After clearing the Heroic Mode once, Jiang Fei had gained another half of a bar’s worth of experience points. Simultaneously, those in the team had reached levels between 20 and 30, while even acquiring quite a few fresh pieces of equipment.
When they came out from the dungeon, Jiang Fei arranged for some of the people to train and increase their levels. Thereafter, he delegated some of the less urgent tasks to Rosette Rose, as he was not too well versed at issues related to management.
Rosette Rose was squealing internally. Jiang Fei trusted her. Moreover, managing the guild was her birthright!
After excusing himself from the overly-attached Mrs. Awesome, Jiang Fei sent a voice message to Herb Box. Ever since his close brush with death courtesy of the ninja, Jiang Fei had grown highly aware of the importance of strengthening his potions. Therefore, he urgently hoped he could get his hands on a certain number of strengthening potions and hopefully be able to sleep at night.
“Yo! Brother Fei, do you have assignments for me?”
Herb Box laughed heartily. After all, Jiang Fei was a famed person in Dawnlight City. He was the number one in terms of level, tanking, being a big-shot equipment dealer, and walking mobile banks. Very few people would not have heard about Verdure Glider!
“Yes! Let us meet up!” Jiang Fei nodded.
“Alright! I am at ‘xxx,’ see you there!” Herb Box answered excitedly.
Very soon, Jiang Fei arrived at the rendezvous point.
“Brother Fei! Over here!” Herb Box shouted from the door to a small tavern. These small taverns came with a few features. One was the big living room. There would be a public notice board which displayed the details of some daily quests. Players would usually gather around to chat and went about with their tasks, if any. Players could also mingle in private compartments. Each person had to pay an entry fee of five silver coins. These compartments contained their own instances, just like private dungeons. Players could speak freely in these compartments without much worry. Nobody would interfere. They could also trade in safety without worrying about robbers.
“Come! Let us talk inside!” Jiang Fei sent a party invite to Herb Box. He paid ten silver coins and directly entered the compartment.
“Let’s hear it, Brother Fei,” Herb Box started. After all, Jiang Fei had always been his greatest customer.
“Yes! Do you still have those strength potions?” Jiang Fei went straight to the point.
“I still have ten bottles. But I’m not going to lie to you. They’re crap. They don’t help much, and cost way too much to be worth anything. Ever since learning the Recipe, I have only made twenty bottles. Apart from the two bottles you bought previously, no one else has ever been interested in any of them!” Herb Box said.
“Great! I’ll take all of them!” Jiang Fei nodded. He was only left with one bottle. These ten additional bottles should last him a fair bit.
“No problem!” Herb Box said, turning to retrieve the remaining ten bottles of the Beginner Defensive Potion.
“Alright!” Jiang Fei accepted the potions and handed Herb Box twenty gold coins.
“Brother Fei, I have recently acquired the Recipe for a new type of potion. Are you interested?” Herb Box asked.
“Oh? What would that be?” Jiang Fei asked, curious.
“Speed Potion!” Herb Box said, holding up a sample.
Jiang Fei took it in his hands and took a closer look.
Speed Potion (Potion, Normal Quality)
Use: Immediately increases your movement speed by a hundred percent for fifteen seconds. Cooldown is one minute!
“Not bad at all!” Jiang Fei nodded. This would serve him well both in-game and in real life. Be it the pursuer or the pursuant, it would be most helpful.
“Well, the materials cost even more, I’m afraid. A bottle would cost you ten gold coins…” Herb Box said, observing Jiang Fei’s face carefully. He was fearful of scaring this tycoon away.
“Alright! I’ll take two sets!” Jiang Fei said after a while. These items would help him even more than the defensive potions ever could. He could not possibly lose anything from this purchase.
“Eh?” Herb Box blinked in surprise. He had been most terrified of scaring this God of Wealth away. Beyond all expectations, the said tycoon had asked for two of those sets? If only he had known this earlier, he would have asked for more!
“What is the matter?” Jiang Fei asked.
“The thing is… I only have two bottles of it…” Herb Box looked rather embarrassed.
“Oh, go ahead and make more of them. I will wait for you here!” Jiang Fei nodded.
“No problem! I’ll be back in thirty!” Herb Box nodded excitedly. He then left the tavern. Two sets of potions meant sixty bottles. It was worth a total of six hundred gold coins! Even if he deducted the production costs, he would still make a profit of three hundred gold coins. This was no small sum.
After all, not everyone was as lucky as Jiang Fei. Two consecutive Unknown Dungeons had earned him a few thousand gold coins. Regular players would drool at mere tens of gold coins. Most others were all broke!
Taking advantage of this opportunity, Jiang Fei arranged the items in his Spatial Ring. Not too long after, Herb Box returned.
“Brother Fei! There you go! Freshly brewed. Still piping hot!” Herb Box treated Jiang Fei with extreme courtesy. At that point, he was more of a devout servant than a trader.
“Great!” Jiang Fei accepted the two sets of Speed Potions and gave Herb Box six hundred gold coins.
“Brother Fei, please remember me the next time you ever have some purchases in mind!” Herb Box called out.
Once he exited the compartment, Jiang Fei entered the big living room in the tavern. Quite a few players were looking for quests there. The quests on the public notice board were categorized in a similar fashion to the levels of equipment, which were white, green, blue, purple and gold. Normal players would opt for white or green ones. Some better-skilled players would form a team to accept blue quests. Some braver folk would attempt the purple quests. However, even parties sizes that stretched to the 3-digit zone would be horrifically wiped out. At this rate, the gold quests might as well have never been published!
As difficult as the quests were, their rewards were never worth the effort. One would still find themselves leveling more rapidly in a concentrated area of monsters, rather than complete those arduous blue quests. Several players did not consider such quests worth their time. However, most pub players would be left with no choice. Let’s not even talk about those concentrated spots. Even the not so populated areas would be hogged by the medium to small sized guilds. Therefore, the bigger guilds occupied the better training areas, while the smaller guilds occupied the slightly inferior training areas. Pub players would be left with no place of their own, and had to resort to accepting quests at taverns!
“Hehe, this is a little interesting…” Jiang Fei browsed through the quests. Although he was not going to accept any, he had always been curious about them.
After briefly running his eyes through the list, Jiang Fei achieved a certain level of understanding about the public notice boards. White quests were mostly delivery missions for individuals. In other words, errand boys and messengers. The quests provided little experience and money. However, they were simple, and any agile thief or hunter class would be able to complete the quests rather quickly.
The green quests were slightly harsher. They mostly required a certain material from certain monsters. However, Dawnlight had grown notorious for its horrible drop rates, so, good luck counting on them.
The blue quests were mostly hunting ones. The goal would be to kill some named Elite monsters. For normal players, at least five people in a team were required to accomplish the tasks.
“Eh?” When he saw the purple Epic Quest, Jiang Fei almost jumped in surprise. He had to accept this mission!