Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
“The Three Hundred… Tang Poems!” Lin Jie’s hands shook, and the book dropped onto the floor with a loud thud.
Just imagine: he had thought he got a superb secret martial arts book and was all prepared to train hard so he could be a master of martial arts and hence look down arrogantly at those who had previously despised him. Yet now he discovered… what he got was just a copy of the “Three Hundred Tang Poems’, a children’s book?!
Lin Jie felt as if he had fallen down from the top of the world, and his heart was now broken beyond repair.
The Wine God Elder, a stubbed, bald burly guy who had a pair of iron-like fists, and who looked so magnificent—in a martial arts book, if he donned a monk’s kasaya, he would be the mysterious monk who had skills surpassing all others. Who could have thought he could pull off such a trick on Lin Jie?
Looking at the messy room, Lin Jie couldn’t help but shake his head and sigh. He dialed the number of the moving company that Old Qing passed him previously, and immediately got a polite yet hurried response, “Hi, a very good day to you! Are you moving house? We will be arriving half an hour later at your new house, and we shall settle everything for you. Bye!”
The conversation was hung up.
Lin Jie scratched his head, full of suspicions. Shouldn’t a moving company help to move the customer’s furniture over from his old house, instead of heading straight to the new house? Furthermore, these guys shouldn’t have the keys to the new house, so… how were they going to ‘settle everything’?
‘Well, one thing for certain is that this pair of brothers definitely is hiding some secrets. They might really be from the Special Troops. Our country has always been trying to hide the existence of such powerful armed forces from the people. Even if I managed to make a correct guess, I better pretend that I don’t know about them, maybe the government might reward me for doing so…’ Lin Jie recalled an old movie which he had watched before, the ‘Transformers’—the family of the protagonist was rewarded for keeping their mouths shut.
After that, Lin Jie started to look around the house. It was full of fist prints, and while looking around, he couldn’t help but be amazed by Wine God Elder’s powerful hits.
‘No one will believe if people said he’s just an ordinary civilian! If only I can learn such skills too, it will be enough to protect my family…’
Kuang—
A sound was heard when Lin Jie patted the bookshelf. This was Old Qing’s personal space, and also the only part of the room which was not covered with fist prints. However, when Lin Jie was browsing through the books on the bookshelf, he discovered three parcels in the drawers, which were wrapped in the packaging used to wrap traditional Chinese medicine a few decades ago.
Lin Jie was curious and carefully tore away the packaging.
There was a letter in the first packet, with messy handwriting on it. Lin Jie had a hard time trying to read the letter and deciphering its contents. It read: “My good disciple, I am glad you found this. If not, those scoundrels would most probably move everything away, and you would really be just left with the ‘Three Hundred Tang Poems’, hahaha!”
Lin Jie furrowed his brows, a quizzical look on his face. No matter what, he could see that this was a letter left by Wine God Elder to his disciple… who would be himself, then. The ‘scoundrels’… was Wine God Elder referring to the moving company?
There was some pale yellowish powder in the second packet.
In the third packet, there was white powder.
‘Maybe…’ Lin Jie had an idea. He immersed the ‘Three Hundred Tang Poems’ book into a basin of water, then applied the pale yellowish powder onto the wet book. The words on the book started wriggling like earthworms, and new words and illustrations were formed after that.
“The Refined Punches”!
Lin Jie was shocked—his guess was correct!
In his previous life, he had once heard Zheng Ziliang mention to him before, as the ones in the Special Troops were all Superman-like figures, their skills were extremely secretive, and any records of their skills would be hidden in exotic ways. Zheng Ziliang’s father, Zheng Guangming, was one of the greatest entrepreneurs around, and hence he got to know of such gimmicks. It was thus why Lin Jie suddenly got the idea of immersing the book in the water.
According to the book, the third packet of powder was needed to be used by the practitioners of “The Refined Punches”. This set of skills were the foundation skills of the Specials Troops. Should normal people try to practice these skills without using the powder, their bones would be broken—only by using this powder, could practitioners increase their bodies’ strength and thus learn this skill properly!
‘Why does the powder smell so much like calcium tablets?’ Lin Jie read through the instructions in the book and realized that this powder was to be applied externally. When one’s muscles were hurt in the training process, applying this powder would heal them.
When Lin Jie was mulling over the book, the door was being forced open, and a group of burly men dressed in uniforms of the same moving company barged in. They looked like tigers! The leader of the group said in a stern voice, “Good day to you! Please get aside, we are starting work now.”
‘Even fools can clearly see that you guys are not employees of a moving company! What kind of service crew would be so fierce…’ Lin Jie thought to himself but kept the powder and the “Three Hundred Tang Poems” book away carefully. He left the house and started strolling around at the nearby garden.
