Destiny Online: Halo Paladin - Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Destiny Online

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Nocturne was in front of his computer, looking at the developer’s notes released by the official site. He was thinking about what class to play. 

Meow.

A soft meow later, a chubby British Shorthair jumped up pnm the table and stepped on Nocturne’s keyboard while nuzzling against his face.

Nocturne caressed Chubby Blue’s stomach and the little fellow laid down on the keyboard, enjoying the massage from its owner.

“Meow. Grrr.”

He then glanced at the time on his screen. It was 11:00 a.m., time to make lunch.

It was then that he noticed something. “What’s this?”

Chubby Blue’s movements on the keyboard accidentally typed a few words on the screen: Holy Paladin, Holy Sh*t.

Nocturne looked at the fast asleep Chubby Blue blankly. It seemed like his cat had decided which class he should play. 

He caressed the cat more before he stood up, stretched his body and headed to the kitchen.

Chubby Blue also jumped off the table after Nocturne left for the kitchen. The chubby fellow stretched its body as well before it attentively followed its owner to the kitchen to see what its owner was preparing.

A box of homemade cat food, consisting of meat and rice, was taken out from the refrigerator. A cup of water was poured inside before it was placed into the steamer.

Then, rice was washed and poured into a bowl, ready to be cooked. Some vegetables were taken out from the refrigerator, after the vegetables were washed and cut, the cat food was done. 

It was taken out from the steamer, or rather the wok filled with water. The water was poured away and the vegetables were put inside for frying.

Some frying later, his meal consisting of bell pepper beef and garlic fried vegetables was done. The bowl of cat food had also cooled down.

A little eggshell powder and taurine was added into the bowl and the delicious cat food was ready to be served. 

“Chubby Blue, it’s time for your meal.”

Nocturne brought the bowl of cat food to the dining table. 

Chubby Blue followed him at all times and would nuzzle against his leg from time to time.

“You are always so attentive during lunch and dinner. You little chubby eater!”

He then placed the stainless steel bowl on the floor.

“Meow. Meow. Grr, Brr…” Chubby Blue then buried its face into the bowl, gobbling down the food like a tornado.

It could not be helped because Chubby Blue was once a stray and seemed to have an unusual obsession towards food. 

Back when Nocturne had brought it back and fed it for the first time, Chubby Blue ate too much and threw up in the end.

After that, Nocturne controlled the volume of its food. Even though it had a bigger appetite than normal cats, it was able to finish every bit of its food and never threw up again.

He recalled how he first met the little fellow while on the way to the supermarket to do some grocery shopping. He had seen a dirty kitten purring in the bushes, he squatted down and called it and to his surprise, the kitten attentively came over. It nuzzled against his leg and even laid down lazily when he started stroking its stomach.

Nocturne realized that he might have been scammed by the cuteness but little Chubby Blue back then had unrivalled cuteness, so he jumped into the rabbit hole willingly.

Little Chubby Blue loved being around humans and was a British Shorthair. Maybe it got separated from its family or maybe it was abandoned. 

Different types of cats ended up as strays nowadays, people would even abandon a Ragdoll on the streets, let alone a British Shorthair.

Most strays were uncomfortable with human presence, they usually ran away before a stranger could get close and were cautious of their surroundings.

However, British Shorthairs were bred to be pets and they were raised indoors, so they were unfit to live in the wild. 

Had Nocturne left it behind, the little fellow might not have made it, so he decided to bring it home after some thought.

He decided to help the little fellow find its family if it was really a lost cat; if not, he would adopt the little fellow himself.

Right after he returned home, he started researching about cats and bought a ton of cat-related things. He officially became an honorary cat slave from that moment onwards.

After lunch and a cup of tea, Nocturne noticed the great weather outside the window. He decided to wash his bedsheets. 

Whether he was a clean person before or not, having a cat made him pay more attention to hygiene. He would clean the floor once every few days and would wash his bedsheets frequently. 

After all, cat fur was the biggest enemy of a cat slave.

After cleaning up, he pulled his chair to the balcony and enjoyed his tea under the sun while having his cat in his lap.

It was the most comfortable feeling.

Later in the afternoon, Nocturne continued reading the developer’s notes from the game and even started to read the forums.

The game had only released basic information at the moment. The classes, races, lore and background plus some highlights of the game were introduced.

