Retrograde Gaming

Chapter 4: Making A Profit

Translator: Henyee Translations

Editor: Henyee Translations

“Does the Spiritual World guild want to buy this quest?” Li Huailin perceived the subtext within Night Flyer’s words, he asked, “What’s the price?”

“You should first ask the village chief whether this quest is a solo quest or a group one.” Night Flyer was quite professional, he didn’t respond to the question and asked him something instead.

“Oh.” Li Huailin nodded in response, he turned to look at the grey-bearded village chief. “Old man, the quest you speak of, does it have to be completed alone or does it require a party?”

“Great brave warrior, although you’re powerful, this mission is filled with dangers, I suggest that you call some formidable teammates to help you,” the grey-bearded old man repeated this in a standardized way.

“It seems like a group quest,” Li Huailin turned around and informed them.

“If that’s the case, I have two proposals for you; one is to accept this quest as a party, we’ll complete it for you. This way we won’t have to pay anything, but we’ll take the reward as payment instead. The second, you can party up to accept this quest, and then you’ll abandon it. We, the Spiritual World guild will complete it without you receiving the reward, we’ll give you a sum as compensation instead.” Night Flyer was indeed worthy to be the deputy leader of a large guild, he immediately thought of two possible proposals.

“Oh, how much is the compensation?” Li Huailin didn’t consider the first proposal at all, he didn’t want to have several tens of thousands of experience deducted. This was why he immediately aimed for the compensation proposal.

“We just recently settled in ‘Heart of Glory’. Because of this, we don’t have much in-game currency, could we use real money instead?” Night Flyer asked after momentarily thinking about it.

“No problem.” Li Huailin nodded.

“Alright, thirty thousand.” Night Flyer immediately made an offer.

“Thirty thousand…” Li Huailin was quite satisfied with this amount, however, he still revealed a sliver of dissatisfaction in his expression. After all, this was business, he couldn’t immediately respond, there was still the possibility that there was room for the offer to increase.

“Thirty-five thousand, the money will be immediately transferred.” When Night Flyer saw that Li Huailin was still somewhat hesitant, he immediately increased the offer.

“Thirty-five thousand plus 10 Silver Coins, then we have a deal.” Li Huailin still wanted some in-game currency as a backup, ten silver coins wasn’t that much to people like them. This was only a thousand copper coins after all, a large guild like the Spiritual World would definitely have this amount.

“Okay, deal,” Night Flyer straightforwardly responded.

“Okay, you guys invite me to the party for the quest, after I accept the quest then give it up, you guys can transfer the money,” Li Huailin said, he wasn’t afraid that the Spiritual World guild would refuse to honor the deal. Now that there were so many players in the surroundings, and considering that the Spiritual World guild was a rather reputable large guild, they probably wouldn’t dupe him.

“Okay.”

Immediately, a party invite was sent over, Li Huailin accepted it. After entering the party, he saw four Spiritual World players; Spiritual World Night Flyer, Spiritual World Fire Head, Spiritual World War Spirit, and Spiritual World Dust Machine, all of them were male.

“Old man, hurry up and give me the quest,” after partying up, immediately Li Huailin said this to the grey-bearded village chief.

“Of course, brave warrior,” the grey-bearded village chief said cheerfully.

System Notice: Newbie village chief has issued an AA-rank hidden quest, Source of Evil. Accept or Not?

“Accept.”

AA-rank hidden quest, Source of Evil-1: Find the source of the dark creatures near the newbie village. Tip: It’s said someone in the village found traces of Demons at the south of the village, please proceed to investigate. Quest Reward: 2000 Experience, 10 Reputation, 1 Silver Coin.

“Only this little amount of rewards?” Li Huailin found it a little strange.

“No, there’s a -1 after the quest, it seems to be a series of quests. This is only the reward for the first round, hidden quests like these definitely wouldn’t give so little rewards.” Night Flyer, who had ample experience in games, immediately saw the reason why there were only such meager rewards.

“I see.” Li Huailin nodded, “But this has nothing to do with me anymore.”

With that said, Li Huailin left the party and then opened up the quest box to give up the quest.

System Notice: do you really want to abandon the AA-rank hidden quest, Source of Evil?

“Yes.”

System Notice: You have given up the AA-rank hidden quest, Source of Evil. You have gained 1,000 Reputation points.

