Chapter 15

Chapter 15: Hei Fan Under Great Pressure

The white elf ranger, who was half a head taller than Mo Tan, looked at him in confusion. "Mana?"

"Uh... yeah, mana." Mo Tan chuckled and nodded. To be honest, his mental fortitude at the moment was rather mediocre, and his lying skills were only slightly better than when he was in his [Lawful Good] state. Although he knew that the plan he had hastily come up with a few minutes ago shouldn't have any flaws in theory, he still felt a bit uneasy.

But that was only in comparison to his other personalities. An ordinary and moderate personality didn't mean his abilities were the same. After all, Mo Tan's knowledge reserves and the number of crises he had personally experienced were countless. He could handle such a small scene.

Sure enough, Yinna didn't suspect anything and simply replied casually, "Yes, we elves all have a bit of mana in our bodies. As we age, it accumulates even if we do nothing. But since I'm mainly a ranger, I've never deliberately trained or meditated, so I can't compare to you."

"And..." She gave Mo Tan a dangerous glance. "I'm still young. Converted to human years, I'm only about seventeen. You'd better watch your wording~~"

Mo Tan let out a dry laugh and quickly nodded in agreement. Then, calculating the time in his mind, he tentatively asked, "So, about recharging the magic crystal lamp... Yinna, can you handle it?"

"What for?" Yinna immediately looked at him suspiciously. "Trying to slack off?"

By now, the two had already put some distance between themselves and Layered Rock City. However, since this was the main road leading to the large northern city of Granite City, there were still quite a few passersby. Every two hundred meters or so along the roadside, a magic crystal lamp was mounted on a short pillar. They didn't operate during the day but provided illumination and warmth for travelers after nightfall, while also serving to drive away low-level wild beasts.

They could be considered the standard lighting equipment on the Innocent Continent.

At this moment, the two had just reached the first magic crystal lamp.

"I'm not trying to slack off~" Mo Tan gently placed his hand on the crystal sheet attached to the stone base, showing Yinna an expression of embarrassment. Then, without activating any skills, he tried to sense the mana within his body and immediately broke into a sweat.

As mentioned before, the game [Innocent Realm] was quite unfriendly to players. There was no such thing as standing near a quest target and having the system automatically pop up a box with 'Inject Mana?' and 'Yes' or 'No' options, then completing a percentage of the quest progress just by selecting one.

Don't even think about it!

Need to inject mana for a quest or something? Fine, then figure out how to inject it properly. Don't expect any 'one-click completion' conveniences.

As for even more ridiculous features like auto-pathfinding or AFK grinding... even browser games these days wouldn't stoop that low, would they?

This world is almost excessively real.

But in truth, that's not even the most excessive part. Players currently in the novice stage don't yet know that it's not just these basic operations—even some higher-level skills require a certain level of skill to activate. For now, everyone can only master low-threshold, low-consumption, foolproof skills that don't require any player technique and can be triggered with just a thought. However, as their class level increases, this situation will completely change...

Incidentally, Mo Tan had long been able to skillfully use a variety of advanced skills, especially in Dark Magic... though he himself has no memory of it.

"What are you doing?" Yinna asked curiously. "Are you treating this thing like your dream lover? Stroking it so intently..."

Mo Tan shrugged helplessly and said, "I've never done this before. Honestly, it's much harder than praying or singing hymns..."

Then he closed his eyes, focused his mind, and tried to perceive the 'mana' that didn't exist in reality. This was undoubtedly difficult, like how we can never imagine what it feels like to have an extra tail or a pair of wings. But it must be said, human adaptability is very, very, very astonishing...

Soon, after holding his breath until his face turned red, Mo Tan sensed two indescribable presences within his body, one concentrated in his limbs and bones, and the other in his brain. Carefully sensing the former, he found that this power seemed to subtly resonate with the surrounding environment—changeable and extremely unstable. The latter, on the other hand, continuously gave him a sense of peace and warmth.

[First-time Mana and Faith Power perception triggered. Intelligence +1, Faith Points upper limit +5.]

A gentle system prompt sounded in Mo Tan's ears. Moments later, the scale on the Basic Mana Crystal in his hand gradually lit up.

