Chapter 3: Scoring
The first volume of the Victory Mantra (Da 37.11c): "The end of evil is called merit, and the fulfillment of good is called virtue. Virtue means gain; what is gained through practice is called merit and virtue."
In two hours, Rong Yuan earned a total of 10 merit points by helping others. Minus the 2 merit points deducted at the beginning because of the middle-aged beggar, he now has 8 merit points, but he has lost his goal for a moment.
It's not that there are no people who can be helped on the street. In fact, there are many such people. For example, there is a young woman five or six meters ahead. She has a baby on her back, a big schoolbag on her chest, a suitcase in her right hand and two plastic bags, and a bulging travel bag in her left hand. They all look heavy and she is in great need of help. According to Rong Yuan's experience in the past two hours, helping her carry things and sending her to her destination should give him two points of merit. But he doesn't know how far she is going and how long it will take. If he had no other choice, Rong Yuan would not spend his precious time on this goal.
For example, the two young men on the street who were walking around like him and looking at passersby all the time, Rong Yuan had seen them twice taking out the mobile phones or wallets of passersby when they were not paying attention, but he had no intention of doing anything to help them, because he also saw the two men exchanging glances with several other strong men, thinking that it was a group crime. With his current physique, doing anything to help others is synonymous with courting death.
As he was walking, Rong Yuan suddenly thought of something and opened the merit book. Sure enough, Rule 4 stated: [Merit can be gained by helping a life form in distress. The amount of merit gained is positively correlated to the degree of distress of the recipient.]
What we need to help are “lives in trouble” rather than “people in trouble”.
Rong Yuan pondered the word for a moment and his eyes lit up.
There are many people who keep cats and dogs in Qinghai City, and there are even more stray cats and dogs who have nowhere to go. Rong Yuan bought a bag of pet biscuits at a nearby supermarket. Whenever he saw stray cats and dogs looking for food, he would throw two biscuits to them. Soon, several small animals with less vigilance surrounded him and began to eat the biscuits cautiously.
[Feed the hungry Chinese rural dog, merit +1 ]
[Feed the hungry curly cat, merit +1]
[Feed a hungry Scottish Fold cat, merit +1]
[Feed the hungry dachshund, merit +1]
…
As Rong Yuan was feeding stray animals, he felt the book of merit in his arms getting hot. Seeing more and more animals coming around, he simply poured all the biscuits in the bag onto the ground, walked out of the circle of cats and dogs, sat on a bench on the side of the street for passers-by to rest, and opened the book of merit to check.
First, there are two more rules for the title page:
[Rule 5: Any product in the Merit Mall can be exchanged for the corresponding Merit Points, but the exchanged products cannot be exchanged for Merit Points again. Any items in the real world cannot be exchanged for Merit Points.]
[Rule 6: Among the goods exchanged from the Merit Mall, only physical props that do not exceed the technological level of the contractor's world can be transferred to others for use. Other goods can only be used by the contractor himself. ]
The content of the first page did not change. The first few lines of text on the second page changed to: [Contractor of the Book of Merit: Rong Yuan]
[Current merits: 23]
[Exchangeable Merits: 23]
Behind it was a series of records of merits and losses. Rong Yuan clicked on the page and found that there were functions such as [Select] and [Delete].
The third page only has a striking title: [Merit Exchange Record] The fourth page looks similar to online shopping pages such as Taobao and JD.com. In the upper left corner is a [Merit Mall] logo, and below is a series of product categories; in the upper right corner are options such as [My Merit], [Optional Products], [Purchased Products], [Favorites], and [Product Search]; the main layout is still occupied by pictures of various popular products. However, probably because his merit value is too low, most of the product categories and product pictures are gray, and you can't even see what they are. In the entire Merit Mall page, only a few items are clearly visible.
Rong Yuan looked at the three options that could be seen in the product classification: [Basic Value], [Life Supplies], and [Weapons]. He slid his finger and clicked on [Optional Products] in the upper right corner.
The mall page instantly turned into a product display page with two rows in one row, for a total of five rows. Each redemption product had a two-inch photo-sized picture, the product name, a functional introduction, and the required merit points.
The one at the top is what Rong Yuan needs most right now——
A simple diagram of the human body with the following words written next to it:
【Product Name: Life Value】
[Function Introduction: Extend the life of the contractor]
[Price: 10 merits/day]
Rong Yuan immediately exchanged for two days of life, and then felt that there was something wrong with one of the pages in the front of the merit book. After he turned to the first page, he was shocked to find that in the description on the first page, there was an extra line of words after the age: [Lifespan: 42:26:37]
The last number 37 is still decreasing by one digit per second.
