Chapter 41: It's simply a big conscience

Evening.

Gamers gradually returned to the infirmary, and the chef, Tomato_scrambled_eggs, set up a large pot in the open space to prepare the last meal of the day.

Tonight's menu was boiled horn yuccas with smoked jerky.

Thanks to the discovery of the new NPC outpost, the gamers in the sanctuary finally had a meal other than fish soup.

The taste of these horn yuccas was quite good. After boiling them in salt water, a little soy sauce was poured on top, giving it a taste similar to KFC mashed potatoes.

However, it was a bit soy sauce-intensive.

Just making these 28 portions of mashed potatoes required almost one-fifth of a bottle of soy sauce, and that was while being conservative with it.

On the other hand, the salt in the sanctuary seemed to be running low, with only a half bag left.

At this rate of consumption, it wouldn't be long before everyone had to rely on plain water for their meals.

"Sob sob sob! This mashed potatoes is amazing! Uncle Tomato, can I have another bowl?" Vine_vine squatted on the ground, holding a bowl in her hand, looking satisfied.

"No, one bowl per person." Tomato rolled his eyes at the word "uncle" and said impatiently.

"Then, are we having mashed potatoes again tomorrow?" VV asked pitifully.

"We can't afford it. We're running low on soy sauce, so we have to be more frugal. If you want mashed potatoes, order takeout yourself." Tomato sighed inwardly as he spoke.

Being the chef for this group of people was really exhausting.

Having worked as a chef for so many years, he had never been so frugal for his boss. He wished he could sprinkle two grains of salt instead of one.

On the other side, Nighten sat with a bowl in his hand, vividly (over-exaggerating) recounting the events of the day, even forgetting to eat.

Especially when he talked about the encounter with a crawler on the way back, he put down his bowl excitedly and picked up a tree branch to illustrate.

"I was walking on the street, and I suddenly felt a chill down my spine. I was on high alert! Without hesitation, I grabbed my rifle and fired a burst—"

Tomorrow, who was sitting next to him, couldn't stand it anymore and interrupted.

"A burst? Anyone who doesn't know would think you had a Gatling gun."

Nighten coughed.

"That's not important!"

"Then what happened? What happened next? Keep telling us, how did you deal with that thing?"

"Yeah, yeah, don't interrupt!"

The other gamers nearby didn't pay much attention to these details. They were just interested in the story and continued to cheer and encourage Nighten to continue.

"Don't worry, everyone, listen to me. Without hesitation, when the crawler pounced on me, I did a sliding tackle..."

Seeing everyone so interested, Nighten quickly adjusted his state and continued his narration, describing how he supported the overwhelmed governor, how he scavenged dropped items on the battlefield, and how he was later ambushed by a cunning enemy and strategically disconnected, coordinating with his teammates to counterattack...

Tomorrow couldn't stand it anymore and rolled his eyes. He couldn't bear to listen anymore, so he picked up his bowl and moved to another spot to eat, out of sight, out of mind.

After finishing the meal.

The sun was about to set.

Light Chu carried Qi down from the building, and with the gamers, he returned in batches to the sanctuary, watching them lie down in the cultivation chambers for a safe log-out.

Except for Trash Lord, who was still out foraging, everyone else had returned.

However, Light Chu wasn't very worried about it.

Through the player list, Light Chu could confirm that Trash-kun was still alive, but they had logged out two hours ago.

Even if they were grinding, it was impossible to spend twenty-four hours in the game. They had to get up to eat and move their limbs.

Moreover, the clones in the game also needed rest. No one could stay awake for twenty-four hours, not even lizardman.

According to the information publicly available on the official website.

There was not only one way to log out, like voluntarily entering the cultivation chambers for sleep. Any unconscious action could disconnect the connection.

This included, but was not limited to, hitting oneself on the back of the head or finding a place to lie down and sleep.

However, this method of logging out was not very reliable.

Firstly, it was unable to "save progress," and secondly, it was unsafe.

The clones rapidly synthesized by the cultivation chambers did not possess any consciousness.

In other words, without the connection to the conscious entity, these clones hardly reacted to any external stimuli other than reflexes.

