Inside the Buzhou outpost, the atmosphere was so hot and dry it felt like it would bake a person to a crisp.
Forty-seven pairs of eyes stared intently at the translucent virtual panel, their breathing merging into the heavy wheezing of a bellows.
The icon labeled “Xeno-Chitin Breastplate” was, at this moment, ten thousand times more tempting to them than a naked beauty.
Moderate defense.
Lightweight.
This wasn’t just equipment; it was the capital they needed to survive in this monster-infested hellhole.
“Exchange! We have to exchange for it!” A player wiped the drool from his chin and reached out to tap the exchange button.
“Even if I have to sell my own blood, I’m getting this thing!”
“Pull your paws back.”
A rough, large hand cut in, clamping down on the man’s wrist like a steel vise.
Li Lei, with a face full of stubble and deeply sunken eyes, had bloodshot eyes filled with an “I am your father” kind of authority.
He pointed to the tiny number at the bottom of the panel.
“Was your elementary school math taught by a gym teacher? Look closely at the price.”
Only then did everyone cool down from their frenzy and look closely.
**Exchange Price: 5 Contribution Points + 5 kg Biomass.**
“That Zergling from earlier, how many kilograms of chitin did we harvest from it in total?” Li Lei released his grip, his voice hoarse.
“At most, that bug can make one breastplate and two spears. There are forty-seven of us. How do we split it? Chop it into forty-seven pieces and hang them around our necks as amulets?”
It was as if a bucket of liquid nitrogen had been poured over the crowd; the burning enthusiasm instantly turned freezing cold.
“Then what do we do? Keeping this gear here without letting us exchange for it is just teasing us!” someone wailed in despair.
…
Twenty thousand kilometers above, in the Ember Space Station.
“That’s it. This thirst for what you can’t have is the ultimate driving force of productivity.”
He opened the backend management tools and brought up the quest editor interface.
Right now, players could only get rewards by killing monsters, which wasn’t going to work.
Killing monsters was too inefficient and too risky.
What he needed was rapid base expansion, and a massive amount of ore and energy to repair the warship.
“Since you want gear so badly, I’ll give you a reason you can’t refuse.”
Yao Qian’s fingers flew across the holographic keyboard, injecting lines of new code into the system core.
“Publish server-wide daily quest: Infrastructure Frenzy.”
“Modify resource weight: Increase the recycling value of rich iron ore by 5%.”
“Add new entry: Fortification Construction Rewards.”
He pressed Enter.
…
On the ground, at the Buzhou outpost.
The fretting players suddenly heard a pleasant chime.
[Server Announcement: Weak base defenses detected. The Commander has issued an emergency mobilization order!]
[Daily Quest: Infrastructure Frenzy has begun]
[Quest 1: Resource Stockpiling. For every 100 kg of standard ore turned in, reward 0.1 Contribution Points.]
[Quest 2: Wall Fortification. Participate in building perimeter fortifications; Contribution Points will be calculated based on labor hours.]
“Holy crap! We get paid to move bricks now!”
“Even 0.1 Contribution Points is money! As long as my liver doesn’t fail, I’ll grind to the death!”
“Construction Site Palu” was the first to jump up, his muscular physique trembling with sheer excitement.
He grabbed a pneumatic industrial pick from the ground and roared at the sky, “Don’t anyone try to steal this from me! I’m claiming the western mine! Anyone who tries to take it is dead to me!”
With that, he charged out of the base gates like a runaway tank, kicking up a trail of dust.
The remaining players finally snapped out of it.
Like zombies injected with chicken blood, they howled and rushed toward the surrounding Gobi Desert.
Even the laziest player now had the roaring soul of a wage slave burning in their eyes.
It was a thirst for gear, an obsession with becoming stronger.
In less than five minutes, the previously crowded outpost was completely deserted, leaving only a few physically weaker players standing bewildered in the wind.
…
However, reality was often far harsher than their ideals.
Half an hour later, at the western mine.
“Is this seriously a job for humans?”
A player threw a washbasin-sized chunk of rich iron ore onto the ground and slumped down, panting heavily.
Even though his hands were wrapped in rough straw ropes, they were already covered in bloody blisters from the friction.
There were no conveyor belts, no heavy trucks, and not even a single wheelbarrow.
Relying purely on two legs and shoulders to carry hundreds of kilograms of ore from the pit back to the base a kilometer away was like trying to drain the Pacific Ocean with a spoon.
“Our efficiency is trash,” another player wheezed, rolling his eyes as his tongue practically hung out of his mouth.
“Running one trip only gets us 0.1 Contribution Points. How many lifetimes is it going to take to save up for that chitin breastplate?”
