Volume 4 Chapter 2 (1/2)
Book 4 Chapter 2 – Web-shopping
Li Yiming opened the shopping app and a very crowded interface appeared on the screen. ”Hey Bai Ze? Do you know how to use this?” Li Yiming hesitated when he looked at all of the different kind of merchandise being sold.
A flash of white light and Bai Ze appeared right beside Li Yiming, leaning over to see what was on the screen. She did not seem more confident than Li Yiming.
”You've never seen this before?”
”Of course not. How long has it been since online shopping has been invented? Heaven's Laws keeps up with new technologies, at least.”
”Let's check it out. Seems promising.” Li Yiming rubbed his hands together and started browsing through the shops. The set-up was just like that of a normal shopping website, except articles such as armor, weapons, pills, forging materials, beast summons, technology and even Dao techniques were being advertised instead of normal merchandise. Anything Li Yiming could think of, he could find it there.
”Wait, the currency used is life marks?” Li Yiming made an important discovery.
”What did you expect? Cash? E-money?” Bai Ze looked at Li Yiming, unimpressed by his late realization.
”Wow, these are so expensive.” Li Yiming was very discouraged. He thought he would be able to easily get his hands on a pile of equipments to extract from and thus grow stronger much more quickly. Without this shortcut, it would be difficult for him to get his hands on more than the few he can hope to encounter in a domain.
'But even a level-two item costs 100 life marks… And a level-five costs 1000. I'm not going to be able to get a whole lot with the 1500 points I have, and that's a.s.suming my extraction works a hundred percent of the time. Oh no… what have I done with that sword… It was worth 1150 points!' Li Yiming was now deeply regretting his rash decision of trying to extract the lightning sword awarded to him earlier.
”It's probably normal for items to be this expensive. Otherwise, guardians would be nothing more than fools who are armed to the teeth.” It did not take long for Bai Ze to make sense of the high price of the items being sold.
”Well, I guess it's better than nothing. Is there anything that would be useful for me?” Li Yiming asked in a rather defeated voice. He opened the interface for techniques. 'Thunderous Strike is a good technique, but it only works once. I need to find something else. Hmmm, 100 for level one, 500 for level two, 1000 for level three, 2000 for level four, 4000 for level five, 8000 for level six and nothing for level seven.'
'That's it? I can only afford a single level three spell?' Li Yiming's mood sank once again; level one and two spells were relatively useless, but beyond that, the price tag soared.
”Let's have a look at consumables instead.” Bai Ze pointed at a b.u.t.ton on the screen.
Li Yiming opened the consumables marketplace. 'Pills, raw materials, one-use spell scrolls. Wow, a Ki-recovering pill costs ten life marks? What a rip-off…'
”Take a look at the spell scrolls!” Bai Ze had an idea in mind.
Li Yiming obeyed her. Rows of yellow paper scrolls with some glyphs written on appeared. None of them were very cheap, the cheapest level one spell, Thunder Palm, cost ten life marks and the more expensive Firebats cost three hundred.
”They sell those?” Bai Ze sounded very excited.
”These aren't that useful, are they? One-time use and expensive.” Li Yiming was rather discouraged.
”They're still a lot cheaper than any of the other things you can buy.” Bai Ze left the rest of the thinking to Li Yiming.
”You're saying that…” Li Yiming
”Extraction!” Both of them said loudly.
”Let's buy a Thunder Palm scroll first.” Bai Ze smiled like a mischievous child.
'Purchasing a spell scroll. Confirm?' A voice was heard in Li Yiming's head after he tapped on the Thunder Palm scroll icon. Then, he noticed that ten points had been deducted, and a piece of golden paper with glyph traced on it suddenly appeared in front of him.
Li Yiming grabbed it and examined the indecipherable characters; he could feel that there was some kind of power sealed within the innocuous-looking piece of paper.
”Come on, let's try extracting.” Bai Ze seemed even more eager than Li Yiming.
Li Yiming picked up the scroll and closed his eyes. He could feel that the inside was just like any other guardian equipment. After practicing for so long with his stash of equipment in the Shangbei domain, it did not take long before he found the glyph which was buried inside of the item. A moment later, thee scroll turned into a small pile of dust. Li Yiming had a euphoric smile. 'Yes! Thunder Palm! I did it!'
”Are you serious? This guy and his hacks…” Bai Ze raised her head and looked at the sky, but she seemed even more excited than Li Yiming.
Li Yiming continued to abuse the ”loophole” and learned just about every thunder spell below level four. Bai Ze stopped him from trying any other kind of spell, since the cost efficiency was the highest with thunder due to his having the Source of Thunder.
”I still have 475 points left.” Li Yiming was shocked by his own good luck. ”Is it normal that all of the extractions were successful? Is that what the Source of Thunder does?” He had planned to use all of his life marks to buy scrolls; unlike normal guardians, life marks were nothing more than currency to him.
”You should keep what you have for now. We have enough.”
”Alright.” Li Yiming rubbed his hands together and made a mental list of the spells he had learned today. 'It's a pity I can't use what I've learned right now. Otherwise, I would be throwing thunder all over the place and making the Earth tremble with my might!'
”Wait a second.” Li Yiming suddenly yelled out in surprise.
”What is it?” Bai Ze had stolen a bag of chips from Li Yiming's storage s.p.a.ce and was chomping on a particularly big one.
”My vein. It changed.” Li Yiming felt that something was different within his body.