5 days passed.
With the help of the Farwitz family, the spread of a new restaurant quickly reached foodies and gourmet gurus, as well as the casual diners of the city. Only Farwitz family Patriarch and Daniela knew of the identity Alexander, so they were able to mobilize their resources to spread the hype of the restaurant.
The restaurant did not disappoint. It introduced different cuisines from earth that weren't present in Oz, or anywhere else.
Alexander took advantage of the cloning system to allow himself to be cloned and take over the role of the chef.
Sadly, since the [Cooking] Feature wasn't open yet, he had to cook manually, but that was fine, considering his training in Culinary Arts for his bachelors before shifting to business administration.
The most common dishes that were popular with the customers were Egg-Fried Rice, Pork Donburi, Chicken Teriyaki, Beef Sukiyaki, and Chicken Adobo. The dishes were fairly priced, making them seem exclusive but affordable for the buying customer.
Rather than be met with resistance from other conglomerates, they were actively buying shares of the restaurant, but compared to the amount the Farwitz Conglomerate got, they were only able to get 3% on average of the total shares. 51% of the shares were still controlled by Alexander while the remaining 49% were divided to the Farwitz, Carmel, Darwin, Tchia, Maryland, and Dominik conglomerates. They amounted to 35%. The remaining were bought up by the Royal family, specifically the foodie guru of the family, who had visited the store on the 4th day and announced that the royal family will be backing the restaurant.
Alexander used this opportunity to open up franchises in other cities in Oz, but limiting the franchisee per city to 1. He also put in strict requirements for the quality of food, the chefs and servers hired, as well as the general ambiance and interior design of the restaurants franchised.
Alexander's reputation continued to soar, increasing successfully to be in the hundred thousand in terms of ranking. With the increase of his reputation, so did his notoriety, increasing by 10 points.
Paolo Guillarme (alias Alexander Banhomme in Azur Realm)
Lvl 12
HP: ????/???? (20000/20000 shown)
MP: ????/???? (40000/40000 shown)
Reputation (Azur): 56789
Rank (Azur): 450323th Place
Attributes:
STR: 15 + 250 (40 shown)
VIT: 20 +105 (25 shown)
AGI: 15 +105 (30 shown)
INT: 170 +130 (100 shown)
DEX: 20 +255 (45 shown)
LUK: 45 + 100 (40 shown)
Hidden stats:
Notoriety: 15
Wisdom: 30
Special Ability: Apocalypse Magic System
Elemental Affinity:
Fire: 15
Water: 25 (15 + 10)
Air: 37 (15 + 12 + 10)
Earth: 15
Ice: 15
Lightning: 15
Wood: 15
Steel: 15
Time: 15
Space: 40
Life: 15
Death: 15
His other stats haven't changed much, as he had not levelled up since meeting Daniela.
Alexander also took this opportunity to actually use his restaurant to gather information. For him, the restaurant's fame is just a cover for his true plan: to make the name of the restaurant the leader for insider information.
Of course, he had to grease some hands and leaders, as well as strike information deals with the military as well as the royal family.
Alexander reviewed his missions.
[Main Mission progress: 50%. Unlocked the questline, "Revitalization of Oz"]
[Investigate, rank SS mission
Investigate the source of the tremors coming from the Marianas trench.
>>Discovered the lost civilization of Oz.
>>> Identify the problem with the civilization of Oz.
>>> Gain "Respected" status among the people of Oz.
>>> Bring back evidence of the existence of the civilization of Oz.
ALERT: The number of deaths must not exceed 1000 Espers.
Rewards: 10000 System points, Level-up Potion (Lvl 30) x5, 50 Karmic Luck.
Additional rewards would be based on the performance during the mission.]
[Strengthen and Fortify
GOAL: Gain 15 levels in 2 months (extended to 4 months due to circumstances). Identify a place you can call as a base of your own (complete).
Reward: 1500 skill points, 15,000 System points. Unlocks 'COOKING' under CRAFTING. Unlocks controllable System upgrades menu.]
Alexander pondered a bit before consulting the main body whether to accomplish the mission by using the potions.
Paolo pondered for a bit and agreed, using 3 potions in one go, allowing him to complete the mission.
[Main Mission Complete]
[Mission: Strengthen and Fortify
Reward: 1500 skill points, 15,000 System points. Unlocks 'COOKING' under CRAFTING. Unlocks controllable System upgrades menu.]
[System has detected the main mission has been completed. Opening: Upgrade system.]
[Opening: COOKING]
[All costs of upgrades are decreased by 100% for the first purchase, then 95%, then 90%, and so on until 0%]
Both Alexander and Paolo in the real world spit the drink they were drinking upon hearing this notification.
It's time to upgrade then, I guess?
---------------
Paolo's side. Earth Realm.
He was browsing over the list of choices to upgrade in the system. There were 3 types of upgrades:
General, Specific, and Random upgrades.
General upgrade basically upgrades the system as a whole, but only by one increment. It upgrades every available function at the time, and for functions unlocked in the future, upgrades them once they are available. It starts with a base price of 2 and is exponentially increasing.
So that's 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048 and so on.
Specific upgrades are upgrades that upgrade a specific aspect of the system, like for example, upgrading the inventory, upgrading the forging, etc., and usually increases the specific system upgrade by not less than 5 increments. This is also the most expensive one amongst the three types, with a base price of 5 and exponentially increasing.
So that's 5, 25, 125, 625, 3125, 15,625, 78,125, 390,625, 1,953,125, and so on, per component being upgraded.
The Random upgrades are upgrades that randomly raise the upgrade level of the system component from 1 - 10 increments, or lowers it from 1-10 increments. It is the cheapest one, with a cost of 1 system point per upgrade attempt.
With that in mind, Paolo opted to do the specific upgrade 7 times for each component, namely MAGIC, ITEMS, EQUIPMENTS, AND CRAFTING. This was a total of 28 upgrades, and then followed by 10 general upgrades; this completely spent his system points.
Under the UPGRADES tab, he could see the level of the upgrades.
MAGIC - 62
ITEMS - 56
EQUIPMENTS - 62
CRAFTING - 87
BATTLE - 0
REWARDS - 0
OVERALL - 0
A slew of notifications appeared.