The gates of Star Dragon Outpost stood wide open.
Blood and stench remained outside.
Linde casually tossed out a quest, tasking the undying players with patrolling the perimeter of Star Dragon Outpost.
Undying players without a quest were not to be trusted, because you never knew what shenanigans they might get up to.
Undying players with a quest were absolutely trustworthy. Even if their own father came, they wouldn't betray their mission... mostly wouldn't betray it.
These "traveling frogs" (literal translation, implying they are always moving around/exploring) had their own ideas. Linde could already tell that a few players were fired up after seeing his skills, and now they were single-mindedly focused on grinding and leveling up.
Never mind that Linde was a non-player character without admin privileges. Even if he did have admin privileges, the players wouldn't listen to him anyway.
All they wanted was to break through and become Great Knights.
However, Linde had no such plans for the time being. He wanted to wait until he got back and read more player posts, to see what the players' analyses were.
Fortunately, the pro gamers were well-versed in how to gain popularity. Technical posts and videos wouldn't be kept secret, so Linde could directly see the players' game progress.
As of now, the players weren't at high levels. WhiteSocksLover and his group were already considered top-tier players.
Linde was free of any filth or bad smells. Crowley's wrath had burned away the grime.
He simply washed his hands and face with hot water and lay down on the bed.
He unbuttoned his clothes, looking at the faintly glowing circle on his chest.
Linde closed his eyes.
Unable to sleep, he decided to browse the forums, lurking to see what kind of shenanigans the players were getting up to.
The Lande Kingdom was vast, and this magical apocalypse world was even larger, with numerous nations.
Players were highly likely to appear in every corner, and they might be able to help him observe the events unfolding in each region with their own eyes, helping him observe and obtain information as soon as possible.
However, after browsing for just three to five minutes, Linde was disappointed.
He felt that these players hadn't grasped the essence of the game, not even truly getting started.
It was one thing that a large number of them were still wandering around in the wilderness, but the rest were being captured and enslaved, used as rations, or even forced to help with farming.
Players who had managed to obtain weapons and equipment were as rare as hen's teeth.
If he had admin privileges, he would definitely squeeze them dry, milk them for all they were worth.
He would issue hundreds of quests every day, making the players build houses and slay monsters for experience, turning them into a full-blown "Fourth Calamity." He would see which was stronger: the original Calamity, or the Fourth Calamity unleashed by the players.
But alas, he didn't have it. So, Linde never thought about controlling the players, only about earning some benefits while guiding them, strengthening his own power and influence in the process, increasing his chances of survival... and, avoiding death at the hands of the players.
After determining that he wouldn't find any useful information, Linde's gaze shifted to the video section.
He had to admit, these people really knew how to make things interesting.
Character creation was so free, giving players a lot of control.
Especially the dancing.
[I think they should open a dance section. Those girls doing borderline-erotic content finally don't have to use crazy filters, makeups and pads! Anyone can be a top-tier beauty here!]
[↑ Genshin?]
[Apocalyptic Elden Ring = Ring = Circle = Origin (Genshin's Chinese Name), get it?] (Referencing Genshin Impact)
[When a joke needs to be explained, it's not a joke anymore. Begone, Genshin nerds! Also, my wife is so cute, I wanna hug her! Ignoring the haters, we're just dancing for fun. But is her booba bigger? haha, lick screen] (Note: "booba" is implied from the original "熊熊" which is baby talk for breasts, in this context.)
Linde scrolled through videos with a critical eye until late into the night.
He drifted off to sleep, groggy.
When he woke up again, it was dawn.
It was now three days after the players arrived.
Linde put on his clothes and picked up the Ghoul Queen's broken sword.
The undying players hadn't returned. It seemed they would be gone for a while.
"Lord!" Old Peter greeted Linde, bowing respectfully.
The other soldiers, women, and children also bowed.
What happened last night was no longer a secret. With so few of them, the topic was bound to come up in conversation.
