Zhang Xiangyi browsed the “Survive” app, mostly checking out the newcomer’s handbook.
1. Player nicknames can be changed, 100 points per change.
Zhang Xiangyi automatically converted the unit in her head and couldn’t help being shocked: 1,000 yuan!
Insane, just insane…
The game was desperate for money, totally desperate…
2. Each month you will be required to participate in the game once. You may freely choose the time within the designated period, or the game may assign it for you by force.
(Likewise, you may freely choose your instance, or the game may assign one by force.)
3. Instance matching is based on the player strength the game detects. In any single game within an instance, rookie players make up 20%–40%.
4. Ways to obtain points: clearing instances, top-ups, item exchange, trading…
5. Instance ratings: one star to five stars, with each star level having Easy, Medium, Hard, and Hell modes.
6. ……
(The game reserves the right of final interpretation of all the above rules.)
After reading the newcomer’s handbook, Zhang Xiangyi’s mood was exceptionally complicated. It was the apocalypse, why on earth could money still be exchanged for supplies?
How were poor people like them supposed to live?
Especially after seeing the prices in the Shop, Zhang Xiangyi clenched her fists in fury, the game was so inhumane!
One steamed bun: 1 point (10 yuan)
One steamed bun!
It was just a steamed bun!
One bucket of instant noodles: 5 points (50 yuan)
A bucket of instant noodles cost only about 5 yuan, and the game had jacked it up, not double, but tenfold!
Zhang Xiangyi didn’t even dare look at the foods that came after. The prices were simply too “beautiful.”
On top of that, the game even sold favorability.
Low-grade favorability item: 1,000 points.
Mid-grade favorability item: 10,000 points.
High-grade favorability item: 100,000 points.
Zhang Xiangyi: “……”
How much money was that…
All those zeros at the end made her eyes swim.
She’d never possessed that much money in her whole life, never even seen it, didn’t have the faintest concept of it.
And never mind that.
Why did even a kitchen cleaver cost 200 points?
And the description was just an ordinary kitchen cleaver, attack power random, that could be brought into the game.
Going by the last instance, one kitchen cleaver wasn’t even enough to chop through, and they still wanted to charge 200 points for it?
What sucker would buy that?
The instant that thought formed, her gaze naturally fell on the “1,444 sold” beneath the cleaver…
Quite a lot of suckers, apparently.
After flipping through every item for sale, Zhang Xiangyi only felt even more mentally drained. Better to rely on skill, she couldn’t afford to whale.
Forget items, three steamed buns a day, three meals’ worth, and she couldn’t even afford that…
At that thought, she felt a little like breaking down.
Did the game actually leave people any way to survive?
After who knew how long spent getting her emotions in order, Zhang Xiangyi finally went to look at the Forum.
She didn’t have the heart to check Trade right now. There was only one word in her head, poor.
So poor!
There weren’t many instance forums at the moment. Besides the “Apartment 44” she’d taken part in, there were also “Vitality Hotel,” “Treasure Hunt,” “Where’s My Friend”…
The “Apartment 44” forum was further divided into a clear-time leaderboard, discussion and study, and so on…
Conspicuously, pinned at the very top, was a game notice: Players “Rich” and “Tall, Rich, and Handsome” damaged the instance and wounded the NPC’s psyche, rendering the instance temporarily unable to launch. Each is docked 10,000 points and 8,000 points respectively, to repair the instance and compensate the NPC. May all players take this as a warning: treat instances and NPCs with care!
Zhang Xiangyi fell silent once again. She remembered being told there’d be a notice, but pinned, what was that supposed to mean?
Was this pin permanent, or would it disappear after a while?
Did she have no face to lose?
Beneath the pinned post, the replies had stacked up to 999+.
—The points I’ve earned don’t even come to this much. What on earth did these two do?
—I went and looked at this instance’s clear-time leaderboard. Rich is first, Tall, Rich, and Handsome is second, and the two of them left third place behind by 4,000 points, with the shortest clear time too! Big shots!
—Oh my god, so impressive!
—If only I could earn that many points.
—Above, earning that many is useless anyway, didn’t you see the two big shots owe the game 2,000 and 1,000 points?
—How did they clear it within four days?
—Want to know +1. I played seriously and tried really hard in there, and it still took me 7 days, ranking me somewhere in the teens. Before I came out I even thought I was hot stuff…
—At least you cleared it yourselves. I got kicked out by the game.
—??? You can get kicked out?
—I don’t know either. I’m timid and can’t do anything, and my teammates’ strength wasn’t great, so we all just turtled up. We turtled for about a month, then got kicked out.
—The game’s still too merciful…
Reading this far, Zhang Xiangyi couldn’t help frowning. You could do that too?
Turtle long enough, and whether you cleared it or not, you’d get kicked out of the game?
Then…
Zhang Xiangyi gave a small smile, her mood lifting a little.
In her slightly improved mood she went to look at the Trade market. Right now there were only some private sellers offering up some furniture, even antiques.
No one was selling food…
What about the authorities, then?
Even though not much time had passed in real life, it was enough for the authorities to put out some explanations and deployments.
Zhang Xiangyi scrolled through the Home page, the Forum…
At last, tucked away in some out-of-the-way corner, she found an official announcement.
