Chapter 7: Store Open! Part 1
The digital alarm on his phone rang at 6 am for Jin. He woke up a little groggy, made his bed and did two sets of 25 push-ups to start the day. It was his usual routine to maintain his physique. After a few slices of toasted bread with jam, he went to the printer to check on the status of his panda print for the standee.
The system did not state that it had to be a human-sized standee so with some materials lying in the house, he decided to do a standee himself without incurring any additional cost. Hence, he used quality paper that was left over from his final year project in university and made a lazy panda standee with inspiration from his cultivation manual.
"Jin, the shop reconstruction was completed at 4.49 am. The echo barriers had been taken away." Yun notified him through his phone as she did not want to disturb Jin's building of the lazy panda standee.
Jin gave a little bit more glue and while waiting for the standee to dry, he checked his phone. "Alright, thanks Yun, I will get going soon." He wore something a little more formal than usual, a simple shirt and brown pants, before leaving the house with the plastic bag that contained the lazy panda standee.
His house was just a few hundred meters away from the shopping district and in 10 minutes, he was able to reach the shop. When he reached the plot of land, he was bewildered. The entire burnt abandoned building was gone. There was a small park erected within the new plot of land with several stone chairs and tables. A few trees and bamboo were planted in the small park as well right beside the store.
Shopkeepers and people who were used to Tiangong Shopping street were stunned by the overnight removal of the abandoned pachinko building. Some even praised the heavens for someone daring enough to remove such a bad omen away from the Tiangong shopping street.
The exterior of the store amazed him, it did not have any modern vibe to it, but rather the sense of a traditional shophouse with three stories. The shutters were closed and there was a door with an electronic lock at the side of the shutters.
"Use your phone to unlock the door."
The lock gave a short beep and Jin went into the shophouse. Lights were immediately turned on via smart sensors the moment Jin went in. The interior was the exact opposite of the traditional shophouse.
The shop had a very clean, bright, minimalistic look with a mahogany redwood bar counter at the centre with full grained leather bar stools that could swivel in the middle of the room. At each side of the room, there were two 49-inch 16K HDR TVs mounted on the wall. A total of four TVs at the moment but the store itself could seem to accommodate another six more TVs.
He copied the concept he got from the outlying towns' dungeon supplier stores. When the customer is in the dimension space, people outside can view it. He had the bar concept to provide some form of refreshments to hopefully earn some money while his customers wait for their turn.
"Before we proceed any further, I have already rewarded you your custom-made dimensional space portal machine, it is at the side of the bar counter."
Jin noticed the machine was actually just a simple looking computer. "I modelled it to look like a computer so it would not take up too much space, unlike those models you saw in the current dungeon suppliers. I am also giving you functions of a workable computer too." Yun said as if she took pride in what she did.
"The Custom-made Dimension Space portal machine, or as I aptly named it Panda Port will provide dimensional spaces to four stations as situated in front of the 4 TVs. Rent your customers these dog tags. As long as they stay in front of the TV with the tags on when the summoning circle appears, they will be teleported into the system."
"There are a few things I need to explain before you can officially open the store. So either listen up or read the email that I am going to send you." Yun became stern.
"The first floor is where the dimension space portals are. 2nd floor is the resting area if they ever get defeated. You are responsible for bringing the unconscious up for them to rest when they are out of the dimension space portals."
"Unlike other suppliers, the system induced a certain amount of extremely pure chi energy in the dog tags so if they were defeated, the emergency chi energy will activate and save their lives. They will only be unconscious for five to ten minutes before they wake up regardless of grades."
"As you have noticed, there are currently neither drinks nor food available at the counter, you need to unlock them yourself. I will provide you with plain water. You are not allowed to bring any external food produce or refreshments for I will provide them when the time comes."
"But I am not aiming to be a chef, I want to be a dunge-" Jin was interrupted when he interrupted Yun.
"A number one dungeon supplier who knows the needs of his customer. If they want to eat in here, they have to pay for a dungeon ticket because this is the business of a dungeon supplier. Each dungeon ticket entitles them panda credit via their phone. The panda credit allows them to buy drinks and food from you. No more, no less. No refillable less plain water."
"A cooking permit application had already been approved and will be sending to your shop soon."
"Wait let me guess, the plain water must be extraordinary if you are providing them," Jin remembered the gourmet fantasy novels.
"No, from your standard tap water, perhaps more purified. That's all."
"Guess I was expecting too much." Jin sighed.
"I was actually joking, yes it is the purest water from deepest springs of the Aqua world where mermaids and merman lived." Yuna chuckled.
"Anyways, the price for a dungeon ticket cannot be changed. All revenue earned will be taken and charged to the system. I will give you a straight 5% cut of everything until you increase dungeon supplier rank."
"5%?! " Jin sighed and reluctantly accepted. He knew there was no free lunch in the world. All the reconstruction work, the beautiful layout in the interior and even the phone was not given for free. No wonder he initially felt that the system was being so generous.
"Wait, what is this dungeon supplier rank? I never heard of it before."
"It is the system's way of ranking you, pitting you against the entire world's dungeon suppliers. Right now, you are in the rank of the hundreds of thousands. To be more precise. Rank 954,885 dungeon supplier. Work hard to be the number one okay? I love you Jin." Yun sent a blow kiss emoji towards him.
"Oh, we digress. The third floor is the personal viewing room. The customer can pay a sum of money to view his video progress with slow-motion playback, zoom in zoom out function and viewing it on a 360 degrees hologram using the commands of simple hand or voice gestures. In order to improve, you need to know your own weakness and study the enemy's strength. There are only ten rooms and with the number of rooms limited, it's first come first serve. Alternatively, customers can download a HD video for 5 Yuan."
As Jin acknowledged Yun in his head, he turned on the computer. He happened to find a menu of the store with a single dungeon instance on it currently. As he looked at the price, he felt his heart drop.
"Goblin Dungeon Instance – 245 Yuan"
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