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A Great Voyage



When you launch unreal world, the title screen plays a passage of lore about The First Winter. The game actually has an hyperlinked infopedia that can be accessed by F1. It contains various tidbits of information, some of it is just background fluff but some of it is also pretty helpful. Here are the entries regarding the creation myths of the world (and also explains the reason for the name "The UnReal World"):





Anyways, with my trades in the Driikilaiset completed, I head back to the shore and depart in my punt. Goodbye stupid reindeer.





Unfortunately I wasn't really paying attention and I was already kinda tired before I even departed thanks to finishing that first reindeer skin and killing/processing that stupid reindeer in the town. I don't get very far before I start really tiring out. Thankfully I find another island settlement and head over to it. Turns out its another Driikilaiset town.




Poking around I see they have some arrows sitting in one cabin, so I grab a half dozen and try to trade for them. My initial offers aren't good enough and I'm not yet willing to trade my reindeer fur away. In addition he responds oddly when I try to offer my rough arrows as part of the trade. I guess the trading isn't coded to differentiate between the same item of different quality, so to him trying to offer arrows to receive arrows makes no sense. I simply put the arrows back and forget it. After sleeping in one of the village cabins, I wander off and see some crowberry bushes at the outskirts of the village and pick a few handfuls. I could pick more, but I've got plenty of food to eat and I only intend to use these as bait in traps I may make in the future.





I set off again in my punt. A kilometer or so from the "Whiteislands" settlement I get a message that says "I feel Comfortable", this means I feel more in tune with the spirit world in my experience. As my familiarity with the spirit world increases, there is a chance I will be able to learn a new ritual, so that is cool. Mindful of my reindeer skin, I tell myself that I'll travel along the coast until I get a bit tired, then make camp. Unfortunately what I wasn't mindful of was something else. As I continue to travel I receive a message that something in my pack smells foul. Checking my inventory, I see my food is fine. A bit later however, I spot my "rotten rinsed black grouse skin". The skin is now ruined and cannot be finished. I wonder if this is what was going bad back in the walled Driikilaiset town on StupidReindeer Island. Oh well, it was only 0.3 lbs of leather.





Still its a good lesson to be reminded of. I soon become a bit tired and beach my punt along the shore. I make sure the first thing I do is clean and start tanning my reindeer skin before I turn to the task of building a shelter. Since plan to stay at this camp until my fur is finished, I also row out and deploy my fishing nets. Next I use the last of my strength to fell a large tree before finally going to bed.






I wake up to rainy weather. Its been about two weeks since I started the game and it is currently the middle of Fallow Month (June). Summer is finally starting to heat up and I've usually been rather warm the last few days, so I take off my fur shirt, but put my nettle cloak back on. Checking the armor/clothing screen I see that the cloak provides average warmth protection to my torso, while my woolen pants and fur shoes provide excellent warm protection to my lower body. Against actual damage types my clothing provides very little protection, except my fur clothing provides good protection against blunt attacks. My main concern right now would be tear damage, as that is what almost all wild animals cause. My tear protection is lousy, but whatever. I'm not THAT likely to encounter a wolf, or a lynx, or a bear. At least, I don't think so...





I go over and rinse off the reindeer skin before turning my attention to the tree I chopped down before sleeping. Using my woodsman axe I chop it up into 8 blocks of wood. Blocks of wood, like boards, can be used to craft a few items, or they can be split into firewood. I grab one block and begin working it into a useful utility item, a wooden shovel. My handaxe is used for the initial rough cutting steps, followed by the carving axe to finish the shape, then my knife for finishing touches. The whole process takes almost five hours and, disappointingly, leaves me with an inferior wooden shovel.




I rest for another 45 minutes to remove my fatigue and eat. While eating I notice my roast reindeer cuts have gone stale. They won't last too much longer. However, I've been liberally eating them and my nutrition rating is now "Abundant", so at least my hunger bar fills pretty slowly right now. Next I grab my rinsed reindeer skin, which has finshed drying, and prepare to finish it. I soon realize that I have already chopped up the tree I cut down with the intention of using as a working surface, oops. Not wanting to waste the time/energy of cutting down another tree, I wander a few dozen meters into the woods and find a fallen tree trunk to use. A handful of hours later I've finished a decent reindeer fur and walk back to my camp. I'm tired once again, so I take another nap. Waking up I decide to try again on making a shovel, but first I dump all the crap I don't need from my inventory and drop down from carrying almost a hundred pounds with an 11% skill penalty to a bit over 36 pounds with a 3% penalty. This either pays off or random chance is with me as I craft a decent shovel this time, yay. It also took almost an hour less than the first attempt. Related? I'm not sure.





Next I row out to my fishing nets and recover them. My catch is good and I score 3 lavarets and 5 burbots. They total 21 pounds of fish, a feast for a Kaumolainen like me. I really wish I knew a proper sacrifice ritual, I'd throw back one or two of the burbots in thanks to the guardian spirits. Still, at least I won't have to worry about breaking into my dried foods. Heck, some of these fish might go bad before I can eat them all, just like the reindeer cuts. Rowing back to shore I gather some branches and gleefully toss the inferior wooden shovel onto the pile before setting it alight and roasting my fishes. While they cook I consider my options. I know I wanted to make some better arrows, and I could cut up part of my furs to make cords. It'd only take 2.5lbs of fur/cloth/leather to make 5 cords, but I really don't want to damage my reindeer skins, I suspect I could probably trade one for several arrows and more besides.






