Ren opened his eyes.
The dazzling sunlight made his eyes, which had been in darkness a second ago, feel very uncomfortable.
Covering his eyes with one hand, Ren was about to complain about another day of 996, but realizing something was wrong, he sat up abruptly from the beach, gasping for air, and looked around in shock and uncertainty at the quiet, peaceful, scenic beach landscape.
Blue water, blue sky, golden sands, and a few large Crabs with their pincers raised high were strolling leisurely beside him, not paying the slightest bit of attention to him, a person from the great foodie nation.
Damn it, where the hell did the server crashing land me?
Is this still in the country?
Or did I catch up with the modern trend, the wave of transmigration, and just go through one myself?
The last memory before waking up was from last night, or maybe who knows how long ago, when he was constantly stuffing various mods and attachments into the allogene private server he had set up, and finally, as the server flashed with a dazzling white light, Ren felt his brain itching a little.
He didn’t have any thoughts like “Is this some kind of prank?”, “Let me check if there are any cameras nearby”, or “Stop pranking me, or I’ll call the police”.
Because no matter how he thought about it, he was a shut-in of the new era’s protagonist level—a nerd with no parents, a house, and no sister; all the friends he could talk to were online, so there was no way anyone would go to such lengths to play a prank like this on him.
Moreover, following normal logic, given the current situation and the “Surprise, MF!” stance of the server before he passed out, it was really more likely that he had transmigrated, right?
Scratching his head, Ren noticed something wrong; why did the scenery before him seem more and more familiar the more he looked at it?
Thinking this, he looked up and saw a white floating spirit—no, wait, it was flying emergency food—ahem—it was Paimon!
A Paimon floating above his head?
Did I transmigrate to Teyvat??!!
Wait, that still doesn’t seem right!
Ren looked down abruptly and saw that he was still wearing the same pajamas he had on last night, and there were no eight-pack abs mysteriously appearing on his stomach.
Ren let out a sigh of relief, not knowing whether to feel regretful or relieved.
It seems I didn’t turn into the Traveler.
But if I didn’t turn into the Traveler, why is Paimon by my side?
Wait, given Paimon’s motormouth personality, why hasn’t he been chattering away for so long, and instead is floating above his head so quietly, as if he were a soulless doll?
Soulless?
Thinking this, Ren suddenly realized something; he looked up once more, and this time tried to touch Paimon.
And just as he touched Paimon, a flash of white light dazzled him, making it hard for Ren to keep his eyes open.
Even though he closed his eyes instinctively, a scene suddenly appeared in Ren’s mind, and Paimon’s familiar voice rang out.
“So, you drifted here from outside this world?” Ren “saw” that on the very beach where he had just woken up, two meteors had been drawn in the sand with a twig, and a small Mondstadt Crab was passing by arrogantly and domineeringly, waving its pincers.
Paimon’s soft and cute voice—especially the reserved tone from when he first met the Traveler and was a bit shy, not like the later, overly familiar and arrogant tone—really made Ren nostalgic.
As Paimon’s voice faded, the fully immersive, hyper-realistic video continued to play.
Two golden meteors, one after the other, quickly streaked past the fleeting Liyue Harbor and the windmill-turning Mondstadt, finally arriving above the sea of clouds from the game’s login screen.
“But when you wanted to leave this place and head to the next world, a strange god blocked your path?” As Paimon finished speaking, two familiar figures appeared on the giant stone slab; they were the twins who traveled between worlds, Aether and Lumine.
Alright, seeing this, Ren sighed.
It seems that what he transmigrated into wasn’t Teyvat, but “allogene”.
Although some people might think there’s no difference between the two, isn’t it all Teyvat anyway?
But having read plenty of web novels before transmigrating, Ren knew there was a huge difference.
According to the trope that has been popular online for a while now about transmigrating into a game where everyone except yourself is an NPC.
His situation should be that he had transmigrated into the game, not into the real continent of Teyvat.
Although it was a pity that he wouldn’t be able to get to know the various cute female allogene characters in reality, if he thought about it carefully.
Before transmigrating, he was nothing more than an online giant and a real-life goblin.
If he really transmigrated, his life probably wouldn’t change much.
If he met a girl, let alone deepening bonds, he probably wouldn’t even dare to take the first step of saying hello.
After all, if you think about it, you didn’t dare to talk to girls before you transmigrated, so how could you suddenly dare to after transmigrating?
With such a big change, are you sure the protagonist after transmigration is still the same person from the urban world before?
In this situation, what’s the point of talking about romance or whatever; as an ordinary person, it’s impossible for him to know these big shots who possess Visions.
Oh, that was overestimating himself; he couldn’t even be called a goblin, because goblins at least have female knights and saints to play happily with; he only had his fantasies and his two hands.
Furthermore, if he really transmigrated to Teyvat, his computer science degree would probably be useless, and his life might even become worse.
With a modern person’s poor survival skills, in this awkward world, he might not even be able to fill his stomach.
And considering the existence of the Heavenly Principles, he might even encounter unexpected dangers because of the extra knowledge in his head.
“So games are better; players don’t have to think so much, while people in reality OL have a lot more to think about.” He amused himself using the Wuthering Waves formula that was still chasing him.
Ren sighed.
Alright, it was time to prepare to choose a character.
Sure enough, as the blood-red spatial rift tore open from the center towards the top and bottom, the unemployed and re-employed Sustainer of Heavenly Principles made a domineering entrance, stepping out with her long, fair legs amidst the suddenly intense music.
Unlike in his previous life where they were separated by a screen, at this moment, Ren was almost face-to-face with the awe-inspiring Queen, and the overwhelming pressure rushing towards him made Ren briefly forget how to breathe.
Is this the Sustainer of Heavenly Principles that I faced back then?
I was really amazing to have been able to fight such an opponent back then.
But these long legs wrapped in bandages— Ahem, it was just purely for academic research purposes.
“Outlanders, your journey ends here!” “Who are you?!” Lumine asked, without any of that cheeky feeling she had when she was the protagonist.