Pada tahun 20XX, sebuah perusaha'an game terbesar berhasil membuat sebuah terobosan baru. Game yang selalu dinantikan oleh para gamers di seluruh dunia, yaitu Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online, atau biasa di sebut dengan VRMMO, akhirnya tercipta.
Free World Online, adalah game VRMMO pertama yang bertemakan dunia yang bebas tanpa hukum.

It was the 3rd month of Tanatswa's unemployment and things weren't looking up for him. He had surfed the web for companies that would put to use his programming skills, even submitting his CV to businesses that didn't seem like they would need an IT person, but alas, his efforts were met with no responses and harsh berating from his mother. He had been called lazy even though he dedicated the entire day to emailing more than 300 companies. Things were tough but his parental figure's scolding didn't make it easier. Some people got jobs through nepotism, knowing who is who in the market, and the fact that' that piece of networking advantage was lacking in his arsenal of talents, made him feel seriously fucked. 



Even when he did get replies and went for interviews, it almost always seemed as if for some reason, he didn't meet their requirements. Tanatswa took his time to learn more web development frameworks and useful tools like Angular.js, Bootstrap and even advanced forms of PHP. He believed that he could impress a potential employer if he closed the gap of knowledge he had concerning things he needed to know as a developer. The growth was ever so slightly an improvement that made him more competent and capable of handling much more complex software projects, but alas, even that effort didn't pay off. This was undoubtedly a dark time for this young man's life.

 

During this period of his life, Tanatswa tried to find outlets to make money, even returning to the skill sets he had given up on to pursue his education. Though, if was being completely honest with himself, he had barely made it through university. He graduated with a 3rd class degree and finally cleared his tuition debt. He wasn't one to keep debts and liked to owe no one anything, but realized that most of the business tycoons he had read about didn't pay their taxes and owed a lot of money to the government. This made him consider whether or not he felt good about being a debt free person who is also broke and unemployed. The thought would make him feel like shit and he would avert his mind onto other matters, matters like getting back to drawing his comic and entering it for an online contest or pursuing a youtube channel that never really experienced any growth. 



Tanatswa had liked art and also partly chose a computer science program because of his interest in game design and the marvelous art that was accompanied with video games. His art skills were rusty but he knew that with a little effort he could get back into it and level up in the skill chain. Apart from farming the coding knowledge on the internet, he would now dedicate his time to improving his gaming skills and killing time with anime youtubers. This was rather a pathetic lifestyle as compared to the expectations that society expected from someone like him.  

 

Tanatswa went through a gradual slump in his life, but was neither an overt trouble maker and got along with most people, exhibiting manners and respect towards people of all walks in life. However, this wasn't always the case for people who he found annoying or deemed insufferable. The pool of friends that this young man had was small and even he didn't believe that he had anyone he would classify to be his best friend. Whenever he felt depressed or wanted to have a discussion about a show he liked, he didn't have anyone to really indulge him in an interesting conversation. Even if he couldn't do it face to face with someone, the online options weren't always to his liking. Going on forums or even the discord servers to find someone like minded was as tasking as getting a job. 



Sometimes the fun people were there, but their appearance was rare and having to filter through the trolls, memers and the perverts who could not get into intellectual discussions peeved him a lot. He eventually got frustrated and barely used any of those platforms. Facebook, twitter and even Instagram got boring for him. Even youtube slowly began to lose its sparkle. Shows that seemed to have their shine became repetitive and he no longer saw any value in consuming their content. This would propel him to search for other content creators, but when he would find their stuff, after a while he would get bored. The young man felt bewildered by this gradual decline in interest and worried about his mood swings.

 

After a while, Tanatswa had two websites up, one as a web application and another as just a normal site. He thought that maybe due to a lack of a portfolio that maybe he had been side lined from job opportunities because of that and decided to send a link of his work included to his attached CV. This happened at the same time as he was about to finish drawing his comic which he was going to submit to a contest. He was thinking that if things were not going to work out on this Japanese site he would take his material to either webtoons or tapastic. He was now in his 5th month of unemployment and he really wanted his efforts to pay off. As he expected, the inclusion of his finished works made a difference and he got called for just 2 interviews. However, this didn't go as he expected.

 

At interview number one, the tall 6 feet tall, ebony skinned, skinny Tanatswa, came in to an office that was at the outskirts of town. He was well dressed, and looked super dashing in his light grey suit, beige shirt and black tie, accompanied with crimson shoes. He didn't have the broad shoulders to finesse his appearance but at least the tailor had made a suit that matched his body type. He walked into the building that looked more like a home that was being repurposed to be a working environment. There the young man went through the process of telling the secretary that he had an appointment with the head of IT there. The woman on the desk who had a nice face but a body that was in desperate need of exercise, made a phone call. Tanatswa waited and darted his eyes everywhere. 



The place looked kind of interesting and there were a lot of certification frames placed all over the wall and as always, the picture of the president of the country was on the wall. The place looked homely, but eventually, Tanatswa's time for his face to face with his potential employer was about to begin. A stocky man who was light skinned, wearing a striped shirt and black trousseaus called for him. Tanatswa followed the man's lead and meet him in his office. There Tanatswa was grilled about his intentions for working at the company, and the shock of his life came from when he got to see how his 2 websites looked on the man's device. The employer had a Mac desktop and its screen dimensions were extremely wide and everything he worked looked different on it. Some of the icons were off and looked like shit.



 Tanatswa opted for the man to check how the website looked on his phone and laptop, lucky for him, the man gave it a shot despite getting an immediate negative impression from the desktop orientation of his websites on his Mac. The websites looked fine on the other devices, but the fact that he had missed one mark had messed his chances. Finally they gave him an aptitude test to see whether or not he could demonstrate real coding capabilities. 



Tanatswa was given a website that was done by some company that wanted it revamped, but the source code seemed like an abomination. It was well commented but it was clearly a template that was reworked by some tasteless developer who left a mess. It was chore to go through and even more of a struggle to find all ids and classes used for everything. Going through the mess took a while and soon enough, his time limit was over. The end result was that they would assess his performance and give him a call. A week passed and he never got a call and the other interview he went for turned out to be a disaster. This was only the beginning to a perpetual list of misfortunes.

 

After Tanatswa had submitted his comic and got his results after 2 months of waiting, he had mixed feelings about the results. The judges essentially stated that he had the best story out of all the contests but his art was in the lower bracket of their score. Due to this uneven scoring, he didn't place really high in the ranking but he got an honourable mention. This was the first time he was acknowledged for his talents by an organisation and he felt a bit happy, but this wasn't really the result he desired. If he had won, he would have claimed the prize money and moved out to pursue his comic as a published author serializing in their magazine, but even if that did not happen, at least he got consolation that he had writing talent. Tanatswa began to dabble into art tutorials online at the same time doing chores for his mom, who seemed to only escalate he indignation towards the unemployed youth. 



Tanatswa's goals had shifted and he now wanted to become a comic artist instead of dedicating his time towards finding employment where employers didn't seem to want him. This change in what he wanted to pursue fuelled him with fire and he practiced stuff like foreshortening, figure drawing and complex angles of dynamic poses. Sometimes the drawings would come out well, but for the most part it was a struggle. Tanatswa began to wonder whether or not he would ever get as good as the artists he idolized and wondered whether or not he should team up with someone really talented to draw in his stead, however, the young man wanted to make this happen through his own merit. He finally entered another contest but this time, he was unlucky.

