Procurement

For this Human King, who would come decades later, Li Wei was intensely curious.

If he could go meet him in advance, that wouldn't be bad either.

However, going to Rivendell would likely mean being unable to return for quite some time, and now he couldn't summon the Iron Golem, which would leave his castle completely defenseless while he was away.

After thinking it over, Li Wei decided to first return to Bree, get the things he needed, and secure his territory before anything else.

He left a sign at the castle gate, carved with the words "Temporarily Away," packed several stacks of food, and after fully preparing his equipment and tools, he set out on the main road, heading west.

Compared to when he came, this return trip was much easier—first, because he was familiar with the route after traveling it once, and second, because he had plenty of food.

A third point was that Li Wei now had a world map, allowing him to check his position at any time and calculate roughly how much longer it would take to reach his destination.

Aside from the monotony of the journey, there were no other obstacles along the way, and Li Wei arrived smoothly at Bree's main gate, where he submitted to the guard's inspection.

This time, however, the guard's attitude surprised Li Wei.

At the gate, the guard opened the small wooden window, glanced at Li Wei, and without even asking a question, directly opened the gate, signaling him to enter.

He also greeted him: "Welcome, friend. How are the roads lately?"

Li Wei paused for a moment, then replied, "Not bad, pretty smooth. I didn't run into any trouble on the road."

"Good to hear."

The guard nodded and went back to sitting down.

Walking along the road, Li Wei fell into thought. Suddenly, he opened the faction interface and checked Bree.

[Bree] Regional Reputation: 34 (Friendly)
Source: Killed bandits, annihilated Orc squad.

So that's it. Even though the reputation module unlocked later, what he had done before hadn't been forgotten.

Once reputation reached 10, the faction's attitude would turn friendly.

To unlock higher-tier achievements, he would need more reputation. Li Wei glanced briefly—the next stage required 100 points.

Not dwelling on it too much, Li Wei focused on the main purpose of his visit to Bree.

Shopping—buying supplies he couldn't obtain on his own.

Things like pumpkin, potato, and carrot seeds.

And also, Li Wei wanted to buy a horse for travel.

A man on foot was never faster than a horse.

Though in terms of endurance, Li Wei was certainly stronger than a horse—after all, he didn't need to stop to eat, burning through half a stack of jerky per hundred kilometers—but running everywhere himself wasn't ideal. He was already tired of it.

With his goal set, Li Wei first checked into a room at the Prancing Pony Inn and directly asked the innkeeper if he could help procure two good horses.

Perhaps thanks to his reputation, or because Li Wei was still spending generously this time, the innkeeper readily agreed to the request, promising to bring the two best horses in Bree in the shortest possible time.

That said, Li Wei had no idea how short that "shortest time" would be. He could only wait.

After settling the room and having a hearty meal at the inn, Li Wei immediately went out, asking around for where to buy vegetables. With the boost from his friendly reputation, the process went smoothly—just a couple of casual questions, and the passing townsfolk pointed out every market and vegetable vendor from east to west in Bree.

Following the directions of the warm-hearted townspeople, Li Wei soon found a farm.

"Welcome, sir. See anything you need?"

The farmer greeted him warmly.

Li Wei stated his needs, and luckily, the crops he wanted were all available here.

Pumpkins, potatoes, carrots, wheat...

"Oh, what's this..."

Li Wei walked over to a basket and picked up its contents.

"Corn!"

[Unlocked Crafting: Corn Seeds]

"Give me a sack of this too!"

Li Wei bought it on the spot.

"Yes, sir. Bree's most diligent hands at your service!"

Then, he spotted some ginger, garlic, and scallions still caked with dirt nearby.

"I want these too!"

"Yes, sir!"

After a round of transactions, Li Wei had spent all the silver coins on him, including the blackened silver coins looted from the Orc squad.

The eager farmer, meanwhile, was all smiles. This business today was truly excellent—this gentleman really didn't treat money like money, didn't haggle at all, and just waved his hand to buy wholesale quantities of whatever crop caught his eye.

"Welcome back anytime~"

Probably not.

Li Wei replied silently in his mind.

You're about to see what MC farming speed really means—wheat that's ready to harvest in a few days, ever seen that?

Leaving the farm, Li Wei looked at the sacks of crops in his backpack and felt a strong sense of fulfillment.

The only pity was that there didn't seem to be any watermelon planted around here; come to think of it, he really hadn't seen any.

With the crops gathered, all that was left was to wait for the innkeeper to bring the promised horses, and then he could head home.

Crop seeds could be handled through the Crafting Table—after synthesis, the crops could be turned into seeds with MC properties.

But as for animal breeding, Li Wei hadn't tried that yet. The wilderness around the Roadside Fortress only had a few wild cattle here and there, and he couldn't even lead them back; their biggest use was being butchered for meat.

This time, buying two horses outright, Li Wei planned to take them back and see if he could get them to breed into MC-feature horses.

But before that, breeding horses in MC required gold.

At the very least, he'd need two Golden Carrots.

Gold ore, though, was a real pain to mine. Li Wei had chipped away at the veins near the Roadside Fortress for over a month without seeing a speck.

No choice—he'd have to find somewhere to trade for it.

Li Wei's first thought was the blacksmith's shop. Following his memory of the location, he arrived at a familiar spot.

"Guest, what can I... Huh?"

"Oh—it's you! Hello there, what do you need?"

The blacksmith greeted him, clearly recognizing Li Wei.

"I'm honored you still remember me."

"Of course I remember, sir. I heard that an adventurer passing through Buli not only took out a group of bandits single-handedly but also killed a bunch of Orcs and Wargs."

As he spoke, the blacksmith set down his work, leaned in close to Li Wei, and asked in a hushed tone, "They say you know magic—is it true?"

Seeing the topic veer off into the wild blue yonder, Li Wei quickly cut him off:

"Stop, brother blacksmith, let's not get into that. I came to see if I could buy some materials from you—do you have any?"

Hearing the mention of business, the blacksmith set aside his gossipy curiosity and asked, "What do you need? Just say the word. Things are different now—your deeds have proven you're no thug. If it's now, buying weapons isn't out of the question."

Li Wei shook his head. "No, I wanted to ask—do you have any gold here? I'd like to buy some..."

The blacksmith immediately did a tactical head-tilt.

"I'm a blacksmith, not a goldsmith, sir."

Well, looks like that was a dead end.

Just as Li Wei sighed and was about to leave—

A familiar place, a familiar spot, a familiar voice rang out.

From behind a nearby fence, a figure suddenly popped up and said, "Hey, adventurer sir, I just heard—what you want to buy!"

"Get lost! You stinking junk peddler, stay away from me!" The blacksmith cursed on the spot, showing no courtesy.

Such a familiar scene—have I seen this somewhere before...

Li Wei turned his head and sure enough, saw that smug, annoying face.

Scrap Merchant.