Chapter 159 158 Mrs. Tris’s Otherworlder Observation Journal, Issue 1

Chapter 159: 158 Mrs. Tris’s Otherworlder Observation Log – Issue 1

It was already noon the next day when the players who had gone to the border city of Batasin to do a quest and experienced the “Batasin Massacre” drove their carriages as fast as they could all the way back to the Scarlet Fortress.

By the time they got off the wagon at the camp, the number of players who had completed the Black Iron Trial had already exceeded seven.

Aside from Little Reed Name, they were all old brothers from the Happy Stick team.

It was obvious that the crafty Happy Stick had already developed a set of “playing methods” that had an extremely high success rate.

At this moment, the only factor limiting level 10 players from completing the Black Iron Trial was no longer their personal strength and skill, but rather the fact that the stock of Burning Oil in Tris’s Alchemy Hut was already in danger.

After all, now that Tris was the honorable Archduke of the Blood Vulture Clan, dealing with clan affairs every day had already taken up some of her time, and coupled with Tris’s stubborn refusal to work overtime, this had resulted in her Alchemy Hut not preparing any new goods for several days.

Little Reed Name and Happy Stick’s Raiders had played a rather marvelous role in pushing the envelope at this point.

Since both the Vampire Elegy bullets used by the gunners and the kerosene demanded by the melee fighters came from the alchemists, the alchemy hut was practically bursting at the seams with players after some great cleverness pointed this out.

The scene startled the salesmen that Tris had hired specifically for the occasion.

Rushing to send a message to the Blood Wyvern Cloisters, saying that Lord Murphy’s warriors had been lining up to purchase Alchemy Kerosene, purchasing in very large quantities, the scene was very scary, and even more so, no one knew what these warriors were planning to do with hoarding so much incendiary kerosene that was enough for the ruins to burn all over again.

But it always felt a little scary.

After Murphy learned of this “little anecdote”, he couldn’t help but have a moment of silence for the ghoul leaders in the sewers of the ruins of Cadman City.

He can already predict that in the next long period of time, those elite ghouls born in the disaster will be ranked at the top of the “player’s favorite monster” list, until the next unlucky person’s targeted tactics are developed.

However, Murphy did not intend to intervene in such a hot situation.

The reason was simple.

Although Happy Stick claimed on the forums that the fighting method he had developed was stuck with a bug, in Murphy’s opinion, it wasn’t actually considered a bug.

After all, in the continent’s long-popular ritual of the Black Iron Trial, there was also no explicit rejection of the trialists not being able to accept help from others before starting the battle; in fact, the sole focus of the Black Iron Trial was only on experiencing tough battles and opening up hidden potentials, not victory itself.

From this perspective, there is no problem at all with Happy Stick’s strategy.

Not to mention, if you’re really a rookie player, even if you’ve bought kerosene and successfully seduced the elites to step into the trap, it’s honestly hard for you to handle the next part of the physical sparring session by yourself, and no matter how much you weakened the Black Iron rank elite creatures, they’re still extremely dangerous for the professionals.

Therefore, Murphy will only feel that his little players finally understand the game, and will not be targeted to “fix” this bug.

However, it is clear that there are other people who are very unhappy about this.

For example, His Excellency the Blood Vulture, who is now in Murphy’s office, is “throwing a fit”.

“You! I order you to take care of your warriors! It is up to me, the shopkeeper, to decide when my little store opens, what to sell, and how much to sell! Why should I have to work overtime to prepare incendiary kerosene and bullets for them to use in vampire hunting?

I’m a vampire myself, okay? It’s like asking me to sell the noose that will hang me! I won’t do it!

The other matriarchs will snicker at me if this gets out!

I can’t afford to lose face!

You get rid of them at once, the little girls I hired are frightened by them!”

Tris fiercely slapped the table and yelled at Murphy.

It was obvious that she was in an annoyed mood because the hot business over at the Alchemy Hut was directly affecting His Excellency the Grand Duke’s time to touch the fish.