The lord possessed great power, and life would surely be better from now on.
Linde nodded. "Reid, come help me make a scabbard."
Reid nodded. "Yes, sir!"
From years of repairing and maintaining weapons and armor, and without a blacksmith, the soldiers were basically jacks-of-all-trades.
Linde had lost his previous sword, which was decent enough, but it didn't matter. He had gained a more solid and useful broken greatsword. He couldn't hang the sword on his waist, but he could make a scabbard and carry it on his back.
Using leather and small iron ingots to make a scabbard wasn't difficult. It would take at most half a morning to complete.
Breakfast was still hot soup and meat.
"No staple foods, huh?" Linde observed the women and children holding their bowls, carefully lining up to receive their portions.
The bowls weren't valuable; the food was.
Two children received their meat broth, cheering happily, and then, guided by an adult, proactively bowed to Linde.
Linde nodded slightly.
There was still quite a bit of wolf meat, but it needed to be prioritized for the soldiers. As long as the non-combatant women and children didn't starve, that was enough, at least for now.
This distribution wasn't just Linde's idea; the women and children completely agreed. Having a place of shelter and being able to drink soup with oil every day gave them a better chance of surviving the winter.
Without staple foods, they'd get hungry too quickly, and the meat was too precious.
He patrolled the territory as usual, checking on the growth of the potatoes in the vegetable garden.
He hoped the potatoes would grow quickly and then be expanded in scale.
"What's going on?" Linde pushed aside the straw, looking puzzled.
The potatoes weren't growing well.
He found a woman who had farmed before and asked her about the situation.
"Lord, potatoes are already very difficult to grow," she said, looking at the sprouting potatoes buried in the loose soil with some regret, perhaps feeling that this planting method was wasteful and it would be better to eat them directly.
"We've tried growing grains before, and we found that the grains would grow, but after growing to a certain point, they would be absorbed by the soil and wouldn't grow any bigger."
This was the first time Linde had learned about the apocalypse from an agricultural perspective.
But the potatoes had already sprouted and grown to this extent, so they definitely couldn't be eaten.
He would just plant them in the ground for now.
The undying players hadn't returned yet, so the idle women and children, temporarily without the chance to act as quest-giving NPCs, had taken on the job of cleaning up the spoils of war.
They simply washed the blood off the weapons and armor and dried them.
Afterward, the soldiers would perform a general maintenance.
It was all equipment to be sold to the undying players, so it had to be treated well.
Patrolling on the outpost.
Having a simple chat with the soldiers.
Then Linde's attention turned again to the official website of Apocalyptic Elden Ring. The number of posts had exploded, with all kinds of help requests flooding in.
Although his battle with the Ghoul Queen was popular, the most popular thing wasn't his video, but a post titled Tips for Increasing NPC Favor. The poster detailed how they had gained the favor of an NPC, as an undying character who couldn't even take off their underwear, leading a female merchant to develop affection for them and gift them a set of equipment, including a decent sword.
While others were struggling to farm and kill monsters, he had already changed into a good set of equipment and was leisurely heading out.
A group of people were calling him "big shot" in the comments.
[Move aside, it's time for me to show off.jpg]
[This is not how the game is played.jpg]
[Apocalyptic World, Gigolo Re-employment, Seeking Advice, I want to seduce Lord Linde~!]
Linde, who was enjoying the spectacle, felt as if he had suddenly been kicked and the smile disappeared from his face.
He immediately exited the post.
Those undying players were really capable of doing something like that.
"Even if you turn yourself into a fairy, there's absolutely no way I'll fall for it!"
If he were to be caught on camera developing lust for a player whose gender was ambiguous, his NPC life would probably be over.
Then Linde noticed...
The official website had already released a new announcement, but he hadn't paid attention.
["Apocalyptic Elden Ring"Internal Beta Version 1.02 Update: Fixed issues with players getting stuck in the map. Lost players will now be teleported to nearby populated areas.]