Edited by Jules
Luo ran with Xiao Lan under the red moon.
The red moon still hung high above in the night sky. Its light red radiance covered everything on the ground in a faint red layer, whether it was the murky black sky, the quiet institute, or the originally verdant and lush forest.
At the same time, it seemed to cover the two people under the moon with red gauze.
Luo was very quick, and the two figures fused into one under the moon, practically turning into a blurry afterimage.
Xiao Lan enjoyed the rare, completely automatic escape treatment. He reached out to wrap his arms around Luo’s neck and keep steady.
Because of this move, the gap between them decreased once more. Xiao Lan was practically able to feel the breathing and heartbeat that still weren’t chaotic at all even as Luo ran so hard.
Sensing the warm breath on his neck, Luo’s lips curved faintly.
He gently rubbed his lower jaw against the top of Xiao Lan’s head for a moment. His mood improved a little more at the feel of the fluffy hair, and he unobtrusively tightened his embrace.
At the same time, Xiao Lan’s attention was divided as he examined the situation behind them.
The dangerous red figure behind them was still fluttering in the distance, but the gap between them was already growing bigger. If this continued, with the help of the terrain, they should be able to throw her off soon.
As if also judging that her prey was about to escape, Lady Red Moon raised her hand.
She was clearly about to attack.
“I’ll do it,” Xiao Lan softly said in Luo’s ear.
“Then I’ll be troubling you.” Luo’s voice was very relaxed, and he didn’t seem worried about the current situation at all.
The next second, Lady Red Moon decisively threw out the sharp fan in her hand. With a cold gleam, it whistled through the air and headed straight for Luo’s back.
The fan was extremely fast and cut a chilling image.
By then, Xiao Lan had already switched 【Dalit’s Bone】 to its rod form and was closely watching the fan.
He concentrated hard, and the initially fleeting image of the fan seemed to slow down in his eyes and turn into a track which he could follow.
When the fan entered the range of his attack, Xiao Lan raised a hand and struck with precision.
Ding — the sharp fan collided with the white bone and was instantly thrown off-track as it fell to the side.
At the same time, Xiao Lan’s skill that was so stingy it frequently pretended to be dead was activated once more:
“Poverty is unable to restrict my imagination, you’ve obtained 【Zhang Dong’s autographed photo】”
【Name: Zhang Dong’s autographed photo (Rare item, bound)】
【Ability: None】
【Description: Zhang Dong also knows that all of you want this very much】
Xiao Lan: “…”
Why is it you again ah?!!
Zhang Dong, the first boss whom Xiao Lan met in the newbie round, was a miserly character who was fond of deluding himself and had a slight narcissistic personality; he felt that his autograph would be very popular with the players.
Last time was an autograph, while this time it was even more outrageously an autographed photo. Was this guy done or not ah?! In the end, how much self-merch had he prepared?
Xiao Lan had nothing to say about his skill’s trash effect.
Unlucky people didn’t deserve to have dreams.
Taking advantage of Xiao Lan’s block, Luo carried him around a building corner. Blending into the darkness, the two figures gradually drew further away.
Lady Red Moon waved her hand, and the fan returned to her hand once more as if controlled.
But her prey had already disappeared.
Under the red moon, the lithe figure quietly stood there for a while.
Not long after that, she flicked the fan close, lifted her skirt in an elegant manner, and turned to walk to the northern tower.
Luo brought Xiao Lan back to the student dormitory.
It was silent all around them.
Not only wasn’t there a person to be seen, there also wasn’t the slightest sign of activity. It was as if because of the night of the red moon, even the most restless students wouldn’t slip out to play during this time.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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“It’s okay; I should be fine after some sleep,” Xiao Lan said, then felt a little regretful. “What a pity that I didn’t get to check out the northern tower.”
Luo stretched out a hand to help him pluck out the leaves that had gotten tangled in his hair during the fight. “You’ve already put in a lot of effort today; it won’t be good to get into another fight. How about I accompany you tomorrow night?”
Xiao Lan thought about it. Indeed, he didn’t have much energy left right now; it would be really hard for him to react to any danger. Even if Luo would definitely help, Xiao Lan still couldn’t, in good conscience, hold him back. The best situation would be when both of them had combat strength.
It was now only the second day since the game began; there should be enough time left.
“Alright ba. I’ll go take a shower, then get some rest. What about you? Any plans for tonight?” Xiao Lan said.
“I’ll continue searching for my fragments here. However,” Luo smiled at him, “I’ll leave after you go to sleep.”
Xiao Lan gave him a baffled look.
Luo didn’t feel any guilt at all as he found a just and honourable reason. “To prevent mishaps.”
After a while.