Murphy maintained the elegant posture of a beautiful man and listened to Tris’s complaints, then he interlaced his fingers and propped his chin, smiling:
“But my warriors also purchased the kerosene in order to clear the threat in the sewers faster, and as you know, Your Excellency the Grand Duke, without weakening the number of ghouls in the city’s sewers to a certain level, our large-scale construction for the Ruined Strip cannot be put on the agenda.

I even have to praise them for doing a good job and knowing how to utilize the flames to fight the evil spirits.

Don’t you wish to see the people under your command return to productive life more quickly, Your Excellency the Grand Duke? Don’t you feel gratified by the ingenuity and battle wisdom of your reserve clansmen?”

“But I don’t have that much time to make kerosene for them! That stuff is simple in principle, but it’s such a waste of time to prepare.”

Tris was not in a position to refute Murphy on such “absolutely correct” grounds, and with a twinkle in her eye, she decided to use “magic against magic”, so she huffed and puffed:
“Moreover, I am still the Grand Duke of the Blood Vulture, I have to deal with the internal affairs of the clan, I am so dedicated to my work, do you want me to put aside my duties to the clan, and go and take care of the logistics for your warriors? That’s not right, is it?
You see, there will soon be a group of Blood Vulture members returning to our clan.

I still have to calm them down, ask them for more details, as well as confirm if that ‘Duchess Cecilia’ really exists and who she is now.

That’s right!

That’s what the Blood Vulture Archduke should do!

Instead of hiding in an alchemy hut, preparing some damn kerosene like a pathetic, crushed apprentice laborer!”

The more Tris said, the more she felt justified.

Her tone strengthened in vain, and she proudly tilted her head to Murphy:

“So, I order you as the matriarch to get this done as soon as possible!”

“Actually, this matter is very easy to settle.”

Murphy looked at Tris with a subtle look as he coughed:
“There are also people in my warriors who are curious about alchemy, like Pigeon Treasure, isn’t he already an apprentice alchemist?

As long as our great Blood Vulture Archduke is willing to spare ten minutes a day to instruct them, I believe that not only can we quickly solve the problem of the shortage of kerosene and special ammunition, even the business of your private property, that is, that alchemy hut, will also become better and better.

Then you would have more money to spend on your favorite wine collection instead of relying on the poor patriarch’s stipend.

As I’ve said before, we need to learn to use my warriors properly in the right way, Tris, and you don’t want to let go of such a good workforce.”

“Okay, okay, I get it.”

Tris waved her hand to interrupt Murphy’s preaching, she had to admit that Murphy’s ghost idea was really good.

Alchemy Fire Oil and Vampire’s Elegy were not considered high-end alchemy, even so simple that any apprentice alchemist could handle them, it was just a matter of spending a little more time.

With the enthusiasm and learning ability of the small players, she really only needed her casual nudges to help her run her small store.

It really was a win-win
No, a triple win!

Tris’s troubles were solved, the small players got a steady supply of alchemical items to pass the Black Iron Trials faster and better, and Murphy got the first batch of player alchemists.

Everyone would be happy, except for the elite ghouls in the sewers.

But considering the ghouls had no brains, their opinions never mattered.

Wild monsters!
Especially feral monsters that lit up their blood bars and were bountied by quests had always had no human rights!

“Snap!”

Tris, who was ready to go forward to “solve the problem”, took out a box from her psychic bag and threw it in front of Murphy’s eyes, she waved her hand and said:

“You’ve got what you asked for, but I’m only going to help you this once, as a Summoner, you’ll have to learn to make your own knuckle staff or hunting whip.

And although the summoner’s profession focuses on summoning objects, but its own also belongs to the category of psychic masters, the spells that psychic masters can use summoners can basically learn, so nothing to see more of that handbook I gave you.

Don’t you like to test your little players?

I’m going to give you a test too after a while, if you can’t pass it huh.”

“Wait!”

Murphy suddenly narrowed his eyes as he stood up and looked at Tris, asking:
“Where did you learn the word ‘player’? I’m pretty sure I’ve never said that word in front of you, who taught you? I know you’ve been stealing their language, but are you actually able to understand the meaning of the word now?”

