Ling Chen lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling. He had not been able to fall asleep for quite some time. He looked beside him, and saw a pair of bright eyes flickering in the darkness with alertness… little Tian Tian was still completely awake, completely on her guard against Ling Chen. It was as if she believed that he would eat her during the night.
Ling Chen was on the outside, Shui Ruo was in the middle, and Tian Tian was protected within Shui Ruo’s embrace. Tian Tian grasped onto Shui Ruo, hiding within her arms. She would occasionally peek at Ling Chen warily, as if he was a big grey wolf that was going to eat her. Shui Ruo hugged Tian Tian with one arm and rested her back against Ling Chen’s chest. Shui Ruo was the first one to fall asleep, and it was the first time in many, many years that she had fallen asleep with her back towards her big brother. Ling Chen was feeling quite down… the addition of this extra little beauty should have been something that made him happy, but because she was here, he couldn’t hug Shui Ruo like normal, he couldn’t whisper into her ear, let alone continue on with the ‘business’ from yesterday.
Plus, he had to endure being stared at by this little girl, who was staring with all her might.
If they couldn’t find her parents, could it be that she would keep staying with them, and this sort of situation would happen every night…? Ling Chen started to have a headache.
Since he couldn’t fall asleep, Ling Chen decided to spend his time within the world of Mystic Moon.
“Ding…welcome to the world of Mystic Moon.”
Ling Chen appeared in the scarecrow territory. He took out his weapons and charged towards a mob of scarecrows. This was a great place to gain EXP, and although there were many scarecrows, he didn’t feel much pressure as their attack pattern was the same every time, and neither were they very mobile. The entire mob was decimated by Ling Chen with one swing from each weapon. It wouldn’t take him very long to reach LV19- after all, a LV18 player killing LV30 monsters was sure to gain much EXP in a short period of time. He looked at his EXP bar, and decided to spend a few hours farming until he reached LV19, then head south.
“Master, tell me a story.”
When he logged on, Leng’Er also came out from the Pet Dimension. She looked at him fighting the monsters, and still made the request regardless. However, she didn’t seem like she was going to help him fight at all.
If he knew that Leng’Er would become addicted to listening to stories, Ling Chen under no circumstances would have agreed to tell her stories from the beginning, even if he was threatened with death. Seeing Leng’Er’s gaze, he sighed, and reluctantly started to tell her a story while farming the scarecrows.
“Far, far away, there was a star called the Xiya star. The ancestors of that star came from a place on earth called China. Because they possessed special magic, they moved to the Xiya planet, and brought a lot of technology from earth with them. One day, the Xiya star was attacked, and many people died. In order to protect her daughter, the queen of Xiya star sent her daughter to earth inside a spaceship. She also told her daughter to protect herself with magic, and to make the earthlings obey her, protect her, give her food to eat, give her a place to shower, etc. She told her daughter to conquer earth, then lead the earthlings to save Xiya star…”
Leng’Er held a doll in one hand, and supported her head with the other, listening with a look of concentration on her face.
The first half was Ling Chen’s guess as to the truth.
The second half was completely from Ling Chen’s imagination:
“…In the end, Ling Chen and Ruo Ruo arrived at the Xiya star and used their god-like powers to defeat all of the bad people. The residents of Xiya star, including little Tian Tian cheered loudly and knelt before them, vowing to devote themselves to Ling Chen and Shui Ruo. From then onwards, Ling Chen and Ruo Ruo became the King and Queen of the Xiya star and lived happily ever after. The end.”
Leng Er seemed satisfied from listening, but Ling Chen was exhausted.
“I like that story…” Leng’Er softly said as she squeezed her hands together.
Ling Chen laughed with pride.
“I want to listen to another one…”
Ling Chen felt as if he was going to cry. He quickly took out a new doll for Leng’Er, “Leng’Er, master has something to do now, so I can’t tell you another story right now. You can play with this doll first.”
Receiving a new doll, Leng’Er chuckled happily, then floated aside and started to play with her new doll. Ling Chen felt relieved, and continued to torture the scarecrows. The scarecrows were of the Wind element so the crystals created by Xiao Hui were Elementary Wind Resistance Crystals. Although they were one of the worse types of crystals, they could still be sold at a decent price. Selling a large quantity of them would still bring considerable wealth to Ling Chen.
After nearly an hour of farming scarecrows non-stop, his EXP had risen significantly, and he was not too far away from LV19. Suddenly, his communication device started to ring, and Mu Bing Yao’s voice sounded out, “Master, Su’Er is in trouble.”
Ling Chen was startled, and stopped farming to retreat to somewhere safe. Frowning, he asked, “What happened to Su’Er?”
He realized that it was midnight, and everyone was offline, except Mu Bing Yao who had just logged on. Mu Bing Yao replied in a clear voice, “Su’Er was with Meng Xin, Xiao Qi and I for most of the day. In the afternoon, Su’Er was picked up by someone sent by her parents to take her to a party, saying that she wouldn’t be back until late at night. Yun Meng Xin received a call 10 minutes ago saying that Su’Er had been attacked by an unknown person on the way back home. The driver and her two bodyguards were knocked out, and Su’Er was kidnapped.”