 

With the popularity of the prior contest a behemoth of pro artists were attracted to the upcoming one and entered it. His art had improved and his story was plausible but compared to the elite talent that had joined in, his work paled in comparison. Deep down inside he envied them and wished these pro god tier artists would have entered something else so that the rookies could get a chance to shine, but nevertheless, his final chance was taken from him and he was left depressed. Tanatswa thought about the webtoon and tapastic options but the only way to make it on their platforms was to have a consistent release schedule of work and also to become a featured artist on their platform. Featured artists would get paid plus with the promotion from their site, a creator could leverage the traffic drawn to them by opting for a *******, but it took him forever to get even one issue out and his mother seemed tired of supporting a bum like him. Thus he would have to be sent to the village and subsist on farm life or live with his poor uncle in the worst possible part of the country. 



The gamble had not paid off and he was unemployed, a failed comic artist and a failed developer. Eventually, drawing itself became a painful experience. The young man turned to porn, masturbating 3 or even 5 times a day, sometimes he would go on those dating websites which he knew were a waste of time because 95% of the user base were men and the supposed sexy women who wanted to get laid were actually bots posing as actual people. This morbid catharsis made him laugh inside but also made him feel like shit. He was 23 years old and feeling like a loser, but he always made a point of hiding that side of him. Tanatswa never liked wallowing in misery and showing the world that he is sad. Whenever he had the chance, he would always dress up and get fancy hair cuts that made him look cool and dashing, hiding his broke appearance, but that was it, it was all just an appearance. He pretended to be okay, dressed up nice and faked a smile, but was really dealing with depression. He reflected on his life and even began to associate his lack of success as to why he never really had luck with women. He had never gotten laid and he was already 23 years old. 



The closest thing to anything sexual he had gotten were lap dances and really arousing grinding from women who probably had to sit on top of at least 40 random crotches of men in a night. This was mainly a means to deal with his sexual frustration, but at those clubs that he did go to, even married men or guys who had girlfriends would get lap dances, grabbing women's asses and doing unholy things with them that they wouldn't even consider with their significant other.


 Tanatswa believed that he wouldn't have had to come to such a place if he had a girlfriend and probably wouldn't even do it for fear of being unfaithful, but seeing all the alpha males getting lap dances, fucking side hoes at the same time having a girlfriend or wife,  gave him a slight paradigm shift. Being a decent human being didn't matter; all he needed was power, fortune and luck! It became clear to him that he was competing in this world at a handicap and needed a boost. However nothing relieved him from his suffering.


A full year had passed and he was now destined to continue his existence at either his uncle's decrepit living hell hole or at the village to become a farm boy. Tanatswa no longer enjoyed drawing, programming, watching television or even waking up. He got interested for a while in music production, exhausting more than a 100 tutorials and even made a few decent bangers, but then after  some research he realized how cut throat it would be for him to even make it in that scene. At that point he was just throwing darts into the air and hoping that something would just stick. He was wasting time, caught in morbid thoughts and drowning himself in some doom and funeral metal to wallow in his misery. The music gig didn't work out, even the acting gig he tried bombed badly. Everything seemed hard and all he was good at was failing. 




Tanatswa sat on his bed and cursed, "Fuck the world, fuck it, fuck it all!" He looked at the ceiling and darted to the left side of his bed which had a pile of tissues that were covered in the semen of his 6 masturbation sessions. It dawned at him that he was nothing but a piece of shit human being and that he wanted to die.  After all he had done throughout his life he had decided that there was one thing he had to succeed at doing. Ending his life!

A young man struggles with unemployment, failed dreams and overall becoming a useless member in society and decides to kill himself. Upon seeking this method of death, he encounters a being from the alternative realm who gives him an option of starting his life over from scratch, from level 1 on his planet. This gives him the chance to finally carve out a path for himself that he could never do on earth.




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If you enjoy the book, please do leave a book review or comment. I will try my best to respond to all of them so please do. It helps me out. Also, the paperback version of this novel will be available soon so if you want hardcopies, it will be available on Amazon.com

It was a sensation of movement that woke Rylee up. The slight sway of someone carrying her, while her cheek rested against their chest. The shirt had a fresh smell to it that reminded her of the lake. When her eyes opened slightly, she could see the small cut on the side of his mouth. But she was too tired to reach out and touch it.

She drifted back asleep with the hum of music around her. The melody seemed familiar, but she was too exhausted to focus on it. The rumble of a car almost overpowered it, and she disliked the sensation. In fact, any sound was starting to make her head hurt.

Rylee murmured unhappily in her sleep, only to feel a comforting hand touch her hair. It put her mind at ease. She was safe. The noise was tolerable with someone there...

The next morning came with more clarity. Her mouth felt like it was covered in something unexplainable sweet. Bandit licked her face and whined for attention, which forced her to open her eyes. She was in her room, on her bed, but still wearing that silly sundress. It was wrinkled, tangled under her legs and caught up in her blankets. Her hand groped for her cell phone, eventually finding it and unlocking the screen. It was still early in the morning, but she felt like she already slept for weeks.

"Rylee, did I hear you moving in there?"  Tara asked, head appearing in her doorway. Rylee sat up with a groan, wondering why everything hurt so much today. 

"Did we crash a car again?" She asked, rubbing her head and wondering why she felt so disoriented. 

Tara chuckled, coming over to sit in her desk chair. "No, but I wouldn't be surprised if you has a hell of a hangover."

"Hangover?" Rylee didn't drink. She couldn't imagine choosing to start now, especially after her recent trip to the hospital. 

"You has a mix up with a bottle of alcoholic fruit punch. Zane left it in the fridge, Evan didn't know, I'm sure they'll apologize more when they see you." Tara had an expression like she was torn between anger and humor. "The good news is you didn't take any of your medication yesterday, so we avoided some nasty side effects."

Memories tricked through her mind like sand. Rylee could remember working with Evan, realizing what his comic was, and then going to find something to drink. She remembered a girl with dark hair and a kind smile, and pizza. She definitely remembered pizza.

"I feel... confused. And my stomach is upset. But you always complain about your head," Rylee commented, wondering why she lacked the splitting headache Tara always got when she drank.

"Well, they hydrated you, fed you, and we let you sleep it off. Seems like that did the trick."

Rylee felt somewhat touched. The guys did a lot to make sure she was okay. She couldn't blame them for the mixup either. It wasn't like Evan gave her the glass. 

She pulled her pillow behind her and leaned against the wall, fingers touching her side. While her head felt fine, her body felt worse than it had before. The bruises had darkened on her legs, the cuts covered in scabs, beginning to feel itchy. After having Tara help her to the bathroom, she wriggled free of her dress and bandages, and gazed at the injuries, heart becoming heavier. The long gash ran across her hip, twisted over her thigh, and stopped above her knee. The stitches held the wound together, but there were still scabs of blood in the deepest spots.

