The next morning, before the sky was fully light,
the dwarf leader Grom came rushing over to Council Hill in high spirits.
To prevent Lin Gui and his companions from leaving, the Fortress Lord had specifically granted Grom leave,
telling him to keep a close eye on Lin Gui during this period and not let them slip away quietly.
He knocked on the door.
The door was opened by Theia, whose silver hair was sticking up in a mess.
She looked depressed, her long ears drooping.
She had planned to follow a novel plot—having a drunken mistake and falling in love after a one-night stand—
but instead, she had managed to knock herself out first.
"Morning..." Theia said, her voice trailing off.
Grom looked past her shoulder into the room.
"Where is the kid Lin Gui? And that human girl?"
The room was empty; no one was in sight.
Theia sighed and replied vaguely,
"They went to exchange some goods for money."
"Exchange for money?" Grom was startled. "Do you mean... the salvage station?"
Theia nodded.
"Yeah, that place where you can sell demon materials or pawn things."
Grom's expression became even stranger.
"Then why didn't you go with them?"
Theia curled her lip.
"If I didn't stay here and wait, who would tell you where they went?"
She turned and grabbed her cloak draped over the back of a chair.
"Let's go. We'll head over together. Lin Gui needs your help with setting up the post office anyway."
Shield City's salvage station was located in the middle level of the mountain interior,
near a busy ore transport route.
Even before reaching it, one could smell a mixture of odors:
rust, blood, rotting meat, and the stinging scent of low-quality disinfectant.
A heavy metal door stood open.
The edges of the doorframe were blackened by smoke, and several strings of dried demon heads hung from it.
A crooked wooden sign was nailed to the lintel,
with words scrawled crudely in the dwarven script:
"We buy everything, we pawn everything."
At the moment, the entrance to the salvage station was packed tight.
Dozens of dwarves were crowded there, standing on their tiptoes and peering inside,
their buzzing chatter blending into a single noise.
"Make way! Move it!"
Grom shouted in his coarse voice, using his bulk to force a path through.
Theia followed behind him, poking her head out curiously.
The interior of the salvage station was much more spacious than it looked from the outside,
resembling a modified semi-natural mountain cave.
Storage pits were carved into the rock walls, stuffed with all sorts of odd-shaped items.
A massive stone table stood in the center,
its surface pitted and stained with dark marks.
"Do you buy everything here?" Lin Gui asked.
His voice wasn't loud, but it was clear amidst the noisy salvage station.
Behind the counter, a dwarf sat on a specially made high stool.
Only then could he look Lin Gui in the eye while the latter stood.
He crossed his arms and replied gruffly,
"That's right, human."
"What do you have to sell?"
As he spoke, he curiously glanced behind Lin Gui.
Several wooden crates were floating silently in the air, half a foot off the ground,
remaining perfectly steady.
The surrounding dwarves were also watching.
Their gazes swept back and forth between the wooden crates and Lin Gui.
There weren't many dwarves who could use magic to begin with,
and they had almost never seen anyone use Levitation so steadily and for so long.
Many people had been drawn here by this very sight.
Lin Gui didn't say much and waved his hand.
The lids of all the wooden crates opened at once.
The items inside floated out one by one,
landing in an orderly fashion on the stone table.
The last thing to fly out was a large object,
wrapped in ice-blue magic and emitting wisps of cold mist.
With a muffled "thud," it landed on the table.
It was pork.
An entire hind leg of a pig, frozen rock-solid,
with distinct layers of fat and lean meat. The meat looked firm and fresh.
Lin Gui pointed at the pork and asked,
"How much is this worth? Check it for me."
In an instant, the entire salvage station went silent.
The dwarf behind the counter stared wide-eyed.
The dwarves watching from the outside were the same.
Dozens of eyes were fixed squarely on that piece of meat.
The sound of gulping could be heard from all around.
Before the counter dwarf could speak, the crowd of dwarves behind them suddenly exploded.
"I'll give three hundred gold!"
"Four hundred! Cash on the spot!"
"Five hundred! Plus three pieces of refined iron!"
The voices grew increasingly urgent and loud.
