Chapter 71

Mei unfolded the bipod attached to the absurdly long barrel of the Anti-antimatter Rifle and carefully lowered it onto the ground. Once the weapon was stable, she crouched beside it and pulled up its item description.

Anti-antimatter Rifle (Mythic+)

A flawed Antimatter Rifle which was created with the intent to destroy any and all matter. Unfortunately, something went wrong during its creation, and instead it gained the ability to create matter as opposed to destroying it.

Effects:

Everything is a Bullet: Any item within the wielder's inventory can be converted into ammunition. The ammunition converted this way gains attributes based on the item's abilities and rarity. Only items below this weapon's rarity can be used.

(Items will not be lost)

Infinite Reproduction: Any item used with this weapon's effect can be reproduced endlessly as long as its grade is below this item's. However, all of the effects are removed from the copies.

Handle With Care: Due to the addition of an antimatter core, if the weapon reaches 0 durability, it will explode, taking all nearby matter along with it.

Mei stared at the item description for several seconds.

Then she read it again.

And once more, just to make sure she hadn't somehow misunderstood what she was looking at.

Slowly, she turned toward the livestream chat.

“Chat, are you all thinking what I'm thinking?”

Foodie: I'm thinking about fried toad legs.

Anubis: I'm thinking about my gorgeous wife @Anput and nothing else.

JustAGuy: I'm thinking about the inevitable heat death of the universe.

EmoKid3: I'm thinking about why my dad never loved me.

Mei stared blankly at the chat.

“Okay... so we are definitely not thinking the same thing.”

She sighed softly before looking back at the rifle.

“What I was thinking was that we just discovered an infinite money glitch.”

Mei flipped her hand over, causing a small golden toad statue to appear in her palm.

The statue depicted a squat little toad with its mouth hanging open like a baby bird waiting to be fed. Its long tongue was stretched outward as though it were in the process of catching an insect. The entire thing gleamed with a polished golden sheen, though Mei knew that wasn't simply because someone had crafted it out of gold.

It was the Treasure Warden's gold-encased corpse.

The moment the Treasure Warden had died, its body had transformed into an item, leaving Mei with what was essentially a solid gold statue of the creature that had tried to kill her.

She had only gotten a brief look at its item description while collecting the loot earlier, but now she brought it up again so the chat could see it.

God of Wealth Statue (Legendary)

A statue representing endless wealth. Also the registered symbol of the Traveling Merchant Union. Can only be procured by completely encasing a high-level toad creature in gold.

Effects:

Wealth Breeds Wealth: By feeding an item to the Wealth God Statue, you may receive coins or items of equivalent value.

God of Wealth's Authority (Traveling Merchant Exclusive): Can be used at the Traveling Merchant Union to create an independent Merchant Agency.

Mei pointed toward the first effect before pointing toward the Anti-antimatter Rifle's reproduction ability.

“You see?”

Her grin slowly widened.

“With these two items, I can create infinite money.”

PityThePoor: While I appreciate your enthusiasm for acquiring wealth on such a large scale, I should inform you that you cannot get infinite money from that statue. It is an equivalent exchange, meaning that if the God of Wealth runs out of money, you won't receive anything. Unless the God of Wealth has infinite money...

Mei paused.

“Well, he's a god of wealth. He should have close to infinite money, right?”

PityThePoor: Probably... not.

Mei's eyes narrowed.

She slowly looked down at the little golden toad sitting in her palm.

Then she looked back at the chat.

“You're the God of Wealth, aren't you?”

For several seconds, nothing happened.

The chat continued scrolling rapidly as thousands of viewers apparently waited to see whether the mysterious user would answer.

Mei's smile grew increasingly mischievous.

When she still didn't receive a response, she pointed accusingly at the screen.

“You are!”

PityThePoor: ...I am.

Mei's grin became downright predatory.

“So you have infinite money.”

PityThePoor: That is not what I said.

“So you have a lot of money.”

PityThePoor: ...

“Which means if I reproduce items with the rifle and use it to feed items to your statue, I can keep exchanging them for money.”

PityThePoor: Technically...

Mei's eyes practically sparkled.

She had just discovered an economy-breaking exploit.

The system might have intended the God of Wealth Statue to function as an ordinary equivalent-exchange item, but the Anti-antimatter Rifle had completely ruined that assumption. As long as the rifle could reproduce an item, Mei could theoretically create as many copies of that item as she wanted.

And if the God of Wealth was the one providing the equivalent exchange...

“Well, this is convenient.”

PityThePoor: Just use them sparingly... please. My assets aren't very liquid at the moment.

Mei blinked.

“Your assets aren't liquid?”

PityThePoor: No.

She glanced at the golden toad statue in her hand.

Then at the enormous rifle lying beside her.

Then back at the chat.

A slow, devious smile spread across her face.

