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Chapter 433 - Herbs! Herbs! We accept all types of herbs here!

After reaching the city outskirts, Liam first asked the group to wait and he entered the place alone to check things out.

Unlike the rest of the players or at least those who did not have high enough demonic or nether affinity, he did not have to worry about anything and can pretty much enter any place freely in the nether realm.

Unless he picked a fight himself or there was some sort of special circumstance, the demons would not bother him too much.

But the same could not be said for Mei Mei, Shen Yue, and the rest of the group. They would have to disguise themselves and even then they had to be constantly wary of their surroundings.

At any given time they could be sniffed out and exposed. Then the entire city would burn them and eat them for dinner.

However, all of that did not apply to Liam. He casually walked on the streets of the city and just like the intel, there were several oddly shaped demons standing and peddling for herbs.

They did not even take a look at what herbs they were collecting. It seemed like they were simply hoarding whatever they could get their hands on.

"Oreyyy! What are you looking at? Do you have any herbs to contribute? Either piss or get off the pot. Do not crowd the space. Keep moving. Keep moving."

The demon in front of Liam shouted at him. From the looks of it, he was too much of a small fry to know Liam's status so he simply treated him like any other random demon.

"Ah right, sorry boss." Liam took a step back and smiled.

After that, he took several steps back and quietly sat down in a rickety looking eatery, all the while not removing his eyes from the group of hawkers.

The bunch of them continued shouting energetically for a while and several demons as well came by depositing herbs every once in a while.

As the sun started dipping, one of the demons, coincidentally the one who shouted at Liam moved around and started collecting all the deposits.

It was quite a big haul and filled two giant sacks, almost the size of the demon himself.

The demon looked smugly at the harvest, grabbed the two sacks, and then started walking towards one of the bull hound carriages at the entrance of the city, dragging the two sacks with him.

Satisfied and proud of his day's work, he jumped onto the carriage along with his haul and sped out of the city.

And a couple of minutes later… the person who had been sitting all this while finally made a move.

Liam's expression was as calm as ever as he once again started casually strolling along the streets, towards the city's main gates.

But just as he reached the gate and stepped out… his speed suddenly increased several folds. He activated [Stealth] and sprinted in the direction where the carriage had disappeared.

The tracks were very obvious and not too difficult to spot and the carriage itself came into view within moments.

"So there you are…" Liam hung back and watched the demon calmly from a distance.

There was no security whatsoever surrounding this carriage. There were not even additional carriages for company guarding this main carriage.

It was almost like the person was taking along something that was utterly useless.

"Hmmm? Did the demons not value herbs?" Liam was puzzled.Freeweb novel

If he wanted, he could take all the herbs from this guy right here and right now and there would be nothing anyone could do about it.

He watched the carriage for a while, stalking it carefully, all the while not showing any intention of making a move.

He waited and watched it all the way until it reached another city, several miles over. The carriage then casually entered the city gates without any pomp and show.

The demon even paid the guards at the gate the entrance fees.

"Hmmm…" Liam stopped in his tracks.

He undid his [Stealth] and then once again started following the city by heading in through the same gates, but this time he did it more inconspicuously.

He followed the carriage all the way until it stopped near one of the tall brick buildings.

This seemed to be the destination as after arriving here, the demon stopped the carriage, jumped out, and dragged the two sacks along with him.

Liam stopped there and did not follow him anymore. He did not even linger in the city and started walking back out of the gates.

"That was interesting." He muttered to himself, a subtle smile dancing on his lips.

Although this was a time consuming process, it was definitely a necessity because he now knew something very crucial. From the beginning to the end, the carriage was completely unguarded!

Slowly, a plan started forming in his head.

"Luna, come out." The small white fox popped out of his hoodie and after walking for a good distance, the duo lifted off into the sky, flying back to their group at top speed.

The rest of the group was currently busy grinding three-tailed dome scorpions. They did not wait idly while Liam was away and everyone was busy honing their combat skills.

They split into groups of two and were clearing the hordes, but not all of them did this.

