“Hey Old Fu, did you also get the message from Boss Jin?” He Rong called Lai Fu, who was scratching his head and yawning since he had woken up only seconds before.
“…huh? What message are you talking about? Do you know what time it is?!” Lai Fu complained as he looked at the alarm clock showing it was roughly 6.30am. Even his wife was mildly irritated by the early call as she turned to the other side of the bed and continued snuggling on her bolster.
“You would have done the same in my shoes! …Something drastic has happened to Tiangong Shopping District. Just look outside and take a look for yourself!” He Rong hurried his friend as he could not believe his own eyes. The Toyz Connection store owner lived approximately a few blocks away the same as most of his peers from the shopping district, including Lai Fu.
“Calm down, you are not making any sense. What exactly happened? I thought Jin was still in the midst of removing the debris so that we could renovate or rebuild our shops. You can’t mean…is it another Ruby Rat ambush?” Lai Fu sat up almost immediately and started to dress his shirt over his singlet as he rushed over to the main hall of his apartment.
At that moment, Lai Fu was slightly stunned and nearly dropped his phone as he opened the curtains to overlook the state of Tiangong Shopping District from afar. (His apartment was on top of the hills, further away from the shopping district and nearer the edge of Tiangong District.)
“Are my eyes playing tricks on me? Is…is that a tree?” The Fresh Price General Store store owner rubbed his eyes a few times and pinched himself to see if he was really awake. A large gigantic tree had appeared right smack at the centre of Tiangong Shopping District. And it was not an ordinary tree if Lai Fu could see it clear enough at kilometres away from his house.
“That’s all you got to say?! You are kidding me, right? From my perspective, that is a HUGE ASS FUCKING TREE. Like how the hell did Boss Jin even manage to import a tree this big?!” He Rong asked rhetorically.
Outside his apartment, some people who went out for work were pointing at the anomaly. Even though the acoustic construction barriers were still up, He Rong could see many of residents near the Tiangong Shopping District taking pictures of the enormous tree and theorising how Jin had accomplished such a feat.
From what he could overhear, some claimed that he employed a group of western mages to spur the growth of this tree while some others seemed to have taken inspiration from the tale of Jack and the giant beanstalk wondering if Boss Jin had bought or created some magical beans to create this tree overnight.
Some nastier opinions pointed out that the dungeon supplier was lucky the tree did not grow to the heavens, else it would be disrupting the air traffic in the vicinity.
However, despite all the mindless chattering, there was no doubt that the colossal tree was as high as the apartments in the area and had become the talk of the morning.
Some residents recalled how Jin had initially created his shop in less than a night, and people were eager to learn what kind of construction company could create such miracles unless it was prefabricated buildings.
Though this rumour has long since been debunked. Some construction specialists had heard about it, had come to check Jin’s shop out in the early days. After some personal inspections (out of their own interest), they swore it was definitely not prefabricated in their eyes but solid groundwork. They could not fathom which construction company managed to do this overnight without the help of a crapload of western mages.
The same thing could be said about this colossal tree right in front of them, but the gossipers believed that even those well versed in nature magic would not boast about being able to perform such a feat. To put it frankly, if there were a few who could perform such a brilliant display of magic, the amazon forest would not be threatened in any way.
“Ah yes, you should check your phone. Boss Jin had messaged us through the Pandamonium App asking us to meet him and gather as many, possibly all of the store owners in by today. Si Fang has already messaged and strongly emphasised to everyone to come at all cost in our Mechat Group.” He Rong was glad that Jin had pushed Si Fang to get all the store owners to at least verify the insurance claim by yesterday.
He believed that if Jin created such a tree amid all the damaged stores, there would be no way to verify and assess the extent of damage those Ruby Rats had done.
“Hmm..if he is rushing, there can only be one thing…” Lai Fu pondered at his balcony as he was still in awe with the colossal tree right in front of him. “He might want us to reopen the stores by Christmas or maybe a few days before Christmas.”
“He cannot be that considerate, can he? The expenses he needs to fork out are already tremendous just to accomplish the recovery of the shopping district!” He Rong could not buy that particular reason though at the same time he was hoping that it was true.
The pending insurance coverage was adequate to get by, and this made most of the store owners resign to the fate that they would lose business for Christmas at best and at worst the Chinese New Year period as well.
“No use wondering, we will know for sure once we meet with Boss Jin.” Lai Fu replied as he started to make his own breakfast. He briefly looked through the store owner’s chat group, yet Jin himself was not included there. In fact, none of them knew his phone number or Mechat account and realised they had been communicating with him exclusively via the Pandamonium App.
The store owners who saw He Rong’s picture in the group chat were all scratching their heads at how Jin was going to handle the reconstruction of their stores. Some even worried that the new landlord was going to break the promise and kick a few shops out of the shopping district with the new sightseeing feature.
However, Si Fang did what he could to relieve the anxiety among the store owners who reacted that way. He too understood what the owners were going through as they could foresee the colossal tree becoming the future main attraction for Tiangong Shopping District.
The shopping committee head could not comprehend how the shops would be placed if the tree was at the centre of the district. Thus, he could only assure them that their new landlord would have their answers ready.
Ironically not shortly after everyone had been calmed down, Jin sent out another message to store owners in the Pandamonium chat group. An ultimatum which he asked Si Fang to copy paste into their group chat.
