Before the update of the apocalypse version, in the Mercenary Store, players could hire ordinary villagers or militiamen with a certain level of combat ability.
Generally, players would temporarily hire some militiamen when wild beasts invaded their territories to prevent casualties among their own villagers.
However, few people would hire villagers from the Mercenary Store. This was because the temporary labor force had a time limit and the hiring price was quite high.
It cost 100 gems per day for a temporary villager, which was equivalent to a hundred dollars a day.
It was almost as expensive as hiring migrant workers in the real world. Players would rather build things at a slower pace than waste their money like this.
Lincoln maintained his usual style. With a big wave of his hand and a generous spending spree, he was going to sweep up all the temporary labor in the Mercenary Store.
But halfway through, he found that the gems he had topped up in the morning were all used up. He tapped the screen frantically, quickly topping up more gems in the game.
He didn't realize the situation until he started topping up. After repeatedly buying the 648 - dollar top - up packages, the skin on his thumb was almost worn off.
"Damn it! Isn't there a larger top - up amount?" Lincoln couldn't help but complain. Even with his fast hand - speed, it was still difficult to top up a large amount.
To get hundreds of thousands of gems by buying 648 - dollar packages each time, he had to make hundreds of purchases.
Thinking about his billions in assets, he felt that he might break his phone before topping up enough gems.
There was no other way, so he had to stop for the time being. Fortunately, hundreds of thousands of gems were enough for a while.
It only cost 80,000 gems to hire all the temporary villagers in the Mercenary Store. In the blink of an eye, there were more than 800 additional people in the territory, and Lincoln put them all into the large - scale reconstruction project.
Suddenly, the efficiency of demolishing buildings in the village increased several times. How could it not be fast?
The small village, which originally only occupied 100 grids, was now crowded with more than a thousand people.
You could see that every available space was filled with people. In a word, there was an oversupply of labor.
If others saw this scene, they would definitely scold Lincoln for being a prodigal. For such a small place, there was no need for so many people to work.
Hiring so many temporary villagers cost tens of thousands of dollars a day. But Lincoln didn't feel bad about spending this money at all.
The large - scale investment now would bring back geometric - level returns to him in a few days.
Lincoln immediately opened his territory interface:
[Millionaire's Hamlet]
[Level]: Second - level small village
[Occupied area]: 100 grids
[Buildings]: Primary Lord's Mansion, 1 Primary Lumber Mill, 1 Primary Quarry, 10 Primary Farmlands, 1 Primary Warehouse, Hero Tavern (under repair), 22 Ordinary Cottages
[Special Buildings]: None
[Residents]: 210 (permanent population)+866 (temporary hired population)
[Basic Resources]: Gold coins* (full warehouse), Wood* (full warehouse), Stone* (full warehouse), Grain* (full warehouse), Iron ore* (full warehouse)
[Rare Resources]: Gems*, Magic stones (0), Crystals (0), Mercury*12
[Occupied Resource Points]: 1 Gold Mine, 1 Stone Mine, 2 Iron Mines
[Initial Heroes]: Not recruited yet
[Barracks]: None
[Strategic Treasures]: None
[Introduction]: A prosperous small village where the villagers live and work in peace and contentment, with a high happiness index.
...
It had to be said that except for defense and military strength, this small village had everything.
Lincoln instantly understood why in his previous life, the beast tides that his village faced were more ferocious than those in other players' territories.
With so many well - fed villagers and such rich resources, who else would the beasts target if not him?
He glanced at the green mountains and clear waters around the territory and secretly made up his mind, "This time, I won't give up this fertile land to anyone!"
The Luxury Small Village was located beside a mountain and a river, with rich natural resources.
It was a pity that in his previous life, he had messed things up. He couldn't even survive the early stage and lost this fertile territory.
Otherwise, just relying on the VIP privilege bonuses and the rich gold and iron ore resources around, he wouldn't have ended up so badly.