“Chat, I think we just found a way to bankrupt a god.”

PityThePoor: Please don't. :please:

“That's a cute emote,” Mei said, chuckling softly. “Okay, okay. I won't exploit the glitch... too much.”

She turned away from the chat and continued rummaging through her inventory, taking stock of everything she had looted from the Sea Monkey's treasure vault of a stomach.

There was the Legendary spear, Gae Bulg, along with the Sea Dragon Pearl that she had already given back to the Sea Dragon. Beyond those, however, there wasn't much worth mentioning. Most of the remaining loot consisted of miscellaneous items she had no use for, including a pair of soiled underwear that she had reluctantly taken after failing to find the last mob.

The rest was mostly a collection of useless knick-knacks scavenged from the bodies of the Treasure Guardians. There might have been some value in them to the right person, but Mei couldn't see any reason to keep most of them.

All in all, the only items that had really caught her attention were the Anti-antimatter Rifle, the God of Wealth Statue, Gae Bulg, and the Sea Dragon Pearl.

“For being the treasure vault of a Legendary-class creature, he sure didn't have anything useful.”

Long_Aotian: He raised a Money Toad which spat out a Mythic-grade weapon upon its death. Likely he had spent his entire fortune raising that toad.

Mei glanced toward the chat with a curious expression.

“You know, I've been meaning to ask. Are you some type of xianxia protagonist or something, Long Aotian?”

Long_Aotian: Xianxia? Immortal hero? No, I'm just a fairly average qi cultivator. Well... also the main character of the planet China.

“Oh, another MC like me?” Mei asked, sounding genuinely interested. “It's kinda weird that China is a whole planet, though. Do you guys also have a Great Wall? What would it even keep out? Mongolia should be a planet too, right?”

Long_Aotian: Mongolia was our rival planet, yes. And the Great Wall is a planetary protective barrier cast by the forefather of qi cultivation.

Mei stared at the message for a moment.

“...What?”

Vytr26: That's super weird. Our planet has those same places, but they're countries.

OffBrandWiki: A high-level player must have visited your planet and decided to name your countries after the various major planets in the universe. I think... 🤔

SeeCuteGirl-iClick: Maybe Earth came first and you all named your planets after our countries.

Avarice: :HAHA: Yeah right.

Gojira: No. The universe is far older than your planet, and our planets existed in it and participated in the Game long before your planet was even formed. However, the Game wasn't always what it is now. Before it became a video game-like existence with livestreams, it was a series of reality shows. Before that, there were various live sporting events, and before that... I don't remember.

Mei's eyebrows rose.

“What does that...”

Before she could ask anything else, a groan came from behind her.

Mei turned around just in time to see Adam slowly push himself upright.

“Damn, my head hurts,” he groaned, clutching his head in both hands.

When Adam had left the water, his [Neptune's Grace] spell had been automatically canceled, leaving him with his regular stats once again. Unfortunately, his body was in no condition to appreciate the return to normal.

The aftereffects of over-drawing his mana made him feel as though Dumas was kneading his soul all over again.

And that wasn't even the worst of it.

Adam hadn't merely exhausted his mana reserves. He had repeatedly strained them by refilling and emptying them over and over again while maintaining [Neptune's Grace]. His mana had been pushed far beyond what it was designed to handle, leaving his entire body feeling like it had been run through a meat grinder.

Honestly, he was lucky he hadn't slipped into a coma.

Or worse, died.

Adam slowly lowered his hands and blinked away the lingering haze in his vision. His eyes first settled on Mei, then drifted toward the small golden toad statue in her palm.

His gaze lingered on it for a moment before moving to the enormous sniper rifle resting on the ground beside her.

“Looks like you hit the jackpot,” he said.

Mei nodded several times.

“I'll show you when you're feeling better,” she said. “You should probably brace yourself first, though.”

“Brace myself?” Adam asked, his brow furrowing in confusion.

Mei opened her mouth to explain, but she didn't have the time.

She had noticed the dragon's eyes opening a moment after Adam's.

Unfortunately, explaining exactly what had happened to the dragon wasn't something she could accomplish in a few words, so she settled for a warning instead.

Whether Adam actually listened to that warning was up to him.

Unfortunately, Adam was still far too groggy from waking up after nearly slipping into a coma to fully process what she had said, let alone act on it.

So when the dragon suddenly reared its massive head and released a long, piercing dragon's cry, Adam had absolutely no chance of preparing himself.

The sheer force of the cry struck him like a physical blow.

Adam was immediately launched into the air, his arms and legs flailing helplessly before he came crashing down into the ocean with a loud splash.

Mei, meanwhile, had already stored her loot back into her inventory and grabbed hold of one of the dragon's enormous scales for balance.

She watched Adam disappear beneath the waves.

“...I told you to brace yourself.”