Thump thump thump!

A violent knocking on the door woke me up from sleep when it was still early in the morning. It was Murong Mingyue calling out to me, “Lu Chen, time to wake up and grab your milk!”

Fuck!

I swiftly climbed to my feet and put on my clothes. When I walked outside and got to the living room, I immediately saw a glass of milk on the coffee table.

I shot a glance at Murong Mingyue. She was wearing a pink, low-cut T-shirt and arranging a stack of brand new fashion magazines by the sofa. The way her enormous breasts rippled after every movement was astounding to say the least.

I glanced back and forth between the cup and Murong Mingyue, but in the end I wasn’t able to hold myself back from asking, “Sis, is this… yours?”

Murong Mingyue stared at me blankly for a couple of seconds before turning beet red. She rose to her feet angrily. “No! What are you thinking? It’s something we ordered from downstairs! Now drink it already! Starting today, we’re drinking a glass of milk and eating cake for breakfast every morning!”

I was shocked. “But my preferred breakfast is deep-fried dough sticks and hot pepper soup…”

Murong Mingyue uttered through gritted teeth. “Can you drink the milk already?”

“Mn…”

Before I could take a seat, He Yi walked out of the kitchen with a tray of evenly cut cake. As I thought, breakfast had already been prepared, and it was by none other than the two beautiful senior executives of GGS Asia, He Yi and Murong Mingyue. There probably weren’t many men who ever got to enjoy such an amazing breakfast in their lives, and I was happy to declare that I was among the fortunate ones.

After I had washed myself properly, I rubbed my hands together and sat next to He Yi. To my surprise, she was wearing a blue lattice one-piece shirt and a brown short skirt. It was a refreshing look that dialed down the professionalism, but dialed up the friendliness. She actually looked more like the girl next door than the impressive vice president of GGS she actually was.

I couldn’t help but look at her repeatedly, and she seemed to have caught on to my attention. She gave me a light smile and said, “Seen enough yet? Come on, don’t keep your food waiting.”

“Mn.”

I glanced to the other side of the table. Beiming Xue was wearing a milky jacket and her usual black stockings.

“You girls disturbed my sweet dreams last night. I could hear your laughter all the way from my room. What were you girls chatting about in Beiming Xue’s room until 1 am anyway?”

Murong Mingyue smiled lightly. “We were talking about reproduction, that’s all.”

“Reproduction?”

“Pregnancy and stuff…”

“WTF!”

I nearly spat out the cake I was eating. I pressed further. “So, what was the conclusion of that discussion?”

It was He Yi’s turn to answer. “Our final conclusion is that Lil Beiming is a sweet and innocent maiden who is still waiting to find her true love!”

I shivered at the revelation before coughing lightly to hide my embarrassment.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t noticed myself that Beiming Xue probably hadn’t done that with anyone. I just wasn’t expecting such a drama to happen to someone in my life, much less be a participant of said drama myself. Beiming Xue’s choice of attire did make her look like a loose girl sometimes, but in reality she was someone who defended her chastity so fiercely that I could almost imagine the walls she put up when Chen Sheng had tried to get on her bed. The guy must’ve been rebuffed like never before.

Today, Chen Sheng was a Flower Room player and thus a subordinate of Li Le. Truly, what a small world we live in. First, there was the complicated relationship between Li Le, Lin Yixin, and me. Then, there was the complicated relationship between Chen Sheng, Beiming Xue, and me again. Finally, our guilds—Snowy Cathaya, Flower Room and Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls—were dragged into our conflict as well. I wondered if I should murder Chen Sheng’s ass the next time I see him, or sit down and have a good chat with him about the ridiculous situation we were both in.

But no matter what the future had in store for us, one thing was certain—, Chen Sheng was destined to be the loser. Despite being a couple with Beiming Xue for many years, he had never been successful in taking the last step. The poor guy even named himself “One True Love”. If he wasn’t a failure, who was?

If I was Chen Sheng, I might have killed myself to wipe the shame from my memory!

……

“What are your plans, Lu Chen? Will you be joining us in our grind?” He Yi asked.

I thought for a moment before shaking my head. “Nah, I think I’m going solo for a bit. I’m going to check if the undead factions have any quests, farm some EXP and become the first player to reach Level 80!”

I looked at the three beauties around me and smiled at them. “With Eve as the tank, Beiming Xue as the DPS and sis as the healer, I’m sure you can wipe any map at your level.”

He Yi smiled brightly. “I think so too!”

“Mn.”

Murong Mingyue took out a notebook and spread it across the table. She wrote down today’s date and smiled at me. “This is our workshop’s quest column. Everyone is required to record their gains before 10 pm at night and contribute 25 percent to the shared treasury. What do you all think?”

I nodded in agreement. “Mn, the sooner we can gather the money to pay the rent, the better… also, why don’t we register a new bank card under He Yi’s name? This is our workshop’s capital, so it’s best if we have it down in black and white.”

“Okay!”

He Yi smiled pleasantly before taking out a green card from her bag. “This ICBC card has been registered just recently, and it doesn’t have any money on it yet. The password’s 123456. Mingyue, I leave this in your care.”

“Mn!”

Beiming Xue was drinking her milk, and she put down her glass temporarily to ask, “Big bro, our previous workshop was called Bloody Mercenaries, and now it’s joined up with Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls. What should we call our new workshop then?”