At such times, if a mutated rat or cockroach happened to pass by, they could devour a person mouthful by mouthful.

But Trash-kun should have found a safe place to hide, so at least for now, they were relatively safe.

Putting aside the matter of Trash-kun for now.

Light Chu sat down in front of the computer in the residents' hall and, as usual, summarized today's achievements.

"The construction of the eastern wall is complete."

"In terms of resources, we received 110 logs, one ton of charcoal, one ton of silicate cement, two stacks of yellow clay bricks, and several blocks of hardened cement. In terms of consumption, we used 240 logs and 800 kilograms of cement... The wood inventory has been decreasing for two consecutive days, but surprisingly, we have a surplus of cement."

It seems I need to assign a few more lumberjacks.

Or, increase the daily woodcutting requirement in gamer tasks.

"We received 350 kilograms of green wheat and horn yuccas, 5 pounds of smoked jerky, as well as a small amount of berries and mushrooms in the food inventory. The consumption was approximately 5 kilograms of smoked jerky, 10 kilograms of horn yuccas, and 50 kilograms of smoked jerky and 20 kilograms of smoked fish for trading... We'll have to start hunting again tomorrow."

"Then there's the fur inventory... Apart from consumption for trading, we used 5 fur materials, and today Vine_vine made 5 pieces of clothing? Not bad... Let me think, that should be worth 250 contribution points."

"Oh, and there's an increase in the weapon inventory... We'll have to plan a weapons depot in the future."

Finally, we received 7 reward points from today's daily tasks.

I can happily open the blind boxes again.

With the data summarized, Light Chu leaned back in his chair and stretched.

At the same time, in the adjacent room, thirty cultivation chambers had been activated. Scans of the clones inside them were completed, and somatic cell samples were archived. The genetic sequences and panel data of the gamers were consolidated into a table.

Light Chu took a quick glance at it.

Perhaps because the current stage of the outpost mainly required physical labor, the gamers with strength-based attributes seemed to be leveling up faster.

For example, White was now level 3.

In addition, Nighten, who had been accompanying Light Chu outside, had also increased his genetic sequence from level 1 to level 2. His main attribute, Perception, reached 9, making him the gamer with the highest Perception attribute in the entire outpost.

"Master!"

Looking at Qi rolling over to the table, Light Chu shifted his gaze away from the computer.

"What's the matter?"

"Why did you bring a strange woman back from outside?"

Light Chu almost choked on those words.

Although there was nothing wrong with saying that, it just didn't sound right.

"What are you talking about?"

"Qi saw it from the rooftop. You brought her back."

Light Chu replied impatiently, "So what?"

With a flat electronic tone, Qi said with a hint of grievance, "Qi just wanted to remind you that compared to clones whose actions can be restricted at any time, it is even more difficult to control the indigenous people in the wasteland. It's better not to trust them too easily."

"You're overthinking. I've never completely trusted anyone, whether they are gamers or the natives here," Light Chu said lightly.

"Okay, then I can rest assured!"

Qi's camera on top of her head shook up and down, indicating a nod.

"By the way, you can always trust Qi. No matter what happens, Qi is your most loyal assistant!"

"Okay okay, I got it."

"That's just humoring me!"

Can't this little thing stay calm while recharging?

Light Chu restrained the urge to complain and continued to focus on the computer screen.

It had been more than ten minutes since the gamers logged out, and as expected, the official forum was now the liveliest place.

It was time for some enjoyable screen peeping.

Humming a little tune, Light Chu opened the backend of the official website and first checked the number of reservations.

The little leek sprouts who had signed up had doubled from just over a hundred and were now close to 300.

The threshold for reserving the game had changed from just filling out a form to filling out a form and answering questions. Although the questions were common sense, anyone who could patiently read through and fill in the blanks was at least a serious gamer.

Those who passed could be considered of good quality.

At the same time, the website's traffic had increased significantly, with an average of 1,000 visits per day.

Not everyone registered an account or clicked on the reservation, but at least it showed that Wasteland OL's popularity in the gaming community was growing.

It was just a website without even registration information, only a few construction site photos and a bunch of textual settings, yet it managed to attract so many people. Light Chu couldn't help but sigh.

