Once beyond the city walls Lauri and Frank summoned their mounts and Sarah waved them off. Donning the Necklace of Greed and setting it to ensure he never gained EXP, Lauri then set to looking up attribute potions. The discount Potion of Potential Agility was still available but he wasn't interested in 'potential' yet, he needed to reach his potential before there was any value in trying to exceed it. Deciding Toughness was the most important to him right now he searched Market System.
{
SP: 1,406,700
[Cost in System Points]: [Item Name], (Misc. Value) Notes
50SP: Potion of Potential Toughness (+1/level. Caps at base 30)
11,981SP: Potion of Toughness (+1/level. Caps at base 30)
25,000SP: Tanky Shield of Toughness (Prerequisite: Warriors, min level 50. 50% reduction of physical damage to HP, +800 Toughness)
100,000SP: Tough Turtle Pet, Level 30
}
"Why do potions of Toughness cost 12k when Potential Toughness costs only 50?"
Frank seemed to know the answer to this, "potential caps quickly but every level you'll be able to chug dozens more that increase the actual attribute. You're better off spending the attribute points you get and supplementing with items. Especially if you want to use an Amnesia Potion ever again."
"It's for my exploit and I despise looking at my current System Points anyway. Though what's with pets? Is it the level you need to be to use them?"
"Yes but it's also the pets own level."
"Can I have multiple pets?"
"You can own as many as you so wish but alike horses you can only equip one as your main and you need to house and feed them or they'll suffer and die."
"Can I use Drain Life on pets not equipped?"
"What per chance is Drain Life?"
"I'll show you if we get the chance later. I want to start buying potions but a dimensional storage should come first. Can they all summon to hand like yours does?"
"All storage belts have that feature but only the Bat-Belt can store more than a few items and all belts are very limited individual max item size. Also be cautious that belts don't have the 'direct from Market' feature."
"What's that?"
"It allows items purchased from System Market to go immediately into dimensional storage devices on your person. Much bigger items like warehouses have 'distant direct from Market' which you can set up with purchase and sales orders and then the System Market sends them there, instead of to you."
"So I could purchase something now and it would go direct to a shed at home?"
"Nothing so convenient. You need to be at the item destination at the time they you create the purchase order."
"How is that any different then?"
"Not all purchase orders get filled immediately. Since we're after horses, there's orders to buy them at 50 SP that haven't been filled yet because there's not enough horses selling at 50 SP to meet them all and the offer isn't high enough to entice people to go out of their way to capture horses specifically to fill those orders."
"Ah, right, Rebecca. How do others work if they don't just appear."
Frank figured that Lauri checked what horses were selling for. "You walk in or reach in and grab it then take it out."
"Okay, I'll try and look them up by category."
"Sure but you'll only see what's available right now and the popular ones, like stables and large sheds, aren't often available."
Lauri rode slowly on his bull as he changed his Market settings until he got a visual he liked, excluding any he couldn't afford, as there were certainly many.
{
SP: 1,406,700
[Cost in System Points]: [Item Name] (Max units/size), Direct?
20: Pouch of Holding (10 Small), Yes
500: Bag of Holding (10 Medium), Yes
698: Quiver of Holding (1,000 arrows) No
997: Backpack of Holding (10 Large), Yes
999: Sack of Holding (10 Extra-Large), Yes
9,999: Backpack of Many Items (100 Medium), Yes
14,999: Quick Belt (10 Small), Yes
15,000: Utility Belt (10 Medium), No
60,000: Starter Shed of Holding (10x10m), No
120,000: Bat-Belt (100 Medium), No
150,000: Dual Belt of Hill Giant Strength and Holding (5 Large), No [+210 Strength]
180,000: Small Shed of Holding (25x10m), Yes, Remote
200,000: Quiver of Endless Arrows (100,000,000 arrows) Yes
400,000: Shed of Holding (50x10m) Yes, Remote
799,999: Simple Warehouse of Holding (50x50m) No
1,000,000: Large Stable (50x6m) Yes, Remote
1,249,999: Quick Bow Holster (1 Bow) No
}
"There's a Bat-Belt for 120k and a large stable for for a million but its space is less than a shed. Why would it be popular or cost more?"
