Chapter 7 (1/2)
ter 7
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Translator: Craxuan
Editor: JerryDaBaws
Chapter 7: Tan Xiong, the Blacksmith’s Strength
As a single player game enthusiast, there was a slight difference between Yue Qiang’s gaming att.i.tude and casual, entertainment seeking gamers. This difference was expressed by the amount of effort spent on playing a game.
Normally, Yue Qiang would explore every available channel such as guides, forums, official websites and more to understand the novelty of a new game. But, this game, with its dubious installation and startup method had rendered the traditional way of acquiring game info almost completely useless. Even the thread he posted earlier on the forum was made without high expectations.
As of now, the only way to understand the game was to go through its plot, or more specifically by talking with the NPCs and inferring from its GUI (Graphical User Interface). This raised a problem:
There is a severe lack of information.
After a period of understanding, Yue Qiang came to realize that this game’s NPCs were designed with great thought put behind them. For example, Chen Zi Han would hand out the basic chapter of ‘Gui Gu Mathematics’ after repeated dialoguing. On the other hand, the dialoguing with the blacksmith Tan Xiong was carried out through eye glances with hints provided by the system. Even talking with the proprietress of an ice seller would trigger an option box.
At the same time, Yue Qiang noticed that this beautiful ice selling proprietress had a pretty interesting surname – Gong Shu. Did you know? An incredibly famous figure was born with this surname during the Warring States Period. His name was Gong Shu Ban, also known by his descendants as the Founder of Carpentry, Lu Ban. In many games, Lu Ban was also known as the father of mechanical contraptions.
Yue Qiang had a suspicion that everyone he had come in contact thus far were probably all ‘plot characters’.
It was hard to imagine that interactions with plot characters in this ridiculously suspicious game would follow the same old fixed dialogue system.
Click Avatar – Talk to NPC – The MC says something – the NPC says something – A quest is sent out – A quest is completed – the NPC gifts you the rewards.
Would it really be logical to a.s.sume that the traditional flow of a single player RPG would apply to this game? Could there be a hidden, deeper way of interaction?
Combining the above with Yue Qiang’s own need to discover more info urgently, he realized that the solution should fall onto the dialogue mode with NPCs.
In other words, there must be a mode of sorts that could be activated.
As for the process for activating it, the system had already given out a hint before. Namely: Not following the normal process, or in other words, completing the hidden mini quests.
So, how exactly should he not follow the normal process? When Yue Qiang first interacted with the teacher Chen Zi Han, he had accidentally used the item ‘A chair’ and placed it beneath Chen Zi Han, and this action indirectly caused the latter hidden conversation to be activated. It was also why he kept a watchful eye on the blacksmith Tan Xiong’s status when he interacted with his second NPC.
This status he was mentioning was neither stats nor skills, but the game itself giving him a ‘Sweaty’ attribute through the use of graphics.
Just like how he dealt with teacher Chen Zi Han’s ‘Haughty’ attribute by pulling him a chair and fulfilling his vanity, the blacksmith Tan Xiong’s ‘Sweaty’ attribute too could very well be a hint stating that by helping and solving the blacksmith’s problem of ‘sweating under hot weather’, he would be able to win his favorability.
More importantly, this must be a hidden quest. No matter how trivial it might appear to be, it was still a hidden quest. Yue Qiang knew deep inside that the secret reward of a secret quest could not possibly be this simple.
Therefore, when he saw that slightly unexpected system message ‘Dialogue System Activated’, he finally felt a tiny sense of accomplishment.
As I thought, this game does need to be played with brains.
He wasn’t particularly in a hurry to talk with the blacksmith Tan Xiong, so he might as well check out first how to use this ‘Dialogue System’.
He looked around the GUI briefly, but could not find any prompts for this ‘Dialogue System’. Yue Qiang thought to himself. Could it be…
He attempted a mouse click on the blacksmith Tan Xiong, and a dialogue box popped into the screen.
The dialog box was empty.
There was also a cursor inside the box.
After seeing this, Yue Qiang was finally certain that his a.s.sumptions were correct. This so-called ‘Dialogue System’ was, in fact, the ability to freely converse with the NPCs through typing.
The significance of this system was huge. If his favorability was high enough, then through a single NPC alone he would be able to acquire through askance a huge amount of information about the game’s world.
More importantly, with this free typing method he would be able to use conversational skills from real life!
No matter how bizarre this game might be, in the end, it was just a game. No matter how smart an NPC was, they were still just an NPC.
Arriving at the thought, Yue Qiang began typing inside the dialog box: “I see that Big Brother Tan Xiong is not only a strong man with wide shoulders and a round waist; but also a humble person who hides his essence and true strength within. This kid had admired you for a long time, and today’s display left me especially impressed.”
Yue Qiang typed as he thought: Let’s throw in some ‘priceless’ compliments and see how the NPC reacts.
“If you have business then we’ll talk business. Otherwise, you can save the bulls.h.i.+t.”
Yue Qiang’s attempts to b.u.t.ter up the NPC was met with a brick wall, but he wasn’t discouraged in the slightest and continued typing, “This kid would like to learn a skill, and I wonder if Big Brother Tan Xiong would grant me this honor?”
He finished the sentence, but quickly felt that something wasn’t quite right, so he changed the word “Skill” to “Dharma” before finally tapping ‘Enter’ and sent out the message.
He pondered words and formed sentences to talk to the NPC while he reflected on the benefits of this dialogue system.
Originally he was going to wrack his brain for a way to trigger the hidden quest to learn the blacksmith’s skill. Now he didn’t have to. As long as he put a little heart into typing the right words, there’s practically every chance in the world to learn a skill, and who knows, maybe he could even get a combat skill. Maybe he didn’t even need to pay a price. This dialogue system sure saved him a ma.s.sive amount of time and energy alright.
Yue Qiang typed out the sentence and waited for the other party to reply. He saw the blacksmith Tan Xiong humph coldly and said, “We are on the eve of our country’s demise, and only now young master had thought of killing the enemy in battle. Don’t you think it’s too late?”
Yue Qiang typed: “It is never too late to sacrifice for one’s country.”
The blacksmith Tan Xiong humph coldly again, “Your const.i.tution really is too poor. I’m afraid you can’t learn my body strengthening dharma.”
When Yue Qiang saw the reply, he instead became excited. After entering the game for such a long time, this was the first time had a proper discussion with an NPC about skills. They might be using some obscure words like ‘body strengthening dharma’, but the meaning was nearly the same.