Chapter 212: Gold Coin Merchant Guild, Trade Launched

The location for the trade center had been chosen, and the development model for the trade center had already been clearly planned.

Group members unanimously supported having "Shou Shou Jili" serve as the president of the merchant guild.

The subsequent topic of discussion became what to name the merchant guild.

During this period, group members put forward various ideas, and a final vote determined the merchant guild's name to be: Gold Coin Merchant Guild.

Named after Meng Yuan Chu's "Gold Coin," this was also the original motivation that drove group members to want to become merchants.

After the group name was changed, Shou Shou Jili, who was already the group leader, began to lay out more detailed guild regulations.

Shou Shou Jili (Group Leader):

Since everyone has decided to form a merchant guild, let's work together to make the guild bigger and stronger.

It's still better to explain certain issues in advance, to avoid various conflicts arising from minor details in the future.

First, changes in guild personnel.

After the guild is formed, our interests will be tied together, but incompatibilities may still arise during development.

For example, some players joined early on but actually made no contributions, yet still want to continuously reap benefits from the guild's development.

Such members must inevitably be kicked out.

Therefore, a complete contribution point system needs to be established.

Points will be calculated based on guild members' activities, including but not limited to: going out to sea to recruit clients, trade center construction, trade center interfacing with foreign races, etc., to earn points. I will write out the details later.

Going forward, each player's contribution will be reviewed according to contribution points, tallied once every 3 months, and anyone below the passing line for two consecutive tallies will be kicked from the guild.

Second, the potential conflicts in decision-making.

Regarding the guild's future development, disagreements will inevitably arise among us.

As for how to resolve these issues, I believe we can settle them through voting.

Since everyone has elected me as guild president, I take the liberty to propose that I hold 5 votes, while each other member holds one vote. Going forward, disagreements will be resolved through voting, and the results will be carried out accordingly.

The third issue is the management of shared funds.

The fourth issue is expenditure on infrastructure construction.

……

Finally, Shou Shou Jili put forward his own idea.

He stated that since they had chosen him to serve as guild president, responsible for future development decisions, he wanted a fixed 5% share of the guild's profits, with other earnings calculated separately based on contribution.

After reading the content, the group members had already realized that the new group leader, Shou Shou Jili, was absolutely a professional big shot.

They unanimously stated that a fixed 5% share was no problem at all.

With the guild's operating rules clarified, Shou Shou Jili immediately began arranging the construction of the trade center.

The first step was the raising of funds.

There were 87 members in the group. Shou Shou Jili stated that each member should contribute 10,000 Shou Jili as the guild's startup capital.

10,000 Shou Jili was clearly not a small number, and quite a few players in the group couldn't come up with it.

But the group leader, Shou Shou Jili, gave the members two days to prepare.

Members could gather the 10,000 Shou Jili through hunting, clearing spatial pouches, borrowing Shou Jili from friends, and other means.

During this period, some members expressed wanting to contribute an extra portion of Shou Jili to purchase a future 1% fixed share.

But this idea was rejected by "Shou Shou Jili," who stated that doing so would undoubtedly affect the future earnings of other members.

Apart from the president, no other guild members would have a fixed share.

But as long as one could bring in a stable trade channel, they could obtain long-term trade profits through that channel going forward.

Unless the race providing the trade was wiped out and no longer provided trade profits to the guild.

……

Two days later.

The Gold Coin Merchant Guild was officially established.

President Shou Shou Jili (A Lan) decided to meet up with the members on Dream Island.

Dream Island is located north of the Colorful Mist Coast, at a straight-line distance of 13.7 kilometers, and is an island relatively close to the Colorful Mist coastline.

The place is surrounded by azure seawater, the island covered with towering ancient trees reaching into the clouds, as well as low clusters of colorful flowers and grasses. The air is filled with the faint fragrance emitted by plants, mingled with the salty, humid breath brought by the sea breeze, forming a unique, refreshing scent.

Having just set foot on the island, A Lan was captivated by the scenery before him.

Recalling his mount, he looked up ahead.

This place formed a stark contrast to the bustle on the Colorful Mist Coast beach; all that could be felt was the tranquil atmosphere of nature.

