Faced with everyone’s staring eyes, Venti acted like a shy teenager, scratching the back of his head and chuckling awkwardly.
“Ahaha, well, who told me to be too fond of freedom?
A god’s power comes from faith.
Since I don’t really manage things and don’t have much faith, it’s only logical that my power is lacking.
Yes, yes, that’s exactly it.” Of course, no one believed those words— “Ah, then…
then is there any way we can help you?
Bar— *cough*, Lord Venti.” Well, the good girl Acting Grand Master Jean believed it.
After much persuasion and bringing up the example of Barbara, a fanatic devotee of the Anemo Archon, Jean was finally convinced that what Venti had just said was merely his habitual deceptive rhetoric, and the matter was finally put to rest.
Having more or less dealt with Jean, who was so serious she seemed out of place among Mondstadters, and with the assistance of Venti—a god who had already revealed his identity and strength—the remaining elites of the Knights of Favonius began to be systematically assigned their tasks.
While Jean and the others in the real Teyvat outside began preparing for the plan to save the Great Dragon Dvalin, within the world of the Genshin Impact game, Ren had also just finished his preparations.
Well, what preparations?
Preparations to welcome beautiful girls, of course.
Previously, Ren had treated this world purely as a game world, unaware that it was actually connected to a real Teyvat continent.
Aside from exploring the world itself, he usually spent his time exploring the beautiful female characters.
However, there was still a difference between the two.
Exploring the world could be done at any time; after all, the world was just there and couldn’t be taken away.
Ren could see it every day as soon as he opened his eyes.
Beautiful girls were different.
As everyone knows, in the game Genshin Impact, playable characters are generally not placed in the open world.
Unless it’s for a quest or other special circumstances.
—For example, after the 5.3 main quest, our real man, the Captain, became a permanent fixture…
well, permanent in the open world, used to help us upgrade the Pyro Traveler’s Constellations.
Of course, Ren, who possessed GM backend management permissions, could summon playable characters anytime and anywhere, placing them in any scene or map.
That was exactly what he used to do.
He would find a map with beautiful, pleasant scenery, place two or three beautiful female characters there, and then begin his daily quest-like exploration— Once finished, he would simply de-spawn the characters, not even needing to deal with the troublesome aftermath.
Aside from the NPC characters’ reactions being as stiff as dolls, there was nothing bad about it.
But since he learned yesterday that the game world of Genshin Impact he was in had established a connection with the outside Teyvat world…
And that the real people in Teyvat might, for some unknown reason, descend into their respective NPC puppets in their dreams…
Then Ren had to make preparations early.
The first step was to bring out all the female playable characters and place them in the map scenes they were most familiar with.
For instance, Acting Grand Master Jean would be in the Grand Master’s office of the Knights of Favonius, Lisa in the Knights’ library, Ningguang in the Jade Chamber, Hu Tao in the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor, and so on.
After all, if a real person from the outside world wanted to descend into their corresponding NPC character in Ren’s game world, that character had to exist in the game world first, right?
Ren actually suspected now that people from the outside world might have been able to descend into his back garden long ago, but at those times, he just hadn’t happened to have the corresponding NPC characters spawned out.
That’s why it was only when he was using Amber as a body pillow—and Amber happened to be sleeping in the outside world—that Amber’s soul triggered the descent.
As for why they were all female characters and where the male characters went?
Uh, Ren, who had been alone for countless years after transmigrating and had long since developed some mental issues, hadn’t spawned a single one.
Not only did he not spawn them, but he even took out an insurance policy.
Well, he added all the female characters to his friends list and added all the male characters to his blacklist.
Although he didn’t know if this second step would have any effect, Ren did it anyway.
After all, Ren didn’t want any male characters appearing in his paradise; this was his back garden.
Even male characters like Neuvillette, the Hydro Dragon King with the highest usage rate before his transmigration, Rex Lapis Zhongli, or Kazuha and Venti—none of them were allowed!
It wouldn’t be too late to make friends with these brothers—whom he had actually never met—after he found a way to go to the real world outside in the future.
Finally, after placing Mualani in her waterside goods shop among the People of the Springs, Ren wiped the non-existent sweat from his forehead.
“Phew, that should be the last one.” Seeing Mualani behind the stall already performing her unique idle animation—a beach dance—Ren poked Mualani’s healthy, Wheat-colored belly.
But it was just a poke.
Having just spent a whole day “dating” the real Amber yesterday—who could cry, laugh, and had her own real thoughts—it was like having eaten instant noodles for several months and then suddenly having a bowl of porridge cooked by one’s mother.
It wasn’t that the porridge was exceptionally delicious or that the flavor was so great; in terms of pure taste, it might not even match the richly flavored instant noodles.
But one really gets sick of instant noodles after eating them too much, whereas eating a long-awaited bowl of porridge cooked by one’s mother is enough to make one cry with emotion.
Currently still in the honeymoon phase brought by the real Amber, Ren couldn’t muster any enthusiasm for puppets that had no reaction or interactive feedback, even for highly popular characters like Mualani or Citlali, the newest popularity queens before he transmigrated.
After all, whatever reactions they could have, he had already experienced them all during that long period of time.
In the end, he just gave her a couple of pokes and left her there.
Afterward, he found a beach chair at the best vantage point in the People of the Springs, lay on it lazily, put on a pair of sunglasses, pulled up his friends list, and idled away the time.