Chapter 22: The Lonely Island in the Black Sea
“Choose a mission.” Asker looked away, forcing himself not to think about the unexplainable question of “why there are only beautiful NPCs in my team.”
“Can we choose any mission?” Nuo also stared at the screen and began to copy the scrolling mission content above.
“Yes.” Asker said, “The missions above can be freely accepted, the only problem is the cost-effectiveness.”
“Cost-effectiveness?” Eleanor was a little puzzled.
“First of all, everyone needs to understand that the content, difficulty, and reward of the mission are all given by the mission publisher themselves.” Asker pointed to the screen and said, “The Mercenary Guild is just a third-party platform for information exchange, and generally does not and cannot audit or restrict the authenticity of the mission, so there will inevitably be problems of false reporting of mission information.”
“For example, when the enemy is actually a goblin tribe with ogres, the mission publisher is afraid that no mercenary will accept it, so they lie and say that there are only two or three goblins. This kind of deliberate lowering of the mission difficulty is the most common.” Asker continued, “For example, the mission reward is 100 pounds, but the mission publisher is a farmer from a nearby village. How can a farmer possibly be rich enough to spend 100 pounds to release a mission? There is no doubt that the other party is offering a false price, and from the beginning, they have planned to pay less or even default on payment afterwards.”
“If we waste a lot of time on this kind of mission with cost-effectiveness problems, it will undoubtedly be very detrimental to the development of the team.” Asker finally concluded, “A senior who used to be a mercenary once said that the best mercenaries are not those who can fight the most, but those who are best at getting the mission reward into their pockets.”
Nuo nodded constantly beside him, writing down a sentence in her notebook: How to actually get the mission reward (circled in emphasis).
“Then how can we distinguish from the vast list of missions those that are truly cost-effective and worth doing?” Eleanor asked.
“This can only be seen from experience, practice makes perfect.” Asker stared at the screen and said, “Eh, Paradise Mountain?”
“Paradise Mountain?” Nuo looked at the screen, but did not see any words related to “paradise.” She saw that Asker had already communicated with the lady at the counter, it seemed that he wanted to take on a certain mission, and the latter replied fluently:
“Azure Longsword Mercenary Group, number MS-995017-247, requests to undertake the ‘Black Sea Fishing Boat Missing’ mission, number 1000000012763212. The mission publisher has a message, do you want to listen to it?”
“Yes.” Asker said.
So the lady at the counter took out a microphone from under the desk and clicked on the corresponding audio file on the computer:
“I am the village head of Burgas Village in the Thrace Province of the Empire. Last month, several fishermen from our village went fishing in the Black Sea and disappeared on the same day, never to return. The latitude and longitude coordinates of the last fishing boat signal were 43 degrees 32 minutes 11 seconds north latitude, 32 degrees 2 minutes 26 seconds east longitude.”
“The families of the missing and other villagers in the village have raised about 3 pounds as a reward. If you can find and rescue them, we are willing to pay 3 pounds to thank you; if you only find their remains, we are also willing to pay 30 denarius silver coins to thank you.”
“Let’s take this one.” Asker made the decision.
“Then please scan the QR code under the counter and download our ‘Constantinople Mercenary Guild’ APP.” The lady at the counter said, “Your default account is the full spelling of the mercenary group name, the default password is eight 8s. After logging in, you can publish mission logs online and listen to relevant mission audio. After completing the mission, you only need to bring the people or remains to the guild, and the reward will be credited to your APP account, please remember to bind your bank card.”
“A month has passed, the probability of the victims surviving should be very low, right?” Medea analyzed, “If we only find the remains, I’m afraid it won’t even be enough to cover our round-trip boat fare.”
“Anyway, we are just practicing, it doesn’t matter what mission we take on.” Asker said with a smile, “Maybe there will be unexpected gains.”
Unexpected gains? Medea frowned, hearing the implication in Asker’s words. The others were taking on a mercenary mission for the first time and were still in a state of ignorance, so they did not raise any objections.
The Black Sea was located north of Constantinople, and to its north was the Principality of Kiev. The two countries mainly traded in fur and timber, and there were fleets running corresponding routes. Asker and the others searched around the Golden Horn pier and finally found a merchant ship willing to carry them.
“43 degrees 32 minutes 11 seconds north latitude, 32 degrees 2 minutes 26 seconds east longitude?” The shipowner looked at the string of coordinates and said, “I did see a newly emerged island in the waters near there recently when I was running the route to Ochakiv.”
“A newly emerged island?” Nuo was immediately interested when she heard this. “Have you gone ashore to see it?”
“Little girl, being too curious is not a good thing at sea.” The shipowner shook his head and said with a smile, “Anyway, it must be either crustal movement or some kind of supernatural event that caused this new island to appear. There may be some dangerous extraordinary creatures on it. For example, there is a large venomous snake island near that sea area, full of snakes with spirituality. If you are bitten, you will die immediately. The venom is so strong that it is said to even annihilate the soul.”
“Snake Island?” Nuo immediately felt goosebumps all over her body.
