The vehicle the three were riding in was an uncommon military-green SUV. It wasn't military issue; the previous owner had simply given it that paint job.
But compared to private cars and vans, this vehicle looked much more professional.
And the various crash bars installed on it were an advantage that other vehicles didn't have.
It was much better than the paper-mache cars produced in the Far East.
Rita sat in the driver's seat. She was the only one who could drive. Durandal didn't even look old enough to get a driver's license, and the probability of Li Sushang knowing how to drive was even lower than her knowing how to ride a sword.
The two of them sat obediently in the back. Durandal didn't even take the passenger seat.
Before long, the vehicle left the city, passed through an unattended toll booth onto the highway, and didn't even use the ETC lane.
Compared to the cleared roads in ARC City, the highway was still littered with chaotic vehicles. Every so often, they would see a car that had crashed through the guardrail and was stuck on the side of the road.
Or several cars that had collided, their tragic state making one wonder if the people inside had even survived long enough to turn into zombies.
But this was China, after all. The highways were built very wide. Even though there were car crash scenes everywhere from out-of-control vehicles, there was still room for vehicles to pass.
Except for a few places that were severely congested and showed signs of being cleared, the road was basically unobstructed.
However, a highway is a highway. After a while, the quiet atmosphere in the car could no longer be maintained.
In the back seat, Durandal took out her phone and opened the city exploration team's dedicated website on Spark. Li Sushang also leaned over, her hands on Durandal's, and the two shared a phone, scrolling and whispering to each other.
"There are so many commissions..." Li Sushang sighed.
Durandal nodded. "If you just look at it like this, it doesn't really seem like we're in the post-Great Honkai era..."
"The internet before the Great Honkai was much more lively than it is now," Rita said with a smile from the driver's seat. "Back then, even a small forum could have hundreds of people chatting at the same time."
"Really?" / "Is that so?" Li Sushang and Durandal exclaimed in unison.
"Of course," Rita replied while driving. "It was normal for large websites to have tens or hundreds of millions of people online at the same time. It was also common for over a hundred million people to be in the same channel.
"Future City's [Utopia] even achieved the feat of having three billion people enter the server at the same time. It's said that even Future City's First Sequence had to allocate some of its computing power to support the smooth operation of Utopia."
"Oh, oh, I know this one!" Li Sushang's eyes lit up. "It's [Taoyuan (Utopia)] (she talk about CN version), right? The other world you enter through the [Ark]!"
"Has Miss Sushang also been to [Utopia] before?" Rita seamlessly switched to a more Chinese-style address, smiling as she turned her head to ask.
This not-looking-at-the-road maneuver startled Durandal, who subconsciously reached up to touch the armor on her body.
Li Sushang, however, didn't mind. She nodded seriously. "Mmm! My sixth martial uncle bought me an [Ark], so my mom and I could go there!
"My mom took me there to be a world-renowned hero who punishes evil! We used our martial arts to specifically fight those red-named bad guys!" Li Sushang clenched her little pink fists and said proudly.
After finishing, Li Sushang muttered sulkily.
"It's just that my sixth martial uncle is so mean. He always steals my kills..."
Rita was silent for a moment, then raised an eyebrow. "Miss Sushang, were you a member of the Yijian Mountain Manor in Utopia?"
Li Sushang shook her head, then carefully lowered her voice, as if afraid someone would hear.
"My mom doesn't know I went to Utopia. The sect I joined is my master's sect! It's called the Supreme Freedom Sect! I'm the first disciple of the sect!"
Ah... so she really is Qin Suyin's daughter... Rita glanced at the golden sword Li Sushang was hugging, then looked away.
And Supreme Freedom... could it be the sect founded by that Cheng Lingshuang?
But Rita didn't remember her ever establishing a guild... so was it just a private master-disciple relationship?
But thinking about what Li Sushang had just said, and then thinking about the rumors she had heard in [Utopia]...
["Did you hear? That Ma Feima from the Taixuan Sword Sect was too ruthless again and made a red-named player quit the game!"
"Doesn't that mean Qin Suyin from the Yijian Mountain Manor didn't make it in time again?"
"Yeah, that's right. Ma Feima is regretting not holding back. Who knows who the next victim will be?"
"All the red-named players know to just log off when they see Ma Feima. Who would obediently let themselves be beaten to a pulp to help someone else level up?"]
Hearing it now... the newcomer who needed to level up was probably Li Sushang, right? It was her sixth martial uncle who had specifically sought out red-named players for her to practice on, but because he always couldn't control himself, it turned into him stealing her kills.
That's quite a bit of blame to take...
Rita didn't explain this, but continued to listen to Li Sushang's complaints.
This was one of the only two forms of entertainment in Li Sushang's once-dull sword practice life. With the opportunity to be a hero, even practicing the sword became interesting.
And there was another person in the car listening intently to Li Sushang's story. Durandal's eyes were wide, taking in every detail Li Sushang said, and constantly trying to understand everything based on her own understanding.
But the knowledge from the few web novels she had secretly read at night was quickly exhausted, and a brand new jianghu appeared before her. [Jianghu refers to the world of martial arts in Chinese wuxia fiction.]
Taking revenge freely (fight if you're not happy), strength is supreme (use your wallet to create happiness, no money, no fun for you), fighting for power and profit (looting equipment), and wandering the jianghu freely (smurfing)...
Was this the world of that [Utopia]? And from the sounds of it, this was just a small section, perhaps even a China-exclusive series.
After all, the [Jianghu] series had a huge market in China, so much so that its popularity could even compete with the [Star Sea] section. Things like [Swords and Magic] couldn't even compare.
Rita, on the other hand, had never lingered in these sections. For her, Utopia was more a place to relax and a place for work. If it weren't for the fact that many clients liked to meet here, and there were too many active information brokers...
You could even make contact with targets in a place like this. Rita probably wouldn't have even touched this thing otherwise.