Chapter 19: Overthinking Plain Water
Donape hadn’t expected the effects of the drink to be so immediate upon his very first sip.
At first glance, Origins Fountain Water seemed like ordinary drinking water. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Yet, the moment the cool liquid flowed down his throat, a sudden wave of energy surged through his body. A gentle warmth bloomed in his lower abdomen, giving him the sudden sensation that he could lift a weight many times his own.
Of course, that was just how it felt on the surface. Donape had no idea what the drink’s true purpose actually was.
Unbeknownst to him, every single bottle quietly cleared and widened the drinker’s clogged meridians, slowly cultivating their natural affinity for both Qi and Mana with every drop they drained.
While Donape could sense Qi and Mana using his Qi Perception ability, he had no concept of how a human body actually stored or circulated energy. Thus, he remained completely oblivious to the priceless treasure he had just casually chugged.
Donape offered a brief smile, turned around, and took a casual step toward his special VR Capsule.
Ji-Hong and Butler Lee were left completely speechless by the sudden move.
"B-Boss? Boss, wait! Why are you in such a hurry to get into your capsule?!" Ji-Hong called out, dumbfounded.
"Hey, brat! Where do you think you’re going, abandoning your customers?" Butler Lee added, mildly annoyed by the shopkeeper’s sheer nonchalance. "You need to explain these products properly first!"
Before Donape could utter any words, the front door of Origins VR Cafe swung open, revealing Irene and her friends alongside Jae-Woong and his companion.
"What are you guys making a fuss about?" Irene asked, shaking a few stray raindrops from her coat.
Her question fell away almost instantly as her eyes swept across the room, her jaw dropping at the shop’s altered interior.
"Wow... The renovation is stunning! So you weren’t lying when you said it’d be done overnight without closing the shop for days. Impressive!"
"Oh! Look, the menu board changed too!" Mira added cheerfully, pointing up at the digital display above the counter.
Her words drew everyone’s eyes upward.
"Eh? Monday to Friday, seven in the morning to nine at night? Fourteen hours?!" Jae-Woong immediately noticed that the shop’s weekday operating hours had expanded from the usual twelve.
"Tch. What’s the point of longer shop hours when our individual playtime is still capped at five hours?" muttered Kennedy—a regular who had frequented the shop around the same time as Mira.
While Kennedy knew Ji-Hong casually, he was much closer with Jae-Woong. As a non-native Starfaller working as an operations manager for a local company in the Baek Empire, his brain was naturally wired to spot efficiency bottlenecks—and a fourteen-hour store window meant nothing if individual limits didn’t change.
Donape sighed lightly. ’Well, it’s inevitable that the shop has a few feature limitations since it’s only Level 2. I need to eventually gain some actual authority so I can make decisions for the shop myself instead of remaining a glorified slave to this Tyrannical System. But for now, there’s nothing I can do except explain things.’
Stepping away from his personal VR Capsule, he addressed the crowd. "Alright, since you’re all here... ask whatever you want."
"Ah, me first! Boss, what were you drinking earlier? What did it taste like?" Ji-Hong immediately cut in, taking full advantage of being closest to the counter.
"The Mortal Drink. It tastes like regular water," Donape replied flatly.
The newly arrived group leaned in, listening intently to the fancy-sounding name—only to immediately deflate at Donape’s deadpan explanation.
Ji-Hong, however, was far from satisfied with the half-hearted answer. "Ehh, Boss! I don’t buy it. This shop is a magical wonderland! There’s no way you’d sell anything ordinary or mediocre. Besides, how could a mere water possibly cost 15 BC?!"
Beside him, Butler Lee found himself silently agreeing with Ji-Hong for once, while Irene and the other four traded skeptical glances, already spiraling into their own exaggerated assumptions.
Regular water? Costing that much?!
Even having seen the digital display above the counter with their own eyes, Irene and her companions were having a hard time digesting the absurd price tag.
Donape truly hadn’t expected this shop—which he assumed would be a smooth path to profit—to make him sigh so often at his customers’ bizarre antics.
"It tastes like regular drinking water," Donape continued, "but it’s incredibly energizing once it goes down. That’s actually why I was in such a hurry to jump into the VR capsule earlier—my body felt overflowing with energy, and I needed something stimulating to burn it off."
"I’ll buy that one then! Right here, right now," Ji-Hong said, completely sold. "What about the Fatigue-Recovery Drink, though?"
"It’s meant for anyone dealing with exhaustion, whether it’s physical fatigue or mental stress. One sip cleanses all those burdens away."
