Chapter 236: President Pei's Exclusive Weapon
Li Yada had originally thought President Pei would show off some impressive pro-level gameplay—dazzling combos, perfect dodges, and smooth kills.
But the scene that actually unfolded… was completely different.
All she saw was:
President Pei confidently increasing the monsters' attack power!
President Pei confidently equipping his weapon!
President Pei confidently charging forward!
And then—President Pei confidently dying!
It was almost as if the whole thing had been choreographed.
The monster's pitchfork attack landed perfectly between Pei Qian's dodge cooldowns, striking him the instant his dodge animation ended.
A flurry of "tiger-like operations," only to be killed by the first little monster—was that even possible?
Pei Qian, however, smiled.
Nice.
He wasn't disappointed!
This was exactly what he wanted!
After all, the whole point was to "make players give up at all costs."
And this—this was the ideal outcome!
Li Yada, watching the cheerful smile on President Pei's face, was genuinely stunned.
President Pei's mental fortitude was on another level!
Any normal player, after getting stabbed to death by the first enemy's two-hit combo, would be either confused or furious.
But President Pei? He was pleased?
Was this because he was about to get serious—to unleash his full 100% effort?
Soon, Pei Qian respawned.
He raised his cleaver once again and charged at the pitchfork-wielding villager.
Five seconds later, the screen went black again.
"Hehehehehe…"
The villager's creepy laughter was as taunting as ever.
Pei Qian thought for a moment, then opened the editor console.
"Which column controls the monster attack values?" he asked.
Li Yada quickly pointed at the screen.
"This one—all these numbers here. If you want to adjust a specific monster, you can input it manually. If you want to modify all of them using a formula, click here."
Following her instructions, Pei Qian opened the global adjustment formula for all monsters' attack values.
'Ah, I see. He's going to lower the attack now,' Li Yada thought, quietly sighing in relief.
For a second there, she'd almost believed President Pei was some kind of gaming god.
However—
Pei Qian selected the entire column of attack values… and multiplied them all by 1.3.
Once done, he nodded in satisfaction.
Yes, that should do nicely.
Originally, one hit would take off around 60% of HP.
Now, one hit would remove about 80%.
Either way, two hits meant instant death—no big difference.
Li Yada was dizzy.
Even through her thick glasses, she couldn't make sense of President Pei's logic.
"Alright," Pei Qian said calmly, "I'm going to give this a serious test. You can head out."
Li Yada nodded.
"Understood, President Pei. If you need anything, just call me."
Once she left the office, Pei Qian reentered the game.
"Good. Let's challenge it at this level of difficulty!"
Pei Qian wasn't delusional about his own skill.
But if he wasn't ruthless enough toward himself, how could he possibly drive players away?
Thus began his journey of suffering.
After dying a dozen times in the village, Pei Qian finally started to adapt to the rhythm.
Although his original goal was to make the game as punishing as possible, he gradually realized something—all high-difficulty games shared a common pattern.
The foundation laid by Lu Mingliang and Bao Xu, then refined further by Li Yada, had unexpectedly… captured that "Dark Souls" vibe perfectly!
It wasn't even intentional—it just naturally turned out that way.
When evaluating whether a game is "hard" or "not hard," it really all boils down to a few key aspects:
First, the numerical balance.
If one wanted to increase the game's difficulty purely through numbers, it would be simple—just keep boosting the monsters' attack power until they could one-shot the player.
But if the numerical difficulty went too high, even Pei Qian himself wouldn't be able to beat it. Then the whole game would turn into a dead end—not a challenge, but a bug. Players wouldn't call it "hardcore"; they'd just call it "unfinished."
So, numerical difficulty had its limits—it couldn't be pushed recklessly.
The second factor was mechanical skill.
For example, requiring players to execute a specific sequence of inputs, in a certain rhythm, with precise timing, in order to defeat a particular enemy.
The third was reaction speed.
Some monsters might have lightning-fast attacks—if the player reacted in time, they could dodge; if not, they'd get flattened.
The fourth was specific counter-strategies.
For instance, certain enemies might only be vulnerable to specific attributes or weapon types.
And the fifth was unexpected events.
Like walking along a cliffside, only for a monster to suddenly leap out and shove you off.
Most games' "difficulty" could be broken down into these five aspects.
However, Pei Qian needed to make sure he himself could still clear the game. That meant the first three—numerical balance, mechanical skill, and reaction speed—all had to stay within the range of a normal human's ability.
Sure, he could make the boss have a million HP and let the player's attacks only deal 1 point of damage—that would definitely drive away most players.
But he'd also never beat it himself.
Likewise, if the game demanded godlike reflexes or inhuman precision, it might be effective for player frustration—but Pei Qian himself wouldn't survive it.
Therefore, difficulty in those three dimensions could only be pushed to his personal limit—essentially, the limit of an average player.
If he wanted to make things harder beyond that, he'd have to focus on the other two dimensions: specific counter-strategies and unexpected events.
For example, maybe certain enemies could only be efficiently defeated with specific weapons.
Or perhaps hidden monsters would ambush players unless they used a special item or lured them out with a ranged weapon.
In these areas, Pei Qian could rely on his "game design insights" (read: peeking at the design documents) to get through without issue.
But for numerical tuning, mechanics, and reaction speed—those would need to stay fair for the average player.
After all that tweaking, the game naturally ended up feeling like a Souls-like.
Pei Qian wasn't exactly a fan of the genre—he was the kind of player who gave up after beating three or four bosses.
Still, dealing with the first few weak enemies was fine.
So, after being impaled repeatedly by that pitchfork-wielding villager, Pei Qian soon got his rhythm back.
He could now take down those small monsters flawlessly.
Which meant it was time for the next important step:
Secretly adding his own exclusive weapon.
Since Pei Qian had full access to the editor console, this was easy:
He'd just pick a weapon model from the art assets, add it to the item database; copy over stats from a similar weapon, tweak a few parameters—like attack power and swing speed; Then attach a special quest entry with a unique, hard-to-find unlock condition.
In short, he'd bury it somewhere no one else would ever think to look.
Pei Qian opened the in-game weapon list and scanned through it.
There were plenty of choices, all with detailed stat entries.
But he had to be careful about which one he modified.
If he went with a ranged weapon, the game's difficulty would plummet.
The issue was, this was an action combat game, so ranged options were intentionally limited—bows, hand crossbows, and the like—and, much like in Dark Souls, they were meant as support tools, not primary weapons.
Balancing melee and ranged combat was a fundamental rule of this genre.
If there existed a ranged weapon with high damage, long reach, and low stamina cost, it would instantly outclass all melee weapons and destroy the core gameplay loop.
That was why, according to Lu Mingliang and Bao Xu's design, bows and crossbows had deliberately low damage and long reload times—their purpose was mainly to pull enemies from a distance, not to kill them efficiently.
If he were to sneak in a "machine-gun crossbow" that could one-shot everything, the system would flag it immediately as a broken or debug-only weapon.
So, even if Pei Qian wanted to secretly insert a weapon just for himself, he couldn't make it too overpowered.
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