Rylee limped carefully to the bathtub, and held the wall so she could stand and clean up. The water stung her body, and she gritted her teeth, forcing herself to stay put. When she was clean, she reapplied bandages and changed into a fresh dress. Feeling exhausted, but more presentable, she limped her way back to her bedroom.

"Hey! I told you to tell me when you were done!" Tara's words were sharp behind her back. Rylee started to look sheepish, until she noticed her roommate has the wheelchair. 

"Are we going somewhere?" Rylee asked hopefully.

"I'm taking you over to Evan's," Tara responded. 

"Again?" Rylee hoped she didn't sound rude, but she was genuinely surprised Tara was letting her return.

"We said you could help, and I think we should follow through. I have to cover your shift today, so I'd rather not leave you alone."

"You act like I'm on probation," Rylee complained. She sat in the chair but it didn't stop her from sulking.

"I didn't realize you disliked seeing Evan so much," Tara replied.

"No! It's not that!" She blushed deeply and looked at her hands. "I just hate feeling so helpless. I mean, on the one hand, I'm helping with his work, but the other makes, it feel like I'm being babysat."

Tara snickered, "I would have fired them if they were actually in charge of keeping you out of trouble, Ry. Bringing you home drunk was not what I expected. You need the distraction, though. I like seeing you spend time with real people not just online friends."

"My online friends are real..." 

"Yeah, where do they live? What are their names?" 

Sensing she was losing, Rylee gave up. 

The car ride was free of further conversation, the only noise being Tara's loud radio. The heavy base beat sent vibrations through Rylee's teeth, and she felt she may have been premature in saying she didn't have a headache. When they got to Evan's, Rylee accepted the help into the chair, and let herself be rolled into the house. It wasn't until Tara drove away that either spoke, sitting back in the computer room.

"So, the next thing I guess you can help with is this commission for a bakery logo. I sent them some drafts and they narrowed down their favorites. I picked out fonts to try, but I'll need help with the lines and some of the coloring. That shouldn't take long... then we need to work on the panels for next Monday's update." He paused, catching her gaze.

"I thought about what you said, and I let my followers know you would be helping, and they're on board. They liked what you did and gave us the green light, so you don't have to worry about that," he explained. Rylee felt relieved, and a little nervous.

"I just hope I don't let you down. I mean, your kind of trusting me with your reputation right now," she gulped.

"You did great yesterday, just don't overthink it," he put the pen for his tablet in her palm. It was like metaphorically passing the torch.

She started finishing the bakery commission without much trouble. Evan had blocked out most of it, she just had to clean up some lines. The comic was more complicated. There were dialog bubbles, frames, and several layers to navigate. She found herself chewing her lip with thought, brow knot in concentration as she settled into a groove. Evan came and went, keeping the distractions to a minimum. He only stopped her when he felt it was time for lunch.

"I made roast beef sandwiches. If you don't like them, I also have lunch meat. I know it's not very exciting," he apologized.

"No, it smells great," Rylee remarked as he helped her into the kitchen. He used the oven the melt the meat and cheese,  and also warmed up a sauce to dip them in. It was simple, but it tasted delicious. It took self control for Rylee not to scarf it down in one bite.

"If you can cook, how come Zane is always bringing over pizza?" Rylee asked when she was finished.

"I guess it's just sort of a habit at this point. We had a lot of nights back in college gaming and ordering pizza because we were too busy to cook. Now I have the time, but rarely the company."

Rylee felt lucky to have her roommate. Sure, Tara was a little obnoxious sometimes, but they shared food and were always within reach. "Do you ever get lonely living alone?" She asked. 

Evan considered it, and finally nodded, "Sometimes. But Zane spends enough time here, he almost is my roommate."

Rylee wondered how she managed to miss so many chances to meet Evan, but maybe the time just hadn't been right. They were on separate paths doomed to cross, and now that they had, it felt almost disappointing it took so long.

Rylee was a college student with her dreams spread out before her. She was engaged to her best friend, pursuing her passion for art, and couldn’t wait for the future. But everything came crashing down when he departed, leaving her heart and her wallet empty. 

Despite the pain of betrayal, she tried not to loose hope. Putting her plans on hold, she was forced to focus on a 9-5 work cycle, secretly wondering about the ambitions she shelved in the process. The occasional artist alley table was not enough to fulfill her longing to do what she loved, and importantly, to find REAL love.

Everything changes as she grows closer to an online friend. Late night role playing adventures turn into long conversations, and his encouragement spurs her to return to forgotten projects. Meanwhile, she meets a famous artist, who makes her want to give love another chance.

Could it be, this love story, would be hers this time?

Authors notes: Bi-weekly updates, original story, thank you for reading!

I have been awed by the mystery and the powers of the elements since I was a kid. I think I ought to give credit to all the anime cartoons that was available in our time, especially when it dominated the Philippine Primetime shows in the 90's. I also caught the Funny Komiks fever which is actually quite an integral part of my childhood as I've learned to read and associate the words just by looking at the pictures – all by myself and with my twin brother, KC. This culture pushed me to draw pictures and cartoon characters that led for me to be creative, ultimately finding out that I can make and invent stories of my own. 

As my skill advanced from the traditional stick figures, I needed a challenge and by the age of eight, I have started to make my own stories loosely based on the arena-type battles such as Dragonball Z, Pokemon, and Flame of Recca. We don't have much money then so we have to improvise to hone our craft. After the end of our school year, my twin brother and I used to pull the spring from my notebook and compile all the empty leaves to stitch 'em up together to form a thick notebook to make my cartoon stories – my very own comic book. We have made tons of it, usually strips of stories that ranged from ten to twenty pages at most, but by the end of my first year in highschool I finished a full length comic book story called "Pyrobot" – a robot created to protect the Earth similar to Combatron and Megaman. But this didn't make me happy though. The plot of the story is quite juvenile then, so I plotted a story – a serious one that touches topics of mystery and gives tales of adventures made by an entirely different civilization. That's when I conceptualized "The Omegatribe", which is the book's original title eleven years ago. I tried to plan it to fruition but then school made me extremely busy, it forced me to just put a pin on that project. 

Graduation came fast which made me happy for a bit thinking I could start the project in hiatus but lo and behold, college revealed to be my enemy too. I tried drawing slides and planned to color it in the computer by scanning it and rendering it on Photoshop but all was in vain as this takes too long a time to continue. This project is going down the drain and I could feel the urge of giving up but luckily, God has given me a window. He led me to our college publication, The Business Access Magazine, and this gave me the necessary foundation to make me adept in putting my thoughts into words. After gaining my bachelor's degree in Management at the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila, I finally vowed to finish the story I started on 2003 and turn this comic book into a novel instead. On January 2009, I started to write it all up. It's quite hard at first as I have been writing it while taking another degree in accountancy at the University of the East. Also, the challenge is the research and plotting the story to make it complete. This ate time that it took three years for me to finish it and another year and a half to revisit the story: to create a time table, assign the time frame, and identify the lunar faces on each chapter. I have finished writing it on the same time I passed the board last year on May 2013. I have to thank God for this miracle as I couldn't have done it without his blessing, guidance, and inspiration. It's quite a challenging adventure, one that I am really thankful to experience.