“Huh?” Li Huailin was confused, he then suddenly came to realize that abandoning the quest was supposed to deduct Reputation points. However, due to the nature of his character’s bug, it now added Reputation points instead.

“Sh*t, can I accept the quest again?” Li Huailin hurriedly asked the grey-bearded old man.

“Sorry brave warrior, this is a hidden mission. Once you’ve abandoned it, you can no longer accept it,” the grey-bearded village chief said regrettably.

“Damn, I can’t farm Reputation points…” Li Huailin said to himself in a low and regretful voice.

On the other side, the people of the Spiritual World guild didn’t pay attention to Li Huailin, Night Flyer and the others were discussing the details of the quest. This was happening while the guild treasurer went offline after being informed of the task for the money transfer.

“Okay, the money’s been transferred to your bank account, here are ten silver coins.” Night Flyer walked over and handed the ten silver coins to Li Huailin. “We’re going to finish the mission, oh right, Huailin, since you’re a solo player, have you considered joining a guild? I can recommend you into the Spiritual World guild, you can join the second team that I lead.”

“Hmm?” Li Huailin was slightly moved, the Spiritual World guild’s second team wasn’t merely an online organization. They were basically considered as a department in a large company, there would be a salary every month, and as reported, it wouldn’t be under ten thousand yuan. There were also bonuses, it was extremely amazing. However, he carefully considered his current situation, if the Spiritual World guild needed to drop in for official business, or perhaps due to some other situation, there was a possibility that they would discover his current situation. Wouldn’t the losses outweigh the gains?

“Sorry, I’m a solo player, I won’t join any guilds.” After thinking about his own situation, Li Huailin earnestly rejected the offer.

“Oh, I see.” Night Flyer nodded in response, there certainly were a group of players who only liked to play alone, he didn’t find this strange at all. “Then forget it, let’s add each other as friends, maybe we can see each other in the future.”

“Okay.”

After they added each other as friends, the members of the Spiritual World guild then left to work on the quest. The surrounding players were still here because they were truly dumbstruck earlier. They wanted to ask Li Huailin what exactly had happened, however, when they saw the members of the Spiritual World guild talking to Li Huailin, they didn’t dare to disturb them—after all, the Spiritual World was a large guild that they couldn’t afford to offend. Now that the members of the Spiritual World guild left, they immediately surrounded him.

With a ‘shua’, before the surrounding players could react, Li Huailin already flickered into a white light, he went offline.

“Sh*t, this awesome brother left so quickly,” the surrounding players came up empty-handed and could only complain in a depressed tone.

“Too awesome, honestly too awesome!” A player on the side still hadn’t woken up from witnessing the fierce slapping amazement of the NPC, he shouted crazily.

“I’m totally impressed, I beg for this kick-ass brother’s name, I want to be his underling!” A large man roared.

“That’s right, he seemed to have fiercely slapped the village chief’s face to receive the hidden quest, right? Why can’t we give it a try?” A player suddenly suggested.

“Yeah!” “Yeah!”

A bunch of players suddenly came to this realization, pairs of thirsty eyes suddenly turned towards the dull grey-bearded village chief.

“I’ll try it first!” A brawny man stepped up, lifted up the village chief by the collar, and slapped him with his right hand.

With a ‘pa’, the player suddenly felt as if he had been rammed by a truck, he flew straight back into the wall of a house a dozen meters away. He then turned into a streak of white light—he died.

“Sh*t, it truly is an instant kill!” The surrounding players cried out in surprise again.

“How does this work? Why was that kickass brother fine and we’re being instantly killed instead?” A player asked.

“Maybe the hitting posture is wrong… I remember that the kickass brother was in this posture.” As a result, another player was sent flying, turning into a streak of white light.

“No, I think it was this posture.” Shortly after, another player flew out.

“Maybe it’s the expression that’s wrong, I remember that the kickass brother had this expression when he hit him.” Another player with a constipated expression was sent flying.

“Maybe this is only effective for virgin males.” Shortly, another youngster flew into space.

…

No matter what happened on the other side, the first thing Li Huailin did when he logged off was to visit his online banking account. He discovered thirty-five thousand more in his savings as expected.

“Hehe, this game’s great for making money, I made thirty-five thousand on the first day of playing. I”m really wild, cool, and flipping awesome,” Li Huailin said contentedly.