The night was already deep. Sonia and Maria, looking a hundred times more energetic than they had in the afternoon, sat at the dining table, their backs practically wagging two invisible dog tails.
Local specialty dishes were laid out on the table, their aromas richly tempting after a brief reheating.
Sonia wrinkled her nose, closing her eyes in sheer intoxication.
The afternoon's exhaustion had left her ravenous, her stomach emitting an embarrassing rumble.
Melina used her Magic Factor to manipulate the wine bottles, making them perform a nimble tap dance across the tabletop before pouring the contents herself.
"Thanks, homie."
Habitually, Sonia brought her index and middle fingers together and tapped the countertop in front of her wine glass.
All three froze in unison.
Then, they burst into laughter simultaneously. Maria looked like a dignified blonde, but when she laughed, she was an absolute party animal. She pointed at Sonia: "Sonia, you've completely exposed yourself as a morning tea lover."
Having changed out of her knight's armor, Sonia wore a black-and-purple pinafore, her unspooled black hair draped over her shoulders, making her look quite the lady.
"What's wrong with drinking tea?" she argued with unshakeable logic:
"My grandma is in her nineties and still drinks morning tea every single day..."
She trailed off.
The group fell silent for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts.
"People always have to look forward." Melina thought of her own family, the corners of her mouth pulling downward uncontrollably as a melancholic expression naturally formed.
"Yeah..." Maria stared into her wine glass, offering a listless reply, her thoughts elsewhere.
Sonia flashed a slightly melancholy smile, propping her cheek on one hand:
"You guys too?"
Melina tapped into her own cruel sense of humor: "No choice. We can't keep picking people who are orphans, can we?"
Maria gently patted her thigh, her smile less one of happiness and more of bitter resignation:
"True enough, occasionally our kind has to step up! It can't always be them."
Sonia raised her glass filled with low-alcohol wine and shouted loudly:
"To the transmigrators who have cars and houses, both parents alive, all siblings present, and grandparents living to a ripe old age!"
Melina clinked glasses with her, then with Maria:
"And to my beloved colleagues handling the luxury car hit-and-run involving my parents!"
Maria asked curiously, "You got here by being hit by a luxury car?"
"Yes."
"Your colleague?"
Melina laughed through the pain: "I worked at a law firm."
Maria let out a cough and gave a thumbs-up: "Brutal."
She clinked glasses with Sonia.
Using her slightly trilled accent, she said:
"May there be no high-voltage electricity in this other world, may this other world offer a hope and a signal for home, and may transmigrators never be lonely, never walk alone!"
Then she belted out at the top of her lungs: "Your dreams may be shattered, but carry the hope in your heart and move forward, you'll never walk alone..."
Everyone was overjoyed.
At least for this moment, they were happy, devoid of that sense of alienation one feels being alone in a foreign land.
Sonia tapped her bowl and dish with a spoon.
Melina tilted her head back and drained her wine in one gulp. A fierce, burning sensation scorched its way down her throat, so sharp it made one want to cry. Did she cry? Not necessarily, because now she would never walk alone.
The local Hamlet specialty, Face of Dagon, had no noodles in it whatsoever; the outside was crispy roasted octopus, wrapping around a stir-fried rice made of green and red bell peppers, sticky rice, and roasted pork. Taking a bite, the flavor aside, just the crunchy, crispy texture alone was enough to make anyone beam with happiness and make *om-nom* sounds.
Hydra Swamp, an ultra-thick fish soup, wasn't meant for drinking, but for dipping bread. The rich, savory fish broth mixed with astonishing protein and nutrition was so potent that even a Red-Feathered Dragon would get gout from a single bite!
Though she hated to admit it, this meal was genuinely much better than anything Melina could cook herself.
Perhaps because supplies weren't so scarce, the common folk of this world didn't need to skimp on oil and seasonings when cooking... it was just a bit unstable. One day the Gatherers might bring back all meat, leading to an all-meat feast, and the next day they might bring back all fish, resulting in an all-fish feast. Though that was just in theory—locals rarely hoarded food; only Ratmen hoarded supplies.
After finishing the meal, Melina needed to tidy up her room, while Sonia and Maria took a sample from her to run test strip analyses.
She had too much Magic Factor, so choosing a weapon required extreme caution.
Senior Sister said that the reason she had been a blade-wielding maiden in her First Playthrough was because her Magic Factor had dropped due to subsequent poor health, turning her into a six-blade maiden before she eventually stabilized as a five-blade maiden. Now that she was completely healthy, the experience from her First Playthrough couldn't be directly applied; tests were mandatory.
The samples required were mainly saliva and blood.
Neither required a large quantity.
Once the collection was done, the two of them excitedly headed straight for the alchemy workshop on the first floor, leaving the second floor to Melina to sort out her luggage first.
Before tidying up, Melina even delivered the mosquito-repellent alchemy potion to Echo Squad.
...
Her body felt a bit sore. Melina rubbed her eyes and yawned.
Drinking still had negative effects on manipulating Magic Factor.
She had originally wanted to replenish her alchemy potions, but in her current state that was impossible, so she simply went to take a shower, changed into comfortable pajamas, and planned to restock the potions during her post-shower clarity.
The second-floor alchemy workshop didn't provide materials, but she had brought her own.
Stealth Potion.
The main ingredients were ground Shadow Dragon scales and ground black gemstone, while the secondary ingredients were common tree roots, spider legs, and crow beaks.