Derek always hunted alone because he was simply too efficient at killing. If someone partnered with him, he would only be effectively carrying them.

Except for him, the others typically teamed up but this time, there was another surprise.

Shen Yue and Mei Mei, the usual duo team had split apart this time. Equipped with the legendary item, Mei Mei's damage was simply too much.

She was massacring the scorpions left and right and this did not leave much space for Shen Yue to contribute anything.

Before she could strike with her twin daggers, all the little girl needed to do was cast a single earth spike.

The dome of the scorpion was split in half and the beast screamed in pain before collapsing on the side lifelessly.

"Mu ha ha ha!" The little girl grinned ear to ear and simply ran around picking up drops. On top of her head, the emerald crown was dazzling brilliantly.

"This is too good!" Mei Mei tried to be very serious as she now knew the truth but it was hard to not get excited with so much power in her hands.

"Come at me you bunch of weaklings! Mu ha ha ha!"

If this world was a game, then she was currently on cheat mode!

Chapter 434 - lt's all about that Give and Take

"Boss, what happened? Did you check out the quest? Was it of any help?" Shin Soo ran over to Liam as soon as he and Luna landed.

Everyone else as well finished off their current target quickly and regrouped around Liam.

"Brother, guess what level I am right now? He He He." Mei Mei arrived first as right now her speed was faster than everyone except for Liam and that was because of the level difference.

"36?" Liam smirked.

"Nope! He He. Wait, yes 36." Mei Mei pouted realizing that her brother did not let her show off.

Liam chuckled, "Anyways…" He then looked at the other party members, "How would you guys like to level up just as fast as her?"

"Huh? Boss, are we really going to do that herb quest?" Shin Soo was the first to put two and two together.

"Yup." Liam then started taking out all the herbs that he had collected or rather stolen from the earth golems while the famous four were busily fighting with the boss.

He also took out some of the reserve herbs he had in his inventory emptying out all of his stock supplies.

Soon, there was a huge pile of all sorts of valuable herbs on the ground. Everyone looked at Liam dazedly. Just how on the earth did he manage to collect so much?

His personal collection of herbs was probably bigger than an entire guild's collection.

Where did he even find time to collect these many herbs and also level up and hone his fighting skills at the same time?

"If anyone else has other herbs feel free to throw it all onto the pile." Liam stepped back and the others as well took turns emptying all of their stocks.

With everybody's herbs in the mix, there was now a giant pile. Shin Shoo couldn't help but gulp in anticipation.

If they actually turned in all of these herbs… just how many experience points they would get… but was it really wise to do something like that? It would be such a waste.

But then again, it would be good to level up fast so that their guild could be a step ahead of the other guilds.

Once they were ahead they would be able to go to the higher leveled zones and using that advantage, they could always be ahead of the other guilds.

After all, everything was a chain reaction in 'Evolution Online'.

A few minutes later… Seeing that all the herbs were collected, Liam clapped his hands loudly, "ok, now everyone should equally split up everything."

He did not take any himself and stepped back.

"Oh, and after splitting up, everyone should follow Shin Soo's lead and do the quest. Don't worry about the herbs. Exchange everything you have and enjoy the break."

His words shocked everyone because it was extremely foolish to exchange all of these precious herbs for experience points, but Liam calmly smiled and reassured them.

"I have a plan. Alright. Let's go. Chop. Chop."

With this, no one hesitated any longer. The group quickly moved and everyone started hurriedly putting away their portion of the herbs.

Since they were short on time, they did not bother going about this in an organized way and it soon became a first come first serve basis instead of even splitting.

Whoever got to the herb first, it was theirs.

Especially, with the legendary item constantly dangling in front of their eyes, everyone was over-enthusiastic.

Liam also did not say anything because some amount of competition within the group was healthy. Otherwise, everyone's growth will stagnate.

So just like that, the pile of herbs ended up getting cleaned out within minutes.

The party then walked over to the city together, all disguised in various shapes and in various colors and their inventory slots full of herbs.

They were not going to enter too deep into the city and considering the population of a typical demon city, they were able to walk in and mingle alongside the demons unnoticed.