Xiao Lan finished showering and changed into the school pajamas. Towelling his hair as he walked out, he saw Luo sitting in his bedside chair and languidly reading a book. Even the gold glasses seemed to be worn very leisurely.
The warm yellow halo of the kerosene lamp limned his figure gently and lovingly.
Xiao Lan’s hands unconsciously stopped.
He looked at Luo a little blankly. This scene felt familiar, as if he had once silently watched Luo on a night like this. When he searched his memories, however, there was no such thing.
Could it also be from that scene when he was fifteen in his dream?
“Sir?” The low voice came from above Xiao Lan’s head.
Only when Xiao Lan returned to his senses did he realise that Luo at some point had come to stand in front of him. There was now a huge difference in their heights, and he could only raise his head in order to meet Luo’s eyes.
After that, Luo reached out to take the towel Xiao Lan had been casually rubbing his hair with.
Luo: “Let me do it, sir.”
In Luo’s eyes, Xiao Lan’s skill at drying his hair wasn’t any different from his stream-of-consciousness cooking.
Xiao Lan followed Luo’s directions and sat on the bed. Luo then sat beside him and gently wiped his hair.
It was easy to get used to things in the world. The first time Luo dried his hair, Xiao Lan was a little unaccustomed to it, but this time, he already no longer felt conflicted at all.
A man’s bottom line was meant to be constantly broken.
And their face would constantly thicken during the process.
The two chatted on and off, and neither of them cared if it was a substantial topic or not.
Under the perfectly managed and gentle strength on his head, Xiao Lan felt his eyelids getting heavier. Finally, his head tilted and his entire body fell towards Luo as he breathed evenly.
Feeling the sudden weight against his shoulder, Luo stopped towelling.
Xiao Lan leaned against him unguardedly as he slept. The teenager’s body was frail and flexible, and had a refreshing scent from his recent shower.
Although Luo couldn’t see Xiao Lan’s expression in this position, it didn’t prevent him from outlining the sleeping face he had stared at for countless nights.
Luo gently caressed Xiao Lan’s back, then returned him under the blanket with tender motions and covered him up.
Finally, he leaned over slightly and drew closer to the sleeping Xiao Lan, and a gentle kiss fell on his slightly curly hair.
“Goodnight, sir. Perhaps we will meet again in your dream.”
After that, Luo extinguished the light in the room and left in the darkness.
This time, he was looking forward to finding his lost fragment very much.
In a pitch-black dreamscape, Xiao Lan felt his sight clear up again.
Everything around him was a little familiar. It was the room he had accidentally entered when he was chased in his dreams. The room door was already fixed and no signs that there had been a fight could be seen.
Dream-him was sitting by the table. The candle on the table emitted a gentle light, and the air was filled with the rich and mellow aroma of black tea.
Nearby, a man dressed in black, who looked identical to Luo, walked over while holding an antique medical kit.
He sat opposite Xiao Lan, his light gold eyes appraising the youth before him. “You seem in a difficult situation, little guy. Is this your first entry?”
The youth was a little confused. “First… entry?”
The man, however, didn’t give a straight response. He stretched out a hand to the youth. “You shouldn’t bandage your wrist like that. It’ll make the injury worse. Would you mind letting me see?”
The youth placed his wrist in the man’s hand.
He watched as the other elegantly unwrapped the wound which he had bandaged haphazardly and revealed a patch of blisters from severe scalding. The blisters had already broken and the area was swollen, and looked awful.
“The treatment of the injury is really terrible. Not only was there no ointment applied, it’s even infected,” the man commented.
The teenager bowed his head. His bandaging skills were only at this level, and he hadn’t even been able to find his family’s first aid kit. He had just casually found a piece of cloth and wrapped it around his wrist, and couldn’t even tell if it was gauze or not.
No wonder the wound had hurt all this time.
Although he regarded the teenager’s bandaging skills with disdain, the man in black nimbly treated the injury for him. Cleaning and disinfecting, removing the dead parts and encrusted blood, applying medicine… Each step was very basic, but didn’t hurt the teenager much.
“Done.” The man finally finished bandaging, and let go of the teenager’s wrist.
After that, he examined other parts of the youth. There were some ligature marks on his throat, but since the youth had struggled non-stop with all his might, they weren’t as serious as they could have been.
At the same time, because the teenager had dodged in time, there weren’t many injuries on his body.
The man in black still applied some ointment on the youth’s throat. “This will soon leave no marks.”
The teenager said to him, “Thank you. I’m Xiao Lan; what should I call you?”
The man in black dropped his chin in his hand and pondered. “Hm… I should be called Lawrence ba?”
Teenager: “…”
What ‘ba’? Do you not even know your own name?
The man smiled and didn’t seem to care much. “Just call me Lawrence. In any case, this is no more than a codename. I’m a teacher here.”