On the way, Lin Jie was curious and started practicing one of the punches from The Refined Punches, Bone Spur! This was an action whereby the practitioner had to focus all the energy to his fist through twisting his body and then punch it out—if it was Wine God Elder, one of such punch from him would create a hole in his target’s heart!
As for Lin Jie…
“Ah! My bones, they broke! WTF!” When Lin Jie followed the actions demonstrated in The Refined Punches, twisted his body and punched out his right fist, a crack was heard in his right arm—it was dislocated! He felt as if his whole arm was flying out and detaching itself from his body… Lin Jie thus understood then why one couldn’t practice The Refined Punches rashly. If one tried to practice more than two actions at a go, he would die of pain before he achieved anything!
Applying the powder to his right arm, Lin Jie felt his bones starting to heal immediately. In less than one hour, it stopped hurting. Lin Jie heaved a sigh of relief.
‘No matter what, this time I did get a treasure! As long as I practice diligently, my body will definitely get stronger!’ Clenching his fists, Lin Jie’s eyes emitted a strange gleam. ‘However… before this, I should go take a look at the new house!’
Returning to the new house, Lin Jie was stunned on the spot.
All the savage-looking fist prints were covered up by the coat of fresh paint, and the walls gave off a light fragrance as it was painted with new age wall paints. The old furniture and books were being cleared off, replaced by luxurious-looking soft beds and a fully equipped kitchen. In fact, his sister’s room was being redecorated and was painted all in pink, the ideal color that young girls liked.
There was a note left on the table.
“You’re welcome!”
Lin Jie looked at the note and couldn’t help but smile. “Thank you…”
——
On that day itself, Lin Jie hired movers to help move his house’s old furniture over to the new house before his family came back. He enjoyed himself thoroughly as he discontinued the house’s rental contract with his landlord, who had always appeared to despise them.
He let his mother in about the planned surprise, and when Lin Xiaoxue returned home from school, he brought them to buy a cake. After which, they went to wait for his father. Standing in front of his father’s construction site, Lin Jie was excited to present his father with this surprise.
“Jie is the house at the Teachers’ Residences area too expensive…?” His mother was still somewhat worried.
Lin Jie patted his mother’s shoulders, laughed merrily and said, “Don’t worry, I can afford it! I will be responsible for my own tuition fees and Xiaoxue’s school fees from now on, you and Dad can just live in bliss.”
“What bliss? Save this promise till when you finally get to be successful!” Lin Jiawu took off his coat as he walked over to meet his family after work. He kept his smile and put on a stern expression when he saw Lin Jie.
Lin Jie chuckled and said, “Dad, let’s go, we shall go home now!”
“Look at that cheeky grin! Are you going to buy some expensive stuff again?” asked his father.
Lin Xiaoxue hugged Lin Jiawu’s arms, laughed happily and said, “Oh, Bro’s got a super big surprise for you! Let’s go!”
“Hey, we passed our house…”
“Haha, we are not stopping here!”
After being pulled to No. 1 Senior High School, Lin Jiawu was dragged up to the third level by his family.
“Ta-da!” Lin Jie took out the key and opened the door. The family’s old furniture was placed neatly in the bright room, and a table was specially placed in the living room. There was a big cake full of candles on the table.
“Happy Birthday!” laughed Lin Jie.
“Wow! My room’s so pretty!” exclaimed Lin Xiaoxue as she ran to her room. “Bro, I love you so much! My bro’s indeed the best!”
Lin Jiawu and his wife, however, were stunned.
‘Was this really… even if it was just rented for a day, it would have been expensive, wouldn’t it?’
Lin Jiawu’s face turned grim, and he shouted, “Lin Jie! Have you forgotten what I used to teach you?!”
Everyone was shocked. Lin Xiaoxue, who was originally in high spirits, jumped at her father’s words and tugged Lin Jiawu’s arms.
“Why spend so much money?! Don’t you need money for your university education? Doesn’t your sister need money for her high school? We had scrimped and saved up all this while to provide for you two, yet now you actually spend so much money just for my birthday!?” Lin Jiawu almost shook with anger, and he bellowed, “Your sister had just received the invitation from the Huaxia Arts Academy, did you know that? Your mum and I had been working overtime all this while to plan to save up for her tuition fees, yet now you… ”
He thought Lin Jie actually spent so much money just to rent this house for a day to celebrate his birthday.
In Lin Jiawu’s conservative thinking, he did not care much about celebrating his own birthday especially since he was so old already—this whole celebration was such a waste of money!
His wife quickly tried to pacify things. “The kids are just trying to make you happy, why blow up such a great temper?”
