Chapter 161 Heading to the Swamp

Feng Xue had not really expected the existence of a seeded competitor, though upon reflection, it made sense. Much like how the Olympic Games always featured a few star athletes, participating in large-scale tournaments of this caliber inevitably meant there would be favored contestants.

As an extraordinary-tier individual who had fully awakened her Origin, Chi Xiaobai held an absolute advantage in combat over ordinary extraordinaries.

The Origin was a threshold one had to cross to advance from the extraordinary to the heroic. Those who had not touched their Origin always suffered a world-level debuff when confronting powerhouses who had awakened it.

This was because the Origin itself was the inherent directional orientation of a transmigrator—effectively the umbilical cord connecting humanity to the world. In any given world, simply touching the Origin meant one could obtain a limited degree of world-level augmentation. [Note: The ultimate state of the Origin is "My mind is the heavens' mind," meaning "my desire is the world's desire"; whereas the concept is the exact opposite, with its ultimate state being "Heaven's power is my power," meaning "the world's power is my power."]

Just as Feng Xue could only use a portion of his Origin in advance with the assistance of the Gourmet Demon, he had found himself suppressed by Chi Xiaobai, whose gourmet cell activity and combat experience were both inferior to his own.

In essence, this was not because the Gourmet Demon was suppressed, but rather because the Origin, which the opponent could use directly, was amplified by the Gourmet Demon's bonuses to a degree sufficient to suppress Feng Xue.

Such a Chi Xiaobai was akin to a sports student: while deficient in liberal arts subjects (such as transmigratory knowledge), she possessed a distinct advantage in the upcoming exchange tournament between Eastern and Western human geniuses. No wonder she had been admitted on a special recruitment basis.

With a slightly cynical thought process, perhaps the original intention of the Central Transmigrator Academy was merely to bring Chi Xiaobai up temporarily; once the competition concluded, she might well be demoted to the lower academy. As for whether she could ever return to the main campus, it would depend entirely on her own efforts.

Yet this made little difference to Chi Xiaobai. For her, as long as there was good food, nothing else mattered. Becoming a great transmigrator, attaining immortality, or ascending to divinity and sainthood were all fleeting clouds.

However, after Chi Xiaobai met Feng Xue, all of this changed.

Feng Xue's comprehensive understanding of various plot worlds could fully compensate for Chi Xiaobai's flaws in this regard. With Chi Xiaobai acting as the vanguard (or, less politely put, the meat shield), Feng Xue could safely cast his ranged attacks from the rear. But come to think of it, were Feng Xue and Chi Xiaobai's roles somewhat inverted—both in daily life and in combat?

[Voiceover: Of course they're inverted! Under normal circumstances, shouldn't the woman cook and the man wash the dishes? Shouldn't the man act as the meat shield while the woman provides DPS from the rear?]

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Feng Xue violently shook his head to dispel the mysterious voice that only he could hear, casting a look at Chi Xiaobai as though gazing at a member of a vulnerable group, which caused the thick-skinned girl to blush faintly despite herself.

"Let's go. We should find a place to set up camp first."

"Mm, let's head to the swamp!" Chi Xiaobai had learned about the swamp from Feng Xue. Not only that, Feng Xue had also explained to her the critical importance of various terrains in the Don't Starve world.

"Why? Didn't I tell you how dangerous it is there? Putting aside the fact that the swamp in the Don't Starve world is already the most dangerous area, as the only region with a reliable source of fresh water, it's bound to be a battleground contested by all transmigrators!" Feng Xue was quite surprised. Although Chi Xiaobai looked rather violent, she was actually someone who "wanted nothing outside of eating." Sending her into battle was less effective than handing her a spicy snack!

"Because I want to taste the ingredients in the swamp!" Chi Xiaobai provided an answer that was completely unexpected yet entirely reasonable.

Feng Xue found himself entirely unable to refute Chi Xiaobai's logic, so he simply went along with it and said, "Fair enough. I seem to have cooked creatures from all the other terrains, leaving only the frogs and tentacles of the swamp zone. But come to think of it, none of those bosses have shown up yet..."

"Then let's set off!" Like a child, Chi Xiaobai skipped along the coastline. There was no help for it, because although the two of them had explored the map for quite a while, they still had not the slightest clue where the swamp actually was.

...

"Feng Xue, hurry up, I want to eat shark fin!" Following Xiaobai's shout, Feng Xue twitching slightly, took the shark that Xiaobai had just hauled out of the water.

Come to think of it, Feng Xue was utterly speechless. There were actually sharks in the sea of the Don't Starve world! The characters in the original work could not enter the ocean, so Feng Xue had never considered this possibility. Instead, Chi Xiaobai, who knew very little about the Don't Starve world, broke the convention, which reminded Feng Xue of the stone tablet he had acquired that provided him with permanent dividends.

"It seems I'm becoming increasingly formulaic myself! Rigidity of thought is a disease, and it needs to be cured!" Thinking this, Feng Xue felt all the more convinced of the importance of having a partner like Chi Xiaobai who was oblivious to the plot.

Just as Sherlock Holmes needed a Watson to provide him with a mortal perspective, Feng Xue, as a shut-in otaku proficient in nearly all ACG media, also needed an outsider's perspective.

"I hope you won't disappoint me, partner!" Watching Xiaobai skip ahead of him, a gentle look suddenly crossed Feng Xue's face. He suddenly thought of Ruki, who was still in the Digital World. Even though he knew time had stopped in that world, Feng Xue still couldn't help but wonder what Ruki was doing right now...

"Look out!" Chi Xiaobai, who had been scouting ahead, suddenly lunged backward, tackling a slightly distracted Feng Xue to the ground. The next instant, a spear flew right over their heads.

Feng Xue was in no mood at the moment to appreciate the softness of Chi Xiaobai's body. The notion that being knocked over by a girl feels wonderful was absolute deceit!

Of course, this might also be because Chi Xiaobai's physical attributes were simply too formidable (laughs).

In any case, the moment he was tackled, Feng Xue subconsciously activated his AT Field. Yet this time, the AT Field showed no sign of repelling Chi Xiaobai along with the attack. In other words, through more than ten days of living together, Feng Xue's subconscious had already begun to accept Chi Xiaobai's presence. And as the physical manifestation of the barrier between people, the AT Field naturally would not isolate someone with whom there was no barrier.

"Turns out I'm just fooling myself too!" Seeing this, Feng Xue smiled faintly, scooped up Chi Xiaobai, and vanished from the spot.

"Where'd they go?" A voice suddenly emerged from behind a pine tree. A young girl—ah, no, he had an Adam's apple; to be precise, a trap—emerged from the woods. However, the other party's state was exceedingly bizarre. Although he was standing right there, he gave off an elusive, shifting impression, as though a single blink would cause him to lose trace of his whereabouts.

"An expert!" Feng Xue, who was likewise in a stealth state, thought to himself.