Ten days of travel passed, but only a single second had passed on the Shattered Mirror Continent.
However, Mu Anqi and Ji Huaichu had a great time during those ten days, so after the vacation ended, Ji Huaichu finally grew a conscience and went to take over Xia Fenghua's work, giving the kid two days off to rest. Mu Anqi also headed to the game area at an appropriate time to check the current game progress. Once the wedding leave period ended, Mu Anqi and Ji Huaichu casually cleared out a Black Mirror Vortex. Now there were fewer and fewer vortices capable of producing rational ghosts, so clearing them became easier—especially with their overwhelming combat power, they could just brute-force their way through without issue.
One month later.
The detection device from Madam Red's faction had been roughly completed. Although the detection range was still relatively small and needed further improvement, producing a few more would allow them to predict when a Black Mirror Vortex would appear and what its strength would be. To clear the vortices more effectively, Taiyin and Mingdu discussed and divided Black Mirror Vortices into four levels: "White, Blue, Purple, Gold." Gold-level vortices were the ones that produced ghosts like Ji Huaichu or Madam Red, or had difficulties that required their personal intervention. Purple-level ones were like Xia Fenghua's type. White was the most ordinary, and Blue was between "White" and "Purple"—not weak enough to be the weakest, but also not strong enough to be impressive.
After operating like this for some time, the Clearing Division also got on track. Once each department could reasonably distribute work, Ji Huaichu finally had some free time.
At this moment, the game dungeon that Mu Anqi and the others had revised countless times was finally ready for its third test! Fate Drama 2.0, begin! [T/N:…Third????? Are we counting the Black Vortex too?]
[Ding! Dungeon activated: Fate Drama!]
[Warm Reminder 1: Killing any white-named NPC has a 50% chance to reset the game! And you will receive the "Misfortune" and "Hatred" buffs.]
[Warm Reminder 2: Angering blue-named or higher NPCs will result in a curse (can stack infinitely).]
[Warm Reminder 3: Negative effects will not be cleared upon game reset.]
[Warm Reminder 4: Purification Holy Water can remove negative effects.]
[Warm Reminder 5: All players, please follow your character's personality and don't make NPCs suspicious! (Bonus small message: there are seven players~)]
The seven unlucky participants in this test had just entered the game. Before they even had time to check their surroundings, they were already dazed by the barrage of reminders. Was this… a puzzle-solving game? But ghosts aren't NPCs…
The players digested the reminders one by one. After noticing the "character personality" requirement and discovering that they had character backgrounds to check, they immediately opened the background files to read carefully.
"…Zhang San?"
"Li Si?!"
"Wang Sanma?"
"Huangfu Tiezhu!"
…
At that instant, every player who saw their in-game name couldn't help but have the word "WTF" appear in their minds. What kind of tacky names were these?! Couldn't these ghosts have some naming standards?
Thinking about having to do missions while carrying these names—without breaking character—they all showed expressions of existential crisis. This was definitely the ghosts' twisted sense of humor!
How could they have imagined that this wasn't only the ghosts' twisted humor, but also the players' twisted humor?
During the first game test, because participating as NPCs didn't count against their vacation days, and since the players often formed teams, their free time overlapped. Wasn't that perfect? Where would they find so many NPCs? Players act as them! Where would they find so many powerful ghosts? Ghost Kings and Demon Kings would cameo, of course!
Wasn't this just three rounds of "team-building" events? Not dangerous, fun, and they could even earn some emotional value—who wouldn't be happy with such a multi-benefit situation?
After the players thoroughly read their own backgrounds, they naturally immersed themselves into their roles and began exploring their starting locations. They had originally thought it would be difficult to find other players in a game where they couldn't break character, but… when Huangfu Tiezhu pushed open the wooden gate of his courtyard and stepped out, and Yuchi Goudan stepped out from the house opposite him at the same time, their gazes met unintentionally, and both froze—
That green name…
"Huangfu Tiezhu?"
"Yuchi Goudan?"
The two male players simultaneously read the four green characters above each other's heads. They never expected the game to be this considerate.
But playing with this green name just feels utterly cringe-worthy. How utterly embarrassing is that?
While both players felt schadenfreude over each other's ridiculous names, Mu Anqi, sitting at the control console, watched with satisfaction as emotional points continued pouring in. The amounts were small, but even a mosquito is still meat.
The two green-named players fell silent for a moment, then tacitly skipped over the naming issue.
"Got any information to share?"
"Haven't explored yet. Let's find the other players first." Huangfu Tiezhu glanced at the other's name, feeling speechless. Compared to "Goudan," he clearly preferred his own name.
The map had long since been updated with more buildings and facilities. However, Mu Anqi had thoughtfully built the villagers' houses very close to one another—first, to help players communicate and identify each other, and third, to make it convenient for her to send NPCs to witness live social death scenes and harvest emotional points.