“This chap has never listened to us since young! Not even once! If you have that much money, why don’t you go buy some revision materials for your sister, instead of wasting it on my birthday?” fumed Lin Jiawu, “Go return this house and get back the money—get back as much as you can!”
Lin Xiaoxue threw a longing glance at the nicely-decorated pink room, and said, “Bro, just return this house then.”
Lin Jie took a deep breath, took out the property’s ownership certificate from his pocket, and placed it in his father’s hands.
“Dad, don’t be angry. From today onwards, I will also provide for our family.”
Lin Jiawu was startled. He read through the property’s ownership certificate in his hands carefully, and asked in a shaky voice, “This… you didn’t borrow all the money from Zheng Ziliang, did you?”
After so many years, it was the first time Lin Jie had ever seen such an expression on his father’s face. His eyes were full of disbelief, as if waiting for Lin Jie to confirm his suspicions and replied him ‘yes’—yet there was a sense of longing too, a longing for Lin Jie to reply ‘no’ and proved that he was wrong.
“This money were all earned by me.” Lin Jie took out his gaming equipment and displayed the virtual image of himself in the game to his family.
“This Warrior is me. My username in the game is Fu Sheng, but the more famous name I own in this game is called ‘Codename Lone Wolf’. This is the Rankings Board, I am first on it. This is the Auction House which is able to make the most money out of all shops in the game, and it belongs to me. This is my own shop…”
Lin Jiawu felt his eyes turned wet.
He recalled back to the time when Lin Jie was still small when he donned the childish kindergarten uniforms. That time, Lin Jie had tried to imitate the adults and put his hands behind his back, puffed out his chest and said in a cute voice, “My name is Lin Jie. This is my activity book, I have got the most distinctions in my class! This is my Arts and Craftwork, I am the best at this subject! This is the award which is hardest to get in my whole school, but I got it…”
Silence resumed for a long time.
“Let’s start dinner, shall we?” commented Lin Jie’s mother softly, “Good son…”
They spent a full four hours over the celebration dinner that night. Lin Jie’s mother asked 10 times if she should warm up the dishes, his sister’s face was all covered in cream, while his father’s normally grim face finally broke into a drunken smile…
Lin Jie placed the invitation letter from the Huaxia Academy of Fine Arts and his bank card on the table, and swore proudly, “Today is the day the Lins rise to glory!”
When it was deep into the night…
Lin Xiaoxue lied heads-down upon her bed. She refused to get up from her soft covers, but couldn’t fall asleep no matter how many times she tossed and turned around. As such, she fished out her diary and started recording down her girlish thoughts.
Lin Jiawu leaned on the balcony walls and took out a cigarette since the longest time ever. He just lit it up when he heard his wife’s footsteps. Hurriedly, he threw the cigarette away and pretended that he was doing nothing but just admiring the moon in the night sky.
As for Lin Jie, he was in his room training hard. The cracking sounds of bones were heard as he imitated the moves which were unnatural to the human body, and it was as if his bones were broken one by one!
He was practicing The Refined Punches, and his body ached all over as almost all his bones were broken! After a long while, when he used up all his energy, Lin Jie applied the powder to his body, lied on his bed and finally put on his gaming helmet.
Unnoticed by him, his muscles emitted off a light sheen in the dark night!
——
—”Welcome back! You have appeared within the City of Light.”
Lin Jie checked on the progression statuses of each guild. Although the Devourers were powerful, as long as the guilds were willing to combat strength with numbers, it was not difficult for them to get rid of a Devourer each time at the risk of getting the whole team wiped out.
The cost of killing a Devourer included loss of EXP, usage of large numbers of potions and expensive repairing fees! After a full day and night, the Dark-Robed Knights which had the fastest progression had finally killed around half of the Devourers, but at the expense of 300 gold coins and more!
There was still quite a bit of time left before the agreed meet up time.
The second Boss was a gigantic Magical Beast called Gnar. For small monsters like Devourers, they had a minimum of at least 100,000 health points—as such, how could one expect the leader of these monsters to have any lesser health points?
Gnar’s health bar was capped at 5,000,000 points!
That’s right—5,000,000 points! It was one of the Bosses in The New Age with the most unreasonable health bar! Coupled with its special system effects, it would take at least up till 10 hours of continuous attacking before it could be killed.
‘I need two powerful Fire-type jobs,’ pondered Lin Jie. Out of all the people he knew, perhaps the strongest Fire-type jobs would be Domestic Fat Cattle, the constant No. 2 on the Rankings Board.
As for the other player… Lin Jie took a look at his Friends Column, and an idea came to him.
‘How about Baili Changcheng?’
