On the deserted island, the burning campfire lit up the world around Jiang Ye, illuminating the blue-gray flat-tailed sea snakes before her in stark detail.
Jiang Ye was afraid of snakes.
The moment she saw a snake, her mind would automatically conjure the image of someone being tightly coiled by one, the snake slowly tightening its hold, the person’s breathing and oxygen growing scarce, until death finally came.
Jiang Ye’s mind was running wild, searching for any information about the blue-gray flat-tailed sea snake.
According to what she knew from Blue Star, these snakes were only supposed to come ashore during spawning season.
So why were they all crawling up here in a swarm now?
But then, she just went numb.
Forget it. Why was she even looking for logic in a game?
There were dragons in the game—did those exist in reality?
Right now, what mattered most was solving this snake horde crisis before her.
Jiang Ye gripped the slightly charred, fragrant grilled sardine in her hand, took a bite of the fish, and used the hot food to clear her mind.
Calming herself and carefully examining the situation, Jiang Ye found that although there was a swarm of sea snakes in front of her, only the three in the lead had levels and HP bars above their heads.
Level 10, with HP half again as much as Jiang Ye’s current Level 7.
Jiang Ye decided to take a gamble.
After all, these three sea snakes were the first wild monsters she’d encountered since coming to the island.
If she accidentally died, even if she dropped gold coins, she was the only one on this island anyway. No one else could pick them up.
With that bit of reassurance, knowing her money was safe, a desire to fight sparked inside Jiang Ye.
What, just three sea snakes?
She’d bet she could catch them and grill up a whole snake feast!
Jiang Ye took one last fierce bite of the sardine and tossed the thin stick to the ground. With a flick of her palm, a boning knife appeared in her hand.
At this, the leading sea snake slowly raised its head from its crouched posture. Its eyes gleamed with a predator’s ambition.
Danger spread through the darkness.
In this moment, neither Jiang Ye nor the sea snake moved.
It seemed they were both waiting.
Waiting for the right moment, an optimal chance to strike.
In the night, the snake’s red flickering tongue darted in and out, breathing through the nostrils above its eyes. The “hiss hiss” sound echoed through the darkness.
A wind blew out of nowhere, swaying the coconut trees. As the campfire’s flames leaped and shimmered, Jiang Ye suddenly moved.
She grabbed a burning plank from the fire without hesitation and hurled it toward the sea snakes.
Sparks burst and glittered in the air, then dropped to the ground with a crack, the plank breaking into pieces. The fire startled the snakes and sent them slithering back.
“Hiss hiss—!”
Suddenly, one snake shot out, its bloody maw snapping straight for Jiang Ye’s face.
Jiang Ye didn’t dodge. She plunged the boning knife into its throat with lightning reflexes. With her free hand, she seized the snake at its weak point, the seventh inch. No matter how it writhed and struggled, she had a clear goal.
She slammed the snake’s head into her own.
Iron Head Technique!
The snake lost half of its HP but wasn’t dead yet, still trying to bite her with its fangs. Jiang Ye wasn’t about to give it a chance—another blow, head-on!
Clang.
The snake was instantly stunned.
Not wasting a second, Jiang Ye stabbed it again and again with her boning knife until the creature was dead.
[System: You have received one portion of “blue-gray flat-tailed sea snake” venom.]
Jiang Ye stuffed the dead snake into her backpack, then took out the venom and smeared it on the boning knife’s blade.
Maybe her brutal snake-slaying just now had shocked the other two aggressive sea snakes—they went completely silent.
Snakes have intelligence, after all.
The pair exchanged glances and launched a coordinated attack at Jiang Ye.
Jiang Ye, who’d grown extremely agile from constantly dodging fish in the sea, managed to sidestep in the nick of time, dodging their pincer strike.
Unwilling to give up, the snakes attacked again in sync.
At that moment, the wind turned against her.
The campfire was snuffed out in an instant, plunging the island into darkness.
But the fear she’d imagined did not sweep over her.
Instead, her heart was ablaze with fighting spirit and killing intent.
Just two more snakes!
Jiang Ye let out a cold laugh, her nerves alert and scanning outward. With her vision diminished, her hearing sharpened to the extreme—she could even hear the snakes crawling across the ground as they prepared to strike.
Sensing danger had become instinct.
Jiang Ye spun the boning knife in her hand, the blade flashing silver in the darkness.
After all, she was a woman who could butcher a pig barehanded for a farmhouse boss back on Blue Star.
Just two snakes.
With a backflip, Jiang Ye evaded their attack, and in a swift movement, her hand seized both snakes as they tangled themselves together, trying to execute a combo move.
Jiang Ye straddled the snakes, using all her strength to pin them down.
The boning knife came down hard.
The blue-gray flat-tailed sea snake venom actually had a control effect, and now, both of the snakes below her fell into paralysis.
Without hesitation, Jiang Ye gave a heavy headbutt.
Ha!
With her Iron Head Technique, who could compete?
