Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Of course, an in-game NPC wouldn't react to a player's complaints or reports; they would just dutifully follow their programmed routine.

Bai Fuling knew this, so he wasn't surprised by this NPC's continued muttering while clutching his student ID.

After waiting patiently for a moment, Bai Fuling couldn't help but speak up: "Can we fast-forward?"

Why is this NPC still running his script?!

By the game's logic, the moment the student ID was presented, the player's nickname should have been automatically registered, and the next step should have proceeded.

But the tall man was still staring intently at the student ID, as if he'd seen something he really didn't want to, muttering: "No, can't... absolutely not..." After freezing for a few seconds, he finally looked up. "...Why is it on you?"

"What?"

"It shouldn't be like this..." Guan Jizhong seemed to be sleepwalking. He tightly gripped a corner of the student ID in his hand, squeezing so hard that the characters for "Fresh Cabbage" became distorted and crumpled.

Through the screen, Bai Fuling saw his student ID being crushed, pixelated bits crumbling off.

Bai Fuling: ?

What's going on? Does this NPC have a grudge against cabbage or dislike the word 'fresh'? Is he really that opposed to my nickname that he's crushing my student ID into a crumbly mess!

Although logically, a student ID shouldn't crumble, but for pixelated objects taking real-time damage, "crumbling" is probably the only visual representation.

Inanimate objects don't have health bars. To avoid his student ID becoming disposable, Bai Fuling stepped forward and snatched it back.

Guan Jizhong let Bai Fuling take back the student ID. With one eye covered by an eyepatch, his remaining good eye fixed its gaze on the Black-haired Youth. He said, "Why is the tracker on you?"

"Tracker?" Bai Fuling was surprised. He widened his eyes, looked down, and tapped to inspect the student ID.

Could it be that the student ID issued by Pelland Academy has a tracking function?! Another part of the twisted school rules? Damn it, I'll go to the electronics repair shop later and have it removed.

How dare they spy on the player's movements, the nerve!

The tall man continued muttering: "That dagger... his dagger, how did it end up with you?"

Hearing this, Bai Fuling shifted his attention away from the student ID.

Dagger? It only took him a second to react. "Liao Zhiqiu's dagger has a tracker?"

No wonder when I took his dagger, the item description had hints like [Seems to have many stories] and [Are you sure you want to take it?]. So there was something inside! Looks like it's connected to more plot.

Hearing the Black-haired Youth mention that name, a spark of hope ignited again in Guan Jizhong's heart, and his clenched fist tightened.

Since the two knew each other, then—even without a photo or the tracker, there might still be a possibility of finding Liao Zhiqiu again and completing the task for the old man. Guan Jizhong thought. The fact that this person in front of him could obtain Liao Zhiqiu's frequently used dagger meant their relationship was close enough.

Guan Jizhong fidgeted with his thumb. His tall frame bent down, leaning closer, and he said slowly, "Kid, what's your relationship with Liao Zhiqiu?"

Bai Fuling hesitated for a moment upon hearing this, then replied, "A beating and being beaten relationship?"

Guan Jizhong: ?

Bai Fuling: "To be honest, I didn't mean to."

Guan Jizhong fell silent for half a second, then laughed hoarsely, "Kid, you're quite the joker. But I can tell—he must care about you a lot."

"Uh... I guess he does care." Bai Fuling paused, pondering, "After all, I wanted to test something earlier and almost beat him to death."

Guan Jizhong: ?

He felt the conversation spiraling out of control and couldn't help but speed up his speech, hoping for confirmation: "But that dagger... it's not something he would give away easily!"

Guan Jizhong had long heard from the old man that Liao Zhiqiu favored animals, was attached to old belongings, and wouldn't easily change weapons once he started using one. That's why the old man secretly implanted the tracker into the dagger.

Since the dagger was now with the person in front of him, then—

Bai Fuling nodded: "Indeed, he didn't give it. So I chose to take it. Uh, that brings us back to the previous topic."

"I wanted to see if he would drop loot, almost beat him to death, so I knocked him out. Since I went through the effort of knocking him out, taking some reward is only fair."

Guan Jizhong: ?

Guan Jizhong opened his mouth, momentarily unable to make a sound.

...What? What exactly is going on? What does this mean?

Is this how young people make friends nowadays?? Guan Jizhong, having spent years deep in the forest with little contact with city folk, had no idea there was such a 'loot-dropping' way of making friends...?

No, wait, based on the information he knew, Liao Zhiqiu shouldn't be so easily defeated.

The old man was the leader of an underground organization. Liao Zhiqiu, being the old man's grandson, couldn't possibly be taken down so easily.

Moreover, the old man probably often sent unsuspecting thugs to "train" his grandson, so Liao Zhiqiu's combat ability shouldn't be weak.

If what this kid said was true—that he knocked Liao Zhiqiu out and took the dagger—then either this kid was incredibly strong, or Liao Zhiqiu didn't really fight back when attacked.

Guan Jizhong looked up at the person before him.

The Black-haired Youth in front of him was tilting his head to one side, still wearing that inexplicably stable Angel Halo accessory on his head. The small braid on his right ear hung beside his slightly chubby cheek, looking playful and cute, without any hint of aggression.