Its effect was that after drinking it down, the Magic Factor within a four-meter radius would mimic the factor sorting of a deserted zone, thereby achieving a certain level of presence erasure. This time she had had enough of a small squad playing red light, green light; if she hadn't lost her mind, everyone might still be out there...
Though Red-Feathered Dragons were terrifying, any professional Explorer had the potential for an undefeated Triple Crown in red light, green light.
Thinking thus, she twisted the valve of the alchemy cauldron.
*Hiss*—blue flames licked outward.
*Gurgle, gurgle*—a large amount of clean water poured in.
*Plop, plop*—add the secondary ingredients first, to avoid adding frost to the already poor economic snow.
*Crackling*—a Banshee with strong magic factors could grind dragon scales and black gemstones bare-handed.
...
*Zzz*—Junior Sister, I've succeeded!
Melina looked at the entire pot of potion, feeling both smug and proud. This kind of potion wasn't easy; making it in one go was a testament to her skill. Next, she only needed to wait for the impurities in the potion to settle, skim off the liquid on top, and finally dilute it with clean water in the proper proportion.
At that moment, a slightly raspy female voice came from the doorway: "Excellent blending."
Melina turned her head and saw Maria radiating intense feminine charm—another Senior Sister.
This one had drunk quite a bit. Just because Sonia had been a stubborn drunk—*“Can't drink anymore? Weakling, weakling~”*—Lao Ma couldn't hold back, drinking Sonia under the table until she had to rush to the bathroom to purge her energy and unleash her drunken fury, while Maria herself wandered around strolling with a rolling wine barrel... Melina had spotted the small wine barrel she was dragging.
At that exact instant.
Sixty-eight versions of the thought *“Whatever this woman says right now is just an excuse”* flashed through Meimei's mind, sealing off the other's path in advance.
Placing both hands in front of her chest, palms facing outward in a standard *“Meimei can't do it”* posture, the words tumbled out:
"If you want to drink another round, wait for Senior Sister. I physically cannot drink anymore."
Lao Ma, light shining in her eyes, pouted with a wronged expression:
"Really can't?"
With her left hand pressed against her waist, her leaning posture was seductively alluring. She was tough and pretty, but not of the same type or breed as Senior Sister. Senior Sister was the flat-chested beauty type—heroic, but leaning more toward girlish charm; whereas Maria was a bit more of a tomboy, and she actually had breasts.
"Cannot."
"There's nothing in this world that can't be done, including beating *Elden Ring* blindfolded."
Maria said in a deadpan, serious tone.
Melina thought to herself: What is *Elden Ring*? Surely not a mobile game?
She mumbled an ambiguous "uh-huh," pretending she understood.
Maria didn't force her to drink, setting the wine barrel down and loosening up her joints. Melina caught a whiff of alcohol, wrinkled her nose in disgust, and offered advice in her slightly sexless, calm tone:
"Drink in moderation."
Maria stared wide-eyed:
"If that bastard Suosuo hadn't fake-claimed the seer, A-Mei, our world would be on the brink of destruction. In the Weeping Peninsula alone, there are several city-ending, kingdom-ending, and world-ending crises. And here you are telling us to drink in moderation? Why don't you go catch a Clockwork Cat and make those Cat Buns provide services for free?"
Clockwork Cats were fluffy, soft Cat Buns with a winding key growing out of their backs, and they only recognized money.
"That won't do." Melina still remembered the book-moldy library, where the Clockwork Cats copied books in a script as neat as a typewriter, charging nearly 3 Gold Lei per book. She had once tried to negotiate prices with them, and those Cat Buns had directly stopped their winding keys from turning, transforming into stone cats and refusing to communicate—until a month later when they forgot Melina's face and finally started talking to her again.
They were just that kind of greedy creatures.
Any discount felt like an insult.
"Then there you go! Drink in time, make merry in time. None of my business, none of your business," Maria said calmly, then stepped onto another alchemy bench to continue a set of alchemy procedures for [extracting gold from sand].
Outwardly, she looked a hundred times more warm-hearted than Sonia, but her internal winter was a hundred times colder than Sonia's.
"Even if the world is destroyed?"
"Even if the world is destroyed, I still have the confidence to survive." Maria paused, looking at her. "In my world, there are two kinds of people."
"One kind is people I know, the other is people I don't know. People I know are truly flesh-and-blood human beings to me; people I don't know are like NPCs. Maybe 99% of people die overnight, and I'll feel sad, depressed, or down. But if the person who dies is someone I know, even if it's just one, I'll be heartbroken."
She stared at the table without looking up:
"But I will help Sonia, and if you're going to help her too, A-Mei, remember what I said."
"Do your absolute best for the people you know, and don't let people you don't know moral-blacklist you. Don't act like you genuinely care about all of humanity, and don't act like you've completely lost your morals either, OK?"
A hidden warmth underlaid Maria's words.
Melina heard it and smiled, making an OK sign:
"Got it."
"Good A-Mei," Maria said flippantly, "Come with me to West Hamlet tomorrow."
Melina bent down to collect the potion with a water siphon: "What for?"
"To get you a custom set of gear. Sonia is paying, so don't be polite with her. Since she's making you fight a dragon dozens of times stronger than that Red-Feathered Dragon you guys met, she has to cover your starting equipment completely."
Melina felt a bit embarrassed, and also wanted to save money: "Is customization really necessary?"
Maria glanced at Melina's chest assets and shook her head vigorously:
"You're not like Sonia; she can squeeze into whatever she wears. Your size... won't really fit."
Meimei had no objections left.