7 Face Slapping a Monster.

The concept of Face in China was something Tao Lin had never learned about before. However, when he discovered the Face parameter in Cosmic Order, he studied up.

Face slapping to a lot of western drifters was like a foreign dish. It sounded cool, and you wanted to try it, but if you didn't know a thing about it. Well, then it was useless.

He discovered the parameter, once again, in this Sapphire dungeon. And he was glad he studied about it.

There were a few main ways you could mess with monster's 'face'. One, which he did a lot, was to run away from them. This was pretty much denying their request to battle. And that would just make them pissed off. Hence, this action alone would raise the face bar up a chunk. And if the bar reached to the top the boss would come find him. Obviously, you didn't want to fight the monster in a tunnel, or at a dead end. So, Tao Lin tried to be respectful to the monsters.

You, for one, could never insult them, or say anything about their appearances. A lot of tjavascript:;hese monsters were very ugly, and temperamental. If, for instance, he called the abominable man a chunk of dirt, it would of went berserk. When monsters went berserk it increased their strength, but it also increased their rewards. So, occasionally, he'd insult the monsters to get better drops. Today, however, he was in a Sapphire dungeon, and he wasn't sure if was going to survive. Let alone spewing out a curse, he could barely feel the air in his lungs.

"Poof!"

Tao Lin crashed in through the waterfall, and quickly wiped himself off. He checked his window to see where his vim was at. His Vim, or his health, was half way down. And for some reason his face bar had inched up a little bit. Unfortunately, he insulted the monster by not dying.

Class: Panda Vagrant

Cultivation: 4th Qi

Vim: 600/1250 (average man's 100)

Attributes: Fire / Wind

Slays: 457

Accomplishments: 116

Comments: Weak!

There was also other, usually hard to tell, ways to insult the monsters. One it was hard to distinguish if a monster was a girl or a boy. Hence, it was usually a good idea to not even try and guess. Tao Lin had learned that the hard when in his last dungeon. He called a fairy dragon Mister, and even though it was polite, he ended up fighting the boss and the dragon at the same time. It was quite an unfortunate quality of Cosmic order. His guess was that the System wanted to instill ancient values into the players. However, Tao Lin found it insanely difficult to keep up with all the rules.

Either you made a mistake with gender, or you made a mistake with age. Unfortunately, the system wouldn't stop there. It would occasionally whisper jokes about the monsters. And if Tao Lin started laughing at an eight-armed baboon. Not only would that be a slap in its face. It would be a slap in its entire community's face. Well, luckily the system knew it was a Sapphire dungeon, so it kept its mouth shut.

…

Diana Hong walked into the shadow realm with Ginger and looked up and gawked. There were quite a few giants smiling down at her. They may have been drooling, or it may have been a smile. As far as she could tell, they looked like mountains with teeth. However, when the rain drops started falling, she had a feeling it was their appetites.

It was her first time seeing any monsters that large. Not even The Alchemist had met the giants! They were the guards for the most important areas in Cosmic Order. However, it was not clear to Diana yet why Ginger had brought her here. She kept giggling and tugging her along like she was her sister.

"You know that gentlemen you were with earlier was pretty cute."

"You mean Tao Lin? He's not bad I guess."

"Well, I think he was cute, and I think you two will be together," Ginger giggled.

Diana just kind of shrugged her shoulders. "I guess my parents would be happy about that," She muttered.

"Oh, you use the plural to talk about your parents. My parents came one person long ago."

Diana scratched her head and looked up at the huge palace in front of her. It had palatial sculptures, and elegant guards by the doorway. She walked into the castle, right after ginger, and bowed immediately when she entered. The shadow from the crown alone stretched all the way out the doorway. The giants bowed.

….

Tao Lin was exploring the dungeon as he activated the flashlight. The flocks weren't usually in the caves, but instead he had to look out for minions. They were usually the boss's friends, and sometimes even slaves. The bosses usually had a penchant for evil. Otherwise, they wouldn't be in all these shadowy dumps. However, it didn't mean they didn't have friends.

The first creatures that Tao Lin saw today were some rather large snow toads. They immediately charged at him and shot out needles from their skin.

When you were fighting monsters, there was usually no perfect way to destroy them. However, Tao wasn't too worried about the cannon fodder at the front of the pack. He was more concerned with the monsters tattling on him to the rest of the pack. He didn't hold back, not even a little bit, and sent out three wind lashes at the first minions. They croaked in a pool of green ooze that reminded him of jelly. They were another level of cold blooded. Their blood was gooey and seemed like an odd desert as it pored onto the floor. Unfortunately, there was no drops. He picked up a set of cultivation pills and kept walking down the path.

He was in a strange labyrinthian tunnel. On the walls there were round windows like you would see on ships. The glass reflected his face, which he hadn't looked at in a while. Yup, he still looked like a human being. He popped down a shot of the pills, as he felt energy swell in his dantian, and his leveling bar rose. He had about fifty more pills to gather before he reached Qi-5.

However, what appeared next was one of those situations he dreaded. On the map, in his vision, all around him there were tons of monsters moving at him. He was afraid he might have to run, and if he ran the face bar would shoot up. So, to test his luck, he jumped up into the ceiling and pushed his back against the ice wall. His Vim slowly started to sink.

"Hey, did you guys see the Toads? The boss wants to hold a meeting."

"Nope, they're probably croaking around here."

"Well, just find them. If we insult the boss we're all going to have to hop on his plate. He said he wanted a Toad today."

"Hmm, well they must be around here somewhere. Split up and look!"

The monsters ran off leaving Tao Lin still shivering on the ice. Unfortunately, his body was so hot it started melting the frozen water above him. Four monsters stayed behind, and one of them was right below him. The water dripped on him as he looked up to see what it was. Unfortunately, Tao had no choice but to step on his face. He immediately brandished his sword as the rest of his pack charged at him. It was not the time to hold back now.