Like now, when the father of the Yuchi family shouted at full volume:
"Where did that little rascal run off to again? Get back here and eat! Goudan!!!"
Yuchi Goudan: …
Seeing Huangfu Tiezhu trying to suppress a laugh, he bit down on his molars. He originally hadn't planned to respond, but—
"You little brat, are you deaf?! Do you need me to get the bamboo board and smack your butt before you come back?!"
"I hear you, I hear you! I'm coming right now!" Yuchi Goudan's face flushed bright red. He was a player! A grown adult! How could he let an NPC chase him around to smack his butt? He shouted back a few times, not daring to meet Tiezhu's eyes, and hurried back home. But just as he stepped through the door, he heard a lion's roar from across the way:
"You little bastard, where did you run off to when I told you to hang the laundry?!—"
Yuchi Goudan turned his head and saw Huangfu Tiezhu having his ear twisted hard by a woman. The player's face was filled with shock and helplessness as he finally bowed his proud head under the endless scolding.
"Ow ow ow—I'll go right now! I'll never slack off again! Mom!!!"
Yuchi Goudan swallowed hard and hurried inside before his own NPC father spoke again. This game… was really something indescribable!
These NPCs were taking advantage of them!
…
After lunch, the seven players finally managed to meet up. The male players were Zhang San, Wang Sanma, Huangfu Tiezhu, and Yuchi Goudan. The female players were Li Si, Shangguan Cuihua, and Nangong Meili.
The moment they saw each other, all seven players wore expressions full of suffering. They didn't even need to say anything—just one look was enough to understand what everyone had been through.
"…Why am I the only one named Li Si?" female player Li Si questioned her life. All the female players were women—so why did the other two get fancy double-surnames? And compared to Goudan and Tiezhu, "Cuihua" and "Meili" suddenly sounded acceptable.
"Probably randomly assigned. Maybe you were just unlucky," Zhang San said sincerely. "This isn't the time to worry about names. Have you guys learned any information?"
"There's a Sacrificial ceremony happening on the mountain in seven days. They say a mountain god resides there."
"The ceremony requires seven young adults to participate—four men, three women… exactly the number of players."
"And each person must carry a magical artifact. Otherwise, it's considered disrespect to the deity. Anyone who hasn't obtained an artifact will be burned to death before the ceremony."
The players passed the information along one after another like a word-chain game. It seemed they had all received the same intel.
"Those chosen will enter an illusion between reality and fantasy to obtain their artifacts," Shangguan Cuihua continued, then couldn't help asking, "But how do we enter this illusion?"
"It's too hard, too hard. I'm completely lost. We have to find one artifact every day for seven days, otherwise… once the ceremony starts and someone is missing, who knows if the mountain god will erupt in anger and trigger a guaranteed death ending?" Zhang San clutched his hair as he wailed.
"It shouldn't be that bad, right? Just missing one person… it shouldn't mean instant death, should it?" Li Si said hesitantly. "Besides, killing a white-named NPC might reset the game. Doesn't that give us a chance to try things out?"
"But we don't know what point the reset will take us back to." Wang Sanma shook his head. "Unless absolutely necessary, we must never kill an NPC. Curses like 'Misfortune' are terrifying in a game. And don't forget the 'Hatred' debuff. The third reminder says angering a blue-named NPC gives you a curse. If you have 'Hatred,' then blue-named NPCs will have negative affection toward you… wouldn't that mean endless stacking curses?"
"But where would there be that many blue-named NPCs? I haven't seen a single—" Huangfu Tiezhu suddenly stopped. He silently watched two girls emitting a faint blue glow walk down the alley and enter the village chief's luxurious courtyard. "Okay… yeah, that won't work." He instantly corrected himself.
From backstage, Mu Anqi quietly gave Zhao Guogu a thumbs-up. As expected of a lucky emperor—she even entered the scene with perfect timing! It was just that the way she clung to Si Suying's arm was a little too affectionate, which didn't match the supposed image of the village chief's refined twin daughters…
The players gathered together and sighed again. Aside from worrying themselves bald, they had no idea what else to do. After thinking seriously once more and realizing there was no new information to share, someone suggested:
"Let's first get familiar with everything around the village—the NPC neighbors, their relationships, the history of the ceremony, things like that. Maybe we'll find new hints."
"Yeah, and that mountain. If we have time, we should form a team and check it out."
Not wanting to waste time, the players dispersed quickly after discussing, each seeking new information. Mainly because if any NPC caught the seven of them huddled together having a meeting, they really wouldn't know how to explain it.
Zhang San walked past a steamed bun shop in the village. For some reason, he was drawn by the delicious smell of the buns and couldn't resist walking closer. Inside, the shop owner was chopping meat filling—thump thump thump thump—startling him. From the shadows, the owner stared at him gloomily while chopping, and a bad feeling rose in Zhang San's heart. Just as he was about to leave, the owner suddenly smiled brightly.
"Xiao San'er, here to eat buns again? How many do you want today?"