Winter Is Coming!

"The leaves wither and turn yellow, temperatures drop, and an unprecedented crisis approaches." "This year's winter will be harsher and arrive earlier than in past years... We do not have much time left to prepare." "From this moment on, we must seize every minute, even every second! Before the situation turns completely dire, we must make all preparations to weather the cold wave!" "The mission board has been updated with a list of necessities, facilities that need to be completed, and their corresponding rewards." "Remember, only through unity can we overcome this trial together!" "Winter is coming." "This is destiny's test for us all!" His rousing voice echoed through Shelter 404's resident hall. Meeting the players' spirited gazes, Chu Guang delivered an impassioned speech, officially kicking off the prologue to the first expansion pack since the game's closed beta began—"Winter Is Coming." With the launch of this new chapter, the atmosphere at Shelter 404's outpost base, much like that on the official website, became markedly different from before. It wasn't just the players. Even Chu Guang himself could feel a prickle of urgency in the steadily cooling air. The outpost's stockpile of supplies had never been generous to begin with, yet the population had skyrocketed from six to thirty—a fivefold increase! While this surge in numbers brought more labor, it also multiplied the outpost's supply pressures. To feed the thirty mouths that would soon arrive, Chu Guang had worried himself sick over the past two days. He was busy from morning to night almost every day, taking Ye Shi—whose gene sequence was Perception-type—hunting far and wide just to stockpile a bit more food. For a time, the two of them turned the entire Wetland Park upside down. In return, the harvest was quite delightful. In three days, Chu Guang killed around a dozen mutant hyenas alone, not to mention countless wild hares and squirrels caught in traps. Though they were all mutants, they were edible nonetheless. Furthermore, Ye Shi, who was in charge of reconnaissance and scanning for enemies, smoothly advanced from LV0 to LV1. Chu Guang himself could also vaguely sense that he was nearing the threshold of a breakthrough. However, the Manager gene sequence was far too unique. Chu Guang hadn't yet figured out the trick to leveling it up and could only rely on the physical examination pod to confirm that his gene sequence development progress was indeed increasing by microscopic increments. Meanwhile, the other players had performed remarkably well—one might even say they had each showcased their own special talents. Using charcoal as a reducing agent and employing calcination, Fleeting White Horse and Fang Chang recovered a small amount of iron slag from rusty rebar, car parts, and other ferrous scrap. They added this iron slag into the cement kiln, calcining it together with crushed limestone and clay to produce a more reliable cement clinker. This was heavy manual labor. Whether it was operating the bellows by hand or hauling stones with the repaired two-wheeled pushcart, both required considerable exertion. Yet precisely because of this, Fleeting White Horse, who had a Strength-type sequence, advanced once more, raising his gene sequence from LV1 to LV2, which also bumped his Strength stat up by one point. As for Fang Chang, who took turns working the shifts with him, he finally broke through his limit and advanced from LV0 to LV1. The stat he gained, however, wasn't Strength, but Agility. It seemed that while gene sequence development aligned with the principle of "use it or lose it," stat growth was another matter entirely. Speaking of leveling up, the most pitiful was probably Gale Force 8. Up to this point, out of the four original closed-beta players, he was likely the only one whose gene sequence remained at level 0. Over these past few days, he had caught quite a few fish using his modified traps, but he was always just a sliver of "EXP" away from LV1. The "EXP" gained from killing mutants with traps didn't seem to be as much as what one earned from defeating mutants in direct combat. Gale Force 8 was quite perplexed by this. