BXBX NOVEL Chapter 421: Genesis.
Rather than favoring melee fighters, the majority of Hunter's entourage consisted of ranged fighters. Cain also had plans to fit them up with the {GT-01 Magnum} handguns. If they had these magical devices, it would make their time scouring the expanding ocean worthwhile.
The construction squad would be headed primarily by Steve, Li, Sisi, and Stan. According to Steve, the suffering they shared at the hands of the Beastwomen had made the bond between them stronger than anything...
...or something like that.
Either way, Cain didn't think the line up was too bad. Plus, they were going to have assistance from many Beastmen and women, as well as some of the people that had followed them from the Northern Island.
With Steve's skills, Cain was sure he would figure something out...
As for the the Maintenance Squads, they consisted of two subdivisions, the guards and the caretakers. The guards were made up of those that had to be ready in case the Rift began spewing Abyssal Creatures, or the ocean decided to spit out a few Mutant Creatures to attack the inhabitants of the Central Island, which happened quite often.
The Guards were headed by Blaze, David, Floki, Calio, and Manny. The caretakers on the other hand consisted of just a few Beastwomen that were simply to weak and terrified of doing any other thing.
Cain didn't blame them at all, as what they had all gone through was definitely terrifying. So he chose to give them less tasking jobs that didn't require combat, such as cooking, finding miscellaneous items that could help in daily life for everyone else, like clothes and soap for washing, and so on...
The last and final Squad, was the crafting squad, responsible for creating and maintaining weapons and equipment. Cain had come to a very important decision...
Trying to rush things this early was a bad idea. Instead, it would be better for him to stabilize his footing. Gather more survivors, create a place where they could thrive, and get stronger in the process...
The creation of these squads was for this reason. And so, he had decided to take on the role of heading the Crafting squad, even though it was quite obvious since he was one of the only people that could create weapons and armor.
Susan could also create leather armor from the hides and scales of Mutant Beasts. She was quite gifted with her hands. This will allow those that preferred moving lighter to have defensive gear as well as opposed to the chunky metallic armor Cain would be able to provide.
Still, the equipment they would be making would be definitely better than anything they could find in the system general store.
With most of the Beastmen and women, as well as the regular himans already split into different squads, Cain's squad had a somewhat unique lineup.
His group consisted of seventeen people, himself, Susan, Jenny, Sue, Roselle, Kai, Lin Lin, and the ten Beastmen that had accompanied him in crafting and hunting back in the Fragmented Lands.
As for Evangeline, She was given free reign like always. However, she also had a secret task that onlys he could accomplish. Something known only to her and Cain...
As for why there were so many girls in his group, all he could say, was he had no clue...
He truly had no clue...
Staring at the group of girls standing in front of him, and the group of semi-terrified Beastmen standing at a corner, he couldn't help but shake his head.
He stared at a certain person who simply refused to acknowledge his existence, he couldn't help but smile bitterly. When he had decided to add Kai, Lin Lin, Roselle, Susan, and Jenny into his squad, Sue had bicketed and argued with him for the better part of an hour.
According to her, he couldn't throw her away, and he had to add her into his squad because he owed it to her. Cain was stumped by her words, but decide to give in eventually when he saw the tears rolling in.
'Tantrums... Freaking tantrums...'
They had chosen a somewhat tidied building with the top floors collapsed on an adjacent building, leaving only the ground floor and the ceiling above it intact.
The reception area still had a subtle ambience to it that was thoroughly washed away by the stale air, cold winds, and creeping darkness that never seemed to go away.
Staring at the tattered decorations, Cain wondered exactly just how long it had been since normal life as he knew it had ended.
He sighed...
Susan had a slightly worried expression on her face,
"How did things come to this?" Looking at the women standing around her, it was clear she was displeased. And so, like any reasonable person, she turned all her agression towards Cain.
"What is your reason for this? Are you planning on building your own harem now that you've finally conquered your portion of the world? Is that it?"
Cain's face paled with fear, "W-what are you talking about? Please stop joking!"
Jenny tapped her shoulder with a wry smile. Clicking her tongue, Susan decided to back down a little, albeit unwillingly.
Cain sighed, "Can we stop with the jokes, please? We can joke later. For now, let's set some things up."
Everyone fell silent at his words. The other squads were probably doing the same right now. Cain had decided to give the Squad heads free reign over how they organized their squads.
There was no way he could do all this by himself, so it was best to assign the job to competent individuals.
Once he noticed that everyone had settled down, he began,
"As you all know, fighting Mutant Beasts requires good weapons and equipment. What we can obtain from the system is pretty limited. The system isn't a crutch. Instead, it provides us with what it can. An avenue for survival. The only thing we can do is capitalize on that."
Cain's voice was calm, "The weapons provided by the system are, for a lack of better words, trash. So we need to make our own. I can say comfortably say that I can made decent equipment. However, they will be useless from Tier 1 and up.
That means if I have enough time and materials on my hands, I can outfit every single one of us with weapons that will make killing Mutant Beasts, Abyssal Creatures, and possibly Devils, much easier."
Cain the turned to Susan who then nodded,
"Although I specialize in magic, preferably healing magic, I can also crafy leather and scale armor with a but of proficiency. I took up leatherworks as a hobby back as a child. To think the knowledge had stuck with me all this time..."
The rest in the group went ahead to introduce themselves and what they could do. Once that was done, Cain moved straight forward,
"The Scavengers and the Crafters... You ten are too weak, so until you can comfortably battle Level 50 and above Mutant Beasts on your own, you won't be allowed to fight..."
"Boss!" Haru wanted to complain, but was shut down by Cain.
"The best you can do is increase your physical levels by focusing completely on your Ki Plundering Techniques. That way, you'll be able to join in on the fun later."
The Beastmen were truly weak. The only reason they had been able to survive for so long was the fact that Stingè didn't intent to kill them outright.
"As for you girls..." Cain directed his gaze towards the six females standing before him.
"Besides Susan, you lot will be Scavengers..."
Kai frowned, "Why don't I like the sound of that?"
Cain chuckled, "It's not as bad as it sounds. All you need to do is hunt down specific Mutant Beasts and Devils for me. I'll be going along from time to time as well."
Roselle nodded, "I see..."
It really wasn't a bad idea. They would be able to raise their levels whilst being of help to everyone.
Susan also nodded in agreement, "We might be able to make this work."
Cain smiled, "As for me, I'll be working on both teams."
With Pudding on his side, Cain would be able to harvest as many precious metals and magic stones. It had been a decent amount of time since he last saw the pink creature. Cain was sure she would have found some good stuff.
The appearance of mana and elemental energies into Urbus had caused many changes. For example, the general expansion and splitting of the landmasses, drastic changes in climates, and many other bizzare changes.
One of those changes, was the mutation of the non-biological materials that could be found in nature, such as rocks, metallic ores, natural gases, and so on...
Finding good magical ores and stones won't be too hard...
'I truly can't wait...'
The ten Beastmen, Susan and Cain would be the Crafters, while Cain, Susan, and the six other girls would be the Scavengers.
There were many other details to iron out, but that was how it was going to go until further changes were observed.