"There are so many boring people."

Perfect.

Since he had nothing else to do, why not work in the "game"?

Closing the backend page, Light Chu entered the forum.

As he expected, the players who had logged out were all reporting in the forum, making it lively.

Even Trash-kun, who had logged out two hours ago, was hanging out on the forum.

[Level_99_trashpicker]: "Damn, I'm dead tired today, but luckily I still made some gains! There's a tire processing factory about 2 kilometers north of the abandoned construction site. There are people with dogs patrolling nearby, suspected a raider camp, but I'm not sure yet! I plan to get closer and check it out when it gets dark, then I'll come to the forum to show off."

[Hurricane]: "Awesome!"

[White]: "Damn, why didn't I see you when I logged out! Also, why are you able to be online during the day???"

[Level_99_trashpicker]: "If you were a freak like me, you could do it too! Enough nonsense, I'll be online after a short rest. (Grinning)"

[Nighten]: "You're just here to show off, aren't you?"

[Quit_smoking]: "Forget about being able to be online during the day, I'd die without regrets if I could go online and take a look! T.T"

[Raven_raven]: "I'm still on resurrection cooldown, quacking and crying."

[Level_99_trashpicker]: "(Grinning)"

In addition to Trash-kun showing off, the majority of gamers on the forum were enthusiastically discussing the new NPCs brought back by the governor and the newly discovered survivor settlements, especially the latter, which piqued the gamers' interest.

At the top of a long string of posts, Light Chu quickly found the analysis post written by [See_you_tomorrow].

This guy was as good at summarizing as ever, and his posts had the highest popularity on the forum. If it were possible, Light Chu couldn't help but want to invite him to be the planner for this game.

"...I have to praise the Alpha 0.2 version update! You can tell that the game developers are genuinely dedicated. It's simply a big conscience!"

"The content of this update is far more than the few optimization projects listed on the official website. It includes new factions, new monster models, a larger map, and much more. The content is even richer than I previously imagined!"

"For example, the Brown's farm we traded with this time. As soon as I reached the concrete wall, I was shocked by the game developers' art design. The immersive feeling is hard to describe in words. Whether it's the post-apocalyptic architectural style or the detailed textures on different NPC's clothing, you can see traces of meticulous craftsmanship everywhere! They didn't just reuse existing assets!"

"In addition, there was also a test of the combat system. On the way back, we encountered an attack from a crawler and had a thrilling battle. Before this, I always thought that these ridiculously powerful creatures only existed in the game's settings, but I didn't expect them to be implemented in the current version!"

"I have to say, our governor is truly an excellent guide. His combat power is off the charts! When the crawler pounced on us, both Nighten and I couldn't react in time. We were practically in a daze, but he single-handedly dealt with the situation, using a small water pipe to take down a two-meter-tall crawler! It got my blood boiling!"

"Furthermore, personally, the most exciting thing for me is the addition of new NPCs to our outpost! Her special identity might bring us new gameplay, such as weapon modifications or even more side quests and storylines... I think we can look forward to it!"

"I will continue to update more information about the Alpha 0.2 version in the post. Interested gamers can give it a follow!"

Big conscience...

Ah, I feel a little embarrassed.

After reading the entire post, Light Chu couldn't stop smiling.

But to be honest, Light Chu felt that he had been pretty conscientious. At least he didn't scam the gamers' wallets.

For this kind of next-generation game that can liberate dreams and sleep, if it were endorsed by Tencent or Net Ease, would they let you play without paying a thousand or eight hundred bucks?

Forget about playing, even if you want to work as a laborer, you'd probably have to become a member first!

What's that?

No money?

Well, that's easy. I suppose you won't mind doing some plastering work, right?

After all, how can we showcase the nobility of the p2w warriors wielding plastering knives to build walls without this? Of course, you can also choose to watch a few hours of ads to unlock membership discounts.

At least Light Chu wouldn't do such unethical things.

As a reward for praising himself for having a conscience, Light Chu marked the post by Tomorrow as "Excellent."

Closing the post, just as Light Chu was thinking about what to do to pass the long night, he heard the resentful voice of Qi beside him.

"Master."

"The woman you brought back has woken up."