Vine Stone

Sure enough, Alice's voice rang out: "Sli? Why are you here? Is Chen Rui upstairs?"

Seeing that the little princess actually remembered his name, the Lesser Devil nodded excitedly: "Master is on the second floor."

Alice skipped up to the second floor, saw Chen Rui, and said happily: "I was just about to go find you, but you came to find me first!"

Who wants to find you... Chen Rui's attention had been on the Super System for the past two days. Suddenly remembering that he still owed her a "wonderful story," he quickly changed the subject, pointed at the "Princess Chess," and asked: "Isn't this Huarong Dao? How come..."

"Hmph, I'm pretty amazing, right!" The little loli showed no shame for being a bootlegger; instead, she looked smug: "If I hadn't had a flash of inspiration and changed it into this, it wouldn't have sold at all. You should learn a thing or two."

"That's right, the little princess is indeed brilliant." Chen Rui smiled bitterly and nodded. These days, piracy was more arrogant than the original, though, come to think of it, he was also pirating someone else's work.

"Since you're here, come help out." Alice flicked her wrist, and her storage bracelet spat out a pile of large items. Fortunately, there were no sexy lace undergarments like the ones he saw during their last picnic.

"Help me sort these by category, then Jia will label them with prices."

She really doesn't stand on ceremony... Chen Rui sighed helplessly and had no choice but to join Jia in cleaning and sorting in the basement. Jia possessed a natural, lingering fragrance, and combined with her incredibly seductive figure and appearance, she was lethal to any male. Chen Rui knew the danger rating of a Succubus was S-rank, so he composed his mind and kept his eyes straight, fearing that if he turned his head, his gaze would be ensnared.

The little loli noticed his tension, rolled her eyes, and asked: "By the way, Chen Rui, I heard that my sister said she would bestow Jia upon you in the future. Are you feeling particularly expectant?"

Chen Rui's heart skipped a beat: How does Alice even know about that?

"Did the eldest princess really say that?" Jia paused. Seeing Chen Rui's nervous expression, she flashed a teasing smile with her red lips and intentionally leaned closer to him: "In that case, when the time comes, should I call you... Master?"

The word "Master" was deliberately drawn out by the Succubus, sounding bone-chillingly seductive. A wave of heat surged through Chen Rui. He lowered his head even further, pretending not to hear, and turned his body away.

"Master, are you shunning Jia? I'm so sad..." The Succubus slowly inched closer to Chen Rui. As she slightly hunched her shoulders, the cleavage between her "chest weapons" appeared even deeper. Chen Rui shuddered, swallowed with difficulty, and cursed the enchantress for being a national disaster. Alice had already pulled up a stool to watch the show, laughing until she doubled over.

Most of the Succubus race were natural-born sirens, and Jia was a standout among them. If not for his heavy psychological baggage, Chen Rui would have almost lost control.

Suddenly, a prompt in his mind jolted Chen Rui awake: "Convertible energy substance detected. Convert to spirit energy?"

Chen Rui only then realized that the attention he had been focusing on was now fixed on the dark purple stone in his hand. The stone was the size of a fist, translucent, and its internal texture was radial, appearing somewhat eerie.

"Little princess, what is this?" Chen Rui asked Alice, holding up the stone.

"That was given to me by that guy Joseph. It seems to be called a Vine Stone, a specialty of the Lord Chiyou territory." Alice noticed Chen Rui's interest in the Vine Stone, her eyes darted, and she wore a strange expression: "Vine Stone has a special use; it seems to be able to... enhance a man's... function. You wouldn't happen to be a man who needs this kind of stone, would you?"

Enhance a certain function? Chen Rui shivered and quickly let go of the stone. No matter how much he wanted spirit energy, he couldn't admit to being an impotent man in front of two beauties!

Jia had originally stopped teasing him, but seeing this reaction, she couldn't help but cover her mouth and giggle, looking infinitely charming. Alice was laughing even more exaggeratedly on her stool, clutching her stomach.

Chen Rui recalled the trick the little loli had played on him when they first met and couldn't help but grow suspicious. Although Joseph was the eldest son of Lord Chiyou, he was also the financial officer of Darkmoon City; it was impossible for him to give such a lewd item to the little princess, right?

For the sake of spirit energy, Chen Rui bit the bullet and asked: "Little princess, what exactly is the function of a Vine Stone?"

The little loli teased him a few more times before she finally had her fill and told him that the Vine Stone could amplify a mage's magic power to a certain extent. It was usually embedded in some kind of magic-amplifying equipment; it was indeed something that "enhanced a certain function."

Chen Rui strongly despised Alice's descriptive abilities and asked: "I really like this stone. Can you sell it to me, little princess?"

"I don't see how you look like a man who needs to 'enhance a certain function'?" Alice saw his serious expression, found it boring, and said sullenly: "If you really want it, five Black Crystal Coins. I'm giving it to you cheap!"

"That expensive!" Chen Rui was shocked. He didn't know how much spirit energy these Vine Stones could provide, but the price alone was enough to scare anyone away. Five Black Crystal Coins was almost his entire fortune. Forget it, he would just wait for the free ore from Zack.