The group then gathered around the hawkers on the street, directly jumping into the business without wasting any time.

"Hello, demon sir. I have some herbs with me here." Shin Soo waved his hand clutching a bunch of plants.

"Give me. You did well." The demon grunted and quickly grabbed the bundle from Shin Soo's hands.

Almost instantly, the notification sounded as well.

[Ding. You have been rewarded 10000 experience points]

"Hell yes! This is what I am talking about!" Shin Soo grinned and started quickly emptying out all of his inventory slots.

Following his lead, Derek, Mei Mei, Shen Yue, and everyone else as well did the same.

[Ding. You have been rewarded 10000 experience points]

[Ding. You have been rewarded 10000 experience points]

[Ding. You have been rewarded 10000 experience points]

…

…

…

The group started handing out all the herbs with them and their experience bars as well began filling up quickly.

Especially, Shen Yue because of her charm seemed to be receiving more rewards for the same amount of herbs so she was the first one to level up in the group.

Quickly, everyone else also started leveling up one after the other.

Before this, they had only heard about games having loopholes and such, but this was the first time for most of the group to experience one such loophole, and… it was glorious!

"Here, take some more."

"I got some more."

"Herbs for you, demon sir."

Grinning ear to ear everyone emptied out their wares.

In all honesty, the group expected the quest to get saturated after a while but to their surprise, the demons continued shouting without showing any intention of stopping.

In fact, the group of peddlers looked more energetic because they had managed to collect an unusually large quantity of herbs today.

So they kept on hawking for more even when the entire party ran out of their herb stockpile.

"This is…" Shin Soo and everybody else were speechless, but their job got done so they quickly got the hell out of the demon settlement before their jig was up.

Everyone almost leveled up twice just from this single trip so their faces were full of smiles.

Although this smile faded a little when they turned around and saw that all of their group's herbs were now gone, neatly bundled up into 20 huge sacks by the demons.

But there was nothing they could do about it now.

They could only silently walk out and distance themselves from the city as per their leader's instructions. Almost all of them had long faces. They had leveled up but at what cost?

And just as this group was departing from the city, suddenly a familiar figure walked past them.

"Huh?" Mei Mei was the first one to respond as she swung her body around to see a cloaked figure entering the city. "Brother?"

Though he was completely covered in a black robe with a hoodie, being in the same group, they were all able to see his player name tag clearly. So they had no doubts about who he was.

"Ha Ha Ha! Boss already told us he had a plan! Of course, he is not going to let go of all those herbs that easily!" Shin Soo fisted his palm in excitement. Only now everyone felt relieved.

They did not dare linger around in case they spoil his plan and quickly evacuated the place, heading back to their meet up point.

And once they were there, the group again started grinding the mobs on the spot.

Now that they had tasted the sweet joy of leveling up casually, they were fueled to the brim and hunted with vigor.

Soon a couple of hours passed by when suddenly the familiar white fox descended from the sky.

And sitting atop the fox was Liam giving everyone a thumbs up!

"All done."

Chapter 435 - Fool me once...

When Luna landed on the ground, still sitting on top of her, Liam started tossing the huge sacks, one after another forming a pile on the ground.

He did not have to explain to anyone what these sacks contained. They already knew the answer!

And more importantly, the number of sacks did not add up. If their calculation was correct, then their leader had somehow obtained more herbs than what they originally had.

"Brother! How did you get everything back?"

"Oh. That was easy. A simple smash and grab." Liam smiled, jumping from Luna's back.

"There is no one guarding the transport carriage carrying these sacks. So all I had to do was deal with the single guy. Very straightforward daylight robbery."

Ah… everyone was dumbfounded.

So this was what Liam was doing while they were busy grinding. He followed the demon and tracked the whole process thereby easily finding the loophole.

He then not only retrieved what was theirs but went above and beyond to steal extra as well. How could it be any more perfect?

They still had their herbs and had also leveled up twice!

Shin Soo particularly was very happy as he felt that this was the first time he had contributed something to the group.

