Ultimate Gamer System: Factory Must Grow!

Chapter 76 Ammo out of the whazoo!

"Ha... ha... ha..."

Sitting back on top of the huge column he had just erected, Theo looked down at the extensive yet rather simplistic system he had just finished.

The rows upon rows of constructors turned copper ingots into bullet casings, only for those to then be combined with copper ingots again, turning them into actual bullets.

Where did the gunpowder and primer inside of those come from? Were they supposed to be shot by some magnetic or maybe even magical means? That, Theo didn't know.

And since he didn't really need to know the answer to those questions, he just opted not to think about it.

"This really looks nice," Theo muttered to himself instead, taking a bite out of the berry only to let its rich, fruity juices flush his parched mouth and then flow down his throat.

Even though his thirst and hunger meters were nowhere close to drying up, this was nothing more than self-indulgence, an act of rewarding himself for working hard.

And contrary to how it might seem from up above the whole factory, he indeed had to work hard to get this whole system up and running.

From the problem of properly balancing the two copper ingot belts that fed directly into the combiner machines, through the madness of laying down a labyrinth of belts due to how slow they were when compared to the numbers Theo needed for this part of the factory to output...

From the outside, his now-finished project looked simple. Yet, as soon as anyone took a closer look, they would be able to witness its true complexity.

'Even though it was obvious from the moment I realized how many bullets I needed to produce per minute, to think it wouldn't dawn on me all the way until the moment I actually had to belt them out of the machines...'

Six hundred ammo boxes per minute. That's how much ammunition Theo needed if he wanted a total of a hundred guns to be able to operate ad infinitum. And while, by every rational means, it was one hell of an overshoot when compared to just creating a much smaller factory coupled with a massive stockpile of ammunition instead...

After witnessing firsthand what kind of dangers awaited him in the areas deeper into the forest, Theo dared not to take any shortcuts.

"Will monsters of the level of that Voiderling be susceptible to the bullets, though?" Standing over the edge of the ditch, Theo couldn't help but worry.

Yet, while there was another weapon he knew how to make with just a little bit of system shenanigans... Not only would it be insanely more expensive than the current setup he hadn't even finished building, it would also take a lot more time, effort, and most importantly, materials to set it all up.

In other words, for the coming invasion... Theo had pretty much no chance of getting his hands on the rocket launchers that he already planned to get. And that left him with nothing more than simple kinetic weapons...

Weapons that the fantasy literature he enjoyed was infamously bad against monsters of sufficiently high level!

'While I could never agree with the idea of modern weapons not working against monsters that could be slashed or crushed with cold weapons, it's not like I'm the one making the rules here, is it?' Theo thought, gritting his teeth at the prospect of all of his plans falling apart, thus forcing him to abandon all that he worked hard to construct.

A prospect that would be akin to a proper death sentence, given the absolute lack of mineral veins he could sense in the direction of the open plain he had come from!

"Just in case, I guess I should stock up on those berries as much as I can," Theo thought, heaving a long sigh as he turned away from the ditch, finally ready to go back to his manor and get some proper rest. "That, and to make those berries last longer, a proper source of water."

Shaking his head, Theo nearly crossed the wooden gate when a simple, stray thought—an idea that was either ingenious or extremely stupid—popped into his head.

"Water, huh?" he muttered to himself as he looked back at the short stretch of the ditch he had made quite some time ago. "And coupled with all that I have easy access to right now..."

The worry on Theo's face disappeared, replaced with just exhaustion and but a fleeting spark of hope and vicious amusement.

"Let's leave it for tomorrow. But if it works..."

The grin on Theo's lips only continued to grow wider by the moment as he continued to build up on the idea that had floated into his head, turning it into a seedling for a fresh plan for tomorrow.

"Then I might just have a way to fully secure my manor from invasions of any kind!"