——So, this is the countdown of his life? He now has 42 hours to live?
Twenty merits should be exchanged for forty-eight hours of life, but now there are only forty-two hours left? Rong Yuan looked at the watch. It has been almost six hours since he woke up. So from then on, his life entered a countdown? If he can't get ten merits within 24 hours, he will be wiped out?
Seeing this data, Rong Yuan was relieved. He felt that the rope around his neck had finally loosened a little, and he no longer had the sense of urgency that his life was at stake. Two days was enough time for him to do a lot of things.
He turned back to the mall page and found that the remaining three merit points could be used to buy daily necessities that could be bought with money, such as kitchenware, food, wine, clothes, water purification, toys, cosmetics, gems, etc. Many of the exchanges seemed very cost-effective. In reality, things that might cost thousands or tens of thousands of yuan to buy only cost the price of feeding a few cats and dogs in the merit mall. If the person who got the merit book was a shopaholic, he would probably dance with joy and go on a shopping spree.
However, for Rong Yuan, money is enough as long as it can maintain basic survival needs. He has no interest in luxury goods, nor in gold, silver and jewelry that can be exchanged for money in reality. What attracts him are the contents that have not yet been opened in the Merit Mall.
The unknown is mysterious, which represents infinite possibilities. Just imagining what is behind that gray area makes Rong Yuan feel his scalp tingling, as if an electric current is running through his body, making every hair on his body stand up in excitement.
Therefore, he would not waste any merit points on unnecessary things, but accumulated them to open as many gray areas in the mall as possible. He also had to exchange more life points. In order to avoid encountering some unexpected situation that would prevent him from gaining merit points, he had to exchange at least 100 days of abundant life.
As for the negative 178.5 million merit points, he wanted to completely offset them - although the calculation of merit points was much looser than he had originally expected, it was not a goal that could be achieved in a short period of time. Anyway, even if the negative 100 million was offset to negative 100, as long as the merit points were not exchanged for lives, the result would still be obliteration, so this was actually the least urgent task. Rong Yuan postponed this item indefinitely.
"Woo woo--" A puppy rubbed Rong Yuan's shoes gently. He looked up and found that all the biscuits had There were still a few cats and dogs wandering around, some of which were licking the wet concrete floor unwillingly.
The one rubbing against him was a yellow local dog. This clever little fellow seemed to know that he was the one who fed them. It was squatting on the side and looking at him pitifully, its pair of watery black eyes like bright black gems.
Rong Yuan was a little puzzled. In fact, he didn't have a good relationship with animals before. They either stared at him and barked at him, or ran away when they saw him, not to mention these stray animals who were wary and even hostile to humans. Now, these stray cats and dogs not only easily accepted the food he gave them, but also lingered around him and even dared to beg for food from him. This was a strange phenomenon that had never happened before.
——Could it be that the merit book has the effect of increasing his affinity for animals?
There were too many situations encountered in a day, and Rong Yuan no longer bothered about such trivial matters. Compared with the time-consuming and laborious help to humans and the various doubts and questions, earning merit from these simple creatures was really simple, worry-free and quick. It can be said that the reaction of the small animals was exactly what he wanted.
Rong Yuan took out all the money he had, and except for buying himself a bottle of water and a piece of bread, he used the rest to buy the cheapest and most affordable pet food. Finally, he left the pet supplies store carrying two huge plastic bags, with the owner looking at him with strange eyes.
On this day, the stray animals near Tai'an Community had a feast. Although it was actually cheap pet food, tasted bad, lacked a reasonable nutritional structure, and had a strong odor, it was a rare experience for them to eat to their heart's content. I don't know how they spread the message, but even stray cats and dogs from other neighborhoods came here after hearing the news. In order to avoid the onlookers, Rong Yuan had to take these little guys to a nearby sparsely populated grove, and even went to an ATM to withdraw money, and bought out several cheap foods in the pet supply store.
…
The moon was shining brightly in the sky, and vague black shadows were shuttling back and forth in the woods, accompanied by the low sounds coming from the throats of animals. An uninformed person who walked in would probably be scared to death, but the only human being among them was content.
Rong Yuan stretched his stiff body after sitting for a long time and looked around. The pet food he bought had been completely eaten, leaving only some residue and packaging bags on the ground. Dozens of small animals were eating until their stomachs were full, playing with each other, or sleeping on their backs with their round bellies. Many animals probably didn't have the same territory, so they left after eating. He picked up all the packaging bags on the ground and threw them into the trash can, ending the day's scoring operation.
