The loot dropped by the Hunting Spider Woman was abundant — aside from heaps of milk tea ingredients and mechanical parts scattered everywhere, there was also a formidable spear that ignored defense, a venom-coated whip that had a chance to inflict a poison debuff, and a silk armor that boosted attack power by 3% of the damage taken.
In addition, there was also a small vial of venom.
For some reason, when the soldiers crouching in the bushes saw that vial, all of their expressions turned a little strange.
He Wuning frowned. “You guys want this?”
Everyone shook their heads in unison.
Perplexed, He Wuning bent down to pick up the venom — and immediately, the whole group panicked. “Hey, hey, hey! Wait!”
He froze mid-action, raising his head with a confused look. “What’s wrong with all of you?”
“You’re still young,” Cao Wu said solemnly, handing him a towel. “Use this to pick it up, and put it straight into your inventory.”
He Wuning found it odd, but he didn’t refuse the kindness. Using the towel, he picked up the vial and read the description aloud: “Highly toxic neurotoxin. May randomly cause the poisoned target to enter a berserk or weakened state.”
Yi Luo leaned in behind him, peering at the vial curiously. “So it’s just a neurotoxin? I thought it was something… less proper.”
“Haha…” Cao Wu laughed awkwardly. “What nonsense are you saying?”
He Wuning stored the venom away. “No listed damage amount. I’ll try coating my blade with it later and test the effects.”
Ji Ou swallowed nervously. “Who are you planning to test it on…? That’s brutal.”
He Wuning frowned slightly. Xing Yue then asked tactfully, “So… there’s no mention of any special side effects?”
“No.” Yi Luo narrowed his eyes. “Why? Does it have hidden properties? Maybe it’s extra effective against similar spiders?”
“Keep it for when we fight that Spider Queen in the dungeon,” He Wuning said.
Cao Wu coughed lightly. “Wouldn’t that be… kind of a waste?”
Yi Luo squinted at him. “My instincts tell me you’re all thinking something very improper.”
“Of course not—” Cao Wu averted his eyes guiltily.
Yi Luo grinned, slinging an arm around Ji Ou and ruffling his hair roughly. “Xiao Ji, you’re an honest kid. Why don’t you tell me—what dirty talk were you all whispering about?”
He lowered his voice. “Don’t worry, He Wuning’s already in the car. He won’t hit you.”
Ji Ou: “…”
Why him out of everyone here?! Picking the softest target again, huh?!
On the verge of tears, Ji Ou stammered, “It’s just, um, that…”
A few moments later, Yi Luo climbed into the car, looking extremely pleased with himself. He called out to He Wuning, “All done for today?”
“Yeah.” He Wuning nodded, glancing around. “Should we give them a lift?”
“Sure, if we can squeeze them in.” Yi Luo cleared his throat. “Oh, by the way, Ji Ou’s team wants to know if you’re selling that whip — their deputy could use it. And the silk armor — the Master is very interested.”
“Alright,” said He Wuning.
Yi Luo stayed by his side, not moving away. “One more thing — about that venom…”
He Wuning cut him off. “Not selling it. I still want to test the damage.”
“Oh, nobody wanted to buy it anyway.” Yi Luo rubbed his nose. “But maybe I should hold onto it for you? Just in case you get any dumb ideas and try using it on me someday.”
He Wuning narrowed his eyes. Q-chan, perched on his shoulder, piped up: “Sweetie, he’s up to no good!”
He Wuning suddenly pulled the vial from his pocket and tossed it over. Yi Luo caught it carefully, his right hand covered in exoskeletal armor, taking a cautious step back.
From his reaction alone, He Wuning could tell there was definitely something fishy about that venom. But he didn’t ask. Instead, Q-chan tilted its head curiously. “What’s the big deal? Why are you all so scared of that poison?”
“You wouldn’t understand,” Yi Luo said flatly, tucking the vial away. “Alright, let’s head back. I’ll tell them to squeeze in.”
The milk tea car was spacious, but fitting this many grown men inside was still a challenge — quite a few ended up hanging off the doors or the roof. Xing Yue insisted on climbing onto the roof himself, asking He Wuning to show him the newly installed anti-air machine gun.
Yi Luo grinned, clearly proud. “I installed it myself. Cool, huh?”
Xing Yue would never actually say that someone else was “impressive.” He just snorted disdainfully. “It’s okay, I guess. But pink? Tsk.”
“Some people like it. What’s it to you?” Yi Luo could clearly see the envy in his eyes, so he didn’t bother arguing. He lazily drove the severely overloaded milk tea truck forward, inching along toward the Safe Zone at a snail’s pace.
Xing Yue muttered quietly, “Why does He Wuning always like that kind of color?”
He Wuning slowly opened his eyes, face expressionless. “Hold on. Why do you assume I like it?”
“Huh?” Xing Yue blinked, hesitating. “Don’t you? I thought I heard someone say that…”
He Wuning gave him a dangerous smile. “Who?”
Xing Yue scratched his head, thinking hard. “I forgot… maybe someone from the Operations Department? Or maybe the Tech Department…”
“Wait, no, I think I heard it in the cafeteria…”
“Or was it something from the forum?”
Yi Luo shrugged. “Well, it wasn’t me who said it.”
