This Life, I Will Be the Protagonist

Chapter 16: The Second Beta Test

Rita never asked the Wilson family about Rick's whereabouts. She tracked down this information with her little sparrows. Before Rick entered the hotel, one of these sparrows had snuck into his hoodie and followed him into his room, now hiding in a potted plant inside the room.

Concerned that the sparrow might spread a decaying smell, Rita had replaced it with a new one each day.

Drinking an invisibility potion, Rita successfully entered Rick's hotel room. Even though she was multitasking, she needed to personally ensure that Rick did not enter the game before she could be at ease.

Inside the hotel room, Rick lay on the bed with a furrowed brow, occasionally shifting. It was unclear whether he was asleep or not.

In the corner of the room lay a phone, its screen cracked, likely from being thrown against the wall.

Rita went over to inspect it. She couldn't discern the brand, but it was likely a high-end phone Zoey had given him. Surprisingly, the screen wasn't shattered.

Once Rick joined the Lopez family, he'd probably enjoy the benefits of a top-tier phone and special services, never receiving spam messages again.

She watched Rick, and when he turned his back to her again, Rita used her toes to nudge the phone into her backpack and then used her invisibility potion to move to the neighboring room—one booked in advance by a Vancouver contact using his ID.

Rita took out the phone, still in invisibility, and wasn't worried about any high-tech features recording her appearance. She inspected the phone, noticing a small dent in the top left corner, likely from hitting the wall. She aligned the dent with the wall and then struck it forcefully.

The phone cracked with a snap, the screen displaying the date while half of it turned into a green and purple distorted mess.

Rita put the phone back in the backpack and returned to Rick's room. The damaged phone was still in the same place, and Rick remained facing away from the door. Rita placed the broken phone back exactly where it had been and quietly left.

She had imagined dozens of scenarios before arriving, but the simplest one occurred. She had even considered what to do if Rick, instead of becoming agitated by the messages, actually got excited and started practicing his skills or playing a game at 6 AM.

She had prepared for the worst-case scenario of having to knock Rick out.

At 6 AM, Rita returned to Rick's room. The broken phone was still on the floor, and Rick was still lying with his head covered, seemingly asleep. Rita used "Wheel of Fate" to set his luck to 1, then went back to the neighboring room to prepare for the second beta test.

At exactly 6:06 AM, she found "StarSea: Warcraft Rift" and immediately clicked to download.

Upon reaching the character selection screen, she saw the familiar undead, but beside [I don't care], there was a new notification—"Wanted."

Rita checked her inner pocket and found the two backpacks she had been carrying were missing. However, the character on the screen had two familiar backpacks hanging at its waist.

She tried using Thief God's [Disguise!] skill to transform into a short goblin.

Soon, Rita's physical form changed; she shrank, her skin turned green, her ears grew larger. At the same time, the undead character on the screen mirrored these changes.

Rita entered the game immediately. She had only one hour of disguise time, so she needed to understand her situation within that hour.

The screen lit up, showing a small goblin standing in a cemetery. Adjusting the game view, she saw the Undead City not far off. She immediately directed her character toward the city, speeding past low-level monsters.

In less than five minutes, she stood at the city gates, where her original undead character's image was displayed. Thankfully, when she created her character, she had randomly selected features, which had made her character look a lot like her.

Although Thief God's disguise skill was short-lived, it was impervious to detection by any item or skill. Rita easily entered the city and headed straight for the goblin district. In the goblin shop, she found the goblin merchant and asked if they accepted gold.

Goblin: "Time is money. If you have gold, why don't you just make it into coins yourself? Didn't your mentor teach you?"

Rita's breathing quickened slightly. She typed in the chat box: "Can you teach me the related skills? I am willing to pay for your valuable time."

The goblin immediately sent a trade window showing a 100 gold fee.

This precious opportunity was too good to haggle over. Rita took out the 100 gold coins given to her by the Undead City Lord and handed them over.

[Goblin Robert L teaches you "Goldsmithing" (Basic)]

She opened the skill details.

[Goldsmithing] (A-Class) (Goblin Exclusive): Infuses gold with magic to create a unique gold coin (Proficiency: 0/10000)

- Trait 1: Each coin forged automatically deducts 20g of gold as tax paid to the Goblin Merchant Association.

- Trait 2: Money can buy anything, but to maintain market stability, each goblin can only produce 3 coins per day for personal use.

Rita immediately took out a 500g gold bar from her backpack. The crafting option showed (4/4). She selected to craft all, and soon, golden light emanated between her character's hands. The progress bar completed in seconds. Her backpack now contained 3 gold coins, and the 500g gold bar was reduced to 140g.

Proficiency increased by 3 points.

This meant Rita could now forge gold coins herself. After making 10,000 gold coins, she could learn Advanced Goldsmithing if she acquired the blueprint or found another goblin willing to teach her.

Although she could only make 3 coins per day, this amount was substantial. Even though she could steal dozens of coins and acquire 100 gold from the Undead City Lord, in the real world, despite extensive gameplay, earning even a single gold coin was arduous.

Rita didn't delay further. She pushed her chaotic thoughts aside and took out several large storage boxes from her backpack. She asked the goblin if they would buy them. The goblin assessed the boxes, dismissing the electronics and toys as trash, offering only 2 silver coins per box. However, for the two large storage boxes of alcohol, he offered 12 gold coins.

Rita sold all 55 boxes of alcohol, exchanging them for 330 gold coins. The trash was sold for less than 1 gold coin.

Next, she asked how many gold coins she could get for 10 pounds of gold. She needed more coins to learn skills.

The goblin offered a rate of 200g of gold per 1 gold coin.

After 5 minutes of haggling, she managed to get a rate of 180g per 1 gold coin. She knew there was still room for negotiation, but with only half an hour left of her disguise, she quickly handed over all her gold—3,216 pounds from Vancouver and the gold from the Wilson estate—totaling 3,240 pounds. She received 6,000 gold coins in exchange.

This amount of gold was almost equivalent to the total reserves of a small to medium-sized guild in her previous life.

Rita then went to the nearby goblin engineering master, upgraded her engineering skill to advanced, and learned over a hundred new recipes. She did the same for alchemy at the alchemy store, upgrading to advanced and learning over a hundred new recipes.

When it came to academics, Rita was hesitant; in gaming, she was aggressive and eager for knowledge!