Before choosing this island, he had conducted a detailed investigation.

It could be confirmed that no race lived on the island, and there were no spiritual resources to be mined.

This was clearly also the reason no race faction was willing to develop Dream Island—it still retained its pristine ecology.

In fact, Dream Island had once enjoyed considerable popularity on the forums.

The cause had nothing to do with the island itself; it was because a very lucky "Control-type" player had picked up a dying cultivation practitioner near Dream Island.

They had also successfully implanted a "Control" brand into the practitioner's corpse, obtaining the first super pet since the game's launch.

From this, the Ascending Race faction made its appearance in the players' field of view.

After that, apart from fishing-party players occasionally visiting, basically no players came to explore Dream Island.

Because this island was far too ordinary, with no highlights whatsoever.

This was also the main reason A Lan chose to establish the black market trade center on Dream Island.

The process of developing the island did not require clearing out natives, saving a lot of unnecessary trouble.

Secondly, with no spiritual resources on the island, it wouldn't attract the attention of those powerful races—after all, occupying this island offered no gains for powerful races.

Having arrived early, A Lan stood by the beach waiting for the guild members to arrive.

At this moment, the number of members in the Merchant Guild group had reached 128.

Among them, 41 players had joined later through the forum, and likewise paid an entry fee of ten thousand Shou Shou Jili.

The future Merchant Guild would gradually grow larger, but in Ah Lan's view, the current roster was still far from enough.

The trading center he envisioned could not guarantee the personal safety of traders, but it had to guarantee that the resources brought by the foreign races were absolutely safe.

This would require quite a few members in the future to serve as mobile warehouses.

Apart from the early bartering model, later on transactions would basically be completed by players serving as mobile warehouses.

For example, when the Night Sky race landed on the island, they would submit resources at the shore to the player serving as the "mobile warehouse," and the amount of resources would be recorded.

After entering the island, trade between the various races at the trading center would all be conducted using record sheets.

When leaving the island, the player serving as the mobile warehouse would hand over at the shore the De De Shang Pin obtained after the Night Sky race completed their transaction.

Throughout the entire transaction process there were no physical goods, guaranteeing the absolute safety of trade resources within the island.

But once off the island, no responsibility would be assumed.

Even if they were plundered one second after delivery and departure, the loss would be borne by the race that came to trade.

This was still only the initial trading model in Ah Lan's conception.

To make the Merchant Guild develop better and better, and to raise its influence to the next level, in the future he would also need to consider issues like client privacy and resource delivery.

Regarding client privacy.

Ah Lan considered that certain races might have rare resources in their hands.

But no matter whether the race had use for such resources, they could not be casually taken out for display.

Perhaps after contacting the black market trading center, such races might want to take out rare resources and exchange them for livelihood resources, yet also feared that this move might draw the attention of other races, leading to a crisis of their race being wiped out.

Therefore they were unwilling to bring rare resources to the black market trading center to sell.

After all, although there were no physical goods during the transaction, as long as clients had met face to face, too much information would inevitably be leaked.

It was inevitable that strong races would note down discoveries at the trading market, and after leaving the island lead their race to plunder.

In the Monster World where the strong prey on the weak, not flaunting wealth was an important rule of survival.

It was best for both sides of a transaction not to meet, to avoid leaking too many secrets of their own race.

The services the trading market could provide were essentially also at odds with the operating rules of the world.

But who let them be players, able to possess many overpowered settings.

To reduce face-to-face meetings between clients, there were many ways to solve it.

For example, building a digital trading market.

The technological products in this area could in the future be completed through the mechanical city of Di Ku Shi Jie.

Assembly lines would mass-produce technological products and deploy them to the trading center.

In the future, clients landing on the island would each be issued a tablet.

Like players directly placing orders when buying goods at the trading post, and then players would be responsible for connecting both sides of the transaction.

Even if the buyer had thoughts of bargaining, or the seller had thoughts of negotiating price, these could all be conveyed indirectly through the player handling that transaction, without needing to meet face to face.

Once privacy was protected, many rare resources that foreign races originally dared not take out would also be chosen to be sold at the black market trading center, providing more transaction service fees for the Gold Coin Merchant Guild they had built.

