Ch64 - 8 Hour Game Battle

Four hours after entering Squirrel Town.

A group of players who obtained nothing rested on a bench by the side of the road to reorganize their spirits. The four of them exuded a strong sense of frustration. One of them had spiked hedgehog hair and he scratched at his scalp in annoyance, cursing rudely, “Fuck, it’s so frustrating! I have a backpack full of items that would allow me to catch 10 Cube Boats!” 

Another person said “Don’t forget, there are restrictions at the five transit stations. If we can’t use items then we can’t use them. Don’t grumble about the wrong thing.”

The hedgehog was very upset. He heard these unkind words and opened his mouth to retort.

The only female of the team who had also updated the system glared to stop the dispute from breaking out. “Stop complaining. She just mentioned the time again. Now make a quick decision. Should we find a place to rest or continue looking?”

The result of the discussion was that they would persist in searching for another 30 minutes. If they couldn’t find the target then rest. 

They got up, picked a direction and slowly left.  The complaints of the hedgehog got further away. “Are the three of them cats? Why can’t we even see their shadows when they hide?”

***

Right now, the trio who were cats were sitting in a row under the landscape of greenery trimmed into the shape of deer, 20 meters away from the team’s resting place. Nan Zhou stuck out his head to confirm their whereabouts. Jiang Fang put his head in the gap between his body and the plants, his chin rubbing against Nan Zhou’s hair as he observed the situation outside with Nan Zhou. Nanji Star jumped onto Jiang Fang’s head, small claws picking at the hair as he copied their actions and looked out.

The two people together made an unparalleled harmony. They confirmed it was safe.

“Put the stone down.” Nan Zhou turned around and spoke to Li Yinhang behind him while picking at the grass on his palm. “I’m here. Would I let you guys have to fight?”

Li Yinhang responded positively and placed the stone covered in her sweat on the edge of the grass. This sika deer green plant wasn’t very tall and didn’t make a good hiding place.

Just now on the road, they almost met that wave of people which made her sweat a lot. Li Yinhang sighed with relief. She was just about to say something when she saw Jiang Fang move his silver hair away from Nan Zhou’s lap.

“I’m relatively tall and my hair is conspicuous.” Jiang Fang spoke sincerely. “Did I crush you just now?” 

Nan Zhou replied, “It’s okay. You’re not heavy.”

It was very pleasant when lying on his lap.

Li Yinhang thought this scene was very: fuck.

It was just a lap pillow. Why make it sound the same as sleeping? She rubbed her nose and wanted to do something serious. “Teacher Nan, how high is the price from the system?” 

“5000.”

Li Yinhang wondered, “What is your ideal price?”

Nan Zhou put up a finger.

Li Yinhang agreed. “10,000? Very good.” 

This could top up their instance income. She was quite content with this amount entering their account. She was a bit afraid of overcharging and offending the system. If the system targeted them and dishonestly manipulated things behind the scenes, specifically giving them hard levels, it wouldn’t be worth the loss. Li Yinhang thought it was reasonable to get 10,000 points as compensation for this bug.

Nan Zhou calmly told her, “One million.”

Li Yinhang, “……”

Jiang Fang gave a slight smile and gently rubbed the head of Nanji Star who jumped onto his palm from Nan Zhou. 

“What’s the matter?” Nan Zhou saw Li Yinhang’s dumbfounded look. “I’m just raising the price. They can make a counteroffer.”

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

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Nan Zhou frowned and was very puzzled. “You bargained with that old lady in that inn in Paper Gold. After a lot of counter-offers, you succeeded in the end.” 

Li Yinhang, “……”

Bigshot, this isn’t good.

He was easy-going in areas he was good at and extraordinarily stubborn in areas he wasn’t good at. Seeing Nan Zhou’s sincere gaze for answers, she wanted to pat Jiang Fang’s arm and signal to him to become Nan Zhou’s teacher. Then recalling that shivering moment a few hours ago, Li Yinhang didn’t dare to make any moves. She just winked at him.

Jiang Fang understood and hugged Nanji Star, explaining it to Nan Zhou in a warm voice. Jiang Fang didn’t start from a human perspective. He explained, “Teacher Nan, the one million price you set is enough to push us to the top of the rankings.” 

Nan Zhou was confused, “Isn’t that very good?”

“The game system is already helping us cheat. If the balance of the game is going to be destroyed anyway, it would be better to sacrifice a rest point.”

