Chapter 61-1: NPC Favorability (1) |
[Cash offered at high prices to purchase Body Tempering Combat Techniques. Payment transferred instantly upon completion of transaction. Honest and fair.]
[Anyone have unused Body Tempering Combat Techniques? Don’t worry about me not having enough money. Name your price if you’re willing to sell.]
—
Zhou Xiao’s good fortune once again sparked a frenzy among players to search for the God of Wealth.
The buying posts for Body Tempering Combat Techniques made by heavy-spending players on the forums further ignited player enthusiasm.
The price for one Body Tempering Combat Technique had already been driven up to 4 million credits on the forums, yet there was no supply in the market. Aside from Zhou Xiao, no other players had obtained it so far.
Though some of the offered prices were just players shouting on the forum, the Body Tempering Combat Technique was still incredibly tempting to ordinary players. It meant that acquiring one could make you rich overnight.
—
Blood-Soaked Plains.
“Flame, heed my call, arise!”
With a full dose of cringy dramatics, one player’s hands ignited with two balls of inky-black flame, rapidly spreading over his body as his flesh burned away, revealing gleaming white bones beneath.
Switching into Bonefire form, the player raised his hand, condensing several fireballs and launching them at the Ragehorns.
“Take this, become lamb skewers!”
The three Ragehorns struck by the fireballs were instantly engulfed in the roaring black flames, crying out in agony.
“Dirt Poor, could you stop being so cringe? You’re giving me goosebumps. Can’t you say something normal?”
Hearing this, Dirt Poor, who had transformed into Bonefire form, flipped off Murderous Intent Rising.
“Pfft, like your little snake entanglement isn’t embarrassing?”
“It’s a great serpent, not a little snake…”
As they hunted monsters, the squad’s voice channel was filled with constant banter and lively chatter.
At that moment, Dirt Poor suddenly noticed a familiar silhouette in the distance. He immediately switched to Owl-Headed Fiend form to get a better look.
With his eagle eyes enhancing his vision, the distant figure became clear.
“Brother Li, it’s the God of Wealth!”
Hearing Dirt Poor’s shout, Li Zheng, who had transformed into a massive serpent over ten meters long, jolted with excitement.
“Ptooey!”
He spat out the Ragehorn clamped in his mouth and raised his giant head to look in the direction Dirt Poor pointed.
His vertical pupils suddenly contracted, zooming his vision, and sure enough, he saw a familiar figure.
Standing about 1.65 meters tall, with light blue hair and an emotionless expression resembling a finely crafted doll, the figure sat cross-legged on a twisted tree, eyes closed, resting.
“Hiss… luck has arrived.”
As Li Zheng spoke, his form twisted and rapidly shrank, switching to his human form, automatically clothed in a simple black garment.
After several days of hard grinding in the Shadowed Cavern, completing purification missions, his contribution ranking had reached first place, and the rewards had raised his Body Tempering Level to level 3. Still, when fighting low-level monsters he could easily crush, he habitually preferred using Black-Scaled Serpent form.
Now, his Black-Scaled Serpent form had grown to level 22, reaching a length of 11 meters, with physical strength that could easily crush a tree.
He had truly reached the level of great serpent entanglement.
Upon discovering the God of Wealth, Li Zheng and the Grind Kings group members were thrilled and decisively rushed toward Broken Star’s location.
Not far away, Broken Star also sensed the approaching figures. Opening his pure white eyes, he looked toward Li Zheng’s group.
But he did not choose to leave. Instead, he was curious about what these self-proclaimed player race beings wanted from him.
As Li Zheng and the others approached, Broken Star leapt down from the tree and landed steadily on the ground.
Before he could speak.
“God of Wealth, we finally found you. Let’s get to the process already.”
“God of Wealth, I want Body Tempering Combat Techniques too. There are ten of us here, one for each please.”
“God of Wealth, do you have some hidden store function? Can we buy exclusive items not available in the normal shop?”
—
Broken Star: “…”
This barrage of questions completely stunned Broken Star.
Seeing him frozen in place, Li Zheng and the Grind Kings squad began to worry.
The team members spoke up in the squad voice channel.
Family-Sharing Stepdad: Brother Li, maybe we’re going about this the wrong way. We shouldn’t ask directly. We need to approach this more subtly.
Leopard-Headed F2P: Don’t rush it. I read a thread the other day where someone talked for a long time before receiving a Body Tempering Combat Technique gift pack. We should chat for a while and wait for the right opportunity, the God of Wealth will give gifts himself.
Dirt Poor: Isn’t it possible that we need to accumulate enough personal favorability before receiving a gift from the God of Wealth? Last time, saving him in that special event raised his faction favorability toward us from Hostile to Friendly, which is why he didn’t attack us on sight. But our personal favorability is still at zero. Demanding things directly won’t work, we need to build rapport. Based on my years of gaming experience, gift-giving is the simplest way to boost favorability.
Murderous Intent Rising: Exactly. Raise favorability first, don’t just demand things outright. That’s too rude.
—
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Why have you sought me out?” Broken Star asked in a low voice, staring at the group frozen in front of him.
After their voice channel discussion, Li Zheng and the Grind Kings squad quickly switched tactics.
They pulled out various flavors of canned food from their inventory and offered them to Broken Star with fawning smiles.
“Would you like something to eat?”
Seeing them pull out items out of thin air, Broken Star’s expression grew quite animated.
He suddenly realized something.
These people actually carried spatial storage items.
He knew all too well how valuable these were.
Currently, he was still only a reserve warrior and couldn’t even be equipped with spatial storage items.
Even for full-fledged warriors of the Anti-Tide Legion, acquiring a spatial storage item required large amounts of battle merit.
And yet these self-proclaimed beings of the player race all seemed to have one.
But after thinking it through carefully, Broken Star couldn’t help but shake his head internally.
Spatial storage items always require a physical carrier. He had previously slain many members of the player race, and upon their deaths, they always dissipated into black mist without dropping any items, which didn’t fit the characteristics of spatial storage devices.
Could it be due to their strange bodily structure? That they somehow carried internal storage spaces?
Broken Star immediately thought of another possibility.
Within the Anti-Tide Legion, there was a racial force called the Void Race. Members of this race possessed a special racial ability where, upon reaching adulthood, their stomachs underwent a wondrous transformation, forming an internal storage space to hold items.
He believed that the members of the player race likely possessed a similar ability, altering their body structures to form small internal storage spaces.
However, upon further thought, this explanation still failed to account for why their bodies would dissipate into black mist upon death without dropping any items.
Facing the food offered by Li Zheng and the others, Broken Star did not refuse. He reached out and accepted it.
He planned to take this opportunity to have a good conversation with these player race members and probe into the inner workings of their race and the origin of their special abilities.
Sitting cross-legged, Broken Star forcefully twisted open a can and sampled a bite, frowning immediately.
The food contained no energy at all, purely meant to satisfy hunger, utterly worthless. Absorbing the energy of heaven and earth directly would be far more efficient in replenishing bodily consumption.
But for the sake of gathering information, he forced himself to eat slowly, waiting for a chance to ask questions.
During this, Li Zheng and the others also sat down before Broken Star. Watching him eat, they mentally imagined floating text prompts popping up over the God of Wealth’s head.
Favorability +1
Favorability +1
With a good start, all they needed now was for the favorability score to reach the threshold, and they would receive a gift from the God of Wealth.
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