Chapter 165: Doris

By the time their loyalty and favor had been raised, Doris had already leveled up.

As for the other three recipes, Doris had already learned the level-one recipe, so she didn’t need it. Su You could keep it for other uses. The level-four and level-five recipes didn’t have crafting processes yet, and those were things for far in the future anyway, so Su You kept those for herself as well.

Su You also took note of the materials needed for the level-two and level-three recipes. Other than the spatial stone, she recognized all the other ingredients and knew where to find them, so gathering them wouldn’t be difficult...

“For now, focus on making leather equipment. You can make some other things too, just follow your usual habits. There’s a good chance we’ll have visitors to the territory tomorrow...”

Doris: “Understood.”

After chatting with Doris about the tailoring shop, Su You suddenly seemed to remember something. She turned around and took out a gleaming golden chest.

Doris stared at the solid gold chest, her mouth slightly open in shock.

“This is...” It was her first time seeing a chest made of pure gold. This thing had to be worth at least several hundred gold coins, right?

Some people never earn that much in their entire lives...

Indeed, some people never see that much gold in a lifetime, but Su You wasn’t supporting just one person—she had a whole city to take care of.

If her luck hadn’t been so bad, she would never have considered the bizarre idea of “melting down the chest to make coins.” After all, things like building cards, recruitment cards, bounty cards, and other rare materials or recipes were almost impossible to buy—the only way to get them was from opening chests.

Her luck was bad? Fine!

She’d stop opening chests herself and find someone else to do it!

“Doris, come help me open this chest.”

Experience had shown that Doris’s luck was always pretty good—at least better than Su You’s. If Doris opened the chest and got something good, that would be ideal. If not, at least Su You could blame it on the chest.

“O-open the chest?” Doris was a little nervous, her hands trembling as she looked at the dazzling golden box... After all, to her, this wasn’t just a prop chest—it was a mountain of gold.

“Don’t worry, just open it however you like. No pressure.” Su You placed the chest directly into Doris’s hands.

Since Su You said so, Doris stared at the chest for a while, then took a deep breath. She held the chest with one hand and slowly unlocked the golden clasp with the other.

As soon as the lid cracked open, Su You caught a faint glimmer of gold from inside.

Just as she was wondering if this was some kind of “golden legend,” the glow faded, and Doris opened the chest fully, revealing everything inside.

[Beginner Sewing Skill Book x1]

[Magic Pattern Book x1]

[Spatial Stone x1]

[Phoenix Wood x1]

[Statue Remnant Soul x1]

...

There were only five items, but each one was more valuable than the last.

Doris didn’t know how valuable these things were. All she saw was that after opening the chest, the box worth hundreds of gold coins was gone, and in its place were two books, a stone identical to the spatial stone she’d used before, a cloudy light-blue gem, and a piece of deep red wood that didn’t look special except for its color.

No matter how she looked at it, these things didn’t seem worth hundreds of gold coins. Doris grew anxious, worried she’d ruined the chest, and looked up at Su You, a little lost.

“Miss Lord...”

Before she could say anything, Su You—who knew the true value of these items—hugged her tightly.

“I knew letting you open the chest was the right call!”

The first three items didn’t even need mentioning. The skill book was useless to her and could be sold. The magic pattern book could be kept or sold. The spatial stone could be used to upgrade her spatial bag or make more of them.

Phoenix Wood, a symbol of good fortune, was said in legends to be where phoenixes perched... Even if it was just a legend, in the game it naturally had special significance.

While not as rare as dragonbone, it was still a relatively rare material.

Most importantly, Phoenix Wood was a lightweight wood—perfect for making light bows!

“I’ll have Doya thank you properly later.” After explaining the use of the Phoenix Wood to Doris, Su You finally relaxed.

At least the wood wasn’t as worthless as she’d feared... That was a relief.

“What about this?” Doris pointed at the blue gem.