A few dwarves even pushed forward, reaching out to touch the meat.
The counter dwarf suddenly stood up on his stool and roared,
"Back off! This is my turf!"
He grabbed an iron hammer from the edge of the table and slammed it down repeatedly.
"Anyone who pushes again gets thrown out!"
It was at this moment that Grom and Theia finally squeezed through the crowd of dwarves.
He saw the mountain of supplies piled on the table,
and then the frozen pork that was being fought over, and he froze.
"Did... did you bring all of this?"
Beside him, Theia looked at the excited dwarves around her with a puzzled expression.
"It's just meat, isn't it?"
"Why are they acting like they've seen a divine artifact?"
Grom turned his head, his expression complex.
"Little girl, you don't understand."
He lowered his voice and pointed to the rock layers above.
"We are a front-line military city-state. We don't produce livestock."
"The cursed demons of the Silent Sea... they aren't edible."
"And the demons in the forest behind Shield City have very bad-tasting meat."
"Last night, you threw up from the roast we gave you, didn't you?"
"As for fresh meat, the Fortress Lord won't let such things take up precious transport space."
"A piece of frozen pork..."
He looked at the bright red on the table.
"In Shield City, you could even exchange it for a piece of Stellar-tier equipment."
Theia covered her mouth in surprise.
Stellar-tier equipment? Was it really that exaggerated?
Lin Gui was also very surprised by this.
Under the longing gazes of the crowd, he silently put all the frozen meat back into the wooden crates.
He only left the other supplies piled on the stone table.
Dry rations, medical supplies, outdoor gear...
These things were of little importance to Lin Gui.
Perhaps because Shield City's supplies were so scarce,
the exchange price was significantly higher than he had anticipated.
His money pouch quickly became heavy again.
With a full wallet, he had the confidence to get things done.
After leaving the salvage station,
Lin Gui proposed his idea to build a post office to Grom.
The captain pounded his chest and agreed to it.
Leveraging his authority in the city, he quickly selected a site.
It was located in the middle level, near the main thoroughfare, making it very convenient.
He also brought along several dwarven master artisans who specialized in construction.
"They're all good hands," Grom said with a smile, though his eyes shifted slightly.
He pulled the foreman aside quietly and gave instructions in a low voice.
"Listen, work slowly."
"No need to rush. Take your time."
The foreman was an old dwarf with a white beard. He pointed at the blueprints Lin Gui had selected and asked in confusion:
"We're building it according to what that human says?"
"This bit of work wouldn't even take a day to finish."
"We were born warriors; we have plenty of strength."
Grom blew on his beard and glared.
"This is the Fortress Lord's command."
"In short, use all your skills for dawdling."
The foreman looked troubled, but he nodded anyway.
The project began, but the progress was outrageously slow.
Two dwarves would carry a single stone slab,
stopping frequently and constantly adjusting their posture.
The dwarves building the walls would step back several paces to scrutinize every single brick they laid for several minutes.
Lin Gui watched quietly, a trace of a smile appearing on his lips.
He had long expected this.
He turned and took several pieces of pork from a wooden crate.
The frozen meat emitted thin wisps of white vapor.
He held up a piece, shook it at the workers, and said clearly,
"Finish before sunset."
"I will reward each of you with a piece of pork."
"If you can finish a few hours earlier, I'll add another piece!"
In that instant, the air seemed to freeze.
And then—
"WAAAGH!!!"
The dwarves who had been dawdling just moments ago suddenly had eyes turning blood-red.
They threw down their tools and charged at the building materials.
Grom jumped up and down in desperation:
"Wait! You wouldn't dare?! What about the Fortress Lord's—"
However, no one paid him any mind.
Meat! That was fresh meat!
How long had it been since they had a proper meal of roast meat!
Everything else was damn demon meat, demon meat!
Stone slabs were carried away at high speed, and the brick walls rose at a speed visible to the naked eye.
The foreman shouted while swinging his hammer,
"Everyone, move it! Tonight, I'll let you taste authentic Blackstone barbecue!"
Grom stood there with his mouth agape, speechless.
Rate on N.U.
