Chapter 8: Fish Spear Sells Well

Lily Rhodes was having a field day selling fire sources when she noticed a new private message pop up in her previously cleared inbox.

Opening the anonymous message, she easily guessed it was from the other fire merchant.

"Friend, isn’t it a bit unethical to poach business? Couldn’t you just stick to selling your water?"

Lily ignored the sender. She exited her private messages and continued listing fire sources while organizing the mountain of materials piled beside her.

She noticed that ever since Shelly upgraded, the System space on her wrist had upgraded as well, boasting a significantly larger capacity.

"Could this System space be tied to Shelly’s Level?" Lily wondered.

To confirm this theory, she would have to wait for the little turtle’s next upgrade, though she was almost certain she was right.

However, even with the expanded System backpack, tossing all her materials inside at once remained impossible. Besides, packing it full would leave no room for future necessities.

Fortunately, she had Bronze Treasure Chests. Unlike ordinary wooden ones, the Bronze capacity was massive, and the Golden Treasure Box and Diamond Treasure Chest offered even more room. Earlier, she had sold part of the catch from her fishing net. When fish meat sharply depreciated in value, she had simply thrown the entire remaining catch into a chest.

She currently possessed fourteen Bronze Treasure Chests, two Golden Treasure Boxes, and one Diamond Treasure Chest.

She had been racking her brain over how to store all these supplies. Piling them on Shelly took up too much living space, and her wrist’s System backpack could only hold a fraction of the materials.

Moreover, if she ever encountered other Survivors, leaving materials out in the open would inevitably invite greed.

Now, with these Treasure Chests, storing everything became effortless.

Lily sorted the materials into different chests by category.

After filling several chests in a row, she let out a massive yawn.

She had spent the entire day in a grueling cycle: hunting for Treasure Chests, casting her fishing net, hunting again, casting again, sorting the catch, and listing fresh water. Adding her recent frenzy of organizing, her body had hit its absolute limit.

More importantly, she noticed several new Survivors selling fire sources in the trading zone.

Seeing this, Lily yawned again and decisively halted her sales, crawling into her Owl Tent for bed.

Only with adequate sleep could she face tomorrow with full energy.

Before sleeping, however, she didn’t forget to drop a Deep Water Bomb on the other Survivors.

She crafted a Fish Spear and listed it in the trading zone.

She deliberately set the price at an astronomical one thousand Crystal Cores, then appended a note below: *Not for general sale. PM for specific pricing. Blueprints prioritized.*

Her goal wasn’t actually to sell this specific Fish Spear, but to advertise that she had weapons in her possession.

She was too lazy to spam the world chat, finding this simple and crude method much more efficient.

Once the item was listed, Lily closed her eyes and fell asleep within a second. She remained entirely oblivious to the shock the Fish Spear caused among the other Survivors. Almost instantly, her inbox exploded.

People waited anxiously for a reply that never came, completely unaware that the merchant they were waiting for had long since drifted into sweet dreams.

Early the next morning, Lily woke up refreshed.

Stepping out of the Owl Tent, she stretched her arms.

She had slept wonderfully, and the previous day’s exhaustion had vanished without a trace. Truthfully, she had never slept this well back on Azurea, a luxury entirely owed to the Owl Tent.

Rolling her wrists to loosen up, Lily looked out at the ocean around her island. "Good morning, Shelly. Did you sleep well last night?"

The calm sea rippled as a turtle head poked through the surface. Shelly turned to look at her, seemingly indicating that she had slept excellently.

Lily pulled a Bronze Treasure Chest from her spatial storage, opened it, and took out some of yesterday’s catch to feed Shelly.

After eating and drinking her fill, the little turtle let out a series of delighted sounds.

Lily examined the fish in her hands; they looked exactly as they had yesterday. She then opened an adjacent Bronze Treasure Chest.

She had purposely stored some fish inside it the day before.

The fish inside were perfectly fine.

However, next to this Bronze Treasure Chest lay a dead fish she had left out in the open as an experiment. Its scales were completely dried out, and it emitted a faint, putrid stench. It was clearly no longer edible.

Compared to the fish inside the chest, the difference was night and day.

"It seems the Bronze Treasure Chest doesn’t just store items; it also keeps them fresh," Lily noted.

This made things infinitely more convenient, eliminating any worries about food spoilage.

After eating a piece of bread, Lily quickly pinpointed the location of the next Treasure Chest and directed Shelly to head there immediately.

Taking advantage of the travel time, she opened her private messages and was stunned by the sheer volume.

It seemed everyone was incredibly desperate for weapons.

She first crafted one hundred Fish Spears. Then, with the discerning eye of an emperor selecting a royal consort, she began sifting through the messages.

"It seems like everyone really does have a lot of good stuff on hand."

Lily practically stared wide-eyed at the purchasing offers filling her inbox.

Perhaps because she had actively collected Crystal Cores earlier, almost every proposed offer included them.

Seeing this, Lily called out to her traveling companion. "Shelly, you’re going to Level up again very soon!"

"Really? I’m so happy! La la la, I’m the luckiest little turtle in the whole world!"

Shelly let out a joyful cry.

After careful consideration and selection, Lily finalized her trading partners.

"Blueprints really are scarce," she mused.

After reading through every single message, she found only a sparse handful of blueprints. Furthermore, some were things she didn’t even need, like a Planting Box blueprint.

Such an item might be vital to other Survivors, but it was useless to her. After all, the ground beneath her feet was already the most fertile soil imaginable; she was merely lacking seeds.

But she would acquire those soon enough.

Despite the Planting Box being of no immediate use to her, she decided to trade for it anyway.

Just because she didn’t need it didn’t mean others wouldn’t.

Aside from the Planting Box blueprint, there were also blueprints for a grill, a cabinet, and other seemingly useless items. Lily accepted them all without rejection.