“That’s right, so this newly emerged island may not be safe either.” The shipowner said, “The missing fishermen you are looking for do have the possibility of being stranded and forced to go ashore there, but I can’t let my sailors risk their lives for this. At most, I can only send you to the shallow waters near the island, and then give you a small boat to go ashore on your own.”
“One day later, my freighter will return from Kievan Rus’, and will wait for you near that island for a maximum of two hours. If you don’t show up, we will leave on our own. And, you need to pay 5 pounds for a one-way ticket. Pay 1 pound in advance, and pay the remaining 4 pounds after getting on the boat. If you can come back alive from the island, you will need to pay another 5 pounds.”
In other words, even if they could find the missing fishermen, this mission was destined to lose 7 pounds. Medea did not speak, squinting at Asker, only to hear him readily agree:
“Okay, here is the 1 pound banknote in advance.”
Sure enough, Asker was not aiming for the mission reward at all. Was there something wrong with the identities of the missing fishermen? Or was it the island itself? Medea secretly wondered.
“Okay.” The shipowner took the banknote and said, “My cargo should be loaded, come with me.”
The freighter docked at the pier was called the “White Iliana,” a coastal freighter that had been running in the Black Sea for many years. The center of the ship’s deck was a recess for containers, and the sailors ran back and forth on the passageway next to the recess and close to the bulwarks, responsible for maintaining the normal navigation of the freighter.
Asker and the others boarded the ship, immediately attracting curious eyes from the surroundings. These sailors were all ordinary people, with neither extraordinary power nor any firearms or weapons, no wonder the shipowner said it was impossible to let these sailors go on an “adventure.”
After reporting to the port office in Constantinople, the White Iliana officially set sail. The departure time was 6 p.m., which was dinner time. The members of the mercenary group were therefore fortunate enough to enjoy a “sea dinner” in the cabin with the sailors: hard-boiled salt water spaghetti, a small bag of ketchup, beans and pork stew cans, and sardine cans.
Peggy picked at the beans in the pork can boredly, her face expressionless. Eleanor had a good appetite and ate all the spaghetti dipped in ketchup, then started to work on the sardines. Nuo opened two cans, but lost her appetite after just smelling them, and slowly ate the spaghetti with a fork.
“Here.” Medea handed Nuo a sausage. “I just bought it from a sailor.”
“Thank you.” Nuo thanked her politely.
“You didn’t use your Mind I ability to ‘buy’ it, did you?” Asker said teasingly.
“Mind your own business.” Medea rolled her eyes.
Asker ate a little of each dish and filled his stomach. Looking out of the porthole, night had gradually fallen, and the sailors had returned to their cabins to rest, leaving only a few people on watch. The shipowner asked the first mate to bring a few sleeping bags, which did not look like the sailors’ bedding, probably the captain’s own collection.
So everyone lay down in their clothes in the cabin. At about 3 a.m., Asker was awakened by a knock on the door and opened his eyes.
“You have arrived at your destination.” A sailor opened the cabin door and said.
Peggy climbed out of her sleeping bag and pushed Eleanor next to her awake. Medea sat up, covering her mouth and yawning non-stop, her beautiful wine-red hair also messed up. Only Nuo seemed to be a little grumpy when she got up. Eleanor called her for a long time before she woke up, and she was a little depressed.
Everyone walked out of the cabin and saw the outline of the island faintly emerging from the night on the left side of the ship. The first mate directed the sailors to put a day’s worth of dry food for five people, ropes, oil lamps, two oars, and a few signal flares on the small boat hanging by the side of the ship, and then shouted for the members of the mercenary group to get on the boat.
After paying the remaining four pounds, the small boat carrying everyone was gradually lowered into the cold sea water. Now even Nuo, who had not woken up yet, was fully awake, looking at the undulating sea around her and asking:
“Are we rowing over now?”
“Of course.” Asker said. He and Eleanor each picked up a pair of oars, paddling the water and pushing the boat towards the island.
Although the island looked not far away, it took everyone half an hour to reach the shore. Fortunately, there was a beach next to the island, so the small boat was smoothly washed ashore by the sea water.
“We must tie the rope to the tree on the shore, otherwise the small boat will be washed away by the rising tide.” Asker said. Everyone worked together to tie one end of the rope to the iron nail at the bow of the small boat, and the other end to the tree trunk on the shore.
Asker looked at the beach and felt relieved. This island… was indeed the same as the game in his previous life. The only difference was that in his previous life, countless player guilds landed on this island, and there was almost a group PK incident on the shoal, while in this world, only his five-person team came to the island.
That shipowner was right. A new island that suddenly appeared for no reason was most likely caused by a supernatural event. It was definitely dangerous, and the benefits were not necessarily there, so NPC mercenaries who felt it was not worthwhile would basically not come.
However, for players who were immortal, any danger was simply a joke. Players only cared about whether the benefits were big enough. Since this island was brought by a supernatural event, there was a high probability that there would be high-value things on the island that matched the corresponding difficulty.
And it turned out to be true in the end.
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