This Text Adventure Game is definitely poisonous
Chapter 218 - 188 The Task of Snatching Bamboo Shoots_1

Chapter 218: Chapter 188 The Task of Snatching Bamboo Shoots_1

In the pet shop, Mu You also learned of this news from Dragon Soars Software’s announcement the moment it came out. The three of them unceremoniously gathered around the computer, opened the official Fool website, and began to read the announcement.

"Details of Version 1.0 Update."

"1. The Fool’s Forum will open a feature for life-span trading."

"2. The game’s personal panel will display more detailed attributes. Remaining lifespan will be accurate down to the second."

"3. Game characters will gain more thought distribution from their real selves, giving them higher wisdom and crisis-handling abilities. They’ll provide more options when encountering events in the game. As a price, the real self will endure one-tenth of the pain when the game character suffers illnesses or dies. This feature can be optionally turned on."

"4. A friend and team function will be launched. In the game, other players can be added as friends. When set as friends, players can text each other through the chat box at any time."

"5. Item binding and death penalty.

Death Penalty: When killed by other players, a random item on one’s body will be dropped (only applicable when players attack each other).

Item Protection: Each person can initially bind six pieces of equipment or non-consumable items permanently. Permanently bound items cannot be sold, cannot be transferred of ownership, and will not be dropped when the player dies. They will be reclaimed by the game when the player is completely dead."

"6. Red Name Penalty: Upon proactively attacking and killing other players, a layer of Red Name Penalty will be acquired. Red Name Layers can accumulate, and one layer is eliminated each day. Under a Red Name status, more lifespan and items will be dropped when the player dies. The more layers you have, the more you drop. Killing players with a Red Name status and launching defensive counterattacks won’t add to your Red Name Layers."

Despite the brief announcement, the content was rather informative.

After reading carefully several times, Mu You found that the second, third, and fourth items weren’t really noteworthy. Overall, they seemed to be just about more detailed attributes, superior game AI, and better access for friend communication.

As updates for a game, these are pretty basic features.

What deserved the most attention was the third point: the increased wisdom of game characters. This improvement doesn’t only make the in-game options richer, but it also prevents the characters from rigidly standing out in the alternate world. This way, they can’t be easily identified as players differing from the indigenous inhabitants.

Additionally, in terms of combat, the game characters can now match the players’ actual strength more closely because of the increased wisdom.

The price to be paid is that players will have to bear one-tenth of their game characters’ pain. Except for those with weak mental fortitude, most players probably won’t mind this. After all, it is just pain and won’t cause actual harm to the player’s body.

Of course, this restriction will make players more cautious to avoid suffering in-game death or injuries, instead of disregarding the welfare of their game characters like they used to during beta-testing.

Aside from the above three items, the real highlights in the announcement were the remaining points 1, 5, and 6.

Trading of lifespan will be enabled!

Don’t be fooled by the brevity of this phrase. The implications it carries are huge.

Lifespan can be traded, and along with the second point talking about lifespan display accurate down to the second, it signifies that lifespan can practically become a higher-quality and more stable universal currency. Even if it doesn’t completely replace existing currencies, it will certainly cause a huge disturbance to the current monetary system!

Moreover, with life-span trading, immortals will undoubtedly come into existence. But given that the total lifespan remains unchanged, it means that as one person becomes immortal, countless others have to die faster.

This reminded Mu You of a movie titled "Time Planning Bureau". When time becomes a form of currency and life can be traded, the wealth gap will be quickly magnified under the value of time. The rich will stay young forever, while the poor cannot afford to sleep, as they need to run to work every day to save as much time as possible.

Thankfully, the situation in reality isn’t as desperate as it is in the movie because of the existence of the Fool game. Everyone can plunder lifespan from another world through the game, breaking the rule ’the total lifespan remains constant’. As the rich get richer, the poor won’t become poorer. Instead, they will also become richer, albeit at a slower pace.

As everyone’s living conditions improve overall, conflicts will greatly reduce.

Other than this point, the real focus of this announcement is items 5 and 6.

Item binding, death penalty, and the Red Name penalty.

"Death penalty... does this mean the game is encouraging player competition?" Little Ya asked as she looked at the computer screen. The fact that players can drop items upon killing each other seems like the game is encouraging players to fight amongst themselves and loot others.

"If we only consider this point, it indeed seems like it’s encouraging competition. But when we take into account the other two points, these three rules actually serve to protect the weak," Lin Xue said.

"Indeed," Mu You agreed, nodding his head. "Thanks to the item binding feature, everyone can initially bind six items. But how many items can newly-joined players possess initially? As long as they bind all of their items, killing them won’t yield any rewards. Instead, it will result in a severe Red Name penalty. This would be a case of the losses outweighing the gains. Therefore, player-kill-player situations will significantly reduce after the game’s full release."

