Boss, we are going to face the tower!" Said Nellya, with a hype-filled voice.
Her group members were all geared up and holding a large bag with anything they might need during this expedition.
"Oh? Are you certain?" He asked as entering was both dangerous and extremely lucrative.
"Yes. Do you have any information about it?" She asked directly as he nodded his head, understanding what she wanted.
"I'll enter the gate with you and gather the information through my skill." He said as she nodded her head, a genuine smile appearing on her face as receiving information in advance would at least grant them more chances in succeeding.
"Here's your payment." She said while handing over twenty thousand Bym, the price of the investigation of two floors at ten thousand per floor.
Letting Miranda take the payment, he moved straight in the gate with the Hatch's family group where he started his research.
{Cosmic Insight}
Once again, feeling the drain on his energy, Lux wasted no time as he sent his spell straight at the tower, a large amount of energy
"To clear the first floor, you will have to kill every monster on the floor." Stated Lux as Nellya, by his side nodded her head as it was a common clearing condition for gates.
"The second floor however, you will have to survive ten days inside the tower. There are monsters, a boss monster and nine elite monsters." Added Lux after another moment, sending his energy on the second floor of the tower to see it and its rules clearly.
"What about the environment of the second floor?" She asked with a frown as compared to the first floor's condition, the second one was a lot harder and the required survival time would greatly increase the difficulty. They had to at least bring enough supplies for a ten day's survival journey. Considering the first floor, bringing two to three weeks of supply would be best.
"A rocky desert." He directly said as her brows frowned, seeing that the tower clearing wouldn't be as easy as she had hoped it would be.
"Thanks." She nodded her head as despite the difficulties, she was confident that she could clear the tower properly and before the ultimate closure of the gate which would happen 22 days later.
Getting out of the gate as he had done what he had to, Lux went straight back to the second floor of his shop.
From the land he had bought the previous day, he had hired some people to refurbish a small apartment building where his new recruits would live until he built a new proper dormitory.
As for himself, he had one single thing to do and that was to improve his profession's level.
'Ah right, didn't I want to do that?' Thought Lux as he was about to step on the stairs.
'Buy an automatic world ledger and the shop option - Ban.' Thought Lux as he went through the system shop and got both items.
The world ledger would allow him to know exactly who remained in the world behind the portal. He didn't wish to unfortunately forget someone behind. If they died, the name on the ledger would even turn red, notifying anyone who cared about their untimely death and perhaps some people would go and get their body if there was one remaining.
On the other hand, the shop option: Ban, was exactly what he had been meaning to get for a while. This function was self-introduced. It could ban some customers from using the products of the shop meaning that they would neither have the ability to enter the portal in the future nor post quests or requests on the job board.
'Now, I can't wait to see you try to come back.' Thought Lux with a malicious grin as he remembered the few groups of friends that hadn't bothered paying for their extra hours and had instead said that he was trying to scam them.
While the ban function wouldn't hurt them, he would at least make sure they had no chance of ever coming back to his place. No matter the disguise or form, anyone banned from the shop would be incapable from using the shop's items.
Looking at his points that went down from 754 all the way to 156, Lux felt a pang at the high cost but he knew it would be useful, especially in the future.
Climbing the stairs, leaving the shops to his two new employees who were happy and interested in their newest and safe job, he made his way to his room.
The first goal? Breakthrough to level two space wanderer. He had put it off long enough, he had to take care of it.
With the pattern already perfectly memorized, the last task was to inscribe it on his level one space wanderer core.
Sitting down, he started his meditation.
——
It was only two days later that the young shop owner finally got up from his seated position.
For those two days, he had only gone to the toilet, drank some water and opened the gate every morning, not even bothering to shower or eat, leaving everything to his new subordinates instead.
Seeing the slightly grown core deep in his soul, the second level pattern faintly glowing over its purplish-dark color, Lux finally released a sigh of relief. Inscribing the pattern on the core wasn't easy. He had no idea how long it took others but counting the time he started to memorize the pattern, he had spent an easy four full-time days on this work.
"Do I?" Asked Lux outloud after thinking of his currently empty second core, his druid's pattern was already perfectly memorized.
"Let's not, I'll continue later." He decided as he really had to stretch and move a bit. Besides, he needed to confirm that the shop was running properly. He hadn't cared about it at all and perhaps some problems had occurred during this time.
Washing up and taking the time to eat some food, he changed clothes and finally walked downstairs and into the currently bustling shop.
"Boss!" Exclaimed Viola who had just finished handling the current needs of a customer.
"Good morning, Viola. How was the shop these two days?" He asked as she showed a bright smile.
"Everything went well. There was no movement from the level four gate and the Hatch's family group, led by Nellya, entered the tower two days ago. Currently they are seemingly still on the first floor of the tower but we have no idea on how they are faring." She explained as Lux nodded his head.
Indeed, even for himself, he couldn't see the current status of the expedition members. While he could see the requirements and the environment, there was no way to actually see anything inside of it. Instead, all he could do was guess approximately the remaining amount of monsters and humans but it would do little to help as he had no way to transmit the information over to them, nor could he help them break out of the tower if they were stuck.
"Leave them be, believe in Nellya, they were well prepared for the expedition." Replied Lux with a small smile as he truly hoped that they would succeed, helping in clearing the tower from the Proteus celestial body.
"Yes." She nodded.
"What about the six guys?" Asked Lux as he noticed that two were currently standing guard in the shop.
"They assured the safety of the shop and continued to train to become stronger. We have also left the hotel and moved into the new refitted apartments." She explained before continuing.
"There were some troubles as some new explorers wished to cut the line, claiming they were with a big guild or whatever. However, according to the rules in the shop, they eventually had to line up. It did help that Frank and Allan were guarding the shop and a few of the stronger regulars were present as well, preventing the scene from escalating." She explained as one of his eyebrows shot up.
"You don't need to bother so much next time. If someone makes trouble, simply ban them." He said.
He knew full well that explorers and professionals were a bothersome bunch as the stronger they became, oftentimes came the confidence in themselves and the arrogance for a few of them. As such, killing the chicken to warn the rest would do well in such a situation if it ever happened again.
"Hmm, alright." She nodded, her eyes innocently looking at him as she listened to his words, ready to apply them if necessary. She would rather such a thing didn't happen again as she didn't want to block a potential source of profit from them.