10. Harvesting & Inventory

After playing around with various tools for a while, time slipped by in an instant, and Shiro began to feel hungry.

"Is it about lunchtime?"

"Yes. Around 1 PM by Earth time—local time 5.4."

"Hmm, I could go for something to eat... though the only thing available is Appria, right?"

"Shiro, there are edible crops growing within this sacred zone. Why not try your exploration skill?"

"Good point. Skill acquisition and food gathering in one go—double win! Can I use my magic to emit waves and search via scene graph?"

Shiro’s spirits lifted slightly.

"Yes. Visualize electromagnetic waves at willpower level 170, radiating in all directions," Mitoka added.

"Requires quite a bit of focus, huh."

Shiro’s enthusiasm dropped instantly.

"Yes. And after the scene graph search, filter by food flag. Output method is flexible—3D visual display or thought projection will do."

Mitoka offered further advice.

"Got it. Just gotta focus!"

Shiro steeled himself and prepared to activate his exploration skill.

It took a moment for his mana to transition into a wave-like form—though it wasn’t actually electromagnetic radiation, the key was imagining mana as possessing wave-like properties.

Then, visualize that wave spreading in every direction, and imagine extracting information like a scan whenever the wave intersects with an object. That’s what “scene graph search” means.

"Let’s start with a search radius of 500 meters inside the barrier, up to 20 meters above ground, down to about 1 meter underground."

As soon as the exploration skill activated, a flood of data surged into Shiro’s mind. Too many entity hits—information overload. The sudden deluge made him instinctively grunt.

Shiro struggled to filter only edible plants, sorting by nutritional value, attempting to output names and locations as thoughts.

Then, information surged into Shiro’s mind, as if memories were being recalled.

——『[Scout] Level 1 acquired』

[NE 400 meters, giant potato cluster]

[NW 300 meters, konoa cluster]

[SW 500 meters, sesamum cluster]

[SW 400 meters, edible leaf cluster]

[NE 500 meters, rock salt]

……

“Just so you know, potatoes are potatoes, konoa is corn, and sesamum is sesame.”

Mitoka spoke, watching Shiro. She could read his thoughts, so she knew the scout results.

“Huh. Turns out there’s more than I thought. Let’s go with potatoes, rapeseed, and rock salt for now? Or… can salt be generated through materialization?”

“Shiro, yes, materialization works for that. A small amount’s fine for eating. For large amounts, mining’s more efficient.”

“Right. So… potatoes—no, wait, ‘potato’—let’s head out and harvest some?”

With that, Shiro decided to head toward the potato cluster based on the recalled data.

Arriving at the potato cluster, Shiro and Mitoka scanned the area.

“Yeah, they’re growing pretty well,” Shiro said. Then, about to harvest, he realized—no tools.

“Huh. Starting from nothing’s tougher than I thought. We’ll need a shovel and something to carry them in, at least.”

Shiro used modeling and materialization to create a shovel and a bucket.

Stainless steel, maybe? he considered.

According to Mitoka’s data, you add one percent carbon, eight percent nickel, and eighteen percent chromium by mass to iron.

Shiro thought with a smug satisfaction: the key during materialization is to visualize the components thoroughly mixed. In truth, he had a hobby for alloys.

Once the tools were ready, the harvest would be smooth sailing. Each potato was enormous—about thirty centimeters long, fifteen wide. After digging up ten or so, Shiro realized they wouldn’t fit in the bucket.

“Mitoka, is the inventory system usable now?”

“Yes, I believe so. But you’ll need to first unlock the 【Inspection】 skill, then the 【Inventory】 skill.”

“Got it.”

Since 【Inspection】 was the same as 【Ideas】’s 【Inspection】, Shiro decided to try it first.

He imagined a laser-pointer-like selection tool using mana manipulation, visualized entity selection, then imagined extracting the information. No attribute conversion or mana control needed. For now, he’d stick with the thought-memory interface.

——『【Inspection】 Level 1 acquired』

Shiro genuinely felt pleasantly surprised. It was easier than expected.

