"It seems so real." Ji Anyi spoke to Xia Shishu from behind.
"Yeah." Xia Shishu nodded in response. It was infuriating to see how the little girl's guardian treated her.
Xia Shishu and Anyi weren't the only ones that witnessed what happened. There were many players on the same street who saw the whole thing. Some felt sympathy, and some felt indifferent. It was just a game to them, they need not care too much for an NPC.
That is… just to some people. In this world, there is always someone who has something to say!
"Eh? Eh? You people are silly! Don't you know that the lady will exploit the gold and use it for herself?! You're a true moron!" A female player from the surrounding crowd taunted.
She was as loud as a rocket, so it wasn't hard to hear her. Xia Shishu turned towards the player and scrutinized her. Her face is fair and her equipment is top notch. Although they were only beginner items, it was better than most players.
"Yeah! You're an idiot! The lady will treat the little girl harsher and maybe even sell her in the future, haha. Don't ya know?" Another player behind the girl added.
Ji Anyi frowned and also looked at the girl player. Behind her were six other people who seemed like her lackey.
Meanwhile, these people were all staring at Xia Shishu and criticizing him. Xia Shishu wore a rather indifferent look, a look that made Ji Anyi worried. Although she had planned to kill the classmate of hers' at first, he seemed like a kind person after actually hanging out with him for a while. Hearing people negatively criticizing him made her think that her classmate's feelings might be hurt.
The next minute, Ji Anyi quickly moved in front of Xia Shishu, trying to prevent the players to stop their criticisms.
"You guys should stop talking! Who do you think you are?" Ji Anyi's voice echoed through the air.
The girl player and the six players behind her smiled. They unsheathed their swords and stabbed it on the ground before like knights. The girl opened her mouth and spoke with a proud voice, "I'm part of Unstoppable Youths! My name is Jing Jing!"
The players behind the girl also puffed their chest. They are just in Highschool, but they were getting paid part-time wages by their leader Luo Ming for playing games! They can even trade their in-game earnings for a significant sum! Why would they not be proud?
"Ahh… It's them." Someone by the sidelines spoke.
"The high school player group who claimed the Enraged Bunnies' zone as their own?" another player shook his head. His friends were killed by them Unstoppable Youths for trying to kill Enraged Bunnies to complete a quest.
Other big teams in Silver Lake Village don't go around claiming a monster spawn area as their own. Luckily, he heard that Unstoppable Youth's leader was PKed in the village not too long ago.
Ji Anyi was a bit surprised but she couldn't care less. "You guys are just from my High school! Why are you acting so haughty!" She had overheard some classmates talking about joining Luo Meng's Unstoppable Youths' team in Second Reality.
Second Reality was the talk of the class the past week. Every day in class, she would listen to some Second Reality gossip just for fun.
"What? You're from Mingkun High?" Jing Jing asked. "Which class are you from? Want to join Unstoppable Youths? Luo Ming's dad is the co-owner of Tianyu Enterprise and he wants to develop his company's brand in the game so he's investing in his son. You can come work for my team and you'll get paid with part-time wages."
"No! I don't wanna be with people like you!" Ji Anyi refused Jing Jing's offer. What a big joke! They just insulted her deskmate and then invited her afterward!
"Why not join? You should be with us rather than that idiot over there who gives a gold coin to a stupid NPC!" Jing Jing brought the conversation back to Xia Shishu once again. She doesn't know why, but she just hates his aura.
"Humph! Mere Mortal tries to disrespect me?" Xia Shishu slowly walked towards Jing Jing's group and stared at her eyes intently with a smirk.
"So what? A newbie like you can not even do anything to me." Jing Jing smirked back at Xia Shishu.
"Humph! Stupid mortal! Wait here!"
"Let's see what you can do! We are in a safe zone! Attack me and my teammates will hold you back until the guards get here!"
"Good! Good! I'll show you my immortal technique! System, Log Out!" Xia Shishu shouted into the skies and clutched his hand.
"Pfft~! Hahahaha did he just log out?" Jing Jing and the players behind her couldn't hold their laughter. Was his immortal technique the super log out technique?
"You guys went too far!" Ji Anyi pointed at Jing Jing's party.
"Went too far? That idiot just probably can't take a little criticism. Hahaha." Jing Jing kept laughing.
Anyi was quite displeased with their actions. She had probably unconsciously labeled her deskmate as her new friend, and seeing that someone was bad mouthing her new friend made her have a heartache.
"You all should be ashamed of yourselves!" Ji Anyi glared at Jing Jing and immediately used her control panel to also log out. Maybe her deskmate's actions were right. Distancing oneself from these people are better than affiliating oneself with them!
Ji Anyi's character turned into light blue pixels and disappeared into thin air. She planned to call it a night and just sleep. Seeing the little NPC girl being treated so harshly made her heart hurt. Hearing her new friend being bad-mouthed made her heart ache. Being left alone made her heartbreak! Sleep will cure everything!
"Hahaha! Those two idiots left the game just because we bad mouthed them a little. How delicate!"
"Hahaha!"
Jing Jing's party laughed together. Who would've known that simple words are enough to make players rage quit? Maybe they should just do this from now on.
Woosh! With a flash of light, someone materialized in front of Jing Jing. The person that materialized in front of her was no doubt the dude Xia Shishu who had just logged out a few seconds ago!
"The fu*k? he's back-" Splash! Jing Jing was about to once again make fun of Xia Shishu for logging back on, but to her surprise, she was splashed with water!
"The fu*k is this?" Jing Jing touched the liquid that was all over her face and questioned Xia Shishu!
