NOVEL NEXT Chapter 9
Chapter 9: Reaping
Before the brutal BOSS battle erupted.
Hang Yu had already received several player death notifications in the Lord’s Hall.
【Player "Zha Jiang Mian" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +14, Abyssal Essence Points +100!】
【Player "Ning Caichen II" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +20, Poisoned Spikes of the Spiked Rabbit +2, Spiked Rabbit Meat +2, Abyssal Essence Points +100!】
【Player "A Sword Comes from the West" has fallen. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +31, Green Giant Frog Slime +4, Abyssal Essence Points +150!】
【……】
Hang Yu: "Eh? Some players have already croaked? That’s faster than I expected!"
Xiao Ba said, "Master, although the magic-corrupted creatures near the territory are only Level 1 or Level 2, they are more than enough to cost the lives of inexperienced and initially weak players!"
Luckily, it was players who died.
Otherwise, the losses would have been too great!
Hang Yu could not help but sigh, "Our human troops may be relatively cheap, but even then, each costs as much as 20 Abyssal Magic Crystals. The small amount of magic crystals I brought would not be able to withstand the attrition during the territory exploration."
But now, it was fine.
No need to tread carefully.
No need to walk on thin ice.
The lives of players cost nothing — just throw them in!
This would not only ensure extremely high exploration efficiency, but also generate generous returns!
The experience points and level drop caused by a player's death were related to their current level and would generally not exceed twenty percent. If there were not enough remaining Abyssal Essence Points, then as much would be dropped as available.
Additionally, all magic stone wealth carried would be lost, and there was a twenty percent chance for items in the backpack to be dropped as well.
What delighted Hang Yu the most was—
Under the strengthening effect of his hidden talent—
Every 1 point of Abyssal Essence exploded from a player’s death would be converted into 5 points for the territory!
Was this even earning?
It was basically a heartless, insane blood-profit!
"For the sake of the territory’s growth, players should die a few more times," Xiao Ba said coldly and ruthlessly.
Hang Yu chuckled, "Didn't expect you, Xiao Ba, to have the makings of a heartless capitalist!"
"The master’s interests are absolute."
Hang Yu said, "In the early stages, we still have to exercise some restraint and not over-exploit. You have to fatten the pig a bit before slaughtering it. These players are way too poor right now; there’s barely any oil to skim."
Players had a set resurrection cooldown.
At first glance, it seemed that this would affect efficiency and profits, but in fact, it was not the case.
First, if deaths and resurrections occurred too frequently in a short period, it might cause damage to the player’s spirit and soul.
Therefore, setting a daily death cap or increasing the interval between deaths was actually a protective mechanism for the players — also a way to ensure sustainable "draining of the pond to catch the fish."
Secondly, players could pay a not-too-expensive amount of Contribution Points to instantly revive. To obtain Contribution Points, they had to engage in "brick-moving" labor: collecting materials and resources for the territory or completing tasks.
Only by continuously recycling Contribution Points and keeping players strapped for resources would they work even harder.
In the long run—
Frequent repeated deaths—
Would inevitably consume a large amount of Contribution Points.
They would then have to find ways to complete tasks and earn more Contribution Points.
Thus, the territory’s benefits would not decrease but instead rise sharply.
As long as Hang Yu controlled the rhythm and scale of issuing and reclaiming Contribution Points, not only could he command players to work and gather resources, but he could also easily obtain materials and assign players to various missions through tasks.
Xiao Ba summarized, "Master, the resources currently recovered are: a total of 450 Abyssal Essence Points, 65 Abyssal Magic Stone Fragments, 4 portions of Green Giant Frog Slime, 2 Poisoned Spikes of the Spiked Rabbit, and 2 portions of Spiked Rabbit Meat."
The Abyssal Essence Points could be used to strengthen himself—
Or used to cultivate soldiers or for other consumptions.
Of course, it could also be used as mission rewards for players.
When players took on missions for the sake of rewards and repeatedly died in high-difficulty tasks, Hang Yu would harvest a large amount of returns from their deaths.
Some of it would be used for personal strengthening or territory construction, and the surplus could be redistributed again through missions...
This was truly a closed-loop cycle — practically a perpetual motion machine!
As for the 110 pieces of Abyssal Magic Stone Fragments, there was nothing much to say.
It took 100 Abyssal Magic Stone Fragments to synthesize one Abyssal Magic Stone, and 10 Abyssal Magic Stones could be refined into one Abyssal Magic Crystal.
Even with the players’ 10x drop rate boost, they had only produced this much!
The value of Abyssal Magic Crystals was evident.
Recruiting units was extremely expensive!
In the early stages, if one did not secure investment or a loan, starting out would be extremely difficult — unless the Lord belonged to a particularly strong race that could manually grind monsters and complete their primitive accumulation.
However, since Hang Yu started as a human, his starting level was too low, and it was inadvisable for him to venture out before his strength grew.