As for resource delivery, he had also considered that the transport link after leaving the island carried serious risks.

Discovering that resources could not be plundered within the island, races with real strength would choose to lie in wait outside the island, waiting for prey—however many came out, they would plunder that many.

Treating the Dream Island they had built as a hunting ground.

Targeting potential problems, the Gold Coin Merchant Guild would in the future provide delivery services to clients.

Players undertaking mobile warehouse missions would follow the clients who completed transactions and leave, until the resources were escorted to the islands where the other race resided.

When the time came, fees could be calculated by distance, or by a percentage commission.

For example, 1 nautical mile, charging a fee based on a certain amount of equivalent Shou Shou Jili in resources.

If the transaction amount of this order was large but the distance was very close, leaving little delivery profit, then a percentage of the resource price would be taken as commission.

With players responsible for delivery, even if plundered during the voyage, it could be guaranteed that the resources would be safely delivered.

At worst, after the player died and revived, they would set out again from the Color Fog Coast and continue delivering.

This could significantly raise the sense of security for the various races in transactions.

Avoiding being targeted by races stronger than themselves and bringing about the disaster of their race being wiped out.

Even after the transaction was completed, there was no need to have players follow and escort; players could just handle the delivery directly.

As long as you pay, everything can be arranged.

Therefore in the future the black market trading center would need a large number of trade delivery personnel.

Apart from the delivery personnel within the Merchant Guild, Ah Lan planned to recruit in the future some non-guild personnel, who would not enjoy profit sharing, but would be paid Shou Shou Jili according to work—off-staff delivery personnel.

For example, newbie players.

Many newbie players often wailed on the forum that they didn't have enough Shou Shou Jili to spend.

He could provide a platform to earn extra Shou Shou Jili.

In the future, players with free time could come to the black market trading center to do a few delivery jobs.

As long as the capacity of their personal spatial pouch met the requirements, and they gave the guild administrator a deposit, they could accept an order and set out; specific earnings would be distributed by the guild after the delivery service ended, and a certain profit would be deducted from it.

The prospects of the trading market, in Ah Lan's view, had very broad room for expansion.

A foreseeable future.

The black market trading center would become the liveliest and most prosperous location in the nearby several sea regions, with large numbers of foreign race merchant fleets traveling back and forth in this sea area.

Dream Island would also become the liveliest area for players besides the spatial nodes.

It could even siphon off various commercial activities along the Color Fog coastline, providing ordinary players with opportunities to interact with foreign races and sell self-made snacks.

But before the black market trading center was established, they still had many problems to deal with.

Thinking about the future, the first wave of Guild members arrived.

There were three players in total, riding a small blue boat.

Just as they disembarked and saw Ah Lan standing on the beach, the expressions of the three arriving players became extremely vivid.

They subconsciously glanced at the player name above Ah Lan's head to confirm his identity.

"Guild Master?"

"Yes, it's me." Ah Lan smiled, stepped forward, and nodded in greeting.

"Holy crap, Upper Realm beings! Aren't you playing the A-version Monster World?" the leading man said with a look of utter surprise.

Hearing this, Ah Lan couldn't help but sigh inwardly, then immediately explained:

"The A-version Monster World has ended. In the future, Eclipse Clan players will enter the B-version successively, which is the current version."

Facts proved that the Eclipse Clan's impression in previous virtual games was too aloof, causing them to become an oddity in the Monster World as well.

This was not a good sign.

Although players called him an Upper Realm being, this was by no means a compliment, but rather a tease regarding the Eclipse Clan's once-cold demeanor.

When players of any race contacted Eclipse Clan members, a natural, unspoken barrier existed.

This was a trend Ah Lan did not wish to see.

In the future, the Eclipse Clan needed to integrate into the player legions, and in terms of future development, cooperate with various factions of the player legions.

Only through integration is there a future; standing apart, or even causing players of other races to feel repelled, would only hinder the Eclipse Clan's development.

This obviously required him, and future Eclipse Clan members who obtained game qualifications, to work together.

To reverse the Ke Ban Yin of players from various races regarding Eclipse Clan members.

At this moment, Ah Lan chose to lower his stance and initiate contact and communication.

