The Tycoon Bull, Cheering for Dreams!

They won? They had actually defeated Six-Eyed Flying Fish, one of the Twelve Demon Generals? Luo Wei and the others stared up at the Cheering Robot in the sky, looks of sheer disbelief plastered across their faces. In fact, everyone was still somewhat dazed. Caught up in the heat of the moment earlier, their blood had been pumping and their adrenaline surging. But now that reason had regained high ground, all that remained was utter bewilderment. Just like that, they had won? "I feel like I've just had an absurd dream," Sif said, rubbing her temples. Yu Xian, however, replied with complete solemnity, "No, this is no dream. The truth is that the power of our bonds defeated Six-Eyed Flying Fish, one of the Twelve Demon Generals. That is an irrefutable fact!" "..." Luo Wei glanced at Yu Xian, unable to shake the feeling that ever since meeting him, the entire art style of the world had shifted. In truth, it wasn't just the style that had changed—the destiny of every single one of them had been rewritten. Under this world's original course of events, they were supposed to be ambushed by Six-Eyed Flying Fish. Heavyhammer would have been the first gravely injured, followed by Sif being knocked down. Carmen would have unleashed her strongest spell, only for it to fail to inflict a single scratch on Six-Eyed Flying Fish. Finally, when the entire Hero Party was plunged into despair, Gabriel the Holy Dragon would have desperately tapped into the power of the Holy Sword Durandal. Channeling Durandal's might, Gabriel would have temporarily resumed his Holy Dragon of Light form to barely repel Six-Eyed Flying Fish. Yet that would have forced Gabriel to return to the orb within Durandal's guard to hibernate once more, leaving the Hero Party completely without a guide. Subsequently, while searching for a doctor to treat Heavyhammer and the others, they would have taken a wrong turn into an underground dungeon labyrinth and been assaulted by swarms of monsters. Just when they were pushed into dire straits once, twice, thrice over, a catgirl assassin would have appeared to help them escape the labyrinth, adding one more member to their party. Now, however, because Yu Xian had barged into the picture, everything was different. Not only had Six-Eyed Flying Fish failed to harm the Hero Party, but the demon had also been cleaved clean in two by the Cheering Robot. Fate had taken a massive detour. Under the falling night, a campfire crackled to life. Yu Xian sat cross-legged before the fire roasting skewers of meat, the savory aroma causing everyone in the Hero Party to constantly swallow their saliva. Gabriel, however, looked inquisitively at the Cheering Robot beside Yu Xian. When they had first heard Yu Xian describe it back in the cave, everyone had assumed this Cheering Robot was a useless gimmick. None of them could have anticipated that it would be so absurdly powerful—it was downright terrifying. Every single one of the Twelve Demon Generals possessed city-destroying might. Even in his prime, Gabriel wouldn't have dared underestimate any of them. Yet Six-Eyed Flying Fish had been utterly vanquished by this machine. "Lord Newton, how on earth was this robot built?" Gabriel couldn't resist asking out of sheer curiosity. In appearance, the Cheering Robot was simply a blonde girl in a sailor uniform. Only by looking closely at its joints, mouth, and eyes could one tell it was a machine. "Want to learn?" Yu Xian asked, dusting cumin over the sizzling meat. Not just Gabriel, but everyone else nodded eagerly in unison. When faced with such a formidable robot, who wouldn't want to know how it was crafted? Yu Xian handed a skewer of meat to Luo Wei, went on to grill chicken wings, and said casually, "First of all, to build a Cheering Robot, we need to find a beautiful girl." "Could it be..." A horrific thought struck Luo Wei in an instant, and he turned to the Cheering Robot in horror. The others paled as well. Sif asked in a grave tone, "Lord Newton, this is no laughing matter. Does crafting a Cheering Robot require sacrificing an... innocent woman?" "What are you two babbling about? Can you let me finish first?" Yu Xian rolled his large bull eyes at them and huffed in annoyance. Then he resumed his straight-faced boast. "Next, spend a little money to hire her as our model. After all, if the Cheering Robot isn't pretty, how could it cheer anyone up? An ugly monster isn't going to boost anyone's morale." "..." A mental image of a hideous monster cheering them on popped into the minds of the Hero Party. Everyone nodded in unanimous agreement. "And then?" Gabriel pressed curiously. A smile radiating the aura of an absurdly wealthy tycoon spread across Yu Xian's face. "Next, hire four legendary mages to work together to forge the components needed for the Cheering Robot. After that, spend ten million gold coins to purchase a Saint-grade magic stone to serve as the robot's core. On top of that, donate two hundred million gold coins to the Church of the Goddess of Wealth to request the goddess's divine blessing, granting it immense power. "Finally, I personally give it a name and flip its switch." "..." Everyone, who had been genuinely preparing to learn, was instantly petrified. Legendary mages—and four working together at that? Who present had those kinds of connections? Without connections, you could only spend money. Even Gabriel knew that hiring them would cost piles upon piles upon piles of gold coins. And that was merely for crafting the materials. Afterward, you still had to spend ten million gold coins to buy the power source. As everyone knew, power sources eventually ran dry—meaning every single recharge would cost ten million gold coins! Glancing at the Cheering Robot again, the party gulped involuntarily. It truly felt as though liquid gold flowed through the blonde robot's veins. "Then what about crafting this frying pan?" Carmen asked, holding Yu Xian's frying pan lightsaber as she seared a steak on it. "One quadrillion," Yu Xian answered with an approachable smile. Carmen's hands instantly began to tremble. If she accidentally broke this pan, selling herself wouldn't even cover the loose change of the compensation. "I don't believe it. How could a frying pan possibly be that expensive..." Gabriel had always taken Yu Xian's claims with a grain of salt. Hearing that astronomical figure, Gabriel immediately leaned close to the frying pan to inspect it thoroughly. Then, silence fell over the Holy Dragon. Though his power had waned, he had lived an exceptionally long life. Moving closer to study it, he discovered that the pan had actually been forged from dark gold. Dark gold was a magical metal refined from regular gold. Roughly a hundred tons of gold, processed through high-level alchemy, yielded a single gram of dark gold. Under normal circumstances, because it possessed supreme energy conductivity and was virtually indestructible, dark gold was reserved strictly for the most critical core components. For instance, if a magic array node needed to withstand an extraordinarily intense surge of mana, a minuscule speck of dark gold would be added to keep the node from collapsing—perhaps around 0.01 grams. The most common application was inside a wizard's tower, where dark gold was added to the core of the mana pool, or at the key impact points of a mana cannon, where a razor-thin layer would be applied. As for using dark gold to forge an entire frying pan, Gabriel had never even conceived of such a thing. Seeing the pan's pitch-black appearance earlier, he hadn't made the connection at all. Yu Xian had claimed one quadrillion, but Gabriel now suspected this pan might be worth even more than that. Seeing the Holy Dragon's reaction, everyone present immediately realized that Yu Xian might not have been lying at all. Carmen's trembling hands began to shake even harder.