Ch.5050. Corrupted Resources

The Corrupted Forest was an extremely dangerous dungeon.

That meant the rewards were just as juicy as the risks.

“This is a gold mine, a real gold mine.”

[Corrupted Gray Wolf Hide]

– Grade: A

– The hide of a gray wolf corrupted by absorbing chaotic energy. Extremely tough with strong regenerative properties.

– When processed into armor, it may become imbued with chaotic energy.

Gray wolves are B-grade monsters in my memory.

Considering the dimensional rift adjustment and exposure to chaotic energy, being A-grade means its rank has significantly increased.

The hide is naturally A-grade as well, which means each piece is essentially a luxury material.

“Wonder how much an A-grade hide would be worth.”

Lately, I’ve been enjoying researching resource prices in the real world.

This was actually a common hobby among Farming World players.

“The rare resource I spent dozens or hundreds of hours farming in Farming World is worth this much in reality!”

“So can you bring it to the real world?”

Such conversations typically ended with someone hitting their rage button and throwing a fit. I never indulged in this potentially disappointing hobby, but the rift dimension is different.

Resources obtained here can be brought to reality.

Valuable resources can be sold at or above market price, and that price becomes an intuitive measure of how lucky I’ve been.

One regret I have is this:

While playing Farming World, I should have at least browsed community forums to memorize the prices of rare resources.

Though perhaps not knowing then allows me to experience happiness and excitement as I look them up now.

Leather materials are highly sought after by blacksmiths who craft armor.

In reality, where death is a real possibility, defensive gear is valued almost as much as offensive power. There are exactly two conditions for armor to have high defensive capabilities:

Either obtain high-grade armor as a drop.

Or craft armor using high-grade leather.

There are no other methods.

There’s no chance of producing good armor from poor-quality leather.

No matter how skilled the blacksmith, their skill only maximizes the value of the resource—it’s not alchemy that turns dung into soybean paste.

That’s why hunters—

High-ranking hunters of A to S grade spend considerable effort seeking armor at even higher prices than weapons.

In most games, this would be an unusual sight.

Damage.

Weapons having the highest value is fundamental.

But in reality, weapons come in various types, and everyone uses different ones, making them expensive but not as rare as good armor.

Good armor can be worn by anyone.

Especially lightweight armor made from leather—aside from tanks who take monster attacks head-on, more than 80% of users prefer leather armor for its lightness.

A-grade is definitely worth taking back.

“I’ll call it ‘trade-grade.'”

Just as items worthy of auction are commonly called “auction-grade,” I’ve created my own term.

‘Trade-grade.’

Items from the rift dimension worth trading back on Earth.

Currently, the value of ‘trade-grade’ items is relatively low.

Even though they’re quite rare resources in reality—like the pure mushrooms—and worth hundreds of thousands of won, they still lack the prestige that comes with the term ‘auction-grade.’

But that will change with time.

The value of ‘trade-grade’ will gradually increase, and eventually, it will refer to truly rare resources that are difficult to obtain even in the rift dimension.

When that time comes, I might need to think carefully about such resources.

Whether to exchange them for items of similar value on Earth.

Or trade them for farm resources to develop my farm in the rift dimension.

“Even the weeds here are corrupted resources.”

Most things in this dungeon have ‘corrupted’ attached to them.

Probably because they’ve been exposed to chaotic energy for a long time.

I cut down all the weeds I could see and collected the “corrupted weeds.”

They’ll be useful somewhere.

Especially items imbued with chaotic energy related to the main quest—they might be essential components or at least have some practical use.

And such resources are scattered everywhere.

Throughout this vast forest.

A thought suddenly occurred to me.

“If I kill the corrupted ogre and cut down the corrupted trees… what happens to this forest?”

Strictly speaking, I’m a rational person.

I don’t usually care about what happens to game characters after the ending.

This forest is no different.

It’s just a dungeon.

Naturally, it would disappear when the boss dies.

Like a sewer.

I’ve never been to a sewer after clearing it as a dungeon.

But once cleared, all traces of the rats that lived there vanish, and it becomes a waterway connected to a lake.

That doesn’t make me sad, but somehow the thought of the Corrupted Forest disappearing feels a bit melancholy.

“Maybe I should gather some corrupted resources.”

It’s only a Level 0 biome, but it’s likely the highest difficulty dungeon in this level.

The chaotic energy will probably continue to appear.

So I had to make a patriotic decision.

“Let’s gather.”

I pulled out my axe.

—————————

I returned home as night was falling.

“Master!”

“Oppa! Are you okay? I thought you were dead.”

“Thanks for worrying.”

They had reason to worry since I left early in the morning.

I hadn’t mentioned it would take long, just that I was going scouting, but it was almost 10 PM when I returned, so they might have thought I’d died.

Kim Sujeong doesn’t know much about Farming World, but Lulu does, so I understood her concern.

Not that it matters.

“Sort these separately, please.”

“Wow! Chaotic energy!”

“What’s this? Huh? A-grade leather?”

After killing the gray wolf, I spent time at the forest entrance cutting weeds, trees, and mining stones.

I gathered resources and picked up any fruits or herbs I spotted.

I had to leave many on the ground because I ran out of belt space.

In my opinion, it would take quite a while to completely farm that dungeon.

“I need to upgrade my belt too.”

It’s a bit late for that.

Typically when playing Farming World, the first thing you do with gathered resources is upgrade your tools, then improve your belt to increase storage capacity.

But I hadn’t felt the need until now.

I still don’t see the necessity of upgrading tools for a Level 0 biome, and I haven’t even gathered C-grade resources yet, but the belt definitely needs an upgrade soon.

Belt upgrades can be done at the [Item Workbench].

The required materials were farm points, basic materials, and 50 pieces of monster hide.

Any monster hide would do, with D-grade as the standard, so just three of my A-grade hides satisfied the requirement.

After upgrading, my belt looked more premium.

It transformed from a rag-like leather strap around my waist to something with a glossy finish.

[All-Purpose Farming Belt]

– Grade: E

– An all-purpose belt made for farming. Seems capable of storing various items.

– Crafted with dimensions of 130 x 10.

– 100% weight reduction when storing items.

– Can store up to medium-sized items.

Three inventory slots were added to my belt.

The stack size also increased from 99 to 130.

It might not seem like much, but it’s actually a significant difference.

It means I can store 90 more resources when only carrying resources.

I wanted to upgrade it once more, but that wasn’t possible right now.

It required not just leather but tailored leather, which I could only get after purchasing the recipe following the village restoration.

Several storage containers were added to the second-floor warehouse.

Outside, I kept resources that needed to be easily accessible.

On the second floor, I planned to store resources primarily used at the item workbench that I wouldn’t need to access frequently.

“Oppa, if you’re just gathering resources, can I help too?”

“I’d like that, but it’s too dangerous.”

“I’m a C-grade mage, you know…”

“The wolves at the entrance are A-grade.”

“…On second thought, farming might be better.”

I had formed a plan.

“I’ll farm in the Corrupted Forest for about four days, then log out once. I’ll buy some armor outside, farm a bit more, kill the ogre, and restore the village.”

The SSS+ ability selection ticket is also important.

If I can get that quickly and roll for two SSS+ abilities, I can farm and develop much faster.

But in Farming World, while rapid development is important, there are definitely times when you need to build a solid foundation while farming.

Resources containing chaotic energy.

I considered these quite important.