Chapter 4: Chapter 4

A whole line of empty information. The feeling she’d imagined—that as soon as she established her territory, a protective shield would spread out—was completely absent. It was as if the lord’s token had been used for nothing.

Territory facilities could be instantly created like in a game, but they required energy, materials, and blueprints. She only had 300 points of starting energy.

There were some default facility templates, or the lord could design their own. Whether exchanging for ready-made blueprints or turning her own designs into usable blueprints, it all required a certain cost—energy.

For now, nothing else mattered. She needed to get a protective shield up to mark out her territory.

Mu Ying opened the blueprints tab and checked the default territory shield template—there was only one.

[Facility: Territory Shield]

[Function: Protects the territory, filters people, appearance can be customized, default is invisible. In basic mode, covers 500 square meters, defends against level 1 and lower attacks. More features can be added with additional energy.]

[Required materials: Initial construction needs 100 energy. In basic mode, consumes 10 energy per day. Expanding the area or enabling more features requires more energy.]

[Blueprint conversion cost: 100 energy.]

Mu Ying converted the blueprint and built it right away, leaving the appearance unchanged for now—invisible.

A ring of transparent energy spread out, forming an invisible shield. It quickly vanished from sight, but Mu Ying could sense the boundary.

She walked to the edge and tried attacking with her kitchen knife. She found that she could attack outward from inside, but nothing could attack inward from outside.

With this shield, she felt much safer. Even though it could only defend against level 1 attacks or lower, all the zombies so far were only level 1, and she hadn’t seen any tougher monsters yet. For now, it was enough."

"With the territory shield in place, Mu Ying now felt confident she could take out those two zombies.

But building the shield wasn’t the end of her troubles—maintaining it required 10 energy points per day. Mu Ying had only invested enough to keep it running for two days, so her initial 300 energy points were down to just 80.

A lot of things could be converted into energy. For example, trees within her territory could be turned into either wood or energy, and even weeds and shrubs could be used.

But Mu Ying hadn’t touched any of those. The trees had taken so long to grow, and as long as they were on her land, she could use them whenever she wanted. As for the weeds and shrubs, their conversion rate was so low they were barely worth considering.

It turned out the copper coins she’d gotten from killing zombies were a much more reliable source—one copper coin could be converted into one energy point.

If every zombie dropped three copper coins, that would be a pretty decent income.

Mu Ying took off her jacket, tore off the sleeves, and cut them into strips. Then she found a sturdy stick and tied her kitchen knife to it.

Armed with her makeshift long-handled knife, she carefully made her way back to the tent. The two zombies were still wandering nearby.

She crept closer, drew their attention, and then moved toward the edge of her territory shield.

Sure enough, as soon as she stepped inside the shield’s range, the zombies were blocked outside, clawing at the invisible barrier.

Mu Ying raised her extended kitchen knife and struck with all her might, easily taking down both zombies.

[You killed Zombie ×1. Gained 1 Kill Experience, 3 Copper Coins.]

[You killed Zombie ×1. Gained 1 Kill Experience, 3 Copper Coins.]

Just as she’d hoped, each zombie dropped three copper coins. Mu Ying picked them up and stuffed them into her pocket.

Once she’d collected the loot, the zombie corpses quickly crumbled into two piles of yellow dirt—safe and pollution-free.

Afterward, she snuck back to the tent by the lake. The thrill of looting was endless.

In game terms, she’d scored: Tent ×1, Sleeping Mat ×1, Sleeping Bag ×1, Extra-Large Backpack ×1, Several Sets of Men’s Clothing, Folding Table and Chairs ×1, Instant Noodles ×10, Instant Hotpot ×1, 1.5L Bottled Water ×3, Cooking Pot ×1, Small Kitchen Knife ×1, Disposable Bowls and Chopsticks (several), Seasonings (various), Fishing Gear (various), Plastic Bucket ×1...

It looked like whoever owned this stuff had planned to camp and fish here for a few days. Now it was all hers. Mu Ying cheered inwardly: Thank you, well-prepared fishing buddy! Now I’m no longer destitute, and I won’t have to worry about going hungry for the next few days!

Happily, she gathered everything up, packed it, and hauled it all back to her territory.

Once she was done, Mu Ying sat on a little folding stool and opened the spell list in her player’s handbook, reading it carefully.

Spells were divided into levels 0 through 9. Level 0 spells, also called cantrips, were generally minor in effect, did little damage, were easy to learn, and consumed very little mana.

Once mastered, a level 0 spell could be cast for just 1 mana point.

Starting from level 1 spells, you could only learn higher-level spells when your class level reached an odd number. In other words, she’d have to reach level 3 before she could learn level 2 spells.

Mu Ying glanced at her own level: [Druid LV1 (3/100)]. Leveling up seemed a long way off.

She was just starting to learn spells. Even though the outside world was dangerous, she couldn’t rush things—she’d start with level 0 spells.

The only level 0 spell with any combat use was Flash, which could temporarily blind enemies. But zombies didn’t have vision, so it was useless for now.

There were plenty of other practical utility spells, like Create Water, Clean, and Light. These could help solve some immediate survival problems.

Right now, she had enough supplies and was close to a water source, so Create Water wasn’t urgent. Clean was even less necessary—when survival isn’t guaranteed, cleanliness isn’t a priority.

Light, though, was handy. Mu Ying hadn’t found any lighting equipment near the tent. Normally, if you were camping and fishing outdoors for several nights, you’d bring some kind of lighting and charging gear. But Mu Ying hadn’t even found a phone, let alone a lighter.

She suspected that when the game world descended, a lot of electronic devices simply vanished.

In the end, Mu Ying decided to learn Druidcraft first.

It was the most versatile of the level 0 spells. With it, she could conjure a small flame to ignite things, predict the weather for the next 24 hours, make flowers bloom, seeds sprout, buds open, or create harmless sensory effects like falling leaves, breezes, or scents.

What Mu Ying valued most was the ability to start a fire. With a campfire, she could cook and have light. It wasn’t as convenient as the Light spell, but it would do for now.

After choosing her spell, Mu Ying read through the casting theory.

It turned out that different classes had different ways of casting spells. Wizards, being pure spellcasters, had it the hardest, while divine casters like Clerics and Druids had it the easiest.

For example, wizards had to memorize complex spell structures and energy circuits, plus master various casting techniques.

But Druids and Clerics only needed to be familiar with the spell’s description and then pray to their chosen “god” for help to cast the spell.

The only difficulty lay in how well you could articulate your prayer, and whether your “god” was willing to help.

Compared to the deities worshipped by Clerics, the “god” of Druids—nature itself—was much fairer. It had no personified will, so asking for help wasn’t hard. It was more like communicating with the forces of nature and, through the spell’s description, asking them to help you cast it.

The higher your affinity with nature, the easier the communication; the higher your perception stat, the clearer and more accurate your articulation.

Mu Ying picked up a small dry twig and, following the handbook’s instructions, used her perception to touch and channel the power of nature, then articulated the spell.

On her first try, a thin wisp of smoke rose from the twig—almost enough to ignite it.

According to the handbook, this meant she hadn’t drawn enough natural power, or her articulation wasn’t strong enough.

On her second try, she managed to light the twig, but she’d overdone it and used too much mana.

She kept adjusting, and the feeling of communing with nature was incredibly comfortable and smooth, like being embraced by a kindly elder. She was enchanted by it.

Unfortunately, she didn’t have much mana—only 60 points. Recovering mana required plenty of rest, so she had to use it sparingly.