“Ch.” Tris blushed slightly, but quickly grasped her mind.

She reached out and placed her hands on her waist to maintain the movement of leaving, and made another weird and flavorful high turn back, staring at Murphy with a subtle expression, and replied in the increasingly skillful, but still with a bit of an accent, Mandarin:
“You don’t really think that complex otherworldly language would be an insurmountable learning challenge for a Spiritual Energy Master like me, do you? Little Murphy, not only do I know that they call themselves players and refer to us as ‘Enphysi’.

I also know exactly what the hell our world looks like to them”

“Oh?”

Murphy was immediately interested.

He walked up and poked his head out to look around, and after confirming that there was no one else around the office, he closed the door to the room, looked back at Tris, and said:

“Why don’t you take this opportunity to introduce me to your research results on the players, Tris.”

“Just a moment, I’ll send a quest to them first.”

Tris pinched her arithmetic jewel and moved skillfully to weave on it what she wanted to convey, then used the translation function to complete the translation.

Click to send.

The treasure beads she and Miriam and the other NPCs with administrative functions used were specifically placed under permissions, and were in the middle of the permissions tree in the matrix currently made up of arithmetic treasure beads, which allowed them to send quests to the players but again, needed to be vetted by Murphy.

Therefore, before the small reed name that Murphy a day what what business not to do in fact is not correct, Murphy a day have a lot of time are spent in the review of the content of these tasks and to do a weak modification on.

For example, Murphy slightly modified a few grammatical errors in the quest written by Tris, and then issued it.

Next to him, Tris was playing with the arithmetic pearl in her hand, carefully learning the process of writing the quest pattern, and then received the drink with ice handed over by Murphy, which was the local flavor that Murphy had specially brought to Tris on his return from his “business trip” to Batasin City.

“Well, the quality of this drink is not bad, where did you get it?”

Tris asked with a wink:

“It’s the Ice and Fire wine from the Yankee side, and it’s good and excellent, I haven’t had the good stuff in years.”

“The representative of the Thorn Clan stocked a batch for his master, I brought it back by the way, it will be delivered to your room in a while, along with a few casks of ‘Frozen Moonshine’ specially supplied by the royal family. You don’t want to drink it all in one gulp, save it to savor slowly.”

Murphy waved his hand and leaned against the classical style desk, looking at Tris and waiting for her answer.

In turn, Tris organized her words and spoke:

“Your warriors.
Those cute and innocent and mouthy little players seem to think that all of us ‘offworlders’ are controlled by a mysterious force called the ‘Development Team’. They stubbornly believe that we, and the world as a whole, are illusory, projections built on some bizarre system.

And that it is all a creation of that particular power called the ‘Development Team’.

This sounds a lot like the concept of a ‘creator god’ that is preached in some traditional mythologies, but it’s different, and at the very least the smaller players have no respect for the ‘Development Team’ as a creator god.

Several times I heard them privately scolding one of the ‘dog planners’ in the ‘development team’ for not doing his job, which, I guess, is one of the gods they perceive as being responsible for bringing down luck and making the rules of the world.

Secondly, small players are smart.

The caliber of their thinking is much more active than most of the civilians in this land and even in this world.

They must have gone through large-scale systematic high level education, and the most terrifying thing is that every single one of them is like that, which is proof enough that the civilization they are in has developed to an extremely high level, and I can’t even imagine that civilization’s posture.

But as intelligent as they were, they had a rather peculiar kind of ‘misguided thinking’.

They seem to think that all their strange behaviors will be ignored by the otherworldly people, so in front of us they always don’t hide their true thoughts, and thus come across as very honest.

Even frank to the point of being overly so…”

Speaking of this, Tris gave a strange smile as she said to Murphy:
“Your warriors would even be in front of Adele to comment on her figure, and it’s just as well that Adele can’t understand, otherwise she would be very annoyed by it. Of course, they would have done the same to me.

But I don’t spoil them.

