Chapter 75: Second Transaction

Lord Trystum stared at the Coral Toad with an intense gaze, scrutinizing the effects of his evolution potion.

As the seconds trickled by, waves of astonishment and shock began to emerge in his heart. He couldn’t help but stutter, “I-it’s real! It has to be real! The increase in the Coral Toad’s strength after the evolution is too great!”

Lord Trystum was a Senior Grade-3 Spirit Master. Throughout the course of his life, he had evolved countless spirit pets, including numerous Coral Toads. With his experience and abilities, he could effortlessly determine that not only had the Coral Toad’s quality evolved to Noble, but its strength had also increased by a large margin.

Evolution would always result in increased strength, or even a breakthrough in rank depending on the situation. Before the evolution, the Coral Toad had yet to reach the threshold of Rank-1. Therefore, it still remained at Rank-0 even after evolving to Noble quality. But the increase in strength brought about by the evolution directly brought the Coral Toad to the limits of Rank-0.

It wouldn’t take long for the spirit beast to reach Rank-1 after this. This was a sight that Lord Trystum had never seen before.

Well, it would be incorrect to say that he’d never seen it before. Every spirit master would get lucky once in a blue moon, matching the attribute traces of the medicine and the spirit pet to a greater degree.

But it was different this time. Lord Trystum had used the data he received from the attribute traces measurement service during his concoction process. The resulting evolution potion was expected to match the Coral Toad’s attribute traces to one decimal place.

The fact that the Coral Toad’s strength increased by such a large margin after evolution was proof of his success, as well as of the attribute traces measurement service’s authenticity. With results right in front of him, Lord Trystum had no choice but to believe.

Accurate attribute traces measurement! Every spirit master longed for this!

With excitement bubbling in his heart, Lord Trystum hurriedly took out a large batch of resources and began preparing samples, just like before. But when he was halfway through, a thought occurred to him, causing him to pause.

Lord Trystum hastily opened the trading forum and found the familiar post. “Only Rank-1? Why can’t they measure higher-rank items?” A distraught expression appeared on Lord Trystum’s face as he looked at the large number of high-rank resources floating in space around him.

Unwilling to give up, he decided to send a message to Wise Man, the avatar who posted the attribute traces measurement service. After completing this little task, he reluctantly returned all the high-rank resources.

Only the Rank-1 resources were still left floating around him. With a thought from Lord Trystum, the servant who previously completed the transaction rushed into the laboratory. “Send over all these samples.”

Without needing Lord Trystum to explain further, the servant understood. He used the same storage ring to store all the resource samples and retreated out of the laboratory with a bow. As he left to complete his mission, the servant curiously wondered whether his master still remembered Young Lord Soren’s birthday.

…

The next morning, Ain saw more notifications from the trading forum. Just as he expected, Goddess Nocturnal and Green Water had returned with more business. But this time, he was left flabbergasted when he saw his updated balance.

Goddess Nocturnal had only transferred five energy crystals, meaning that she had only sent five items this time. However, the surprise was from Green Water, who directly transferred 235 energy crystals, bringing his total up to 257.

Ain sat there in stunned silence, thanking the stars for his decision to set up this service back then. From a rough calculation, he would need over three hundred of his weekly trips to earn the same amount of money. But now, it had only taken him a few days, and the effort he put in was minimal.

It was said that comparisons are often odious, and now Ain finally understood.

“I’ll reduce the trips from now on.” He silently decided.

He had accumulated a decent amount of experience now, and his income was no longer dependent on the weekly trips. It would be better to invest this time in other things. He would limit his trips to once or twice a month. It would serve as a form of training.

After collecting his thoughts, Ain shifted his focus to another issue that arose.

“I’ll have to visit the transmission hub again…”

People’s worries evolved alongside their progress. The closest transmission hub was over an hour away. If he constantly received measurement requests, he would need to travel back and forth from the transmission hub often. This task couldn’t be allocated to others either since the transmission token was bound to his account.

Ain had actually learned of a way to avoid this issue when he first scouted the Cyberspace transmission hub, and it was to create an organization. If he created an organization to offer the attribute traces measurement service, all the trades would be under the organization’s name. This would allow authorized members within the organization to use the transmission tokens.

But as soon as this thought appeared in his mind, Ain immediately shot it down. There was no reason other than his privacy. Moreover, creating an organization came with its own potential trouble. He wasn’t in the mind to deal with all of that at the moment.

Since the transmission hubs were unavoidable, Ain could only sigh and prepare himself.