After Mo Tan had consumed 20 Mana points at a rate of 5 points per second, the energy in the crystal was completely saturated.

"Not bad~" Yinna patted him on the shoulder and smiled, "That's already impressive for someone who only knows how to pray and sing hymns. But actually, you didn't have to fill it all the way. A crystal at seventy percent charge and one at full charge don't differ much in duration—the latter is just brighter."

Mo Tan nodded. Instead of immediately heading with Yinna to the second Magic Crystal Lamp, which was about two hundred meters away, he looked at the Apprentice Ranger with a somewhat ingratiating expression, lowered his head, and said, "Remember our topic just now?"

"About slacking off?" Yinna raised an eyebrow.

"Not exactly." Mo Tan sighed. "I've run into a bit of trouble. If you could keep it a secret..."

He glanced at Yinna, silently repeating in his mind, 'If you're a woman... if you're a normal woman...'

"Of course I can!" Yinna's eyes lit up, and she quickly said, "I'm more than happy to share secrets with others and keep them locked away in my stomach!"

It turned out that she was indeed a normal woman. It seemed that even an elven female, even just an NPC, could hardly resist the temptation of gossip.

"I want to prepare something in about forty minutes," Mo Tan said in a low voice. "I might need to leave for a while. If you could help recharge the rest and tell everyone back there that I wasn't slacking off, that would be great... Especially Futaba, don't tell her anything."

Yinna leaned against a stone pillar with keen interest, a sparkle in her eyes that could kill several truckloads of cats. She chuckled lightly, "That's not a big deal, but what's your excuse? And why keep it a secret from Futaba in particular~?"

Mo Tan didn't speak, just gave Yinna a look that said, 'You know what I mean.'

Yinna immediately nodded. "I get it~ I get it!"

[What exactly did you get from that look of mine? I don't even get it myself!! What an incredible ability to fill in the blanks...]

Mo Tan laughed sheepishly while screaming internally, but his actual intention was to let her go off on a tangent, completing some self-made narrative of who-knows-what, and that would be fine.

"Then I'll leave it to you, Yinna," Mo Tan said, scratching his hair and giving a silly grin. "If I haven't met up with you by the time everyone gathers, just say I went to help the priest with a sermon. I promised him earlier and couldn't refuse."

Yinna blinked. "You've prepared that thoroughly? Looks like you're pretty confident, huh?"

[Confident my ass! What confidence?!]

Mo Tan twitched the corner of his mouth and nodded, forcing a laugh. "It's okay... it's okay..."

"So, have you set a date? Need any help with anything!?" Yinna seemed to have completely forgotten about the mission.

[What date?!]

Mo Tan's heart was already in an ORZ position, but on the surface, he let out a long sigh and shook his head. "I'd better keep working on these magic crystal lamps first, try to leave you as little as possible."

"You can leave now if you want~" Yinna waved her hand generously. "The important stuff comes first!"

[What important stuff?! In your eyes, routine patrols and maintaining order are just trivial matters?! Sister, your stance is really dangerous!]

Mo Tan waved his hand weakly. "No need, no need... There's still time... Let's continue..."

Yinna shrugged noncommittally. "Whatever makes you happy."

So, for the next half hour, the two continued the task assigned to the Fenrir Squad by the Territorial Guard. Thanks to Mo Tan's efforts, they completed about seventy percent of the work. This was limited by his low mana cap; otherwise, he could have done a few more...

Then, at around 7:25 PM real time, a chat window suddenly popped up in the corner of Mo Tan's vision.

Sender: Futaba

Content: "Hey! Still busy?"

Mo Tan quickly replied: "Yeah, only a little over half done after all this time. By the way, don't you have work?! Why are you still online?"

"If you log into the game during break time, you can rest twice as long! Alright, about time—I'm logging off now. Good luck!"

Futaba replied even faster, and after saying that, she immediately logged off.

Although the friend list in *Innocent Realm* didn't have statuses like "Online," "Offline," "Invisible," or "Visible Only to XX," Mo Tan could still guess that Futaba had likely already exited the game by now.

Then...

