Ch 87: Guide to Running a Shop in Another World II

“What?”

Lu Yao had a bad feeling.

Cheng Ye glanced sideways at the customer waiting at the counter and then leaned closer to Lu Yao, whispering, “Customers have figured out they can spend money on in-game purchases.”

It was a straightforward situation. The young leopard demon, ever since getting cozy with Zhong Lianjia, had become addicted to the game.

He also befriended Guanzhong, and the demon and the leopard demon often teamed up for ranked games.

The more they played, the more they naturally started exploring other aspects of the game.

In particular, during every hero selection phase, the skin interface would be prominently displayed in the center. Initially, the leopard demon and Guanzhong only clicked around for fun, unaware that these skins could be equipped on their characters.

But once in the game, they often encountered teammates or opponents showing off flashy skins, which unsettled them.

First, they found it hard to recognize characters when their appearances changed, given their lack of familiarity with the game.

Second, the skins had special effects. Although they didn’t provide any gameplay advantages, the visual effects made them look significantly cooler and seemingly more powerful.

The leopard demon had coveted skins for a long time but didn’t know how to purchase them.

Today, with Guanzhong absent, the leopard demon entered the game alone and encountered a particularly poor ADC who fed the enemy bot lane two kills early in the game. Upon returning to the lane, the ADC got caught and died again.

The bot lane was collapsing. Playing as the jungler, the young leopard applied Brother Zhong’s teachings, ganking bot lane twice to help them recover their advantage.

By the end of the match, the leopard demon’s stellar performance earned him MVP.

After the match, the ADC player sent him a friend request, wanting to duo queue and offering to gift him a skin.

Flattered by the repeated calls of “big bro,” the leopard demon, utterly charmed, carried the ADC through three more matches.

True to their word, the player asked which skin the leopard demon liked and offered to gift it immediately.

Unfamiliar with how gifting worked, the leopard demon called for the staff’s help.

Cheng Ye, reasoning that it was voluntary gifting by another player and didn’t violate the café’s policy of discouraging customer spending, assisted with the process.

However, when the player attempted to gift the skin, a system error occurred, preventing the transaction.

Despite multiple attempts, the skin could not be sent.

Confused, the leopard demon sat idly for a while. Then, recalling Cheng Ye’s earlier navigation of the store interface, he opened the shop himself, clicked on a skin, and attempted to purchase it. A notification popped up: his account lacked game currency and required a top-up.

After some back-and-forth with the player, the leopard demon figured out how to make in-game purchases.

Overwhelmed, Cheng Ye had no choice but to involve Lu Yao.

Lu Yao had previously implemented some restrictions through the café’s internal system.

While ordinary in-game item and material gifting was unrestricted, premium items like skins were blocked by the internal network.

This small detail, however, hadn’t been communicated to the staff, leading to the current situation.

Unlike regular customers, the leopard demon spent a lot of time with Zhong Lianjia and had become an adept internet user. His understanding of the game far surpassed the average customer, making it almost impossible to deceive him now.

Moreover, he seemed to have noticed the café’s reluctance to encourage spending. He piled a heap of spirit stones on the counter and asked Jiao Niang for instant noodles and sausages.

His attitude mirrored the time he tried to win over Brother Zhong, as if preparing to bribe Lu Yao and Cheng Ye with a luxurious instant noodle feast.

Despite Lu Yao once mentioning that Zhong Lianjia didn’t like instant noodles, the leopard demon firmly believed his initial offering of a deluxe noodle set had won Brother Zhong over.

Lu Yao understood that prohibiting spending altogether wasn’t a sustainable strategy. For now, her goal had been to delay the onset of customer spending and online shopping.

Now that the leopard demon had uncovered a way to spend money, Lu Yao decided it was time to gradually ease the restrictions.

However, Lu Yao still wanted to hold out for a little longer.

She walked to the counter and told the leopard demon that the café’s in-game purchase system was not yet set up, so online top-ups and product purchases were temporarily unavailable.

The leopard demon immediately frowned, feeling that the owner’s explanation wasn’t entirely truthful.

Lu Yao had no choice but to promise that in two weeks, at the latest, the café would launch partial spending services.

Two weeks—fourteen days—was merely a blink of an eye for a demon.

The leopard demon, feeling the sincerity in Lu Yao’s promise, grudgingly returned to his seat.

Just then, the spider demon Zhuying entered the café and saw the interaction. She swayed her hips as she approached the counter. “Will the online shopping service also be available then?”

Zhuying had been obsessively using the purple lipstick Lu Yao had gifted her and came to the café almost daily.

Every now and then, she would see advertisements while browsing online. They tormented her to no end, and she found herself desperately wanting to buy the products.

Her longing had grown so intense that it began interfering with her cultivation, even threatening to develop into a nascent heart demon.

With no other choice, Lu Yao nodded. “Yes. In two weeks, both online shopping and in-game spending services will be available.”

Thrilled, the spider demon booted up her computer and bought a pile of snacks, eagerly anticipating the new services.

After Zhuying and leopard demon discovered ways to shop online, Lu Yao had consulted the Head Guard at the park about the issue.

Currently, the shopping street was connected to eight different worlds. The fourth and sixth shops served modern urban worlds where the products, while not identical to those in the shopping street, had similar functions.

Lu Yao originally considered rerouting the supply chain, connecting the online shopping service to Eden Sea World or Sanhua City. This way, customers could purchase goods from other worlds, and the currency would be converted based on purchasing power. At the very least, they wouldn’t need to spend soft currency, and the café could still make money by charging a small handling fee.

Unfortunately, this proposal was firmly rejected.

The Head Guard explained that the contract between the Demon God and Lu Yao strictly limited services to this world and her personally. It would not extend to other worlds.

The café was already an exception, as its location was within the shopping street and connected to this world’s network. With the amusement park’s strict oversight, mistakes were unlikely to occur.

Bai Jian made no secret of the fact that this setup was the Demon God’s favor to her.

No soul, living or dead, had ever received such preferential treatment. Even Bai Jian sometimes found it puzzling.

…

Not long after leaving the amusement park, Lu Yao received a warning email from the proxy bot.

Unlike the usual voice notifications, this email was harshly worded. It emphasized that the main business of the eighth shop was the internet café, and all virtual services and online shopping goods must originate from her current world. The system explicitly forbade misrepresentation or off-world goods as a risk-mitigation tactic.

Furthermore, at least 90% of the shop’s revenue had to come from its main business; otherwise, the shop would be deemed a failure.

This wasn’t the first time Lu Yao had sensed the system’s hostility.

But this time, it openly displayed its intention to prevent her from achieving her dream.

If they didn’t want her to succeed, why bind her to the Dream Fulfillment System in the first place?

It was exhausting for her and for them.

Lu Yao couldn’t make sense of it. The main system was absent, Lu Mingxiao had lost his memory, and no one could answer her questions.

But the more the proxy system pressured her, the more rebellious she became.

If it was just about online shopping and in-game purchases, she could solve it without involving other worlds—it would just take more effort.

After dealing with the leopard and spider demons, Lu Yao sent out a meeting notification in the group chat:

At 4 p.m., the three employees from cinema and the two internet café staff members were to meet at the pet cafe.

The meeting location was set there because Lu Yao had asked Lei Lei to notify 1041’s Team stationed in Nightlight City.

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