CONSTRUCTION OF THE BASE

Fer walked around a part of the island to familiarize himself a bit with his new surroundings; he studied everything he could for about 1 hour. When he saw enough, Fer decided it was sufficient and that there was no need to inspect thoroughly; after all, he would have this island to himself for a long time, and there was no rush to see every corner.

He stood in the same spot where he had left the raft initially; Fer looked at the lush flora in front of him. If he wanted to establish his base, he would first need to clear all this flora that occupied the site where he would make his base. He took out the stone axe and began chopping down trees and stone; since he wanted to make the base only out of stone, he would also need to use the stone axe to gather more stones from the rocks. Since the stone axe was a very basic tool, its durability only lasted for breaking a few trees or stones before breaking, but since it was very cheap to repair, this wasn't an issue per se. The only thing it did was delay time. In response, Fer decided to make three more ivy axes to avoid wasting time on repairs. Only when the four stone axes were broken would he stop to repair them all at once.

Thanks to the weight mod, Fer didn't have to worry about weight at all; this meant he had no restrictions on gathering materials continuously with the 5x multiplier. And with 500 energy points, it was almost as if Fer were a perpetual-motion machine working constantly.

The hours flew by in the blink of an eye, and the once lush place was now almost completely cleared, revealing a vast expanse stretching hundreds of meters, surrounded by towering and imposing mountains that acted like a massive natural wall. Fer sat at the bow of the raft, with a look of not physical but mental exhaustion on his face. Although his physical energy could be abundant and almost endless, after all, he was still human with limited mental energy.

But despite the weariness on his face, Fer couldn't hide the deep satisfaction of having completed a part of his goal—to clear this entire expanse to build his base. He looked up at the sky and saw that the sun's position was almost directly in the center, indicating it was at least midday. He arrived on the herbivore island around 8 a.m., which means that, excluding the exploration time, he spent a solid three hours constantly clearing the flora from the expanse.

If it hadn't been for the weight mod, his increased strength, and the 500 energy points, the time it would have taken to chop down trees and break rocks would have stretched out by several more hours. Thinking about these things, Fer realized how overpowered the mods he had activated for himself were; his spirits lifted at the thought of these advantages.

While thinking about many things, he suddenly thought of something that made him furrow his brow as he looked around carefully with his eyes. "What if everything reappears as in the game?" The moment that thought entered his mind, a kind of urgency arose within him. Although if trees and rocks grew back, it wouldn't actually be bad; quite the opposite, it would be beneficial. But right now, having worked hard to clear the land, that scenario wasn't favorable for him, as he wanted to establish his base in the place where he had cleared all obstacles.

…

After three hours of continuous work, Fer looked at all the resources he had gathered with effort. 20,730 wood, 12,834 thatch, 8,632 flint, 21,863 stone, 17,589 fiber, and 826 uncooked metal, not to mention the miles of berries he had after collecting most of the plants. This amount was more than enough for him to build the stone base with extra materials to create other structures, such as a forge to melt raw metal.

Fer went to the crafting folder, and as he already had all the necessary knowledge, he directly clicked to craft 60 stone foundations, then clicked to make 120 stone walls, plus the doorframe and the door itself, and another 60 stone ceilings. While everything was being crafted together, the time it took was approximately 15 minutes. During that time, as his speed slowed down while crafting things in the inventory, Fer didn't move much while the structures were being crafted, as he wanted to make the most of the time to rest his mind.

…

When he noticed the 15 minutes had passed, Fer opened his inventory to see the completed structures and the greatly reduced materials. Previously, there was 20,730 wood, 12,834 thatch, and 21,863 stone. But now there was 14,130 wood, 8,034 thatch, and 8,663 stone. But the gains weren't just that. Regardless of the loss of materials in the process of crafting stone structures, the experience gained from making all these structures was simply insane—2,544 experience points for crafting everything.

A total of 11 levels to increase, the experience given seemed like a bug, but with this benefit, Fer wouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. Since he didn't want to waste too much time for now, he left aside the matter of leveling up his stats. He first wanted to build his base before nightfall when everything would get dark enough to prevent him from seeing his surroundings clearly.

Fer stood up, heading toward the center of the expanse. For over 10 minutes, Fer tried to find the perfect spot for his base. That perfect spot was for the base to be precisely in the center and symmetrical.

He placed the first foundation where he wanted and began building his base. The building method was practically the same as in the original ARK game, so building posed no problem.

…

Moments later, Fer looked a bit helplessly at the shoebox that could be called a house; his building skills were essentially nonexistent compared to other players who could create castles or monuments. But since he could only make a 10x6 shoebox with two walls high, he simply left it as it was; after all, he couldn't do much else.