Chapter 23

The disruptor was kicked out of the game, and at the same time, Sun Ran heard the pleasant voice of the game administrator in his mind.

"Congratulations, the mission is completed. Please, Order Maintainer Sun Ran, take the Staff of Shul and exit the Hall of Time."

It seemed the game administrator was preparing to reclaim this extremely unbalanced Tier 4 weapon, and Sun Ran, of course, followed the instructions.

The mage apprentices behind him wanted to stop him but didn't dare to take a single step forward. After all, the person in front of them was a super mage who had single-handedly defeated the Dragon King, nearly reaching legendary status, and his aura was too overwhelming.

At the gate, a golden beam of light shot down from the sky, and within the beam, a figure with an indistinct face floated.

The figure spoke, its voice gentle and grand, audible within a radius of several hundred meters.

"I am the messenger of Shul, the Great Mage Rosso. Your wisdom and power have been praised by the Supreme God. As a reward, do you wish to return with me to Shul's divine realm?"

This was just a formality, and Sun Ran nodded in cooperation: "I am willing."

Then, the messenger turned to the mages inside the Summer Palace and said, "It has been proven that you cannot protect the safety of the divine staff, nearly causing irreparable disaster to this beautiful world. Shul has decided to reclaim his gift."

The mages were speechless. The Great Mage had been killed by the Dragon King, and they indeed couldn't protect the divine staff. However, many mages secretly resented it: It was clearly the Supreme God's own son who caused this, and the father's failure to educate his son couldn't be blamed on them. It was truly frustrating.

Of course, this was just a thought, and no one dared to say it out loud.

Thus, under the watchful eyes of hundreds of mage apprentices, the messenger of Shul extended his hand to Sun Ran, inviting him.

Before leaving, Sun Ran turned his head to look at the place where Jasmine was hiding.

Jasmine was still hiding in a secluded corner, her invisibility spell still active. No one had discovered her presence, but her invisibility couldn't hide her from Sun Ran's eyes.

In his eyes, Jasmine was staring at him in a daze, lost in thought. When she saw him about to leave, her mouth opened as if to speak, but she ultimately remained silent.

Sun Ran had lived for tens of thousands of years in the virtual world and had seen everything. He easily understood Jasmine's thoughts. They were just strangers who met by chance, not even knowing each other's real names. Their meeting was due to a maintenance mission. Now that the mission was completed, their connection was over. Even if there was some affection, there was no need to bring this relationship into the real world.

The virtual world is virtual, and the real world is real. A game is a game, and life is life—this is the universal worldview of modern people. In other words, Jasmine's affection for Sun Ran wasn't enough to break these conventions.

Sun Ran smiled slightly, brushing aside the lingering emotions, and turned to take the hand offered by the figure.

A golden figure emerged from the body of the slave he had possessed, following the messenger of Shul, floating up into the sky.

After a moment, the figure disappeared into the horizon, the beam of light vanished, and the Staff of Shul, one of the fragments of creation, was taken away, leaving behind only the corpse of the slave.

The mages of the Summer Palace watched this with awe, discussing it among themselves. After a long time, they returned to the Summer Palace and faithfully recorded this event in the annals.

"In the third era of creation, the tenth month of frost. The Great Mage Rosso battled the Dragon King Ophion on the peak of Agas. The Dragon King fell. The Great Mage Rosso, invited by the Creator God Shul, ascended to the divine realm."

Six months later, a new statue appeared at the entrance of the Summer Palace. Its face vaguely resembled the slave whose body Sun Ran had possessed.

This was all that remained of Sun Ran's maintenance mission in the Dragon World. His deeds were recorded by the mage apprentices of the Summer Palace and passed down, gradually becoming a legend. As for Charlie and Jasmine, who were also present, they were ignored due to their lack of outstanding performance, leaving only a few words in the records, and gradually disappearing from history.

......

Sun Ran woke up from the sensory chair, feeling somewhat reflective. He thought he would have to search for the fragments of the creation artifact, but the mission ended unexpectedly.

Returning to Lan Xin's room, he immediately looked at the holographic screen in front of him.

There were two emails flashing with green light on the screen. Red light indicated warnings, while green light indicated ordinary civil matters. These were likely about the Shul Virtual Company.

Sun Ran opened the emails and a smile slowly spread across his face.

The first email was from the Order Maintainer Alliance, with a very concise content.

