ebookslot Chapter 1515 - 109: Reality (2)
Chapter 1515 - 109: Reality (2)
"Later, during the tournament held at Kains Academy, you wanted to participate and feel your recent improvements. However, in the first round of the preliminaries, someone kicked you straight off the stage, leaving you out of the academy’s tournament. Furthermore, more people became aware of your existence and mocked you, which fueled your hatred and desire for revenge. But you knew that with low power in the Imperial Capital, you couldn’t do anything, so you chose to lie low."Listening to Taichu’s account, Lu Hong’s thoughts slowly returned to that time.
At that time, he was thoroughly embarrassed. Although he had become Hughes’ disciple, he hadn’t attended a single class in the academy. Also, when he first entered this Otherworld, how could Lu Hong know the normal standards of students at Kains Academy? So he foolishly signed up, wanting to prove his strength to someone, ahem, that someone was Nono. Yes, Nono was cute and kind, who wouldn’t like her?
Anyway, Lu Hong, a single gamer and homebody, immediately liked her, including the mature Danni.
However, with just Lu Hong’s mediocre skills and his lack of any background, these two beauties certainly wouldn’t be interested in him.
That’s why Lu Hong wanted to prove himself, but he proved wrong, and ended up losing face badly.
But Taichu modified those memories, allowing Lu Hong to experience the joy of becoming a champion, and even receiving a summons from Konstantin.
In reality, none of that happened; Lu Hong was just a loser eliminated in the preliminaries.
The blow motivated Lu Hong to work even harder, beginning to hunt Demon Beasts, hoping to enhance his power through experience.
The problem was, the Imperial Hunting Ground wasn’t open to those without status or background, and the fee for entry was extremely high.
Being completely broke, Lu Hong couldn’t afford it, so he sought help from Hughes, his master.
But Hughes wasn’t as kind as in the Dream Realm. He only accepted Lu Hong as a disciple because of Princess Nuonuo’s face and treated Lu Hong as a registered disciple, not caring at all about this transmigrator.
So, Lu Hong was met with a closed door, and because of Lu Hong’s embarrassment in the Kains Academy tournament, Hughes was quite upset, ordering him not to pretend to be his disciple anymore. After all, Lu Hong registered only because he was Hughes’ disciple, otherwise, why would someone not from the academy participate in an internal event?
Though Hughes didn’t kick Lu Hong out of his small corner in Kains Academy, he basically treated Lu Hong like he was a stranger.
Without a source of income and unable to enter the Imperial Hunting Ground to hunt Demon Beasts, Lu Hong finally opted to go into the wild to hunt fierce Demon Beasts.
The surroundings of the Sacred Empire’s capital were very safe, and most Demon Beasts had been cleaned out.
Lu Hong set out to execute his Demon Beast hunting plan outside the city, requiring at least three months.
Reflecting on this, Lu Hong couldn’t help but smack his lips, "I remember now, those times were truly my most frustrating days!"
Indeed, being just a First Transformation Level 3 warrior without even a proper sword, relying on a wooden stick in battle, who would accept that?
This made Lu Hong’s idea of joining a mercenary squad to hunt Demon Beasts outside a constant failure, with no one willing to take him along as dead weight.
Hunting Demon Beasts for rewards is a dangerous job, literally risking life and limb for money; who’s there to do charity work?
Desperate and cornered, Lu Hong grit his teeth, ventured alone into the wild forest, and began solo hunting Demon Beasts.
For his first encounter with a wild Demon Beast, he came across a Level 4ish red-eyed rabbit, roughly the size of a wild dog, with crimson jewel-like eyes radiating a bloodthirsty glow.
This type of rabbit ate meat, so Lu Hong was seriously injured by the rabbit, with a chunk of flesh torn from his arm that almost exposed the bone.
Lu Hong struggled but managed to defeat the Demon Beast rabbit. Upon querying the system, it showed that to level up to Level 4 warrior required 1000 experience, while this rabbit only provided him with 50.
