Mini World Game Console-Chapter 742 - 743: Zhao Huo, You Are a Good Person
Ren Suo had 1,070 Merit Points left.
If he converted all his Merit Points into Truth Points, that would be 10,700 Truth Points, which would be more than enough to purchase the full version of "Absolute Blade Armor."
However, he wouldn't do that. The value of the Door of Truth, controlled by the Mini-World Game Console, was below that of the Mini-World Game Console itself. By the same token, the currency of the Door of Truth, Truth Points, was less valuable than the Mini-World's Merit Points.
Ren Suo had set a Krypton Gold red line for himself at 1,000 Merit Points. He would not let his Merit Points drop to three digits; the Merit Points of the Mini-World should be used for more meaningful purposes—such as the lottery that appears when a Player's Level is upgraded. The emergence of the virtual reality equipment 'Pandora's Magic Box' was the result of an unlucky draw he'd had back then.
Moreover, he still needed to keep 20 Merit Points for asking questions in the Mystic Tavern, so he could only cash in another 50 Merit Points for 500 Truth Points.
Adding the rewards left from the first Level, Ren Suo now had a total of 3,700 Truth Points.
A lot, yet very little.
He still needed 1,100 points to exchange for the Bead Turning version of "Blade Armor."
Without any hesitation, Ren Suo sold off all emotions worth 120 Truth Points—these were mostly strangers who only had passing interactions with him. If they didn't meet for a few days, Ren Suo would automatically delete them as superfluous memories. It was better to convert these fleeting friendships into Truth Points to keep by his side.
Yet, for emotions worth more than 120 Truth Points, Ren Suo was a bit more concerned. Let me reiterate, Ren Suo's Absolute Rationality did not mean he was without emotions, but he would treat each emotion reasonably. The emotions remaining now had a necessary existence as Bonds for Ren Suo.
Gu Yuexuan, 125 Truth Points.
Gu Wenyi, 120 Truth Points.
It seems my father-in-law and brother-in-law have quite the opinions about me.
However, Ren Suo was very certain that he would not live with these two in the future; Gu Yueyan was becoming independent and a bit rebellious, surely she wouldn't be swayed by their malicious fabrications.
He selected both.
Dong Zhenzhong, 225 Truth Points.
Bei Wuyue, 230 Truth Points.
The Dong family parents were much better than the Gu father and son; it seemed his parents-in-law truly respected Dong Chengling's opinion and appreciated the man her daughter liked without bias. For a wonderful and corrupt married life in the future, Ren Suo now needed some inadvertent help from his parents-in-law.
He selected both.
Having sold off the emotions of four in-laws, he got a total of 700 Truth Points—still short by 400 points.
However, Ren Suo no longer had any fathers-in-law, mothers-in-law, or brothers-in-law to sell. Strictly speaking though, Ren's father and Ren's mother were both his parents and his in-laws...
In the Emotion List, Ren's father and Ren's mother's status was almost akin to that of a luxury villa in the Sky Capital Second Ring. They just sat there, doing nothing, and as the economy improved (meaning the stronger the Gatekeeper became), their value would skyrocket. Every time a Gatekeeper ignited a Primordial Substance, their price would surge significantly, appreciating faster than the Bonds gained from painstakingly attending social mixers. They were like the fattest pigs on the windfall.
If not necessary, Ren Suo wouldn't touch these two potent stocks poised for a price cap.
The same principle applied to others—the higher their value, the less likely Ren Suo would touch them.
So, was Ren Suo planning to sell emotions from low to high according to the price list?
Not exactly.
For instance, Yu Kuangtu, 180 Truth Points.
If it weren't for the need for these Truth Points, Ren Suo would definitely not sell his emotions towards Yu Kuangtu. He was one of Ren Suo's important bonding partners, having granted Ren Suo the powerful Bond Ability, "Flame Overlord," which, to date, still remained Ren Suo's main combat skill.
Ren Suo was not yet clear whether selling emotions could affect the Bond System, but he didn't need to take the risk.
Suddenly remembering something, Ren Suo checked carefully and found the Emotion List was not complete—there were no feelings between him and the game characters. For game characters like Ren Han, Truth Seeker, and Zhao Zili, with whom he had met in reality multiple times, it would be too far-fetched to say they had no kind of relationship. However, they were not even on the exchange list, meaning the Mini-World Game Console had blocked this selling option.
Ren Suo naturally did not know the exact reason, but he believed it was because the game characters' privileges were higher than those of the "Door of Truth" game, preventing the Door of Truth from probing Ren Suo's feelings towards the game characters.
Skipping this interlude, Ren Suo redefined his selling strategy.
Selling those rather dispensable feelings worth less than 120 Truth Points was, from all perspectives, more beneficial than holding onto them. But for emotions worth more than 120 Truth Points, which were beneficial to Ren Suo, selling them required considering not only their potential value but also their real-world impact.
The more substantial these feelings, the less he should sell them.
Therefore, Ren Suo planned to only sell the emotions of one more person to gather the full 4,800 Truth Points.
However, looking at the exchange list, Ren Suo deeply felt the peculiar nature of his interpersonal relationships.
The distance in a normal person's relationships would either be pyramid-shaped or columnar-shaped.
Pyramid-shaped means knowing many acquaintances or clients with whom one has a distant relationship, some friends with good relations, and only a few very close family members and partners—common among working classes where managing interpersonal relations is necessary; columnar-shaped means having a similar number of people with distant, close, and intimate relations—often seen among working individuals who have specific hobbies but smaller social circles.