There were four races in the game: Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Orcs.

There were nine available classes to choose from: Warrior, Paladin, Hunter, Mage, Rogue, Priest, Warlock, Shaman and Druid.

The Shaman class was unique to the Orc race and the Druid class was unique to the Elves; Paladin and Priests were unique classes for Humans and Dwarves.

The summary of the game background was about the humans, dwarves, elves and orcs forming an alliance to defend against the undead and demons, which sounded as cliche as it could get.

Destiny Online. The biggest highlight of the game was that every player would be assigned to a random talent. 

According to the developer, the talent system was completely random. Some were granted natural superhuman strength, some gained outstanding intelligence and some had powerful ancestry and lineage.

Character creation would begin at 8:00 a.m. tomorrow and the server would be officially open at 8:00 p.m. at night.

The developers shortened the game time so that one day in real life would equal to two days in the game. 8:00 a.m. would be the first day in the game and 8:00 p.m. would be the second day.

It was adjusted this way because the developers wanted to take care of working players. It was not some secret super advanced technology or whatsoever, the developers simply wanted to divide the time just to make the time in the game flow more consistently and reasonably. 

After dinner, Nocturne was reading webnovels on his phone when he received a call from home.

“Yes, mom.”

“Hey, Noc! You are having your holidays am I right? How’s work lately? Are you getting busy?”

“Yeah, I’m having my holidays now. I guess it’s okay, not too busy.”

“I see, how are you? You better not order takeout that often, try to cook at home and make yourself some soup. It is cleaner and healthier. It’s getting dangerous lately, you better take care of yourself. Drink more milk if you can, stay strong and boost your immune system.”

“I got it mom. I’ve been cooking at home lately and I’m drinking milk too.”

“Great. Take care of your health. Go out if you have the time, go out and make some friends, go talk to girls if you like them. You are not young anymore and yet you’ve never had a girlfriend before. I’m getting worried you know. Look at your primary school buddies, their children can already stand! Now look at you, single and lonely! You better hurry up and get married so that I can have a grandchild in my arms, I’ll help you take care of your children!”

“Mom, come on. It’s not something you can rush! You can’t just Google search for a girlfriend. Besides, I’m still young, why should I be worried?”

“Young my a**! You are almost 30, how is that young? Hurry up and get married and bring one home during the festive season. Try to make it before next year’s Chinese New Year.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it.”

“Don’t patronize me, you little bastard!”

…

“Okay, you better sleep early, don’t stay up too late. I’m hanging up.”

“Kays, bye.”

Every time his mother called him, she would ask about his relationship status.

Nocturne was actually keeping a secret from his family: he had resigned from his job two months ago.

He joined the company before he even graduated from university and worked for four years. Two months ago, due to a failing project and a multitude of problems, the company decided to retrench its employees. 

Other than the few managers who were in charge of the project, most of the employees were retrenched. After finding out the company would compensate them handsomely, Nocturne agreed. Nevertheless, he had to agree, it was better for him to leave on good terms rather than fighting his way to stay while things got sour.

Nocturne did not feel bad about it. He had had to work overtime almost everyday and clock in on the weekends without getting paid for overtime. His salary barely increased after his second year and all the bonuses that the team got from the project would be diverted into other project funds. 

Several veteran managers were sly enough to siphon a portion of the bonus for themselves and normal employees like Nocturne did not even get breadcrumbs.

It was exhausting to be honest. Therefore he decided to take some time off before going back to work again.

Fortunately, he had a habit of saving and managed to save up to a few hundred thousand in the past few years. Even if he did not do anything, he could survive for at least three to four years more.

He took a bath after some scrolling and got to bed around 11:00 p.m.

Nocturne’s daily routine was carefully planned out. He slept at 11:00 p.m and usually woke up at 7.30 p.m.

He lit up the agarwood incense in the pot beside his bed. It was said that the aroma of the incense could aid sleeping.

He carried Chubby Blue to his side before he laid down. He said to the cat, “You better behave at night, don’t you nuzzle me again.”

The chubby fellow somehow had a bad habit of nuzzling its head against Nocturne after he took a bath. The nuzzling would be too fierce at times and it would make his forehead red in the morning.

2:00 a.m.

The nuzzling got stronger.

“You fat a**, go away!”

He might cook the cat for breakfast tomorrow.