Chapter 170.1: Doctor and Bounty Hunter

[Server announcement:

The LD-47 rifle's stats has been adjusted, and it has now been launched at the outpost Weapon Shop. Players who have won the lottery before should ask Boss Xia for the collection of your equipment. LD-47s semi-automatic precision shooter model will be launched tomorrow, so stay tuned.

]

Hearing that there were new weapons in the Weapon Shop, players near the outpost gathered together, but most of them dispersed after a while.

The weapon itself was not expensive, 200 silver coins was only twice as expensive as an iron-barreled rifle, but bullets were the problem.

With the price tag of 1 silver coin per bullet, a magazine with 30 rounds would cost 30 silver coins! Newbies who had just entered the game couldn't afford it at all.

Moreover, the Sickle assault rifle was different from the iron-barreled rifle. The structure of the latter's receiver was extremely simple. In theory, as long as the caliber was matched, it could be used whether it was a coiled bullet or a punching bullet. In addition, if the smokeless powder was not enough, even black powder could be used.

Looking at the shelves of the weapon store, those newbies sighed one after another.

"Damn it! It's too expensive!"

"Sigh, let's focus on leveling up first."

"Indeed, you can only receive missions with higher rewards if you have a higher level. This kind of automatic weapon is too difficult to maintain in the early stages!"

Chu Guang was not at the outpost. At about 2:00 in the afternoon, he took the truck to Longevity Town.

When he arrived, many players had returned from the Elm District with their prey, and were handing in their prey to Luca to complete their missions.

Recently, Longevity Town was short of food, so hunting missions were very profitable.

The base income of hyenas has been increased from 5 silver coins to 8 silver coins, and the snow wolf with more valuable fur has been increased from 10 silver coins to 15 silver coins, which was higher than the deers passing through the northern suburbs of Clearspring City some time ago!

In addition, there was regional prestige that could be obtained.

Many Lifestyle Profession players, who were eager to set up factories and were not short of money, squatted directly at the intersection of Elm District, bought prey from hunters at high prices, and then brought them to the warehouse to complete the missions, which was equivalent to spending money to buy prestige and contribution points.

It was at least 10 kilometers from Elm District to Longevity Town. Those players who liked hunting could also save their time from the round trips and focus more on their jobs.

As long as the price was acceptable, having a little less contribution or regional prestige wouldn't be a problem.

Most Combat Profession players did not need regional prestige, and farming contribution points was enough for them.

𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

By noon, 15 mutated snow wolves and 21 mutated hyenas had been hung on the wooden shelves at the door of the warehouse.

The former had an average weight of over 40 kilograms, while the latter was around 30 kilograms. The meat extraction rate was almost 40% or so, which would add up to nearly 500 kilograms of raw meat.

At this rate, within two days, the players would be able to eat everything in the Elm District...

Luca, who was standing at the door of the warehouse, was very busy.

When he saw the administrator approaching, he immediately greeted him and said, "Sir, we need to hire two more butchers to handle the corpses of all the prey they brought back!”

"I've also released the mission on the VM, but... No one is applying," Luca said with an embarrassed expression. "I've increased the hourly rate from 1 silver coin to 2 silver coins, but still not many people are interested."

Every mission and position had a benchmark value, such as the butcher's hourly wage was 1 silver coin, and then they would get a cut of every game they slaughtered. When an NPC published a mission, they would formulate the mission reward according to the benchmark value, and could adjust it according to the priority of the demand. The authority of Luca was that he could double the base value.

But even so, no one came to apply for the job...

As soon as Chu Guang heard what happened, he immediately understood what the problem was.

Most of the players from Alpha 0.8 version were in the novice village, which was the outpost.

The hourly salary of 1 silver coin plus contribution points was significant for new players below LV5, but it was a meager amount for old players who had just experienced the expansion.

In particular, slaughtering required skills. Not everyone could use knives as skillfully as Tomato Eggs and waste as little edible meat as possible.

"It's okay. If no players are willing to do these tasks, we can find someone among the refugees outside to do it. I plan to go to the refugee camp in a while, you can come with me."

Although not trusting those refugees, Luca didn't say anything after Chu Guang gave the order, and nodded respectfully. "Yes, sir."

Just as Chu Guang brought Luca and two guards and headed towards the east gate, the situation in the refugee camp didn’t look too optimistic.

Looking at the old man curled up in the shack with a sickly appearance and coughing from time to time, Jiu Li's face was full of worry.

That was the fourth person he had seen that day.

Even if he was not a doctor, he could still see that the condition of the old man was not very optimistic.

"They are sick, most likely from typhoid fever," the thin man standing next to Jiu Li reminded, "If we don't deal with it as soon as possible, it will be very troublesome."

His name was Jiu Xun, Jiu Li's younger brother and also his helper.

Before, he was actually called Xun, but since his older brother was given a name by the ruler, he changed his name accordingly, which was regarded as adapting to the local culture.

Jiu Li fell into silence and said after a while, "We can't drive them out of here."

"We have no choice. We have no medicine and no doctors. They won't make it." Jiu Xun tried to persuade, "We have already lost half of our people before we get here! Are we going to sacrifice another half for those dying old men?"

"Who are you calling a dying old man?!"

Accompanied by an angry voice from the side, a burly man walked out of the crowd. He grabbed Jiu Xun by the collar, stared at him and questioned, "What do you want to do to my father?!"

The man was called Sun Cheng. He was a butcher from a small village of a hundred people in the middle of the River Valley Province.

Due to marauders' looting, he had to leave his hometown with his fellow villagers, abandoning his burnt homeland, and braved the cold winter to migrate south, looking for a chance to survive.

Like many people here, they joined this group halfway. And in order to get there, they, like these people, paid a heavy price.

For the sake of a bowl of hot porridge the night before, he handed over his gun under Jiu Li’s persuasion.

Sun Cheng originally thought that everything was worth it.

Earlier, when he was picking up firewood outside, he heard that there was a bunch of people in front of his shack.

Guessing that something bad happened, Sun Cheng immediately left his work and rushed back.

Coincidentally, as soon as he got back, he heard what Jiu Xun said, and he was enraged to the point that he almost wanted to tear the person in front of him to pieces.

Jiu Xun was silent and looked at him blankly. He let Sun Cheng grab him by the collar at will, but his right hand had already touched the dagger in his pocket.

Seeing that the argument was about to get physical, a few people immediately stood up in the crowd.

Some people stood behind Jiu Xun, and some stood behind Sun Cheng; the two groups of people were glaring at each other angrily.

The atmosphere at the scene was extremely tense!

However, there were obviously more helpers on Jiu Xun's side, and almost all of them were armed.

Knowing that if there was a conflict, it would definitely be his side that suffered, Sun Cheng let go of his grip on Jiu Xun's collar and looked at Jiu Li next to him. "I see it now, you guys want to break your promise."

Jiu Li also looked at him. "I never said that."

"Never said that?" Sun Cheng smiled coldly. "I know what you said just now, and everyone around you also heard it. Do you need me to repeat it?"

Jiu Li looked at him calmly and said, "I apologize for my brother's thoughtless remarks, I never said I would give up on anyone, nor did I intend to. Now that someone is sick, and to prevent the spread of the plague, we must separate the sick from the healthy. We got here because of unity, didn't we?"

"Unity? Getting rid of my father while I was away is called unity? You forgot who covered you when crossing the snowy land?! I see it clearly now, you only care about yourself!" Sun Cheng raised his chin and stared at him. "My father will not go anywhere, and I will take care of him myself. If you want to take him away, you have to do it over my dead body!"

The situation was in a deadlock.