And Ren Suo was quite impressive.
The number of people he was close with surpassed those he was merely acquainted with.
He had few friends, but he had many girlfriends.
Those who counted only as his good friends, without the additional Attributes of 'sister', 'girlfriend', or 'daughter', totaled just four: Bai Ji, Zhao Huo, Yu Kuangtu, and Li Dan.
Among them, Bai Ji was the only one whose emotional value reached four digits, almost qualifying him to join the ranks of girlfriends—a special high-potential stock. Ren Suo couldn't help but take a new view of Bai Ji—he knew their friendship was strong, but he hadn't expected it to be this strong! Even if Bai Ji suddenly came over, grabbed Ren Suo's hand to swear brotherhood by beheading a chicken and burning yellow paper, pledging an unbreakable bond as sworn brothers, Ren Suo wouldn't be surprised.
So, how many women with whom Ren Suo had close relationships had an emotional value of over a thousand points?
Dong Chengling, Gu Yueyan, Qiao Muyi, Luna, Ren Xingmei, plus Ren Xiaojiu and Lin Xianyu—seven in total!
Excluding Ren Xiaojiu, who was raised as a daughter, and Lin Xianyu, whose emotional value was about to fall below four digits, there were still five!
The girlfriend group completely trounced the friend group!
This led to a small problem: when Ren Suo didn't want to sell off those feelings of great potential or special Bonds, he really didn't have much choice.
Therefore, his gaze naturally fell upon that familiar name.
Zhao Huo, 410 Truth Points.
Surprisingly, after these two days of interaction, Zhao Huo's emotional value had risen quickly. Ren Suo thought this change occurred because he and Qiao Muyi had previously teamed up to deceive Zhao Huo, who was an honest man. When Zhao Huo suddenly came to his senses, he naturally held anger towards Ren Suo, so Zhao Huo's initial emotional value was very low.
But Zhao Huo was like a six-year-old child; his anger wouldn't last more than two days before he'd nearly forgotten about it. Plus, Ren Suo had also hung around him several times, engaging in mundane but amusing daily conversations, so Zhao Huo's feelings for Ren Suo quickly recovered.
Speaking of which, he had known Zhao Huo for nearly a year now.
The first meeting was at the civil servant training base where he, Zhao Huo, and two others shared a dormitory.
Who were the other two again? Forget it, they probably already turned into Truth Points accompanying me.
Even at the civil servant training base, Zhao Huo stood out as a special figure—tall, handsome, and imposing. However, his usual attire of Painful Clothing (clothes with anime girl designs) and jeans was enough to dispel any fantasies others might have had about him.
At that time, only dormmates got to know Zhao Huo better. It couldn't be helped; Zhao Huo looked tough and wasn't someone to be trifled with. Ren Suo knew early on that Zhao Huo had a fiancée; the ten earrings he wore in his ears were like brands from his fiancée, not much different from a dog's collar.
Zhao Huo later moved to Heavenly Lotus Academy as a teacher with excellent results, and when they met again, both Ren Suo and Zhao Huo were pleasantly surprised.
In an unfamiliar environment doing unfamiliar work, there wasn't anything better than the appearance of a friend with whom one could share one's thoughts. Moreover, Ren Suo and Zhao Huo were similar; both of them were dead set on their hobbies. Although they couldn't understand each other, they achieved mutual respect.
Ren Suo had criticized Zhao Huo for watching anime perversely, but he had also helped Zhao Huo create subtitles for adult anime. Zhao Huo, in turn, looked down on Ren Suo for playing single-player games instead of 'Paper People' mobile games, yet Zhao Huo never refused to help when Ren Suo needed him.
When Ren Suo was a stranger in a strange land, it was Zhao Huo who told him about the quiet girl eating alone in the cafeteria, named Dong Chengling.
When saving Little Jiu at the comic convention, it was Zhao Huo who helped him conceal his identity, though he genuinely thought Ren Suo was there to help him perform on stage.
During boring times, observing Zhao Huo's Shura Field involving his fiancée, childhood sweetheart, and junior classmate became one of Ren Suo's motivations to keep living. The thought of 'wanting to witness Zhao Huo's ending' filled Ren Suo with Hope for the future.
And there were many more.
In retrospect, Ren Suo realized that Zhao Huo was an unavoidable crucial character in this phase of his life.
A mere 410 Truth Points were really insufficient to measure the relationship between Ren Suo and Zhao Huo. Even though Ren Suo was no longer driven by emotion, his rationality told him that the Bond he shared with Zhao Huo was deeper than he had imagined.
As this idea popped into Ren Suo's mind, the emotional exchange list in his field of vision suddenly began to change.
Zhao Huo, 550 Truth Points.
Ren Suo: "..."
Ren Suo suddenly realized something: compared to Absolute Rationalists, those with Absolute Sensibility might have a far greater advantage in selling emotions than he had ever imagined.
He sighed lightly, opened Pandora's Magic Box, sat down in front of the computer, and created a new document named "Zhao Huo Strategy."
One's life is bound to diverge from many others, even from friends who were once very close. If you're tolerant to the point of weakness, you'll surely be bullied; only when you're brave enough to say no will you not be constrained. You must sever ties with those people and things that bind you to become an independent and brave person. Bridges burnt, mountains high and rivers long. Paths diverge, with no relevance to each other. Zhao Huo, you're a good person. But I still need 400 Truth Points to become stronger.
