Chapter 38: Vehicle Leaderboard

She couldn’t afford to build it for the time being, but that didn’t stop her from learning the blueprint first.

Looking at the Thunder Pattern Sea Python Meat she had obtained, Lily Rhodes listed it in the trading area at a price of ten Crystal Cores per hundred grams.

Whether it was for building city walls later or other areas, she needed a massive amount of Crystal Cores.

Most of the Crystal Cores she had on hand were consumed when she just crafted the Arrow Towers. Activating so many Arrow Towers simultaneously would also cost a hefty sum.

As soon as the Thunder Pattern Sea Python Meat was listed, it was snatched up by the crowd. After all, this was a good item that could enhance one’s physique; anyone with a brain wouldn’t miss out on it.

Among them, someone even managed to contact her directly through some unknown method.

It wasn’t through a private message; the text popped up out of thin air.

[Hello, my name is Titus Abbott. I’ve established a mutual aid society. As Azureans, we should help each other. You are very strong; would you be interested in joining us?]

Looking at this line of text, Lily Rhodes fell silent for a moment before thinking to herself, "As expected, things like Guilds have still emerged."

However, she didn’t mind occasionally cooperating with others, but as for joining a fixed Guild, she had no such plans at the moment.

[No, thanks. I prefer to act alone.]

Seeing Lily Rhodes refuse, the other party didn’t get angry. After all, judging from her ability to produce D+ grade Thunder Pattern Sea Python Meat, anyone who wasn’t a fool wouldn’t want to offend a powerful Survivor.

[It’s okay if you don’t join now. You can think about it carefully. Also, how much Thunder Pattern Sea Python Meat do you have left? We want to buy it all. In terms of price, I can add two more Crystal Cores to your original price.]

Seeing this, Lily Rhodes, holding the belief that only a fool would turn down money, sold more than half of her Thunder Pattern Sea Python Meat to Titus Abbott, along with five hundred milliliters of Healing Water.

She looked at the Crystal Cores she received, which amounted to several thousand.

Before she could even rejoice, she thought of Shelly’s size. Even if she took out all these Crystal Cores, they wouldn’t be able to build much of a city wall.

However, the fact that Titus Abbott could bring out so many Crystal Cores at once still shocked her.

It seemed he had probably pooled all the Crystal Cores from everyone in his Guild into his own hands.

This was also why she was unwilling to join a Guild.

After all, there was no such thing as a free lunch. If one enjoyed the benefits brought by a Guild, they naturally had to provide corresponding returns.

Especially since she genuinely held many good items, it was foreseeable that if she actually joined a Guild, there was a high probability she would be the one getting leeched off.

Even if the other members in the Guild didn’t dare, what about the Guild leader?

Aside from selling items, she didn’t pay much attention to the chat channel the rest of the time. Therefore, she naturally didn’t know when this so-called Guild had actually appeared or how long it had been around.

However, the emergence of these Guilds was a good thing for her.

After all, with the Guild leader pooling all the members’ Crystal Cores together, they could purchase more items, and her speed of earning Crystal Cores would naturally accelerate.

And so, over the next few days, with Shelly around, she lived a peaceful and uneventful life. Although Sea Beasts attacked every night and she occasionally encountered them during the day, none of them caused her much trouble.

After the drumstick mushrooms matured, the entire first batch was bought up by the few people in the trading group. After all, each of them had families to feed and their demand was high. Not only did they buy out the first batch, but they also pre-ordered the second batch.

The items they used for trading were also extremely precious. After looking through them, Lily Rhodes selected what she needed, and the rest was entirely converted into Crystal Cores.

This continued until the seventh day. Once the clock struck midnight, a familiar voice rang in the ears of all remaining Survivors.

[Congratulations, Survivors, for successfully passing the first trial of the novice stage. Next, you will officially enter the extreme survival stage. The difficulties and dangers you face will only increase. Please try your best to survive.]

[Your vehicle is your life. Please take good care of it.]

[The vehicle leaderboard is now open. The leaderboard will calculate rewards once every seven days. The top one hundred Survivors on the board will receive generous rewards! This leaderboard is based on a comprehensive score evaluated from the Survivor’s Vehicle Level and vehicle construction. It is absolutely fair and just!]

As the voice faded, a golden leaderboard popped up in front of everyone.

At the same time, almost everyone looked at the very top of the board, the spot for first place.

[Leaderboard Rankings

1st Place: Lily Rhodes. Vehicle Category: Special Vehicle. Vehicle Level: Level 7. Vehicle Comprehensive Score: 3564

2nd Place: Finn Lynch. Vehicle Category: Ordinary Vehicle. Vehicle Level: Level 5. Vehicle Comprehensive Score: 1520

...]

In an instant, both the world chat channel and the regional chat channel became lively.

"This Lily Rhodes really is first!"

"More than that, this is absolute domination. The second place doesn’t even have half of her Points."

"How on earth did the big shot Lily Rhodes do it? She even has a special vehicle. I heard the difficulty of upgrading a special vehicle is several times harder than an ordinary one. In the top ten, only big shot Lily Rhodes, the ninth, and tenth places are special vehicles. There isn’t a single one from eleventh to twentieth place; they’re all ordinary vehicles."

"She’s hacking. She’s definitely hacking. I want to report her!"

At this time, Lily Rhodes still didn’t know that the chat channel had already flipped upside down because of her. However, even if she knew, she probably wouldn’t care. After all, the channel had blown up over her far too many times these past few days; she was already immune to it.

Right now, she was checking the System’s rewards.

As the first place, the rewards were naturally the most generous.

Two random special buildings with uniqueness, five thousand Crystal Cores, and two Advanced Self-selected Item Boxes.

She had obtained an Advanced Self-selected Item Box once before, but the box from that time didn’t look as magnificent as these ones. They should be able to yield some good items.

Storing the Crystal Cores into her warehouse, Lily Rhodes first inspected the two unique buildings.

[Underground Fortress (Unique)

Can ignore terrain to generate an absolutely hidden space beneath the vehicle. Warm in winter and cool in summer.]

"An underground fortress? Wouldn’t that be inside Shelly’s stomach?"

However, the effect of this building was still quite good. Absolutely hidden, warm in winter, and cool in summer. With this underground fortress, she wouldn’t have to worry about the weather’s impact anymore.

The second building was much more high-profile compared to the underground fortress.

[Observatory (Unique)

Function: Stargazing]

And that was it.

Lily Rhodes looked at the Observatory, her eyes staring blankly for several full seconds before she accepted this reality.

Still, it was a unique building after all. It couldn’t be truly useless, right?