GRMFBS CH253

Arriving in Youfeng City, Zhan Yan and Gu Jiancheng first booked a hotel in the town, planning to go out and play the next day.

It was much cooler here in Youfeng City, and the hottest days of summer had already passed. Otherwise, they wouldn’t dare host a large-scale outdoor role-playing game. Even if they did, it would have to be a Flaming Mountain theme; it definitely couldn’t be the Eighteen Scenes of the Underworld.

Otherwise, with the sets looking all gloomy and eerie, but the tourists and actors sweating profusely and wiping their faces, only boiling oil cauldrons and volcano sets would feel immersive, right?

“What are the Eighteen Scenes of the Underworld?” Zhan Yan was flipping through the official tour guide.
He knew about the Eight Scenes of the Underworld and the Eighteen Levels of Hell.

Gu Jiancheng lay next to him, reading along, their two heads close together.

“The Gates of Hell, the Bridge of Helplessness, Fengdu City, the Home-Viewing Terrace, the Offering Pavilion, the Lotus Terrace, the Forgotten River Road, Meng Po’s Shop, the Stone of Three Lifetimes, the Reincarnation Terrace…” Zhan Yan muttered. “They just stuffed in places from various different legends and forced them to add up to eighteen, didn’t they?”

Gu Jiancheng looked at the introduction again: “Role-playing as a batch of ghosts guided to the underworld by the Black and White Guards… In our version, after the ghosts are sent to the underworld, are they just left alone to clear the stages themselves, and they only get to reincarnate if they succeed?”

Zhan Yan laughed jokingly: “Right, so smart people don’t reincarnate; they run away when the Black and White Guards come to catch them.”

Gu Jiancheng played along with the nonsense chatter: “Then how do they reincarnate after running away? Isn’t the Reincarnation Terrace in the underworld?”

Zhan Yan continued to talk nonsense: “We don’t reincarnate; we become humans as soon as we land.”

Gu Jiancheng: “Turn into little babies?”

Zhan Yan: “Yeah, turn directly into little babies.”

He stopped speaking here, the smile on his face unconsciously fading.

When he first got the Gossip System, Zhan Yan had searched for his own gossip feeds.
Perhaps because he was checking his own life and things he had personally experienced, the gossip system wasn’t limited to only going back a year or two, like when searching for other people’s gossip feeds.

He scrolled back page by page, from nineteen years old all the way to six years old. He was adopted by his parents when he was six, and he had stayed in the orphanage for half a year before that. Six was the estimated age given to him by the caretaker at the orphanage.

Zhan Yan’s earliest memory stopped at age six. He only remembered living in the orphanage; he couldn’t remember anything earlier. When he was little, he asked the orphanage caretaker how he got there, and she said he was picked up at the orphanage door during the summer.

Zhan Yan found that gossip feed.
[You were left at the entrance of the Starlight Orphanage.]

He didn’t scroll back any further.
A hand suddenly rested on his waist.

“Hmm?” Zhan Yan had just turned his head to look at Gu Jiancheng when he was grabbed by the waist, pulled into an embrace, and rolled over on the bed.

The wall, the ceiling, the other wall… the scenery before his eyes spun rapidly as the world turned upside down. Finally, he lay flat on his back on the bed, with Gu Jiancheng’s handsome face hovering above him. They were so close that their breaths intertwined.

Those star-like eyes sparkled brightly in front of him, and he suddenly flashed a brilliant smile:
“Smile, Yanyan.”

Smiles are contagious. Zhan Yan couldn’t help but start smiling along with him.

That handsome face pressed down, nose tip touching nose tip, rubbing twice like a big cat. His lips pressed over too—incredibly soft, melting one’s heart with the friction.

Gu Jiancheng hugged him and rolled over again. Both of them were now lying on their sides, arms tangled together.
He leaned in again, muttering contentedly by his ear: “Yanyan looks so good when he smiles.”

Zhan Yan’s heart felt overwhelmingly tender and soft.
He hugged Gu Jiancheng, opening his mouth to say something, but couldn’t get anything out.

Xiao Gu didn’t have a home anymore, either.
He just wasn’t very lucky before the age of six, but after turning six, he had been lucky all along. He got a very, very good home.

