Meteor Fall Master in the 'Starry Abyss'
Chapter 273 - 093. Surprisingly, it’s a Placement Play

Chapter 273: 093. Surprisingly, it’s a Placement Play

Li Aozi chuckled as he led them into Triangle Town.

The residents of Triangle Town felt uneasy about these forty-some strangers who were forcefully brought here, especially since the players were like toddlers, wanting to touch everything, eat anything that could be put in their mouths, and sleep on any available bed—of course, these behaviors quickly led to beatings and rebukes from the locals. The players with itchy hands had no choice but to scurry back to Li Aozi’s side.

It had to be Li Aozi who treated them well; he even invited his own people to the laboratory. A mentor was truly a mentor.

For many people, it was their first time seeing the sights of the Outer World and settlements, and they were especially shocked.

"Oh my, is this the Outer World? This is the first time I’m seeing such a shocking scene. The sky is red and black, and there’s not a single glimpse of the sun."

"How do they farm in such ice and snow, and sandstorms? Just storing water must be a huge problem."

"That’s a nuclear reactor over there, so it seems there’s still some hope."

The players from Bai Ri Guild were relatively calm. They carefully observed the surrounding character images, switched to ’Camouflage Mode’ from time to time, actively communicated with Triangle Town’s residents, and noted down which NPC sold what, which NPC triggered what task, the NPC’s knowledge of the local area, and their views on Li Aozi, and then posted the information on their internal channel. This turned into exclusive data for them.

"The actual ruler of Triangle Town is the warlord Oakland. He may look like a young boy, but in reality, he’s a hero with the memories of seven generations of his family. The motto of Triangle Town is ’Triangle Alliance,’ and you must shout it while facing your leader. To Triangle Town, Li Aozi is both a protector and a force they invested in and supported to rise. The relationships here aren’t complicated..."

Bai Ri Guild had its own analysis team, and after getting the available data and photos, they quickly deduced a lot of useful information, helping Bai Ri Guild to further establish its foothold.

What surprised President King Yan was that, after some interaction, Triangle Town’s people seemed to respect Li Aozi even more than the warlord.

If the warlord leader was the sovereign to Triangle Town, then Li Aozi might very well have been a mythical figure.

Gradually, from their mouths, the players also heard the reasons behind Li Aozi’s fame.

"Mingji Humanity Extermination War," "Liberation of Grante Duchy," "Airborne Meat Grinder," "Direct Penetration of Frost Plated Airspace"—each of these events alone was enough to be written into a DLC.

The most outrageous part was that the latter three achievements occurred only after the PV of "Starry Abyss." From a player’s perspective, it was like Li Aozi was a harmless guy yesterday, but by the next day, he had become a cruel champion of extinction.

These four famous feats firmly established Li Aozi’s unparalleled reputation. Combined with his pale skin and his help in solving the Mingji Humanity disaster for the Outer World people, it seemed unreasonable to the Outer World people not to erect a shrine for him.

"Looks like we underestimated Li Aozi’s capabilities," King Yan worriedly said to his men, "If he’s this strong, could the threshold for transferring to a [Mutant] be very high?"

"A high threshold only means the [Mutant] is powerful," the players under him didn’t really mind, "After all, we’re in the beta test, so we have the opportunity. Rather than hesitating when the official version comes out and being overtaken by others, it’s better if we take the plunge now."

King Yan thought this was logical, but he still felt a bit uneasy.

"Starry Abyss" was unlike any other game they had encountered, whether in realism or completeness; it was all too high.

Not to mention, they could even release Water Magic by taking off their pants or embed weapons into an Olige for a toxic enchantment.

More wickedly, Silver Coin discovered a mischievous trick: using the NPC recruitment feature of player bodies, after dying three times, the character would disappear, so they directly borrowed high-interest loans, sold organs, sold themselves until they died, then had teammates resurrect them, and continued selling. Once the three resurrection opportunities were used up, they took the loans and organ-selling money to escape and started a new character the next day.

Although the ’selling oneself for loans’ trick actually resulted in a loss of a month’s game time, with the money earned far from covering the losses, and all favorability, task progress, and current level being reset, some players were still willing to try this underhanded method.

King Yan’s worry mainly came from the leveling system of this game: compared to other games, "Starry Abyss" had a very slow level-up pace. If you started practicing Martial Way skills with the same NPC, from the NPC’s perspective, you wouldn’t necessarily learn faster than them.

From this perspective, even a prodigy, whether a player or NPC, couldn’t reach Li Aozi’s level of strength before turning 30, starting at age 18.

Would those NPCs at Li Aozi’s level, who must be proud, even take a liking to them?

Moreover, Li Aozi so easily invited them over, making King Yan feel that something was fishy.

’Could there be a catch in the [Mutant] transition? Or is this occupation not as good as advertised?’

If it were game designers deliberately making them run through stinking and lengthy long-term tasks, King Yan could still accept it. But if the [Mutant] transition conditions were too simple, then it would be worth carefully considering.

King Yan didn’t have much time to suspect, as after a few more steps, the players arrived at Li Aozi’s laboratory.

The door slowly opened, and an automated mechanical production line continuously produced a large amount of Biochemical Potion, injecting it into the Biological Pool. The dazzling mechanical arms repeated the actions of grasping, squeezing, placing, and transferring at an astounding speed. The air was filled with the smells of formaldehyde, ammonia, chlorine, and some burnt smell, making one feel instinctively nauseous. However, after a while, as the human body adapted to the air here, the players unexpectedly found that they had gained a ’nutrient-rich’ status on their panels.

The life activity here was extremely vigorous.

The players curiously walked up, touching here and flipping there. Li Aozi didn’t mind them, smiling as he watched them bumping their heads against the wall, trying to find hidden rooms.

As they were enjoying themselves, the lab door slowly closed, and Li Aozi, no longer hiding, laid his cards on the table:

"You people aren’t from Azure Star, are you?"

At these words, the players who were rummaging through drawers put them back, those who were flipping tables righted them, those prying open safes obediently locked them again, and the players nervously looked at Li Aozi, with the top echelons from several guilds exchanging glances.

"What now?" Antarctic Penguin, president of the ’Arctic Ocean’ guild, had an awkward expression and didn’t know how to react.

"Did he just break the fourth wall?" Old Blind, president of the ’Fishmen’ guild, who loved to stir up trouble, looked on gleefully. His guild was a hub for entertainment and mischief, and the president himself was a major streamer, chatting while munching on popcorn.

"See, I knew it wouldn’t be so simple." King Yan, with a ’I’ve been expecting this,’ crossed his arms, "There’s no free lunch in this world, now we’ve been had. The next step could be interrogations and various forbidden human experiments to uncover the secrets of players’ bodies, then Li Aozi gasps: Yikes, the fourth calamity is terrifying, this guy can’t be kept around any longer—hehe, this is how a fantasy novel unfolds."

Though they all felt scammed, as players, they were more excited about the plot than anyone and just waited for Li Aozi to continue his performance.

To their surprise, after waiting for a long time, Li Aozi just sat there playing on his phone, ignoring them.

This, this isn’t right?

What happened to the plot performance?

Qiqiao Network, are you screwing with us again?

Although they could now closely observe the beautiful person’s face, being left to just stare without being able to touch or feel—this, this was worse than having their eyes gouged out.

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