In the morning, when Roland lazily opened his eyes and instinctively reached toward the space beside him, all he touched was a cold bedsheet. The chill instantly cleared his head.
"Ah..." Roland smacked his lips listlessly. With Nyx away, he had returned to the carefree, neglected days from when he had first arrived in Flowing City, living without a worry or a thought in his head.
"I've fallen... I need to become disciplined!" Roland silently encouraged himself.
"I'm too far gone. No way I can be disciplined..." Less than two seconds later, Roland burrowed back under the covers.
"System check-in!" Only after lying there like a corpse for a while did Roland begin his daily perfunctory routine. Given the damned system's usual behavior, there was no way it would give him anything worthwhile on such an uneventful day. At most, it would toss him some little trinket as consolation. It used to give him Shire Horses fairly often, but now it did not even give him those anymore!
"Check-in successful! Congratulations, Host, for obtaining an Equipment Advancement Card—Swift River Infantry!"
"Oh? It actually dropped something?" Roland abruptly sat up in bed. This was a rare sight! He had only seen this a few times in all this time. The last one had been a Universal Equipment Card—One-Handed Sword. Every soldier Roland obtained had come with a refined steel sword, but this equipment card was actually for a designated troop type.
"Let me see what this is." Roland opened the system panel and discovered a covered card. On its back was a golden six-pointed star formation wrapped around by a coiling dragon!
"Whoosh!" As Roland flipped open the equipment card in midair, the entire card burst with golden light before dissolving into specks of light and scattering through the air.
"Congratulations,