Chapter 17: Ticket Fraud

With the aggregate of all information, he received his formal player number, gained an additional characteristic, two items, four potions, a gift package, and three tickets, along with a bonus of two thousand.

Flipping his collar, he indeed had a string of numbers similar to that of the delivery woman on his shoulder, only in different colors and numbers. Every player who passed the initial screening should have this sort of number: cannibal players red, murderers black.

It didn't seem like a regular tattoo, whether it can be destroyed or altered remains to be seen.

He first looked at the items.

The "Super Running Shoes" looked no different from ordinary shoes on the outside. They felt light on his feet. His original speed was already more than twice that of an ordinary person, and with a thirty percent increase on top of that, it was quite remarkable.

His old shoes couldn't be placed in the item bar; they were discarded on the spot.

The "Arsonist's Tool" was a solid-colored brass lighter, less distinctive than what Big Tattooed Brother had given him. But from its description, it seemed like an interesting item with remote attack capabilities, yet more convenient. Unless someone was not wearing clothes, it would be a surefire weapon.

Of course, it would be a different story if there were other items that could defend against it.

He slipped the lighter into his pocket and then checked his new characteristics.

"Insider's Perspective" enhanced vision. Once selected, his eyes were like being covered with a magnifying glass, magnifying tiny details, truly a microscopic observation.

It was similar in nature to "Tireless Legs," both essentially bodily evolutions, just in a tricky manner linked with the profession.

This implied that the choice of game profession wasn't meaningless. The characteristics players could develop were more or less connected to their professions. The higher the completion of the role in the game copy, the more characteristics they might develop.

Although in the long run, regular players certainly have more potential for development than cannibal players, for new players, cannibal players who can seize power just by eating are more advantageous, especially their vitality.

The delivery woman's strong self-healing ability and the method of playing dead used by the first-class seat player were both signs of strong vitality.

Similarly injured, the wound on the palm of his hand still throbbed faintly, no different from before his evolution.

"To narrow this gap..."

Xu Huo shifted his gaze to the evolution potion, grabbed a bottle and gulped it down. It tasted pretty good, strawberry flavored. After waiting half a minute, he felt nothing, but the evolution percentage jumped to 9%.

After chugging two more bottles, the evolution percentage jumped to 10%, and an additional note appeared:

[Congratulations to player Passerby A for completing 10% of evolution. Please note, players, that the effectiveness of the P0 Potion will gradually decrease after surpassing 10% of evolution. Strive to find the P1 Potion, it might be hidden in the game!]

He squeezed his fingers and punched the air, actually producing a clear breaking sound. Both his strength and speed were incomparable to just two minutes before.

However, if the effectiveness of the potion diminishes with evolution, the further he goes, the more limited the potions will be. Besides P0 and P1, there might be P2 and P3 in the future, but physical strength won't grow indefinitely.

"So the key is still the growth of characteristics."

Xu Huo, touching the stubble that had grown on his chin, took out the three tickets.

Game tickets were not paper tickets from real life but a rectangular piece of glass, three fingers wide and half a finger thick, somewhat resembling a transparent phone. The front floated with the name of the station, and the back listed the times of the trains, marking both game time and real time, which could be selected by sliding.

And the nearest train to the next copy was leaving in thirty minutes.

[Player has selected Train 134. This train will depart in twenty-nine minutes. Players must arrive at the station five minutes before departure. Would you like to teleport?]

Xu Huo did not hurry to choose yes, but continued to try each potion in turn.

The Self-Healing Potion barely accomplished what an obsolete product should, barely alleviating pain when applied to the wound, virtually negligible.

The Cleansing Potion was quite useful, however. A wipe on the clothes, and the dried blood stains disappeared instantly, leaving the cut area looking as if it had been washed, no wonder the cannibal player had no traces on him on the train.

Ordinary players might have one or two characteristics or items when they board, but this was no advantage on the initial screening train. In contrast, the cannibal players have shocking physical strength and props that can destroy evidence... It seems the game isn't very friendly to ordinary players.

He casually dabbed some Hair Growth Potion on his head, waited a while with no reaction, then clicked [Yes].

Seconds later, he stood inside a glass-constructed station.

Calling it a station, but aside from the wind-blocking glass panels and the projected screen floating in the center, it lacked everything else a station should have. The empty glass room looked as if it were floating in midair, touching neither heaven nor earth, like being squeezed between two mirrors made up of blue sky and white clouds, endless, completely devoid of physical sensation.

There were five strangers in the station; two of them, men in suits, started staring at him the moment he appeared.

"We're the station attendants here, we need to check your ticket," said the tall, skinny one as he approached.

Xu Huo glanced at the two men and slowly took out his lighter to light a cigarette for himself, exhaling a puff of smoke.

The skinny man had expected him to obediently hand over his ticket, but Xu Huo completely disregarded him, even daring to provoke him openly. He bristled, "Refuse the attendant's inspection, and you want to be exiled?"

"Of course not," Xu Huo flicked his lighter on and off, mixed with the sound of the brass lid opening and closing, he said, "But I don't have a ticket. Do you have one? Can I borrow it?"

The two men exchanged looks, the skinny one continued, "Take out your ticket. You have to check it before you get on. All players here have been checked."

Xu Huo looked at the other three players who were silently staring at this side and said with a smile, "But I don't have a ticket."

"How can you not have a ticket!" the shorter one shouted angrily, "The screen showed a train number when you arrived!"

Xu Huo had already noticed that there was only one train number on the hovering screen and nodded, "So it turns out the train number only appears when players with tickets arrive. That means you all don't have tickets, how pitiful."

"If you can't get a ticket in the next few minutes, I wonder what'll happen. You can't get on the train nor leave. You might just starve to death here in the station. Cannibal players might last a few days, waiting for the next batch of ticketed players."

"But the game didn't say that ticketless players can stay indefinitely. Maybe when the time's up, you'll be cleaned out like trash, thrown to some desolate place, or directly become fodder for humanoid monsters. The worst is being teleported into a high-risk copy. Do you know what that would be like?"