Chapter 40: Merit Points

【Repair Novice Village Wall】, 【Store materials】, 【Scout Death Soul Mountain Range】...

"These are all quests exclusively issued for hunting Ghost Mage."

"The quest to repair the city wall requires collecting various rocks, wood, and materials dropped by monsters in the Polluted Area."

"The quest to scout the Death Soul Mountain Range requires players to go to the Ghost Mage's territory, gather intelligence, and disperse the fog of war."

"After completing the quests, no Reward Points are issued; the quest rewards are Samsara Clay Pots of various grades."

Fang Yi smiled slightly and explained: "I need 500,000 Reward Points to upgrade the city wall myself, but by outsourcing the quests to those gambling-addict players, I only need 50,000 to have them work themselves to the bone collecting materials for me to upgrade the wall, using the rewards opened from the clay pots."

The White-haired Loli worriedly asked: "The Ghost Mage is about to attack; if you exploit the players like this, won't it cause them to revolt?"

There was once a technological world that did this.

Besieged by a Fourth Tier Pollution Source, the Fallen Angel, and a group of associated pollution, they chose to exploit, which directly led to the collapse of the technological world, turning it into a chaotic apocalypse, and even the strongest batch of Mecha War Gods betrayed them.

The consequences were very severe.

Hearing her concern, Fang Yi laughed: "I didn't hold a knife to the players' throats, so how can it be considered exploitation?"

"Everything is the players' own voluntary behavior, and they should even be thanking us!"

Behind the screen,

Tsunade stood at the edge of the city wall, at the station for submitting the 【City Wall Repair Quest】.

She opened her inventory, which was filled with densely stacked materials of all kinds.

These materials were all things she had picked up while hunting ghosts during this period; it didn't take any extra time.

Of course, there were also very rare materials, such as Soul Power Crystals dropped by Ghost Captains, leather containing rich ghost aura, iron ingots, and so on.

They were all produced by Elite ghost monsters, and the drop rate was very low.

If sold entirely to the Mall, they could earn 800 Reward Points.

"Selling to the Mall only earns a base amount; that's a huge loss!"

This was Tsunade's thought.

She was unwilling to sell the materials to the Mall; it was common knowledge that selling various materials directly to the game officials yielded the lowest price.

Selling to some merchant players in the Novice Village could earn roughly 1,500 Reward Points.

These merchant players had very weak combat abilities; even if their levels weren't low and they had full sets of white gear, it was difficult for them to hunt monsters of the same level.

Therefore, the merchant players gave up on hunting,

And spent their days roaming around, buying materials and equipment from players at base prices, then selling them to another batch of players who were in urgent need, earning the price difference.

"Even if I sell to a merchant, I won't earn much."

After careful consideration,

Tsunade cleared her inventory and threw all the materials into the city wall repair station.

A burst of golden light.

All the materials disappeared, and a panel suddenly appeared.

【Materials submitted: Ghost Leather (Inferior) *15, Ghost Iron Ingot (Inferior) *20, Soul Power Crystal (Medium) *8, Ghost Rock (Inferior) *99...】

Merit Points possessed: 5654

Tsunade muttered as she calculated: "A Level 1 equipment clay pot costs 100 Merit Points, but what I want most is the skill clay pot, which costs 1,000 Merit Points; I can only buy five clay pots."

After thinking it over, she finally exchanged for the skill clay pots.

She was a Level 13 Cleric, wearing a full set of Level 10 Blue Potential 【Ghost Cavalry Set】 from the 【Feixu Chengbao】 dungeon, which could greatly enhance defensive capabilities and add Strength attributes.

She didn't lack equipment; what she lacked now was skill experience.

Taking the Level 10 Awakened profession skill 【Holy Cross】 as an example, not to mention the Reward Points, just upgrading it to Lv. 2 required 500 points of skill experience.

This meant she needed to cast the skill five hundred times.

Not to mention the time, the massive consumption of Blue potions was a significant expense.

The Game Mall sold Experience Capsules, but they were ridiculously expensive, and no sucker was willing to buy them.

Tsunade clenched her fists, staring nervously at the clay pot in front of her, and said: "Skill clay pot, there is a 20% chance to drop a skill experience capsule; I don't believe I can't open one!"

At the beginning, she was actually unwilling to spend a huge amount of Reward Points to upgrade skills.

This was a thought many players had, simply because upgrading skills was too expensive, and the higher the quality of the skill, the more expensive it was to upgrade.

But in the end, they all abandoned this idea and would go bankrupt just to upgrade.

There was no way around it,

The temptation of upgrading skills was simply too great for players to resist.

For the same skill,

【Holy Cross Lv. 1】's healing effect was slightly stronger than ordinary Medical Ninjutsu, but by Lv. 2, the healing effect was three times that of the Mystical Palm Technique!

It was just like Wood Release.

With the support of the Third Hokage Tsuchikage Onoki, a certain Iwagakure player exchanged for the expensive Wood Release skill from the Game Mall.

But the result was unsatisfactory.

The effect of Lv. 1 Wood Release didn't have the powerful might of the legendary God of Shinobi at all.

At most, it could build wooden houses, and the strength was only that of an ordinary Jonin.

The Tsuchikage, who had witnessed the power of Hashirama, was unwilling to give up and painfully gave that player the resources to upgrade Wood Release to Lv. 5, and then...

The originally weak Wood Release had its power multiplied countless times after the upgrade; although it couldn't reach the level of Hashirama, it could easily create a small forest.

Behind the screen,

The White-haired Loli asked curiously: "Master, Merit Points and Reward Points are both currencies used to purchase items; why go through the trouble of having both?"

"Of course they are different!"

Fang Yi's mouth curled up slightly as he explained: "Reward Points are assets without any shackles, capable of exchanging for any item at will."

"Merit Points cannot be traded; they can only be used to exchange for clay pots at mission points, and they automatically reset to zero every thirty days, so they cannot be stored for long periods."

The white-haired loli felt even more strange, widening her eyes as she said: "Restricted item types, no freedom to purchase, and there's even a time limit? Have the players lost their minds, actually trading precious materials that could be sold directly for Reward Points just to get Merit Points?"

"Of course, it's because it's cheap!"

Fang Yi said matter-of-factly: "After the game update, the drop rates for equipment and Skill Scrolls increased, so the Samsara Clay Pots sold in the Mall naturally became sluggish."

"Most players would rather grind than buy expensive random clay pots."

"However, the price of the Merit Clay Pots sold at mission points is very accessible, especially when compared to the clay pots in the Mall; they are like deeply discounted, super-profitable goods."

"The only downside is that they cannot be bought with Reward Points; they require Merit Points earned after completing the tasks of repairing the city walls and scouting the Death Soul Mountain Range."

The issue of the Merit Points expiration date is also easy to solve; can't you just spend them all before they expire?

What if they aren't spent?

Then you can't blame the game merchant for being black-hearted; you can only blame the players themselves for not managing their exchange time well.

It's just like the informed consent form chosen before logging into the game; if players find the content too long and are unwilling to read it, they can't blame us, the game developers, after the fact, right?

(End of this chapter)