Chapter 6: Message in a bottle
Translator: Sparrow Translations Editor: Sparrow Translations
“Hey, Lu Shu! Why do you not seem tired at all?” Lu Xiaoyu asked curiously as they headed back in after building snowmen together. Normally, Lu Shu would be exhausted and panting just from going out to buy a 10kg bag of rice.
After mulling over it, Lu Shu agreed that there was indeed a huge change. In the storybooks, it was often shown that people who possessed a solid skeletal structure were able to train more efficiently and now that he had consumed the Refresher Fruit, could his skeletal structure be considered better?
At this moment, Lu Shu smiled to himself. Unsure of this different world and how it came about, his imagination started to run wild.
After witnessing his own new system, he decided to take things slowly and researched more about it… who knew what could happen in the future.
When he reached home, Lu Shu nested himself on the sofa and was happily immersed in his smartphone. Lu Xiaoyu curiously tried to steal a peek but was not able to figure out anything, “Lu Shu, what’cha doing? ”
“Just chatting,” as Lu Shu continued to focus on his phone.
“Let me have a look,” said Lu Xiaoyu as she grabbed onto his hand. She coincidentally saw Lu Shu on WeChat. The chatroom he was in was labeled: Message In A Bottle.
Lu Xiaoyu said disrespectfully, “Lu Shu, you’re actually playing with this feature?!”
Lu Shu was too busy to care about her, sending yet another anonymous message: Is cute little fatty there?
Anonymous: How about a big fatty?
Lu Shu: So are you fatty?
Anonymous: Yep.
Lu Shu: d.a.m.n, you’re actually here reading messages instead of trying to lose weight?!
The other party went bonkers! Are you sick in the mind !?
However, all Lu Shu did was to look joyfully at his inbox: From Lu Mengyu’s distress, +50 points…
…
“Alright, alright, raking in the points. I guess it was rather efficient earning points from toying with others and inducing animosity within them.”
If it actually involved scaring others, Lu Shu did not really have that sort of talent… but if it was about annoying and causing them to feel distressed, he was just the right person for this job!
And then another anonymous message came in, the other party’s message was, “Can’t sleep, who has some interesting videos to share.”
Lu Shu, “I have, care for some b**bs?”
Anonymous, “Quick! Send it to me! Bless you, good samaritan!”
Lu Shu searched for a photo of an x-ray of a chest on the web and sent it over to the other party.
Anonymous: ???
“From Li Mingle’s distress, +20 points… …”
Lu Shu was holding gleefully onto the handheld device he painstakingly spent hundreds of dollars on; happily imagining all the rewards he could redeem or win from partic.i.p.ating in the lottery using these points.
It’s as if this ‘talent’ of his had finally found an avenue to be utilized in a legitimate way… If only it could actually be considered as a genuine talent…
After leaving the orphanage, Lu Shu spent close to two years studying at Luo Cheng International School. However, the reason he did not have many friends would probably be due to his abnormal personality which others found rather unbearable…
“From Zhi Wei’s distress, +1 point…”
Hehe, having considered taking a little bit of his revenge, Lu Shu decided to rest his case with this guy.
Under normal conditions, he was used to not giving a second thought about what he would say…
In a blink of an eye, Lu Shu had efficiently acc.u.mulated a high of 700 distress points tonight, and a Celestial Fruit would cost him 1000 points. Lu Shu had an inkling to try out the effects of this fruit. However, on second thoughts, since he was lacking in his knowledge on sorcery, he was not certain of the actual purpose of the fruit’s effect. Furthermore, he was unsure if it had any expiry date and if it would go bad if left unconsumed.
In his eyes, only the Refresher Fruit was the most applicable and useful for Lu Shu personally. In that case… perhaps going for the lottery would be most apt for him.
What prize could there be in the lottery? Would there be a rare grimoire to be won?
As these thoughts raced through his mind, and Lu Shu was getting all fired up.
