Chapter 433 Gold Coin Income and a Strange Atmosphere

Barracuda Bay, Saltwater District, Cable Street.

As he stood by the crowded road, the twin swords on his back rose and fell slightly with his breathing.

Xia Nan held a small bag of Sugar Tangerines he had just bought from a roadside stall in his left hand, and half a peeled tangerine in his right. His mind unconsciously replayed his recent experience at the Salmon Roe Grocery Shop.

He had happened to run into a local gang collecting protection fees. Because of his relationship with the shop owner, the punks' attitude had immediately shifted.

The exact same thing had happened back when he went to Nym for his Advancement Quest. He remembered crossing paths with that gang during a later commission—they were called the Black Badger Gang or the Gray Badger Gang, something like that. He wondered how they were doing now.

In truth, Xia Nan didn't mind using his reputation or his status as a Class Holder to make life a little easier for Paddy, Colin, and the others.

It was just that, through his sharp Perception, he noticed those punks—especially the short guy who seemed to be the leader—looking a bit strange.

But since it had nothing to do with him and they had fled long ago, he couldn't be bothered to look deeper into it.

"You! Come here!"

"What's your name? What's your business here!?"

A stern voice suddenly rang out nearby.

Frowning slightly, he instinctively looked toward the source of the noise.

On one side of the bustling street ahead, several guards in the standard armor of the Governor's Mansion were interrogating a half-orc dressed as an adventurer.

He was just a bottom-tier adventurer who hadn't yet obtained a Class Level. Clearly not wanting to offend one of the three major powers in Barracuda Bay, the half-orc was extremely cooperative, answering whatever they asked.

However, his Common seemed very poor. His stumbling replies only made the surrounding guards more suspicious, and his inability to express himself clearly caused him to panic.

He started mixing in grunts and growls, gesturing wildly while spouting an orcish tribal dialect. His light green face flushed red with visible panic and terror.

Xia Nan swept his gaze over them, looking thoughtful.

He hadn't paid much attention earlier, but thinking back on the roughly twenty-minute walk from the grocery shop to here, he had seen at least three patrols from the Governor's Mansion.

In the Saltwater District, this was highly unusual.

He couldn't help but associate this with the strange behavior of those street punks, pondering the connection.

As he pondered, one of the guards in the patrol ahead seemed to notice his lingering gaze and turned his head to look in Xia Nan's direction.

The two stared at each other in silence.

Equally unwilling to stir up trouble, Xia Nan began secretly drafting a response in his head, considering how to deal with the guard.

To his surprise, the guard just looked him up and down, let his gaze pause briefly on Xia Nan's arm, and then looked away, even offering a slight nod.

Xia Nan blanked for a moment.

He instinctively looked down at his arm.

—The small cloth bag filled with Sugar Tangerines was gently swaying in the air.

Realizing what had happened, the corners of his mouth twitched into an awkward smile.

Most of the time, Xia Nan gave off the first impression of a cold, stern, and young elite adventurer.

But right now, the bag draped over his arm and the half-peeled Sugar Tangerine in his hand gave him a much more domestic vibe—like a tough guy from his previous life holding a cup of Starbucks.

A proper, law-abiding town resident!

Combined with the fact that there were already plenty of adventurers coming and going on the street, he naturally wasn't flagged as a suspicious target for questioning.

"Xia Nan, are you done on your end?"

A cheerful greeting reached his ears.

Alton the Halfling walked out of a roadside casino, a bright smile on his face as he tossed a copper coin in the air.

The raucous noise of the gambling den could faintly be heard from behind him.

Clearly, he had just finished his ritual to please the Goddess of Luck inside.

"Yeah, I just dropped by to support their business. I didn't stay long," Xia Nan replied, handing over a Sugar Tangerine.

After returning to Barracuda Bay from the Goblin Lair, he had first gone to the inn to take a bath, washing off the blood and gore before heading to the Salmon Roe Grocery Shop.

Since Alton had been planning to perform his ritual, they had traveled together.

"What about you? Did the ritual go smoothly?" he asked.

After all, given a Halfling's ritual habits—their aggressive behavior at the card table and their absurd, undefeated win rates—if they ran into a less rational casino boss, they could easily be cut off mid-game, before they could lose everything in a final all-in bet.

