Bai Qiu silently downvoted the post and exited the thread.
He quickly browsed through several of the most popular posts and discovered information about three newly added monsters: the Armored Porcupines Iron-Claw Saber-Toothed Tiger, and Giant-Tailed Rat.
Among them, only the Giant-Tailed Rat existed in both normal and Lord-class variants.
The other two had neither normal versions nor Lord-class individuals.
Bai Qiu also discovered that the forum had a tipping system and a feature for exchanging Sanctum Coins.
There was even an organization from a relatively peaceful region dedicated to gathering intelligence.
They compiled all kinds of information into a weekly publication.
Anyone willing to pay could access it.
Interestingly, although readers had to pay for the publication, contributors who submitted information would also receive Sanctum Coin rewards based on the value of the intelligence they provided.
Take Bai Qiu himself as an example.
At this point, it felt as though everything about him short of the color of his underwear had already been sold off.
Every one of his public achievements had spread far and wide.
That kind of information counted too.
For instance, if someone discovered a blessed land rich in a particular medicinal herb, they could submit detailed descriptions of the herb, its effects, and the location.
After the publisher verified the information, the contributor would receive payment.
As for why verification was necessary?
Because spreading rumors was no longer illegal.
They had to guard against clever opportunists trying to make money by fabricating stories.
Intelligence submissions required photographs and screenshots of system panels.
Purely text-based reports had to undergo especially rigorous scrutiny.
Bai Qiu spent one hundred Sanctum Coins to browse the first week’s intelligence journal.
There, he learned something that was very good news—at least for him.
Mental Power Potions had never appeared in any other region.
That meant that once the marketplace expanded to allow wider interregional trade, the market for his Mental Power Potions would not suffer.
On the contrary, demand would become even greater.
He immediately made up his mind:
Once he got back, he would raise the price again!
After gaining a general understanding of the forum’s functions, Bai Qiu quickened his pace and headed toward the first blessed land.
At first, he encountered plenty of players.
There were at least dozens of people competing for monsters on a single street.
However, as he moved farther away from the safe zone and drew closer to the remote mountains, the number of players he encountered steadily decreased.
Conversely, the number of monsters increased.
Bai Qiu casually killed them along the way.
The Purgatory Darklame Spear was quite effective for dealing with these minor mobs.
Because the level gap was too large, each monster only granted him the minimum of 1 experience point.
Thanks to the King of Monster Grinding achievement, he received an additional 2 guaranteed experience points.
Meanwhile, the Father of Exploration achievement doubled all experience gains.
As a result, each monster he killed rewarded him with a full 6 experience points.
This was precisely why leveling had become so slow.
In fact, most high-level players faced the same problem.
Zhang Shiyao had managed to catch up in levels because she constantly participated in high-level dungeons, earning resources while also gaining large amounts of experience.
At present, player strength and levels could be divided into four tiers.
T0 Players included people like Bai Qiu, Zhang Shiyao, and Li Qingshan. Their whereabouts were unpredictable, and their defining trait was that they were always busy.
T1 Players, represented by Ning Xingxue’s trio, occupied fixed dungeons within their own regions every day, farming large quantities of resources.
T2 Players formed large groups and ventured outward together, searching for places with many monsters and few competitors in order to grind levels.
T3 Players could only survive by scavenging scraps near the safe zones—and there were a lot of scavengers competing for those scraps.
……………
Upon reaching the foot of the mountain, Bai Qiu saw dense vegetation enveloping the entire mountain range, forming an almost impenetrable wall of greenery.
From here, he only needed to travel another ten kilometers to reach the location of the blessed land.
Bai Qiu had no intention of walking.
He directly summoned his Wind Spirit Hoverboard, stepped onto it, and ascended vertically to an altitude of five hundred meters before accelerating toward the blessed land at full speed.
The reason he had not used it earlier was that he wanted to conceal his movements and avoid being recognized by other players.
Very few people currently possessed a Wind Spirit Hoverboard.
The moment someone saw one, they would immediately know who he was.
But this area had yet to be reached by anyone.
Now was the perfect time to travel at full speed.
Before long, he passed through the mountain range wrapped in dense vegetation and arrived at the location marked as a blessed land on the Fragment Map of Mountain and River.
At this point, even someone unfamiliar with the route could identify the location by the vegetation below.
A gigantic fruit tree stood at the center of this blessed land, towering over a hundred meters tall.
Its branches were laden with plump, ripe fruits, and its lush canopy spread wide.
Even from several hundred meters above, Bai Qiu could smell an invigorating fragrance wafting from the tree.
He immediately put away the Wind Spirit Hoverboard and descended straight toward it.
Surprisingly, there were no monsters guarding the tree.
However, the ground beneath it was littered with dried, shriveled animal hides.
Intrigued, Bai Qiu landed directly on the treetop.
As expected, the very next moment, numerous vine-like tendrils shot out from the canopy.
Like countless green snakes, they lashed toward him at high speed.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
The sharp tendrils struck Bai Qiu’s Skyward Battle Armor, yet failed to leave even a scratch.
After roughly testing their strength, he found that their attack power didn’t even reach C-rank.
Casually plucking a fruit, he activated his appraisal skill.
Fragrance-Gathering Fruit
Quality: C++
Description:
A fruit produced by the Fragrance-Gathering Tree. It attracts living creatures to approach and is exceptionally rich in nutrients. Consuming it increases physical strength and carries a chance of granting the [Great Strength] physique.
Seeing that it wasn’t merely a poisonous fruit designed to lure prey, Bai Qiu was relieved.
He proceeded to harvest every fruit on the tree before leaving, obtaining a total of 118 fruits.
The giant tree had devoted nearly all its nutrients to fruit production, leaving its offensive capabilities far too weak.
Keeping it alive meant it could continue bearing fruit in the future, making it enormously valuable.
As expected of a location classified as a blessed land.
Its attacks were sufficient to kill small animals, which would then decompose and nourish the tree, allowing it to produce even more fruit.
Meanwhile, Bai Qiu simply waited for the fruits to mature before returning to harvest them.
It was an incredibly satisfying arrangement.
It was like a diligent worker spending months earning money, withdrawing cash from the bank, and getting robbed before even having a chance to warm it in their hands.
The Fragrance-Gathering Fruits were entirely golden in color.
Each resembled an enormous mango, about the length of Bai Qiu’s forearm.
Every fruit weighed over five kilograms and had a soft, springy texture.
Bai Qiu tore open the skin.
Golden juice immediately seeped from the flesh, releasing an irresistibly alluring aroma.
One bite was enough.
The fruit was sweet, tender, juicy, and delicious.
Even Bai Qiu found himself captivated by the fragrance.
He ended up eating three whole fruits before finally feeling full enough to abandon the idea of eating a fourth.
The flesh and juice were rapidly digested and absorbed within his stomach.
He felt his muscles being nourished almost instantly.
Not only was the sensation incredibly refreshing, but his physical strength also increased noticeably.
The improvement was substantial.
Completely won over by the experience, Bai Qiu decided to head for the second blessed land.
Then another thought crossed his mind.
Could the information about this fruit be sold to that intelligence agency in exchange for some Sanctum Coins?
After all, his recent expenses had been rather heavy.
— The end of the Chapter–
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