Merrick calmy set the newly merged mushroom to the side and reorganized his baskets.

  After moving the other 26 samples into the larger basket, the one with wheels and a handle to pull behind him, he placed the fungus in the hand-carried basked by itself, next to the remaining rejuvenation potion he’d brought out with him. There was only one thing to do in that situation.

  [Merge successful. T2 Unknown Fungus Merged. See More…]

  [Merge successful. T2 Unknown Fungus Merged. See More…]

  [Merge successful. T2 Unknown Fungus Merged. See More…]

  [Merge successful. T3 Unknown Fungus Merged. See More…]

  …

  [Merge successful. T4 Unknown Fungus Merged. See More…]

  His second attempt gave him what he’d been expecting the first time, a larger brown mushroom shaped like an upside down dinner plate, this one about the same size as a dinner plate as well. The lack of the little star next to the T4 in his [[Skill Log]] told him that it was the standard outcome as well, expanding the ‘See More’ down to the third line told him that as well.

  “If there are seven segments to the horn with each one requiring a tier above the previous, that means I’d need a set of Tier 2 for Segment 1, T3 for S2, and so on. Assuming the key for the next room in stored in the shrouded seventh segment, the highest I should be expected to complete is Tier 7 samples for the sixth Segment of the cornucopia.” Although Merrick had upgraded his [[Math]] skill to [[Quick Math]], speaking aloud had always helped him work through the numbers even if speech was a lot slower than thoughts.

  “That can’t be right though, there is no way that there is enough space on the walls for twenty-seven alcoves in each room. Not when every [[Merge]] seems to increase the size of the samples. I really should have counted how many I needed for the third segment before walking away. I might have just wasted some effort. That’s not really the crux of the issue though.

  “I don’t even know if I could merge a seventh tier if I tried, if I had three tier 6 materials in front of me. With the way the GTR Mod seems to be scaling though, I fear that I’m going to get far too many mutations which are going to increase the number of [[Merge]]s required to get to a tier seven significantly. There would need to be drastically less alcoves in the next few segments.”

  Merrick could feel the headache coming. Though he lacked the statistical data required to map the percentage chance of a mutation when merging, he’d already concluded that the GTR Mod seemed to be added together during a merge and then increased by a tenth. That amount of exponential scaling told him it would be damn near impossible to get to the seventh tier of a [[Merge]] in a short order of time.

  “I’m for sure going to have to spend days in here waiting for my rejuvenation potion tolerance to decrease. Although…” Merrick had a thought.

  If he was going to have a mutation for the merges as often as he feared, then it might be worth it to concentrate on one plant on a time. If he started with the fungus, focusing on getting up to the maximum tier he required, then there was a decent chance he’d get three of the mutated tier 4s. He could then merge those together to submit for one of the T5 alcoves. That way there would be the least amount of redundant merges possible.

  With his battle plan set, Merrick’s mental vision was soon cluttered with a series of [Merge Successful] messages, though he started to fail around ten percent of the tier 3 merges for reasons he couldn’t understand. It seemed his theory about hidden negative modifiers, as he’d decided the Mod most likely meant, was even more likely.

  It made sense, very few abilities existed in the world that had infinite potential with no drawback, and none of the ones that did would be held by an unclassed young adult like himself.

  The next seven tier 4s were the standard output, much to Merrick’s pleasure. It appeared, he thought, that his worry about an overly high mutation rate were unfounded. He went to merge the tenth tier 4, hoping that it’d be a standard outcome like the last eight so that he could merge them all together into a tier 6, when he finally hit another ‘Improved output’ message.

  The mushroom looked identical to the first T4* mutated mushroom, reaffirming his plan. So long as he got another [Critical Success] while working on getting the required components for a T7 merge, he’d be able to make a T5* mutated mushroom and submit that one, saving himself one T5, three T4, nine T3, and twenty-seven T2 merges. Depending on how many alcoves were in the later segments of the dungeon cornucopia, that could add up to saving him hours if not days in the room.

  His next three attempts at a T4 merge, during which he dusted two out of eleven T3 merges, were all [Critical Success]s and almost left him in tiers.

  Merrick fell to his ass, careful not to upend the wicker basket in his hand, and slowly sobbed to himself as he looked into the basket. Two T4* unknown fungus with green gills instead of brown, one T4* unknown fungus that was pointy rather than flat, and two T4* fungus that smelled strongly of roses.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  There were multiple results for [Critical Success].

  Merrick took several minutes to cry in frustration. He would be trapped down there far longer than he wanted, but he knew he would be able to get out eventually. He just hoped nobody broke into his workshop and stole all his worldly belongings, as few as those were, while he was trapped there. It’d be just his luck if the landlord finally decided to evict him while he was gone.

  Seeing that his time saving strategy was far less likely effective than he’d hoped due to the variable results and sudden failures, Merrick decided he would do one last T4 merge before going back to his new favorite chair and taking a nap. There wasn’t much point sprinting for the finish line at the start of a marathon, after all.

  During the climb from picking the mushrooms out of their patches and merging them up to three T3s, Merrick had his first failure merging T2 mushrooms. It was only once, but it did not bode well for him and only made him feel even more exhausted. His failure rate for the T3 also increased, having failed 3 out of 12 merges now. With tired eyes and an even more tired soul, Merrick pushed his way through the T4 merge, half expecting that he’d begin to arbitrarily fail those soon as well.

