Jay glanced down at her dark silky hair with its subtle sheen of crimson. It seemed so soft and clean, even in the humid swamp air.

As she suckled on his shoulder, Jay raised his arm – but stopped himself.

Wait, why do I want to pat her hair… what’s wrong with me? He shook his head.

In a few moments she was finished. She licked the wound, and tucked herself into his blanket. She wasn’t impressed with Jay’s antics, and the wound on her leg and the stinking shack only added to her misery.

“I’ll be back soon, Asra. Red, guard her.”

“Mm.” Asra mumbled back.

Jay left and Red closed the door, standing by Asra’s side. Jay could still sense Sweeper somewhere below them, but decided to leave it to its duty.

I’ll drop off the amber spheres later, he shrugged.

Initially, Jay had Red, Blue, and Sweeper guarding Hegatha, but after seeing Hegatha’s compliance while healing Asra he decided to keep Blue with him.

With Asra safe, Jay walked back to the edge of the water and gave Blue some instructions.

(Blue, I want your sub-skeletons patrolling the depths, killing anything down there that eats bones. I also want them pushing any corpses further away from here. I have a bridge to make, and I can’t have it collapsing when the corpses under it decompose or get eaten,) Jay pointed to the water.

I will just need a few guards to stop it from degrading, so Blue’s minions should do the trick.

The group of skeletons waiting by the shore had a bone snack to heal themselves, and received their new axes and hatchets; some were still appreciating these new tools, and now they understood why their master sent them to gather rocks.

Jay sent the group back through the water one last time, to truly make sure any bone-eating eels were truly dead, then stepped to the water’s edge and began construction of a second bridge.

One that would last this time.

Similar to other constructions, he dumped large bones down first, letting them stack up and form the foundation. Blue was sent to test it, jumping and stomping to make and unstable bones shift and collapse until they fell into a stable position.

Once the foundation was ready, Jay added gradually smaller bones until there was a flat layer of pebble-like bones on top, and in no time, his bridge was finished. He took more care this time as he wanted the bridge to last longer.

Jay slowly made his way across the foggy black water, each step sending a few bone pebbles falling off the bridge and into the water – most of these ‘pebbles’ being finger bones.

Stepping onto the other shore, the band of log-cutting skeletons had already left the water, and Jay could already hear axes hitting wood, echoing through the fog.

“Good” he nodded, whispering to Blue.

For Jay’s purposes, just one tree trunk would do, but he let them cut a few down so they could get used to logging, and hopefully gain some experience.

(Bring the tree trunks back once you’ve cut them down.) Jay ordered, waiting patiently on the side of the bank.

While he had to do some culling to collect the spheres, he trusted the skeletons would be able to cull a significant portion of enemies – especially since Blue’s smaller skeletons could manage to slay the fire lights. It would be no problem for the higher levels.

While waiting, Jay analyzed one of the amber spheres.

< [Breaking Shard] >

[?]

[?]

[Unknown]

< [Description] >

[Unknown]

“A breaking shard?” Jay raised a brow. How can it be a shard when it’s a sphere? He wondered, rolling in between his fingers. And what’s the difference between unknown and a question mark? The only other thing I have with a question mark is that large starry gemstone, which is probably an egg.

Jay rolled the amber sphere between his fingers as it let off a slight shine, even in the gloomy fog.

Hmm, if this is an egg too, then what is Hegatha doing with it? … Well, I’m sure she won’t mind – or notice – if one goes missing, Jay thought, and his lips curled into a smile.

After a while, the skeletons began to bring some tree trunks back. Each trunk was ashen-gray, about 20 feet tall, and the top had a smoldering ember – the same smoldering burn as Asra’s wound.

It was odd to see the embers as the tree didn’t shorten or burn up. It remained the same length, even as the ember smoldered and smoked.

Jay had them dip the burning end into the water, and it released some hisses and bubbles for a few seconds before dying down, but after they pulled it out again, it returned to a hot glow.

“It’s like it’s frozen in time?” Jay guessed. He had seen time magic before, when Kel was practicing, but it was nothing like this. And it didn’t explain how Hegatha was fixing Asra’s leg by eating crushed leaves and without using mana.

… Hmm, I’ll figure it out later, he shrugged.

(Cut off the burnt ends, and put them in a pile near the water, then cut the logs in half down the middle) Jay instructed.

So far, the skeletons had gathered two logs. There was a group of smaller skeletons using hatchets and were still cutting another tree, so Jay sent Lamp away to help them finish it off and drag it back.

After the skeletons cut the log down the middle, he had them cut along the middle pieces again, then again and again. Much of the log split down the side and broke away, but it didn’t matter – all he needed was to make some sticks.

After the skeletons cut the logs into sticks, he had enough to make the two or three of the traps that Hegatha wanted – but joining them together would be a problem.

Knowing that Hegatha used her sentient leaves to stick some bait to the trap, Jay guessed that she probably used them to hold the trap together too. It wasn’t something he was capable of, and using bone to make the trap was no option.

But I can’t always rely on magic, he nodded. I shouldn’t.

Jay sent the skeletons out again, this time, to gather the long swamp grasses and the reeds from the water.

The swamp grasses were either barbed or covered with tiny hairlike filaments which pierced the skin and caused itching. Some were simply full of a viscous poison. Over the years, even these grasses had grown resilient to the harsh swamp, accustomed to the world of hungry maws around them, still clinging to life despite the rotting decay and the lack of sunlight.

Yet the skeletons weren’t deterred in the slightest, easily bringing bundles of grasses back after a few swings of their axes and hatchets.

The next step wasn’t hard – to instruct the skeletons to strip away the green parts covered in the barbs and needles, leaving the tough spine of the grasses, which they twined together.

Creating something which resembled a cage wasn’t hard to make, and while the twine and the quality of construction wasn’t great, Jay didn’t care that much. These traps weren’t for him, and he certainly wouldn’t be eating anything caught in them either.

As a bonus, he would also give Hegatha the bundles of chopped pseudo-sticks and the long fibers left over from the grasses.

If she’s not happy with my work, she can do it herself. He shrugged, holding one of the traps.

Suddenly, a mischievous smile appeared on Jay’s face. He quickly sent a skeleton into the water to grab one of the corpses left over from the feeding frenzy while he dipped each trap into the swamp waters, making them look like they had been used.

The skeleton came back with a mangled jellyfish that had thick, green, snake-like tendrils, and dark purple veins covered its body.

Ugh, I hope that tastes better than it looks, Jay frowned.

He carefully placed it into a trap before sending them back with a skeleton, its feet tapping across the bone bridge towards Hegatha’s front door.

“Now… we can get on with the hunt.” Jay glanced at his skeletons, and they assembled before him.