39: Chapter 39: Making a fortune of ten thousand, a cunning and unscrupulous merchant!

Lin Xiao took off his glasses, his expression graver than ever before.

This was no ordinary disaster phenomenon, but a precursor to some form of erosion.

"Brother Lin," Wen Yiran said, still shaken, her voice trembling slightly, "If the train keeps heading in this direction, it couldn't possibly, it couldn't possibly be planning to drive into the ocean, right?"

"Hard to say."

Lin Xiao's reply was ambiguous, but a storm was already raging in his heart.

The encroaching, eerie ocean and the terrifying things bobbing in the pitch-black water—this was the most obvious omen imaginable.

The next stop, or rather the next phase of the disaster, was highly likely to be directly related to this ocean and the indescribable "kin" within it!

Whatever leaderboard ranking or event card rewards there were, all the joy was instantly washed away at this moment.

As expected of the second-hardest survival instance...

Lin Xiao sneered inwardly.

Starting off by releasing a few zombies to let the newcomers get a "taste" of success, and then cranking the difficulty to the max.

He was all too familiar with this kind of malice designed to drive people to their deaths.

Thinking of this, Lin Xiao turned to look at Jiang Wanwan: "Can we draw cards now?"

"We can." Jiang Wanwan nodded. Seeing his grave expression, she couldn't help but ask, "Will the fifth round be very dangerous?"

"Not this week, but next week..." Lin Xiao didn't finish his sentence, but his unspoken words only added to the anxiety. "Therefore, we must make the most of the fifth round to stockpile as many resources as possible to cope with the impending drastic changes!"

He glanced at his personal panel. [Currency: stardust * 5165, pleasure tokens * 1]

"I have five thousand stardust here."

Lin Xiao quickly weighed the options.

According to conventional logic, investing one or two thousand to draw an event card was the safe move, but, "Let's invest three thousand stardust this time and gamble for a buff suitable for farming resources, how about that?"

"Five thousand!"

Unexpectedly, the usually conservative Jiang Wanwan now extended her fair hand, fingers splayed, her tone resolute. "Invest it all!"

"Wanwan, don't be reckless. event card effects are random; a larger bet doesn't necessarily mean higher returns," Lin Xiao frowned. "Besides, stardust might have other uses..."

"It's fine, Little Lin."

Jiang Wanwan stepped forward, her soft body pressing against his solid arm. "Our family has plenty of stardust now! If we're going to gamble, let's go big. I trust your judgment, and I trust my luck!"

Plenty of stardust?

Lin Xiao was confused.

"Brother Lin!"

At this moment, Wen Yiran also quietly approached and hugged his arm.

She lowered her voice, a hint of small triumph in her tone. "I didn't waste the fifteen hundred in startup capital you gave me earlier, and, I actually earned a bit more..."

Lin Xiao looked at the slender finger she held up and guessed, "You earned one thousand?"

In his opinion, that was already a decent achievement.

Wen Yiran shook her head.

"Uh, one hundred?" Lin Xiao raised an eyebrow.

"I'm not that wasteful! It's ten thousand!"

Wen Yiran immediately retorted, puffing out her cheeks, her voice rising involuntarily. "To be precise, it's a net profit of 11,240 stardust, and I'm still holding onto inventory of various materials worth over six thousand stardust!"

How much, ten thousand?

Lin Xiao had intended to comfort Wen Yiran for her failed business venture.

Upon hearing this, his hand trembled slightly, and he nearly dropped the glasses case containing the spirit realm lens.

He looked at Wen Yiran. In those eyes, now sparkling with shrewd brilliance, there was no longer any trace of the panic from being scared.

"Where did you earn it from?"

Even with his experience, earning this amount in the first week of the game was astonishing!

Jiang Wanwan smiled on the side, pressing her lips together. "Little Lin, you have no idea. This is the first time in my life I've seen with my own eyes how a cunning merchant is forged, I'm serious!"

Involving a field where she could showcase her talents, Wen Yiran immediately straightened her back and began to describe her series of operations.

"Step one: use stardust to quietly sweep the market, buying up large quantities of all materials with low unit prices on the network trading platform—wood, scrap iron, rubber, and so on, especially those that individual sellers were desperate to offload for stardust."

"Step two: list the batch of equipment you provided, Brother Lin, at a price slightly lower than the market average but still high, then simultaneously broadcast in the channel that I accept designated synthesis materials for discounted purchases. The more they buy, the bigger the discount!"

"The passengers have stardust but lack materials. Since repairing facilities and equipment usually requires various materials, they have no choice but to use stardust to buy equipment. Even if the equipment is priced a bit high, they still feel it's worth it."

