Chapter 15: Bulk Water Trading and Monopoly!
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Three hours later, every crisis across the ten-story building had been resolved, and no new zombies appeared.
At the same time, only one hundred and one living people remained in the entire dormitory building.
With an impressive score of 87 points, Wang Ao stood at the top of the leaderboard.
Judging by the way the leaderboard had been designed, the survival game clearly encouraged everyone to risk their lives outside.
…
The first light of the fifth day pierced the blood mist and spilled over the dormitory building.
Along the corridors strewn with corpses, blood—some fresh, some dried—shimmered brilliantly beneath the scarlet sunlight.
“I’ll definitely be the one who survives to the end!”
Wang Yang pushed open his dormitory door, his eyes bloodshot.
He had been injured the night before as well. If he had not killed a special zombie in time, he would have died too.
All the “bosses” shared the same conviction of certain victory as Wang Yang and dragged themselves out of their rooms.
These big shots had to guard the resource points first thing in the morning, lest someone raid their rooms.
Those resource points capable of producing good items had already become their territory by common consent.
If they were not afraid of danger, they would have slept right there at the resource points.
…
Whenever Xu Lang had nothing else to do, he sat cross-legged and meditated.
It cleared his thoughts and kept his mind alert.
Cao Yaxuan and Tong Qi woke one after another. Seeing that there were only one hundred people left in the chatroom, they found the sight deeply shocking.
Surviving the zombie attacks did not mean everyone was safe and sound. Some people would still die from their injuries.
Besides, the players themselves could turn on one another.
For instance, if Zhou Tao were lying gravely wounded in his room right now, would Xu Lang want to kill him?
Of course he would!
“Xu Lang, open the door!”
“What happened to you last night? Why didn’t you come out?”
“Open up! Xu Lang, how did your door get upgraded? Is it a Level Three door?”
“Xu Lang, I want to become your tenant!”
Early that morning, Room 200 was once again surrounded by people.
Besides the local residents on the tenth floor, some players had come specifically to the tenth floor in hopes of changing rooms.
The moment they arrived, they saw Xu Lang’s distinctive door.
“Xu Lang, what should we do?” Tong Qi asked nervously. The knocking outside was growing louder and louder.
Xu Lang shook his head. “Ignore them. The Strong-Force Zombie slammed into the door yesterday, but its durability didn’t drop at all.”
Cao Yaxuan was already used to it. She remained completely unmoved by the knocking outside and continued browsing through the chat records.
The young heiress was not entirely foolish. She knew she should gather information whenever she was able.
Just then, Xu Lang received a private message.
[Wang Ao, Room 44: Brother, I heard your main door has been upgraded. How did you manage that?]
Wang Ao had changed rooms and remained the owner of his new one.
For the owner of a room to change dormitories, he needed to possess the key to another room.
As the leader of a group, Wang Ao probably had little difficulty obtaining one.
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Xu Lang did not reply to Wang Ao’s message.
He did not know how to respond, and there was no need to answer.
Wang Ao did not press him either.
He sensed that Xu Lang might be dangerous. He still had to guard his resource point and had no time to provoke a new enemy.
And so Xu Lang adopted a policy of complete indifference until sleepiness overcame him.
The players outside left before long.
They had been busy all night and were exhausted in both body and mind. Their energy levels were nowhere near Xu Lang’s.
Xu Lang stretched, pulled Cao Yaxuan and Tong Qi into his arms, and fell into a deep sleep.
He could afford to be so relaxed because the players had discovered something over the past few days.
Tenants had to ask their landlord for permission before they could open the door.
It was remarkably considerate.
Otherwise, if the landlord happened to be away one day, the tenants could simply join forces with outsiders and ransack the room. That would be quite a spectacle.
To put it plainly, tenants were parasites attached to the landlord, rather like knights and their lord.
…
[1 day, 14 hours, and 30 minutes remain until the game ends]
Xu Lang woke after exactly eight hours of sleep.
