Afterlife Dream

I gulped.

"R-right," I lied.

Kitty\'s eyes were radiating such strong rays of hope. I did not want to be the Dimensional Master\'s henchman, there to snuff out the light in her eyes. Instead, I switched the topic.

"So what brings you here?"

"Shopping," she answered, still with the radiant smile on her face. "There are a few ingredients that I need to make some dishes."

"You still need to shop?" I asked, a little startled. After all, Kitty had a farmhouse with a lot of cattle. Wolfhound also specialized in fishing. What other ingredients did she need to buy?

Kitty laughed.

"Of course I do, silly Anty. There are a lot of items that I don\'t have. Certain fruits, flowers, leaves, and roots."

Speaking about fruits.

"Do you know how much a peach can sell for around here?"

Kitty\'s eyes turned round out of surprise.

"Are you selling some? You are not looking to buy, are you Anty? I remember that you do not specialize in cooking."

"I am selling," I confirmed.

"Oh. How great! Peaches are very rare. I am interested to buy all that you have!" she shouted with gleaming eyes. "Will you sell them to me?"

"For how much though?" I asked.

Kitty held up four fingers in the air.

"400,000?" I asked, full of hope.

"No, silly. Four million of gold."

My jaw dropped when I heard the number. There had to be a mistake.

"Um, each?" I asked again dumbly.

"Yes, each! Why, how many do you have in your inventory, Anty?"

"Um..."

I remembered how many, but I opened my inventory to check anyway.

"Uh, 125 peaches."

Kitty whistled.

"I will buy all for 500 million of gold? How does that sound?"

Wow.

"Deal!" I said right away before Kitty changed her mind. Kitty was my friend. She was unlikely to scam me. 500 million of gold was a lot of money! All my friends were rich. Why did I suck so much in making money? I was already wondering what to do with the extra 500 million gold in my inventory when I heard Kitty groaning. She was frantically checking her inventor.

"Damn it, I don\'t have enough money. I didn\'t expect to be able to buy these many peaches today."

"Why is it so expensive anyway?" I asked out of curiosity.

"One peach can be used to make five servings of Fried Peach Ice Cream With Cashew Nut Sprinkles. That dessert can be sold for 7 million gold each."

Wow. Seven million? I had never heard of a more expensive dessert.

"What magical property can it give? How is it so expensive?"

"It doubles all of your skill attributes and buffs for half an hour," Kitty said casually without looking at me. She was busy scanning her inventory for something to sell. It was my turn to whistle. Wow. It was an even more powerful dessert than Chocolate Cake. It would be worth using at raids. If not for the 120+ raids, then when facing the Dimensional Master.

"So, have you sold a lot?"

"Not really because peaches are extremely rare. The tree seeds only drop from gachapon machines or something, I don\'t know... Argh, shoot. There is nothing I can sell within a short amount of time."

"I don\'t mind trading. Maybe you do have something that I need. I still need a mount and a pet," I offered.

"Mmmm..."

Kitty slid next to me and showed me her inventory.

"Is there anything here to your liking, Anty?"

Kitty was a true merchant. She was even more of a hoarder than I was. She had collected a lot of Mount Summon pieces of various mounts, a lot of Pet Purchase Receipt shreds of various pets, and also a lot of expensive dishes that she made. Aside from that, she somehow also collected many other items that interested me beyond mere mounts and pets. I had to suck in my breath when I saw 60 Dark Moon Pieces and 50 Angel Feathers side by side.

Seeing that my eyes were stuck to the two items, Kitty asked, "Do you want the Dark Moon Pieces and Angel Feathers, Anty?"

I sighed.

"Yea but... I don\'t think 500 million is going to be enough for both of them."

I had been trading Love Dungeon drops against the Dark Moon Pieces. One piece was worth around 500,000 gold or so. Angel Feathers were worth around 15 to 20 million gold each.

I had 20 Dark Moon Pieces already; I only needed 50 more to get a full Dark Moon set. As for Angel Feathers... I have 25 so far. I still needed 175.

"I can give you all of those for 100 peaches," Kitty said with a wink. "Accept or not?"

I would be stupid to say no. But I did not want to scam Kitty.

"Kitty, these Angel Feathers sell for a lot. You can get like... a billion gold for 50 Angel Feathers."

"True, except that these days no one really wants to buy them. People are feeling desperate these days. They only want to exit the game. They are not interested in flying all over the land anymore."

I had to admit that these Angel Feathers were indeed more like luxury items now. Who would want to piece together a pair of Angel Wings when they had to level as soon as possible and defeat the Dimensional Master?

"Take them," Kitty said. "I have no use for them now anymore. Feel free to pay me more money in the future if you feel that you owe me too much money. Of course I will appreciate it more if you give me peaches instead, hehehe."

"Really...?"

"Yes, really."

Kitty traded me both items without hesitation. I gave her all my peaches. After promising Kitty that I would sell her more peaches in the future, I exited the Global Market with the 50 Dark Moon Pieces and 50 Angel Feathers. Now that I had all 70 necessary Dark Moon Pieces, I only had to put up the equipment in the guild crafts and then ask someone from the guild to activate them for me.

"Cool, Antares put up crafts for one set of Dark Moon equipment," Perennia said in the guild chat. "Is there any order to start the craft?"

"None, you can start with any of them."

"Okay, then we will start with gloves, my specialty."

That day marked the fifth day since the Dimensional Master emerged. At 16.00, our guild safely finished another Queen Spider raid without disturbance this time. Dominion had been focusing on getting their guildmates Fire Golem helmets the whole day. HinoKun might have told them to stop bugging us to prevent the relationship between the two guilds to worsen.

The high-level players in our guild did the level 90 raid at 10.00 AM every day. The rest of the day was spent grinding for experience. While grinding, they also contributed to the guild crafts. By the time I was done with the Queen Spider raid of the day, three of my seven Dark Moon equipment were completed. The great thing about equipment craft was that they came with random enchantment levels from 0 to 20. It was desirable to get high enchantment level equipment out from crafting because then the enchantment cost would be much lower. My first three crafts were not too bad. They did not all come out as blanks, and I already felt grateful about it.

+2 Dark Moon Gloves

+1 Dark Moon Crown

+0 Dark Moon Top

I grinned at the three pieces of equipment in my inventory. I could barely wait for the other four to be finished so that I could get rid of my silly-looking Native Islander Set.

While I was on my way from Summer Rainforest, I messaged Aurendiria, Ingenious, and ArrowRain. I said that I would like to talk to all three of them privately in Oakstone Tavern.

Coincidentally, they were just finishing their daily activities and were heading toward Paradise Island anyway. We agreed to meet up for dinner, just the four of us. Being the first one who arrived, I picked a table at the farthest corner in Oakstone Tavern. I trusted that the three of them would not freak out upon hearing what I had to say, but the topic was very sensitive. I did not want anyone in the tavern to see them getting upset. Especially not Aurendiria.

After me, Ingenious was the next one who arrived. I winked him over and he strolled casually toward me.

"Hey, Antares."

"Hi, Ingenious."

Ingenious quickly ordered a Ginger Ale for all four of us. I noticed that he had already reached level 140. He too would reach 150 in no time. ArrowRain was 135 the last time I checked. While sipping at his drink, Ingenious the Shadow Master stared at me.

"So," he said, putting his drink on the table. "Did HinoKun approach you guys this morning?"