Carefree City was fresh with an earthy smell after the drizzle. It was almost eight in the morning and the sun was breaking in the dawn. The city was waking up from its nightly slumber. However, Lin Huang was bummed as he did not manage to book the Demonic Crystal Spaceship tickets the night before and would have to wait for the next scheduled flight which would the following Monday.
He called Lin Xin and unsurprisingly, she picked up even before her phone started to ring. A video was projected before him.
"Brother, was it successful?!" Lin Xin looked at Lin Huang in excitement.
"Yes, I’m now an Iron-level hunter!" Lin Huang nodded in matched enthusiasm.
"Ever since you left, I’ve browsed through some information about the Six-Armed Demon on the network. It seemed powerful but brother, you’re even more powerful than the demon!" She shouted. Lin Xin always thought her brother was invincible, and moments like those proved her right, for her own sake.
"Of course!" Lin Huang smiled.
"Brother, when are you coming back?" Lin Xin asked.
"There’s supposed to be a spaceship that departs to Baqi City today but I just got my settled down after sorting out my stuff from yesterday and didn’t manage to get the ticket. I'll have to come back next week…" Lin Huang explained. "However, I have some things to settle when I’m back in Baqi City so that'll take one or two days. I'll get that done in Carefree City since I'm already here," he continued.
"Oh…" Lin Xin said, sounding upset.
"Carefree City is a food heaven, I’ll bring you good food when I’m back. What would you like to eat?" Lin Huang smiled and asked.
"I want everything!" Lin Xin said playfully.
"Alright, I’ll get one each for you." Lin Huang nodded.
"No, I want two of each dish!" Lin Xin said.
"Can you finish so much food, you little glutton?" Lin Huang raised his eyebrows.
"Of course! We'll share it. I want you to eat with me!" Lin Xin's tone remained playful.
"Alright then, I’ll get two of each…" Lin Huang shook his head.
"Brother, can you stay longer this time when you’re back?" Lin Xin asked after a moment of hesitation.
"That shouldn’t be a problem, why?" Lin Huang replied, curious at her request.
"It’s summer break next week. I will be so bored without you at home…" Lin Xin explained, rolling her eyes and pouting at the thought.
There were four seasons in Division7 as well. Everyone, no matter a child in school or an adult at work would have four long holidays every year. Spring break was a long holiday during the rainy season which was usually 15 to 20 days. However, it would not be raining in all the areas and the holiday did not apply to certain areas as well. Summer break was similar to the experience back on Earth, it was the warmest season of the year. The break would usually be one and a half months and if it was too warm, the break could go on for two months. Autumn break would be the anniversary of the establishment of the Union Government. The break lasted for 10 days. Lastly, the winter break which was similar to the one on Earth. This coldest holiday would last for one to two months. Some areas that were colder would get a holiday that was longer than two months.
Lin Huang was shocked when he learned about the four long holidays in this world. The first thing that came to his mind was, "We get five months of holidays in this world? These people are so pampered!" He later found out that to ordinary people, it was not really a holiday for those who were working during the summer and winter. It was more like a work from home situation.
"Ahh, I almost forgot about the summer break…" Lin Huang scratched his head, "It would be boring to stay at home for one to two months. Why not you pick a destination and we'll travel there?"
"A vacation? Yes please!" Lin Xin screamed. She had never left Wulin Town since she was little. She was so excited when Lin Huang suggested the vacation.
"You pick the destination within the next few days. After I get back, I'll rest for two or three days before we depart," Lin Huang told her. He was relieved when he managed to coax her out of her solemn mood.
"Okay," Lin Xin nodded her head hard.
After he hung up the phone, he had breakfast downstairs. He then went to the reception and booked his room for another one week and left to the Hunter Association. There was a division of the Hunter Association in the middle of each foothold. Lin Huang planned to trade the dead monster carcasses to get credit points when he got back to Baqi City but now that he could not leave just yet, he figured he would do it that here instead since it was the same. In reality, the price of dead monster carcasses was fixed so it would not matter which city he went to.
The Hunter Association divisions were built in the central area of each city. It was not far from the hotel that Lin Huang stayed in. It only took him a 10-minute walk to get there. It was 8:30 in the morning when he got there and it was already crowded. Lin Huang followed the crowd to the main hall and made his way to the reception desk on the left of the entrance. There were many people at the counter, and after waiting for quite a while, he was finally at the counter.
"Hi, I would like to know where to trade in monster carcasses," he asked.
"It’s at the Monster Carcass Warehouse behind the hall, I’ll get someone to bring you there." The receptionist in a red dress called a number and immediately hung up after a short exchange of words.
"Someone will come get you, please give them a moment," she told him.