Not far away, the players responsible for searching for the xenomorphs also returned covered in dust.
“Don’t even ask. There isn’t a single bug hair within five kilometers,” the leader said, jabbing an entrenching shovel into the ground.
“The system has flagged the nearby monsters as cleared. If we want to hunt, we have to go further out. But with our current stats, going too far is just delivering takeout.”
They couldn’t mine effectively, and they couldn’t find any monsters.
The passion that had just flared up was about to be extinguished by the cruel laws of physics.
“Make way, make way.”
A strange scraping sound came from behind them.
Everyone turned their heads and saw “Hardcore Lao Wang” pushing a bizarre-looking contraption toward them.
It was put together from several curved heat shield tiles salvaged from the landing pod wreckage, along with some metal pipes dug out of the ruins.
The two wheels were of different sizes, and God only knew what the bearings were made of; they squeaked and groaned as they turned, but at least they turned.
“What is this? A wheelbarrow?” someone asked, eyes wide.
“To be precise, it’s an individual heavy-duty transport platform based on the principles of leverage and rolling friction mechanics.” Hardcore Lao Wang adjusted his non-existent glasses with a proud look.
“The heat shield tiles serve as the cart bed. It’s a bit ugly, but this thing can hold five hundred catties at a time. Pushed by two people, it’s ten times faster than carrying it on your shoulders.”
Li Lei walked over, circled the wasteland-punk style wheelbarrow a couple of times, his eyes growing brighter and brighter.
“Can you mass-produce it?”
“As long as we have enough materials, you can have as many as you want,” Hardcore Lao Wang said, patting the cart bed.
“Great!” Li Lei slapped his thigh hard and turned to the players collapsed on the ground.
“Stop playing dead! Get up and work! We’re turning this into an assembly line!”
Under Li Lei’s command, the forty-seven people were quickly divided into three groups.
Group one was responsible for loosening the ground with pneumatic picks, specifically breaking off large chunks of ore.
Group three sorted and stacked the ore at the base, and pushed the empty carts back.
“One, two, three, lift!”
“Off you go!”
The originally dead silent mine was suddenly transformed into a bustling hive of activity.
Over a dozen makeshift wheelbarrows shuttled back and forth across the Gobi Desert, the dust they kicked up stretching across the setting sun like a long, dusty yellow dragon.
Efficiency instantly surged by more than five times.
…
Inside the Buzhou base.
As cartload after cartload of ore was dumped into the recycling chute, the numbers on the system panel began to tick up frantically.
The players were exhausted like dogs, drenched in sweat, their grass skirts long reduced to shredded rags, yet their faces wore a bizarre sense of satisfaction.
Some even posted in the public chat.
“Brothers, the weight feedback in this game is insane! When I was pushing the cart just now, the force feedback from the shifting center of gravity was absolutely incredible! I’ve never seen a game with a physics engine this detailed!”
“Yeah, even though it’s exhausting, the feeling of watching the base grow richer bit by bit is so satisfying! And you don’t even have to pay to win, it’s all based on hard labor. This is what a decent game looks like!”
“Even if we’re moving bricks, we have to do it with industrial aesthetic appeal!”
This group of free labor, exploited to the absolute limit, not only did not complain, but instead began to justify the grind to themselves, even believing that this kind of pure physical labor was a rare, hardcore experience.
In space.
Yao Qian watched the numbers on the energy bar climb at a terrifying speed, completely stunned in an indescribable shock.
150 points…
200 points…
300 points…
It had only been a few hours.
These players were practically dairy cows who felt uncomfortable if they weren’t being milked.
They didn’t need rest, didn’t need wages, and would even praise you for doing a good job just because the quests you gave them were difficult.
Just as he was preparing to dish out some more benefits to this lovely batch of leeks…
oh, wait, heroic warriors…
*Beep—!
Beep—!*
A piercing red siren blared without warning, cutting off Yao Qian’s train of thought.
On the main control screen, the previously calm deep-space radar interface suddenly flashed crimson.
The faint point of light that had been lingering at the edge of the monitor for the past three days had now broken into this sector of space.
[5 hours until impact! Full-spectrum holographic image analyzed.]
The static on the screen quickly faded, and a clear image was brought into focus before him.
It was a giant object, roughly three hundred meters long.
Its surface lacked any metallic luster, covered instead in a layer of dark red, constantly writhing fleshy membrane.
Countless thick, purplish-blue blood vessels wound across the hull like some kind of parasite.
Its rear had clearly suffered severe damage; a large chunk of rotting flesh was peeling off, trailing long plumes of black smoke and nauseating green fluids.
Pulled by gravity, it was falling toward the far side of the planet.
“Is that… a biological warship?”