"...So this is it, huh?" Jin looked at his watch and saw that the clock struck midnight. It was officially December. Throughout the past week, Jin alongside many other Another Jins had tirelessly worked to create not only the Christmas Instance as well as the revamped Recovery Instance with the help of Pei.
The fox doctor lady had corrected a lot of glaring mistakes that Jin had made and pushed him to do better until the result turned out to be something similar to a Luxury Hospital Hotel. Yeap! No more of those crude common area bedding which did not provide any privacy for the cultivators to rest properly nor the uneasiness to be bunked alongside strangers.
For the new Recovery Instance, everyone would be placed together according to the party they had created in the waiting lobby area unless of course, they had opted for the random party member option.
Trust and privacy issues were important to Jin, and it was even more essential, for his female cultivators who wouldn't like being placed together with some random male cultivators.
Jin wished to avoid an incident where the males would start to harass, or (Panda) God forbid, take advantage of the females when it should be a place of resting. Even though such an incident hasn't occured, Jin needed the trust of his customers.
With him expanding his business in the near future all thanks to CEO Ke Loong, the possibility of going global was high. It also meant that there would definitely be people with ill intentions guaranteed to appear to harm Jin or his customers. It was best to set things proper even before such situations could happen.
Sure, the System always had its eyes pried open for such offenders, but why take the risk? Thus, it would be for the most ideal to make the individual randoms be bunked into single room beds and let them chat with their last party through the Pandamonium App if they wished to communicate again.
The rooms in the recovery instance were all furnished to have a grandeur look. Since space was not an issue for Jin, he designed them in such a way that it looked like a hotel suite room with hospital facilities and had Panda Nurses on call 24/7.
Besides, the customers had paid premium ticket prices to play his dungeons. Jin could at least make the finishing experience even more memorable so that they would yearn to come to his shop again.
What's more, he even reintroduced the snack vending machines which a number of cultivators had been bugging him about ever since he had repurposed the existing second and third floor of the shophouse into a library.
However, the most impressive thing he had done was to connect the Emerald Mountain Hot Spring Instance to every ward. Should one choose to relax in it afterwards, the price was discounted by 10% as a show of appreciation for using Jin's dungeons.
"When you told me that you wanted to make it into a luxury experience, I didn't expect you would go all out choosing different themes for different levels," Pei said as she shook her head looking at the revamped Recovery Instance while wearing a Victorian Dress.
"Well I don't deserve all the credit, I got my inspiration from you. Hahaha." Jin grinned when he pointed at the dress Pei was currently wearing.
"Whatever," Pei smirked away from Jin's sight as she toured one of the levels of the Luxury Recovery Instance where the interior decor was based on Greek and Roman architecture. The classical luxury theme of the place eluded grandness with a twist of modern interior design.
The scheme colour of the decor was mostly white as it featured elements like tall pillars and marble tiles. He did not forget to include a bit of his own touches through Roman Statues but in Panda Forms. (As well as a parody painting on the ceiling of the main hallway featuring one of Michelangelo's paintings, the Creation of Adam with a man touching a Panda God's finger.)
"Oh this is good. Awfully brilliant! But I feel like it lacks something... Do you mind adding a fox at the corner? You know, the one to sin them all." Kraft chuckled as he came out from nowhere to admire the painting. Jin rolled his eyes at his bellator's request. Even Pei found the idea revolting.
"Since you are here, mind telling me how the social media thing is going? I had no time to check though I saw an email notification asking me to subscribe to a newsletter." Jin asked Kraft since he had noticed 'Bubbling Social Media Director' in addition to Bodyguard, Most Awesome Original Bellator, Ultimate Fox Lover, Cyber Hacker, Counter Intelligence Agent on the list of titles on Kraft's attribute page when Jin last saw his update.
"Kiyu is having fun creating those publicity images and advertisements. For now, she is going to stick to a few pictures and a general video introducing your shop. Don't worry. We have contacted some more popular users to further spread the word. The best part after having watched the video, not a single one asked for payment in return so that it won't cost you a penny! Or erm Yuan or Dungeon Dollars- Gah! Whatever suits your boat." Kraft answered as he took out a phone gifted by the System to allow him to keep track of these social media activities.
He showed Jin the video Kiyu created, which started very ordinarily, showing a glimpse of the various Instances and a few footages of cultivators fighting. However, as soon as she appeared in the video to showcase the Shop Instance, Jin felt a little absorbed watching it. If not for Pei right beside him, he would probably be bewitched yet again.
"Oooh looks like Kiyu's power may have grown again… or are you just slacking off, Pei?" Kraft teased seeing how Jin tried to fight back, but Pei gave an annoyed look in return.
