[Tainted Lands] 8 – Carpentry

Two more days passed, and I went from having two golems to eight, seven in similar shape to the Wooden Doll and the still single slime. In these past two days, I've done nothing but carve, eat, drink, and sleep. I had an idea.

Golems wouldn't last long, and if I had too many, I wouldn't be able to charge them all at once, but I found with a command, I could make my Golems hibernate unless stirred by something around them. Doing this allowed me to have six Wooden Doll Golems in reserve whenever I needed them, and I had a plan for them. 

My inspiration came from Games I used to play. In these games, Golems remained inactive during a cutscene or free roam until the Player did something like loot a chest or pull a lever. These Golems did the same, only activating under a small set of conditions.

The first was by the command, "Golems, Awaken." The second was if anyone other than me neared. Lastly, the third way they could activate is if they heard, or, more accurately, 'felt' something fighting nearby. Also, the idea of stuffing these guys in a box, throwing them at something, and watching them swarm over it like bees was somewhat amusing. That horrific giant monster in town deserved it after what it put me through.

Though I did it for more practical reasons, I wanted a safeguard in case those monsters left town and headed my way. At least they'd be able to block their paths long enough for me to escape if need be, and to back this up, I had the SUV stocked with a few bags of food and some tools I'd need to survive or fight if need be.

I'd also begun chipping away at a rather large log I managed to drag back home, wanting to see if I could make bigger Golems than the ones I had, though I was still days away from finishing, and I doubt I had enough mana to even animate the thing remembering that the tiny dolls took nearly everything I had.

Though I did have some success, my stats increased with training! It was a negligible increase, seeing as I was already fitter than most, but a slight improvement was an improvement nonetheless. What increased was simple Agility and Focus, both by one point. Agility seemed to go hand in hand with how well I controlled my body and hands, so combining that with focusing very hard and how much I've been carving lately, it's no wonder both went up by a point.

Though that was not the only gain, I also unlocked a new skill: carpentry, which unlocked a new section of my skills, one called 'Mastery.' Carpentry was already level 8, and as each level increased, I had more ideas about what I could do with wood. I even found carving easier with my knife.  

After learning that, I wanted to see if I could unlock other similar skills, so I planted some grass seeds. To see if I could unlock Farming, I figured it would require that I cultivate something, and I still had a bag of seeds I bought a bit ago to cover a patch of dirt in my yard with some grass. 

There was a farmer's market in town where I could raid for some seeds to grow some crops, but it was near the center of the town and likely surrounded by those things. If I wanted to get my car and get more supplies outside of raiding my neighbors, I'd need an army of Golems before I even try for that.

I also decided to try and have a chance at calling the police yesterday through the old home phone I still had, but nothing happened. I tried calling everything I could think of, but all I got on the other end was static, like the phone lines were disconnected. 

This made me think that this wasn't a local problem but a global one. I didn't want to try driving to one of the bigger cities nearby and find out the hard way that the world I knew was gone, especially if doing so would leave me stranded and without any way to get back here.

...

Another day passed, and I managed to get quite a lot of work done. I had made a chicken coop and a coop for the rabbits with twine, sticks, and tarps. I'd have used chicken wire, but I did not have any. If the Rabbits and whatever chickens I caught in the future escaped, I gave my Golems new orders to capture the animals and put them back. 

The more I used the Golems, the more helpful they became. They acted more like machines than anything else, but they followed my orders to the letter, though they had difficulty with complex orders. Another problem I found with the Golems was that they could not adapt. When they were not given instructions and orders, they would remain motionless, doing nothing unless told to.

For example, without giving them orders, they'd just stand there like statues. Another downside is just how much they followed my orders in the letter. For example, I told them to attack any intruders, and they began to stomp every bug, insect, and leaf that drifted into my yard. There's something to say about seeing multiple wooden dolls chase after a butterfly and trip over one another, only to do it all over again, but they immediately stop once the butterfly flies out of my yard to the forest and away from my house.

I was also almost done carving the sizeable wooden statue. Having leveled up my Carpentry two more times, I was left with smoothing out the surface and trying to make the statue anatomically correct. I was carving away at the arms at the moment, trying to make it balanced so that it wouldn't fall over if it moved its arms, and after that, I would begin working on its hands, giving both a normal hand with five fingers.

I won't lie; I have been carving the statue to resemble a woman more than anything, and that goes for proportions as well. It gave me something nice to look at while I worked tirelessly to make it as perfect as possible.

Stretching, I stepped away from the almost done statue, just needing its arms and lower body done.

Its face was blank, having nothing besides some grooves to make it seem like it had eyes. It was kind of creepy and definitely had some horror vibes. I certainly wouldn't want to step around a corner in darkness only to find its face leaning towards me.

My intentions with the Golem were to see if I could make something that would be an excellent laborer and potential combatant in the future, especially if I could teach it to use weapons and tools. Just imagining a dozen of these wooden statues armed with guns made me a bit giddy with excitement.

Though that would have to go on the back burner until I had enough mana to animate this statue.