Chu Fu thought for a moment before saying, “Please wait. I’ll have someone qualified come speak with you.”
Li Weizheng and Laoji Fuli both had a bad feeling.
They would much rather negotiate with Chu Fu herself.
Sure enough, the next moment, they saw Feng Huimin push up her black-rimmed glasses and appear before them.
She had already received Chu Fu’s private message.
[Who Wants to Be a Plant]: “Elder Ji and the others want our contribution points in exchange for the city upgrade blueprint. They said they can give us shares in Martial Soul Town.”
[Commander Feng Huimin]: “Boss, if I may be frank, Martial Soul Town is official territory. There’s practically no profit to be made there. The only dungeon, the Goblin City Counterinvasion, is one we rented to them.”
[Who Wants to Be a Plant]: “You’re thinking too small. Your perspective is too narrow.”
[Who Wants to Be a Plant]: “When you negotiate with them, don’t ask for shares in Martial Soul Town within the game. Ask directly for shares in the real world!”
[Who Wants to Be a Plant]: “Martial Soul Town is an official settlement. That means once the game invades reality, it’s bound to take in a large number of urban residents—possibly even more than Thorn City. Where there are people, there’s money to be made.”
Chu Fu intended to turn Thorn City into a high-end market.
Naturally, there had to be a lower-end market as well.
That was something Linjiang City and Martial Soul Town would have to handle.
There still weren’t enough safe zones.
They couldn’t accommodate everyone in Linjiang City.
In fact, even now, many players still hadn’t entered the game.
Therefore, once the game invaded reality three months later, those people would certainly relocate to Martial Soul Town and Linjiang City.
If Martial Soul Town became an actual city, it would be able to accommodate even more people. The taxes it generated—essentially protection fees in another form—would be enough to make Chu Fu a fortune.
[Commander Feng Huimin]: “I understand, Boss. I’ll get to it right away.”
[Who Wants to Be a Plant]: “First, tell the players in the guild not to redeem anything. Tell them negotiations are underway. Anyone with more than one million contribution points can buy in directly. Everyone can get rich together.”
For the time being, Chu Fu had no intention of distributing shares in the Thorn Guild.
That said, the guild’s players were already receiving considerable benefits.
None of them would leave, of course, but they still received all the benefits they were entitled to.
If the negotiations succeeded this time, then even if they obtained just 0.01% of the shares, they would still become shareholders.
That would give them a genuine sense of belonging.
Feng Huimin immediately understood.
[Commander Feng Huimin]: “Understood, Boss. I’ll notify everyone.”
Sometimes, Feng Huimin really admired her boss.
She had realized that Chu Fu wasn’t particularly good at business, nor was she especially skilled at management. But in a game where strength reigned supreme, her boss’s position was unshakable.
And yet, despite lacking those abilities, Chu Fu was remarkably perceptive when it came to winning people’s hearts.
She was willing to share profits and provide generous benefits—she had already surpassed 99 percent of the bosses in the market.
Afterward, Feng Huimin began negotiating with Laoji Fuli and the others.
Chu Fu, meanwhile, began studying her first Epic-grade treasure: the Lich Tower.
It was in an absolutely miserable state.
The Lich Tower stood thirty meters tall, with a bottom diameter of fourteen meters and a floor area of roughly 150 square meters.
The bottom three floors had suffered severe corrosion, but their basic framework could still be seen.
What was more, some items had not been contaminated by the poison.
A Necromancer Advancement Crystal!
Chu Fu sucked in a breath.
She carefully examined the enormous crystal placed on the first floor.
[Necromancer Advancement Crystal (Class Advancement Item)]: Touching it allows the user to change their class to Necromancer, a special class.
The very first floor had already given Chu Fu a huge surprise.
Didn’t this mean she could let people change classes as many times as they wanted?
What was more, she could charge for the service.
With a grand wave of her hand, Chu Fu set the price at 5,000 gold coins!
That was also the current market price—though it was a case of something being available at a price but impossible to obtain, since the drop rate for class-change tokens from dungeons was painfully low.
The first player to obtain a class-change token and advance had been extremely grateful to Jiaojiao Bu Jiao.
However, the Lich Tower was now on the verge of collapse, so Chu Fu immediately called for people to come and rebuild it.
Players with Metal and Earth affinities came rushing over. On top of that, even Orthopedic Surgeon Director Chen, who had recently joined the team, came to help.
Director Chen greeted Chu Fu and said, “President, I obtained a second talent and a second class.
I can crush bones, and I can also piece them back together.
This Lich Tower is actually made of bone. If we use bones to construct the walls, the necrotic aura will become much denser. I can help crush and reassemble the bones.”
Chu Fu was extremely surprised.
“You’ve improved so quickly!”
But it wasn’t all that strange. After all, Orthopedic Surgeon Director Chen had obtained the first clear for two Origin-level dungeons.
Strictly speaking, Chu Fu had only obtained two first clears herself—the level 20 and level 30 Origin-level dungeons. Director Chen, on the other hand, had cleared every Origin-level dungeon from level 10 through level 30 first.
That was why the five relatives of the wheelchair guys who had joined the team later had seen their strength soar so rapidly.
“Just luck, just luck. I don’t really know why. It seems I’m particularly suited to absorbing divine power. The others work harder than I do, but somehow, I’ve changed more than they have.”
Could something like that really happen?
Feng Huimin was busy, so Chu Fu asked the secretary team instead.
The secretary team quickly answered her question.
“President, it is indeed as you said. This time, the divine power absorbed by the members as a whole wasn’t particularly effective. However, a few classes advanced extremely quickly—for example, those related to death, dark elements, and spellcasting.
“We believe this is because the Necromancer Legion differs too greatly from us humans in nature.
“Of course, our secretary team has another possible explanation: there were too many people, which diluted the divine power.
“There is one final possibility: the Necromancer Legion was too powerful, so the amount of divine power we plundered was too small.
“Eliminating one Necromancer Legion wouldn’t attract the attention of the God of the Undead, because undead aren’t afraid of death in the first place.”
Chu Fu found the secretary team’s analysis convincing.
They really were impressive. The secretary team’s usefulness now rivaled that of Hua Country’s Analysis Bureau.
Their analysis was logical, well-supported, and persuasive.
After finishing her discussion with them, Chu Fu looked back at the Lich Tower.
By then, even Shen Chi had arrived.
He had come to help rebuild the Lich Tower.
Orthopedic Surgeon Director Chen crushed bones and mixed them into the soil and metal, reinforcing the Lich Tower so it was no longer on the verge of collapse. They also built a staircase leading upward.
The second floor had been completely corroded as well, but it contained a hundred black coffins.
The coffins were made of a special material and had somehow escaped corrosion. They had only been stained with poison.
At first, Chu Fu didn’t understand what they were for.
But she soon figured it out.
[Coffin of the Undead (Resurrection Item): Place a corpse inside the Coffin of the Undead, and it can be resurrected after two hours.
A Necromancer bound to a Coffin of the Undead will have their soul return to the coffin upon death. By placing any skeleton inside, they can resurrect themselves.
Note 1: Necromancers and other races whose souls return in this manner will become undead rather than humans, and any equipment dropped upon death cannot be recovered.
Note 2: After the Lich Tower is cleansed by the Primordial Gate, those who become undead will not change factions or begin worshiping the God of the Undead.]
Chu Fu couldn’t help but marvel.
What other surprises could this Lich Tower have in store for her?
She climbed up to the third floor.
