432 I Dont Think Theyre Human (2/2)

The bearded man laughed and whispered, ”I know you're blending in here for this purpose, but unfortunately, you can't! If you had come a month earlier, I could still help you figure out a way, but now… the Water of Light has been slowly disappearing for some unknown reason, no longer accumulating the light element, but escaping outward instead. Because of this matter, the great white-robed archbishop has almost lost all his hair.”

Seemingly thinking of the archbishop's balding appearance, the bearded man laughed joyfully.

This caused many people next to him to hold unpleasant looks.

The bearded man immediately smiled apologetically at the surrounding people.

Then with his arm around Roland, he headed over to the pyramid stairs while saying, ”But don't worry, things will always work out. Stay here for a while longer, you and I will make more friends and I will figure out a way for you.”

The implications behind the bearded man's words were quite clear to Roland.

He nodded and smiled. ”Don't worry, I'll be very sincere.”

It certainly would be nice to be able to buy a portion of Water of Light with gold coins.

There wasn't a single solution to a quest. After staying in this game for over a year, almost two, all players were now aware of this.

Descending again into the interior of the pyramid, Roland found that it had become very crowded with white-robed priests walking about or chatting and that there was also a great deal of furniture and apparatus.

It was a clear contrast to the previous visit when all the corners were empty.

The entrance to the pyramid was still guarded by soldiers, but since the bearded man was leading Roland and others out of the pyramid, they were not questioned by the soldiers.

The city was full of summer sunshine and the streets were quite warm.

Many pedestrians were coming and going, and when they saw the rather unique fashion of Roland and the others, they would take a few more glances, but they wouldn't keep their eyes on them for too long.

Bringing Roland to a patch of shade, the bearded man let go of the former, and then, with arms akimbo, and a rather bold expression, asked, ”Have you found a place to settle?”

”No,” said Roland with a smile. ”I wonder if you have a good introduction to the location, Uncle?”

”Then let's go to my hotel.” The bearded middle-aged man laughed and said, ”My house is a hotel.”

Roland was startled for a moment and then smiled. ”All right.”

They were then taken to stay in a hotel not far from the pyramid.

Roland got six rooms. This bearded man was quite nice—for six decent rooms, it only cost Roland three silver coins per day.

The bearded middle-aged man enthusiastically chatted with Roland for nearly half an hour, while also telling Roland his name.

Mippels!

After the bearded hotel owner left, the five gathered in Roland's room for a meeting.

Betta was the first to speak, saying, ”On the way to the hotel, I looked at the proportion of pedestrians on the street, and there were many women.”

”It's no surprise that women love to shop,” continued Brazil, tossing a salt bean into his mouth.

Betta shook his head. ”Not shopping, they were in a hurry and most of them were carrying heavy loads and looked more like they were working.”

Brazil shrugged. ”I remember in the small country of Thailand, isn't it also women who work and men who sleep? It's probably not surprising that there is a similar custom here.”

”That's true.” Betta nodded.

At this moment, Roland placed his hand on the tabletop and tapped his index finger on it, contemplating something.

Li Lin noticed this and asked, ”Roland, what are you thinking? Or have you noticed something special?”

”I think… it's too coincidental.” Roland thought for a moment and said, ”After we officially entered the dungeon, there was the Well of Light in the sink in front of us. At that time, we had two choices. One was to rob the Water of Light by force, but that definitely wouldn't work. With more than a dozen Master-level guards and a large number of professionals in the pyramid, we'd be dead if we dared try. The other was to bribe a local as I did so that he could take us out of the top floor of the pyramid without alerting the guards and then we could continue the rest of the storyline for the dungeon. Although the system didn't give any hints, I think we might have followed one of the branch plots—being led by the nose by the dungeon quest's plot.”

”Why would you think that?” Li Lin asked curiously.

His question also represented the others' doubts.

Roland explained, ”The first person who spotted us was Mippels, which is too unusual. Logically, it should have been those Master guards who were guarding the well. How could the reaction speed of normal people be faster than that of professionals?”

The other four listened and found this quite reasonable.

”Besides, it's the ultimate coincidence that Mippels is also someone who runs an inn. How does a man who runs an inn have the right to be near the Well of Light? Unless he has another identity.

”I feel like the details of this dungeon are instantaneously computed. The NPC's actions, their identities, will change with our actions, creating a massive tree of quest processes.”

Li Lin looked baffled. He only had a high-school education and didn't understand what Roland was saying.

Brazil and Husseret both went to third-tier diploma mills. Back then, they went to waste time; one picked up girls all day, the other played LoL all day. They cheated on the graduation exams and their theses were half-copied and half-altered.

Besides, diploma mills' graduation exams were not very strict.

The two of them didn't quite understand what Roland was saying, but they could still barely understand what was on the surface.

Beta really understood what Roland was saying. ”You mean the NPCs in this dungeon… are real NPCs, not people?”