His biological clock had already adapted.
[Base Nightmare Coins: 40. Conversion rate: 196%. Total produced in eight hours: 118 Nightmare Coins]
[Total Nightmare Coins: 264]
“There’s only one day left before the survival game ends. I’ll upgrade the Nightmare Bed then,” Xu Lang thought to himself.
The prerequisite for lying low and developing was having the means to lie low. He could not spend all his Nightmare Coins, only for the survival game to unleash something massive on the final day, forcing him into a doomed battle. That would be a terrible trade.
For now, life was quite comfortable.
According to the pattern established earlier, night would not fall until midnight. In other words, Xu Lang still had two and a half hours of leisure.
But he did have things to do during those two and a half hours.
First, he ate and drank to maintain his strength, then briefly looked through the chatroom.
That took half an hour.
Afterward, he began his grand shopping plan.
Based on what he had learned the previous night, he could almost confirm that his dormitory door was invincible.
With such impenetrable protection, revealing a little of his wealth no longer mattered.
After several days of fluctuations, the marketplace had gradually returned to normal.
At present, the four resources players needed most were dormitory-door upgrade blueprints, iron, medicine, and water.
Xu Lang had none of the first three, but he had water in abundance.
…
Canned beef—buy!
French bread—buy!
Instant noodles—buy!
Ham sausages—buy!
Empty paper cups—buy!
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Clean female-student uniforms—buy!
Toothpaste—buy!
Buy, buy, buy…
Nearly half the water in Xu Lang’s barrels was gone, replaced by piles of supplies stacked in the corners of the dormitory.
Afterward, he posted a trade listing on the marketplace.
[Seller: Xu Lang]
[Item: 1 liter of water]
[Price: 500 copper coins for 5 portions]
[Quantity: 5 portions]
[Additional information: I’m asleep. Don’t send me private messages. If you want it, buy it directly.]
The price of 500 copper coins was one Xu Lang had settled on after observing the market. Anyone who was not excessively poor could afford it.
At first, the listing did not attract much attention, until someone shouted about it in the chatroom.
In the blink of an eye, all five liters of Xu Lang’s water were sold.
That was not an exaggeration—it happened in an instant!
Water was the scarcest resource at present. Many people had already begun establishing closed-loop systems even if they still possessed some water.
That alone showed how precious water was.
As for copper coins, no one had yet figured out what they were useful for.
The only reason anyone bothered picking them up was that they did not take up inventory space. Otherwise, nobody would have wanted them.
At the same time, large numbers of people added Xu Lang as a friend.
If one calculated carefully, nearly ninety percent of the players had sent Xu Lang a friend request.
The chatroom exploded as well.
[Wang Tingting, Room 186: @Xu Lang, you’re so rich!]
[Zhu Yan, Room 5: @Xu Lang, Brother Lang, tell us—did you awaken some kind of tycoon system?]
[Wu Leiting, Room 112: @Zhu Yan, Lord Lang has lots of supplies, not lots of money. He probably found a hidden resource point.]
[Hang Yan, Room 195: Impossible. I’ve never seen Xu Lang open his door!]
[Wang Yue, Room 148: @Xu Lang, just open the door for me. I’ll come in for an hour and leave afterward. I guarantee you’ll enjoy it. I don’t want much.]
Xu Lang pretended he had seen none of it. He walked over to the water dispenser and pressed a green button on its casing.
In an instant, a consumption notification appeared in his field of vision.
[Copper Coins -100]
Xu Lang kept the green button pressed. Water inside the dispenser continued rising until it was full.
All told, only 1,500 copper coins had been deducted.
Not only had he refilled his water supply, he still had 1,000 copper coins left!
With one transaction leading into the next, he had done practically nothing and still made a fivefold trading profit.
“So this is what it feels like to have a monopoly. Damn, this is great!”
Xu Lang’s eyes shone with excitement.
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