Lu Mi came out carrying his shopping bag and saw Roman already waiting for him by the entrance.
"I bought some everyday supplies. What about you?" Lu Mi asked casually.
Roman said, "I don't know either. The staff recommended them, so I bought them."
"Recommended?" Worried he had been talked into something, Lu Mi said, "Let me see."
He opened the bag to find three enormous jars of catnip, along with a few little toys like cat teaser wands.
Lu Mi fell silent for two seconds, then raised his arm and pointed toward the shopping center.
"Get back in there and return them."
Roman was confused, but obediently did as he was told.
He found the staff member from earlier and said solemnly, "Exchange these. He doesn't like them."
The staff member stared at him. "But none of these have even been opened or used. How do you know your cat doesn't like them?"
"He told me himself to return them," Roman said. "Obviously, he wants them returned because he doesn't like them."
"Are you sure it's a cat?"
"Yes, a tabby cat."
"..."
The staff member nearly fried their brain trying to make sense of the situation. In the end, they concluded, "Could your cat be angry?"
"Angry?" Roman looked thoughtful. "He does seem a little angry."
The staff member made another recommendation. "If you want to earn a cat's trust, it's best to base your actions on a solid understanding of the theory. Especially with a naturally unruly tabby cat. With the right approach, even they can become very clingy."
"Very clingy..." Roman murmured.
Holding a copy of "A Guide to Growing Closer to Your Cat: The Tabby Cat Edition," Roman happily walked out of the shopping center.
He was illiterate and couldn't read it. But that was all right. It was only temporary.
Before he had gone more than a few steps, however, he spotted Lu Mi sitting on a nearby stone bench, chatting with a woman with wavy blond hair. They were talking and laughing, looking very happy.
The smile at the corners of his eyes vanished instantly.
Roman silently slipped behind a tree.
"That's really amazing. You can use this flat little thing to talk to your friends. Can you also look up things she's posted online?"
Lu Mi pointed at the object in the woman's hand as he asked.
Roman looked closely. Having traveled through different worlds countless times, he immediately recognized it as a smartphone from modern society.
The woman answered him with a gentle smile.
"You can. But this is a game world, so the phones we bring in don't get a signal and can't access the internet. We can only play offline games, watch shows we downloaded beforehand, look at photos and videos, things like that."
The more Lu Mi heard, the more excited he became. "Photos? You mean you can keep photos in there?"
"Of course." The woman tapped and swiped a few times on her phone, pulling up a photo to show him. "This is a picture I took with my roommates when we graduated from college. Want to try?"
"Sure."
The two leaned in together, and the woman opened the front-facing camera. "Come on, give me a smile-"
Lu Mi saw himself on the phone and found it fascinating. "It's just like a mirror."
"Are you really from the real world? How do you not know what a phone is?" As she spoke, the woman pinched his cheek.
Seeing that, Roman steadied his breathing.
He wanted to kill that woman.
After thinking it over carefully, he headed back into the shopping center.
At the counter, the staff member repeatedly asked for confirmation. "Are you sure you want to buy this?"
"Yes."
"Almost no one buys these here. Are you sure? It'll use up almost all your points."
"Yes."
After the woman left, Lu Mi waited quite a while before he heard Roman call out to him.
"What took you so long?" he asked, but Roman simply pushed a white box into his arms.
The familiar gesture gave him a bad feeling. When he opened it, he found a smartphone inside.
"I happened to overhear your conversation with that woman," Roman said. "You seemed to like it, so I got you one."
Lu Mi lowered his head, holding the box in his hands. After a long while, he quietly called his name. "Roman."
"Yes?"
"What happened to that light green sweater?"
"I left it in that instance. I probably can't get it back," Roman said reassuringly. "There are plenty of other nice clothes. That one doesn't matter."
"That's not what I meant..." For the first time, Lu Mi felt truly bad at expressing himself. "Anyway, thank you. Is there anything you want?"
Roman had been about to say no, but after his eyes shifted, he answered, "Yes. I want you."
"What?" Lu Mi froze.
"To stop letting just anyone pinch your cheeks," Roman said, as though Lu Mi had merely misheard his startling declaration.
"You mean that woman just now? Her name is Jin Bi. I went over to ask her about her phone, and she was really friendly. We even agreed to enter an instance together next time if we got the chance."
Afraid Roman might not understand, Lu Mi explained, "The longest you can stay in the rest area is seventy-two hours. If you want to enter an instance as a team, you have to hold hands beforehand. That way, you'll enter the same instance."
Roman didn't care about that. He stared intently at the spot on Lu Mi's cheek where she had pinched him. "So she's your friend now?"
Lu Mi was taken aback, not expecting that question. "I suppose so. A new friend. We'd have to spend more time together before we could be as close as Xiao Ning and I."
Roman nodded thoughtfully, urging him to open the box and try the phone.
If she's a friend, I can't just kill her.
Lu Mi didn't notice the flicker of regret in his eyes.
He carefully picked up the phone and swiped across the screen, copying what Jin Bi had done.
After fiddling with it for a while, he successfully opened the camera.
"Roman, let's try taking a picture."
He excitedly raised the phone and pressed the button at the bottom center, only to find that it wasn't quite what he had imagined.
Roman silently watched his puzzled expression, then smiled and said, "You switched it to video just now. You do it like this..."
In the Public Rest Area, there was no need to work or worry about food, clothing, shelter, or transportation.
Ignoring the people who were "dealt with" for breaking the rules, life seemed peaceful and happy.
But the inevitable always came. After hearing someone in the plaza break down and mutter, "I don't want to enter an instance," for the umpteenth time, Lu Mi calculated how long he had been there. It was almost his turn, too.
At two in the afternoon, Lu Mi and Roman went to meet Jin Bi beneath the electronic screen in the plaza, as arranged.
Jin Bi had brought a man with a buzz cut, who immediately grabbed Lu Mi's hand and shook it vigorously. "Hello, I'm He Shengguang. I'm so lucky to get to enter an instance with you this time."
Lu Mi exchanged a few polite words with him, a little puzzled as to why he would say that.
Jin Bi smiled and pointed at the electronic screen above them. "You don't know yet? The rankings update in real time. Lu Mi, you've only been through one instance, but you've already earned far more popularity points than other players at your level."
Sure enough, the screen displayed a ranking titled [Rising Popularity Star], with Lu Mi's name prominently listed at the top.
About to enter an instance. Players, please prepare. Countdown: 10, 9...
Before you continue