Yan Qing had forgotten when he had downloaded this game, probably just to pass inspections. After all, he worked at a game company, and not having his company's games on his console would be quite awkward. He had only opened it once, registered a character, and never played it again.
So what's going on here? I've not only crossed into the game world, but now I can play my least favorite MMORPG inside the game world too?
Even if I could launch the game, there are no other players here. Is this what's called a single-player private server?
Though it felt a bit inexplicable, with nothing else to do, Yan Qing clicked to open the game "Messenger".
"Resist unhealthy games, reject pirated games.
Note self protection, beware of being deceived.
Moderate gaming benefits the brain, gaming addiction harms the body.
Arrange time reasonably, enjoy a healthy life."
Yan Qing was a little disappointed. He thought maybe the game's world had mutated, like having features such as 'Deep Blue Points' or 'Simulation Deduction'. But seeing these eight phrases, he felt this game might really just be a game.
Then he quickly skipped over the opening CG. Strangely enough, it even skipped the account login and directly led to the character selection screen.
When Yan Qing saw his character library, he was stunned.
He still remembered that the character he registered was named "Laplace Demon", which was his universal character name in all games, and it should have been a female character with looks resembling a blend between Buzhihuo Dance and Tifa — the part where he'd spent the most time in this game was the face-customization phase.
However, the only character name in the game library now was "Yan Qing", and from the appearance, it was a male character that looked remarkably like him, and it showed the location as "Secret Realm·Thief's House."
Could it be...
Yan Qing's eyes sparkled, a strange excitement rising in his heart, and he decisively chose to log in as the game character "Yan Qing"!
However, the screen popped up with login failure information.
"This character is already in the game."
What?
Yan Qing tried several times but still couldn't log in.
If he guessed right, this game character "Yan Qing" should represent himself, meaning as long as Yan Qing logs into this character, he can strengthen himself in the game.
Attribute points allocation, pet recruitment, weapon embedding, skill strengthening... Even the most ordinary and common experience point system would be a great help to Yan Qing!
Because "Messenger" has quite a variety of gameplay; besides fighting monsters, players have many ways to gain experience and train skills, so Yan Qing might be able to elevate his level in a short time.
However, if he can't log in, everything is for naught.
Yan Qing stared at the screen, unwilling to give up. To log into the "Yan Qing" account, he needed to log out himself, but besides dying, what other way is there to log out? He couldn't summon the game panel to exit the game in reality — from 'linkstart' to 'Deep Blue', he recited all kinds of system spells.
He obviously knew that this gaming console was the lifeline he could grasp in this world he had crossed into, but unfortunately, this lifeline was like the moon in the water, beautiful yet unreachable.
For the next half-hour, Yan Qing kept trying various ways to 'log out', such as pretending to sleep to fool the gaming console, but all to no avail. He lay on the bed looking at the gaming console screen, his expression as troubled as a billionaire who had forgotten his bank card password.
"Sigh."
Yan Qing placed the gaming console on the bedside table, tucked himself in with the blanket, not caring about anyone or anything, and decided to sleep.
But within two minutes, he picked up the gaming console again — I refuse to believe this gaming console is completely useless!
However, at this time, the gaming console's screen interface wasn't "Character Selection", but "Create New Character", probably because when Yan Qing put down the gaming console, he accidentally pressed another character slot, so the system directly entered the character creation phase.
Yan Qing instinctively wanted to exit, but then he suddenly realized a problem: If the game character "Yan Qing" really represents himself, what would happen if he creates another new character?
Anyway, it's something to do while idle.
The first step was face-customization and naming. Yan Qing instinctively wanted to create a female character resembling Tifa and Buzhihuo Dance, but the gaming console had obviously mutated. If he created a voluptuous female character and the gaming console identified it as his body... Yan Qing decided not to take the risk. But he was also lazy to sculpt a face resembling his own, so he directly chose the default male character 01 face.
The next step, adding attribute points, was the main event. Yan Qing hadn't seriously studied this game, but as a player, a quick glance at the introduction gave him a rough idea.
The initial character has four main attributes: "Qi Blood", "Spiritual Mastery", "Agility", and "Comprehension".
"Qi Blood" influences the character's health points, stamina, physical attack power, physical defense, movement speed, vision, resistance to diseases and poisons, and a series of physical-related secondary attributes;
"Spiritual Mastery" affects the character's spiritual power, skill intensity, mental resistance, instinct perception, and a series of soul-related secondary attributes;
"Agility" influences the character's attack speed, dodge rate, hit rate, and secondary attributes related to skill;
"Dexterity" is negatively affected by one-third of the difference between "Qi Blood" and "Spiritual Power." For example, if a character has 20 points in Qi Blood and 10 points in Spiritual Power, then their "Dexterity" would receive a -3 penalty, meaning the character's dexterity value is calculated as 3 less.
Whether it's the 'dim-witted truck driver' with high Qi Blood and low Spiritual Power, or the 'genius in a wheelchair' with low Qi Blood and high Spiritual Power, both scenarios signify that the character cannot fully utilize their potential, presented in data as reduced dexterity.
