Chapter 634: Reward and Punishment
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
A month later, Shi Yangyu walked out of Madam Mi’s Pub with a weathered, experienced face. He looked at the people coming and going in the street and was keenly aware of the great forces that shaped each life.
Finally, he was leaving this d*mn place...
Over the past month, heavens knew what happened to him. Apart from helping the proprietress do odd jobs and receive guests at the pub, he had to practice various dances with the proprietress most of the time.
After a month, the proprietress’ purse was increasing in size but he was getting thinner day by day, and even his spirit was significantly traumatized.
Yes, it was trauma.
After all, every day he had to go to great lengths to entertain those big rugged guys. Surely any man with a normal mentality would not be able to bear the lewd stares of those NPCs, right?
Sometimes, he even had to endure the NPCs’ vulgar grabs and on several occasions, some big hunk had even forced his way in when Shi Yangyu was sleeping in the middle of the night. Even so, fortunately, Shi Yangyu’s fighting skills eventually preserved his virginity.
As he silently marveled at how lifelike the NPCs designed by Blacklight Biotechnology were, Shi Yangyu groused inwardly that all of this was too d*mn realistic. If he had not been a man, one who was an armed police instructor, he would have lost that night. This game deserved its PG18 rating and was exceptionally obscene ...
Although he wanted to complain about the game, it would be impossible for him to give up this game. Over this period, he had already come to regard this game as his second life and was completely immersed in it.
While thinking about his next plan, he walked to the small square outside the pub expressionlessly. Before the stunned eyes of pa.s.sers-by, he took out a cigarette and placed it in his mouth, but before he could take out the lighter, a dozen men had rushed over, fighting to light the flame by his mouth.
“...”
Shi Yangyu secretly disdained them. “Heh, men...”
After lighting the cigarette, Shi Yangyu was bored and opened his own attribute panel. At this time, his attributes had undergone considerable changes —
“Name: Juyang Jushi.”
“Gender: Female.”
“Age: 18.”
“Race: Human.”
“Attributes: Strength 9, Const.i.tution 10, Size 9, Agility 13, Charisma 15, Intelligence 10, Perception 11.”
“Occupation: Dancer.”
“Professional skills: elementary pole dancing, elementary striptease, intermediate hip-shaking dance.”
“Special skills: flirtatious glancing, advanced fighting, advanced military boxing, advanced fighting technique.”
During this month, he had gained one point of strength, two points of agility, and one point of charisma. Shi Yangyu knew that these were all trained because he had been forced by the proprietress to dance every day during this period. Of all the games he had ever played, this game was the one where leveling up was the slowest yet most hardcore.
Still, fortunately, even though he felt tired after training and his muscles would secrete lactic acid and turn sore, after the pain switch was reduced to zero, these feelings could be blocked.
It was this function that enabled him to hold on for a month, otherwise, he would have broken down and fled.
He originally wanted to keep going, but unfortunately, the proprietress had already started to push him out. She paid him 10,000 coins in the Joint Resistance Army’s currency as this month’s wages.
Within the area of this Blacklight city, the purchasing power of 10,000 Joint Coins could allow an ordinary person to live for about half a year, but as far as Shi Yangyu knew, this was not a lot of money.
Each player also had a forum function. As long as one had the attention to spare, one could browse the forum while working.
Shi Yangyu saw it on the forum a while ago. Many closed beta players killed their characters directly after figuring out the game’s routines. Then, they chose to rebuild their characters and created a tough man with a height of 2.3 meters. After entering the game, the novice’s task was to join a local gang or bodyguard organization, and the daily salary could reach more than five hundred Joint Coins.
As for his actual combat ability, Shi Yangyu felt that he was by no means inferior to those players who only relied on their physiques. What was more, this was not a third-rate online game focused on upgrades. There was almost no difference between its physics engine and reality. He only had to wield a small dagger to be able to easily kill any target.
Thinking of this, Shi Yangyu could not help but feel a little tempted. Maybe he should go to the bodyguard agency in Blacklight City to give it a try.
This was because on the forum, he had also seen many posts about the purchase of Joint Coins.