"Boss! Can we do this again?" He asked, a big greedy smile plastered on his face. If they could just milk this a bit…

However, he did not get the response that he wanted. Like pouring cold water on his dreams, Liam broke his bubble.

"We can only probably do it one more time. There should be another shipment of herbs heading out in a few hours just before the night falls. We can try at that time."

"But this won't be as easy. Things might get a bit tricky. So we need to be more prepared this time."

"Ah. That is so unfair!" Mei Mei had also wanted some more free fast exp and so did the rest of the group so they couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed.

Liam looked at the bunch and shook his head helplessly. These guys were too spoilt!

"Listen up. You guys should not underestimate these demon cities. Each city has a garrison. They had an army of demons ready to set off on their command."

"This army is many times more powerful than the NPC armies of the Gresh Kingdom. They will wreck us and slaughter us all with their sheer numbers. Do you understand?"

"Have you guys forgotten the rift battle? We only got this precious chance because we caught them off guard."

"They don't seem to value their herbs too much. So let's use this chance well and not get greedy." Liam flicked his sister's forehead.

Hearing his words, everyone else sobered up as well. At least they can repeat this one more time, right? That part was a little comforting.

Liam did not have to remind them again as everyone quickly divided all the herbs among themselves.

After that, the group redid their disguises slightly different from the previous disguise and once again set out to the small demon city.

This time around, the city was a lot more chaotic. The demons were bustling about here and there busily. There was palpable tension in the air, probably because they were robbed.

Also, there were now a lot more demons standing around the herb hawkers.

The big guys were still exchanging copper coins and experience points for herbs but the security had definitely doubled and all the demons looked extremely pissed.

They were no longer simply hawking but bullying and manhandling the passersby to 'donate' herbs for their cause.

"They must have a daily quota to meet." Observing the behavior of the demons, Liam was sure about this.

"They must have been happy that they managed to meet their quota earlier but since everything was stolen, they are angry."

"Ok this time, let's not go all at once. Don't even go near them. Just cross them and they should take care of the rest. Give it like 10 mins break and the next person can go."

Everyone nodded in understanding. Shen Yue decided to go first and try her luck since she had her charm working for her.

Of course, unlike the other demons who were pulled over and almost frisked, she received an entirely different treatment.

She elegantly took out one herb after the other, handing over everything to the demons who were thanking her by kneeling on their hands and feet.

A couple of minutes later, she was done and she managed to level up one more time. She then returned back to the group like a champ with a sweet smile on her lips.

"Ok. Me next! Me next!" Mei Mei licked her lips and ran over excitedly, only to be stared down by the demons. She sighed helplessly and then gave them all her herbs.

How could she possibly get the same treatment as Shen Yue? She did receive experience points in return but she walked back to the group with an unsettling feeling. Life was not fair.

Liam smiled and patted her. "Don't worry. We will teach them a lesson later."

Mei Mei perked up after hearing that and stared at the bunch of demons with hatred as if she was mentally already skewering them.

She might not be as enchanting as sis Yue, but she was also good-looking, damn it! She only lacked in one department! Was that such a crime?!

And just like Mei Mei, the others were also 'bullied' into exchanging their herbs. This made their life easy and experience points rained down non-stop.

In a good mood, everyone joked around as the group headed out one after the other and collected all the experience points for a second time by exchanging the same batch of herbs.

Sweet free exp! This was life!

However, after this part got over, then came the second half, the more difficult half of their mission. They now needed to get all the herbs back.

The group walked out well before the last person submitted so as to not arouse any suspicion but unlike last time they stayed close by, lingering around the city outskirts.

Not long after, a carriage headed out. This carriage carried all the sacks filled with herbs. There were about 25 sacks loaded in the carriage, a haul even bigger than the previous time.

However, before the group of players eyeing this single carriage like hawks could feel relief, five other carriages headed out right behind the first one.

And each of these five carriages was jam-packed with tall and sturdy demons, all sitting next to each other, carrying several weapons.

Liam was right. The demons had amped up the security this time around!