Chapter 27 Another New Room?

"Damn it, if I had known it would be like this, I would have..."

Li Zheng scratched his head speechlessly, opened the trading hall, and searched for finished equipment, only to find a bunch of swords, spears, halberds, axes, hooks, whips, clubs, hammers, claws...

"Why is everything cold weapons? Is no one selling armor? I need clothes!"

Li Zheng flipped through dozens of trading pages, finally changing tactics and searching for armor.

"Goodness gracious, damn it, I really mean damn it!"

Seeing the results after the page refreshed, Li Zheng almost scratched his scalp till it bled.

"Why are they all shields? What's this? A round wood shield? And it's only gray grade? You even have the nerve to rent out a gray-grade round wood shield? Explosion-proof shield, composite shield, giant shield, board shield..."

After flipping through several more pages, he still couldn't find what he wanted.

"Alright, let's try different criteria this time—armors without attributes, just everyday decorative clothes maybe?"

Entered the criteria, searched!

"JK, Lolita, camisole, teacher, nurse, swimsuit..."

After flipping a few pages, Li Zheng went crazy on the spot.

"What's wrong with this place, is this a trading hall or a pervs' gathering spot? Isn't there a single men's wear seller?"

No, wait, there actually is!

"Spiderman cosplay outfit, Batman cosplay outfit, Superman cosplay outfit... all tight-fitting clothes, is this a gay parade now?"

Li Zheng scratched his scalp in frustration till sparks flew, then had a brainwave and entered "suit" as a criterion, and finally, the trading hall's results looked normal.

"Ah, so the search function in the trading hall needs to be this detailed to work, how thoughtful..."

"Thoughtful my foot! It's downright anti-human design! Who would buy that garbage!"

Ultimately, Li Zheng traded a Luoshen Flower for a set of black and white casual wear. After putting it on and feeling it, he finally decided to trade another Luoshen Flower for some intimate apparel.

"Ah, much more comfortable now."

In The Matrix Survival Game, it doesn't matter what the player's body type is or what kind of clothes they wear; as long as it's obtained from the Matrix, it will fit perfectly and there's no gender restriction on any clothing.

So theoretically, Li Zheng could wear a swimsuit layered with a camisole and then wear teacher outfits on top.

"Since I've been searching anyway, why not see if anyone's trading blueprints?"

Fully dressed, Li Zheng was no longer in a hurry and began studying the trading hall's search function.

Enter "blueprints" as the condition, and all types of blueprints were displayed.

These included equipment, devices, furniture, etc.

Further specified, equipment blueprints were divided into weapons, armor, shields, etc.

If further refined, weapon blueprints were split into melee and ranged, etc.

Even more refined, melee weapon blueprints were divided into knives, spears, swords, etc.

In even more detail, melee knife weapons were classified into long knives, short knives, dual knives, Tachi, etc.

If further... well, let's not get too detailed, even though this is a free chapter, such wordiness isn't good. In short, if you want to accurately find a particular item in the trading hall, your search criteria must be very detailed, otherwise, you'll end up with a heap of loosely related items, which is very frustrating to sift through.

After all, this is a marketplace used by more than three billion people, and the number of listings that appear in one day can't be described as anything less than massive.

That's also why Li Zheng put up the toxic meat for sale in the middle of the night, and only after William Houston's announcement did players notice it at six in the morning.

After doing some research, Li Zheng rested his chin in his hand and muttered to himself, "Even though there are so many items out there, the truly useful ones being traded are extremely rare."

"Even if some things seem very practical, players prefer to use a rental model or set an outrageously high price."

"In this situation, it might take a few more days for exploration and market saturation before things change."

So hoping to find something useful in the trading hall today is practically impossible.

Before shutting down the trading hall, Li Zheng searched two more criteria.

"Mystery" and "USB."

The former search returned empty transaction records.

"No mysterious-related items? Or is it items without the 'mysterious' tag or mysterious attributes?"

Unwilling to give up, Li Zheng searched "Mysterious Lantern" but also found nothing.

"Great..."

The USB search results also came back with various blueprints.

Helpless, Li Zheng changed the keyword to "illustration," and finally made a new discovery.

"Oh, there's actually one?"

In the trading hall, a solitary black USB with golden thread decorations was listed.

Much like the illustration he had seen before, this black USB had no available information.

Even though it was up for sale, there was no item information description.

"Strange, why would an item in the Matrix appear with no information at all? Could it be a bug?"

Li Zheng glanced at the price, and the seller's demands were quite high, wanting a tool to develop Genetic Ability, regardless of grade or type.

"Quite a big appetite, for an item with no visible information, that's an outrageous price tag."

Li Zheng was a bit irritated, knowing that illustrations have the heavenly ability to hint at the weaknesses of monsters.

So far, he's only managed to collect one "Biological Illustration (7)," which means he likely has at least six more illustration sets to gather.

"If I can collect all the biological illustrations, wouldn't all the weaknesses of organisms in the Matrix be laid bare before me?"

At that point, wouldn't I just walk across the Matrix?

The illustration right before him yet unattainable, Li Zheng was clearly not content.

"Contact the seller... William Houston?!"

Seeing the seller's name and confirming the channel number, that feeling of vexation was indescribable.

"Damn it, such an indomitable spirit..."

Annoyed, Li Zheng closed the trading hall without even considering contacting William Houston.

Because he knew that the other party had probably, like him, already put each other on a private chat blacklist.

Now, Li Zheng really understood what they call "self-inflicted misfortune cannot be lived."

"What a mess..."

Li Zheng looked up at the sky, stewed in his frustration for a bit, and finally decided to leave this place first.

"I still have eight exploration chances today, I need to speed up... huh... why is it only seven?"

"Oh, right, this is the third room I've entered today."

Li Zheng counted on his fingers, didn't dwell on it, went back to pick up Sakura, packed up his capsule residence, and started inspecting the metallic doors.

Above was ignored.

Li Zheng had entered from there, no need to check again.

Below was also ignored.

His Gravity Shoes were broken, looking was pointless.

The four remaining metal doors were labeled: Dangerous (Red) Creature, Dangerous (Red) Creature, Dangerous (Orange-Red) Environment, Unknown (Gray) Same type.

"The detector has given a new assessment level!"

"Unknown?"

"Same type?"

This means,

behind the door,

is there a player?

Li Zheng's wounds hadn't fully healed, so apart from this potentially player-occupied room, he wouldn't consider the other three at all.

He swiped his card at the door.

Li Zheng sighed in admiration, "No wonder it's a product from the Treasure Chest, my clothes were burned away, but the detector is intact."

What a treasure indeed, thank you, Treasure Chest!

He stepped forward and entered the door.

In his heart, Li Zheng enthusiastically gave the Treasure Chest System a thumbs-up.