Before long, the Guild members arrived one after another.

After the Guild members disembarked on the island and saw him, their first sentence was generally expressing surprise at his identity as an Eclipse Clan member.

Some Guild members even joked, asking if there was an internal cheat tool to modify the brothers' attribute data for fun.

Preferably adding a few zeros to the Shou Shou Jili value.

To this, Ah Lan similarly replied in a joking tone that if there were cheats, he would definitely use them on himself first, as he too felt troubled by the difficulty of acquiring Shou Shou Jili.

By self-deprecating, he placed his own needs and the Guild players on the same footing.

This narrowed the distance between him and the Guild members and reduced the barrier.

As communication increased, the sense of strangeness faded.

Once all the Guild members had arrived, Ah Lan stood up and looked up at the lush forest inside the island.

He then summoned the map function, drew a circle in the central area of Dream Island, and shared the display with the Guild members who had already formed a party.

"Let's begin, clearing the area according to my plan." After Ah Lan spoke, he led the Guild members toward the center of the island.

The island was covered in vegetation, and there was no suitable site for building a trading center yet; in the starting phase, a large number of trees needed to be felled to clear a patch of open ground.

During this period, eight routes connecting to the coastline also needed to be opened up.

The players following Ah Lan also summoned their weapons at this time and began clearing the vegetation along the way.

Axe chops, ink-flame fireballs burning, wind-return whips lashing... the members of the Gold Coin Guild launched a reclamation campaign using their Painful Painful Minghun abilities.

Clearing the island was a considerable undertaking, but the members of the Gold Coin Guild could also earn meager profits from it.

Felled ancient trees could be dismantled into wood blocks and listed on the Trading Hall for sale; players setting up stalls to grill fish by the shore, those constructing guild bases, making sailing ships, and various other types of players would spend Shou Shou Jili to purchase them.

However, these common resources found everywhere in the Monster World could not fetch a high price.

One ancient tree could sell for only about a few fractions of a Shou Shou Jili.

Listing them on the Trading Hall was mostly to clear space on Dream Island, saving the process of transporting and destroying them outside, so even if given away for free, the players in the Guild were willing.

During this process, the members of the Gold Coin Guild worked with immense effort.

Expectations for the future were already maxed out; all members felt that the early efforts would inevitably yield high returns later.

As time passed, the clearing work progressed step by step.

Under Ah Lan's command, the Guild members cooperated seamlessly; felling, dismantling, and listing, every link was orderly.

The central area of Dream Island was originally covered by lush vegetation; nearby giant ferns spread their pinnate leaves, vines coiled around ancient tree trunks like snakes, hanging roots swayed gently in the wind, and layers of branches and leaves interwove into an impenetrable green dome.

The ground was also covered with thick fallen leaves; stepping on them felt soft and silent, and one would sink right into them.

Due to the passage of time, the lower layers of fallen leaves had already rotted, and the air was filled with a damp, decaying scent.

As the clearing work progressed, this environment shrouded in greenery gradually revealed its true appearance.

During this period, ancient trees were felled one after another, listed on the Trading Hall at the lowest price of 0.01, and were quickly bought up by other players in need.

When the ancient trees in the central area disappeared, sunlight poured down onto the newly opened clearing like sharp swords.

This area, which had not seen sunlight for countless years, finally welcomed the first ray of brightness of the new era.

Watching the fine wooden dust floating in the air, the players of the Gold Coin Guild had sweat on their foreheads, but smiles hung on their faces.

This kind of effort where the future could be seen filled their hearts with the desire to strive.

Standing in the center of the site, Ah Lan also looked around at this time; the cleared open ground formed a sharp contrast with the dense jungle surrounding it.

He used the guidance view to lift his perspective and look down from above.

The clearing was like a blank space suddenly appearing on a carefully trimmed green canvas; sunlight poured down here without obstruction, illuminating the tangled tree roots and mottled moss on the ground.

The air carried the fresh fragrance of grass and trees, completely different from the previous stuffy and damp atmosphere.

"Everyone, rest for a while; we will continue the reclamation in one hour."

Seeing through the party list that the Guild players' fatigue values were a bit low, Ah Lan immediately called for the players to rest, then put away his weapons and stopped working.

