Returning to the Floating Ice City, I immediately created my Level 4 Food Items. Truthfully, I should have been the first player to create level 4 Food Items. If I said my cooking level out loud, I would probably shock a lot of people.
Arriving at the storehouse, I took out a huge amount of salt and chicken from my storage after talking with the NPC. I also had enough ginger in my inventory. Seemed like my profit-making chance has come.
Opening the cooking interface, I added the ingredients: Chicken x 20, Salt x 10 & Ginger x 15. I started the cooking and immediately, a ball of magic light floated in my hands–
“Ding~!”
System Announcement: You have made Cold Sliced Chicken x4. Your cooking skill gains +5 exp!
……
Ha? I made 4 Lv-4 Food Items in one go?
I was overjoyed and immediately entered the second round of ingredients. Indeed, this time I got 3 portions of Cold Sliced Chicken. This Food Item was an extremely delicious chicken meat wrapped in leaves that could heal 400 mana in a moment. It was a high quality item that any high-levelled mages must have at all times!
After almost half an hour, I made a total 120 portions of Lv.4 Food Item. It was divided into 12 slots, with 10 Cold Sliced Chicken in each slot. All these were equivalent to cash!
Setting up a stall in the plaza, I hid my player ID before I shouted loudly, “Selling Lv. 4 Food Items, it’s an item that can heal 400 mana in one go! Don’t miss it, it’s on sale now! 80 silvers for each Lv. 4 Food Items! Anyone who needs it, please come and see!”
In this crazy times, 80 silvers is equivalent to 800 RMB. Normally, who would want to spend 80 RMB on one mana recovery item?
However, there were a lot of rich, extravagant people in front of me. They were all people who afford throwing hundreds of golds just for high-levelled Food Items!
Many high-levelled players started to gather together. Most of them were conservative and only bought 1 or 2 Lv 4 Food Items. At the most, there were some who bought 5 portions. It was as if they had bought it because they were going to kill some BOSS with their comrades. In reality, high-levelled magicians and priests, especially priests who consumed 30 mana for a Level 3 Holy Light, would need a lot of mana. If they didn’t consume high-levelled Food Items, they would have consumed all their mana in 2 minutes. At that time, the chances of their team being completely decimated would be very high.
In the midst of the racket, suddenly a voice resounded, “The person who is selling the Food Item, I want to buy all of your goods. How many do you still have?”
I froze. Turning around, I saw two high-levelled heavy-armoured players talking to me!
They were Red Iron Tablet and Rainy Clouds. These two people were not only one of the red-named players in the Floating Ice CIty Player Ranking Board, they were also the aces in Mad Dragon Guild, nicknamed the “Twin Stars”. I would never have thought of meeting them here.
Although I hid my ID, my equipments were all too eye-catching. Furthermore, I always wore a cloak to hide my face. It was extremely easy for them to recognise me.
Red Iron Tablet’s eyebrows shot up as he shouted, “It’s you!”
I laughed, “Yeah it’s me, what are you going to do about it? Do you still want to buy the Food Items?”
“Yes, of course we want to buy it!” Rainy Clouds gritted his teeth and said, “How many Level 4 Food Items do you have in total? Humph, don’t tell me you are not going to sell it to us just because we PKed before?”
I smiled, “Revenge and business are two different things. Of course I’m not that close-minded!”
Saying that, I counted the remaining goods in my inventory and said, “I still have 95 portions. Since you guys want to buy everything, then I shall give you a special price. One Level 4 Food Items for 1 gold!”
“What?!” Red Iron Tablet shouted furiously, “Didn’t you sell it for 80 silvers each to those other people?”
“You guys are different, you guys are special!” I said, indifferently.
Rainy Clouds held back Red Iron Tablet who were about to explode and replied, “Here’s 95 gold. Let’s trade, sell me those Level 4 Food Items!”
“OK!”
I happily opened the trade interface and placed 95 portions of Cold Sliced Chicken while Rainy Clouds placed 95 gold. With a “ding”, the trade was completed!
Red Iron Tablet was a little unsatisfied. Lin Yi Xin and I had stolen the BOSS that they had fought so bitterly after all, yet they still had to pay me money right now.
