Chapter 127 - Be Particular About the Method (1/2)

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Roland wasn’t in a hurry to leave. Since the players varied in distance from Mory, they agreed on a time on the forums to meet in the woods on the eastern outskirts of Mory within 10 days.

Currently, more than a hundred players had signed up, but Roland estimated that only half would make it without a hitch.

This was not the modern world, where one could drive hundreds of kilometers by car on the highway or take a high-speed rail or plane and arrive in a few hours.

This was an alien world with extremely primitive transportation. More importantly, apart from the ranges where humans moved about, there was also dangerous no man’s land between cities, crawling rampantly with wild monsters and magical beasts.

Diseases, weather, and emergencies, these could all make people disappear on the road.

Travelers and merchants could make a lot of money because they were fighting for it with their lives.

Unlike Roland, who directly joined an organization and received pay, most players were as broke as can be, so then there were players clever enough to take advantage of the system’s Backpack.

In contrast, it was much more convenient for players to be traveling merchants. For one, they were professionals, and in groups of three to five, their strength was quite something. Ordinary bandits wouldn’t dare to do anything reckless.

And… even if they were robbed, the goods were all stored in the Backpack and wouldn’t be lost. It was very safe, and at worst, they could just take a detour.

A two-by-two-by-two Backpack could also hold a lot of things. All they had to do was find those small, but more valuable things to transport.

It took the better part of a month, but they could earn a gold coin or two.

Then, other players who wanted to make money followed by example, and in a short while, an indistinct trend of a “running business” was formed.

Using the forums, they could also communicate about what goods were missing in which location, and what the specialties of different cities were.

Roland dedicated his time in Delpon to studying magic and didn’t go out much, so he didn’t know much about the current state of the players’ world.

Now, apart from the two t.i.tles of undying and Golden Son, there was also a vague addition of the t.i.tle “great merchants from another world.”

Those traveling merchant players were just “economic coolies” at the lowest rung, while the high-end players were already attempting to control the prices of certain special items in their cities.

For example, the people around Princ.i.p.al Huang and Fan Six Hundred Million.

Of course, these things had little to do with Roland.

After making a reply on the forum, he stayed at the Magic Tower for two more days to make sure that things were calm after John Senior returned and that the latter didn’t take any drastic actions. After doing so, he finally planned on setting out.

But before he left, he made a special trip to see Hawk and Link.

Now the docks here had begun to scale, the next part was the problem of how to attract investors and expand channels.

Hawk sat in a high place and looked down at the docks with a perfectly content look.

For civil engineering slaves, leading and completing a big project was in and of itself something to brag about for a lifetime.

Although this was only in a game.

Roland found Hawk, took two handfuls of gold coins from his Backpack, and put them in Hawk’s large hands. “Here are 20 gold coins. You can count them.”

“So much this time around?” Hawk’s eyes lit up.

Again, the Silver Wings Guild was currently paving the way for the future with money, so they would accept whatever gold Roland had.

Roland also sat down and said, “Over the past few days, people have successively found my statue in the capital and started learning my skill. Now, one or two gold coins come into my account every day.”

“Tsk, it’s so nice to make money lying down.” Hawk sighed.

“Once Silver Wings paves the road, it’ll be even more profitable.” Roland looked down at the majestic docks. “I guess your guild leader wants to create a waterborne transport logistics company in the alternate world.”

Hawk smiled and said nothing.

Large guilds were great for this point. They had a wide range of talent and abundant resources, and they did things on a grand scale with a sense of perspicacity.

“The mayor is back. What are you guys going to do?” Roland asked.

Hawk pointed to the distance and said, “Pay more taxes in exchange for full autonomy. We’re willing to follow the rules here, but if they’re too greedy, like trying to get their hands on a key part of the Silver Wings waterborne transport and logistics company—it’ll be impossible. The elites of Silver Wings are already starting to s.h.i.+ft toward this area. How many players do you think can topple a city?”

“I’d say fifty,” Roland answered after a moment’s thought.

Players were undying. Moreover, the players of large guilds were more disciplined and their commanders had plenty of experience with “armchair strategies.”

Some large group battle games, such as Shadowbane and PlanetSide, had already raised the strategic vision and improvisational command ability of large guild commanders to a certain extent.

Intersperse, divide, and outflank—this kind of mobile warfare in games was something they were already skilled at playing.

Besides, Zhao Kuo¹ wasn’t a bad armchair general, he just met Bai Qi², quite unfortunately.

These commanders were all armchair strategists like Zhao Kuo with plenty of room to grow, but what made them more fortunate than Zhao Kuo was that they had countless trial and error opportunities.

NPCs only had one.

Fifty players was Roland’s most conservative estimate.

At this moment, Hawk smiled. “We’ll have 83 guild players.”

Upon hearing this, Roland began to laugh.