A black belt appeared in Franks hands. "You often need to dig deeper into item descriptions to get their full details but word of mouth is easier, so good question. Stables can automate a lot, such as buying feed when low, giving feed to horses, putting on and removing blankets and it summons endless water for the horses. It wouldn't be ideal for the horses to be completely hands-off, but you could."
"The Bat-Belt sold already. Should I buy the stables?"
"Thanks for mentioning it, as I purchased that belt. Do you have a million System Points?"
"Regrettably, I do."
"Oh yeah, right right. Small sheds and up to large warehouses count as Extra-Large items so don't buy one now unless you have a Sack of Holding."
"You can put storage items inside storage items?"
"The rules are simple but application can get complicated. Don't go more than 2 dimensional items deep and make sure that the total of all the items fit within the topmost storage and you'll be fine."
"So could I put a Sack of Holding in a belt that has medium slots?"
"Yes."
"Does direct from Market work if the item is inside an item that doesn't have direct from Market?"
"No."
"Can I put the stable in the sack and then the sack in the belt?"
"No because the stable is a larger item than the belt can accept and be warned that even if it did go in then anything inside the stable would be 3 dimensional items deep."
"Ohhhhh. I think I get it but I've realised there are WAY better trade deals I could be making than horses. So I'll pass on the stables."
[Purchased 1x Backpack of Many Items for 9,999 System Points]
[Purchased 1x D. Belt of H.G.S.H. for 150,000 System Points]
"Whoops, I somehow accidently purchased the belt of Hgsh. Ever heard of it?" He waved the belt before he put it on, almost falling from the bull in the process.
"Sounds to me like an acronym. No idea what it is."
"Ah, you're right. The item description has it in full, Dual Belt of Hill Giant Strength and Holding. It only increases my strength by a little but I was taken in by its ability to hold up to large items."
"Large? Must have been an expensive belt? More like Belt of Giant Holding."
"Cost 150k. You didn't see it?"
"I only filtered on the Bat-Belt. I've had a buy order for one at 100k for half a year but nobody sold."
"Why's it called a Bat-Belt?"
"Probably because it's often used in conjunction with the medium sized weapon Exploding Baseball Bat."
"Oh. It's like a combo item." Lauri moved his warhammer from his back into his new belt and noticed it's very visibly attached but felt weightless.
[Purchased 42x Potions of Toughness for 503,810 System Points]
"Umm. I just purchased 42 Potions of Toughness listed at 11,981 and it cost me 503,810. Now, I don't mean to showboat how I'm better at math than the entire Guild of Mathematics but I'm pretty sure 42 times 11,981 is 503,202. Did the Market just rip me off by 608 or is these some tax I've been overlooking?"
"There's a 5% listing tax, refundable only if an item fails to sell after 2 months, but it's paid for by the seller, not the buyer. If you don't specify a price limit then when the cheaper items sell out the System keeps buying at the higher prices until it reaches your quantity or you run out of points. You can tap the purchase log to receive a complete breakdown of your purchase."
"Oh yeah, you called it."
Lauri started chugging potions but that stopped all conversation so he took a gap to prompt Frank, "I can pay for my entrance to Horses Trot now, I'll exchange some points for gold."
"Let my still loan you. Exchanging points for gold is a bad idea."
"Because it furthers the gold currency crisis and causes starvation?"
"What?"
"I combined two different theories I heard. They were contradictory so it's kind of a joke." Knowing he'd triggered Frank he went back to chugging potions.
"First, there's no crisis, gold doesn't expire because it predates the System. And the System doesn't create, export or import gold because the Goddess limited the System as such within our world. When you trade SP for gold someone else in our world is selling that gold in exchange for that SP. Prices either go up when people who horded gold start spending a lot of it, putting more gold back into a closed system, or when goods become unavailable. People are starving because they can't buy food and trading SP for gold is completely unrelated."
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
Once finished the next potion he gives Frank another prod. "Why don't rich people just buy food and feed all the starving?"
"Contrary to what some people seem to believe, gold doesn't make for good fertilizer. If all our farms can produce enough food for only a normally populated city, and no more, then no amount of any form of currency will make up for that food shortage. You'd only be shifting around who gets the limited food that's available and having rich people with competing bids for that food, in a failed attempt to feed everyone, would only serve to drive prices through the roof."