When Bathala created the world, He made sure that the Earth will be safe from the Mortals: the Men and Women of the Earth. Their potential for evil has saddened Him deeply. He has to go away to create Paraiso but He needs to protect them from destroying themselves.

To make sure that life will prosper on Earth, He has blessed three righteous tribes and mandated them to protect the Fountain of Life from being corrupted. The Fountain seeds green life on Earth. Without the fountain, life will cease to exist.

The three tribes that are led by Nagozul, Yagisiv Haya, and Daomagar, left their villages and created their dominion on Bathala's three islands collectively known as The Holy Lands. Their purpose: "Protect the Fountain of Life at all costs." They have been true in following their holy edict and have proven themselves to become the Holy Sentinels of the Lands of Bathala. They have maintained the secrecy and the anonymity of the Holy Lands with perfection as life continued on Earth.

Tens of thousands of years later, the Kingdom of Nagozul has now grown arrogant and has disobeyed Bathala's mandate. An impending doom now shrouds the Holy Lands. Extinction of the mortal race is upon them and the fate of the world is at stake. It is up to the brave Holy Sentinels, the young Princes of Nagozul, to complete the mission and save the souls that are inhabiting the islands of God.

Self-made cotton paper was a very important and necessary item when hamster breeding. It could be bought from the Internet. The product was whole, raw, pulp paper, without any artificial dyes, and it could be cut into finger-wide strips. Hamsters would instinctively search for nesting materials after giving birth to their pups. If they couldn't find them, they would be anxious, even if the owner had already made a nest for it. It was useless, however, as it would only be reassured if it was a nest made by the hamster themselves.
The cotton paper was given to the children for free by Zhang Zian––a pack was only ten yuan––and he had the children cut them into paper strips.
When the children saw that the female hamster was actually eating the cotton paper strips, they were all very shocked.
"Is the female hamster hungry? Why is it eating cotton paper?" Little Celery asked, worried.
"Yes, should we give it some food to eat? What if it gets so hungry it eats the little hamsters?" another child added.
"You all think it is eating the cotton paper? No, it is just keeping the cotton paper in its cheek to make it easy to move it to build a nest. The reason why we needed to cut the cotton paper into thin strips was because if it was too wide, it couldn't fit it into its mouth…"
After the cotton paper passed through its mouth, it would become softer, and hence it could not be replaced by normal sawdust. Sawdust was too hard; it could not eat it and it was not suitable to build a nest with.
It kept several pieces of cotton paper strips into its cheek pouch, then ran back to its baby hamsters. It spit out the cotton paper and started to make the nest without any guidance. After that, it ran back into the corner to eat the cotton paper again.
"Isn't it better to directly put the cotton paper closer to the babies?" a child who asked. "That way it wouldn't have to run back and forth. It just finished giving birth so it must be very tough for it, right?"
Zhang Zian nodded. "It is indeed very tough for it, but during the making of the cotton paper and the transporting of it, it is impossible to prevent it from getting some human scent on it. When it puts it in its mouth, its own scent overpowers the human scent. It can't be put too close, otherwise that wouldn't happen."
The children saw that the hamster mother was very busy even though it had just given birth and had used all its strength. It was still painstakingly traveling back and forth, building a shelter for its children. They could not help but pay tribute to it.
Zhang Zian said, "When your mother gave birth to you, she experienced much more pain than the mother hamster. In order to take care of you, she also did more hard work than the mother hamster. She not only had to take care of your clothes, food, and living, but she also had to run between her house and her workplace every day to earn more money in exchange for a bigger and more comfortable house––in exchange for good food, for things for you to play with, in exchange for a happier life for you… So you all should be considerate of your mother, and not always make her angry. Try to help her share some housework, which will be the best reward for her."
Remembering their mothers' daily hard work and how they often made her angry because of their studies and their naughtiness, a few of the usually naughtier boys bowed their heads in shame. Several already sensitive girls were so moved they had to wipe away tears.
If one just stood on the platform and nagged, it would absolutely not have such an effect. One would not be able to let the children intuitively understand the hard work of motherhood. They had to witness it, personally feel it, in order to leave a deep impression on them. If one could do that, the cost of buying pets and the hard work of keeping pets would be meaningful.
No matter if it was pets kept at home or school rearing courses, the purpose was not simply to let children play, but to cultivate their love and sense of responsibility in the process of raising pets. If they could also experience the hard work of mothers in the breeding process, that would be great.
The children had made up their minds to try to start doing housework when they got home later that day––even if it was just helping their mother sweep the floor or wipe the table.
"Little Celery does very well in this aspect. You all need to learn more from her," Zhang Zian encouraged.
"I… I still have not done enough…" Little Celery lowered her head, embarrassed.
Wang Yaning was a bit awkward. Her studies were very good, and all her time outside of school was spent on homework and various interest classes. Her mother also did not let her do any housework.
While they were chatting quietly, the female hamster had already moved all the cotton paper into the corner, made a shallow pit in the sawdust, put the pups in it, and then covered it with the cotton paper to make a simple and warm nest. After all, the newborn hamsters were hairless and had poor heat preservation abilities.
"The baby hamsters won't suffocate?" someone asked worriedly. They saw that the cotton paper had already totally covered the baby hamsters.
"Don't worry. That's the good thing about cotton paper and sawdust: There are a lot of holes in the middle and they can breathe, so it's not a problem," Zhang Zian said. He retrieved the food bowl the female hamster normally used and opened a bag of small steamed buns made of goat's milk and eggs that he purchased online. He put a few into it, and then put them into cardboard boxes as supplementary food for female hamster.
Although he did his best to encourage the children to prepare their own pet rearing supplies, baking was too hard for children.
The female hamster was still busy making a nest. Even if he prepared food for it, it did not have time to eat. It was just hurriedly drinking water to replace the water that it had lost while giving birth.
"You have an electric kettle here, right? Bring an egg tomorrow and boil it in plain water. After boiling it, you can break off the egg white that is the size of the nail cap and feed that to it to make sure it has enough protein. Don't overfeed it. The rest can be fed to other hamsters," Zhang Zian ordered.
"I see people feeding hamsters with mealworms. Is it better to eat live food?" a boy asked.
The girls all scrunched up their faces and said, "No mealworms. That's disgusting!"
Zhang Zian was standing on the girls' side this time and agreed. It was better not to feed them mealworms. For house pets, live food was not necessarily good because live food could carry bacteria, and there was a small amount of toxin on the mealworms.
In a twinkling of an eye, there was a small bulge where the baby hamsters were, and almost no trace of the baby hamsters could be seen.
In the end, the female hamster had managed to finish all the work and was finally satisfied. It went under the cotton paper. If it was not for the slight movement of the cotton paper, there might even be people who would mistake the paper box as being empty.
"How does mother hamster take care of baby hamsters? I really want to see it," the children said sadly, but the paper cotton completely blocked their sight.
"If you really want to see it, there's a way. Is there any other mother hamster who's about to give birth? Find a normal glass fish tank, or an acrylic, transparent hamster cage, and spread the sawdust a little thinner. You can see from the bottom up. Maybe then you could see how the mother hamster takes care of her baby," Zhang Zian suggested.
The children suddenly realized that and they were full of expectations for the next delivery.


