章 24: Chapter 24: Upgrading Potions
Qin Ming, holding four white treasure chests, immediately began the fusion process. After combining them, he upgraded them into a single blue treasure chest. Without hesitation, he opened all three chests he had in hand, and they generously rewarded him with three pieces of loot.
Item 1: The Butcher's Cozy Shirt
Quality: Blue Shirt (Plot Equipment)
Effect: +5 Strength, +5 Constitution
Description: A shirt meticulously crafted from dinosaur leather. You deserve it.
Item 2: Dinosaur Gene Serum (Constitution)
Quality: Common Silver Consumable
Effect: Permanently increases Constitution by 5 points (Dinosaur serums can only be injected once).
Description: A high-quality serum only available to upper-level poachers. The quality is guaranteed.
Item 3: Inferior Dinosaur Gene Serum (Strength)
Category: Blue Consumable
Effect: Permanently increases Strength by 3 points.
Description: Strange? Due to its poor effectiveness, this substandard gene serum is usually given to elite lackeys as a reward. Why is it blue quality?
Three items—a piece of equipment and two potions—all top-tier items.
Especially the two potions. Although the attribute boosts they provided weren't as high as the increases from equipment, equipment could always be replaced, whereas permanent attribute boosts were, well, permanent and never went away.
This type of consumable, which could increase attributes forever, was worth far more than items of the same level.
Staring at the three items on the table, Qin Ming rubbed his chin and furrowed his brows. After a moment of consideration, he came to a decision.
Between the two potions, he decided to use the silver-quality one that boosted Constitution—not because it had a higher grade but because Constitution was simply more valuable for survival.
As for attack power, Qin Ming already had his trusty revolver. A gun's damage is fixed; it wouldn't increase with higher Strength. At this stage, increasing his Strength wasn't necessary, especially since he already had a title that boosted his Strength by 10 points. Strength wasn't something he lacked.
Given the current situation, raising his Constitution to boost his survivability was a much safer bet.
However, Qin Ming wasn't quite satisfied with the potion's current quality. He wanted to upgrade the silver potion to a higher level, maybe even a radiant silver or perhaps the legendary gold quality!
Items in Nightmare Space were categorized by a fixed hierarchy:
White
Green
Blue
Dull Silver
Common Silver
Radiant Silver
Dull Gold
Common Gold
Radiant Gold
Each equipment type also came in normal and plot equipment versions.
Plot equipment was always superior to items of the same level. For instance, Qin Ming's revolver, dinosaur goggles, and the newly acquired cozy shirt were all plot equipment.
To maximize his benefits, Qin Ming planned to upgrade the one-use-only dinosaur serum.
To upgrade consumables, he needed a lot of other consumables to fuse with it. Unfortunately, this meant Qin Ming had to use up his stash of croissants, which he had bought earlier for emergency use.
After fusing his nine croissants, Qin Ming created a dull silver-quality croissant.
A silver croissant! This was probably something even veteran adventurers had never seen before!
The effects of this upgraded croissant were insane. It could instantly restore 50% of your health and, over time, restore an additional 25%.
As long as you weren't dead, one bite of this croissant could practically bring you back to life! It was absolutely overpowered.
But as great as it was, Qin Ming was only using this croissant as fodder to upgrade other items. The problem was that a dull silver croissant still wasn't enough to upgrade the potion to the next tier—it was one rank too low.
With no other option, Qin Ming left his personal room and headed out, bringing his loot along.
After entering the elevator and selecting his destination, the door closed, and it began its descent. With a ding, the doors opened, revealing a massive plaza.
This was the legendary Adventurers' Trading Hub—specifically, the Low-Level Trading Hub. There were also intermediate, advanced, and top-tier trading hubs for veteran adventurers.
As a rookie, Qin Ming could only browse the lowest-level market.
Noticing the dark fog concealing his identity, Qin Ming smiled with satisfaction. He stepped into the crowd, starting his search for cheap consumables.
Unfortunately, after making a full round through the market, Qin Ming found that nothing was cheap. Even the most basic consumable items, like plain croissants, cost around 1,000 points each.