This was also why he had been hiding inside the territory all this time.
Although this bit of magic stone income seemed insignificant for now, as players grew stronger, hunted increasingly powerful monsters, or as the player population expanded, the income generated would become an unimaginable number.
As for the remaining three items, they all belonged to the resource category.
Among them, the Slime and Poisoned Spikes were materials, mainly used to craft equipment, tools, or consumables.
In addition to that, there was another use — they could be thrown into the Lord Core for conversion, thereby obtaining the basic materials needed to build the territory.
These two materials were of little use.
Hang Yu tossed them into the Lord Core.
【You have converted "Green Giant Frog Slime" ×4, "Poisoned Spikes of the Spiked Rabbit" ×2, and obtained "Tier 1 Common Material Essence" ×6!】
This "Material Essence" was the basic material consumed for constructing the territory.
Normally, it could only be obtained through material conversion — Tier 1 materials could be converted into Tier 1 essence, Tier 2 materials into Tier 2 essence, and so on.
This amount of materials—
Was, of course, far from enough!
Hang Yu summoned the Lord Panel.
In the 【Territory Construction】 option, there were sub-options like 【Building Construction】 and 【Building Upgrade】.
Hang Yu opened Building Construction, and saw a list of initial human buildings displayed before him.
————
【Territory Canteen】, construction cost: 100 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 200 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 0/2.
【Forging Workshop】, construction cost: 400 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 500 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 0/1.
【Alchemy Workshop】, construction cost: 300 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 400 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 0/1.
…………
【Trading Hall】, construction cost: 200 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 500 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 0/1.
【Abyss Barracks】, construction cost: 500 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 2000 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 4/4.
【Stars Teleportation Station】, construction cost: 3000 Abyssal Magic Crystals, 10000 units of Tier 1 Material Essence, current buildable amount: 0/1.
————
There were sixteen types of basic buildings for a human territory, covering all fundamental needs such as food, drink, excretion, production, and skill learning.
As long as the corresponding fees were paid, construction could proceed.
Each building for an Abyss Lord possessed special abilities.
Besides these basic buildings, special building blueprints or blueprints for other race-specific buildings could also be obtained during map exploration or battles against other Lords, enriching the troops and strength of the territory.
Whether it was building new structures—
Or upgrading existing ones—
Both required large amounts of funding and materials.
At present, Hang Yu had enough funds for the time being, but he severely lacked Material Essence.
This was why he issued collection tasks, urging players to go out and hunt monsters to obtain materials.
At this moment—
Hang Yu noticed—
Players like Black-Eyed Rui Ge, Ye Li Meng, and Chimera Wraith were performing quite well.
Not only had they successfully hunted a large number of wild monsters, but they had also leveled up to Level 2 and then teamed up to challenge a Snake-Tailed Flame Chicken.
Hang Yu immediately burst into laughter.
The Snake-Tailed Flame Chicken was a Level 3 Elite monster.
Players clearly lacked understanding of the dangers of the Abyss World!
The strength evaluation of Abyssal creatures mainly followed two criteria: Level and Rank.
The Stars divided Abyssal creatures into ten ranks. Even if monsters were of the same level, due to differences in rank, there would be vast disparities in strength.
There were many naming conventions for these ten ranks.
To make it easier for players to understand, Hang Yu had Xiao Ba redefine the monster ranks, from low to high, as: Common, Elite, Commander, Overlord, Monarch, Emperor, Master, Epic, Legendary, Mythical, and Unknowable.
Although the Snake-Tailed Flame Chicken was just a Level 3 Elite, in terms of strength, it would not lose to a Level 8 or Level 9 Common monster.
Given the players' current strength, they had almost no chance of victory.
As expected!
【Player "Black-Eyed Rui Ge" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +140, Abyssal Essence Points +250, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Feather +6, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Meat +8!】
【Player "Street Slayer" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +122, Abyssal Essence Points +250, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Feather +9, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Meat +4!】
【Player "Chimera Wraith" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +117, Abyssal Essence Points +250, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Feather +8, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Meat +5!】
【……】
【Player "Ye Li Meng" has died. Abyssal Magic Stone Fragment +125, Abyssal Essence Points +250, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Feather +7, Snake-Tailed Mountain Chicken Meat +6!】
"All eight players have been wiped out!" Xiao Ba reported: "Congratulations, Master! You have obtained 2000 points of Abyssal Essence, along with 1123 Abyssal Magic Stone Fragments, 63 material items, and 41 food items."
Not bad.
It was a bountiful harvest.
The current total income was 2450 Abyssal Essence Points and 1188 Abyssal Magic Stone Fragments.
Hang Yu first converted all the materials, and now the territory’s reserves of Material Essence had reached 69 units.
He said with satisfaction, "It’s only been about eight hours since the game started. At this rate, all the supporting facilities will be built in no time. With these players who are so eager to get themselves killed, how can the grand cause possibly fail!"