It was called a gem, but unlike most gems, it was cloudy and ugly, full of impurities.

“That’s a Statue Remnant Soul.”

A Statue Remnant Soul was one of the materials needed to build a statue—the same kind of statue card you could choose when first establishing your territory.

As Su You explained its use, she took the pale blue “gem” to see which “god” the remnant soul belonged to.

[Statue Remnant Soul: Doris]

Type: Special

Quality: Red

Description: This stone contains a fragment of the soul of Doris, Goddess of Life. Once a statue is built, place this inside and the statue will bestow Doris’s blessings upon those who worship her.

...

The Goddess of Life, Doris. Su You had never worshipped her before, but she’d heard her blessings were quite good.

Each statue’s blessing corresponded to its deity’s title, so the “Goddess of Life” naturally gave life-related blessings.

Doris could grant health and vitality to her followers, strengthening their bodies and increasing their stamina and endurance.

In game terms: “reduced chance of disease,” “faster HP recovery,” “increased max HP/defense,” “faster stamina recovery,” and so on.

All in all, a pretty decent remnant soul.

The materials needed to build the statue were [Stone x1000, Marble x500, Statue Remnant Soul x1]. She had enough stone, and now the remnant soul, so all she was missing was some marble.

Statues were the kind of thing where the sooner you built them, the sooner you benefited, so Su You decided to make it a priority.

Conveniently, when she went to mine marble later, she could also check out the area near the monster cage and set things up for tomorrow.

...

With the chest opened, Su You sorted through everything and took out two spatial bags.

“Keep one for yourself, and give the other to Doya. Make sure to teach her how to use it.”

Doris’s loyalty and favor had long since maxed out, so giving her a spatial bag was only natural—especially since she’d made them herself.

As for Doya, while not maxed out, her loyalty was at 90 and favor at 89, which was good enough.

With a spatial bag, hunting trips would be much more convenient.

“All right. Anything else, Miss Lord?” Doris had no objections to Su You’s arrangements.

“Go ahead and take care of your own things. And remember to rest.”

(End of chapter)"

"166. Vivian

After Dolly left, Su You headed to the tavern, planning to recruit some NPCs first.

Since it wasn’t mealtime, the tavern was empty—there wasn’t even any sign of Meck. Who knows where he’d gone or what he was up to.

Su You skillfully opened the recruitment panel. She barely glanced at it for a few seconds before directly selecting an NPC to recruit.

【Vivian】

Gender: Female

Age: Young

Loyalty: 65

Affection: 25

Talents: Medicine (85), Magic (70)

Skills: Novice Physician, Novice Healing Magic

Traits: Drug Sensitivity (increased success rate for medicine-related checks), Malicious Personality (takes pleasure in provoking strong emotions in others)

Profile: 【Vivian’s father comes from a long line of doctors, while her mother is the daughter of a famous performing troupe leader (including but not limited to: magic, acrobatics, theater, etc.).

Under her father’s influence, Vivian displayed an exceptional talent for medicine and studied the craft under him from a young age.

But this was just due to her natural talent—it didn’t really suit her personality.

Vivian was born with a mischievous, almost devilish temperament. Rather than quietly healing the sick, she much preferred playing pranks—not for the process, but for the outcome.

She also loved standing on stage, putting on jaw-dropping performances, and relished seeing all sorts of intense emotions on the faces of her audience—whether it was shock, tension, fear, or panic.

During one acrobatic performance, Vivian sneaked onto the stage and got injured, but was unexpectedly discovered by a magician in the audience, who noticed her magical talent. With the promise that she could perform on stage if she studied magic well, Vivian joined the Mage’s Guild.

Unfortunately, after Vivian “graduated” from the Mage’s Guild, her mother’s performing troupe disbanded for various reasons, and her dream of performing on stage was shattered...】

...

Even without considering Vivian’s personality, her two skill talents alone were enough for Su You to make a quick decision.