Damn it, should Lu Hong then kill nineteen more rabbits of the same kind? Just thinking about it made him want to give up.
Yet for his sister, Lu Hong gritted his teeth and endured.
With no money, Lu Hong had to rely on the system to identify wild herbs, learning to bandage his wounds and stop bleeding.
Meanwhile, the scent of blood from his injuries made him a shining beacon for those carnivorous Demon Beasts.
After several fierce battles, Lu Hong was lucky to escape the wilderness.
Unfortunately, at this point, Lu Hong was gravely wounded.
He barely made it back to town, traded the Demon Beast materials for some money, and found a place to recuperate.
Yet the Demon Beasts Lu Hong hunted were low level, and their materials were cheap, so within three days, he ran out of funds, forced onto the streets, living wretchedly.
Drawing back to the present, Lu Hong’s expression grew complicated, "You’ve made such drastic changes to my experiences, it’s like two completely different worlds!"
"My idea was to transform you in the Dream Realm into a different person. Though life’s filled with ups and downs, it can be smoothly navigated in the end. This way, you’ll be more willing to believe in this world, even subconsciously bypassing any flaws you might glimpse."
Upon hearing Taichu’s explanation, Lu Hong nodded in agreement, "You’re really evil, aren’t you!"
"And then?"
With Lu Hong’s question, Taichu continued narrating Lu Hong’s past events.
After fighting fiercely in the wilderness for nearly half a year, Lu Hong finally broke through from First Transformation Level 3 to Level 6, having a significant leap in strength. No longer did he have to fight for survival, but now he could hunt Demon Beasts with increasing efficiency, and his condition improved with each excursion into the wild. His earnings began to balance with expenses, and eventually, earnings exceeded expenses, allowing Lu Hong to purchase a decent Heavy Sword with his saved Gold Coins.
At first, Lu Hong didn’t plan on returning to Kains Academy, since there were no Demon Beasts there to kill and his strength wouldn’t improve.
Nevertheless, Kains Academy came to the town where Lu Hong was training.
It was a team from Kains Academy prepared to lead students into the Hell Rift for training. The team comprised elite competitors of this tournament, numbering at least three hundred though not as massive as in the Dream Realm.
Nono was among them.
In the street, Nono happened to see the ragged Lu Hong and approached him with surprise, learning that Lu Hong was surviving by hunting Demon Beasts here.
Upon hearing Nono would venture into Hell with the academy to hunt Demons for training, Lu Hong was tempted.
Lu Hong specifically queried the system about the criteria for kills.
The system responded to Lu Hong, saying as long as the final blow was yours, it counts towards your experience gain.
With this answer, Lu Hong devised a brilliant plan to boost his abilities, which was to follow the academy team. Even if he could only finish off combats on the side, the experience gained would definitely be faster compared to solo hunting these low-level Demon Beasts.
Therefore, Lu Hong wanted to join Nono’s team in entering Hell.
Initially, of course, Nono wasn’t agreeable, but Lu Kefan, pursuing Nono, was persuaded by Lu Hong.
After all, Lu Hong taught him the eighteen tricks for wooing women and took him to the town’s Hell Heaven, experiencing for the first time true male happiness. Although the girl back then wasn’t great, Lu Kefan truly enjoyed the experience.
Considering his strong influence as the academy’s top tier, bringing along a tag-along didn’t seem to matter much. Especially since this new little brother indeed was resourceful. So Lu Kefan agreed to Lu Hong, and ultimately, Nono consented.
With the Empire Princess’s approval, the academy tutors weren’t the type to nitpick either, and didn’t say much.
"Luo Kefan..." Lu Hong softly uttered this name, then chuckled, "Taichu, you’re really adept at crafting stories, you’ve altered my backstory as completely as flipping heaven and earth. I truly admire you, such a Dream Realm indeed makes me want to indulge in it."