Chapter Twenty-Five: Three Hundred and Twenty Thousand Points of Negative Emotion

"Please have mercy, give me this silver!"
"I haven't eaten for seven days, please, give it to me...!"
"I have an eighty-year-old mother above and a three-year-old child below. I don't need an ounce of silver—a string of coins will do!"
"Please, don't toy with us..."

At last, some beggars couldn't hold back any longer and launched their final assault of pleading upon Lin Fan. They had decided: if this delicate young man before them refused again, they would give up for good.
So, in that moment, this ragged crowd began to pour out their grievances one after another.
In an instant, countless voices rose in a cacophony, like a swarm of hornets buzzing by one's ears, making the mind reel.

Lin Fan listened to the din, not interrupting their entreaties, waiting patiently for the crowd to quiet down.
Only then, with a look of pity in his eyes, he spoke slowly, "I want to ask—who hasn't eaten for seven days?"
"Me! Me! Me...!"
His words lit up the faces of six or seven beggars, who waved their hands eagerly at him.
"And who among you has an eighty-year-old mother and a three-year-old child?"
Lin Fan pressed on, producing ten ounces of silver from his storage ring as he spoke.
"Me! Me! Me...!"
This time, fifteen or sixteen stepped forward with shining eyes, responding loudly.

Lin Fan nodded, then turned to the group claiming seven or eight days of hunger, pausing for two seconds. "Seven or eight days without food... shouldn't you be dead? How are you still alive?"
Beggar A: "???"
Beggar B: "???"
Beggar...

Wasn't this the moment to hand out alms? Why was he insulting them instead?
So he was just toying with everyone...?!
The six or seven beggars looked at Lin Fan with strange expressions; the resentment that had just faded now gathered anew, thicker than before.
"Negative emotion from Shi Teng: +333!"
"Negative emotion from Cong Lin: +333!"
"Negative emotion from..."
As the subtitles rose in his mind, Lin Fan turned toward the fifteen or sixteen who had spoken up. "And those of you with eighty-year-old mothers and three-year-old children."
"What are you thinking? Tell me, what are you thinking?!"
"If your mother is eighty, you should be fifty or sixty yourself. You probably have grandchildren by now—yet a three-year-old child? You're fooling children!"
"Suppose your mother had you at forty, and you married at forty, it's possible to have a three-year-old child. But look at yourselves—sixty-year-olds, teenagers, twenty-somethings—which of you fits the image of someone with an eighty-year-old mother and a three-year-old child?"

His words left the beggars blushing, some overcome with shame, heads lowered, not daring to meet Lin Fan's gaze.
Some, wrapped in thick negative emotion, turned and walked away, ignoring him.
At last, Lin Fan looked at those who remained and sneered, "If you're going to beg, be professional. If you're going to lie, at least do it well!"
"Negative emotion from Li Jingyu: +354!"
"Negative emotion from Chen Xianglan: +287!"
"Negative emotion from Xiao Xuan: +248!"
"Negative emotion from Zhang..."
Seeing the system's tally surge by more than six thousand negative emotion points, and watching the beggars begin to turn away, Lin Fan dropped his mockery, smiled gently, and addressed them in a clear voice:

"I have no silver to offer, but I do have rice porridge, steamed buns, and pickles. For ten days, you'll have your fill, morning, noon, and night. But you must work for your own sustenance. I hope that in these ten days you'll find a job and support yourselves!"
"Soup kitchen—!"
With a loud call, a dozen people appeared in the distance, carrying tubs of rice and large basins.
Steam rose from the porridge, and the basins were piled high with steaming white buns.
The beggars, who had lost faith in Lin Fan's words, now surged forward, fighting to get to the food distributors.
"Don't rush, everyone will get their share. Please line up—there's plenty of porridge and buns, and pickles are on their way!"
Among the servers, a leader spoke up loudly: "You should thank Young Master Lin. He has paid for your meals for ten days. Don't let him down—work hard to become self-sufficient!"
Hearing this, the beggars suddenly remembered the delicate youth. They looked to where he had stood, only to find he had vanished.

