Chapter 319 - Pebble
The story starts in Chapter 399 of "Player Reload": Chapter 319: Chapter 291: PebbleCompared to the over 10,000 youths globally turned into vegetative states,... Don’t miss it!
Chapter 319: Chapter 291: PebbleCompared to the over 10,000 youths globally turned into vegetative states, the national agencies and Global Supernatural Alliance are more concerned with the implications behind this phenomenon.
The existence of Otherworld players is no secret; if an Earth player dies in the Otherworld, the person or animal who killed this player will automatically gain player status.
If the newly born player happens to be a government official, they can fully disclose battlefield intelligence to high-level government officials, leveraging national power to study the battlefield,
and using technology from the battlefield to achieve a leap in civilization development,
or even reverse the heavens, using some unknown means to infiltrate Earth.
If Earth, where players are abundant, is called the Main World, and the Script World, where players can mess around freely, is referred to as the Subworld,
then the most terrifying thing for Main World residents would be encountering another Main World full of players,
or a subordinate world trying to ascend to become the new Main World.
Li Cheng briefly explained the situation to Gray Rain after returning home,
Gray Rain scratched his head and said, "Luring 10,000 youths’ souls, now this is really ’No Job Reincarnation, get serious in the Otherworld.’ Speaking of which, aren’t you going to visit your cousin and the others in the hospital?"
"All domestic victims have been transferred to major hospitals, with Special Affairs Bureau’s medical team taking care of them, receiving the best medical treatment in the country,"
Li Cheng said, "Moreover, the Global Supernatural Alliance GOC even asked the Evil Science Alliance to take a look, and even the Evil Science Alliance, who excels in soul manipulation, has no solution. There’s no point in me going."
Due to the rigorous education in the killing field, most players are very pragmatic; instead of dwelling on why such things happened, it’s better to calmly think about solutions.
Gray Rain knows roughly about Li Cheng’s complicated relationship with his aunt’s family, and seeing Li Cheng frown unconsciously, opted not to ask further but consoled, "If it really doesn’t work out, let your aunt adopt again. I see public service advertisements suggesting adoption instead of purchase everywhere online."
What hellish joke is this?
Are you talking about an orphanage or Stray Cat TV?
With a black line on his forehead, Li Cheng flicked Gray Rain’s head, just about to tell her to go back to reading when his expression suddenly became stern.
Gray Rain, pretending to be hurt, immediately reacted and quickly changed the topic, "A task has come up?"
"Yeah."
Li Cheng simply nodded.
New task format...
Li Cheng squinted his eyes, quickly rushed to the computer, and opened the player forum.
He remembered clearly that in all past battlefield cases, even if the task content was simply about killing, they would never specially mark the task type as "slaughter."
Sure enough, on the latest forum page, several posts from different players had been published, all discussing receiving a task named .
"Not all players will log in to post. From the ratio, at least dozens or hundreds of players received the same task."
Li Cheng lightly clicked the mouse, his mind racing.
This task reeks of eeriness; usual task objectives only ask to "wait for teleportation at a certain time,"
except this time, the battlefield directly used the term "corda plane."
Indicating that the task location might not be a complete Script World.
Next, for each unit killed, the corresponding game currency and experience points are obtained.
On the surface, it seems to hint at the presence of significant danger in the task, but on second thought, it is luring players to commit evil.
Not to mention players can slaughter each other, those poor youths’ souls brought to the corda plane alone would be a considerable number.
Even if a single soul is worth only 10 experience points, a thousand souls equal ten thousand points, enough for mid-to-high-level players to level up several times...
"Hey," Yuan Zhixia sent a message via friend communication, "Did you receive the task?"
"Received."
"Check the forum, GOC’s account."
Li Cheng refreshed the player forum page, and on the homepage, a new post in red font from the GOC official account appeared.
Given that the corda plane might hide malice from the Otherworld, the Global Supernatural Alliance requests all players receiving the task, regardless of whether they accept the task, to quickly gather at the GOC office in the slum.
Over the years, GOC has indeed eradicated considerable threats for human civilization, receiving decent feedback amongst the player community,
thus when Li Cheng arrived at the GOC office building in the slum’s center, the ground floor lobby already hosted numerous players responding to the call, around two hundred when viewed broadly.
Among them were familiar faces, such as Zhao Zijing with both GOC and Special Affairs Bureau backgrounds, and Father Andre from the Temple Knight Guild.
Through eavesdropping on their conversations, Li Cheng also learned that not all recipients of the task were related to corda software victims.
Some players were randomly selected.
"Everyone, please quiet down!"
Seeing the crowd being nearly complete, a GOC representative with a white porcelain mask and a name badge on his chest spoke loudly, "I know you have many questions. I will now introduce the currently known information about the corda plane."
With the aid of 3D projection slides, Bai Qi quickly outlined the cause and progression of the corda software incident.
Besides the content revealed by Yuan Zhixia to Li Cheng, a new piece of information was added:
The corda software underwent version iterations.
Initially uploaded to the dark web, the software installation package did not spread immediately. The reason was a hellish joke—United States middle and high school students, and college students, were rampant with drug use,
From Ivy League elites to high school students striving to elevate their social class through studying, many were using prescription drugs originally meant for treating ADHD, like Adra and Ritalin.
These prescription drugs induce neural excitement, forcing concentration, and are also humorously called "study aid pills" or "smart drugs."
Some audacious United States youths consumed thirty milligrams or even three hundred milligrams a day,
The intensity of the drug effects directly eclipsing the early version’s brain enhancement effects provided by the corda software, rendering it utterly uncompetitive.
Until the fifth day of upload, the corda software quietly underwent revision and upgrade, significantly enhancing its intelligence optimization effects, surpassing smart drugs in efficacy, and thereby starting its rapid spread.
Proving the software uploader could monitor changes in the real-world Earth in real-time.
"Based on all the information gathered, we can temporarily surmise that corda software is a means of Otherworld infiltration into Earth, a probing stone."
Bai Qi said solemnly, "Whether for the souls of Earth youths trapped in the Otherworld or the future of human civilization,
we earnestly request all of you to seriously consider this task.
As long as you are willing to take on the task, GOC will provide a reward of at least 2000 points of game currency to each person, along with a set of standard equipment."