GRMFBS CH179

Zhan Yan opened the gossip thread his sister shared with him.

A Dragon King statue disappeared from a Dragon King Temple in Bince City. Upon investigation, it was discovered that a certain believer felt it was too tiring to go to the temple to worship the Dragon King, so they secretly “invited” the Dragon King home to worship.

Zhan Yan smelled a familiar scent from this piece of news. Opening the Gossip System to search, it was as expected: this was an altered news piece by the True Science News Agency.

[Taking advantage of Dragon King Yuan Wei’s rotational shift, Little Black Dragon Yuan Jing renovated the Dragon Palace into a disco club style, and installed a flashing disco ball on Prime Minister Turtle’s back. Prime Minister Turtle reported this to Dragon King Yuan Wei, and Yuan Jing ran away from home and refused to return. Dragon King Yuan Wei could not leave his post without authorization, so he possessed the divine statue and found Yuan Jing, who disguised himself as an ordinary person, to beat his son.]

Pfft, hahahaha.

Thank you, sister, for sharing the happiness! It was a pity he couldn’t send the truth back to his sister so they could eat melons together.

Zhan Yan’s mood improved. He got up and went to the bathroom to wash up, and realized he had forgotten to close the window last night. The sink’s drain plug was also closed, collecting a shallow layer of water inside, and three little sparrows were happily splashing around in it.

Oh, so this was the little puddle they were talking about.

The sparrows were startled by Zhan Yan’s sudden entrance and flew out of the sink in a panic. Two flew away out the window, while one fluttered around the room dizzily, unable to find the window.

“Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid,” Zhan Yan extended his arm and stood still, “I won’t hurt you, come, I’ll take you out.”

The sparrow gradually calmed down and landed on his arm, tilting its head to look at him with great curiosity. It boldly walked a few steps forward along Zhan Yan’s arm, lowered its head to peck at his sleeve, and then looked up at him again.

A suppressed “Holy shit!” came from behind.

Zhan Yan turned around and saw Chu Chengcheng staring at him dumbfounded.

The little sparrow became agitated again, and Zhan Yan hurriedly walked to the window to send it out.

Only then did Chu Chengcheng dare to speak. He was incredibly excited and gave Zhan Yan a thumbs up: “Son of Nature, living up to the reputation!”

He had heard about Zhan Yan’s animal-attracting constitution before but had never seen it with his own eyes.

Zhan Yan smiled shyly and pointed at himself: “Innate Holy Body for Veterinary Medicine!”

He discovered that his constitution had unknowingly changed back, and was even slightly more potent than before. In the past, he didn’t have the ability to make a panicked sparrow land on him.

Perhaps it was because the system upgraded animal communication?

“Why are you up so early?” Zhan Yan asked.

Usually, these two had to wait until he finished his morning exercises before getting up.

Chu Chengcheng yawned: “Sigh, my eldest uncle woke me up. He said his son is sick and asked me how to treat him.”

Zhan Yan: “Cat son or dog son?”

Chu Chengcheng: “Neither, my cousin, a human.”

Zhan Yan: “Huh?”

Chu Chengcheng: “He just heard I was studying medicine, he didn’t know it was veterinary medicine.”

Zhan Yan: “Pfft.”

After his internship, Zhan Yan went back at night and continued scrolling through Red Crystal’s gossip threads.

[Red Crystal found an unoccupied corner in the network and secretly practiced how to build a world using data.]

[Red Crystal failed in practicing how to build a world using data, and switched to practicing how to build a room using data.]

[Red Crystal failed in practicing how to build a room using data, and switched to practicing how to build a cube using data.]

[Red Crystal failed in practicing how to build a cube using data, and angrily cleared out a large swathe of network anomalies.]

Zhan Yan was confused by these gossip threads.

What was going on? Red Crystal could annihilate virus anomalies with a single finger, summon a rain of red crystals in the network world, and easily create a barrier encapsulating the entire game world. How could someone this strong not even know basic skills like building objects using data?

Could it be… that Red Crystal, just like him, only recently discovered he had outstanding talent for network-type abilities, hence why he was very strong but didn’t understand basic common sense? Looking at the gossip threads, it was highly likely. Red Crystal’s gossip threads first appeared during that time clearing out virus anomalies. It was also Zhan Yan’s first time seeing such severely fragmented gossip threads. The past was completely blank, not that he couldn’t scroll to it, which indicated that Red Crystal was a newly emerged identity. That instance of clearing out virus anomalies was Red Crystal’s first time entering the network.

Zhan Yan saw the gossip threads continue to refresh.

After clearing out a batch of anomalies, Red Crystal’s mood smoothed out, and he continued practicing basic network-type skills.

He really was a newbie!

But why could Red Crystal directly sweep away network-type anomalies despite not knowing anything and needing to be taught by others after discovering his network-type talent?!

Jealous, so jealous! To think there was such an astoundingly talented person in this world!

Zhan Yan recalled being scared by Red Crystal last night, and decided to enter the network and secretly sneak near where Red Crystal was practicing to exact revenge for being teased.

Looking at how Red Crystal was secretly practicing, he probably felt embarrassed to ask someone to teach him. Hehe, once he discovered him, he could offer to teach Red Crystal, and then ask about Red Crystal’s relationship with the apocalypse, the Lord, and the Artisan.

Zhan Yan began entering the network with anticipation.

…

Zhan Suiru hadn’t used her psychic power for too long; picking it back up required her to re-adapt and practice. Psychic power was an extremely sensitive force; without sufficient control, one couldn’t perform fine operations. And when it came to searching for a soul, fine operations were the most important. She worried about causing further trauma to Yang Ran’s soul.