"What are you spacing out for?" Yinna noticed Mo Tan standing still and gently patted his shoulder, asking, "Did you overexert yourself?"

Mo Tan quickly nodded, then pretended to glance up at the sun, exclaiming, "Ah! I should get going..."

There were no watches in this world, so Yinna couldn't track time as accurately as Mo Tan, who had been silently counting his own pulse to keep time. She could only guess roughly how long had passed, so she immediately said, "Okay! Good luck! I'll cover for you in the squad~"

Five minutes later.

[You have voluntarily disconnected. Please choose whether to reconnect.]

"No."

[Do you wish to initiate the wake-up procedure?]

"As soon as possible."

[Understood. Current time: January 1, 2049, 19:30. You will awaken in one minute.]

When Mo Tan opened his eyes, the phone display showed exactly 7:30 PM.

"Time's about what I expected..." He got up, poured himself a glass of water, and then complained with great misery, "Ah~ Whether it's working part-time as a hacker or dealing with hackers, it's super dangerous and way too troublesome!"

But his complaints at times like this weren't to be taken seriously. In fact, no matter when he complained, for someone like "Mo Tan," it was never genuine.

After all, he had a condition...

After closing his eyes and resting for about two minutes, when Mo Tan opened his eyes again, the feeling he gave off was completely different.

He was still him, but no longer the same him from before.

"Take that back~" A gleam of excitement and delight flickered in his eyes as Mo Tan chuckled to himself, "If this world had no trouble at all, it would be way too boring."

Without a doubt, at this moment, he didn't mind trouble coming his way at all, and he was more than happy to cause trouble for others~

Although actively switching personalities drained a lot of Mo Tan's energy, he didn't rest any longer. Instead, he walked straight to the game pod and lay down inside.

...

[Your mental connection has been detected.]

[About to enter [Innocent Realm] — Player Public Space.]

[Please select the area you wish to log into.]

"No. 13."

[Understood. About to access Public Space No. 13. Welcome, Chaotic Neutral Tan Mo.]

...

After a brief moment of dizziness, Mo Tan found himself in a space that wasn't very spacious. Based on his initial assessment upon opening his eyes, this place seemed to be a prison cell.

The faintly glowing iron door in front of him was the exit.

"The game is called [Innocent Realm], yet the public space where only players exist is set in an environment targeting 'prisoners' or 'sinners.' Heh~" Mo Tan shook his head with a chuckle. "What a blatant satire..."

With that, he reached out and pushed the half-open iron door.

[You are about to enter a public area. Please choose whether to blur your appearance.]

"Of course~" Mo Tan whistled, responding to the system prompt with perfect ease.

Unlike the game world, the official introduction to the player public space was fairly detailed. The fact that one could blur their appearance was something you could learn just by skimming the materials—no need to consult the forums.

And why mention consulting the forums instead of customer service? Simple—because [Innocent Realm] has no! customer! service! hotline!

That was, without a doubt, one of the biggest oddities in the gaming industry...

No customer service hotline, no customer service email. You had to handle every problem yourself, and once the 24-hour return window passed, you couldn't even get a refund.

That was the attitude of Innocent Company toward its players. Despite being a fledgling company, they carried an air of 'I'm your boss, and that's that,' looking down on everyone with such arrogance that players couldn't help but look at them in a new light.

Then curse and swear...

After being blurred into a mosaic, Mo Tan finally left that 'cell' and entered the No. 13 public area.

Strictly speaking, he was refreshed into it. After all, if the system actually installed a door here, once the player count grew, you'd be crushed to death just from the crowd! If some unlucky gnome player hit a peak hour, tragedy would be almost inevitable...

So, while the system might be your boss, it was still quite considerate most of the time~

Mo Tan was still wearing the gear he had as Tan Mo, but all his skills were locked, and his constitution had been reduced to that of an ordinary person in reality. Equipment and attribute bonuses were clearly meaningless here.

Glancing around briefly, he almost immediately spotted the girl in a robe with long orange hair and round glasses.

"Hey~" He sneaked up not far from Futaba and whispered to a tall, burly orc man beside him, "What do you think about mixing Erguotou into water?"

"???"

Chapter 15: The End