Nie Yan spent most of the day visiting a couple of relatives with his parents. Afterwards, the whole family moved everything to their residence in the suburbs of Huahai City. They still had a lot of unpacking to do.

Nie Yan’s new home was a luxurious villa beside a crystal-clear lake near the mountains. It had an enormous courtyard filled with all sorts of plant life with numerous flowers in full bloom. The scenery was beautiful. The villa in his memories, however, wasn’t this one but rather a different place a few hundred meters away from here.

The situation in this life somewhat differed from his past one, so there were bound to be minute changes.

His rebirth produced a tiny butterfly effect which gradually proliferated outward, altering the world in a distinct but subtle way. He suddenly had a strange thought. Was it possible for his tampering with events to even influence the upcoming election?

Maybe so... No one could predict the future.

Even as a reincarnator, he could only drift along the currents of time. The future was forever out of his control, just like the unpredictability of the stock market. All Nie Yan could do was slowly raise his personal strength, to let himself wield some power to ruthlessly strike at the rails of destiny in the face of an uncertain future, altering the direction of history. At the very least, he couldn’t allow the events of his past life to recur. That much would be enough.

Nie Yan enjoyed the warm happiness of being together with his parents.

To him, having a dull, ordinary life like this again was a gift from Heaven.

Nie Yan gave Guo Huai a phone call.

「Your family moved to Huahai? Where?」

「27 Ping’an[1]District,」Nie Yan replied. In his past life, he had once ridiculed the name of this district for being so lame and boring. Only later on would he come to realize just how precious the words safe and peaceful were to him.

「That’s a neighbourhood with all villas, right? Even the cheapest place in that area is at least ￥50,000,000! Wow! Not bad, brat! You’re a rich and loaded prodigal son now! By the way, my old man assessed various places in Conviction. The valuation of a single plot of land in Calore is ridiculously expensive! You know those properties you had me buy on your behalf in the other cities? Their value can’t even be estimated!」Guo Huai said. Nie Yan’s current net worth was high enough to leave people speechless. As for exactly how many properties Nie Yan owned, even Guo Huai was unclear.

「When stronghold sieges start in the future, if we can occupy a stronghold and create our own city, you’ll find out what it really means to be rich in the game!」Nie Yan laughed.

「I’ll wait for that time to come, then. I heard in-game currency conversion will be released in five or six days. Reportedly, an auction of virtual properties is going to begin soon. A portion of them will be auctioned off on the transaction platform. The time still hasn’t been announced yet,」Guo Huai informed. Many powers would definitely be looking to invest into Conviction in the future. Even his old man was starting to get a little restless.

Only now did Nie Yan recall such a matter. His heart turned cold. Financial bigwigs like Cao Xu were finally about to enter the playing field.

The auction houses, NPC potion shops, and so on of every major city would be auctioned off. Many financial institutes would definitely convince players to sell all their in-game currency for real world money, then divide up the virtual assets among themselves.

When Nie Yan’s father entered Conviction during the peak of its craze, he sadly discovered that he had already missed the best time to join. Sometimes, opportunities were fleeting. Once missed, they would never appear again.

What Nie Yan wanted to do was purchase as many virtual properties as he could. During the next few weeks or so, he would no longer dare to be so extravagant as to spend 500 gold on Magic Bombs. The 1,000 Magic Bombs he had now were enough to power level Undying Scoundrel, Sun, and the others to Level 30.

「Make an announcement to the guild members that we’ll be exchanging in-game currency with guild contribution for the next few days. 1 silver for 25 merit points will be the rate. This will tentatively last for three days. In addition, for every silver contributed to the guild, the player will receive an additional 20 merit point discount when exchanging Level 30 equipment. If a player contributes 10 silver in one go, when they reach Level 30, they can redeem one piece of Level 30 Silver-grade equipment—30 silver and it’ll be Gold-grade,」Nie Yan said after thinking for a moment. He wanted to rely on this method to quickly amass in-game currency.

「1 silver for 25 merit points? Aren’t we taking too big of a loss?」Guo Huai asked in shock. In Asskickers United, 1 silver was roughly equivalent to 20 merit points. If they went with Nie Yan’s conversion rate, wouldn’t the guild’s treasury be swept clean in no time?

「It’s fine if we take a bit of a loss in the short term. Besides, during this time, the value of in-game currency will definitely increase. We’re gathering gold now in preparation for the upcoming virtual property auction. After it’s over, we can replenish the guild treasury,」Nie Yan said. This was a tactic to get all the guild members to give their money to the guild. After the virtual property auction was over, the future profits from the properties Nie Yan acquired would be used to help give back to the guild members.

「Those contribution incentives are pretty good,」Guo Huai said. He was a natural businessman. With a simple glance, he could tell how good those incentives were. For the sake of having good equipment to wear when they reach Level 30, the guild members would definitely do their best to raise money to give to the guild. The guild wouldn’t have to expend too much effort to obtain a great amount of gold. When the virtual property auction ended and the real world currency exchange opened, the profits they’d earn would definitely be at least a thousandfold. When the guild members reached Level 30, the guild would naturally be able to provide them with Silver and Gold equipment.

