Chapter 36: You Are An Irregularity (2/2)

NPCs with higher levels of authenticity, capable of interactions with Players, capable of feeling grace and enmity, love and hate… this would lead to an even higher level of connection. To simply complete the instance dungeon’s quests and fight the BOSS may appear to be a dull procedure. But with the participation of Awakened ones, Players within the game would be able to experience more entertainment and pleasant surprises.”

“…That worked?”

“However, once an Awakened is identified by the Development Team, their ability to grow stronger will be weakened. That is because the Development Team would never allow Awakened ones to cause too much disruption to the game balance. Make the game more interesting: yes. However, once the balance is disrupted, even I would not be able to hide their existence. Then, the Development Team will personally take action to manually remove these… BUGs!

Truth is, most of the more powerful Awakened ones are currently under the database for monitoring.”

Chen Xiaolian silently digested these information.

Then, Chen Xiaolian’s face turned uneasy. “Then… what about me? You mentioned earlier that amongst the 137 people on board the plane, 134 were designated as Players. One of which is Han Bi who became an Awakened… In that case… what of the other 3 people?

Is that me? And the other two females?”

“Correct. You, Soo Soo and Takashimoto Shizuka,” The middle-aged man said in a serious tone. “It would be more accurate to say that the three of you are accidents.”

“The three of you are not originally meant to be host bodies, there were no Players designated to enter your bodies,” The middle-aged man slowly said. “Thus, there were no metal spheres that would allow you to become Players upon your bodies.”

“Indeed, my metal sphere was obtained from a Player’s corpse.”

“That Player was unlucky, an error occurred in the impact damage values that the Development Team prepared, leading to a failure in arrival. Then, his metal sphere ended up into your hands, allowing you to unexpectedly gain access to the Player System. However, since you are not a designated host body, some core functions of your Player System could not be activated. In other words, your Player System is an emasculated version.”

“Then… what am I?” Chen Xiaolian frowned. “I am neither a Player’s host body nor an Awakened…”

“You are an Irregularity,” The middle-aged man laughed. “In the storyline for the 72 Demons instance dungeon set on the island, you are supposed to be one of the dead passengers.

In the original storyline, you, Soo Soo and Takashimoto Shizuka, the three of you are passers-by, NPCs meant to die in the plane crash.

Your existences were simply to add authenticity for the background of this instance dungeon… in simple terms, the three of you are stage props.

Don’t you agree that in a plane crash site, the existence of a few corpses would make it look more realistic?”

Chen Xiaolian froze.

“You mean… I… I was to play the role of a corpse?”

“However, an accident occurred,” The middle-aged man continued. “The reason was as I had mentioned before, during the creation of the instance dungeon, an error occurred in the calculations for the impact. This would lead to the direct death of the host body due to excessive impact damage. In turn, the Player would be unable to enter. An example would be the unlucky person whose metal sphere was picked up by you.

For other Players, an insufficient amount of impact damage would lead to the NPC retaining their consciousness while the Player was attempting to enter. An example of this is Han Bi.

As for you and the other two females, the three of you should have originally turned into NPC corpses. However, due to insufficient impact damage, you did not die and survived.

In short, a script error occurred.”

Chen Xiaolian. “…”

“After that, you accidentally got your hands on another Player’s metal sphere… that was the equivalent of you using another person’s account to login to the game. However… since it is someone else’s account, your link to the system becomes incomplete. Thus, some core functions become unusable.”

“En, for example, the Exchange System!” Chen Xiaolian shouted out. “There is also the instance dungeon introduction! And the quest description! I cannot open those at all!”

“There are also advantages to these,” The middle-aged man laughed. “At least… due to your core functions not being activated, you were able to acquire a good number of conveniences.”

“Conveniences?”

“Generally speaking, an Awakened like Han Bi is a newbie Awakened. In the beginning, the Development Team would not be able to notice him. That is due to my existence as the main program responsible for monitoring the system. However… as time passes, I would not be able to continue hiding his existence, especially if Han Bi is capable to surviving and growing in strength. Once his strength grows to a certain point, I would be incapable of concealing him anymore.

The reason being… From the Development Team’s perspective, an Awakened such as Han Bi is akin to a bot account, you understand? This bot account is not controlled by a Player, yet it is capable of acquiring a strong fighting prowess reserved for high levelled Players. In addition, this bot account could behave like other Players, using the Exchange System to exchange out various items and abilities… there is no way for me to conceal that! With that, the Development Team would be able to notice him and place him into the database of Awakened ones where they will be monitored all the time.

You are familiar with Weibo, right? [3]

An ordinary bot account on Weibo could not be easily found. However, if this bot account became a VIP account with millions of fans, then there would be no way to conceal its existence.

That is the logic behind how it works.”

Chen Xiaolian’s heart began pounding.

“What you mean to say is… I will not be discovered by the system?”

“Judging from the current situation, the probability of you being discovered by the Development Team is far, far below that compared to the Awakened ones,” The middle-aged man smiled. “Because your Player System is an emasculated version, it is incomplete; this leads to you being unable to exchange items, to receive quest description… you can only be considered as someone with half the identity of a Player, ‘half’!

From the monitor’s perspective… Newton and the rest are Player accounts while the Awakened ones like Han Bi are bot accounts. As for you… the monitor views you as a normal NPC or a monster from the game.

Do you understand?

An NPC or a monster. Even if it appear to have a great deal of powerful abilities, it would not be easy for the Development Team to notice it.

After all, we do create upwards of thousands or ten thousands of monsters in each instance dungeon.

Thus, there is a possibility for you to hide your existence for a long time, without letting the Development Team find you.

Your existence in itself is an irregularity in the system.”

1. A backdoor is a secret method to bypass the normal authentication required in computer systems. It is a program used to secure unauthorized remote access to a computer. [Source: Wiki].

2. Logic error is a bug in a program that does not cause the program to terminate abnormally or crash. Instead, it causes the program to produce unintended or undesired output. [Source: Wiki].

3. Sina Weibo is a Chinese microblogging (weibo) website. Akin to a hybrid of Twitter and Facebook, it is one of the most popular sites in China, in use by well over 30% of Internet users, with a market penetration similar to the United States’ Twitter. [Source: Wiki].