Chapter 229: Advancing The Base Level Skill

’Base skill?’ Tera frowned. ’Hold on a second. You knew!’

[( ? -?)?]

[This system does not understand what Host is—]

’You knew this portal was capable of this, this entire time?!’

[THIS SYSTEM DID NOT—]

[(ノ°Д°)ノ]

[This system did NOT know!]

[This system is being completely transparent with Host!]

[The teleportation portal was designed as a transit function! Entry point, exit point, passage between! That is ALL this system intended it to be!]

Tera’s eyes narrowed. ’Then what’s the complaint about me knowing how to use a base skill?’

[BECAUSE HOST IS INSANE!]

[(???)]

[No rational user would look at a door and think, "What if I drag the door through the wall instead of walking through it?!"]

[This system has NEVER encountered a Host who conceived of such an application!]

[This system is genuinely—this system does not—Host came to this conclusion entirely WITHOUT this system’s involvement, and this system is still processing how that is even POSSIBLE!]

[This system had not even considered it at all until now]

Tera eyed the system with open suspicion.

’You must think I’m stupid or something, huh?’

[ˉ\_(ツ)_/ˉ]

Tera’s jaw dropped.

’What the fuck?!’

[(•?•)]

[What?]

’Excuse you! I am the one who just invented a new use for MY skill you never even considered, and YOU’RE looking at ME like I’m the idiot?!’

[(????)]

’YOU’RE the stupid one here!’

[( ?°?°) !!]

[Host!]

Tera ignored the system and rolled her eyes, resisting the urge to strangle the floating screen.

’Never mind that.’

She looked at the ground beside her and focused on a small patch about a foot to her left.

Entry point. Exit point.

She had done this a thousand times. The portal was second nature to her now, opening and closing with barely a thought. But she had never tried to move one through solid matter before.

Now that she had put her mind to it, it felt fairly easy. She visualised the small portal on the ground, and another right beside it.

Then she pushed it downward.

As the portal sank into the earth, Tera watched the cylinder of earth appear right at the exit point.

[(???;)]

When Tera closed the portal, there was a clean, cylindrical hole in the earth, and the portion that had been dug out remained on the surface.

With ease, Tera used the portal to return the dug earth back to where it was.

’Shit...’

It actually worked!

And it was far easier than she had expected. Why did it take her this long to try it?

[(⊙_⊙)]

[How did Host—]

Tera shrugged. ’I wouldn’t know. I am stupid after all.’

[?????]

Tera stared at the spot she had just dug out and closed back up, and she sat straight at the light bulb that lit up in her head.

The bamboo aside, she could easily just use this to dig the foundations for the structures!

Her skin tingled at this realisation, and she nearly jumped to her feet in surprise but had to restrain herself when Calis shifted in her lap.

Tera walked the system through every remaining detail after that. The bamboo stalks lining the kill zone, not just as weapons but as obstacles she could weave through and use to propel herself forward.

She was smaller and faster on her feet than a building-sized frog, and a forest of vertical stakes would force the beast to slow down while she moved freely between them. She had considered the possibility that the creature might be intelligent enough to stop and think before attacking.

If it paused, it would make things even easier for her. The beast would have become a still target for her to attack. And if it charged, it would impale itself. Either outcome worked for her.

The system had still pushed back, but by the end of everything, its protests had thinned from genuine alarm to what could only be described as professional sulking.

It agreed reluctantly.

Now came the harder part.

Tera needed a strong motivation to not die.

She felt strangely calm despite what she was about to do, and a lot of it came with the confidence from what she had up her arsenal aside from her physical traits.

Her fingers trailed absently from Calis’s hair down to his jaw. She traced the line of it slowly, feeling the roughness of stubble beneath her fingertips. Her gaze drifted lower, settling on his chest where the hide covering had shifted in his sleep, exposing the hard plane of muscle beneath.

It would really, truly, deeply suck if she died.

Not just because of the cubs, or her mates or the clan. They were all important.

But if she died, she would never get to have sex again.

Now, that was unacceptable!

She had three beautiful, fantastic meats, and she had not even yet had the full experience with the wolf currently sleeping in her lap with his stupidly attractive jaw and his stupidly broad chest and his stupid, perfect—

Tera’s hand stopped on his jaw.

She had been planning to spend some quality time with him before she left. A little smooching. A little exploration. Something to take the edge off before she marched into a death mission.

But now a different thought formed.

She wouldn’t touch him.

Not until after all this was done.

She would go to that swamp, kill that beast, and come back alive. And when she came back alive and victorious, she was going to have Calis as a full course meal.

Starter, main, dessert, and seconds.

Then she can wine and dine with Ermin and Xavi and go around the merry-go-round however she liked.

No way was she leaving this behind!

That was her motivation.

’Dick!’

She was going to survive on the raw, primal power of wanting to get laid again.

The system, which had been quietly monitoring the shift in Tera’s thought process, spoke up.

[What?!]

[(⊙_⊙)]

’What?’

[You just said a deplorable word!]

’Uh! It isn’t my fault you’ll never experience the peak sensation of having sex, you emotionless machine!’

[( ?°?°) !!]

[THIS SYSTEM IS TOO ADVANCAED FOR SUXH BASELESS URGES!]