Xiao Gu should also have a very, very good home.
But right now, this very, very good home was full of little secrets.

Zhan Yan let out a small sigh of worry. He liked secrets, but he didn’t like this many secrets…
Fortunately, Xiao Gu hadn’t been clinging to him as much recently, so he had free time to get busy with other things.

Checking the gossip feeds, his parents had also started getting busy. The two of them had spent a sweet, long vacation together, and now that the holidays were over, they each donned their secret identities and went back to work—although there was nothing recently that strictly required them to take action, they couldn’t just never show up.

He now had his sister’s help. Having half the pressure shared out felt so relaxing.
He wondered how his sister’s progress was going?

Just as he was thinking about this, Luo Wang sent him a message.

Admin Luo Wang: “Ahahahahaha.”

Approaching Science: “Haven’t seen you around in a long time. You slept for so long this time.”
“What are you so happy about?”

Admin Luo Wang: “I don’t know what happened this time either, sleeping for so long.”
“But as soon as I woke up, there was a good thing hahahaha.”
“Oh right, you know that the Artisan was poached by the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau, right?”

Approaching Science: “I know.”
Not only do I know, I even participated in it. But how is the Artisan joining the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau a good thing for your Wan Yao Alliance?

Admin Luo Wang: “You haven’t checked the forum, have you?”

Zhan Yan grew curious. He had been too busy lately and hadn’t browsed the casual chat section for a while. Was there a new post in the forum?
Zhan Yan clicked into the casual chat section and started scrolling through posts. Before he could find it, Luo Wang sent him a link.

Admin Luo Wang: [Link]
“Go look, go look!”
“Hahahaha”

Clicking the link, it was another one of those enduring ranking-flame-war posts—arguing over combat power, arguing over looks, arguing over everything.

There was nothing special about the post itself. As usual, some people praised while others stepped on them. It was just a bunch of bored people rambling on, using all sorts of verified and unverified things as evidence for their arguments. Except for a few comments that went too far and got deleted, the admins couldn’t be bothered to manage most of it, nor could they manage it all.

89L:
How could the Chongming Demon King’s ranking be so high?! He’s incredibly petty, has a bunch of bad habits, and looks worse with feathers than without them. Without feathers, at least he looks appetizing.

Zhan Yan checked and found out this was Xiang Liu’s alt account. Xiang Liu’s ranking was quite a few spots lower than the Chongming Demon King’s.
Tsk, tsk, tsk, you didn’t say that when you were getting beaten up.

Xiang Liu could only take advantage with his words. Zhan Yan continued scrolling down and finally found the reason the thread had become so lively—the Artisan had also appeared in the thread and was fiercely blasting Xiang Liu’s alt account.

The two went back and forth arguing for nearly a hundred floors. In the middle of it, they got several accounts banned for using censored curse words. The “Artisan” had already extended to “Artisan No. 7,” while Xiang Liu had switched to his 37th account. Mostly because Xiang Liu didn’t know how to curse creatively; every time he got too angry, he would start spewing censored words, get banned, and then fail to learn his lesson, continuing to use censored words the next time.

[Xiang Liu’s 2nd head scolded his 4th head: “I told you not to curse **!”
3rd head scolded the 4th head: “You’ll get banned!”
5th head scolded the 4th head: “This alt account is gone again!”]

[Xiang Liu’s 4th head was angry and aggrieved: “The 1st head also cursed ***, why aren’t you scolding him?”
The 1st head jumped up with a howl: “You just finished scolding me a round ago!”]

[Xiang Liu’s 6th head said: “Stop arguing, stop arguing! The Artisan is cursing at us again!”
7th head: “Quick, think of how to curse back!”]

[Xiang Liu’s 8th head said: “****”
9th head: “No, no, we can’t say that word; we just got banned for it a moment ago.”]

Zhan Yan: …Pfft, hahahaha.

109L:
My God, am I seeing things? Is the one arguing the Artisan?

113L:
They’re all fake alt accounts, right?
Doesn’t the Artisan only fan over the Tianshi?

116L:
I can prove it! It’s not just alt accounts, at the very beginning the Artisan’s main account showed up, but because they cursed too harshly, it was banned and shielded. It was originally at 90L.

120L:
Ah? Does that mean the Chongming Demon King poached the Tianshi’s fan?