"Heh Heh. Lady, It's my immortal art! Are you surprised? Good thing you waited or else I would have to chase you down!" Xia Shishu smiled and placed his arms behind his back like an expert who had just shown the world a super magic art. On one of his hands, there was a glass cup.
"What kind of dumbass immortal art is this?" Jing Jing trembled as she stared at Xia Shishu with hatred in her eyes.
Xia Shishu titled his head towards the sky and smiled. "I used my immortal arts to summon toilet water onto thou's face. Good and refreshing ain't it?" When Xia Shishu had logged out, he quickly ran into the kitchen and picked up a glass cup and scooped some water from the toilet. The rest can easily be surmised. He brought it back into the game!
"Toilet... Water?" Jing Jing stared at Xia Shishu in disbelief. How the heck does one gets toilet water in Second Reality? Do players need to sh*t and urinate in the game? Regardless if this is truly toilet water or not, it's still really humiliating that she was splashed with water! Why doesn't this count as being attacked in a safe zone!?
"Pfft look at the girl. She deserves it." Some players that formed a circle around Xia Shishu and Jing Jing's party gossiped.
Jing Jing glared at them with evil eyes and the surrounding players immediately stopped for the moment. They didn't want to be singularly hunted down by a group of idiotic high schoolers who thinks that they are god in a beginner village. Once everyone passes lvl 10 and moved on into the bigger cities, there will be so many bigger guilds and groups that will overshadow Unstoppable Youths. They're only getting a little limelight in the beginner's village.
"F*ck this. You guys get ready for battle! I don't care if we are caught and sent to jail!" Jing Jing who was just three feet away from Xia Shishu screamed with anger.
"Ahh okay," MasterOfSword who was part of Jing Jing's party replied, but he was still hesitating because he didn't want to be sent to jail.
"See this, newbie? This is the power of a team. We have resources, equipment, manpower, and what do you have? Nothing! Don't you dare humiliate me again or you'll never leave the beginner village!"
"Hey, you can't just pk in the village!" The players around them spoke up once again.
"You want to be my enemy!?" Jing Jing tried to use her scare tactics once more. She had been doing this for a few days already and it had worked quite well.
"You surround the guy in there, but we surround your party with tens of players. What'cha going to do?" Most of the players that were surrounding Jing Jing and co nodded. The fellow players spoke up for Xia Shishu because what he did didn't seem that bad.
First off, he had tried to help a little NPC girl. Which is a plus in their eyes.
And secondly, he had punished the mean girl from Unstoppable Youths with 'toilet water'! What more can they ask for?
Also, a group of online bullies certainly can't bully a group that is larger than themselves! Even if the Unstoppable Youths group is going to hunt them down, they are, after all, a band of random players. They won't be able to hunt every single one of them down.
"It's okay, guys!" Xia Shishu thanked the random guys and gals around him. There are good people in this world after all!
"What? You don't need our help?" A player replied.
"Nope!" Xia Shishu answered and sent a punch towards Jing Jing's chest area.
Puchi. The punch landed but all Xia Shishu felt when he punched the area was a flat board. The feeling was of course due to the sexual harassment prevention in Second Reality.
[Player Xiao Wugui has attacked Player Jing Jing. The opposing party will have 5 minutes to retaliate. Guards will show up shortly.]
"You!! You dare humiliate me again! You all attack him! We have the freaking rights!" Jing Jing spat out towards her team. Even though the Sexual Harassment Prevention had prevented the player Xiao Wugui from feeling her chest, she still felt pain in the area because Xia Shishu's punch registered as an attack rather than actual sexual harassment!
"Everyone! Formation Jabs! We can retaliate! We won't gain infamy!" Those from Jing Jing's group didn't hesitate this time. They surrounded Xia Shishu, pointed their sword tips, and quickly enclosed the circle.
Sword tips can do quite the damage because of their piercing property. They've used this method to kill quite a lot of Enraged Bunnies out in the field.
Xia Shishu stood where he was and waited for his death. Since he is just a beginner player with no equipment, he had expected that he would die with a joint attack. Although his character actually has unnatural stats, he hadn't quite tested it out yet. Other than the wild chickens that he had killed, he did not use his unnatural stats anywhere else!
"Nah, we're helping you, bro!" With his two other friends, a man that is as big as a bear jumped in and tackled down Jing Jing's henchmen that were planning to surround Xia Shishu.
"Hell yeah! Safe zone PVP!" Another player on the sidelines yelled with happiness. THIS was what he had played for. Only fighting monsters and doing quests was so boring.
In no time at all, the safe zone market street turned into a chaotic pvp zone. The NPCs fled and players kept joining the fight one by one. After one player dies, two more players join. Some people even called for their friends and someone posted it on the forums after dying!
Players that didn't want to join the fight quickly ran and hid so that they can watch the show. Xia Shishu was part of this group.
Scavengers ran about, picking up loot like they are on an Easter egg hunt.
"Damn! This game is awesome!" Xia Shishu who had safely hidden in the sidelines praised the game.
"Fu*k you all! Where is the idiot!?" Jing Jing swiped some players away with her iron sword that she had bought from the blacksmith's place and looked around for Xia Shishu. She wanted to get revenge and then get out of the chaotic pvp zone.
Xia Shishu saw the mean girl Jing Jing and then turned his eyes away from her and looked at the glass cup that was still on his hand. "Hmmmm" Xia Shishu stroked his nonexistent beard.
As Jing Jing turned her head away from Xia Shishu's hiding place to ward off another player, Xia Shishu threw the glass cup.
Maybe it was due to a stroke of luck. Maybe it was meant to be. Maybe…
Splatter! [Player Jing Jing has been stunned for 2 seconds by a flying glass cup.] …