100 Chapter 100 - Peddlers’ Stree (1/2)

Royal God Call was quite pleased with himself for finding out how Gu Fei was able to unleash the full potential of Moonlit Nightfalls' Spell Damage. Feeling satisfied with what he deemed as a great accomplishment, he spiritedly continued explaining to Gu Fei about the Mage job class.

Royal God Call rattled off to Gu Fei all the combat techniques of the job class based on his past online gaming experiences as a Mage. Although each online game was distinct, the Mage job class' general design was more or less the same. The specialty of a Mage, besides the difference in the skills available, had always been unchanging. Therefore, there would still be advantages if Gu Fei applied Royal God Call's techniques into the spells in Parallel World.

The current spells available in Parallel World were largely similar to the ones found in other MMOs. As a result, many players' research of the spells in this VR game had hugely been guided by their past gaming experiences.

Royal God Call listed out all the spells' characteristics in large chunks, unmindful of Gu Fei's ability to remember them all. Fortunately, Gu Fei was interested in what Royal God Call was saying, as the methods and tips sounded to him like a new form of kung fu, so he raptly listened to the latter. However, when Royal God Call explained how the spells were executed in other MMOs – tapping on a keyboard and moving a mouse – Gu Fei zoned him out.

In Parallel World, everything – observation, physical movements, timing of unleashing skills and spells, et cetera – depended entirely on the players. This largely differed to other MMOs. This large difference became apparent to the two when Gu Fei tested the theories mentioned by Royal God Call to some monsters in Yunwu Basin, giving the two a bit of a shock.

Gu Fei was like a sponge the way he easily absorbed all the new information given to him. But while his flawless execution of the requested moves, steps, and attacks was enough to shock Royal God Call, what truly made the latter surprise was how the techniques always ended up failing. Maybe it should not be considered as 'failing', but that they 'did not achieve' the results expected by Royal God Call upon being performed in Parallel World.

Royal God Call forgot to consider something important: Players no longer had the panoptic view of their surroundings in Parallel World unlike in other MMOs. Meaning, they could no longer see everything around them.

”Seems like we'll need to do major adjustment to these techniques,” Royal God Call muttered, asking, ”You can't see what's behind your back, right?” But before Gu Fei could answer him, Royal God Call already voiced his discontent, ”D*mn. This is really troublesome! I need to experience some things for myself to have a better grasp of them, but now—f*ck! To hell with the Archer job class!” He then proceeded to toss his bow to the ground.

”It's alright. Just tell me all those techniques and I'll try to adjust them myself,” Gu Fei said. In truth, he was more skillful than Royal God Call in executing those techniques because of his real-life combat experiences. He just did not wish to hurt Royal God Call's pride by pointing this out, especially after the latter had just declared himself as the 'number one' Mage.

Royal God Call not choosing to be a Mage in Parallel World might be a good thing, as this fully immersive game had practically rendered all the experienced players' past gaming techniques with their keyboards and mouses obsolete. A majority of the players in fact had to research every fighting technique anew with this VRMMO setting as the fulcrum. In this aspect, a gaming noob like Gu Fei who possessed great physical prowess had actually become the more skilled expert in Parallel World.

There were two types of physicists: theoretical and experimental. Likewise, there were two types of players in Parallel World.

The individual differences in terms of ability and potential of the players playing Parallel World gave birth to these two types. Those who could understand and speculate the VR game's mechanics but never apply them real-time were categorized as theoretical players, with Brother Assist being the most extreme among them. Given their inability to apply their gaming knowledge in Parallel World, Sword Demon and the rest could also be considered as theoretical players despite being top experts in other online games. As for Gu Fei, he could be categorized as an experimental player – a top level experimental player.

Right now, Gu Fei and Royal God Call had this sort of symbiotic relationship. One provided theories and the other experimented with them. In Parallel World, experimenting was a lot harder than theorizing. So while Royal God Call was easily identifying the failed theories executed by Gu Fei, Gu Fei was painstakingly testing all the theories mentioned by Royal God Call.

After some time, the two left the grinding map and returned to Yunduan City. Royal God Call brought Gu Fei to a crowded, wide street. Players were flanking both sides of it with various items, such as job classes' equipment and crafting materials, on display on the mats in front of them.

”To think that there's such a place in this city!” Gu Fei exclaimed in surprise. Although he had seen some players occasionally setting up stalls on the ground everywhere, he had never thought that there was a street specially intended for peddling goods and hawking wares in Yunduan City. All the in-game cities were large and Gu Fei only went to places he knew, so he would naturally not be familiar with all the areas in this city.

”Why don't they sell their stuff in the Auction House?” Gu Fei asked Royal God Call.

”The system charges a fee when using the Auction House. The cost one incurs is dependent on the bid price set and the number of days it is listed. So if a player places an item and no one buys it, he or she will just end up steadily losing money,” Royal God Call explained.

”I see!” Gu Fei nodded his head in understanding.

Royal God Call eyed him, ”I've always suspected that you're a noob. Now, I've confirmed it!”

Gu Fei laughed, unperturbed. Not only was he a noob when it came to playing a game, he was an extremely unmotivated noob as well. He had been playing Parallel World for quite some time now, yet his knowledge about it was still rudimentary.