But regardless of "Qi Blood," "Spiritual Power," or "Dexterity," none are as important as the fourth attribute, "Perception"!
"Perception" affects the rate at which all skills gain experience; each point in Perception increases experience by 1%.
A new character has only 10 free attributes, and even if all are added to "Perception," it only increases experience by 10%, which doesn't seem much. Meanwhile, adding to any of the other three attributes can provide a better game experience for a starting character. However, when Yan Qing chatted with colleagues, he learned that in the game "Messenger," there are very few ways to increase Perception, whereas there are various ways to enhance Qi Blood, Spiritual Power, and Dexterity.
Many players find it hard to level up around the fourth transition due to initially not adding to Perception or adding too little. For full Perception characters, this bottleneck doesn't occur until the sixth transition. Additionally, "Messenger" is a subscription-based MMORPG that deliberately offers no point-reset items, making players who add points incorrectly create new characters to start over.
1 point in Qi Blood, 1 point in Spiritual Power, 1 point in Dexterity, 10 points in Perception!
Next, select the game mode. However, Yan Qing found that both "Adventure Mode" and "Asura Mode" were grayed out and unselectable, leaving only "Real Mode" as a choice.
"Adventure Mode" is the most common PvE mode with standard experience gains;
"Asura Mode" is designed for PvP, offering 200% experience gain to facilitate rapid leveling on the PvP battlefield, while drastically reducing dungeon and wild creature yields, making it usable primarily on the battlefield;
"Real Mode" gives players an additional 5% experience, but the cost is having only one life, and death results in the character being deleted.
Obviously, only those into self-challenge or pro players would choose "Real Mode." Yan Qing had never tried Real Mode, but at this point, he could only give it a go.
As for the character name, let's call it... 'Yan Yi'!
Three main cities have affiliated newbie villages to choose from: "Jiangnan Affiliated Newbie Village," "Chang'an Affiliated Newbie Village," and "Nocturnal Heaven Affiliated Newbie Village." Yan Qing casually chose "Nocturnal Heaven Affiliated Newbie Village" and then started the game.
As the screen lit up, Yan Qing saw the newly created character 'Yan Yi' appear in a village, wearing a cloth dress and holding a wooden stick, even without shoes.
Ah, is it really just playing a game?
I thought I'd be transported into it or something…
Yan Qing familiarized himself slightly with the controls and intended to take on quests to level up. However, after controlling the character to walk around twice, he quickly realized something was very wrong—why is this newbie village empty?
Not only was no one there, it even appeared dilapidated, with charred buildings, collapsed straw huts, and knee-high weeds making it look like an abandoned village. Inside a scorched building, he found a water jar and clicked to check for contents. What appeared on screen made Yan Qing's eyelids twitch violently: inside the jar were two severely decayed skeletons, one large and one small, seemingly a woman and a child from their clothing.
Standing in the village center, Yan Qing was bewildered. No quests, no monsters, and no newbie village—what should he do next?
There was a road extending out from the village entrance, so Yan Qing decided to explore along the road. Fortunately, his luck was good, and he soon reached the main road, even encountering a passerby. When he asked for directions, people either avoided him or raised their weapons and watched him warily, except for one kind old farmer who told him, "Go forward and you'll reach Ping City; you'd better head back to the village."
Ping City, although not a main game city, should have quests, right? At the very least, there should be NPCs, and even without relying on monster hunting to level up, Yan Qing needed to learn skills from other NPCs to improve his level.
Ping City was indeed close, or perhaps 'Yan Yi's walking speed was fast, taking only a dozen minutes to arrive. Although 'Yan Yi' had only 1 Qi Blood, which was the average for an adult, being a game character, 'Yan Yi' could expend stamina to sprint. When stamina was about to deplete, he switched to normal walking speed to recover stamina. This cycle of "sprint-walk" allowed 'Yan Yi' to surpass many merchants and civilians along the way.
At the city gate, there were woodcutters bent over with loads of firewood, rural gentry riding donkeys with attendants, and traveling merchants carrying luggage lining up on the left side waiting to enter the city. Although there were guards on the right side as well, no one used that entrance.
Naturally, Yan Qing didn't feel like queuing and went straight through the right entrance, only to be stopped by the guards.
Guard: "Who are you?"
Yan Qing was inspired, and in the game 'Yan Yi' brought up a dialogue option.
Yan Yi: "Traveler, wanting to enter the city."
Guard: "Passage permit?"
Yan Yi: "Passage permit? I don't have one."
Guard: "Do you know anyone?"
Yan Yi: "I don't know anyone."
On screen, Yan Qing clearly saw the guard stroke his chin, then exchange a glance with others and show a peculiar smile. Subsequently, two guards grabbed 'Yan Yi' on either side and pushed him into the barracks by the city gate.
Yan Qing tried to leave, but the game indicated that 'Yan Yi' had Qi Blood too low and lacked the strength to break free from the guards' grip.
Inside the barracks, there was suddenly a thump, and 'Yan Yi' fell to the ground. The screen turned pitch black, and the health bar dropped by a third.
Soon the health bar was depleted, and a game prompt appeared:
"You have died."