Another empty bottle disappeared from Lauri's hand before he asks "if gold doesn't expire, why doesn't it still rust?"
"Because it's noble."
"Ah, but that doesn't necessarily make it royal?"
"Is that a joke?"
Realising he must have said something stupid, he wasn't going to admit it straight-up. "Yeah, because you were getting too passionate," Frank broke into a laugh. Lauri waited for him to finish before asking the real question, "so then why shouldn't I trade SP for gold?"
"Because you should use the SP to buy popular items and then sell those for gold. Accessing the System Market is the adventurers biggest advantage. People only use gold to buy SP if they think they can use that SP to buy something from the Market for less than its straight value in gold. They're always right too, let me tell you. Which is why we should instead force them to buy the items direct from us adventurers. Adventurers risk their lives in the process that generates SP but there's lots of ways to get gold with no risk of life."
"So when you were talking about selling the horses?"
"If you need gold then yes, sell them for gold."
"Oh. I see."
Arriving at Horses Trot Lauri finished off the last of his potions quickly then held his belly from the consequenses. "Be warned my Agility still sucks. There's no Market access in dungeons so I'll buy stuff now just in case."
[Purchased 10x Potion of Power for 500 System Points]
[Purchased 1x Skillbook Cure Wounds for 1,000 System Points]
[Purchased 16x Potions of Agility for 127,990 System Points]
He checked and saw his SP was now at 613,401, still a lot he figured. Then he relearnt the Cure Wounds skill and appreciated how expensive it is. Out front the portal the stationed man asked for "500 gold each, please." Frank went up and passed a pouch with gold coins, which the man poured onto a scale.
"Looks like Potions of Agility are a few steps cheaper. Around 8,000 SP each."
"Everyone wants a bit of Toughness. Those who focus it tend to learn to keep it maxed via the points from levelling alone. While buying the cheaper potions if they desire to supplement other attributes."
"Doesn't effect my choice but why didn't you mention earlier?"
"Because you're not levelling and this is some trick to exploit the System, right?"
"Right."
The stationed man announced "you're both clear to enter."
Lauri receives a party invite from Frank and accepts it. The entry to Horses Trot launches a System screen.
[Welcome to dungeon Horses Trot
The following announcements aren't banned for your world:
Now with over 10,000 floors available across over 800 universes Horses Trot can fill all your horse, horse monster and horsing around needs!
With infinite flexibility, feel free to include Horses Trot in any universe, story or anime, royalty free.
Your world doesn't allow cross-world instances but there are thousands of floors which can be booked for limited-time world-excusive access.
Your world of [Unnamed] has full-time exclusive access to the whole floor of Dike's Floor with 1,000 hectors and thousands of horses of a large variety.
With so many floors the floor list starts already filtered, for your convenience, to better see floors available to you right now as well as appropriate for your current measure of prowess.
Tap here to see the full floor list and don't be afraid to change the filters. We recommend ticking the box to include floors that you can book reservations for.
Suffering from choice paralysis? Then the 'choice' floor for you right now is Flaming Ponies and Papa]
"What's an anime?"
"I'm afraid that I have no idea. Are all dungeons like this?"
"It's not randomly placing us on the most deadly floor and it's not tormenting us, so no, they're not all like this."
"Should we check out Flaming Ponies and Papa?"
The stationed man interrupted. "If you're wanting ridable horses then always pick Dike's Floor. Any other and you're more likely to import otherworldly items than get ridable horses."
"Thank you good sir. We will select Dike's Floor."
"Good sir? Does nobody know my name?"
With a tap they were transported in.
As their eyes adjusted to the new image before them, they found themselves and their mounts in the middle of a massive meadow with countless horses visibly running near and far. A blue sky with white clouds and bright sun stretched out to the horizon. Other people could be seen chasing the wild horses around, some of them on foot, some working in teams to try and herd them and some hopelessly by themselves. Other portals could be seen across the plains and they surely connected to the same world but Lauri was yet to know if they connect to the exact same location.
"Wow," Frank looked around with wonder.
