Chapter 362: Tickets Sell Well

Leaving the kitchen, Lin Dong rushed to check the results of the promotional campaign. For this campaign, two caravans and four eagle beasts were prepared. With Lin’s Inn as the center, the caravans moved left and right, spreading throughout Lingnan City. They served as mobile warehouses to carry scrolls too large to fit in storage rings, as well as mobile billboards.
Each caravan was equipped with two eagle beasts responsible for distributing flyers and posting the scrolls on billboards already set up at street corners.
Compared to the previous launch, this campaign was smaller in scale and slower in progress. Additionally, since Lin’s Gym was already well-known, and betting on matches had long spread through various gambling houses, its impact was naturally much weaker.
Lin Dong’s expectations weren’t very high either. After all, this was just the first campaign, and there were still many more sports stars to promote in the future. It would be sufficient if over 50% of the people in Lingnan City knew about it.
As for how interested those who knew would be in the campaign’s content, Lin Dong’s requirements were even lower. For the 3,000 tickets for the match between Li Dafeng and Wang Liang, he would be satisfied if the remaining 2,000 tickets could be sold out within three days of ticket sales starting, aside from the 1,000 given away for free.
Since the eastern part of the city had geographical advantages and was considered the focus of the campaign, the caravans moved slowly. After flying swiftly over the rooftops for a while, Lin Dong caught up with one of the caravans.
The results met Lin Dong’s expectations. Wherever the caravans went, there were indeed crowds of onlookers. However, along the way, aside from some children, few adults followed. To Lin Dong’s surprise, the discussion about the match between Li Dafeng and Wang Liang was quite lively. Behind the caravans, although pedestrians stopped in their tracks, most gathered in groups of three or five to discuss the outcome of the match and their various guesses about Li Dafeng and Wang Liang.
This level of engagement exceeded Lin Dong’s expectations. After all, most of these pedestrians didn’t know each other, but they gathered to discuss it because their curiosity overcame their discomfort around strangers, making them eager to share their guesses.
After following the caravans for over a dozen streets and seeing that the results remained consistent with no unexpected incidents, Lin Dong decided to turn back. Instead of using his spiritual power, he walked slowly back to the inn.

Along the way, in front of more than a dozen billboards, many pedestrians still stopped to look. When passing the sixth billboard, Lin Dong stopped, his brows unconsciously furrowing. Under the iron frame, there were seven or eight onlookers. And the painting on the billboard had, somehow, had a large section torn off. Li Dafeng’s entire lower body, from the knees down, was missing; Wang Liang was in slightly better condition, but both of his feet had also been torn away. “It seems we need to take additional measures,” Lin Dong thought. His fingers moved lightly in the air. He had considered the issue of the paintings being damaged. Children and idle people were the biggest threats to these paintings. That’s why he had designed the iron frame to be five meters tall, with a two-meter gap below, without any horizontal bars. Plus, since each promotional cycle wasn’t too long and the billboards were scattered everywhere, as long as they weren’t severely damaged, it shouldn’t be a problem. But now, one painting had been damaged in less than half a day. If we assume one painting is damaged every half day, it would only take twenty days for all the paintings on the billboards to be destroyed—far worse than expected. Of course, this might just be an isolated incident. The short time span and small number made it hard to use as a basis for speculation. Still, preparations needed to be made. Lin Dong didn’t want to deal with the problem once it became confirmed. After pondering all the way back to the inn, although he still hadn’t come up with a viable solution, it was fortunate that none of the other billboards showed any signs of damage. Unable to figure it out, Lin Dong was too lazy to keep thinking about it. He would leave it to Ma Chun and Liu An to deal with later; if they couldn’t solve it, it wouldn’t be too late to find another solution. Back in the backyard, Lin Dong hastily had a meal in the kitchen before returning to his room to practice. In the middle of the night, there was finally a knock at the door. When Lin Dong opened it, aside from Ma Chun and the Yu Linglong sisters, Liu An was also standing outside. “Boss, I brought you some food along the way,” Ma Chun said, lifting the tray slightly. There wasn’t much on it—a large bowl of white rice, one dish, and one soup, but each portion was substantial. “Not bad. If you set up the Lin Family later, you can handle being the head butler with ease,” Lin Dong praised, taking the tray from Ma Chun. “Boss, the task is done,” Ma Chun couldn’t resist revealing an even bigger surprise. “I could tell as soon as I opened the door. Come in!” Lin Dong carried the tray to his desk and sat down.

