Chapter 334: Sudden Drop in Ticket Revenue

Arriving in the front yard, Lin Dong made his way to the corner where the cellar was located.
He lifted the wooden plank covering the cellar, and a faint damp smell wafted up, forcing Lin Dong to hold his breath.
Since the cellar needed to be opened several times a week, the dampness wasn’t too strong and dissipated quickly in the air.
Descending the wooden ladder, the temperature gradually dropped despite the calm, windless conditions.
Compared to the starry night outside, it was pitch black inside. Only by channeling spiritual energy into his eyes could he see clearly.
The entire cellar was about fifty square meters, storing mostly perishable raw meat and vegetables, along with jars of red wine and thyme.
He activated the inn system and silently commanded to set up the cellar, and the layout of Lin’s Inn appeared in his mind. A small red dot appeared at his current location.
“Stretch!” Lin Dong thought, but the red dot on the layout remained motionless.
Lin Dong frowned slightly.
Based on the scale of the layout, the area of the red dot was at most five or six square meters.
What kind of cellar was that with just five or six square meters?
He tried “stretch” again, but the red dot stayed the same.
Scratching his head, Lin Dong glanced around to confirm the cellar’s location before setting up the system cellar in an open space.
Ding: Congratulations, the cellar has been set up successfully.
A square pattern connected by thin red lines appeared in the open space. Upon closer inspection, it was exactly five square meters.
Lin Dong stepped forward and squatted beside the square pattern. He noticed that inside, several thin blue lines divided the pattern into five rectangular sections, each of equal size.
Lin Dong was stunned. Did this mean the system cellar was divided into five parts, with each part occupying at most one square meter?
The larger the space, the more items could be stored, allowing for more temperature and time control devices, thus reducing costs. Conversely, a smaller space would significantly increase costs.
Storing one jar of wine required one spiritual stone to extend storage by one year, while storing ten jars required the same amount to extend storage by another year—the difference was substantial.
Things weren’t going very smoothly since opening the inn!

Lin Dong touched his nose and looked up at the gray sky. If there were no height limit, it would be easier—just dig the cellar deeper. But that possibility seemed unlikely; since the system restricted the area, it surely wouldn’t allow unlimited height.

Based on Lin Dong’s guess, the height should also be about one meter. Of course, regardless, they had to give it a try. He took out the five jars of top-quality wine obtained from Old Ding and placed them in one of the areas—three jars at most. After calculating the height of each jar and determining it to be less than fifty centimeters, Lin Dong stacked the other two jars on top.

After handling these five jars of fine wine, Lin Dong immediately checked the cellar’s attributes and set the corresponding area to extend time by twenty years. Just for these five jars, twenty spirit stones would be consumed per day, which, at market price, was equivalent to twenty taels of silver. The total weight of these five jars was around 150 jin, all purchased from the capital after a long journey. Adding up all costs, the total price was no less than 3,000 taels of silver.

Spending twenty taels of silver just on time-expanding fine wine was practically negligible compared to the overall cost.

Lin Dong’s disappointment due to the small size of the cellar quickly faded. After further calculating the costs of thyme and red wine, he felt even more reassured. Not to mention red wine, even thyme, the cheapest option at just ten wen per jin—if the cellar’s height was indeed one meter, meaning a volume of one cubic meter, a thin mold made according to the cellar’s shape could hold at least 1,000 jin of thyme.

With the one-year time extension, the cost would be just one tael of silver, plus the ten taels for the wine, totaling eleven taels. A year’s worth of thyme sold at a price 50% higher than regular thyme. Even just this lowest-grade thyme ensured a profit. For a three-year period, the additional cost was only three taels, but the selling price was five times higher. For five-year, ten-year, thirty-year periods… the higher the duration, the greater the cost increase, but the value increase was even faster.

After making these calculations, Lin Dong glanced at the other four areas and took action immediately. He placed one jar of red wine in each of the four areas and set the time extensions to one year, two years, three years, and four years respectively. Additionally, in the second and third areas, he tested the height limit by first placing several jars of thyme and then stacking more jars up to about one meter high. He continued this process until he reached over three meters, nearing the ceiling, before stopping.