Lesser, non-combat consumables were somewhat cheaper but still hovered around 700 to 800 points.
With only 8,000 points to his name, Qin Ming realized he couldn't afford enough consumables to create the upgraded item he wanted.
Frustrated, Qin Ming rented a stall for 100 points, setting up his unwanted loot for sale.
His primary item for sale was the blue-quality strength potion.
As soon as he put up the potion, which increased Strength by 3 points permanently, it immediately attracted attention, and adventurers started gathering around his stall.
Seeing the growing crowd, Qin Ming switched to auction mode, allowing the surrounding adventurers to bid for the item. He set a starting price of 8,000 points, a fair amount considering the market rates.
With everything set up, Qin Ming left the stall, ignoring the questions from potential buyers, leaving the potion behind and letting the system handle the transaction.
After all, with Nightmare Space's rules in place, he didn't have to worry about anyone trying to steal his goods. The punishment for breaking the rules was far harsher than any battle technique.
Qin Ming continued browsing the market, buying the cheapest consumables he could find. After half an hour, a notification rang in his ears.
The auction had ended, and his potion sold for 11,650 points.
Clearly, items that provided permanent attribute increases were highly sought after.
Now flush with cash, Qin Ming was reinvigorated. Without hesitation, he spent all the points on consumables.
Carefully calculating the number of items and fusing them together as he went, Qin Ming finally returned to his room.
Sitting down, he gazed at the two freshly upgraded potions in his hands, nodding in satisfaction.
His remaining points now stood at a mere 560.
Even though he had spent nearly all his funds, Qin Ming was able to stretch his budget thanks to a lucky encounter with a vendor selling low-quality healing items.
That vendor had been selling bandages—12 rolls in total—for only 300 points each, which was extremely cheap.
Of course, the bandages themselves weren't great. They couldn't be used during combat and only restored 5% of health—a pitifully weak effect.
Compared to other consumables of the same level, which either worked in combat or restored significantly more health, these bandages were practically useless.
Still, with the help of those bandages and his ample funds, Qin Ming had successfully upgraded his potions.
Now, he held two potions in hand: one of dull silver quality and one of radiant silver quality.
(End of Chapter)
章 25: Chapter 25: Injecting the Gold-Tier Serum!
Two dull-grade potions fused into a single common silver-grade potion. Then, Qin Ming combined that potion with the dinosaur gene serum, upgrading it to a radiant silver tier. Finally, using this radiant silver potion as the base, he fused it with another radiant silver consumable he had painstakingly gathered.
As the dazzling light flashed, a potion glowing with golden light appeared before Qin Ming, who was now visibly excited.
Name: Dinosaur Gene Serum (Constitution)
Category: Consumable (Dull Gold Quality)
Effect: Permanently increases Constitution by 10 points.
Description: A gold-tier potion? Where did this come from?
Looking at the significantly enhanced potion in his hand, Qin Ming took a deep breath and, without hesitation, drank it down. Then, glancing at the 8 free attribute points he had earned, he contemplated briefly before using all of them.
After undergoing these upgrades, Qin Ming's stats saw a substantial boost.
Name: Adventurer 441985
Talent Skill: Junk King
Strength: 7
Constitution: 15
Agility: 10
Spirit: 5
Equipment: Teshuehn's Wife (Common Silver Plot Item), Butcher's Cozy Shirt (Blue Plot Item), Dinosaur Goggles (Dull Silver Plot Item)
Worlds Experienced: "Cadillacs and Dinosaurs" – First Stage
Remaining Points: 560
Qin Ming had distributed his 8 attribute points across his weaker stats, which made him even more satisfied with his progress.
Having only completed one world so far, Qin Ming was already quite pleased with his luxurious base attributes and impressive gear. However, what troubled him was that his remaining points were too few to buy more consumables—he would need to save them as an emergency reserve.
While browsing the trading area earlier, Qin Ming had noticed that nobody was selling loot keys. After asking around, he learned that these keys were non-tradable and could only be used by the person who obtained them. This discovery crushed his idea of fusing and selling keys for profit.
Buy low-tier equipment, then fuse and sell higher-tier ones? Sure, but that would require startup capital, and Qin Ming had next to nothing at the moment.