Admin Luo Wang: “You saw the Artisan speaking up for the Chongming Demon King, right?”
“Hahahaha, so what if the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau scooped up the Artisan?”
“Look, aren’t they a fan of our Chongming Demon King now?”

Zhan Yan: …Crap.
Ah, if Luo Wang knew about it, Ling Yu should know too, right? And if Ling Yu knew, the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau would know too… Won’t they misunderstand?

Zhan Suiru hadn’t done it on purpose. Mainly, Xiang Liu’s words had been too nasty at the start, and she couldn’t hold back. Xiang Liu’s nine heads each had their own flavor when cursing, and eventually, Zhan Suiru accidentally got caught up in the heat of the moment.

The siblings coincidentally both switched to their alt accounts to reply to the thread.

123L:
What do you mean poached?
That guy was speaking so nastily, isn’t it normal to not be able to stand it and retort a few times?

124L:
Isn’t the Artisan free to fan over whoever they want? Both big shots are great, what’s so strange about fanning over both sides at the same time?

125L:
But the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau and the Wan Yao Alliance don’t have a good relationship hahahaha, now it’s awkward, isn’t it.

129L:
What’s the big deal? It’s not like our forum doesn’t have people who fan over both sides. @ApproachingScience

132L:
Hahahaha this is getting fun, before Approaching Science was a fan of the Chongming Demon King first, and later became a fan of the Tianshi.
The Artisan was originally a fan of the Tianshi, and now is a fan of the Chongming Demon King.
Do these two big shots share fans?

Zhan Yan: …How is this sharing fans? This is sharing kids.

Looking at the gossip feeds, Nie Yu had indeed already seen it and was worrying with her brother Nie Ling about how to report this news.

Zhan Yan quickly poked his sister. He used to think the two big shots wouldn’t care who their fans liked, but ever since he tried and failed to praise his mom in front of his dad, he realized that his dad was actually a bit petty…
Even though he didn’t know if his mom would be like that too… but what if she was?

Zhan Suiru held her phone, worrying. She had just taken a break halfway through trying to repair Xiao Ran’s soul and casually browsed the forum. Who would have thought she’d run into someone hating on her dad? She couldn’t hold back for a moment.

Artisan: “How about I go send some things to show that I still love her the most?”
Approaching Science: “Give it a try.”
Mainly because there was no other way.

At the Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau.
Nie Yu had long seen this post and was anxiously discussing it with her brother.

“What do we do, brother…”
Rong Sui was an external staff member of their Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau. She had formidable strength, was personally bound to a super big shot in the crafting category, and had a close connection with the Dawn World that was currently merging. Any news related to her was no small matter.

Nie Ling: “It’s not necessarily that she became a fan of the Chongming Demon King, right? Maybe she just couldn’t stand the sight of it and said a few words. Just report it normally.”

“Look at how she argued using up to 7 alt accounts for the Chongming Demon King; it definitely wasn’t just a momentary urge. Besides, there are plenty of posts like this, and we’ve never seen her speak up for anyone else before.” Nie Yu muttered, “Honestly! When did the Chongming Demon King contact Rong Sui and poach her? Our Captain is so great… How are we going to tell the Captain about this?”

Nie Ling poked her.
Nie Yu: “What’s wrong?”
Ji Yueming asked from behind her: “Who poached whom?”

Nie Yu jolted.
She slowly turned her head: “Cap-Captain, you’re back?”

Ji Yueming, who had just returned from a sweet vacation, was in an excellent mood. She looked at her smilingly: “What is it that you can’t tell me?”

Nie Yu had a bitter expression on her face. How did she get caught gossiping secretly again?
“It’s nothing, just… just…” She stumbled over her words as she explained the situation with the forum thread.

Ji Yueming didn’t mind at all: “What a minor thing, look at how troubled you are. Just because she thinks the Chongming Demon King is good doesn’t mean she thinks I’m bad. Liking whoever is all the same; the Chongming Demon King isn’t a bad person anyway.”

Nie Yu: “That’s different…”
Ji Yueming rubbed her head and joked, pretending to be worried: “Sigh, what do we do then? My fan ran away…”

Nie Ling coughed.
Ji Yueming turned her head. Rong Sui, dressed all in mysterious black, was standing right at the doorway.