Chapter 6: Moving Into a New Home

Fana thought she was just daydreaming, but she never expected that this world three thousand years later actually offered such a service.

No assets needed, no proof of employment required. The lending company could just loan her a sum of money.

Though the interest was a bit steep. Fana did the math, and borrowing one hundred thousand imperial coins for a month meant she would have to pay back one hundred and forty thousand including principal and interest.

But right now, she had no better choice.

After loosening the permissions and letting them lock onto her citizen ID for future debt collection, Fana's account immediately received one hundred thousand imperial coins.

Pretty fast.

However, if she could not pay it back, the lending company could sue her using her citizen ID, then have her exiled to a mining planet to work off the debt with her labor.

That thought worried Fana a bit, but she had no choice. If she was going to live a life of hardship, why bother coming back for a second shot at all?

With one hundred thousand imperial coins in hand, Fana felt a bit more grounded.

She went online again to look for a place to live and to buy a neural terminal.

Those two things were what she needed most right now.

The temporary reception center was only free for three days. After that, she had to leave, and even paying would not help.

Since Fana wanted to make a big move, she had to have a stable residence.

She planned to run an online store, so the location did not need to be prime. Just clean and safe.

Soon, she found a suitable place.

One thousand imperial coins a month in rent for a two-bedroom, one-living-room unit with a kitchen, bathroom, and shower, quiet enough and safe enough.

That price was acceptable to Fana, so she signed a six-month contract with the landlord right online.

Out of the one hundred thousand imperial coins, she still had eighty-eight thousand left.

The moment the payment went through, the landlady immediately said Fana could move in.

Fana also ordered a low-end neural terminal online.

Not that she did not want a high-end one, but she just did not have enough money.

Even the low-end model cost twenty thousand imperial coins, let alone the high-end ones. Those ran into the hundreds of thousands.

She set the delivery address to her newly rented place, so by the time she got there, the neural terminal might have already arrived.

After finishing up on the reception center's neural terminal, Fana packed nothing and strode out the door.

It was a bit far, and since she was new to the area anyway, she just hailed a flying cab.

Not that Fana was being extravagant, but the standard mode of transport in this world was these energy-saving flying vehicles.

Ten minutes later, Fana arrived at 8-9 Thistlewood Road.

She walked up to the electronic screen at the entrance and, following the landlady's instructions, registered her fingerprint.

"Welcome to your new home, Miss Vesper. I hope you will take good care of our place over these six months."

The landlady was a kind elderly woman of advanced age.

The old couple were currently on vacation in the scenic Sapphira Prime, and since they would likely be staying there for a long time, they had decided to rent out their place in Myrelle City of the Aethelgard Empire.

Fana quickly replied, "Don't worry, ma'am, I'll take good care of it."

"Then I wish you a pleasant stay here. The old man and I are off for a picnic up the hill. Goodbye, young lady," the old woman said cheerfully.

Fana did not want to hold her up, so she said her goodbyes and headed inside.

The place was spotless, all thanks to an old household robot.

"Dear master, hello. The bedding has all been changed, and the bathtub is filled with hot water. Please go freshen up and get some rest." The robot's dull eyes shifted as it looked at Fana.

Fana's eyes lit up. She was really tired and could use a bath to unwind. "Alright, thank you so much."

And just like that, Fana moved in with nothing to sort out.

After she got herself cleaned up, her neural terminal arrived at the door.

Low-end neural terminals all looked about the same, so Fana just got straight to using it.

She placed an order online for courier service, and five minutes later, the courier company's staff member, oh, no, the work robot, came to install the delivery port for her.

This robot was short and chubby, but its eyes were sharp, and its facial expressions were quite realistic, clearly a high-end work robot.

"Ma'am, the delivery port is installed and ready for use. If you run into any issues later, feel free to leave a message on our company's official website, and we'll come out to provide repair service right away."

Fana was studying the delivery port and its display screen with great interest.

"Alright, thanks for your service," Fana said without looking up.

"Ma'am, I'll be on my way then. Enjoy your use."

After the courier robot left, Fana had pretty much figured things out.

She was not stupid by any means. Otherwise, she would not have gotten into a good university and landed a decent job despite her parents' neglect.

She first entered the farm and tried moving one-tenth of the over a thousand strawberries out, roughly one hundred and twenty of them.

Then she registered a small shop in the free trading market on the virtual network.

After a round of verification, the shop finally got its name, "The Gourmand's Nook," and could finally list products.

Forgive her. She was just terrible at naming things.

Fana fiddled around, posing the strawberries in several arrangements, before snapping a few mouth-watering photos.

She had originally wanted to go into the farm and photograph the growing strawberries, but the system immediately warned her.

"Warning, warning! Host is prohibited from disclosing farm information through any means, including speech, text, or images. Violators will be subject to electric shock punishment! Electric shock punishment!"

That scared Fana into backing off instantly, and she dropped the idea of taking photos.

She quickly uploaded the images to her shop and came up with a flashy product title.

"Fresh Strawberries, Grown Naturally with Zero Pollution. One Bite and You'll Never Forget!"

Then she set a price of three hundred and eighty-eight imperial coins for ten pieces.

That price looked pretty steep, but Fana had checked the market, and it seemed reasonable.

There was no shortage of fruit in this world, but there was a shortage of cultivated fruit.

Wild-picked fruit was abundant and extremely cheap.

But cultivated fruit cost about ten times more than wild-picked fruit.

So by that calculation, Fana's price was not even on the high side.

The items were listed, but no one was biting.

Fana was not worried, though. This was a new shop, so it was normal to have no customers. She just needed to wait patiently.

She was also afraid that getting too anxious would mess with her mindset, so she simply logged out of the trading market and wandered around other parts of the virtual network.

This world's virtual network was like a complete little world.

There were places for buying and selling, entertainment venues, learning spaces. It covered almost everything from the real world.

Fana's head was in a state of extreme exhaustion, and she just wanted to relax, so she went straight to the entertainment section.

She had not expected that three thousand years later, people would still be so...