Chapter 23: The Interview! Su Nian and Su Yu's First Encounter in the Game?

Thousands of damage from a single skill... No wonder that in his past life, even teams of over a hundred people could never complete this hidden quest.

One punch, one kid down.
One skill, a whole group of kids down.
In the starting village, having stats like these—is this even reasonable?

But then he reconsidered...
He didn't really have the right to complain about others.

[-211.]
[Talent not triggered, execution probability +0.01%.]
[Current execution probability: 5.98%.]

Fortunately, before coming here, Su Nian had grinded his percentage-based execution probability to a very impressive level! Otherwise, it would have taken much longer.

"Kid, are you just scratching me?" The wandering merchant landed a left hook on Su Nian, his eyes beneath the bamboo hat filled with disdain.
"That’s exactly what I should be asking you."
"You’re courting death!"

The wandering merchant glared.
Roundhouse kick!
"Bang!"
[-5785!]

The wandering merchant was stunned.
He still wasn't dead?
But in the next second...
[Skill triggered: Heal!]
[HP +15990.]

The wandering merchant: "???"
This... this isn't right, is it?
This is the starting village, right?
What kind of monster is this?
Is he bullying an NPC who can't see player stats?

Taking advantage of the merchant's confusion, Su Nian stepped back to create distance, firing off attacks while saying, "Just give up, you can't beat me."
"Kid, how dare you look down on me?"
"I'm merely stating a fact."

Hearing this, veins bulged on the wandering merchant's forehead. In the blink of an eye, he was right in front of Su Nian, his hands engulfed in raging flames!
"Kid, you brought this on yours—"

Before the merchant could finish his sentence:
[-46624.]
[Percentage execution talent successfully triggered!]

"See? You can't beat me." As the wandering merchant dissolved into specks of blue light, Su Nian shrugged helplessly.

[Congratulations on completing the 'Wandering Merchant' hidden quest. Reward obtained: Clue to the Divine Blessing x1.]

"???"
Su Nian, who had been calm and indifferent a second ago, was instantly stunned and unsettled upon seeing this prompt. But once the realization hit him...

A surge of wild joy followed!
As far as he knew, even the most basic Divine Blessing could provide players with an extra boost no less than an A-grade talent, and rare ones far exceeded S-grade! He only knew of a handful of players in his past life who possessed Divine Blessings. Who would have thought that in this tiny starting village, there would be a clue to one?

Su Nian quickly clicked to view it.
[Clue to the Divine Blessing: Find the owner of the Commission Tavern in the starting village; you might have an unexpected harvest!]

"The owner of the Commission Tavern?" Upon receiving this clue, Su Nian didn't hesitate and headed straight for his destination. But when he arrived at the tavern, Su Nian looked at the employee in front of him and asked, "Where is your boss?"

The employee looked up: "The boss is out on business. If you're here to accept a commission, you can talk to me. If you need the boss, you'll likely have to wait a while."
"Great..."
Su Nian walked out of the tavern, feeling somewhat helpless.

Next, he had two choices: the Land of Treasure or the first kills of the three bosses.
If he remembered correctly, on the second day after the server opened, one of the four bosses in the starting village was surrounded and killed for the first time by hundreds of people organized by a club!

It seemed the boss first-kill needed to be prioritized; besides, the average person wouldn't discover the Land of Treasure anyway. And the boss first-kill rewards were given to every member of the squad that dealt the killing blow!

Thinking of this, Su Nian opened his friends list. But before he could even look for his two "bosses"... someone had already reached out to him!

[Yurong Naida: Big shot, big shot! Are you interested in joining a club? As long as you say the word, we guarantee to offer the highest price on the market!]

Seeing this, Su Nian replied with only two words.
[Me: Let's meet.]

On the other side, Yu Yurong, who was grinding low-level mobs with Su Yu, was slightly stunned when she saw the big shot's instant reply, followed immediately by pure ecstasy! The big shot actually wanted to meet her in person? In her view, the big shot wanting to meet meant he was interested, and interest meant a high probability of joining the club! If the big shot didn't want to join, why would he agree to a face-to-face meeting? She would finally get to see the big shot's true form!

Thinking of this, Yu Yurong punched a mob into the air and looked at her sister Su Yu, who was drawing her bow to aim, and said excitedly: "Sis, let's go, stop grinding for now. I'm taking you to meet a big shot!"
"Okay." Su Yu followed obediently.

Meanwhile, after sending his location to Yu Yurong, Su Nian also sent a message to Hou Xiaoyu, whom he had added on WeChat yesterday, via the phone linked to his virtual pod.

...

A few minutes later, on a small hillside outside the starting village.
From a distance, Yu Yurong spotted the blurry figure on the slope and her eyes lit up: "Big shot, I'm here!"
She waved her hand while running up the hill with her short legs, Su Yu following behind.

"Heave! Ho!"
When Yu Yurong finally climbed the hill, breathing heavily, she realized something was wrong!
"Wait... 'Slaughter the World'?"
Staring at the four-character ID above the masked man's head, Yu Yurong was taken aback, feeling very confused. She quickly looked around. Where was 'Emperor'? Where was the big shot? How could 'Slaughter the World', the player ranked second on the level leaderboard, be here?

"Ding!"
A message popped up in her friends list.
[Emperor: I'm right in front of you.]

"???"
Yu Yurong looked up in shock at the masked man in front of her, unable to believe it: "You are... Emperor?"
Su Nian nodded slowly.
"Ah, this..."

What was going on? The person in front of her had the ID 'Slaughter the World', but the one chatting with her was 'Emperor'? Yu Yurong's brain worked at high speed, almost to the point of overheating. Fortunately, at this moment, Su Nian slowly unmasked a small gap on his face.

"No way! The ID changed?"
Yu Yurong instantly realized. The big shot actually had a dual identity?
Wait... now that she knew this secret, would she be silenced?

"Just a prop, no big deal." Su Nian seemed to see right through the thoughts of the white-haired loli in front of him and said calmly.
'Slaughter the World' was just a secondary account dedicated to the path of slaughter. He wasn't good at pretending to be weak to pig-out on his enemies, but he knew that once some people realized he had a dual identity and didn't fear the negative effects of the Red Name status, allowing him to slaughter players at will, no one would dare to disturb his progress!

Of course... what was the point of hiding a dual identity? Once the equipment leaderboard appeared, how would he explain two accounts having the same equipment? Or even having the same combat power later on? It would be known sooner or later anyway.

Just as Yu Yurong let out a sigh of relief, Su Yu, standing beside her, was slightly stunned.