After opening the character panel, lines of information appeared before Jiang Li’s eyes.
[Player: Jiang Li]
[Stamina: 3]
(Weak and currently hungry. Negative status effect applied.)
(Average adult reference: 8–12)
Negative Status Effects:
[Spirit: 9]
(Average adult reference: 6–9)
[Skills: None]
[Storage: Beginner Gift Pack, one Beginner Random Skill Reward.]
Jiang Li had played this game before and knew what was inside the Beginner Gift Pack.
She opened it directly.
Three items appeared on the ground:
The dried meat didn’t resemble any meat she recognized.
There wasn’t much of it, roughly half a pound.
She couldn’t be bothered to examine it.
Starving, she devoured it ravenously.
The texture was chewy and springy. As she chewed, it reminded her somewhat of roasted cicada meat she had eaten during childhood summers.
Unlike ordinary pork, beef, or mutton, this meat was extremely filling.
After eating only half, she was already full.
She stored the remaining half away for tomorrow.
The negative hunger status on her character panel disappeared.
Next, Jiang Li opened the bamboo tube and took several gulps of water. The discomfort in her body finally eased.
“Filtered water?”
She peered into the opening of the bamboo tube.
The water wasn’t clear. Tiny ash-like particles floated within it, and the taste wasn’t pleasant.
It certainly wasn’t purified water.
That was how beginner gift packs worked.
The food and water they provided were items that genuinely existed in this world.
Since the system had given it to her, there shouldn’t be any safety issues.
At worst, it simply tasted awful.
At that moment, a clear knocking sound echoed through the silent, empty cave.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Steady.
Rhythmic.
Like someone lightly tapping the wooden door with curled fingers over and over.
Even though Jiang Li had mentally prepared herself, fear still gripped her heart.
She had played this sandbox survival game before.
The game focused primarily on survival, with horror elements as a secondary feature.
During the daytime, things were relatively manageable.
No ghosts or monsters would appear.
If you were unlucky enough to encounter a disaster beast, all you had to do was run for your life.
But nighttime was an entirely different story.
The game’s visuals would shift into a bleak, gray palette.
Even inside a shelter, players weren’t completely safe.
They had to obey the rules of the Evil Wraiths.
Every night, various wraiths would come to harass players, filling them with dread.
Players could only huddle inside their shelters, trembling in fear.
Moreover, not every Evil Wraith came with clearly documented rules.
Information about each type of wraith had been purchased with players’ blood and tears.
Jiang Li wasn’t a top-tier player.
She was simply hardworking.
Most of her days had been consumed by exhausting and suffocating work, and gaming had been her only outlet for stress.
Playing the game had already been frightening enough.
Now that the game had become reality, it was terrifying.
Her heart pounded violently.
Cold sweat soaked her back.
The thought of suffering the gruesome deaths she had once seen happen to players made her body tremble uncontrollably.
She had assumed the Knocking Wraith would leave after receiving no response.
Instead, a familiar voice suddenly came from outside.
“Jiang Li! It’s me! Open the door!”
The knocking became louder.
No longer knocking—now it was pounding on the door with fists.
The voice was so familiar that Jiang Li immediately recognized it.
It was her supervisor.
Zhou Peng.
Nicknamed “Boss Zhou the Skinner.”
Thanks to having an uncle in upper management, he constantly tormented lower-level employees.
As one of his direct subordinates, Jiang Li had suffered under him countless times.
She had wanted to quit her job more than once because of him.
Outside, the voice continued.
“Jiang Li, open the door! Once we get back, I’ll give you a promotion and a raise…”
Jiang Li’s pale face darkened instantly.
Naturally, she didn’t believe it was really Zhou Peng.
Setting aside the question of whether two people could transmigrate together—
Even if Zhou Peng had somehow entered this world with her, there was no way he could have accurately found her shelter.
Nighttime was the most dangerous period in the game.
Not only was there Gray Mist, but countless murderous Evil Wraiths roamed the darkness.
Without shelter, survival in the wilderness was impossible.
There was only one explanation.
The thing outside wasn’t a Knocking Wraith.
It was a higher-ranking wraith.
A Mimic Wraith.
A Mimic Wraith could extract memories from players and impersonate familiar people to trick them into responding or opening the door.
Its rules were even more dangerous.
Simply speaking to it was enough to trigger its death condition.
Jiang Li had never expected a Mimic Wraith to visit her shelter on the very first night.
Fortunately, she knew the rules governing these low-level wraiths.
Otherwise, she would truly have died here.
Listening to the increasingly frustrated and angry voice outside, Jiang Li found herself calming down instead.
She understood that in this world, fear was the most useless thing imaginable.
She needed to adapt quickly.
Otherwise, psychological pressure alone could destroy her.
Opening her status panel again, she examined her attributes.
The negative status effect caused by extreme weakness had disappeared after eating.
Her Stamina had increased by one point.
Stamina: 4
In the game, eating and drinking restored stamina.
Going hungry reduced it.
Compared to the average adult range of 8–12, a value of 4 was pitifully low.
Fortunately, attributes weren’t fixed.
They could be increased.
The simplest method was physical training.
Learning combat techniques could also raise stamina.
Besides the Beginner Gift Pack, she still had one remaining reward:
A Beginner Random Skill.
Whenever a new player entered the game and successfully found a shelter, the system granted a random skill.
The purpose was to improve a beginner’s chances of survival.
Random rewards depended on luck.
Unfortunately, Jiang Li had always been notoriously unlucky.
Still, every skill had some use.
Closing her eyes, she first bowed respectfully in a random direction.
Every deity she could think of flashed through her mind.
Then she rubbed her hands together and activated the random draw.
“Please bless me…”
What she wanted most was a combat skill.
In the early stages, combat abilities were by far the most valuable skills for beginners.
The sounds around her seemed to disappear.
Everything became silent.
Focusing on the character panel before her, she soon saw a new line of information appear.
[Skill: Soul of Nature]
(Soul of Nature: Temper the Body, Nurture the Soul, Command the Power of the Five Elements.)
The description alone filled Jiang Li with delight.
In this survival world, the body and soul were the two most important things a person possessed.
If either was weak, surviving would be nearly impossible.
And that wasn’t even mentioning the ability to command the Five Elements.
Metal.
Wood.
Water.
Fire.
Earth.
Each possessed powerful combat applications and defensive capabilities.
Jiang Li couldn’t believe it.
Her luck had always been terrible in the game.
Yet after entering the game world itself, she had somehow become lucky.
“Thank you, Buddha. Thank you, Guanyin. Thank you, God of Wealth…”
After expressing her gratitude, she wanted to test the skill’s effects.
Unfortunately, she was simply too exhausted.
Although the Gray Mist Disease had been cured and her negative status effects were gone, the body’s constitution remained poor.
If she didn’t get proper rest, she might spend the entire next day stuck inside this cave.
Worried that something unexpected might happen, she didn’t dare sleep in the deeper part of the cave.
Instead, she lay down beside the wooden door.
Her mind grew heavier and heavier until she drifted into sleep.
Unbeknownst to her, faint green lights began appearing within the pitch-black cave.
Like tiny fireflies, they floated gently through the darkness before slowly merging into her body.