Walking along the street, Lin Fan glanced at the system's thirty-two thousand negative emotion points and felt deeply satisfied.
Over the past seven days, during the first three, he had roamed every bustling tavern in Xiao Bei City, seeking to earn negative emotion points.
He would take out a hundred-ounce silver note and loudly announce he had a hundred ounces—who wanted it?
When all eyes turned to him, he'd grin impishly: "You want it? I'm not giving it to you!"
The first day went well; he raked in seventy thousand negative emotion points. On the second day, his haul dropped to fifty thousand, and on the third, only thirty thousand.
Why did the points decrease? Because new customers were rare; all the regulars, after two or three rounds, assumed he was insane and paid him no mind.

At the same time, his antics brought significant risks.
On the first day, six body-refining and four qi-gathering experts, unable to stomach his provocations, attacked him.
Fortunately, he dispatched them swiftly, pummeling them and earning extra points in the process.
On the second day, a qi-channeling expert, infuriated, also struck out, making things very dangerous.
They weren't mortal enemies—he was merely provoking for fun, and couldn't use most of his secret techniques to fight back. Wind and Thunder Force was off-limits, as was the Godbreaker Crossbow, which would have been fatal. So he had to run—run for his life...
Luckily, he was fast; otherwise, judging by the qi-channeling expert's demeanor, he'd have been beaten beyond recognition.
On the third day, he wised up: after finishing his spiel, he made a quick escape. By the fourth, he realized this was unsustainable—what if he got caught off guard?

Besides, he didn't want to make enemies everywhere.
After some thought, he decided to try a new approach. Just then, his sleeve was tugged by a little beggar, sparking an idea.
Why not do good deeds and harvest negative emotion points at the same time?
This way, he could help many people, and most importantly, there was no risk—no beatings. If anyone did try to attack him, what beggar could best him?
From the fourth day on, he gathered beggars with silver and then went wild collecting negative emotion points. Once he'd gotten enough, he'd extend a helping hand and do some genuine good.
He truly wanted to help these people, hoping they could become self-reliant.

He started by going to the northern part of the city, where the beggars congregated.
His first soup kitchen served more than two hundred beggars, earning him eighty thousand negative emotion points.
The second day, he went south, finding only a hundred beggars, who contributed forty thousand points.
The third, he visited the west, where just seventy beggars gave him thirty thousand points.
Today, he was in the city center, barely gathering thirty beggars and earning close to twenty thousand points.
Adding what was left, he had just over thirty-two thousand points—not quite thirty-three thousand.
He hadn't gone east, as that was where the City Lord's mansion and the garrison were; not only beggars, but even shops and taverns were absent there.
He pondered that tomorrow he might need a new method to collect negative emotion points, though he had no clear plan yet.

Suddenly, his eyes brightened—he thought of the barracks and nearly rushed off to enlist.
He still remembered Hai Shark Association's Xie Haining's analysis at Four Seas Tavern: within a year or two, there would certainly be war. He could imagine, when two armies faced off, tens of thousands strong...
If he fashioned something like a megaphone, stood atop the city wall, hands clasped behind him, gazing coolly at the tens of thousands of Hulan soldiers, and casually declared, "Forgive my bluntness, but you are all trash—!"
The feeling would be exhilarating!
Just imagine, tens of thousands of soldiers directing negative emotions at him; even if each one gave him a hundred points, that would be ten million points!

"No, I must enlist!"
What began as idle fantasy made Lin Fan stop in his tracks, heart pounding, as he made up his mind.
"But I can't enlist just yet—I must first apply to Celestial Academy, finish organizing my techniques, then use that as a springboard to enter the army. By then, I should be able to lead my own troops, and with each promotion based on military merit, as a commander, I could say this to the enemy every day—ha!"
Lin Fan burst out laughing. Perhaps only he could comprehend his current mood. The speed at which he'd harvested negative emotion points felt ingenious, almost lightning-fast.
But compared to his latest plan, it was utterly paltry!