After everyone had entered one by one, Lin Dong turned to Liu An beside him and asked, “Are there any problems with the promotional materials?”
Liu An nodded. “It’s not a big deal. Just today, I checked the over sixty scrolls posted in the east part of the city again at night, and two of them were damaged—one of them was even less than half intact.”
“I noticed this problem this morning too. Is there any solution?” Lin Dong nodded in approval. Whether Liu An had a solution or not, his willingness to check them all again at night showed undeniable responsibility.
“There is one, but it will cost some money,” Liu An hesitated.
“Tell me,” Lin Dong urged.
“We can divide it into two tasks. First, we find two workers to handle the damaged billboards and clean the dirt off the frames.”
“What’s the second task?” Lin Dong pressed.
“For the damaged scrolls, it’s usually caused by some troublemakers or kids playing around. We can write down penalties and rewards underneath the scrolls. Since the scrolls belong to Lin’s Gymnasium, whoever damages them must compensate at the appropriate price. Whoever provides information about the culprit will get half of the compensation.” After a pause, Liu An continued, “Also, we can state that for any scrolls that remain undamaged, Lin’s Gymnasium will distribute snacks under the frames when new promotional scrolls are put up. After compensating a few times and distributing snacks a few times, this should solve the problem of scrolls being damaged.”
“That’s a good idea. You take care of it!” Lin Dong decided right away.
“Okay!” Liu An glanced at the Yu Linglong sisters and asked, “If the boss has no further instructions, may I go now?”
“Go ahead!” Lin Dong nodded.
After Liu An closed the door, Lin Dong turned to Ma Chun and asked, “Have Chen Yantian and Hong Wanfu both agreed?”
“They both agreed and even signed agreements,” Ma Chun said with a smile. He took out a brocade box from his storage ring, opened it, and took out a stack of papers. He flipped over the first two sheets labeled “Agreement” and set them aside. On the first of the remaining sheets, three large dark characters reading “One thousand taels” stood out sharply.
“Besides the agreements, there are also 28,000 taels in silver bills,” Ma Chun explained. “Hong Wanfu contributed 18,000 taels, and Chen Yantian contributed 10,000 taels.”
“Distribute the silver bills as rewards—two taels per worker, three taels for the cooks. The rest can be divided among you, Liu An, Jiang Kui, and the guards,” Lin Dong said casually.

“Mm!” Ma Chun smiled as she put the silver notes and documents back into the brocade box, then stored it in her magic ring.
“Again… Take Yu Linglong and the others to Qiufeng City later, and find a member of a guard team to send them to Tiandi Cave,” Lin Dong decided.
“To Qiufeng City?” Yu Mudan was surprised.
“Yes!” Lin Dong nodded.
“Owner…” Ma Chun hesitated.
“It’s okay!” Lin Dong shook his head. He understood Ma Chun’s concerns, but they were unnecessary. Although Yu Linglong had not been at the inn for long, her loyalty had already reached full capacity among all the chefs since she returned from Wen Yanshan. Yu Mudan wasn’t at full capacity yet, but she was very close. Jiang Kui and Qiao Tianhao already knew about the Transport Gate, so there was no big deal in letting Yu Linglong and her sister know as well.
Seeing Lin Dong’s firm expression, Ma Chun said nothing more and nodded in agreement.
Over by the side, Yu Linglong had an idea and asked, “Owner, do you want us sisters to go there to train?”
“That’s right!” After taking out the dishes from the tray and arranging them, Lin Dong ate greedily while explaining vaguely, “Tiandi Cave is filled with Jinghong Stones. Training there can double the results. Of course, the prerequisite is being able to endure the pulling force exerted by the Jinghong Stones. The longer you can endure it, the better the effect. I think you two should be fine, right?”
The two shook their heads without hesitation. For revenge, they were confident they could endure any pain, no matter how severe.
Lin Dong nodded. He also believed that Yu Linglong and her sister’s performance in Tiandi Cave would be no worse than his own.
“But…” Yu Linglong hesitated. “Just the journey to and from Qiufeng City takes a month. Even at the fastest, it might take over twenty days. Plus the time for training…”
“For training, three months should be enough. As for the journey…” Lin Dong smiled. “If we use the Eagle Beast Bird, one day is enough for a round trip.”
“One day?” Yu Linglong was surprised. “The Eagle Beast Bird is fast, but a round trip to Qiufeng City probably still takes half a month. After all, the spiritual energy of these birds isn’t very high, and their recovery speed is surprisingly slow. The same goes for the Eagle Beast Bird—carrying one person at full speed will deplete all its spiritual energy in just one day. Even with special pills for the birds, it would take a day or two to fully restore their energy.”
“That’s why I asked Ma Chun to send you to Qiufeng City,” Lin Dong said with a smile. “The inn has a ninth-tier teleportation array that can take you there instantly.”