1. Download a suspicious game
2. Catch a few magical pets as partners
3. Go through interesting daily routines and lead the pet shop to a whole new level

Kimura Kazuki knew that Takeshi Rena was actually sent by Ryo Otake to start a scene.
Actually, there was no need for that. Ryo Otake, however, was attentive to detail, so Kimura Kazuki accepted his ideas wholeheartedly.
Nonetheless, she was thankful to Ryo Otake for sending Tadeshi Rena over. Looking at the warrior shadow behind Takeshi Rena, Kimura Kazuki asked calmly, "Are you here for the manuscripts?"
"Yup." Takeshi Rena answered honestly. "Miss Qingqiu, you have not updated your comics for a month... Based on the rules, you have to upload one new chapter per week to be published in installments. Otherwise, you might lose a lot of readers. If you still refuse to upload any new chapters, I am afraid Seikisha will cut your comics off their company..."
Seikisha? What a coincidence!
Kimura Kazuki was slightly surprised. She had not thought that Ryo Otake was the editor of Seikisha...
After some contemplation, she let out a friendly smile, "Do editors usually come to the comic artist's residence to ask for their manuscripts?"
Even Chiba Shiori could not resist Kimura Kazuki's smile, it was only natural that the same would apply to Takeshi Rena. She was in a daze for a while. After snapping out of it, she stuttered, "No, not exactly. We usually ask for manuscripts through phone calls since these comics strips are to be uploaded to the magazine. Only comics artists who are well-known in the industry would be visited by the editors asking for manuscripts." After speaking such statements, Takeshi Rena was also curious.
The comic strips of the girl known as Kimura Kazuko in front of her were not well-known. Why would the Chief Editor ask her to pressure Kimura Kazuko for her manuscripts? Was it because Kimura Kazuko was staying at the Weier apartment? Or was it her established family background, making it harder for them to cut off her comics?
Takeshi Rena harbored resentment toward the rich and famous in the past. However, she did not feel any resentment toward Kimura Kazuko.
Kimura Kazuki nodded her head. Then, she looked at the back of Takeshi Rena. The warrior shadow was still standing beside Takeshi Rena unmovingly.
The strength of this thing was... actually weak, it did not even reach the First Foundation State. However, it was similar to a ghost. Hence, Kimura Kazuki was attentive to it.
After being lost in her thoughts, Kimura Kazuki said, "I will resume uploading comics next week." She gave a smile and said, "This is the first time I am visited by editors asking for my manuscripts. I think this is a good experience. If you have anything in the future, you can give me a call. I can help you with any small matters."
Takeshi Rena was not good at concealing her emotions, so Kimura Kazuki could see how Takeshi Rena was feeling through one glance. So, she had acted the role of a young lady of high status. Kimura Kazuki knew that if she left a deep impression on Takeshi Rena, she would definitely think of her at the first second if she faces any trouble.
Kimura Kazuki gave his own personal contact number to Takeshi Rena instead of "Kimura Kazuki's."
"Sure!" Takeshi Rena added Kimura Kazuki's number into her phone contact list excitedly. At this point, she had willingly dropped all of her pride, ego, and dignity as it would be foolish to reject such an opportunity. The contact given was different from the one on the notes provided by her boss. Perhaps this was the private contact number of the young woman in front of her.
By asking for manuscripts from a comic artist, she had earned such a fortune.
Takeshi Rena might have exhausted half of her lifetime's fortune to meet such a young lady of high status right before her.
Subsequently, Kimura Kazuki and Takeshi Rena engaged in a conversation happily, and both got to know each other more. Takeshi Rena revealed her family matters bit by bit as Kimura Kazuki slowly led into it.
Takeshi Rena grew up in a single-parent household. She was raised by her father, and she had a younger brother. However, from Takeshi Rena's story, Kimura Kazuki felt that Tadeshi Rena's younger brother was a lost cause. From Takeshi Rena's description, her brother frequently cooped himself at home. If they weren't, she probably would not even interact with him at all.
However, from her description, Takeshi Yuta, Takeshi Rena's younger brother, seemed to be improving himself...
Upon hearing Takeshi Rena's words, Kimura Kazuki was deep in thought. If she guessed correctly, her main focus was on Takeshi Rena's brother.
Time went by swiftly as both women were conversing with one another. When Takeshi Rena was using the washroom, she glanced through her cell phone. She found out that it was already 5 o'clock in the evening and she was startled. She needed to go to her company for reports. Hence, she immediately bid farewell to Kimura Kazuki.
Kimura Kazuki did not try to ask Takeshi Rena to stay. He told Takeshi Rena that he would upload her comics next week. After bidding farewell to Takeshi Rena, he sat on a sofa and took out her cellphone and a notebook. Then, he started texting romantic messages written in the notebook to his seven "boyfriends."
After receiving news transmitted by Kimura Kazuki, Ryo Otake signaled the other seven police officers to start their romantic texting session.
The texting session was actually very significant. Based on Kimura Kazuki's assumptions, Natsuna Yamanaka filtered and picked her victims based on data messages. Or else, how would she be able to murder three women within two or three days? Searching for victims was a bothersome process. Natsuna Yamanaka's choices of victims were pretty strange. Her victims were women who were in a relationship with different men.
A case that was rare enough as it is. She could even find many cases as such. She was smart.
In the end, Kimura Kazuki stopped sending text messages after securing a dinner date with one of his "boyfriends." Of course, the dinner date was fake. The message was to lure Natsuna Yamanaka.
Later that night, he was standing at the french window of his bedroom. Kimura Kazuki gazed at the Tokyo Tower from afar and let out a sigh. It was good to be rich... All of a sudden, a greenish-black ghost face passed through his windows.
Kimura Kazuki turned his head rapidly with an expression of fear and panic. He shouted, "Who's there?"
Kimura Kazuki glanced twice and regained his composure. He did not think that Natsuna Yamanaka would come here so fast. It looked like she had a personal vendetta against beautiful women. He was only sending out his selfies to his "boyfriends" a moment ago, but he was actually trying to lure Natsuna Yamanaka out.
Indeed... Natsuna Yamanake was already searching for him in just less than an hour.
Even though Kimura Kazuki was sympathetic to Natsuna Yamanaka's plight, she should not become a ghost after her death and harm someone else.
While lost in thought, his eyes were fixated on the computer in her bedroom. The computer screen suddenly lit up. The whiteness of the light was as blurry as the old television and emitted a buzzing sound. It was horrifying in such a big bedroom. The next moment, the computer shone again, and he saw a big tree and a house on the computer screen. This made Kimura Kazuki had a flashback. This was Sato's house at Spirit District, which was also where Natsuna Yamanake was found dead...
As time passed, he could see that the ground underneath the tree was shaking gently.
Kimura Kazuki was speechless. Natsuna Yamanaka was actually emulating the classic scene from the movie, "The Ring." She was thinking of appearing out from the computer screen to scare him.
Moreover, Kimura Kazuki had to express emotions of fear to play along with her act.
Any normal individual involved in such a situation would probably be horrified and broken down. Even though "The Ring" was a movie, the movie alone had scared many people to death.
The emotions portrayed in a movie would be different than in reality.
Kimura Kazuki would play along with Natsuna Yamanaka. However, he still needed to confirm something.