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be any good solution for the time being. Aside from the four dog admins who had been the first to experience the game, the two new recruits were equally full of drive, barely resting for a moment over the past few days. Take "WC Really Has Mosquitoes," for example. The fellow wasn't in any hurry to level up. He continued doing carpentry work, occasionally helping out Fleeting White Horse and Fang Chang, or assisting Gale Force 8 with repairing damaged traps. Aside from these tasks, he spent his time on his own project. According to Mosquito himself, he planned to build a simple wooden cabin to serve as his chemistry lab and warehouse. While helping transport stones from the construction site these past few days, he had scavenged a good number of bottles and jars along the way, placing them beside his little cabin. Although Chu Guang was highly skeptical of the wooden cabin's safety, seeing how thoroughly the guy was enjoying himself, he felt it was best not to interfere too much with the players' choices. Compared to Brother Mosquito's leisurely pace, "Scrambled Eggs with Tomatoes" was practically a textbook example of a hardcore grinder. As the outpost's cook, he was not only responsible for preparing meals, but also had to help the Manager process the captured game. This included bleeding, skinning, deboning, butchering, and most crucially, smoking the meat. Since the outpost's salt was nowhere near plentiful enough to be used lavishly for curing meat, Brother Scrambled Eggs adopted the most primitive smoking method. Namely, adding nothing at all. He hung the sliced meat directly on racks made of rebar, stuffed them into an earthen kiln built from clay and mud bricks, generated smoke with charcoal, slowly roasted the meat over low heat to dry out the moisture, and sealed the opening with pine boughs and leaves. Smoked meat produced this way was actually more akin to jerky. Even without salt, it could be preserved for a while, and there was no need for fancy tricks like wrapping tobacco leaves around the outside. By the early or middle part of next month, winter would roughly be setting in. When that time came, they could wrap these strips of dried meat in plastic bags or tree bark and bury them straight in the snow. Eating them until early spring next year shouldn't pose much of an issue. However, in return, the texture and flavor of smoked meat made this way could only be described as complicated. In addition, Brother Scrambled Eggs didn't let the pelts stripped from the mutant hyenas go to waste either, collecting them to make leather. In truth, tanning was an exceedingly complex and tedious process, far more troublesome than making dried meat. At present, however, what the shelter needed was not sleek, supple luxury furs, but simply warm materials capable of warding off the cold; quality was essentially not a concern. Thus, many unnecessary steps could be omitted. When Fleeting White Horse had previously burned plant ash, the filtered potash lye had been stored in scavenged plastic buckets. Scrambled Eggs with Tomatoes put all this potash lye to use as tanning liquor to soak the raw hides, which had been stripped from the game and washed clean. Once the collagen had sufficiently bonded with the tanning agents, he hung the hide on a makeshift tanning rack to dry in the sun, yielding a piece of leather of passable quality. "...Respected Manager, I must report to you that I'm truly about to be overwhelmed. I desperately need a helper—even just one would do!" Taking the freshly killed game from Chu Guang, Scrambled Eggs' gaze involuntarily drifted over to Ye Shi. He always felt like this guy had too much free time. Aside from carrying game for the Manager, he never seemed to be doing anything else. Why not... have him lend a hand? Ye Shi saw through his scheme in an instant and waved his hands frantically. "Don't look at me. I'm very busy." What a joke. Grinding levels alongside an NPC—where else could anyone find such a sweet gig for free EXP? There was no way he was going to learn cooking with this guy! Seeing Ye Shi's resistant attitude, Scrambled Eggs couldn't help rolling his eyes, muttering inwardly: *Busy, my ass!* Looking at the complaining Scrambled Eggs, Chu Guang offered comforting words: "Ye Shi needs to help me track prey, and his danger sense is vital as well, so I cannot leave him here to assist you. However, I promise that your problem will be resolved soon. Our reinforcements are already en route, and they will reach the surface shortly." "All right, thank you... If that's truly the case, that would be wonderful." Scrambled Eggs sighed, paused for a moment, and continued, "There's one more thing. Although I've tried tanning leather, I can only manage basic processing. As for turning them into clothes... I'm truly out of my depth." Chu Guang smiled and said, "No need to worry about that. Among the arriving reinforcements, there are individuals skilled in that area. I will assign the work of tanning and crafting warm clothing to that person." Not just a tailor. Among the twenty-four newly selected closed-beta players, there was a smattering of talent from all walks of life. While they might not necessarily be industry experts—some were even students—within the scope of their abilities, they could still prove useful to some degree. Besides, they had the internet as a tool. Chu Guang was brimming with confidence in these vibrant, energetic players. As long as they worked hard enough, he would be able to move into a big mansion sooner or later. Solid as a rock!