Chu Fu's shop opening immediately solved the players' problem of not wanting to set up stalls or hawk their goods after earning profits.
Some materials wouldn't fetch a good price at NPC stores, but players actually needed them, so prices naturally skyrocketed.
Gradually, everyone came to Fufu's Sundry Shop to buy.
Not only that,
Chu Fu also hired several life-class players from the Thorn Guild to help out in the shop, paying them wages plus commission.
Besides sales staff, she also offered cooked spiritual rice products for sale.
After all, aside from NPCs, if spiritual rice was sold directly to players, they'd still have to gather firewood and roast it themselves.
That wasn't friendly to players focused purely on grinding monsters and leveling up—they didn't want to cook.
So, the spiritual rice was made into rice balls, hearty meals, and fried rice.
The aroma wafted everywhere.
It even came with advanced stats—after all, spiritual rice was a gold-tier item, yet one serving only cost 20 copper coins.
Players were more than happy to eat it.
...
In the blink of an eye, four days had passed.
Chu Fu's level had reached 20.
The others had also hit level 19—with a bit more effort, they could reach 20 too.
Meanwhile,
the Primordial Gate server had already opened up to District 48.
Right after midnight,
a wave of players spawned into the newbie village.
There were a bunch of unruly youngsters, along with a group of middle-aged and elderly players.
They all rushed outside, trying to seize the respawn spawn points for Red-Eyed Rabbits.
Among the middle-aged crowd, they chatted in their phone group as they ran.
"Has anyone awakened flight? Otherwise how do we fight bees and boars?"
"Did anyone awaken as a Mechanic? Someone like Xiao Chi who can build a flight wing would also work!"
"Those flower-growers—did any of them turn into plant-morphs?"
Just as the group was discussing endlessly, a crude message slammed into view.
"Motherfcking bastards, I saw Wan Huanyu! I awakened an S-rank talent, and I'm gonna gut him right now!"
In the newbie village,
a woman with the ID "Eighteen Stabs" stood there, her thick, deep eyes blazing with murderous intent.
Maybe because she was so consumed by revenge, when her nephew mentioned that a name could be a jab at herself—or reflect her real-life experiences—she chose this one.
She was Shen Chi's aunt, Xu Can.
She was the late-born child of her parents, and while the family wasn't wealthy, no one was poor either. But then her nephew got in a car accident, and the culprit not only refused to compensate or apologize, refused to pay with his life, and pulled every dirty trick in the book.
He even swindled 500,000 out of her!
Xu Can was livid.
Basically, "Scam my feelings, fine. Scam my body, whatever—the guy even hired a top-tier male model for that. But scam my money?"
That was absolutely not okay.
She wanted to raise hell, but it was a case of an arm twisting a thigh—she was outmatched, and besides, she wasn't the only one affected.
In the end, she swallowed her anger.
Her sister and brother-in-law eventually paid her back, but she knew deep down it was really her nephew's compensation money.
She didn't want it, but her sister cried so heartbreakingly, feeling she'd dragged her into this mess, that Xu Can finally took the money.
So after Shen Chi was paralyzed, she often bought health supplements and sent them to her sister's house.
She had never forgotten who the enemy was.
When she spotted Wan Huanyu in the crowd, she was stunned. Why the hell was he here? Was fate lending a hand?
Little did she know—
Wan Huanyu was even more frustrated than she was.
That reckless idiot called Dream King actually camped his corpse for a full 24 hours.
Not only that, but he even offered over a hundred million in real money, and Holy Healing Angel still refused to revive him.
After 24 hours, his corpse despawned.
That infuriated him to no end.
But there was nothing he could do. His character was dead, so he had to create a new one in a different district.
Previously, every server was packed to capacity, but ever since The Cosmic Guild was raided and Wing Honor Guild went bankrupt, the old districts actually saw a surge of players.
Especially Wangxi Village in District 030—it was absolutely swamped.
The newbie village there had been expanded to accommodate 50,000 new players a day.
Some people who had squeezed into the new districts even switched back to the old district 030 instead.
After all, jumping into a new district meant waiting around.
So, players who had applied for District 048 moved partway to the old district, and District 048 went from "full" back to "open for applications."
Huanyu Kuangwu and the rest were all on that server, with at least 200 thugs total. Naturally, Wan Huanyu chose to go there.
When creating his character, he didn't dare use his old ID. He thought it over and picked a new one: Spatial Overlord.
[Name failed! Already taken!]
A simple, domineering ID like that—there was no way someone hadn't taken it already.
In the end, Wan Huanyu settled on the ID "Cosmic Emperor." Maybe the character for "cosmic" was obscure enough that no one had claimed it.
After locking in the name, it was time for talent awakening.
What left Wan Huanyu breathless was that his talent had indeed dropped from S-rank to A-rank.
"No, doesn't matter. There's still the fort assault battle—I can earn contribution points and upgrade my talent back to S-rank."
Wan Huanyu told himself.
At least his class, Spatialist, was still available.
He entered the game and soon regrouped with Huanyu Kuangwu.
The other guy had also changed his ID, going with "Most Handsome Emperor in the Universe."
Did this kid not realize long names killed intimidation?
Couldn't be bothered to deal with him, Wan Huanyu led the group toward the Red-Eyed Rabbit spawn points.
Just as they were heading out of the village, a man suddenly shouted.
"Attention all players! We are the official Linjiang City Game Anomaly Response Bureau for Primordial Gate!
To ensure comprehensive game development and a healthy gaming environment, please avoid PvP as much as possible. Strictly no verbal abuse, no mob-clearing monopolies, and no deliberately farming player kills to obtain the Golden Mask.
We hope all players cherish your game characters and coexist peacefully."
Wan Huanyu curled his lip with a dismissive sneer.
Who the hell listens to that?
He certainly didn't.
Because he'd joined the game early, even though he'd PK'd groups of players before, he never killed a hundred in the newbie village, so he never triggered the Werewolf Butcher mission condition, and never got the Golden Mask.
And the Spawn of the Evil God only appeared in the newbie villages.
Killing a hundred in the town didn't spawn the quest NPC.
Wan Huanyu had missed it.
This time, he was definitely going to get it.
Just as he was thinking about that, he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine, like a viper had locked onto him.
The next second, a woman appeared behind him.
"Revenge Soul!"
A blaze of fire erupted from Wan Huanyu's head, like a gaping, savage maw ready to swallow him whole.
[Revenge Soul: Marks a hated player as a target. Cannot switch targets for 1 day, but while marked, you deal +300% damage to them.]
Eighteen Stabs whipped out her dagger and started slashing!