Moments later, seeing two more portions of snake venom added to her backpack, Jiang Ye smiled and wiped the blood from her forehead.
A triple kill!
Jiang Ye grabbed both dead snakes by hand, her eyes turning to the rest of the snake horde slithering toward her from the distance.
Why were they still coming after her even after their three leaders were dead?
Could it be...
the rest of the snakes were wild monsters too?
But Jiang Ye had no confidence in taking on a hundred foes at once.
She swung the snakes in her hands like noodles pulled at the bottom of the river, shouting with authority, “Back! Back! Back!”
At this command, the horde of snakes paused, then actually turned and left. Their bodies undulated as they disappeared from her view, and soon after, she heard the splash of water—the sound of the snakes returning to the river.
Jiang Ye stood there in a daze, her mind buzzing. Could her “back back back” really have had that much effect?
The system’s level-up notification explained it all.
The sea snakes had been added to the “Marine Collector” manual.
No wonder the rest of the snake horde listened to her.
She tapped the sea snake icon. The snake flicked out its scarlet tongue, then curled its body into a heart shape.
Absolutely outrageous.
Jiang Ye felt ready to kneel before the dev team’s twisted sense of humor.
Under the snake’s little grid, its information was displayed.
[Blue-gray flat-tailed sea snake. Gentle-tempered, highly venomous, obedient and clever, can be summoned. A must-have treasure pet for home and travel on the island~]
[Blue-gray flat-tailed sea snake venom is produced and stored automatically, with a max storage of 9 portions. Skill cooldown is 30 minutes.]
Jiang Ye stared at the description, recalling how the snake had pounced at her with its mouth wide open just moments ago, and fell silent.
Gentle-tempered?
You call that gentle, you dog devs?
Whatever the case, Jiang Ye had experienced her first monster-killing on the island and leveled up.
She was now Level 9.
She held the top spot on the Second Server level rankings.
Even at night, there were still people online in this game.
Yuchi Xi was sitting in the Blacksmith’s smithy, sharpening his knife. When he saw the rankings update and someone reach Level 9 in an instant, he paused.
He opened the friend list and saw that A Leaf Boat had their location hidden, now showing as Level 9.
The knife in Yuchi Xi’s hand made a crisp sound.
Even when doing a hidden quest, for A Leaf Boat to gain two levels in just a few hours of game time was impressive.
He was glad he’d chosen to be friends instead of rivals.
In the game forum, discussions about the top player on the Leaderboard were heating up. Many people were speculating about this person’s identity, some even offering to pay for a power-leveling tutorial from the master.
A lot of players had been tormented by Carefree Wanderer.
The NPCs were annoying, loved making things hard, the randomness was off the charts, and it was common for a quest or monster fight to get derailed halfway through by some unexpected event.
That was why so many players leveled up slowly.
Even following guides leaked from the First Server’s West Continent wasn’t a guarantee of success.
These NPCs acted almost like real people, impossibly cunning.
Many suspected the damn game was hiring real people to play the roles of NPCs.
As for the top player’s identity, the forum was full of theories.
Some claimed she was a top player who’d transferred over from the First Server’s West Continent.
Others said she was a rich person power-leveling by throwing money at the game.
Either way, Jiang Ye might be isolated on her island, but her legend was spreading everywhere.
Aboard a starship floating amid the starry river, a blue-haired man who had just exited his game pod turned to the woman beside him and issued a command. Anyone who saw his face would be shocked.
“Find this person.” As he spoke, the sapphire cross hanging from Lu Jingsui’s right ear shimmered.
“Yes, Captain,” the woman named Jin Luyi replied softly.
...
Jiang Ye knew nothing of what was happening outside the island. At this moment, she had just finished eating a delicious grilled sea snake, burped, and was about to lay back down in her wooden hut to sleep.
The wooden hut came with a windproof buff, enough to block out much of the chill.
Jiang Ye piled up a bunch of grass on the ground, laid out some cloth, stretched, and lay down, ready for a nice long sleep.
Night had fallen and this island was no place for her to keep moving around.
Since entering the game, Jiang Ye’s mind had been running at full speed. The moment she touched the pile of grass, she fell asleep.
In her dream, she returned to Blue Star.
But, inexplicably, she found herself at the North Pole.
She was wearing only a tank top and a pair of shorts, standing barefoot on the ice, shivering in the cold.
Jiang Ye gave a thunderous sneeze.
Clang——
The sneeze ended. A loud crash followed.
Jiang Ye woke in fright.
Rubbing her eyes, she found that the small wooden hut she’d painstakingly built by ramming her head into the ground had collapsed, its four walls falling outward in the four cardinal directions.
The roof had been blown clean off by the wind.
The white cloth she’d been using as a blanket had wrapped around her, so from a distance, she looked just like a giant ghost.
The ghost herself glared at the system message, her urge to turn into an evil spirit rising.
[System: Your wooden hut collapsed due to being too flimsy. Please spend 9,980 gold coins to upgrade your wooden hut!]