In order for players to reach the first station, they have to cross a distance of 100 kilometers using a very crappy wagon.
No matter how strong a person is, under normal conditions, they cannot drive this kind of wagon faster than 10 kilometers per hour. However, since the world is covered in ice, once a certain speed is reached, the amount of energy required to keep the wagon moving decreases significantly.
Thanks to this, a sufficiently strong person can cover a distance of 100 kilometers in as little as one day by resting enough and working hard enough.
Of course, most players struggled to adapt to the game during the first few days due to the sudden change in the world, and as a result, most players barely managed to reach the first station within four days.
Some extraordinary players, like Alice, on the other hand, had already reached the first station before the end of the first day.
Some of the first stations were connected by only one or two train rails, but this was definitely not a good thing. Because these kinds of first stations were usually made up of just a single large building, a building of that size could easily be looted by a single person, and the people who arrived later would find nothing left.
In reality, there was not a single place in any first station or second station where people could shop.
So even if they completed some achievements and obtained Ice Train coins, they still had to loot in order to solve their hunger problem.
Some unlucky players could not find any food at the first station, which left them with only two options.
Either they would take the risk of collecting basic materials like wood or stone from the surroundings to trade with players who had hunting experience, or they would grit their teeth and drive their trains for 500 kilometers straight to the next station.
The problem was that if they chose the first option, the moment they stepped out of their trains, there was a risk of hypothermia or being targeted by snow wolves. Even if they were truly lucky, a level one train did not have a furnace inside, meaning they would have to gnaw on raw meat.
Considering that the meat of snow wolves was no different from car tires, even that could turn into torture.
As a result, 70 percent of humanity had already been wiped out.
While all of this was happening, there was a very interesting topic circulating in channel 99 chat.
Some people said that there was a merchant at the first station where they could shop. Conversations that started like this became even more heated when Alice began talking about things like the existence of Ice Train coins.
Alice was clearly not a heartless robot who did not care about other people's lives. She told everyone in channel 99 to look around for treasure chests.
Because of this, some people were lucky enough to find treasure chests during their journeys, and with the items that came out of those chests, they gained hope of survival.
From some people's treasure chests, nothing but a few coins came out.
The old man who took coins from these people in exchange for food also became famous during this time.
Alice knew that this old man was the person who had bought the steam train engine from her, and because he had become the first owner of a steam train in the world, he had earned 10,000 coins along with several other rewards. Thanks to this, she understood that the old man had entered the world rankings even before meeting the merchant at the first station.
Alice thought that she wished she had been in the old man's place.
If she had had that many coins before entering the station where Leo was, she could have bought plenty of food with those coins, just like the old man was doing now, and then earned even more coins through trading.
Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do about it now.
Alice became the first person to reach the second station and earned another pile of rewards. However, her luck did not hold, and she could not find any food at all.
Alice looked at her train, which was about to be upgraded to level three. To reach level three, she only needed a little more iron.
So she opened the system's trade interface, first checked to see if anyone was selling iron, bought all the iron that was being sold, and then grit her teeth and bought one more loaf of bread from the old man.
If she continued trading at this pace, she would be able to upgrade her train to level three before reaching the third station.
Alice lowered her head and opened the system to check how far away the next station was.
[Next station Trade City: 2894/5000]
Letting out a sigh, Alice opened the train door and stuck her head outside to look at the scenery.
The small steam train was like a cage made of thin bronze. Even a girl like Alice would need to spend iron to repair it if she punched it.
However, this aspect of the train also provided certain advantages. Combined with the reduced friction of the frozen rails, the train's light weight caused it to consume very little fuel.
At this moment, Alice saw that she had reached the peak of the ice mountain ahead.
After closing the door and going back inside, she used her hand to shut off the steam engine's water supply pipe. Since she would be going downhill for quite a long distance, there was no need to waste fuel.
Even so, she did not dare to shut down the coal furnace of the steam engine.
Ever since the beginner protection had worn off yesterday, she had not dared to move even a single centimeter away from the steam engine, for fear of freezing to death.
As the train accelerated and continued on its path, Alice received a private message.
When she checked the message, all of her resentment toward the old man instantly vanished.
With eyes that looked like they were about to cry like a little girl's, she put on the padded jacket that the old man had just sent her through the system interface.
The reason why the old man had done her such a kindness was not something she needed to think about for now.
Elsewhere, after receiving the jacket Alice had sent and seeing her message of thanks, the old man smiled.
The reason he had sent such an expensive gift was that he wanted to establish a trustworthy relationship with her. At the moment, among all the players, she was the only person he could entrust his money to, because her wealth must have been even greater than his own.
The old man told Alice about his plan to send her his money and shop remotely through her if he did not encounter a merchant like Leo at the next station, but Alice did, and Alice excitedly accepted his proposal.
After that, Alice started crying again. If she had been as smart as the old man, she could have thought earlier about trading with Leo through a player who encountered him.