"I don't stand a chance of catching up to a horse on my bull."
"Looks to me that nobody is actually fairing well. Considering the entry fee one might have expected this to be an easy profit."
"Wish I'd asked Rebecca along, she seemed to know this floor well."
"Wait, you actually know her? As in to say, personally?"
"She's another member of Survivors Guild. I met her yesterday."
"If we don't get a single horse today then you should... just buy one with SP. Considering the entry price I'm not leaving here before my times up unless it is with a profit."
"Oh, I see, there's an 7 hour and 59 minute countdown. That's new for me."
"I've done timed runs before but this is exceedingly long for a timed run. Go try your chains out."
"Huh? How?"
"There's a horse a mere 40 meters that way. Activate your chains."
After trying several things Lauri figures out that he can take either end of the chain and when he tosses it the chain unreels from... well, nowhere. He can even toss both ends at the same time. Starting to have fun, Lauri reels out a length of the chain and spins it around, picking up momentum, until he tosses it about 10 to 12 meters.
"Nice! But that horse is way too far away." By the time he said it the horse was sprinting, so it was doubly true.
"Perhaps this was not the best venture for you to learn a new weapons intricacies and capabilities?"
"Can you chase one past me?"
"I fear that I would fare no better in that pursuit than everyone else whom we can see pointlessly chasing horses around."
"What even is the limit to this chains length? I'd like to test it."
Lauri started unreeling the chain as his bull trotted along, leaving a growing length of chain behind him. This goes on for some 5 minutes until the chain doesn't unreel anymore and the friction of what had laid was so great it yanked him off of his bull instead of being dragged.
"Ooph! I think that's the limit, how long is that?"
"I've no yardstick for an accurate measure and the grass makes an estimate of any quality quite difficult."
"Can you chase a horse over the chain?"
"Not a bad idea my friend." He rides off to give it a try.
It takes some finagling but Frank manages to separate a horse from its pack and as it runs every which direction he does end up managing to get it to run over he chain... but nothing happens. Heading back the Lauri Frank asks "Did you try to activate it?"
"I'm not sure. Maybe I should practice on you?"
"I am not game for that suggestion. Not happening."
"Hmm. What next?" As they both stood there the spooked horse started trotting back to its pack. When Lauri saw it moving past the chain again he tried whipping the chain, sending a wave running along the length of it. The wave had almost disappeared when it hit the horse but the reaction when it did was very animated. The chain started wrapping around the horse until its far end wrapped around the horses neck. "I got it!"
"Yes!"
As the horse spooked again Lauri got dragged by it. "No!" [-10 HP]
"Let go of the chain!"
[-10 HP] "I can't!"
"Let go of the horse!"
[-10 HP] "I'm trying!"
"Wrap your chains around your legs!"
[-10 HP] He tried to but failed due to being dragged as he was, "I'm screwed!"
"Use your emergency teleport stone!"
"My what!?" As he's dragged past another horse, fleeing from who knows what, Lauri tossed the other end of his chain at it and the chain became animated, wrapping it up. It tried to run but the two horses counter each other, causing Lauri to be lifted and stopped in place between the two.
"You did it!"
[-50 HP], [-50 HP], "I made it worse!"
"I can kill one while it's stopped!"
[-50 HP], [-50 HP] "That will only make the other drag me again!"
"This was a bad idea!"
[-50 HP], [-50 HP] "Kill them both at the same time!"
"HOW?!"
[-50 HP], the two horses stopped pulling and Lauri fell to the ground, "thank the goddess!"
"What happened?"
"I think they were held still long enough to be tamed."
"How are you doing?"
{
Class: Ritualist
Profession: Level 1 Sealer
Effective Level: 1
HP: 110/500, PP: 390, MP: 3
Strength: (12) 28/28, Toughness: 50/50, Agility: 3/19, Memory: 14/14, Reasoning: 8/16, Charisma: 31/24, Destiny: 1/2
Skills: 5
}
After checking he answered. "Thanks to all those Toughness potions I drank, I have 110 health left out of 500."
"I though potions of potential maxed at 30?"
"I started with 50 potential in Toughness."
"Call it quits here?"
Lauri nodded, "call it quits."