Giant Fish Survival: I Can Hear the Giant Fish's Heart

Zhou Wen quickly put away the 20 iron ingots. He had obtained 5 ingots in the treasure cave, used 3, and had 2 left, for a total of 22 ingots.

"Finally, we have extra iron ingots in reserve!" Zhou Wen exclaimed excitedly.

An iron broadsword requires three iron ingots. When Zhou Wen only had two iron ingots left, he always felt hesitant to use the iron broadsword, as if he was afraid of breaking a precious treasure. Since he only had one, if he accidentally broke it, it would be gone.

But now things are different. With 22 iron ingots, equivalent to seven iron swords, he can use them freely and boldly.

"Should we make an iron dagger?" Zhou Wen still had a blueprint for an iron dagger that he had traded before. He was reluctant to use it because he didn't have enough iron ingots before, but now that he had enough, he could make one to play with.

After thinking about it, I decided against it. The main reason is that iron broadswords are far superior to daggers nowadays, so there's not much point in making one.

With nothing else to do, Zhou Wen began a new round of physical training. His strength points had increased slightly, so he needed to add more weight.

For this push-up exercise, Zhou Wen used three pieces of equipment as weights: spiked breastplate, spiked leg armor, and spiked groin guard, totaling 80 pounds.

However, Zhou Wen did not wear all the equipment. After all, push-ups mainly train the strength of the arms and abdomen. Wearing spiked leg armor on the legs would add weight to the lower body, so it would not be very effective.

Therefore, Zhou Wen used the spiked leg armor and spiked groin guard as counterweights, placing them on his back, and did push-ups while wearing a spiked breastplate.

After doing one repetition, Zhou Wen clearly felt the pressure, indicating that the weight was effective for training, so he continued to exercise.

After completing a hundred, a private message arrived. Zhou Wen was also a bit tired and decided to take a break. He opened the message and found it was from Zuo Junyang, the guild leader of "Leviathan".

【Hello, boss.】

【Is there a problem? 】

Here's the thing: I saw on the World Trade Channel that you listed 9 portions of Mirror Skin Barracuda Meat two days ago, intending to trade them for your equipment slots.

Oh, you have an equipment slot, but you want to increase the price?

Zhou Wen immediately realized that Zuo Junyang wanted to exchange his equipment slots for more Mirror Skin Barracuda Meat. This was negotiable, since for Zhou Wen, the equipment slots were far more important than Mirror Skin Barracuda Meat.

No, I wanted to ask if we could trade a different item. Our guild wants to acquire these 9 portions of Mirror Skin Barracuda Meat.

Zuo Junyang didn't ask about the equipment slots. After all, even if he asked Zhou Wen, he might not tell him. Besides, the name of the equipment slots was already straightforward enough. Anyone who had played the game knew what they were for.

It's possible, but only by exchanging blueprints or for some extremely rare items.

The Mirror Skin Barracuda Meat has been on the market for two days, but no one is trading it. It may be too rare, or the survivors may have used it themselves after getting it. In that case, it would be better to trade it with Zuo Junyang for something of value.

[Um... sir, actually I have a trading method that would be more advantageous for you.]

What method?

The guild leader of "Survivors" just proposed an idea to allow the Leviathan to skip the feeding phase. After discussion among our major guilds, we think this idea is very feasible, so we've decided to try it out tomorrow.

[I know this; I saw it on the world chat channel. It is indeed a brilliant idea, but what does it have to do with your trading of mirror-skinned barracuda meat?]

In fact, Zhou Wen had roughly guessed what Zuo Junyang wanted to do, and the thought of coming back to him after going around in circles made him feel a little amused.

We were thinking of waiting until our hypothesis was confirmed tomorrow, and then trading seaweed for mirror-skin barracuda meat with you.

[Of course, the amount of seaweed is definitely not a few hundred or a few thousand portions, but rather 25 portions to skip the feeding stage entirely, and this quantity is only used to trade one portion of mirror skin barracuda meat.]

【If you're willing to trade all nine portions to us, we'll also give you an extra amount of seaweed to skip the feeding phase. What do you think?】

"My God, you're a genius!" Zhou Wen looked at Zuo Junyang's message, and the more he read, the more he couldn't suppress his smile, until he finally burst out laughing.

"Good grief, it's come full circle and it's really back on my head?"

However, it must be said that Zuo Junyang does have some ideas. If seaweed is sold separately, for example, 25 portions of seaweed are sold in different ways, then the higher life-saving value of "skipping the feeding stage" will be lost.

250,000 portions of seaweed may seem like a lot, but it's not actually that valuable. After all, tens of millions of people consume 200,000 to 300,000 portions of seaweed every day when they transform into Leviathan, so this is practically free.

If you're ruthless enough, you could sell 10,000 portions of seaweed at once, and with Zhou Wen's purchase price, you could get 1,000 portions of basic materials.

What does a thousand sets of basic materials mean? For most survivors, it's an astronomical sum, enough to make their lives go from difficult to easy and comfortable.

Therefore, when seaweed begins to be traded on a large scale, the supply will definitely exceed the demand, and the price will inevitably drop. It is impossible for Zhou Wen to trade 1 unit of basic material for 10 units of seaweed at the same price.

到时价格很可能是1份基础材料交易100份海草，甚至1000份，那25万份的海草，就相当于2500份基础材料或是250份。

Moreover, Zuo Junyang is the guild leader, so he can collect the seaweed from guild members. He doesn't need to collect too much; if each guild member submits a thousand portions of seaweed, that's a million portions.

Therefore, upon analysis, Zuo Junyang's method of trading mirror-skinned barracuda with Zhou Wen was essentially a way to get a free girlfriend.

This is indeed a good trading method.

So you've agreed to the deal?

However, I am still quite confident in my abilities; I don't need to skip the feeding phase.

How could Zhou Wen possibly agree? If he tried to trade with him using the method Zhou Wen proposed, what could Zhou Wen say? He could only comment, "You have ideas."

Moreover, in the eyes of others, Zhou Wen really didn't need to skip the feeding stage. He was already the number one survivor, the strongest, and the anchor worm posed no threat at all.

However, as the guild was established, Zhou Wen's status in the eyes of the survivors gradually became not as high as before. After all, how could one person compare to a guild with a large number of members, unless he was a cheater?

[Boss, please reconsider. We also have another guess: skipping the feeding phase might grant an extra supply box.]

In other words, you can obtain four supply crates per day.

[An extra supply crate sounds good, but does that mean you're guaranteed to get a blueprint? Or is it guaranteed to contain rare materials or items?]

When asked this question, Zuo Junyang was completely speechless. Zhou Wen could have traded the blueprints and rare materials with the Mirror Skin Barracuda meat, so there was no need for him to get an extra supply box.

Thus, Zuo Junyang's method of trading mirror-skinned mullet meat with seaweed was completely unworkable for Zhou Wen.