Chapter 403
“Do you have plans to increase the number of computers so each faction could form a raid party that could conquer large dungeons?” Solinae asked.
“Not for now since more computers would increase the chance that we would encounter issues. Since gamers here play so slow, it would probably take quite some time before anyone is high-level enough to attempt to conquer dungeons made for parties larger than four,” Mark answered.
“So what is our next step for the café? Do we need to play one day more before we open it to the public?” Dozon asked.
“We’re not ready! We should test the game for one more day!” Toby said but everyone ignored the teenager except for his Father.
“You don’t need to worry too much, Toby. Nedertu is planning to open a net cafe that will be exclusive for us and you can use those to play the game. We need to talk about several things like the hours of operation for the café and the price per hour,” Hamil said.
“I recommend that during the first week, we allow the café to be opened for twenty-four hours to stress test the work, the computers, the servers, and the generator,” Mentorra said and Mark was highly impressed since she sounded like a person from Earth instead of a magical elf from another world.
“Since there are three of us, we can simply work in shifts,” Eilintraee added.
“For the pricing, I recommend one mana stone for four hours and that should be the minimum and the customers are only allowed to play for a maximum of four hours a day so a lot more people can play the game, at least for the first week,” Lorendo suggested.
“Okay, starting tomorrow, we’ll open the café to the public and the operating hours for the first week are going to be twenty-four hours. We’ll charge two mana stone for four hours but the first four hours will be free. Of course, they would need to pay for the next four hours so they could avail themselves of the free four hours. For the first three days, we’ll allow the customer to play four hours a day as a test and increase it depending on the situation,” Hamil said.
“I would also recommend, Mark, that you set your expectation that you will need to add more computers,” Lorendo added.
“At most, I’ll probably add eight more computers but that’s it.” Mark shrugged.
“Hamil, you will need to purchase a communication tool in Narcone so we can contact Mark anytime there’s a problem in the café,” Mentorra said to Hamil, and the circus leader nodded.
After their meeting, Toby ran back to his game and Dozon and Lorendo soon followed. Mark asked the elven sisters to stay since he was planning to give them a crash course in computer networks.
They spent a couple of hours for that lesson and the elven sisters now knew the basic process of how to set up a computer and connect it to the servers.
When he went outside the café, Mark saw that the crowd in front of the café increased and it was because of the television that Hamil set up at the front showing the trailer for the game. Of course, Mark was the one who provided the television to the circus leader as well as the trailer for Star Wars The Old Republic game. Besides the television set, there was a board where the pricing, the hours of operation starting the next day, and the rules of the café were listed.
He ignored the crowd who were becoming restless upon watching the trailer and went back to the RV. When he arrived there, the twins and Liriel were mad at him since he missed dinner so to apologize, he served ice cream to everyone.
While everyone was eating dessert and Mark was eating the leftovers that Lisa cooked, he asked Nedertu when they were planning to set up the tent that would house the computers that the circus people would use to connect to the game and the catman said that it was already built at the back near the server tent.
Mark wasn’t surprised since the circus was experienced in setting up a tent so he decided to set up the computers after dinner. He would probably set up just four computers for the exclusive use of those who wanted to play the game. He told Nedertu to look for someone who wanted to manage the Circus Net café exclusively for their people. He also asked Milena to give funds to Nedertu and Connor to set up a one-hundred-seater temporary theater tent in the place where they would hold the Star Wars convention. The temporary theater was for the twins’ friend's use during the convention and besides that temporary theater, Mark asked Milena to hire a few people that would handle the buffet table that he was planning to set up.
The buffet table would be filled with food and he told everyone that it would last the whole day since he would keep replacing it with a new table filled with food as soon as the food on the table was emptied by the visitors. Of course, the only ones who would be allowed to eat from the table would be the holders of the invitation card from the twins and the circus people.
“Oh, you’ll allow the from the circus to eat from that table? You’ll probably need to replace the table every ten minutes then,” Milena laughed.
“It’s just a one-day celebration,” Mark shrugged.
After dinner, Mark told the kids that Lisa would be the one tucking them in since he still had work to do and the children protested saying that they were not sleepy yet.
“You’ll need sleep or you’ll be short when you grow up. Our bodies need rest when we’re young. Do you want to be as tall as Rendira even though you’re already as old as an adult human?” Mark told the children and that shut the kids up.
Mark asked Lisa to put the kids to sleep after about an hour even though the twins were pouting and Liriel copying her older brothers. He just laughed when he saw the kids’ expressions.
He followed Nedertu to the place where they set up the café exclusive for the circus and it was behind the small tent that housed the servers. The inside of the tent already contained a carpet, tables, chairs, magic light, and runes for temperature control so the only thing that was lacking was the computers.
Since there were already computers in his inventory that were fully set up with the Star Wars The Old Republic game, he just replicated four of them and connected the computers to the server and the generator. He then asked Nedertu to get three more players so they could test the four new computers.
Nedertu ran off to look for his friends and after five minutes returned with three other men. Mark recognized them as part of the animal handlers of the circus, basically, Zenethor’s men, and guessed that they were Nedertu’s best friends. They were all beast men but one of them was a beautiful fox lady Mark had seen once or twice. Nedertu once told him that the fox lady rarely shows herself to humans due to the possibility of them coveting her beauty.