Nan Zhou pondered on it for a moment and returned the logic perfectly. “We aren’t stopping them from bargaining.”

Jiang Fang laughed and inquired, “What is our Teacher Nan’s psychological price?” 

Nan Zhou answered seriously, “I can’t tell you.”

Jiang Fang was interested. “Why?”

“The game planners might be able to hear what we are saying. We have to hold the bottom line and not expose our bottom price.”

Jiang Fang shrugged at Li Yinhang, indicating that he failed in his persuasion and could do nothing. Still, he had the added bonus of being greatly pleased by Nan Zhou’s cuteness. 

Li Yinhang, “……”

If the game planners could really hear this dialogue, they would probably die of anger before finding out Nan Zhou’s bottom line. Even so, she was a bit uneasy.

“Are we… going too far?” Li Yinhang was quite worried. “After the mess today, we have attracted the attention of at least half the server… even if we do take this system bug and exchange it for the score we want, the system and other players will pay extra attention to us.”

Nan Zhou looked at Li Yinhang like he was surprised by her concern. 

Jiang Fang asked gently, “What makes you think so?”

“You think.. there are so many players staring at our every move. If we get too many points all of a sudden, they will soon find that the system’s updated ‘ban on catching instance creatures’ is directly related to the large number of points we get.”

“There are players who haven’t downloaded the update yet. If they find the role of the bug, they might immediately go to an instance to catch a boss, causing a chain reaction. Then if they do business with the game, our advantage will be gone…”

Jiang Fang laughed. “It is a good concern but it won’t happen.” 

Li Yinhang wondered, “Why?”

Jiang Fang explained, “It is very simple. There are two points. We have the bargaining chip and the time. Other players don’t have this.”

Li Yinhang paid attention to these words and suddenly became cheerful. Yes. For the game planners, Nan Zhou didn’t leave them much time. They forced players to update the patch but the person didn’t rush out. The time wasn’t enough for them to fix it.

In their view, the Cube Boat team could place the door at the entrance of Squirrel Town after realizing they couldn’t make a deal and were about to run out of oxygen. Then they could retreat directly into an instance and slowly update the warehouse. In any case, it didn’t matter if Cube Boat made a deal with the system or left the boss in town to harm other players. It was a great benefit to Cube Boat. 

Meanwhile, the other players eyeing the instance bosses didn’t have that opportunity. Even if they understood what was going on and immediately entered an instance with the old system that could still capture the boss, it would take them quite some time to clear the instance.

During this period, there was plenty of time for the system to make a new patch. Besides, catching a boss was a highly risky matter. If the players really did have the ability to risk death and bring out the boss, they might leave the instance only to be greeted with a forced update patch.

Jiang Fang said with a smile, “So these benefits can only be owned by one team.”

Nan Zhou nodded. “Brother Fang is right.” 

At the same time, he turned to Li Yinhang. “We are always going to be number one. At that point, it would be hard not to be noticed.”

Nan Zhou’s voice was very light. “Yinhang, you should get used to it as soon as possible.”

The blockage in Li Yinhang’s heart was washed away.

She looked at these two men and realized for the first time that they were so well matched. No matter their personality or appearance, the confidence deep in their bones made their souls stand side by side with the same radiance. She quickly emerged from her anxiety and spoke positively, “Then I’ll post the countdown.” 

***

The original instance boss whose strength soared into the sky was reduced to pork on the chopping board without any dignity. The two parties started to bargain based on the price.

The writer of the private letters became increasingly impatient in the later stage but managed to maintain a polite appearance. The writer gritted their teeth and an agreement was eventually reached.

Li Yinhang was just counting down the last 15 minutes when the system sent the 13th private letter and a deal was successfully struck. 

It was 75,000 points and each person could get 25,000. In addition, there were three A-grade items. Based on the meaning behind this number, it was obvious that the system was strongly suppressing anger.

Li Yinhang ignored the incompetent fury and spoke happily, “It must be scolding the three of us for being stupid.”

Nan Zhou sent Li Yinhang a puzzled look, counted the incoming points card and replied in a serious manner, “No, it is clearly the stupid one.”

The points entered their backpacks in the form of a points card because the system didn’t have the right to directly modify their points. 

At present, the initiative was all in the hands of Cube Boat. In other words, the system had to give the rewards first. They would manually update to the new version of the warehouse after confirming it.