Instead I let my fish finish cooking and dump then and most of my gear into the bottom of the punt and depart. As I sail down the coast I muse to myself hoping there is no event that could potentially capsize my boat, as I'd lose a ton of stuff, but I doubt there is. Eventually the coast shifts from moving souteastward to just eastward, a promising sign. I grow tired and stop at a small island to set up camp.







Nap complete I once again set off in my punt heading east. Eventually I find a large bay and explore it, but find little of immediate interest. However checking my screenshot of the my UnReal World's map, I identify the bay on the map and it looks like I have another 80km or so until I reach the part of the coast that turns northward into a BIG bay, which I dub The Great Bay. The center of of The Great Bay contains the mouth of the rivers that are my final destination. Overall, I estimate I have another 120km almost to travel until I reach that point. Yeesh. While paddling I also stop at one point to throw the few remaining stale reindeer cuts overboard. No sense eating meat that is probably going bad soon when I've got a surplus of fresher roasted fish I could eat. Eventually I tire out again while exploring another bay and set up camp on a small island in the bay.




I continue onwards. Things aren't very eventful at this point. So let's talk about something no one has probably noticed or possibly even cared about, but I certainly had kept in mind. I'm traveling across the coast of The UnReal World, which is Fantasy NotFinland, yes? Which means I'm traveling along the gulf of Finland in the Baltic sea. Yet, I've been having no trouble drinking the water. Isn't this technically the ocean? At first I thought this was just a simplification, but I decided to google it and apparently due to the Baltic sea's closed nature and the large amounts of water runoff from the many, many snow-melt fueled rivers of the northern lands, the salinity of the baltic sea is actually quite low. It is not the best tasting water, but it is basically drinkable, especially for an iron age person who doesn't exactly have a lot of salt in their diet. Neat.







Time passes as I continue eastward. All this uneventful rowing must give a Kauomlainen time to think and contemplate his place in the universe, eventually I receive a message saying that I "feel comfortable and safe" and the ritual window opens up with a new ritual listed in red. It is a ritual to sacrifice to the supernatural guardians after killing an animal, thanking them for allowing me to take prey from them. Unfortunately I do not actually know the ritual yet, I must first speak to one of several different occupations of spiritual leader at a settlement. They can teach me the proper words and motions for the ritual.





The voyage continues. At one point I spot a person along the shore. Fearing bandits, however, I decide not to make landfall and investigate. Later, while making camp one night, I notice with some annoyance and dismay that my carving axe is missing. I somehow must have left it behind at one of my previous camps, probably the one I made the shovels at. Double checking my inventory, that seems to be the only thing I'm missing. It is unfortunate, but I'll survive. My non-dried food supply is running a bit low however, I think the next camp I make will have to be a stay of a couple days to gather more food.







The journey continues and eventually I reach the part where the coast turns north into the Great Bay. My fish runs out and my rye bread spoils. I press onwards, eating the dried reindeer cuts I started the game with until I eventually stop at a tiny crag of an island.






I make camp and begin the process of finding food. I deploy my nets a good distance from the island, create some lever traps, baiting them with lingoberries I found and picked on the island. I'm not expecting much of the traps, as I saw no animals on the crag (which I walked completely around) so I'm relying on wandering birds to find them. After sleeping I check the traps (nothing) and then row my punt out into the water and start fishing. Luck is with me today and two fishing sessions catch a pike and five breams.





The fish are roasted, one eaten and I row back out to do more fishing as there isn't really anything else to do on this tiny island. I catch two more pike perches in two seperate fishing sessions. My third fishing attempt fails but I get a message telling me I "feel unity with the world", this would've been another chance to learn a ritual, but I can't learn another until I actually get a sage to teach me how to perform the Sacrifice for a Kill. Unfortunately I was a bit stupid and forgot to wait for the pike to finish cooking before going back out to fish and when I come back I find it spoiled from burning. Whoops.

While frying the fish I notice that my cooking and fishing skills have both gone up. Every time you use a skill there is a teeny-tiny chance it'll improve by 1%. If you look closely at a few skills, you can see a small lighter colored sliver at the end, this represents how much my skill has improved since I created the character. The tracking skill is the easiest to see this change in, since I got a free boost as part of the tutorial.



I go to bed after cooking my latest catch (and making sure I collect it). Once awake I go out and check my nets. If they have fish I'll cook them, but either way I plan to depart the island afterwards. To my surprise they hold a large bounty of fish! I go back to the island and roast them all. I now have a large stockpile of roasted fish. It is time to continue my voyage.





I've reached it. The northern coast of the Great Bay. I explore its shoreline until it starts turning southward again, confused I stop to make camp and recover my strength. Once back awake I hop in my punt and quickly realize I made camp right at the mouth of the river that will lead inland. I've done it.



My estimates say this trip along the coast was a voyage of nearly 200km covered. I set out on the river to the coast on the 7th day of the 7th week before midsummer. Sitting here at the mouth of the river in The Great Bay, it is now the 3rd day of the 4th week before midsummer, meaning it has taken roughly two and a half weeks to cover that distance. I made 12 major stops to rest and/or gather food along the voyage.

Despite this, my journey is not completely over. I must now travel up the river into the great lakes and find somewhere suitable to create my homestead. Winter is still many months away, but there is much to be done before it arrives.