The reclamation process could not be completed in a single day.

He felt there was no need to rush; there would be plenty of time in the future to advance the construction of the trading market.

……

Three days later.

Relying on the attributes and abilities granted by the Painful Painful Minghun's characteristics, Ah Lan led the Gold Coin Guild to successfully complete the initial clearing on Dream Island.

Then, using some of the timber left over from the clearing, they erected simple greenhouses on the open ground.

This was the prototype of the Black Market Trading Center.

The simplest first step was complete; next, Ah Lan began issuing instructions for the next phase of tasks.

The second step was more difficult and also the key step for the future development of the Black Market Trading Center.

Guild members needed to travel to the alien islands of the various seas in the guise of mysterious merchants, attempting to establish trading contacts.

During this period, players would inevitably be killed.

But what the players had to do was to go back and forth repeatedly, conduct trade on the islands, and gradually attract the various races to Dream Island.

This step would also determine the early revenue sharing.

Every alien client would be a player's share quota within the Gold Coin Guild.

At Ah Lan's request, the players who had finished the clearing set sail one after another, beginning to expand the Gold Coin Guild's market.

At this stage, three alien races with which trade relations could clearly be established were identified: the Night Sky Race, the Giant Stone Race, and the Violent Wing Race.

These three races had already traded with players in the Gold Coin Guild; next, they needed to try to get them to come to Dream Island to trade, giving them more profit in the early stage to enhance Dream Island's attractiveness.

For example, last time the Night Sky Race spent 46 Crisp Fruits to purchase 693 Energy Bars from Zhong Yi.

On this trip, Zhong Yi, following Ah Lan's instructions, prepared to inform the Night Sky Race that if they came to Dream Island to trade, they could exchange 40 Crisp Fruits for 700 Energy Bars.

From a long-term perspective, early profits were unimportant; expanding the Gold Coin Guild's influence was the core key.

Only by establishing sufficient influence could the Gold Coin Guild secure continuously growing future revenue and a steady flow of customers.

This step required the joint effort of all members of the Gold Coin Guild.

……

After leaving two provisional managers on Dream Island, Ah Lan turned back at this time.

Returning to the Colored Mist Coast space, he used the teleportation array to arrive in the Di Ku Shi Jie space.

Stepping out of the space, the scene of a dilapidated mechanical ruin lay before his eyes.

After re-forming a party with his teammates, he summoned the map.

The teammates' positions were displayed on the map in the form of blue cursors.

Ah Lan immediately began to jog toward the area where his teammates were located.

Recently, his main focus had still been on the mechanical ruin scenario in the Di Ku Shi Jie.

He wanted to witness with his own eyes whether the Tower of Eternity in the concept of the Machine Guard Race truly existed.

It was now confirmed that the Star Net could enter the game world by seizing qualifications.

But it was temporarily impossible to determine whether it would enter with the structure of an ordinary living being, or with the body of a semi-mechanical, semi-biological intelligent brain replicated from the real world.

Therefore, the Tower of Eternity became extremely important.

Assuming the Star Net arrived in the Monster World in the form of an ordinary living being, the Tower of Eternity could subsequently be used to house the Star Net's consciousness, allowing the Star Net to become the ruler of the mechanical ruin city.

If it entered in its original form, it could also merge with the mechanical ruin city.

Inheriting the legacy left by the Machine Guard Race, it would control the vast mechanical city.

Countless armories could operate under the Star Net's will, mass-producing technological products and mechanical troops.

But what could be confirmed was that repairing this mechanical city would require enormous Shou Shou Jili expenditures.

The Gold Coin Guild was one of the funding channels for the Moon Eclipse Race to repair the mechanical ruins.

Viewing the Moon Eclipse Race's development in the Monster World from the perspective of first principles, funding sources were indeed important.

But the ultimate goal was still to convert it into power, so the importance of the mechanical city was self-evident.

This might be the key assistance for the Moon Eclipse Race to establish an initial armed force in the Monster World.

After meeting up with his teammates, the fusion mode was activated.

Ah Lan led his teammates toward the central district of the mechanical ruin city.

(End of this chapter)