Chapter 14 - Upgrades

After the fight ended Derek was happy. He was criticized harshly by Max, but he got used to the character of this mysterious man. Also, Max really said the right things generally when he was not insulting and not saying some unknown words to Derek. Derek was thinking now that Max was also some kind of a scholar. He could not make up so many unknown words and get mad on Derek because he did not know them.

'System can I pay for guests from the money I earn through different methods that are not connected to the club?' Max asked in his head.

'You can only buy food and access for a capsule for the people you choose. You cannot make any upgrades to the system or the gaming club or buy anything else with this money that is not connected to the gaming club earnings.' The system answered in Max's head.

Max was happy. Derek could earn the maintenance for his studies by killing bandits.

"Derek go and get their money. After you collect it give it to me." Max said.

"Why?" Derek asked, puzzled.

"Because of the tips I gave you and the fact that it cost a lot of money for you to go and train in the capsule. Also, I'm shocked by the fact that you don't use your brain while you fight. It is not surprising you could not beat the level one bot. You need start thinking. I know it's hard but bear with it for some time. Maybe you will get some result." Max answered.

"..."

Derek was speechless. This guy was so shameless. The bad part was that Derek really needed to start and to develop some kind of strategy if he wanted to beat the bot in the near future.

After Derek collected the money Max got down from his seat and received the silver and bronze coins from Derek. He was surprised that those guys had around 60 silver coins. It was not bad. It will be enough to pay for Derek's training for almost two months. The food's price was pretty low, so Max did not worry about it too much.

"Do we have some city that does not look like a village near by? I want some human interaction." Max said.

"Well, we do. Didn't you wanted to get to Alexandria? Was it not our goal?" Derek asked, puzzled.

"Yes, it was but people change. Like you and your brain." Max answered with a straight face.

Derek sighed and answered: "Yeah we do have a medium sized city named Manchester. It should be a good place to rest if you want to. It should be around a day or two of walking."

"Alright let's go to this city. Let's see if people got further in the evolution path in that place. Lead the way." Max said.

Further that evening Max got the gaming club of the spatial ring. He and Derek got into the building to have dinner and get some sleep. Max started studying the earth explosion skill. He was happy with his pyroblast skill and wanted to have another mass attack of the same kind with different element to it if his enemy will have defence from the fire element. He was sure that he could not study it in four months (8 hours of sleep in the real world), but he still needed to start somewhere. Also, he still continued training his archery and fighting skills, by fighting the level 6 bot. He did not see any major progress in any of those directions. Still, he was not disappointed. Also, after the system talked about an upgrade that he could do to it Max got interested. He opened a panel for upgrade with the help of the system and saw different upgrade options:

-Upgrading gaming club size - 50,000 magic crystals.

-Warrior skills upgrades - 100,000 gold coins.

-Mage skills upgrades - 100,000 magic crystals.

-Add courses for education (Math, Physics and so on...) - 1000 gold coins.

-Ability to add popular online games to play in a simulation - 1,000,000 magic crystals.

-System upgrade: 1,000,000 magic crystals

...

Max saw different options, but he got attracted by only six of them right now. He got the meaning of the first four upgrades but the adding of games to the simulation and the system upgrade prices did not make sense.

'Why are the prices for the system upgrade and the online games adding are so high?' Max asked.

'The games adding upgrade will let the costumers get stronger by playing online game with the ability to get the game's character stats and gear into the real life. A magic weapon from a game could be a treasure in the real world. As for the system upgrade... It's a surprise. The system cannot disclose this information, but it is defiantly worth it.' The system answered.

Max shrugged his shoulders and said in him mind: 'Whatever. I don't have any money to buy it anyway. It's too early to think about those stuff.'

After he got of his capsule and went down to the first floor and saw Derek already awake and waiting for his arrival to go and eat some breakfast. Max raised an eyebrow when Derek was beaming from ear to ear.

"Did you get some brain damage? What happened to your face?" Max asked.

Derek's face stiffened after hearing Max's reply, but he still continued to smile and said: "I got some progress with fighting my copy."

"Oh. Did you kill the level one bot?" Max asked, surprised.

Dereks scratched his head and said: "Well I'm able to injure it but I did not come victorious yet. I need more time."

Max nodded to Derek and said: "Very well. Let's go and eat some breakfast."

Max got bored from the dishes he could eat but he did not really have a choice. He saw that he could upgrade the food as well, but it was not the time to do it. He did not have the money for it anyway.

After finishing breakfast, the duo departed to the direction of Manchester city.

After traveling with nothing special happening for the whole day Max finally caught the sight of the city from afar. 'It is indeed not small. It should have a population of more than one hundred thousand people. Maybe I even stay here for some time.' Max said in his head.

"We are too far from the city to get into it today. Let's have a good sleep and then explore what the Manchester city has to offer." Max said while materializing the gaming club.