631 Chapter 631 - Dying Left and Righ (1/2)
Gu Fei's 'I can kill you' solution would work; when the game revived a player, they would revive them at the last spawn point the player had registered their account. Gu Xian got displaced to Baishi City the moment he logged on, so logically speaking, his account should not be registered in this city still. Therefore, his death would naturally send him back to Xiawu City.
Gu Xian furrowed his brows as he calculated. ”I'll indeed be able to get back like that, but that also means losing a level, and I won't be where I forcefully logged out; it's just not worthwhile to me.”
”You care for something like losing a level? Don't you often forcefully log out?” Gu Fei asked.
”You don't seem to have experience in this, huh? I have not met a situation where I would directly lose my level after forcefully logging off before, and the most I would lose was experience, but more often, I would find myself losing equipment,” Gu Xian said.
”Wouldn't you lose money as well?” Gu Fei asked.
”You can keep that in the bank.” Gu Xian scoffed. Thinking of something, he asked, ”Oh, yeah. I heard you say that you've struck it rich?”
”Yeah. I started a workshop and developed the efficient monster grinding routines.” Gu Fei gestured with a punch and kick.
Gu Xian was a kung fu practitioner, so he immediately understood what was going on with the efficient monster grinding routines. In truth, even if Gu Fei did not make an effort to develop the efficient monster grinding routines, other kung fu practitioners like them would naturally develop this sort of efficient fighting style in the process of grinding on these AI monsters. It was just that they would not intentionally summarize it in the manner he did.
”No wonder there were many people recently asking me if I know that efficient monster grinding routine. So you're the one behind all that,” Gu Xian said.
”Why would anyone ask you?” Gu Fei asked.
”Your big bro here is also a renowned kung fu master in Xiawu City.” Gu Xian smirked.
”Tsk!” Gu Fei expressed his disdain to this by clicking his tongue. He would never consider Gu Xian as a kung fu practitioner in his heart. It was only that online VRMMOs had become a medium in which the man could demonstrate what he knew. In real life, all Gu Xian had going for him at most was the unsatisfied fantasy of being one in his mind, since he no longer had the physical condition necessary to utilize kung fu.
As the two chatted idly by the door, the ex-soldiers vacillated between fighting them or not. Sounds of jeers from the crowd started. Meanwhile, Broken Water Arrow anxiously messaged Ye Xiaowu, asking him what would happen if they could not pay for damages, and the consequences if they insisted on leaving. Plus, with over a dozen of them here, how would the final bill be settled? Would the 3000-odd tab be split among them all, or would just one person be burdened with it?
Ye Xiaowu was still feeling despondent from having died by Gu Xian's hands again! Meanwhile, the particular design that Broken Water Arrow was inquiring after was rather complicated, and even Ye Xiaowu had trouble giving a clear account for it. When designing this particular aspect of the game, the standing solution was to simply designate everything inside the tavern as indestructible, such that it could not be damaged or moved by anyone and anything, or to set taverns as safe zones so as to spare them the trouble of everything.
However, because the game began promoting itself as a fully immersive environment for players to experience, their big boss decided against such shoddy handling of the minute details in the day to day. As such, public places, like a tavern, where players would frequent must be similar to real life. Things ought to be movable and destructible.
Then, a problem arose; how would they deal with players flipping or even destroying the furniture? Should they treat it like the rubbish monsters had in the grinding maps, restoring the place completely to how it was at intervals?Find authorized novels in Webnovel，faster updates, better experience，Please click visiting.
That was when their boss's capitalistic nature reared its ugly head. ”Damages of course must be paid! Set up a compensation system.” It was unknown just how much designing had to be done in order to accomplish this one statement from the boss. He did not really care, anyway. The boss was there to create problems, and then it would be up to the employees to solve them.
Honestly speaking, creating such a system for this was easy; the real difficulty came with creating a system that the players would find acceptable. Thus, when it was first created, the game designers were all uneasy about how it would be received, but after these rules were revealed during the beta test, there was hardly any huge reaction regarding this from the player-base. It was as if the players considered the rule of 'once broken, considered sold' commonly seen in the real world to be very reasonable.
Seeing the players held this mentality, the designers were thus emboldened and became all the more audacious, and it finally created the rule which delegated the role of enforcing this compensation collection to the system. Of course, to maintain a semblance of realism, this enforcement was essentially the system directly deducting the needed sum from their players' pockets, as well as symbolically sending out guards to educate these players of this bad behavior. If it was not enough, it would sternly inform the player that he or she owed money, and all the coins they collect would automatically be confiscated until the debt was settled.
