My Romance Game Updated – Chapter 4

Update Gift Pack

Ren Chenxi had just been wallowing in self-pity, mocking herself as “Battle Power 5 Scum”¹ who wouldn’t last a single day in the apocalypse. But the moment real danger arrived, her survival instinct instantly maxed out.

She refused to just stand there like an idiot and let a zombie eat her alive without a fight! Scum or not, she had to struggle! She would just treat this as a realistic game simulation—every day she survived was a win.

Fired up with sudden fighting spirit, Ren Chenxi immediately accepted the Game Update Big Gift Pack² from the system and tore it open.

To help a rookie survive the apocalypse, this pack surely contained a weapon, right? What kind? If it was a gun, would she know how to use it? If she could use it, could she land a headshot on a zombie?

However, reality proved Ren Chenxi too naive. Upon opening the Game Update Big Gift Pack, aside from a few system notifications, only a single syringe-like object appeared in her inventory slot. She checked the item info: Permanent Zombie Virus Immunity Antibody…

Good grief. Ren Chenxi had actually been counting on the idea that if she accidentally got bitten, she’d turn into a zombie, lose her human consciousness, and mindless wandering wouldn’t matter. But now, with this antibody, it was obvious: she wouldn’t turn into a zombie. Instead, she’d get the distinct pleasure of physically experiencing a lingchi³—being eaten alive, bite by bite, while fully conscious! Even worse, right after she finished reading the info, the damn thing thoughtfully auto-injected itself. What? Was it afraid that since she wasn’t a nurse, she wouldn’t know how to give herself a shot?

As for those system notifications, Ren Chenxi had no time to pay attention. She was too busy staring in horror through the shattered window at a terrifying, disgusting head—rotten flesh hanging off a skull—swaying back and forth outside the mobile phone shop.

Honestly, this was Ren Chenxi’s first time seeing such a realistic zombie. Games and movies had plenty of gross monsters, but they always carried a sense of 3D modeling or prosthetic makeup. But in this “absolutely realistic” game, Ren Chenxi felt it in her bones: this zombie was a real, living human that had transformed! She didn’t have time to analyze just how real it was, though, because the damn thing was already stumbling around the shop entrance. If not for the partial roller shutter and the debris scattered across the floor acting as obstacles, that zombie would probably already be inside, giving her that “authentic experience” of being chewed to death.

Ren Chenxi’s excellent vision allowed her to see clearly as the zombie staggered past the window—its mouth full of broken, yellow teeth stained with unidentifiable gore. She definitely didn’t want to be bitten by teeth that disgusting! Forcing down her fear and racing heart, she scanned her surroundings for an escape route. In her panic, she spotted a dropped mobile phone nearby. Adopting a “might as well try” attitude, she turned it on.

She had to marvel at the durability of this era’s “Senior Phones.”⁴ But while the build quality was solid, the startup jingle was… a bit too loud.

Sure enough, the moment the jingle played, the zombie trapped at the entrance grew agitated. It swiped excitedly, tearing a hole right through the thin, deformed roller shutter. Seeing that arm flailing wildly through the hole, Ren Chenxi was so scared she almost chucked the phone right then and there. Fortunately, she steadied herself. Noting the startup sound had finished, she took one second to think, then rapidly tapped into the settings and selected a ringtone that started low but exploded into a thump-thump boom-boom⁵ cacophony.

This was the alarm tone Ren Chenxi used most often during her gaming days, necessary to force her—someone who struggled to get out of bed—back into university life. It was also fortunate that in the three months she’d been back in the real world, she hadn’t forgotten how to operate these Senior Phones. Ren Chenxi started the ringtone and, with maximum speed, hurled it toward the window. Perhaps due to the life-or-death crisis, her potential exploded; she aimed perfectly through a small break in the glass, and the phone smashed onto the street outside.

If this were any of her phones from the real world, functioning after a throw like that would be questionable. But this was a durable Senior Phone of the game world. Not only did the thump-thump boom-boom ringtone blast out, vibrating the device violently, but Ren Chenxi actually worried it might have smashed a hole in the pavement!

Whether the pavement had a hole or not was the least of her concerns; her focus was entirely on the zombie with its arm stuck in the shutter. As the deafening ringtone echoed through the silent street, the stupid zombie’s attention was indeed captured. It clattered and struggled against the door, and in the end, instead of freeing its arm, it simply yanked until the limb tore off. Leaving a severed arm stuck in the hole, the zombie happily trotted—pidian-pidian⁶—toward the source of the noise.

