Lord of the Myriad Worlds

Chapter 205: A Fortified Field

Standing on the rooftop, looking out over the ruined town, George's plan unrolled in his mind like a scroll.

To execute it, he first needed a thorough understanding of the town's terrain layout, the Rat King's territory and movement patterns, and the location and extent of its underground tunnel network.

He had long assumed that the Rat King's main den was at the center of town — a former park, as far as he could tell. Even now, a few trees stood there, surrounded by wide stretches of overgrown grass. In summer, that place would have been alive: columns of mutant rats charging through like mounted raiders, chasing down mantises, grasshoppers, beetles, and guarding their little berry patches.

Nice life, if you could get it.

But what Li Yue's staged scene today had actually revealed was that the Rat King's tunnel system extended all the way to the western edge of town. Which raised the question — did the tunnels also run beneath the north side, directly under their five-story building?

Fortunately, this northern section had a lot of hardened road surface, which meant no tunneling threat to worry about. But thirty meters south of the building was a small patch of green space — roughly two mu — no more than an overgrown lot.

Back when Li Jiao was still alive, he'd mentioned it as a potential farmsite.

Li Jiao was gone. He hadn't lived to see it done. How could George feel good about that?

Well. For his memory, then. That land was going under the plow.

George allowed himself a faint smile, picked up the shovel, and went downstairs.Without a word to anyone, he activated the Bear Hunter title to push his Strength to 25. Then he started digging. Earth flying, shovel flashing — George was moving fast enough to leave an afterimage.

The "small excavator" reputation wasn't earned lightly.

By sunset, when Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue returned laden with parts from the parking lot, George had dug the two-mu patch into something that resembled a swimming pool.

Growing fish? Farming? Neither of them could quite tell what he was building.

They didn't ask. Partially because the sight of open earth without a concrete foundation put both of them on edge now — that ever-present sense of the Rat King watching from below.

They were also, privately, hoping the Rat King would take this opportunity to come after George.

Kill him, preferably. Then the mission line would resolve and they could go home — job done, competitor eliminated, their own departments' Seed Players left with better odds. Their superiors would probably give them end-of-year bonuses.

As for claiming the Pioneering Territory themselves — they both knew their limits.

So they said a brief nothing and quickly left.

The only places in this entire ruin where they felt even marginally safe were the parking lot and the five-story building itself.

George, meanwhile, was not afraid of the Rat King at all.

A tunnel collapse took time to prepare. He didn't believe for a second it would dedicate effort to undermining this building unprovoked. And beyond that, he had the reflexes and the read-time to make a clean retreat if anything started shifting underfoot. He was confident in that.

So he kept digging. All day, with breaks for food. He worked until around ten at night, by which point the full two-mu plot had been excavated one person's depth deep. Only then did he pack up and go home.

Cold house, cold stove. Nobody had cooked.

Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue were still eating their personal stockpiles. Just how much food had they brought?

Well, they had the resources. Nothing to be done. Roasted dry rat it was, washed down with boiled water, sprinkled with salt. Actually quite satisfying.

Just before sleep, faint rain began pattering outside. The first spring rain of the year — a few days earlier than he'd expected.

A distant rumble of thunder rolled from far away. Right now, it sounded like a lullaby.

Morning. The light rain had stopped. George paid 5 Contribution for night watch to Liang Yuzhi, leaving him with 220. Liang Yuzhi was now at 110 cumulative. Li Yue at 120.

His auntie was advancing fast. She'd been collecting night-watch pay every single day — effective, but the cost was brutal. Those massive dark circles under her eyes said everything.

Easy Contribution; dangerous if you made a mistake. She'd figure it out on her own terms.

By five this morning, George was already out digging before they'd come down at ten to start their day. Li Yue had stopped going anywhere alone. The threat was well-established.

George by then had already deepened the pit further.

"Xiao Wei, what exactly is this? Why so deep?"

They stood at the edge looking down, having initially assumed farming, but this didn't look like farming anymore.

"I want to check if the Rat King's tunnels run through this area. I'm thinking about digging until I hit them and drawing it out for a decisive fight."

George said it with complete sincerity, because that was the truth. He didn't have a dishonest answer that was any better.

Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue were half-convinced. Liang Yuzhi's dark circles had deepened. Stripping vehicles wasn't easy work either — and doing it with the constant awareness of the Rat King watching from somewhere unseen, ready to fight at a moment's notice, was exhausting in a different way. She was already regretting the whole night-watch strategy.

"Xiao Wei, can you take tonight's watch? The last few nights have been catching up with me."

Liang Yuzhi finally conceded.

"Of course, Auntie — though you'll have to cook me something decent in return."

George said it lightly, like a bit of friendly negotiation. Which it was. Perfectly reasonable within the logic of their situation.

After they left, George rested briefly, then went right back to digging — the kind of manic, all-in focus that would have reminded anyone of a certain legendary construction worker charging through obstacles.

Morning to night. Ate mid-day. Short rest. Kept going until one in the morning, then slept.

Night watch? He skipped it.

Fine him. Ban him. George was unbothered.

【You did not perform your mandatory night watch duty. Although no dangerous incidents occurred overnight, your behavior remains unacceptable. You have been deducted 10 Family Contribution. Current total: 205.】

The notification appeared. George acknowledged it and did nothing about it. He grabbed a skewer of dried rat — didn't bother cooking it — bit in raw, drank the well water unboiled.

Then he went downstairs to dig.

Dug until noon. Result: a hole four meters deep and approximately two mu in total area.

The construction experience from the digging, combined with his earlier well-digging, had accumulated to a total of 1,000 Construction Experience points, earning him two One-Star Artisan Cards. He took note and kept working. These were details — irrelevant to the actual plan.

At which point the rain started again. Light drizzle at first, with the look of something that planned to settle in and pour for days.

The smell of wet earth. He loved it.

George smiled silently, went back upstairs, resumed eating dried rat and drinking well water to capacity, then slept. When he woke, he went back down into the increasingly heavy rain, resumed throwing stones into the pit — concrete chunks, slabs of old road, anything heavy and hard, the bigger the better.

Once down in the hole, each piece had to be arranged properly — like laying a foundation. Large pieces as the structural frame, smaller pieces filling gaps. Solid, tight, stable. Dense enough that even a rat trying to squeeze through would struggle.

Worth noting: through all of this relentless, barely-sleeping activity, the Four-Star Rat King never came anywhere near him. Whether that meant the creature was genuinely clever, or there was some mission mechanic at play, he couldn't say.

The rain, however, was not good news for Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue.

The ground became slippery. The sun disappeared. Mist settled in — by a hundred meters, everything was invisible. And in that mist, the rats were thrilled, scurrying everywhere, actively hunting. They needed food too.

Meanwhile, the parking lot started flooding. With no lighting and poor visibility, the two women couldn't safely continue stripping vehicles. They were stuck.

That was the gap — not enough raw power to force through situations like this. Without that, all that remained was to lean on George through in-game plot mechanics. A player with George's capability would have had no such problem: strip the ruins, kill every rat in sight until they stopped coming, and invite the Rat King to try its luck.

Simple.

The spring rain lasted three full days and nights. Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue were effectively confined to the building for all three. Not completely idle, though.

They spent two days dismantling vehicle parts inside the building, and managed to install a large sheet-metal barrier at the third-floor gap, plus a second small access door — tight enough that you had to duck to get through.

On top of that, they actually constructed two functional traps.

The defensive improvements to the Level 1 Scavenger Camp were substantial enough to push the Family Contribution cap to 950. Both women received 20 Contribution each. The night-watch fee was reduced from 5 to 1 per person — finally back to a reasonable figure. Mandatory night watch was effectively over.

Maybe once the skies cleared, they could finally deal with the Rat King together. George's pit looked like it might be useful for drawing the creature out...

They were still thinking too simply.

On the fourth day, the rain stopped. The sun came out. Skies washed a brilliant blue. Beautiful day.

They looked at the pit.

George — covered head to foot in mud, looking like something dredged from a riverbed — was sitting on top of a massive, three-meter-high, solid stone foundation he had built inside it.

He was grinning at nothing in particular.

The realization hit Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue like a thunderbolt.

He wasn't digging a trap. He was never digging a trap.

He was building a fortified farm plot — one that the Four-Star Rat King couldn't touch.