Chapter 8: The Blood of Falling

  In "Gods and Demons", equipment levels are divided into eight levels from low to high, corresponding to different font colors.

  Grey is coarse, White is normal, Green is fine, Blue is rare, Purple is epic, Orange is legendary, Gold is artifact, Dark gold is relic.

  So far, there have been no divine artifacts in "Gods and Demons", and only a dozen or so quasi-divine artifacts have appeared worldwide. The terrifying Ivan has two quasi-divine artifacts on him alone because he was the first to reach level 30. Apart from system rewards, a very small number of lucky players have also obtained quasi-divine artifacts by completing high-difficulty tasks.

  Zhou Jian excitedly picked up the next divine artifact.

  Next artifact - Fallen Blood, attribute unknown, needs appraisal.

  With this thing, he can pay back the money owed to Lü Bu and still have some left over. However, Zhou Jian did not intend to sell it as this item would be of great help in his future upgrades.

  One divine equipment, two epic suits, six assignable attribute points, 1,000 honor value, this time I really made a big profit. The attribute points are temporarily not sure what to do with them, so they will be left for now.

  At this time, the other team members also picked up their own equipment. Looking at their joyful expressions, they must have each gained something. However, the system determined that the greatest contributor to this kill of the Demon King's minion was Zhou Jian. The others only obtained equipment as good as the broken military sword, which was an orange legendary-grade equipment.

  In "Shén Mó", no matter what copy, the first time through rewards are the most generous, almost everyone can get a pretty good piece of equipment. After that, the probability of dropping equipment again is much smaller, and by the third or fourth time it's even less, to the point where you might only get some green fine equipment. So the first time is crucial for every player.

  At this time, the system opened a return portal for the players. As they stepped through the portal, the broken military knife turned its head and looked at Zhou Jian, "Do you have any grudges with Liu Shui?"

  Zhou Jian shook his head in denial, "I didn't intentionally lure the boss over. At that time, I was flustered and only thinking of myself, how could I have thought of harming others?"

  The broken military knife just smiled and said indifferently: "Flowing water has no intention of doing things without choosing a means, be careful in the future, if there's anything that needs help, I can help you, this time... thank you."

  "Nothing, just taking what we need, I also want to thank you."

  One by one, the team members returned to the city through the portal. When it was Qingyun Xianzi's turn, she turned her head and looked at Zhou Jian for a moment, intending to say something thankful, but in the end, she just smiled and said, "76342399999, my Tianxin number."

  Zhou Jian could feel that Qingyun Xianzi's smile was very humble, different from the polite but slightly arrogant smile last time. This time her gratitude and smile were both genuine. The 5-digit number ending in 9 was really cool, Zhou Jian also reported his own heavenly message number, a string of messy Arabic numerals.

  "Goodbye." The Light Cloud Fairy said, and then disappeared.

  Zhou Jian returned to the city and the first thing he did was take the quasi-divine artifact for appraisal. Currently, only the high-level appraisers in the city's NPCs can appraise quasi-divine artifacts.

  The senior appraiser of Pangu City was an old man with a white beard. In Zhou Jian's impression, nine out of ten appraisers in online games looked like this. "Master, hello, I'm here for appraisal."

  Zhou Jian said, placing the Blood of Falling on the table. Even under the bright magical lamp, the unique golden glow of the quasi-divine artifact was extremely dazzling.

  The old man with a white beard saw the quasi-divine artifact and his eyes lit up instantly, "Blood of the Fall, what a great thing! I didn't expect that you, at such a low level, with such inferior equipment, could get your hands on this."

  Zhou Jian furrowed his brow. This old NPC's mouth was really foul. He said impatiently, "Hurry up and appraise it, how much is it?"

  "Not many, not many, this number." The old man with a white beard chuckled and stretched out his thumb and index finger, forming the shape of a gun.

  "Eight hundred gold coins?" Zhou Jian had previously appraised green fine equipment for only ten gold coins, he thought that a quasi-divine artifact should be more expensive, eight hundred gold coins was the limit.

  The old man with white beard shook his head.

  "What about those eighty gold coins?"

  The old man with a white beard nodded and said: "Eighty plus ten thousand is just right."

  "Eighty... million!?" Zhou Jian almost jumped out of his chair, "Old man, what kind of joke is this?!"

  "Eight hundred thousand gold coins, and this is the price for a quasi-divine artifact." The old man smiled like Maitreya Buddha, but unfortunately, the row of golden teeth in his mouth ruined the impression.

  "Damn it, why don't you go rob." Eight hundred thousand gold coins are equivalent to eighty thousand RMB. Good grief, if this is appraised, my property will shrink by half.

  "Don't be angry, young man. There are only a dozen or so of these divine artifacts in the entire world right now. One piece costs 800,000 gold coins, which isn't expensive at all."

