Tender Palms

That night, the gang members still distributed the same dry black bread to them.

They couldn't eat any more, so they saved the bread.

Because the gang leader was drunk, they didn't have to hand over any copper coins, which was considered good luck.

Mel Carlo lay on the straw, making a decision in his heart.

He had to speed up his understanding of this world. If there were any overlaps with the game's background, it would all become his precious treasure.

"Lily, I met a Knight today! Shiny armor, silver hair, he was so cool!" Akai lay on the haystack, hands behind his head, recounting his day's encounter.

He felt grateful towards the Knight, but an explosion had occurred in the city at that time.

If possible, he really wanted to take these children away from the gang's control, no matter what they did, even if it was harder work.

"Really? Was that bread given to you by the Knight?" Lily was also very interested in the topic. Knights were too far removed from their social class; they could only learn about them through stories at best.

Mel Carlo listened quietly. He didn't want to butt into the children's conversation. He couldn't share with these two children how he had stolen his mother's heirloom, as that would be too beastly.

He wasn't overly concerned with his conscience; his priority was ensuring his own safety. If he had obediently handed over his wallet at the time, who knew what the consequences might have been.

"An explosion? I saw it too, not far from me," the chubby kid next to them suddenly interjected.

When the explosion happened, he was not far away. The Knights arrived very quickly. It seemed that cultists had caused the explosion.

Seeing that no one was paying attention to him, the chubby kid added, "I heard that the Knights were dispatched to track down cultists. We need to be careful from now on, those cultists are very cruel!"

Upon hearing this, Mel Carlo quickly got up from the haystack. Did this world also have cultists? In the original game, cultists were usually between Level 30 and 70. But this world wasn't a game; anything was possible.

Cults generally involved forbidden arts like spirit magic or blood sacrifice rituals. If one was unlucky, they could easily become a sacrifice.

It seemed best to avoid these deserted alleys for the next few days and stick to the main roads for safety.

In the dark room, only moonlight could penetrate through the window. Lily was looking at the Grape Hairpin in her hand, illuminated by the faint moonlight.

"Chubby kid, how much do you know about cultists? Are they very dangerous?" Mel Carlo pressed for more information.

If he could get his hands on magic, regardless of what kind, it could potentially become a trump card in the future. Even forbidden dark magic, at least in the game, wasn't terrifying. For many chuunibyou teenagers, it was a super cool profession.

"I don't know, I only heard about it. I heard they sacrifice people to cultivate dark magic." The chubby kid scratched his head awkwardly. He hadn't expected his words to actually grab Mel Carlo's attention.

Mel Carlo confirmed another key piece of information: dark magic. It was possible for dark magic to exist in this world. However, he couldn't be completely certain until he saw it with his own eyes.

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He wouldn't naively treat this place as a game world; otherwise, he would eventually pay the price. Experience is the mother of all knowledge.

Because in this medieval fantasy setting, the worldview was very mixed. If this world possessed some cross-era technology, it might be mistaken for magic by some.

He glanced at his own tender hands, unable to help but feel a sense of awe. The world was vast, and he was so small. Even trying to understand the world had become a difficult task.

He swiped his finger across the System menu bar. It was similar to the game menu, but it was empty. He could only see the Level and HP/MP bars, with no specific numerical values, nor any way to improve them.

The way to level up in the game was by fighting monsters, but he was so weak now that even fighting a Level 1 monster would be difficult.

The low-level monsters in the Imperial City were rats in the sewers. The rats were generally Level 1 and numerous, suitable for leveling up a new character. However, there was a problem: the rats in the game were poisonous. In real life, being bitten by a rat could be even more dangerous.

There was a possibility of contracting rabies and the Black Death, and he didn't have the Purification skill, so the negative effects could truly be fatal.

That slightly restless heart was once again suppressed by reason. Coming to another world, who wouldn't want to achieve something? His past life, while not filled with regrets, was certainly not the path he wanted to choose.

Seeing Mel Carlo swipe his fingers in the air, the chubby kid felt a chill and quickly turned over to lie down. What he couldn't see didn't concern him.

Mel Carlo continued to study the System carefully for a while before finally giving up. The lottery section was even more useless, with no indication of what could be drawn. Besides being able to check his Level, the most useful thing at the moment was the 100 inventory slots.

"Did I reincarnate a bit too early?" Mel Carlo had read many online novels in his past life. There was a trope where the original host had already achieved success on their own before the System came online to distribute beginner packages.

"Or perhaps the System needs something to activate it, or the game's plot hasn't truly begun."

While Mel Carlo was speculating about various possibilities, he never considered that the System had met its annual business target, and therefore he was released without System guidance.

He had to figure everything out on his own. There were no distributed quests, no deliberate guidance, as if he had been abandoned in this strange world, a true orphan.

Lost in thought, Mel Carlo fell asleep. When he woke up the next day, the others had also woken up. He felt sticky and uncomfortable. He hadn't bathed since reincarnating, and the original body of this body also seemed not to have bathed in a while.

However, in his current identity, it was unlikely he could change clothes. Although the weather wasn't too cold yet, washing and drying clothes would take a day, meaning he might have to go naked for the entire day.

Mel Carlo walked out of the room and went to the water vat to fetch water to wash himself. If he could change into a different set of clothes, that would be ideal. The stains on his burlap clothes had already caked on.

"Mel, you seem a bit unhappy?" Lily followed behind Mel Carlo.

"I'm a bit uncomfortable. I really want to take a bath and change my clothes," Mel Carlo replied truthfully, continuing to walk outside.

"But we don't have any clothes to change into," Akai said, standing nearby. He was used to it and didn't mind.

"Let's go, we're going out." Mel Carlo left the courtyard with the other two. Although they still had copper coins, it didn't mean they could do nothing.

The money in the System could be used for offerings, but if they couldn't explain the source of the money, the gang's informants would easily notice. Therefore, they had to continue as usual.

They had to sneak around, beg when necessary, and once they had the chance to escape the Imperial City Gang's control, they could naturally live like normal people.