Chapter 85: Arrival
Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation
Meng Fan made a few more attempts in different directions in order to be more familiar with the presence masking hat. In case something happened, he didn’t want to end up killing himself.
This included the different ways of wearing the hat.
For example, if he shrunk the hat and put it on his finger, the effect was still the same.
This made Meng Fan discover that although the hat could make a person’s sense of existence disappear, but its existing validation was still quite solid. It was painless to punch or poke anything with the finger that was wearing the hat.
Meng Fan also secretly tried to take a hard object and hammer his finger with the hat, but the result was hard.
Once it was enlarged to fit his head, he had the equivalent of a metal skull.
Thump, thump, thump.
Meng Fan used his head and slammed it against the lamppost a few times. Pretty good.
Yes. When the pa.s.sing pedestrians heard the sound, they were all stunned.
With this effect, Meng Fan could run around naked, and n.o.body would really see him.
Meng Fan Pa.s.sed through a bar that just happened to be the kind that required an admission ticket to get in and receive drinks. Meng Fan buffered for a moment. He thought about it and walked over.
At the door, the two bouncers handing out stamps were stumped for a moment. They looked at each other. Did someone just walk in? Doesn’t seem like it, alright. They received the next customer’s ticket and stamped her arm with an imprint that meant she could freely enter and exit for a limited time.
Ding, ding, ding!
Dang, dang, dang!
Meng Fan strolled around for a while before leaving. Originally, it had just been a bold idea. Although it wasn’t some sinister evil nor was he violating the law, Meng Fan still was hesitant to boldly try it. It was one thing to be nervous, but he couldn’t betray his own ethics.
Some ‘first times’ just shouldn’t be experienced!
This was the first warning he had set for himself upon receiving the hat.
‘Use this hat to do something that brings yourself joy that you won’t regret in the future and want to slap yourself for. That’s more than enough!’
‘Positive energy, positive energy!’
He was only reincarnated and received the System because of his positive energy, no?
Although the system wasn’t a legitimate one, he should still be a decent person!
Yes, even if he had to be a gentleman, he had to be a decent one!
There was another amazing reason that helped Meng Fan solidify his perspective. After gaining +1 observational skills, Meng Fan was able to find all kinds of indecent sc.u.mbags with wandering hands in the bar. He was afraid he couldn’t control himself and tackle them one by one… That would be interesting.
Leaving the bar, he took off the hat. In an instant, the people lined up at the door all looked up from their stamps, and crowded to look at Meng Fan.
His validation had returned!
“Sorry to disturb you, goodbye!”
Meng Fan stuck out two thumbs up, baffling the audience with his praise.
‘Where did this guy suddenly come from?’
‘Wow! What’s that gesture? Is that what’s trending this year?’
Meng Fan stuck his arm out and immediately a taxi pulled up.
The experience of going from zero validation to a high level of validation felt wonderful!
Suddenly, Meng Fan put his hat back on again, and the taxi driver paused for a moment before driving off.
He hadn’t been trying to toy with the driver, but because he had looked up while he was walking and saw a hotel.
After the taxi left, Meng Fan quickly removed his hat, and upon confirming his validation had returned, he carefully crossed the road using the pedestrian crossing.
Buzz, buzz, buzz.
About two minutes later, Meng Fan’s phone began to vibrate with all kinds of calls, messages and WeChat notifications.
When he returned to his room, he began browsing his phone after taking a shower.
“Bro, when are this week’s ill.u.s.trations coming out? I’m out of surplus!”
“I saw your stream. Mother*f.u.c.ker, you actually ran from Hangzhou to Shanghai? How ferocious! I’m in Shanghai. Do you have time to meet face to face? I’ll treat you to dinner, plus I have a business to discuss!”
These were from the G.o.d tier author, Mr.Sleepy.
“I’m heading back to Hangzhou on the 7th, so I’ll get you the drawings by the 8th at the latest.”
To be honest, as a fan of his books, Meng Fan was really eager to meet Mr Sleepy. Only, he wasn’t sure if he could hold back from giving him blade shards in person.