"But if they don't have enough stardust, what can they do? They can only sell some synthesis materials they don't need at low prices, which, coincidentally, I buy up entirely, forming a perfect closed loop."

"Moreover, every time I list new equipment, I quietly raise the price slightly compared to the previous batch, while hinting in the chat channel that supplies are limited and it's first come, first served."

"Once panic and the scarcity effect are created, those who were waiting on the sidelines won't be able to sit still, because if they don't buy now, they really won't be able to afford it later!"

Having heard this, Lin Xiao nodded slightly.

The methods weren't complicated, but he asked curiously, "There should be other people selling equipment on the market, right?"

"Of course there are, especially those high up on the leaderboard, like Liu Bi."

Wen Yiran's mouth curled into a cunning arc. "But their equipment is either for their own use or only exchanged for core resources or high-priced stardust. They don't care about piecemeal material trades at all. And the equipment that can flow from individual sellers is too scarce to make an impact, so I quickly seized pricing power for mid-to-low-end equipment."

"And then?" Lin Xiao pressed, knowing this wasn't the end.

"Hehe, and then comes the most brilliant step!"

Wen Yiran crossed her arms and paced twice in the small compartment. "Think about it, Brother Lin. Those who are still alive now are either lucky koi with heaven-defying fortune or ruthless wolves who dare to fight. But regardless of which type, if they want to survive, they must rely on two things."

She held up two fingers: "Equipment and territory facilities. Both of these have durability and need regular repairs. And what do repairs need?"

"They need materials, and specific combinations of materials at that!" Jiang Wanwan added at the right moment, playing the perfect straight man.

"Right! But the few materials they get from killing zombies are random in type and scarce in quantity; they aren't enough at all. They even sold them off for stardust to buy equipment!" Wen Yiran's smile deepened. "So now, in whose hands are most of the basic materials circulating on the market?"

"Ours!" Jiang Wanwan raised her hand and tapped her chest with a serious face.

"Then other people..." Just as Lin Xiao was about to ask, Wen Yiran explained:

"Exactly, the others aren't fools. Some tried to dump materials at low prices to disrupt the market, or hoard them for speculation."

"But thanks to my earlier capital accumulation and faster operational speed, I either snatched them up first or used lower wholesale prices to squeeze them until they were unprofitable, forcing them to sell the materials to me in the end. Especially..."

Wen Yiran paused and lowered her voice. "Just before you came back, that group from Compartment 14 didn't know what kind of madness they were in; they were frantically sweeping the trading channel for scrap iron, wood, and rusty parts. They offered prices readily and barely haggled. Just from them alone, I recouped three or four thousand stardust!"

Lin Xiao nodded, understanding.

Liu Bi's team was in urgent need of a large amount of basic materials.

It seemed it was to repair the shields and weapons that had suffered heavy wear and tear during their hard fight with an elite monster.

"Of course, there are still some people holding onto a few materials, holding out and not buying, thinking they can make it through."

Wen Yiran concluded, her tone light, but her eyes revealing a cunning and sinister look. "But that's okay, I'm not in a hurry. Once the fifth round of disaster hits and the number of zombies surges, their weapons will be chipped to the edge, and their doors will be battered until they're tottering. When that time comes, they'll be crying and begging, willing to pay any price to trade for the materials I've marked up!"

After saying this, she chuckled.

Lin Xiao looked at her quietly for two seconds, then reached out and vigorously ruffled her chestnut-colored hair.

"Well done!"

This praise came from his heart.

Wen Yiran's series of operations hadn't just earned stardust; they had invisibly constructed a resource barrier.

Then, he added, with a hint of teasing, "It's a good thing there are no streetlamps on the train."

Wen Yiran blinked, not catching on. "Huh? What streetlamps?"

"Otherwise," Lin Xiao replied, suppressing the smile at the corner of his mouth, "with these tactics of hoarding and market manipulation, you would definitely be strung up on a streetlamp by an angry mob anywhere else."

Wen Yiran immediately put her hands on her hips, pouting and acting coquettishly. "Brother Lin! I call this the rational use of market rules to optimize resource allocation!"

"Hahaha..." Jiang Wanwan had already collapsed on the bed laughing, her shoulders shaking uncontrollably.

This interlude lessened the originally oppressive atmosphere in the compartment quite a bit.

Lin Xiao took a deep breath and pulled his attention back to reality.

He looked at Jiang Wanwan, no hesitation left in his eyes. "Then, five thousand it is!"