It was a very harsh rule, and the designers were once more hesitant about its reception, wondering to themselves if such a forceful hand would just push these players with debts to the breaking point and simply stop playing the game altogether. Ultimately, reality proved that the designers themselves had habitually underestimated the players' intelligence! Since they knew the taverns had such a rule and knew that the system would penalize them monetarily with absolutely no leeway, who would care to make a fuss in the taverns for any small matter if they could help it? In certain cities out there, challenging others to a PK fight in a tavern was now seen as a manner of challenging the other person's wealth, instead. If someone dared to break a table, the opposing party would break two, which then cause the original person to break three tables. This sort of people were also the kind to have a clear understanding of the consequences of their actions before making their move, so they were more than willing to deal with the amount they ended up being penalized for, and they would probably head out to the forums after leaving to brag, ”I was feeling lousy today, so I broke ten tables at the system-operated tavern at one go.” Which would then result in the ensuing replies: ”Original poster has plenty of money to indulge!”
In the end, the players were kept under control by this rule, yet it was the reinforcement that the chief designer, Ye Xiaowu, brought in that had gotten themselves in trouble because of it.
Ye Xiaowu could more or less understand the situation. Broken Water Arrow's lot wished to head out to fight with Thousand Miles Drunk and that newcomer, but the problem was that they might not even have the chance to fight if they were to leave as the NPC guards would surely arrive and force them to pay up if they took one foot out of the door. If they wanted to have a safe environment for the fight, they must first pay up for all the damages they had cost first.
Ye Xiaowu stewed in his regret! Had he known how much trouble this would give them, he would not have chosen to strike in the tavern! He had honestly never thought they would end up turning the entire tavern upside down just by making their move; he thought that they would at most just flip a few tables and be done with the deed.
”The Priest was sending the money they need here; don't you kill him if he comes back.” Gu Fei just happened to be instructing Gu Xian of this at the moment!
”Aren't you rich? Just lend them the coins and help settle the compensation for them first. I fully intend to give him a good leg work-out today.” Gu Xian was resolute.
”They're unwilling to borrow from me! Can't you wait till he hands over the money before you kill him?” Gu Fei asked.
”That works, too.” Gu Xian nodded.
Broken Water Arrow and the others were chagrined when they heard the two men deciding their fates, blissfully ignorant to everything and everyone around them. Even though the soldiers in them understood the saying, 'Strategically scorn the enemy, but tactically attach importance to them', hearing the two so blatantly disregard them like this was truly upsetting. Someone even pulled out his crossbow and fired at the two men, who both ducked back out the establishment. Another thought to give chase, but Broken Water Arrow stopped the man. They were not afraid of being penalized, but they could not afford to mess things up if they headed out and caused the system guards to be sent their way.
Ye Xiaowu easily made his way back to the tavern soon enough. This time, he did not directly head right over but searched around once he reached the corner of the street. In the end, he saw those two martial arts practitioners fighting right by the front door of the tavern.
”Internal strife?” Ye Xiaowu was delighted as he quickly got closer. There was plenty of spectators surrounding the tavern right now, and the two men had drawn quite a lot of attention with their fighting. However, Gu Fei and Gu Xian were still able to catch Ye Xiaowu sneaking his way over.
”He's back,” Gu Fei said to Gu Xian.
”I saw him, but I think he looks pretty happy?” Gu Xian said even as his fist came careening over.
”I don't know!” Gu Fei dodged the attack and counter-attacked with a kick.
”Could it be that I wasn't vicious enough with my attack?” Gu Xian asked.
”No, you were vicious enough already,” Gu Fei hurriedly assured. Gu Xian's unprincipled kung fu was already a lot more ruthless than any kung fu practitioners he knew. Real kung fu practitioners like him could not let go of those deeply rooted misgivings toward those deadly moves even if they were in a game, as it was a matter of convention. Gu Fei was already pretty good with his flexible mindset, while someone as simple as Eternal Dominion still needed reminding before he got enlightened, and yet he still showed hesitation after he broke his opponent's arm.
”I'll go ask him.” Gu Xian feinted a punch before he disengaged from the sparring session, stepping right before Ye Xiaowu to block the man. Ye Xiaowu was keeping an eye on the two men even though he was trying to slip past along the wall and into the tavern. He assumed that, with how focused these two men were fighting, they would not notice his presence, but who would have known that one of them would abruptly come over and step in his path to obstruct him from pushing onward with a palm on the wall?
Ye Xiaowu knew even having ten of him would not be enough to get anywhere, so he swiftly patted his Windchaser's Emblem, utilizing the teleportation he had prepared in advance to escape.
”F*ck!” Gu Xian was stunned. He was just about to open his mouth and say something!
”See what you've done; you scared him off!” Gu Fei was exasperated. He reckoned Fleeting Smile must have teleported himself to the Bounty Assignment Hall, and that location was far from the tavern. Since he was a mere Priest with a less than stellar movement speed, it would take even more time for the man to get back here.