Stepping out of the residential complex, Bai Bai oriented herself and followed the perimeter wall toward the back gate.
In the original host’s memories, residential areas where Awakened individuals gathered usually had a nearby “Black Market” frequented by Awakened customers.
If she wanted to obtain Source Crystals, she had to go to a Black Market.
A neighborhood like the one she just left looked quite prosperous; perhaps there was a Black Market nearby. Since she was already here, she might as well look around.
Bai Bai dared to do this because the location was far enough from the tenement building where the original host lived, meaning news wouldn’t travel back to Lu Lutong’s gang.
However, she still had to be careful. Low-level Awakened individuals had limited strength and insufficient income. Merely maintaining daily essential living expenses took all their effort, leaving them with zero financial ability to buy Source Crystals in bulk. She needed to exercise restraint.
With a stroke of good luck, after rounding the back gate of the complex, she spotted an alley nearby. Most of those entering and leaving were Awakened individuals.
Bai Bai turned into the alley and followed the flow of people to an open space at the end, where she found the Black Market.
The Black Market was simply an open-air bazaar. Anyone could enter for free, and buyers could browse at will. However, vendors were charged a management fee by the organizers when closing their stalls.
Bai Bai first searched for stalls selling Source Crystals.
The Source Crystals sold at the Black Market were all low-grade goods dug out from the roots of ordinary mutated plants.
The cheapest Source Crystals were only the size of a mung bean and were classified as Grade 1. Being extremely poor, the original host’s knowledge of Source Crystals was limited to knowing that the higher the number, the higher the grade.
The price of Grade 1 Source Crystals was transparent: a complete 50-jin (25 kg) bag of grain could be exchanged for 5 crystals. Every stall charged the exact same price.
After looking around, Bai Bai picked a vendor who looked agreeable and exchanged two 50-jin bags of grain for 10 Source Crystals.
In the Black Market, grain was the hard currency—far more useful than cash. It represented an Awakened individual’s strength. Poor wretches who couldn’t produce grain shouldn’t even bother hanging around the Black Market.
Once the transaction was complete, Bai Bai left the Black Market directly and sat down on the roadside.
Since transmigrating, she had been walking continuously for over two hours. She desperately needed to rest; otherwise, she wouldn’t have the physical strength to walk home.
Furthermore, her depleted mental power kept urging her to absorb the Source Crystals immediately.
Bai Bai laid her hands flat on her thighs, intending to retrieve the Source Crystals and absorb them in her palm, when her mental power suddenly jolted.
Inside her space, the Source Crystals shattered one after another.
Her parched mental power began to recover bit by bit. Like a glass measuring cylinder being filled with water, the level rose steadily at a visible pace until it reached the brim.
“Burp…”
Bai Bai let out a satisfied hiccup. Her vision cleared, and even the dust particles floating in the air became vividly sharp. Taking a look inside her space, she saw that only 3 of the 10 Source Crystals remained.
Does fully replenishing my mental power take 7 crystals? I’ll have to go to another Black Market tomorrow to exchange for a few more.
Now that her mental power had recovered and her Double Duplication ability was no longer restricted, Bai Bai wanted to test its limits.
Since Source Crystals had to be exchanged for grain, why not just duplicate the Source Crystals directly?
No sooner said than done.
Double, double, double…
She chanted in her head for at least a full minute, exerting all her strength, but not a single Source Crystal was added to the space.
Bai Bai gave up, but not entirely.
“Is it impossible, or am I currently incapable?”
She rubbed her chin. Considering her meager mental power, she preferred to believe it was just temporarily impossible.
Next, she looked at the remaining eight bags of grain inside the space.
“Let’s try this instead.”
“Double Duplication.”
Whoosh. The eight bags instantly turned into sixteen.
“Oho!”
Bai Bai’s eyes lit up.
“Duplicated items can be duplicated again?! Is this what ‘the clone retains identical attributes to the original’ means?”
“I’m rich! This is a zero-cost business!”
Amid her excitement, Bai Bai carefully sensed her mental power and found that it was still quite full.
“It seems duplicating ten large bags of grain all at once doesn’t consume much mental power. No wonder that electronic voice reminded me about the three safe attempts. Duplicating ordinary supplies isn’t strenuous by nature. Otherwise, my mental power would have been drained dry and I would’ve dropped dead on the spot during my first attempt with the grain.”
“Oh right, money!”
Bai Bai pulled out her wallet from the space, extracted a ten-yuan bill, and placed it back into the space alone.
“Alright, show me what you’ve got!”
She pushed hard for a long time, but just like when she tried to duplicate the Source Crystals, the bill remained completely unchanged.
“Huh! Money can’t be duplicated? Does currency not count as an objective physical material? Or is legal tender considered a rule-bound substance that can’t be copied?”
With her mental power fully restored, Bai Bai’s mind was operating rapidly.
“Or is it simply preventing me from turning into a money-printing machine?”
“Fair enough. At least I’ve tested the boundaries of the rules.”
Bai Bai refocused on the immediate issue.
She took out her water flask, poured out the strange-tasting water inside, and placed the flask back into the space.
Using the spatial micro-manipulation skills the original host had honed over the past two years, she directly unsealed a gallon jug of water. A stream of water flew out of the jug, precisely filling the flask. She swirled it around to clean out the residual water, then took it out and dumped it onto the ground.
After repeating this process twice, Bai Bai opened the bags of salt and sugar, retrieved a small amount of each, and poured them into the flask. Finally, she filled it to the top with water and gave it a vigorous shake.
A full flask of salt-and-sugar water was ready.
She chugged half of it in one go, relieving her desperate thirst.
Licking her lips, Bai Bai felt it wasn’t sweet enough. She opened the lid, poured a bit more sugar inside, shook it hard again, and took another gulp.
Now the sweetness was just right.
She thoroughly enjoyed a first gulp, then a second. Just as she was about to take a third, she noticed a dust-covered woman standing beside her, licking her lips while staring at her.
Bai Bai paused briefly and capped the flask.
“Can I help you, Sister?”
Regardless of the other person’s actual age, calling them “Sister” was a default courtesy.
“Are you selling water? I’d like to buy some from you.”
As she spoke, the woman unhooked a plastic water bottle from her bag strap.
“Just fill this up, and I’ll give you two yuan.”
“I only have large gallon jugs. Do you trust me, Sister?”
The woman went silent for a moment.
“Let me see the water jug.”
Bai Bai immediately produced the large gallon jug of purified water she had just opened.
The woman’s eyes lit up, and she nodded in satisfaction.
“Works for me.”
With that, she handed over two one-yuan bills.
The moment Bai Bai accepted the money, a thin stream of water condensed from the jug and flew through the air, landing neatly into the woman’s open bottle.
This sight instantly stirred Bai Bai’s heart, sparking an intense desire—a strong urge of ‘I want this.’
She yielded to the thought and accepted it.
She wanted it, so she would take it.
Her fully restored mental power was instantly drained by more than half, and her full state vanished in a flash.
The swelling on the back of her head throbbed with sudden pain again.
Bai Bai’s lip twitched involuntarily from the pain, but she quickly composed her expression. Wearing a look of restrained, subtle amazement, she appreciated the woman’s display.
The woman’s bottle filled up rapidly, and the water stream snapped off at just the right moment without wasting a single drop.
Bai Bai almost applauded.
After taking several large gulps, the woman let out a satisfied sigh and hooked the bottle back onto her bag strap.
“Thanks a lot.”
Bai Bai politely shook her head in response and watched the woman walk into the Black Market.
Then, her gaze shifted toward her own water jug. Looking at the calm surface of the water inside, she gently hooked her fingertip at her side.