He demanded with the vested power as the new landlord to all store owners to attend the meeting he was set up in his Dungeons and Pandas store at 12 o’clock or else there was a high chance he would not entertain their request to remain part of the district any longer.
True enough, not all of the store owners had arrived at the allocated meeting time at the Dungeons and Pandas, but Si Fang asked Jin to give him some time to contact them.
The dungeon supplier was aware that some store owners had decided to close their shop permanently after the incident as they believed the shopping district had to be cursed with the episodes of the pachinko fire and now the Ruby Rat.
However, after some convincing on Si Fang’s part, Jin eventually decided to give the latecomers some leeway before he brought the other store owners to the meeting room instance where everyone was surprised by the atmosphere of the office environment.
A replica model of the tree was right in front of the conference table as well as the design of the layout outside of the tree that occupied the shopping district.
“Thanks for waiting, I managed to reach all five of them, and everyone refused to enter this new phase of the Tiangong Shopping District.” Si Fang entered the conference room last with the aid of Yun.
Three of them did not believe in Jin as the new landlord and instead assuming he was crazy to pull a stunt like that, while the last two had reached their retirement age and had decided to let their business die off with the new renovation of Tiangong Shopping District.
“I see, then we shall get started.” Jin, who looked more presentably for the occasion with a set of formal shirt and pants, had begun his presentation. Only instead of a standard presentation, the dungeon supplier used the Tiangong Shopping District model right in front as the prop for discussion.
“This will be the new phase of Tiangong Shopping District. I assume all of you have seen the giant tree right outside the store, considering it is a bit hard to miss, that will be our new mall.” Jin started with a joke, earning some polite chuckles before he became more serious.
He went forth to the middle of the conference table and removed half of the tree replica right in front of them, showing the anatomy or the intersection of what was inside the tree.
The store owners immediately understood the purpose of that tree.
Instead of the typical modernistic style of new malls, Jin had chosen to go for the opposite route in this concrete jungle city.
As Jin had mentioned, the tree was indeed like a mall with a number of floors that could accommodate more than the number of occupants that were sitting in this room. The stores would be situated around the circumference of the tree, with the centre carved out be empty in order to insert a gigantic copper Panda statue which resembled one of the highest ranking deities in heaven, Tian Gong.
More commonly known as The Jade Emperor.
Kraft found it extremely hilarious that Jin had decided to use the Jade Emperor, the past nemesis of the System at the epicentre of his shopping district. However, not in the image of him directly but the very symbol of the Panda clan.
“A direct insult to him!! I am loving this district already!” Kraft was rolling on the floor laughing at the sight of the copper Panda statue. It was draped in the design of royalty clothes as well as the crown in a separate instance within the Dungeon Maker as the System was continuously refining the said statue.
Jin dubbed it the Panda Tian Gong Statue which he would use as advertisement for the district so that the panda statue would gather love and popularity from the visitors.
It was also a subtle move to gain support for the lost Panda Clan and the System approved of it so much that it had decided to use the highest quality of copper and gold to create the statue. At the same time, it also employed the goblin craftsmen to refine the details, ensuring it would be lifelike despite the type of material they used. (Copper can be considered everlasting, since it does not rust, and very easy to mould into shape.)
But back to the issue at hand, the store owners realised that though numerous there was not much space in each of the individual stores with the largest not even sufficient to house He Rong’s old store. That was when Jin looked at them with disbelief.
“Are you kidding me, guys? You all still cannot figure out why I haven’t put that much space for the storefronts? Do I need to remind you how I earn my bread and butter?” Jin asked them somewhat impatiently, and Lai Fu and the others suddenly felt very stupid, which led to a series of laughter.
“You are not joking, right? You are for real that you are going to do that?! Because if that’s the case, I am going to send in an absurd number of requests for you to fulfil it.” Lai Fu questioned Jin seriously, and the dungeon supplier returned with a smirk.
“Trust me anything is possible… for a price of course.” Jin smirked at him, and slowly, the store owners came to understand the ramifications of Jin’s claim.
Jin was going to make a dungeon instance for all of their stores. And each one of them could have it designed anyway they wanted. (as long as they were willing to pay for it)
“Don’t worry I won’t nickel and dime you guys. The charity fund that I have created will be split among you guys after I sent some recompense to all the victims that were involved in the fight. I am giving it out equally to everyone, and all these funds would be accounted in the Pandamonium Charity Report. I want each one of you to start as soon as possible in this critical period of time. That was why I urged all of you guys to be here for this meeting” Jin reiterated, and the store owners understood Jin’s reasoning for not revealing everything up front.
He only wished for those to remain who genuinely cared for the district, who attended this meeting with concern and not greed in mind.
“There are some things that came out from my pocket, like the subsequent decorations and the Panda Tian Gong Statue. However, the rest can be seen in the report if you download the Pandamonium App.” Jin stated as he opened the report right in front of them at the projected screen on the wall, detailing the approximate amount all of them would be receiving as recompense.
He was planning to make this whole tree mall ‘instance friendly’ so, Jin required all store owners to individually install a (slightly modified) Pandamonium app into their phones to fully utilise the dungeon instance making process.
Each and every store owners were extremely excited as they were given a chance to make their dream shop a possible reality.