Safe… for now?

Ren Chenxi quietly let out a breath. She didn’t dare relax completely. While using a bandage to stop the bleeding on her injured foot, she enlarged the mini-map to find a temporary hiding spot. The bandage came from the system’s built-in inventory. During her cycling trip, she had prepared plenty of essential medical supplies and stuffed them all into the system backpack.

Speaking of the system backpack, Ren Chenxi once again felt grateful for her Lao Ge’s⁷ gaming OCD. Aside from hoarding money, her brother loved expanding inventory slots to the max. She didn’t know the default size, but the backpack she inherited had one hundred pages with one hundred slots each—all unlocked by whatever method her brother had used! Furthermore, identical items could stack up to 999! Thank goodness the system had only corrected the player profile while leaving the other game data untouched. Now, all these inventory slots belonged to her.

However, looking at the massive emptiness of the backpack, Ren Chenxi felt a wave of melancholy. Why did she only focus on playing during her trip? Her brother had hoarded so much money; she should have gone on a shopping spree while traveling…

Compared to the ten thousand available slots, the items Ren Chenxi currently held seemed pitifully few. Although few relative to the total capacity, she still occupied over a hundred slots with the random items she’d tossed in. For a normal person, a suitcase might not fit all their travel clothes, but for Ren Chenxi, that only took up a few grid squares. So, despite being pulled into the game barefoot, her inventory was stocked with sneakers, hiking boots, and even slippers.

Bandaged up and wearing shoes, Ren Chenxi limped toward the back door of the mobile phone shop. As for how she knew there was a back door… it was marked on the map! The map indicated the area behind the shop was safe. If she circled around from the back, a single turn would lead her to the hotel where she hadn’t yet checked out.

Survival in the apocalypse! First step: find a safe haven. Then consider how to turtle⁸—hunker down and survive—in this cruel new world!

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“Sigh…” Gnawing on a piece of rock-hard Nang flatbread⁹, Ren Chenxi let out a long sigh.

Originally, Ren Chenxi had defeatistly assumed she wouldn’t last a day. In reality, she had already managed to scrape by for a week. During this week, she had been chased by zombies and had vomited at the sight of human corpses. But for the most part, she stayed dutifully hidden in her original hotel. According to the mini-map, this hotel was the area with the fewest red dots. Other locations showed red dots representing danger, though scattered and sparse nearby. Further out, however, the dots became increasingly dense.

Over the week, Ren Chenxi gradually emerged from her despair and depression. She began to muster the courage to scout around the hotel and grasp the state of the world. The “Game Update” email in her inbox contained detailed patch notes, specifically pinpointing the exact day the apocalypse descended upon this once-sweet campus romance game.

Ren Chenxi re-entered the game in October 2×22. Yet, she clearly remembered that when she disconnected three months ago, the game panel had displayed October 2×20. She had only been back in reality for three months, but two years had passed inside the game! Even more coincidental, the update notes stated that on the very day she left the game, the world suffered global catastrophes—storms, earthquakes, tsunamis. A massive number of humans fell into unexplained comas. Some woke up as devoid-of-humanity man-eating zombies; others awakened various Esper abilities¹⁰. Those who didn’t fall into a coma remained ordinary humans, forced to struggle for survival in this overturned world.

So… did she disconnect just in time to avoid the immediate horror of the apocalypse? Or… did her disconnection cause a data error that plunged the game world into doomsday?

But quickly, Ren Chenxi ruled out the latter. How could sneaking onto her brother’s save file and replacing him to woo the Goddess cause a data collapse? If she had that kind of power, wouldn’t her previous unauthorized gaming sessions have caused issues too? Besides, regardless of why this dog game¹¹ updated, she was the innocent victim dragged back into it.

Therefore, for the trapped Ren Chenxi, trying to stay alive was the only thing that mattered!

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The author has something to say:

Mhm… The author really does have OCD about unlocking game inventories. I once learned tailoring in a certain MMO just to make bags. Even in private single-player games, I’ll use a Cheat Device¹² to max out the storage…

However, 100 pages of 100 slots is indeed a bit exaggerated, hehehe.

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