The youth asked, “Mr. Lawrence, can you tell me where this is? And why I appeared here?”
The man in black picked up the black tea and conveniently poured a cup for the teenager. “Please help yourself.”
He then continued, “This is Kriv Institute; it belongs to the Advent World. As for why you would appear here — according to a certain person’s theory, it’s because ‘you are the chosen lucky one’.”
The youth clasped the tea, doubts in the depths of his eyes. “Lucky?”
He didn’t feel that being hunted down could be considered lucky.
The man in black said, “By being chosen to enter the Advent World, you have the chance to gain power.”
The teenager: “Then… what if someone doesn’t want it? Can they leave?”
The man in black was puzzled. “Why not? Isn’t the pursuit of power a biological instinct?”
The youth was also confused by the man’s words. “But everyone has different goals ah. Some want to be businessmen, some want to be authors, some want to be celebrities, and perhaps someone’s dream is to make a super-delicious cake?”
The handsome face of the man in black revealed a rare bewilderment. He tilted his head. “Why would there be such a strange… dream?”
Among all the people he had seen here, every single one risked their lives for power, and they didn’t even hesitate to attack their own kind.
But this teenager said that there were some who didn’t want it.
The youth straightened his back. “What’s strange about that?! For example, my mom. Her dream is to have a happy family, and she hopes that our family can live safely and peacefully. She might not be interested even if you give her the world’s greatest power.
“My mom makes the world’s best biscuits. They’re very buttery, and have chopped hazelnuts and chocolates inside. Each bite is crunchy and flaky.”
Perhaps it was the youth’s nature; he had just experienced a terrifying chase, but now that he had rested a little, he had recovered greatly. At the mention of the biscuits his mother was skilled at making, a yearning expression even appeared on his face.
“Are there many people like your mother?” The eyes of the man in black were contemplative; they reflected the candlelight and flickered with a gold light.
The youth nodded. “There’s quite a lot. People nowadays have all sorts of dreams.”
“Is that so?” The man’s expression was inscrutable and it was hard to guess what he was thinking.
The room fell silent for a while.
The man pondered silently, while the teenager watched him without a word.
The youth watched him for a good while and still couldn’t help but say, “You seem… different from the people here. You’re not like the other teachers or the students.”
The teenager keenly noticed the difference in the person before him.
Although this institute was very odd, and both the teachers and students were very weird, this person, who was the only one who had reached out and lent him a hand, had an incongruous vibe which he couldn’t describe.
The man looked at the teenager and his lip curled suddenly. “Oh. Did I reveal any flaws?”
The teenager thought about it. “The look in your eyes when discussing them is like when an adult looks at a child, as if you know all the answers…”
“Hahahaha —” The man in black couldn’t help but break into laughter.
Interesting. Although he didn’t deliberately conceal it, this teenager, who had entered a game for the first time and clearly had no experience at all, unexpectedly was able to see through him.
After laughing, he looked at the slightly apprehensive youth and said, “My identity is roughly similar to that of a gardener ba. But I usually don’t manage things, and I generally dump everything on another guy.”
The teenager couldn’t hold back his curiosity. “Another guy?”
The man raised a finger to his lips in a shushing gesture. “Shh — he’s very short-tempered and doesn’t like other people discussing him.”
Hearing this, the teenager’s eyes widened and he carefully covered his mouth.
That appearance was genuinely a little cute. The man in black couldn’t control himself, and reached out to stroke his head.
“Hey, hey, what are you doing?! A man’s hair can’t be casually touched!” The youth hurriedly avoided him, but the other still prevailed.
The man in black drew back his hand with a smile. “Oh, apologies, apologies.”
The ruffled teenager fumed. “…”
It felt like this guy just thought it was interesting, and wasn’t sincere in his apologies at all.
But it was precisely because of this incident that the mood between them became even more harmonious.
After a while, the teenager’s anger faded.
He couldn’t help asking, “What’s your real name ah? Lawrence definitely isn’t your name.”
The man in black tilted his head. “Hm… I don’t have a name.”
The youth was astonished. “How can you not have a name?”
Man in black: “Because there is no need. No one will call my name.”
The youth pierced his heart with a single sentence. “Then you obviously have no friends.”
Man in black: “…”
He unexpectedly couldn’t refute it, because he truly had no friends. In his world, there was no such concept as ‘friend’.
The teenager leaned against the table and looked at him with limpid eyes. “Are we considered friends? See, you invited me to drink tea, and we’ve already chatted for so long.”
Faced with those eyes, the man in black nodded, as if demons and gods were at work. “We are ba.”
The youth revealed a smile of success. “Then I’ll give you a name!”
The man didn’t mind at all; it was a name that wouldn’t be called out. “Alright ba.”
