With now almost three entire days since I left the arena city, I was quickly running out of things to do.
Properly plant all the herbs into orderly rows in my magical garden? I even made sure to install some makeshift watering installation with the use of a limited amount of wood and ore that I managed to salvage before it turned into the dust under the influence of the parasitic core.
Take care of the small world and make sure it would be as accommodating if I were to somehow bring some real residents in?
Well, that was the hard part without any proper building materials, but after working hard for over ten hours on the shore of the island, I managed to salvage enough various elements to turn simple mud huts that I erected in the subdimension into something looking like a small shack sculpted out of the big rock.
To my surprise, the subdimension shared the same affliction towards the time that all my tools did, making the flow of time almost three times faster inside than in the real world. That was also one of the reasons how I was able to complete the monstrous task of finishing all the matters inside the subdimension in such a short amount of time.
Obviously, not everything went as I hoped.
Despite the initial success in taming down the beasts I hoped to use as livestock, in just a few hours after moving the to the subdimension, they started to wither.
No matter how many methods I used to fix their problem, their bodies were constantly in dire need of huge amount of energy, almost forcing me to cut my own wrists and share my own damned blood with them to keep my herd alive!
Thank God, my aversion of cutting myself after all the torture my body went through before assimilating the power of entropy made me figure out a slightly better way to fix this problem… But it leads to yet another unsolvable matter.
After tinkering a bit around my private garden, I found a way to speed up the flow of time inside it, for the cost of lessening the amount of energy that it received. With its insane properties, I could keep the growth of my herbs at a much higher rate, allowing me to gather enough of mature samples to feed my beasts, without affecting the frail stability of the garden.
One herb too much with each visit and the garden would deteriorate with time, unable to reproduce enough stalks to match the consumption!
But that still took me just enough time to get through the third day, when the boredom and the need to do something started rocking against my consciousness.
Thinking about it, without any modern way of approaching the plagued site, there was only a minimal chance that anyone left in the arena city would pose any threat to me. Even if those zombies were initially dangerous because of Eve being beside me, going there by myself shouldn't pose any troubles!
For now, the most important thing was to procure some storage rings and find a way to transport them safely to the island, preferably full of resources. While on my level, the stuff sold in the city was at most, a bit better than mediocre, it was still better than nothing!
As long as I would be able to craft some new weapons for me or at least a better staff suited for my current entropic nature, I should be able to weather through the dangers of travelling to the neighbouring islands, from where I could get any sorts of natural treasures I could want!
No matter what, I had to make my move as soon as possible, otherwise my own guilty consciousness that I managed to dull by putting Eve's future above everything and using her future health as an excuse for any misdeed of mine would simply crush me. Even if I wouldn't gain anything, I had to at least confirm that this fucker that wounded her was either dead or safely kept in a place from which I could delicately pick him up after growing a bit, to make him atone for the gravest sin he has done.
With my determination set, I took the stock of my current possessions.
Outside of the tattered clothes that I wore on my back when I was teleporting for the first time, I only had the pieces of equipment that I was wearing back then, with the exception for anything that held subdimension in it.
After making sure that my mana was at its full, my staff cleaned out of the dust and my robes still covering my intimate parts, I went outside the tower and prepared for the spatial jump.
Bonger, can you open the teleportation to back to the arena city?
"Blop!"
"That won't be possible."
"Setting stable teleportation is only possible upon anchoring it on both sides, meaning that the host would have to place the anchor on the opposite side."
"Only quick teleportation is possible now!"
As if I ever asked about the stable teleportation, but this additional information was actually quite helpful!
Bonger, how do I settle the anchor?
"Blop!"
"It's required to create a rune in the desired place, fueled by a spirit stone imprinted with the host blood. While it can only be created by the host, anyone who will step inside will be transported to the other side!"
Ugh… That's actually even better.
If the city is as dead as I hope it to be, all I would need to do is to find the treasure room of my former auction house, make sure the entrance is hidden and settle the teleportation anchor there. Even if in the distant future, some grave robbers would come to scavenge the city, there was no way they would be able to overcome all the defences set in that place previously!
On the other hand, if I was forced to create stable teleportation right from the bat, I would risk this island becoming exposed to anyone or anything that was currently roaming on the other side!
Unless I made sure that it was safe to travel to this city, I couldn't take any risks!
Now that I think about it… Shouldn't there be a need for another anchor for me to use when I get to the other side? If I can't create a stable connection to the distant location without an anchor, how I was supposed to do so from the arena city to this place?
"Blop…"
"..."
"Thanks to the host's connection to the core of the stronghold, the system is capable of serving as the anchor…"
Well, that settles it! What's the point of acting all sly now?
Bongi, create teleportation for me, would ya?
"Blop!"
"On it!"