Chapter 537 - 268 Fuel Consumption
After an uninformative briefing and words of thanks, the relationship between Doomsday Fortress and Cozy Cabin rose to 70, and the standard cost for hiring an NPC now was 12 kilograms of edible meat. This price was tempting for Lin Wu, but Maya did not approve of it. In deciding the base’s major directions, Lin Wu still gave much face to Maya and decided against hiring.
Stone later told Lin Wu that not hiring was the correct decision, because it was a commercial trap. NPCs couldn’t generate value, they only consumed it. If you insisted on hiring them for 20 kilograms of meat, then quests would never appear. When you refused to hire them, they would offer discounts. For Dawn, their value lay in consuming player resources, so as long as you kept not hiring them, they would continuously post quests.
Originally, your 38 yuan phone package was enough for everything. One day, someone called you, offering to upgrade your package and give you 50G of data for a year, with the fee rising to 58 yuan, but they would pay 20 yuan for you every month. What’s the logic behind this? The cost of data for the operators is extremely low. They’re betting that once you get used to the data, the 38 yuan won’t be enough. Even if they lose, there’s no harm to them since the cost is nearly zero.
It also doesn’t rule out the possibility of fraud. After the year’s end, when you want to revert to the 38 yuan package, they tell you, "Sorry, the 38 yuan package has been canceled."
Lin Wu felt Stone was the real scammer, tricking him into not hiring NPCs. Su Shi thought money is meant to be spent, and if supplies are abundant, there’s no need to worry about hiring costs.
The main reason is poverty; if Shadow was still as affluent as in the first summer, even if it was still 20 kilograms, they would hire NPCs.
...
Maya drove the pickup back to Doomsday Fortress first. Peanut and Dashuang, for reasons unknown, with Peanut’s help, went back to the second-floor dormitory to rest. Now the only option was to move clumsily from the second floor back to the first, and with Lin Wu’s help, lie in the bed of the pickup.