Huaxia: We are very sorry for not stepping forward at the first moment. The zombie outbreak struck suddenly, the game descended, everything came out of nowhere, and the nation was not prepared. The instant the zombies broke out, the nation immediately convened meetings and began deploying, but the orders had only just been issued when more than half the population entered the game…
The announcement was very long. The first half mainly explained what the nation had done during this period, why rescue had not yet been launched, and so on.
Then came some of the nation’s deployments, only a rough plan, really, plus reassurance for everyone that the nation would not abandon a single person.
Finally there was some inspirational pep talk, but it was genuinely heartwarming.
We know that at this moment everyone is anxious, panicked, lost about the future, beset by uncontrollable agitation and despair, but please believe in us, believe in the nation.
So long as the nation still stands, it will not give up on a single person. It will use every effort to save all the people of the country.
This disaster is, of course, terrible. The nation did not detect it in advance, nor did it receive any related intelligence. But our nation has always stayed vigilant in times of peace, we are not without preparation…
Below is the nation’s work deployment for the near term, submitted for the supervision of the people nationwide:
1. Grain: the nation’s reserves are enough to feed the entire population for three years. Please rest assured, everyone! The communications network has not yet been successfully repaired, so we will issue grain through the game software’s Trade section. Due to game restrictions, one jin of grain costs 10 points.
2. We have already established shelters in each centrally-administered municipality and province. The facilities are not yet complete at present, but rest assured we will accelerate preparations and cover districts, counties, and towns as much as possible. Each shelter is equipped with varying levels of armed forces and resources according to its size and scale, and everyone may choose where to go based on need.
Shelter tier classifications:
The Headquarters Shelter is located at…
Tier-one shelters are the centrally-administered municipalities and provinces, located respectively at…
Tier-two shelters are the districts and counties, located respectively at…
Tier-three shelters are the towns and villages, located respectively at…
At the same time, we will also publish the official contact information for each shelter. Please stay on high alert, even in the apocalypse, guard against scams.
3. Game instances run once a month per the game’s rules. We will publish clearing guides in each game’s section of the Forum, but please note that these are not absolute. Inside the game things change in an instant, and these can only serve as a reminder, a direction. We will work to refine them going forward…
4. The National Emergency Department is establishing a Game Field-Testing Bureau, mainly to enter the game ahead of time to gather game-related intelligence and compile clearing guides. We are once again recruiting the broad masses of the people to join.
Reminder: it is very dangerous. You may enter several games in a single month. Decide whether to join based on your own strength.
Game Field-Testing Department contact information: ……
5. To pilot sustainable development, the nation is once again recruiting talent of all kinds.
Agriculture… benefits and compensation…
Construction… benefits and compensation…
……
Computing and networks… benefits and compensation…
……
6. National emergency contingency plan: regarding this zombie outbreak and the game’s descent, the nation has made certain predictions. Natural disasters…
Line after line, covering nearly everything, and to achieve this much in such a short span of time was already great-power speed. The nation’s strength was formidable.
Her gaze landed on the Game Field-Testing Bureau’s contact information, and Zhang Xiangyi felt a little tempted.
Dangerous?
Compared to being so poor she couldn’t afford to eat, it wasn’t all that scary, and with the nation backing you, things were easier to get done.
Zhang Xiangyi gave the announcement a like and reshared it.
Looking at the view count, far too few people knew about this, resharing would spread it more widely.
What she didn’t anticipate was just how big her own influence was.
In under half an hour, the view count had climbed past ten thousand, and it was still rising.
—Wahhh, wahhh, I knew the nation wouldn’t abandon us, wahhh, wahhh, I love the motherland so much. In life a child of Huaxia, in death a ghost of Huaxia!
—Ahhhhhh, when did they build shelters?! I’m right next to a shelter, how come there’s been no sign of it at all?!
—With the nation still here I feel so much more at ease. Before, I wasn’t afraid of starving…
—Right? The game’s such a ripoff, 10 yuan for one steamed bun? Why don’t they just rob us?
—The nation has reserves, sure, but it can’t just sit and eat through the mountain, can it? In the end won’t it still come down to in-game resources? So isn’t it just a matter of dying sooner or later?
—You think the nation’s like you? Three years of reserves to feed the whole country, if everyone tightens their belts and eats sparingly, it’ll last even longer, never mind that the nation will keep working out solutions in the meantime. You think it’s like you, just sitting and eating through the stores? Going by my family’s traditions, I reckon it could last more than three years…
—So many job openings! Sure enough, no matter the times, with ability you won’t starve. The benefits are great!
—Why am I so bad at studying?
—Am I really the only one who noticed the game clearing guides?! With these, doesn’t survival rate go way up? Hahahaha… I, Hu Hansan, get to live a few more years! [1] a line from the film Sparkling Red Star: the villain Hu Hansan’s smug crow about having clawed his way back, used jokingly to mean “I’m back in business / I get another shot” jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_2691994_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_2691994_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });
—The clearing guides are nice, but it also says they aren’t accurate. Who knows whether the game will adjust based on our strategies? And those are guides others bought with their lives… sigh…
—You shut up!
References[+]