Time travelling from the majestic era after the Recuperation of Reiki, he became Kimura Kazuki, a 16-year-old high school student in Japan, one year before the Reiki Recuperation.

Tentatively, he set out to hone himself to the bone, burning candles at both ends to stockpile resources in preparation for the imminent Recuperation of Reiki. His goal was to be many steps ahead of all humanity when the time comes.

However, it seemed like fate had decided to play a cruel trick on him.

One year later, the Recuperation of Reiki... did not happen as expected.

Wu Ji and his team went to Japan for an Asian MMA training camp. In addition to the training, there's a few friendship games and regular competitions, too.
The fighting conditions in Japan were considered very good in Asia, featuring both an excellent social foundation and atmosphere, as well as plenty of competition experience. Kyoto, especially, is the best site for large fight competitions in Asia outside of Macau.
When Wu Tong realized Wu Ji was going to Japan — and after finding out about events at the Singapore airport — she instantly called Meng Fan. It sounded like Meng Fan was staying a few days in Japan, so she instantly thought of having Meng Fan find Wu Ji.
She was still worried for Meng Fan!
While she was proud of Meng Fan, she was still concerned. She was afraid there was an organization behind the hijacking; if they found out Meng Fan's identity, they'd do him harm. Yet Meng Fan was so relaxed he still wanted to be out in Japan, which wouldn't be as safe as China. 
She heard previously that Meng Fan was going to Japan after Singapore — something to do with manga — now that Meng Fan told her the same thing, she didn't want to force him to come back to China. However, she still ordered Meng Fan to stay at the hotel and not go anywhere before Wu Ji's arrival.
After some more conversation, Wu Tong could hear Meng Fan was checking into the hotel, so she hung up.
The lobby for the Aman Kyoto Hotel was on the 33rd floor. The tallest part of the lobby was almost 30 meters high, crossing six levels, and proved to be a stunning sight when you looked up.
The interior of the hotel lobby featured a distinctive style similar to Japanese lanterns, presenting a different effect with the light and shadows, depending on the time of day. It was very unique.
The huge lobby offered check-in services as well as meals and drinks. One could enjoy an afternoon tea, all meals, plus drinks and coffee and more. In the afternoons and evenings, female artists in kimonos would play piano and provide art performances.
To Meng Fan, the most striking thing about the lobby, other than the grandiose size, was its symmetry.
When he was checking in, the employee offered him a welcome drink and hot towel. Then, he was led upstairs.
His second eldest sister, Meng Cailian, reserved a luxury suite of almost 80 sqm for him. Divided into a bedroom, lounge, office, and bathroom, the room was large and comfortable.
Since Meng Fan was Chinese, the employee taking him upstairs was bilingual in Chinese and Japanese. After she explained the facilities of the room and other services, she left after delivering a welcome letter, snacks, and a room entry card.
The entry card was built into a belt buckle and could be worn on his waist when he went out to prevent losses and make it easy to carry. Of course, this belt buckle was a custom design and made an ordinary belt look quite upscale.
What if you didn't have a belt?
Then you could put the entry card wherever you liked.
After Meng Fan closed the door, the first thing he did was take a shower. It had been more than 24 hours since he last bathed, not to mention the six-hour-plus flight he just had.
"Ahh, this is nice."
Meng Fan walked into the bathroom and turned to the right, which had a toilet next to the double counter. There's plenty of room in the bathroom; other than a shower and a jacuzzi, there's also a sauna.
All of the toiletry products in the bathroom were the Aman Kyoto Hotel brand, with great quality and a full selection.
After a shower, Meng Fan started soaking in the jacuzzi.
Then, he sweated for ten minutes in the sauna. So relaxing!
If Meng Fan wanted, a phone call would bring a massage therapist, male or female. Female therapists would undoubtedly be pretty; however, they were medical therapists, and there's nothing funny with their services.
After a relaxing time in the bathroom, Meng Fan ordered a meal and went toward the TV console in front of the bed.
The TV was hidden inside the console and could be moved up or down.
Behind the TV console was a minibar. After he opened it, he saw all kinds of beverage containers for tea, wine, coffee, and others. There was a fridge full of soft drinks, water, milk, and juice, all of which were free and were refilled daily. If one drank them all and wanted more, it could be refilled for free as well. In fact, if you didn't want the drinks in the minibar, handmade coffee could be delivered to you.
The environment was amazing; the service was comprehensive. After all, this hotel charged more than 100,000 Japanese Yen per day.
This time of year wasn't the peak tourism season, so the hotel charged 120,000 to 130,000 Yen for this kind of room. If it was the peak season, a smaller room would run to more than 10,000 Chinese yuan.
When it came to peak and off-peak tourism seasons in Japan, there was an interesting theory. For all southeast Asian countries including Japan, the peak and off-peak seasons depended largely on whether the Chinese people had holidays.
In a little while, Meng Fan's meal was delivered. It was a two-people dinner as requested. The food looked beautiful, the kind some girls would take photos of before reluctantly eating. The taste wasn't bad.
Meng Fan wasn't in the habit of checking food for poison. He inhaled the food quickly, then he started pacing in the hotel suite.
Even if Wu Tong didn't give the order, Meng Fan didn't plan to go out. He didn't even want to go to a CV meet and greet in the afternoon.
Why?
He was staying in to draw manga!
By now, he had +12 points in comic book Settings and Scriptwriting attributes. The story in his mind had been plotted over and over. He also had an outline and many sources of pictures, so he wanted to focus and draw today. He planned to have an opening chapter before visiting Shueisha Comics and Kodansha Comics — he wanted to submit his manuscript! 
There were also 10 points in attributes he didn't assign yet.
Meng Fan started thinking of how to assign them.
The 10 points weren't too many, but they weren't too few either.
Wait!
Meng Fan remembered something else. He hadn't completed [100 Champion Honor Points] yet. If he got this title, he'd receive +3 points in Drawing skill, Settings, and Scriptwriting as rewards in attributes.
Currently, in his bank card, in addition to the 500,000 yuan from Bai Zhi, he also got paid for the royalties from 8th Station streaming platform last month. In addition, there were the 100,000 dollars in reward from the airport and Japanese airline, which was given to Meng Fan after a conversion to Chinese yuan, so he definitely had more than a million yuan now.
He made money so he could spend it.
Meng Fan was perfectly happy using the one million yuan to get nine properties. Strictly speaking, it was 500,000 yuan; after all, half of what he rewarded him belonged to himself.
He logged onto his account on Penguin Animation and Comics Online, and in a flash, he added 100 million Penguin Bucks into his account!
He was going to use them all on "There's a Spirit Underground" but thought it was too selfish.
He clicked on "Create New Work" in the publishing platform. After careful consideration, he entered the name of his original comic, "Legend of the Mountains and Seas," and uploaded a book cover he drew earlier. Now the book was ready for review.
Meng Fan called his editor, Yixin, asking him to help review and approve the book.


To reward Meng Fan for his bravery before his heroic death, the cosmos rewarded him with a 'system', sending him back in time to three months ago, alive.