  "Can I get a discount?"

  The old man spread his hands and said, "Sorry, in order to save time for our customers, we don't offer discounts here."

  "Dizzy, I'll save you the trouble, I won't bother identifying it." Zhou Jian turned around and left, but even after he walked out of the gate, the old man with a white beard didn't react at all.

  The script wasn't written like this, why didn't he stop himself, is it really at this price?

  Zhou Jian finally restrained his curiosity and didn't appraise it, not because he was stingy with money, but because he feared that after appraisal, his level wouldn't be high enough to use it, which would leave him truly despairing.

  This divine artifact is really not something that a small citizen like myself can use. The appraisal fee alone is 8,000 yuan, let alone the cost of buying one.

  Just then, Zhou Jian received a message. He opened it and saw that it read: "Hand over the equipment you've been working on right now, kneel down in front of me and kowtow one hundred times. I might consider letting you live like a dog. Otherwise, I'll make sure you can't even die!"

  The signature was Liu Shui Wu Yi, and Zhou Jian saw this message with a feeling of wanting to laugh. Anyway, he and Liu Shui Wu Yi were already at odds with each other, so he didn't mind provoking the other party again. He replied: "Being brain-dead isn't your fault, but coming out everywhere to proclaim that you're brain-dead is your own wrongdoing. Brother, I have something else to do, goodbye."

  Zhou Jian quit "Shen Mo" immediately after sending out his message.

  He took off Xiao Yin's gaming helmet, Zhou Jian put on his own helmet, locked the door, logged in to the game, and switched his consciousness to Mingjian Ghost Killer. He looked at his attributes and found that they had all increased accordingly, and there was also an additional divine artifact, Blood of the Fallen Gods.

  As guessed, Ming Jian and An Jian are the same game character in different worlds.

  After confirming this point, Zhou Jian was very happy in his heart. This means that the famous sword can continue to become stronger, of course, on the premise that there is money.

  Money! Money! Money!

  He needs money to buy a new gaming helmet, he also needs to rent an apartment outside for convenient operation of the famous sword, identifying divine artifacts requires money, and registering a company also requires money.

  But he is now burdened with nearly 30,000 yuan of debt...

  I currently possess a "Ghost Killer" in reality and a quasi-divine artifact in the online game, but these treasures cannot be converted into cash for the time being.

  Zhou Jian had no choice but to think of ways to make money, otherwise once Xiao Yin came back, he wouldn't even be able to use his gaming headset.

  He created a Word document on his computer, wrote an advertisement himself, and then took it to the school print shop to print out a copy.

  Content:

  "Accepting various high-risk tasks, including fugitive pursuit, capturing villains, killing ferocious beasts, escorting valuable goods transportation, price negotiable, contact QQ: ××××××"

  Zhou Jian took a look, still somewhat satisfied, and then photocopied several dozen more copies. He bought a box of paste, and taking advantage of the sparse pedestrian traffic on the main street at noon, he set out with these things in hand.

  Zhou Jian put his hands in his pockets, pretending to be nonchalant, and slipped away to a utility pole. After glancing around to make sure no one was watching, he took out the paste and started brushing it on.

  He had just painted half of it when Zhou Jian suddenly discovered that there was already an advertisement behind the utility pole, which read: Guaranteed cure for various sexually transmitted diseases and gonorrhea, guaranteed cure for premature ejaculation...

  I'm screwed.

  Zhou Jian had an impulse to throw away the paste bucket on the spot. Can't you be a bit more creative? Who is so cruel to stick this thing, isn't it insincere to oneself in the past? Only ghosts would believe two advertisements stuck together.

  But thinking about it, I really don't have any other way to get work, forget it, I'll endure!

  In this way, Zhou Jian spent two hours posting all the advertisements and also copied several landlords' contact numbers. He planned to move out soon, after all, it was too inconvenient to use the Ghost Killer "Mingjian" in the dormitory.

  Zhou Jian returned and took a bath, preparing to rest for a while, then logged into "Shen Mo" to continue leveling up. Just as he did, his phone rang, and upon seeing the number, it was his roommate Wang Xiaoyin calling him.

  "My god, you're so capable! I haven't seen you for a day and you've already made such a big name for yourself. Have you cleared the new instance?" The voice on the phone was filled with envy."

  "Lucky you, your news is quite up-to-date."

  "Are you kidding me? The whole forum is blowing up and you still don't know?"

  "Has the news reached the forum?"

  "You're so famous now, I almost couldn't help but sell you out."

  "Shut up, don't say a word more, I've messed with someone this time who can't be messed with, let's keep a low profile."

  "Alright, alright, I know, you'd better hurry up and take a look at the forum, it's going to be popular no matter what."