On the train, Stelle sat in her seat sipping juice.
Welt and Himeko had gone ahead to the hotel to handle check-in, while March 7th, seeing that Stelle wasn't going to recover quickly, went back to the room to gather some more things.
That left only Pei Guang and Stelle here.
With only the two of them together, Stelle felt a little restless. Influenced by Pei Guang, she clearly remembered her experiences in the dream, and precisely because she remembered so clearly, she now had many questions.
"What do you think we'll run into in Penacony? Our dreams told me: this place definitely has big problems!"
Pei Guang glanced at her. "Me? I don't know. You know me, I can only guess, not explain. But if you want my feeling, I'd say what we'll face in Penacony this time won't be any smaller than the Luofu."
That line instantly got Stelle's attention.
Her dizziness vanished, her limbs no longer numb, and she looked at Pei Guang expectantly.
"Tell me more! Tell me more!"
Pei Guang said, "It's simple. Remember what Penacony's setting is?"
"The world of dreams?" Stelle answered.
Pei Guang nodded. "Right, a world of dreams. And we came here for the festival. But that's exactly why I think there's a problem: dreams as a theme can be terrifying.
First, Penacony. I looked into its setting before: it's the world of beautiful dreams. Every visitor here can use dreams to experience things they can't in reality. And Penacony publicly advertises its dreams as safe and reliable.
But you know how advertising works. I'm starting to suspect these so-called safe dreams could be crawling with a Freddy running around murdering people… or maybe someone will offer us colored pills to take… or it's also possible that after we arrive in this world, we'll have to play our own Hunger Games."
Hearing Pei Guang's complaints, Stelle's expression fell. "Great… so in this Trailblaze Mission we'll probably just get chased around by weird stuff trying to kill us again…"
Pei Guang kept going. "And that's the good scenario. What if these dreams are layered like in Inception, with multiple dream levels—and then toss in a few loops? That'd be torture. I don't even dare imagine how painful it'd be to experience reincarnation in full reality."
Stelle's eyes suddenly lit up. "Eh? Then in that case, who's our enemy?"
Pei Guang spread his hands. "No idea. But I do know this: from the moment we step off the train, we beat up whoever we see, all the way until we find Himeko and Uncle Yang. That way, we'll definitely beat down all our enemies at least once."
Hearing that, Stelle felt like it was actually doable.
She was curious what it would be like to punch her way through everything.
Seeing her eagerness, Pei Guang quickly stopped her from taking it too seriously.
"Wait, wait, wait! It's fine to think like that for this run, but don't actually do it. Otherwise, we won't be able to build NPC favorability on this map. Even if they're enemies, you can't just beat them up if it means losing treasures they might drop later!
Think about it: on the first proper map, the Xianzhou Luofu, once we built good relations, we ended up with so much loot. Who knows how much more this complex map could give us?"
In many games, brute-forcing enemies as soon as you see them is an efficient solution. But based on Pei Guang's research these past days, if you wanted the really good stuff, you had to properly play through the story.
The harder the story, the better the rewards.
If only for those fun rewards, he couldn't bring himself to smash everything on sight.
Listening, Stelle nodded in agreement. "You're right. For the sake of our golden legend, we can't just fight everyone we see. But I hope this time's boss is like Phantylia, and drops a ton of consumables~"
Her eyes sparkled as she fantasized about what might happen next. She was already looking forward to the kinds of treasures they could get in Penacony.
Once Stelle's condition fully recovered, the three of them—Pei Guang, Stelle, and March 7th—left the train together and arrived in Penacony.
The moment they stepped off, Pei Guang and Stelle immediately strode toward the hotel.
But before they could get far, March 7th grabbed the hems of their clothes from both sides.
"Hold it, hold it! What are you two doing?" ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ꜰʀᴏᴍ ⓝovelFire.net
Pei Guang replied naturally, "Going to find Himeko and Uncle Yang, of course."
Stelle nodded. "Yeah! What, are we supposed to do some kind of ceremony first?"
Pei Guang: "Like what?"
Stelle: "Like… telling some trash can stories?"
Watching the two banter back and forth, March 7th suddenly remembered something crucial: Pei Guang and Stelle had never done a Trailblaze Mission through proper procedures!
Normally, arriving on a planet meant handling formal entry procedures. But here was the problem: these two had never once gone the official route!
Both of them had just appeared out of nowhere at the Space Station.
And for various reasons, going back there was like going home, so they could come and go wherever they wanted without restrictions.
When they got to Belobog, sure, they reported to the people there, but all they did was say a word on the first day, then got arrested the next, and ended up fighting and killing their way through… right up to taking down the ruler of Belobog.
When they reached the Xianzhou Luofu, they literally snuck onboard, fought their way through again, and even 'killed' a Lord Ravager.
Thinking back on all that, March 7th stared at them in shock. "Don't tell me you two really thought every planet works like that, where you can just charge right in?"
Pei Guang was startled. "It doesn't?!"
Stelle: "Do we really have to tell people we've arrived? That sounds so troublesome..."
At this moment, March 7th finally confirmed that these two were caught in the same kind of misconception she herself once had.
Looking at the two who clearly had no idea about such things, March 7th puffed out her chest proudly.
"Hmph! This time, let me be the one to show you how to enter properly! I'll have you know, when we Trailblazers go pioneering and trailblazing, we're supposed to go through the official process!"
March 7th was feeling a little smug.
After so long, she could finally do something as the experienced one, leading Pei Guang and Stelle.