  [Critical Success! Merge successful. One T4* Unknown Fungus Merged.]

  Merrick was granted a small, regular T1 sized T4* unknown fungus, with a small teacup plate size and shape. The frills located beneath the mushroom cap were the same rich forest green as the other two samples he’d merged.

  Feeling only moderately exhausted from his skill, but extremely curious about the outcome of merging three ‘Improved Output’ fungi, Merrick downed the final rejuvenation potion he’d taken with him into the rows of plants and proceeded to do the tier five merge.

  The first thing he noticed was that the translucent blue lines he’d grown used to seeing conjure themselves before his eyes while channeling the skill were far more solid looking than ever before. They also required far more of his concentration to keep from falling apart. Placing the first of three T4* fungus felt like the equivalent of doing six or seven T4 merges at once. The second placement felt like eight or nine, and the third placement, right into the center of the 3x3 grid, almost made him feel like he was going to pass out.

  As the three T4 fungus pulled themselves together in the center of the grid, Merrick’s only thought was that he would only be able to do two T5 merges per rejuvenation potion if they were all that difficult. He regretted, instantly, doing all the merging in the field rather than bringing the mushrooms back to his workstation and doing it there. Their large dinner-plate like size, combined with their fragility, told him it was going to be a pain in the ass to carry them all back and he didn’t want to leave them in the field while waiting for his potion tolerance to decrease.

  [Critical Success! One T? Mutated Fungus Merged.]

  [SML: ::100%, GRW Mod: 0%, GTR Mod: 0%, RFN Mod: 0%, CFT Mod: 0%.]

  [Total 100% Potential. No Excess Detected. No Personal Blessings Detected. Variant Change +/- %0. Standard Output]

  In his hands was a mushroom that had not gotten much larger. Instead, it felt more firm in his grip and felt as dense as a steak would be rather than a mushroom. The green coloration of the frills under the mushroom cap looked far more vibrant and appeared to grow in shapes that reminded Merrick of esoteric runes rather than the straight lines they’d been before.

  He carefully placed it in the basket before grabbing one of the standard T4 fungi and placing it on top of the basket like it was a lid. Leaving the other 8 T4 standard fungi behind for the time being, Merrick grabbed the handle for the roller basket and started trekking his way back to the cornucopia.

  He had one of each T4 sample and a single fungus that didn’t, for some reason, register as a T5 in his [[Skill Log]]. He did his best not to panic about that, or the implications that all the GTR modifier had been drained when he merged the ‘Improved Output’s.

  Before he spiraled about what his newly redeemed innate skill was doing, or how it was functioning, he needed to confirm that the cornucopia would accept what should have been a T5 result and then take a nap.

  He approached the massive horn o’ plenty from the entrance side, the cavernous opening to the structure plainly visible through the rows of crops the dungeon had grown. He rolled the basket behind him, careful not to allow it to bump against too many roots ‘lest he stumble and drop or damage the mushrooms in the hand-held basket.

  Whether it was due to his abundance of caution or lack of poor terrain, Merrick made it to the entrance unmolested. He realized that his anxiety was ramping up again, causing him to be come paranoid about literally nothing and attempted to recenter himself as he walked through the first two segments of the horn, their smooth walls lit up by the glowing rings of light that had once separated them.

  “I’m an idiot.” Merrick couldn’t help but be annoyed with himself. The conclusion he’d come to out in the fields was correct, fortunately or unfortunately, and the number of alcoves in the third segment had decreased by six. He’d only needed to collect twenty-one different tier four samples of plants out in the field, and he’d likely need even less for the following segments due to the ever-increasing size of the plants.

  “Why the hell didn’t I scope out the third segment before going back out there? Being annoyed is no reason to be sloppy, I should know this by now,” Merrick berated himself as mentally selected which six samples he was going to set aside. “I’ll just make sure these six get used in the next cornucopia segment, so my effort isn’t wasted.”

  Starting with the dinner-plate sized T4 mushroom, Merrick filled each of the alcoves in the room with the merged samples in descending size. If he was going to have to do several trips to his workbench with collected produce, he decided he’d want to use the plants that were smaller and took up less space in his baskets to reduce the trips.

  After the 21st plant was placed, once again being the potato-like tuber which was now the size of a small pumpkin, the ring separating the third and fourth segment lit up and the way to the next section was open. Merrick wandered in carrying only his hand-carried basket that contained the various mutated fungi and other small T4 plants he’d relocated to the basket while emptying the larger roller basket.

  After counting only 13 alcoves in the fourth segment, Merrick’s eyes widened. If the numbers kept decreasing so drastically, he might not actually be trapped there as long as he feared. That was, of course, assuming the dungeon registered his newest merge as a T5 creation.

  Gently, with his eyes squeezed shut and a prayer sent up to any higher being that was listening for them that this would work, Merrick set the small, green-frilled fungus into an alcove that was far too large for it.

  Even with his eyes squeezed shut, Merrick was unable to prevent himself recoiling from the sudden flash of light.

  https://imgur.com/CQXDpNK