There were more and more visitors coming to ask Chen Ge about the new scenario, and Chen Ge was willing to share some unimportant information with them. He knew what the visitors were hungry for, and the information that he tossed out was like delicious bait, luring them into taking the challenge.
"Boss Chen, we meet again. How come I feel like you've gotten much younger?" The woman who stood before Chen Ge had her hair cropped short, and her tomboyish apparel made her look even more stylish than the guys. However, her voluptuous figure did not diminish her feminine charm either.
"That might work on middle-aged uncles—do I look that old to you?" The woman could be counted as Chen Ge's friend. Her name was Ye Xiaoxin, a blogger that specialized in reviewing Haunted Houses. She had more than a million followers. When the people from Tian Teng Medical Hospital came to visit, she had joined their group, and after she exited, she had practically closed in on herself on the spot.
"I would never waste time on ingratiating words; I really do think you look much younger." Ye Xiaoxin took out her phone. "Give me a ticket to the underground morgue. I plan to review that scenario today."
"The underground morgue?" Chen Ge did not hide the disappointment on his face. "Aren't you going to consider challenging my new scenario? It's fun."
"No thanks, I'll wait for the guide to show up online first." Ye Xiaoxin tossed her hair back handsome. Then, as if reminded of something, she added, "By the way, there is a group online purposely gathering and sharing the pictures of the scenarios inside your Haunted House. Are you sure that you don't want to do something about that? I have a feeling this a concerted attack against you."
"It'll be fine. I see it as free advertisement." Chen Ge had Tong Tong's help, but since there were too many scenarios, Tong Tong could not handle too many things, and of course, this also had something to do with Chen Ge purposely going easy on the visitors.
The Haunted House was rapidly expanding, and there would be a horrible match with the futuristic theme park in the future. Before the results were out, popularity was crucial to Chen Ge. After all, if he wanted to stop these activities, it would not be too difficult on the account of his employees being different from others.
"Just be careful. If people can't take you down from the front, they might do something from the back." Ye Xiaoxin lowered her voice. "When I was queuing up earlier, I saw this man at the resting hall, be careful of him."
Ye Xiaoxin searched through her phone and showed Chen Ge a picture. The picture showed a man wearing a large coat. Even though the sun was blazing, he did not seem to feel the heat. He was talking on the phone with a smile on his face.
"He looks so educated and polite, nothing like a bad guy."
"Don't be tricked by his appearance. If you visit the Haunted House-related forums, you'll realize that the man is on many Haunted House's blacklists." Ye Xiaoxin stood to the side so that she would not block the line. "He's not a normal visitor—there's something wrong with his mind. He's a creeper, and the strangest thing is that he prefers to expose himself to others inside a Haunted House. He has made a few female actors inside the Haunted House weep from his actions already."
"He's that horrible of a man?"
"Yes, he was even detained several times for his actions, but he doesn't seem to change." Ye Xiaoxin sighed. "He understood the rules placed on the Haunted House actors. He knew they could not hit him. He also would not interact physically with them; he would only flash his parts at them to satisfy his perverted desire. The man is clever in a way; he only did his deed in corners hidden away from surveillance. The time that he was detained was because he went so over the line that the other visitors on the same tour couldn't resist beating him up."
"Such people need education, a deep and serious education." Employees could not do anything, but other visitors could. In any case, Chen Ge saw many solutions to this problem.
"That's all, I suppose. Be careful, I'll be going in now." Ye Xiaoxin followed the rest into the Haunted House. Chen Ge used his Yin Yang Vision to glance toward the resting hall. The man was still on the phone, but Chen Ge noticed that when he was talking, the man's eyes kept darting about like he was searching for something.
With him as the center, Chen Ge looked around, and he noticed that in the blind spot of the man's gaze, there was another man on the phone. This man had on a large hat, and his skin was white. He appeared rather soft and feminine.
"He has a partner?" Just as Chen Ge turned to look at that man, the man in the coat hung up and walked out from the hall. Coincidentally enough, so did the other man, accompanied by another three individuals.
The five started to queue. One stood at the front of the line, one at the back and the others at the middle; for all appearances, they did not seem like they knew each other.
"Are they from the futuristic theme park?" However, Chen Ge felt like he had left a deep enough emotional scar on the people from the other theme park that they would not return so soon. Chen Ge paid them special attention. After the three barged into the queue, there was sudden chaos. Three people started to move and gather together. "They came prepared!"
Chaos erupted, and this caused annoyance among the other visitors. One of them yelled directly and angrily, "Why are you cutting the line? Get back!"
He was being very loud and attracted everyone's attention immediately. The one who spoke was a middle-aged man around 1.5 meters tall. His appearance did not match his temper at all.
"Mr. Shinozaki, please calm down. We're here to seek inspiration—there's no need to get into an argument with others." A woman in her twenties stood next to the middle-aged man; she appeared to be his assistant. The woman seemed used to the man's explosion, and she apologized to the neighboring visitors.
"Shinozaki? A foreigner?" Before Chen Ge could say anything, the man called Shinozaki started to get into a fight while speaking fluent Chinese. Handing the ticket-selling job over to Uncle Xu, Chen Ge quickly ran over to break up the fight. "Please stop fighting. Who cut in the line earlier?"
Seeing the operator walk over, both parties stopped arguing.
"It was him! He was the line-cutter. I'm telling you, if we're not in a lawful society, I would have punched him in the face already, such lawlessness." The middle-aged man was quite a firecracker.
"Understood." Chen Ge turned to the line-cutter. He stood next to the man with the large cap. Obviously, they were partners. "If you wish to visit my Haunted House, I will need all of you to get to the back of the line and follow the rules accordingly."
Chen Ge left no room for negotiation. The man was obviously not satisfied with this arrangement, but with the persuasion from his friends, he obediently moved to the back of the line.
"Okay, everything's fine now." Chen Ge stayed at the back of the line. For some reason, the middle-aged man felt like he had been ignored and felt a certain way about it. He yelled at Chen Ge, "There's such a long line on such a hot day. Don't you have a VIP lane or something? I'll pay extra!"
"I'm sorry, but I treat all my visitors the same."
"Great! A principled man! Then I shall leave! Everyone's working against me!" For a reason that eluded Chen Ge, the man was angered and turned to leave.
"Wait a minute, Mr. Shinozaki! This haunted House is really unique! We're already here, so we should at least go in for a visit!" The young female assistant tried to stop the man, and then she ran to beg Chen Ge. "Boss, can you make an exception for us?"
The woman looked at Chen Ge with her pleading eyes. "Mr. Shinozaki is a comic artist. He has been lacking inspiration for the past few months, and his temper has worsened because of that. He isn't normally like this."
"A comic artist? Is he famous? How come I haven't heard of his name before?" Chen Ge was instantly reminded of Yan Danian. Perhaps he could use this chance to fulfil Yan Danian's wishes.
The assistant's face flushed. "Mr. Shinozaki bases himself overseas, and he is famed in the industry, but over the past few years, he has started to change his style! In any case, he's a very powerful man!"
Chen Ge nodded and purposely said in a raised voice, "If you don't want to line up, there's only one choice. I just opened a new scenario, and those who wish to visit it can skip the line and join me now."
"A new scenario?" The woman did not dare to make the decision, so she turned to look at the man.
"I just praised you for your principles earlier, but you changed your mind once you heard my name. Fine, I'll give you a chance to impress me today." The middle-aged walked over leisurely. "The new scenario it is!"
Seeing the middle-aged man jumping the queue, a man stood out from the back of the line. "I wish to visit this new scenario as well."
The man was wearing a coat. The temperature was high, and there was no air-conditioning. His head was pouring with sweat like he was burning. Hearing his voice, the other people in his group wanted to stop him, but it was already too late.
"Okay, come in with me then. Is there anyone else?" Chen Ge accepted his volunteer quickly and took his money, so they had no chance to regret his decision.
The others in the group slowly shuffled out. Chen Ge had Uncle Xu give them the tickets while he used his phone to search for Shinozaki's info online.
The man was not a foreigner—he merely had a foreign-sounding name. However, it was true that he was based overseas. His fans called him the Walking Mosaic[1] and the Father of Saint Light[2].
[1] This is referring to how mosaic is often used to censor sensitive parts in erotic comics.
[2] Holy Light or Saint Light is more common in erotic animations. When an animated character undresses or is naked, instead of mosaic,  light or smoke is used to block key parts. Therefore, animation fans call it the Saint Light.