"Then why don’t you drink one now, Boss?" Ji-Hong pressed. "Aren’t you exhausted from overseeing the renovations last night and dealing with those thugs?"
"Origins Fountain Water is enough for now. My current fatigue is manageable," Donape replied, reaching beneath the counter shelf to retrieve two bottles of Origins Fountain Water. "I plan to drink the Fatigue-Recovery Drink after I play. That way, all my accumulated fatigue gets washed away at once."
Ji-Hong and Butler Lee each took a bottle and popped the caps, nodding in silent agreement at Donape’s sound logic.
As they gulped down the seemingly ordinary water, Irene and her group watched intently, bracing for some miraculous visual transformation.
Instead, Ji-Hong and Butler Lee froze. Their eyes widened in sheer disbelief as a surge of physical warmth and vitality flushed through them, instantly cutting through the chilly, drizzly morning air.
Understanding Donape’s urge to burn off the sudden energy, the two didn’t say a single word. They turned around in total, focused silence and marched straight toward the VR Capsules.
To Irene and her group, that complete silence looked entirely staged.
"Shopkeeper, be honest... you guys are in cahoots, aren’t you?" Irene asked, utterly unconvinced by Ji-Hong and Butler Lee’s deadpan, wordless departure. "They didn’t even say if it tasted good!"
It was a misunderstanding so petty that Donape didn’t even bother attempting to clear it up.
"There’s no point in me staging anything to promote a drink," Donape replied with a nonchalant shrug. "The rules are simple: if you want it, pay for it. If not, don’t buy it."
He then tapped the counter-board. "Also, just so you know, there are only four operational VR Capsules right now. Which means out of the five of you... one gets left out."
"Wait, left out?" Ga-Eun asked, counting heads. "What about you?"
"As usual, I’m playing too," Donape replied, pointing a thumb over his shoulder toward his personal VR Capsule.
Before the sentence even fully settled, Jae-Woong and Kennedy exchanged a sharp look and bolted straight for two of the remaining VR Capsules.
Now, only two VR Capsules remain.
"Hey! You men are greedy! You never give in to women!" Mira grumbled, watching the two guys lock themselves in.
"How about three of us wait until more VR Capsules free up?" Ga-Eun suggested reasonably. "That way we aren’t splitting up our playtime unevenly."
"Agreed. Let’s set up here," Irene decided, unslinging her bag. "We brought our laptops, so we can work on our college assignments while we wait. Five hours goes by quickly anyway—we can grab lunch outside or order takeout in the meantime."
"Sure. Make yourselves comfortable, as long as you don’t cause any trouble," Donape said, pausing for a moment before adding, "By the way... do any of you have a lot of social media followers?"
"Why?" Ga-Eun asked, raising an eyebrow.
"You want us to post that viral video of you fighting those thugs last night, don’t you?" Irene chimed in nonchalantly.
Donape rolled his eyes. ’Why do pretty women have to be so difficult to deal with?’
"No. I want you to post on social media to help promote this place," he replied, looking away and scratching his cheek in mild embarrassment. "It’s an idea I’ve been sitting on for a while now, but... I’ve been too busy playing games."
"What a wonderful excuse to brag about being lazy, Shopkeeper," Irene said with a dry chuckle.
That was how another lively morning unfolded inside Origins VR Cafe beneath the cloudy, drizzly Sunday sky.
Meanwhile, miles away on the city’s outskirts, a very different atmosphere reigned.
Hidden far from residential districts, crowds, and the watchful eyes of municipal CCTV cameras stood an abandoned, run-down warehouse. Parked haphazardly around its perimeter were several jet-black, bulletproof SUVs.
Outside, the drizzle tapped lightly against the cracked pavement. Inside, echoey footsteps resounded across the concrete floor.
Gathered in the dim structure were roughly forty operatives, all clad in tactical black attire and reinforced military trousers.
"Are you sure this is enough men?" one voice broke the silence.
"It will have to be. We traded extra personnel for heavier, high-grade weaponry instead."
"Isn’t it too early to gather like this? If we move carelessly, the police and some prominent families in the city will be on our tails before we even complete our mission. After all, our execution date is still nearly a month away."
"No. The timing is right," another voice interjected coldly. "We need to blend into the city and familiarize ourselves with the target environment. We can’t afford to be careless."
A low, lethal grin spread across the leader’s face.
"He’s right. Assassinating the target from the Baek Family is no trivial matter."