Chapter 162: Opening the Chests

“All of us are part of a trade caravan. If you ever need anything in the future, just come find us.”

A trade caravan?

No wonder they knew so much detail. It seemed likely they’d been to this territory before, maybe even dealt with the lord directly, which would explain why they were so well-informed!

If that’s the case, then what they said is probably true.

“Well then…” The middle-aged man rubbed his hands together a little awkwardly, his eyes flickering with a complicated emotion. “I just wanted to ask if you could tell me a bit more about that territory you were discussing earlier?”

“To be honest, I originally wanted to join XX Territory, but luck wasn’t on my side. They recruited once before, but now they’re full. I heard it’ll be a long time before they expand again… I have a whole family to look after, and I can’t keep dragging them around with me, so I’m hoping to find a good place to settle down.”

“I see…” Member A nodded in understanding. “No problem. Ask me anything you want to know—I’ll tell you everything I can!”

“I’ve been to quite a few places myself. If you’re really looking for somewhere to settle, I can give you some advice too.”

The two sides fell into a lively Q&A, chatting happily.

Since they hadn’t moved from their spot in the quest hall, more and more people gathered around them as they talked.

The middle-aged man managed to learn a lot about the territory from the caravan members, and seeing the growing crowd, the caravaners realized their mission was pretty much accomplished.

Thanks to the caravan’s efforts, Su You noticed by mid-afternoon that the territory’s reputation had shot up significantly.

It had been at 23 points, but now it was up to 29.

“Captain Yun really is something,” Su You thought, a little impressed.

She didn’t know exactly why the reputation had increased, but she could guess it probably had something to do with Yun Li… Of course, it might not be related to Yun Li at all—it could also be from the regional bounty she’d posted.

The bounty card was a reward from her first system quest, and she’d been holding onto it because she hadn’t found the right time to use it.

Now, with the social bonus aura active, Su You decided to post the regional bounty. This way, she could take advantage of the next couple of days to recruit more people, and also use the opportunity to trade with merchants and caravans, exchanging her money for much-needed supplies.

…

On the first day the bounty was posted—the eleventh day of the datafied world—there were no visitors to the territory.

Not only that, but Wang Yi and Wang Er, who had only stayed to save their own skins, also left that day.

As for the other traveler, he’d already left with Yun Li and the caravan, so he was long gone.

With those two gone, the population of the territory dropped from eleven back down to nine… But as luck would have it, not long after they left, the tavern’s recruitment refreshed.

Before heading to the tavern to recruit new NPCs, Su You stopped by the quest hall, planning to open up the pile of treasure chests she’d accumulated and see if there was anything good inside.

There were seven chests in total: one wooden chest, one bronze chest, two iron chests, two silver chests, and one gold chest.

None of the chests were very large, but with so many of them, they nearly filled up the cabinets behind the front desk in the quest hall.

“Let’s test my luck first,” Su You thought, pulling out the wooden chest at the bottom.

The moment she opened it and saw the familiar contents, Su You couldn’t help but tug at the corner of her mouth in exasperation.

[Obtained: Basic Wood Pack x1, Basic Stone Pack x1, Basic Fiber Pack x1, Animal Hide x10, Random Seed Pack x5]

The wood, stone, and fiber packs were collectively known as the three basic resource packs.

The Basic Wood Pack gave 100 wood when used; the Basic Stone Pack gave 100 stone; and since fiber was usually needed in larger quantities, the Basic Fiber Pack gave 1,000 fiber scraps.

All in all, this wooden chest just provided basic resources… Not a lot, but better than nothing.

Still, the animal hides and random seed packs were decent.

Thanks to Dolly, animal hides were always in short supply. Doya was skilled, but hunting depended on luck—if there were no animals around, even the best hunter couldn’t do anything.

As for the random seed packs, they could help diversify the crops in the territory… assuming she didn’t get duplicates.

[Random Seed Pack]

Category: Special

Quality: None

Description: Use to obtain a random plantable seed. High chance of white-quality seeds, small chance of green-quality, and a very small chance of blue-quality or higher.

Looking at the five palm-sized cloth pouches, Su You didn’t hesitate and untied the strings—

[Obtained: Wheat Seed x1]

[Obtained: Corn Seed x1]

[Obtained: Cotton Seed x1]

[Obtained: Pasture Grass Seed x1]

Su You: …Great.

Four seed packs, three duplicates, and the only new one was pasture grass, which wasn’t even useful.

Pasture Grass: A plant used to feed herbivorous animals.

The key point: humans can’t eat it, and aside from being made into “grass feed,” it couldn’t be used for anything else.

Looking at the last seed pack in her hand, Su You didn’t hold out much hope… She was already used to bad luck—she wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be a berry seed or something equally useless.

So, when she untied the string on the last random seed pack, she received a notification—

[Obtained: Spice Seed x1]

Su You: Well, that’s actually pretty good.

It really was! She didn’t get a duplicate!

Although, to be fair, it wasn’t especially useful either.

“Oh well, I’ll give it to Meike—he’ll probably like it,” Su You muttered, tossing the seed into her backpack.

Here, “spice seed” didn’t mean perfume or incense, but “seasoning.”

On Sunset Continent, seasonings weren’t as varied as oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, and tea. Even the spices she’d bought from the caravan were actually just the fruit of this spice plant, ground into powder.

The only real benefit to having this seed was that they’d never have to buy seasoning again—they could produce their own.

…Forget it, no point in trying to comfort herself. It was basically useless. A few silver coins could buy enough seasoning to last for decades—what big use could it possibly have?