The hearse with the weird odor slowed to a stop before the entrance. The sound of pebbles could be heard bouncing on the ceiling. There were footsteps coming from the corridor, and there seemed to be someone sawing next door. The door knob to the room rattled slightly, and the faucet in the bathroom kept dripping even though it had been screwed shut. There was a rubber ball that rolled on its own underneath the bed. Wet footsteps started to surface one after another on the floor. 
At 3 am, Chen Ge held a cleaver in his hand as he hid beside the room heater. The call he was trying to make was finally answered. "Landlord, is this what you meant by 'the house can be a little crowded at night'‽"

Eva and Topaz worked like this for months, only talking about character designs and how to proceed with the launch date the site requested. They didn't exactly see eye to eye on a lot of things and butted heads frequently. 
That was the problem when two creative people worked together. Different minds had different ideas and expectations. Getting those things to mesh together into a single product could be tricky. 
Topaz became less hostile once Eva approved her background designs without a single complaint. Sometimes they even got sidetracked talking about things not directly pertaining to the comic. 
One day they got into a debate about the best kind of male lead. The one in her novel was a cold and gloomy person around everyone but the female lead. She had always found that sort of thing romantic but Topaz disagreed. 
Eva ended up teasing her about having a crush because of her vehemence about which kind of man was best. The last thing she expected was to hear that she had gotten married to someone she didn't even know. 
Topaz didn't give many details about the situation, which drove her crazy. Hello! She was living out an actual romance comic here! Her single-since-birth soul needed details!
Her curiosity about the kind of person the artist was skyrocketed after that. Who on earth would propose to an entire bar full of strangers? She was a bit worried about her too. What if her husband was a total wacko? 
But as the weeks passed and Topaz continued working on the comic like usual her worry lessened. After that conversation Eva felt like they had taken a step closer to becoming friends so she started messaging her more often simply to chat. 
Most of the time she got ignored but eventually Topaz responded by sending a picture of a mani/pedi and saying it was because her husband gave her $100 and told her to get her nails done. That sounded an awful lot like sugar baby territory and she couldn't stop herself from saying so. 
Topaz said that wasn't possible because they hadn't even kissed, sparking another discussion about her strange relationship with the man she called Citrine. Based on everything her online friend said, the man was obviously deeply in love with her and didn't want to scare her off. 
But she refused to believe it, saying she was simply a substitute for his first love. Eva didn't buy that at all. Men didn't act that way. 
She had never had a steady boyfriend but she had been on an awful lot of terrible dates. Every guy she had ever encountered wanted something from her that she wasn't willing to give without emotional commitment. 
Citrine demanded neither physical affection nor emotional commitment. He was willing to provide for Topaz without demanding anything in return but her presence. That went against everything she knew about the male species. 
This guy had to be deeply in love with her but she refused to believe it. Eva shook her head at the woman's density but there was nothing she could do. Topaz didn't reply to any more of her messages until she got back from her vacation with her husband. 
It was obvious she would have fallen for the guy eventually with how much spoiling was going on so hearing Topaz had a crush on her husband wasn't surprising. Citrine still seemed more like a mythical unicorn than a man but Eva was happy for her friend. 
Happy and jealous. Why did all the good things happen to other women? When was she going to get the chance to properly be in love? 
Maybe she would be stuck alone with her fictional characters and celebrity crushes forever. She could always do what Topaz did and propose to a bar full of strangers in Las Vegas too but chances are she would probably end up murdered in a back alley somewhere. 
It was a miracle that she hadn't ended up with a psycho. Totally romance comic plot armor. Topaz must have been born under a lucky star. 
Eva managed to mostly put the artist's romance out of mind as she continued the mindless drudgery of her daily life and started a new novel. Until some of the writing site's staff reached out to her about participating in a convention in Florida. 
She lived in Georgia, less than eight hours away by car. They would pay her for her time and provide all of the accommodations. That was an offer she couldn't refuse—she had vacation time saved up and wanted to go to Disney World and Universal Studios while she was down there. 
The problem was that they wanted Topaz as well and getting her to cooperate wouldn't be easy. She had no idea where the woman lived other than that it was somewhere in the Mountain Time Zone. 
It would be so much fun if they could actually meet up and spend time together but she still hadn't figured out how to ask when Topaz dropped the bomb that Citrine was actually her first love. Eva honestly didn't know how to respond. 
That conversation was short and unfulfilling. She had the impression her online friend was hiding all of the details that actually mattered. That only made her want to meet the woman in person even more. 
Getting the truth out of her might be easier face to face. She kept her responses limited and didn't push for further information because that usually annoyed Topaz and made her stop replying. 
It was surprising that she agreed to come to the convention but Eva was thrilled. She couldn't wait to meet this mysterious artist and find out more about the crazy life she lived! 
Unfortunately, the convention was still over a month away. And Topaz wouldn't exactly have time to talk with all the line art she had to complete on short notice now. How annoying. 
She sighed, wishing she had a clingy significant other who wanted cuddles while they were sick. That honestly sounded so cute. What she wouldn't give to have someone who loved her that much. 
To distract herself from her depressing singleness she pulled out John Abramson's book on the Bay Area Blade. Eva had gotten her bachelor's degree in psychology hoping to go on to become a criminologist but grad school had seemed too daunting at the time so she ended up working in the call center instead. 
She made a decent living from her novels but knew she would never have time for them if she went back to school now. Maybe someday she would have the time to change careers but in the meantime reading about criminal psychology would have to suffice.

“I’ll marry anyone who will take me!” Hazel declared loudly. “I don’t need love!”

“Get down!” Will hissed. “You don’t know what kind of people are lurking around in here! Talking like that might get you killed!”

==

Hazel Dixon thought she was putting her troubled past behind her. But when the person she thought she trusted most betrays her, she loses her head and proposes to an entire bar full of strangers. 

Enter Will Sheffield, a charming stranger who decides to take her up on her offer to save her from herself. 

He spoils her rotten without expecting anything in return and Hazel's confusion only grows. She doesn't know why he is acting this way. Or why he reminds her so much of the 'dangerous' childhood friend she thought was gone forever...

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