The youth asked, “How many words do you want?”
Man in black: “One is enough.”
The youth began scanning the tabletop. There were many books on the table, in various languages and covering a range of content, which made one wonder if this person actually did understand so much content.
Soon, his gaze locked onto a Chinese book, the content of which had to do with an archaeological record of an old tomb.
The reason he chose this book was very simple: It was the only one he could read.
The teenager reached out and picked up the book before casually flipping to a page. Then, he pointed at a word and said, “Luo; how about this name?”
The man in black came closer for a look, and saw written in the book: The Luoyang shovel is the symbol of archaeological drilling tools. It was first used by tomb raiders, and was later used for archaeological drilling.
Man in black: “…”
Although he hadn’t seen all humans, it was very obvious that this word didn’t have much to do with a human name. If he had said earlier that he wanted a name with three words, would this name full of a tool vibe be tagged to his head?
The teenager said, “Get rid of the two words behind, and this Luo on its own is still quite handsome ah.”
The man in black looked at him. “Kid, aren’t you treating me a little too nonchalantly?”
The youth thought about it. “Then let’s do this ba. I’ll flip to a page, and you say a number for the corresponding word; how about it?”
The man in black reluctantly agreed. “Fine; the fifteenth word.”
The youth closed his eyes and flipped to a page, then looked for the corresponding word. He laughed. “Look, it’s still Luo, of the Luo River. You chose this, so you can’t back out oh.”
The man in black dubbed Luo: “…”
This was probably destiny ba.
OMGGG AHHHHHHH THE WIFE NAMED THE HUSBAND!! AWSL. Wait so luo was a gardener? So he took care of the world? The other guy is our mc father then?
Ahahahahahahahaah!
Luo is like a caretaker but when he dumped it on xl father he took advantage to create loopholes
Or Fate
XL was the one who gave Luo his name🥺
That other guy is probably XL’s dad. As for gardener… hmm.. still very mysterious. What does he harvest? Also, it seems Luo isn’t a human then? As he said, “Although he hadn’t seen all humans…”
Gardener not harvest, he cultivate plants in the garden. The one who harvest is the farmer
It’s been said several times that Luo isn’t human… And yay for XL giving Luo his name, I’m squealing here!😊
So this is how the handsome man in black get his ‘formidable’ name 🤣🤣🤣 the wife name the husband!!! Superb 😍 a sweet dog food for me🍰🍩
AAAAAAAAH
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHThanks for the chapter ❤
Hmmm… Interesting…
Thank you for the chapter ❤️
Luo was kinda different man before he met MC. He has no resemblance to loyal black bellied gong right now we have
I think they fell in love so after he lost his memory and shattered he doesn’t remember but he knows he loves xl
So many information (・∀・)
XL named Luo ;w; it’s so beautiful
Thank you for the chapter!!! ❤️❤️
OMV OMG OMG OMG
Thanks for the chapter! (♡´▽`♡)♡
I have another idea xD What if the ill tempered guy is Zhang Dong? He is sus after all. He gave XL Luo’s envelope at the beginning and well… gives XL useless items with his own signature lol Even if he isn’t the mentioned other person, it still feels like he has/had smth to do with XL. Or big, big plottwist… Zhang Dong is XL father lololol He turned into that person after he died lol Okay, I’ll shut up my nonsense xDD (Since I can’t even remember anymore if XL’s father died before or after he entered the world.)
Thx for the ch ٩(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )و
gasp I also was thinking that Zhang Dong may have been XL’s father, but than it’s not clear why his appereance has changed
oh, and maybe Zhang Dong is someone who Luo controls
Luo…of the Luo river? Reminds me that Luo Binghe got his name from the Luo river because he was picked up from there. 👀
Luo Bonghe have more beautiful and reasonable situation in what he was named. Luo was named first as a shovel and only than as a river)
Thanks for the chapter~
So Luo was first named after a… shovel?? The river would have been nicer as a first choice, LMAO 🤣😂
thanks for the chapter! <3
If Lawrence will be translated to Chinese, it would be… Luo Rensi? Hmmm… it is so cute that it was actually Xiao Lan who named Luo.
(I SWEAR, I DIDN’T THINK OF SOMETHING ELSE WHILE READING THIS 😩🖐️)
OMFG the origin of the name tho HAHSHAS 🤣🤣🤣
Thanks for the chapter~💕
So he was named after a shovel and a river? 🤣
💜💜💜
Luoyang Shovel.. Lmao.. 😂
aaaaaahhhhhsuawhdiadiqadq he was the one who gave him his name!!! So ofc he was the only one that was able to read it on the letter!!??!! Oh my god the destiny, fate, heavens
awwww! QAQ!! he gave him is name sobs!!!