After all, the speed at which this guy updated his chapters was beyond irritating!
“If you want to meet, I’m not sure if I have enough time. What did you want to talk about?” Meng Fan responded.
Mr.Sleepy responded within two seconds, “Time is like that. You can always squeeze it for some. You squeeze your schedule. I’m free anytime, not busy. As for the business, it’s best to tell you in person. If you really can’t meet, I can tell you later, no problem.”
“Not busy? Then gtfo and update your book!”
Meng Fan couldn’t hold it back. He thought about it and deleted the ‘gtfo’.
“Uhm, it’s a bit late. I’m sleeping first.”
“If you have time, let me know. Yes, it’s a plan. You should sleep early!”
From the ill.u.s.trations that Meng Fan had provided him compared with the ones he did for the other authors, Mr.Sleepy could tell that Meng Fan was a big fan of his books. There were too many details that weren’t noticeable unless you were engrossed in the novel.
If Meng Fan was an ill.u.s.trator or a streamer, Mr.Sleepy was very happy to chat with him. He had to excavate the story of why Meng Fan ran from Hangzhou to Shanghai.
But if Meng Fan was a fan of his book… Heh. Overall, Mr.Sleepy was less confident when it came to facing his fans.
Time to leave!
Meng Fan was speechless but soon diverted his attention to his conversation with Wu Tong.
After eleven o’clock, Meng Fan matter-of-factly ended the conversation.
He also listened to Wu Tong’s suggestions, finally sleeping at two o’clock.
He woke up naturally at five o’clock the next morning and forced himself to lay in bed for half an hour before getting up. He gathered his stuff and got some breakfast at six am. After eating, he strolled around for a bit, and at 6:55, he went online and started running at 7:00.
Because he had walked some distance, he was only 21 kilometers from the final destination or about a half marathon away.
He was going to run it in one go.
Meng Fan had promised his netizens he would do this and wanted to challenge himself as well.
Because he had announced it yesterday, plus it had been his last journey from Hangzhou to Shanghai, the number of viewers on his stream had exceeded 3000.
At this hour, it must be true love for there to be this many viewers.
With his +2 strength, Meng Fan’s overall physical quality improved a lot. Based on the virtual interface of his black magic running shoes, he was able to pace the next three kilometers at 6 minutes and 50 seconds!
Three kilometers later, his speed increased again, pacing himself at 6 minutes and 40 seconds. However, after running another three kilometers, it returned to 6 minutes and 50 seconds and remained so for the next ten kilometers.
Ten kilometers elapsed a total time of 1 hour, seven minutes and 50 seconds.
After twelve kilometers, his speed gradually slowed down. At the fifteen kilometer mark, his pace had slowed down to 7 minutes and 30 seconds.
After reaching the fifteenth kilometer, Meng Fan wanted to eat an energy chew but then resisted the urge. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to spend the points, but because he wanted to challenge himself.
Presently, twelve kilometers wasn’t much, but Meng Fan firmly believed he could finish a half marathon without the help of his energy chews.
Of course, even if he couldn’t eat restorative things like the energy chews, he still needed the sports drink to keep himself in peak performance.
Twenty kilometers. Elapsed time, 2 hours, 20 minutes and 18 seconds!
For the last kilometer, Meng Fan was able to maintain an optimal posture. The endurance he built up from his last few days of exercise had broken out during this critical time, all the while keeping his speed level.
“Meng fatty, add oil!”
“Meng boss, you’re bada.s.s!”
“Gambatte!”
“You can do it, you’re almost there!”
When he was 800 meters away from the destination, Meng Fan could hear cheering in the distance.
Of course, it hadn’t come from the destination, but from closely up ahead.
A dozen or so people were cheering Meng Fan toward the finish line.
As Meng Fan pa.s.sed them, they continued to cheer as they followed him. They fueled him all the way to the end, the Stadium’s gate!
Boom, boom, boom.
When Meng Fan arrived, four people out of the group set off the firecrackers they had prepared before.
Flouris.h.!.+