Chapter 138: Explode Through the Heavens!!

Nie Yan walked up and picked up the equipment dropped by the scaled frog. It was a level 30 mage’s golden staff, and additionally, a mid-tier potion formula had also dropped.

Elemental Convergence Potion: After drinking this potion, the casting time of elemental magic skills is reduced by 10%. Required ingredients: Wind Spirit Grass, Coagulant Potion, Decomposition Potion, Mercury.

This Elemental Convergence Potion could be crafted by mid-tier alchemists. If successfully produced, each bottle should sell for more than two silver coins. At the current level, this price was quite expensive. Nie Yan had granted permission to BirdNoEgg, who had already taken the potion formulas dropped by the Ghoul Overseer from Nie Yan’s personal warehouse. BirdNoEgg had likely already crafted some potions and begun listing them for sale.

Dropping a good potion formula often brought huge economic benefits to an apothecary and could attract a large influx of customers, boosting the sales of other potions as well. Nie Yan frequently farmed monsters above his level, obtaining formulas that were mostly unavailable on the market.

Nie Yan put the mid-tier potion formula into his inventory and tossed the golden staff to Tang Yao.

Tang Yao’s voice chat activated. He frowned slightly, and a very cutesy female voice came through.

“Yaozi Ge-ge, will you take me leveling?”

“I’m currently farming monsters in a level 50 area. I’m busy,” Tang Yao declined, surprisingly immune to the charm usually directed his way.

“Yaozi Ge-ge, is leveling fast in the level 50 area? Take me with you, please.”

“I told you I’m busy.” Tang Yao abruptly ended the voice chat. Life was lonely. Back when he had said he was leveling in a level 20s area, nobody believed him. Now that he was on the leaderboard, claiming to be in a level 50 area still attracted a crowd. How opportunistic! Tang Yao remained rational toward these women. He enjoyed teasing them when he had free time, but he would never invest serious effort in them.

That was just Tang Yao’s personality.

As childhood friends, Nie Yan knew Tang Yao well. Although Tang Yao appeared flirtatious, he was definitely not the type to lose his head over every woman. This had been true in his past life, and likely remained so in this one.

Whistling, Tang Yao logged into the leaderboard and felt a sense of relief. Players from Yu Lan eagerly asked how he was leveling up so quickly. Tang Yao replied that he was grinding monsters with Nie Yan, after which they no longer found it surprising. In their eyes, Nie Yan was simply beyond ordinary understanding, and they couldn’t help but envy Tang Yao.

After leveling up, Tang Yao’s damage output against scaled frogs became increasingly noticeable.

Flames danced, and another elite scaled frog fell. Nie Yan checked his experience points, finding he was just a hair away from level 13. Since he received more experience than Nie Yan, Tang Yao’s experience gradually surpassed Nie Yan’s. Nie Yan couldn’t help but sigh; mages leveled faster than rogues, even when in a party. Although red-name players received extra experience from scaled frogs, Nie Yan’s share still couldn’t match Tang Yao’s.

After killing three elite scaled frogs, which would respawn only the next morning, Nie Yan and Tang Yao continued farming sub-elites, their experience soaring.

“I haven’t dropped what I’m looking for yet.”

“What are you after?”

“This place drops the Maniac Medal, an accessory that only drops when you’re red-name. If you clear your red-name, you won’t have a chance anymore.”

“Maniac Medal? What does it do?”

“The Maniac Medal is the best accessory at early levels, providing various attribute bonuses,” Nie Yan explained. Having it would make leveling or PvP much easier.

Nie Yan’s equipment wasn’t good enough yet, nor did he have many skills, largely due to his limited dungeon runs. Therefore, he sought out rare items to enhance his attributes.

Tang Yao’s rapid leveling attracted considerable attention. He had just entered the Top 10 leaderboard when he quickly gained another level, then another. By the time he was about to log off, Tang Yao had reached level 14, nearly catching up to the leaderboard’s #1, Po Tian. Nie Yan also reached level 14, though his level wasn’t displayed.

The entire Granland Empire buzzed with discussion.

“This Yaozi must be on some kind of performance-enhancing pill. His leveling is insane!”

“At this rate, he’ll soon overtake Kaixuan’s leader, Po Tian.”

“Go Yaozi! Take down Po Tian!”

Such a meteoric rise in level was truly terrifying.

Although Kaixuan was a wealthy and powerful guild with extensive connections, they had often cleared out areas for exclusive training sessions while leveling, acting too arrogantly and provoking resentment among many players. Thus, many still supported Tang Yao.

