Chapter 54: You Authors Are So Weird!

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Due to the empire's involvement in the northern war, its control over the southern border weakened drastically, directly resulting in rampant banditry in the border regions near the barbarians.
Vivian, Lolly, and Grella, who insisted on tagging along, set out on the journey back home.
There wasn't much to say about this trip...
Vivian and her companions seemed to have poked a hornets' nest of thieves; there was never a moment of peace along the way, with outlaws and bandits continuously popping up to cause trouble for them.
Fortunately, all three of them were quite capable mages, and dealing with these bandits was a breeze.
After spending five days and wiping out seventy-nine waves of bandits, Vivian finally arrived near her village.
Looking at this dense block of text, Ron felt his entire scalp go numb.
The protagonists of other stories, although they also encounter troubles, always have a primary focus. For instance, encountering one or two clueless bandits so they can easily annihilate the opponents and show off.
Bloody hell, I encountered seventy-nine waves of bandits here. How am I supposed to write this?
I can't possibly write all of them out and stretch it across seventy-nine chapters, can I?
If my novel were already serialized and I didn't care about my rankings, I might actually use this padding to drag out the plot.
The crucial point was that among all these robbers, hardly any left a deep impression on Ron.
Basically, as soon as they appeared, they were wiped out by Vivian and the others.
Moreover... Vivian contributed the least among them.
Just look at Vivian's two friends.
Lolly, the genius apothecary whom even Wiegrafet would praise.
Grella, the young miss of the empire's strongest chamber of commerce.
After Vivian demanded poison and had her plans thwarted by Grella, Lolly learned her lesson and developed a series of magical toxins that directly upended and poisoned the bandits into a chaotic mess.
As for Grella, she pulled out various scrolls and items as if money meant nothing to her. Often, just as the bandits showed their faces, a scroll inscribed with a Great Mage's spell was already smashed into their faces.
Lolly and Grella were far too dazzling, leaving Vivian—the strongest mage among the three on paper—with no room whatsoever to showcase her abilities.
After much deliberation, Ron decisively decided to summarize this entire plot arc in a single sentence within the novel.
Then, he silently resolved to make Vivian stay far away from these two ladies in the future.
As long as they were by Vivian's side, Vivian would never have any chance to shine.
Condensing five days of plot into a single sentence in the novel still gave Ron a bit of a headache.
Fortunately, he had saved up enough drafts beforehand, so he wasn't at the point where he had to ask for leave just to rush through the plot.
Even so, it was indeed an issue that needed consideration.
Now, Ron was the one hoping that Vivian would encounter some trouble back in the village; otherwise, he truly wouldn't have anything left to write.

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Ron spun his chair around in frustration.
If only his old subordinates from ten (or five thousand) years ago were still around, he could arrange for them to play villains and help him pad out a plotline.
Just as he was feeling annoyed, Ron's phone rang.
It was Bailu calling.
"What's going on with those canned goods you're selling in the group chat?" Bailu asked straight to the point.
The sudden trading of a large number of transcendent items had already triggered the editorial department's alarm system.
Such situations often occurred when creators actively degenerated and opened doors, allowing them to bring massive amounts of transcendent items out of the spiritual realm and convert them into item cards for trading.
However, Bailu's tone remained very amicable.
She was a faithful reader of Ron's novel and knew that Ron's resonated spiritual realm was a magical world, which did not produce such canned goods.
As long as the author wasn't stirring up trouble, Bailu was always the editor who trusted authors the most.
Ron's reason for selling canned goods was actually very simple: arbitrage.
The average price for the canned goods he procured from the fresh supermarket dungeon was around ten thousand. As long as he took them out to sell—even if he didn't exchange them for other item cards but for cash instead—a single can would start at sixty to seventy thousand.
Some functionally powerful ones, like the [Canned Yellow Peaches], were even sold for over half a million.
[Canned Yellow Peaches] could cure the vast majority of illnesses, and a price of half a million was practically a bargain compared to the treatment costs for some severe diseases.
A fifty-fold profit was enough to make anyone take risks.
Ron had been acting as a scalper over the past few days and had made quite a small fortune.
It was a pity that most of these canned goods were auxiliary in function and leaned toward daily life, having limited impact on combat power; otherwise, they could have been sold for even more.
However, truly powerful items were rarely traded for money; they usually involved physical item-for-item trades using cards.
Hearing Bailu's inquiry, Ron didn't hide anything and directly revealed the secret of the supermarket dungeon.
This wasn't because he was particularly generous.
First, that place required payment. If you lacked currency recognized by the other party, they would collect your organs instead.
Second, after Ron had continuously sheared their wool for five days, the canned goods on the shelves had basically been completely swept clean by Ron.
According to the store clerk, it would take a while for them to restock.
The only thing that made Ron feel a bit guilty was perhaps that he had kept a spiritual realm dungeon a secret.
Bailu didn't get angry over this.
Human bottom lines were extremely flexible.
When an invaded spiritual realm dungeon was harmful to humans, they would eliminate it no matter what, proclaiming that maintaining world safety brook no delay.

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However, when a spiritual realm dungeon proved beneficial to humans, they would start hedging and intentionally allow the dungeon to persist.
"I thought you'd order me to go eliminate that dungeon," Ron said with a smile, hearing Bailu's nonchalant attitude. "After all, isn't the World Will supposed to destroy all invaded spiritual realm dungeons?"
"Theoretically, yes. But I'm just a deputy coordinator," Bailu said with a beaming smile.
Bailu's words gave Ron a hint of something deeper.
Could it be that sometimes, editors' interests differed from those of the World Will?
Between humans and the World Will, did these editors lean more toward humanity, or more toward the World Will?
"For now, I should be the only one who can enter this dungeon without taking damage," Ron stopped probing further and shifted the topic. "At worst, I can just help everyone else buy things as a proxy."
"That's not necessarily true," Bailu thought for a moment. "That Cyber White Crane fellow seems to have excised quite a few of his own organs. Maybe he can use those organs to trade in there."
Ron was stunned for a moment upon hearing this.
"Huh?"
"I wonder how many cans reproductive glands could buy."
"......Huh?"
"Hehe, I'm just joking," Bailu chuckled.
Only then did Ron let out a sigh of relief; otherwise, it would have been too bizarre.
"How could such important organs be used to trade for canned goods?"
"......"
"This is also what I wanted to tell you," Bailu's tone gradually turned serious. "Resonance is two-way. Experiences in reality and the spiritual realm jointly influence your consciousness. You must always remember that you are first a human of this world, and everything else comes second."
"I really don't want to send away another author of mine," Bailu said with a long sigh.
Take Cyber White Crane, for example; he had actually reached a very dangerous borderline.
If it were any other editor, they would have long since requested an audit and banned him.
Only Bailu was still willing to give the other party another chance.
Ron muttered, "I probably won't."
"Huh?" This time, it was Bailu's turn to be confused by Ron's words.
Ron touched his own frail physique and thought about his actions in the spiritual realm.
"My body wouldn't be able to take it."

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