Great! I'm surrounded by villains!
Chapter 237 - 157: Wishing You a Dream of Prosperity

Chapter 237: Chapter 157: Wishing You a Dream of Prosperity

People always have their weaknesses, and Duan Mingyuan realized that beyond investing, the field of Elixir studies was not his forte either.

Alchemy is all about interlinking processes. Merely assembling various materials coarsely could lead to an explosion.

Just like now.

The silver lining in the unfortunate event was that no one inside the Elixir Pavilion was injured, only one Alchemy Furnace was damaged.

The injured was downstairs of the Elixir Pavilion—standing in the crowd, Garoya clenched her fists. By her estimation, if the "Dream-Returning Pills" could be sold successfully, she would be able to increase her thrown-in chips by more than tenfold overnight, and thereafter, she would invest the 1000 Bei for more.

This was not only her way of assessing civilizations, but also one of the hobbies of the Shan Clan People.

The underground exchanges they had set up on various planets, where lifespans served as chips, were just their ordinary games. In pursuit of thrills, many Shan Clan People would even set their lifespan chips to 1 hour upon entering the exchange, obliging them to change their destiny within the remaining 1 hour.

As far as Garoya knew, every high-ranking member of the Chamber of Commerce had played this game, more than once.

She was no exception.

However, now she had lost 70 pieces of principal on a remote planet, in a world of fools with no business sense.

More infuriating to Garoya than the loss of chips was the lingering sense of humiliation.

The accident didn’t appear to be a problem with her own judgment, but rather a vicious business competition.

Someone had followed her and after learning her plan, had blown up the Elixir Pavilion.

About a quarter of an hour later, Garoya identified the prime suspect at the scene.

Mr. Mingyuan, the "Defense Against the Dark Arts" teacher, was bustling around inside the Elixir Pavilion, pretending as if he had rushed to help upon hearing the news. The scene was chaotic, and thus no one noticed that this man, unrelated to the elective "Elixir Studies," had actually come down from the attic from the very beginning.

Alright, this is how you do business, huh?

Garoya reflected on her own mistake; in the end, it was an error in her judgment of character.

She had initially thought that someone like Duan Mingyuan would not resort to such petty theft, yet even she had been deceived by this seemingly honest man.

But this was not her first time encountering obstacles in the assessment process.

Garoya always informed the other party of her assessment criteria before the evaluation began.

The time limit was three days.

The more wealth she accumulated during this period, the lower the civilization’s rating would be.

Upon learning these two points, the other party would naturally try to destroy her business by all means possible.

The direct ones would send thugs to try to restrict her personal freedom.

The more indirect ones would invite her to all sorts of events in various ways, trying to fill her schedule for these three days as much as possible.

Duan Mingyuan was clearly of the "direct" type, belonging to the most extreme radicals within that category.

To sabotage her business, he even blew up the school where he taught.

Garoya’s gaze towards Duan Mingyuan’s retreating figure grew dark, like a venomous snake discovering its prey in the shadows.

If that’s how it is, let’s create something "unexplodable."

The market and customers’ needs hadn’t changed; what she needed to do was to switch strategies after one path had been blocked.

She took out her phone and increased her chips from the remaining 30 to 10,000.

Debt of 9970 Bei.

Garoya had not intended to do this, but the error in judgment increased her aggressiveness by quite a bit.

As for the debt, that was nothing to the Shan Clan People—they believed the greater the investment, the greater the return.

...

That evening, a major chat application spread like wildfire among the students of the academy.

"Monster Chatroom."

The name sounded ordinary, yet it made the functions clear to the students who, after reading about the chatroom’s capabilities, were instantly energized, preparing to stay up all night.

Inside the chatroom, they could encounter various monsters with diverse personalities, have heartfelt conversations with them, and if the chat was enjoyable, they could use the app’s attached feature to reward the monsters with snacks.

As night fell, Garoya leaned against the headboard, admiring her own masterpiece.

The backend administrator interface showed the real-time number of users, and after the news spread, users were no longer limited to the faculty and students of the academy.

There are ways to gain patience, sincerity, and courage other than elixirs; with the internet as a barrier, people’s words are usually full of bravery in any civilization.