The moment they saw the points card and items in the warehouse, the three members of Cube Boat had different ideas. Nan Zhou seriously hesitated. He wondered if he should go rogue and take the points without giving them the boss. Yet even if they had the boss, they didn’t know how to use it. Secondly, it was a waste of a storage slot and third, it would still be recycled when the system developed the corresponding patch.

Thus, he was happy to click the warehouse update button. He watched the hideously twisted monster disappear from his storage slot.

It was probably due to Nan Zhou’s exorbitant price of ‘one million points’ just now. The moment Li Yinhang saw the 25,000 points, she could only say, “…That’s it.” 

Then she immediately slapped herself inwardly. This was 25,0000 points! Li Yinhang, sober up a bit!

In order to distract herself, she asked, “Now those players are still looking for us in Squirrel Town. What should we do?”

They had obtained the rewards and she started to worry about their personal safety.

Jiang Fang smiled. “They are easy to deal with. Just use your points card.” 

Li Yinhang, “……Eh?”

Nan Zhou told her, “Yes, use it.”

Li Yinhang couldn’t figure out the reason so she simply listened to the bigshot’s advice and used the 25,000 points card. The countdown was coming to an end. The attention of at least thousands of people was unanimously focused on the player ‘Li Yinhang.’

As a result, her score and ranking skyrocketing in real-time was captured by hundreds of people almost simultaneously. There was a moment of silence before the world channel boiled over. 

[They really have an instance creature in their hands! They really traded with the system! I guessed right!]

[Yes! Squirrel Town is a place where pension players stay. How can there be any games that increase the points by so much? It isn’t Paper Gold with the casino!]

[Can an instance creature be caught???]

[Ahhhhh fuck! If I knew this, I wouldn’t have updated!] 

The players in Squirrel Town also received this message. They had to face the cruel truth. The truth was that they had been treated as idiots. Moreover, the countdown was simply for the system to see. They were the ones cheap enough to run over on their own. They should’ve been furious.

The reality was that after a brief debate, the ambitious players who searched for Cube Boat in Squirrel Town all made the same decision.

Leave Squirrel Town. Go and steal the boss in the instance!

They weren’t the only ones to think so. Many players scattered across the other four resting points, both those who had and hadn’t voiced their opinions in the world channel, made a unified choice at this moment. 

Enter the instance. Grab the instance creature.

There were also many players who didn’t have the guts to enter the instance. Players who used Squirrel Town as a permanent rest point were afraid of Cube Boat and the other teams still on the island and decided to stay away for a few nights to watch the situation. Cube Boat used only one action to attract players they had never met to follow them, the players dancing like puppets.

Squirrel Town became an empty paradise where only the three of them lived.

Jiang Fang could predict the actions taken by players even if he didn’t see it with his own eyes. He clicked and used the points card before upgrading the warehouse system. Once the page was in an upgrading state and couldn’t be controlled, he looked at Nan Zhou who was muttering over the inventory with Li Yinhang, a gentle, warm light in his eyes. 

In his mind, there was no need to return the door to the system. Destroying the town and earning points were two things that weren’t contradictory. The points compensation was the price the system should pay for allowing the bug.

Using the boss to clear some players was an effective way for them to rationally use the system bug and clear up some obstacles in the way of the final victory. Competitors were worthy of respect and deserved to be treated in a fairer way. Still.. it had to be said that dead competitors were really good competitors.

However, Nan Zhou had the final say. In any case, there were players who had ambitions and rushed into a dungeon, approaching the boss with a selfish heart. A batch of them would always die. The system would no longer allow any bargaining.

Jiang Fang thought up to here and straightened gracefully. On the whole, his mood was pleasant. He glanced at the time and smiled. “We should go to the central square.” 

Nan Zhou wondered, “What do you want to do in the central square?”

“There are fireworks at 6 o’clock in the evening every day in Squirrel Town.” Jiang Fang sent an invitation to Nan Zhou. “We can go and celebrate.”

Li Yinhang heard this and felt that something was wrong. It was just that she couldn’t say what it was. Thus, she didn’t take it to heart.

Nan Zhou stopped moving. He spoke softly, “Brother Fang.” 

The perfect smile on Jiang Fang’s face slightly stiffened.

The moment Nan Zhou called out his name, he realized what flaw he had just exposed. Nan Zhou stared into his eyes and asked, “How do you know there are fireworks in Squirrel Town at 6 p.m. every day?”