He had already guessed that what he had was thoroughly different from others. From the countless web searches and doc.u.ments he had gone through in order to find out about his circ.u.mstance, not one person knew anything the trinket which once hung from his neck. It was as if it was a unique, one-of-a-kind piece of artifact.
On television news, some claimed to have awakened their supernatural power suddenly while some claimed that they had gone through some life-changing stimulation before awakening to these powers.
There were also others who doc.u.mented priests as they spent long periods of time honing themselves on the peaks of mountains before gaining their powers. From the looks of it, it seemed like everyone had gotten their powers through countless, different ways.
However, others with powers already had a head start in this field compared to him. Lu Shu was dying to find out whether this new system would be able to grant him a new spell; that way, he would be able to take his first step into this new world of sorcery.
Nonetheless, if the dawn of the magical energy had only started, it would mean that those with a headstart in this field would not be that far ahead since these incidents only occurred months apart.
Although he had consumed the Refresher Fruit, it felt as if nothing much really changed and he did not even gain any new powers.
After earning his 700 points, Lu Shu brought Lu Xiaoyu back into his house and in a fit of excitement, decided to go all-in with his points and enter the lottery another 7 times!
Lu Shu stared blankly at the lottery wheel landing on the spot “Thank you for partic.i.p.ating” 5 times, as disappointment started to show on his face.
Others who would normally awaken to a greater power by undergoing some stressful stimulations were to be envied.
Lu Shu was currently going through a stressful situation too, even though the circ.u.mstance as of now was caused by himself. Laughably, when some others went through stressful stimulations, they would attain a new power but as for him, he would only receive “Thank you for partic.i.p.ating”.
As usual, lady luck was never on Lu Shu’s side.
On his sixth try, he had won the Refresher Fruit and upon seeing this, Lu Shu could not contain his excitement.The fruit’s effects were very obvious and since it was his second time winning this item, it meant that the odds of winning it in the lottery were not very low. Hopefully, from this, his skeletal structure and foundation would continue to improve?
On the seventh attempt, the lottery awarded him with a golden piece of paper with ever so familiar words on it, and he sang along naturally…
“Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are… …”
Lu Shu: ? ? ? !
What is this?!
“Who can tell me what exactly the heck this is!? Compared to my efforts the whole night, even the old man collecting and recycling soda bottles could not have been more diligent than me, and this rubbish is what I got from the lottery?”
If only his own distress could be absorbed and converted into points for the system, he would be unstoppable!
Lu Shu was in disbelief as he felt that he was in a great amount of stress and anger right now. Why was he not awakening to any powers yet? This whole system was actually meant to stress him out right? ! It had to be!
After another look, the words seemed to have changed a bit.
“Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, how I wonder what you are.
Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky
When the blazing sun is gone, when nothing s.h.i.+nes upon
He could not see which way to go if you did not twinkle so”
Lu Shu tried singing the entire lullaby out loud but nothing changed from the piece of paper. Saying it out loud once more with all seriousness, there was still no reaction from it.
Even if the lyrics had changed and you were no longer the same person as you were in the past, this will still stay as just a plain, old lullaby. Holding on to that piece of paper, Lu Shu was too dumbfounded to even complain.
At the same time, Lu Xiaoyu who at the other side of the apartment started shouting, “Lu Shu, Lu Shu, the snow has stopped! ”
Lu Shu jumped up abruptly and headed towards the window.
From the snow-filled skies, the stars were s.h.i.+ning brilliantly in the calm, silent night. The silver-white starlight made its way into the house through the windows and onto the golden piece of paper, causing it to burst into a bright, white flame.
As the burning flames seemed to reach its climax, the piece of golden paper was burnt to crisp, white ashes; which immediately fused together with the tree-like symbol on Lu Shu’s palm.
Lu Shu suddenly thought, perhaps if he would sing this extraordinary lullaby once again, would anything extraordinary happen?