More importantly, even if Duan Mingyuan were a bomb maniac with a reputation throughout the universe, he couldn’t blow up the internet, a virtual entity.

That was the skill of a hacker.

It was evident that the level of information technology on Blue Star was still quite rudimentary; the little technology they had mastered was simply incomparable to that of the Chamber of Commerce.

10,000 Bei were used to purchase tools that would allow the monsters of the back hill to log into the chatroom, as well as to provide corresponding registration benefits for every monster who signed up.

As long as the software was used, one could receive small gifts; the longer one used it, and the more friends made, the richer the unlocked rewards became.

Once this supply and demand chain was established, there was no need for further financial investment; it would be time to reap the rewards.

However, Garoya had taken slight advantage of her power.

The development of the software, the rental of the servers, and their maintenance were all readily available resources from the Chamber of Commerce, and her subordinates had completed the tasks she assigned in just a few hours.

A smile lifted the corners of Garoya’s mouth.

She believed that Duan Mingyuan was still paying attention to her every move; naturally, he would have learned about the "Monster Chatroom."

At this very moment, this seemingly upright "Strange Gates and Devious Techniques" teacher must be throwing a tantrum in his room.

.........

Meanwhile, on the other side.

"I just knew it, Jiuyue! My theory was never wrong!"

Instead of being angry in his room, Duan Mingyuan was actually making a fist with one hand, appearing greatly inspired, "As long as you can develop a piece of software that a lot of people use, you can make a lot of money!"

This was the conclusion he had drawn after some time of theoretical learning and contemplation.

Although he had ultimately failed to develop any phone software, upon seeing "Monster Chatroom," he felt that his theory had been realized through Garoya.

Or to go a step further, his business acumen might well be on par with that of the Shan Clan People, the most skilled merchants in the entire universe.

"Mr. Mingyuan, haven’t you given up yet?"

Life is tough, Jiuyue sighed.

In this matter alone, she had no confidence in Duan Mingyuan.

Other than books related to "Strange Gates and Devious Techniques" and "Defensive Art Against Evil Spirits," Mr. Mingyuan studied mostly various business and self-help books; it seemed he was always reluctant to face his own luck, insisting that his investment losses were due to not possessing the core technology.

If only he could master that core technology, he could surely turn his fortunes around beautifully one day.

Jiuyue felt it was simply fate that he didn’t have financial luck and Mr. Mingyuan could not be blamed for not trying hard enough.

It was heartbreaking to see effort unrewarded, and all she could do was let Mr. Mingyuan sleep with his head on her fluffy tail at night, hoping for a dream of wealth.

Beyond that, Jiuyue was at a loss.

On Blue Star, her ability to manipulate fortune was unmatched, yet even with all her tricks, she could only maintain Mr. Mingyuan’s investment finance at a break-even level. A slight inattention could send Mr. Mingyuan’s financial account plummeting.

"You can’t blame all your failures on luck; the representatives from the Chamber of Commerce who came to Blue Star are the most skilled at doing business in the whole universe, and you can definitely learn something from them that’s not in the books."

Duan Mingyuan wouldn’t accept defeat.

Especially after meeting Jiuyue, he found it even harder to tolerate.

He had devoted so much effort, pouring over various books and market analyses, only to find that he still didn’t do as well as Jiuyue simply picking up money on the street.

It was as if he was doomed to live on a fixed salary.

What was this all about!

"Ah—!"

The little fox demon sighed.

But perhaps this wasn’t entirely a bad thing.

If not even the top investment experts in the universe could save Mr. Mingyuan, perhaps he would finally come to terms with his own luck.

With that thought, she opened the Monster Chatroom’s contact list, and in just a few minutes, 99+ friend requests appeared.

It seemed that the "Monster Authentication" and "Shape-shifting Little Fox Demon" tags were fatally attractive to humans.

She hadn’t even had the chance to change her profile picture to her usual self.

She clicked on the contacts interface, and then her phone popped up with "Risky software," forcing an exit.

When she tried to open the chatroom again, she found she could no longer get in.

The webpage had been classified as harmful and was permanently banned.