Adapting to the application methods of network-type abilities was a great way to practice applying psychic power. But her practice wasn’t going very smoothly.

She was accustomed to directly utilizing her own psychic power. Her actions in the network world could be very smooth; attacking anomalies and setting up protections were things she was used to doing in the past. But she didn’t know how to interact with data.

The restrictions of the network felt like a layer of binding to her, and the omnipresent data was like a tangled mess of ropes.

These tasks requiring her to interact with data were like making her work while bound in ropes, whereas the network-types of this world could all knit rope nets and tie knots simultaneously.

Her practice wasn’t progressing smoothly, but Zhan Suiru felt it was fine. She could completely persevere, not to mention there were readily available targets here to vent on.

However… when this kind of practice was discovered by someone, it wouldn’t be so wonderful anymore.

That network-type who slipped away yesterday scurried out again like a squirrel.

He even sent her a bundle of information: “Yo! What are you doing?”

So punchable.

Zhan Suiru clicked her tongue. Didn’t he slip away at just a little scare yesterday? Why was he so gutsy today?

Did he discover her practicing and realize she was a “newbie”?

She wasn’t a real “newbie” though…

But Zhan Suiru didn’t mind continuing to tease the kid.

Zhan Suiru: “Pretending to be a cute newbie to fish for a bite.”

Zhan Yan: …You’re lying to me, I already saw it in the gossip threads, you just don’t know how!

Zhan Yan: “If you don’t need help, I’m leaving.”

Zhan Suiru: “I need it. Are you willing to teach me?”

Zhan Yan: “Hmph hmph, let’s go, I’ll take you to another place.”

While he was practicing earlier, he had built a few rest rooms himself. Now they came in handy.

Zhan Suiru happily followed the “squirrel”.

See, didn’t the fish take the bait?

Zhan Yan hadn’t been hanging out with Red Crystal for even two days when Nie Yu came looking for him.

Administrator Lingyu: [Is your relationship with Red Crystal pretty good?]

Approaching Science: [Yeah, how did you know?]

He and Red Crystal hit it off quite well. For some reason, getting along with him carried a wondrous sense of tacit understanding and ease.

After Red Crystal discovered he didn’t know how to clear anomalies, he even took the initiative to teach him. The two were currently engaging in a skill exchange.

Nie Yu felt a bit numb seeing Approaching Science’s reply.

The Abnormal Affairs Management Bureau had been incredibly busy these past few days because of Red Crystal, this suddenly emerged mysterious network-type. But Red Crystal appeared and disappeared like a ghost; the only time they caught him was when Approaching Science ran over to research the barrier and happened to bump into Red Crystal.

After seeing the report, Nie Yu guessed that the one who dared to directly touch the barrier was Approaching Science.

He was truly incredibly daring.

Not only was he incredibly daring, but he was also very sociable.

She really didn’t know how Approaching Science did it; all those difficult-to-deal-with people had a good relationship with him. Deep Shadow was one, the Artisan was one, the Chongming Demon King also appreciated him very much, the Tianshi in their Bureau was the same, and now came a Red Crystal.

Administrator Lingyu: [What do you think of Red Crystal? Is he reliable?]

Approaching Science: [Very reliable, his efficiency in clearing anomalies is super high, and he even taught me.]

Administrator Lingyu: […He even taught you?!]

Approaching Science: [Ah… um, it’s not that I don’t want to learn from you, it’s just that you’ve been busy lately. You teach super, super well!]

Administrator Lingyu: [I don’t mind that… never mind.]

Administrator Lingyu: [Do you know how many network-types want to learn from Red Crystal?]

Approaching Science: [Huh?]

Zhan Yan was a bit bewildered. He hadn’t cleared anomalies before, nor did he feel there was anything special about the methods used to clear network-type anomalies. Weren’t they all the same method? It was just that depending on each person’s ability characteristics, there would be some differences.

Administrator Lingyu: [Red Crystal’s methods are very special. The barrier he laid down is different from any network-type. We didn’t find any analyzable data from it, yet it exists within the network world. You understand what this means, right?]

Zhan Yan understood.

The network world was composed of data. Data was everything. Just like the real world was composed of atoms. If something undetectable by data appeared in the network world, it was like an object appearing in the real world that wasn’t composed of atoms.

This either meant the appearance of another unknown new particle or an entirely different law of existence, or it meant there were rules concerning “atoms” that people had yet to discover, such as cathode rays composed of electrons.

Regardless of which reason it was, this meant major changes were about to occur among network-types.

But when Zhan Yan was learning from Red Crystal, he didn’t feel anything special.

Part of the reason was that Zhan Yan was a complete newbie among network-types; he had no fixed mindset. Like a blank sheet of paper, he smoothly accepted the things Red Crystal taught him. And the other reason was…

Approaching Science: [But when we move in the network, we don’t utilize data either.]

When he initially entered the network, he didn’t utilize any data. He could see the data stream like heavy rain, but the data was the data, and he was him. He traveled through the data without having a body composed of data. He felt the data passing through his will, and didn’t feel he shared any similarities with the data.

Nie Yu was stunned.

She suddenly discovered a flaw in her own cognition. Yes, when they moved in the network, they didn’t utilize data. They relied on their own power—they were living human beings, not virtual existences in the network. Their consciousness entering the network was in itself their own power.

In other words, was Red Crystal utilizing entirely his own power? Then what should this power be called, and how should it be utilized?

Nie Yu suddenly felt a helpless bewilderment, along with the accompanying anticipation and excitement.

What was this power?