“Now, the inventory design is exactly as I envisioned. First, I need to create a linked anchor point inside my body via mana manipulation.”

“Ah, so the design is the same,” Shiro said, relieved.

Still, to actually use it, he wondered—was it really thought-based mana manipulation?

“Um, is it okay to imagine a box with a fixed coordinate system permanently embedded inside me?”

“Yes, that works.”

With that, Shiro focused, solidifying the image in his mind.

“A box that persists just beneath my heart…,” he murmured.

“Once you’ve solidified the image in your mind and can sustain it, recite: ‘Inventory acquired: initialized, interface: full, time coefficient: zero, link count: unlimited, index: automatic, extension: Idea Library integration.’”

Shiro recited exactly as Mitoka instructed.

——‘[Inventory] Level 1 acquired.’

“Whoa, it worked!” Shiro exhaled, excitement flickering through him.

“Now, for putting things in and taking them out, you select an object using your鉴定 skill, touch it, then chant or visualize ‘inventory intake.’ The parent link of the target entity will then be rewritten to point to your internal link origin.”

“Huh. So this is what a thought interface is good for.”

Shiro said it for what felt like the hundredth time, still impressed.

The inventory system in this world was identical to the one Shiro had designed—but this was only possible because the world operated on an entity-based architecture. Every ‘thing’ was an object called an entity, existing in a link to this reality. By rewriting the link destination to another object, you could move existence itself.

The magical link origin object was a special kind of object, possessing conceptual attributes on par with an entire world. That was why it could serve as the parent link for anything—any object. By rewriting the parent link, the object’s existence would shift from this ‘world’ into Shiro’s inventory.

It wasn’t the same as the typical fantasy trope of a “subspace” or spatial-temporal pocket. That kind of thing was possible here too, sure—but this was different.

Additionally, entities beneath a linked origin object can be initialized to have individually adjustable rates of time progression. In this world, the smallest unit of time is one iteration of the global object processing loop. How much processing an object receives during the world's overall update cycle determines its time coefficient.

Zero means no processing at all—thus, time does not advance for that object. It's roughly analogous to a game engine's main loop, though the degree of parallel and distributed processing differs significantly.

Furthermore, managing captured items will use the UI module. For example: [2D Screen List Display], [Audio], [Memory Output], [Imagination Output].

The simplest is 2D Screen List Display—essentially a visual interface, like status displays, rendered on a semi-transparent screen. The fastest is [Imagination Input/Output], which uses a thought-based interface to retrieve or store items through mental visualization. You can pull out or put away things you’ve memorized just by thinking of them.

So, inventory now functional—Shiro was swiftly stuffing potatoes into his inventory.

Next, Shiro headed southwest, gathering edible leaves, herbs, and a few sesamum plants that had just reached peak ripeness.

"Mitoka, can oil be extracted from these sesamum seeds?"

"Yes, it can. But we won’t get much from just what we’ve gathered."

Hmm. So that’s how it is. Shiro sighed in disappointment.

"Then, can I synthesize plant oil directly through materialization?" Shiro asked.

"Yes. A mix of oleic acid, linoleic acid, linolenic acid, palmitic acid, and stearic acid," Mitoka replied with a smug grin. Then,

"Specifically, canola oil analogs would work well with roughly 60%, 15%, 10%, 10%, and 5% respectively. And if you blend in oil extracted from sesame seeds, it’ll add a nice flavor."

"Ah—so materialization really is the ultimate tool."

Shiro felt a spark of excitement at the sheer convenience of it all.

He thought, *Well, no container anyway—just synthesize it during cooking*, and decided to head back to the stone stage for now.

Along the way, he realized he’d need firewood for cooking, so he modeled and materialized an axe to cut it. A hand axe, about fifty centimeters long, made of stainless steel—his specialty.

The trees in the shrine’s forest weren’t overly large, so fallen branches were just the right size. He picked up suitable ones as he went, gathering fuel.

Still not enough, he felled a single tree whole and stored it in his inventory—then returned to the stone stage.

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