plumnovel Chapter 70 : Underlying Currents
Chapter 70 : Underlying Currents
Underlying CurrentsSince she had found a house to call her own, it was only natural for her to go inside and have a look.
However, having just the deed wasn't enough to get inside. At the moment, the door was securely locked, and though it was only a rusty little iron lock, due to the system's restrictions, no amount of brute force could break it down.
After spending a minute or two trying to pry it open with her dagger, and even pulling out her handgun to fire several rounds at the lock, Cecilia finally understood something when she looked at the perfectly undamaged wooden door.
Without the matching key, no matter how much effort you wasted, you just couldn't open this lock.
Therefore, if she wanted to officially take over the house, there was one more thing that had to be done: find the previous owner, and get the key from him.
Left with no other choice, Cecilia set out once again with Gu Yanxi. Comparing the previous owner's address listed on the deed, they diligently checked each house number one by one.
Fortune favors the persistent. After patiently searching through the nearby neighborhood for several minutes, Cecilia finally found the previous owner.
He was an elderly man, dressed in a faded, well-worn old suit. Sparse hair covered his scalp, and two streaks of white mustache grew above his lips. He didn't look any different from other NPC Merchants in the Main City.
He looked at Gu Yanxi, who was standing outside the door, and asked in a hoarse voice, "You're here to take over the house? Good, let me have the deed for a look."
Gu Yanxi glanced at Cecilia for confirmation, and when she nodded, handed the deed over to the old man.
After examining Gu Yanxi's deed for a long moment, the old man fumbled in his suit pocket and finally produced a key, handing it back together with the deed to Gu Yanxi. He continued, "Alright, there's no issue with the paperwork. Beautiful young lady, that house now belongs to you."
......
With the key in hand, Cecilia and Gu Yanxi returned to the door of the small building.
This time, nothing stood in their way. Using the key, they easily unlocked the door and entered the stand-alone house.
With a series of teeth-gritting "creak" sounds, the long-sealed door was slowly pushed open. The first thing in Cecilia's sight was a lobby decorated in a style reminiscent of a tavern: wooden floors, a bar counter, several sets of tables and chairs—all made of solid wood. Having sat unused for a long time, everything was blanketed in a thick layer of dust.
Aside from this, there was a faint musty odor in the air. Some parts of the stairs were badly damaged from moisture, and when Cecilia carefully stepped onto them, they creaked loudly.
She cautiously climbed up to the second floor. On both sides of the short corridor, all the room doors were tightly shut. Old kerosene lamps hung from the ceiling; the fuel inside the lamp-shades had long been depleted. In every respect, the place was no different from the inns Cecilia had visited before—just older, and even more dilapidated.
The third floor was more or less the same as the second. In short, the interior of this house was very old. If it was to be used again, everything would need to be renovated.
After inspecting the house, there was nothing else to do. Although the arena wasn't far away, given the recent candid photo incidents on the forum in the past couple of days, to avoid any further escalation, Cecilia and Gu Yanxi locked the house up again and logged out of the game.
The midsummer night was unbearably stifling. The air conditioning hummed, but inside, the room was tranquil.
.......
The next morning, Cecilia was once again awakened by a noisy commotion.
Enduring the dizziness brought on by low blood pressure, she struggled out of bed, went to the bathroom to freshen up, and ate the breakfast that Gu Yanxi had bought.
After breakfast, she lounged on the sofa scrolling through the forum for a while, checking for any offensive posts. If there were any, she'd delete them, and conveniently slap the poster with a 999-day gag package, then it was back to another day of relentless leveling.
Apart from taking breaks to eat and use the bathroom, for the next few days, Cecilia and Gu Yanxi were fully immersed in the world of Legend of Kaloran: farming materials and carefully leveling up.
At this stage, leveling up had greatly slowed, but Cecilia's efficiency at monster farming was extraordinarily high. After a full three days—she had no idea how many times she had repaired her equipment or how many wild monsters she had slain—Cecilia's experience bar was finally maxed out again. She painstakingly leveled up from 16 to 17.
Meanwhile, Gu Yanxi, who had always teamed up with Cecilia, also officially broke through to level 15, becoming the second player in the world to reach level 16.
With Cecilia's retirement, the world of Legend of Kaloran finally returned to its old tranquility over the last few days. No new events; players found no new world-class bosses.
However, beneath this calm, surging undercurrents remained.
The new version was about to launch, and the server merge with the Japanese and Korean servers was fast approaching.
Because there was so much new content in this update, and it would have a huge impact on the current game environment, most players were desperately leveling up, saving money, and expanding their influence, in hopes of building a powerful force after the update, ready to resist and counter the influx of foreign players.
Of course, there were also many, like Cecilia, who planned to launch inter-server wars once the servers fully merged, fighting to compete for the Japanese and Korean servers' territory and resources.
In this atmosphere, the Kaloran continent's naturally robust and vibrant folkways grew even more pronounced—everywhere was bursting with vitality.
On the other hand, in the real-world forum, topics related to Cecilia's photo remained persistently hot.
In the past couple of days, lots of people had even traveled from other cities specifically to visit that bank, taking photos in the same spot and pose and then posting them on the forum—a practice known as "pilgrimage."
This not only boosted foot traffic for the bank, but also became a trending topic on the forum.
However, since Cecilia herself had not appeared publicly, most netizens just amused themselves, with only a small minority still tirelessly wandering the area in search of Cecilia's whereabouts.
In the blink of an eye, it was the fourth day.
That morning, Cecilia drew aside the bedroom curtains. At eight o'clock, sunlight flooded into the room, making everything brilliantly bright.
The sky was clear without a single cloud. Clearly, it would be another scorching-hot day.
It hadn't rained in Xijiang City for more than a week. According to Gu Yanxi's calculation, her first period would be completely over within the next couple of days.
After breakfast, as usual, Cecilia scrolled through the forum, banned a few mouthy fools, and then logged into the game together with Gu Yanxi.
Today was a day worth remembering: if nothing unexpected happened, the Darkwing Demon Bat would reach level 14 and, at last, cross the fabled "Kaloran watershed" to level 15.
Cecilia had never forgotten—level 15 was the level at which the Darkwing Demon Bat unlocked the "mount" function.