"That’s right. Furthermore, the announcement refers to ’initially binding six items’. Since it’s initial, this indicates that the number of items that can be bound can likely be increased. As long as the number of bindable items is sufficient and everyone binds their most valuable belongings, the rewards for killing others will be minimal. As a result, even high-level players will hesitate to stir up conflicts."

Lin Xue adjusted her glasses and nodded in agreement. "It’s an excellent measure to prevent infighting amongst players."

The two of them went back and forth, digging out the deep implications of the announcement.

Then, Mu You went on the forum to check out the discussion amongst players.

Sure enough, once this announcement was made, no one paid attention to the previous hot topics anymore. All eyes were directed towards the latest bulletin.

Mu You briefly skimmed through it and the results matched their analysis. The official version significantly strengthened the protection for newcomers while largely reducing the benefits of in-player fights. Of course, this was a good thing for the general public.

The three of them shortly discussed the changes brought about by the public test and the new announcement. Afterward, Little Ya and Lin Xue excused themselves to go home.

Mu You saw them out and glanced at the time when he turned around. It was precisely ten at night on a Saturday; the Elf Horn should have refreshed by now.

He entered the game and, as expected, the cooldown for the Elf Horn had ended.

Mu You didn’t delay and directly blew the horn.

[You blew the Elf Horn.]

[Fairy Lady Orea · The Blessed One appears before you and has presented you with a task.]

[Collect Pollen: The Fairy Race usually relies on collecting pollen to maintain their luck power. Recently, the Fairy Lady has been busy dealing with the undead and has no time to spare. Within a week, please collect one hundred different types of magic pollen to preserve her luck power.]

[Reward: Choose one of the following blessings. 1: Permanently gain 7 points of free attributes. 2: Increase fire damage by 10%.]

"No wonder the Fairy Lady doesn’t drop as much Lucky Dust. So she’s been too busy to feed on pollen..."

Mu You’s expression was somewhat strange as he finally understood the mechanism behind Lucky Dust production. It turns out it is actually converted from pollen.

Collecting magic pollen wasn’t very difficult, but finding one hundred different types of pollen was a bit more challenging.

All the materials he had on him could only yield a dozen or so types of pollen. To collect one hundred different types, he would need to find some special magic flower garden within a week.

Shaking his head, Mu You reversed time, planning to check out the other options first.

[As time flows, you blew the Elf Horn once again.]

[Dark Elf Queen Fred the Exile appears before you and presents you with a task.]

[Collect Sunflowers: Dark Elves have been living in the Dark City underground for a long time and are unable to tolerate direct sunlight. Within a week, please go to the hottest city in the Star Spirit World, Sun City, and pick more than two hundred sunflowers.]

[Reward: One Devil’s Egg, which can hatch a random demon.]

...

[You blew the Elf Horn as time reversed.]

[Forest Elf High Priestess Riley the Flutist appears before you and presents you with a task.]

[Troll Tomb: Trolls have hidden in ancient tombs filled with overly powerful troll senior undead, preventing the Elf Ranger Troop from getting close. Because trolls are exceptionally sensitive to the scent of elves, we hope you can bring the ’Troll Spiritual Niche’ into the Troll Tomb to absorb the remains of at least ten higher-ranking trolls. Allow the Ranger Troop to have the ability to raid the tomb.]

[Reward: The Troll Spiritual Niche itself.]

...

Mu You looked over the four tasks one by one. He realized that the Sunlight Elf task and reward hadn’t changed; it still needed an Abyss Dragon and rewarded a Phoenix Egg.

The Dark Elf task was similar to last time, only that it now required twice as many sunflowers. Simultaneously, the reward had evolved from a ’Devil’s Wing’ to a ’Devil’s Egg’, which could be considered an upgrade.

"It seems like if I don’t handle their needs, the tasks might persist for a long time..."

Mu You rubbed his chin. This way, no matter which task he chose, he still needed to prepare for the other tasks in advance.

After thinking for a bit, he finally chose the Forest Elf task. Since he was already in the Elf Forest, this task was the most convenient and had a reward he found quite tempting.

[Troll Spiritual Niche: A trophy won by the elf ancestors in their battle against the trolls. It can absorb troll remains, with a maximum limit of 20. After activation, it can resurrect two random trolls it has absorbed to fight for you. The higher the rank and the larger the number of remains absorbed, the stronger the summoned trolls will be.]

This task seemed a bit excessive, asking him to take something from the trolls, go into the troll’s tomb, and scatter the ashes of the troll ancestors...

But who could help it if this item was really handy? With just one use, he could summon two more creatures, and ones that could continuously evolve at that. This would greatly help enhance his current abilities, so no matter how excessive, Mu You decided to take it.