Next, he opened a separate message he received from Green Water.

Ain read through it with a glance and contemplated for a few seconds. Green Water was inquiring whether or not Ain could measure higher-rank resources. This was a question that Ain himself wanted to know the answer to.

He had yet to come into contact with anything beyond Rank-1, so he couldn’t be sure.

So far, Ain only knew that Scan couldn’t determine Nox’s quality, which he knew was Ancient from his mentor’s explanation.

In order to breakthrough from Rank-4 to Rank-5, spirit pets and spirit beasts first needed to evolve their quality from Transcendent to Ancient. Ain had also learned that Rank-6 was the limit of Ancient.

Using these pieces of information, Ain could easily infer some things.

Ancient corresponded to Rank-5 and Rank-6. Since he couldn’t measure the Ancient quality, he likely couldn’t measure anything Rank-5 and beyond either.

Conversely, since he could measure the Transcendent quality, the limit of Scan might be at Rank-4. Of course, Ain still needed to verify it.

Before this, it was difficult for him to obtain higher-rank resources. But now, Rank-2 resources were within reach, especially with the energy crystals.

Ain glanced at Green Water’s message and decided to postpone his reply. It wouldn’t be too late to reply after confirming his ability.

Since there wasn’t much to prepare, Ain briefly checked up on the cat and the pups before leaving towards the transmission hub.

Two hours later, Ain completed his business and found himself at Liberty Firm again. He had just visited the store the previous day, but it was at the location near Forest Gate. He was currently in the store near the Spirit Tamer Association HQ, in the central region of the city.

Ain’s target was clear, and he arrived at the section for Rank-2 resources. There was a no-touch policy here and customers could only inform the shop assistant of their selections. Otherwise, he would’ve already verified Scan’s limits long ago.

Ain browsed through the Rank-2 ghost resources available before selecting a Ghost Pearl. Ghost Pearls were a common Rank-2 ghost resource, making them a suitable target for Ain. Anything that was common was oftentimes cheaper as well.

Moreover, Nox had yet to even reach Advanced Rank-1. Although it could still absorb the Ghost Pearls, the efficiency would be terrible. It was like adding premium fuel into a machine that could only use regular fuel. Not only would there be no greater effects, but the machine might even malfunction.

As such, Ain only purchased the Ghost Pearl to test Scan. When Nox reached Rank-2, or even just Advanced Rank-1, he could pass it over. Another alternative was just to resell it.

Soon, Ain left the building with the chilly Ghost Pearl clenched in his hand. It had only cost him half an energy crystal. It was roughly equivalent to 500,000 star coins. Ain compared it to the Rank-1 Ectoplasm that only cost 10,000 star coins and sighed internally at the difference.

On his way to the hoverbus station, Ain used Scan.

[Name: Ghost Pearl]

[Attribute: Ghost]

[Rank: Beginner Rank-2]

[Attribute Traces: Ghost 92.874%, Fire 2.974%, Earth 0.952%, …]

When the results of Scan appeared in his mind, the corner of Ain’s lips curled up subconsciously.

Success.

It was possible to measure attribute traces of Rank-2 items.

This was great news for him, as he could earn even more energy crystals with this. Although the spirit energy consumption had increased drastically, it still wasn’t a noteworthy amount to the current Ain, whose spirit energy had been augmented by the Purple Cloud Fruit and his training.

In the hoverbus, Ain replied back to Green Water before updating his post.

He increased the limit from Rank-1 to Rank-2, charging five energy crystals for the latter. After some deliberation, he added another phrase at the end. From now on, customers were required to prepay the return transmission fee.

It might seem a little unreasonable, but Ain wasn’t operating a proper store, so he didn’t care too much about customer service. Moreover, with the progression of his spirit master and alchemy studies, Ain began to truly realize the significance of attribute traces. He wasn’t worried about his customers leaving.

The transmission fee could vary based on the items being transmitted. So, prepaying was often a hassle. But this was irrelevant to Ain. He only added an extra note to the package before returning it. The fee wouldn’t change at all.

Green Water’s package contained over two hundred resource samples, much greater than last time. But the transmission fee was still three energy crystals. Adding more samples didn’t seem to increase the fee either.

Despite knowing that, Ain still felt unsettled paying for the transmission fee, so he added that last phrase. Who knew if the transmission fee would skyrocket one day. After all, he knew that the transmission distance was a significant variable in the price, and he couldn’t control his customers’ location.