Chapter 56: The Night Is Coming
“I know that the loss of control of the Nightmare Seed has brought us unnecessary trouble.”
Joe Finn shirked his responsibilities by saying this. He was pinning the blame on the Nightmare Seed, human’s mutual enemy.
“Dark Side was being devoured while resisting the invasion of that Level S Nightmare Seed, which was why it was accidentally delivered to your country. Thank you for giving it a proper place to stay. And yet, I’m afraid it’s difficult for it to adapt to the environment in your country. Can you return it to us? I hereby express our grat.i.tude on behalf of Supernova Pictures.”
“Why can’t it adapt? The condition of this Dream Seed is very stable at the moment,” said Director Lu.
This reply made invisible cold sweat appear on the foreheads of the researchers around. They knew that Director Lu was lying.
Even the amateur Dream Makers could see that the current situation of Dark Side was awful.
Dream Seeds that were more than half corroded by negative emotions could basically be judged to have the possibility of turning into a “Nightmare Seed.”
It could be judged by just looking at the surface of Dark Side, even though he was trying his best to control the evil side of his consciousness world. Without a Dream Maker to build a new Dream Dungeon for him to interfere…
The Dream Game Dungeon he was carrying right now couldn’t stop the spread of the contamination at all.
“This… sir, and Feng, this Dream Game is far more difficult to control than you imagine. It’s really difficult for your country to provide a sufficient source of energy for it. Right now, the source of energy that supports its operation is our multiplayer online game, ‘Dark Side.’ Once it loses this supply of energy, its stability will take a nosedive.”
Joe Finn’s words sounded like he was trying to convince them, but they actually carried a bit of a threat.
As far as Qiu Ren knew, even though Dark Side himself had come to the Celestial Empire, his Game Dream Dungeon was still operating.
There were a lot of fans who liked him in the multiplayer online game “Dark Side.” As long as this game was still here and operating, he could maintain his self-consciousness, even though his life wasn’t as glamorous as that of those superheroes.
However, Joe Finn used the suspension of the game to threaten the Central Research Inst.i.tute to return Dark Side to them. After all, the right to operate the Dream Game was in their hands.
Once they announced the discontinuation of the game, Dark Side would lose his only source of energy. He would then not be able to resist the contamination inside his body and would completely turn into a Nightmare Seed.
It wasn’t a big deal… to have one more Nightmare Seed in the Celestial Empire. Though, compared to having a free Level S Dream Seed, this was definitely earth-shattering bad news.
“I don’t want to admit this, but Mr. Joe Finn, we have many fans of superheroes in our country as well. Even if Dark Side loses your market, we can still provide him with a better habitat,” Director Feng Nian said.
However, what Director Feng Nian said made Joe Finn chuckle. He shook his head slightly to show that Director Feng Nian had misunderstood him.
“Feng, don’t you know that we also planned to create Dark Side with the standard of Supernova many years ago? We threw in a large number of resources to film his own movie back then and did everything to advertise it, but the result didn’t come out as expected. There are many reasons for that, but the biggest one is, there are too few scripts that suit him.”
Joe Finn paused for a second and continued, “His genre has been changing all these years, becoming more niche. Since the stories based on Superhero World are all the most basic ones and he has a lot of complicated requirements, he has stumped our screenwriters. Under the condition of having so many restrictions, it’s already a success to be able to build a Dream Dungeon with such popularity. If you think you can make a breakthrough, I’m afraid it’s just wishful thinking. I don’t think there’s any Dream Maker in your country who can do so.”
Joe Finn spoke honestly. Director Feng Nian and Director Lu didn’t even refute him.
The more outstanding a Dream Maker, the better they understood the difficulty of constructing a Dream Dungeon for a Level S Dream Seed. Low-level Dream Seeds could be stuffed with any story. All stories were suitable for them.
However, the higher the level of a Dream Seed, the more requirements it had. The most intuitive example was that every Lord of Nightmare took in different emotions.
Feng Nian also treated Dark Side, this Level S Dream Seed, in awe. He wasn’t sure either if there was a screenwriter in the country who could write a script that was suitable for this Level S Dream Seed, let alone making it popular.