"I suppose...there should be some feedback already?" Jin asked, and Kraft showed the statistics of the video uploaded by those popular users as well as their own channel.
At first, Kiyu's MeiBo channel was sluggish, but the day Kraft gave out the video to be shared around, her channel instantly boomed with thousands of unique IP addresses, indicating there were people, not bots, following her channel.
The comments were the typical polarising sort ranging from 'That girl is effing hot.' to 'That store must be desperate to hire such a hottie to promote, but maybe I will give it a try.' Still, one fact was for sure, Kiyu attracted both genders, although it was apparent that the majority belonged to the male side.
"Hehe, as long as there are publicity results. I will take them." Jin smiled at the number of views the channel attracted. "Not to belittle her, but did she honestly make that on her own? I find it somewhat hard to picture her as a person who would like to do video editing and such." Jin asked and suddenly he sensed another presence behind his back.
Kiyu's arms came forward and grabbed Jin while slowly caressing his body. She was more aggressive than Milk could ever be, but he was secretly enjoying it, even more than the previous time until he felt a sudden pang of sexual hungriness possessing him. Pei noticed that and immediately cast a spell with word enchantments for the first time, returning her master's sanity.
Jin came back to his senses and kindly asked Kiyu to get off of him despite the obvious fun she was deriving from her master's futile resistance. "Got a taste of my abilities?" Kiyu asked, and Jin reluctantly nodded his head.
"Similar to video editing, it's not something I excelled in immediately, even though I had a talent for it. But anything can be learned and trained. The video you've seen is merely the latest iteration. It's something that I worked my ass off, so it hurts my feelings to hear you have doubts." Kiyu playfully bit Jin's ear and gave him a light cheek kiss before leaving his side.
"Thankfully, the System interface is user friendly enough that a bumpkin like me was able to quickly get the hang of it. Kraft would provide a few naughty tips every once in a while. Hehe!" Kiyu explained as she flicked her hair to the side. Jin did not want to know what kind of 'tips' Kraft had given Kiyu, but as long as it managed to bring more customers in and is not borderline offensive, he did not care. (He just did not want any possible investigators querying him about the content he was responsible for.)
"Alright, I'm sorry for having doubted you. Please keep up the good work. I believe I informed Kraft about the Christmas Instance a few days ago. Have you managed to prepare anything for it? Personally, I would like to have the Instance released as soon as possible since it's already December." Jin said as he changed the topic.
"You do know, you can just send me the details directly, right?" Kiyu replied but Jin shook his head.
"Kiyu, you are the most attractive and seductive person I've ever met. I'm pretty sure I would embarrass myself going crazy over you, if not for Pei. It's best I go via Kraft. The lesser evil." Jin told her the truth, and Kiyu pretended to act very disappointedly by going down on her knees while holding her hands close to her chest.
"You hurt me so badly, Master. I work my hardest to be rewarded by you, yet you shun me so unfairly. Uh huuu uh huuuu~!" Kiyu cried her crocodile tears, which Pei told Jin to ignore acting.
"Boo, Pei you are no fun at all." Kiyu stuck her tongue out in retaliation as she stood up, adjusting her bright pink tight fit dress which showed her figure prominently.
"In all seriousness, please send me the details directly in the future. The video for the Christmas Instance is done. You can take a look, and if you approve of it, we will upload it immediately." Kiyu said with a straight face.
"Okay...but you did not require my permission for the previous one, so go ahead with this one too. I trust you can provide solid content for the public to view and bring me a fortune." Jin praised her and Kiyu's expression perked up.
"You...sure?" Kiyu did not expect her master to be this supportive of her work. Kraft looked at her and nodded his head too. He still remembered how previous System Users had viewed her as merely an object of desire and not a treasured bellator. (Ming was not one of them since he had not had the chance to come into contact with the locked up 'troublemakers'.)
"Be honest, did you let me play with Jin's emotions so that you can show me that he might be a cut different from our former masters?" Kiyu sent her thoughts only to the two bellators beside her.
"How is he different? Still just as lecherous as every other man." Pei secretly smiled back at them. "But I have to admit that at least he makes an effort to resist compared to the rest of the masters we've encountered before...and he is receptive to feedback. He can improve if he moves in the right direction."
"That is why the System was willing to release the two of you to me as part of his reward. Even though the System does not show it, it had begun to trust Jin more... Or at least it's willing to take a high risk bet with him." Kraft replied via his thoughts while Jin was busy fiddling with his phone.
"Blah, the System is as shady as ever if you ask me. Trust is a luxurious commodity to it." Pei said as Kiyu came over and hugged her. "Do your job well and don't tease him that much."
Pei gently rubbed her head before Kiyu returned to her newly created room in Jin's Terrace House to publish the video of the Christmas Instance that would be released later in the afternoon.