Xiao Zhou was stunned by Shen Xin’s academic prowess.

Damn, how did this big shot have time to maintain such an impressive alternate identity? And it was even more incredible than the main one.

To excel in academics while maintaining a thriving gaming career—this woman had to be a god, right?!

As the barrage of comments from tourists and haters flooded the chat, Xiao Zhou returned to the live stream, where amid the sea of comments, some people were still managing to throw shade:

【 So what if she’s good at school? Aren’t good people still capable of harming society? 】

【 Hah, she’s only got a bachelor’s degree. 】

【 Everyone knows universities nowadays are a joke. Who knows if she bought her way into the honor roll? 】

【 Shen Xin’s behavior is reprehensible; we recommend S University expel her. 】

These comments, made solely for the purpose of dragging her name through the mud, earned a collective laugh from S University students.

【 Can you buy first place in a national robotics competition? Quick, let me buy one too! Seriously, though, please! 】

【 Yes, yes, yes, having good grades is useless. She’s only participated in the world robotics competition and brought honor to our country. 】

【 Who’s our school’s darling? It’s our Saint Shen! 】

【Those who say college is the bare minimum are probably unfamiliar with the mechanical industry, right? Is this field even about academic credentials? When Shen Bodhisattva applied for internships during his senior year of college, it was like watching gods fight—no, I mean, it was like watching god-like companies fight over him.**

【Indeed, those god-like companies were all incredible, each more powerful than the last, fighting to snatch up Bodhisattva. The rest of us, who were thoroughly examined and rejected ten times over, can only shed tears of envy and inadequacy.**

【My apologies, everyone, but upon entering the chat, I discovered my stinking little brother dared insult Bodhisattva here. I’ve given him a beating already.**

【Now that you mention it, there were a few others insulting Bodhisattva earlier, and they seemed to be employees from our company. Are they slacking off during work hours? Someone report this to the finance department for a deduction in wages.**

【Oh, right, don’t go saying “You’re also slacking off by watching streams,” because this is my dad’s company. 】

As expected, the chat was much quieter shortly after. Among the most vicious anti-Bodhisattva commenters, Fan Qing and Xiao-Jie’s fans had their voices silenced; whether they had left of their own volition or been forced to log off was unknown.

The stream’s atmosphere became harmonious.

Xiao Zhou hadn’t expected this turn of events, nor had he anticipated that the incident would actually increase his viewership. He stared at the prepared messages in the chatbox for a while before deleting them one by one.

Jing Yan encountered Fan Qing and Xiao-Jie in the town, and he was surprised to see them alive. “You guys aren’t dead?”

Fan Qing and Xiao-Jie trembled when they saw Jing Yan, the pain of being hacked by a scimitar resurfacing in their minds. They immediately bolted, but Jing Yan, quick on the draw, threatened them with his knife, “Don’t run!”

The two stopped in their tracks and bowed respectfully to Jing Yan. “Hello, big bro! Don’t be impulsive, big bro!”

“Who’s your big bro?” Jing Yan continued from where he left off. “Didn’t you guys become data and vanish? How come you’re not dead?”

“Er…” Fan Qing hesitated, prompting Jing Yan to wave his knife again, scaring the man into telling the truth, “Yes, we died, but then we respawned in a house in town.”

“So there’s respawn…” Jing Yan pondered briefly before asking, “Then is there a death penalty?”

“Yes!” Fan Qing looked like he was about to cry without tears. “All the equipment on our person vanished, and our health and stamina maxes decreased by 10 each. We lost ten thousand points altogether! Our scores are both in the negatives now. Please be mindful; we can’t withstand your attacks.”

Fan Qing originally had a score of around 1000 points, so this death truly cost him everything. Not only did he lose all his belongings, but he also ranked last in the player scores.

“Um, big bro, have you seen our swords?” Xiao-Jie asked cautiously. “We can always gather more of the other stuff, but there’s no place to buy swords on the island, and we need those to kill monsters and level up…”

Swords? Those were with Shen Xin.

It just so happened that Shen Xin was lacking in weapons, so she kept the two ordinary longswords. After Xiao-Jie and his companion left, Jing Yan ran to Shen Xin’s field, where he bumped into her while she was picking strawberries.

The strawberries in the game were beautifully rendered, each one plump and fresh. As Shen Xin picked the succulent red fruits, Jing Yan swallowed hard.

It had been a long time since he’d had fruit…

With the effects of multiple crops and doubled yields both in play, Shen Xin pulled off one strawberry but received four. Seeing Jing Yan’s longing gaze, she tossed two over. “Wait here, I’ll make lunch.”

After figuring out how to make the buff food, Jing Yan wanted to buy large quantities of it from her, or at least high-quality produce.