In response, the Halfling simply smiled and shook the copper coin at Xia Nan.

"Of course!"

"The Smiling Lady will always bless me!"

That made sense.

It might be a different story elsewhere, but in Barracuda Bay, every casino worker had likely heard of the legendary figure named Arlene, who had been like a god of gamblers.

Running into a little guy displaying the exact same behavior, they would be too terrified to actively intervene.

Understanding the situation, the two casually chatted, one tall and one short, as they headed toward the tavern.

...

Right now, five days had passed since Xia Nan returned from Cliff Rock Island.

The loot brought back from the sea had basically all been processed.

Just as the Sea Elf half-blood had predicted, the moment Xia Nan listed the [Azure Wave Blade] in the Adventurers' Association's local consignment catalog and highlighted its special effects, he received more than one offer.

While it didn't trigger a frantic bidding war, the response was still quite enthusiastic.

After all, its attribute—"increases stamina recovery by 20% when the user is wet"—was almost a perfect match for the aquatic environment of the Southern Archipelagos.

Add to that the solid quality of the curved blade itself, and the notoriety of its previous owner, "Oily Hand" Bourne.

In just three days, the price was driven up to nearly four digits before the offers gradually slowed down.

Ultimately, Xia Nan sold it to a veteran Class-Grade Ranger for a whopping 968 gold coins.

After deducting the Association's "5%" processing fee, he netted 920 gold coins.

The twin swords and longbow belonging to Nick and Leda from the Silver Claw Osprey squad were bundled and sold to a well-regarded blacksmith shop in Barracuda Bay.

The two decent-quality white-tier items brought him another 275 gold coins in profit.

With this, aside from the [Practice Staff] still sitting on consignment at the Association, the rest of his haul from the trip to Cliff Rock Island had been fully sorted out.

Adding the [Fish Bone Conch] staff and the ruined [Purgatory Pulse] that he had sold to Pearl Spun Yarn on the day he returned for 295 and 175 gold coins respectively, plus the 100 gold coins he was allocated from the Black Gull...

The total came out to "295 + 175 + 100 + 275 + 920"...

1,765 gold!

If he included the nearly 900 gold in his bank savings...

Xia Nan's net worth had now skyrocketed to "2,785 gold, 6 silver, and 3 copper"!

That was enough to buy his former dream item—the full heavy plate armor sold at the Rockhammer blacksmith shop for a staggering 1,500 gold.

If he spent it all on mushroom soup, even eating three bowls a day, it would last him over forty years.

For a hard laborer hauling cargo on the docks of Barracuda Bay, it would take fifteen years of working without eating, drinking, or spending a single copper—over five thousand days and nights—to save up that much.

Even for the wealthy merchants and nobles living in luxury in the mansions of the White Cliff District, it was undeniably a massive fortune.

To be honest—and he wasn't afraid to admit it—when Xia Nan first saw the numbers in his bank account, his heart really did skip a beat.

Depositing so many gold coins at once would stir the emotions of almost anyone, unless they were completely numb to their vast wealth, or a rich heir born with a silver spoon who had no concept of money.

Let alone someone like Xia Nan, an adventurer who traded his life for money, risking his neck every time he set out.

Slaying a single Goblin only earned him three silver coins. He knew exactly what kind of weight this massive sum carried.

However, unlike other adventurers, he didn't squander his gold at the gambling tables or in brothels. Instead, he patiently waited, calming his mind.

Even when buying Sugar Tangerines just now, facing a fruit vendor who quoted a price clearly above the average, he had still used his high Charisma of 6 points to haggle it down a bit.

Because Xia Nan knew perfectly well that even though his strength was rapidly growing, he wouldn't score a haul like this on every mission.

The primary reason his earnings had broken into the four digits this time was all thanks to stumbling across the Flying Fish Oil Barrel pirate crew at sea.

The [Azure Wave Blade] alone had provided over nine hundred gold coins of income.

And he simply wasn't the kind of person who could discard his humanity for a bit of cash, engaging in wanton slaughter and constantly flipping his identity between "pirate" and "adventurer."

Just like the fluctuating lines of the stock market from his past life, there were ups and downs. Where there were days of bumper harvests, there would naturally be times when he took a loss.

Maintaining a calm and level head was extremely important for an adventurer.