"Sun Ran

Black Iron Level Order Maintainer.

Mission Completion Evaluation: Legendary!

500 points added to your credentials. Please continue to work hard."

Order Maintainers needed credentials to advance, which could only be obtained by completing various missions. The higher the evaluation, the more credentials were added.

The evaluation levels were Ordinary, Excellent, Perfect, Legendary, and Mythical. An ordinary evaluation added 10 points, excellent added 50, perfect added 100, legendary added 500, and mythical directly advanced the level.

Of course, mythical was mythical. It was said that the Order Maintainer Alliance treated this as a goal, and no one had ever reached it. Legendary was basically the highest evaluation in reality.

From Black Iron to Bronze required 1000 credentials. If all evaluations were ordinary, it would take at least 100 missions to reach Bronze, which was time-consuming and labor-intensive. For a typical Order Maintainer team, it took about three years to advance a level, but for those with exceptional talent, it could take just a month.

This system ensured that powerful individuals or teams could quickly advance to higher difficulty virtual worlds, while ordinary teams had to accumulate credentials in lower-level worlds.

But this was temporarily irrelevant to Sun Ran, who opened the second email.

The second email was from the Shul Virtual Company, notifying him of the mission payment.

The Shul Virtual Company transferred 10,000 credits to him. Two thousand were for the basic Black Iron mission, and the additional 8,000 were extra compensation, corresponding to four times the reward for a legendary evaluation.

Sun Ran was incredibly excited. This was the most legal income he had ever earned in his life, and it only took less than half a day.

Now he had 10,000 credits, and it would only increase in the future. He had heard that Gold Level Order Maintainers started at 200,000 credits, and with a high evaluation, earning over a million credits in one mission was not impossible.

He had heard that the residency requirement for the second-level garden area was a million credits. Sun Ran decided that once he had a million credits, he would move out of the dark, metal-smelling underground world of the slums and enjoy life in the garden area.

Now that he had money, what should he do? Naturally, he should enjoy it.

Sun Ran immediately got up and quickly walked to Lan Xin's food delivery port, preparing to have a hearty meal.

Due to Sun Ran's previous property transfer agreement, 10,000 credits, after deducting 5% in compensation, left 9,500 credits, which all went into Lan Xin's account.

Lan Xin's account was password-protected, but she had long given the password to Sun Ran, allowing him to use the credits freely.

Sun Ran unceremoniously spent 200 credits, ordering seven or eight exquisite dishes claimed to be purely natural and free of synthetic additives. After some thought, he spent another 100 credits on a mid-range bottle of red wine, preparing to enjoy a feast.

Five minutes later, the food and wine arrived, looking and smelling delicious, worth the 300 credits he had spent.

Sun Ran, who had been poor in the real world, had never eaten such expensive food before. Looking at the exquisite dishes, he was almost reluctant to eat, just staring and salivating.

To him, this was completely different from the virtual world. In the past, his fragile heart had prevented him from having any hopes for life. He had only thought about how to stay alive, living cautiously, fearing sudden death. The sense of achievement in the virtual world had also numbed his ambition, and he had never imagined he would have this day.

To him, this harvest was heavy and meaningful.

He stared at the food for about ten minutes, and just as the dishes were about to cool, he sighed and prepared to start eating.

At that moment, some sounds came from the adjacent bedroom, the sound of the nutrient tank opening, indicating that Lan Xin had woken up.

A few minutes later, the bedroom door opened, and Lan Xin walked out.

She had just finished bathing, her hair still damp, casually draped over her loose loungewear. The steam had made her face slightly flushed, her skin smooth and radiant, looking incredibly beautiful, making Sun Ran's heart skip a beat, almost losing his composure.

As soon as she entered the living room, she sniffed the air and her gaze moved between Sun Ran and the food on the table, a look of confusion appearing on her face.

Her account didn't have many credits left, certainly not enough to buy all this food.

She checked her wrist computer, her beautiful eyes widening in disbelief. The credit balance had somehow increased to 9,232.

"Sun Ran, what is this?" She couldn't figure out where the money came from.

As Lan Xin approached, a fresh fragrance filled the air, and Sun Ran greedily inhaled, feeling his mood greatly improve. He waved his hand and said, "Come, come, I've been waiting for you. Let's eat and talk."

Good wine and food should be shared with a beautiful companion.