Cthulhu's Candy

After confirming the skills, Wu Lei said with a satisfied look, "So, what do you think of the skills I assigned you? Liu Xing, you can now serve as the most important Doctor in a Cthulhu Mythos RPG, protected by your teammates. It's a shame you rolled such low Size and Strength. Your HP and damage are both too low, so you're basically the type who dies the moment you get separated from the group. Still, you have 50 Credit Rating now. Once the campaign starts, try to get yourself some weapons and equipment. That should make up for the innate flaws in your Character Card."

Liu Xing nodded. Wu Lei was absolutely right. The strengths and weaknesses of his Character Card were equally obvious. Its strength was that Liu Xing could fill the indispensable Doctor role in any Cthulhu Mythos RPG team, and he also possessed an important skill like Psychoanalysis. Unless the situation was extremely urgent, his teammates would protect him. His weakness, however, was his pitifully low HP and damage. Under normal circumstances, even a single round of attacks from a Ghoul might instantly kill him. That was why Liu Xing had put points into Jump. As for his attacks, they were practically nonexistent...

Thus, Liu Xing's Character Card had already determined that he would be a team-oriented character. He began praying that he would run into some reliable teammates.

Liu Xing chatted with Wu Lei for a while longer. Naturally, Liu Xing subtly probed for information and gained quite a bit of personal experience regarding Cthulhu Mythos RPGs. As a Veteran Driver, Wu Lei's advice benefited Liu Xing greatly.

After politely declining Wu Lei's invitation to lunch, Liu Xing returned home, turned on his computer, logged into the Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG Game Hall, and finished allocating the Skill Points on his Character Card.

After finishing all that, Liu Xing fell into deep thought. How should he spend the next few days so that he could die without regrets...

After thinking about a bunch of random nonsense, Liu Xing decided to browse the store out of boredom and see what items his 50—no, 49 Points could buy to give himself another chance at survival.

The store in the Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG Game Hall was no different from those in other games. Recommended items scrolled across the top, while all sorts of items and the gift packs Shan He had mentioned were displayed below.

To Liu Xing's delight, these gift packs were not expensive. Most ranged from 10 to around 200 Points. However, after reading their descriptions, Liu Xing felt they might as well be renamed Lucky Bags, because they were basically the most common type of gacha pool in mobile games. Players could only draw the listed items from each pool, and there was not even a pity system.

For example, Liu Xing was currently hesitating over one particular gift pack—the Newbie Gift Pack. This pack contained over fifty possible items, ranging from an Eldritch Charm worth 5 Points to a Character Card worth 1,000 Points. Liu Xing only needed to pay 20 Points to buy this Newbie Gift Pack and randomly receive two items. Of course, it could only be purchased once.

In theory, the lowest possible return from this Newbie Gift Pack was two Eldritch Charms worth a total of 10 Points, resulting in a loss of 10 Points. However, according to its description, every item had an equal chance of being drawn. The odds of getting two Eldritch Charms should therefore be extremely low. Buying the Newbie Gift Pack ought to be a guaranteed profit, unless his Luck was unbelievably terrible...

Then Liu Xing remembered that his Character Card had a Luck score as high as 80. Gritting his teeth, he bought the Newbie Gift Pack.

Liu Xing deliberately washed his hands first, then dug out a box of mosquito coils left over from last summer. This counted as the "bathing and burning incense" ritual. Then he sincerely prayed to Cthulhu, hoping Cthulhu would give him a hand today...

After all, this was the Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG Game Hall. It was only natural to pay respects to Cthulhu.

Ding.

After a crisp chime, Liu Xing opened the Newbie Gift Pack.

When Liu Xing saw the two items he had drawn, he finally let out a long breath. It seemed his Luck really was quite good.

The first item was a bottle of green tea from a certain brand. This green tea could restore Sanity Value and could be used up to three times. Each use restored 1d6 Sanity Value and had a 50% chance of pulling a Player out of a state of madness. It was absolutely a miracle drug in a Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG. Under normal circumstances, Sanity Value did not recover on its own. Only when one of a Player's skills exceeded 90 points would they receive a Sanity Value recovery reward. According to the rules of the Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG, once a skill surpassed 90 points, the Player was considered a master in that field, much like Professor Yuan in the field of hybrid rice. Otherwise, they had to receive psychiatric treatment through certain special methods. Green tea like this, which could restore Sanity Value anytime and anywhere, was practically insurance for his sanity.

A bottle of this green tea was priced at a full 200 Points in the store. Just drawing it meant Liu Xing had made a killing from the Newbie Gift Pack. But the other item was worth even more than the green tea.

Cthulhu's Candy. Eating this candy would bring unexpected results. Value: 999 Points.

Liu Xing could not help falling silent. He had not expected such a move!

"Cthulhu's Candy" was a homophonic meme. In a song about Cthulhu, there was a lyric: "I'a! I'a! Cthulhu Fhtagn!" Its original meaning was "Long live Cthulhu," but when it spread to China, someone misheard it. A cute-minded translator then changed the lyric to, "Yiya, yiya, Cthulhu's handing out candy!" From then on, the "Cthulhu's Candy" meme spread among Chinese Cthulhu enthusiasts.

However, Liu Xing had never expected even this Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG Game Hall to be using the meme. Apparently, this was not a serious game hall either...

We're a game hall with a higher Total Party Kill rate than the Main God Space. Can we stop acting cute?

Liu Xing could not help rubbing his forehead and sighing.

However, the description of this candy from Cthulhu left Liu Xing completely baffled. He had no idea what it meant. Liu Xing could only interpret Cthulhu's Candy with the utmost suspicion. Could those "unexpected results" mean turning him into a Deep One?

With that thought, Liu Xing decided to put the candy away for safekeeping and never use it unless absolutely necessary. After all, he had no desire to turn into a Deep One for no reason at all.

After browsing the store for a while longer, Liu Xing exited it. Naturally, he was short on funds. However, he did not log out of the Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG Game Hall right away. Instead, he went to the Guild Interface and started reading the announcements. The announcements not only listed which Players would begin games on which days, but also marked the areas in which those Players specialized. For example, Liu Xing was classified as a support-type Player.

Thus, Liu Xing settled on the date of his next Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG session: ten days later, because twelve combat-type guild members would be starting a game that day.

P.S. Looks like the main plot will only begin in the next chapter. Please continue to bookmark and recommend.