Jaycee quietly ate his food in the corner of the camp. They had grown nearly three times in size throughout the day. The massive influx of people meant things were changing constantly, but Percy was doing a good job making sure things stay at least somewhat organized.
He had succeeded at remaining the clear and decisive leader despite others wishing to be in his position. By now it was hard to look for a single person amongst the camp and seeing as he didn't have any friends or people he felt comfortable with he ate by himself. The cooked meat began to fill his stomach as he ate.
There were a lot of things people were learning constantly. The first ever profession had been offered to someone. A man who had been doing the majority of the cooking of the meat had been offered the Cook professions. It apparently worked similar to the class as it provided some stats for every level.
It also allowed him to imbue food with the ability to give the people who are it increased powers. Jaycee could feel the meat increase how fast his health and mana regenerated. He thought about what he would want his profession to be. Assuming he had to be experienced enough with something before the system offered him a profession.
As of right now he didn't know enough about anything to think of anything substantial, but it was good to make sure he was thinking of his future. Another piece of info that Jaycee could hear circulate around the camp was the fact that gods had blessed some individuals in their group. Jaycee assumed the energy that Lady showed was from some sort of god.
He had seen enough fiction to know gods bless people that like so there was clearly larger figures at play here. Percy had fortunately let Jaycee go from his group. Mostly it was just a fact of Percy not wishing to slow down the younger man. It was obvious Jaycee moved to his own drum no matter how slow and lazy the beat was. Jaycee activated his Mana stealth skill and walked around the camp practicing its use.
He was now able to hide from everyone except the higher leveled archers which was only 4 people. Of course if he was any closer than 10 feet he would be detected by people. But his effective range with his magic was farther than that.
The next day started with Jaycee getting randomly scouted to join a party in helping clear the area around the camp. His skill with his magic was starting to become more practiced and well working. The group he had joined was nothing special, just a group of random people with an excitable archer leader.
He didn't do anything flashy the whole day either but focused on developing his magic. The beasts were no challenge and by the time he settled back into the camp at the end of the day he was on the verge of making a skill.
'Skill Gained, Orange: Flame Remote Charge'
With a touch, place a pocket of fire mana that can explode at your command.
He had finally created the skill after a day of repeated practice and adjustments. The skill wasted less energy and was more refined. He just had to touch an inanimate object and a pocket of flame energy was visible on the surface.
It was possible to somehow 'hide' his skill but he didn't know how to do that. If he could make landmines that would be pretty cool but right now he had to experiment with less complicated ideas. Sitting on the ground he leaned back on his arms and watched people settle down for the day. The day had brought in more people swelling the group size to a healthy 250 people.
There was a few problems that came up throughout the day. Some people didn't want to fall under the leadership of Percy but there was group of people who were very loyal to Percy and they were able to consolidate all of the positions of power. Jaycee himself wasn't very popular and was definitely at the bottom of the food chain in the political scene of the group.
Very few people knew of his level and connection to Percy. He didn't radiate power and confidence like the medium warrior, so there was borderline no reason for anyone to approach him. He looked like an unapproachable guy in an incredibly torn and ruined robe.
Yet still, a girl about as old as him walked up to him and began to talk to him. "Hey uh my name is Keira and we've just been gathering all the other college aged people. So if you wanna hangout or something we're all down at the back of the camp." She said.
Jaycee smiled and nodded. "Okay cool I'll stop by." He didn't want to stop by but he would anyway. Personally he enjoyed not being asked for his opinion right now. Thankfully nearly no one talked to him.
She cutely bowed before shuffling away. Jaycee closed his eyes and laid back on the ground. A small patch of moss marked his bed where he slept. Fortunately there were no small bugs or things to harass him while he slept. So he was only a little uncomfortable.
He still occasionally thought of the woman archer who had almost killed him. He mostly thought of his lack of answers to any damage inflicted by poisons. So he had to either find a way to deal with poisons once inflicted on him, or find a way to reliably defend against any attempt to inflict him with poison.
Of course the first option would be the best but quite frankly he didn't see a way for him to counter poisons. But a goal of his for a while was strengthening his defenses. They were minimal at the moment. He began to experiment with creating his magical shield in different forms. His first thought was to try and improve basic things.
The first idea was to change the before flat shield into a rounded surface that encouraged deflection. He could create a shield with a solid bend to it relatively easy but he noticed its quality was lower. It was the skill. The skill was meant to be a solid wall of energy. Changing it meant violating what made the skill the skill.
Jaycee instead switched to using his freeform magic to manipulate mana, which he noticed other mages had a much much harder time doing. In fact most of them couldn't even create anything without hours of practice through freeform magic. Immediately the strength was slightly better but still lackluster. One of the problems with his freeform magic was that it simply wasn't as strong as a skill.
Skills were fundamentally different than freeform magic. Freeform magic was like Jaycee trying to coral mana with his hands. But a skill was like he had a net that catches the mana for him and helps him form it into the mold of the skill. When trying to change what the skill does it creates weaknesses.
His brainstorm was starting to take off. And seeing as he hadn't used much stamina throughout the day, he stayed up until early morning before falling asleep.
Jaycee cracked his knuckles while absentmindedly watching the people on the podium talk. The camp had progressed to more of a town over the course of a week. There were many small cabins built and now more than half of their population had professions like builders and crafters and engineers. They had an ever expanding parameter of wooden barricades that served to protect the camp from beasts and enemies.
Over the course of the week every person in the tutorial had either found a camp to settle in or were solo out in the forest now. The beasts have ramped up significantly in threat and strength. They now occasionally gathered and attacked camps with numbers in the thousands. There were rumors that many camps had fallen to these beast waves but Percy's camp had survived their first wave.
There were 6 camps left now. The rest had all either merged or been wiped out by another camp, or beasts. But there was no more merging between the groups anymore as each leader seemed to wish for their own control. Percy had been starkly against any large scale human on human violence. Especially when most of the people fighting couldn't care less who their leader was in this confusing and dangerous time.
But Percy had created a cult following from his genuineness. He had been a helping hand during much of the construction and location of resources to help people. Percy ran a mostly smooth camp. Percy had gifted Jaycee his own cabin as a thanks for just being exceptionally helpful. Jaycee enjoyed the special treatment as well.
Nothing was really stopping him from leaving except for the fact that he hadn't developed himself as much as he wanted. He still had minimal connections except Lady, who somehow still found him everyday to have a meal with him. She had fully integrated into Percy's party and was one of his most trusted party members.
The strong man had reached out to Jaycee again about joining his party, but being close to finishing his skills he refused. Now, there was a small voting conference happening in the middle of the camp. They were essentially electing people who can be the treasurers or things like that.
Percy offered his position to a vote but it turned out to be exactly as everyone expected. They voted the handsome man as leader with no competition. No one even bothered running against him. Jaycee only watched the event because he was interested in how people were creating government right in front of him.
Of course the tutorial only lasted a few months but it was long enough that weak leadership could result in a fractured, weak human population. Jaycee began to turn as the last election ended. He got a cold sweat and faced the podium. He watched as the crowd parted around Percy as he walked toward Jaycee. Panicking Jaycee tried to sneak through the crowd but was caught by the man. "Jaycee, I need your help." Percy said.