In the fourth and fifth areas, Lin Dong used them to test the temperature control feature. Given the quality of the wine jars, they naturally couldn’t withstand extreme cold or heat, so he set the temperatures to zero degrees and fifty degrees respectively.
After finishing all this, Lin Dong stretched, went down to the wooden ladder, and glanced up at the entrance. The sight of Old Ding’s head startled him.
“Elder, why did you come here? Scaring people can even kill them.” With Lin Dong’s composure, his heartbeat quickened for a moment before returning to normal.
“Better if it kills me!” Old Ding snapped irritably. “I was going to ask you! Why did you steal five of my fine wines and run away? I thought you had some urgent need for them and planned to use my spiritual senses to find out which scoundrel dared to drink my good wine. Who knew you’d bring them to the cellar?”
“Is there anyone who steals in front of your face?” Lin Dong climbed up the ladder, emerged from the cellar, and covered the wooden board before calmly saying, “I was helping you store the wine.”
“Store the wine?” Old Ding immediately grew nervous. “Don’t tell me you’re short of money and can no longer afford good wine.”
“It’s not that there’s not enough wine; I’m storing it for three to five years to make it more mellow,” Lin Dong said indifferently.
“Three to five years…” Old Ding was amused and exasperated. “Since when have you become so impatient? If I’m not mistaken, new wine will arrive from the capital in a few days. You can store another batch then. Why did you have to sneak away with five of my fine wines without saying a word?”
“You’ll find out tomorrow. I have a surprise for you,” Lin Dong said, too lazy to explain. His spiritual energy flowed into his meridians, turning him into a shadow that vanished into the backyard.
“A surprise tomorrow?”
Old Ding grinned, wanting to ask more, but Lin Dong had already disappeared. Left confused, he gave up.
Early the next morning, after breakfast, Lin Dong headed to the main hall. Unlike the previous day, he didn’t spend the whole day at the counter. After giving Ma Chun a few instructions about the cellar and waiting half an hour after the inn opened to ensure the number of customers hadn’t dropped significantly compared to the previous day, he strode out of the hall.
After walking for just two or three minutes, Lin Dong stopped at the end of the street.
The shop across from him was empty, with nothing but a counter and a clerk. Above the shop’s door, a sign with blue background and gold letters caught everyone’s attention.
Lin’s Gym!
He strode into the shop. The clerk at the counter looked up and suddenly stood up.
“Owner! Why have you come here?”

Lin Dong glanced around the empty gym and asked, “Chang Fei, how’s business at the gym?”
“It was okay yesterday, but today it seems much worse,” replied Chang Fei, the employee transferred from Qiufeng City. He explained, “For the four major events, eight thousand tickets were sold yesterday, worth almost 830 taels of silver. The most tickets were sold for the fighting competitions—almost all of them, three thousand in total. The fewest tickets were for the running competitions, only about 1,200.”
“How about today?” Lin Dong asked.
Chang Fei explained, “The first event today is archery. A thousand eight hundred tickets were sold yesterday, and it’s already started, but so far only a little over 1,200 tickets have been sold.”
Lin Dong frowned slightly. A sharp decline just on the second day? If this continued, it would be a serious problem.
After thinking for a moment, Lin Dong asked, “Which event was archery yesterday?”
“The second one!” Chang Fei replied without hesitation.
Lin Dong fell silent. The order of the four major events changed every day, but their durations remained fixed. According to the previous world’s time, the first event started at 8 a.m. and ended at 10 a.m. After an hour of setup, the second event began at 11 a.m. and lasted two hours. The third event started at 2 p.m. and ended at 4 p.m. The fourth event started at 5 p.m. and ended at 7 p.m.
Lin Dong expected the second and fourth events to have the fewest attendees, as they both fell during meal times, forcing people to watch the competitions on an empty stomach.
Since archery was the second event yesterday, it should have had the fewest attendees. But now it was scheduled as the first event, meaning today’s attendance would be at least 600 fewer than yesterday’s—probably around 700 fewer.
At this rate, only 600 people would watch the archery competition tomorrow, and the day after that… the gym might even have to close.
The appeal of the four major events was far lower than expected. Lin Dong had thought that, thanks to the novelty factor, they could last for a few months. By then, the remaining competitors would be among the best, and the appeal would increase significantly, allowing them to sell 700 to 800 tickets per day for each event. Once this downturn passed, next year the competitors’ skills would improve further, and ticket sales would gradually rise.
With 700 to 800 tickets sold per day for each event, and considering the average ticket price at Lin’s Gym at 100 wen per ticket, the four major events would generate 300 taels of silver per day. Over a year, that would amount to just over 100,000 taels.

After deducting the nearly 100,000 taels in prizes for the four major events, as well as costs for labor and other expenses, a profit of around 3,000 to 5,000 taels could be made in a year. Even without considering Linji Winery and Linji Inn in Qiufeng City, just ten county-level branches could generate a net income of about 30,000 taels per year. Compared to these businesses, making 3,000 to 5,000 taels a year didn’t warrant much effort.

But as long as there was money to be made, Lin Dong was willing to invest ten or even a hundred times more effort in managing Linji Gymnasium than he did in running Linji Winery and its inn branches. The reason was the potential profits behind Linji Gymnasium.

Not to mention that after matches in the morning and afternoon, hungry spectators would likely head to Linji Inn on the same street for meals. Take the fourth match, for example—it ended around 7 p.m. By then, even in summer, it was almost dark. Those living nearby would rush home, while those farther away had no choice but to find an inn nearby to stay, either by traveling through the night or otherwise.

According to Lin Dong’s estimates, when Linji Gymnasium was still in its early stages, 90% of the spectators would be local residents, meaning only 10% came from afar to watch the matches. Of these 10%, over 80% would be wealthy people with carriages. Among these, only about 20% would stay at an inn nearby. As for the remaining 20% without carriages, although they might be reluctant to spend money, the accommodation at Linji Inn wasn’t too expensive, so over 50% of them would choose to stay there.

