Sixiang City

A system notification arrived: at 8:00 a.m. the day after tomorrow, the second casual instance, "Returning Home," would open. The Returning Home instance was a ten-million-player instance, with a separate instance generated for every ten million players. Item bars and skill bars were disabled. Upon entering, every player would receive travel expenses ranging from 100 to 500 yuan; this currency could only be used within the Returning Home instance. The instance had a seven-day time limit, though completing the main quest allowed players to leave early. The main quest was very simple: find a way to return home within seven days. The tags for this casual instance were "AI Reality" and "Emotionless." The system explained that instances with the "Reality" tag excluded all supernatural elements. "AI Reality" meant the world was governed by an AI, with fundamental laws carried over from reality. As for "Emotionless," it meant the NPCs in this world were robots lacking human emotions; without emotions, it would be virtually impossible to get them to offer direct help. You could not obtain money from NPCs through emotional pleas, nor could you convince them to bend the rules for your convenience, and doing good deeds would earn no gratitude. Ding Shi sorted through the instance information while eating his noodles. First point: Bank cards were not locked, meaning players could trade Yita dao with other players for instance currency. Second point: This was a road-trip instance with an exceptional degree of freedom; players could make use of all kinds of real-world vehicles. Third point: This was a world governed by law. Or rather, it was an intensely lawful world. Fourth point: AI surveillance meant that every camera served as its eyes. Summary: Do not mess around in front of the cameras. After lunch, Ding Shi went for a walk nearby. Sights and sounds suddenly appeared across the sky canopy—the system had begun introducing Sixiang City. Players who completed two casual instances would receive a one-way ticket to Sixiang City. Those who failed to complete two casual instances would be teleported directly there instead. What was the difference between the two? And what kind of place was Sixiang City? The video answered both questions in thorough detail. Those who traveled to Sixiang City using a one-way ticket would be granted the right to reside rent-free for one year in a sixty-square-meter apartment. Based on each person's traits, the system would assign them a job requiring thirty-five work hours per week. Those aged sixty and above or under eighteen did not have to work, and would receive a monthly cash subsidy. Conditions in Sixiang City closely mirrored reality, though due to land constraints, every apartment building was over two hundred stories tall. There was a mega-community in each of the four cardinal directions—east, south, west, and north—with a commercial center in the middle, capable of accommodating eight million residents in total. Every time a city reached eight million residents, a new one would open, designated Sixiang City 00, Sixiang City 01, and so on. The East Community consisted of villas with hefty rents, and anyone with enough money could purchase one outright. The West and South Communities were high-rise neighborhoods where ticket holders could draw an apartment. The North Community was a dormitory neighborhood, also made up of high-rises. Dorm rooms were twenty square meters, equipped only with communal bathrooms, practically devoid of appliances, and serviced by very few elevators. Those without a one-way ticket who were forcibly transferred to Sixiang City could only live in the North Community. The system would assign them jobs requiring up to fifty hours of work per week. Most interesting of all were two of Sixiang City's rules. Rule One: Under normal circumstances, North District residents had no right to enter the East, West, or South Communities, and West and South Community residents had no right to enter the East Community. The living amenities differed drastically between the four communities. Though the reason was unknown, it was evident that Yita World deliberately divided people into strict social classes. Rule Two: North Community residents possessed no political power—they had neither the right to vote nor to run for office, and did not even possess the right to submit complaints or suggestions. Sixiang City was temporarily governed by an AI, with robots handling basic labor. Step by step, humans would replace the robots, and eventually even replace the AI, becoming the true administrators of Sixiang City. When that time came, whether to abolish the rules discriminating against the North District would be entirely up to those administrators. More details would naturally become apparent once one arrived at Sixiang City. Upon completing two casual instances, players would receive a one-way ticket. They were then faced with two choices: use the ticket to become a resident of Sixiang City's West or South Community, as the video detailed, or tear up the ticket and continue challenging instances. Subsequent instances would have the death penalty enabled. Dying in an instance meant being stripped of all assets and skills, followed by a mandatory placement into the North District by the system. To compensate, players in those instances had an extremely minuscule chance of obtaining a golden one-way ticket. Using a golden one-way ticket outside an instance granted permanent ownership of an East District villa, a monthly urban living allowance, and the freedom to select any municipal management job one wished. Most importantly, such players belonged to the aristocratic class: they could legally have up to three spouses and enjoyed a certain degree of criminal immunity within Sixiang City. Ding Shi had the angel Xiao Tangtang replay the video three times. He had good reason to suspect that Yita World was running a casino book. After two instances, most players would confront a pivotal dilemma: boldly go all-in to continue the instance journey, or walk away while they still could? The phrasing "an extremely minuscule chance of obtaining a golden one-way ticket" practically screamed that nine hundred and ninety-nine out of a thousand gamblers would lose everything. "Xiao Tangtang, is this your human observation project?" Ding Shi asked the little angel. Xiao Tangtang tapped her fairy wand, and four words materialized: "No comment." Ding Shi asked, "Is your goal to sift through humanity to find the people you need?" Xiao Tangtang: "No comment." Ding Shi asked again, "Or are you simply finishing a homework assignment? Like a kindergarten teacher assigning summer homework to observe ants, so the parents find an anthill, smoke it out, flood it with water, and tempt them with food just to study their behavior?" Xiao Tangtang: "No comment." Ding Shi's patience ran out. "Do you have hemorrhoids?" Xiao Tangtang swung her fairy wand, and a bolt of lightning struck the rock right in front of Ding Shi. He jumped in fright. Just as he was about to talk his way back into control, he watched the rock crumble into fine powder, scattering away into the air on the sea breeze. Subtitles appeared: "Politeness. Respect. Thank you." Ding Shi said, "You're not polite to begin with, so how am I supposed to respect you?" Xiao Tangtang froze for a second, then spoke, "I respect you very much, but I am not good at expressing myself. My baseline for politeness is not swearing at people." Ding Shi replied, "Nine out of ten people get hemorrhoids. Why would you think I was swearing at you?" Xiao Tangtang answered earnestly, "I didn't say you were swearing at me, or the lightning would have struck your body." Ding Shi asked, "Would it kill me?" Xiao Tangtang answered, "No." Ding Shi spread his arms wide. "Come on then, give it a shot." Xiao Tangtang answered flatly, "Refused. I am a person of quality." Ding Shi figured that as long as it didn't kill him, he ought to test it out to learn more about Yita World. Even now, he had not figured out what kind of creature Xiao Tangtang really was. An AI avatar? An alien staffer? An intelligence collector? A decorative ornament? A mascot? An alien's pet? A laborer? Ding Shi looked at Xiao Tangtang and spat out two words: "Ugly freak." The next instant, a bolt of lightning struck him square in the chest. Ding Shi instantly understood why Ghost San Niang had shrieked and wailed like a banshee when she was struck by the Heavenly Dao's punishment. The agony could not be described in words. If he had to put it into language, it was a sharp ache drilling straight out from the marrow of his bones—impossible to grasp, impossible to scratch, its source impossible to locate, so pervasive that he couldn't even tell where the point of pain actually lay. A minute later, Ding Shi lay sprawled on the ground like a dead fish. His body was unharmed and his clothes were intact, but his soul felt somewhat shattered. "Prevert," Xiao Tangtang tossed out before drifting off to play by herself.