on your studying while I continue to work on designs and getting robots assembled. Sound good?"

"I don't have any issue as long as I get to study next to you."

"Fine by me."

The two of us discussed several other things and as soon as we were ready, we departed the planning/relaxation area for the small room I used not too long ago for my level up. Arriving there quickly, I was about to head in but before I could, my Alice turned me around and gave me a kiss on the lips.

"Good luck, Dom."

Grabbing hold of her, I planted a kiss of my own and said while looking into her beautiful and glimmering blue eyes. "I'll see you in a bit, Alice."

With a good luck kiss from my girl, I proceeded into the small space and began retrieving the medstims and p-dex syringes I was going to use for this event. Drugs in hand, I spent the next several minutes filling myself up full with the medstims' cocktail of chemicals and super nutrients. The instant I was finished with the medstims, I moved onto the p-dex and injected two doses, the same as the previous time.

Ready to level up once again, I sat down in the comfy chair that I partially destroyed previously due to the pain I was feeling then. Opening the holographic system window, I looked at all the stats that have increased in the short period since I've last leveled up. More satisfied with the pretty huge progress I've made, I navigated over to the level up section of the system menu and right before I was about to initiate it I had a thought.

Hold up, I got that Molemen Removal quest ready to turn in and with it rewarding three attribute points, I could net myself well above a hundred additional skill points if I dump them into intelligence. Do I really want those extra skill points over getting luck to 11 and using the remaining two points on charisma...

No, the extra skill points aren't really worth it when compared to getting a new perk and if I delay turning in the quest further until I get charisma to nine I'll get two new skill perks at the same time.

That actually doesn't seem like too bad of a plan. It'll save me from having to waste perk points on Growth to raise my attributes on both luck and charisma, both of which are a kind of problematic to raise. Yeah, I'll delay turning it in for now and wait till I've raised my charisma attribute to nine.

With that decided, what do I want to do with my Master All Trades quest, I could turn it in now and gain one more level up and get everything done in one go or do so after my level up and hope my intelligence attribute increases in the leveling process so I might get a wee bit extra exp from the quest turn in.

Well, every little bit counts, so might as well put it off, and besides, reducing the amount of knowledge being stuffed into my head all at once, even by a miniscule amount, is definitely worth it to me.

My quest turn ins planned out, the effects of the pain suppressant I injected moments ago began kicking in.

Time to face that excruciating pain again.

[Do you wish to level up?]

[Yes] - [No]

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Want to keep me motivated to write throw the work some power stones.

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