Chapter 22: Chapter 22: Barter and a Bountiful Harvest
The stall owner shoved all the attributeless cards Perry Yates had selected into her hands, as if he was afraid she would change her mind.
"Don’t you worry, ma’am. My cards are the real deal, honest business. Go on and use them. I guarantee they’ll shut your enemies up for good."
After stowing away the attributeless cards, Perry Yates was about to leave when other players blocked her path.
"You must be a Card Hunter, right? I was wondering if you have any other attribute cards on hand. We’re willing to pay a high price."
Compared to item cards, Skill Cards were always the rarest. Besides, not every player was lucky enough to successfully fuse a card in the first round of the game.
There were probably very few players who could afford to be as picky as Perry Yates had been inside the game.
The fact was, nearly half of all players had yet to fuse a card.
A small portion of them, like Perry Yates, were holding out for higher-grade cards, but most simply hadn’t had the chance to fuse one.
"I do have a few cards on hand," Perry Yates stated clearly, "but I’m only accepting trades. No money."
She was here to improve her strength, not to make money.
For players, making money was both difficult and easy. All they had to do was survive the thirty days of the game.
Hearing Perry Yates say she actually had more cards, the crowd began to stir again.
Someone mustered up the courage to ask, "Could you tell us what attributes your cards have?"
Hearing this, Perry Yates didn’t answer. Instead, she began looking around.
A moment later, she finally found a suitable spot in a corner.
As Perry Yates walked over, the others followed closely behind.
Seeing this, Perry Yates had no choice but to speak up. "Excuse me, I need some space."
As she finished speaking, although no one knew what she was planning, the crowd obediently cleared a space for her.
With a light wave of her hand, a heavy marble table appeared out of thin air.
"A Space Ability!"
At this point, players had no concept of four-star cards, so when they saw Perry Yates conjure a table out of nowhere, they naturally assumed she had fused a card with a spatial attribute.
After spreading a piece of red velvet cloth over the table, Perry Yates began to lay out her cards one by one.
A two-star Earth Attribute Swamp Card.
A two-star Gold Attribute Striped Giant Tiger Card.
A two-star Poison Attribute Two-headed Snake Card.
Three two-star cards in a row. The onlookers gasped, one after another.
In addition to these three, Perry Yates also produced two one-star Thunder Attribute cards and one Fire Attribute Card.
’Putting out so many cards at once, including three two-star cards—wasn’t Perry Yates afraid of being robbed?’
Of course not.
After all, anyone who dared to cause trouble here had already gone to meet the King of the Underworld.
Looking at the restless crowd, Perry Yates emphasized again, "Everyone, I’m only bartering. Don’t even bother asking about cash or Gold."
Just then, a small, thin man squeezed out from the crowd. He placed a card in front of Perry Yates and said:
"This is a two-star item card. I wonder if I can trade it for one of your two-star cards?"
The moment he said this, everyone present thought the man was dreaming.
’How could a two-star item card possibly compare to a two-star Skill Card?’
Perry Yates, however, picked up the card to examine it.
Card Storage Device.
Its function was to store cards and activate their Card Ability by thought—though this only applied to item cards.
It also had an auto-storage function.
Perry Yates’s heart pounded when she saw the card’s ability, but she didn’t let it show.
"This card is decent, but it’s a bit of a stretch to trade it for a two-star card. How about two one-star cards?"
In terms of power and potential, one-star cards were naturally no match for two-star cards.
However, the two cards Perry Yates was offering were not simple either. One was Discharge, and the other was Electromagnetic Sensing.
The thin man hesitated for a moment before gritting his teeth and agreeing. "Fine. I’ll trade."
With the deal done, Perry Yates put away the item card and looked back at the crowd, waiting for the next trader.
There were many people present, and plenty of them were tempted by the cards on the table. But no one dared to step forward—not because they didn’t want to, but because they had nothing of value to offer in trade.
Just then, a loud female voice suddenly rang out from the back of the crowd.
"Make way, make way!"
A woman wearing a mask, a ponytail, and a red jacket struggled through the crowd to the front of the table.
Her eyes quickly scanned the cards on the table, finally landing on the Gold Attribute Striped Giant Tiger Card. She breathed a sigh of relief.
"Thank goodness, the card is still here."
Then she looked at Perry Yates and said, "I have two two-star item cards and a one-star Skill Card. Is that enough to trade for this Gold Attribute card?"
Perry Yates wasn’t shocked by the woman’s lavish offer. She simply smiled and said, "Whether it’s enough or not, I’ll have to see the cards first."
She examined the cards the woman brought over one by one.
The two item cards were a Tent Shelter, which looked a bit more compact than a Safe House...
...and a Candy Box. Its ability was to refresh with different flavored candies every day, with a ten percent chance of producing candy with special effects.
The candies refreshed each day had to be consumed that same day, or they would disappear.
’She had heard of this item even before she became a player. It came from a candy-themed instance.’
’Quite a few people had obtained this card back then, but most were one-star or White Cards.’
’Not only did they produce fewer candies, but the probability of getting special ones was minuscule. That said, the candies they did produce tasted great.’
Finally, she looked at the only Skill Card.
’Yin Yang Bagua?’
The card depicted a Yin Yang Bagua symbol, and even its attribute was represented by two fish, one black and one white.
’What kind of card is this? The attribute is so strange.’
However, after reading the card’s skill description, Perry Yates could barely contain her wild joy.
[Yin Yang Bagua Card: Balances multiple forces within the body. Only applicable to players with multiple attributes inside them.]
’This card was absolutely perfect for her.’
Forcefully suppressing her glee, Perry Yates said with a blank expression, "Fine."
She pushed the Gold Attribute Striped Giant Tiger Card toward the woman while sweeping the three offered cards into her spatial storage with her other hand.
Before the eyes of the crowd, she just gave a light wave over the table, and the cards vanished.
After taking the card, the woman gave her a long, hard look, then turned and left without a second glance.
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