Shen Xin didn’t agree at first. She had plenty of crops, but that didn’t mean there was enough food for everyone.

According to Xiao Feng’s rumors, players weren’t the only ones suffering from food shortages; the NPCs were also lacking.

The NPCs had even begun competing with the players for food resources, so much so that there was not a single edible vegetable left in the wilderness.

Not only that, but as players’ fishing skills gradually improved, they discovered that the number of fish they could catch in a day had decreased from twenty to ten.

It wasn’t that ten wasn’t enough, but the clear decrease in the number of fish being caught was undeniable.

Perhaps…one day, it would no longer be possible to catch any fish at all.

Everyone understood the principle that overfishing would lead to a decrease in resources, and some suggested pursuing sustainable development by limiting the number of fish caught each day to ensure the natural reproduction of fish stocks.

At first, everyone agreed, and the next day, some indeed left after catching one or two fish.

Those who caught so little inadvertently allowed those who remained to reap a bumper crop, and some even caught dozens of fish. The ones who left early now refused to accept such paltry catches, and in the end, no one was willing to yield to anyone else, resulting in fewer and fewer fish being caught.

Shen Xin could only say that the UOL developers loved psychological warfare, having grasped human nature so thoroughly.

Food resources would become extremely scarce in the future, which was why Shen Xin was initially unwilling to engage in trade with Jing Yan.

Jing Yan said, “I’ll buy them at a price you’ll be satisfied with.”

Shen Xin replied, “Money can’t buy food right now.”

“But money is useful in other ways,” Jing Yan countered, adding more to his offer. “I can give you random seeds for free in the future.”

Shen Xin remained unconcerned. “I can get those by defeating monsters myself.”

Jing Yan fell into a dilemma. The monsters underground were truly difficult to deal with; he needed those supplies.

Jing Yan asked, seeming rather helpless, “You don’t lack for anything, but what about manpower? For example, would you need me to help you tend your fields?”

Putting aside whether or not he could physically farm her land, even if he could, who would the produce belong to—Shen Xin or Jing Yan?

Shen Xin wanted to refuse, but she suddenly realized she did need some help.

“Let’s do this instead. I won’t ask you to help with sowing seeds, but on the first day of each season, I’ll help you in return for something else.”

Shen Xin leaned forward as she spoke, and Jing Yan leaned in closer as well.

“What is it?”

“On the first day of summer, the shop will restock summer seeds. At that time, could you help hold off the others? I need to purchase a large quantity of seeds.”

Previously, Shen Xin had never lacked for food, and because no other player had an agriculturalist profession, she was able to secure all the spring seeds by herself.

But that wouldn’t be the case in the future; food acquisition would become increasingly difficult, so more players would inevitably join the farming ranks. When that time came, there would be too many people fighting over a limited resource, and how could she continue to level up as a farmer if there were no crops left? At that point, she’d have no choice but to join the miserable masses struggling to obtain basic necessities.

Having access to seeds was extremely important.

Upon hearing that Shen Xin hadn’t purchased summer seeds, Jing Yan’s eyes lit up.

Players like him didn’t want to rely on others, so if he could guarantee his food supply for the spring, he’d rather plant high-level crops himself for sustenance during the summer.

Shen Xin guessed his thoughts, so to entice him, she revealed a bit of her own strategy. “I’m a farmer, which means I have a chance of reaping four times the harvest from my crops.”

There was no one else on the island more suited to farming than her.

“If you plant them yourself, your harvest will be significantly smaller, and the quality won’t be as high.” Now Shen Xin was the one convincing Jing Yan to collaborate with her. “But if you help me, I’ll sell you four portions of buff-enhanced food every day.”

She added, “If you buy summer seeds from me, I can upgrade that to six portions.”

Each cooking attempt yielded two or three portions of food, so she only needed two or three high-quality ingredients per day.

There was nothing left to say. Jing Yan promptly made his decision, “You can go ahead and enter the shop to buy seeds at that time without a worry, I’ll stand outside and make sure no one tries to steal your stuff!”

The two reached their agreement yesterday.

As Jing Yan enjoyed the sweet and tart strawberries, he handed over the random seeds to Shen Xin and asked, “Still haven’t figured out how to plant these?”

Random seeds differed from regular seeds in that they could not be directly planted into the ground.

Shen Xin thought that either the seeds inside were not meant to be planted in spring or that they needed additional processing before being sown.

While Shen Xin was still researching the planting method, Jing Yan told her that the two idiots from yesterday were still alive.

“Players don’t get kicked out of the game upon death?” Shen Xin was equally shocked upon hearing this.

So that’s how the game mechanics worked… It certainly wasn’t a hardcore survival game.

Jing Yan nodded. “But there is a penalty for death.”

