Starbound: A Space Odyssey

When the teleportation device was activated, John had to close his eyes because of the strong light that enveloped his body.

He felt like he had no weight for a feel second and everywhere he looked was just a white world.

Soon enough, John was hit by a sudden dizziness.

When he opened his eyes he saw that he had already landed on the planet.

His foot was touching the gentle mat of grass and flowers. Looking in the horizon he could see the voluminous quantity of towering trees on the horizon. Figures of flying creatures traveling through the beautiful and clear blue sky.

John inhaled. Given that the PIPS gave no warning that means the air of the plane can be breath by humans. The air was clean and fresh. The only smell was that of nature itself.

He looked around and saw that the ideal landing spot selected by S.A.I.L was atop a small mount, outside the forest.

John then proceeded to check his belongings and see if he was ready to start the exploration.

'PIPS, flashlight, food, water, pistol, handcuffs, hunting knife, and the Matter Manipulator' He took note of everything he has.

He opened his Inventory and took the Matter Manipulator out.

The Matter Manipulator is completely colored in gold color and looks like a pistol, but it can't fire anything. This tool allows the Protector to dismantle or build with its laser. The laser is capable of slowly absorb the thing the Protector want to retrieve and store it directly inside the PIPS' Inventory. This tool is the symbol of the Terrene Protectorate and is an irreplaceable tool to guarantee the Protector's survival during his travels. The Matter Manipulator is also able to absorb any type of liquid. This incredible tool has a lot of functions but to unlock them the Protector has to use Tech Modules that aren't easy to find now that the Terrene Protectorate Head Quarters in Earth is destroyed.

John went to the forest. When he entered, the first thing he did was test the Matter Manipulator.

He pointed the tool toward a tree and pressed the trigger. The moment he pressed the finger a blue laser left the muzzle of the Matter Manipulator and enveloped a small fraction of the tree trunk and slowly started to encompass the whole tree. After a few minutes, the tree disappeared like it was never there in the first place.

Looking at the Inventory, John was able to see just some wood boards. The PIPS automatically cut the tree and stored it using the most optical possible way. One tree gave John the amount of 20 wood boards relatively large.

"You found some wood" John heard S.A.I.L's voice coming from the PIPS in his wrist, "My databanks tell me wood is a material with a great many uses. I suggest you kill additional trees for more resources"

John's PIPS is connected to the spaceship, so this way he was able to hear S.A.I.L, monitored the situation of the ship and, when the time comes, he could activate the teleport and beam up to the ship.

He dismissed S.A.I.L's suggestion and looked at his own Status in the PIPS. He saw that the Energy that previously was at the maximum 300 Units of Energy (UE), dropped to 270 Units. His current Energy Regeneration stats is 1200 Units/24 hours or 0.8 units per minute. It is possible to increase the Energy Storage and Regeneration by using Tech Modules.

This show that to absorb the tree, the Matter Manipulator used 30 of energy.

Energy is the most important resources that allow the PIPS' host to use a huge variety of tools, weapons, and armors. The body of a human is constantly generating Energy from heat, kinetic, friction, etc. The PIPS is able to store this Energy and convert it so that other tools that are in direct contact with the host is also able to use this Energy. Some type of Armors or clothes can increase the Energy Regeneration by absorbing energy from outside the host's body and store it inside the PIPS, and some other Armors have a different space that increases the Energy Storage of the host.

Next, John took the Protector Pistol from the Inventory. He looked at the stats of the gun.

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Protector Pistol Mk.1

Type: Semi-Automatic Energy Pistol

Tier 1: Basic range weapon that is able to somewhat pierce armors from the Tier 1, but it will have difficulty piercing Tier 2, and is basically useless against Tiers higher than 2.

Energy per shot: 2 UE

Fire Rate: 2.0 (Bullets per second)

Augmentation: None

Upgrades: None

Special Ability: None

Special Ability Energy Cost: None

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John stored the Matter Manipulator and held the pistol with his two hands. He aimed at a bright colored bird that was resting in its nest, just about 20 meters away from John.

*Bam*

The bullet pierced the head but no blood came out. The heat of the energy bullet was so high that the moment it pierced the flesh it instantly cauterized the wound.

Even though the gun wasn't powerful, the somewhat low energy cost of each bullet and the high fire rate for a Semi-Automatic weapon was enough to cover for the deficiency in the firepower.

John placed the pistol in the Protectorate uniform's holster that was on the right side of his waist and went to check out the carcass of the bird he just had killed.

He approached the body and took a closer look. The bird was 1 meter long by measuring from the tail to the end of the beak, and 3 meters from the end of one wing to the other one. Its entire body was covered in bright colored feathers, it was a mixture of blue, red and yellow, and the beak had a small curvature at the end.

John used a stick he found in the floor to flip the body over. Under the wings of the winged creature, he was able to see some razor sharp feathers that probably was the creature's natural weapon. John took his hunting knife from the Inventory and started to dissect the bird.

He patiently plucks the feathers out and cut the bird into pieces. He just has 3 cans of food in the Inventory, he needs more food.

John stored all the meat and feathers, but not sharp ones. He took the razor feather and tested its sharpness in one of the tree trunks nearby.

He threw the feather with all his strength.

The feather easily cut through the wind pierced halfway in the trunk.

"Oh?" John exclaimed in surprise. It wasn't because of the sharpness, but because of the accuracy of the feather. He didn't just casually threw the feather, but he aimed for a specific place of the tree trunk and the feather easily traveled the distance without changing the course and hit where he aimed.

The feather was just what he needed. A silent weapon that can be used from the distance and it doesn't badly destroy the preys he hunt.

He looked inside the Inventory and saw that he had about 80 of this feathers.

John packed up his things and started to walk deeper into the forest. All kinds of creatures appeared from time to time. Most of them could be categorized as a mixture of Earth's animals, strangely enough. The small creature John would use the feathers to kill, and the big ones were a lot sturdier so John had no choice, but to use the pistol to finish them off. He always takes everything he killed with him after he dissected and separated what could be useful and what was useless to him.

Just when he was about looking for a place to go through the night, he saw some black smoke coming from the distance. He stared at the smoke for a moment before he started to walk toward it.

The sun was just about to completely set when He finally arrived at the location of the smoke. It was a campfire.

John crouched at the nearby bush and stealthily approached the campfire.

He looked around, but he was unable to see anyone close. He changed location and then he was able to see a tent.

John cautiously approached the tent. The moment he was a few meters away from it he smelled something, the pungent smell of blood.

He opened the tent and there he saw a middle-aged human male lying his own pool of blood. The man had a burly constitution and he had a full-grown beard and short brown hair.