"Ugh... Did I get hit?" Wang Ji woke up in an alley, clutching his head and hissing in pain.
Then a torrent of memories flooded his mind. "Hah! I can't believe I got swept up in the transmigration craze too. Jiangnan Base City... Yi'an District No. 3 Middle School... Hong and Thor... Ugh... This is the Swallowed Star World!!"
Wang Ji staggered out of the alley. Dozens of stories of imposing buildings loomed on either side, and below them stretched busy, thoroughly modern streets. It took him half an hour to reach a cramped residential complex.
North Bank Residential District, Building 48, Apartment 4402.
The tiny apartment was only thirty square meters, yet it had been divided into two bedrooms and a living room. It was cramped, to say the least.
"Cough, cough! Xiao Ji, you're back..." came the weak voice of a middle-aged woman.
Wang Ji looked up. In the bedroom, his mother leaned against the headboard, her eyes full of concern. His nose stung, and a rush of affection surged through him. Before he knew it, he called out, "Mom..."
In that moment, the image of his mother from his previous life, who had passed away years ago, merged with the middle-aged woman lying in bed. Wang Ji had truly become part of this world.
Who cared if he had transmigrated or not? The self he'd been in his previous life had vanished when that dump truck hit him. In this life, he'd make a fresh start in this world of infinite possibilities.
The next day, Wang Ji got up early and went to school with his older sister, Wang Yan. Their family consisted of just the three of them: Wang Ji, his older sister, and their mother. Their father had died when Wang Ji was little, and their mother had been bedridden for the past two years. Wang Ji and his sister could only support themselves by working after school.
After school that afternoon, Wang Ji followed his memories, transferring buses twice before reaching a dilapidated factory building by the city wall.
In the distance, the towering, broad reinforced-concrete wall stretched away like a mountain range, rising hundreds of meters high. Beneath it stood run-down factories and courtyards that reeked of filth. That was right: it was a waste-sorting facility. Wang Ji worked there part-time.
For a seventeen-year-old kid with no particular skills, finding steady part-time work after school in the crowded Yangzhou City Base City was incredibly difficult. So he couldn't afford to care whether the job was smelly or dirty.
Following his memories, Wang Ji entered the factory's office with practiced ease.
"Hey! Wang Ji, why didn't you show up yesterday? I'm counting that as skipping work! Do you even want to keep this job?" The speaker was a greasy, chubby young man. He glared at Wang Ji with an air of arrogant menace. The boss's brother-in-law, he was the supervisor of this waste-sorting facility.
Drawing on the tact and experience of his previous life, Wang Ji grinned and showered him with flattery. Half a minute later, he finally got off the hook. The chubby man said, "I'll let it go this time! I'm docking you a hundred!"
Wang Ji smiled and thanked him. The moment he turned around, his face twisted with the urge to kill the fat bastard. Damn it, he only made sixty a day, and the guy had docked him a hundred while acting like he was doing him a favor. Fat bastard!
In the workshop, Wang Ji sat beside the conveyor belt, greeting the workers next to him as he sorted the waste with practiced ease.
Plastic, scrap metal, sticky household garbage, and all sorts of other rubbish—all sorted and dealt with.
"Huh?" Wang Ji stared at a battered helmet coming down the conveyor belt. Why was it glowing with a hazy light? Could it be a treasure? But why did the workers around him act as if they couldn't see it?
Curious, Wang Ji reached out and picked up the helmet. "Ding! Instance space discovered: Monster Town. Enter?"
Damn! A cheat! Wang Ji was ecstatic.
Since transmigrating the day before, Wang Ji had tried all sorts of things, but his cheat had never appeared.
He'd been so dejected, thinking he didn't have one. These days, who transmigrated without a cheat?
Who would've thought it was waiting for him here!
Buddha bless me!
Wang Ji cautiously asked Uncle Yan beside him, "Uncle Yan, take a look at this helmet."
Uncle Yan glanced up. "Oh, it looks like a helmet used by warriors! The material's a lot tougher than steel helmets. But it's cracked this badly... I wonder what happened to the warrior wearing it..."
"What do you think happened? It's caved in, and there are two huge cracks. The guy's brains must've been smashed to pulp," Cripple Song remarked with a curl of his lip.
"Didn't you see anything else?" Wang Ji asked cautiously.
"Anything else?" Cripple Song asked, puzzled.
Wang Ji felt relieved. "Oh, nothing. I just meant this is probably equipment used by an official warrior. It might be worth a bit."
Uncle Yan chuckled. "It should be an A1-grade helmet. In this state, it's scrap. A new one might be worth tens of thousands, but this one... isn't worth two or three hundred!"
The main issue was that A1-grade material contained too little Kro Alloy. Recovering the small amount of Kro Alloy from the material might not even cover the labor costs.
At long last, ten in the evening came, and Wang Ji finished his shift. He hurriedly carried the damaged helmet toward the exit. As waste sorters, they were allowed to take a few things that were still barely usable. They were all poor families, and plenty of things could be used again after a little fixing. Of course, they had to pay for anything they took. It wasn't free.
"Supervisor, I'll take this busted helmet!" Wang Ji said with a broad smile to the greasy, chubby supervisor.
"Hmm? Oh! Four hundred!"
"What? This thing's worth four hundred?" Wang Ji put on an expression of shock and indignation.
Uncle Yan chimed in beside him. "Supervisor, this thing would only fetch a hundred or two as scrap! Xiao Ji's been working here for over half a year!"
"Fine, fine. Two hundred!" the chubby supervisor said impatiently, waving his hand.
Wang Ji nodded gratefully to Uncle Yan. Without another word, he took out two hundred and handed it to the chubby supervisor.
At night, with everything silent, Wang Ji quietly slipped out of the cramped bedroom. After a moment's thought, he picked up the War Blade he used for training. Though it was made of special steel, in today's society it was considered no more than training equipment. After all, it wasn't made of Kro Alloy, so it would struggle to pierce even a Primary Beast Soldier's defenses.
After closing the bedroom door, Wang Ji touched the damaged helmet again. "Ding! Instance space discovered: Monster Town! Enter?"
Wang Ji tried communicating with it, but it seemed completely impossible. That confirmed it: his cheat had no intelligence of its own!
That was fine too!
With a thought, Wang Ji said, "Enter!"
In the blink of an eye, he went from the cramped bedroom to a similarly dark, ruined building.
"Roar!" A beast suddenly roared outside, scaring Wang Ji so badly he nearly wet himself! That roar was way more terrifying than a tiger's roar at the zoo in his previous life!
Wang Ji didn't bother with anything else. With a thought, he said, "Exit! Exit!" In an instant, he reappeared in the bedroom.
"Whew! Whew! That was terrifying!" It took Wang Ji a long time to calm his racing heart. Fortunately, he could return instantly. As long as he wasn't killed in one blow, it was actually fairly safe. The only real danger was dying before he had a chance to react.
"But... Monster Town... Hmm, it should be where Quasi-Martial Artists go for their trial. If I'm not mistaken, the danger should be manageable!"
Wang Ji steeled himself and silently repeated, "Enter!"
"Roar!" Wang Ji still shuddered, but at least he managed to hold back his fear.
"Ding! You have entered Level 1 instance space: Monster Town! Mission: Kill at least 3 monsters to complete the trial!"
Before you continue