Although Yue could barely fill the role of a healer with her water magic, water mages have the weakest healing abilities. In terms of healing power, it goes: Healing Mage > Light Mage > Water Mage.

Yue’s healing magic could only close wounds, not restore health, so its effect was quite limited.

What’s more, Vivian also had physician skills. This made Su You, who had been debating whether to build a clinic in the territory due to the lack of a doctor, decide immediately.

And to be honest, Vivian’s negative trait wasn’t even that bad... She just enjoyed seeing people scared, right?

Su You not only had ways to satisfy this little quirk of hers, but could even use it as a reason for Vivian to stay.

After recruiting her, Su You left the tavern and gathered materials to build a clinic at the edge of the residential area.

The materials for the clinic were the usual trio—composite wood planks, composite stone slabs, and marble bricks.

Although Su You needed marble for the statue and probably shouldn’t be using it up, the amount on hand wasn’t enough for the statue anyway, and now there was a quarry... so it didn’t matter.

【Consume Composite Wood Plank x5, Composite Stone Slab x5, Marble Brick x5 to build a Clinic?】

【Construction in progress: Clinic. Estimated time: 300 minutes】

Besides the clinic, Su You also used some wood planks to repair a few houses, bringing the total number of residences up to ten. That way, there would be enough space for new recruits tomorrow.

Once the buildings were set up, Su You took the quarry construction card, two level-one storage pouches, and some materials and tools, and headed straight for the mines.

...

...

“Lord, this is...” Laike stared in surprise at the quarry building that had suddenly appeared before him, but didn’t seem to think a structure springing up out of nowhere was all that strange—just a bit surprising.

After Su You explained the quarry’s function, Laike immediately realized it was similar to the lumber mill.

“This is for you. Take good care of it. It works like a wooden cart, but can only store three types of items.” Su You handed him a storage pouch, then looked around as if searching for something.

“I’ll take good care of it,” Laike replied, understanding its use and nodding earnestly.

He didn’t ask where the pouch came from, simply slinging it over his shoulder.

“Where’s Lyle?” Logically, Lyle should be around here, but Su You didn’t see him anywhere.

“Are you looking for Lyle, my lord? He’s over by the stone gate ruins you sealed earlier... Said he wanted to keep an eye on the place in case something happened.” Although Laike thought this was unnecessary and rather dangerous, he couldn’t talk Lyle out of it, so he just let him be.

Anyway, since he was nearby, if anything happened over there, he’d hear it.

“Got it.” With that, Su You headed toward the monster spawn cage, reminding Laike before leaving to start mining marble.

The warehouse still needed about 120 more pieces of marble to build the statue. With Laike’s speed and the new quarry, Su You figured they’d gather enough marble soon.

Laike: “Understood, I’ll get right on it.”

...

Just as Laike said, Su You found Lyle by the monster spawn cage.

He was chopping wood while keeping a close eye on the cage, his expression complicated, as if lost in thought.

When he saw Su You approach, he stopped what he was doing.

“This is for you.” Su You handed him a storage pouch and repeated the explanation she’d given Laike, mentioning that Laike had one too.

Lyle was clearly much sharper than Laike. He immediately grasped the value of this seemingly ordinary pouch and understood the trust Su You was placing in them.

“This is really valuable.” As a player, Su You was used to having inventory space—twenty slots, no less—so she couldn’t fully appreciate how precious this pouch was to them.

For Lyle, this was an item on par with the “spatial magic” that only high-level mages in legends could use.

“It is, but you both deserve it.” Although the brothers’ loyalty and affection hadn’t maxed out at 100, the lowest was already 97. With numbers that high, it was only a matter of time before they reached full value, and it wouldn’t take long.

Besides, Su You wasn’t blind—she could see how much the brothers had contributed to the territory.

If it weren’t for them, Su You would have been exhausted just gathering materials on her own.

Hearing Su You’s words, Lyle was deeply moved.

(End of chapter)"

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