“Rainy Clouds… how could you allow that brat to do this?” Red Iron Tablet shouted furiously.
Rainy Clouds smiled lightly, “Young Master had already issued his command, we must get 100 portions of Level 4 Food Items. We shouldn’t say any more, in any case, Young Master had given us the funds to buy it.”
“Humph!”
Red Iron Tablet stormed away angrily, while Rainy Clouds shot me a warning glance, smiling, “Business is business. Brat, you should be careful when you step out of the Floating Ice City!”
I didn’t reply him. Instead, I sent a message to Du Shi San, “Come to Floating Ice City, quick. Be prepared to sell gold!”
……
After a few minutes, Du Shi San arrived. He traded me and gave me 40 gold as he laughed, “We should already have a total of more than 100 gold, right?”
“How much would a 100 gold be worth?” I opened my hands and a bunch of gold appeared on my palms. A line of numbers that showed exactly how much gold I had appeared: 258.
“What the h.e.l.l?” Shi San was thoroughly shocked before he started laughing out loud. He patted my shoulders, laughing like a maniac as he said, “We actually had that much money?! Isn’t this the same as when we had those RMB20,000? Hahah, Lu Chen, Little Ghost and I were actually troubled about how we were going to pay for our rent next month~~”
I replied, “Don’t be too happy, the value of gold will decrease with time. Quick and get a client to sell the gold to!”
“What do you mean client? We can just sell it on a platform in the forums!”
“Oh? There’s that kind of system?”
“Go there quickly!”
……
Hence, I immediately went to the forums from within the game. There was indeed a trading platform, with PBC acting as the intermediary. The exchange had a 1% transaction cost.
Sweeping my glance across, I saw a lot of players here to trade gold. There were thousands of pages of gold listings. Those who could afford to sell more gold put up around 50 gold for sale, while some only put up 3-5 gold, trying to make a small amount of money. After all, the price of 1 gold was currently at 95RMB-120RMB. However, this price would definitely fall steeply when most players had levelled up. No one knew how much it would drop.
I immediately put up a post. Selling 250 gold, 100 RMB for 1 gold. The price should be quite cheap, unlike those dishonest people who were selling 1 gold for 145 RMB. That was really too high!
Not even 5 minutes had pa.s.sed after I posted my sale when a “ding” suddenly sounded. A message had come —
System Announcement: Respected customer, the 250 gold that you have put up on sale has been sold. With the 1% deduction as transaction fees, a total of RMB 24,750 has been transferred into your China Construction Bank account: 662700200873*******!
……
Very good, I had money now. I had made close to RMB 25,000 in an instant!
Crimson Mercenaries was developing smoothly, at least our near crisis had been resolved. We could probably eat outside and drink some beer everyday, enjoying the view of beautiful girls pa.s.sing by. What a bliss!
Enough, I shouldn’t be satisfied with a small achievement like this.
I gave the helmet that Domineering War G.o.d had dropped to Du Shi San. It was a Lv.25 Black-tier equipment, a little better than Ghost Valley’s helmet.
I hovered around the Floating Ice City Plaza for a while, looking at new trends. Seemed like the opportunities for business were not limited to what I had done these previous days.
Standing in the middle of the plaza, I started shouting loudly, “Buying Level 2 Food Ingredients! Buying glutinous rice 50 copper each and chicken meat 40 copper each. I’ll buy whatever you have!”
Not long after I shouted that out, a lot of players who had Hunting Skills surrounded me, shouting the number of glutinous rice and chicken meat they had.
These two Food Ingredients were only Level 2, so those who had Level 2 Hunting Skills would already be able to harvest it. At this period of time, there were quite a few players who managed to level their Hunting Skills to level 2. Furthermore, all the single players who managed to gather Food Ingredients did not have an outlet to sell it too, they must have a friend who had trained their Cooking Skill. Hence, they could only sell it to the NPCs.
A portion of glutinous rice and chicken meat for 50 copper and 40 copper each, why shouldn’t I buy this deal?