Putting it all together, Lin Dong expected that about 3% of the spectators would stay at Linji Inn. With 700 to 800 spectators, that meant over 20 guests per day for the inn. Even if many of them were families, each room could only hold two people, at most three. Adding ten more rooms to Linji Inn would hardly be a problem.

In Lin Dong’s eyes, being able to add ten more rooms meant that even if it resulted in a loss of 30,000 to 50,000 taels per year, it was still worth it—after all, guests meant more experience points for the inn.

But now, after just the first match on the second day, there were only over 1,200 spectators left, and it wasn’t even the running event, which usually had the fewest spectators. Expecting an average of 700 to 800 spectators per day was nothing short of delusional.

“Owner…” Seeing Lin Dong lost in thought, Chang Fei gently called out.

Lin Dong snapped out of it and stretched out his hand. “Give me a ticket. I’ll go in and take a look first.”

“Hmm!” Chang Fei immediately opened the drawer, took out a stack of tickets, tore one off, and handed it to Lin Dong. “Boss, all the seats in the first row are sold out; only the second row is left.”
“It doesn’t matter!” Lin Dong glanced down. The seat number on the ticket was Row 3, Seat 6. After noting down the location, he headed toward the back door of the store.
The Lin’s Gymnasium covered slightly over 10,000 square meters. Compared to real gymnasiums, its size was pitifully small, but compared to a regular store, it was enormous. Since such a large space was needed, it was impossible to buy up all the shops on the street. Instead, they chose residential houses behind the shops.
Entering through the back door and handing the ticket to the attendant in charge of checking tickets, Lin Dong strode inside. The first thing that caught his eye was a circular arena.
The center of the arena was about a meter lower than the surrounding ground, forming a square competition platform 30 meters long and 30 meters wide. Around the platform were rows of seats that gradually rose upward—ten rows in total, with around 300 seats per row. These seats were separated by four aisles, dividing them into east, west, south, and north sections.
The ceiling was empty. Looking up, one could clearly see the rising sun high in the sky, but the sunlight that reached down was somewhat dimmed.
The reason was that the ceiling wasn’t open to the sky but was covered with a thin layer of the sap from the Bai Ling tree.
The Bai Ling tree was a third-tier spiritual material, a strange spiritual tree that Lin Dong had obtained in Autumn Wind City. When this tree’s sap came into contact with air, it would instantly solidify into a thin film. This film had excellent sealing properties and great toughness. The Vitality Balls were made by dipping Vitality Beef Balls in this sap.
When studying the structure of Lin’s Gymnasium, Lin Dong immediately thought of the Bai Ling tree, also due to the sealing and toughness of its sap.
If one were close to this film, it would be impossible to see anything clearly. Only from about ten meters away could one barely make out faint shadows of the scene on the other side. Thanks to its toughness, it could function like a semi-transparent glass that could block sunlight and rain.
The ceiling of Lin’s Gymnasium was made up of hundreds of such films. Although there were many joints in the ceiling, from a height of 14 to 15 meters, those without the strength of the Mental State phase and who didn’t focus their spiritual energy through their eyes could never detect these joints.
To ordinary people looking up, their first impression would definitely be that there was no ceiling. Only those with sharp eyesight or during rainy days could notice the oddity.

A magical ceiling—Lin Dong had also considered this as one of the gimmicks of Lin’s Gymnasium. Unfortunately, for Lin’s Gymnasium to thrive, relying solely on a transparent ceiling, a unique business model, and overwhelming promotional efforts was clearly not enough. Lin Dong understood that the main reason for the gymnasium’s struggles was the insufficient skill level of the competitors, which in turn led to a lack of appeal. Yet, improving the competitors’ skills couldn’t be achieved in a short time—at least a year was required. Only when real prizes were awarded could more people be motivated to train and compete. To solve this problem, either the rules needed to be changed to allow martial artists to compete, or the competition format had to be altered to use weeks or months as competition cycles while reducing the prize amounts. In Lin Dong’s view, both approaches were merely temporary fixes. Allowing martial artists to compete might indeed boost interest in high-quality matches in the short term due to some casual participants showing up, but as a result, ordinary competitors would gradually withdraw, leaving only a few martial artists after a few months. Moreover, there were already few martial artists willing to compete; otherwise, holding separate martial arts competitions would be an alternative. If the competition cycles were shortened, the prospect of large sums of money could indeed motivate competitors to train harder, and although it wouldn’t be as exciting as having martial artists compete, it would likely increase appeal. Yet, the consequences would also be severe. The main issue was that shorter cycles meant frequent small peaks but no major ones. Deciding winners in just a month was far less exciting than doing so over a year. If conditions allowed, Lin Dong even wanted to create a World Cup held every four years. Doing so would ensure that audiences lose interest in the four major events within a year. With a headache as big as an ox, Lin Dong sighed, found his seat, and sat down. Just as he was about to look up at the competition area, a red-and-blue silk robe right below caught his attention.