[Trade Market].
The moment Colin opened the Parchment, he saw this new feature.
When he clicked on it, he found it already filled with all kinds of materials.
The food category in particular made Colin frown as he read the listings: [Rotten Aberration Flesh] [Bones] [Rotten Eyeballs] [Fat Maggots] [Aged Corpse Leg].
"What the hell are all these nightmare-inducing things? How is anyone even selling this stuff?"
Colin's mouth twitched. He was a little disappointed, since he had money to spend.
He'd also seen that some people seemed lucky enough to have hunted beasts and gotten fresh food, but when he clicked on the listings, it didn't seem like they actually wanted to sell.
[Fresh Wild Roe Deer Meat.]
[Item Description: One jin of fresh rib meat cut from a roe deer. More nutritious than bread.]
[Type: Consumable.]
[Time Remaining: 1 day]
[Price: Hardened Black Bread*10, 500 ml of Filthy Dim Blood]
[Seller's Note: If you have "Mist Points," "Level 3 Water," or other rare items, message me privately to discuss the price.]
There were plenty of other listings like that. None of them looked like they were really meant to sell. Anyone with any sense would avoid buying them.
At this stage, people cared more about eating enough than eating well. They wouldn't die from going without meat.
If they rationed ten pieces of Black Bread, they could make them last many days. But no matter how carefully they rationed a jin of deer meat, it wouldn't last long.
Besides, the seller wanted an extra five hundred milliliters of Filthy Dim Blood. Colin estimated that it would take killing a hundred ordinary Aberrations to collect that much.
And those hundred couldn't be weaklings like Wailers.
"Wait."
As Colin kept looking, he suddenly spotted something fishy.
Once an item was listed on the Trade Market, the [Time Remaining] in its status seemed to stop counting down.
In other words...
Colin rubbed his chin.
These people were using the Trade Market's listing feature as a refrigerator.
Time stopped. Nothing spoiled, rotted, or went bad. Could there be a better fridge than that?
No chance!
"No wonder they've all been listing their stuff."
Colin gave a helpless laugh. Then something occurred to him, and he hurriedly opened his Inventory. Several chunks of meat that had been mildly spoiled yesterday had turned moderately spoiled, while the moderately spoiled ones had become severely spoiled!
Colin's face turned green.
Mildly spoiled meat didn't smell bad. It might taste a little different, but it was perfectly safe to eat.
Colin had eaten some yesterday.
Moderately spoiled meat smelled a little worse, but it was still edible, though it might upset his stomach.
Severely spoiled meat was another story. It smelled awful and was hard to swallow, so Colin hadn't picked up any of the severely spoiled chunks by the entrance.
Without delay, Colin followed their example and listed a few pieces of meat from his Inventory.
Once he saw that their remaining time had indeed stopped, he breathed a sigh of relief.
"I have to hand it to them. These people are geniuses."
Colin smiled and browsed the Trade Market again, looking to see what strange things these people had found.
As he scrolled, he suddenly noticed that water seemed to be what people wanted most.
The water shortage hadn't seemed so bad yesterday. Thanks to Colin's leak, many people had completed their daily task and gotten bread, which had kept them alive.
But hardly anyone had found water.
A drop of water was worth its weight in gold. That was no exaggeration.
Not everyone was like Colin, able to see hints in the fog and find water in one go.
Most people didn't even dare stray far from their houses. Getting lost in the fog meant certain death.
So after a night of mounting desperation, water had become everyone's most urgent need.
If they didn't find water soon, they might die of thirst.
"The top trending topic on World Channel is 'How to Make Water.' Huh? Since when are there trending topics?"
Colin was taken aback.
He suddenly noticed that World Channel had also been updated. It now had posts and a search function, making it a bit like Weibo.
And replying to posts didn't cost a Megaphone.
The top four trending topics were: first, "How to Make Level 3 Water."
Second, "How to Avoid Getting Lost in the Fog."
Third, "A Detailed Guide to Killing Aberrations."
Fourth, "One Survival Tip a Day."
There were ten topics like these, all related to survival. There wasn't a single post about boxing, entertainment, gossip, or anything like that.
"Holy crap, is this really the same old cesspool?"
Colin muttered, then glanced farther down. His expression turned strange.
He found that his name was actually trending at number seven. The posts seemed to be either thanking him or cursing him.
Uh...
So I'm the garbage after all.
Colin opened the first topic with an awkward laugh and found that people had come up with quite a few useful methods.
For example, they heated monster body parts or anything else that contained water, making the liquid evaporate so they could collect "foul-smelling water."
By distilling it again, they could get "Level 3 Water."
The water they collected this way had a bit of a rotten smell, but nobody cared about that anymore.
They'd drink urine if they had to, let alone water.
That also turned the rotten flesh and other things Colin had just seen into "hot sellers." They were priced cheaply, often going for a few pieces of wood or stone.
"I got ripped off."
Colin thought of all the meat he hadn't picked up yesterday and felt like he'd lost a fortune.
Overall, though, the Survivors were short on water. A single portion of Level 3 Water could often fetch an astronomical price.
And even then, demand far outstripped supply.
"I'll trade a Servant for a liter of water. If they trade fast, I'll be left with just one Servant!"
"+1. Servants for water! These useless Servants only slow down my axe swings!"
"Here's a huge secret: you can combine Black Bread and water to make oatmeal porridge! It's way easier to digest than Black Bread. I ate that garbage bread yesterday, and now I can't take a dump."
"Holy crap, really? I hereby declare you Colin the Second."
"Anyone selling water? Someone was selling muddy water just now, but it disappeared while I blinked. You people actually bought muddy water? It tastes awful! Are you even human?!"
As Colin read the posts, a question suddenly popped into his mind.
Wasn't what they were doing the same kind of thing as when he'd told people how to light their lamps?
Why weren't they being sanctioned?
Could it be that everyone in the whole game was doing things that should get them sanctioned, and he was the only one who'd actually been sanctioned?
Colin felt his face darken, but just then, a prompt appeared in his mind.
[After careful thought, you realize that only matters involving the system itself and causing a significant impact will be sanctioned, such as Hurricane Lamps.]
[Although you believe your own intentions were not entirely pure, and even feel a trace of guilt about it,]
[you saved many people.]
"Guilt. A significant impact. Saved many people. There are still more than six hundred people in Regional Channel. Nearly four hundred people died in my region alone yesterday."
Does that really count as saving many people?
Colin suddenly felt a chill run down his spine. Just how many people had this game wanted to kill yesterday?
"Forget it. That's not something I should worry about. My top priority is staying alive."
Colin looked at the people clamoring for water and rubbed his chin. "It's not like I'm the one trying to fleece you. You're the ones offering yourselves up."
Before you continue