"Mr. Fan, you are amazing! Becoming a great Druid at the age of 23 is really impressive. I have never heard of anyone becoming a Druid at such a young age before," Linya blushed and lowered her head. She had always been praised by others, but she had never received such compliments from a stranger before. It was her first time sitting in a bar with someone else, hearing such beautiful words, and being approached by a stranger... Today was full of firsts for her.

"Um, you can call me Wu or Big Brother Wu. That's how my friends address me. Calling me Mr. Fan sounds strange," I said with a bitter smile. The names here were similar to those in Western countries in my previous world, so everyone assumed that their surname was Fan.

"Okay... Okay... Fan... Wu..." Linya's voice became as soft as mosquito whispers as she lowered her head even further. It seemed like I still needed to work on training her to be more comfortable around me since our time together has been short-lived thus far; however, I must find ways to make her use that angelic voice and call out "Big Brother" tenderly enough to melt bones - ohoho...

I didn't know this while daydreaming; calling each other by name directly already indicated an intimate relationship between people here - especially between members of the opposite sex where it is even stricter than usual social norms dictate back home - so when Linya didn't shy away from talking with me anymore after our conversation earlier about turning jobs early due to excellent bloodlines (which meant coming from big families), it showed that she already had some positive feelings towards me.

"Oh yeah, Linya..." Suddenly bored again during our chat session; I remembered something we talked about earlier.

"You said you could turn jobs early because of your excellent bloodline? You must come from a big family, right?"

"Huh?" Linya was surprised by my question and looked at me with confusion.

"Um...," I seemed to have said something stupid again.

"Don't you know about my family?" Linya asked in amazement. She thought it was ridiculous that this interesting man in front of her didn't even know about her family but dared to come up and talk to her. Her face turned red as she thought about it.

I tried hard to recall our previous conversation; did she reveal any information? Usually, the name of a family is related to its members' names. Oh yeah! It's the Spirefield Family! Her full name is Linya Edel Spirefield or something like that!

"Oh, I remember now! It's the Spirefield Family!" I pretended to be amazed and even shot an admiring look at her.

Suddenly, a cold wind blew past us for no reason...

"..."

"..."

"It's the Edel family," said Linya, staring at me with her big eyes for a long time. I felt a bit embarrassed and lowered my head. She was such a kind girl that she didn't want to see me in an awkward situation.

"Uh..."

Being ignorant and pretending to be knowledgeable is truly the original sin of men. My face turned red like the armor of a holy knight as I rubbed my nose vigorously, feeling ashamed of myself. "Right, Linya, what level are you now?" I coughed and tried to change the subject.

"I'm already level 3." Before I could finish my sentence, Linya suddenly became excited and answered immediately.

The kind-hearted beauty Linya didn't want to see the man next to her in such an embarrassing situation anymore. She wanted to comfort him but couldn't find any suitable topic due to her lack of experience. Her heart was anxious because it had been so many years since she had been this happy before. Deep down inside, she began paying attention to this interesting yet somewhat strange-looking man.

Seeing me ask this question made her even happier than being called on by a superior officer; she stood up straight away and answered loudly out of fear that I might not hear her clearly enough: "Uh...oh...so you're already level three."

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I was confused when I saw how excited Linya reacted all of sudden; it caught me off guard for a moment.

Phew! Seeing that there was no more embarrassment left (having thick skin really makes things easier), Linya breathed out heavily as if relieved from carrying a heavy burden on her chest while waves rippled through it.

"Eh..." As everyone's gaze focused on herself all at once, Linya tilted her head in confusion after just sitting down again without knowing why they were looking at her like that earlier. Suddenly realizing how inappropriate she acted earlier caused even those old mages sitting at the nearby tables, who were usually calm and collected, to look at her with surprise.

"I'm sorry!" She stood up again immediately and apologized to everyone in a sobbing tone. Ah, she was such a silly yet adorable girl. If you can catch her heart, don't let it slip away. I wonder if her so-called family would approve of me as a little druid though? But it doesn't matter; we could always elope if they didn't. I mean, Dark Land is so vast that there must be some place for us to hide.

Ignorance is truly terrifying. If only I knew that the Edel family's influence spread throughout the entire Dark Land and was one of the few prestigious families on the continent where 60% of its members were outstanding job changers with over ten grand mages above level 60 alone...I wonder if I'd still feel so relaxed about this situation?

"Leveling up must be tough." Of course, when you get here you can no longer call leveling "leveling"; low-level players have to say "training," while high-level ones have to say something like "fighting for light against evil forces from hell," got it?

I looked at Linya sympathetically; even though she was born into a big family, which made people think she had special treatment or protection in this cruel Dark Land where pampering meant death, these past few months had been just as hard for her as they had been for someone who started out as an insignificant nobody like myself - maybe even harder than all those strict and almost brutal training sessions she went through since childhood combined.

As soon as we touched upon this topic Linya forgot all about being shy or timid earlier and began complaining non-stop in an almost coquettish tone: how ugly those sinking demons were! They danced weirdly while getting hit by swords which hurt them badly! And those disgusting zombies! She couldn't even look at them in the beginning, but when she finally gathered up her courage to attack with her eyes closed, she ended up hitting them a few times and almost died. Luckily someone from the family came to help just in time; otherwise, she would have been dead by now. And that hairy mouse was too sneaky! It hid in the grass and shot arrows from behind people's backs so many times that it made her butt hurt so much...

Linya felt that she suddenly became very strange, and even she herself didn't know why. These shy little secrets that she had planned to bury in her heart secretly, the grievances that she had never confided to her family, were now being revealed to a stranger whom she had just met not long ago.

She spoke for more than half an hour before finally feeling like she had vented everything. But when she came back to reality, she suddenly realized that at some point, her whole body was leaning against me. In the eyes of others, we were already intimate with each other. She even held onto my sleeve and wiped away tears of grievance from her eyes from time to time.

It seemed like slow motion as Linya slowly lifted up her head and looked at me intently with those cute and deadly facial features magnified right in front of my eyes. Her breaths smelled sweet like orchids on my face.

"Ah..." It took her a while before realizing what happened and let out a scream. She stood up abruptly feeling dizzy as if the world was spinning around her. She turned around several times then ran outside like a frightened field mouse without leaving any trace behind; leaving everyone stunned including those two cool assassins who lowered their heads deep in thought probably calculating whether they could catch up with the little mage after using acceleration.

I shook off my soaking wet sleeves bitterly - women who lose themselves are truly terrifying.

At this moment, the waiter walked over with a professional smile on his face: "Sir, Miss Linya's bill has not been paid yet..."

After paying for both mine and Linya's bills together, I looked around only to realize how out of place I was here. I wondered what went through the mind of this beautiful girl before I arrived since it seemed like such an eerie place for someone so young to be lost in thought.

Before leaving, I turned back towards Area 1 and saw Doug acting as a human loudspeaker, arguing fiercely with four barbarians. I decided not to go over there and suffer with them since it seemed like they would be staying here for quite some time. Instead, I left the bar alone.

Standing outside the bar, I took a deep breath of air that was different from the polluted air in my original world; it tasted sweet and fresh like lemon.

Looking at the busy street filled with strangers without any familiar faces or places around me made me feel suddenly afraid. Throughout this journey, Lahr and his companions had been accompanying me so I never felt lonely until now when I finally had to face this familiar yet unfamiliar world all by myself.

"Ha..." Taking another deep breath, I gave myself a pep talk - Wu Fan! You are going to punch Mephistopheles, kick Diabolos Apollo's feet and beat up Demon King Baal as the greatest Druid in history! How can you get stage fright over such small things?

And then...I took my first step forward...