Guan Jizhong reached out, grabbed the Black-haired Youth by the back of his collar, and lifted him up like picking up a rabbit—for Guan Jizhong, who was used to dragging heavy objects through the woods, the weight in his hand felt almost featherlight.

Bai Fuling didn't struggle, behaving very obediently.

So the conclusion was simple: it wasn't that this Fresh Cabbage was strong, but that Liao Zhiqiu didn't really fight back. Therefore, this person must still be someone important to Liao Zhiqiu.

Guan Jizhong reached this conclusion internally.

He overlooked the possibility that Liao Zhiqiu didn't treat Bai Fuling as a person but as an animal.

"Kid." Guan Jizhong set Bai Fuling down on the ground and smiled. "I told you before, we have no grudge. I won't make things difficult for you."

"But I'd like to ask for your help—could you call Liao Zhiqiu over for me? I have something to discuss with him." Guan Jizhong placed a hand on Bai Fuling's shoulder. "I won't hurt him, and I'll let you go."

Bai Fuling glanced at the quest log; there was still no new quest prompt. This meant [Find Liao Zhiqiu] wasn't a new quest.

"I don't have his contact info, and I don't know where he is." Bai Fuling said honestly. "Liao Zhiqiu seems to have no fixed activity area; he spawns randomly."

Times like these highlight the advantage of fixed NPCs. Bai Fuling started missing the previous bespectacled NPC again.

Corporate slaves are great—they appear reliably at fixed locations on time!

"You don't know?" Guan Jizhong, of course, didn't give up. His desire to find the culprit had become an obsession, and the prerequisite for obtaining clues was to stop Liao Zhiqiu from going to mourn his pet in the next couple of days. He had to find Liao Zhiqiu.

"You should know, because he cares about you—he cares about you. He didn't fight back."

Bai Fuling pondered for a moment: Really? He didn't fight back? Could it be that Liao Zhiqiu actually enjoyed it???

Anyway, what this NPC kept bringing up here must be useful! I’ll keep an eye on that Liao Zhiqiu guy when I run into him later, Bai Fuling thought.

Then he checked the quest log again—still no new quests had popped up.

Why wasn’t interacting with this NPC unlocking a quest? Had the trigger point not been reached yet?

Bai Fuling frowned, ran the conversation back in his head, and finally caught on—he got it. It must be because the quest the big NPC guy was talking about wasn’t for him, but for Liao Zhiqiu.

How can an NPC steal another NPC’s quest assignment? NPCs shouldn’t delegate to NPCs; they should give them to players!

So he asked, “What do you need from Liao Zhiqiu? You can just give it to me.”

“No, I must find Liao Zhiqiu,” Guan Jizhong said, his lips going thin. His hand still rested on Bai Fuling’s shoulder, trembling with emotion. “Kid, you get me? I won’t hurt you, and I won’t hurt him.”

“—But if he doesn’t come, I can’t let you go.”

Having lived deep in the woods for years, Guan Jizhong didn’t care about society’s rules anymore. With the only person he cared about—his sister—gone, he didn’t have any moral or legal limits.

All he knew was that if he let this person go now, he’d never get another chance.

“I don’t want to hurt you, kid,” Guan Jizhong said softly. “But you have to stay here the next two days. I can’t let you go out to tip him off, and I still need to search for him… I have to hold up my end of the deal. I need leads on the murderer.”

The murderer! Bai Fuling finally caught the keyword, his eyes going wide.

He knew it—NPC info-dumps always had crucial clues, which was why he hadn’t skipped it (though he still hadn’t found the dialogue skip button in this game).

“You’re looking for the murderer? The recent Crescent Scythe Murder Case?” Bai Fuling said, the penny dropping. So that’s what the new storyline was about.

This was the follow-up to that actual mystery quest from Sweet Dream—finding the murderer.

“No problem, you can just give it to me,” Bai Fuling nodded. “I’m already on it.”

What? Guan Jizhong was taken aback. “You?”

“Yes, allow me to introduce myself,” Bai Fuling typed breezily. “I am the renowned Farmer Detective Fresh Cabbage.”

Guan Jizhong: “…Never heard of you.”

Since when do NPCs talk back to the player! Bai Fuling’s eyes widened. Shouldn’t NPCs just agree with whatever the player says?

Why is the second step of this quest so hard to get? He refused to believe he couldn’t land it!

Challenged, Bai Fuling felt even more fired up. He copied and pasted lines from Detective Conan into the free dialogue box, editing them as he hammered it out.

“I was once a detective known the world over, but after witnessing a dark deal, I was attacked and forced to drink poison. When I woke up, my body had shrunk to student size.”

“For safety, I have to hide my identity. I can’t tell you my old name, so I go by a new one: Farmer Detective Fresh Cabbage.”

“A detective who knows everything, whose mind is still sharp though his body is small. There is only one truth!”

After this speech, the tall male NPC fell silent, finally stopping his doubts.

Bai Fuling was satisfied. “Alright, now can you confidently hand this over to me?”

With classic detective lines entered, the game’s AI had to accept that, right?

Author’s Note:

Guan Jizhong: …Is this how city people are?