There was no shortage of peddlers everywhere in the world. The main point of those posts was to purchase Joint Coins and the price could reach a 1:1 exchange, which meant that if someone sold 10,000 Joint Coins in their possession, they could obtain 10,000 USD in reality.
This was already a windfall and some players with poor backgrounds who were incidentally qualified for the closed beta could use this game to embark on the path of getting rich overnight.
Still, Shi Yangyu had no plans to ??exchange currency for the time being, because he was not short of money. At least, ten thousand dollars was not too large a sum to him. Why was he single, after all? Being single meant he only had to feed himself, so although he was not rich, he never faced any financial pressure.
However, if it was one hundred thousand dollars or one million dollars, then he had to consider it carefully. After all, it cost a lot to get the age-reversal treatment and he also wanted to get a new car in reality.
Still, just as he was thinking this over, the three handsome men had appeared before him. They were all over two meters tall, with bulging muscles.
“Juyang Jushi, it seems that your novice mission has been completed.”
One of the big guys interrupted Shi Yangyu’s pondering. “Our boss wants to see you, come with us.”
Shi Yangyu raised his head when he heard these words and frowned slightly. “You guys are also players? How do you know my name?”
“Hahaha, is there anyone in all of Blu Street who doesn’t know the name of Juyang Jushi, the stripper?”
With a wretched smile, the big man mockingly said, “Although we know that you’re a man in reality based on your name, your customization skills are truly something else to be able to create such a beauty. Our boss would like to invite you to join us and make a lot of money in the game.”
“Oh, then I’ll give it a shot.”
Shi Yangyu also stood up indifferently. He patted his b.u.t.tocks carelessly. His plump b.u.t.tocks jiggled slightly, causing the hearts of the native residents who were frequently peeking around to skip a beat. “How are we going there?”
“By car, of course.”
The big man pointed to a black retro car by the curb. “This car was just bought by the boss two days ago. It cost more than 300,000 Joint Coins.”
After their exchange, Shi Yangyu got into the car directly and then the car drove into a dark alley.
A few minutes later, Shi Yangyu met the boss behind the three players.
This was a fat man wearing a black tuxedo. At this time, there was a large amount of food on his table. Shi Yangyu glanced over. Hmm, all of it was high-carbs, high-fat stuff. No wonder it took only a month for this man to become this fat.
“Juyang Jushi, come, come, sit down!”
Seeing Shi Yangyu’s arrival, the man waved for Shi Yangyu to sit down without even wiping his mouth. He seemed to notice Shi Yangyu’s contempt and grinned suddenly. “Can’t help it, in reality, I’m quite the glutton. I’ve eaten myself into the hospital several times. Fortunately, there’s no such restriction in this game. As long as I have money, I can eat all the delicious food in the city. Even if I die, I can just rebuild a new account.”
“You’ve bought the car one month after the game was launched and three closed beta players are working for you. It seems that you did make a lot of money.”
Shi Yangyu nodded and said.
“Haha, I didn’t make the money.”
The fat man smiled, shook his head, and flaunted. “I don’t have the drive to work hard for thousands of game coins. I just need to open a post on the forum and declare that I want to buy game coins. Naturally, some players will come to me. Isn’t this a quick method to get money?”
“So, you were the one who bought the Joint Coins on the forum?”
Shi Yangyu immediately glanced at the forum. “Caesar Reinhardt, is this your game nickname?”
“That’s my real name.”
The fat man said with a chuckle, “I belong to the Reinhardt family in Europe, mainly doing financial investment. You may not have heard of us, but Shengangdi Capital is our family’s property. In addition, we also operate sixteen financial companies, five...”
“Wait!”
Shi Yangyu waved his hand impatiently. “Don’t talk about reality in the game. My time is limited. Why don’t you tell me how you plan to cooperate with me?”
Hearing these words, the fat man’s eyes lit up. He stared wantonly at Shi Yangyu until Shi Yangyu had gooseb.u.mps all over. Then the man flashed a lewd smile. “My request is very simple...”
Shi Yangyu raised his eyebrows upon hearing this.
...
A few minutes later, as screams came from the warehouse, Shi Yangyu cursed and walked out of the alley.
There was a wound with a depth of four to five centimeters in his arm, deep enough to reveal bone. The blood constantly flowing down his arm was evident too. If he were a normal person, he would have fainted from the pain, but for Shi Yangyu, he still looked the same, only his face was a little pale.
