In the silent teahouse, Yun Jin's calm voice echoed.
As everyone looked at her, the room quieted down.
And Tartaglia, to be fair, was actually quite agreeable when no interests were clashing.
Seeing Yun Jin like this, he no longer felt it appropriate to approach Bai Ge.
"Lady Yun Jin, please—go ahead, sing, sing!"
Tartaglia said with an apologetic, awkward smile.
"Oh right—boss, come over here for a moment!"
He called over Fan Er-Ye.
"Take stock of the damage on the second floor. The Fatui will fully compensate it, along with today's venue fee."
"And as for Lady Yun Jin's performance fee today—tell me the number. I'll pay triple, as an apology."
Tartaglia spoke with extravagant generosity.
The human-form ATM of the Geo Archon had begun to display his absurd wealth.
"Ah, that's far too kind…"
Hearing Tartaglia's words, Fan Er-Ye—who had been a little frightened when summoned—instantly broke into a beaming smile.
With money covering the losses, he no longer felt any pain over the damage to the second floor, and immediately began directing the staff.
"What are you all standing around for? Tea Master, bring the tea! Everyone else, quickly clean things up for our honored guests! Move, move!"
The second floor of Heyu Teahouse sprang into activity.
Before long, tea was served, snacks were laid out, and Yun Jin's melodious opera voice rang out once more.
Everything seemed to return to normal.
Only then did Bai Ge, who had been seated the entire time, finally let out a quiet sigh of relief.
He sent a grateful look toward Yun Jin on stage.
While singing, Yun Jin casually met Bai Ge's gaze.
The operatic aria—Divine Damsel of Devastation—continued, yet everything was understood without words.
Because at this moment, Bai Ge was already exhausted.
That light-speed burst to break the ice cocoon had nearly drained all his strength.
Thankfully, Yun Jin had taken the stage in time and stopped Tartaglia from approaching.
Otherwise, this time, Bai Ge would probably have been exposed.
"That was close…"
Bai Ge sighed inwardly, calmly picking up some snacks from the table and eating them.
Today's fight had been a bit reckless—but the gains were huge.
If previously Bai Ge had only been roughly estimating his own strength level,
then now, he finally had a clear sense of where he stood.
At present, he was like a signature-move specialist from his past life's game, League of Legends.
His raw stats were slightly lacking, but he had a few killer moves.
With the element skills and bursts he'd obtained through daily sign-ins, those "three axes" were extremely intimidating.
Just like how he'd frightened Signora today by breaking her ice cocoon.
But then again—black cat or white cat, as long as it catches mice, it's a good cat.
Even as a signature-move specialist, if he could bluff convincingly with those three moves, he could still trade blows with a top-ranked challenger, couldn't he?
How many people get completely farmed like cannon fodder when facing a true king-tier player?
Bai Ge estimated that he had now broken out of the "youth group" level of combat power and was roughly on par with Keqing—perhaps even stronger in ultimate burst damage.
After all, he had all seven elements, while Keqing only had one.
Of course, having all seven elements was Bai Ge's biggest secret.
That was a cheat reserved for the Traveler twins—he would never reveal it lightly.
It was said that white light splits into seven colors, meaning that when the seven elements merge, they form a higher-tier energy—light energy.
In other words, one day, Bai Ge might become both light and human.
(…Probably.)
For now, though, he simply didn't know how to merge them yet.
So in summary—
As long as Bai Ge steadily followed the 9-to-5 System and kept signing in, everything would be fine.
Once his base stats were fully built up, he'd naturally become a top-tier powerhouse.
After releasing his pent-up desire for battle today, he could likely remain low-key for quite some time.
Still, today's fight wasn't without concrete rewards.
Bai Ge opened his status panel.
Name: Bai Ge
Constitution: 67
Spirit: 65 → 66
Strength: 69 → 70
Agility: 67
Elemental Power (Seven Elements): 60
Other: …
It seemed that because he'd truly pushed himself to the limit in that fight, his Strength and Spirit had both increased by one point.
Bai Ge still remembered that when he'd first arrived, his four base stats were only in the teens or twenties, and his elemental power was just 1.
Back then, likely due to how low his attributes were, each daily sign-in gave him 4—or even 5—points.
Later, as his stats grew higher, the gains from daily sign-ins gradually dropped.
By this month, most of his sign-ins only gave 1 or 2 points.
Only once had he gotten 3 points in elemental power.
And now, a single all-out battle had given him 2 points—pretty decent.
Still, compared to the risks of combat, leveling through fighting was relatively slow.
It was a viable path—but not an urgent one.
Bai Ge didn't need to rush.
After using the 9-to-5 System for four months, gaining many skills, he'd come to a clear conclusion:
The most broken part of this system might actually be the daily sign-in.
Skyscrapers rise from the ground up—and the steadily increasing base stats from daily sign-ins played exactly that role.
After organizing his thoughts, Bai Ge finally had the leisure to truly listen to the opera.
Yun Jin's exquisite singing voice was utterly intoxicating…
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