MMORPG: Rebirth as an Alchemist - Chapter 173: [BONUS] Crossing Paths in Diamond Palace

Athar VonCruz, an orphan, had always been at the bottom rung of the society. He had been bullied, belittled and pushed down for his entire life.Beast taming in this world is not a hobby or a profession but is the only way of survival for a human and to gain power.Athar invests his entire life savings for one of the beast eggs; the only chance he has to rise and get ahead in his life.The egg cracks, and a creature of unknown potential emerges from it. In that pivotal moment, Athar's destiny irrevocably shifted. In that moment, Athar unearths a strange and wondrous secret; a hidden power that would become his ultimate trump card.Read how Athar VonCruz carves out a path out for himself and strives to reach the pinnacle of life.

When natural disasters rage, extreme cold and storms spread infinitely...When global mutations occur, zombies flood like tides, and horrific anomalies appear...When the apocalypse arrives, massive devouring abysses with diameters of hundreds of kilometers begin to appear around the world...When people look up to the atmospheric clouds and see the slowly emerging giant corpses of evil gods...From that day on, people started to notice that the time of sunrise became later and later,until the sun no longer rose, and what awaited was an endless polar night.To survive, on that day, the doomsday broadcast announced to the world for the last time:Everyone, head east, escape the dawn!...Lin Xian awakens the “Mechanical Heart” ability, allowing him to devour machines to gain various mysterious skills, scan machines for blueprints to create new machinery, and even use his mind to synchronously drive various machines.Thus, he finds a 200-ton heavy gas locomotive, pulling specially modified storage, planting, production, medical, and living carriages, embarking on a 320,000-kilometer journey along the star orbit, charging eastward!

One scam package,That's all it took to drag the 17-year-old Cail into the world of the void....He thought he had ordered a limited-edition sneakers. But what came was a shady-looking package on his front gate. It smelled like rotten egg and sulfur. Inside the package was a strange box.It's filled with eccentric junk. They looked very intricate and mysterious. He thought, “I probably got someone else's package, a package from someone that was very interested in mysticism.”An old coin, a cracked compass, a ring with an ugly center stone, and some other weird looking trinkets.So he did what any broke student would do:He sold it. He figured someone might want them for cosplay or something. Well, except the gold-rimmed glasses that seemed to fit him very well.“Damn, I paid 7,000 nu for that sneaker; I better get something out from this scam package.”Then all hell broke loose. Strange people started approaching him.People brought that junk. Very strange people wearing suspicious get up trying to buy those stuff in the sketchiest manner possible.As he kept selling, he realized that the box was refilling, it seemed to have an endless supply of those strange stuff. Those people called it 'artifacts'.Then one day he woke up with a strange tattoo on his arm; inside the tattoo was an independent space containing the box. It is basically inseparable from him.“I didn't ask for any of this to happen. But now, strange people come to me with desperate offers. Money, memories, and even soul.”He's just trying to survive high school while earning some money!He had no idea what was going on, but apparently, this thing that he got? It's not just an artifact. It's a contract.As Cail navagates school life, part-time jobs, and otherworldly clients, he starts asking the real question:When did I become an artifact dealer?!By day, he is just an ordinary student, a NPC character.And by night? He is The Dealer. Selling ancient items and dealing with people that he probably shouldn't be talking to.“Since I'm already in this mess, might as well profit off of it.”

...[Inside an underground basement]“You are going to die for nothing, hahahaha,” the old man's voice thundered through the room, sending chills down my spine.Step.With a swift and ruthless motion, he lunged forward, his sword slicing through the air and slashing my throat, crimson droplets staining the darkness.“We'll see,” I whispered defiantly, my final words escaping as a mere breath against the impending darkness.Slowly, inexorably, my consciousness slipped away, and I descended into a deep, unfathomable slumber.“Huh!?” My eyes fluttered open, and I found myself seated in a bustling tavern, the air thick with laughter and the clinking of glasses.In front of me stood a captivating lady, her beauty juxtaposed with an angry furrow upon her brow, threatening to shatter the harmony of the jovial scene.“Don't follow me around!” Her words pierced the air like shards of ice, the intensity of her emotions palpable as she cast a resentful glare in my direction, before swiftly departing from the tavern....Am I trapped within the confines of a game? The fragments of my shattered common sense scattered before me, leaving me to question the very fabric of my reality.