The two were amazed. They had heard of teleportation arrays before, which were said to be lost, so they never expected Lin’s Inn to have such a mystical array.
“By the way, if we need to train in Tiandi Cave for three months, what about the inn?” Yu Linglong asked.
“No problem. The inn is still doing well right now, and with the popularity of Lin’s Gymnasium boosting business, your absence for a few months won’t have much impact,” Lin Dong explained.
The two nodded, exchanged a glance, and couldn’t hide their joy.
After briefing Ma Chun about the range hood matter, Lin Dong confirmed there was nothing else to discuss and waved his hand. “Alright, if there’s nothing else, get ready. You’ll go with Ma Chun tonight. Don’t forget to bring the two owl beasts.”
The three got up and left. After closing the door, Lin Dong finished his meal and continued focusing on his training.
For seven consecutive days, aside from eating when hungry, Lin Dong spent almost all his time in his room.
The five-day promotion for the sports star went very smoothly, as evidenced by the number of tickets sold each day.
Before the promotion, even under the best weather and timing for the most popular fighting matches, only eight or nine hundred tickets were sold per event. During these five days of promotion, although none of the matches involved Li Dafeng or Wang Liang, the popularity driven by betting led to increasing ticket sales for each match. By the last day, the best-selling match sold 1,300 to 1,400 tickets, with even the lower-selling ones exceeding 1,000.
By the time tickets for Li Dafeng and Wang Liang’s fight went on pre-sale, Lin Dong was fully confident in the effectiveness of the promotion strategy.
On the first day, aside from the 1,000 free tickets, over 1,400 of the remaining 2,000 tickets were sold in the morning, and by noon, none were left. The popularity was so high that Liu An had to add two more ticket-selling tables on the spot.
It could be said that both the sports star promotion and betting strategies had proven highly effective, far exceeding expectations. Similarly, the increase in audience size brought even greater benefits to Lin’s Inn.
Both the lobby and the guest buildings saw a rise in business during this period.
All that remained was to see if this momentum could be sustained.
Near noon, after seven days, Lin Dong stepped out of Lin’s Inn for the first time.

He made his way to Lin Ji Gymnasium. Outside, the streets were bustling with traffic—hundreds of times more crowded than the last time he was here. One reason was that the match hadn’t started yet, but the main reason was that there were indeed many people eager to watch it. Otherwise, so many wouldn’t have waited outside so early for it to begin.

The street, which wasn’t particularly busy before, was now overcrowded. Under the scorching sun, passersby struggled to move through the crowd. Meanwhile, the street vendors and shop owners along the street were beaming with joy.

With such a large crowd, there were naturally many customers for these vendors and shops.

At the edge of the biggest crowd outside Lin Ji Gymnasium, Lin Dong stopped and waited quietly for the match to start.

“Tickets for sale! Watch Li Dafeng and Wang Liang’s revenge match—today we’ll find out who wins!”

“Buying tickets! Two tickets for the match that’s about to start. Two taels of silver per ticket—come if you’re willing to pay. Even the worst seats are available.”

The lively shouts kept coming one after another, and what they said left Lin Dong in disbelief.

The worst seats in Lin Ji Gymnasium used to cost only twenty wen each, but now someone was offering two taels of silver per ticket—yet it seemed they still couldn’t sell them all. That meant the price of these tickets had at least increased by a hundred times.

In just one and a half days, the price of the tickets had skyrocketed by a hundred times.

When Lin Dong left, he had initially worried it wouldn’t be lively enough, but now he was concerned it had gone too far.