Chapter 389: Tumultuous Fate (1/2)
I grinded at Ice Soul Cave until it was past 8 pm before checking my experience bar. When I first entered the cave I was sitting at Level 107, 22%. Now, after half a day of grinding, my experience had only grown to 45%. At this rate, it would take me around two days to gain a level. I could’ve grinded faster by aggroing the Ice Soul Giants en-masse and killing them all at a choke point, but that would cost me too much equipment durability and force me to return to the city.
I also obtained 18 pieces of Ice Soul Steel for my hard work. The item drop rate was so low that it would take me at least another two or three days of hard grinding to gather 100, but I should still be on track, all things considered. Things were easy once all the materials were ready. I would head to Violet Empire, seek out a Master Blacksmith and pay them some gold to turn my blueprint into reality.
……
Beep!
It was at this moment I received a message from Murong Mingyue: ”Log out, boy!”
”What for? I’m busy…”
”It’s dinner time.”
”Eh, next time. Bring me two sesame seed cakes when you girls are done, please…”
”Fuck! Eve’s plane will touch down at Wuxi 8 am tomorrow, and you are coming with me! Unless you’re planning to show her the dark circles under your eyes, you’d better eat early and sleep early so you can meet her tomorrow in tip-top shape!”
That jolted me right out of the zone. ”Oh, okay. I’m logging out right now!”
I looked around and put down a tent at a secluded spot where the mobs wouldn’t spawn. After that, I slipped into the tent and logged out of the game.
……
As I took off my helmet, the realization that He Yi was coming back tomorrow—tomorrow!—finally started sinking. I felt a rush of hope. For the past couple weeks, I had been feeling a bit empty on the inside, and now I realized that it was because my beautiful and generous boss wasn’t by my side.
When I exited the room, Beiming Xue and Murong Mingyue were already waiting for me. The two girls were dressed lightly as usual. ”Come on, time to clear out the Chuyunge map at least three times before we leave!”
I smiled. Chuyunge was a good buffet restaurant that cost 150 RMB per person, and I had been wanting to visit it for a long time now. However, I hadn’t found an opportunity to do so until Murong Mingyue forced me to log out today.
……
Murong Mingyue was too lazy to drive her own car, so we traveled to Chuyunge in my X12 instead.
Inside the rear-view mirror, Beiming Xue chirped excitedly, ”Yay yay! I’m so excited for Who Will Rise the day after tomorrow! We’ll definitely place well in the tournament, right?”
Murong Mingyue smiled. ”Of course. Eve is coming, so it’s entirely possible for a certain someone to turn beastial and become the champion and MVP of the tournament!”
Murong Mingyue teased me. ”Maybe, but dare you say you don’t want to turn beastial when you see her?”
Caught off-guard again, I changed the subject embarrassedly. ”Fuck, can we please talk about something else?”
Beiming Xue asked, ”Big bro, what were you doing this whole day? You seem busy…”
”Oh, I’m grinding for Ice Soul Steel inside an ice cave.”
”Ice Soul Steel? What’s that for?”
”You’ll know in two days.”
”Okay!”
I looked at Murong Mingyue through the rear-view mirror again. ”Sis, there’s something I absolutely need your help with.”
”Oh? What is it?”
”I want you to buy 5 Rank 2 Cyanfire Gems in Sky City. I’ll pay for everything!”
”Cyanfire Gems?” Murong Mingyue sounded astonished. ”Isn’t that the gemstone that adds Attack? It’s… pretty expensive though. I heard that a single Cyanfire Gem can sell for tens of thousands of RMB these days. It’s enough money to exempt a white collar from working for half a year…”
”That’s right. Remember, I want 5 Rank 2 Cyanfire Gems! Don’t mix it up!”
”It’ll cost you around 700k RMB or so. You sure you want to do this?”
”Hmph hmph, it’s fine!”
I knew full well that there were only so many Spirit Rank bosses in Sky City right now. It was to prevent Spirit-grade equipment from proliferating the market too soon. When I exploited a bug and spent half a day whittling the boss Ziyu’s health to nothing, all I got for my efforts was one Spirit-grade sword. When Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls battled Warsky Alliance and zerged the Desert Giant King, we were also rewarded with one Spirit-grade Titan Barrier only. Spirit-grade equipment might be the best possible equipment a player could get their hands on right now, but it absolutely wasn’t something one could buy with just wealth and power alone. No, one must possess luck and good karma as well. Right now I had landed on a golden opportunity to forge He Yi a high-level Spirit-grade shield, and I would be a fool not to give it my all and make it a reality. 700k was but a small price to pay for this!
”Mn. I’ll transfer 700K to your account later. Don’t forget to check.”
”Sure.” Murong Mingyue curled her lips. ”Although I wouldn’t know even if you didn’t send me the money. You’ll need a bigger cash flow than that to affect the 8 digits sitting inside my bank account…”
”WTF!”
I felt gloomy. The pressure of living together with rich women was too real. If even an assistant like Murong Mingyue had over ten million in her bank account, I couldn’t even begin to imagine how rich He Yi was. According to Murong Mingyue, He Yi’s asset value went up and down by the hundreds of thousands per second, literally. In this case, the two of us lived in completely different worlds.
……
Now that I had assigned the duty of gathering the Cyanfire Gems to Murong Mingyue, I could focus fully on grinding the Ice Soul Steel. With my level of connections in Violet Empire and a bit of money, it shouldn’t be a problem to forge the Spirit-grade shield at all. Moreover, I was almost certain that it was as good as Gui Guzi’s Titan Barrier!