Douluo Continent, Heaven Dou Empire, Heaven Dou City.
Li Rong stood on a bustling, lively street, yet for a long moment, he felt utterly out of place.
Crowds flowed endlessly around him—hawkers shouting, pedestrians brushing past, carriages rumbling by—while he remained motionless, as though isolated from the noise and warmth of the world. To anyone watching, he probably looked like someone who had lost his soul. Even the nearby street vendors began casting suspicious glances, wondering whether this young man had fallen asleep while standing.
Only after a long while did Li Rong finally move.
First priority: eat.
After all, going without food for a day made anyone hungry.
As a pseudo-otaku who had transmigrated from a new era, Li Rong had developed a very clear philosophy when it came to food. He could tolerate food that tasted mediocre, but he absolutely could not tolerate hunger. Hunger destroyed everything—mood, patience, dignity.
Back when he was broke, he had once cooked an enormous basin of stir-fried chili with meat, stuffed it into the refrigerator, and lived off it for days. Every day was the same routine: Lao Gan Ma egg-fried rice mixed with the chili meat, a full basin at a time, washed down with cola. After eating, he would sit in front of his computer, squandering his not-so-meaningful life by gaming for ten hours straight. When exhaustion finally set in, he would wash up and collapse into bed before his stomach could even protest. He'd sleep until the next day, lie in bed scrolling through his phone until hunger struck again, then get up and repeat the cycle.
One cooking session could last four days.
In his view, there was nothing in the world more satisfying than a full stomach. Games came in a distant second.
That kind of decadent lifestyle was also the reason his weight had skyrocketed. When he first graduated from university, he had the standard southern male build—170 centimeters tall, weighing 110 jin. He had even lost some weight during his first year of work. Then came his "voluntary resignation." In just three years, his weight surged from 110 jin to 200 jin and never looked back.
That was also why he was still a bachelor—an authentic "three-no" bachelor: no house, no car, no savings.
Li Rong had been single since birth. The only time he ever held a girl's hand was in high school, back when everyone was still innocent and naive. He had tricked his deskmate into it. Even now, he couldn't remember how such an obvious trick had worked. Maybe she had already liked him back then.
Whenever he thought of it, Li Rong would mock himself, toss his phone aside, and start fantasizing to help himself fall asleep. In his dreams, he was rich and handsome, while his deskmate was beautiful and wealthy. The two of them were a perfect match—scheming together, shamelessly getting rich, climbing to the peak of life, enjoying a blissful marriage with children doting on them. They were a model family in the eyes of relatives, a golden couple among classmates, and a new-era exemplary household worthy of strong governmental promotion.
Unfortunately, dreams were dreams.
Reality was far less forgiving. In reality, Li Rong was an introverted chatterbox, a clean-freak lazybones, a poor money-grubber, an appearance-obsessed ugly man, a stubbornly kind person, a narcissistic self-doubter, a zero-experience love "expert" with an overactive imagination, and an unmotivated successor of society.
He didn't ask for much—but he had even less.
Average-looking, obese, socially awkward. He lacked both the courage to start over and climb upward, and the resolve to abandon everything and burn his bridges. All he could do was live alone, isolated, barely surviving in a massive city.
The only people who truly loved him were his parents.
And the only people he felt he had failed were also his parents.
That was why, when fate finally showed him favor, Li Rong seized it without hesitation.
He chose to come to this World and become the Sacrificial Dao Lord's wish collector.
When he saw the clone—born from his flesh, blood, and expectations—living in his place in the original world, Li Rong felt nothing but gratitude toward the Sacrificial Dao Lord. Someone else would now stay behind, take care of his parents, and let them enjoy their later years in peace.
For that alone, he was willing to work himself to death.
Given a new life, transmigrated to another world, and granted such a powerful cheat—freely exchanging items with faith points—if he didn't work 007, Li Rong would feel unworthy of being human.
From this moment on, the Sacrificial Dao Lord was his one and only faith.
Finding a secluded corner where no one was watching, Li Rong opened the system's faith-point exchange interface. He claimed the reserve funds first, receiving ten thousand sacrificial coins. As the crisp ding echoed in his mind, he spent ten sacrificial coins to exchange for a large spatial storage ring, then exchanged again for ten thousand gold coins.
Only then did he glance around and begin searching for a place to eat.
Spending on credit was nothing new to him. Repayment was a problem for the future. Eating came first. Besides, how could he deceive—no, gather—faith without a basic foundation? He wasn't good at socializing.
Grabbing strangers on the street to loudly preach the divine might of the Sacrificial Dao Lord? Showing off divine power in public? He couldn't do it. If he had that kind of thick skin, he wouldn't have been "voluntarily resigned" in the first place.
Li Rong entered a small restaurant at random and immediately ordered a meat-and-egg combination: lion's head meatballs with steamed egg, a plate of stir-fried beef, a pot of small wine to cut the grease, and a large bowl of rice. He ignored vegetables entirely, eating until oil shone at the corners of his mouth and he was burping in satisfaction. Only then did he leisurely pay and leave.
After asking for directions, Li Rong found the Kiba. Once inside, he didn't bother haggling. He was terrible at bargaining—he could get ripped off buying vegetables, let alone negotiating property. He stated his requirements clearly and accepted the quoted price without fuss.
In South City, near a side gate, he purchased a street-facing shop with a small courtyard, suitable for both business and residence.
He immediately followed the Kiba agent to the government office to register the deed. Including the agent's commission, the original ten thousand gold coins weren't enough, so he exchanged an additional thirty thousand. The joy on the clerk's face made Li Rong click his tongue in admiration. Clearly, this was a profitable transaction. What a pity—he'd never had such ability in his previous life.
After storing the deed in his ring, Li Rong returned to the shop, shut the door, and opened the interface again. He exchanged for basic renovations for both the storefront and living quarters. As a clean-freak lazybones, he didn't care about luxury—clean and usable was enough.
He installed the defensive array, pressure array, insight array, and aura-shielding array first. These were the biggest expenses. Fortunately, this was Douluo. If he had chosen a world like Doupo, he would probably be bankrupt after installing just these four arrays.
Next came crystal cards, a card-reading tool, and three crystal screens for posting temporary bounty missions and displaying available goods. With that, the shop's basic setup was complete.
Yes—Li Rong was opening a shop to sell goods and collect faith.
Money, something universally desired, naturally carried a faint trace of faith power.
That said, Li Rong had no intention of accepting gold coins. To him, gold was just a mineral, not a true transactional medium. He planned to establish his own currency.
Sacrificial coins.
They would have no physical form and would exist only on crystal cards.
There were only two ways to obtain them. First, by completing temporary or urgent bounty missions issued by Li Rong. Second, by exchanging valuable items—minerals, herbs, rare cultivation techniques, elixirs, or magical artifacts.
As long as he could ignite the fervent desire of the continent's cultivators for sacrificial coins, faith points would flow in naturally.
He had briefly considered conquering the entire continent by force, compelling the masses to pray before the Sacrificial Dao Lord's idol for three hours every day. Anyone whose faith was insufficient or impure would be branded a heretic and eliminated.
Just thinking about it made Li Rong feel deeply uncomfortable.
For someone as useless as himself to receive divine salvation, only to turn around and oppress ordinary people—he couldn't accept that.
So he discarded the idea.
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