[OASNG] Chapter 106: Ai Lin"s Opportunity
[August 25, 2019] ... "Whether she meant harm or not doesn"t matter to me. I only wish she"d conduct herself with more awareness of her own abilities."
Ming Xi always tried to be caring and gentle with girls. While Luis and Gerasi didn"t go out of their way to be as considerate as Ming Xi, they did try to always be patient. Tian Ya, on the other hand, had no such considerations. He spoke his mind, often cuttingly, to whomever regardless of gender.
Just then the server came with their order.
"Well food"s on the table. Everyone quickly eat before it gets cold!" Luis urged. Though he didn"t like Yifu she was still a young miss from a house somewhere. They needed to leave her some pride.
Everyone picked up their cutlery to eat but the mood had soured.
Luis couldn"t stand the silence and was thinking of saying something to break the mood when thunder rumbled in the sky. Rain quickly followed, pelting the roof with a hard pitter patter. The sky that was bright and sunny just a few seconds ago turned completely dark. It felt like night despite being three in the afternoon.
"How"d it turn to rain so fast? This can"t be good." The sudden change made Elena edgy. Masters like her didn"t have sudden mood changes. Sudden mood changes usually signified that something was about to happen and whatever it was, would be related to them.
Ming Xi furrowed his brow. He suddenly felt stuffy and oppressed. It wasn"t a good omen.
Elena and Ming Xi weren"t the only ones who felt their mood suddenly shift. The others felt it as well. They had studied at Xingguang Holy Academy for years so their strength was naturally much higher than the freshmen they were with.
"Boss do you have a room?! I"d like to book one please." A girl dressed in blue and carrying an enormous umbrella spoke out from the doorway. She was bedraggled, but her clothes were dry.
Ai Lin knew Zi Cheng would encounter something that would cement a part of her destiny at the badlands. Ai Lin planned on stealing whatever it was, so she had travelled to the badlands in order to lie in wait for Zi Cheng. She planned to infiltrate Zi Cheng"s team and have Zi Cheng lead her to the treasure.
Things didn"t go as planned though. She"d only been on the road for a bit when it started pouring. Fortunately she had an umbrella in her dimensional bag. She pulled it out just in time and managed to stay dry. Otherwise she would have been soaked to the bone.
"Yes, yes of course. I"ll book a room for you right now." The clerk immediately booked Ai Lin a room and got the keys for her.
"Huh? Zi Cheng? Feng Wu? Why are you guys here?" Ai Lin walked over to them, looking surprised. No one would have suspected she knew Zi Cheng would be there, that she had in fact run over to the inn to lie in wait.
Her surprise wasn"t completely fake. Ai Lin knew the general time Zi Cheng would get to the inn based on her memory of the story, but she didn"t know the exact time. Because of this she planned on getting to the inn a few days ahead and wait for Zi Cheng to appear.
Zi Cheng should have still been in Souya for Sir Germaine"s wedding. Why was she here so many days earlier than expected? What happened?
In the novel, Sir Germaine was kidnapped before the wedding. Lady Minerva felt it was unmanly of him to be kidnapped so easily, and because of that had cancelled the wedding.
It all went according to Sir Germaine"s plan to avoid the marriage. He was, in fact, the anonymous person who sent the mission to the Adventurers" Guild!
Originally Sir Germaine would have been kidnapped and it would have taken Ming Xi and his party two days to find and free him. Zi Cheng would choose to stay and help in the search. Afterwards the wedding would be cancelled and Zi Cheng would follow Ming Xi and his party to the badlands.
But things unfolded differently. The wedding wasn"t cancelled because of a kidnapping, it was cancelled because of the appearance of a pretty face seducing Lady Minerva.
Was it the b.u.t.terfly effect? One change and everything else changed too? But even if it was, these changes were too drastic!
Details of the wedding cancellation and the people involved all changed. People that weren"t in the story were now in the story! Why were Feng Wu and her group in Souya? They were never mentioned in this segment of the story.
Ai Lin felt like her world was tilting but she didn"t let it show. Her smile was unshakeable.
"Ai Lin? What a surprise. What brings you here?" Zi Cheng saw that Ai Lin had a bit of a mishap outside.
"I came for a mission. It was supposed to be to sabotage a wedding, but by the time my team got here, the deed was already done! I was going to return to school, but then I thought since I was already here, I might as well visit the crystal veins and see if I could mine some magic ores."
The Souya royal family owned a large magic crystal vein. It was a famous vein that attracted people from all over the world. The vein opened to the public after most of the precious ores had been mined. For an entrance fee of ten gold, anyone could dig and keep whatever ores they found. It was unlikely anyone would find a precious ore, most of what remained were just ordinary ones. Nevertheless it still attracted a great number of tourists.
As a freshman, it would have looked strange if Ai Lin said she was going to the badlands, so she used the nearby vein as an excuse for being in the area.
Zi Cheng replied with, "Oh, so that"s why you"re here. Are your teammates also coming later?" She had noticed there was something odd about Ai Lin"s att.i.tude towards her ever since they met in the virtual world. That, combined with her inability to raise Ai Lin"s favorability rating no matter what she did, made her cautious. There had to be something strange about Ai Lin if she couldn"t be influenced by the system.