「I’ll leave you to handle this matter. Let’s see how much gold we can gather in the next few days,」Nie Yan said. The property he was eying the most was the auction house at the heart of Calore. Even though other auction houses had been established in all parts of Calore, fragmenting player attention, it was still a landmark structure. It was the most prosperous auction house in the entire Viridian Empire! If he wanted to purchase it, he would need to bring out at least 2,000 gold. In the previous timeline, it was sold for a final bid of well over 2,000 gold.

If Nie Yan could buy the auction house at the center of Calore, it would have an extremely far-reaching impact on the future of Asskickers United.

The various financial institutes were also amassing funds. Their network of contacts went far deeper than Nie Yan’s. While the bigwigs were fighting with each other, if he could cut out a piece of juicy meat for himself, it would already be considered a success.

「Don’t worry. I’ll definitely help you manage this matter well,」Guo Huai said, full of confidence.

「There’s one other thing I want you to help me with. How deep are your contacts in Huahai? Can you help me look into a certain person?」Nie Yan hesitated for a moment before asking.

「Who?」Guo Huai asked in surprise.

「A girl called Xie Yao. She’s a second year in Class 3 at University of Huahai’s Affiliated High School,」Nie Yan said. He decided that it was still best for him to find out about Xie Yao’s background first. Know thy self, know thy enemy, or a crush in this case... In the previous timeline, he didn’t know anything about Xie Yao’s family circumstances. All he knew was that her family was well-off. In this life, he was finally enlightened. He knew where to start.

「Oh? A blockhead like you has finally fallen in love, huh? So this is going to be my future sister-in-law, I see. Don’t worry, I’ll immediately help you investigate. Even if I have to go down a meter deep, I’ll still help you dig the information up.」Guo Huai chuckled. It was quite rare for Nie Yan to have his eyes set on a girl. How could he not help out?

「Don’t trouble her.」

「Of course, I know that,」Guo Huai said.

「What about you, huh? How goes your progress with our former class pres?」Nie Yan teased.

Guo Huai dryly coughed to cover up his embarrassment.「It’s still more or less the same. I only took her out on a date once.」

Nie Yan laughed.「You dared to ask her out. That’s already good progress!」

「Haha...」Guo Huai awkwardly laughed.

The two chatted for a while longer before hanging up.

Nie Yan’s father had already left to manage the company, while Nie Yan accompanied his mother as they walked around Huahai. Around evening, his relatives from Ninjiang would come over to have dinner. The travel time between the two places wasn’t that long anyway, only around thirty minutes. Everything had already been unpacked in the villa. They had finished one day earlier than expected.

Nie Yan’s room was located at the southern part of the villa. If he opened up the curtains, he could see a beautiful landscape outside. His father had already had some people deal with the formalities of transferring to a new school. He would start classes in two days.

The gorgeous red clouds on the horizon caused by the setting sun were quite dazzling.

A cool breeze blew in from outside the window, clearing Nie Yan’s head.

Nie Yan took a deep breath of air. His mood had gotten a lot better lately for some indescribable reason. He was about to relive his final year of high school. It was something he was really looking forward to.

In the previous timeline, he was basically a nobody in his class. At least half of his own classmates weren’t even able to recognize him. In this life, he wanted to genuinely fit in with everyone.

「Damn! You’ve moved to Huahai? Which school?」Tang Yao asked in excitement.

「University of Huahai’s Affiliated High School,」Nie Yan replied. Tang Yao went to school at Huahai High School 1. The two schools were quite far from each other.

「University of Huahai’s Affiliated High School?」Tang Yao paused for a moment to think.「Let me ask my old man, and see if I can transfer over.」

Nie Yan recalled his past life. Tang Yao had also said similar words back then, but later on, nothing came out of it.

「We’re both only a year from graduating. Forget it, save yourself the trouble,」Nie Yan said with a light laugh.

「Do you still remember that brat, Wei Kai?[2]」Tang Yao suddenly asked.

「Yeah, why? What about him?」Nie Yan asked. Wei Kai was a person who walked the path of a criminal. The less contact made with such a person, the better.

「He just took over a guild called Shattered Gale. It’s a decent sized guild with around 5,000 to 6,000 members. That guy knows I’m Young Sparrow Hawk and you’re Nirvana Flame, and that we both established Asskickers United. He says he wants to rely on us for help!」Tao Yao said in high spirits. He recalled just how insufferably arrogant Wei Kai had been in the past. Now, he was like a subservient dog as he approached them for help.

Shattered Gale... Nie Yan had heard of such a guild in his past life but didn’t really have an impression of it. 5,000 to 6,000 members could be considered not bad. Wei Kai had actually sleazed his way to a bit of success with 2,000 subordinates who were willing to throw their lives away for him. However, from what happened to him in the previous timeline, evidently that still wasn’t enough. Before he could bask in the limelight for long, he ended up disappearing to who knows where, while his fate was unknown.

Nie Yan weighed the matter over. A person like Wei Kai was a double-edged sword. If he took Wei Kai in, there was a chance he might bring some unsavoury trouble with him. However, at an essential moment, having the power of someone from the criminal underworld would still prove useful, just like the relationship Cao Xu had with Heaven Breaker. Heaven Breaker was a somewhat infamous criminal, after all.

「Let me carefully think this matter over. Don’t give him a definite answer for now,」Nie Yan said. This sort of thing had to be carefully deliberated before making a decision.

[1] The two words mean safe and peaceful.

[2] Wei Kai appears in Chapter 14 to Chapter 16. He’s a neighbourhood thug in Nie Yan’s hometown.