His tone clearly carried disappointment. “To be honest, I was quite fond of the competition prize.”

“After taking care of those two, I suddenly had an epiphany. If I were to ‘accidentally’ take out some of the players with the highest popularity, I’d have a chance at taking first place.”

“Unfortunately, players don’t log out of the game when they die.” Jing Yan’s tone was disappointed. “But they do lose points upon death. How about I break into their house? I could keep them pinned near their spawn point so they die over and over again, until they die so many times even the audience won’t be able to revive them… Hey, this might actually work!” As he spoke, a new idea formed.

Shen Xin nodded. “It certainly could work. Then, once the match ends and you step out of the UOL gates, you’ll be ambushed by those players’ fans.”

“Ha ha ha, true.” Jing Yan sat on the chair at Shen Xin’s place and swung his legs, waiting for her to come out from the kitchen with food, before heading off into the mountains to hunt monsters.

After Jing Yan left, Shen Xin placed a stool by the riverbank of her farm and went fishing.

She didn’t lack for food, as she had stocked up on fish, so her sole purpose in fishing was to obtain chests.

She’d thought that with fewer fish, the number of chests would increase instead.

But the reality was, with fewer fish, the chests became scarcer as well.

After catching a couple, Shen Xin surmised that the prerequisite for triggering a chest was a fish biting the hook, and then there was a certain chance that the hooked fish would transform into a chest.

Her current fishing level allowed her to catch treasure chests at twice the original rate.

This sounded like a significant increase, but the drop rate for high-level treasure chests was originally only 1 percent, now doubled to 2 percent. It still wouldn’t be easy to catch one.

As expected, after reeling in a low-level treasure chest and seven fish, Shen Xin caught nothing else for the rest of the day.

If she couldn’t catch anything, she might as well stop trying. Shen Xin packed up her things and decided to get some early rest.

In the early stages of the game, she’d pushed herself to the point of exhaustion just to afford all the seeds she needed. Now that she had food and shelter, she could afford to take it easy.

Meanwhile, many players who’d been lazy during the early stages were now forced to wander all over the mountains and forests in search of food while also avoiding increasingly strong wild monsters. Their days were no less harried than Shen Xin’s had been, but their rewards were far less impressive.

Yun Yuwei experienced his umpteenth unsuccessful attempt at fishing, and in a fit of rage, he threw his fishing rod to the ground. “I quit! I’m dropping out of this competition!”

Qin Chengyue reminded him, “We signed a contract earlier stating that we can’t drop out.”

“Fuck.” Yun Yuwei lay sprawled on the ground. “Then I guess I’ll starve to death. I’ll just quit when I die; who cares? Whoever wants to play this game can go ahead.”

“Then go to the forest,” Qin Chengyue said. “You’ll die faster that way.”

The forest was now filled with blue slimes, whose attack power was 1.5 times greater than that of green slimes; a few hits could easily kill Yun Yuwei.

“Is this how you advise your customers?” Yun Yuwei wasn’t stupid; dying of starvation merely led to minor discomfort, but being killed by monsters was painful!

He lay on the ground, allowing his stamina to decrease at its own pace.

When his stamina dipped to ten, his health began to slowly decrease as well. Yun Yuwei was already dizzy from hunger, barely able to hear the System’s warnings blaring in his ears.

At that moment, he wished desperately for Qin Chengyue to deliver some food, but if he ate, he would suffer even more in the game.

For the first time, Yun Yuwei gritted his teeth and persevered, waiting until his health dropped below three points before laughing in relief. “Ha ha ha! I’m leaving! You can stay here and suffer!”

The world around Yun Yuwei transformed into data as it reorganized itself.

Upon waking up again, Yun Yuwei sat up excitedly, only to discover that he wasn’t sitting inside UOL’s gaming pod, but rather, had been reborn on a bed within the game.

“Motherfucker!”

Fan Qing sighed tragically as he stared at the ranking of scores, Xiao-Jie once again trying to console him. “Fan, it’s fine, it’s just points, don’t be sad.”

Fan Qing waved him aside. “Go away, go away, you’re not last, of course you wouldn’t find it embarrassing!”

He sighed again. “Ay, how am I going to fill up these scores? Negative ten thousand is a huge hole.”

Suddenly, Fan Qing noticed that his score ranking had changed from “20” to “19”.

Rubbing his eyes in disbelief, he exclaimed, “Holy shit! Xiao-Jie, quick, check if I’m still at the bottom!”

Xiao-Jie’s ranking had also changed to “18”.

“No, no! It looks like another player died; their score must be lower than ours!”

“Ha ha!” Fan Qing laughed. “Thanks, thanks a lot! Whoever it is, you’re truly a selfless saint!”