Since Bai Zhi was moving into a new house, there were certain essential purchases to be made.
After finishing his breakfast of soft bean curd and chili oil, the sight of which also happened to turn the stomachs of a whole bunch of Players just leaving the Game, Bai Zhi took a walk around the mall and picked up some essentials—household goods and a set of exercise equipment.
From today onward, physical training was going to be part of his daily routine.
Meanwhile, life returned to a semblance of peace over the next few days. In the privacy of his new home, Bai Zhi spent some time testing the Potato Mine and Wall-nut cards, and the results of his experiments proved that... the potatoes were delicious.
The potatoes were not only good as food, but could also be used as explosives... Bai Zhi folded his arms and stared thoughtfully at the plate of fried potatoes before him.
So, the bun-grenades from that show* must have been a real thing too!
During this temporary lull, Bai Zhi checked the Players' Forum on and off so he could keep tabs on any outbreaks of supernatural incidents in the world, while also scouring the web for reports of urban legends. After all, prevention was better than cure, so there was plenty to be gained by staying abreast of the situation.
The population of supernatural entities, up to and including Impossible-class entities, continued to increase over time, but with the combined resources of governments and Players from various nations, those Impossible-class entities were mostly confined to very limited areas of influence. In the event that a supernatural entity could not be confined, such as the Kid Reaper, which inevitably triggered a death every time it appeared, it was put under close surveillance.
Thus, generally speaking, most of the world lived their lives in relative peace, and any incidents that did occur were handily taken care of.
Even though Bai Zhi was doing his best to locate supernatural entities he could defeat for the experience points he needed to get to Level 5, the strength and size of his information network naturally paled in comparison to that of something like the government.
By the time he was able to track down a supernatural entity from various leads on the internet, the Players from the Concerning Department would invariably have beat him to it. They were ruthlessly efficient, but it was thanks to that efficiency that the general populace was able to live peaceful lives, blissfully unaware of these threats.
On the other hand, Bai Zhi did manage to encounter a neutral creep downtown—it was a two-meter-tall creature that looked like a blue Bowser**, but to normal people, it just looked like a large, aggressive dog.
Defeating neutral creeps like that could not only net him experience points but also a bunch of Coins. If he was lucky, they might even drop items and equipment. However, before Bai Zhi could engage it, a police vehicle stopped next to the dog and some specialists bundled the blue Bowser into the car with rapid, practiced movements, then quickly drove off like they were never there.
Bai Zhi stood in stunned silence for several minutes, forced to watch as the neutral creep that he had finally managed to encounter after so long was stolen from under his nose.
Forget it, I'm better off waiting for the System to assign me a quest. I'm even getting nostalgic for the early days when that supernatural entity was stalking me... I wonder where that campus belle impostor is now?
Bai Zhi sighed in exasperation as he stared at the numbers on his Status page—Level 4 and 250 experience points—which had stayed stagnant for the past few days, despite his constant efforts.
Life was a pain, and Bai Zhi sighed again.
As the weekend rolled around, Bai Zhi continued to grapple with such frustrated feelings as he bought a ticket for a coach to the orphanage where "he" had grown up.
Even though it was the weekend, there were only a handful of passengers on the bus—seven, all told, including Bai Zhi. There was an old lady with a burlap sack on the seat next to her, a young-looking woman with someone who looked like her daughter, two delinquent types and someone wearing earphones, who looked like a university student.
Bai Zhi gave his surroundings a cursory scan and headed to the back of the coach without thinking too much about it.
As someone who had spent his whole childhood at the orphanage, the other Bai Zhi had harbored a deep affection for the place. In fact, his entire education, up to getting into university, had been personally sponsored by the director of the orphanage. The feeling was mutual, as even now, the orphanage reserved a special room just for "Bai Zhi".
"He" had also routinely prepared some gifts to take to the orphanage every month, before Bai Zhi reincarnated into his body.
Of course, the money to buy the gifts had been swindled, one way or another, from his girlfriends, though he lied to the Director that he had earned the money through the work-study program at school...
A man with who had completely done away with his morals was a terrible thing, indeed.
The old "Bai Zhi's" greatest wish had once been to study hard, do well, land a good job, make money, and make something of himself. However, ever since getting addicted to video games and realizing that he could quite easily get the same amount of money by scamming his girlfriends as he did from a month of honest work, he completely gave up trying.
Since then, his greatest wish became... to mooch off women forever.
Which was what he had done his whole life.
Leave the Director some money, then go to the room and erase everything related to "my" dark past...
Leaning back in the last row of chairs at the back of the bus, Bai Zhi went over his plans in his mind, a preloaded bank card he had specially prepared for today held between his fingers.
The bank card contained 800,000 yuan, which was not that much, but could be considered a token of gratitude to the Director made on "Bai Zhi's" behalf. After all, the Director had been nothing but kind to "Bai Zhi" all his life and treated him like his own flesh and blood.
As for the items in the room that held so much of "his" hidden history, like novels and notebooks, Bai Zhi resolved to get rid of them as quickly as possible in this trip... Not that he had any personal feelings about those things, since he wasn't the one who wrote them, but if those things were to ever get out, he would be the one to suffer the embarrassment...
Just as he was lost in his thoughts, his mobile phone buzzed with a notification. Somewhat puzzled, Bai Zhi took it out to check and was taken slightly aback by what he saw.
He had received a text from and unknown sender.
Turning his attention to the front of the bus, Bai Zhi stood up and began moving toward the exit as he shot back a text in reply.
Almost instantly, he received a new text.
Bai Zhi frowned as he read the new message, but soon made it to the exit. To his surprise, when he tried to step off the bus, he found that his feet would not leave the floor, as if they were firmly glued to it.
Just then, the driver, whose most prominent feature was the large bald spot at the back of his head, said matter-of-factly, "Dear passenger, please return to your seat, the bus is about to move."
* 敌后便衣队传奇, or Undercover Team Behind Enemy Lines, a dramedy set in wartime.
** Bowser's Brother/Fake Bowser