Q-chan eagerly volunteered, floating up into the air. “Let me check where the rumor started on the forum!”
“Oh, it was a post from a few days ago. The date… looks like the day we first set up the milk tea stand near the Safe Zone!”
Yi Luo chuckled. “Then it’s probably just because they saw your pink milk tea car and assumed you liked pink. A baseless rumor, nothing more.”
Q-chan read aloud: “The post title is: ‘Today I bought milk tea from Boss He at the Safe Zone — Yi Luo said Boss He likes pink!’”
Yi Luo: “…”
Wait a second… could it be—
He suddenly remembered — the day he painted the milk tea car pink, he’d been holding a bucket of pink paint. A few ordinary players had seen him and completely misunderstood, thinking it was He Wuning who liked pink…
He Wuning chuckled softly. “Doesn’t seem so baseless after all.”
Yi Luo: “…”
Good thing the venom was already in his hands.
Q-chan seized the chance to show how considerate he was, comforting He Wuning. “It’s okay, sweetie! The post comments weren’t bad at all! I even saw people saying things like ‘That’s the color real men love’ and ‘The pinker the car, the harder it crushes monsters!’ It totally doesn’t hurt your image!”
“So manipulative, this AI,” Yi Luo clicked his tongue. “Honestly, this whole misunderstanding started because you wanted the pink paint, didn’t it?”
“What, are you blaming me now—” Q-chan instantly changed tone when facing Yi Luo. “I’m trying to calm my sweetie down, and you’re getting in the way!”
He Wuning: “…”
Headache.
Cao Wu sighed wordlessly. “Captain, maybe… change the topic.”
“Oh…” Xing Yue scratched his head awkwardly. “Right, He Wuning — do you not usually run dungeons?”
He Wuning: “…”
Yi Luo: “…Xing Yue, you’re incredible. Out of all possible topics, you always hit the landmines. You’ve got real talent — after this, we should package you up and send you to the enemy’s diplomatic corps. You’d turn everyone against each other in minutes.”
Xing Yue looked baffled. “Wait, that’s something I can’t ask?”
He Wuning lifted his eyelids lazily. “It’s fine. It’s just… it’s dangerous to run dungeons with me. I got my first fragment in one.”
Everyone knew by now that Administrator Permission Fragments dropped from highly intelligent, abnormally difficult monsters.
So if He Wuning had encountered such a creature on his first dungeon run, it made sense that he’d avoid teaming up with others afterward — to keep them from getting dragged into danger.
Xing Yue let out a breath. “As long as it’s nothing serious.”
“Mm.” He Wuning replied lazily. “It’s just that, back then, my teammate told me he didn’t want to die to a monster and asked me to kill him myself. That’s how I discovered that players killed by other players can respawn at the Safe Zone’s revival point — at level 1. I passed that info to Xue Xun.”
He turned to look out the window, speaking in the calmest tone imaginable — while telling the most chilling story. “That’s how I first met Xue Xun,” he said quietly. “That was the beginning of everything.”
“Oh right — because of that incident, Xue Xun even specially applied for me to be issued a gun. He was worried that killing people with a dagger might feel too realistic and cause psychological issues.”
“But I barely used it. I stopped teaming up with others after that.”
The air inside the car froze for about half a minute. Xing Yue opened his mouth. “You—”
Cao Wu nearly jumped to his feet. “Captain, please! Just shut up! Don’t say anything more!”
Xing Yue scratched his head awkwardly. “No, I just meant—”
“So basically,” Yi Luo picked up the thread smoothly, “the system probably fixed that bug where party members couldn’t be exempted from friendly fire because of you. Xing Yue wasn’t trying to pry into your past — the idiot was just trying to roundabout ask if you’d like to run a dungeon with us.”
He shrugged. “I told him his emotional intelligence isn’t even capable of being roundabout, but he didn’t believe me. And look — case in point.”
He Wuning actually chuckled. “I asked the Voice of the World about it once. It said dungeon difficulty is determined by each player’s individual potential as evaluated by the system.”
“If I enter a dungeon with you, the difficulty would automatically jump to the maximum. My advice: don’t.”
No one else in the world would think to treat the Voice of the World like a customer support hotline. Everyone exchanged stunned looks, while Xing Yue kept frantically signaling Yi Luo for help.
Without even turning around, Yi Luo said, “Actually, I’ve got an idea.”
He looked eager, eyes gleaming. “How about we test just how lenient this game is with our bug exploits?”
He Wuning raised an eyebrow slightly.
“First, we send in a small team to lower the dungeon difficulty. Then we deliver people inside through the milk tea car.” Yi Luo pointed to the crowd crammed together inside. “We’ll literally drive a truckload of players in.”
“We’ll go full zerg rush — wave after wave of people. Let’s see how many runs it takes before the system sends a warning.”
He Wuning looked a little tempted. “And if we figure out its limits?”
Yi Luo grinned. “Then we’ll know exactly where the line is — and we can spread our wings wide on the edge of breaking the rules.”
“And if it doesn’t count as breaking them—”
“Then we change how dungeons work forever. Forget five-player limits — we’ll send an entire division.”
-----
The author has something to say:
Everyone is slowly turning into Brother He when it comes to exploiting game bugs.
----------
No comments:
Post a Comment