Chapter 1297: Chapter 727: Departure
Alright.
Dorothy quickly adjusted her mindset.
Hmm, this isn’t too bad, if it’s on the way, it saves on the delivery fee.
She thought to herself.
The delivery fee in the Witch World is actually quite expensive.
It’s not that the delivery system in the Witch World isn’t developed enough. In fact, quite the opposite. Ever since the Magic Network was born, online shopping businesses flourished alongside it, and with the development of online shopping, the delivery or logistics industry naturally thrived as well.
As of today, there’s a multitude of delivery and logistics guilds, some run by otherworldly races, some by witches, and even some by angels, demons, and Great Dragons, the other Three Calamities.
After all, everyone needs to eat, earning a living isn’t shameful.
Even with such a developed delivery and logistics system and so many guilds to choose from, the prices of delivery logistics fees still remain high and never come down.
There’s only one reason, and that’s because the cost is too high.
There’s no helping it. In the Witch World, sending a delivery is like the escort agencies or mercenaries delivering goods that Dorothy saw in her previous life. This is a job where you gamble with your life, licking blood from the knife’s edge, trading life for money.
Well, it’s more accurate to say that’s the normal situation. In contrast, those delivery logistics running freely in the streets as Dorothy remembered in her previous life are actually the rare exceptions.
That’s a sight only found in times of peace and prosperity.
But peace, no matter the era or world, is always a luxury.
Most countries aren’t peaceful, most races aren’t peaceful, most worlds aren’t peaceful, even the powerful Witch World or the other old Three Calamities are like this too.
Witches are a race of war, so naturally, you can’t expect the Witch World to be peaceful. In fact, the Witch World might have never been truly peaceful for even a single day in its hundred thousand years of history.
If you are an ordinary otherworldly race courier, for example, an Orc courier, you just received a new order, arrived at the client’s house to pick up the goods, and it’s a Great Witch client. You ring the doorbell, the door opens, and the next moment, a Magical Beast Dog sticks its head out.
That’s the witch client’s guard dog, a Hellhound.
To witches, it’s a pet, but this terrifying creature with three heads, each capable of casting different magical attacks, towering like a small mountain, with claws larger than a human, is a deadly threat to you.
So, you die, becoming dog food.
Yes, it’s just that casual. It even sounds a bit laughable, but this is the real daily life of those ordinary otherworldly races scraping by at the bottom in the Witch World.
Every year, countless otherworldly races die from such accidents. Maybe they fall prey to a witch’s pet, maybe a witch’s brat, or perhaps they just get unlucky and encounter a broom-riding Bōsōzoku witch on a delivery run who crashes into them.
Such occurrences are too common, so common that the Witch Daily can’t be bothered to report them.
Oh, the life and death of exotic beings are not deemed newsworthy enough to make it into the Witch Daily, unless it’s some rare exotic race, like the Elf Queen, Orc Chieftain, only then might there be a small corner column for it.
Nothing unusual then.
Furthermore, even if you manage to retrieve the goods smoothly, the delivery route itself isn’t safe.
Relative peace in the Witch World only exists in the various Witch Territories. And that depends on the local Witch Lord’s temperament. If they’re orderly, they might strive to maintain basic order in the territory, but if they are a chaotic Merry Maker, then the exotics living in that Witch Territory play out a real-life version of survival games like Battle Royale every day.
Who knows, you might glance too long at a pretty witch on the road and get shot dead by a Magic Bullet right on the spot.
Even if you carefully avoid the Witch Elders, only wanting to make deliveries, you still have to watch out for other exotics like us seeking our fortunes in the Witch World.
The lives of these exotics eking it out at the bottom are also tough. If they can’t scavenge leftovers from the Witch Elders to fill their stomachs, what would these hungry bellies do?
They definitely don’t have the guts to directly ask the Witch Elders for food, but they certainly have the courage, and quite daringly too, to snatch food from the luckier exotic races who found something to eat today.
If you take on an order from a Great Witch today, your other delivery colleagues who didn’t get an order might not be too happy.
They might not dare to covet the witch’s goods, but the Witch Elders usually don’t care who delivers the package in the end, as long as it arrives on time.
And if the order isn’t a local delivery, but needs to be sent to other Witch Territories...
Hmm, direct teleportation between Witch Territories isn’t possible. Teleportation Circles are like public buses for the Witch Elders, but for otherworldly races, they’re like personal luxury yachts. A humble courier like yourself can’t afford to use that, you have to resort to the most primitive method, running there yourself.
But once you leave the Witch Territory boundaries and enter the ownerless wilds outside, you’re faced with countless exotics robbers, or if unlucky, witch robbers.
These exiles are reckless, truly daring enough to kill and loot.
You’re lucky. Although there were scares along the way, you ultimately arrived at your destination without any real danger and delivered the goods to the recipient.