Royal God Call finally stopped in front of a rather large stall. The items on display in this stall were more exquisite and of greater variety than the ones set up by others. Gu Fei glanced at the stall owner and was momentarily stunned. The person before him was like an Adonis in white robe that had just stepped out of a portrait. He was clearly a NPC given the professional smile decorating his face.

Royal God Call bought a large quantity of booklets and quills from him. Gu Fei could not help but sigh upon learning where the in-game booklets and quills came from. Knowing what Royal God Call would need these things for, Gu Fei was thoroughly impressed. Just recording all his profound gaming knowledge about the Mage job class would require so many of these newly bought booklets. I wonder how many kung fu manuals can be made from all these booklets... Gu Fei calculated in his mind.

”Are you going to write down all the techniques and tricks you know in these booklets?” Gu Fei asked.

Royal God Call affirmed, ”I doubt you'll remember everything if I verbally pass them on to you.”

Gu Fei nodded his head in acknowledgement, ”Sorry to trouble you, then.”

Royal God Call's eyes suddenly shone brightly, ”Hey... Do you think my techniques can be sold for coins?”

”Does the game have a movable printing skill?” Gu Fei riposted.

Royal God Call's eyes immediately lost their sparkle. These techniques that were fast becoming obsolete in Parallel World could not even be put to good use in their final moments.

Gu Fei patted his back sympathetically, ”Let me summarize everything. Then we can start classes and collect school fees from those. When the time comes, you can have half the profit.”

”Will that work?” Royal God Call asked, interested.

”That's my career,” Gu Fei smiled.

”It's settled, then! I'll go and start writing your teaching materials!” Royal God Call shook the stack of booklets in his hands.

”I'll walk around and take a look. Check out our source of students,” Gu Fei said.

”F*ck!” Royal God Call cursed, before leaving the Peddlers' Street.

As Gu Fei continued to window-shop along the street, he found everything he lay eyes on a novelty. Seeing the haggling of the players around him, he felt as if he had been transported to a flea market in reality; the only difference between the two was that the air around here was a lot cleaner.

”Violent Fei!” Gu Fei suddenly heard someone calling him while he was strolling along the street. He already knew who the person was with such a distinctive way of greeting him. Turning his head to look at the person, he saw that Xi Xiaotian was dressed in a thief cape. She was furtively squatting by the corner of a wall; her face was covered and a dilapidated stall was in front of her.

Gu Fei vigilantly looked all around him, only cautiously approaching her after he had ascertained that there was no trap or ambush laid for him.

”What're you doing here?” Gu Fei asked, suspicious that she was currently doing some sort of shady business.

”I'm selling things!” Xi Xiaotian nudged the small stall before her.

Gu Fei inspected the items briefly and saw that they were a hodge-podge of crappy baubles and trinkets. He did not even need to appraise them to know that they were all cheap objects. The top-grade equipment, especially weapons, in Parallel World could clearly be distinguished with eyes alone. Top-grade weapons usually had aura or energy field enclosing them. Gu Fei's Moonlit Nightfalls, Sword Demon's Frost Memories, and Silver Moon's King's Blade were examples of top-grade weapons. Royal God Call did not consider his weapon as top grade precisely because it did not have any aura.

”Since we know each other so well, why don't you tell me what you're really doing here?” Gu Fei asked Xi Xiaotian, as he squatted next to her.

”I'm just selling my items. Really,” Xi Xiaotian insisted as she adjusted the shawl covering her face.

”Do you have to conceal your face when you're selling things?” Gu Fei asked.

”It's because I'm trying to maintain a low profile!” Xi Xiaotian replied defensively.

”Is that so?” Gu Fei was sure that there was a reason behind this. He got up and looked around him to see if he could find any angry customer looking for her. This lady could also be trying to make him her scapegoat once more. In the end, he found no one like that, as everywhere around him remained peaceful.

At this moment, a player approached the stall, showing an item to her, ”Sis Xiaotian, how much do you think this item should cost?”

Xi Xiaotian glanced at it, ”12 gold coins. It'll be marketable if you sell it at the price of 10 gold coins.”

”If I'm looking to cheat a noob?” the person asked while displaying a conniving smile.

”This item won't fool any noob, since he or she will consider it as garbage,” Xi Xiaotian explained.

The person sighed and walked away.

”A syndicate of hustlers?” Gu Fei asked Xi Xiaotian.

Xi Xiaotian rolled her eyes and was about to say something when another person approached her, ”Help me see how much this item's worth.”

Xi Xiaotian gave it a glance and then shook her head, ”Your level's too high. My Appraisal skill didn't work.”

Upon hearing this, the newcomer tried to pass the item over to Xi Xiaotian so that she could inspect the traits of the item, but Gu Fei quickly stopped him.

”What're you doing?” The newcomer thought that Gu Fei was trying to rob him, so he hurriedly stuffed the item back inside his dimensional pocket.

”Giving your things so easily to people? Beware of not getting them back,” Gu Fei kindly gave his advice.

The newcomer was dumbfounded, ”What a joke.” With that, he took the item out once more and passed it over to Xi Xiaotian while carefully guarding against Gu Fei.