"Don't be so stingy," Alice laughed like a little fox: "I know my sister rewarded you with five Black Crystal Coins through Aldas."

She even knows that! So the little loli was determined to make him go bankrupt; she was truly the owner of a black-hearted shop! Chen Rui said with feigned indignation: "It couldn't be that the eldest princess told you to do this on purpose, right? I'll go find the eldest princess right now and just return the reward to her."

"No!" As soon as Alice heard he was going to find her sister, she hurriedly called out: "I was just joking with you, why are you being so serious?"

It seems that to deal with the little loli, this is the move! Chen Rui felt secretly smug, only to hear Alice offer a new, speechless price: "Then four Black Crystal Coins and ninety-nine Purple Crystal Coins!"

It was just the difference between five thousand and four thousand nine hundred and ninety.

"Too expensive, I'll pass," Chen Rui decided decisively. It seemed impossible to get the Vine Stone from the little loli today.

"Don't you see that everything here is expensive? If it weren't expensive, how could it show my status?" Alice pouted, "However, I judge people based on whether I like them or not when I sell things. If you can make me happy, there's another Vine Stone here, and I wouldn't mind giving it to you as well."

Two Vine Stones! Chen Rui's spirits lifted, but making Lady Alice satisfied was not easy. Over the past few days, his mental inventory was almost exhausted.

"Little princess," Chen Rui pondered for a moment and said: "How about this, I teach you how to run a shop to earn more money?"

Alice's large eyes lit up, but then she furrowed her cute brows: "Isn't that how a shop is run? Everyone does it this way, and I'm already much smarter than those people."

Chen Rui shook his head, his eyes revealing powerful confidence: "A shop is not run like that."

Some time later, the Lesser Devil waiting downstairs saw his master walking down from the second floor and hurriedly went to greet him.

Chen Rui frowned and said: "Why didn't you tell me sooner that this was the little princess's shop?"

"Didn't Master want to find a shop that sells strange things?" The Lesser Devil saw his master's dissatisfaction and smiled ingratiatingly: "This is the weirdest shop in the city, and Master is so familiar with the little princess, there must have been a surprise this time, right?"

Chen Rui looked at Sli's sycophantic smile and held up the two Vine Stones in his hand.

"Vine Stone!" The Lesser Devil exclaimed, recognizing it at a glance. "This is very expensive! I remember that in the magic shop under Lord Joseph's name, they sell for fifty Black Crystal Coins each!"

Fifty Black Crystal Coins each! Chen Rui glanced upstairs in surprise, his impression of this black-hearted little princess finally changing.

Chen Rui left Alice's shop. On the way, while Sli wasn't looking, he secretly used his conversion skill to test it. The Vine Stones were indeed worthy of being expensive magic materials; the two of them provided a total of 230 points of spirit energy. His total spirit energy had reached 406 points, as if a destitute peasant had suddenly reached a state of moderate prosperity.

The harvest of the Vine Stones ignited new hope in Chen Rui. He had Sli lead the way to the magic shop under Joseph's name to see if he could find any other treasures.

The magic shop was located in the most prosperous part of the city center, but there were very few customers inside. The reason was simple: it was too expensive. Take the kind of Vine Stone Chen Rui had absorbed, for example; it was even more expensive than what the Lesser Devil remembered, at sixty-eight Black Crystal Coins each, and there were only three left. The prices of the other magic materials were also shockingly high, far beyond Chen Rui's current economic level. It seemed that mages and alchemists were both money-burning professions.

Chen Rui felt a wave of disappointment, but today's harvest was already bountiful enough. With a long-term source of spirit energy from Zack in the future, he should be content.

Just as he was about to leave, a voice rang out from the entrance: "Isn't this Master Aldas's human apprentice? What are you doing here?"

Chen Rui looked over and saw a man dressed in exquisite clothing. He was handsome with an extraordinary temperament, though his brow was slightly sinister. The man's appearance was no different from a human's; he should be like Athena, a Greater Devil with a high-level mutant bloodline, possessing two forms.

Behind the man followed two Greater Devils, one male and one female, who appeared to be his servants.

Beside the man, another familiar-looking male Greater Devil was staring at Chen Rui with a sinister gaze; it was Athena's suitor, the garrison commander of Darkmoon City, Allen.

Sli hurriedly stepped forward to salute, also intending to remind Chen Rui: "Lord Joseph, Lord Allen."

Only then did Chen Rui realize that the handsome young man was Joseph, the current finance officer who held the economic lifeline of Darkmoon City and the eldest son of Lord Chiyou.

"Get lost!" Allen barked sharply, scaring Sli so badly that he scrambled to hide behind Chen Rui.

Chen Rui secretly activated his Analytical Eye, which displayed Allen's comprehensive strength rating as E-rank, the same level as his own current standing. However, with the example of Gangke, Chen Rui understood that having the same rating did not mean their strength was comparable. Athena had once said that even among Intermediate Devils, those at the peak stage were at least ten times stronger than those who had just entered the stage; this comprehensive rating was likely the same.

Behind Joseph stood two Greater Devils, both of whom were D-rank in strength, which was quite formidable, while the strength evaluation for Joseph himself was: Unable to determine!