I didn’t intend to make Level 4 Food Items anymore, gingers were simply too hard to get. On the other hand, I still had quite a lot of Green Peppers left from harvesting them at the Frozen Canyon. Hence, I decided to create Level 3 Food Items to increase my experience and level up my Cooking Skill to Level 5. The sooner I capture the food market, the better monopoly I would have.
Level 3 Food Items require 20 portions of glutinous rice and 10 portions of chicken meat. Based on the price that I had named to buy the glutinous rice and chicken meat, one Green Pepper Meatball would cost me around 14 silvers. However, I could sell those Green Pepper Meatb.a.l.l.s for 50 silvers or more. That was quite a huge profit margin, it was around three times higher than the cost of goods. This was definitely a rewarding method, furthermore, I could also level my cooking skill.
Alright, today I won’t level. I shall do business!
I bought glutinous rice and chicken meat relentlessly. There were even some people who was selling green peppers later on, and I bargained the price down to 50 silvers a portion. All of the Food Ingredients needed were finally gathered. I kept buying the ingredients as I made the Food Items. I ask for 30 gold from Ghost Valley and spent it all as capital. Du Shi San was waiting at my side to receive all the manufactured goods and sell it to interested customers.
I kept busy until around 12pm at night. The three of us had 54 gold at first, but after manufacturing relentlessly, at dawn, we have received a total of 805 gold! This was the advantage of business, earning a huge profit margin with a low capital!
I gave Du Shi San and Ghost Valley 200 gold each, while I took 400 gold for myself. They obviously didn’t have any problems with that. In reality, I was the only one producing all the goods. Being able to get such a huge portion of money made them very happy.
We converted some gold to RMB 30,000. With the addition of the RMB 20,000 income we earned in the afternoon, Crimson Mercenaries had now earned RMB 50,000 of profit. It was really an auspicious day!
Ghost Valley took the gold and spoke very resolutely, “Boss Broken Spear, this kind of business opportunity will not be able to last long. I think, at the most, two days later, or even one day later, we won’t be able to earn so much!”
I nodded, “The other players with Cooking Skill might also have trained their Cooking Skill to Level 3 already. When they reached Level 3, not only would we not be able to earn much, the price for Green Pepper Meatball would definitely plummet down.”
“Yeah!”
We predicted correctly. At 1 am, two players selling Level 3 Food Items had already appeared. One of them was the Cooking master from the Domineering Clan, whose player id was called the Domineering Food G.o.d. The other was a level 32 archer from the Mad Dragon guild, called Rice Dumplings. They were all high-levelled experts.
I went out to train until 3 am, when I finally reached Lv. 36. However, I found that I had already fallen through the ranks of the top 10 rankings in Floating Ice City —
1. Wind Fantasy Lv. 38 Occupation: Radiant Ranger
2. Domineering Heaven Blade Lv. 37 Occupation: Warrior
3. Domineering Mage G.o.d Lv.37 Occupation: Mage
4. Rainy Clouds Lv.37 Occupation: Magic Knight
5. Red Iron Tablet Lv.36 Occupation: Warrior
6. Domineering Knight G.o.d Lv.36 Occupation: Magic Knight
7. Fallen Hero Lv. 36 Occupation: Undead Swordsman
8. Domineering Warrior G.o.d Lv.35 Occupation: Warrior
9. Domineering Archer G.o.d Lv. 35 Occupation: Archer
10. Clearwater Lv. 34 Occupation: Archer
……
Lin Yi Xin had continued to train relentlessly, leading by a whole margin at level 38. Domineering Heaven Blade had followed closely while Domineering Mage G.o.d occupied the third place. The Twin Stars of Mad Dragon Guild occupied the fourth and fifth rank. The Floating Ice City level race had become more and more intense. Indeed, spending a whole day earning money had made my ranking dropped by a whole lot. Tomorrow I must level for the whole day.
After entering , I had always constrained my levelling speed in one way or another, but I shouldn’t let my level be too far from the rest. It would be best if I could rank at the 11th-20th place, but although I wasn’t within the top 10, I would have the strength of a top 10 player. Wouldn’t that be interesting?