With more people, management became more complicated. Especially with more than a thousand people crowded into a 100 - grid small village, it looked extremely crowded.
Lincoln thought for a while and then assigned a group of the remaining labor force to open up new land. Actually, it just meant weeding and moving stones.
It was still before the apocalypse mode, and the area around the territory was quite safe. By clearing the weeds and rocks around the territory now, they could expand the territory a bit and leave more space when building the city wall.
Currently, his territory was only 100 grids in size, which was just the size of a first - level village.
According to the specifications of a second - level village, the maximum occupied area was 200 grids. With Lincoln's VIP bonus, it should be 240 grids.
"What a waste!" Only after being reborn did Lincoln realize how extravagant he had been before.
He had left such a large area unused. It was no wonder that he couldn't defend his territory in the apocalypse mode!
Compared with demolishing buildings and building roads, clearing weeds and rocks was much easier. With little effort, the villagers had cleared an area of more than a hundred grids for the territory.
Coupled with the fact that most of the pavilions and small bridges had been demolished, the Luxury Small Village now looked like a flat plain, completely open and unobstructed.
As time passed, the Hero Tavern finally finished its repair with a "ding" sound from the system prompt.
Just then, Sea Buckthorn sent a message to Lincoln: "Rich guy, I've collected a batch of recruitment tickets. Do you still want them?"
Lincoln's eyes immediately lit up. "How many?" The other side quickly sent a screenshot: "There are multiple common recruitment tickets, over 3000 rare recruitment tickets, and over 200 precious - grade ones."
Good heavens! Even though Lincoln was mentally prepared, he was still stunned by these numbers.
"Goodness, did you gather all the recruitment tickets in the whole server?" he murmured to himself while smacking his lips in surprise.
Lincoln had never seen so many recruitment tickets before. Although they were all primary - level recruitment tickets, the sheer quantity was astonishing.
"Tsk tsk, I really found the right person this time! If I had to collect them on my own, I don't know how long it would take." Lincoln sighed.
However, seeing that Lincoln didn't reply for a long time, Sea Buckthorn on the other side was a bit nervous.
This was the biggest deal he had ever made. With the precious - grade recruitment tickets included, this was a transaction worth over a million dollars.
Although not all of these were his goods, as the organizer among the game merchants, he had staked his reputation on this deal.
If he broke his promise, he would be completely ostracized from this circle.
Thinking of this, Sea Buckthorn almost wanted to slap himself. He wasn't a child anymore. Why was he so impulsive?
The other guy had already agreed to settle the bill every 100,000 dollars, but he had to hoard the goods until it reached a million!
Just when Sea Buckthorn was regretting his actions, Lincoln finally replied: "I'll take them all. Just list them on the Exchange and lock the buyer as me."
This simple reply instantly lifted Sea Buckthorn from the depths of despair to the heights of elation. The Exchange was the official and legitimate trading channel.
Of course, he preferred to use it. Although there would be some handling fees deducted, it was much safer.
Sea Buckthorn was afraid that Lincoln would go back on his word. He used his fastest speed ever to list all the goods on the Exchange and filled in Lincoln's name.
"This is over a million dollars' worth of goods! Please don't let anything go wrong!" His hands were trembling as he clicked on the screen.
[Ding! Your goods have been purchased. You've received [amount] !] When the pleasant sound of the payment arrival notification rang out, Sea Buckthorn finally let out a sigh of relief.
"Phew! Thankfully, he didn't deceive me!" He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and his eyes looking at Lincoln's chat window gradually became filled with enthusiasm. "This is truly a client I've never had before!"
Regardless of Sea Buckthorn's anxiety and worry, Lincoln had already shifted his attention to the warehouse full of recruitment tickets.
There were stacks marked "999+", dozens of them in total! Adding the recruitment tickets he had collected in the morning, he now had nearly 50,000 recruitment tickets.
Lincoln didn't have the mood to care about other things for the moment. Since the Hero Tavern had just been repaired, he decided to try his luck.