I don't think you need 1 - 3 bil for a current character... You should be ok 1 hitting mobs for grinding without spending anything.
For Bossing, you'll probably want to buy a few 6% stat items for 60~80 mil each (Depends what piece and world) and try scrolling your own crappy weapon through event scrolls.
You won't be the fastest, but you'll be able to do some decent dmg in a party.
If you want to solo bosses, you'll probably wanna spend about 1~2 Bil tops, still highly depends on your character.
If you don't fund a current character at all, you can easily raise your dmg by getting Link Skills considering it takes like... 2~3 days to lvl to 120.
Google about Link skills if you want to find more info.
As for the Decent Adventurer, I agree you need like... 10bil+