Chereads / 4X Life / Chapter 9 - Research, Build, Swing and Miss

Chapter 9 - Research, Build, Swing and Miss

"So, what do you mean by Plant Control Skills?"

"It's a skill to hack into the plants and take control over them."

"...What?"

"The Research Center collected the data from the Lab and after a million or so preliminary simulations it was discovered a latent ability in our bodies. By utilizing the Plants body part as an interface to connect and interact with other plants, its theoretically possible to assume control of the other plant's body and stimulate it's growth, hack it's senses or active it's triggers. That means it allows us not only forcefully grow plants, but also dictate in which direction, speed and strength it will grow. Or we can use it to search for minerals in the underground or for by connecting with multiple plants we can create a detection array. We can also explode bean pods and alike but the resulting damage should be negligible, but as long as we research other kinds of plants such skill can be used to activate many types of natural traps including poison, spikes and acid sprays. Of course all that requires a few conditions like a minimum amount of nutrients and minerals as well as deep roots and energy reserves, so a research on the know how of utilizing each skill and its requirements is necessary as well as a round of tests and security measures, so-"

"STOP! STOP! Please speak English! Simple and Plain English!"

"Sigh... After the research is complete, it will enable me to feel and use the plants in which ever way I want as long as the soil can sustain the plant's growth."

"Oh!!! Now that makes sense!"

No it doesn't. But whatever, as Apollo was finally satisfied, he petted the girl's head and commanded.

"Good, how long will it take?"

"8 hours."

"Great! Then hurry up! We don't have too much time left!"

"Yes master!"

Seeing the last girl gone Apollo scratched his head and looked back to the 3D printer.

(Well, I can't leave all the work to the girls. Let's build somethings)

Accessing the console again, Apollo choose to build a shovel in the weapons menu.

The mechanic arms started moving and little by little the shovel started taking form in the middle of the printer's platform.

Instead of watching, Apollo moved to the next printer and ordered an ax, followed by a sword, a crossbow and finally a cart. As Apollo finished ordering the cart, the shovel was already done, so Apollo grabbed it, went outside and tried it on the floor.

"Nice! This is quite solid! If it was a bit lighter, it would be perfect, but I think that's what one should expect from a stone shovel."

Apollo tried a few more time and returned to the factory satisfied.

"Great, next let's test the Ax!"

Apollo took the ax, approached a mid sized tree and prepared himself to swung it with all his strength.

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Far above the atmosphere, in the 4th Monitoring Station, a man watched bored as different players appeared in different monitors.

"Haaa...This work is so boring. All these guys do is run around from one place to another building things with those metal balls... I can't wait until the invasion begin..."

Suddenly, in one of the monitors, he sees Apollo exiting the factory with an ax in hands.

"Oh! This guy made an ax! What does he plan to do with it?"

Apollo approaches a tree, readies himself, flex his muscles...

"Ho ho... I would laugh so hard if after all this the idiot would swing and miss!"

Apollo plans the move once, slowly simulating it, then again and a third time. Finally his eyes goes sharp, his muscles contract themselves and he swings using all his strength!

Swish!

Bang!

"Hehehehehehehehehehehehe! ahahahahahahahahaha! This guy is the best! The best!"

Apollo's face turns red from the embarrassing mistake.

He looks around and ensures no one saw him, then sneakily approaches the ax, lift it and goes back to the tree as if nothing happened.

"All right! Once more with feeling!"

Apollo readies the ax, and without simulating or anything he simply swings using all his strength again.

Swish!

...

Aaaaaaand the ax was gone, flying through the tree branches until it land god knows where.

Apollo looked around for a few minutes, scratched his head, kicked a stone by the side of the road and went back to the factory to grab a new ax.

"Hahahahahahahah! Perfect! Let's save this scene and share it with everybody later! I bet it will be included in the best moments!"

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This time he approaches a bit closer and reduced his strength, successfully swinging the ax on the tree and cutting a third of the tree's trunk.

"Nice! This is sharper than it appears! It will surely come in handy if I need more trees!"

Taking his ax back to the factory and leaving it along the shovel. He orders two another axes and a shovel and goes out to test the sword.

No mistake happens this time, but the sword is quite heavy, maybe even heavier than the ax, making swinging it quite hard and even keeping it standing required effort.

"This is no good, the center of balance is completely off! It's better if I only make axes and spears than having to rely on this shitty sword."

Throwing the sword in the grass, Apollo went back to the factory.

The crossbow was also not good as it would break after a few uses, so he also gave up on it.

.

..

...

Time passed and as Apollo waited for the cart to be finished, he kept building shovels, axes, spears and a few ropes. Finally 2 hours later, as the cart was finished, he had used up all wood and stones in the factory's storage, creating 5 shovels, 10 axes, 12 spears and 4 ropes measuring 5m each.

As he got out of the factory pulling the cart, he saw the engineer girl pushing a silver rock twice her size and many times her weight toward the factory.

Honestly, he was so surprised he forgot to help and just watched as she approached the factory with each push.

And as the rock touched the building, the girl spelled "Store" and the rock vanished as if it had never been there.

(Hooo....So we can also do that, hmm?)

"Great job! Hey, did you also find some sand?"

The girl jumped surprised as she heard her Master's voice, she had been too concentrated in pushing the rock to notice him until now.

"M-Master!? Y-yes, I found it but had no way to bring it, so I gave up..."

"Great! Then, lets use this cart and shovels to bring it back! Lead the way!"

"O-okay..."

30 minutes went by as Apollo reached the sand area. It looked like a dried lake, maybe it was seasonal, but no matter what it was empty now and only the sand was left. Apollo handed over a shovel to the girl and grabbed one himself.

"Help me fill the cart."

"Y-yes..."

The two used another 2 hours to fill the cart and finally went back to the factory as the Sun reached the highest point in the sky.

"Store!"

The cart vanished along the sand, surprising Apollo who thoughtlessly had send the command.

"Damn! Give back the cart! Give it back!!!"