Of course, the other reason Xia Nan could look at the massive sum in his bank account with relative calm...

...was because in a few days, before the money even had time to warm his pockets, it would be transferred to someone else's account.

Using the materials harvested from the Shark Beast hunted at Cliff Rock Island, Xia Nan had commissioned enchanted gear from Celianne, the half-elf owner of the Pearl Spun Yarn tailor shop. Over the past five days, he had already reviewed the preliminary designs.

A tight-fitting inner lining paired with outer armor.

A total of two enchanted items!

According to the half-elf's theory, wearing them both simultaneously might even yield a stacking effect, similar to an equipment set from his past life.

Xia Nan figured that these two pieces of gear would likely be the first blue-tier armor he received since transmigrating into this world.

He was incredibly excited.

Right now, they were still in the design phase and hadn't formally started crafting. Per Pearl Spun Yarn's usual policy, Celianne hadn't collected a deposit yet.

But based on Xia Nan's understanding of enchanted equipment prices in this world...

The cost for two pieces of blue-tier armor absolutely wouldn't be cheap.

Even though he had provided some of the primary materials and the surplus Shark Beast parts could be used to offset the fees to a degree...

...the items he still had to pay for included labor costs, special metals for the outer armor, and auxiliary crafting materials...

Considering that the [Ember Fall] straight sword—which was also blue-tier under normal conditions—had still cost him over a thousand gold coins even after he supplied the main materials...

Even if these two pieces of blue armor didn't require rare materials like "Solar Flame Iron Plating Powder," piecing it all together would definitely run him at least a thousand gold coins.

Calculating it like that, his savings of 2,785 gold were just "barely enough." He was absolutely not at the level where he could start splurging.

Consequently, Xia Nan's original plan to renovate the Flying Fish Oil Barrel had been temporarily shelved due to fears of running out of funds.

Otherwise, when it came time to recruit a crew, restock supplies, and purchase equipment, he might genuinely not have enough cash.

Xia Nan even thought that if he didn't need to sail out on his own in the short term, he could simply rent the pirate ship out to make a little extra money.

Fortunately, no matter what, things at Pearl Spun Yarn were progressing quite smoothly.

The tailor shop's owner, Celianne, was a perfectionist by nature, bordering on obsessive-compulsive.

He might be a bit of a hassle to deal with in daily life, but as a "contractor," he was almost perfect.

Xia Nan still remembered when he went to the shop yesterday to see the first draft, only to be handed a stack of blueprints as thick as a hand.

Even the details of the cuff buttons were designed with extraordinary precision.

They had spent an entire afternoon discussing just the preliminary design.

The half-elf had even factored in the future changes to Xia Nan's muscle mass as his physical attributes increased. Using the measurements taken of Xia Nan's body, he had adjusted the dimensional tolerances for the final product.

Given his absurd rate of destroying armor, this level of foresight probably wouldn't get much use.

Still, he genuinely respected and appreciated Celianne's artisan attitude—his constant striving for excellence and perfection.

As long as it was finished within the time limit, a delay of a few days wouldn't matter. No matter how much he had to cooperate, he didn't find it troublesome at all.

...

They chatted as they walked down the street, occasionally stopping at roadside stalls; the intermittent twenty-minute journey eventually led them back to the Three-Legged Sea Dog tavern.

"My treat. Want a drink?" Xia Nan asked.

Because the Halfling had contributed so much during the mission without asking for anything in return, Xia Nan had previously promised to cover Alton's food expenses while he was in Barracuda Bay.

Since it was just a few casual drinks and wouldn't cost much, the little guy didn't refuse.

Tucking the copper coin into his shirt, he pressed his hands against the seat of a high stool, hopped off his short legs, and landed his small, light frame at the bar.

Xia Nan sat down beside him, pulling a gold coin from his pouch and sliding it across the counter to the tavern owner, Hera.

"Two bottles of 'Siren's Tear' to start."

"Hehe, coming right up!" Gazing at the black-haired adventurer before her, Hera tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear and replied with a smile.

Suddenly remembering the guards from the Governor's Mansion they had passed on the way back, Xia Nan rubbed the Silver Ring on his right ring finger and casually asked, "Has something happened in town these past two days? The atmosphere seems a bit off."