'I'm exhausted, utterly exhausted.' Faye Yardley discovered it was still raining outside. She looked down at her filthy body, took off her clothes again, and rushed into the rain to wash herself clean.
After washing up, she discovered the clothes she had left by the fireplace were now dry. The fireplace had also gone out, its fuel spent.
Her haul from this run included charcoal and coal. Faye Yardley found them and tossed one unit of each into the fireplace. A prompt appeared, informing her that the charcoal would burn for 4 hours and the coal for 8 hours.
She moved the large iron pot, already filled with water from outside, the horseshoe crab shell, and the metal box indoors, setting them down beside the workbench.
She once again used a corner of the cloth she'd been using as a bath towel to dry her body before wrapping it around herself.
Faye Yardley looked at the blue cloth wrapped around her. 'It's just one bolt of cloth, it shouldn't matter, right?' she thought. 'Even if it does, now that I've used it this way, can it still be used for crafting from a blueprint?'
A message notification from her friend, Zachary Pierce, popped up. Without looking closely, Faye Yardley replied first, "Sorry, Mr. Pierce, I just took a quick shower in the rain. Let's tally up our haul now."
Only then did she actually read what Zachary Pierce had sent: "Yardley, the Point Shop is closing in half an hour. Take a look and see what we should get. I want to use my points for a Small Group Chat Coupon, but you can decide on the rest for both of us."
Faye Yardley sat before the fireplace, squeezing the water from her still-dripping hair. "You take the three thousand points from the reward, and I'll take the remaining 1,327. Is that alright?"
"Alright."
"Also, I already got a Small Group Chat Coupon from a Silver Treasure Box in the dungeon. You can have it. Save your points for something else. I suggest you buy an Intermediate Body Refining Pill, a High Level House Building Plan, a Fireplace Blueprint, and some items for both Cold Resistance and Heat Prevention. [Red Envelope: Small Group Chat Coupon]"
"Alright, thanks."
Faye Yardley then added, "As for the other miscellaneous stuff, I'll send you a list after I've sorted and tallied everything."
"No rush on that. But, um, could I have the Peerless Treasure Sword? You can have everything else, I don't mind." Zachary Pierce truly felt he had struck gold teaming up with Faye Yardley. She might not have killed many monsters, but her luck was absolutely invincible.
During the time she was unresponsive, he had been reading the public chat and talking with some of the other guys. He wasn't completely in the dark about what was happening outside their little team.
He believed that once Faye Yardley had a moment to check the public chat, she would quickly realize that their dungeon run had basically been a handout compared to what others went through.
Since he wasn't in a rush, Faye Yardley decided not to rush either.
She opened her last bottle of Sprite and, GULP, GULP, drank down nearly half of it.
She was exhausted and just wanted to go to sleep and deal with everything later.
But her points hadn't been spent yet, so she forced herself to stay awake and told the system to open the Point Shop.
'Everything else can wait,' she thought. 'Items that boost my own power have to come first.'
She bought three Basic Body Refining Pills at 100 points each, then five Physical Potions and five Energy Potions, both 10 points per bottle.
That left her with 927 points. Two Intermediate Body Refining Pills at 300 points each. Instantly, she was down to just 327 points.
'These points sure go fast,' she mused.
A Basic Wood House Upgrade Voucher for 100 points—she snatched that up.
Two Space Stones at 100 points each.
With only 27 points left, Faye Yardley couldn't be bothered to think anymore. She exchanged them all for wood needed to upgrade her raft. At a rate of 1 point for 10 wood, she ended up with another 270 wood in her inventory.
After she was done, she thought she would fall asleep the moment she lay down, but unexpectedly, her mind was racing with all sorts of thoughts, and she couldn't get to sleep at all.
"System, display the regional channel and group chat."
Both were bustling with activity.
[Thanks to whichever big shot got the system to open the trading function early! This is awesome! No more worrying about getting scammed in trades.]
[The system is such a rip-off. It even charges a transaction fee! One wood is still a resource, you know! My heart aches just thinking about it.]
[Damn it, other people's trial dungeons have them fighting a Second Tier boss, but my trial dungeon was just me getting chased all over by trash mobs!]
[One trial dungeon, and the total population of the region dropped by a five-figure number. What a 'great experience,' huh.]
[Hailey Miles: The trial dungeon was definitely a bonus round! Didn't you guys notice that you don't just get points for killing monsters, you can also break them down for all sorts of raw materials? I even found a bunch of fruit trees on my island and picked a ton of fruit.]
[Hailey is such a King of Luck! I was on a barren island getting chased by monsters. Just surviving until the end of the dungeon felt like a victory.]
[Kyle Lewis: To the person who can make Blood Replenishing Potions, are you there? I'd like to trade with you. I've posted an offer on the trading system with the specific items you requested.]
'Huh. This Kyle Lewis seems to have something interesting,' Faye thought.
Faye Yardley shifted her attention from the regional channel to the trading system.
It was her first time using the new trading system. You could just search and filter for what you wanted—it was so much more convenient than before.
She couldn't search directly for a seller's name, so she had to search for red dates and Shannon White. Searching for both at once instantly narrowed the results down to just five trade listings.
Kyle Lewis was offering 60 red dates and 10g of Shannon White. Faye happily clicked to accept the conditional trade.
This way, she only had to give Kyle Lewis two Blood Replenishing Potions, and she could not only keep two for herself but would also have 2g of Shannon White left over. If she could just get another 15 red dates, she could make another potion.
She was overjoyed!
Her exhaustion vanished in an instant. She did a kip-up, springing from the bed and making a beeline for the workbench.
She loved the feeling of getting something for nothing. (*^▽^*)
After trading the Blood Replenishing Potions to Kyle Lewis, Faye Yardley also sent him a friend request on a whim.
'My ten friend slots aren't even full yet,' she thought. 'I can add him for the time being.'
'I'll keep the useful ones and can always replace the ones who aren't.'
Since she was wide awake now, Faye Yardley decided she might as well sort out the dungeon haul. It wouldn't be right to keep Zachary Pierce waiting too long. A moment ago she'd been exhausted and sleepy, but now that she was buzzing with energy, it was better to get it over with sooner rather than later.
Fortunately, Zachary Pierce wasn't the type to haggle over every little thing; in fact, he could even be described as generous.
Their shared total of wood was 345. Faye Yardley sorted out the split, retracting an initial Red Envelope she had prepared for Zachary Pierce before sending him his final share. After the division, she was left with 147 wood. Added to her original 159 and the 270 from the point exchange, her grand total came to 576 wood.
"System, upgrade the raft to Level 4."
[Do you wish to upgrade to a Level 4 Raft? Materials required: 576/500 wood.]
"Yes."
Faye Yardley heard a DING DING DONG DONG sound from outside. A few minutes later, the 3D diagram of her raft updated to show its area had expanded to 100 square meters.
The rain canopy was now located under the eaves to the right of her door. It had originally extended past the edge of the raft, but now it was well within its borders.
'This will be inconvenient for fishing and pulling up treasure chests,' she thought.
Faye Yardley rearranged the new sections into a 10x10 square raft. She then shifted the Wooden House 2.5 meters to the right, which was the perfect distance to accommodate the rain canopy.