The drip... drip... drip... of the leaky roof was a form of water torture.
Lin Hao was pacing the grimy concrete floor, his mind a frantic, high-speed engine. The BSA patrol had been a blessing, a terrifying, pants-wetting blessing. It had confirmed his worst fear: this "lair" was a joke. The Low-Grade formation was a "KICK ME" sign for any real cultivator.
He had to move. He had to get billions.
He looked at his new, god-like balance: [Upgrade Points (UP): 29,250].
He had the supply. He just needed a new product.
His first instinct was to upgrade another knife. Or maybe a gun. Something powerful. But he immediately dismissed the idea.
The "Man in the Gray Mask" had made his debut. The world's-most-wanted, grainy footage showed him flicking a Level 5 monster to death.
He was now, in the world's eyes, a killer. A god-tier enforcer.
If he tried to sell another "Qi-Guiding Blade," he wouldn't be a "merchant." He'd be seen as a terrorist, an arms dealer. It was too crude, too low-brow. It would attract the BSA, the military, the "Prodigies"... all the wrong, violent attention. He needed to avoid fights, not start them.
He had to pivot.
His new clientele wasn't Level 2 pawn shop brokers. His new clientele was the old world. The mortal, trillion-dollar elite. The ones who were, right now, cowering in their high-tech bunkers, watching the world they owned be taken over by "Awakened" children and "Prodigies."
What did those men, the truly rich and powerful, want?
They didn't want a "sword." They had armies. They didn't want "power." They had governments.
They were old. They were mortal. And they were terrified of dying before they could figure out how to buy this new power.
They didn't want a weapon. They wanted health. They wanted life.
Lin Hao smiled. A new, cold, business smile. He wasn't a hidden killer. He was a hidden pharmacist. The product wasn't a weapon. It was a miracle.
He walked over to his small pile of supplies. He had used his mortal money, in his "Lin Hao" persona, to do some online shopping. He pulled out a large, ostentatious, gold-foil-covered bottle.
"Supreme Emperor's 90-Day Vitality Boost"
It was a $3,000 bottle of high-end, mortal-grade ginseng supplements. A scam, sold to rich old men.
It was the perfect raw material.
He placed his hand on the bottle. "System. $Object Upgrade$."
[Object: Bottle of 10x 'Supreme' Ginseng Pills (Mortal Grade)] [Details: 10% ginseng, 90% rice flour and binders. Medically worthless.]
Lin Hao scoffed. He'd been right.
[Upgrade: 10x Low-Grade Spirit Tier 'Minor Vitality Pills']?
This was it. His new product line. Then, he saw the cost.
[Cost: 5,000 UP]
Lin Hao's breath hitched. Five thousand.
This was not a 10 UP knife. This was not a 100 UP Gongfa. This was a colossal capital investment. 5,000 UP was almost half of what he needed for his sister's talent upgrade. It was the same price as his own L4->L5 talent jump.
This was a gamble. He was betting 5,000 UP, a king's ransom, on a product.
But the payoff... if this worked... it wasn't millions. It was billions. It was the key to the entire mortal world's treasury.
He was a planner. He was an entrepreneur. He had to spend UP to make money, to make UP.
"Confirm."
[Deducting 5,000 UP. 24,250 UP Remaining.]
The gold-foil bottle in his hand didn't just get warm. It became a furnace.
FWOOSH!
A wave of pure, dry heat blasted his face. The bottle glowed, first a dull red, then a white-hot, blinding incandescence. The cheap, plastic bottle vaporized. The 10, chalky, brown pills inside were revealed, suspended in a miniature, white-hot, gravitational vortex.
The 90% rice flour was incinerated at a molecular level. The 10% ginseng was refined, purified, and infused with the 5,00GUP of pure, systemic power.
The white-hot light collapsed in on itself.
Psssssh.
The light was gone.
Ten, small, perfectly round, pearl-white pills fell from the air, clattering softly into his open, waiting palm.
They were glowing.
A faint, soft, steady, pure-white light pulsed from each one, in time with his own heartbeat. And the smell... the warehouse, which had smelled of dust, oil, and rain, was now filled with a profound, sweet, living aroma, like a field of divine, alien flowers.
He didn't need the System to tell him what they were. He could feel the life energy, the pure, distilled vitality, pulsing against his skin.
He held one up. He knew, with absolute certainty, what this pill could do.
It could cure cancer. It could reverse heart disease. It could clear a lifetime of mortal ailments in an hour.
And, as the prompt had stated, it could add a single, perfect, healthy year to a mortal's life.
He was holding ten.
He closed his fist, the warm, pulsing light of the pills shining between his fingers.
The world's elite was about to go insane.