If they dare to make a yellow noise, they go straight to the silencing technique, and that’s something they’ve learned over time.”

“They always do.”

Murphy was nonplussed by this, shrugging his shoulders:

“It’s weirdly embarrassing every time they compliment me on my handsomeness, but I know it’s coming from their hearts, so I’ll take it all in stride. Anything else? About your ‘Otherworlder Observation Log’.”

“Yes!”

Tris said as she toyed with her wine glass:

“As I said earlier, they must have come from a very old civilization!

As I studied their language, the deeper I got into it the more I could sense that some of the everyday phrases they used contained simple but practical wisdom, and I have a feeling that the stage of civilization that our world is currently at is one in which similar references can be found in the history of their world!

They call it the ‘Middle Ages’.

Admittedly, while it’s true that the huge influencing factor of psychic energy doesn’t exist in their world, the overall progress of civilization is much higher than ours.

It makes me more and more curious about their world
Murphy, you were the first ‘native’ to come into contact with them, aren’t you curious about all this?”

“I certainly have explored it.”

Murphy lowered his head and picked up his own glass to hide the change in his expression at that moment, he took a sip of his drink and raised his head back up, addressing Tris:
“But I don’t want to disrupt their current perception of our world, Tris, so I’m asking you, at this stage, to only maintain this private observation rather than initiate a civilized conversation with them across worlds.”

“Why?”

Tris said with a raised eyebrow:
“If they knew that this was all true, I believe that the truly adventurous warriors amongst their vast collective alone would instead be more enthusiastic…”

“As you said, their civilization is thousands of years more advanced than our world, and that means that my warriors have a power of control on their side of the world that we can’t imagine! Tris. A game of spiritually distant travel and ‘otherworldly contact’ in the true sense of the word are two concepts in the eyes of the Higher Powers.

This is the same in any world.

And I don’t want to cause my cute little players to be in unnecessary danger in their world because of me.

That’s my bottom line!”

Murphy interrupted Tris’s question as he persuaded:
“Moreover, I think you’re underestimating the significance represented behind this matter, I mean, we’re facing an atheistic otherworld whose strength is like that of a god compared to us! I think we ‘otherworldly forerunners’ should be a bit more cautious about any contact with that side, no matter which way we look at it, don’t you think?
I’ve even heard the small players mention a weapon over there before when they were joking around verbally .
It’s said that that kind of weapon can instantly wipe out a country the size of Transylvania with just one, easily exterminating millions of people while at the same time rendering the land incapable of giving birth to any life for hundreds of years.

Isn’t that more threatening than the so-called divine magic?”

Murphy put on a serious stance to scare Tris and said:
“According to the small players, the number of weapons like that on their side is counted in units of ‘10,000’, and their state apparatus can create more extinction weapons at an extremely fast speed whenever the need arises.

The conventional power in their hands alone is also something we can’t fight against!
Can you imagine making tens of thousands of tons of steel soar into the sky without relying on psychic energy? Being able to make artifacts fly out of the world into the sea of stars and get a close-up view of those stars?
They can create temperatures in the tens of thousands of degrees, as well as simulate absolute zero in the true sense of the word!
And I’ve heard that their cutting-edge technology has been able to master the mystery of molding a sun from nothing, albeit for only ten seconds or so
The most terrifying thing is that their world has nearly 10 billion people and can support as many people as the gravel of the star ocean! Our world has less than one tenth of that number, even counting the inhabitants of the New World and the sea.

Tris!

You think you know, but you don’t understand what kind of power you’re dealing with!

The forces that exist behind my little players clearly wield a greatness that rivals that of the gods and changes the heavens, and I don’t doubt that my warriors would joke around about such things.

Even if only a third of what they said was true, that would mean we were defenseless against them.

Therefore, Tris, we must be cautious.”

He stepped forward and reached out to place a hand on Tris’ shoulder, staring into her sultry eyes:
“We have enough trouble on our hands, please don’t make it more difficult for the both of us, okay? I’m begging you.”

(End of chapter)