“What?” Ling Chen had a deep frown on his face. Su’Er’s father was the mayor of Beijing, and her uncle was China’s third highest official. With such status, their family was sure to make many enemies. In fact, their family being ambushed or assassinated wasn’t anything surprising. He quickly calmed down, asked, “Found any clues yet?”
“Not yet, the Su family is searching the whole city right now. It won’t be long until there’s a result.” Hearing Ling Chen’s concern in his voice, Mu Bing Yao asked, “Do you want us to make a move?”
“No.” Ling Chen refused flatly, “Beijing is the Su family’s territory; it is shameful enough for them for Su’Er to be kidnapped. They definitely won’t let the people holding Su’Er leave Beijing. Unless those people kidnapped her out of revenge, and would sacrifice their lives for hers, she should be safe for now. She’ll be found within the hour.”
“Roger that.”
Su’Er wasn’t a very talkative girl, and would blush when people looked at her. She was as fragile as a little kitten, and was not even a little bit as domineering as princesses from rich families usually were. After spending so much time together, he really came to like this girl who liked to peek at him secretly. He couldn’t help but worry when he heard that she was missing after being kidnapped… he hoped that the Su family could find her quickly and not let this delicate girl come to any harm.
Ling Chen continued with his farming, throwing the entire scarecrow territory into chaos. Even without Xi Ling, he was able to gain EXP very quickly. Not only did he have ridiculously high attack power, but the range of his skills, as well as the fact that he could dual-wield meant that his farming speed was simply incredible. Xiao Hui didn’t want to lose out to Ling Chen in terms of speed, so he would gobble up the corpses and spit out crystals just as quickly as Ling Chen killed the scarecrows.
Another half an hour went by, and Ling Chen’s LV18 EXP bar was 70% full. He was about to ask Mu Bing Yao about Su’Er’s status when a system announcement rang out in his ears.
“Ding…someone is calling from the outside world, would you like to log off?”
Ruo Ruo’s calling me? Ling Chen unhesitatingly logged off.
Just as he left the Mystic Moon world, he heard Tian Tian’s pitiful voice…
“Wuuu… but, but I really want to eat chocolate. Big sis, please let me have some, okay? Okay…?”
It was completely dark in the room, but little Tian Tian’s eyes twinkled in the darkness… there was probably a stream of tears running down her face. She pulled on Shui Ruo’s clothes and begged her for more chocolate. Ling Chen was simply astounded. This girl had eaten a dinner that could feed six people, and yet here she was, in the middle of the night, asking for chocolate?!
“Be a good girl, Tian Tian, big sis really doesn’t have any more chocolate. Plus, it’s not good to eat chocolate in the middle of the night… ah, big brother, you’re awake.” Seeing that Ling Chen had woken up, Shui Ruo exhaled in relief, “Big brother, Tian Tian wants to eat chocolate, otherwise she can’t fall asleep. She already finished all of the chocolate we bought in the afternoon, so…”
“Okay, I’ll go buy some more.” Ling Chen said resignedly. He knew that if it wasn’t completely necessary, Shui Ruo wouldn’t have interrupted him when he was in the game.
“En!” Shui Ruo nodded, “I remember that they sell chocolate in the vending machine nearby… little Tian Tian, don’t cry, big brother is going to buy you some chocolate. Quickly thank him.”
“Heh!” The little Tian Tian curled her lips, “He was already This Demon Queen’s servant, so it’s his duty to buy me chocolate. There’s no need to thank him!”
Shui Ruo smiled sweetly, “Okay, okay, then please lie down Your Demon Queen Highness. You need to get a lot of rest at this age.”
After settling Tian Tian in bed, Shui Ruo took Ling Chen’s jacket and put it on him, “Sorry big brother, she’s just a kid after all… please come back soon.”
Ling Chen sighed as he walked out of the house into the cool evening breeze… and this was just the first day! If she stayed here forever, how was he going to survive?!
This child that he and Shui Ruo brought back seemed to be even scarier than a real Demon King or Demon Queen!
However, he decided to go along with it. After all, Ruo Ruo really liked this little girl.
“Protect them.” Before walking out, he gave out an order in a low voice.
Ling Chen strolled in melancholy, and before he knew it, he had already walked past two streets. It was nearly one, and cars only passed by occasionally under the dim street lights. Soon, he arrived at his destination. It was a pedestrian street not too wide, and every shop was closed already. There were only vending machines on the street sides.
With both of his hands tucked in his pockets, Ling Chen wandered forwards. Suddenly, his ears twitched, and he stopped.
Skreeee!!!
The sound of a car braking suddenly screeched out from the intersection in front of him. Leading after that, two blinding car lights shone onto Ling Chen. The car shot towards Ling Chen, and it was right in front of him in no time…however, there was no sign of it slowing down.
Vehicles were prohibited on pedestrian streets, but this car kept accelerating after it turned into the pedestrian street, and exceeded 120 kilometers per hour when it reached Ling Chen. The lights in the pedestrian street was bright enough, and Ling Chen was walking in the middle of the road. The driver could definitely see Ling Chen, but did not slow down at all or swerve to avoid him. In just moments the car would crash into him.
“This person’s looking to die!!” Ling Chen face dropped. If it was an ordinary person, they would surely die from being hit by a car at such a speed. At midnight, someone who dared to drive in such a manner on a pedestrian street, not caring if they hit and killed anyone, was definitely either a madman or a criminal.