He had turned this pale out of fury.
“D*mn idiot!”
While leaving the alley unhurriedly, Shi Yangyu scolded. “He knows that I’m a man but he still gets ideas about me? This time, I’ve taken your lives. You’d better not show your faces again or I’ll kill you each time I see you until you all delete your accounts!”
With that, he left, muttering angrily. At the same time, his uninjured hand also carried a black leather suitcase, where he had collected more than one million Joint Coins from the warehouse.
It was not until half an hour later that the scene in the warehouse was discovered by pa.s.sers-by and the police were called.
When the police arrived, there were a total of four corpses in the warehouse, all of which had been cut beyond recognition and were dead beyond dead.
“Sheriff, the four dead are all outsiders.”
A police officer handed the information to the sheriff. “They were all tortured to death by a dagger-like weapon. The murderer’s methods were very cruel. Each person experienced at least thirty-six cuts and the boss among them experienced even more — seventy-two cuts.
“It can be seen through surveillance that the murderer was a young woman with blond hair, of medium build. She was proficient in fighting and a.s.sa.s.sination. She seemed to have received formal military training. This is another case of conflict involving the outsiders... This is already the 332nd case in the month.”
“D*mn outsiders...”
Hearing this, the sheriff’s face could not help clouding over. He hated the 100,000 outsiders who suddenly came to Blacklight City.
Although these people had only appeared in Blacklight City for about a month, they were incomparably cruel, without any laws and morals to speak of. They dared to kill people and steal cars on the road at every turn, and would even rush forward with a knife after being surrounded by dozens of police officers.
They were a group of desperadoes!
Fortunately, Blacklight City had strict management of firearms. Otherwise, even the police would suffer heavy casualties...
However, regarding this situation, the higher-ups’ reaction was very strange. They had already instructed these police stations that they did not need to pay attention to the conflicts between these outsiders. Only when they attacked the local residents would the police need to severely crack down.
“Okay, dispose of the bodies of these people, you know the rules.”
The sheriff commanded unwillingly and then these police officers collected the corpses and transported them directly to the corpse truck. Without even the process of any trial, they were thrown into the sea at the pier...
This incident was just one of countless conflicts in Blacklight City. With the influx of 100,000 players, it had begun to exert tremendous pressure on Blacklight City. To limit these lawless players, Chen Chen had already told the X-112 here that, once a player killed an innocent NPC or performed other criminal acts that endangered the safety of the city, a Black Knight should be immediately sent to kill them.
It was just like playing GTA. Once the player committed a crime, they would become wanted by the police regardless of whether there were witnesses around them.
Nonetheless, in Ancient Civilization, it was not as easy to escape the police’s pursuit as it was in GTA. Rather, the player would remain wanted until they escaped Blacklight City or were killed...
Only this would deter those players of the chaotic evil alignment.
...
“Sir G.o.dfather.”
Little X slowly walked into Chen Chen’s office. “When I was monitoring the Internet, I found a consortium named Reinhardt in Europe offering a bounty on the black market for a player of Ancient Civilization.
“They’re offering three million dollars as a reward for the true ident.i.ty of the player named ‘Juyang Jushi’, and at the same time, contacted our customer service, trying to find a breach from our side...”
Chen Chen raised his head slightly when he heard these words and sneered. “So that’s happening?”
“The specific reason is very simple, just because when a member of this consortium was playing the game...”
Before Little X finished speaking, Chen Chen raised his hand and interrupted. “No need to explain all that. I’m not interested in their conflicts in the game.”
“Then should we take note of this?” Little X asked.
“I don’t care who is right or wrong in the game. I only know that offering a reward to uncover the true ident.i.ty of the player is a slap in our face!”
Chen Chen said coldly, “If even the privacy of a player isn’t well protected, wouldn’t our credibility be greatly compromised? It will even affect our plan to recover the end dimension.
“X, make an immediate announcement to inform the world that, in light of that guy’s act of offering a reward for the real information of other players, no matter who he is or what status he holds, we’ll directly and permanently ban his account, and he’ll never be allowed to enter Ancient Civilization!”