Dungeon Miner Slave

Chapter 36

The next day, Flinx remained at his table on the first floor to create a budget plan. The first thing that he did was browse his system shopping site, looking for cheaper alternatives to the ones that he had been purchasing. After several minutes, the only solution was still to create his own food, like, for example, making sandwiches and eating those for breakfast, and then buying a cheaper menu.

After a while, though, he realized that looking for cheaper alternatives felt like he was planning to deprive himself. He had been eating nothing but bread, water, and a little meat during the time that he was a dungeon miner slave, and he did not want to go back to that, even if those meals were magically turned into something tolerable due to the Prestidigitation spell.

Flinx had collected a lot of mana stones, and soon, he would return to killing monsters and should be able to collect more. He thought that the best thing he could do was enjoy the benefits his system was giving him, and that meant not depriving himself of the good things it could bring him, like good food and good things. Even if he was becoming powerful, there was a chance that he could die while attempting to rescue his fellow Earthlings, so all those savings would just turn into waste.

He thought that the best thing he could do was to limit his spending to 100 dollars a day. That was enough to truly enjoy himself.

After Flinx had arrived at that decision, he decisively bought himself a nice breakfast. Then he went outside, dispelled his tower, and teleported to his spellcasting practice location to continue practicing his spells and his battle simulation.

For the next three days, he did nothing but practice his spell casting and practicing his battle simulations. The only interruption that he allowed himself was to spend a couple of hours a day translating a fairy tale book from English to the common language to give to the priest Anuel.

During those three days, he also followed his budget, so he spent exactly 300 dollars for food, bringing the total amount of money remaining in his shopping system site from 810 to 510.

After three days, he felt that he was now used to casting all of his spells, so he decided to purchase the next set of spells that he thought would assist him in his combat and survivability. That meant turning his attention to the 3rd-level spells. He only had three 3rd-level spells, which were Fire Ball, Galder’s Tower, and Fly. Before sleeping, he reviewed the spells that he could purchase. After reviewing the 3rd-level spells, Flinx purchased Ashardalon’s Stride, Blink, Counterspell, Dispel Magic, Erupting Earth, Glyph of Warding, Haste, Intellect Fortress, Leomund’s Tiny Hut, Magic Circle, Major Image, Melf’s Minute Meteors, Protection From Energy, Remove Curse, Sending, Sleet Storm, Slow, Summon Fey, Summon Lesser Demon, Summon Shadowspawn, Tidal Wave, Tiny Servants, Tongues, Wall of Sands, Wall of Water, and Water Breathing.

The 25 3rd-level spells cost Flinx 250 low-level mana stones. Flinx knew that purchasing the next set of spells would need to be put on hold until he was used to casting the new set of spells and incorporating them into his battle simulations. Since he felt tired, he decided to rest and continue planning the next day.

The next day, after breakfast, Flinx continued writing his battle simulation that now included the new spells that he had purchased, but the plans were tentative. He needed to practice the spells first so he could have a modicum of an idea of how they would work.

Before he left, he spent 100 dollars on food that he would eat for the day. He made sure that he purchased food that he would enjoy eating. Flinx did not want to deprive himself anymore. He also made sure that the food was a little healthier than the food he previously bought, but when he said a little healthier, he simply added a few salads. Based on the food that he purchased, which mostly consisted of meat and carbs, that was now stored in his 4th tab space, he wondered if the one that would kill him was not the wizard enslavers, but a heart attack.

Flinx left his tower, dispelled it, then teleported to his spellcasting practice location. For the whole day, he practiced his newly bought spell to make sure that he intimately understood that he understood how they worked and he would know how to incorporate them in his battle plans. At noon, he briefly stopped to eat some of the food that he purchased, then continued until the sun set.

His spellcasting practice location now truly resembled a devastated battlefield. Unsurprisingly, monsters were now avoiding the place. When he got home, he cast his Galder’s Tower and took a bath. Flinx felt that his day of practicing his newly bought spell was not enough and planned to continue doing the same thing the next day. He did the same thing for the next two days and only incorporated the spells in his battle plans on the third day.

Every day, he spent exactly 100 dollars on food, so by the third day, he only had 110 dollars left in his system shopping site. While he was eating dinner, he checked his total finances.

The total low-level mana stones that he managed to save while he was a dungeon miner slave were a surprisingly exact amount of 5000 low-level mana stones. Ever since he transmigrated, he spent a total of 801 low-level mana stones. The spending came from the spells that he purchased, the clothes, items, and food. The mana stones that he earned from killing monsters in this new world were 67 low-level mana stones, 25 medium-level mana stones, and 2 high-level mana stones. According to his system, a medium stone was equal to 100 low-level mana stones, and a high-level mana stone was equal to 1000 low-level mana stones. That meant that the total low-level mana stones that he had earned were 4567 low-level mana stones.

Flinx realized that he should not worry too much about spending money on food because the mana stones that he earned by killing monsters were truly enough to cover his expenses, given the fact that he had only started killing monsters for just a few days.

He felt stupid for not doing his accounting, since if he had done it sooner rather than just now, he could have avoided worrying about earning the funds to support his consumption.

Since Flinx now felt relieved about his finances, he slept restfully that night. The next day, he returned to his spellcasting practice location to practice his planned battle simulation that now consisted of his newly bought spells. He practiced for the next three days. During those days, he spent 10 low-level mana stones to add to his system shopping site. The remaining funds on the site were now 800 dollars.

After that day, Flinx knew that his practice was not enough and planned to continue doing the same thing for a few more days.

In the meantime, he thought about the next set of spells. Should he purchase them once he was used to casting the 3rd-level spells that he bought? He had not decided yet. The problem with the number of spells available to him was that Flinx did not want to get overwhelmed and confuse himself during battle. He decided that the only way for him to avoid something like that from happening was to continue practicing.