Chapter 139 – Taiga Black (1/2)
Chapter 139 – Taiga Black
In the present day, several gold was an immense sum for a team or guild, to say nothing of a lone individual. After all, even when an elite team was clearing dungeons, they would earn no more than several dozen silver a run. When that money was divided among numerous team members, there wouldn’t be much left for the team itself. Not to mention most players weren’t all all that wealthy in the first place; they would need to spend their money on equipment, skill books, potions, and other consumables. More often than not, these players were strapped for cash themselves, so what money would they have left to be donating to their guilds? Every guild-related affair came with considerable expenses, especially so in building the warehouse. So even after being squeezed out of all their wealth, these guilds would still have to occasionally visit black market websites to exchange real-world money for in-game currency to supplement their funds lest they fall to ruin from the burden of their daily expenses.
Establishing a guild so early in the game was an incredibly costly affair in both the real and virtual world. Black market dealers were constantly running low on supply due to the high demand, resulting in a premium on in-game currency. Even then, although guilds were willing to buy, these dealers would often have nothing to sell. The average player didn’t even have enough money for themselves, so how could they possibly be willing to sell their in-game currency for some pocket change in real-life? A guild was basically a giant sinkhole that swallowed funds and caused endless headaches for the guild leader. If the flow of money ever stopped, the whole guild would quickly collapse. However, in spite of all this, as long as these guilds persevered, their prospects would be exceedingly optimistic. Further down the road, when the Path to Power patch was implemented, strongholds in every city would be open for guilds to contest over. If a guild successfully besieged a stronghold and occupied it for a period of time, then that stronghold would belong to them, meaning they would receive the taxes from every property, shop, and any sale that was conducted within the stronghold. When that time came, the wealth these guilds would amass would be quite astonishing.
It was precisely because of these prospects that so many guild leaders were willing to pour such a great deal of resources and energy into the game, but at the same time under this immense burden, they didn’t have much money left over for purchasing properties let alone opening up a shop. If it weren’t for the pressure they felt from the flourishing business of the Starry Night Potion Shop, they would have never rushed to open a potion shop themselves. However, due to insufficient funds, they could only afford properties in remote locations, and the shops they opened were merely Tier 1. Moreover, most of the concoctions created in-house would be used for themselves, and only the surplus would be given to stock the shops. As a result, their businesses were doing very poorly.
Alchemy wasn’t the only lucrative crafting profession. There was also Tailoring, Tinkering, and Blacksmithing, but for the time being, they weren’t very popular. In the early ranks, the items they created were garbage that no one had any interest in. Take for example a Blacksmith, at Apprentice rank, the weapons they created were all around Novice-grade. After advancing to Junior Blacksmiths, their creations would still only be Bronze-grade at best. Even if they sold them in the marketplace, they wouldn’t earn much money. This was why Alchemy was currently the most popular crafting profession in the game. After all, even low-level concoctions would have some effect when used at higher levels.
Tailoring, Tinkering, and Blacksmithing… Nie Yan certainly had ambitions of stepping into these markets, but for the time being, he didn’t possess the resources. Right now, most of his money was being invested into buying land. After settling his current affairs, real-estate in other cities and the Starry Night Potion Shop, he would then be ready to expand to other markets. He figured that at that point many Blacksmiths, Tinkerers, and Tailors would still be uncontracted. And if he truly couldn’t find anyone suitable in the future, he could simply headhunt them from other guilds or shops by offering a much higher salary. After all, this was how Cao Xu frequently handled affairs in the previous timeline.
After upgrading the Starry Night Potion Shop to Tier 3, Nie Yan withdrew the remaining money, which amounted to 36 gold, and teleported to the second largest city in the Viridian Empire, Nisode. Calore, Nisode, and Hayson, City of Radiance were where Cao Xu had held the most influence. Back then, Cao Xu had owned over 50% of all properties in these three cities. So in order to prevent him from achieving such dominance again, Nie Yan was purchasing land in these cities for the express purpose of ruining Cao Xu’s foundation for growth.
Upon arriving in Nisode, he discovered that nearly all of the smaller plots of land had already been purchased. However, the larger plots, which costed upwards of 10 gold or more, remained untouched.
He was eyeing a specific property located at the heart of the city that costed 28 gold. With such an expensive price tag, no matter how big the guild was, they still wouldn’t be able to gobble it up for the time being. The population of Nisode was much lower than Calore’s, so although commerce here was still flourishing, the number of players who were wealthy was comparatively lower.
It would be an understatement to say that the property at the city center was the best in Nisode. If he built an auction house in this location, then in the future it would become the landmark building of the city. Purchasing this plot of land was equal to purchasing half of Nisode!
Nie Yan bought this property without the slightest hesitation. However, simply buying an expensive property wouldn’t guarantee success. When it appreciated in value in the future, the monthly property tax would become a considerable expense. The system AI was clever. Although the original price of a property wasn’t high, its property tax would rise correspondingly as it rose in value. There was a set amount of tax that would need to be paid every month, acting as a constant stream of money flowing outward. So, if the player was bad at managing their business and couldn’t pay their property taxes, then they would be forced to sell their land, thereby preventing regional development from stagnating by transferring the property to a hopefully more competent owner.
Aside from this, Nie Yan also bought a few relatively cheap plots of land. With only 1 gold remaining in his pockets, he teleported back to Calore.
Nie Yan checked his own status bar. The Level 30 Elite Scaled Frogs proved extremely effective at reducing his PKer status. Now, his name was no longer branded red but rather yellow instead. While his name was yellow, NPCs would be wary of the player and treat them rudely. But aside from negatively influencing a player when they were receiving quests, it had no significant impact on anything else.
A Killer’s Demonic Medallion had a chance of dropping from Scaled Frogs when the player was branded with the PKer status effect. Sadly, Nie Yan’s luck wasn’t great this time around and it didn’t drop. Although it was quite a pity, he had no other choice but to suck it up and try again tomorrow. If it still didn’t drop, then there was nothing he could do. It could also be due to his PKer score not being high enough. Conjecture aside, it wasn’t unusual for an accessory with excellent properties such as the Killer’s Demonic Medallion to have an abysmal drop rate.
He then checked his skill bar. The Adjudicator of God skill that he received from the Chapter of Courage finally shifted from being greyed out to brightly lit, signifying that it was now active and available to use.
This skill on a 10-day cooldown timer had made him wait for quite some time!
Nie Yan felt incredibly excited. If he used Adjudicator of God in conjunction with Sacrificial Gambit, then his damage would be astonishing, especially if his luck was good. These two skills along with Steal should even allow him to meet the requirements to clear the next quest.
A strike from Sacrificial Gambit when Adjudicator of God was activated would be quite frightening. Adjudicator of God would increase Nie Yan’s health by 500 points, allowing him to reach nearly 900 health. 30% of that would be 270, so that meant as long as Sacrificial Gambit didn’t miss, it would be able to instantly kill most players.
After ten years of playing this game and countless days of theorycrafting, this was the completely brand new style of Thief that he had aspired toward!
In this life, he wouldn’t leave behind any regrets. He wouldn’t merely stop after Shadow Dancer; he would advance even higher and become a godly existence!