Besides, in the low-tier adventurer trading area, you couldn't really sell high-tier equipment. Selling low-tier items wouldn't earn much, and there was even a risk of losing money. On the other hand, high-tier gear was expensive, but how many adventurers at his level could actually afford it? Silver-tier items could cost tens of thousands of points—who in the low-tier group would have that kind of money?
Feeling the pinch of his empty wallet, Qin Ming shook his head and decisively chose to exit the Nightmare Space, returning to the real world.
Once back, he collapsed onto his bed and fell into a deep sleep. The recent events had been overwhelming, leaving him both physically and mentally exhausted. He needed a few days of proper rest to recover.
After his rest, he planned to dive back into arcade games to gather more intel...
A month passed in the blink of an eye. During this time, Qin Ming quickly sold off all of his remaining stock of items at a discount, as he no longer had the time to manage a stall. To avoid further losses, he chose to sell everything cheaply.
With his real-world affairs wrapped up, Qin Ming returned to his personal room in the Nightmare Space, focusing all his attention on playing games to gather data on enemies.
However, he soon realized that the arcade games were far more numerous than he had anticipated—there were so many enemies, all with unique traits. By the time his month-long rest period was over, Qin Ming had barely scratched the surface of the available games.
After getting a full night's rest, Qin Ming woke up early on the first day of the second month and began preparing his equipment.
A silver revolver—loaded with over a hundred bullets purchased using the money he earned in the "Cadillacs and Dinosaurs" world.
He also had his trusty dinosaur shirt and goggles—everything in place.
Wearing a red vest underneath, a long coat on top, and a round hat on his head, Qin Ming quickly donned his goggles, holstered his revolver, and stood up from his chair. He closed his eyes to rest, waiting for the moment to enter the next world.
When the clock struck noon, a humming sound filled the air as Qin Ming vanished from his room. At that same moment, throughout the entire Nightmare Space, adventurers—both in this dimension and the real world—began to disappear, marking the start of another grand adventure for those who had chosen to enter at this time.
As Qin Ming's vision cleared after the sudden transportation, he found himself sitting up on a wooden bed inside an old, worn-out cabin. Before he had time to fully grasp his surroundings, he heard a noise from the wall in front of him as dirt began to crumble away. As the dust settled, rows of numbers appeared:
World: Round Table Knights (First Stage)
Difficulty Level: D-Class
Participants: 5
World Background: The evil Duke Garibaldi rules the land through black magic, plunging the world into darkness. However, the prophesied chosen one, destined to pull the sword from the stone and overthrow the tyrant, has arrived and, alongside his companions, challenges the evil duke…
Main Objective: Kill ten swordsmen or one heavy-armored swordsman.
Completion Rewards: 1,000 points, 1 free attribute point.
Failure Penalty: Lose 1,000 points. If insufficient, one random attribute point will be deducted.
Optional Objective: Participate in the killing of Stage One's boss, Sir Scone.
Completion Reward: 2,000 points, 2 free attribute points.
Failure Penalty: None.
Note: This mission is in peace mode—killing other adventurers will not cause them to drop items.
It was another D-class world, but this time, Qin Ming wouldn't have the luxury of a double-attribute buff or the guarantee of meeting all the main characters like in the last world. This time, he might not even encounter any of the main protagonists.
If Qin Ming remembered correctly, by the time the protagonist trio—Arthur and his knights—arrived, the village in the first stage had already been overrun by enemies. The evil Duke's soldiers, led by Sir Scone, were massacring the villagers, and the protagonists fought them in the village streets.
Looking out the window, Qin Ming noticed that the village was still peaceful, with no signs of a battle yet.
This meant he had arrived at a time before the protagonists' appearance. If things continued this way, the protagonist trio might complete their quest elsewhere, or worse, they could die before he even had a chance to meet them.
This battle would rely solely on Qin Ming and his team. Alternatively, he would have to find a way to trigger the protagonists' early entrance.
As the writing on the wall faded, Qin Ming let out a deep breath. He stood up, adjusted his hat, and pushed the door open, stepping out into the unknown world beyond.
(End of Chapter)
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