One or two minutes later, a strong, young man approached Lin Huang when he saw him standing next to the receptionist.
"Are you the guest who would like to trade in monster carcasses?"
"Yes, that's me," Lin Huang nodded.
"How many are there?"
"I think there are 300 to 400 of them, I didn’t count," Lin Huang really had no idea of the exact amount as he collected so many himself while he was following Li Yanxing. Bai and Charcoal killed quite a lot of monsters as well. The storage in his ring was full to the extent they were not able to bring back the carcasses of the monsters they killed later on.
"Alright, please follow me," the young man said. He brought Lin Huang to the back of the hall.
It was a large backyard. The young man led Lin Huang across the backyard to the far end. There was a massive house that looked like a warehouse. The young man stopped at the entrance of the warehouse, turned around and said to Lin Huang, "You can put all the monster carcasses here, I’ll get my master to count them."
The young man then walked into the warehouse. Lin Huang took out all the monster carcasses from his storage ring, and soon the carcasses were piled into a small hill at the entrance of the warehouse.
A moment later, a short and stout old man walked out slowly. The young man walked behind him without saying a word. The old man looked at Lin Huang, nodded, and walked around the pile of monster carcasses. He then said to Lin Huang,"There are a total of 421 of them, 187 are bronze-level rank-3 and 234 are bronze-level rank-2. Is that correct?"
"I didn’t count them myself, so I have no idea how many are there." Lin Huang replied, stunned at what had just happened. He thought it was strange that the old man just walked around the monster carcasses and he managed to get such an accurate figure. However, what he was certain of was there were only monsters of bronze-level rank-2 and bronze-level rank-3 as he cleared out all the bronze-level rank-1 in his storage to store more valuable monster carcasses.
"Hercules, help him count them," the old man ordered and waved to the young man casually. He then walked back into the warehouse.
"It’s impossible that my master would have miscalculated. I'll count them for you again then," the strong, young man said then lifted a monster’s thigh and tossed it aside.
Lin Huang was shocked. The young man had just lifted a Trihorn Rhino. Although it was not a gigantic monster, it weighed at least five tons but the young man managed to lift it with just one hand. What shocked Lin Huang even more was, there were no signs of Life Power on the young man’s body.
"Was he born strong or is there some other reason?" Lin Huang looked at him skeptically while he counted the carcasses. The figure was exactly what the old man said.
"Are you done counting?" The old man came back and smiled at Lin Huang while he stood at the warehouse entrance. "The price of a bronze-level rank-2 monster carcass is usually within 300,000 to 500,000 credit points while bronze-level rank-3 would be within 500,000 to 800,000 credit points. The accurate price for all these carcasses would be 215.15 million credit points. I’ll round it up to 215.2 million credit points for you," he said.
"Sure, thank you old man," Lin Huang replied. He thought it would have been great if he could get at least one hundred million credit points out of the carcasses but it was so much more than he expected.
"Hercules, please do the transfer for him," The old man then passed a note that was the size of his palm with '215,200,000’ written on it. Lin Huang was surprised but he took the note.
"Let’s go, we need to go to the finance department near the hall," Hercules said, and he ushered Lin Huang out of the warehouse and into the hall.
While they were walking, Lin Huang could not help but ask, "What does the Hunter Association do with so many monster carcasses?"
"Most of them will become food in the market while rare ones will be sent for research," Hercules explained.
"The Hunter Association collaborates with the House of Food and many other organizations so there are many orders for the carcasses," he continued.
"Ahh, so they collaborate with the House of Food…" Lin Huang finally understood why the Hunter Association needed massive supplies of monster carcasses.
The House of Food was an organization that many Food Hunters joined. The organization only recruited Food Hunters so they need to collaborate with other organizations for other resources. For the safety of food ingredients, they did not purchase ingredients from the market. The selection of food ingredients was done by the Hunter Association and Adventurer Paradise, which saved the House of Food a lot of time.
Hercules brought Lin Huang to the finance office, Lin Huang then passed the note to the middle-aged woman behind the counter. The woman looked at the note and looked at Hercules and Lin Huang, "215.2 million, is that right?" she confirmed.
"That’s correct." Lin Huang nodded. A white interface then popped up before him.
"Please scan at the bottom right corner. The transfer will be done within three minutes," the woman said.
Lin Huang scanned the barcode at the bottom right corner with his Emperor’s Heart Ring immediately. Just as he retracted his hand, he received a transfer notification. It was a message from the credit bureau.
"Dear Mr. Lin Huang, you have received a transfer of 215.2 million credit points."
Looking at the number, Lin Huang was over the moon, "Who cares what kind of currency this is, I finally have more than a hundred million in my savings…"