Kaixuan was also busy on their end. Under Po Tian’s orders, some guild members began investigating who this “Yaozi” was. However, since this Yaozi had no prior reputation and his sudden level surge was likely just luck—perhaps finding a good farming spot—Po Tian didn’t take him seriously. Once this hype died down, if Yaozi lacked real strength, his level would surely drop again. What was there to worry about? Currently, nobody could shake Kaixuan’s dominance, nor Po Tian’s. Being #1 in level didn’t equate to being the strongest.

In Po Tian’s eyes, his rivals were players like Ban Xing Hu Li and Ai Qing Sha Shang, and a few others, but definitely not some “Yaozi”!

After defeating the last scaled frog, just short of level 15, Tang Yao and Nie Yan stopped. The game would shut down in half an hour.

“I need to go to Carol first. It’s too dangerous here for you alone. Log off now and meet me here tomorrow when you log back on.”

“Okay. Do you have any plans after logging off today?” Tang Yao asked.

“No, why?”

“A few old middle school buddies want to hang out. They also play Faith. If we’re going to form a guild, we can invite them too.” Tang Yao explained. They had been close friends since middle school, often joking around, and still kept in touch occasionally even after high school.

Nie Yan thought for a moment and replied, “Sure, going out to hang out sounds fine.” Recalling those carefree middle school days brought back nostalgic memories.

“I’ll call you tomorrow. I’m logging off first.”

“Bye.”

Tang Yao logged off, his figure gradually fading away. Nie Yan used a recall scroll, a streak of white light flashing as he returned to Carol City. His backpack was now full of equipment. However, most of it was level 30 gear, which couldn’t be sold now. Nie Yan planned to use all the loot to stock the guild warehouse. Players seeing a large stock of high-level silver and golden equipment in the guild warehouse would surely have no doubts about the guild’s strength.

After tidying up his personal warehouse, sorting gems and other miscellaneous items, Nie Yan headed toward Starry Pharmacy. It had been a while since he last checked in on the pharmacy’s operations—he wondered how things were going.

Nie Yan’s first impression upon entering Starry Pharmacy was the crowd. It was packed, with a constant flow of customers, especially with the game about to shut down soon, making the crowd even denser.

Glancing at the pharmacy shelves, BirdNoEgg had done a commendable job. The shelves were filled with a dazzling array of potions—most common potions were available, and even some rarer ones were sold in specialty counters.

BirdNoEgg came downstairs and spotted Nie Yan in the crowd, quickly sending him a private message. “Boss, you’re here.”

“How’s everything going? Seems like business is booming,” Nie Yan remarked, checking the pharmacy’s financial records. He was shocked to see the revenue had already reached 56 gold coins. The pharmacy’s profit margin was substantial, practically daily income in the form of gold coins. This was largely due to the popularity of the Petrification Resistance Potion, which accounted for a significant portion of sales.

“Operations are going smoothly. We’ve recruited more alchemists these days. Currently, the pharmacy has 27 junior alchemists and 131 alchemy apprentices. Our upstairs lab is already insufficient. Plus, the storefront is too small; some players can’t even squeeze in,” BirdNoEgg said with a troubled tone.

Upgrading a level 3 shop required 20 gold coins. Nie Yan considered upgrading the pharmacy and using the remaining funds to acquire one or two prime gold plots in other cities.

Many plots in Carol City had already been purchased. Although some remained, their appreciation potential was limited. Buying those wouldn’t be worth much in the future. Good steel should be used on the blade—better to invest in other cities.

“I heard nearby guilds like Kaixuan, Guang Ming Sheng Yan, and Sheng Cai Zhe have opened pharmacies too, but they’re still level 1 shops with few alchemists and not many customers,” BirdNoEgg proudly added. Despite being major guilds, their pharmacies were still in early development stages, while their pharmacy had already surged ahead of the player community.

“Keep an eye on your alchemists’ movements. Watch out for poaching attempts,” Nie Yan warned. It wouldn’t be worth it if their painstakingly trained alchemists were lured away.

“Yeah, I’ve noticed. I’ve signed exclusive agreements with the alchemists upstairs. If they jump ship to other pharmacies, they must pay more than five times the compensation. We’ve invested so much in them; the compensation alone would scare them off,” BirdNoEgg showed his business acumen.

“I’ll go upgrade the shop,” Nie Yan said. Since BirdNoEgg had already thought of everything, he had little to worry about.

System: Do you wish to upgrade your shop to level 3? This upgrade will cost 20 gold coins.

Yes!

System: Shop upgrade successful.

Starry Pharmacy rapidly expanded, more than doubling in size and becoming a three-story building. The second floor was reserved for alchemist laboratories, the third for storage, and the storefront became significantly more spacious. The hall could now be described as grand and luxurious.

With Starry Pharmacy’s rapid expansion, it would quickly capture the market in Carol City, seizing potion sales market share and becoming the industry leader.