…

After opening the wooden chest, Su You felt she could pretty much guess what would be in the other chests.

(End of chapter)"

"163. Space Pouch

Inside the copper chests, Su You found some copper ore, marble, cotton, and some copper ore slag.

From the two iron chests, Su You got some iron ore, glass, clay, wooden planks, stone slabs, fabric, and some iron ore slag.

Just as Su You had expected, all the items from these first three types of chests were basic materials—nothing worth mentioning.

Since there were quite a lot of materials, Su You could only carry these along with the remaining three chests to the warehouse.

She planned to open the last two silver chests and the one gold chest inside the warehouse.

Silver chests were at least the second-best kind, so when Su You opened the first silver chest, she finally saw something that wasn’t just a basic material.

[Intermediate Blacksmith Skill Book]

Category: Skill Book

Quality: Blue

Description: After learning, instantly raises blacksmithing skill to intermediate level.

Looking at the skill book, Su You nodded in satisfaction. She rummaged through the now-opened silver chest and found that, aside from a pile of miscellaneous basic materials, there was nothing else inside.

“…So what’s the point of having so many different chests? Aren’t the contents basically the same?” Su You was genuinely speechless.

She’d thought the silver chest would have something good, but in the end, it was just this one skill book—and only an intermediate one at that. And then… nothing?

After confirming there was nothing else in the chest, Su You opened the second silver chest.

Her luck was a bit better with the second silver chest: it also contained skill books, but this time there were two.

One was an intermediate farming skill book, which would be perfect for Yousen; the other was a beginner fishing skill book—not particularly useful, but better than nothing.

Besides the two skill books, Su You also got a non-duplicate building card: a Quarry card.

[Quarry] (Can be fully dismantled and recovered)

Category: Resource Building

Cost: Unknown (Unlocks after learning the “Quarry” blueprint)

Description: The quarry can automatically link to the territory warehouse. Stone (including regular stone, marble, sandstone, etc.) and ore stored in the quarry will be automatically transferred to the territory warehouse. This feature can be toggled on or off. If the warehouse is full, resources will be temporarily stored in the quarry’s own storage, which has 100 slots and a stack limit of 100 per slot, and only accepts stone-type resources.

…

Previously, there was a lumber mill, and now there’s a quarry. With these two buildings, the territory’s resource collection speed will only get faster and faster… Su You was even more satisfied with the quarry than she was with the intermediate farming skill book.

Compared to the previous chests, Su You would rate this one an 85 out of 100.

“The last one… the gold chest.” Before opening it, Su You hesitated, because this gold chest looked… pretty valuable.

Here’s the thing: wooden chests are made of pure wood, copper chests are pure copper, so naturally, gold chests are made of pure gold.

But once a chest is opened, it disappears instantly, so she wouldn’t have a chance to do anything with it. Su You was now debating whether to melt the gold chest down to make gold coins, or to try her luck opening it.

You have to understand, even though the chest isn’t that big, gold coins aren’t that big either—about the size of an old one-yuan coin. This one gold chest could be melted down into at least several hundred gold coins!

If an NPC with a high blacksmithing skill did the smelting, maybe they could extract even more gold!

That’s the beauty of a high-freedom game—if you can think of it, you can do it.

Of course, the gold chest could also contain something really valuable, maybe even worth more than a few hundred gold coins, but Su You really didn’t trust her luck…

Just as Su You was struggling with her decision, someone appeared at the warehouse door, holding a bundle of things, and knocked.

“Is the Lord here? I’d like to show you something.”

The only one who called Su You “my lord” was Dolly.

Su You didn’t know what she wanted, but she put the chest aside and went to open the door.

The moment she opened the door, Su You saw Dolly holding a big pile of things that looked like waist pouches. If she guessed right, this must be what Dolly wanted to show her.

Before Su You could get a good look, Dolly started explaining: “This is a pouch that can hold things, but not in the ordinary way—it’s more like a wooden cart…”

A wooden cart?

Su You immediately understood what she meant, and picked up one of the pouches to check its information.

[Level 1 Space Pouch] (Can be upgraded with materials)

Category: Item

Quality: Green

Description: A backpack made from space stones, usable by anyone. Has three slots. Except for tools and special items, all items have a stack limit of 10. (Note: No carrying limit, but only one space pouch per person can benefit from the weightless effect. Items in extra pouches will still add significant weight, and the weight increase is not 1:1. Use with caution.)

Usable by anyone… doesn’t that mean even NPCs can use it?

Three slots might be a bit small, but that doesn’t diminish how powerful this space pouch is—especially since it can be upgraded!

The only drawback is that basically everyone can only carry one; carrying more makes them too heavy to lift.

Extra pouches can still store items, but the weight remains, and it’s not a simple 1:1 increase… meaning you might put in a single stone, but when you pick it up, it feels as heavy as a mountain.

This is probably to prevent people from exploiting loopholes, and Su You could understand the reasoning.

Still, what she cared about most was where this space pouch came from.

“Did you make this?” Su You couldn’t think of any other explanation.

But she’d never heard of a space pouch before, so it was probably a newly added item.

Hearing Su You’s question, Dolly nodded. “Yes… here’s what happened: you asked me to help organize the chests, and yesterday while I was sorting, I found a few recipes pressed under some stones in the corner.”

And one of those recipes was for the “Space Pouch.”

Recipes for special items like this are usually extremely rare, but somehow this precious thing had been left forgotten in a corner. If Dolly hadn’t been so careful, it probably would have been thrown out as trash.

(End of chapter)"