However, Feng Nian and Director Lu both looked at Qiu Ren at the same time.
Dark Side was apparently abducted by Qiu Ren. If not, he would have been unwilling to yield and might have even killed himself together with Lian, the Lord of Nightmare.
The two of them had no idea how Qiu Ren stole the enemy’s aircraft carrier, but they were sure that he must have an idea or a script that had interested Dark Side.
Qiu Ren was eating watermelon on the side right now. When he noticed the two seniors looking at him, he couldn’t speak because his mouth was full of watermelon. He could only give them an “OK” hand gesture.
Director Feng Nian immediately became confident when he saw Qiu Ren’s hand gesture. Though it sounded ridiculous to believe a first-year university student, this guy had already tamed two Lords of Nightmare. It made sense for him to tame the consciousness of another Level S Dream Seed.
“You don’t have to worry about this, Mr. Joe Finn. We may also be able to write scripts you can write, and the Dream Seeds you can raise may also have a better life here with us,” Director Feng Nian replied.
“This… is a truly disappointing decision. It looks like Dark Side will have to stay in your country for a while. I look forward to seeing your smooth construction of a new Dream Dungeon for Dark Side. I hope it can be released in the cinemas and become a hit at the box office.”
Joe Finn suddenly changed the subject.
“So, if your country has another way to provide energy for Dark Side, I think… we will stop operating the Dream Game, Dark Side, temporarily. Regrettably, Dark Side will lose his only source of energy. Of course, if your country can’t stabilize Dark Side’s condition, you’re welcome to give him back to us for control anytime.”
“Sure, see you in the cinemas then,” Director Feng Nian said.
Dream Makers that specialized in building Movie Dream Dungeons like him were all about the box office, after all.
“I’ll see you in the cinemas. I hope the progress of your production can keep up with the release of our ‘Flash 2.’” The last thing Joe Finn said carried a hint of threat.
“The Flash” series was a new superhero production of Supernova Pictures. The first individual movie had a fantastic performance at the box office around the world. Once the second movie was released, it would surely get pretty good results as well.
By then, even if the movie based on Dark Side produced by the Celestial Empire was released, Supernova Pictures could probably use the Flash to snipe it.
However… n.o.body could be sure who would be sniping who.
The unpleasant video conference finally ended. Qiu Ren happened to have finished eating melon seeds and watermelon, too, but he didn’t say anything to Director Lu and Director Feng Nian.
Instead, he entered Dark Side’s Dream Dungeon alone.
Meanwhile, the game Dark Side was still operating, but the operating company would announce the discontinuation of the game very soon. This game world, which had operated for nine years, would come to an end.
Qiu Ren sat on the edge of the tallest building in the game and gazed at the setting sun in the distance.
“Aren’t you going to say goodbye to your fans?” Qiu Ren asked the black shadow that had appeared behind him.
“It’s too soon to say goodbye. I’ll meet them again in another form sooner or later,” the black shadow said with a deep voice.
“Indeed.”
Qiu Ren looked at the sun setting slowly far away. The announcement of the discontinuation of the game came sooner than Qiu Ren expected and was also very sudden…
When Qiu Ren looked at the server notification that flowed before his eyes, he felt a little complicated.
“Dear players, due to the accidental loss of the Dream Seed carrying the server, ‘Dark Side’ will stop operating from April 3rd, 2021, 23:59:00. Thank you for your support along the way.”
In a heartbeat, the server was flooded with speaker messages. The players, who had no idea what was going on, looked at this message absentmindedly. Some were at a loss, some were cursing, some couldn’t understand it, and more couldn’t accept it.
When the sun completely went down, the world of this game also fell into silence and darkness.
Countless fans of Dark Side were kicked out of the game back to the real world. They were certainly protesting as well.
However, Dark Side had too few fans.
n.o.body paid attention to their meager protest. And yet, right before they left, they heard Qiu Ren’s voice…
“The night is coming.”
Qiu Ren gazed at the old world shrouded in darkness.