Her question stumped me immediately. I muttered to myself, “What should we call our new workshop? Maybe we can just call it Bloody—nah, that’s not good, we have Eve and Mingyue now. Ancient Sword is clearly not good either, we’re a workshop that is detached from our gaming base. It’s gotta be a new name…”

Murong Mingyue puffed up her chest confidently and declared, “Let’s just call it Mingyue workshop…”

I shot a glance and snickered. “Who do you think you are? There’s no way we can use your name…”

He Yi also nodded in agreement. “That’s right, you’re just a healer. You can’t be the face of our workshop. It should be a whole new name, but what?”

Beiming Xue tried. “We have three girls and one boy here, so how about we call ourselves… the Emei Sect?”

“Pu!”

I accidentally spat out the water in my mouth. “Why on earth would you want to be a bunch of Daoist nuns? Absolutely not.”

Beiming Xue blinked. “Well, there are three girls in the workshop, so… do you have an idea, big bro?”

“I wonder…”

I thought for a moment when a light bulb suddenly appeared above my head. I declared confidently, “From now on, our name is Stayfree workshop…”[1]

“Pu!”

This time, it was the three girls who spat out their drinks. The living room dissolved into chaos for a moment.

……

In the end, we weren’t able to come up with a good name everyone was satisfied with, so we decided to put it on the backburner and tackle it another time.

I logged into the game after breakfast was over!

Swhoosh!

I checked my level after I appeared in Floating Ice City’s inn. Due to Beiming Xue’s matter the day before, I had dropped to the fourth place of the player ranking.

NameLevelClassWind Fantasy74Light WandererClear Perfume73ArcherPurple Marquis73WarriorBroken Halberd Sinks Into Sand72Undead SwordsmanDominating Heaven Blade72WarriorBeiming Xue71Dark ArcherGui Guzi71Undead KnightShadow Chanel71MageIndigo Collar71WarriorDominating Mage God71Mage

……

Lin Yixin was still number one, and Clear Perfume probably had just finished some epic quest line since she leveled up twice in a single night, entering the Top 3. As of now, the entire podium of the Heavenly Ranking belonged to Snowy Cathaya In other words, they were as dominant as the sun in Floating Ice City!

There were four Snowy Cathaya players, three Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls players, two Gods of Destruction players and one Peach Garden player on the Heavenly Ranking. It was the world of the Top 4 guilds of Floating Ice City!

I checked the contents of my bag for a bit. I didn’t have much of anything, but my gold count did go up by ten thousand or so. It was the sum I got after selling the random assortment of top-tier equipment I had gotten during my adventures. The income was good. Thanks to my high level, awesome equipment and solo grinding, I was able to earn a couple thousand RMB a day. Thank you very much for the gold~~

After I was done admiring myself, I checked my skill list next and noted that my Cooking was now Rank 7. Very good. It was time to find some Rank 7 ingredients to grind and reach Rank 8!

As the average level of players increased, so did the MP expenditure of the top-tier mages. The most basic of Rank 7 spells cost 70 MP, and such mages’ total MP was around 2000. They would literally run out of mana with a few high-rank Fireballs. Therefore, Rank 6 Magic Consumables were no longer enough to meet their needs. It was time to look for something better.

I brought up the official database and searched for the term “Turtle Meat”. The only information I found was:

Frost Turtle: A wild monster between Level 75 and 85. They can be spotted at the freshwater lakes to the southwest of Floating Ice City. Their diet consists of fishes and prawns, and their bodies are extremely tough. Empowered by the power of ice, they are capable of firing magic attacks at their enemies.

……

Very good, I should be able to gather a ton of Turtle Meat if I hunt down these monsters!

Right now I had no idea where I could find a quest to do anyway, so I might as well check out the west side of Floating Ice City.

I opened the world map and saw all of Floating Ice City. Some portions of the giant map were open for access, and others were concealed, including the freshwater lakes that were supposed to be at the southwest side of the map. Not even the names of the concealed locations had been revealed to the players. However, I could spot a blue area in that region. I was sure that it was the lake I was looking for.

It was only a 50-minute journey away from where I was, but to most players it was too much running and not enough grinding. Most players would choose to travel to a leveling ground at most 20 minutes away, because it seemed foolish to spend an hour traveling instead of fighting monsters.

I repaired my equipment, bought some pots and checked my bag again. I still had some of the Rank 6 Health Potions Lin Yixin had given me last time, and they should be enough for my trip even if I happened to run into a boss. Plus, my Defense was awesome, and Tenacity of the Dead could instantly restore 25% of my HP. Soloing a boss below Level 80 shouldn’t be entirely out of the question for me.

I ran along a small trail across Frost Forest as nighttime arrived. The forest grew increasingly wetter as time passed, and dew was starting to form on the leaves and branches. The slightest touch would cause them to splash against my flesh and induce a cool, icy sensation.

I aspired to maximize my gains as much as possible, and if nothing else, gather as much Turtle Meat as I could before returning to Floating Ice City. If I added some carrots to the mix, I could even cook special Turtle Soups that gave 20% more MP than normal. For example, a Rank 7 Magic Consumable could restore 800 MP in one go, so a 20% increase would make it almost 1000 MP. That should be enough to satisfy the needs of Level 70 mages!

1. Stayfree is a female hygiene product brand